Post by xитpocтb on Jun 14, 2010 22:23:21 GMT -5
This guide is made of Personal Experience, Opinion, and Internet.
The Mary Sues.
You've all seen one, played with one, read the adventures, and rolled your eyes so hard that you almost have a lazy eye. Don't know what a Mary-Sue is? Allow me to Elaborate.
(Picked by random)
Lets say you're reading a fan-fic about LOTR, all is well and good, the writer is skilled, any non-canon content so far is showing some thought and is believable, then out of nowhere, a random woman from Gondor joins the fellowship, beats down an army of orcs single-handed , manages to talk down the mouth of Sauron, swoons and beds Aragorn AND Legolas in one fell swoop. Oh, and it turns out shes a half-elf, and was destined long before the ring was created to save TEH WORLD! Oh, and did I mention she has sparkling purple eyes, blue-green hair with streaks of red, and she has cat ears? OH! She also has a pet dragon (Also purple).
Yup, Sue is in the building, and the only path to take here is nuke it from orbit and pray to whatever God you worship that the writer is struck hard by the Originality Stick (Patent Pending).
A Mary-Sue by definition is a character that has far too much gravity in an IP, and in general just has so much going on for them, and so little going against that they are just sickening to read/watch. The universe bends over backwards to make sure that they can fit in, they couldn't fail a challenge, even if they intentionally tried. Every character will at least acknowledge them as some major character within the IP, if not fall madly in love, or become their rivals, who secretly love them. They are often so chock full of little perks and tweaks that you could probably make about 20 characters out of the elements of one sue.
!!Please see the link, it will direct you to the "Writeriums Mary-Sue Test"
www.onlyfiction.net/marysue2.html
The previous site will bring you to tests to get an overall idea of exactly how Sue-like your characters are, and you'll also get a bit more in depth idea of what precisely makes a Sue. You'll probably be surprised to find with what you get.
-----Waiting for Test------
So, whats your score like? 35+?
Not to worry, there is still hope! Its time to put you through Mary Sue Chemo.
Now, making a character is a bit like cooking a decent steak. When you first make up its concepts and basic info, its fairly bland, its edible, but it won't have people interested in another bite. Add some interesting factors about them, interesting background, maybe some interesting little quirks and they'll be looking for more, add too much, and they'll punch you in the throat and ask for their money back.
The more elements you add to a character, especially the more cliche, the higher you'll need to compensate to make up for it. A good writer can compensate for a sue, and pull it off, however, the more sue-ish, the better you'll need to be. Now, if you immediately think "Well, I'm a great role player, I shouldn't even need to worry about that, then." If you did, please stab yourself in the hand with a fork.
Keeping your characters simple not only makes them more believable to RP with, but they also promote the RPer to focus more on using his creativity to make them more interesting, rather than their naturally bizarre nature.
Take that to heart people, simple is good. The quiz covers a fairly large list of sue features, try to take them to heart and avoid them, or at least use them in a sparing manner.
-----
Musical Intermission:
(For your enjoyment, feel free to pretend you're in some Jazz Bar.)
-----
Powerplaying.
"Well, my character is the MAIN character, so he's allowed to have that much power!" ("Power-play", "Power OVERFLOWING!1!", "Uber Sue", "KAKAROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!")
One of the most feared and well known cardinal sins, also one of the most common to fall for.
Lets say you're playing a hunter, but just being a hunter doesn't feel adequate enough, he lacks that certain "spice" to make him unique. So you give him great agility, nothing big, just slightly above average dexterity. Its not enough! YOU NEED MOAR! Go all out, add in that he can do back flips, can leap tall buildings in a single bound, and he runs faster than a sports car. Ooh, and make his eyes flame-y, and he has spirits looking out for him, and his fur made out of metal! Hell, lets throw in some magical Dragonball Z/ Every Magical Girl anime evur super mode that he can enter when shit hits the fan. Better yet, lets make it where a God lends him its power temporarily... no wait, make HIM the SON/Daughter/Cousin/illegitimate Bastard Child of <God>!
Did you start getting giddy and excited? If so, we're going to need you to take a seat, go ahead, take a seat, right over there. I'm Hit, and this is "To catch a power-player." Seriously folks, just because a character is low level in terms of power doesn't make him dull. Nor is it a requirement for even the main character to be of that strength.
Hell, I'm bolding that for extra emphasis.
No character is REQUIRED to be powerful, its better to avoid it, unless the universe itself is made up with super-powers, then no one is "Actually" super powered.
Character Descriptions.
"So what if most lions don't have blue hair, mine does!" ( "Gotta have blue hair!", "Kaleidoscopic Eyes" , "Rainbow Sprinkles")
A sin often committed by Otakus and Anime fans (Or people running out of ideas, and yes I know using "Otaku" and Anime fan back to back is redundant!) like myself.
It is the act of giving your character wonky colored eyes, hair, and less frequently, skin. It is often favored by the femmes when they're writing a character, and often abused by males making a female as well.
Example: Her scarlet eyes, piercing, and intense, framed well by her Sunset Orange hair, seemed to.. Oh dear God I can't finish this sentence without damning my soul, you get the idea.
Look, we can all get behind a girl with Pink hair every once in a while, but its best to avoid these. If you can, think up a legitimate reason for why they have said freaky-deak colors on their body, and it better not be "They're special!" or I will hunt you down, and beat you into a stupor with a herring. Twice, for each outstanding color on the character.
(Examples: Another race (If you say "Half-<insert> the same punishment is due), Hair Dye (If there are folks who can shoot fireballs, there are dudes who can make you some aqua marine hair dye.) )
Not to be confused with "Soul piercing glares."
Sue-per Vision.
Your eyes, they're so piercing... they're... l-lobotomizing me!! AAAAH, MAKE IT STOP! ("Laser Beam Eyes", "Y'Gon' Git SOUL PIERCED!" , "Reverse Shoop - Da - Whoop")
This line is usually abused by people trying to get across the message that their character is "SUPER INTENSE!", or they're literally trying to drill into a person's mind with their eyes.
This line is so unbelievably cliched and over used that some places will outright refuse your application for using it, that or force you to rewrite it.
It doesn't just cover "Piercing" eyes, it basically covers the majority of the descriptions for "Intense eyes", though to a lesser extent.
Examples: "Eyes like burning embers" , "Eyes shining with an intense glow" , "EYE-BEAMS! KYAAAH!"
While the overall idea you're trying get through isn't cliched, its the delivery, try to think outside the box. Honestly, despite being #8, this is one that I normally brush aside, though I usually grin and get put off track when I hear it.
So, unless your character is Superman, or some other super hero, or he/she really DOES have eye beams, try again!
The truth about: Half-breeds.
"I am Half Lion, half Cheetah, half Chicken-wolf." "What?" "You heard me." ( "MAN-BEAR-PIG!" , "The blood of a dragon runs within my veins!" , "I am NOT an inuyasha clone, I SWURR!")
Stemming from the over use of half-breeds in popular medias (Anime, Western Cartoons, Movies, Tabletops (I'm looking at you, half-elves.) ) the idea has since leaped into one of the most common and cliched lines you can ever read.
Often pictured as Wangsty (Overly Angsty) loners who constantly lament the often strange blood in their veins, overly bubbly half-breed girls who seem to snorting a mixture of coffee beans and speed, or an annoying pair of the two.
Honestly, this is like phoning in a character, if you're preparing to make a half-breed, you'd better bring the heat, or scrap your character and work from the ground up, 'cause I swear you will never see the Dynamic Entry coming.
To a lesser extent, this covers <Blank> in human form, and others, my overall idea is the same on them.
Cliche, boring, and annoying to work with.
Work to use a more original framework, or better yet, make a way to have half-breeds suck less.
And the final order of business...
"I can do anything I want, and you have no say in the matter! NYEH!" ("The CAD factor" , "I AM THE GOD OF YOUR FATHERS!" , "All signs point to jackass.")
Despite what the following were, this one is fittingly not based on your character, rather, it is based on you.
The biggest sin of role playing with others is that you either outright refuse to take logical criticism, to improve your style, or to attempt to interact in a way that is (in general) more enjoyable.
While there are plenty of exceptions, and most instances of this are far from easy to jam into an overall thing.
Remember that role playing, unlike short stories, and novels are NOT a solo effort, you're working with other writers, with differing styles, opinions, and character interests than yours. While its best not to completely rework your character or overall idea of what they'd do to the whims of others, its best to keep yourself flexible. If your character would normally act a certain way that would be negative towards another player's, try to work around it, or better yet, talk it through with the player(s) in question.
This also falls towards all forms of original fiction, no writer is perfect, so taking criticism is important. However, in my line of RPing, I tend be prone to a very "If it is blatantly out of spite, I sure as hell hope you're wearing a cup, 'cause there's going to be retribution." style. Not the best, honestly, but hey, sometimes you get wankers.
The same can be said for doling it out, only make a criticism if it is well founded, and has a logical reason to be said. If you've got a problem in terms of the writer themselves, take it to private channels.
I'm sure you're expecting this line to be "And don't be racist, sexist, or a jackass in general.", however I am going to have to pass on that. This is a guide for writing, if you need me to tell you this now, please slap your parents, your friends, and more importantly, 4chan (They always have a hand in all of the evils of the world).
Remember folks, follows these rules, or it's the Death Penalty!
*Concentrates hard to keep himself from face-palming from his own actions*
The Mary Sues.
You've all seen one, played with one, read the adventures, and rolled your eyes so hard that you almost have a lazy eye. Don't know what a Mary-Sue is? Allow me to Elaborate.
(Picked by random)
Lets say you're reading a fan-fic about LOTR, all is well and good, the writer is skilled, any non-canon content so far is showing some thought and is believable, then out of nowhere, a random woman from Gondor joins the fellowship, beats down an army of orcs single-handed , manages to talk down the mouth of Sauron, swoons and beds Aragorn AND Legolas in one fell swoop. Oh, and it turns out shes a half-elf, and was destined long before the ring was created to save TEH WORLD! Oh, and did I mention she has sparkling purple eyes, blue-green hair with streaks of red, and she has cat ears? OH! She also has a pet dragon (Also purple).
Yup, Sue is in the building, and the only path to take here is nuke it from orbit and pray to whatever God you worship that the writer is struck hard by the Originality Stick (Patent Pending).
A Mary-Sue by definition is a character that has far too much gravity in an IP, and in general just has so much going on for them, and so little going against that they are just sickening to read/watch. The universe bends over backwards to make sure that they can fit in, they couldn't fail a challenge, even if they intentionally tried. Every character will at least acknowledge them as some major character within the IP, if not fall madly in love, or become their rivals, who secretly love them. They are often so chock full of little perks and tweaks that you could probably make about 20 characters out of the elements of one sue.
!!Please see the link, it will direct you to the "Writeriums Mary-Sue Test"
www.onlyfiction.net/marysue2.html
The previous site will bring you to tests to get an overall idea of exactly how Sue-like your characters are, and you'll also get a bit more in depth idea of what precisely makes a Sue. You'll probably be surprised to find with what you get.
-----Waiting for Test------
So, whats your score like? 35+?
Not to worry, there is still hope! Its time to put you through Mary Sue Chemo.
Now, making a character is a bit like cooking a decent steak. When you first make up its concepts and basic info, its fairly bland, its edible, but it won't have people interested in another bite. Add some interesting factors about them, interesting background, maybe some interesting little quirks and they'll be looking for more, add too much, and they'll punch you in the throat and ask for their money back.
The more elements you add to a character, especially the more cliche, the higher you'll need to compensate to make up for it. A good writer can compensate for a sue, and pull it off, however, the more sue-ish, the better you'll need to be. Now, if you immediately think "Well, I'm a great role player, I shouldn't even need to worry about that, then." If you did, please stab yourself in the hand with a fork.
Keeping your characters simple not only makes them more believable to RP with, but they also promote the RPer to focus more on using his creativity to make them more interesting, rather than their naturally bizarre nature.
Take that to heart people, simple is good. The quiz covers a fairly large list of sue features, try to take them to heart and avoid them, or at least use them in a sparing manner.
-----
Musical Intermission:
(For your enjoyment, feel free to pretend you're in some Jazz Bar.)
-----
Powerplaying.
"Well, my character is the MAIN character, so he's allowed to have that much power!" ("Power-play", "Power OVERFLOWING!1!", "Uber Sue", "KAKAROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!")
One of the most feared and well known cardinal sins, also one of the most common to fall for.
Lets say you're playing a hunter, but just being a hunter doesn't feel adequate enough, he lacks that certain "spice" to make him unique. So you give him great agility, nothing big, just slightly above average dexterity. Its not enough! YOU NEED MOAR! Go all out, add in that he can do back flips, can leap tall buildings in a single bound, and he runs faster than a sports car. Ooh, and make his eyes flame-y, and he has spirits looking out for him, and his fur made out of metal! Hell, lets throw in some magical Dragonball Z/ Every Magical Girl anime evur super mode that he can enter when shit hits the fan. Better yet, lets make it where a God lends him its power temporarily... no wait, make HIM the SON/Daughter/Cousin/illegitimate Bastard Child of <God>!
Did you start getting giddy and excited? If so, we're going to need you to take a seat, go ahead, take a seat, right over there. I'm Hit, and this is "To catch a power-player." Seriously folks, just because a character is low level in terms of power doesn't make him dull. Nor is it a requirement for even the main character to be of that strength.
Hell, I'm bolding that for extra emphasis.
No character is REQUIRED to be powerful, its better to avoid it, unless the universe itself is made up with super-powers, then no one is "Actually" super powered.
Character Descriptions.
"So what if most lions don't have blue hair, mine does!" ( "Gotta have blue hair!", "Kaleidoscopic Eyes" , "Rainbow Sprinkles")
A sin often committed by Otakus and Anime fans (Or people running out of ideas, and yes I know using "Otaku" and Anime fan back to back is redundant!) like myself.
It is the act of giving your character wonky colored eyes, hair, and less frequently, skin. It is often favored by the femmes when they're writing a character, and often abused by males making a female as well.
Example: Her scarlet eyes, piercing, and intense, framed well by her Sunset Orange hair, seemed to.. Oh dear God I can't finish this sentence without damning my soul, you get the idea.
Look, we can all get behind a girl with Pink hair every once in a while, but its best to avoid these. If you can, think up a legitimate reason for why they have said freaky-deak colors on their body, and it better not be "They're special!" or I will hunt you down, and beat you into a stupor with a herring. Twice, for each outstanding color on the character.
(Examples: Another race (If you say "Half-<insert> the same punishment is due), Hair Dye (If there are folks who can shoot fireballs, there are dudes who can make you some aqua marine hair dye.) )
Not to be confused with "Soul piercing glares."
Sue-per Vision.
Your eyes, they're so piercing... they're... l-lobotomizing me!! AAAAH, MAKE IT STOP! ("Laser Beam Eyes", "Y'Gon' Git SOUL PIERCED!" , "Reverse Shoop - Da - Whoop")
This line is usually abused by people trying to get across the message that their character is "SUPER INTENSE!", or they're literally trying to drill into a person's mind with their eyes.
This line is so unbelievably cliched and over used that some places will outright refuse your application for using it, that or force you to rewrite it.
It doesn't just cover "Piercing" eyes, it basically covers the majority of the descriptions for "Intense eyes", though to a lesser extent.
Examples: "Eyes like burning embers" , "Eyes shining with an intense glow" , "EYE-BEAMS! KYAAAH!"
While the overall idea you're trying get through isn't cliched, its the delivery, try to think outside the box. Honestly, despite being #8, this is one that I normally brush aside, though I usually grin and get put off track when I hear it.
So, unless your character is Superman, or some other super hero, or he/she really DOES have eye beams, try again!
The truth about: Half-breeds.
"I am Half Lion, half Cheetah, half Chicken-wolf." "What?" "You heard me." ( "MAN-BEAR-PIG!" , "The blood of a dragon runs within my veins!" , "I am NOT an inuyasha clone, I SWURR!")
Stemming from the over use of half-breeds in popular medias (Anime, Western Cartoons, Movies, Tabletops (I'm looking at you, half-elves.) ) the idea has since leaped into one of the most common and cliched lines you can ever read.
Often pictured as Wangsty (Overly Angsty) loners who constantly lament the often strange blood in their veins, overly bubbly half-breed girls who seem to snorting a mixture of coffee beans and speed, or an annoying pair of the two.
Honestly, this is like phoning in a character, if you're preparing to make a half-breed, you'd better bring the heat, or scrap your character and work from the ground up, 'cause I swear you will never see the Dynamic Entry coming.
To a lesser extent, this covers <Blank> in human form, and others, my overall idea is the same on them.
Cliche, boring, and annoying to work with.
Work to use a more original framework, or better yet, make a way to have half-breeds suck less.
And the final order of business...
"I can do anything I want, and you have no say in the matter! NYEH!" ("The CAD factor" , "I AM THE GOD OF YOUR FATHERS!" , "All signs point to jackass.")
Despite what the following were, this one is fittingly not based on your character, rather, it is based on you.
The biggest sin of role playing with others is that you either outright refuse to take logical criticism, to improve your style, or to attempt to interact in a way that is (in general) more enjoyable.
While there are plenty of exceptions, and most instances of this are far from easy to jam into an overall thing.
Remember that role playing, unlike short stories, and novels are NOT a solo effort, you're working with other writers, with differing styles, opinions, and character interests than yours. While its best not to completely rework your character or overall idea of what they'd do to the whims of others, its best to keep yourself flexible. If your character would normally act a certain way that would be negative towards another player's, try to work around it, or better yet, talk it through with the player(s) in question.
This also falls towards all forms of original fiction, no writer is perfect, so taking criticism is important. However, in my line of RPing, I tend be prone to a very "If it is blatantly out of spite, I sure as hell hope you're wearing a cup, 'cause there's going to be retribution." style. Not the best, honestly, but hey, sometimes you get wankers.
The same can be said for doling it out, only make a criticism if it is well founded, and has a logical reason to be said. If you've got a problem in terms of the writer themselves, take it to private channels.
I'm sure you're expecting this line to be "And don't be racist, sexist, or a jackass in general.", however I am going to have to pass on that. This is a guide for writing, if you need me to tell you this now, please slap your parents, your friends, and more importantly, 4chan (They always have a hand in all of the evils of the world).
Remember folks, follows these rules, or it's the Death Penalty!
*Concentrates hard to keep himself from face-palming from his own actions*
