Character Biographies

Started by Tiernan, January 14, 2006, 02:10:20 PM

One of the many things I enjoy about Armageddon are the stories that we share with other players about the characters we played long ago.  The one about your Byn Sergeant who was killed by his own men on a mission, or that time when some evil defiler trapped your character in a stone tower, unleashed a horde of jakhals and watched as your body was ripped limb from limb... ah yes, the memories.

We, as players, tend to put a lot of time, thought, and energy into developing our characters.  We have a background that we construct that starts to tell the story of his/her life.  It's really the first chapter in their biography.  Often there have been times when I wish I had put down in writing some of the really enjoyable moments in my character's life story.  To add another chapter to his biography at a point where everything was still relatively fresh in my mind and the story could be told with all the passion and excitement still with me.

It's with that intention in mind that I've spent the last few weeks working on a fairly robust coding project that would allow us to add new chapters to our character's biography.  I've invested a great deal of effort into getting this system implemented and I sincerely hope that it is welcomed and used in the spirit in which it was designed.

The 'biography' command syntax is outlined in this help-file.

I LOVE YOU.



That is all.

Edit: Because it didn't look big and bold enough.

Holy crap!  You guys rock!

It's going to take me forever to enter all the stuff I've already written about my character, though.

Absolutely fantastic! I've been waiting for something like this. It is immensly appreciated from my end, Tiernan.
..and the puppet explodes.

Wow...amazing.  I'm so glad I've logged 95% of my current PCs game play, so now I can go back and write up a history and put it in.

Is there any maximum character or paragragh length for individual biography entries?
quote="mansa"]emote pees in your bum[/quote]

Hey that's really cool.

Just curious: will the bio entries be included in that Wiki history project?

Edit to add:  I think LM just out-Venomzed Venomz (below).
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream." - Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House

THANK YOU, GUYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Child, child, if you come to this doomed house, what is to save you?

A voice whispers, "Read the tales upon the walls."

Wow wow wow, muchos gracias.

Will benders be able to read these biographies?  It would be interesting if they could skim the person's mind, flipping through the mental pages of their past, looking for useful information.

Thanks for giving me a seizure Laura.
*blank* hmms to himself, carefully peeing across the ground.

Quote from: RaesanosI want to kill everyone.

Eyvallah...
A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way. -MT

I love this idea.  The best part, if the IMMs choose to read these, is how comically innaccurate they will be from what -really- happened to the PC.


Seeker
Sitting in your comfort,
You don't believe I'm real,
But you cannot buy protection
from the way that I feel.


So, we would write entries as if they were a background?

>drop pants
You do not have that item.

I plan to write them like little snippets of flashback stories, myself.

Which I figure you could do for a background as well.

But yeah, you're supposed to write them as if the intended audience was someone learning about your character's backstory.  So, background style.  No using them to keep notes and OOC logs, stuff like that.

According to the documentation, these should be written in the same style as backgrounds.   So third person.
Morgenes

Producer
Armageddon Staff

Quote from: "Tamarin"Is there any maximum character or paragragh length for individual biography entries?

Wondering what the character limit is as well.

This is an aweosme who to the game.  Yes!

Quote from: "Morgenes"According to the documentation, these should be written in the same style as backgrounds.   So third person.

...

I don't write my backgrounds in third person.
Back from a long retirement

Quote from: "Hexxaex"Thanks for giving me a seizure Laura.

YOU'RE WELCOME
Child, child, if you come to this doomed house, what is to save you?

A voice whispers, "Read the tales upon the walls."

*looks back at the backround text that's shown when characters are created*

*looks at the background examples on the website*

Well, alright apparently there isn't a third-person requirement, that just seems to be the majority of what we get.  So until we make it a requirement, I'd say that just keep it consistent.  If you wrote your background in 3rd person, use 3rd person in your bio entries.  And vice versa, if you used 1st person in the background, keep using it in your bio entries.
Morgenes

Producer
Armageddon Staff

Well, thanks for clearing that up.
Back from a long retirement

Awesome, not to mention this will lessen confusion for an IMM if they pop in and think why is this person doing this?  It helps outline the slow progression of a character from beginning to end.  That's really awesome.

Can mindbenders read them?
quote="Tisiphone"]Just don't expect him to NOT be upset with you for trying to steal his kidney with a sharp, pointy stick.[/quote]
The weak may inherit the earth, but they won't last two hours on Zalanathas

I don't think anyone should ask or tell what mindbenders can or can't do.