What inspires you to make a character bio?

[Noctis the Devious]

Character skeletons in general give me a hard time mostly because I can't seem to fit all of my character within those certain attributes listed or I haven't thought about that particular attribute. Personalities and biographies are especially difficult for me as most of my characters have personalities that are hard to describe. Biographies on the other hand just right out hate me, and as I'm staring at my character skeleton that won't be completed until I finish those last three paragraphs I'm going to ask you all this: what's the story behind your character's back story? Is it difficult to make them different than others? To make up life events that lead up to where they are today? Or do you have any tips for those like me who struggle with this?

 

[Diana]

Sometimes I have a character so clearly developed in my head, it's a piece of cake to jot everything down.

....MOST of the time, I end up getting borked on the details. O__O I have a loooot of characters filed away and I like to at least try to make them unique people, even if I tend to play the same archtypes and personalities.

I just recently discovered that it's a lot of fun for me to have other people give me a bunch of potential "random facts" about my character. From those little things I'm able to come up with a more solid personality and background history for them. Like "THEY LOVE DINOSAURS" or "THEY'RE OBSESSED WITH RED THINGS" or "HAD AN AFFAIR WITH TEACHER" I take the suggestions I really like, and then develop it in to my character and figure out what happened in their life to make them like these things or have those experiences.

The ooooother thing I do religiously, is the stuff that gets posted in the Roleplay Institute Exercises. The character exercises are great for making characters more like real people. O_O

 

[Fijoli]

I tend to, when making characters, use the skeletons of others, to create something that with complement my partners characters. This is mostly because I like to create the story in my partners favor, you could say I am eager to please.

Sometimes, however, I am forced to be selfish, and I am challenged to create first. In these cases I look to encyclopedia's of deities, gods, historians, well known figures...I actually 'study'. I choose a gender and then let my pencil do its work. Once I have the rough sketch I create the name, and then with a carefully chosen theme song (either I create myself or choose from youtube) Start writing out who this new creation is and what they are all about.

I suppose that I go through phases of my artistic and creative talents to help me create something original and never before seen. This doesn't mean that there aren't undertones of similar traits, but that will always be a given, Inspiration has to come from somewhere within, without, and show through the eyes of your own imagination. This is what I like to believe :) hope I helped a bit. Good luck Expri <333

 

[Trevinth]

Creating characters comes rather naturally for me. When I see an RP I like I first think of the types of characters I can enact. When I choose one I then work onto the story. I personally like to make characters with tragic or memorable pasts so that they can have a bit more of an emotional affect on others. When I am in a slump, I try to enact parts of an RP that I think will happen in my head and see from a cinematic perspective how it looks. If I like what I see I will alter my character to better fit what I saw in my head. When it comes to appearances, I tend to look through pictures until I find one that suits my character's personality.

Well this is the way I think up characters. It may not work for some people, but that's my five cents worth.

 

[LogicfromLogic]

I make character biographies based on how I see them. I don't have an exact pull for character inspiration, it comes to me. And once that character's personality is established, I answer these questions:

-What made them that way?
-Why is that their opinion?
-Who is in their life now, and who isn't now? And why?
-What are they? What do they do, or did they do?
-How did they come to those conclusions, and how does that play into their being?
-Where does all of their negative and positive attributes come from?
-When did they start to mold into their person?

That is what I use every time to create a proper background to fit the character's being.