I ask myself what possible purpose that character fills in the plot. I then create the character and fulfill that purpose. Does the plot call for a warrior? Time to make a warrior. Does the plot call for a high school student with magical powers? Time to make me one of those fancy schmancy Hogwartsy people.
"But Brovo! What if the role play has no plot?!"
Then it has no conflict, and there's nothing to resolve, and it's a shitty story. Move along to the next one because that one will inevitably die about four pages in.
Next thing I do is I take my role-fulfilling dude, or chick, or pineapple, and I ask myself
why they took that role, and
why they would be interested in resolving the conflict in the story. Because a character without a motivation has no reason to do anything at all, and then I will feel no inspiration to write for that character, because I will have
no idea why that character wants to do anything. Maybe the warrior wants to slay the big bad because of some personal vendetta. Maybe the high school student with magical powers seeks to succeed on a family legacy, and not let them down. Who knows, it just has to be something that would keep driving the character toward conflict resolution. It also doesn't hurt to see what other characters already exist in the plot (either by the GM or by other players), to make sure I'm not overloading any particular role. "Nine half naked warriors, one tent" is the title of a porno, not an interesting and diverse cast.
Also, side note: The simpler the motivation, the broader it is. "Warrior wants to slay big bad" is quite blunt and gives me lots of ways for the warrior to succeed at that objective. "Warrior wants to slay the big bad
specifically with this stick of +4 Baguette of Truth" narrows the objective down and gives me less ways to accomplish their motivation. (Ex: If a better weapon comes along, they might not abandon their baguette. Which could be interesting in its own right, since that could be a critical character flaw, but that's getting more complicated. Which isn't necessarily bad, but there is such a thing as making a character too complicated to feasibly understand.)
The next step after role and motivation is, well,
flaws. What holds them back from accomplishing the conflict resolution? This step ensures I don't create God Sue: King of the Tension Murder. Maybe the Warrior isn't strong enough to battle his way through the entire palace of guards to get his revenge. Maybe the hogwarts student--being a student--still has much to learn and starts out struggling to meet the expectations of their hardass
asian parent meme family. In an appropriately diverse cast, this also ensures that my characters will have to form relationships with other characters around them to accomplish their long term motivation in relation to the plot. Like the warrior might befriend a thief who can break into the palace and give him a one way beeline toward his target of revenge, or the hogwarts student might befriend other students who have a menagerie of talents that they can learn from.
Because our human flaws are really the only reason we even live in a society that depends on thousands of specialists to get things done. If everyone was perfectly self-sufficient, we wouldn't need other people.
The last step after that is to flavour my character. Give them a gender, give them a sexuality, fill in all the personality bits in relation to everything else. When making the personality, I try to balance the traits to make a facsimile of an interesting person. A warrior who spent his life training to murder someone is probably a rude brute, but is likely a goal oriented person who enjoys working with others that have a determined personality like his own. The hogwarts student is probably the overly grateful type, perhaps even to the point of being a sycophant, who does everything they can to try and convince others (and themselves) of their own self-worth, in spite of their own insecurities because of their family.
And that's it, really. Works like a charm every time. To summarize:
- Make the character fill a role the story needs. If the story has no conflict, ignore it: It's a shitty story, and a waste of my time.
- Give that character a motivation that relates to the conflict in the story. The simpler it is, the more flexible it will be.
- Give them some flaws so as to explain why they can't simply instantly resolve the conflict, and to ensure that relationships will develop organically. (Because people don't just eat friendship pills. They generally share common interests of some kind. Like wanting to murder the big bad.)
- Give the character less important but still interesting traits that can further distinguish them in their role and motivation. Like their gender.
And uh... That's it I guess.