Lets Workshop your Character!

I've been a little sick lately so I've a bit of free time. I'd like to do some character workshopping. Do you have a character you'd like me to review? Then I'll make you read mine!

I assume you're probably not sick anymore but are you still doing this?

Sure lets roll!

Yay thank you, the link to Shade is in my signature below.

Can we start with your purpose for this character? What roles did you want it to fill?

I'm guessing you're going for a general use character that is useful in lots of situations. The problem is most of his abilities seem redundant and not really tied to his history. You've run into a situation where you have a bundle of plot threads that could be interesting but don't really go anywhere.

I think what you want to do is build an arc out of this. You've got a character who makes a change in his lifestyle pretty dramatically. He goes from being a criminal in the actual past to being a hero today. I think you want to focus your writing on that transition. 

He gets like abducted by aliens, but they're mutants. Why are they called Lazari? Where did they get a UFO? What does all this mean to the world of Sonic?


He needs a reason to change. Try and think of why he wouldn't want to be a criminal anymore. I've got a examples:

A new designer drug hits the underground markets called Lazarus. It puts people in a suggestible dreamlike state where they can be happy despite their real life suffering in poverty. Isaac frequently delivers his drugs to an old man whom he befriends.

The old man never had any children, but he saved his money all his life to hopefully have a family with. Someone deceives the old man while he's on the drugs and steals his savings by convincing the man that he is the man's son. Isaac sees the suffering his drugs caused and decides that he must fight against the suffering it causes instead of peddling it.

That is just an example, don't feel like you need to use it.

There are also a couple of nit-picks I'd give you-

Dichromatism (having differently colored eyes) is a rare condition. It is however common in anime fan characters. I think not having that would actually make your character more unique as compared to other fan characters and more realistic.

I don't think his outfit and age match his history. I can't believe a criminal mastermind would be at the top of his game under the age of twenty. For that matter I can't imagine a professional criminal wearing Dank Memes on his apparel. I would make him older if you want to keep him a professional. I'd also loose the "Trapped in Amber" for thirty years.

On the other hand you could just double down on him being a kid and being from the past. Instead of/in addition to memes he could be interested in the pop culture of his childhood, like synth music and Star Wars.

Okay, thank you. I will definitely take these points into account for Shade.

No wait! This is a give and take thing. I tell you my ideas. I'd also like to know what your mentality was creating the character. I can curtail my advice better if I know what you want out of your character.

Also if you want to read mine you can give me some advice.
https://sonicrpnation.forumotion.com/t3973-kamille-the-sheep-templar

Okay sorry. Of course I'll check out your character. I imagined Shade being yeah, a general use character that I just made up and have grown a liking to. I want Shade to be someone driven by emotion and the urge to know that he's done something good. Shade is someone who has a bad past but that has shaped him into a better person overall. I have just one question, why are his powers redundant? I mean I understand that they're not very connected to his history but I thought they were a good choice.

Let's do this, then, 'cause I genuinely want to make my characters better. I know the backstory and stuff may be a little cliché here and there, but hopefully it's decent enough, so I choose Caen! Bio's in my signature.

Oooh I'm quite interested in this. Feedback on bios is always nice and perhaps I could develop my character a bit more with your review c: If you would want to do it of course! If so, could you please read through Dione's bio? Her link is also in my signature :3

Hex, this is probably gonna get a little nick picky so you might wanna take these points with a grain of salt. Anyway let's begin:

1. Explain who and why Kamille was given the nickname Kammy. I know this is an insignificant detail but I think it might help show us the relationship Kamille has with friends, co-workers, family or whoever gave her it.

2. Add more about about Kamille's personality, all we have are small points like "she likes apples" and whatnot which is good but it doesn't really tell us what kind of person Kamille is.

3. Talk about how Kamille deals with being both a New Knight of Spigonia and a University Student. Does she keep in touch with her friends at the uni or is she a loner?

4. Strengths, Weaknesses and Fears. This along with 2 are probably the biggest points I have and for a good reason. Showing us your character's flaws and what they fear is good at showing that your character isn't some big powerful ancient soldier but make sure to also add about an equal number of strengths too.

That's pretty much all I can think of because you've made a good character and of course you don't have to take my points into account and don't worry, I won't mind if you don't.

It's just kind of a laundry list of abilities. Being able to talk to animals and read minds seems kind of redundant, especially since the "Animal Buddies" can already communicate through pantomime.

I just have to accept that all Hedgehog fan characters are fast. It does make sense for a drug runner to be fast. Silver the Hedgehog isn't fast though. It seems overlapping and overpowered to have super speed and gymnast like flexibility to doge attacks while also having the ability to reflect attacks off of a shield and use your Psychokinesis to redirect attacks.

When you put it that, yeah I understand your point now. Thank you

This isn't a playable character per-se, and more than likely she would only be hosted in roleplays I've created, but I have Nyz who is sort of my new omega level threat. She's basically the Unicron/Galactus in my universes.

https://sonicrpnation.forumotion.com/t4112-nyz-the-world-eater

https://sonicrpnation.forumotion.com/t4147-arctururs-pyro-telesis#184784

This here is Arctururs "Pyro" Telesis, first character I've added to the character bios section of this forum, and my main character among the few I'm going to add. Along with this one is intended to be three extra characters that come with him - Ace, Bonnie, and Metal Pyro - and an original character not from Tristitia that I have not made yet, capping my character count at five with a potential of getting seven characters all together, eventually. 
Just saying, I stopped Sonic RPing a while ago and only recently have I decided to pop back in after my own original universe stuff has been slowing down, so I just want to make sure Pyro's re-entry to the Mobian atmosphere is a safe one. .3.

Thank you so much Hex! 

I'll look at the grammar in a minute and I'll try to fix it. I'll also try to describe her powers a bit more c:
This really helps to make her bio and herself a better character so I appreciate it lots x3

HalfmoonHex wrote:Okay Pyro, I’m coming for you!


Soo starting off I notice this Tristitia place is from some DA roleplay group or something. If “Shakra” is native to this world I find it odd that he still maintains those powers. It reminds me of the Speed Force in DC. When the Flash leaves the DC universe sometimes he loses his powers and sometimes when other Speedy Heroes ender DC they discover they can access the Speed Force.


So how did Ace know Pyro’s parents were going to be attacked by a monster? Why save Ace when she could have woken up Pyro’s parents so they could just fight the monster? And if Pyro was rich why not just pay Roxane to raise them? I know people want their characters to have tragic backstories, but dead parents is really cliche in fan characters.


Another cliched tropes he falls into is Fire Powers. Even before the appearance of Blaze the Cat Sonic OCs have had an over abundance of pyromancers. You’ve got a huge wall of text on how his powers are so cool. That stuff is fun to write but not really fun to read. I’d suggest simplifying it and improvising with powers rather than writing yourself into complex mechanics.


I’m not understanding why Ace is using Pyro as a slave when she could have just stolen his wealth. Maybe what you want to do is put some kind legal barrier between Pyro and his parents wealth. I would imagine there would be some sort of legal guardian appointed to take care of war orphans. I’d imagine life as a John Doe in Sonic’s World would be pretty hard to bear if he was once wealthy.


This is really heavy stuff. You’re tackling some really dark stuff with not a lot of context. I can’t imagine how this person could ever be happy. If you want me to believe he’s a goofball you should back off some of the tragedies.


I hope this isn’t too harsh…. but I also think you need to work on run on sentences. I’m guilty of it myself, but it’s a weakness you’re suffering from.


“After that point, Ace sent machine after machine, sentry robot after sentry robot, even hunter robots known as "The Animatronics" that she built based on a pizzeria chain she bought specifically to get closer to the animatronics on the stage and fix them up to her liking so that they'd be capable war machines, effectively(seriously, she turned animatronics into war robots designed to capture Pyro), all after Pyro as he ran for the Green Plateau... there, he found the Crystal Tree one day.”


That’s all one sentence. There needs to be spots where the reader’s brain can take a break and compile that stuff.

“After that point, Ace sent attack robots to capture Pyro. She sent machine after machine, sentry robot after sentry robot, and even hunter robots known as "The Animatronics.” These deadly bots were repurposed pizzeria animatronics. Eventually Pyro escaped to the Green Plateau, where he found the Crystal Tree.”

Oh my. .3.
Thank for the feedback! I discussed it with a friend - it actually got me thinking about Pyro more than I usually did, and I made a decision on what I'd do with this new critique.
In the past, I always followed a generation system... however, I find that to be probably the MOST TEDIOUS SYSTEM EVER. 
SERIOUSLY. 
So, at this point it's best to say screw the Generation system and just fix my character whenever I need it, and not define it constantly. In this case, I may disappear from the forum a bit, and the one RP I popped into, I will disappear from. 

Sounds a little stupid, I imagine. But at the same time, these are some major changes to the character I'm in need of, the two major ones being how dark and cliche his backstory is. I always used his age as an excuse as to why I needed to get rid of his parental figures. It wasn't a good excuse, but at this point, it's one I can't use anymore. But changing his backstory, especially such a pivotal part, would change quite a bit.
Even if his personality doesn't seem to match up, ironically. .3.

A new version of Pyro will be made soon, I really don't want to go unactive on this forum though. Thanks for the feedback, given me alot to think about, certainly. :3

In the meantime, the deal is you do a character for me, and I talk about one of your characters, right? Have any specific one in mind?

I would recommend against leaving the site or writing the profile from scratch. I think it is much more important that you keep getting experience roleplaying than worrying about doing it right.

Think about your brain like a muscle. When you're exercising you damage your muscles, and your body grows them back stronger. If you keep writing and making mistakes you will learn. Your future roleplay will be better for it.

I would recommend doing a bit of grammatical re-education though. There's stuff we've all learned in Junior High that we forget by the time we're in highschool or even 25 year old slobs in their underwear.

Re-read stuff out loud to test the flow. If it sounds funny try diagramming your sentence.

Thanks for the suggestions, but I didn't say I was leaving the forum entirely nor did I say I was doing the character app from scratch. I was suggesting I'd be less active, and that the character app would need alot of edits. 
The analogy does make sense, though, and I'll try the "grammatical re-education" you suggested. 

PyroGX wrote:In the meantime, the deal is you do a character for me, and I talk about one of your characters, right? Have any specific one in mind?

Can I have some feedback? Zap used to be evil, but he had good in him, when he split into two parts, Good, and, well, evil, when Darkness destroyed his ship. (It's short, but, eh.)

Soo I've got a lot of questions. This isn't much to go on, but I think we can do something with it.

What do you mean when you say Zap was evil? What sorts of evil deeds would he do? Did he have any moral code or was he something like a sociopath? I think most real people tend to think they're the good guy and will rationalize their bad deeds. Sociopathy is when someone feels no morality. It's common in ficition but very rare in real life.

What do you mean by him being split? Is it literal like a split personality or becoming two people? Do you mean it metaphorically like he's emotionally divided on his actions?

I don't know what "Darkness" is or that the character has a ship. I think there is a lot there that you know in your head but I have no clue what you mean. You're going to need to lay it all out. It doesn't even need to be a written profile at first. You could just write statements out in a google doc then expand them later.

Like do this-

Darkness is a XXX
Darkness wants XXX
Darkness will get it by XXX
Darkness's weakness is XXX

Say if I wanted to explain Dr. Eggman to someone who's never played a Sonic game I'd do this-

Dr. Eggman is a Mad Scientist.
Dr. Eggman builds robots to use as his minions.
Dr. Eggman wants to take over the world.
Dr. Eggman will take over the world with his robot army.
The thing stopping Dr. Eggman is Sonic the Hedgehog.

Could you give me some descriptions of these characters that you've listed?