Is your character you?

[Mortifera.6138]

Is your character you? Is it filling the role of being the virtual you while you game? Or does your character have nothing to do with you?

 

I made mostly female characters, because that's who I am IRL. Problem is, I take flaming and attacks personally, because they're directed at me by extension.

 

Maybe I should make a buff norn, which has nothing to do with me? Then when people insult me in game, I won't take it personally.

[robertthebard.8150]

Nope. I flip a coin at character creation to determine M/F, and then roll from there. The only exceptions are characters that I carry over from universe to universe.

[mes.4607]

In a way I consider my main character 'me'

[Just a flesh wound.3589]

I have 18 level 80s that I play, all races and both sexes so I’m going to say no, my character is not me

[Yggranya.5201]

If someone can consider some vapid chosen one to be themselves, then who am i to judge. If you feel offended by this, then i'm sorry.

 

I'm still curious, do you just think the characters appearance is an extention of yourself/what you would like to look like, or do you think the commanders forced "choises" and reactions as the hero emulate what you would do?

[otto.5684]

No my character is not me. I view them kinda like pets.

[Batel.9206]

No - unless I am actually a male plant creature with green vines for skin and green leaves for hair, and somehow I didn't know it all this time. :D

 

My characters, whether they're my main - my "canon" Commander - or not, all have their own distinct personalities. I'm a writer; I can't help it. I might put some small aspects of my personality in them (I share my ranger's Eeyore-like pessimism, for example), but as I play them and write about them they take on lives of their own. I do have an RP character who is basically "me" in Tyria, but she, like the others, has since formed her own personality to be a bit different from my own. She looks somewhat like me, though...mostly. Can't quite get her face right...and I keep missing my chance/am continually broke/am too cheap to buy the reading glasses from the gem store, haha.

[firedragon.8953]

Yes and no.

 

My main character, which I play and go through the story, feels as if I share a type of shared embodiment with. It is the same feeling I get when I read a novel that takes place primarily from one character's perspective, or when I watch a movie that focuses on the experiences of a character. I know they are not me, and I do not intend them to be me, but I share in their struggles, choices, and emotions even if I would not choose them for myself, if that makes sense. I play my own sex (male) because I feel that gives a sense of continuity and whenever I play an alt and they speak it seems kind of weird because I am used to my character's voice. I also play female alt characters, but somehow the story/plot seems tied to my "main". The choice of character sex was merely because I thought it fit the "backstory" that I wanted to imbue into my character at the time of creation. If I chose another race/profession I could have easily chose a female character if that is the starting story I wanted and it probably would have not ended up any different.

 

So, I do not think I am my character, and he doesn't really represent me much beyond artistic and design choices, however I experience the story through him. He is just an avatar through which I experience Tyria and hold some control over but not all. I am mostly along for the ride.

[Smoosh.2718]

Mine has cat ears, I am too... Just all levels except physical.

[Dragon Priestess.9760]

Not really. I go for aesthetic preferences. So I try to create characters that are visually appealing to me.

[Joe Schmoe.6981]

Yeah, he's me. What you see is what you get. Role-play just goes over my head, so basically my characters thoughts/opinions are mine. ;)

[Westenev.5289]

I guess my Avatar is kind of like my dress up doll?

 

My characters definately aren't me, or a portrayal of how I act in the game - I'm way too salty to be that cute.

[necromaniac.7629]

just an alter ego roleplay

[Eekasqueak.7850]

Pretty sure I'm not an Asura IRL...

[maddoctor.2738]

It would be hard for me to be more than a dozen people all at once. Even excluding the appearance and the different races, that would mean I had a serious multiple personality disorder.

[aspirine.6852]

Since most of mine are female... Ehh no..

[ManOfKebab.7054]

Noooooope.

[Crono.4197]

My main character is charr. My character isn't me, but with both Guild Wars 1 and Guild Wars 2, I've been invested in the game story. For me the game's story and characters are something similar to watching a movie I like, I wanna know how the story develops and what happens next. That's why I just go with the flow and I usually don't care about the direction the story goes in. You can't change a movie creator's plot while watching a movie and same applies for me with the story of the Guild Wars franchise.

[Vavume.8065]

> @"Mortifera.6138" said:

 

> Problem is, I take flaming and attacks personally, because they're directed at me by extension.

>

 

It does not matter what character you are playing, if someone talks to you then they are talking to YOU, so if they insult you or your character they are not actually insulting your character (it's just pixels) they are insulting you as a person, so just play whatever character you want, if you have a thin skin you are still going to get upset...

[Donutdude.9582]

My character embodies everything I would like to have been were I born in another age.

[Pockethole.5031]

Yes and no. When I'm in GW2 I want to enjoy the game (alone or with others) and try to take nothing personally. If someone insults me or bothers me in any way I do my best to not waste any time on them. I used to talk about personal stuff in games but honestly that didn't get me anywhere so I stopped. I cannot bring myself to trust anyone ever again, save for the people I know already. Relying on anyone only brings disappointment and mental pain. So try to keep myself as a person out of it, even though my personality may leak from cracks now and then, but I never start telling my life story or anything.

 

However, it's important how my characters look like and what class/build I enjoy. That's where "me" is. I give my characters a little personality of their own with their looks. I don't want them to look alike even though some share same hairstyle. I pick a build that's done and over time change it to be more like what I enjoy. That's what I also like about GW2, class building choices are abundant. Character customization is important to me as well.

Everything else is co-operating with other people if possible, a casual chat in /map now and then, but I don't want to get personally involved with anyone. Yes, I can listen to your troubles and give my thoughts on it but if I can I don't want to talk about my life because honestly nobody cares. It doesn't matter. Whatever. I'm just there to enjoy the game. All that said, playing GW2 is 80-90% of my day awake right now, if that helps putting things into perspective.

[coso.9173]

yes and no. my character is part of me. evidently I change thing around. I odn't make na exact replica, but when I play it I see it as myself, going through all these things.

[Wrong Device.3014]

One character is probably me. The rest are his buddies.

[Danikat.8537]

I have 11 permanent characters, covering all the different races and both genders, I also like to make up personalities for them beyond what the game gives and they're all quite different. The one I play most often is a human female like me, and has long hair like I do, but hers is slightly shorter, black instead of brown and much less frizzy. Otherwise we look nothing alike and I've never tried to make her look like me.

 

Sometimes I'll decide that whenever the story gives me a choice this particular character is going to choose the one I think is best, but even so I wouldn't say we have similar personalities either. I used to say that if I was playing myself I'd just stay in town and be a merchant or crafter because I wouldn't be willing or able to put myself in danger the way my characters do. But then Season 3 gave me a better answer: I'd be part of the Pact forces who go into Orr after most of the risen have been cleared out to try to restore the land. (Although if my real-life career in conservation is anything to go by I'd be one of the ones based in LA organising the logistics and not getting into the field nearly enough.)

 

My approach to making characters for a game is to start with the 'key features' I know I want, like a profession or biography choice or something and then imagine a person who fits that and the role I know they're going to play in the story, then I make that person. I'll decide things which probably seem fairly trivial or aren't in the game at all like their personality and details of their backstory at the same time as deciding their race, profession, what weapons they'll use etc. because in my head it all ties together.

 

Sometimes it leads to some weird choices, although GW2 is pretty good about limiting bad combinations you can make. Some of my Elder Scrolls characters have been a weird mess of compromises between how the stats system worked and what I wanted to play. Although it was almost disappointing in Skyrim to find they'd simplified it so much that what I'd normally pick was now not really different to any other choice.

[Randulf.7614]

Yes, I am a 7' bearded viking warrior with pythons the size of Hulk Hogan's