McSpazz

Hello again! It's me! McSpazz! I got quite a few likes on my post regarding flaws, so I thought I'd do ANOTHER long post talking about power levels and the complexity of managing them in a roleplay setting. ESPECIALLY in City of Heroes. Keep in mind that this is going to have a lot of my own opinions mixed in, so if you don't agree, that's fine! Consider this the ramblings of a spazz. Because that's kind of what it is. This is going to be WAAAY longer than talking about flaws since it's a more detailed topic, so there will be chapters. If you finish this, I will give you a digital cookie. CHAPTER 1: WAT First of all, let's get something out of the way. What do I mean by "power level"? I don't mean something that can be defined by numbers (*crushes visor*) or character level. When I talk about power level, I mean how capable a character is in relation to everybody else. While a character with no super powers what so ever might not be able to shoot lasers, their skills and intelligence might make them hold their own against even Rularuu. However, you aren't alone here. You aren't the hero of the story. We all are. Which can be a problem when power level is concerned. Power levels aren't just an indication of how strong your character is in relation to everyone else, but what they are capable of. If your power level is too high, nobody will want to involve you in stories because your character will keep making challenges trivial. Ironically, there is no such thing as too LOW of a power level since even a bottom level civilian can contribute to a story. If anything, making a character super weak, at worst, limits the ways your character can impact a story on a more personal level where as, in contrast, over hyping a character's power level begins to impact the enjoyment of everyone else. It's not enough for a character's power to not be outrageous. You also need to be considerate of others. That might involve adding something to the story to explain why you cannot utilize your full power. It could even mean not actively participating at all. If you're the only one having fun, you aren't embracing the spirit of the hobby. CHAPTER 2: I Wasn't Even Supposed to BE Here Today!!! Let's say for a moment that your character is a basic mutant. They have problems and conflicts you would expect of someone at that level of heroism. Suddenly Superman swoops in and starts fixing all of their problems and now that street level mutant basically has nothing to do unless they want to take on Superman's threats which are. Uh. Well. You know. Just a bit bigger than street level. Notice that I am not speaking of power gaming right now. That is to say, I'm not talking about a character designed to "win". Don't get me wrong, I'll get to that, but I want to start with a less malicious way a character's power level can be detrimental to a roleplay. Basically, when entering a roleplay, you should be cautious that what you are bringing to the table isn't so huge that it invalidates other characters. You could have a character that is totally fine and balanced for saving the world kind of tasks but would totally wreck a bunch of Skulls mucking about. The best way to do this, in my opinion, is to make your character just as vulnerable to an invading force of Praetorians as they are to Skulls. How do you do that? Take Batman for example. He's seen fighting everything from punks to world destroyers. What allows him to do this is that he employs necessary force and doesn't bring more to the fight than he has to...even if it means some random thug can land a punch on him. Which does make a lot of sense in the CoH setting. Registered heroes are, after all, basically extensions of law enforcement and necessary force is a pretty important subject within that field (no political debates! Shoo! We're not talking about that right now! >:U). In contrast, if you look at the X-Men, many of their membership would most definitely not be able to stop a world destroyer...on their own. Even if an individual X-Men is basically street level themself, their cooperation with other heroes is what makes them viable to help. A great balance overall is to tier your character to being variably middle of the road with a few very potent abilities. Chapter 3: Enhancements make my character go BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR One of the worst ways you can determine a character's power level in any respect is by how they perform mechanically in combat. This goes for just about any form of RP setting. Remember, the most important aspect of a character is what they bring to the roleplay. The concept that the only thing that matters is how fast you can down an enemy or how many hits your character can take is what matters when building an RP character is something that even extends to tabletop games where min-maxing is put before character development. In an MMO setting, it's even less important. Or, at least, it should be. Remember, not everyone has the same amount of time to put into an MMO or, in some cases, the IRL money to invest. Time and money can make a huge artificial difference in how well a character performs. A player's skill can also make a character mechanically stronger than other characters, but it's unfair to use that as a reflection of reality because, say it with me: you are not your character. This is one of the reasons that people that absolutely insist on using PVP to resolve IC conflict are, more often than not, bad actors. It's easy to challenge someone to a PvP match to determine the outcome of a roleplay when you have practiced PvP, have built your character for PvP, and can often tell that the person you are challenging has neither of those things. Simply put: mechanics are a very poor representation of a character's actual narrative potential. That isn't to say it's useless or should be ignored entirely. After all, if a character you claim is super durable and immune to most damage is also blaster and faceplants literally every other mob when you go out to fight crime, it's going to be a little hard to not laugh and take your character just that much less seriously. Even if the narrative should take precedence. CHAPTER 4: NUH UH! MY ARMOR IS BULLET PROOF AND MAGIC PROOF AND ANTI-STUPID PROOF!!! And we finally reach the ugly side of poor power level management. Power gaming. While it can be done accidentally, characters that are so powerful they can basically win all of the things forever are, more often than not, designed this way because the player always wants to be part of or the entirety of the solution. While it is possible to play with these concepts in a way that is actually well done, for the sake of argument, please presume that the person using these is not an honest actor. Before I go into examples of how a character can be broken power level wise, I want to first point to my overly long post talking about character flaws (TM) as that is very important reading before moving forward. Flaws can actually help balance a character out that would be totally broken otherwise. The last section on when flaws aren't really flaws is what's especially relevant here as those are what most bad actors use to try and make it "okay" that their character is capable of doing everything forever. Hey. Remember how my post on flaws had a list at the end? It's time for another list. Complete Immunity to Hot Dogs in the Hot Dog Dimension Immunity to anything is an EXTREMELY potent trait. Many tabletop games, for example, only hand out immunity to a threat in rare circumstances mechanically and the dungeon master often finds themselves pulling out their hair as a result. Generally speaking, the more narrow an immunity is, the better. For example, immunity to heat might not make you immune to the fact that fire sucks out the oxygen around them. Immunity to fire might somehow make you not suffocate, but, hey. At least lightning can still ruin your day! Unless you're immune to energy which suddenly starts covering the vast majority of threats you could encounter. If a character has a super broad immunity but some means of circumventing it that doesn't involve jumping through a million hoops, that would be one thing. But COMPLETE immunity (or a very very niche circumvention method), more often than not, can just frustrate other players. If you still insist on having complete immunity with no or very very few means of circumvention, directly tie a major flaw to that immunity so it's clear to everyone else that, while you might have this cool thing they can't beat you on, it comes at a high cost. If the flaw you use to justify the immunity is unrelated, no matter how severe, you're going to find yourself frequently reminding people that the flaw balances things out which...well, doesn't sound very good. Eyes and Ears Everywhere. INCLUDING THERE!!! You know what is the absolute worst thing for a mystery? Somebody that somehow knows it all. Your character doesn't have to have information on everything. If their concept is that they're an information broker, guess what? You STILL don't know everything! Have spies in every major organization? Worms in every major data server? At some point you stop being super knowledgeable of the world around you and start being an omnipresent god. Part of the fun of being a character that strives to know everything is having to actually LEARN that everything. And introducing...HACKERMAN! It's one thing to be good at a profession. It's another thing to be perfect at a profession. It's another thing entirely to be so good at a profession that anyone who knows even a small amount about the profession screams into the void in second hand agony. While I have most commonly seen this with hacker characters, this is mainly because my major was computer science and I'm far more aware of when people who obviously did no research into how computers work start having characters do impossible things with computers. Just because your character is good at something, doesn't mean they don't sometimes struggle with it or even fail. How am I supposed to take your character seriously when they say they hacked into a Malta server and have been living in it rent free after poking around on Windows command line for a few hours? I actually plan to make an entire post talking about how I often see hacker characters miss the mark, but the ultimate tragedy of all of this is that even a cursory understanding of the subject can actually not just make your character's achievement more believable, but also more impressive. Explaining the levels of social engineering that took place in order for you to get into the payroll page on the Malta's intranet as a backdoor into their membership listing is FAR more awesome than watching your character kick up their feet and just say, "Yeah. I'm that awesome." EVERYTHING IS IMPERVIUM! EVERYTHING! (AKA: The lore says it exists so I can use it!) This comes in two flavors. The first are characters that coat everything in Impervium and the second are characters that act like Impervium is no big deal. Basically, this method of power gaming either totally abuses something acknowledged to be a thing in lore (ie: Impervium), then ignores important details in order to make something more impressive. Going back to Impervium, an example might be building an entire fortress out of Impervium while ignoring how god damn expensive it would be to build that many walls with solid impervium. Another example, in contrast, might be a character ripping impervium in half like it was cardboard despite it being literally the strongest metal known to man in the lore. It doesn't matter if it makes sense, what matter is how awesome it makes them look. This can also extend to players writing their characters to not just know but be best buddies with canon characters who swoop in to provide the kind of support only a canon character can provide. SUPA MAN While I personally feel invulnerability to damage period is something best reserved for non-player characters, it is possible to play with the concept on a player character...but it really only works if you REALLY lean in on the psychological struggle of being indestructible yourself but not being able to extend it to those around you. I know I already talked about immunity to things, but I felt like invulnerability was kind of its own topic. Not being able to be damaged can seriously draw a lot of tension out of a situation since while everyone else is worried about death, you're totes fine and it's nothing to worry about. Yeah, yeah, I know invulnerability to damage is not just a trope in comics but can also be found in CoH itself. But, hey. Even Ajax was brought low. What makes you so special? I'll admit that this one is VERY much just a personal opinion and I have roleplayed with plenty of characters that were immune to damage. They just managed to not drain the tension out of every crisis. Speaking of... Yeah. I'm basically Jesus. When it comes to the dangers heroes face, the threat of bodily harm if not death is way up there. Not just for yourself, but those around you. That pesky specter of death looms over (most) of us at (almost) all times. That makes characters that can heal or patch people up very important. There are many ways a character can fill this role, but there is one particular means by which someone can roleplay a healer that can drain the tension out of a scene faster than almost anything: healing without consequence; or, as I like to call it, Jesus Healing. No matter the injury, no matter the ailment, no matter the disease, these characters have you covered. They'll have you fixed up in a few minutes and will suffer no real cost for conducting the patch job be it time, energy, or their own health. Yeah, it is true that this is how healing kind of appears to work in CoH, but remember: this is an MMORPG. Mechanics aren't aimed at making narrative sense, they're aimed at being fun. If you play a healer character, that's great! Just be sure to add a bit of risk and a bit of cost to what your character does. Everyone else will thank you for it. Oh, my character doesn't do that. I mean, yes, it's exactly the same, but no! They are different! This is a bit of a weird one, but still something to keep an eye out for. Let's say that you want to play a character that eats souls, but are annoyed that not everything has a soul or might have a soul but is probably different than a human soul. How might you overcome this? Why, create a totally new fictional concept that functions exactly the same way as a soul, is just as bad to lose as your soul, and can have additional vulnerabilities that you can exploit because you made it up! In short, this method of power gaming basically invents new vulnerabilities in everybody else and, more often than not, is exactly like/more powerful than/more potent than something that already exists and basically only exists exists because that pre-existing thing wasn't threatening/powerful enough. It can even be specifically designed so that, by its definition, literally everybody has it and they can just ignore the people who don't want to play ball. Remember: You do not write for other characters. If you create a concept, the more intrusive it is, the more important it is that you include an exit clause for other players to take advantage of. Funny you mention that! I have just the solution to that as well! AND THAT! AND THAT!! This is most commonly found in people that display attention seeking behavior. It's pretty easy to spot, but only as a pattern of behavior. Most commonly found in characters that proclaim to be jacks of all trade or are experts in laughably vague fields, this usually shows itself when a character somehow always has a way of solving a problem. For example, a character who is an "expert in magic" always having some random spell to fix a problem. Or a character that has nanites that are capable of basically doing anything as the situation calls for it. While similar to #3, this is usually done in far broader strokes and treats concepts as professions (such as an "engineer" being capable of robotics, complex cybernetics, hacking, software, AI, advanced physics, etc). While this is a fantasy and a character can be a prodigy in multiple fields, this becomes a problem when this leads to them always having a solution right in their back pocket. Oh, I don't know how to fix it. But he does! Just...let me alt onto them. There's nothing wrong with alts. I have many of them! Many of you reading probably have more! But there is a way alts can be abused and it's kind of similar to the previous point. Sometimes, bad actors will try and get around making a character too powerful by making a bunch of alts, making them all distinct people, but end up treating these different characters as basically a hivemind. They all know each other, they all get along directly or through another one of their characters, and they are all willing to help one another on whatever problem might arise. While the characters might be fine individually, this method of roleplay means that any character weakness or gap in understanding can be filled by another. A slight against one of these characters will trickle down their whole roster. Yes, I know that this is overpowered. But I'm doing this so I don't have to put up with _______ Well. At least it's honest! I've encountered this several times. The example I will give is that a super group I was friendly with had a defense system that was insane. I'm talking about multiple turrets that fired shells the size of coke cans at near super sonic speeds at intruders. I'm talking power suppression that was somehow smart enough to only affect members and also knew if they were duplicates. I'm talking top level stuff you'd expect to be defending the god damn president of the WORLD. And...it was protecting a small group out in Etoli. When challenged on how insane their security was, they initially tried to defend it, but eventually just stated that, yeah, it's insane. But we just don't want to deal with people that want to invade the base or something. Which, while valid, doesn't have to be solved like that! You could have modest security and then just...not accept roleplay where your base gets attacked. You can write around it. Purposefully making something overpowered to ensure something doesn't happen is lazy and, really doesn't look good, and, most importantly, can totally muck up story arcs that should be unrelated. Adding onto Chase's fine post here is that this can expand to beyond hard cash. This can also be found in characters who provide potentially costly services pro bono and barely if not entirely unprompted to people they might have even just met earlier that afternoon. If a character is going to sink a lot of resources into something, be it cash, time, or materials, they should probably have a very good personal reason for doing so if they aren't being compensated and you should consider how deep of an impact it's going to have on their bank account. <Insert Ancient Aliens Meme Here> The source of your power belongs to some distant race of alien or was gifted to you by an eldritch being that cannot understand doesn't mean that you can start doing literally anything you want. The same rules of managing how powerful a character are to keep it fun for everyone applies regardless. If somebody asks how your nanites are capable of individually having more raw computational power than a super computer, just saying "ALIENS" is not actually answering the crux of the actual concern being put forward. Some sort of alien power being the source of your immense power simply explains the source of this power. Not why it makes sense or why it isn't overpowered. Here's some supplementary reading from the comment section! This is part of a series of tutorials regarding roleplay! You can find the full list of tutorials here!

Hi there! I'm McSpazz! For those that don't know, I help @CrystalDragon teach the bi-weekly roleplay workshop. One subject that comes up during that workshop are character flaws and I never feel like I have the time to REALLY dig into them. Why they're important, how impactful a flaw might be, and, most importantly, when a flaw really isn't a flaw. So I thought...HEY! Why not post something to the forums that probably no one is going to read and expand on what I'm never able to cover during class! 1. Brass Tacks First, what exactly is a flaw? While on the surface it is any aspect of a character that in some way hinders them, I think it's important to really drill into a more important aspect of flaws as far as roleplay is concerned. See, a flaw can't just be something that a character struggles with. Needing to wear glasses can be a flaw, but lots of people wear glasses without issue. Velma not being able to see anything without her glasses? Now THAT is a flaw. It can't just hinder a character, a real flaw needs to be something that is actually present in character interactions. But why are flaws important? Beyond making a character interesting, that is. I think everyone is fully aware that a character with no flaws is going to come out very flat and boring, but there is a bit more to it where roleplay is concerned. When a character gets involved in someone else's story arc, the person handling the story, no matter the scope or size, needs to consider where this new character fits into things. Not only that, they need to figure out how they can keep the narrative challenging and keep everyone involved even with this new addition. Flaws, in a way, give the director of the story a means of providing a challenge that requires somebody else's involvement to resolve. The last thing people want is for one person to basically invalidate any challenge a story might bring forward. Flaws are that important limiting factor that ensures that you can keep everyone important to a story without forcibly making that the case. 2. It's not enough to just HAVE a flaw. Given the utility flaws serve outside of narrative, it's not enough that flaws exist. For example, a flaw that states that a character who is vulnerable to cold weather might be super impactful in Alaska, but it would be far less impactful in Paragon since they'd have no problems half of the year. Even less so if the roleplay was in Florida. A heavy alcohol addiction might have a big impact, but only if the character is actually shown to be struggling with it. Being vulnerable to the sun could be a huge flaw, but if most roleplay occurs indoors or in caves (ie: most of CoH's missions), it might be far less of an issue. There are also things like being stubborn which can be a flaw in certain situations, but your character would have to be that to an extreme in order for it to JUST be a flaw and nothing else. What's more, a flaw needs to be accessible or exploitable. Otherwise it's just a character quirk. For example, if your character doesn't have a secret identity and also has civilian love ones, that could be a very compelling flaw. However, if at every turn, your character has made taking advantage of the flaw boarding on impossible, it's only a flaw in theory. If a character has an anger problem but only loses their temper when it's convenient, then why bother? 3. An ode to tabletops One thing that comes up here several times as well as in general discussion of flaws is tabletop gaming and how flaws generally play out there. While it is true that the mediums are very different, remember what I mentioned earlier: flaws have utility outside of a narrative. In a tabletop setting, flaws are sometimes directly integrated into the game's mechanics and have actual, noticeable affects. For example, let's say your character had an addiction trait. In a tabletop game, you might be forced to roll to resist an offer of your addiction or take penalties to rolls if you have gone too long without it. While it is also important to have flaws that exist separate from pure mechanics, these flaws in tabletops offer a very visible and immediate output of results. Obviously, we don't have that in MMO's. The reason why flaws in tabletops are often brought up (especially by people who play tabletop games) is, more often than not, an attempt to emphasize what I have gone over above. Flaws need to have an impact and be accessible/exploitable. In short, the flaws need to actually matter beyond when it's most convenient to the story. If a character constantly drinks and is constantly intoxicated, people expect that they aren't going to behave as if they were sober whenever it would be inconvenient for them to act drunk. If your character is deathly vulnerable to cold iron, they expect there to be a good reason why they are wielding a cold iron weapon themselves. If your character has a flaw, they expect there to be an actual cost. And since this is all self-enforced in an MMO setting, it's all the more important that attention is paid to it. 4. Flaws that Aren't Flaws I want to touch on one of the most important things to avoid personally and look out for in other characters: Flaws that aren't really flaws. I kind of touched on them already, but these flaws either only matter in theory, are invalidated by a character's other traits, or are only flaws if you don't think about them for two seconds. This gets a little bit more complicated, so I'm going to break down a few examples separately. I Care Too Much I'm sure people have heard this old gem before outside of roleplay. It's kind of a meme before memes were coined; usually at job interviews. While this can theoretically be a flaw, it's generally a placeholder when nothing else can be mentioned. What does it actually mean to care too much? How is that expressed? By the time this is elaborated, there is generally a better way of expressing it than just "they just care too much!" In short, it's generally not a flaw because it doesn't actually mean anything. How to fix it As I said, the ultimate issue here is how vague it is. Is your character overly possessive of their loved ones? Are they too dogmatic in their ideology? More often than not, the best way to resolve this is to simply flesh it out and narrow it down some. What do they care too much about? How intense is their fixation? They're super paranoid This could be a great flaw, but it comes with one major precondition: they can't always be right. A common issue I see with "paranoid" characters is that it's less that they're paranoid and more so that they just go to completely unreasonable lengths to gather information on everything and covering all of their bases but only in ways that are actually helpful. Basically, the 'paranoid' flaw ends up turning into, "they have contingencies for everything." Always bear in mind for every adventure story where the paranoid nut job with a bunker in his back yard ends up having all of the tools the heroes need to succeed, there's the reality that the vast majority of paranoid preppers end up creating more trouble for themselves than they need to. How to fix it There's a reason paranoia is considered a flaw. It makes you see things that aren't there, prepare for things that will probably never happen, push away people that just want to be there for you, suspect things of others that aren't actually the case. If your character is going to be paranoid, actually commit to it and have their accusations and beliefs actually turn out to be wrong more than you might expect. The point is that Pepe Sylvia doesn't actually work here. Follow through on it. Fear of Thyself/God Complex One of the most eyerolling flaws you can encounter is the fear of a character's own powers even as they are using their powers in front of you. While this can be done well, these kinds of characters only really work when they actively go out of their way to not use those powers. That is pretty difficult to do in City of Heroes roleplay where using your powers is half of the setting. This flaw is especially cringeworthy when it is being held by characters with god like powers that constantly say they don't use their powers as to not interfere with mortal lives...only to then interfere with mortal lives. The Hulk feared his powers, but it worked because he didn't seek out trouble. Trouble found him. The crux of the issue here is that player characters are very active in the lives of others and frequently encounter problems where their powers could make the difference. Not using those powers is just going to piss people off and the excuse of "but your free will" isn't going to mean much to someone who just lost their loved one to some horrible illness. When the crux of your character not acting starts to bring to mind things such as the Epicurean Paradox, you are probably making a character too powerful to have regular interactions with Joe from down the street. How to fix it First of all, don't play a god. To clarify, I mean a god in the Abrahamic sense. Many pantheons had gods who were, in short, far more in line with how we view super heroes today. They were powerful, but not all powerful. Extremely wise/knowledgeable, but did not necessarily know everything. Formidable, but, in some cases, were actually put down by determined mortals. These kinds of gods are entirely capable of existing in an MMO roleplay environment as while they still have authority over their domain, their power is not so extreme that only other god characters could really oppose them. If the crux of your character's fear is what would happen if they lose control, consider the ramifications. If losing control means the sun is destroyed and all of reality as we know it collapses, it's very unlikely anyone will take your character seriously because while that is a legitimate fear, it places not just a great deal of importance on your own character versus even established canon characters, but also implicitly outlines the upper limit of what your character is capable of which can be a pretty naked truth as to how broken your character actually is. Keep the ramifications of losing control relatively localized. The best balance is that your allies could stop you, but at a significant emotional or material cost. If your character's fear is the the corruption of power as a metaphorical concept...just don't. It's a legitimate concern, but that isn't a flaw that is unique to your character. It's true not just of physical power but also of soft power (government officials for example). You can have that be a concern, but it's not strong enough on its own to be a flaw. I'll also discuss how these not-flaws can be fixed and turned into genuine flaws. Think of this as "don't do this, but here's something similar you could do." Addiction Without Consequence Addiction is sadly one of the most commonly misused flaws, in part, because many of the people writing them don't understand addiction. For example, if your character is addicted to a drug, in reality, using that drug would psychologically feel as necessary as breathing. This is why addictions can be such a compelling and heavy flaw for a character to carry. However, there is something worse than an addiction only coming up when it's convenient. Even worse than it barely coming up at all. It's when there's really no consequence of indulging that addiction. If your character's powers or the methods they obtain them not really disadvantageous, then being addicted to using them is likely barely going to register as a problem. How to fix it Put simply? Have the addiction mean something. If your character is drunk all of the time, have them mess up because of it. If your character is a chain smoker, have them get twitchy and irritable if they can't get their fix. Most importantly, if your character's powers themselves are addictive, actually have using them yield direct negative consequences that don't reset at the end of every scene. Most importantly, actually do serious research into what addiction is like. This flaw most often falls flat because the people using it don't actually understand what having an addiction is like. Just watching an interview with an addict talking about it can really put into perspective how this flaw should be operating. Nearly impossible to kill until the fighting's done I once knew of a character who could take on another form and, while in that form, was basically unstoppable. Nothing could kill it or stop it...but a portion of all the damage they took would be passed down to them after they reverted to normal. While that might sound like an extreme flaw, consider that by the time they turn back, people will be able to aid them. There is no more threat to speak of. Focus can now be put on stabilizing them. Who says they have to revert immediately after fighting? The flaw gets even more trivial if there's some kind of immediate healing mechanism or, for example, the existence of some kind of technology that can teleport you to a hospital and get you stabilized super quickly (like mediporters). There's also the fact that everyone else has to trust that, should some arbitrary amount of damage occur, you would be willing to actually apply long lasting medical complications if not death onto your character. How to fix it There are three approaches to this. The first is, if a fight was particularly messy, actually put your character out of commission for a period of IRL days based on how bad it was. While that does mean you might miss out on more butt kicking, this is the price you asked to pay with this flaw. Actually showing your character recover and vocalizing the pains of recovery is important to show other players that you are actually taking the concept seriously. The second is to take on an additional flaw that negates many of the issues I mentioned above: resistant to accelerated healing. Even if your character heals faster than normal already, the fact that external healing cannot make your character heal or stabilize much faster means that everybody including your character are going to be mindful of where you stand as the fight goes on. As blunt as it is, the third way is to...just not do this. In short, part of the reason this flaw can be frustrating is that it comes off as if you wanted your character to be invulnerable, but didn't want the baggage that came along with it. If you want an invulnerable character, actually play an invulnerable character and figure out flaws that help balance it out which aren't easily resolved. No! Trust me! If this happens, they'll be TOTALLY screwed! Some flaws rely completely on trust. For example, #5 would likely only be seen as a flaw if everyone else believed you would actually follow through on it. While everything this might touch might not necessarily fall under "not really a flaw" on its own, if these make up the bulk of your character's flaws, then your character's flaws are all hypothetical. Not really something that is actually currently present. An example of this might be that your character has an evil family member that hates them and wants to kill them. While that is a flaw, it's only a flaw in so far as other people believe you are actually going to do something with it. Even then, the flaw only really presents itself when you decide you want to do things with that evil family member. How to fix it Because of how weak these flaws are, you should never rely on them as your primary flaw nor make up the majority of your flaws up with them. Feel free to use them, but use them in addition to other flaws. Don't worry guys! They have a weakness... Bit coy with the title, but if your character's primary weakness is something extremely niche that other players would have to bend over backwards to include in a story, your flaw is so weak it might as well not be there. For example, a character that is totally invulnerable unless exposed to sunlight produced by druidic power would basically be unstoppable to 99% of the planet. Every storyline they were involved in would need druidic sunlight included in order to maintain any sort of tension. While that might be a serious flaw in a world inhabited mainly by druids, it's kind of meaningless in a setting like CoH. Even Superman's kryptonite, something that was theoretically hard to come by, was frequently utilized by his enemies as if you could just buy it off the black market for a quarter. How to fix it From my experience, many people who have flaws that are so niche they barely exist don't actually realize how niche they are. As I mentioned in the impact section, vulnerability to sunlight can seem like a really big deal until you break down how it would actually work out in a setting like City of Heroes (where most roleplay is probably going to happen indoors). I believe the best way to figure out if your weaknesses are too niche is this: Imagine you are making a story arc for other people. You have the entire thing worked out to some extent and have balanced it based on a balanced party of standard super heroes of approximately your own character's power level. Now imagine that somebody else is suddenly introduced to your story arc playing your character. How much would you have to bend over backwards to ensure that there was a threat that could oppose them? Now do that thought experiment again, but this time with a different theme. Was the initial story tech based? Make the next magic based. Was the initial story on the moon? Now imagine them under the ocean. While different characters are going to excel in different environments, what matters is that final question: how many concessions need to be made simply to allow your character to interact with the story without completely invalidating it? Going back to the Superman example, while Kryptonite might be niche initially, it's not difficult to imagine a villain of any origin or creed getting their hands on some if you, the author, wanted to give it to them. Even if it would be hard for them to do, a good writer could figure something out. Back to the sunlight example. If your character is vulnerable to sunlight, artificial sunlight being something that could still at least hurt them would be a good means of providing an obtainable threat that a villain could procure. However, if you were to exclusively limit that sunlight to only being natural sunlight or sunlight created with magic, suddenly a story centered around a tech based villain is made redundant and the only way to resolve it is for them to also utilize magic or work with someone who does; a concession for your character that, while required, might not make sense in the context of the narrative. If your character had another weakness that could be exploited by a tech based villain (ie: sunlight might be out of reach but silver isn't), then the flaw would no longer be a problem. This isn't to say you should make your character super weak to every foe, but your character shouldn't have a common scenario where they are unstoppable. Jack of all trades; Master of none; okay, well, pretty masterful actually. There's a danger in making a character who's the jack of all trades and master of none: someone else is likely going to be better at it than you. While that is part of the flaw of being a jack of all trades, some people forget that being a jack of all trades means that you aren't really great at everything. If a character truly is a jack of all trades but approaches them as a master, the important flaw angle of this character trait is truly non-existent. How to fix it First, REALLY understand what you are getting into if you're playing a jack of all trades. For every situation you can contribute to, there will be many others that other characters can contribute to better. Also consider the complexity of what they are knowledgeable on. It's going to take far longer to become minimally competent at rocket science than automotive repair. Muscle memory takes time and there are some weapons that take longer than others to become good with. Not all locks are created equal. The list goes on. Second, recognize that you really have to show that your character isn't a master with all of that they know. This flaw/trait is very much reliant on trust and the best way to build that with other players is to show you are actually giving your characters active limits to their skills and abilities. I am completely unable to drive a car. Now, please, hop into my motorcycle! This is a fairly important one and something that I am going to bring up again in my overly long post talking about power levels (TM). Some flaws are pretty massive, but are actually pretty easy to circumvent or clearly only exist to act as an excuse to justify the character having some insane ability. For example, if a character is totally unable to interact with magic but keep on utilizing technology that achieves the exact same result as a spell they are unable to use, all you really did was inconvenience your character. If your character is incapable of using anything but a sword but then whips out a gunblade, are they REALLY incapable of using anything but swords? Or are you just looking for loopholes in your own system? How to fix it First, don't create flaws and then seek out to circumvent them or create flaws that are easily circumvented. If your character is mute but can speak if they cast a spell, then they aren't really that mute. If your character has to rely on battery power but can draw electricity from the environment around them, the entire world is a recharge station. So on and so on. You should also enforce your flaws when other people try to "fix" them. For example, if your character starts out with the flaw of being deaf, fixing it shouldn't be as simple as shoving bionic ears onto their head when another character offers them. if your character is huge, finding affordable clothes shouldn't be as simple as someone dragging you to an Icon. If your character has cancer, you should probably side eye anyone who claims their character can cure it. If you believe a flaw helps define and/or balance your character, don't make it an easy fix. If the flaw is fixed then, and this is important, either derive a new flaw from it or introduce a new flaw in the near future to help keep things balanced. CRAWWWLING IN MY SKINNNNNN This can range from annoying to obnoxious. This flaw often takes the form of, "I'm such a monster," or something similar. An example of this concept falling flat is Edward from Twilight standing in the sun, glittering like a unicorn, living his best "vegetarian" vampire life, and proclaiming that he is a monster. One example I encountered a while back was when a succubus who did everything she could to avoid the stereotypes proclaimed herself to be a monster because of who her father was to my nightmare entity. Who once killed/tortured people for fun. And ate babies. You can imagine his incredulity. This can also be found in characters who possess a trait that is harmful to others, but that trait is easily negated (see #9) but they consistently refuse help all the while complaining that the problem still exists. This flaw mainly exists to make a character more edgy and less to add depth to them. Also, while an evil character who does horrible things could be considered a monster and might even call themselves a monster but not care, it's not much of a flaw if they never interact with polite society or people that really care how they act (ie: doing horrible things to accomplish your goals will be frowned upon more in Paragon than the Rogue Isles). How to fix it First, recognize that, generally speaking, people look towards a person's actions to determine if someone is a monster. If your character does have a trait that makes people's first impressions to be negative, harping on how people presume they are a monster to the very people who accept them is going to get very old, very fast. Most importantly, if your character has to remind people that they are a monster, they probably aren't a monster be it in their morals or appearance and the more they scream that they are, in fact, a monster, the more people are going to get sick of the character's attitude both IC and OOC. Consider your character's attitude towards their existence to be a journey that is, in large part, affected by how people see and interact with them. Perhaps they might start at internalizing how the world sees them, but maybe they grow frustrated with it and lash out. Maybe they come to hate those that are repulsed by them. Maybe they outwardly accept it but still struggle with it internally. What's important is that their struggle with their identity doesn't remain one note and evolves as they interact with others. If literally everybody they meet argues that they aren't a monster or don't have a negative first reaction to them, actually have the character struggle to figure out why nobody else can see what they're seeing. Explore that. Yes. This does eventually mean that, if your character is given love and emotional support, they might overcome this flaw. That's good. It means your character is growing like a person. As to monstrously evil characters surrounded by other evil characters...honestly, there's not much I can say to it. Your flaw is only a flaw when trying to cooperate with normal people. That's still a flaw, but if the only characters you interact with are fine with you, that flaw is only going to start coming into play if they start to doubt their own actions and ethics. 5. Some Classics A commenter mentioned that this post was extremely negative. Lots of what not to do and no ideas for what you could do. So I want to spend some time going over some classic flaws that, if executed correctly, can have great outcomes for the narrative. Amnesia This might be a bit cliche, but there are tons of different potential stories you can tell with it. I would recommend you figure out what type of amnesia your character has, as not all forms of amnesia are the same. What's more, keep in mind that muscle memory, language, and other similar skills are often unaffected by memory loss. Also keep in mind that, eventually, you'll be all caught up memory wise and there won't be any meat left to the flaw. Big mouth, no filter A character who always says what's on their mind regardless of the consequences can have fun results especially if the character actually doesn't want to upset anyone. Note that this isn't an excuse to be unnecessarily cruel without expecting people to react in turn. If you act like an asshole, people are going to treat you like an asshole. ESPECIALLY if you use this as an excuse for your character to be mean to others. Some additional reading from responses I found were also helpful! This is part of a series of tutorials regarding roleplay! You can find the full list of tutorials here!

I have a few more tips to keep in mind! Avoid adding links to your description that are too long OR are from a URL shortening service. The former takes away from your precious 1023 character limit AND is less likely to be used as people will have to carefully copy the whole thing. The latter because those URL's can be used maliciously and can spook people away from using it. I recommend using https://fbsa.cityofheroes.dev if you want a good external link for descriptions or services like LinkTree. I'm sure there are others and I'll mention them here if they are pointed out. Avoid putting forward ideas that are not cannon if you aren't also going to define them in your description or make clear what it is. For example, if I said that my character was a world class Pata'dooda, you would have no idea what that means and it wouldn't serve as a hook as you, as the reader, would have no idea where to even start with that. Simply adding that Pata'dooda is some sort of fighting style from another dimension or even just "the Pata'dooda fighting style" goes a long way. Don't include your character's ENTIRE background. Aim for a cliffnotes version if anything at all. This is not just because you want to leave things up for discovery, but also because the limited character limit will make any detailed backstory feel gutted. As Crystal said, use hooks.

YEEESSSS! I didn't realize how much I needed this!

Hey yall! It's me! @McSpazz! Yes, I just tagged myself. Why? For the funzies. As Dragon mentioned yesterday, I will be fully leading the next few classes! Tomorrow (FrIdAy ThE 13th!!)! We'll be going over part 1 of the lesson plan and all that good stuff. We will be meeting in Atlas Park! None of the classes I will be hosting this weekend will be in bases. Instead, I'll be spotlighting cool RP spots in the game world. See you all tomorrow!

This is very well put together! It honestly does everything I wanted a parser to do! ...except it appears the creator of this encountered the very thing I realized before I even got started. It can't tell the difference between combat, system, and emotes. It's a shame, because if there was an [Emote] tag, it would be fairly simple to suss out and even filter.

I'll look it over, but I doubt it can reliably handle combat/emote/system inputs. If it can, I'd love to figure out how...

A loong while back in SCORE, I was considering writing an automated parser for the chat logs. After looking into it some, I decided against it. The reason? The current chat logs would be a MASSIVE pain to parse. I'm going to get to my suggestions in a bit, but I need some preamble to get to it. First, here's a sample chunk of text from a chat log (provided to me by @CrystalDragon thank youuu!) > 2021-01-18 11:29:39 [SuperGroup] Scions of Everlasting Message of the Day -- If you got a friend interested in the group, feel free to invite them to visit the base! Scions-3706 > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 You are flying! > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 Welcome to City of Heroes, CrystalDragon! > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 You may ask for help from other players by using the Help chat tab. > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 <a href='cmd:gmotd'><b>Click Here</b></a> or type /gmotd to see the global message of the day again. > 2021-01-18 11:29:42 Using global chat handle <@!281515951285862401> > 2021-01-18 11:29:42 [Looking For Group] Baron Von Evil: <color #010101>Looking to JOIN a Farming Mission ..need the levels > 2021-01-18 11:29:42 You have 2 unclaimed respecs available. Type /respec in the chat window to begin respecing your character. > 2021-01-18 11:29:42 You don't have any available free tailor sessions. > 2021-01-18 11:29:56 Entering Atlas Plaza. > 2021-01-18 11:30:05 [Help] Dr. Fantasy: <color #010101>oi whhhhhyyyyyy!?!? Purples are still crazy expensive looks like. > 2021-01-18 11:30:13 [Looking For Group] Lo-Pan: <color #000000>lvl 5 lf dfb or AE > 2021-01-18 11:30:44 [Help] Unity Red Echo: <color #010101>yep! > 2021-01-18 11:30:50 [Local] Darcy O'Toole: <color #010101>Anyone around that wants to help out a newbie? I just started last night with another character, but didnt get far > 2021-01-18 11:30:58 Shutting off Fly. > 2021-01-18 11:30:58 You are no longer flying. > 2021-01-18 11:31:02 [Help] Snixnix: 20m aint nothing compared to 250m > 2021-01-18 11:31:57 [Broadcast] Darcy O'Toole: <color #010101>Maybe Maybe I should have asked in broadcast? Anyone around that wants to help out a newbie? I just started last night with another character, but didnt get far > 2021-01-18 11:32:08 [Broadcast] Snixnix: help how so? > 2021-01-18 11:32:40 [Broadcast] Darcy O'Toole: <color #010101>I dont know! Hehe > 2021-01-18 11:32:49 [Broadcast] Darcy O'Toole: <color #010101>like, what to do next? > 2021-01-18 11:33:17 [Broadcast] Snixnix: mmmmmm, well im happy to answer questions. feel free to dm me > 2021-01-18 11:33:38 [Broadcast] Snixnix: not gonna level a new player though 😄 To start, this makes the need for a parser pretty apparent. It's why I wanted to make one in the first place. However, things break down once you get to emotes, combat, and system messages. In short, there is no reliable way of differentiating them from one another. Since logs are basically HTML files saved to a text document, the only thing I (or anyone really) would have to rely on is what is present in the text document. Unlike standard channels, I can't just look for the presence of [Name] after the date and time. That leaves me with trying to identify patterns. I could potentially get away with using RegEx functions (which are annoying to those not aware) to differentiate them if not for the fact that there is no pattern that exists that is exclusive to them. So system actions can look like this: > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 Welcome to City of Heroes, CrystalDragon! > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 You may ask for help from other players by using the Help chat tab. > 2021-01-18 11:29:41 <a href='cmd:gmotd'><b>Click Here</b></a> or type /gmotd to see the global message of the day again. Combat actions can look like this: 2021-07-16 04:17:40 You create a Phantom Army of pure illusion! 2021-07-16 04:17:44 You activated the Blind power. 2021-07-16 04:17:44 HIT Soldier! Your Blind power had a 95.00% chance to hit, you rolled a 5.36. 2021-07-16 04:17:44 You Hold Soldier with your Blind. 2021-07-16 04:17:44 You hit Soldier with your Blind for 52.92 points of Psionic damage. 2021-07-16 04:17:45 Readying Arcane Bolt. And emotes can look like this: 2021-03-15 00:29:28 Rock Lyte removes his helmet, which would visibly vanish as if either being digitized or melding right into his arm. "Only if you can explain why you're having your bots scan someone without permission." He'd give a light grin in response as well. 2021-03-15 00:30:01 [Local] May The Sidekick: <color #010101><bgcolor #64aac3>"They scan everybody...sort of standard rules with my dad..." 2021-03-15 00:30:04 [NPC] Darrel: Can you believe Gentlemanly Giant rescued Positron? 2021-03-15 00:30:26 Adamantium: Protector Bot protects you from all attacks with a Force Shield. 2021-03-15 00:30:53 Dalentium: Protector Bot protects you from all attacks with a Force Shield. 2021-03-15 00:30:56 Protector Bot protects you from all attacks with a Force Shield. Where can the confusion come in? Glad you asked! Some eagle eyed readers might notice that the last chunk of text actually contained a combat log. Protector Bot is not a character. It's a minion casting force shield on the player. There is literally no difference between the text at the top of the chunk and the text at the bottom. And what about Adamantium and Dalentium? Are those combat logs? Emotes? Who knows! While in most use cases, you probably aren't going to encounter a player character named "Protector Bot", "You hit", "Readying", etc. However, those are all valid names. The only consistency I can rely on while making a parser is the standard chat channels. Everything else requires manual consideration. But this doesn't just apply to some fancy parser I want to make. If a player wants to take out a particular segment of chat logs, not only do they have to trim the fat of any channel they don't want (which is relatively easy to do in notepad with the find feature), but they also need to go through it manually to remove system, combat, and/or emotes. So how would I fix this? Without knowing the likely horrific spaghetti code behind the chat box and logger, I can't say for certain. I know what I would LIKE to see. Even if [Emote], [Combat], [System] was not added to the text as it appears on the chat box, I would absolutely love it if those could be added when the text is saved to the chat log. It would make logs far more useful in my opinion.

Hey all! It's me! Spazz! Here to hopefully make a post in the right place! I've had these badge ideas for ages and always thought it was a shame they weren't in the game. So...here they are! 1. "Bad With Secrets": I've always been amused that Ouroborus is supposed to be this super well kept secret but all it takes is for someone to throw down a portal and you're given instant entry. Thought a funny nod to that would be if you were awarded this badge if someone else who did not have the "Entrusted With the Secret" badge used your Ouroborus Portal. My personal choice for the description would be: "You had ONE job!" 2. "Trick or Terror": Did you know that the seasonal instanced mission for Halloween where you roam the mansion and beat up a roided up Frankenstein's Monster actually has a hidden Easter egg where you murder two innocent civilians (regardless of alignment) and summon a literal demon from the depths of hell? It's true! Just off to the left, there's a few witches hanging around a ritual site. One of them can be spoken to and, if you do, you have the option to help them complete a ritual! How you ask? Well, like I said. You poison large containers of candy, tell a random civilian to eat from it, murder them, then return to the witch for the ritual. It's real anti-climactic. The summoned creature is only a boss and goes down like a chump. Still, it's always confused me why they'd throw that in there and not have a badge for it.

Oh wow. Okay, I know there's no way I can win compared to some of the AMAZING efforts here, but I'm still proud of what I've put together and would like others to see it. Kudos to all of the other builders. You've earned it. Character Name: Sergent Gamble Global: @McSpazz 9-Tail Labs Everlasting 9TAILS-12137 Builders: @McSpazz Description: It appears to be just a house situated among others near the primary Vanguard owned area just outside of the Rikti Warzone. But behind a bookshelf in the basement, there is an entry to the underground workshop owned by Trixie Gamble. 9-Tail Labs: We make it because nobody else will take you seriously!