In “Roleplay” or RP you will meet one of a Mary Sue, eventually. While mostly dedicated to girls, guys can be “Mary Sues” or “Gary Stus”.
What is a Mary Sue: think of an individual who does not want to tell a story, but be everything to everyone in every story. The lines of demarcation are blurred. They will have all their “objects of desire” fall in love with them, including her villains. Mary Sues can do no wrong, and if she does wrong, it can be easily overlooked.
They have no story and their backstory is so confusing to listen to, it will be like “Mommy and Daddy didn’t give me a pony for Christmas and so I’m mad at them”, but then the character is an orphan.
For guys it’s the “Ultimate Power of the Universe” and it I build my super saiyan powers to maximum with a COD lightsaber pistol with a grew up hard, gangster lifestyle as a Sith Lord, then no one will beat me, ever.
In essence it is a form of GODMODDING!
It ruins storytelling. Those that delve in it are NOT RPing, hence they are not performing with SWAG 77.
What a character has to have:
A character sheet somewhere. What are their reasons for existing? What is the plot to their story? Exposition? Theme? What is here that I want to see a character.
A believable backstory based on the facts of the genre and a reasonable continuity. Making up new stuff is a flow of creativity, but not a fairytale that makes it impossible to believe.
Why do people do this? LAZINESS! They don’t care, they just want to plug and play. They have not qualms or quips about being better. All they want on social media is to be distracted from their mundane lives than to build anything positive. They are TROLLS in the RP community and when they are discovered, they resort to cyberbullying the individual who has discovered their insecurities.
These same individuals will cry foul on you, when you delve deeper into their motivations. When you review their feeds, they are of no substance.
They are fantasizing about their “character” really being with your character and they LIVE THEIR LIVES BEING THEIR CHARACTERS. They actually believe they ARE ________________ (insert latest popular movie/book/RL celebrity) — an no, not talking about cosplayers, or page or Twitter managers. If you ask them their true name, they will say their character as their name. They LIVE through their character’s lives and they want to be that. It’s a dissociation identity disorder hiding behind a mask with a mix of narcissism. It’s like, “I am Napoleon…”
What to do: If all you want to do is be distracted, there are other ways than misleading the public that you are a badass character from your favorite story, then switching your character when their popularity wanes.
You TELL YOUR STORY! If you don’t know how? We offer resources to where you can learn how to do that on our Facebook page.
Write your character sheet and test your character in this litmus test.
OUTLINE the story you wish to tell. Be prepared to receive criticism. Don’t be afraid of that. Because if you are, it means you refuse to grow into something better. And most of the time, people are well-meaning.
Participate in writing activities. Do you blog? Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? If you are a good performer, step up your performance and put in the written word. Show what you’ve got. And remember:
Break a leg!
Star Wars Performance University 