A question from the newbie

[cyclopeanmerc.livejournal.com]

Hey, my player would like to know, is it unusual to feel guilty when he makes me do things that will cause me a lot of trauma and make a lot of people pissed off at me and just, in general, make me not happy?

Comments

[leeadama.livejournal.com]

Perhaps booze would-- No, actually, not at all-- *offers valium*

[auroryborealis.livejournal.com]

My player actually *likes* putting me through horrible crap.

So yeah, no help from this corner. :)

OOC for... uh, OOC?

[notstakedyet.livejournal.com]

Hopefully nobody minds me treating this question seriously and not in the usual jokey fandomtherapy tone =)

Speaking as the former totally evil vampire and now souled vampire with no people skills, I get where you're coming from. It can be hard to do things that are 100% IC for your character, but which don't make for happy moments in game.

My advice, which is probably worth exactly what you're paying for it, is to do what you can to make you happy. You're the one doing the typing. You get the final say, not Pip.

Which isn't to say never ever do things which make for unhappy characters. Some of the best plotlines come out of conflict and hard times. But try to find ways of doing that which make you comfortable. Talk with the other players OOC. Find ways to have Pip be IC without making you feel guilty. Figure out ways to do that even if you have to tweak things a little.

Also, remember that the players are not their characters. Right now Angel would cheerfully spend an afternoon putting bamboo shoots under Pip's fingernails, then contemplating what order he wants to attack Pip's internal organs in. You barge into the vamp's room uninvited and insult the method by which he tried to kill his family for everyone's safety and that does not go over well with him.

But I, on the other hand, am chatting with you right now and am not contemplating the bamboo skewer/organ thing. I prefer poison

;)

Re: OOC for... uh, OOC?

[flash-serpent.livejournal.com]

I have to concur with everything here. Crowley is such a jerk to everyone, I can't believe anyone wants to interact with him. I...me-the-player...am so not like that and it sometimes kills me to be so mean. Hence the abrupt slides into things like "Kiki, you have ugly shoes. I'm really mean, I am." because although C miight be evil, I'm not and I can only take so much before I need some levity. Thankfully, it's canon for Crowley to be funny. *praises Gaiman*

Re: OOC for... uh, OOC?

[notstakedyet.livejournal.com]

[nod] Exactly. And that's how we work in little narrative outs for ourselves so that we stay IC yet still allow for fun gaming.

Heck, that's why I'm glad Angel's got Sean. If nothing else if he gets so broody that he's impossible for people to deal with, I can give him puppy time to get him back to being verbal. Or verbal for him, anyway ;)

Plus there's plenty of characters who are assholey in their behavior - Bel, Blackadder, Logan, GOB - just to name a few, but who make interacting with them fun even when they're at their worst.

IC Angel would *love* to beat the shit out of Bel for all the things that he's done to remove the soul. But OOC I glee whenever I get to do a scene with Bel's player. The fighting is sexually charged a fun writing challenge, and the antagonism allows Angel to do and feel things that I couldn't get him to do otherwise speaking of sexually charged....

So there are ways of having the bad stuff, yet no player guilt or misery. Win/win. =)

[cerulean--eyes.livejournal.com]

Probably not. But if your player didn't feel guilty, he would spend a lot less time angsting in the bathtub about his scarlet emo tears of the soul.