I have to agree I need to know what my character is thinking what makes her tick. What would they do in this situation. I write down the back ground and add to it if as my character grows and learns.

Well most of my characters were ones on which I had spent a lot of time thinking about them and deciding what they woul dbe like, but none of them lasted longer than one term.

I was in the TP yesterday and just thinking about changing from Nicolas because he didn't work out and thinking about using Grace, my other RP charrie and checking out a few pictures to see who she could look like. I came across a photo of Alicia Silverstone and just then a girl called Sabrina Evanstar just walked into my head. Well, Sabrina had, I took the name Evanstar from my Ministry RP charrie. This sort of thing had actually never happened to me before. A charrie just in my head, fully formed and I saw her as what she would be like as an adult.

So I am going to use her and see if she works out. I think she will.

So far I've only had two characters. The first one I based on an alter-ego of myself. I had actually already got a personality and name for him so I went from there. I gave him family and then history and an extra talent or two. After that I just developed him in my posts. My second charrie I based on a name and my most recent holiday in Chile. I wanted him to be from there and to have the name Tristen. After that I made a basic history and started.

I'm hoping someone will read what I'm about to say and be inspired because I find the potential of the Harry Potter universe nearly limitless.

Though I don't actually ask myself this question, but this is what I aim for when I create a character: "How can I expand upon the HP world while staying true to the source material."

My first character, the one I am currently playing, Helios Sunrider came from my love for Greek mythology, so I went about trying to figure out how he would fit in at Hogwarts.

First I noticed that Circe (the sorceress from Homers Odyssey) is represented in the HP universe as one of the chocolate frog wizard trading cards. I also noticed that Cerberus is represented by the three headed dog Fluffy. The Basilisk is originally from Greece. Centaurs are from Greek myth. You know where I'm going.

Next factor was my appreciation for ancient Sparta and its legendary warriors. King Leonidas from the film 300 was a big inspiration which gave me the idea of making Helios royalty. I also decided to liken his stay at Hogwarts to the ogage trials.

The hardest part was that I needed a name. There was a character in the 300 graphic novel called Stelios. That name stood out for some reason. Then it reminded me of the name Helios (Greek sun god) so I went with that which in turn gave me the idea to give him hair that mimics the sun and eyes that copy the sky.

That's pretty much where he came from. An ancient Greek in Hogwarts practically.

I also have ideas for a traditional Chinese, Japanese, Native American, and a modern American character whose family is in the business of stage magic. I even went as far as to say that there is a office in the Ministry of Magic that regulates stage magicians like David Copperfield, claiming that they are actually wizards but must perform spells that seem more like sleight of hand than real magic.

I really wish I had enough time to play them all, but I can only hope that someone picks up on one of my ideas and decides to run with it. I really hope to flesh out the world of Harry Potter. Maybe even one day my ideas for the Magic World War will come fruition.

When I make my charrie, I always don't go into too much detail, because I feel that you need to let the character form through RPing and your charrie needs to also change while they progress through school, like we do in real life. I've had a mixture of charries while I've been here. My first was shy when meeting people but then was really outgoing once they met the other person, kinda like me

My others were similar to this, but had many flaws. So, I tried my best to make my next one worked out, but not too much. Just enough so she didn't have flaws. I'm using her now and I made her from Australia because I felt I needed a little more interesting RPing to be happening. And what better way to do this then to have her come from another country, right?

I didn't want her to be too interesting that it was unrealistic, like having her parents dead and her to be really mixed up in the head or something. You need to remember not to make your charrie too interesting, otherwise people won't really like you for obvious reasons. Anyway, it's not like your writing a book on the charrie, so there doesn't need to be a huge background and history like Harry, unless you want your charrie involved in the plot.

Anyway, when I make my character I follow a few simple steps and then I work out the rest through RPing.

1. Gender. Gender is a very important thing to begin with, mainly because guys and girls act very differently. If one the thing happened to a girl then she would very differently than to how a guy would act if the same thing happened to him, thus the charrie's history changes and they become more, say, brave.

2. Personality. The personality is the next important step. Will the character be kind, nasty, flirtatious, couldn't be bothered about the opposite sex, outgoing, shy, or a mad scientist? How smart will they be? How hard to they try in school? Are they organized?

You also have to remember what house your charrie is in. If they're in Slytherin are they self-centered, cunning, etc.? If they're in Gryffindor are they brave, have a good heart (deep down or not), etc.? If they're in Hufflepuff do they work hard, are loyal, etc.? If they're in Ravenclaw are they wise, try their best, ect.?

3. History. Then comes their history. Here you have to think about how their parents brought them up, if they have any siblings, how they interact with their siblings, what bloodline they have, how rich they are. Remember not to go into too much detail about these things.

4. Appearence. Now you finally get to think about your character's appearence. First you should think how their personality impacts on their appearence, then the rest will come easily. Do they take care in their appearence? Are they a snob and uses unnessessary make-up? Do they try to imprese guys with their appearence? What parts of their appearence is genetic?

How long is their hair? What colour? Curly, wavy, straight, or does your character change it every day? Is it neat or done in a rush? How big are their eyes? What colour are they? Remember that lots of people's eyes change every day. Are they short or tall? Thin, average, or have issues with weight?

5. Name. Now comes their name. You can pick a name you like, choose an interesting name, or base the name on it's meaning. Don't be dramatic in the name and be realistic, but using an uncommon name is really good if you know where the 'line you must not cross' is. Then pick a surname. You can make it up in gibberish, use your neighbour's surname (like J.K did for Potter), or scan the dictionary for a word that applies to your charrie and then jumble the letters up. eg. Incognito = Initcogo

The rest of your character will form when you begin to RP!

Well, first I thought about my favorite name.
I went with Isla, cos it's pretty. So Isla, means it's a girl.

Second, I thought about her looks, I made her thin, light skinned, green eye'd and black haired, because that's what I imagined a person with the name Isla would look like. I didn't make her a busty, blonde bimbo because honestly, what use would that be? Would you be able to hold an actually intelligent conversation? Well, maybe, but anyway.

Then I worked on her history & personality, but really, in 'real life' who stays the same for they're whole life? I think that people are always changing, so there-fore as my character grows up, she changes. Oh, and something else that is one of my pet-peeves, who on earth is the nicest, awesomest, perfectest person? No-one, so maybe your character should atleast have a couple of flaws... else thats just unfair for all us imperfect people.

I Actually based my character on myself.

1]-Attitude: I thought about how I wanted my charrie to be like me and how I wanted her different. I thought about how I would handle everything in life and the obsticules[Sp?] I would go though along life. So planing ahead of what you want to happen in your characters life at Hogwarts and how she/he would handle her/his friends and everything else would be A good idea, Instead of thinking at the last minute.

2]-Gender: After planning out my charries personality I picked the gender I wanted. I picked female because of her personatity and i couldnt se A guy RPing as me. So after tinking about your Characters Attitude it would be good to choose his/hers gender, to go along with it.

3]-Looks: Next thing I did was decided how I wanted my charrie to look. I figured an "Emo/Rebel" look would be different from everyone elses. Deciding how you want you charrie to look like would be next to go along with what you have planed so far.

4]-Name: The last thing I did was chose my name. I've always thought choosing the name last was best so I had time to think about her Attitude and everything else, Giving me the name Tuesday. So choosing your name last would be the best.


EDIT: Sorry. Not trying to be bossy saying "Do this first, Do this next." Im just puting it out how I made my charrie =]

ok that makes plenty of sense

Well I wait until one of the little people bouncing around in my head presents his or herself and goes "Hullo I'm Gem."
Translated into english I wait until inspiration hits me.
And then I go make a bio which looks like this sort of--

Name:
Age:
Gender:
Race:
Personality:
History:
Best Subject:
Worst Subject:
Wand:
Likes:
Dislikes:
House:
Pets:
Other:

I have currently only used one charrie, but I have developed many. I strongly suggest keeping all the information neatly organized in a Word Document. And I always do it the same way.

Full Name:
Names come to me randomly, and I put together combinations until I have one I like. Name generators or baby name websites can be helpful to find an origin or meaning you like. By getting a name, you usually get a gender with it. Only a few names, like Chris or Alex, really give you a choice of gender.

Personality:
A character's personality is very important and this area is what I always spend the most time on. For some of my characters, I have broken personality down - basic personality and specific personality. The specific personality includes Pet Peeves, certain events that bother the character, etc.

Physical Description:
There are a few ways to do this. Usually I go one of two ways - find a picture and write a description of it, or write a description and try to either find a picture or make one. Pictures, of course, are nice but not needed.

Background:
Usually I never use this info in the RPG. It's for myself, possibly explaining some of the charrie's personality or ideas. If I use it at all, I hint at the background. Most of my characters have some strong event that marked them positively or negatively.

After the basic descriptions, I add details, such as wand type, pets, best/worst subjects, patronuses, and even their Gringott's Vault Number.

These are merely guidelines that have worked well for me.

~Alanna

I just follow what kind of a person I want to be like. But, nobodys perfect, so add a few of the flaws I'm proud of, and BAM, my character just forms itself, and the rest comes out...like me and dreams. It's like me and dreams mixed in a brewing potion, with the results that just come naturally.

My charries normally are based how i feel at that certain moment in time. I get most of my inspiration from music and mags or other books i have read. I think alot about personality. then i will decide on the gender. i always tend to go with a cliche look like blond har and blue eyes. However my cahrries are always affected by either thier family or a hidden secret. I love my cahrries to look mysterios though i do try to keep it realsitc. as my charrie develops i tend to add morethings and the process goes on.

Normally, when I create a character, I follow a few simple steps:

Gender
Appearance
History/Family
Name.

Sometimes, though, I base it on people I know/have heard of. My first character was based on my best friend, my second was made up, and my third . . . well. My current one is based on myself.

If you have a solid idea to work with, like a model, it's much easier to create a realistic character in my opinion.

I don't know I just make it up as I go along. Maybe start with a personality and then decide what physical traits would go with it. Or the other way around. I drew a picture and tried out several looks until I liked it.

Ok. How do I create my characters?

Honestly, I don't know if I really have a process for creating RP characters. My first RP character ever (on a different site) was literally me with magical powers. Same name, appearance, and everything. I used her for several different threads (actually, I still do. ). Then I branched out.

A lot of the time, my characters are loosely based on me. At least, personality-wise. I find it easier to come up with dialogue and everything if I understand how the character works, and if it's basically how I work, even simpler. A lot of the time, I think about some aspect of the character, like ancestry or whatever, to come up with the name. A lot of the time, baby name books come in useful. And, in one case, a story I have been writing.

Rhiannon was originally a character I created on a different site. But she didn't have a last name, and was not a witch, in the strictest sense. She was more of an elemental, with power over water as well as faerie powers passed down from her ancestor from which she got her name. When I decided to get into the school RP here, I decided to use her as my character. I had to change her background slightly, of course, to make her a witch.

This is where I have fun. Coming up with histories. Because, I really think your history does influence how you act, or react to situations. Since I had the basic outline of Rhiannon's history already essentially done, I had fun with details. I came up with her parents' names, as well as when her birthday was. Since her parents were dead, and she had grown up with her aunt and uncle, I came up with names for them, as well as their children. And a loose idea of their backgrounds, like heritage, etc. (i.e. even though Rhiannon is a pureblood witch, her cousins are halfblood, since their father is a Muggle). But since those histories are loose, I can come up with more details while I RP Rhiannon. And I already somewhat have.

This may or may not work for other people. But it seems to for me.

I just do the basic personality and it all roles out from there.

Well to start off with I always work out their personalities. Who is this person, who do they want to be. I use my personal character traits to base my charries on. Or I do the opposite of who I am.

Tomasina (my Hogwarts charrie)- She is exactly like me. She is up front and to the point. She is funny and can be a fun person, but she she is in a bad mood no one wants to be around her. She can be mean when she wants to be and even when she doesn't notice that she is being mean. She has a sarcastic wit about her. She always acts before she thinks. But under all that swagger and attitude she is a sweetheart and her close friends know it.

Egypt (my Ministry charrie) - she is my opposite. She is nice and gentle, and emotional. She sees the world through her emotions and she wears her heart on her sleeve. She is always conscious of other's feelings and always wants whats best for everyone else.


I make it a point that all my characters are African American, well because I am black And there aren't a lot of black characters on here, so all my charries are black. All of them have been females only because I didn't want to create an ideal of a guy that just wasn't realistic, but I have made one male character. I might get a few more

Then after I get their personalities down i think about their histories. Where do they come from, who is their family. Are they purebloods or half and halfs or muggles. My main charries are purebloods, but the rest of my charries are muggleborns or half and half. Then I think about what they will look like. Like i said all of my charries are black so i choose pictures of black musicians and actresses.

Then I finish up with the name. I like to choose unique names, I mean a name says alot about a person more so than you can say.Thats how I make up my characters

I'm pretty new as an RPer, but I've done character development/story stuff in other places. The way I tend to start is focusing on a story problem. That is, I start by asking myself what story arc or theme I'd like to explore. What does my character think they want? What do they in fact need to grow, and what would I like them to learn?

I think that answering these questions informs every other aspect of character development including their personality, background, name and even appearance. It also helps me to have a road map of where my character is and where I want them to go (whether a real journey or just an inner journey).

When I first started the RP, I saw that most of the people in my house came from pureblood wizarding family backgrounds. In contrast to that, I wanted to make my character an almost existential character, with no family history. The story problem I wanted to explore was the theme roots: how do you find a way to blossom, if you've never been given any roots? What would it be to be a person in the wizarding world with no roots, especially in a House that is so focused on familial ties and blood pedigree?

So in Aryanna (Xana), I built a character whose main problem was that she needed to develop roots and stop undermining herself so that she could thrive. I gave her severe abandonment issues (she was a foundling), a detached relationship with her legal guardian, and other traumas so she would have no one to cling to from her past as a support network. I made her brilliant and gave her a ton of potential and made her physically attractive so on the surface she'd appear on first look as something of a 'Mary Sue'-- but scratch the surface and you'd discover that she was carrying huge emotional scars that made her make bad choices and cling to anyone who gave her any positive attention (whether they were good for her or not). To underscore the concept of her need to "put down roots", I made herbology her passion and strength. She had mad skillz, but prior to Hogwarts she had no real drive to exploit them because she felt nothing she did mattered, her life was meaningless and no one cared, anyway. (Emo? Perhaps. Such is existentialism. ) I gave her a 'passion for high places' because she was literally a character caught between the metaphorical stars that were within her reach (success due to her strong skills) and her need to feel 'grounded' before she could feel the motivation to reach for those stars.

When she first arrived on the scene, she had been ruining herself. She'd been kicked out of more schools than she could count, and when she arrived her irresponsible behaviour with Josh Moonson was indicative of the fact that she didn't think she'd be sticking around Hogwarts. She never took the long view for her actions, because she didn't see herself as having a future.

Then, in her arc she met people (one in particular!) who truly cared about her, nurturing her spirit and helping her to see her own value. As those relationships started to take hold, she began to feel grounded, and her attitude changed. She began to try; through feeling grounded she was finally able to explore her own potential. At the end of her arc at the school, she'd come to feel accepted and valued, had found success as a top student and was looking forward to a real future with real plans for the first time in her life. In essence, she'd found a way to stop feeling lost-- by putting down roots, she felt grounded and felt secure enough to finally 'reach for the stars' and seek success (as a Slythie, deep down she was ambitious-- it just took that journey for her to be able to act on her ambition).

Even with secondary characters, such as with my house elves or my thief in special ops, I find that knowing their motivation and backstory -- what leads them to the moment when you meet them, and what they think they want-- helps make every other aspect of the character development have a reason and a purpose; e.g., my thief is a hairdresser. He was born with great, shiny black hair, which he used as a marketing tool for his very BAD hair potion product. It failed to sell, causing him to lose his fortune and his wife. This is why he's using Polyjuice potion and stolen hair from his barbershop to commit his crimes and hopefully restore the fortune he lost and win back his love... My house elves are named in honour of anti-slavery and womens' rights movements leaders (Harriet Tubman, Frederick (Bailey) Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, etc) because the house elf rights struggle, in my mind, draws parallels from the struggles of those people, and I wanted to draw from those histories in order to understand their motivations. You get the idea...

Even if many of the reasons for my choices in character building are never clearly stated in the RP, it helps me to have subtext and know their story, motivation, and theme so I know why they react as they do and how to portray them. Does it work? I have no idea. I sure hope so! But I think it's fascinating to see other people's approaches here and so I thought I'd throw in my own two sickles on the matter.

I've only done one charrie, Sahrina, but this is how i did it:
1) I actually started with her name and gender. I wanted my first charrie to be a girl, I wanted her name to besomething origional, so I went to a website and looked up "S" names (because mine starts with an S), and I found Sarina, which means one who laughs, (and that fits me), I added the H and there it was.

2)Then I chose her looks. Was she skinny? Dark hair? light hair? tall? short? . I decided I wanted her to be blonde like me, be normal skinny, and be medium height.

3)then her history and family. Was she muggle-born, half-blood, or pureblood? where does she live? Does she have both parents living with her? did one die? did they both die? Does she have siblings? Are they older? younger?
Sahrina lives with her mum and dad, and now with her 2 month old baby sister.
4) personality. Was she nice, sweet, shy, nosy, mean, know-it-all, evil, quiet, outgoing, adn much more.
I decided Sahrina, since she is in Ravenclaw, would be a know-it-all. She used to be shy, but has gotten much better.

5) then, finally, I chose the last name.

My ones actually quite amusing.
My friend had a gerbil called Sebastian, and I love that gerbil to death, it's so cute, it's like got a little black fringe type thing.
I love Milan. Seriously, I love it so much.

The images I use for Sebastian have always been 'emo' type boys, *'cause I'm in love really.*

His personality is a gentle one, but he's so loyal, and its just the type of thing that I'd love a boy to be like

So far, my favorite charrie is by far Cale, so I'll share with you how I made him up

For me, I usually just pick a name out of the blue. For Cale, I was watching Disturbia and I really liked the name of Shia LaBeouf's character I think they spell it with a K in the movie, but I thought it was spelled with a C, so that is how I got that name After some research I found out that Cale is actually short for Caleb. I like middle names too (Emma never had one) So I just picked Markus, which is a nice German name. A lot of my characters are German cause I'm German and I can speak German, and that adds a little bit of a cultural background to Cale.

Newell was, yet again, another name I thought sounded cool XD

For the looks, I had a general idea of how I wanted him to look, so I went out and tried to find a picture of someone who resembled what I had in my head, and I landed on Kevin Jonas

As for year, I wanted to play him no younger than 5th year, since I myself am around the same age as a 6th year and can relate to the feelings and emotions of an upperclassman. Obviously I'm not a guy, but guys still go through the same drama as girls, right?

After that, it was personality, which is by far the hardest. For Cale, I actually took the personalities of guys I personally know from school and mixed them together. He's sweet and sensitive deep down, but he would never tell anyone that unless he is really close with them. He doesn't like wearing his emotions on his sleeve. He tends to show off a bit, and that can get him into trouble. His ego is probably around 10 stories high But even with all that ego, he is sweet and caring once you get to know him. He'd do anything for his friends and he looks out for them.

Once all that was done, I had to think of a history for him, since he would be starting school 5th year and no one has ever seen him before. I remembered that in DH Ron mentioned something about parents homeschooling their children if they wanted to, so I made up a story that involved Cale being homeschooled because his father had just passed away, and his mother was suffering a bit of a depression after that and kept him home out of fear that something would happen to him at Hogwarts. As for his family ties, I just made him the cousin of my previous charrie, Emma, who is also his best friend He even has a bit of a romantic past with his old friend Faye, who is RPed by my younger sister Chelly. I have a whole family tree worked out for Cale including cousins and aunts and uncles...not to mention his two younger sisters, Theresa and Ellie, both of whom I plan on playing once Cale is a big boy and has graduated

Any other little personality quirks, like being in love with Butterbeer, having a tendancy to bump into people, and being a Beater were all created as I RPed. The fun of making a charrie keeps going as you're playing! Charries are constantly changing due to the other people around them, as well as plots and experiences that they go through.

So, that's how I make Characters in a Nutshell Hope I helped! Give your character a lot of hard work--the more developed they are, the more fun it is to RP!

This is what I did for my character,Reese...

I went on PhotoBucket and looked up some pictures.I came across a picture of Ashley Tisdale and it just hit me.And one of my favorite actors,Reese Whitherspoon,and it just hit me.So at this point I had a first name and a picture.I pondered for a moment and decided I wanted her last name to be Northway.I got a notepad out and just started writing random stuff down and wa-la
I had all her history and everything else.
I was very proud of myself

For me, creating characters came like just... seeing people on the sidewalk. I love creative writing so that might have something to do with it too. I just never had trouble coming up with characters. I keep myself inspired with lots of things - pop culture, music, drawing, watching movies, reading books, reading law books (just kidding, hahaha)... Stuff like that. That way, your brain is overflowing with information and little bits you can use to make a good character.

Maya IC for me was a very inspirational first character. She just kinda... Walked into my brain fully dressed up (no pun intended) and everything. I was in a subway listening to music and she just kinda... Popped into my brain. To this date I lost the playlist but I know it was just so inspirational. My current motto? Always, always, ALWAYS make a playlist of good music.

For Emily though... She came a little harder. I was wondering if I should make another character during a walk and I saw this girl that just SCREAMED every bit of Emily's personality - bossy, impatient, sarcastic... So I literally ran all the way home to make her bio. XD I had to build up her history, family line and the person she would look like (I didn't have a camera with me. )... You know. Something like that.

For celebrity pictures, try to be original. Keep in mind that not all pictures should be celebrities - they're too common. Try looking on places like Deviant Art. It's a good site for good pictures. Celebrities are good options too but try and keep them original, fresh, someone no one has yet to use. Also keep in mind that not all people are super pretty/good-looking... Try doing celebrity can-did shots, where they were spotted on the streets in normal clothes. Those are always the best - they don't seem too made up but the quality is still good.

Hahah, I'm done rambling now folks.

Hey, do you guys think it's OK to be the granddaughter of Luna? It fits with the timeline.

Yeah I think if would be fine! Many RP'ers around the site as well as myself have characters that descendants of canon characters. Just keep in mind, create your own character. Also keep in mind that the granddaughter of Luna isn't going to have the last name Lovegood. Be original with your character and have fun!