[OOC] X-Men: The Divided

[knighthawk]

I... Have blocked out most of gym from my memories. I just remember the un-mimic-able *POINGT* when you slapped the rubber.

[knighthawk]

In unrelated news, Crimson is the 500th post!

[MistressCyanide]

Why is it when mansion time comes all the excitement levels just drop? It feels like I am losing people around this point but it is probably due to past experiences which is messing with my head at the moment. I am sure some of you know what I am on about. :/

[Solemn]

I dunno, I think we've still got a decent amount of momentum. But I am a bit glacial paced myself.

[Zagan]

posted, I tried not to fall on you Crimson so I landed just infront of you

Solemn, its up to you if your attack goes through or not cause i didnt want to god mod to say that Jax will continue being the top fighter.

[Assallya]

Tee hee! There we go. Secondary character nigh and as a secondary character, you have no idea what his point of view is!

[CrimsonWarrior55]

knighthawk said
In unrelated news, Crimson is the 500th post!

And there was much rejoicing...

MistressCyanide said
Why is it when mansion time comes all the excitement levels just drop? It feels like I am losing people around this point but it is probably due to past experiences which is messing with my head at the moment. I am sure some of you know what I am on about. :/

I noticed that, but I never know why. I kinda like the down time to work on character relationships.

Zagan said
posted, I tried not to fall on you Crimson so I landed just in front of you

No big. Aya had already slid under and past Jax anyways.

Assallya said
Tee hee! There we go. Secondary character nigh and as a secondary character, you have no idea what his point of view is!

Ah, so that's what you mean. Now that I see it in action though, I have to say I'm not a big fan of using that for secondary characters only because it makes them feel like NPCs. Kinda like, "Why should I care at all about this character". And there's no way to really tell them apart from NPCs like that. But that's just how I feel, you can use it all you want.

[Assallya]

You need to know what people are thinking to empathize with them? Think about your statement empirically. How do you have any friends without some sort of telepathy? *lol* I am, of course, teasing here.

I rather think of secondary characters as NPCs but that doesn't mean they don't have personality or flair. When you read a novel you don't know the thoughts and motivations of every person walking down the sidewalk near the protagonists. What it should do is encourage protagonists to explore who these people are. You have to learn about who they are and what they're doing the old fashioned way, by interacting with them via your protagonists, asking them questions and watching their body language. It also encourages a person to write the secondary character in a manner they not be used to, trying to inform the audience what a person is thinking without explicitly stating such through narrative voice.

This reminds me of a PBEM I tried to run a long while ago. In an effort to expand the writing ability of my player I told them I didn't want a character sheet. I wanted a sequence of documents and pictures concerning their characters with the limitation of only one diary entry. I'd accept school report cards, newspaper articles, the afore mentioned diary entry, letters written from one relative to another concerning the character, arrest reports... just little snippets that allowed someone reading them to slowly piece together an idea of who the person was... but still leave plenty of room for surprises.

Unfortunately, they were tabletop RPG types... they just weren't artistic. Just under half of them embraced the idea.... the others just gave up before they began.

[CrimsonWarrior55]

Oh, trust me, while I may not be able to sympathize with everyone, I and empathize with a TON of people. Empathy seems to be my specialty.

Anyways...

The thing is, you as the writer know EXACTLY what these secondaries are thinking. So writing them as if you don't is impossible. And can also lead to a horrible case of talking to yourself when your characters need to interact when you're not careful. But that's the thing. I think of any character (given emphasis via CS) being controlled not as primaries or secondaries, but as a main character. The idea of primary and secondary was only introduced to me after you made mention of the third person narrative. Normally, I would try to give them equal time, but here I can't. Aya's my main, Leon is my secondary. Which brings up another point. What are the secondaries gonna do when the mains are gone? If they are used as you like, it's no biggie. They can vanish and it's not important at all. Only if a main is nearby will they even be mentioned. We have no clue what Sebastian is doing or where he is unless it's mentioned in a previous or future post. Until a main talks to him, he's completely irrelevant. But when you treat them like I like, you have a problem. There is always something they can do, but it has to be detailed. Plus they now have the job of handling any third person characters. Like in a novel, how there may be three main characters. The third person ones interact with them and that's all we see of them. Ever. But if the narration switches to characters besides those three. You get a temporary main. Someone who takes over the role of first person so the third person characters can have someone to interact with. I don't know, it just doesn't seem like a good idea to have a third person as one of your personal characters, but what the hell do I know? This is the first time it's ever come up in my 5-6 years of RPing.

And by the way, if it seems like this was weird, I was literally writing my points as they came to me.

[MistressCyanide]

Assallya-Will he be hitting on Kitty during this or is that sometime much later on? I remember in one RP he was married to her unless you changed it this time.

--

I had this idea but I don't know if it can be done. I was thinking of doing an arc where all the newbies become Omega for a short time and so do a few others. But I am not sure if this will turn people away or not. They would end up in an alt world and things are very different for them, I was thinking it could be a growth thing and and maybe a moral thing as well. What do you think?

[knighthawk]

A thought is that the non-x-men go to the museum of natural history where someone releases MGH andkick to try and boost humans into a mutant outbreak with dozens of people unable to handle the new powers. Now you have the secondary characters getting a jump as well but at least something resembling training for most to help quell the chaos before it becomes a full scale riot.

[CrimsonWarrior55]

That sounds quite interesting. I take it out powers would basically rise to the extreme extent?

[CrimsonWarrior55]

Heads up. I'm changing Aya's picture. Damo found one that just works so much better. As much as I love Ai Shinozaki, I just can't imagine her as a dark, demented, psychotic bitch.

This is the new Ayame Denzan!

[MistressCyanide]

^When I think of a Japanese Psycho Bitch I think Chiaki Kuriyama. I guess it is because of Battle Royale and Kill Bill 1. I guess I love her acting.

[CrimsonWarrior55]

MistressCyanide said
^When I think of a Japanese Psycho Bitch I think Chiaki Kuriyama. I guess it is because of Battle Royale and Kill Bill 1. I guess I love her acting.

Oh, YEAH! I remember her! I think? Didn't she have the most kills by a girl and the second most kills period (after Kiriyama, of course)?

[Damo021]

Yeah she was crazy, and dangerous lol

[CrimsonWarrior55]

Maybe, but Kiriyama kicked her fucking ass!

[Zagan]

I like the idea mistress. Sounds interesting

[MistressCyanide]

She is still awesome though.

[CrimsonWarrior55]

True. Too bad her craziness is nothing compared to some anime chicks. I wouldn't mind seeing how Japan would bring Yuno Gasai to the big screen.