Where Does Your Inspiration Come From?

I was just curious as to where my fellow WTF members get their creativity / inspiration from! I mean, like, where do you draw ideas for role-plays, for characters, etc.

I know that, usually, ideas are created from an abundance of things (we get a little here and a little there and tie it all up with a bit of ourselves), but I wanted to know what is the usual factors that gets put into a) your role-plays and b) your characters.

For the most part, I'd assume you guys draw from different sources for the two. I also kind of wanted to know how do you guys create your characters! For instance, do you guys get inspired by an outside source and then replicate it? Or do you guys like to put pieces of familiarity into them? Etc?

And, if possible, it'd be cool if everyone just shared their insight on why they do it the way they do. The pros, the cons, etc. Also, feel free to talk about other proposed ideas. I think we need to get this subforum moving! It's such a nice place to refine our craft and whatnot. (:



(I'll share my own methods soon enough. I just wanted to give people a chance to put their own thoughts down and not make the whole thread a: let's respond to what Jing has written and how I agree or disagree with her position)....

That's hard. I suppose any sense or thought that can strike a note. What's sad is forgetting them, because it doesn't have that same inner feeling sometimes. Used a hose on some dirt once and took a picture to decide how the land would be in a world for a story. Had a dream about a tea party with witches and animals, and then we each had to take a bit of the rhino to signify our allegiance, after having killed Mom's Satan spawn, which eventually I might use for something. Most recently I've been making characters, literally, by the dozen, dividing them equally between ancestors, magical grouping and gender, and even organizing by shades/tints/hues of colors for their eyes, height and the wave of their hair to be as varied as possible; major headache but worth it.

I forgot that I made this thread (haha...) !


@ KRIEM : Oh wow, that dream sounds really interest, haha. It kind of reminds me of Alice in Wonderland, but that might just be because you mentioned "tea party."


As for my method...

I draw inspiration from the books I read to the movies I watch. I take aspects I liked or enjoyed and, very slowly, add to it until I feel like the end-product is something I am satisfied with. For instance, with Halcyon, I started with the idea of agents-for-hire. After a few months or working and reworking the story, I came up with the final product, which still carries the agents-for-hire aspect, but in a distinctly different way from how I had first wanted it.

In most cases, my ideas begin with a single topic; the topic can be anything from a tangible object to an idea. And, over time, I add and remove things.

When it comes to characters, I like to think about the role-play and what kind of a character would be fun or interesting to explore in the world. I want to know that my character will not only fit the world it is created for, but it has a chance to be affected by the world. In regards to the personality, I tend to dislike modeling a character too strongly after personal experiences. I don't think it's necessary to write from experience. Having said that, I do apply a small part of myself or of people I know (and admire) to every character. For instance, Danny Chevalier (an old character from an old role-play) is, in part, based on personal insecurities: the need to not be a burden, the inadvertently sharp tongue. To this day, even though Danny is not my most polished character, he is one of my favorite creations.

I think a little humanity in characters is important; it is what allows the reader to connect and understand a character's motivation, which is how a character truly grows and develops. If the audience can grasp the motivation of the character, the character has, quite literally, come alive. It's a very, very special moment and feeling.

LOL, I just realized a connection that I've been missing. I do the same thing with making charries: put a little bit of me in them. I'm pretty sure that none of them are exactly like me or other people I base them on (even if they look the same) and that might be the reason why I don't like orphaning my charries--They is my babies!

Anywho, I've had that issue with making something and it becomes something else. Advise: Do not constantly tell your best friend of the changes you do as you make them; after so many times they don't have the level of excitement they originally had. XD

I would be interested in seeing how people have their charries develop. I'm a determinist/necessatarianist (still debating them in my head), so my charries should eventually end up changing into who they would have changed into regardless of the environment/plot/roleplay. Admittedly, I have failed before in that and I've attributed it to adjusting the charries to suit my RP partner. (For instance, the amount of disrespect her charry displayed toward mine should have gotten her killed, but I knew she didn't want that so I toned down the evil aspects of mine and sometimes his powers.) I hate doing that and view it as cheating for me, but it would be interesting to see how others have their characters grow in different atmospheres.

Haha, I'm the same with orphaning a character: I don't like it. I don't like the idea of someone else writing for or as my character because, well, the character is mine.

Ah, I don't usually talk about role-playing with people outside of the community. Role-playing, for me, is a very private hobby. I do it for myself and I don't find it necessary to include others. Not to mention, role-playing is one of those hobbies that don't generate positive reactions, lolol.


Hm... I like to leave my character development fairly open-ended and flexible because it gives me (and those I'm writing with) greater freedom to behave dynamically. I mean, it's not as if I don't have any plans at all. There are certain things I would like to see happen, but I am also perfectly okay with altering those plans if something else comes up. My goal, when creating a character, is to play inside someone else's world and, knowing first-hand how much time it takes to craft worlds, I like to respect that design. It's like being invited to a friend's house. I don't force my friend to alter their house rules to suit me.

Having said that, it's not as if I only consider the environment. I think the other characters are just as important. I won't create a character that can't interact/work with the existing cast.

All that aside, and this is rather off-topic, but I really enjoy playing characters that have innate prejudices. I find it so hard to accept characters when, in a very biased world, every character is oddly open-minded. I mean, when I see that, I just... I just... I just cant, haha.

My motivation is usually;
"Where can this story go?"
"What kind of character would fit in it?"
"How much badass potential does this have overall?"

If I don't like the answer to either of those questions, I simply don't join the RP. If I do join it, the answers to those questions (even if the plot doesn't go as I would prefer) is enough to keep me active and posting.