I am NOT My Character! *Rant*

[Tortuga]

Er, I know this is a bad way to introduce myself to the forum community. I am usually a nice, happy person, okay? I just have to get this off my chest.

I have a lion character named Zuberi. He's a well-meaning guy that cares a lot about his pride, but he's really blunt, rude, and brutally honest when he says what's on his mind. Basically, he's a jerk. He's horrible with other animals and that's his fault, I get that being crude and rude is a pretty nasty flaw in a person and it makes them hard to like. I'm doing it on purpose. We're just roleplaying, right? Nothing personal or anything we should take into real life.

So WHY are you blocking me and kicking me from your group as if I attacked you somehow? You DO know that Zuberi isn't me, right? Just because Zuberi said something, it doesn't mean I agree with it. Just because Zuberi hates your character doesn't mean I do.  Just because I attacked your character doesn't mean I want to RAWR MURDER YOU. I'm not mad when my character is mad, sad when my character is sad or anything of the sort! I'm not even always happy when my character is! I'm just playing my role and having fun with it. My character is NOT ME. I don't always create characters that share my views and personality; that would be boring. So, please stop taking roleplay so seriously and personally. It's just a game after all, and without conflict, drama, discovery and excitement, it's not as interesting.

A related scenario came up with my albino lion, Oyoo, who came to a pride of black lions with a racist leader. The leader was trying to ward Oyoo off because he's white, but Oyoo wouldn't budge because he wanted to talk to a lioness whom he'd seen moping outside the den earlier. I'm not sure if it was one of the roleplayers or my accompanying friend who whispered me, but she advised that I block him to avoid a fight.
 
Why? Why would I do that? We're roleplaying! It's part of the game! It's in-game drama, and I like it. It's fun!  What's the matter with characters not always getting along? I even explained this, and she still told me to block him!

Seriously? Are these people allergic to conflict or something?

I can't be the only one who runs into this when roleplaying...!

[Yeska]

I barely came here today, and I've noticed this as well a little. I dunno, I guess some people do act as their character and do take things personally, even if it is in-character. I agree with you though, it is something that people need to understand. Though, luckily my charrie is based of my own attitude and such, but still yet, I don't see the point in getting mad at someone for an in-character remark they made, it's in-character, it's not the person that said it but the character's personality that determines what the character will say. d:

[Silhouette]

Unfortunately, when you're in a public map you are liable to run into this /all/ the time. There are many users who don't even know what role playing is yet they do it every day. Others, know but do as you say and consider themselves the character whether they realize it or not. They cant bring themselves to fully stick to a character's true personality sometimes. 8/ And these users do not know or do not understand the difference between being in-character and out of character and where someone draws the line.

I have characters who are far braver than I am who would give the shirt off of their back (If they were human XD) for a stranger in need. Likewise, I also have characters who would likely stab someone else in the back at the first opportunity. And then I may have a cub who is so naive and innocent that it dosent even occur to him/her that the world is a dangerous/cruel place. Is that to say that Im either brave, a backstabber, or so naive that I dont acknowledge the problems in this world? No, of course not.

What do we need to start doing? Posting a disclaimer before every post that says: The views of my character do not fully reflect/support all of my personal views? [And sadly, Ive seen some people put things similar to this in their bios, particularly on characters who.... arent the most approachable] Im joking of course but its frustrating... and its likely those types of people are never going to look past the 3d canine or feline on the screen to the fact that there is a real person there.

[Wendingo]

I have this problem a lot. Almost all of my characters are evil/deranged/jerks. A lot of people accuse me of being a rude, mean person. I'll be completely honest, even OOC, I am a bit blunt, but I'm not rude. My characters are. :I I second Silhouette. I actually used to add disclaimers often with my characters, perhaps I should start doing it again.

[Silvermoon22]

I know how you feel  i have tons of  evil  charecters   and when i role they take it so serisouly

[LordSuragaha]

I have to say that I only had this problem once even after I told the people I was roleplaying and it discouraged me from ever playing the evil character again. I have seen alot of people go through it to. Most of the time though its because people are so tired of trolls and people who aren't roleplaying that have nasty attitudes that they just automatically block. Not to mention some people who do play the evil character sometimes over do it making the RP itself unpleasant. Best thing is to just let everyone know, like you guys mentioned a disclaimer. Sorry you had to go through all that Noa

[Turrent]

Ahaa...
Lil' ol' Kechrone goes through the same thing.
When Kechrone plays one of her favourite characters, who is a mean, selfish, nasty, bad-tempered little brat, Kechrone just loves to get right into roleplay her. Trouble is, while Kechrone was rolelaying, one person came up to Kechrone and said they were going to report her for "attacking" them. Kechrone was only roleplaying

[Tortuga]

I have to say that I only had this problem once even after I told the people I was roleplaying and it discouraged me from ever playing the evil character again. I have seen alot of people go through it to. Most of the time though its because people are so tired of trolls and people who aren't roleplaying that have nasty attitudes that they just automatically block. Not to mention some people who do play the evil character sometimes over do it making the RP itself unpleasant. Best thing is to just let everyone know, like you guys mentioned a disclaimer. Sorry you had to go through all that Noa

I understand that people get wary. There are trolls who just join stuff to be a pain, and  the harsher characters are the most annoying when their roleplayers expect your character to sympathize with, feel bad for and/or like their "mean" character, especially when they have NO redeeming personal qualities.  My point is that roleplayers shouldn't expect everyone's characters to be perfect angels that are all around pleasant to the characters within the universe, get mad when they don't meet their standards and then assume that their creator is just like them. Zuberi is completely separate from who I am, and we have next to nothing in common. Besides, he's not really "evil", like the kick-your-puppy, tear-your-wife-in-half, eat-a-baby and be a grouch about everything sort of character; he's just not all that "nice".

Referring to the disclaimer thing; shouldn't one already know the difference between real life and a game, just like you would a movie or a play? O_o

Anyway, I haven't run into the problem all that often, sorry if I said anything that made it seem like it did. It did bother me when it happened, though.  I suppose I should just be a little more choosey about who I roleplay with. XD

[Redlinelies]

I'm sorry if I might tackle this thread wrong, and I might not be the greatest roleplayer out there, but to be fair it's all about how you execute your behavior and check which users you actually are around.

If you and your character is somewhat of jerk, then maybe you should only show this when you are certain that your accompany/party is regulars to roleplays and knows what OOC is and what is not and can tolerate what you want to be. For example if you spend time with a new group in which you have not spend time with you cannot assume they know when you are roleplaying as your character nor accept the sort of roleplay you want to do.

The jump between what is play, and what is not is hard to differ at times to be really honest, I myself both play and roleplay as myself since I do not like the idea of having lots of characters. If someone I never really talked with that much started acting like a complete bumhole towards me within the game in a public map I'd actually respond to their actions of doing so. The majority of the users that has been jerks towards me in public maps in the past in a "roleplay manner" never, ever told me anything if it was a roleplay or not, which means I can just assume.

You most likely aim this thread towards set up roleplays in which you already explained to the rest that your character is what it is and it that case I'd understand it completely since there's no reason for anyone to take it out on you, but otherwise you cannot really expect that these users are able to tell easily, especially if it's not a very serious literate roleplays with private maps and set roleplay times. If I personally would want to roleplay as a jerk character I'd only do so when I was certain that everyone understood me doing so. But then again, some might take things more personal than others.

[Tortuga]

Hi, Red! You pretty much nailed the premise of this post in your last paragraph. =) I don't just spontaneously roleplay with people, especially when I'm playing characters such as the one I mentioned above, because I know how easy it is to get mixed up and I hate offending people; I'm very careful to only try those stunts during an officially set up game or when a group has specifically identified itself as a roleplay. The roleplayer I had trouble with knew we were roleplaying (heck, she was the host, and had invited me via a whisper), but didn't like how my character acted, even when I explained. I tried apologizing to her in hopes that we could keep playing together, but no cigar; it was a shame that what was turning out to be a very exciting roleplay ended due to hard feelings. In the future, I'll try to make sure to explain my character a little better or point them to the biography I have written for approval so there's no misunderstandings.