InsaneJournal

30 Days of RP Meme

Inspirations
Day 01 - Where do you get inspiration for characters and/or plots?
Day 02 - How do other RPers inspire you?
Day 03 - What are the inspirations for your characters' usernames?

Backstage Information
Day 04 - Tell us about a character you almost didn't pick up.
Day 05 - Tell us about a character you wish you still played.
Day 06 - Tell us about a character you're excited about but haven't had a chance to play or develop yet.

PBs
Day 07 - Post pictures of your PBs that would be totally OOC for your character but amuse you anyway.
Day 08 - Post favorite YouTube videos involving your PBs.
Day 09 - What comes first, the PB or the character?

Learning
Day 10 - Tell us about something you learned about or researched for a character.
Day 11 - Tell us about something you learned about from someone else's character or a game plot.
Day 12 - Tell us about a hobby or occupation one of your characters has that you would be interested in pursuing.

Surprises
Day 13 - Tell us about a character who surprised you.
Day 14 - Tell us about a character relationship that surprised you.
Day 15 - Tell us about a plot when the consequences surprised you.

Favorites
Day 16 - Favorite plot tropes.
Day 17 - Favorite character archetypes.
Day 18 - Favorite type of games.

Character Lists
Day 19 - Pick a character and list the contents of their purse, wallet, backpack, or briefcase. (Or whatever container is applicable.)
Day 20 - Pick a character and list their routine of getting ready in the morning.
Day 21 - Pick a character and list what's on their current "to do" list.

Tips and Advice
Day 22 - Best tip/advice for creating a character.
Day 23 - Best tip/advice for getting your mojo back after getting into an RP funk.
Day 24 - Best tip/advice for figuring out what to do when you feel lost with one particular character.

Eras
Day 25 - What's your favorite thing about RPing in contemporary times?
Day 26 - What's your favorite thing about RPing in past/historical times?
Day 27 - What's your favorite thing about RPing in future times?

Potential Games
Day 28 - If a game's premise involves ____, you'll always give it a look.
Day 29 - When investigating a potential game, what things excite you and persuade you to apply?
Day 30 - What goes into your thought process when choosing a first character to apply for in a game?

Day One: Where do you get inspiration for characters and/or plots?

For characters this varies a lot! Often what I do is just look at casts lists and go through names until I decide on one and then just write and see how they turn out. I usually write history first and use that to influence personality too. Other times I choose a PB and get characteristics from the PB. Other times I look at character trait lists and pick off some traits I think could be interesting and go from there. Sometimes I use traits of people I know (a lot of my characters are organised/neat freaks despite the fact I am extremely messy. David hates people touching his notes and school work because they might mess them up. My best friend is like that. I didn't realise that until after I'd written that though but I think it subconsciously gave me the idea) or characters off TV shows or movies or celebrities. Not whole characterisations, just a trait I find interesting. Like I've had a character idea for ages based on an interview I read with Eric Grothe Jnr, who's a rugby league player (and not even on the team I support! But I love him anyway). Or Ruby is cleaning obsessed, sort of like Monica Gellar and Merton's arrogance is based loosely on Noel Gallagher(VERY loosely, because I don't think he's that much like Noel. I love Noel Gallagher though!) Sometimes I just get idea for characters while I'm doing (usually boring) things. Like I have a Natalie Anderson muse that refuses to be written up, but she started chatting while I was paper shredding for my dad one day. And continues to chat everytime I have to shred. 

Another way I get ideas for a character is by coming up with something for them to be interested in, like Evie and her TV obsession. I never really played muggleborns that often but always thought it would be fun to just be able to reference things from TV because that's something I, and a lot of my friends, do in RL. So Evie became TV obsessed so that I could do that for once. Sophia played hockey because I played hockey so it's something I know welland can talk about, which makes it easier than if I'd decided she played netball or something.

For tng characters that are kids of a character I've played, I do like to put aspects of their parents personalities into their personality. Like I play two Cadwallader kids. Blake's obviously like Rhodri (except worse) in the ego and sweet tooth sense so that makes him easily recognisable as Rhodri's kid. Megan got things like photography and a love for alcohol from her mum and travel from her dad but she's also a lot like Rhodri in her inability to open up and tell people about herself. Which I love because everytime she's like that it surprises me how much like Rhodri she really is. 

I'm terrible at coming up with ideas for plots! Usually I just talk to other people and bounce ideas off them until we come up with something.