Do your characters have pre-spawn histories?

[SekoETC]

It feels better if they have.

[creepyguyinblack]

I think I've seen others do this too, but I usually just assume a new character of mine has spent his first 20 years learning the basics of the world, feeding himself, doing small insignificant tasks in the area he was born. Now that he's twenty, he's finally old enough to be recognized and listened to by the public. People claiming to have histories, even if they are related to actual cantr events, just seems too artificial and forced.

[rklenseth]

I have. Not all but some of the of the more interesting characters. I do it more to explain their behaviors today. I usually make sure that I as a player have some understanding of the history of the area so I can fit the character's prespawn history into it.

But one thing about making prespawn histories is to always make it so your character was born in the place he or she was spawned. As well as they shouldn't have traveled around an area before 20. They were born in spawn place, lived their first 20 years there. Otherwise it really stretches the Capital Rule a bit and come close to breaking it. And keep your character's prespawn history simple. The only I do is to make so as to explain my character's background which sort of explains the character personality and behavior.

An example of this is; James Whitmore was born in Drojf. He would have been a teenager around the time that the First Krif Empire took over Drojf where Maynard's people killed a whole bunch of people in Drojf. Know today as the Drojf Massacre. Now James story is that his parents perished in that massacre, he became an orphan living out on the streets of Drojf until when he turned 20 he was recruited by the Krif Dark Legion to serve the First Krif Empire. It sort of explains how James got where he was then. Also explains is somewhat tortured soul but very few people know of this these days. Most people only know him as the owner of the Metalworking Shop in Seatown Forest these days rather than the spy, warrior, orphan, traitor, etc... He wasn't always the simple shop keeper in the Forest.

[SekoETC]

This has risen to be a trouble again. It is not officially said (at least to my knowledge) that the characters were not in fact alive and materialized before the age of twenty, so people would logically presume that the life starts from 0 and fill the void with something. Usually this "childhood" is not mentioned, but sometimes you have to pull it up. If it is with a crazy character there's no problem, they can say ok, he/she is just imagining things. But if a sane (or meant to be sane) character has to explain pre-spawn life to another person who has been spawned and cannot understand the concept of childhood, it's like explaining colours to a blind person. And in this case you are also blind, only that you used to see many years ago. Or so you think. But if everyone else is also blind, after a while you start to wonder if there in fact are no colours, like everyone seems to claim. Ok, off with the metaphore. Unless you totally wipe out your character's early past and either tell others to forget all that has been said about it, or tell them that you have been lying, making it all up, the only options that remain are:

You are mentally ill

or

You are not a human (or Cantrian, what ever they are called).

The latter would make you an elf-sort of figure from the invisible zone no one can enter. And we are told we cannot play other than human characters. So does that mean that most of my early characters are all nuts? (Well we know that Seko is nuts but the others too?)

[Pirog]

rklenseth>

I thought it was considered a serious CR breach to let actions that your characters hasn't experienced "in person" have an impact on them?

[Zoot]

Some of mine do---but I don't really come up with them until there's a reason to reveal them. I come up with the character and motives, then the backstory that explains them. Cart works before the horse.

I only have a single character right now, Thalia, with an especially detailed backstory, and that's partly because she took up with another character with a -really- good one.

No--two. I've been working on David...

[Nick]

I believe the answer to this should be a definite no...
Isnt this like one of the parts directly talked about in the Capital Rule?
*searches for a quote*

[SekoETC]

Well I repeat I do not remember seeing such thing and I read through about every background thing before joining Cantr. And new people usually have some sort of an idea that there has been life, if not detailed than at least some sort. What rklenseth wrote is a good story, I don't think he did it in order to gain any advantage by knowing things that happened when the character was not game-technically around and I bet it has given the charrie depth, I'm sorry he's dead. I think it's pretty rude for people to start bouncing on others for not knowing that in Cantr 20=0. It's unlogical, so it should be posted with big letters and hide the not so important babble.

[Pirog]

I agree on it being a good story, but it takes away an important factor in Cantr, and especially in that region...forging history. If you have played there with older characters and apply their knowledge to your new ones simply because you know it has happened you must somewhere know that you are breaking the CR.

This is why children will be so important for Cantr. Then you truly will have a background, and your parents will be able to tell you about the horrible invasion when they were young etc.

[SekoETC]

Totally. But there really is a problem for me that will not go away until -- lets see... *frown* ok only Seko, Jaina, Hannah and Gahak have the problem from my newbie ignorance (because they have reference to family). So until they have all either died or gone insane before it stops affecting me. And you can have a historical background by hearing things OOC. Now my histories are brief and take place in the void between the locations and roads, always in an area similar to the spawning location but still it cannot be exactly in the location since people are not seen before spawning. So (at least for me) there exists a generation of "celestials" that have come from some supernatural dimension. Which is also a CR breach.. Oh well... I was thinking I have enough freaks as it is but you know Seko is totally nuts and the others have shown signs of unstability.

[Revanael]

I'm pretty certain it was agreed that characters have no, and can have no, history before they spoawn.

[Zoot]

If pre-spawn histories are kept private--to a small, like-minded group of rolplayers in a given area--I don't see what the problem would be.

It isn't quite akin to walking into the middle of Quill and yelling, "Boy, have I had some exciting pre-teen adventures!"

The former wouldn't effect general gameplay. It'd only enrich the experience of the select few who like that.

[SekoETC]

After running ingame into a couple of people that were "grown" on the area and casually asked if a person (name probably picked from the citizens list) was around - though he had left years ago - I'm beginning to see the trouble of this. Growing in the void between locations could be ok though it's always hard knowing you can't go back home, but if you say you were born in that location, it creates many problems. You don't know the people or what has happened, and they do not know you. Sure in a small location everyone could play along but still there's too much gaps. That's why we need childhood.

[Pirog]

Zoot>

But if you apply a background to a character in a region that has been massacred by their neighbours andact from that pre-existance knowledge you break the rules even if you keep it to yourself...

[Schme]

It does not make sense to have a pre-spawn history. First, if you had it, why did no one else know about it? Who were your childhood friends.

The whole thing with the spawn is that is your birth. Cantarians cannot conceive children, all people are spawned at twenty, consequently, the spawn date is your birth, and you are born a full able person, witht he body of a twenty year old ( but in Cantr, a newborn)

I have always just assumed my characters materialized out of nowhere, and came into being with personalties, ambitions and opnions, even knowdlege, seemingly out of nowhere.


I liked how one person put it in their characters memoir "I journeyed through time and space, appearing in the town of town, with no recolection of anything before that moment." or something like that.


But then again, what do I know?