Memory Spans

[88302]

If there's already a topic like this I apologize.

I was looking at something today, and I realized my character was very clearly recalling events from a month or so ago. Now for me, this is no big issue, but for this character- that would have been years ago.

Do we give our characters more of a memory span than they should have? I can't clearly recall my birthday last year (and I'm speaking of before the alcohol), but our character remember not only days that are milestones to them, but many uneventful days that span back for years.

I'm not suggesting we make them resemble a goldfish or any such. I'm just curious as to what others think on the subject. Do our characters remember things better than they should be capable of? Considering the ratio.

[fishfin]

My character's memory span is no longer than my own, mine is limited to about a week for most things that I don't consider vital (like cantr).

[Voltenion]

my charries memories are terrible because I have too many so I end up confusing their events and bla bla bla... In the end, I rp with many of my charries bad memory

And my memory is terrible too. By reading your name, 88302, I forgot my ID --'

[Doug R.]

As far as I'm concerned, my character's memory is my saved logfiles, so with a little effort, they could remember anything at all from their whole life.

[Sebas]

And my memory is terrible too. By reading your name, 88302, I forgot my ID --'

Haha!


We could just rp cantrians have a good memory

[Lyd]

My characters tend to have a longer memory span than I do...simply because of the logs. However, some of my characters are more industrious and compassionate than others...so it depends on my, the player's, level of laziness which characters I will actually go back and check logs.

I have had bad luck with my daily logs switching over to Text on my email...even when I switch it back to HTML...so inevitably when I need some information about a character...it will be a daily log that I have lost to this strange change that occurs ever so often. So I fear several of my charries come off as absent-minded...

I have one whom I am playing as losing her memory. She is advancing in age, lost her lover and has thrown herself into droning work...so it is credible.
Poor thing! *Weeps while she works* Oh wait...I just described your basic 50 year old woman...

[Missy]

I don't collect my logs. Everything my characters remember, they remember from me. Some of them keep journals (which is where I mark important dates, because Im not good remembering numbers. For example, IRL I don't ever remember how old I am and I still can't remember how old my mom is or what year she was born That's sad isn't it? I have to ask my husband "I'm 25 right?") So my characters get that flaw by default and like I have to write things on a calender, my characters have to write them in a journal--at least for date specific things.


I don' tknow what happened to me in the last year. I was so good at remembering everything for this one character. It rarely forgot anything. Remembered who everyone was, what crime they had even if it was twenty five years ago IC, where the crime was at, why I didn't like them/felt they were suspicious. (and that's without.."Without" having to write notes in peoples names to remember them.)What I owed to someone in a trade, who wanted to trade even if it was twenty people all at once. What the name of the persons boat was etc. Now Im lucky if I remember what it is the character was doing before I logged out last. I hate it. I don't know what happened to me/the character that caused this to happen but it's awful to go through. (Well especially when you prided yourself on never forgetting anything or anyone.)

[Chris]

Do we give our characters more of a memory span than they should have?

The fact that most of us as players run multiple characters as well as have a life outside of Cantr detracts from the characters' ability to remember. Our ability to search text logs — if we take the time and know what to search for — adds to it. Overall, it's a wash.

[SekoETC]

I keep all the logs but I don't store them on my computer anymore. That was too much hassle. Since Yahoo Mail has infinite storage capacity now, I keep all the emails. There's also a search function, although it occasionally doesn't work. I only refer to the logs if it's something important, and even if I found some info on the logs, my character doesn't necessarily recall it if I didn't already remember it without the logs.

What Missy wrote made me laugh. I remember last summer as I was working in the café and a co-worker asked my age, I couldn't remember. I'm not always sure about it but I usually remember it after a while of pondering. I don't remember the ages of my parents, I just remember dad is over 50 (actually he's over 60 now) and have big trouble remembering that mom is over 50 (keep thinking 45 or so). I remember which month people -- no wait, can't remember dad. But dad was born in the summer. Mom was in March and my brother was in April.

Oh, and I hate it how characters can remember by the gram how much their project resulted in. And that people post those ridiculous copy paste logs! Lazy bastards. At least replace the strings of x speaks to y, y speaks to x with I saw x and y discussing with each other, and feel free to leave out people entering and leaving buildings if it doesn't contribute to the story.

[Bowser]

I have characters that are 80 years old and over 100 years old and I forget names of old friends and dates of important events that occured long ago because I don't keep a log. So, I think that anything important enough for me to remember that happened 6 RL years ago, my character will remember as an old man.

[tiddy ogg]

Cantrians' memories are different from ours. IRL names are some of the first things you forget, but that is the one definite thing Cantrians remember.

[Bowser]

I am talking about people I knew way back when who are long since gone... people's names I want to mention when telling histories of areas and such. I don't remember a lot of them.

[Piscator]

It always annoys me like hell when I meet someone I have clearly met before and I can't remember where and when that's been. Well, happens in RL too I guess.

Remembering the ages of people is quite hard for me too. Probably because they change every year. (Years were much longer in the good ol' days *sigh*) I'm much more succesful in remembering years of birth.

[frenchfisher]

I don't write anything down about my characters, and my record of saving names is shoddy

[Trapaças]

My chars always write something important for their lives on a note, that way I can recall it better make an RP like "Man how long has this happened this really brings back some good memories" and stuff.
My personal memory in terms of remembering names is quite bad, i usually have a description of them written somewhere so i don't forget their names until i get used to them
I guess this depends of the chars owner memory, his\her laziness and respective chars personality.
Of course a thief char won't remember his\her last pillage on detail because that could give some trouble, the only thing they can remember is the last place they "visited" so they no longer go there in a while