Need some advice...

[formerly known as hf]

Ok...

It's done... No turning back now...

[Lumera]

While we're on the subject, I'm wondering if someone could clarify something for me, because I've been thinking about this awhile, Where exactly did your character come from? Is it safe to assume the area they've spawned is where they've been all their life, or have they just been wandering around with amnesia for awhile and suddenly snapped out of it, or what?

It seems like a combination of the two would make the most sense, ICly. Maybe some weird form of amnesia that attacks young adults and makes them lose their memory or go wandering off is a common disease in Cantr, just like sleeping sickness. Real amnesiacs still remember how to use ovens and eat potatoes and things like that, so it makes sense that you know the use of the tools and resources in the area you spawned into, (because you learned all that while growing up), only you of course don't remember any of the people or laws or anything like that, which is why it's common for the government to place helpful notes around to help "new people" get orientated.

I know all that may be stretching it a bit, but I just feel there needs to be some sort of consistent IC explanation as to where all these people came from before anyone can be expected to "correctly" roleplay their characters.

Most people just seem to gloss over the issue. I see most newspawns saying something like "Hi, my name is so-and-so and I'm new here." Well if they're new, where did they come from? Doesn't anybody ever wonder? Don't they? Are they travellers or what? Most serious roleplaying games make you submit a history for your character, and they make sure it fits in with the world before they let you play, but with Cantr you can't do that without plugging in OOC knowledge. In the end I think it strains credulity to have all these twenty-year-olds essentially having to act like wide-eyed little children, with no explanation as to why. And even the 'wide-eyed little children' part doesn't make sense, because in that case, when did your character learn to speak? Or read, for that matter?

[The Industriallist]

Well, the one background point that I think is solid is that characters don't have any pre-spawning existance in the cantr world.

[Lumera]

But that have to have existed somewhere, right? They're at least twenty years old.

LOL, I hate logic holes. I'm fine as long as I don't think about it too hard, but when I do...

It's just that your character's origin and what they do and do not know has such a huge effect on the way people roleplay, but no one can seem to agree on any of this stuff. I'm amazed more characters haven't brought this up ingame, it seems like it would be a huge mystery that everyone wonders about.

[The Sociologist]

1) Cantr has no dictionary, so I think you can assume that the language that you're playing under is developed to the level that it is today. Ie: "Yo'" means "Hello", and "xenophobia" is "fear of people" - In other words, everything English speaking knows of the English language as a whole, excelt if you RP that they don't. If there were restrictions on words, it wouldn't make sense to the players. So, essentially, since your character has all the language knowledge that you do, they should know the meaning of shield - Unless you want to RP that they don't.

But this seems to be an excellent series of points, all of which I agree with. To take it further though, if your character understands the commonsense meaning of shield, then he or she should possess an a priori understanding that "oven" means a device used for cooking. Had Jos not intended this, then he would have called an oven a "winglefabbit" and a loom a "grimplefarber". This is all I was really saying before.
.

[The Sociologist]

In the end I think it strains credulity to have all these twenty-year-olds essentially having to act like wide-eyed little children, with no explanation as to why. And even the 'wide-eyed little children' part doesn't make sense, because in that case, when did your character learn to speak? Or read, for that matter?

Well, given that I was new to the game not long ago, that's how my characters literally were. They didn't have the faintest clue... If a sheriff asks you to help drag and you try dragging him instead, then being wide-eyed helps.

So I suppose a certain duty falls onto experienced players to try an establish the "credentials" of a newspawn. Why are they acting the way they are? A genuinely hopeless case, or a promising new player who will benefit from advice?

Many towns do rather well at this, but a few are pretty dreadful.
.

[myst]

I have to agree that Character History is a sticking point for me. All of my character histories are exactly as Lumera described - glossed over. Can characters say they are newly spawn? Are they? Or do they always have some new and innocent, out-of-town upbringing in the way that we understand it? That is a simple question with (that I've found) no simple answer.

Do the characters know that turning 20 is sich a huge event in their life? Could some history, some "Time of Choosing", "Coming of Age" etc be introduced formally?

The logic hole - the not knowing if what you are doing with your character is by the rules - its very frustrating. Especially back when you are new to Cantr.

PS The resolution here of how IC understanding of objects works makes lots of sense. It should be in the FAQ...

[The Industriallist]

Well, I think you have some freedom about that. All anyone can be sure of is:

>Characters have absolutely no prior knowledge of anything in the region.
>No one under 20 ever appears in the world.
>If characters come from somewhere, it's a physical impossibility for them to go back.
>Characters can be spawned without anyone noticing. So it isn't a spectacular process...at least, not usually.

Any memories your character claims before 20 have to be consistent with these, unless you intend the character's 'knowledge' to be in contradiction of objective reality. For example, if your character refers to their parents (yes, I've seen that ), remember that no one has ever seen those hypothetical parents or heard of a process by which people can create new people. At least not since they turned 20.

[myst]

So what ARE cantr people? They clearly aren't human. They do not reproduce, they spawn. Do they therefore have reproductive organs? Cos theres been an awful lot of CR breaches if they don't! (The "funny things" thread has a few references...) Can they actually have sex? Obviously the actual RPing of that would be... interesting... but if not then it really affects the way that people should behave. And if there are no consequences of it, would it actually be a big thing in the Cantr world. (On which subject: is "not wearing anything worth mentioning" wearing anything at all? Cos why would people go out of there way to manufacture a loincloth to replace their normal clothes otherwise? OK, the wanting to be Tarzan RP would do it, but most characters I've seen wearing primative clothing are constructive types)

OK, most of that is completely irrelevent to the original discussion but they are still valid points I haven't yet resolved. You might well want to RP something involving clothes, and I'm betting there are couples out there.

Gosh. All my non-dense characters might start taking up a religion - since science is not going to do a whole lot of good in Cantr!

[kroner]

well, i can answer one of those questions. before clothing was intorduced there was no description of what they were wearing (obviously). then when clothing came around, it said that characters were naked. suddenly half the characters in cantr started rping embarassment about how they were suddenly naked (even though they had really been so all a long). it was a big mess... and so the description was changed.

[Lumera]

Aww, they should have kept it that way. I'm sure that's actually happened to some cultures on Earth; it might be perfectly acceptable to go around with nothing on until everyone else starts wearing clothes, and then you're embarrassed to be naked. If nothing else it would have been an incentive to produce clothes and trade the raw materials. I'm always surprised at the number of well-established characters I see that don't bother to wear anything.

Oh, and which one of you is Alex, aka "A" the amnesiac? That's gotta be someone who read this thread, it just seems like too much of a coincidence...

[Chrissy]

It might be perfectly acceptable to go around with nothing on until everyone else starts wearing clothes, and then you're embarrassed to be naked.

Exactly. Except it should come over a period of time. The minute clothes were introduced characters said,"oh my gosh, I'm naked!" Which was rediculous because they had been naked for 20 years.

I'm always surprised at the number of well-established characters I see that don't bother to wear anything.

About 5 cantr years ago a few of my characters started to become conscience of the fact they were naked, because so many other characters are starting to be dressed, so they're getting dressed. I have other characters though who just see the clothes as a bother and something that would interfere with their daily lives so they'll never probably wear clothes. That's just where they're at now. It could be different 6 months from now.

[The Sociologist]

On which subject: is "not wearing anything worth mentioning" wearing anything at all? Cos why would people go out of there way to manufacture a loincloth to replace their normal clothes otherwise? OK, the wanting to be Tarzan RP would do it, but most characters I've seen wearing primative clothing are constructive types

I tend to see Cantr characters as starting out wearing those untailored Maoist trouser suits with the little floppy peaked caps and living in a sort of socialist utopia where all your basic needs are provided by boundless potatoes, but no more.

So compared to that a fur bikini is a status symbol. Maybe even a loincloth...
.