Disassociation from Your Character

Christopher Reeves is not really Superman, James Earl Jones is not Darth Vader and neither was the man in the suit. These personalities were characters, just as the personality you create for roleplay purposes is a character. This character is not you and should be as unlike you as possible.

As I mentioned previously roleplay is a hobbie of skill and ingenuity. Celebrated is the roleplayer who can create a character as unlike them as possible and sucessfully roleplay them consistently. People may find YOU just as interesting as any character created however, this is a different world; in this world you must remember you don't exist, just your character.

The importance of distinguishing yourself from your character.

Because roleplay is a art which aims to make fantasy as real as possible, you'll find your ficticious character has found themselves in some very realistic situations and must deal with some very realistic emotions. When this occurs, it is left to the common sense and standard sanity level of the player to realize that these occurances are between characters and not the players who play them.

Alot of places have strict rule governing in character (IC) and out of character (OOC) behavior and how they coincide. If you feel this person is targeting you for out of character reasons it would do you well to speak with them out of game, figure out if such is the case and if such is the case report them to the proper gaming authorities.

Never take in game situations personally and never let yourself get so drawn into a situation that you begin to believe an aspect of your characters life is yours as well. A common situation in which this is most prone to happen is the issue of in game relationships reaching out of game and into your real life. If ever you find yourself humoring such ideas, consider this:

You created a false personna (your character) and met another false personna (another character)and your character has fallen in love with this person or is infatuated etc... You may find yourself falling in love with that character as well. But it is no more real nor substantial as falling in love with Rambo or Lara Croft. You have fallen in love with the character, not the player. You've become infatuated with a made up personality with a made up fantasy image and to humor the thought that the player is just like the character is to run into disaster later on.

You don't know who's behind that character, it could even be a female character being controlled by a male player or vice verse. The character may be eighteen, but the player might in fact be fourty-seven. Roleplay has a habit of creating more then perfect images in people's head. Real life is never perfect, don't set yourself up for disaster.

Roleplaying is by no means a great way to play the dating field either. Don't be heading into an roleplay game (RPG) or situation with the intent of drumming yourself up a great date. As is always the case with the net the likelyhood of this person living in the next town is next to nil. More then likely there is countries seperating you from the other player.

RP is simply a detailed hobbie, just like reading a book it isn't in your interest to get so pulled into the scene as to lose sleep over things. And if you happen to be in a situation you don't want to be you may choose to step out of that situation just as you can close a book at will.

Don't let yourself get carried into your character. You may find you created them with alot of your same traits, but as time passes and your skills increase, work towards giving them their own personality and habits. You should work towards the perspective of a director if you haven't done so already. One where you look at the entire scene from the outside in. Asthetics and realist detail should be your first concern and the only personal attachment you should have to an rp is one that leaves you feeling proud of the great RP effort you put into things.

When entering an RP situation, you should hold true to the disclaimer here and assume the other player does as well, as the players aren't what matter for the most part, just the characters.