Guide: God-Modding

[Shizuka]

(c) KEIRA from origin-wolves-v2.proboards.com

Here, I will explain what god-moding is, how to avoid it, and how to create a believable, natural, lovable (or hatable) character.

We'll start with the definition of god-modding. God modding means acting like God, such that you are invincible, immortal, unhurtable, perfect or just plain powerful. It can also involve the use of power playing, wherein you control other people's characters without their permission, or making a Mary-sue/Gary-stu-ish character wherein they have no flaws, and are perfect. It is an annoying and childish form of roleplaying, which eventually leads to frustration since no one wants to roleplay with a perfect or invincible character. The person who god-mods also generally feels hurt and distrungled, and thus they leave the site.

So who wins here? No one. When you god-mod, people don't like your character, they don't like you, and you don't like the site. No one is happy with this situation. (Least of all the admin.) Thankfully, this serious roleplaying vice can be easily avoided. Let me list down the steps of avoiding having a perfect character and/or god-modding. Please note, that while god-modding is generally associated with power playing, a lot of these other aspects also come into it.

So to avoid god-modding:

• First take a look at your character. Are they vincible? Mortal? Do they have flaws? Unless they are a God (and sometimes even if they are) they can and should have flaws. A kind person who is very proud? A powerful princess who is cynical and also makes wrong decisions? A lethal assasin who has a weakness for drink? Be creative with your characters flaws as well as their strengths. Also, don't let your first year wizard know everything in the book, and if they do (like Hermione) give them some flaws like her bossy attitude and her know-it-all reputation. Also, don't stick with one flaw, give them many interacting flaws and make them complex instead of one-dimensional. For eg. you have a character called Lia, who's shy, intelligent, sweet, beautiful. And then you read this and decide to give her a flaw like, "She's innocent." And that just doesn't work.
  
  
• Take into account the consequences of the deeds of the characters. Heck, you might have a character who really likes to use unforgivable curses, but it's quite likely that Hogwarts would have removed them from the school. Also, that debonair guy who breaks all the rules and gets away with them, and flouts authority like he just doesn't care (aka Gary-stu) should know where the Headmaster's office is.
  
  
• Take another look at your characters appearance, too. How many people in the world have you seen that are completely beautiful? In a rough world, people have rough hands, they have scars, they have tattoos, they have injuries, they have diseases - unless of course their upbringing has been unnatural. Flawless skin and soft hands might work on Rich Daddy's Spoilt Princess but they don't work on abused peasant girl or runaway daughter from abusive parents. So look into it.
  
  
• Now, when you are roleplaying with someone else, remember who your character is, and who their character is. Do NOT, for example, post like this. (There are two charries in this roleplay, Destiny and Stella.)
  
  Stella posts:
  
  Stella sat down on her bed in the room, and waited for her sister to come in.
  
  Destiny posts:
  
  Destiny came into the room and said, "Hi Stella." She then took a pillow and hit Stella with it. Stella screamed and picked up another pillow.
  
  (Why is this wrong? Because Destiny is deciding two things that only Stella should decide: 1) that she got hurt with a pillow and 2) that she picked up another pillow)
  
  So let the other person decide! It's their character, thus it's their choice whether they got hurt, whether they cried, whether they dodged, whether they died or whether they ran away.
  
  
• Last thing, when in battle, don't be invincible. Unless it has already been established that the person before you is much lower than your character in fighting skills, you cannot keep hurting that person without them even touching you. (Think about it. A gentle healer and a brave knight, yes the knight can win easily. But a joust between two mages, or two knights, two wizards...not so much)
  

One last thing. You can powerplay in one ocassion, that is when there are NPC's or non player controlled characters. Sometimes we have to create armies, or dark-knights or creatures or pets for us to control. Then, you can powerplay all you want. Just as long as it is NOT someone elses character.