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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6684627" data-attributes="member: 42582">I definitely agree with this. I'd go so far as to say that, for a good RPGing experience it's incontrovertible!Ditto.I've grouped these two quotes together because they both raise the issue - What does it mean to play "in character"?I don't think I agree that it is a spectrum between "method acting" and mere tokenism. And I know that I reject the idea that playing a character in an RPG is primarily about voice or mannerisms.I think voice or mannerisms - what can more generally be called colour - becomes a focus when the players lack the capacity (due to overt rules, default play procedures, or whatever) to make any more significant impact on the fiction. But where players are able to actually impact the fiction, then in my experience the fictional events that result from those play choices are far more significant than whether or not the PC has distinctive mannerisms.My view is expressed well in <a href="http://www.rpg.net/oracle/essays/itoolkit3.html" target="_blank">this quote</a> from Christopher Kubasik:Characters drive the narrative of all stories. However, many people mistake character for characterization. Characterization is the look of a character, the description of his voice, the quirks of habit. Characterization creates the concrete detail of a character through the use of sensory detail and exposition. By "seeing" how a character looks, how he picks up his wine glass, by knowing he has a love of fine tobacco, the character becomes concrete to our imagination, even while remaining nothing more than black ink upon a white page. But a person thus described is not a character. A character must do. Character is action. That's a rule of thumb for plays and movies, and is valid as well for roleplaying games . . . . This means that the best way to reveal your character is not through on an esoteric monologue about pipe and tobacco delivered by your character, but through your character's actions.Here is a bit from pages 2 and 4 of Fate Core:If you've never played a roleplaying game before, here's the basic idea: you and a bunch of friends get together to tell an interactive story about a group of character you make up. . . . If you're a player, your primary job is to take responsibility for portraying one of the protagonists of the game, which we call a player character . . . You make decisions for your character and describe to everyone else what your character says and does.I think the emphasis on decisions is important. Action over mannerisms. (There is also no very significant contrast between this and the AD&D 2nd ed text, unless you give the words "pretend" and "appropriate" in that text some very specific meanings.)</blockquote>

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