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How to Make a Brief Description of a Character for an RPG Game

Whether you're creating a player character for an online game, programming your own computer-based role-playing game or describing a non-player character for a tabletop game, writing a brief description of a character uses the same set of skills and follows the same rules. A good description will convey information the players need to know about the character while being brief enough for them to remember it easily and vivid enough that they'll want to interact further with the character.

Things You'll Need

Writing materials

Instructions

- 1
  Make a list of all the information you need to convey about the character. What will help the players understand who this character is? You may want to consider the character's age, sex, ethnic origin or profession. If there are other pieces of information you need the players to know--for instance, if the character is carrying a noticeable object--write them down now.
- 2
  Consider ways to convey this information through appearance. For instance, if the character is a carpenter, perhaps his or her clothes are covered with sawdust. Telling details make characters more memorable than giving simple statements.
- 3
  Read your description with brevity in mind. Many game masters or players become anxious that details about their characters won't come out in play. This can lead to introductions that cram in every detail about the character until the players' eyes glaze over. With descriptions, sometimes less is more. Confine your description to the obvious and let the players discover details in play.
- 4
  Compare your description to other character descriptions in the same game. Have you left out anything other writers have included? Don't feel that you need to duplicate other character descriptions; just use this as a last check for anything you might have forgotten.

Role Playing Games