Character Adoption Policy

[Wes]

Hi Star Army,

With over 1,200 wiki articles in the character: namespace, Star Army is definitely a universe with a lot of PCs and NPCs in it! But a lot of these articles are no longer being updated. When players leave, their characters are often stuck in limbo. Nobody wants to step on the owner's toes, but sometimes the characters are in an important positions as part of a plot.

What I want to do is come up with a policy that allows characters that haven't been used in a certain amount of time to be claimed by other players (to use as player characters) or by GMs (to be used as NPCs).

Here's my suggested criteria.

---

Characters become adoptable:

• If their player has said the character is adoptable or up for grabs.
• If their player has declared they're leaving the site.
• If a player is inactive: Hasn't logged into the forums for over 1 calendar year.

If the character's player is still active, you need to get permission from the player to adopt their unused character. Characters who are a background fixture of the setting (e.g. heads of state) are not adoptable and characters with high ranks need permission from the appropriate faction manager.

To adopt a character:

Post that you're going to adopt the character on the roleplay and setting discussion forums. If no one has a legitimate objection within a week, the character is now. Legitimate reasons include:

• The player is involuntarily unable to log in (due to medical issues, military deployment, etc) but is expected to return.
• The original player can cancel the adoption of the character he created if he/she shows up and posts an objection. If this happens, the original player is obligated to start actually using that character. Open RP is a good place to use plotless characters.
• Some other player or GM has already announced prior plans for a character and can show proof of that. Player plans take priority over GM plans.
• In general, character adoption is "first come, first serve."

If you adopt a character, you are expected to use and maintain that character. If the character's page is not updated within 7 days, or if the character is not used within a month, they are adoptable again.

The staff may regularly comb through bios looking for abandoned, neglected old characters that could use some love, particularly ones with unused art in them. You are are allowed to adopt characters to update and release them (e.g. fix up and make into better adoptables so they can be used as pregens). New players will be offered the option of adopting one of these fixed-up "pregen" bios.

To Opt Out:

Players can opt out of adoption or assign a friend as caretaker of that character by putting a note in the OOC section of their biography.

---

Your feedback is appreciated.
Let me know what you think.

 

[Yoshi]

I personly would not like someone who really had nothing to do with my characters to take them over, not matter how long they are in limbo. I know that if i put a character there it would be because I want to put them away and maybe come back to them down the rood.

This polocy would cause me to have to check everyday the character thread to make sure one of my characters are not being taken.

I think that if folks want to donate characters to a orphanage then that would be a much better idea. Then only characters that are given away will be handed out. As for only a month of down time before they can be taken... It seems pretty short. If a family crisis comes up, ti can last longer then a month, And as much as i love SARP, it isn't my end all be all. And during a crisis, checking in here would go out the window. so a situation outside my control could lead to me losing all my characters...

So like a I said I think only characters that have been put up for adoption should be on that list.

 

[Reynolds]

That's about what I was going to say. Giving someone's character to another player without their permission sounds like a Bad Idea.

I would be comfortable with a GM-run NPC variation, though. If the player disappears and it's necessary for the character to do something, I think the GM already has permission to control the character. I'd say continue that for the first month, and then mark the character as abandoned, and have them fade further into the background for a bit. If the player doesn't return for, say, three months, then the character should be flagged as an NPC that GMs could use to fill out a crew or setting, as long as no major changes are made. They're just a face and a name filling a spot, so we don't have to keep making up new NPCs. Especially useful for saving art, I'm sure getting chibis for people who leave after a month is frustrating.

Established players should have to opt in for this, if they announce they're leaving. Taking someone's character away because they retire does not sound very nice. Say, once someone has played here for one year, they should only be up for this if they disappear or say they've donated their characters to the GMs. People who have been around for a while will probably have a plan for how they want to 'retire' their characters, and don't particularly want them to just be grabbed up and altered as punishment for leaving.

 

[Nashoba]

I do not think that a character should be eligible for adoption if the owning player is still active.

• For example I have an NPC that I created a long time ago for when I create designs for Star Army. So she does not get much updating. But that does not make her orphaned.
  
• GM NPC's should be restricted to GM's. These characters are often key figures not only in plots, but in their Faction and should be kept in the hands of GMs.
  
• I suggest that the inactive duration be a bit longer, 3-6 month range. We have had folks who due to circumstances beyond their control vanish for a couple of months and then return.

 

[Wes]

What if players could leave "wills" on character bios that allow characters to be passed on to a specific trusted member of their choice, and/or give that person a sort of "power of attorney" over their character? Would that help?

So like a I said I think only characters that have been put up for adoption should be on that list.

But the vast majority of characters that would be adoptable would be ones whose creator is long gone and can't "opt in" to put their characters up for adoption. That's why it needs to be automatic. People that are still semi-around and still care about their characters (e.g. Kim) can just object to the character being adopted and/or give the adopter their blessing. Maybe we can give players an option to "opt out" by leaving a note on their character bio that they prefer that the character is not reused by another player or GM.

I suggest that the inactive duration be a bit longer, 3-6 month range.

The reason I went with a month is that is when the player rights expire and because I wanted characters in a plot to be able to be picked up by other players in that plot in a reasonably short amount of time. Having to wait multiple months would mean the character would be forced to be a GM NPC or be removed for the interim.

 

[Floodwaters]

What if players could leave "wills" on character bios that allow characters to be passed on to a specific trusted member of their choice, and/or give that person a sort of "power of attorney" over their character? Would that help?

I like that idea.

But the vast majority of characters that would be adoptable would be ones whose creator is long gone and can't "opt in" to put their characters up for adoption. That's why it needs to be automatic. People that are still semi-around and still care about their characters (e.g. Kim) can just object to the character being adopted and/or give the adopter their blessing. Maybe we can give players an option to "opt out" by leaving a note on their character bio that they prefer that the character is not reused by another player or GM.

I agree with the sentiment of this statement, in that players who vanish for months (more than three) don't really have a leg to stand on if they come back and find that their characters have been hijacked. I do remember reading during the character creation process that it's already expected that you keep up a certain level of activity, or the GM can do with your character as they please.

However, shorter time periods are a little grayer, as Nashoba suggested above.

I do also think that there could be some mitigating circumstances that should allow this to be bent a little bit. The "will" suggestion above could mitigate some of this, but new players might have a tougher time finding someone to agree to be their executor.

 

[Doshii Jun]

I hate to be the jerk here, but I feel this hasn't yet been answered: What's the point of this?

You are establishing a policy where players are able to take up the creative output of a person and suddenly use it for themselves. Characters that might or might not have history, but certainly have a flavor, a purpose, a something-that-is-unique to the creator.

I get there are legal (player rights expire) and monetary (we spent money on them) arguments to this. But do you really expect a lot of people to want to pick up someone else's discard and use it for themselves?

I also get you want to make it even easier to get the Open RP going. Is this really the way to do it? Players now could join the site and, under this policy, just pick up an adoptable character to use. No interaction. No real process. No substantive gatekeeping.

GMs already have the authority to NPC characters when players bail. Plot audits ensure that we have to update the bios of chars in a plot.

Again, I have to ask: What's the point of this policy?

 

[Kyle]

Sorry, but no. There shouldn't be any reason for another player(other than a GM), who had nothing to do with a characters creation, to be taking over another players character. Not only does that player not understand the history behind the character they would be taking, they also don't understand the personality and how that character has been portrayed in the setting.

By allowing another player to take over, it can radically change the way that character appears; it can also potentially allow people to take a character of 'high standing' and use that character to cause abuse in the setting. Such as someone taking an officer character, and using it to cause grief to a player in the setting that they don't like.

Not only that, but this policy would be very unfair to players who suddenly get a work schedule that requires them to have to take a brief hiatus from the site without notice, an example being soldiers; who tend to have long deployment times with little to no access to the internet. There are times when a soldier might get deployed and be unable to post anything about it due to it being sudden.

 

[Doshii Jun]

Wes put in a military deployment exception, so that part should be covered.

 

[Gwathdraug]

Characters should only transfer control due to necessity on the part of a GM from an extended AWOL or through a player-to-player agreement where the stipulations have been set on a personal basis and a sufficient level of understanding has been imparted between the two involved parties.

Having an institutionalized process (especially one with such a short grab period as thirty days) seems more like a potential way to dive towards an unhealthy roleplaying environment than anything else.

 

[Wes]

Imagine you're a kid and your friend comes over and plays with your Legos. While there, he builds a little car. Every time he comes over he drives his little yellow Lego man around in the car and you guys have fun playing. At some point, his dad gets a new job and he moves to another state and you'll probably never see him again. Now the car is sitting there unused. Is it okay for you to drive his little Lego car now, or take it apart for those parts you want to use? How long do you wait?

this policy would be very unfair to players who suddenly get a work schedule that requires them to have to take a brief hiatus from the site without notice, an example being soldiers; who tend to have long deployment times with little to no access to the internet. There are times when a soldier might get deployed and be unable to post anything about it due to it being sudden.

This was already covered in the OP post; deployments were even addressed specifically!

Not only does that player not understand the history behind the character they would be taking, they also don't understand the personality and how that character has been portrayed in the setting.

That stuff should be on the bio. A character played a little differently is better than one that is doomed to never be used again because the creator disappeared.

it can also potentially allow people to take a character of 'high standing' and use that character to cause abuse in the setting.

Again, I'd rather have someone play a character in most cases than have them unused. High standing characters such as fleet admirals could be off-limits due to the "part of the setting" rule in the OP. However, would love to have a veteran SARPer take over Shizuka Endo or one of the other abandoned admirals (after an OOC interview or something) and help me run the Star Army of Yamatai.

You are establishing a policy where players are able to take up the creative output of a person and suddenly use it for themselves

The point of this site is to build off of each other's contributions. When articles are submitted to the wiki, including characters, they are there for the community's benefit. That doesn't stop because the person leaves.

But do you really expect a lot of people to want to pick up someone else's discard and use it for themselves?

I don't expect this feature to be used hugely but it's good to have it made official instead of it being used inconsistently as it has with past adoptions.

Players now could join the site and, under this policy, just pick up an adoptable character to use. No interaction. No real process. No substantive gatekeeping.

It's less work to join but the new players would still have their intros and the adoption (process) threads, which is the same number of threads a submitted character would.

What's the point of this policy?

• Restore abandoned characters to use.
• Make Star Army easier and less stressful to join.
• Reduce the amount of neglected wiki pages.

 

[Toshiro]

When I left for a year, I stated that Yaichiro was off working an office job and Toshiro was exploring and having adventures off-screen. If I came back to find them being used by someone else, I couldn't tell you how infuriated I'd be.

You can talk about copyrights and the like if you want to be nasty about it, but our characters are our creations and nothing changes that. This should not stand, and no good can come of it.

 

[Gunsight1]

I don't like this idea one bit. My characters are my characters, I do not want there to be a possibility that someone else could mess with them. What if someone is drawn away from SARP due to a long term medical emergency? Come back, characters all divvied up among other players.

I just don't like this idea at all. If I decide I want to put a character aside for a while, or that I need to take a sabbatical I want my characters to be there waiting for me when I come back, not tossed off to others.

People come and go. It's how the world works, both players and characters, just as in the real world, not everyone stays around forever. It's unrealistic to think every character will always be around. Also, who is going to manage all this? Who is going to spend who knows how long digging through the wiki finding, managing, organizing and advertizing all the inactive characters and checking every players activity on the site? This is an impossible task for even a group of people to do. Wes are you going to stop GM'ing the Eucharis and managing SARP as a whole to take on this massive burden yourself? Or delegate it out to others who will spend all their time on the site doing this rather than gaming?

Also...making is easier for new people? I never like using other peoples characters or pre-made characters when joining an RP group. They are not mine. I did not make them, did not create their personality, back story or anything. The whole point for joining an RP in my opinion is to create and play MY concept for a character in the set universe, not someone elses.


I don't like to get involved in politics or disagreements in groups I am in, but I have to put my opinion in on this. I am dead set against this. I think this is a bad direction for SARP to go handling peoples characters. Very bad.

edit: How about this, if you wanna have available characters for those new people who DO want to take over an existing character, make a series of generic template characters that players can take, name and develop into their own rather than taking over a character someones put their hard effort and creativity into.

 

[Gwathdraug]

Imagine you're a kid and your friend comes over and plays with your Legos. While there, he builds a little car. Every time he comes over he drives his little yellow Lego man around in the car and you guys have fun playing. At some point, his dad gets a new job and he moves to another state and you'll probably never see him again. Now the car is sitting there unused. Is it okay for you to drive his little Lego car now, or take it apart for those parts you want to use? How long do you wait?

One, I actually was in this exact situation and in my own case I gave the Lego car to him when he left as a sign of our long term friendship and the trust and respect between the two of us.

Two, your hypothetical situation isn't what this here is at all Wes, if your friend comes over he is playing with your Legos, which by the very nature of their existence are yours and not his. Roleplaying characters are very different territory and therefore deserve the same respect we gave their creators when they were with us.

If I were to really use my imagination this seems more like a case of my friend and I used to meet up in the park and play together with each of our respective Lego sets. Together we had a full medieval kingdom and unimaginable fun was had - but now he is moving away. So, with that in mind, while his family was away getting a truck to haul away all their stuff I used the key they gave me because they trusted me to break into their house and steal all my friend's Legos since I, without a doubt, needed to keep the kingdom together.

I don't expect this feature to be used hugely but it's good to have it made official instead of it being used inconsistently as it has with past adoptions.

Here I'm just going to say what I am thinking and it is this: you are flat out wrong on this point one-hundred percent. The fact that it wouldn't be used often is exactly why there should be no official system in place for this kind of transaction. Different character transfers will have inconsistencies and should have them; the individual circumstance between the two players and their character in question will always render these situations unique from one to another.

Anytime an adoption takes place what is going on between the two players on an individual level needs to take precedence over the neatness of a micromanaging system.

 

[Wes]

Based on feedback, I'm going to implement the following changes to the OP:

• 
  1. Players can opt out of adoption or assign a friend as caretaker by putting a note in the OOC section.
  2. Change rules to cover players who haven't logged in for THREE MONTHS instead of just one to be more sure that the player is actually gone.

 

[ShotJon]

I am just going to say I dont like this too much either. If I join a plot I do expect that if something happens GM takes over my character. That is fine, we play together and HE KNOWS the character at least a bit. If someone just comes up and read the bio, he does not know the character. He might knows its history and the rough description of its psychology and how it looks like. He would NOT KNOW the feelings behind this character. Characters I make (and pretty much everyone else I think) have some feeling put into them, they are not just puppets with guns.

As for the adoption, when someone is gone for a month or long. Let's go into theory. Let's say I get into horrible car accident. No one around me know I roleplay on SARP and could come here and tell you what happened. I would be in hospital in coma. Sure this is almost the worse possible thing that could happen, but it could happen. And if just someone would come over and took over my precious characters and played it would make me really really really sad. And not just me.

I think the other players who have their own chars, accompany my would not feel the same if someone else would suddenly play my characters. They would be talking differently, cloth differently, move differently. It would be strange. It would be wrong. That is how I feel.

Wes please do not forget one thing. Yes we write here, we do it fro the community, but everything we write is not just some piece of fluff or information. We put feelings into it. Don't take our feelings away from us.

 

[Gwathdraug]

1. Players can opt out of adoption or assign a friend as caretaker by putting a note in the OOC section.

While this would be a start towards the right direction if such a program is necessary it would require that all current inactive characters be grandfathered in as opted out of the program by default.

One of my biggest issues though is the fact that this entire program is unnecessary, but my earlier posts have already covered my thoughts on that.

To pull some curtains off I am just going to go on record and say that the main reason I am opposed to this program is not even with any concern towards any of my or anyone else's characters. What worries me is the value and viewpoint in which this perceives both players and characters. It is to the core disrespectful and in a hobby that prides itself on allowing people to experience something that is tuned towards exactly what they were personally searching for this policy would reap out a frightening level of individuality.

 

[Yoshi]

What i don't understand is the need... This universe we play in is almost infinte, and I bet if you took every character, pc or npc, you wouldn't even have enough for a single city, worth of population. Why does every old character have to be in use, why can't they retire and fade to the back ground.

unless we are going to have those characters being rp as such? Let them fade, let new lives emerge. Having to recycle all the old characters would be a stagnate, opposed to the new blood joining us, and bring in new characters and ideas.

Past that, Why does if feel like you Wes have made the discussion, that this is what is going to happen. Then I guess I wonder why bother calling it a discussion.

 

[Reynolds]

Yeah, the attitude of this whole thing is a bit upsetting. The LEGO analogy is rather telling.

We're not taking pieces of your world and just putting them together, then playing with your toys with you. If you think my character is yours to do with as you please, that they're more yours than mine, just because you own the setting, we're going to have a big problem.

 

[Gwathdraug]

I've really been dancing around what I've been trying to get across here and after thinking on it for a bit I'm just going to drop everything and make this my last post.

You brought up the Lego example and I brought up my own counterpoint Wes, but I don't think this really gets across to you how badly most of us see this idea.

The problem is for most RP'ers a character is not just a possession, but a facet of themselves they let loose and developed side-by-side with their own personality.

This isn't a case of property and that isn't why I have shown such a negative reaction to the entire idea.

Instead this, to me, comes across as the violation of a person themself - both RP'er and RP character - and no matter how long someone has been unconscious or insensate doing what you please with them breaks every social more I know of.