Miscellaneous

Character Abilities

Your character's abilities, like many other things, are important. A character's strengths and abilities can help determine whether s/he is accepted into a pack, as the pack's leadership will almost always inquire as to what usefulness your character has. Most wolves can run, hunt, jump, and swim. These aren't "special abilities" at all, so unless your character is the best of the best at one of them, it's not a good idea to consider these as your character's sole skill. On the other hand, if your character has other special abilities like medical knowledge, star-navigation, piercing & tattooing, spying, stealth, tree-climbing, human knowledge, reading/writing, etc, the pack leadership will definitely want to hear of those skills. Be creative and think of something cool you can do, then try as best you can to apply it to a wolf's skills. It's not a good idea to go and say your wolf can do something and have absolutely no idea what you're talking about, though. So make sure you at least know a little bit of what you lay claim to.

Don't forget that your characters weaknesses are just as important as his or her strengths. Make sure your character has at least a few flaws, whether major or minor, physical or mental. Is s/he crippled in some way? Is s/he a homocidal maniac with a taste for puppy blood? Is s/he deathly afraid of heights? Is s/he prejudiced against normal wolves? Against Luperci? Coyotes? Flaws make a character interesting to play; no one is perfect and it gets very boring very quickly if your character has no weaknesses.

Making Your Character Unique

Having a unique character makes it fun for you to play and for others to read about. A little twist here and there is all it really takes; think about all the things that set different people apart in real life! A trend in the roleplay community has been to give characters textbook psychological disorders -- many people seem to have schizophrenic or bipolar characters. This is fine for the most part, but keep in mind that too many completely crazy characters running around doesn't make for very interesting or varied roleplaying either, and there are tons of other ways to make your character interesting other than dumping an extreme disorder on them. Remember also that many disorders aren't so obvious. There are many different symptoms that play into every condition, and you might have more fun being subtle than being over-the-top.

You can also consider religion, prejudice, or even just a funny way of speaking to set your character apart. Your character can adopt a wide variety of religions and belief systems, whether it's as simple as respecting nature, belief in a moon or sun god/dess, or something more complex and based on human beliefs such as Christianity or Wicca. How do these beliefs affect your character? Do they participate in any rituals? Do they pray? Do any of their beliefs put them at odds with others? Prejudices can also help define and set apart your character. Traditionally at 'Souls, there has been a divide between the wolf majority and the coyote minority. Where does your character stand on this issue? Do they believe in the supremacy of either side? Are they indifferent? How does their own heritage and upbringing affect their opinion?

Although few consider this issue, you may also want to think about how your character talks. Think of how normal people speak, and try to emulate their natural flow of speech when writing your character's speech. Some people like to find people who represent their characters' voices—for example, you may describe your character as having a "raspy growl" for a voice, and use Gran Torino-era Clint Eastwood to exemplify this voice. Wikipedia's English Dialects page is also excellent for character voices.

Though 'Souls takes place in Nova Scotia, Canada, not all characters have to be local. Characters from the rest of North America are common, but we've also had a number of characters from Russia and Europe. Part of this is because the canine societies in those two areas are more advanced and humanized -- that is, many of them live a sort of medieval human lifestyle with primitive technologies. As such, ships and boats headed off to explore "unknown" areas are reasonable, and many characters find themselves landing on 'Souls shores. For more information on various parts of the world in the 'Soulsverse, check this out. Playing a foreign character can add an exotic touch to your roleplaying. Your character's primary language may not be English and s/he may struggle with it. Your character may have different customs or traditions from their homeland. The possibilities are endless!

Companions

Some people choose to have NPC (non-player/playable character) companion animals such as birds, rats, etc. These companions can follow your character around, helping him or her in various ways, or just provide company. You can have almost any kind of NPC character, even other canines! If you have a canine NPC, however, certain restrictions will apply. You must designate one of your characters as a main roleplaying character and the other as the NPC. They cannot be equals. Your main RP character may be controlled alone without the NPC, but your NPC character must always appear in posts with your main character and cannot be roleplayed alone. Additionally, NPC wolves may have restrictions placed on the ranks they are allowed to obtain, depending on the policies of individual packs. For 'Souls rules governing canine NPCs, see section 6 of our Procedures.