• Hail Guest!
    We're looking for Community Content Contribuitors to Stratics. If you would like to write articles, fan fiction, do guild or shard event recaps, it's simple. Find out how in this thread: Community Contributions
  • Greetings Guest, Having Login Issues? Check this thread!
  • Hail Guest!,
    Please take a moment to read this post reminding you all of the importance of Account Security.
  • Hail Guest!
    Please read the new announcement concerning the upcoming addition to Stratics. You can find the announcement Here!

[NEWS] Roleplaying An Armour-Smith Part 2

Bryelle Vaughn

Journeyman
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
A great deal of roleplaying a character depends on the mindset you are in while playing them. For tailoring and doing armor this is even more the case. A lot of players avoid this as their main for one reason, its repetitive. Or at least the skill gaining is. However, once you have made it to a Legendary level you realize exactly how useful this can be. I got to sit down with the player behind Laurina and discuss exactly what it takes to play this character and this skill set.

One of the first things we discussed was the back story and its place in a characters rp. Taking the time to craft how and why she/he is forms a good deal of what you will use to deal with the world around as well as explain where the crafting aspect came from. In Laurina's case it was part a need to keep outsiders from knowing she was there rp'ly as well as to create things that couldn't be found on Europa at that time. It is a good point to add in here that most crafting characters are born out of a necessity. The fact that they end up in rp ranges from Happenstance to dumb luck. In Laurina's case the first and not the latter is the cause.




A lot of tools are used when both beginning to create and actually playing the character happens. Laurina's player uses in game books as well as out of game fiction to tell her stories. Both of these are items that you commonly find among some of the best rp'ers around. In Character items such as journals can be used as private records and as a way of passing information in game that you wish to leak out. I very much enjoy entering a house and being able to mouse over literature that has been saved and placed. These types of tools tell a lot about the character just by the title on the book.

One of the items that almost all players use came up while we were discussing literature in game: Song choice. Characters all have their own soundtrack, Laurina is certainly no different. I have to say, I loved her constant choices of The Eagles and ballet music. A firm believer that Eagles goes with ANY character, the Ballet music is decidedly Laurina. Additional songs that work are Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls, Don McClean's Vincent, and All About Eve's Martha's Harbour. When actually crafting she uses Slipknot and Metallica.




Lastly, we discussed templates. Rp'ing a crafter instead of making her a straight mule (those characters we dump skills on but never rp) means giving a bit here and there. For example, Placing cooking on a melee character can have it's issues. You end up having to squelch a skill at times. In Laurina's case one of her templates is as follows:


100 Arms Lore
120 Blacksmithy
80 Carpentry
100 Cooking
100 Mining
120 Tailoring
100 Tinkering


If you take a good look you will notice this leaves out Magery or any other skill in which she would defend herself. It is also a key reason why you won't see most of us fighting on this type of character or why a lot of us have two of them with the same name. On the flip side, I know a character on another shard that rp's a chef but has swordsmanship. Templates, like the players behind them, vary greatly. As does the thought process in putting them together.

Regardless, I have said it many many times: There is something unique about adding a crafting skill in, be it cooking, tailor, fletcher or other. It adds a whole other dimension to the pixel in front of you. When it comes to making a character jump off screen, Europa and Laurina did not disappoint.
 
Top