1st stop! – How to make a Child of the Light Character!?

[Nynaeve]

Welcome to the CotL (Children of the Light) RP Group! In order for you to join our ranks you must first create a character, by submitting a biography, and going through the approval process. Bellow you will find a detailed explanation of what needs to be done, in order to facilitate things for you!

 

 

 

CotL Biography Form

 

Here is the minimum of what must be included in your biography. Please check the bio board if you'd like to see examples of acceptable bios. Once you have written your bio, email it to CotLDiv[at]dragonmount[dot]com with the word Bio in the subject line. If you can, also CC it to: Nynaeve.n10[at]gmail[dot]com. It will guarantee a quicker process.

 

- DM handle

- Full Character Name

- Age

- Email address

- Subdivision (ie. Army, Hand or Whisper of the Light... IF you already know where you'd like to go. Otherwise leave blank)

- Physical Description (One paragraph; height, weight, color of eyes, color of hair, any any other physical features you might want to include)

- Place of Birth/Raising

- Character History (Max of a page; should include any major events in the character's life prior to joining the ranks of the CotL)

 

 

 

*Before you start writing your bio, take note of the following guidelines.

 

CotL Biography Guidelines:

 

Physical Description

1. No ridiculously weird hair, eye, or skin colors. Nobody is purple. Nobody has green hair. No one's eyes are red flecked with silver. Try to be reasonable. If it doesn't occur in nature, you can't do it. Lets just agree that some of the Children aren't the most tolerant of people and something like one violet eye and one gold eye would draw their attention and probably their accusations of Darkfriend-ness. Best to play it safe unless you like spending 'special time' with the Hand.

2. Try to stick with the prescribed characteristics of the various nationalities. If in doubt (say, wanting a tall Cairhienin) go with mixed parentage (a Cairhienin mother and Andoran father). Generally Altarans are olive skinned, Saldaeans are short, topknots are from Shienar, etc. If in doubt, check The Concordance - it's a great resource.

3. No Ogier. They are pacifists. We are not. No Aiel either. They arent pacifists, but still no.

 

Place of Birth/Raising

Characters must be from the mainland of Randland. No Seanchan, Sea Folk, or Sharans, and as previously stated, no Aiel.

 

Character History

1. Minimum age to join the ranks of the Children of the Light and become a soldier is 18 naming days. Any younger and we will send you back home to your mother where you belong.

2. As an initiate of the Children you begin with a WS of 4. By the time a person enters the Fortress, it is reasonable that he or she may have a basic knowledge of sword work or some comparable weapon, but will by no means be considered proficient.

3. No mention of special abilities that would be possessed only by a soldier with many years experience. This includes things like military strategy, tactics, and guerilla warfare. Keep in mind your character will be a green recruit and therefore unlikely to be a strategical genius, despite what they've read.

4. No godder characters. This means no phrases like "the best swordsman ever", "unstoppable", "fantastically wonderful and perfect", and the like. While it is reasonable for a person to have one special skill or gift or talent, having all of them is not. When giving your character a strength, try to balance it with a weakness as well.

5. NO Channeling. NO, I said none. Not even a little. NO! You channel, we give you over to the Hand. The end (A VERY compelling reason, if such exists, can be brought up to me. Low chances of success, though).

6. Try not to do the whole 'a Trolloc ate my mom so I hate the Shadow'. There are a million reasons to hate the Shadow. Make yours one of a kind.

7. The Children of the light do not beg, pressure, or cajole anyone into joining. No meeting a large group of Children in an inn and having them plead with your character to sign up at the Fortress. No matter how impressive your character is, no Kid worth their salt has so little pride they would be like "Oh, please join us mister skillfull awesome man."

8. Last, no mentions of the main characters from the series. In addition to the Three Amigos and their women, this includes monarchs, past Amyrlins, current military leaders, that sort of thing. This is a Portal Stone World (hence the name DRPSW) and often things arent exactly as they are in the books. Plus, the Dragon Reborn is far too busy talking to the voice/s in his head to be hangin' out with your new character.

 

 

To sum up:

 

This is a character that you will hopefully be playing for some time. Some people have been playing the same characters for five years, others for only five days, but either way it is important to know some basic things about your character.

 

Choose a name that you're comfortable writing, and comfortable being known as both IC (In Character) and OOC (Out Of Character). Don't use a major character name from the books if you can help it. Try looking at baby name sites if you're stuck for ideas, or try looking in the street directory (it works for me!). You can find a WoT name generator here.

 

Pick a homeland that you found interesting when you read the books, and try to stick by the typical appearance and speech patterns of that homeland. It's useful to check out the Wheel of Time Concordance and click on your chosen homeland. If your character is unusual in some way, give reasons for it. Remember, though, that the Aiel, Sea Folk and Seanchan have their own RP Group, and Sharans are unknown in our PSW.

 

Your character's history can be a help to you in future RPing - events described in your bio may be followed up in later RPs (for example, the loss of parents may spark a RP looking for revenge).

 

Many people are tempted to make characters that are good-looking, great with weapons, popular, noble, honorable, brave and, well, just overall cool. The thing is, while it's easy to make up a character that you think everyone will like, the chances are that everyone won't like him or her for the very same reasons. Playing characters with flaws can be more fun than playing perfect characters - not to mention that some of the most interesting role play that you can do might arise from these flaws.

 

Don't forget - your character is a living, breathing human being. There's absolutely nothing wrong with updating your bio, to include more information and let other people get to know your character a bit better. The more you know about someone, the easier it is to NPC them without making any major mistakes, and that makes group RPing much easier.

[Nynaeve]

What Happens after I submitted my Biography???

 

Once you sent your bio to the email directed above then it reaches my hands, aka, the CotL RP Leader. If there is anything that needs to be edited, I will contact you to explain in detail what needs to be changed and why. Once that is sorted (or assuming there were no alterations needed to begin with) I post your bio in the biography board to be Cross Checked (CCed) by a bio checker of another RP Group. This is done in order to verify that the biography adheres to the rules and that I haven't missed anything. We're all human after all... well, most of us >.>

 

The entire approval and cross checking process should be resolved in a matter of days, giving you ample time to read all the informational stickied threads and start forming ideas of RPs in your head! Once the cross checking is done you are ready to start role playing (RPing)!!! ^_^