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[ArtOfLight]

So, I've recently begun an experiment on Malcolm. That is, having Malcolm become slightly self destructive since his reinstatement in his frustration with his current situation and making a few rash decisions based on that frustration.

The most recent of these incidents involved a public denouncement of WHG over what he felt was a personal betrayal, and he did so in a very unprofessional and childish manner. The idea was to have Malcolm intentionally make some difficult mistakes that would force him to reconsider his current situation and grow and develop as a character, rather than simply force the changes to him OOC without any IC provocation for it.

However, I'm curious how many have done something similar and how it panned out for you? For Malcolm, it's proven to be great for closed-circle RP but seems to essentially be character suicide in wider circles, like IGS and The Summit. Is it bad to let your character make bold mistakes like this?

[Silas Vitalia]

I'd disagree strongly with 'character suicide in wider circles'

People are people. It only makes your character 'look bad' if you have tried to develop an air of invincibility around their personalities. How one deals with upsets IC is usually much more interesting.

I let Aldrith Shutaq 'ruin' my last public event and cause bitter IC tears and kill lots of my IC associates (sort of an ooc 'welcome back Aldrith, let's get you some press!'  Was fun.  He still owes me some more grisly  write-ups of murdering Sabik cultitsts, maybe we'll get them someday...

[ArtOfLight]

Perhaps character-suicide was too strong of a term, true. More like it seems to be a much greater setback than intended at times. Perhaps I'm expressing it wrong.

Either way, I remember the party-crashing and I loved the way it was handled. I've never tried to make my characters seem invincible, I always try to make them human - complete with flaws and vices. In this case, Malcolm is Civire and without a focus for his aggression (having be stripped of everything he's worked toward), it's getting the better of him.

However, the backlash from it has sort of humbled him and now he's trying to figure out what he can do before he spirals further down the hole. It's interesting to observe how different the RP is from tighter circles compared to fallout in the wider circle, is all.

[orange]

The danger is you might lose control of the direction you were headed.

Dex could have swung the other way, thrown his support behind Malcolm and pointed to the destruction of a neutral ship in Providence a few months ago...

Suddenly, Malcolm is no longer being outlandish, but bringing up a valid concern - "What are WHG's ROEs outside of the warzones & State space?"  What you thought of as a personal betrayal becomes a professional point of contention.

[Graanvlokkie]

Perhaps character-suicide was too strong of a term, true. More like it seems to be a much greater setback than intended at times. Perhaps I'm expressing it wrong ...

People that you don't closed-circle RP with will always miss the character development that the particular issue has brought about, and will throw up your mistakes for years to come.

Be prepared to deal with it, and enjoy the character development that that the initial mistake brought about, and the character development brought about by the subsequent interactions and fallout.

[Ken]

Suddenly, Malcolm is no longer being outlandish, but bringing up a valid concern - "What are WHG's ROEs outside of the warzones & State space?"  What you thought of as a personal betrayal becomes a professional point of contention.

SANB
[SPOILER]Shoot All the Not Blues!

Same applies inside FW plexes. We are NRDS in general lowsec space though.[/SPOILER]

[Jev North]

Very "I was only gone for a month and WHAT IS THIS." I liked it.

Fancy going pirate yet?

[ArtOfLight]

That was pretty much EXACTLY what I was going for, Jev.

Malcolm going, "What is this?! I don't even..." and then getting slapped because he overreacted, which I imagine would be a common thing for a head-strong, highly aggressive Civire that just got through with being Disassociated for two months.

[Ken]

Fancy going pirate yet?

Now that would be a twist... 

[Kybernetes Moros]

Having the confidence to let a character mess up publicly is a good thing, I feel; fallible characters tend to be much more fun for me to engage with. I'd argue that it's less character suicide and more RP of the mistake's consequences, too, but at the end of the day if people's opinions in those venues falls of one character or another for a solid RP reason, fantastic. Much better to dislike a character for a particular flaw or error than "oh no he's with that faction I don't like, quick get the age old arguments", IMO.

[Jev North]

I find failing with grace is rather more charming than the usual chest-beating and desperate scrabble to hide or downplay any evidence of doing anything other than Charlie Sheen bi-winning.

[Ken]

Regarding the OP topic, Mal, as you know I am all about developing conflict in RP for the sake of a more compelling narrative.  I've been OOG and thus missing all of this, but it's looking good from here.  The challenge level is certainly set fairly high since you're putting the character through a very uncomfortable series of scenes that will definitely follow him into the future, but I think this adds a lot of value.  A history laden with conflict and imperfections is far more interesting than one without.

Edit:  I made the above statements before I could actually get a look at the IGS content directly.  Man, that was a full broadside from the founder and former CEO!  Des is being really diplomatic IC, but the rank and file response will not be a good one.  I note Ishenko already said her piece before the thread descended into political philosophy.  :igs:    Hoshi's response is muted by the light years of space between Samanuni and New Caldari Prime, where she's away on duty.  Seriously, you could go pirate.  Like some sort of honorable pirate.  Mal Reynolds style, basically.  Milo would probably offer a nice signing bonus too... 

[Gottii]

I'm much more interested in players struggling to play imperfect characters rather than players struggling to play perfect ones.

[ArtOfLight]

I think I went unrealistically too far, however. Having Malcolm experience a bit of a shock to see the things WHG was doing in his absence was one thing, but having him go extremely public with it, as he did, was probably a bit much for the character.

EDIT: Edited to fix poor wording that suggested things not intended.

[Lyn Farel]

Every character can slip and seem unrealistic when mood comes into consideration. It is not that unusual to see people RL or characters in (good) fiction feeling out of their role from time to time when something breaks inside them, or anything else that makes them behave anormaly.

I have done it on purpose with my character too, and I can say that my problem was actually to make that a habit, at the opposite of yours.