General Discussion

Hello!

I was wondering what other people with OCs of all sorts would reply with to this question:

Do you think that someone who will never do anything serious (ie. officially published book, (web)comic, video game, etc.) with their characters has to strive for perfectly developed characters, such as the ones promoted in a lot of writing blogs and sites like springhole.net? Bonus if you provide the reasons why/why not!

Note: While civil debates are ok, please do not harass or bully others for their opinion, thanks!

@Alkyona
You don't have to have perfectly developed characters. In my opinion, OCs are characters that you make for your own enjoyment. Develop them how you want and have fun with them rather than make a completely developed character that you might not even use in the future.

I have a ton of OCs of my own who don't even have a personality. I just like drawing them. :)

@Alkyona
I think it depends on what purpose the character serves, since if they don't really serve a purpose then why would you create them in the first place? But characters don't have to exist as fully fleshed out entities, especially if they're just something you created for fun. They're your creations so do what you want with them.

For me, I have a mixture of both. I have some very fleshed out characters (granted, a lot of those are from a story I'm writing) and others that have very little information but are fun to draw. Both have their own pros and cons, and both I would equally consider worthwhile.

I apologise if this is all over the place. It's midnight, I have insomnia and I'm tired. Hah.

@Endie
Heh yeah, that's true... I've had that happen to me more than once, almost fully developing a character only to forget about them a couple of days afterwards. Thanks for sharing your opinion!

@*******
Thanks for sharing your view c:
Same here on the mix of both, I don't think many people only one of either kind of character to be honest.

Honestly, just do what you want? OCs are basically the height of self-indulgence. Especially so if you don't have plans or aspirations to put them in a story to show or sell other people, key word being sell. Quality characters are great and all, but if there's no monetary commitment going on, who cares if a character is developed perfection, or a cardboard cutout.

I have a bunch of OCs, and I make em all the time. Most of em are just designs since art is my preferred past time. I have favs that have been developed more while others are just pretty throwaways.

If you aren't going to use them for anything then I say whatever you want. If you just enjoy creating drawings of characters and you don't like having to fully flesh out a personality, then don't. I personally like having well developed characters that have complex personalities even though I don't use them in anything

I am going to agree with the others here - do whatever you like / have the most fun with.

For me personally it comes down to context. Many of my OCs have started out as / still are used as either forum-rpg or tabletop characters. I need a clear idea of the character, their motivations and most obvious or reoccurring personality traits to play them well. Having well fleshed out characters is also beneficial to creating a gripping atmosphere. A character suddenly acting in contradiction to their previously established beliefs or personality traits is something that will always take me right out of it.

Over the years I ended up with 90+ OCs and most of them are not fleshed out to the tiniest detail. On others I could write a whole novel series. In general I am not a fan of these types of ‘100 questions for your OC’ lists. Thinking about what your character’s favourite colour is will not necessarily contribute to them being more fleshed out. My advice would be to stick to what you feel is important for your character.

Like other people said above, it depends on what you want to do with them, if you just make them for fun, don't use in any stories, roleplays, then of course you can do what you want, make them just plain designs, give them crazy personalities, make overpowered, have fun.

If you plan to use them in fanfics, roleplaying, sell them etc. then you should think about some development, personality.

Slightly of topic, but I personally think people sometimes worry to much about character development and stuff, of course your character (if you use him/her for story) should have defined personality, goals etc, but these sites, blogs, yup they are useful and you can learn much, but, often they go to deep into this, actually many famous movie, book, video game characters aren't that developed as those sites promote and they are still likeable heck, even some real people, don't know that much about themselves as some those character templates ask.

I can only agree to what the others have said already: do whatever you want! They're your OCs after all. If you were planning to use them in a story (no matter what format: book, comic, roleplay ...) I'd say yeah, they should be fleshed out more, but since you're not planning on using them for anything "serious", it doesn't really matter anyway :D

I have a few characters that I'm trying to flesh out as best as I can, but they're all for stories that I want to write, so it makes sense. I also have OCs that are super bland, because they're just fun to draw or think about, and I'm not planning on using them for anything serious. So yeah, it's completely okay to have OCs who aren't that fleshed out!