Discussion Character themes! How and why?

[Aloy Vizsla]

What it says on the tin! How do you decide what your character's theme is and why did you pick what you have so far?

 

[Vulpesen]

Vulpesen's obvious motif is fox related stuff. Fox shaped mask, fox name, and a fox tail. And while he's gotten considerably more powerful over the years, he still focuses on being clever than brute force.
Beyond that, he's also growing the theme of force druid because nature is awesome. I guess now that he's become more powerful, its a natural extension of his usual bestial theme.

Reasons for the motifs are simply things I enjoy. My favorite animal is a fox. I love nature, and Vulpesen has also turned into something of a space cop because I am also pursuing law enforcement.

 

[Caltin Vanagor]

While Caltin is one of my "trinity" (one of the three main characters of my collection), he is the first Force User I have ever created. I wanted to see what it was like to flesh one out and the site I joined did not require a Padawan(which you had to start as) to be a Youngling. I had experience playing landing troops, SpecOps, Spies, Pilots, Professional Wrestlers (Hey! Don't judge! lol), and businessmen. I wanted to try this set discipline and see if I could work it in.

Then I started writing his bio,

... the more I wrote... the less reason he had to be a Jedi.

It was actually the very first thread that I was in that convinced me that he needed to be a Jedi and not the Sith that everything about him was leaning towards. If you have seen "Batman Forever" he says to Riddler (To whom I have never forgiven Joel Schumaker for making Tommy Lee Jones, a PERFECT casting choice for the time, play Two-Face as a "Second Joker" so to speak) "I'm not 'Batman' because I have to be, I am 'Batman' because I choose to be."
That hit my feeling towards Caltin to a tee.

 

[Darth Metus]

Metus is one of the many Latin words for Fear and is a play on his specialization of Dread Master. His birth name, Isley, stemmed from my overwhelming Claymore kick when I joined Chaos. (Isley of the North specifically). And because I was a Mandalorian n00b at the time, Verd as a last name was picked because "warrior is cool!"

My Jedi, Josiah and Abel Denko , are Biblical. Named after particularly righteous figures to coincide with their being Light Siders. (Josiah was one of the few righteous kings in biblical history, Abel was the righteous sibling murderized by Cain). Denko as a last name was a by-product of looking around my dorm at random objects and mooshing the letters together.

Agravain is my favorite Knight of the Round table from Arthurian legend, 'nuff said. Rience and Malok are both Destiny references. Isran Varad is named after the infamous Dawnguard leader from Skyrim. Yusha is named after my little brother and is a regional remix of his name (Joshua). The character is a reimagination of a thief I wrote on a Fantasy/DnD-esque site before Chaos.

Hisashi is my first formal RP character ported into the Star Wars universe. Last name is Shinja, roughly meaning Believer. Hisashi means Long-Lived. A play on "eternal/everlasting faith" was how I came up with the name. The genre was, originally, Naruto, so he's very shinobi/Japanese-inspired in his current form.

Could ramble on and on, but those are the main ones these days

 

[Darth Vinaze]

Derleth's theme has always tried to be very Lovecraftian. If you're a big fan of the Mythos than his name is kinda obvious, taken from August Derleth who wrote most of the Mythos after Lovecraft's death.

 

[Jegy Sesara]

Oh boy...this be a doozy. For the sake of sanity, I am only doing characters that I have on here, else I be here all day.

When I came to this site, I wanted to create someone that was for once, not a Force Sensitive and let my imagination grow wild. So I created Haon Hafey , I wanted someone that had a more rustic appeal while having my favorite cowboy show, Have Gun Will Travel (Also the name of the Company). It went from a rather rustic harsh character to a more level, more creative genius that is not afraid to get behind people that needs help. Essentially, I love this character but I am distancing so time can let him age more.

This character, Jegy Sesara been created over eight years ago. Originally, I only wanted him to be an Imperial Combat Medic on Star Wars Galaxies for roleplay, a Sullustan was rare on the server and the idea of being raised by Tuskens was just different and brought something new to the table...but fate decided to twist that idea very quickly into something much more drastically different. Going from there, all the way to a full fledged Inquistor, it became a rather unusual story that expanded the lore of the Lorekeeper Line I started twelve years ago. A quiet person but generally wise but not very intelligent, this character went from the background to the foreground on and off as a powerful Force User, though at times would wish to be left alone. At this pooint, he has redeemed himself and quietly went towards the sunset as a Jedi at long last and be hard pressed to push him back in unless it was personally asked by friends.

Ben Acrax , more known as Crane Baxa, is the son of Jegy Sesara. This character was created after Jegy Sesara on a website called Combine. After a while, he to became Force Sensitive and the chances on there was stupidily rare on the first try. So I decided to link the two together through storyline purposes. Instead of being like Jegy, he was more outspoken and had a more cheerful attitude and while intelligent, may not always be wise. It is almost an opposite of the character, sometimes I wonder if it reflects my personality in real life on just these two characters. The idea of him being a more technomancer came from having such a high skill in lockpicking early on, something I got very good at and reflected it as a criminal mastermind but not really as a character that can be called a Jedi.

Captain Gaki was a character made for a way vastly different purpose years ago but here, it got another breath of fresh air. A pirate with the most unorthodox methods...as if Jack Sparrow ran directly into Nym with the worst pirate crew of all. That is the only way to describe it. While a minor force sensitive, I mainly just play around with him being just strange and unusual. I last played this character with Black Sun fleeting and currently, nothing really brings the need to have him back just yet. Him and his crazy crew can currently just lay back and rest for a while, at some point, I will find inspiration for him once more.


Now for the rest...

The Scout Trooper was mainly an idea of having a person in power armor, more of a DOOM style of fighting. It worked out somewhat but as time went on, it just did not work as intended and went back to the drawing board. Listib Hibin was my vehicle creator and mainly all he was, at a time special forces but has since been retired due to him now being part of the Factory Judging and prefer not to change that any time soon. Issac Hafey is still in development, more for the horror aspect of Star Wars and the creation of Haon Hafey when I get the chance to mess with it some more. Mithara Cohen just been a strange case of wanting to create another story but not having enough ommph to get it ready yet, mainly a user of the Force but just not finding a good motivation. Renair Naki is to be a more snotty nosed character originally but has long since been changed into a Jedi in training but given how the Jedi are here...I could not go any further and just stalled out.

 

[Ravenous]

It was pretty easy choosing a theme for my boy Ravenous. You see the whole point of Ravenous' character is to seem inhuman while retaining the obvious looks and characteristics of a person.

He has a sort of valley effect that makes him bizarre to the point where one can identify with him but fail to create a connection. When choosing a theme I decided to go with something that felt evil and detached but still easily identifiable.

Gotta love the Organ!

 

[Jsc]

Music Discussion ?

Well. I just tend to pick whatever music I'm listening to at the time. I think Sam's theme was from Two Steps From Hell until I switched it to Jeremy Soule. But idk.

 

[Chiara Viren]

Chiara is really the only character I've ever had a set theme for. When she was first created on the SW site I came from, she was based loosely off of Aerith from FF7 with incorporated historical influences from The War of The Rose's time period, because I wanted to write political intrigue with lazer swords and magic.

 

[Roth Likonis]

I think I've always written spy / agility / rogue & scoundrel type characters honestly. While I love Star Wars and the Force, I've not written that many Force Users - the struggle of us normals against these bigger than life forces have always been much more interesting to me. Theme wise, you can't go wrong with a spy motif; though plenty of my characters were also designed around the criminal element and the cyborg enhanced. A lot of inspiration from Cowboy Bebop.

 

[Aloy Vizsla]

I meant *Theme music, My bad lmao! But I've seen a lot of interesting discussions here so far!

While I'm here, I might as well share Aloy's (Because who doesn't want to listen to the edgy mando ramble her life story, Right??)

When I first got here, I wanted to play a mandalorian because, Well, It's always been my thing. The Bounty Hunters, The armour, The nitty gritty space western themes, It's what got me into star wars initially. My first character was a failure. No agency, Entirely too dependant on a specific major faction for RP,Bland and edgy mando like all the others.

So whenthat faction collapsed, I created Aloy here. Previously "Joti Jjota". She was meant to break the cycle. I made her about as hurt and moody as any warrior going through the extinction of her people would, Yes, But I made her hide it. Her most prevalent theme is "Not what she seems".

She acts out going, Always ready to strike up a conversation. She's a mandalorian, bred and raised to kill, But she actually finds no joy in killing, Rather seeing it indifferently and even avoiding it when she doesn't need to kill.

She originally started as a villain of this RP. A Simple bounty hunter that took any and all jobs regardless of the morality involved, But over time she started putting that aside. Several of her targets(all PCs) showed her that there was more to life than hunting and waiting to die, That she might have been done a wrong turn in her life but that she had the power to alter it's course if she tried just a little harder.


Entermy 2020 revamp: She's changed her name, Become an honorable soldier, Helped liberate her homeworld, Has a home and family even, A lover, A foundling child, All of it! She also has a refined moral compass and is about to become commander of the Nite Owls.


I based her story off of the classic mando bounty hunter vibe initially, Slowly drew in more influence from the ghost of tsushima and the classic "cynical anti-hero to hero" storylines, and here we are one year later.

 

[Damocles]

When I post Damocles, I always have a DOOM theme (Rip & Tear being his most common motif) ready to pop into the post. It embodies exactly how the man is feeling - the need to kill and pure, unbridled anger. It helps set the aura I have for him as basically an avatar of vengeance, coming to exact punishment upon those from his past. I believe that once he moves on/achieves revenge, his music will likely calm down and be something like your regular Star Wars soundtracks.

 

[Irveric Tavlar]

TOOL - INVINCIBLE

A warrior on his last legs searching for that final victory and triumph to seal his legacy. Absolutely powerful lyrics.

 

[Siobhan Kerrigan]

Siobhan's main story arcs had already played out long before I found these songs, but they fit her really will:

Gloria Regali

Undone

Both produced by Tommee Profitt. Great lyrics, great artists.

Technically, she's not a queen, but she certainly sees herself as one. She's had both triumphs and defeats, and reigns absolutely in her sphere. But there have been many sacrifices on the way and it has come at a personal cost. She may have been 'crowned in glory', but that is fleeting. Uneasy is the head that wears the crown. Increasingly, she is characterised by distrust, loneliness and an obsession with securing her legacy.

 

[Koran Bardok]

:Locus Flamemaker: is as westerny as a character can get, and since I love FNV his theme is "Big Irom on His Hip"

My other character :Koran Bardok: is more complex. He is a lone scientist and a explorer, with his own beliefs who listens to nobody, this, alongside my love for Indiana Jones made me pick "The Raiders March" as his theme.

 

[Gren Blidh]

Gren is a Chaos Gnostic. He revels in action, adventure, strength and ecstasy. He's a witches' brew of a space cowboy mixed with Odin. In it for nobody but himself. Fuck all factions except loose warbands of biker gangs in space.

So outlaw country suits him pretty well.

Now pardon me, I've got someone to kill.

​

 

[Maple Harte]

Well, I picked character themes for very specific reasons, in that I was trying to convey the nature of the character or their story arc.

For Maple, Laertia, and The Amalgam (My three main characters) they all have Bond Themes. These were chosen because not only is it part of my ongoing habit of smashing together Marvel and Bond concepts, stirring them to puree with a Lightsaber held by a Disney Princess, but because in Laertia and Maple's case, their songs are most reflective of their relationship with The Amalgam, and The Amalgam's song references her relationship to them.

Maple- GoldenEye, By Tina Turner: Conveys the idea that the Amalgam is totally obsessed with turning a master sharpshooter to the darkness. Also used to convey that Maple takes some of her inspirations from the Brosnan Version of Bond.

Laertia-For Your Eyes Only--meant to convey the special regard The Amalgam has for Laertia, and how she played dangerous games with Laertia's sanity and insecurities, and how it was ultimately Laertia that helped the Amalgam free herself from her Ursula Identity, and in one flashback Laertia had, she was immediately kidnapped after being knighted by Ursula--by a temporarily free Amalgam--who directly drops lyrics from this song to describe how Laertia was making Amalgam doubt her faith in the Dark Side

The Amalgam-License To Kill, by Gladys Knight. Primarily it is meant to convey how psychotically obsessed Amy is with making her daughters Sith and how she will stoop to any low to turn them. It was also used to foreshadow that she was their mentor, as originally Id intended only characters who had been members of The Marksmen to have Bond Songs, though this eventually expanded into any character directly involved in the Meta-Arc between my three mains.

Syd--Girl on Fire by Alicia Keys--Someone cursed to burn for what they have done and is able to visit the same on others. Conveys the idea in this context of someone who has literally all the prerequisites for being a success and getting what they want but is ultimately doomed to remain lonely because of the incredibly tragic and destructive results their "success" has on the world and those closest to them, twisting and inverting the original context of the song into something bitter and sarcastic

Nine--A View To A Kill, by Duran Duran--Conveys the idea of someone operating in a Clandestine manner, and how Nine's decisions to try and save Atrisia, while well meaning, ended up ruining her human life and turning her into what she is today, and how she now survives via deception and obfuscation

As for my overall main themes:

Recurring instances of exploring the Star Wars concept of good and evil, as well as Redemption and whether the words of Kreia in Kotor 2: "One who has fallen so far, committed so much evil, does not deserve Redemption. In a way, such a turning from One's nature is cowardly, a betrayal of the Self." or how "Redemption is a form of Spiritual Collapse. A fall few recover from." have genuine merit and if so, how far should that sentiment extend if the person who wants redemption (in this case, Syd) tries really hard...and should they even bother to?

The dynamics of a toxic relationship between Parent, Sibling, or Child

The idea of Physical Beauty and Perfection versus Inner Character and the merits of remaining merely Mortal.

Physical Beauty failing when someone's inhuman nature is revealed.

Achieving great power and skill...and not truly knowing what to do with it when all is said and done, and questioning whether gaining such rarified heights of capability was worth all the sacrifices and horrors suffered to reach that point, and if so, is the character prepared to keep paying the price to keep and use such skill even in the face of the negative results?

The concept of someone you care for and trust turning out to be (or have once been) completely morally reprehensible and forcing you to question your own ability to forgive them and try to fix them or your own nature in having called them your friend to begin with

 

[Kaalia Pavanos]

For Kaalia, I chose Camo & Krooked's Ember. It's a perfect storm of what the character represents. The song title reflects her affinity for Fire Shaping, as well as the 'flame of defiance' I often refer to when describing her personality. As for the actual music, it has this intangible energy that just fits her somehow. It's probably just in my head.

For Nylea Apollodor , I chose Aether's Temple. It's a calming, yet lively piece of music that represents her goal of healing the galaxy. A noble effort, though a bit naive sometimes.

For Jaya Tandris , I chose Reach's Throw Handz. She likes punching, and vibes well with bass music. Simple, yet effective.

 

[Colrenth]

This fit his personailty

 

[Jacen Nimdok]

I could've sworn that I've answered this question about musical themes before, but I can't seem to find the thread or my post. That's okay though, because I remember what I said, I have more characters now than I did then, and I can see that several people are taking "character themes" to mean something other than music, which is neat.

Nimdok - I used a track from the soundtrack to Halo 2: "Heretic, Hero". Great soundtrack, have always loved it. I chose that particular track because it has a very industrial sound that reminded me of the sounds you would hear at a construction site or dig, but it also has a choir singing in addition to those noises, which lends it a more ancient feel. Nimdok is an archaeologist, so the combination works really well.

Aside from that, his character themes primarily revolve around identity. Is he Nimdok, or is he just an impostor pretending to be him? Is it possible for him to become the "real Nimdok" eventually, and by what paths could he achieve that? Just by being possessed by the spirit of Nimdok? My thesis is no - there's much more to Nimdok than that. I use the various prisms of his identity - the teacher, the scholar, the seeker, the father, the husband, the lover - to explore what it means to be him, and by extension maybe even what it means to be human. But that's just me blowing smoke up my butt.

Inanna Hoole - Ah, poor Inanna. She's supposed to be retired soon, but I did have a lot of fun writing her for the most part and I do consider her one of my stronger PCs. Her theme was a little tune from Galaxy Express 999 called "Planet Maetel - Arrival". It's a very melancholic lullaby/love theme, like something out of a dark fairytale. In this case, I was never fully on board with the choice of music, but I couldn't come up with anything else that suited her. For whatever reason this piece of music stuck to Inanna like glue lol. "Maetel" was also one of the fake names she used.

Her character themes were always about how far she would go to accomplish her goals. I knew from the moment I conceived her that she would be someone who wouldn't mind degrading and debasing herself, so long as she did it for a cause she truly believed in. Of course, this earned her one of her other themes - that of the Fool. Sort of like the tarot card, she marched right off a cliff when she waltzed into the Sith Empire thinking she could charm the right people and get what she wanted. Instead, she got treated like a doormat, was basically tricked into betraying her own family, and had her hopes dashed to the ground and stomped on. I will happily admit that one of the reasons I'm trying to retire her is because she has been through so much, I honestly don't know how I would handle heaping more trauma onto her. I don't think I would be able to write it without hating every word, at least not so soon after all the other abuse that was heaped onto her these past few months. It would get into needlessly cruel territory at that point.

Starlin Rand - Well, he's currently sitting at the top of a pivotal precipice for his character, one that will decide what direction he goes from here, so I consider his theme outdated. But his was Daft Punk's instrumental "Da Funk". It's exactly what it sounds like - a funky song meant to evoke an urban city, with all its rhythms and moods. Starlin's a city boy, his character playlist is full of funk (the musical genre lol). It seems to really speak to him and his enthusiastic personality.

Starlin was a character I made on a whim that somehow turned out to be really great. He evolved completely naturally, I didn't force anything with him. So what the hell is his theme? Well, I always approached him as a bit of a dumb kid who doesn't know what he's doing, doesn't realize the danger he's in, and is very innocent, but in a believable way, not as a dopey stereotype or caricature of a kid. My primary inspiration was Luke Skywalker, the dumb farmboy from Tatooine that I hold so near and dear to my heart, but as I wrote Starlin he started to absorb characteristics from people I had known in my real life. In particular, he has a lot in common with one of my cousins I'm fairly close to. Like Starlin, my cousin was raised in a broken home in a bad neighborhood, he loved music and used it as an outlet, and he went off to join something bigger than himself (the military = the Jedi I guess lol) because he "needed time to mature".

Messala - The villainous Messala's theme is "Darkness Fails" from the soundtrack to the movie Legend - or at least the first minute or so of it. It's a dark seduction theme composed for a character who is quite literally meant to represent the Devil, the Lord of Darkness. I've been debating switching this theme out for the version of "Al Nadda" from Civilization IV: Warlords, mostly because I can't make heads nor tails out of this character. He keeps changing. I originally conceived him as a "seductive", persuasive character, hence the seduction theme, but so far he hasn't been able to convince anybody of anything. So I may introduce the Warlords music for this new theme he seems to be manifesting - a general love of violence and chaos. Because if you can't have power for yourself, the next best thing is to make sure that nobody else has any power either.

Now, his backstory is still very vague and nebulous and not well fleshed out yet; he's technically just a one-off villain for a story that wound up getting stretched out over multiple threads. I've been trying to let him breathe and just throw him into whatever threads I can to see what happens, but as a result he is far from consistent right now. So far, I've seen his character themes as being about trying to find balance - or perhaps a better term would be to game the system so that he can do whatever he wants without upsetting the balance. "To everything there is a season," is a phrase he's fond of. He has a gray alignment in the Force, despite being a truly abysmal being as far as his actions go. That was another thing I wanted to explore - morality in SW outside the Light/Dark black and white duality of the Force. Can a truly horrible person still have a neutral or even Light-sided Force alignment, so long as they don't use the Dark Side? Ooooooh, nasty!

Tom Kovack - Lolol, this character is basically brand new and I have no clue what his deal is, but he does have a musical theme: "Kodo" by the Yoshida Brothers. I consider it a cousin to Starlin's theme.

Bithia - Girl, not only do you not have a voice yet, you don't have a theme either! Ah well, I'll at least bestow upon you a theme song: Balanescu Quartet's orchestral cover of Kraftwerk's "Computer Love". I was using this as a theme for Ayreon before I decided to downgrade him to an NPC, but I don't think it ever truly fit him. For those of you who don't know, "Computer Love" was originally an electronic song, but here they've performed it with an orchestra, and I actually like it better this way. It's an interesting thing, translating something that supposedly sounded cold and mechanical into the organic warmth of musical strings. Suits Bithia much better, given that she is a human soul transplanted into an inhuman (but still technically organic) biot body.

As for Bithia's character themes, she was made to be a replacement for Inanna in the story. She has a more personal reason for getting involved. More than that, I'd say she's made a much greater sacrifice - she willingly gave up her human body in exchange for something far more powerful and capable, but now she's afraid of losing what humanity she still has left over. She won the battle for independence and is no longer a servant enslaved to her programming, but she's missing a lot of the input that we associate with the human experience - not only physical senses, but many of her emotions are absent as well. She doesn't feel fear anymore, not in the visceral way we do - nor can she feel sadness, joy, anger, or impatience. It's debatable whether she can feel love, rather than just the memory of it from when she was human. It's a classic sci-fi framework for a story about what really makes us human, and one that I've been wanting to play with ever since I first started writing.