About choosing a character concept
When coming up with a character concept, it’s a good idea not to pick the first thing that comes to mind. Wait until you have a bunch of good ideas, figure out what you find interesting about them, then try to incorporate those things harmoniously into one character concept.
 

Inspiration is in the details
There are thousands of places you can get inspiration for your character. Remember, you’re creating a person, complete with likes and dislikes, opinions, beliefs and preferences. These don’t come from the ether; they have to be rationalized. If your character hates a certain food, for example, it’s helpful to know at least what sparks it. You don’t have to write up a bible’s worth of psychological info, but describing why your character does the things she does will also help you improvise a response if someone brings the thing you hate, love, fear or are allergic to towards your character. Anything can be used as inspiration. A line from a poem, a quote, the way a character you love looks at someone, the way your favourite actor walks into a scene, the colour of a muscle car at night; scraps of anything can breathe unique life into your PC. Again, you don’t need to write a dictionary, but picking a few interesting quirks, movements, speech patterns, costumes, etc, can make all the difference in giving your character that convincing breath of believability.
 

Starting at the beginning
Before your character’s birth, figure out where she’s from and when. This will determine language, general social climates, and what conditions your PC (Player Character) was born in. Were you a child of the 60’s? Then social rebellion, or the reactionary militarism that came after it, would be what was going on at the time. Were you born in 1900s Bulgaria? Maybe you were born to poor farmers. If you were born in Europe in the 1800s, you may have been well-insulated from the horrors of the world, or you may have been in the military participating in them. Where you were born and how you were raised lays the groundwork for how you view yourself and the world and how you think. Not that characters don’t change over time and circumstances, but this will be your starting base. Again, it’s not necessary to go into too much detail; just a short summary of the where and when, with some interesting facts for depth.
 

In the middle
How you fill in the middle of your character is up to you. Keep in mind her starting point, but feel free to be creative. Not every character needs to have a glamourous life, be a tomb raider or model, or win a Nobel Prize. Most of the best character concepts are regular people, and it’s how they interact with their change and vampiric society that makes them interesting.
 

Embrace me
It’s up to you to determine the circumstances of your Embrace. Were you a Ghoul first? Did your mortal have some type of introduction to Kindred society before the Kiss, or was it something you found out about afterwards? Did you wish for or reject the Kiss, or were you even given a choice? This part of your character’s history is fairly important, since it will largely affect how your character interacts with vampires and their society and how she views her place in it.
 

Unlife
Next, determine what you’ve been doing since the Embrace. It’s pretty much like how you determined the story for the middle part of your mortal life, just with vampires. Keep in mind the different aspects of Kindred and Camarilla society. Your clan, sire, status and city will affect what you learned, how you are viewed, what you do and how you’re treated.
 

Questions
 These questions are just to help you direct your character creation to have more depth. Characters are people, and sometimes we get caught up in the interesting aspects of Vampire before we’re done creating them. These questions are only to inspire you to detail and can be added to or discarded at will (though there are some details that are necessary for character creation.)
 

1. When and where was your character born?

2. What social class was she born into?

3. Give some details about your character’s parents, their status (i.e. together, divorced, widowed), and your PC’s relationship with them.

4. How did your character grow up? Give the general environment and your character’s thoughts on it.

5. What schooling did your character have, if any?

6. If necessary, describe her family.

7. What did your character do as an adult? Did she continue school, join the military, get a job, get married?

8. Did anything unusual happen to her?

9. Did anything unusual happen to her environment?

10. Describe your character’s family, friends, co-workers, peers.

11. Put in any interesting or relevant details about your character; did she travel, start a church, learn a valuable skill or lesson, meet important people?

12. Were there any issues of trauma or crisis at any point in your character’s life?

13. Describe the circumstances of your character’s Embrace.

14. Make some notes about your character’s opinions, contacts, allies, enemies, events and actions with Kindred and their society.
 
 

Details

1. What are your character’s goals? What does she hope to accomplish?

2. How does your character feel about her state and its aspects?

3. How does your character feel about the sect, Kindred society, mortals, her clan?

4. What does your character consider valuable (i.e. security, resources, status)?

5. What is her Achilles Heel?

6. What is she afraid of?

7. Describe your character’s haven and its details (i.e. location, ownership).

8. Where did your character’s Merits, Flaws and Beast traits originate from?

9. During your character’s history, there should be an explanation of her Nature and Demeanor. If there isn’t, please explain them as they apply to her concept.
 
 

Back to the General Character Creation page
 
 

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