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Guide to Legal Civillian Roleplay | Part 1 | Creation, Development & Realism


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Guide to Legal Civillian Roleplay

Part 1  |  Creation, Development & Realism

 


 

Introduction

Hey there! So you are looking to get a more indepth knowledge on how to roleplay as a legal civillian? Then you've come to the right place. In this multi-part guide, you'll be taken through it step by step on how to create a realistic legal civillian character.

A ''civillian legal character'' is a very broad term to talk of, it can range from a hobo below the bridge to a millionaire living in Rockford Hills, or from the C.E.O. to the DJ keeping your clubs alive! Civillian legal roleplay is really diverse and that is what makes it extremely fun to roleplay as!

 

Note: Civillian legal roleplay is very, very, diverse. It is nearly impossible to hit every point in even a multi-part guide. If I missed anything, feel free to comment and it will be amended. For the sake of this guide, a ''legal civillian character'' will be defined with the following:

Quote

''A legal civillian character is a character that was originally created to live by the law, with the occasional petty crime. A legal civillian character can become an illegal civillian character when it gets involved in a criminal organisation and/or voluntairy commits felonies for its own personal gain or for the gain of the group it associates itself with.''

It is a very subjective manner, you will have to ask yourself in what way this applies to your character.

 


 

Guides of the same Series

Click on one of the guides below to get started, or remain on this one!
Part 0  |  Definitions and Meanings (WIP)
Part 1  |  Creation, Development & Realism

Part 2  |  Roleplaying Fear & Interaction with Illegal Roleplay (WIP)
Part 3  |  Outdoor Activities (WIP)
Part 4  |  Property and Financials (WIP)

Part 5  |  Interacting and Joining Factions/Companies (WIP)

Part 6  |  City v. County Roleplay (WIP)

Part 7  |  Niche Roleplay (WIP)

 


 

Creation of your Legal Character

Character Traits.
Creating your legal character is like creating any other character. However, it is very important to know that even though legal and illegal characters can have similar skillsets and traits, they are applied vastly different from eachother. Keep this in mind when you're creating your character. A famous exemple is; ''If Al Capone went into legit business, he'd make a brilliant C.E.O.''

 

It is very important to avoid making a character which is good at everything, which is very tempting to make. However, each character has its flaws. What I always like to do when I'm completely stuck on this part, how silly as it sounds; Sims 4.

When creating a sim, you are forced to choose between different different traits. For reference, see the below lists of skills and flaws. Its very easy to pick three of each if you are really, really, stuck! Keep it to three, maybe four. It is not advised to make a superhuman, so know the limits!

 

What is important to note however, is that this is just ''merely'' for the generation/creation of your character. A character with reasonable development behind it could change over time. Traits are never permanent! Side-tracking just a bit into the next paragraph of development; always go off of what happens ingame to your character and decide what effect that would have on them.

 

NOTE: the below traits are from the Sims 4 game. Descriptions slightly alterred to fit GTA World.

 

Emotional Traits

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  • Active: These characters are often full of energy and like sports/excercise.
  • Cheerful: These characters are generally happy as their ''neutral'' mood, and are more happy/positive than other people around them. Can't work together with Gloomy.
  • Creative: Speaks for itself, these characters often work as graphic designers, clothes designers, or models.
  • Genius/Smart: Your character has an above average IQ.
  • Gloomy: These characters are often sad/negative/down in life. Can't work together with Cheerful.
  • Goofball: These characters are often the jokers of their friend circle. Pranking, joking and ''trolling'' are common!
  • Hot-Headed: Can get angry/instigated very easily, has a temper.
  • Romantic: These characters tend to be flirty and occasionally prefer romantic interactions over social interactions with strangers / love interests. Can't work together with the trait Unflirty.
  • Self-Assured: These characters tend to be confident and determined.
  • Unflirty: These characters feel uneasy when engaging romanticly in public, and can feel uneasy nearby romantic interactions. Can't work together with the trait Romantic.

 

Hobby Traits

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  • Art Lover: These characters have a sense of art, and can be artistic themselves too. They admire art and often have specific tastes, but not always.
  • Bookworm: These characters like reading.
  • Foodie: Characters with this trait often go out to eat, love food, food art, and joking about ''food babies'' is common.
  • Geek: Nerd.
  • Maker: These characters like ''making'' stuff. They are real undertakers for projects, or for personal endeavors.
  • Music Lover: Characters with this trait often listen to music. At home, in the car, in clubs (duh), in public. Music is their life.
  • Perfectionist: Handy trait often found in mapping-characters aka interior designers. Always strive for high quality.

 

Lifestyle Traits

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  • Adventurous: These characters are always searching for new and unique experiences, and have adventurous hobbies like hiking, cycling, etc..
  • Ambitious: These characters get motivated by pure success, wether it be in the personal setting or work setting. Failures affect these characters harder and more direct than with other characters.
  • Cat Lover: Your character has a fondness for cats.
  • Waterrat: Your character prefers water related activities over other activities.
  • Childish: Your character often acts childish openly without being ashamed for it. Acting like a teen while being 27 for exemple.
  • Clumsy: Your character often drops things, but more often laughs at their failures than get upset about it.
  • Dance Machine: Often goes out and rarely says no to a party/night out.
  • Dog Lover: Your character has a fondness for dogs.
  • Erratic: More severe cases can be classified as insane, but is a real diverse trait. The most common things that Erratic characters do is acting unpredictably, can get upset over the most innocent things, and/or switch emotions very frequently.
  • Freegan: These characters reject consumerism and prefer recycling over throwing away.
  • Glutton: React more agitated to/when hunger/hungry. Can enjoy eating at a fastfood diner and a 5-star restaurant.
  • Green Friend: Strives/supports eco-friendly motives.
  • Kleptomaniac: Your character often borrows from others without asking or letting the other know *wink wink*
  • Lazy: Your character is lazy. Simple.
  • Outdoors: Tend to be more happy and at ease when outside.
  • Materialistic: These characters often buy new stuff for the sake of owning stuff.
  • Neat: These characters tidy up their home to the fullest, and have a disgust for litter.
  • Slob: Opposite of Neat.
  • Snob: Only gets impressed by high quality.
  • Squeamish: Feel sick at the sight of bodily fluids, bugs, vomit, violence and death. Often scared for direct confrontation aswell.
  • Vegetarian/Vegan: Speaks for itself.

 

Social Traits

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  • Bro: Sports fanatics, always hangsout with their best friends (bros) and feel more assured around their bros.
  • Evil: Often have dark thoughts, and enjoy hurting other characters.
  • Family Orientated: These characters want/have a family and see that as their top priority. Their love for their family trumps everything.
  • Good: Opposite of Evil.
  • Hates Children: Your character can not stand kids.
  • Insider: Love being in clubs or communities, and be a part of something bigger.
  • Jealous: Get more easily jealous.
  • Loner: Opposite of Insider, likes being alone / likes being a lone wolf.
  • Mean: Likes being mean to others, isn't afraid to pick a (physical) fight.
  • Noncommittal: These characters avoid closed relationships and fulltime jobs, to an extent.
  • Outgoing: These characters are very social and often go clubbing.
  • Paranoid: Always look over their shoulders.
  • Proper: Are more at ease in formal wear and openly disapprove Mean or Evil characters.
  • Self-Absorbed: Everything evolves around themselves!

 


 

Development

Character Backstory

NOTE: Development is something that is consistently adressed throughout these guides. We won't go in-depth into development in this section for that reason.

 

Development of a legal character is, ofcourse, way different than that of an illegal character. You have different factions to join, different oppertunities, and different situations as a whole. The thing that marks a start for your development is always a solid background story. The background story defines your character from before you started playing it, and you can use this to define a lot of indirect traits aswell. Common chapters in a backstory can include the following;

  • Family Basics, Origins
  • Childhood
  • Late Teens
  • Adulthood
  • Traumas endured
  • Aspirations / Life Goals

 

A proper background story for your character should, for exemple, include an explanation for different traits you have chosen for your character and not allow any traits that counter themselves. Character development is the process of building a unique, three-dimensional character with depth, personality, and clear motivations.

 

Character development can also refer to the changes a character undergoes over the course of their life as a result of their actions and experiences. Imagine your character walking down Vespucci Boulevard at night, and gets robbed at gunpoint. Your character is taken by complete surprise, and is quickly searched by the robber. The phone, money, juwelry, all gets taken under the threat of your character's life. Not only is this frightening; this can very well be traumatizing and this could lead to your character having nightmares, avoid walking at night, or even get a CCW under this motivation (and not an illegal gun). This is development. This event had an impact on your character's life and your character is acting upon it and facing the negative and positive consequences accordingly.

 

One major thing you wish to avoid is''Avatarism''. Its a relatively unknown term, but to make the meaning behind it as clear as possible; avatarism is the act in which you portray yourself in a character with little to no actual new traits or development added to it. The character is simply an empty husk, and is being played for the RPG elements of the server. To an extent, avatarism is bannable and you wish to avoid this at all costs. Avatarism is barely present in the illegal roleplay scene.

 

When making a legal civillian character, it is important to note that you should take specific things into consideration. It is, for exemple, likely (but not only) that your character comes from the more wealthy parts of town, and not from South Central. It is also likely a legal character takes measures to avoid interaction with illegal roleplayers, such as avoiding certain parts of town.

 


 

Realism of your Character

What is Realism?

Realism in your character aswell as your development means it would be feasable to have him/her excist as a person within the real world, outside your computer. It is actually a requirement for each character to be realistic, described within the server rules at ''6) Character Rules''.

 

It is important to realize what is realistic and what isn't. A few exemples of what most commonly is considered non-realistic, which can be combined too;

  • Your character is 18 and;
    - Owns 5+ cars and/or;
    - Is CEO of a huge company and/or;
    - Has millions worth of assets and/or;
    - Owns a supercar
  • Your character has no fear at all for illegal roleplayers because of his heroic soldier / street vigilante background.
  • Your character works multiple jobs which would be unlikely to work together with the skillset of your character; you're basicly doing it for the money.
  • Your character is a university student but owns a Kawaii without having millionaire parents; student loans are crippling.
  • Your character is 27, has the mentality of a 15 year old, and owns a CCW license.
  • Your character is a city-rat, came from New York to live in San Andreas, and takes a house in Sandy Shores purely to own a house, even though your character does all her activities within the city of Los Santos.
  • Your character is a model, bartender, CEO, racer, tattoo artist and DJ all at once.
  • Having tattoo's all over your character's body which have little to no meaning at all, apart from looking cool.
  • Your character is a mechanic but owns a supercar and/or lives in a mansion.

 

The realism of your character is monitored by the Roleplay Quality Team, and they actively enforce roleplay quality. You can report poor roleplayers, but people can also report you for poor roleplay.

 

Are there exceptions? Yes, as with any case, there are exceptions. But keep in mind that these are extremely rare and IF you are going to portray one, your roleplay is expected to be almost above server expectations. Exceptions are exceptions, and never the average.

Crime is not uncommon among legal civillian characters, however it is not rampant. If you rather want an illegal gun and can't wait to have a justified kill, you're better off with other roleplay oppertunities within the community. Legal civillian characters often involve themselves in petty crime, if involving in crime at all. A legal civillian character should not have a lengthy criminal record (unless its a rehabillitated criminal).

 


 

Noteworthy Mentions from Players

Quotes from players within the comments of this thread, which are noteworthy to the guide.

 

none at the moment

 


 

Guide is subject to change over time. As new information gets available and more input is given, I will update this guide regulary.

Edited by ThatDutchPerson
Contributors: ThatDutchPerson (Author), Cipher, i dont wanna od in la, Yoak!, Winged
  • Upvote 4
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2 minutes ago, Cipher said:

Civilian and legal, when creating a character, aren't mutually exclusive imo.

Thank you for this feedback, and I understand where this comes from.

I have amended the wording in the guide to specificly mention ''civillian legal characters'' instead of just ''civillian character''! 🙂 

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Nice! This looks good! Might actually push me enough to polish up my 14 page long character chart that I use for creating new characters, and post it here for others to use.

Edited by GamingNinjaSheep
  • Upvote 1
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b1a8a26389ae81b75bcf38e1e69a020e.png
this entire guide seems fairly invalid. there's no such thing as civilian roleplay in the first place, because it would be the vast majority of the playerbase, including everyone who isn't a part of pd or sd. i suggest you to rather re-write this into a thread on developing a realistic "legal" character instead of trying to standardize mallrat roleplay.

  • Upvote 3
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1 minute ago, i dont wanna od in LA said:

this entire guide seems fairly invalid. there's no such thing as civilian roleplay in the first place, because it would be the vast majority of the playerbase, including everyone who isn't a part of pd or sd.

I have to agree with this part of the comment. ALTHOUGH. It's a really nice idea to try and have a guide for people to follow who want to do legal roleplay. I really do like the idea because some people do need guidance so if you'd like help with this let me know! @ThatDutchPerson

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1 minute ago, Yoak said:

I have to agree with this part of the comment. ALTHOUGH. It's a really nice idea to try and have a guide for people to follow who want to do legal roleplay. I really do like the idea because some people do need guidance so if you'd like help with this let me know! @ThatDutchPerson

I think the issue here is that the author of this guide isn't addressing particularly legal roleplay. He's talking about the group that is currently recognized as the "civilians" (which is an invalid term, as I've proven in my last post), but they do drugs, they carry weapons, they commit crimes, they just aren't a part of any proper factions. The issue here is the wording, I believe. You should either stick to only legal roleplay, or simply encourage more people to roleplay human beings, with their traits and story, rather than bland avatars, that do nothing but speed around in their 200k cars purchased with the starter paycheck, esex and engage into vigilante acts of gunning down criminals. That's only my two cents, however.

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5 minutes ago, i dont wanna od in LA said:

b1a8a26389ae81b75bcf38e1e69a020e.png
this entire guide seems fairly invalid. there's no such thing as civilian roleplay in the first place, because it would be the vast majority of the playerbase, including everyone who isn't a part of pd or sd. i suggest you to rather re-write this into a thread on developing a realistic "legal" character instead of trying to standardize mallrat roleplay.

I have to disagree with you, as the guide clearly speaks of a ''civillian legal character'', which doesnt neccesarily mean PD or SD. And afterall, further down in the guide you can see clearly that mallrat behaviour, although not specificly mentioned, is not recommended.

I made this guide as a direct result from various topics, these two in particular:

3 minutes ago, Yoak said:

I have to agree with this part of the comment. ALTHOUGH. It's a really nice idea to try and have a guide for people to follow who want to do legal roleplay. I really do like the idea because some people do need guidance so if you'd like help with this let me know! @ThatDutchPerson

Looking forward to working with you! ThatDutchPerson#9107 is my discord.

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1 minute ago, ThatDutchPerson said:

I have to disagree with you, as the guide clearly speaks of a ''civillian legal character'', which doesnt neccesarily mean PD or SD. And afterall, further down in the guide you can see clearly that mallrat behaviour, although not specificly mentioned, is not recommended.

I made this guide as a direct result from various topics, these two in particular:

 

You need to re-read my posts. I realize that it's pretty difficult to understand that, but if you're actually willing to help people improve - do it the right way. Guides like this do more harm than good.

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1 minute ago, i dont wanna od in LA said:

You need to re-read my posts. I realize that it's pretty difficult to understand that, but if you're actually willing to help people improve - do it the right way. Guides like this do more harm than good.

If you mean that legal roleplayers sometimes commit petty crimes themselves too, I've amended that into the guide. They're no saints afterall! 😛

If this is not what you meant, I invite you over to my discord together with Yoak: ThatDutchPerson#9107 🙂 

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  • ThatDutchPerson changed the title to Guide to Legal Civillian Roleplay | Part 1 | Creation, Development & Realism
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