JoeDios.com Forums - how many characters for a dio

12-21-2006, 09:08 PM	#11
ender098 Veteran Offline --> Posts: 3,665 --> Join Date: Dec 2005	I think the size of the team (or # of characters you use) depends on what your story is about. Every story has a "quest" , Ie: the Weather dominator; seeking the three elements, Serpentor; seeking the bodies to create him, Destro having nanites; how to stop him. Sometimes Your "Quest" is the main charatcer and the real Charatcers support that. Because I know the Characters, I find these the best stories where we don't get weighed down with personal stuff too much and we get to see the characters in their element doing what they need to do. (But I'm in the minority!) Another problem is developing a character may require a flashback into a time when they were a civilian, and even though I'm trying to get more "civilians" (Corps! Cops, firemen, Construction workers and Wow! Power Girls) it's hard (and expensive!) to get a group of believable civilians and film a non-war scene. If you don't do that, you're forced to do an "Explanation" where a Character tells about the incident, which can lead to scenes of long boring dialog. I think if you're getting in depth, use no more than 3 Characters. If you're 'just' getting into their characters, 5-8 is ok. If their cannon fodder Ala the movie "Hamburger Hill" throw the whole collection on! And enemies...go for broke....in Action sequences, you need tons of body count! But remember, this is MY OPINION. A lot of people here will disagree with me, but take a little from everyone and find what works for you!!

12-22-2006, 12:41 AM

#12

Blowtorch

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Quote:

Originally Posted by ender098

I think the size of the team (or # of characters you use) depends on what your story is about. Every story has a "quest" , Ie: the Weather dominator; seeking the three elements, Serpentor; seeking the bodies to create him, Destro having nanites; how to stop him. Sometimes Your "Quest" is the main charatcer and the real Charatcers support that. Because I know the Characters, I find these the best stories where we don't get weighed down with personal stuff too much and we get to see the characters in their element doing what they need to do. (But I'm in the minority!)

Another problem is developing a character may require a flashback into a time when they were a civilian, and even though I'm trying to get more "civilians" (Corps! Cops, firemen, Construction workers and Wow! Power Girls) it's hard (and expensive!) to get a group of believable civilians and film a non-war scene. If you don't do that, you're forced to do an "Explanation" where a Character tells about the incident, which can lead to scenes of long boring dialog.

I think if you're getting in depth, use no more than 3 Characters. If you're 'just' getting into their characters, 5-8 is ok. If their cannon fodder Ala the movie "Hamburger Hill" throw the whole collection on! And enemies...go for broke....in Action sequences, you need tons of body count! But remember, this is MY OPINION. A lot of people here will disagree with me, but take a little from everyone and find what works for you!!

Very good point and I never really thought of it that way before. Some advice very well spoken (written in this case)

12-22-2006, 08:41 AM	#13
Sonneilon aka 'Paul WS Anderson' ;) Offline --> Posts: 7,751 --> Join Date: Jul 2005	Just FYI, in my 1st dio, I knocked off a ton of chars cuz I did do a big melee. Torpedo, Big Ben, Surefire, Rampage, about everybody who had a lame figure (imo), died. At the same time, I didn't work on their personalities or anything. I think my 1st dio, it showed what NOT to do. LOL! (I intro'd Crosshair in the beginning and he didnt' even end up with a real role!) Being an old fogey now, if Joe chars start dying off, I need a good reason. I'd rather not see Wetsuit and Torpedo just get knocked off for the fun of it. Now, if you used a bunch of greenshirts who are used as fodder, cool. But characters are characters for a reason. I suppose the whole concept of the GSs is to allow the Joe side to have a huge army and people getting knocked off w/o wasting real chars. I probably should've been more clear about development. I don't necessarily need a "where they came from" sequence. Some of the chars we just assume why they are there. I don't need to know WHY Torpedo joined up BUT if you do put in a blurb, it deepens the character. And it can be done in a couple of lines. "I joined cuz those Cobra twits killeded my brother!!!" Yet, you take a char like Gung Ho, nobody will question him. shrug I like to work on the characterizations of my figures so it deepens the storyline. Makes them more real and it helps when things go bad or when things go good. I worked hard on the relationship 'tween Bombstrike and Gung Ho in my latest 3.75". Aliens and Starship Troopers are great in terms of dealing w/ mass chars and mass chars getting knocked off. Do we care that Frost, Baski, and the rest of the crew got knocked off? Not really, but at least there was a tiny bit of time given to the char so we KNOW who got killed. Starship Troopers had mass people dying w/ a core set of chars that the story revolved around. When Dizzy died, people actually cared. This is just me. My feeling is, if you give us just a few chars to care about, the rest can be used as fodder in the end.