[Demonskid]

Kaimid is a shop NPC, he supposedly runs the Body Shop. That is what I was told at least. Since he likes to inflict pain on 'squishies' what better way to do it legally than a tattoo/piercing parlor?

Then again, back when staff had ownership over their NPC's they would get on them and interact with users in that NPC's Persona... so i'm not sure who all know's that Kaimid liked to experiment on humans (squishies) to see how they worked and try to understand pain. Hence the one little comic kaimids 'owner at the time' had made:



I think Fakir runs a shop too.. i forget which one if he did..

If you make them forum personalities and take away their shop jobs, who'd take over their shops? Kaimid is perfect for the Body Shop.

[Suzerain of Sheol]

Why do there have to be shop owners at all? I have yet to be given a single reason we should have them. All they seem to do is make item release announcements far more of a headache to write up.

I hate to break it to you, but characters like Kaimid would be the very first getting the axe in the reset we're talking about. Any of them who were owned by former staff are right out; you said it yourself, no one knows their quirks and mannerisms. They aren't our characters. The entire point would be to cut out all of those problematic old artifacts and codify what remains into something that will actually work.

( on my phone, sorry for any errors.)

[Salone]

Call me a whatever you wish here, but I am vehemently against any sort of shop NPC being in any sort of major story. I know it's about as fun as using IcyHot as eyedrops, but shop owners generally don't go around having adventures. They can do mascot work, have their own little mini tidbits, but if the first thing that defines someone is "shop owner", then generally they have enough things going on in their life with said shop that the most adventure they have is correcting an error in a ledger or actually trying to procure merchandise. They don't really belong in a main story, save for being a cameo or minor reference. At most they should be brought in only if a character needs to actually purchase something, and once again, only if it's story related.

A lot of the NPC's are just written as a complete mess. Some are salvageable, and some have been used to a much greater degree than I would have ever thought possible. But there are so many in the Character sections that read like D-list superheroes. I won't name any specifics, because generally I like you guys a lot and I know if I mention one it'll probably be the creation of someone I'm fond of and my aim was never to insult. But there's no point trying to build on to characters that are about as developed as a third-world country. It's like Pokemon, or even Chocobo breeding. Do you hold on to the failures, or do you set them free in the pursuit of a much better end result? Allusions to eugenics aside, I think we are standing before a great opportunity to end the old stories, archive them for new and old users to browse through and see what was, and then look forward to a grand new chapter to see how far our storytelling has grown.

[ml1201]

I know one site that had characters as shop owners, but someone was also trying to make some kind of comic with them, then they decided to ditch some of that and are now trying to 'remake' some of the shops. Which by the way has only resulted in maybe one shop owner and two event runners. I personally don't see the point in having shop owners, but maybe some flavor text describing what one sees when entering the shop would be nice. I love the flavor text on my MTG cards~♥♥♥

[Gallagher]

I don't think I get the opportunity to say it much, but.

I really, really, really, really, really hate Kaimid.

[ml1201]

I honestly have no opinion about him accept that I don't really like his hoodie. x'D Though I do have a question, what will happen to those character themed items? Will they stay/name changed or will they be removed and us reimbursed for them being removed?

[Gallagher]

No matter what choice we make, we're not going to wipe the things we have now and pretend they never existed. Character themed items will stay just as they are, there's no need to change them.

[ml1201]

Okay, was just wondering, so now I have a suggestion for those items, can we get them in more color combos then? Just because several of them I wish I could get in other colors, or should I leave that for the suggestion thread?

[Illusion]

Originally Posted by Suzerain of Sheol

Why do there have to be shop owners at all? I have yet to be given a single reason we should have them. All they seem to do is make item release announcements far more of a headache to write up.

I hate to break it to you, but characters like Kaimid would be the very first getting the axe in the reset we're talking about. Any of them who were owned by former staff are right out; you said it yourself, no one knows their quirks and mannerisms. They aren't our characters. The entire point would be to cut out all of those problematic old artifacts and codify what remains into something that will actually work.

( on my phone, sorry for any errors.)

In that case, why do we have to have a story at all? (Deep critical thought and response on this question gives you bonus imaginary points!)

Shopkeepers are the face of the stores, thus the face of the whole concept of Trisphee of being a avatar site. So writing a story of the faces/mascots of the story is the whole purpose of the world. I mean, you don't slap Pikachu on all Pokemon merchandise and come to find out that Pikachu isn't a Pokemon or has anything to do with the franchise itself. If you give me a non-shopkeeper character in Trisphee that has nothing to do with me the user, and then tell me they are a main character that's not going to work. Gaia actually tried that with zOMG! It stared a female lead, and her story bubbled into nothing because she had no purpose outside of zOMG, she wasn't a shopkeeper, and she was just there to tell a story that had nothing to do with Gaia itself.
If you want to get rid of shopkeepers, in a site perspective that's simply not going to work. In a story perspective, yes it will work because your simply telling a story. You need to be able to write a story within the perspective as a user of Trisphee then a perspective of an average reader. What point does a non shopkeeper/a NPC used to identify a tool or function have to do with Trisphee? They don't, which is why a story of the faces or mascots of Trisphee is the route you need to go.

If you want to get rid of those old staff characters, why not go with the superhero reboot route and take that character give them a new origin, new story, but keep the identity and pools of resource you have in tact. Comic books have retold their stories countless times in different universes and worlds. Which is exactly what your doing, they still have almost all the characters from the previous stories because they were popular, and were re-written with a new origin, story, and an altered identity. There has been multiples of the same character in the same universe as well, so no matter what route you go you can always pool together something out of it.

Take Kamid for example, you already have a fleshed out personality and a character that's easily identifiable, and so far the only reason why you want to can him is because your saying you aren't competent to write for a character that is not of your own because you don't think you can write for a different personality. Which again is an example of a bad writer. (An example of a decent writer is actually attempting to write for that character, and an example of a good writer is to write for that character well. In case your wondering my stance on how you judge how good a writer is.)
Yes someone else made a character for the site, and they are great. Use your resources and pool together something new from it if need be. I'm just trying to say don't throw away perfectly good things that are liked by many. Give something a look or outfit, change bits of story. A story of a robot god turned human could easily be flipped into a story of a human who thinks he's a robot/wants to be.

I can now see why you have been rejected so many times on somethings that need to happen... Even I can't agree, but it's not my decision in anyway to begin with. But I hope you can grab something from what I'm saying.

Originally Posted by Gallagher

I don't think I get the opportunity to say it much, but.

I really, really, really, really, really hate Kaimid.

And he was my favorite character... ._. This is like talking about superheros and someone says they hate Aquaman for example and I go "I like him..."

[Salone]

If I remember correctly, Kaimid is a machine god who was cast out in the realm of mere mortals, a god who is eons old at that. And yet with all of this, he acts like a 14 year old anime comic relief character with little grief concerning his backstory. He's taken the mortal banishment thing very well, almost as if it's not really a thing for him. The idea of someone getting used to things such as "pain" and other mortal concepts is a great idea, but it was executed about as well as...you know what, I'll skip that analogy.

Anyway, Kaimid's story bits are actually a fairly decent example of what I was talking about. You have the perfect setup for a vengeful god on a quest to be reinstated, or even semi lighthearted as he discovers this "eating" concept and remembering to breathe before he even gets his bearings, but he's reduced to a nonsensical anime character role of "Hey squishie feel this pain aye is this concept something you're aware of?"

Just such wasted potential.

[Illusion]

Originally Posted by Salone

If I remember correctly, Kaimid is a machine god who was cast out in the realm of mere mortals, a god who is eons old at that. And yet with all of this, he acts like a 14 year old anime comic relief character with little grief concerning his backstory. He's taken the mortal banishment thing very well, almost as if it's not really a thing for him. The idea of someone getting used to things such as "pain" and other mortal concepts is a great idea, but it was executed about as well as...you know what, I'll skip that analogy.

Anyway, Kaimid's story bits are actually a fairly decent example of what I was talking about. You have the perfect setup for a vengeful god on a quest to be reinstated, or even semi lighthearted as he discovers this "eating" concept and remembering to breathe before he even gets his bearings, but he's reduced to a nonsensical anime character role of "Hey squishie feel this pain aye is this concept something you're aware of?"

Just such wasted potential.

What you wanted was more so his buddy Fakir then Kamid himself.

And in fairness of his personality, if a child was frozed at his age for example his personality is intact and he'd never technically age with his mind because his brain hasn't or have aged with it. The only clause to this is if he did age and became older and then reverted to a non aging child form, but even then while he may be more mature he will never evolve or change from there.

[ml1201]

I have to butt in here and point out that's not necessarily true. There's been plenty of times where a child's maturity is far beyond that of their physical age because of things they've seen or been through at that age. Even as a kid people always said I acted much older than I actually was, even more so when compared to my brother. This could be because of the fact that when I was five I honestly thought my brother had died because when he was eight years old he fell eight feet on August eighth and got a blood clot in his brain. Which at the time there was only a fifty-fifty chance of him surviving. So when I saw a bit of blood on his cot I freaked and started screaming that he's dead. I was only five when this happened and for me it was very traumatic. I was pretty shaken up after that happened, even more so when I wasn't allowed to see him for a long time, so I thought he was barely alive and stuff. And later on it also didn't help when my real mother couldn't hold down a job (mostly because of traumatic things that happened to her that actually prevented her mind from maturing for the most part) and we've literally have had to go without food. So it really all depends on the situation and the mentality of the person to be completely honest about that.

[Espy]

Originally Posted by Gallagher

I don't think I get the opportunity to say it much, but.

I really, really, really, really, really hate Kaimid.

I like Kaimid D: And Fakir, really, but if they gotta go, they gotta go. -shrug-

I mean, hm. I don't really pay much attention to other sites' NPCs, but I vaguely remember Roliana's storyline had NPCs that has /zilch/ to do with shopkeeping. I mean, you're not going to sit down the god of mass destruction and tell him to help people try on shoes. (This is also my issue with Sarya and Trisiana and whoever-the-heck-else was some sort of goddess-in-disguise-as-a-mere-mortal. That I don't remember names as an ex-writer goes to show how many unnecessary NPCs we have.)

I don't see the point of /needing/ shopkeepers. I don't think we do. I can tell you that most of the staffers loathe Sebastian, or at least, writing for him.

EDIT: Really, there's no point in arguing about the ~AI personality~ and ~cutesy-ness~ of Kaimid. While I like him, he and his peers are mostly poorly-written characters.

[Quiet Man Cometh]

Originally Posted by Illusion

Shopkeepers are the face of the stores, thus the face of the whole concept of Trisphee of being a avatar site. So writing a story of the faces/mascots of the story is the whole purpose of the world. I mean, you don't slap Pikachu on all Pokemon merchandise and come to find out that Pikachu isn't a Pokemon or has anything to do with the franchise itself. If you give me a non-shopkeeper character in Trisphee that has nothing to do with me the user, and then tell me they are a main character that's not going to work. Gaia actually tried that with zOMG! It stared a female lead, and her story bubbled into nothing because she had no purpose outside of zOMG, she wasn't a shopkeeper, and she was just there to tell a story that had nothing to do with Gaia itself.

Um, is not Trisphee already full of non-shop characters? Or is entire Taskal War/Deivai/Quesaria set all working stock in the shop warehouses?

If you want to get rid of shopkeepers, in a site perspective that's simply not going to work.

Why not?

In a story perspective, yes it will work because your simply telling a story. You need to be able to write a story within the perspective as a user of Trisphee then a perspective of an average reader. What point does a non shopkeeper/a NPC used to identify a tool or function have to do with Trisphee? They don't, which is why a story of the faces or mascots of Trisphee is the route you need to go.

This sounds like you are suggesting we toss the stories and characters that aren't involved in the shops, which is pretty much was is being discussed. What exactly is the point you are making here, besides they don't belong? The way you talk about tweaking characters and story, it seems like you want the other npcs and stories to be resolved at least. I don't see why we need to bother.

If you want to get rid of those old staff characters, why not go with the superhero reboot route and take that character give them a new origin, new story, but keep the identity and pools of resource you have in tact. Comic books have retold their stories countless times in different universes and worlds. Which is exactly what your doing, they still have almost all the characters from the previous stories because they were popular, and were re-written with a new origin, story, and an altered identity. There has been multiples of the same character in the same universe as well, so no matter what route you go you can always pool together something out of it.

That would essentially just be making new characters. What resources would we be reusing if the plan is to rework them? Do you mean like keep the name "Batman" and his batcave, but re-write his origin story? Not sure if you've noticed that but irritates a lot of people. Ultimately, when you do something like that, a character loses integrity and becomes an outfit rather than a character.

Take Kamid for example, you already have a fleshed out personality and a character that's easily identifiable, and so far the only reason why you want to can him is because your saying you aren't competent to write for a character that is not of your own because you don't think you can write for a different personality. Which again is an example of a bad writer. (An example of a decent writer is actually attempting to write for that character, and an example of a good writer is to write for that character well. In case your wondering my stance on how you judge how good a writer is.)

No, that's you making assumptions based on your own ideas of writing. Whether a character is relatable or not can depend entirely on the reader. I don't find him very relatable at all, or perhaps I just don't find him that interesting a character to read about. I haven't written for Kaimid because it wasn't something I had to do.

Not talking about Kaimid specifically here, but if a character isn't that developed or has a contradictory personality to begin with, what personality is really there to work with? They way you keep suggesting we adapt the characters we have, makes it seem to me that, to you, a character is comprised of a name and a face and a few details about what they can do or have, the rest being malleable as needed. I call that shoddy writing.

Yes someone else made a character for the site, and they are great. Use your resources and pool together something new from it if need be. I'm just trying to say don't throw away perfectly good things that are liked by many. Give something a look or outfit, change bits of story. A story of a robot god turned human could easily be flipped into a story of a human who thinks he's a robot/wants to be.

And by doing that you don't actually have Kaimid anymore. You have a character that happens to be similar with a name you didn't bother to change. Really, what's the point?

Many of the NPC's are around because of events in a story that is now largely defunct. Why keep them at all? If we yank the story, the characters no longer have any reason to be around, nor do they have justifications for their personalities as what has defined them is gone. Is Ryuko going back to being happy dragon-man with two daughters or are they not going to exist any more?, and since they didn't get murdered by Meisha (or did they? Would she still be around too?) there is no justification for dark god Ryuko, at least, not without writing something new. In that case, why not just start with something new in the first place?

I figure much of the reason to keep the current cast around would be nostalgia for the users who are already here. To a new user who has no idea who any of these people are without back-reading through a mess of text and events, they won't mean a thing.

Sure, that will happen overtime with any cast we create, but at least if we start a new, we can build up a better foundation from with to launch a story that wouldn't be so arduous on newcomers.


I didn't proofread a thing in this post so I hope is makes some sense.

[Taiki]

Well considering Trisphee is kind of futuristic and takes place over multiple planets... if a reboot were to happen I'd just suggest refocusing the story on a "different part of the galaxy" where they're not in contact to the old story/characters without having to delete them from the canon. That stuff happened, now let's see what's going on over here for a new story kind of thing. Lets us start fresh without having to remove the canon.

[Espy]

Let's remove the canon.

There's no point in keeping it and having users ask questions about a now-defunct world and setting. If we're starting over, we're not going back there anyways.