Application Guide
Combined tips and feedback regarding applications. Please read through once and use this resource as a check when making apps. This guide will be continue to be updated into the future, so please consider it the go-to for current application advice!
Jump to:
Questions Etiquette
Core Advice
Formatting
Be Careful With
Recommendations
Do's and Don'ts
Questions Etiquette
Guidelines on where and how to ask your questions in a way that keeps your mods happy.
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Group note is preferred for questions. If your question is general (e.g. about wider world canon or group meta) or is relevant to multiple mods, definitely use group notes. Only note mods personally if your question is specifically about that mod's city or guild. If in doubt, use group notes. (Journal comments are ok too but get lost more easily as they're harder to track - if we haven't answered in a couple of weeks, please send a follow-up note!)
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Don't note multiple mods the same questions, or bounce many questions around multiple mods without reason. We talk to each other so we will know if it happens. It consumes our time unnecessarily and just comes across as you trying to jump the queue. Send your question(s) once and wait patiently. If you need to ask questions of multiple mods, compile and send them via group notes as we all see those.
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Know what you want to ask. We don't do app checks so don't send us concept dumps for general critique - it's not something we have time for. Be clear about what you are asking, and ask it as (a) specific question(s). Be concise with concept checks; all we want to see for those is a summary of the ideas you're concerned about.
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As always, be patient with us. Sometimes the mod who needs to answer is busy, tired, absent, etc. Sometimes we'll need to discuss it and it'll take a while because of timezones and real life. Opening periods are generally stressful for us so please be gentle (which isn't to say we dislike it, but it's a lot of work and can be an overwhelming few weeks). If your question was sent in by group note, we haven't missed or forgotten it and will get back to you when we can.
Core Advice
Advice on what core criteria we look for when assessing your apps. These points are all important and can make or break an app so please take them into account when concepting and writing. Most of it boils down to 'show you understand your character, are honest with their imperfections and can plot sensibly'.
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Don't be afraid of giving your character meaningful flaws and weaknesses. By this we mean traits that:
a) Other characters could reasonably dislike; and
b) Can lead them to lose, make serious mistakes and in general be fallible.
Don't dilute, qualify or spin a solid flaw to soften it*. Don't pick only half-flaws that are as good as they are bad (e.g. 'perfectionist', 'self-sacrificing', 'blunt') or flaws that protect from vulnerability (e.g. 'cynical', 'manipulative', 'guarded'). Be clear about how they impact your character†. Seriously, flaws can be the most endearing and interesting parts of a character, and are excellent material for that sweet character development!
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Explain everything properly:
a) The personality description should be a complete summary of the character. Each trait should be justified or indirectly supported. Don't over-focus on narrow facets (e.g. relationships, combat style) - we want to know how they face life and make decisions in general.
b) Skills, occupations and events in the history should be justified. Don't leave large gaps in the history - even if nothing much happened, please say so! If you have spoiler backstory that you'd like to keep secret, please link a 'full story' stash/gdoc in the join request just for the mods so we can make sure everything is ok. We'd hate to have to knock you back months into the group if your reveal doesn't fit the world canon!
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Be coherent and consistent. The personality should be more than just a collection of disparate traits; it must feel whole, give a good feel for the character, and explain any surface contradictions‡. Actions in the history should be consistent with what the personality describes and vice versa - e.g. if a character is supposed to be fearful, convenient acts of bravery with no reason would be considered inconsistent.
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Be realistic. This may be a fantasy group, but whether or not magic exists does not change human nature or cause-and-effect. 'Illogical' and 'overly convenient' as criticisms still apply to plots in a fantasy setting.
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Focus on your character, at present. The personality should focus on who they are right now; don't confuse it with who they used to be. The history should focus on their life and not, say, diverge at length into their parents' romance. The only exception is if the information is currently relevant - e.g. if their old self is still in there deep down, or if the family's past is an important part of their present life.
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Write your character as an individual. While it's totally fine to write characters together (e.g. family, friends), don't let your character's app rely so much on someone else's that they're incomplete without them. Every character needs to be able to stand on their own, with their own depth, motivations and self-contained backstory.
*E.g. Original - 'Amos has a bad temper.'
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Diluting - 'Amos can sometimes be said to have a slightly bad temper.' So does he or does he not have a bad temper? If it's only sometimes / only according to some / only slightly, then is it actually noteworthy any more?
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Qualifying - 'Amos has a bad temper but only when really pushed.' This adds a condition that makes the bad temper meaningless. Surely any normal person will lose their temper when really pushed?
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Spinning - 'Amos has a bad temper when confronted with cruelty to children or animals.' This isn't really a negative as it's only used to make him look good and just. It's no longer a flaw because it's presented as a positive.
†This means being explicit about how a flaw manifests as a negative. E.g.
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Amos has a bad temper. He is sensitive and has a tendency to take things personally, which often leads to him getting offended and lashing out when it's not deserved.
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Amos has a bad temper. He is pleasant when in control but his first instinct when anything upsets him is to get angry. Dropped his beer? Curse up a storm. Beaten to the last bagel? Embark on a petty revenge mission until his friends or better sense get a hold of him. Embarrassed by having a crush? Go full tsundere.
‡This means explaining how they fit together. Two traits that contradict on face value may not necessarily contradict if the details mean they make sense together. E.g.
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Jovin is both jaded and naive. He is jaded in his attitude to romance, but is naive with money and easily conned.
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Elspeth is both bossy and laissez-faire. She is bossy in a crisis, but prefers to take a back seat when all is well. This is because she has been burned by her own unchecked controlling habits in the past and tries to compensate, however stress brings it back out.
Formatting
Advice on how to format an app for maximum mod satisfaction. You won't ever be rejected on formatting (unless it gets actually illegible) but we would dearly appreciate this advice being taken as it makes us much happier to read an app.
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Be clear and concise in third person. Aim for efficient and easy to read. Avoid purple prose and going into great detail if it's for decorative purposes only. That said, certainly keep the detail if it explains why things happened or what things meant for your character (e.g. how they felt, what they learnt, how they coped). We are old and tired so please have mercy and make it easy to read.
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Stick to the word limits. They are not optional. There's no official limit for the additional info or relationships but keep it reasonable; they shouldn't be the biggest section of your app.
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Get a beta-check if you're unsure about your English. Some wonkiness is fine (not everyone's a native speaker and that's no problem), but if we can't read it then we can't assess it!
Be Careful With
Things to be careful with as they often lead to rejections or long corrections. These aren't necessarily auto-reject but are easily taken too far - in which case it can and will result in a rejection.
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Magic and technology. We're perfectly happy for you to come up with cool magic or tech ideas, but please do check concepts with us by group note before committing if you're not sure from the resources! Alvapedia has a lot of good info on magic and some on tech, but as always it's a WIP and there may be relevant details that mods know but haven't published or thought to publish yet. We won't ever reject solely based on things you couldn't have known, but checking makes everything so much easier for both you and us!
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'Badass' character archetypes. We find these almost always end up very lacking in terms of weaknesses. Common ones we see and knock back a lot are the 'boss-villains' (who are powerful, cruel and often wildly infamous) and the 'master of secrets' types (who can manipulate secrets out of anyone while protecting their own - which gets too meta-gamey). It's not impossible to do these well, and if you believe you have a good handle on the weaknesses part you can certainly try, but our past experience has been that they're usually written as OP.
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Special power / 'rarity'. We understand that your character is their own protagonist, but as we are a group please keep in mind that there are many other characters you must respect as equal protagonists. So while you can definitely give your character special, cool things (we like creativity!) don't take it to extremes such that they necessarily outshine, wow or are more special than others (e.g. 'loses to no-one', 'everyone knows (of) them', 'immeasurable potential', multiple 'rare' gimmicks, anything with superlatives). Be careful with magical powers - remember that every class in the same tier should be on par with each other in combat. The most commonly overpowered on this measure are Summoners/Conjurers.
Recommendations
Recommendations for better apps (in our opinion). While these are not necessarily mandatory, they are what we'd consider good practice and will certainly win or lose you brownie points. So follow them if you can!
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Picking cities and classes. Preferably pick cities and classes which have less people - check the EXP Tally (Trivia Statistics tab) to see the current counts!
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Use your chosen city's influences. Generic is always acceptable but picking up on the culture of your chosen city is very much appreciated. This doesn't mean you have to stick to stereotypes or particular kinds of personalities - but consider how growing up in a culture would affect attitudes, values, habits, tastes, style of dress, etc. That said, don't put undue emphasis on national colours - a Mirian can wear orange as easily as they can wear blue, and vice versa for a Kobener.
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Stick to your chosen class. E.g. If you want your character to be good at archery, pick Hunter or Ranger - don't pick a mage class and tack on archery expecting that it can be a key part of their skills. Be clear on what your character's key skills are and don't try cherry-pick from other classes. Over-skilling your character doesn't make them cooler, it just makes them overpowered.
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Character age and class skills/tiers. Please avoid pushing the minimum age limit for the class tiers. The minimum ages are minimums even for the talented and trained, not averages or free-for-all thresholds. It is not underachieving or even unusual to be at Base or Intermediate in late life because class skills are not a life necessity. As a guideline, add at least a few years' buffer between your character's age and the minimum for their tier (and even more if they're an elf). Consider also how much time a character can invest in their class vs. their career - those with demanding occupations unrelated to their class (e.g. non-healer surgeons, experts in a non-class pursuit) should be of lower class tier.
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Disabilities and curses. These should in principle be more negative than positive. Research disabilities before you write them and don't hand-wave away the problems - e.g. prosthetics as good as or better than the real thing, albinism with no health issues, very rare edge cases such as echolocation as a fix for blindness. Ignoring or trivialising the trials of a disability is shallow, objectifying and disrespectful to a real sufferer. Please don't choose disabilities for purely aesthetic purposes. Similarly, curses should be more harmful then helpful - including in the immediate term. Cool side effects are fine, but remember to keep them balanced so that the negatives outweigh the positives overall!
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Nobility and politics. Only make your characters nobility if you want to them to be canonically involved in politics. The responsibility of nobles is political custodianship. If all you really want is a riches and a swanky lifestyle, make them gentry/low nobles (and call them 'gentry' rather than 'nobles' in the app to save confusion) or just rich instead. Don't forget to ask for your city mod's permission if you want nobles - this includes 'family are nobles but not them', 'formerly nobles', and important noble NPCs. We'll want to know anything that can affect our political landscape!
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Creativity. There's actually a lot we will allow conceptually if it can make sense in-world and isn't OP! Though this doesn't mean you need to be grandiose or gimmicky - we'd like to see concepts that are unseen/rare within this group (you can skim the existing characters in a city folder to see what its 'usual' is), histories that explore novel/underdone experiences, tropes developed in interesting directions, personalities with interesting traits, etc. This can involve simply taking a trope to an extreme people tend to shy away from - e.g. a hardcore Delvan evangelist, a corrupt Linhian official. The point is just that we'd like to see something new for the group, and that deviates from middle-of-the-road.
Do's and Don'ts
Specific things we would like to see less of or more of. These are not deal-breakers or prescriptive so having one doesn't automatically mean the chopping block, but we would really like them to be considered in the interests of diversity. This list will be updated every app round in response to the tropes and habits we see, so keep an eye on this section if none other if you want to avoid things we think are overdone or aim for things we think are underdone.
Do less:
Things we would like to see less of because they're so common in the apps we get that they've become trite or frustrating:
General:
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Tragic house fires
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Depressed, abusive fathers
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Frail, angelic mothers
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Mysteriously dead parents
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Out-of-the-blue mentors
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Travelling with 'seeing the world' as the only motivation
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'Perfectionist', 'sassy' or 'sarcastic' as central flaws (they're more neutral quirks)
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Races where they shouldn't be for no good reason (read the World and Races pages!)
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Discrimination where none exists (e.g. against acceptable half elves in human cities)
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Characters who are untouched by their society / environment (e.g. a Relan feeling ambivalent to light elves), or are dismissive of it (e.g. one who scoffs at canonically correct prejudices)
Skills & Occupations:
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Excessive language fluency
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Gaining skills without practice / experience (e.g. just by observation or books)
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'Informant' as an occupation (it's almost never done well)
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Traders in luxury goods or exotic animals (people need ordinary things too!)
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Vague occupations with no specificity - if it's a generic title (e.g. trader, scholar) then it's your job to specify!
City Specific:
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Half-elves or elves in/from Valsk
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Aladdin stereotypes in Tusa (e.g. the harem girl, the plucky thief, the slave)
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High society / big city lifestyles in Iadlain (it's a rustic country town)
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People in Wispwood like it's no big deal (it's a horror movie forest, don't be the cocky chump!)
Do more:
Things we would like to see more of:
General:
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Dark brown skin and hair on wood elves
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Culturally appropriate names (in regards to origin)
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Humans over the age of 30 and elves in their 3rd century
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Histories that acknowledge the group plot
Skills & Occupations:
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Conventional occupations (e.g. innkeeper as opposed to part-time thief-assassin-busker)
City Specific:
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Helvarg
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Nice, normal people in Reluir
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Tougher or more jaded types in Cantor & Nisalvini
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Iadlish to be appropriately wary, superstitious and respectful of the dangers around them.
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Linhians who aren't petty criminals (it's a capitalist port city, not one large slum)
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Valski who aren't blacksmiths
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Desert-appropriate wear on Tusar (i.e. protection from sunburn)
Again, these are not supposed to be applied retrospectively! If you've been accepted but have any of these in your app, don't worry about it - what crosses the 'too common' threshold now wasn't so common back then!