Hi everyone,

In the last couple of weeks, my board has experienced a sudden spike in membership, I don't know HOW they've managed to find my site, but they've found it. The first few applications I've received are great (at least, according to my low standards) but now I have two applications that I'm stuck on.

The first is a classic Mary Sue, the character is a young (16) girl who is "into the punk/emo style". She was orphaned, but she makes up for it by making friends throughout the city (the RP area). She's also very happy and fun-loving, and it's easy for her to make friends.

She's also insanely powerful.

Without trying to go into the mechanics of the world too much, she's still in training (learning how to use her abilities and powers) but someone simply "gave" her an insanely powerful artifact just because of some kind deed she did for him. Did I mention that the character class she's referring to are all secretive when it comes to magickal devices? To top it all off, I don't think a "stuffed Hello Kitty" fits in the dark, gritty world that I'm trying to create.

Anyways, I sent her a PM about what I thought would need changing, and she hasn't gotten back to me yet, I hope I handled it well.

The second profile is a little trickier. It started off okay enough, but I get the impression that the player's first language isn't English (his writing style's very abrupt, and sometimes he doesn't use the correct tense), I don't want to hold it against him, and I don't want to seem like a total jerk, but I'm also looking out for quality. Can anyone understand my dilemma?

So far, those are the only two profiles that I'm stuck on, so if anyone could offer any advice (especially with case #2) I would appreciate it.

Krystal

The first profile you handled perfectly. I have one of those in pending on my site as well. All you can do is be patient. If they don't reply after say, two weeks or so, then simply deny them. There's nothing else you can do, really. Sometimes things just suck like that, unfortunately.

As for the second app. Is their grammar and writing style the only thing wrong? If so, accept them and then message them nicely explaining you noticed some errors, would they like help with their grammar...

I agree, you can always help them out with grammer and tense and such. We had a member join like that and with a little nudge in the right direction they turned out to be a very active, very good and very helpful player.

Hey, thanks for the feedback!

I have an update on case #1. Apparently, she got my PM and has added a bunch of things, problem is, I think she's actually made it worse! >_<

Here are a couple of quotes from her character's profile (square brackets are my stuff):

I have a couple of issues with this paragraph. My first problem with it is that the roleplay setting is a City which has over a million residents, so it's impossible for her to know about EVERYONE (especially since the City has demons who would sooner rip her guts out and laugh at her if she asked about them). Secondly, I've already set up a character who does the EXACT SAME THING as her character. (She owns a shop that functions as the city's rumor mill.) As a side note, the character I've already set up would probably kill her if she started encroaching on her territory!

The second quote's even worse (IMO):

This quote requires a little explaining. In the RP world, some humans are born with superhuman abilities (called Talents). A person usually shows an affinity for a particular talent (necromancy, demon summoning, working with runes, etc.) but some choose to take a secondary talent, so, a necromance (who can raise the dead) might also specialize in working with runes. However, there is no way that a person can "dabble" in everything without really, really, hurting themselves.

And, as I've already mentioned, she'd be dead meat if she crossed my rumour-mongering NPC.

Do you think I should just tell her that I don't think she'd be a good fit for the board? Maybe offer to let her try again with a different character? I'm really stuck, because she did what I asked, but she blew everything out of proportion.

Krystal

well first off, like I said before, you're handling this amazingly. But yes, I think by this point, it's time to tell her she's simply not a good fit for that character. Tell her you'd love to have her on the board (even if deep down you don't want her to even think of it again) but she should try again with another character.

If nothing else, help her understand just how unrealistic her claims are. If you did so already, pardon my poor reading comprehension, but so far it looks like you've explained more to us than to her. You've been handling it in an exemplary fashion, but it might not be a bad idea to go all out and explain how many things are wrong with the character, including all the unrealistic things even above the stupid quirks, and see how that goes. In my experience, that prompts either an "oh crap I'm so sorry" response and subsequent fixing, or more commonly, whining and/or teary farewells and claims that the forum just "isn't for her." Either way, you win!

Hey Munch,

You know, that's exactly what someone else said when I showed them the PM I sent her! Don't worry, though, this time my second PM will be even more detailed than the first one.

I guess I just find it really hard to rip into people's characters because I don't like it when my stuff is critiqued! I think I'm getting better at it, but sometimes I'm just like: o_O How do I fix this? I don't want to be mean!

Krystal

Another Update:

I feel really stupid now! I was in the process of banning a bunch of spammers, and I noticed that case #1's e-mail address is the same address for a character I just approved! Now I feel silly (approving one character and trashing her second one), but I think I'll keep tabs on the one I approved, since she seems to be bordering on god-modding. (Her posts aren't bad, though, it's just with that one character.)