Character dev?

[MYŌJIN]

I'm starting to feel like I'm stagnating a bit with Draven and his constant development and story. Any advice or suggestions, and such could be helpful!

[Mongo the Destroyer]

One of the things I've thought of when thinking of Draven is- what drives him?

Like I'm taking the seat of an Old World vampire looking at Draven wrestling for AWF. I'm hella confused. Here's a guy who could do literally anything and he's choosing to roll around with cattle for sport. Cattle he doesn't even eat!

Does Draven have friends? Vampire or normal? What does he think of vampire movies? I'd lean more into his vampiric or at least gothic stuff to see how he interacts with those things. I'm really curious about Draven so I'd love to see where you can take him.

Does face Draven interact with children? What is that even like?

[Dave D-Flipz]

Honestly I've enjoyed the human side of Draven and seeing how he fights back those urges. It's a good story. I will say AWF sorely lacks faces so if you decide you need to change don't just go back to the monster vampire again. As anyone who knows me can tell you I'm not a creative type. My best work is me picking a topic and just running with it or sinking into one character and resisting change since change usually makes me worse. SO I'm not the best advice for this.

[MYŌJIN]

Thanks, DT. That's very encouraging.

Also some of those questions HAVE been answered, Mongo- if you would read my rps! It's kind of established Draven does this because he's bored and enjoys a combative sport to pass time but he grew to be more emotionally invested in wrestling. He has a human friend, a fan of his named Amy- and an old vampire friend named Selene, she runs a club in Seattle. He constantly is against an family member of his, named Alaric, who I have neglected as a side character unfortunately but that's soon to change.

Playing him as a face has been pretty tricky. On one hand, I can't imagine someone who's done things like kidnapping, biting people, drinking a referee's blood that one time, etc- can ever exactly become the kid-friendly sort of face. But I think it'd be interesting if Draven grew to be considered a fan-favorite instead of the current anti-hero status he has going on. I try my best to show the way he's reacting to people liking him and being cheered a lot, he's not used to it but he's starting to embrace it. He probably isn't the type that parents would allow their children to get autographs from, haha.

He thinks vampire movies are both stupid and entertaining in a dumb way.

[Justin]

If you want to turn Draven face, and I mean really, you've got to give him a major case of regret and remorse. The only way he ever develops sympathy would be to struggle with the change and eventually beat the urges and gain control, even at the cost of a title match or something like that.

If I were booking it I'd have him lose the US Title because he didn't do "the thing" (whatever that may be) that he normally would, then the money is in the road to redemption, paying off with him ultimately overcoming odds stacked against him for once to win it back fair and square.

My only issue with Draven is that in theory he should be able to rip a human being in half, it breaks my kayfabe brain any time he takes any punishment at all, let alone loses.

Maybe have him get de-vamped, that might be something good.

The struggle to be a human.

Yeah, do that.

[MYŌJIN]

I've been kind of exploring the struggle of being human, but I feel as if turning Draven completely human would lose his uniqueness in characterization.

[Cross Recoba]

I'm enjoying the conflict that Draven has going into COTI. I think you've got a rich vein of material in exploring Draven's 'human' side without needing to go 'full mortal'. That the animal within him can escape and the lengths he needs to or will go to to keep the beast contained within.

[Robbie A]

With character development I’ve always had an end point. This an be short, medium or long term but I’ve always thought “okay where do I want to finish”. That’s been Rob reconciling with somebody, a designed turn, or anything that I think “okay let’s get him there because rps with that frame of mind really could take things up a notch”. What I discovered is as long as you have something you want to work to, you can build the detail as hard or softly as you go along. The chaos that is an rp fed will probably give you some extra to work with.

Finally, if you’re out of ideas, it may be time to give the character a rest. Even if it’s for a couple months. A clean break and playing with a different character can be quite a pallet cleanser.