Post by ForeverKuroi on May 25, 2020 10:42:33 GMT -5
Hello, everyone! Professor Viper in the building today! (Just a joke. It'll be me, Erez. Not Viper. But he was a professor, y'know.)
What are we going to go over today? Why, it's the theme most central in e-fedding.
Your character.
Without characters, e-fedding doesn't happen. Remember that one Prestige where it was just Copycat? (I think it was Prestige XXX) Wasn't that weird? Now imagine wrestling with ZERO characters. That would also mean zero referees, announcers, commentators, nothing. Wrestling just doesn't happen. WHO PUTS TOGETHER THE FAKE WRESTLING RING?!
Now obviously we all want characters. That's why we're here. Perhaps you're having trouble with your character. Perhaps you've never made a character and want to make sure you move forward on the right foot. You're in the right place!
I'll just preface this by saying that everyone has their own opinions and this is what I know and from my experiences. Of course, everyone has their own idea as to what's good, but this is what is general consensus around these parts.
So - this isn't real life, FYI. Your character can be whatever you want, and many of us have several different characters. For the purpose of this fed, this'll generally base on your main character but we'll touch on the side characters too.
Now in professional wrestling, what they generally teach you is to pick a gimmick that's similar to your own in real life. This gimmick should heavily influence your voice. Your persona. If you can do something or know how to do something that's different than what most people can, it'd be really good to put that there. Example? Kurt Angle is a legitimate Olympic gold medalist with legitimate wrestling skills. Ken Shamrock and Ronda Roussey both have legitimate MMA skills. Chris Jericho is basically a rocker, and he has his own band. He legitimately makes music. It's not a stretch of the imagination that in most instances, people can sell what they actually do. Of course, there are exceptions. The Undertaker has never actually worked with morticians nor helped with funeral services. Exceptions do occur, but it's important to know which rules to break and others not to.
Now let's take a look at some of e-fedding's characters and their handlers.
Mongo The Destroyer - Corporate fat cat. He's an executive. He's made of money. Now look at Mongo OOC, even though the coward won't show his face except very rarely. Mongo's not rich. And he doesn't own a business, but Mongo does know business. His personality is one that knows how to delegate. He feels very comfortable in the corporate world. For him, Mongo just makes sense.
Chris Card - If any of you have ever spoken to Teeps in Discord, you'll know that this man is smart. I learn something from him every day and he imbues this into Card. Now I used this example in a recent post and I want to disclose that Teeps puts a lot into Card but not everything. Teeps uses his sophisticated side, his love for languages and culture - and then just adds a ripped body and a butt load of money and there's Card. Well that and you have to remove Teeps' ethic. I mean, Card has ethics too but Teeps wouldn't play semantics to get his way like Card would.
Jeffrey Viper - This one's a little more of a stretch. Now I don't go around trying to sleep with people's mothers and I try to be pleasant. You would NEVER catch me acting in public the way I would with Jeffrey Viper in a promo. But do I have an asshole in me that I can bring out if I wanted to play a heel? Damn right I do. I've even used him in a wrestling camp I went to in October of 2017, the first year of the AWF. We had a class full of professional wrestlers and Kevin Kelly, ROH commentator, critiquing our promoing (It was a quick two or three minute promo). We all chose to make a promo and for this promo - along with my e-fedding experience, I drew from my inner Viper to make a promo.
Hell, for fun I'll basically type down what I can remember from my promo.
"You wanted to challenge me. I've beaten you time and time again, and yet you come looking for more. You don't know when you've truly met your match so when you challenge me, I will say yes. One. Final. Time. Now you can call this whatever you want. You can call this a bloodbath. You can call this a massacre. Me? I'm calling this a divorce. *takes my wedding ring off and throws it down* NOW GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!"
I had about two minutes before they got to me for my turn and for the time that I had, considering I've been with people who actually do have fully fleshed out characters, I was happy with how I had it. Actually, I like to think I had better skills than some of the others from the critique I've got and heard out. I even thought to myself, "I could make a great manager."
I listed three e-fedding guys and their handlers. What do these three have in common? They all have gimmicks based on who they are or can be. The lesson here is that successful characters aren't some odd device far away. They're intimate. They draw from and are inspired by your characters.*
*But they aren't carbon copies. I HIGHLY advise against using carbon copies for a myriad of reasons. The first of which is that anything in e-fedding is fair game. Seth Dillinger being gay? It's been used against him. Michael Storm being black? Oh yeah. Even with the "no racism" rule, people find a way around that. One of Kanyon's RPs comes to mind to where he keeps getting cut off by calling him "A ni-" and when prompted, says, "A nincumpoop" or a "nice guy" when we all know what's going to be said. Both the AWF and the XHF Network have no hate speech policies, but sometimes people can try to slide by.
So if there are things about you that you're sensitive about, I wouldn't put it in. If you're trans and you know a trans joke would set you off, it might save you a lot of aggravation not to put that in. If you've been a victim of abuse, if you're disabled in some way, if there's anything that you're sensitive about, think twice. I want to make sure I'm not telling you that you can't do that; I'm simply saying that by putting that in, you're opening yourself to that. And it doesn't even have to be something really huge. We're all different and I'm sure we're sensitive about a lot. I use my pic base for Jeffrey Viper and I simply do that because I can handle a fat joke or two. (I've handled it for five years in the original XHF when I was a lot heavier). I also wanted to try a different way of promoing, but that's beside the point.
So yes, choose something that's similar to you or about something you can fit into. Before creating a new character, ask yourself, "Can I really go far with this character?"
This is important because the best characters have layers, they have history, they have little things that make them quirk. During my e-fedding tenure, I've had DOZENS of characters. Most of them died before I've used them for three shows or less. I'll go through some of them:
Michael Rodriguez - I think I put him in because Eddie Guerrero was my favorite character. Either that or Eddie Guerrero died and this was my tribute to him. I honestly can't remember. He was about the Latino lifestyle. Now I know very little about the Latino lifestyle. I couldn't really get into his mind. Lesson Learned: Just because you like the pic base doesn't mean you'll have a successful character with him.
Jacob Jacobowitz - He was my original CW guy. He's created to make a little joke out of my Israeli heritage, but with his Jewish turned up to eleven. (Mine's at approximately a -2.) He refuses to wrestle on the sabbath, his finisher is circumcizing his opponent to which he will do it appropriately according to the Torah. He's an admitted comedy character, but rarely used. Lesson Learned: Even if it's a satire based on your own culture, unless you're invested in that type of character, the shelf life is worse than milk outside the refrigerated section.
Lilly Anderson - Kuroi's wife. (KUROI HAD A WIFE?!) Yup. In the original XHF. Her pic base was Carmella Decesare, like from the original diva search. Why did I have her? She was hot and I wanted my Kuroi guy to be around a hot chick. I was also 14 or 15 and didn't know better. She didn't really have other redeeming qualities. Lesson Learned: Blue balls is not a valid reason to create a new character.
So let's talk about you. Why do you want a character? There are a lot of reasons and I'll give you my unsolicited opinion why.
1. I want to be the best! It's probably the most common one. Wrestling has belts. The belts go to the best, or at least, that's how the canon shapes it. Thing is, while this is the most common, it's also generally the most short lived. Everyone comes in wanting a belt but the thing is, if you don't win the belt quickly enough, you'll be tempted to quit, to leave. And someone who has been a fed head for a serious length of time, there have been PLENTY of times that I've rooted for Maverick to win, but tore my heart out because I voted against the other guy. It has nothing to do with me not loving Maverick. His character is fantastic and has written the only RP I gave a full five stars with the AWF. But I have to vote with the RPs I find to be deserving of key matches.
Very few people win belts, especially top belts, off the bat. Steele's an exception, and that's because he won the belt at the beginning of the AWF. Then, we had very few people. The fed was created and the winner came to that who won the inaugural tournament, which he did. Could he do the same now? Well, it certainly would be a lot harder this time around. And what if AWF turned out to not be a success? Well, he'd be be a belt of a dead fed. Being the champion of a dead fed is not a rewarding experience either.
Here's the thing about e-fedding. You'll win and you'll lose. I went HARD after Caff when he made that claim that he'd go through 2020 without a single loss. Both in character and in the bookings thread, because as good as you are, it's damn near impossible. We all have different levels of competitiveness, and we'll all have moments where we'll have disappointing losses. These are all losses where either you felt you deserved them or were generally otherwise upset. I had that feeling at the XHF Rumble this year. I tried so hard to win that belt and took that loss extremely poorly. Also, you'll have to realize that different admins or judges value things differently. At the COTI women's chairs match, we at one point had a THREE WAY TIE. We later had a double tie with two people on two different women. Sometimes, people won't like that.
If you are here just to win, you're going to have some bad times.
2. I love writing! I love this reason. It's pretty much why I'm here. It's also why I have several characters. We have several guys who honestly don't care about winning and don't care about losing. This is the reason I have Copycat. Copycat loses. All the time. Even when he won at Clash of the Icons, he still lost. Now here are some true facts, friends. When you're writing, you're god.
I've written a novel before and my favorite part of it was writing it. (As opposed to what, you may ask? Oh, just the constant editing and submissions to publishers.) When I write, my favorite part is that I created a world and several different characters. What happens to them? Do they survive and save the day? Do they die? Do they get tortured? What's their fate? The answer is simple - whatever the hell I want. That's what happens to them. Writing is not necessarily based on reality either. If you want to write a book based on flying zombies that eat cars and poop out diamonds? You do you!
Even at the XHF Network, we bend reality to our will too. The Trons? They come from... (Tell me, DT. Where do the Trons come from?) One of my characters, Kind Edmund, comes from an island in the space of water between England and The Netherlands calls Supremia. Here's the thing about Supremia, for those of you that don't know. ...Supremia doesn't actually exist. I used some Photoshop magic to make something that looks like land and wanted to make a fake country that could be used for an oppressive government regime (similar to North Korea) where the national religion is Pastafarianism, where there is no link to the UN or any other national treaties that guarantees rights for their citizens, that promises to make a national holiday the day that The Queen of England dies (he has an awkward and unexplained hatred for her) and is claiming to develop the invention of antibiotics (something that has existed almost 100 years ago).
If you love to write, it doesn't matter if you win or lose, because you'll always win by writing.
3. I'm looking to hone my skills.
This is often combined with Reason #2, but this is a REALLY good way to do this. They say that the best way to develop your language skills is by reading. Read often. I've had a VERY easy time with my reading skills and I hear it even helps if you have learning disabilities like dyslexia.
But the only skills e-fedding will give you are not JUST writing or reading skills. Like the example I used for my wrestling camp, it helped me with public speaking. It helps with confidence. It gives you character. It gives you creativity.
But we all know that e-fedding isn't just about writing. Mongo loves talking about how far I'll go to succeed at learning things from e-fedding. Example - I've learned Photoshop skills from e-fedding. I've learned Premiere (movie) skills from e-fedding. I even spoke to my admins about wanting to make a program when I learn coding (which I'm currently doing although I'm not quite there) that would input the coding to make show writing even easier.
Guys, writing and reading skills will help you in life. If you're into graphic design, Adobe programs are life relevant. Coding skills will help you in IT or programming fields. This is the best place to practice these skills. If you screw up in real life, you can lose your job. In e-fedding? At worst, you lose your match.
More about your character, one major thing I highly suggest is fleshing out your character. Here's a great tool to use:
www.novel-software.com/theultimatecharacterquestionnaire
Here, you can answer questions about your character. Some of the relevancy here is immediately important. How old are they? Where are they from? You don't need me to know you may need those to promo.
However, I advise you answer them all. A few reasons why:
1. It'll help deepen your character. You might go to a certain question and think more. Let's use a random question. "What is their worst childhood memory?" You could easily say, "I have no plans to make an origin story." That's cool. You don't need to do one. I've never done one for Kuroi. BUT - let's say you answer that question and say, "When I was eight, my older brother dressed up as Pennywise and scared me. Now I have an inherent aversion to clowns." Maybe it could manifest as anyone acting foolish, like a clown. Or act like comedy relief. Maybe someone dresses up as a clown for Halloween. You never know the possibilities.
Or as another example I heard from Teeps, for favorite alcoholic drink, what Chris Card drinks is often an indicator of what he's feeling at the time. Is he drinking something elegant? Full bodied? Or simply the harshest liquor he has? By the way, Teeps is the most insightful person regarding this. I'm sure you can ask him for further questions as well.
2. This can give you direction. Now let's imagine it like this. You found a character based loosely on yourself. His name is Joe Schmoe, he's thirty-two years old and he's going to be a hippie who wants to prove himself in wrestling, but loves world peace because that's who he is. Let's say that you feel like you can do that well. ...So what? What's he going to do in his promos? Well there's a love section in here. There's also a question asking, "What's your character's kryptonite?" My first thought is, "Joe Schmoe could have a love interest, let's say Jenny Frumdablok, that is the opposite of him. She doesn't care about world peace. She wants fame and suddenly, Joe Schmoe has a dilemma where he knows he couldn't have gotten to where he is without Jenny and loves her, but finds out that she's making him a terrible person.
That gives this more depth.
3. This gives your character a weakness. Now you might be asking, "I want my character to be strong! Why would they have a weakness?" Simple. Weakness makes your character stronger.
This sounds like an oxymoron, so I'll elaborate.
I didn't realize this until after the original XHF, but weaknesses are what makes your characters human. Without weaknesses, the readers can't empathize with them. I was surprised when my wife read my book and one of my characters, who were filled with flaws, died. And she told me she felt it was because they were relatable. She felt the fears they felt. She got sucked in through their causes, and their motivations were aligned.
Think you can't do this with a heel? Think again.
Michael Storm's biggest heel moment was after he came back from the dead. He was constantly tormented by his demons and felt that everyone was a monster. He wanted to bring out the monster in his opponent because he wanted to see himself be right. His flaws was that he couldn't see people as being legitimately good so he put himself in a situation where he'd either be right or completely blind to the truth, and that was made evident a few times.
And lastly (which I use loosely because honestly, you can go DAYS about how to create a good character), find an overarching storyline. I do this with all my main characters and for one specific reason, your characters are living, breathing bodies. We don't stop developing and neither should they. Also, don't think of them as episodes like The Simpsons or Family Guy where their development ends after an episode. Think of them as full out series where the single matches take you from Point A to Point B in the storyline not from beginning to end.
Give your character a journey. They don't want to merely exist. They want goals - both long and short term.
Anyways, that's me for right now. There are a lot of other things I can go over, but the rest I can think of are just small pointers. (Example: Not every character needs a nickname.) For now, this is enough.
What are we going to go over today? Why, it's the theme most central in e-fedding.
Your character.
Without characters, e-fedding doesn't happen. Remember that one Prestige where it was just Copycat? (I think it was Prestige XXX) Wasn't that weird? Now imagine wrestling with ZERO characters. That would also mean zero referees, announcers, commentators, nothing. Wrestling just doesn't happen. WHO PUTS TOGETHER THE FAKE WRESTLING RING?!
Now obviously we all want characters. That's why we're here. Perhaps you're having trouble with your character. Perhaps you've never made a character and want to make sure you move forward on the right foot. You're in the right place!
I'll just preface this by saying that everyone has their own opinions and this is what I know and from my experiences. Of course, everyone has their own idea as to what's good, but this is what is general consensus around these parts.
So - this isn't real life, FYI. Your character can be whatever you want, and many of us have several different characters. For the purpose of this fed, this'll generally base on your main character but we'll touch on the side characters too.
Now in professional wrestling, what they generally teach you is to pick a gimmick that's similar to your own in real life. This gimmick should heavily influence your voice. Your persona. If you can do something or know how to do something that's different than what most people can, it'd be really good to put that there. Example? Kurt Angle is a legitimate Olympic gold medalist with legitimate wrestling skills. Ken Shamrock and Ronda Roussey both have legitimate MMA skills. Chris Jericho is basically a rocker, and he has his own band. He legitimately makes music. It's not a stretch of the imagination that in most instances, people can sell what they actually do. Of course, there are exceptions. The Undertaker has never actually worked with morticians nor helped with funeral services. Exceptions do occur, but it's important to know which rules to break and others not to.
Now let's take a look at some of e-fedding's characters and their handlers.
Mongo The Destroyer - Corporate fat cat. He's an executive. He's made of money. Now look at Mongo OOC, even though the coward won't show his face except very rarely. Mongo's not rich. And he doesn't own a business, but Mongo does know business. His personality is one that knows how to delegate. He feels very comfortable in the corporate world. For him, Mongo just makes sense.
Chris Card - If any of you have ever spoken to Teeps in Discord, you'll know that this man is smart. I learn something from him every day and he imbues this into Card. Now I used this example in a recent post and I want to disclose that Teeps puts a lot into Card but not everything. Teeps uses his sophisticated side, his love for languages and culture - and then just adds a ripped body and a butt load of money and there's Card. Well that and you have to remove Teeps' ethic. I mean, Card has ethics too but Teeps wouldn't play semantics to get his way like Card would.
Jeffrey Viper - This one's a little more of a stretch. Now I don't go around trying to sleep with people's mothers and I try to be pleasant. You would NEVER catch me acting in public the way I would with Jeffrey Viper in a promo. But do I have an asshole in me that I can bring out if I wanted to play a heel? Damn right I do. I've even used him in a wrestling camp I went to in October of 2017, the first year of the AWF. We had a class full of professional wrestlers and Kevin Kelly, ROH commentator, critiquing our promoing (It was a quick two or three minute promo). We all chose to make a promo and for this promo - along with my e-fedding experience, I drew from my inner Viper to make a promo.
Hell, for fun I'll basically type down what I can remember from my promo.
"You wanted to challenge me. I've beaten you time and time again, and yet you come looking for more. You don't know when you've truly met your match so when you challenge me, I will say yes. One. Final. Time. Now you can call this whatever you want. You can call this a bloodbath. You can call this a massacre. Me? I'm calling this a divorce. *takes my wedding ring off and throws it down* NOW GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!"
I had about two minutes before they got to me for my turn and for the time that I had, considering I've been with people who actually do have fully fleshed out characters, I was happy with how I had it. Actually, I like to think I had better skills than some of the others from the critique I've got and heard out. I even thought to myself, "I could make a great manager."
I listed three e-fedding guys and their handlers. What do these three have in common? They all have gimmicks based on who they are or can be. The lesson here is that successful characters aren't some odd device far away. They're intimate. They draw from and are inspired by your characters.*
*But they aren't carbon copies. I HIGHLY advise against using carbon copies for a myriad of reasons. The first of which is that anything in e-fedding is fair game. Seth Dillinger being gay? It's been used against him. Michael Storm being black? Oh yeah. Even with the "no racism" rule, people find a way around that. One of Kanyon's RPs comes to mind to where he keeps getting cut off by calling him "A ni-" and when prompted, says, "A nincumpoop" or a "nice guy" when we all know what's going to be said. Both the AWF and the XHF Network have no hate speech policies, but sometimes people can try to slide by.
So if there are things about you that you're sensitive about, I wouldn't put it in. If you're trans and you know a trans joke would set you off, it might save you a lot of aggravation not to put that in. If you've been a victim of abuse, if you're disabled in some way, if there's anything that you're sensitive about, think twice. I want to make sure I'm not telling you that you can't do that; I'm simply saying that by putting that in, you're opening yourself to that. And it doesn't even have to be something really huge. We're all different and I'm sure we're sensitive about a lot. I use my pic base for Jeffrey Viper and I simply do that because I can handle a fat joke or two. (I've handled it for five years in the original XHF when I was a lot heavier). I also wanted to try a different way of promoing, but that's beside the point.
So yes, choose something that's similar to you or about something you can fit into. Before creating a new character, ask yourself, "Can I really go far with this character?"
This is important because the best characters have layers, they have history, they have little things that make them quirk. During my e-fedding tenure, I've had DOZENS of characters. Most of them died before I've used them for three shows or less. I'll go through some of them:
Michael Rodriguez - I think I put him in because Eddie Guerrero was my favorite character. Either that or Eddie Guerrero died and this was my tribute to him. I honestly can't remember. He was about the Latino lifestyle. Now I know very little about the Latino lifestyle. I couldn't really get into his mind. Lesson Learned: Just because you like the pic base doesn't mean you'll have a successful character with him.
Jacob Jacobowitz - He was my original CW guy. He's created to make a little joke out of my Israeli heritage, but with his Jewish turned up to eleven. (Mine's at approximately a -2.) He refuses to wrestle on the sabbath, his finisher is circumcizing his opponent to which he will do it appropriately according to the Torah. He's an admitted comedy character, but rarely used. Lesson Learned: Even if it's a satire based on your own culture, unless you're invested in that type of character, the shelf life is worse than milk outside the refrigerated section.
Lilly Anderson - Kuroi's wife. (KUROI HAD A WIFE?!) Yup. In the original XHF. Her pic base was Carmella Decesare, like from the original diva search. Why did I have her? She was hot and I wanted my Kuroi guy to be around a hot chick. I was also 14 or 15 and didn't know better. She didn't really have other redeeming qualities. Lesson Learned: Blue balls is not a valid reason to create a new character.
So let's talk about you. Why do you want a character? There are a lot of reasons and I'll give you my unsolicited opinion why.
1. I want to be the best! It's probably the most common one. Wrestling has belts. The belts go to the best, or at least, that's how the canon shapes it. Thing is, while this is the most common, it's also generally the most short lived. Everyone comes in wanting a belt but the thing is, if you don't win the belt quickly enough, you'll be tempted to quit, to leave. And someone who has been a fed head for a serious length of time, there have been PLENTY of times that I've rooted for Maverick to win, but tore my heart out because I voted against the other guy. It has nothing to do with me not loving Maverick. His character is fantastic and has written the only RP I gave a full five stars with the AWF. But I have to vote with the RPs I find to be deserving of key matches.
Very few people win belts, especially top belts, off the bat. Steele's an exception, and that's because he won the belt at the beginning of the AWF. Then, we had very few people. The fed was created and the winner came to that who won the inaugural tournament, which he did. Could he do the same now? Well, it certainly would be a lot harder this time around. And what if AWF turned out to not be a success? Well, he'd be be a belt of a dead fed. Being the champion of a dead fed is not a rewarding experience either.
Here's the thing about e-fedding. You'll win and you'll lose. I went HARD after Caff when he made that claim that he'd go through 2020 without a single loss. Both in character and in the bookings thread, because as good as you are, it's damn near impossible. We all have different levels of competitiveness, and we'll all have moments where we'll have disappointing losses. These are all losses where either you felt you deserved them or were generally otherwise upset. I had that feeling at the XHF Rumble this year. I tried so hard to win that belt and took that loss extremely poorly. Also, you'll have to realize that different admins or judges value things differently. At the COTI women's chairs match, we at one point had a THREE WAY TIE. We later had a double tie with two people on two different women. Sometimes, people won't like that.
If you are here just to win, you're going to have some bad times.
2. I love writing! I love this reason. It's pretty much why I'm here. It's also why I have several characters. We have several guys who honestly don't care about winning and don't care about losing. This is the reason I have Copycat. Copycat loses. All the time. Even when he won at Clash of the Icons, he still lost. Now here are some true facts, friends. When you're writing, you're god.
I've written a novel before and my favorite part of it was writing it. (As opposed to what, you may ask? Oh, just the constant editing and submissions to publishers.) When I write, my favorite part is that I created a world and several different characters. What happens to them? Do they survive and save the day? Do they die? Do they get tortured? What's their fate? The answer is simple - whatever the hell I want. That's what happens to them. Writing is not necessarily based on reality either. If you want to write a book based on flying zombies that eat cars and poop out diamonds? You do you!
Even at the XHF Network, we bend reality to our will too. The Trons? They come from... (Tell me, DT. Where do the Trons come from?) One of my characters, Kind Edmund, comes from an island in the space of water between England and The Netherlands calls Supremia. Here's the thing about Supremia, for those of you that don't know. ...Supremia doesn't actually exist. I used some Photoshop magic to make something that looks like land and wanted to make a fake country that could be used for an oppressive government regime (similar to North Korea) where the national religion is Pastafarianism, where there is no link to the UN or any other national treaties that guarantees rights for their citizens, that promises to make a national holiday the day that The Queen of England dies (he has an awkward and unexplained hatred for her) and is claiming to develop the invention of antibiotics (something that has existed almost 100 years ago).
If you love to write, it doesn't matter if you win or lose, because you'll always win by writing.
3. I'm looking to hone my skills.
This is often combined with Reason #2, but this is a REALLY good way to do this. They say that the best way to develop your language skills is by reading. Read often. I've had a VERY easy time with my reading skills and I hear it even helps if you have learning disabilities like dyslexia.
But the only skills e-fedding will give you are not JUST writing or reading skills. Like the example I used for my wrestling camp, it helped me with public speaking. It helps with confidence. It gives you character. It gives you creativity.
But we all know that e-fedding isn't just about writing. Mongo loves talking about how far I'll go to succeed at learning things from e-fedding. Example - I've learned Photoshop skills from e-fedding. I've learned Premiere (movie) skills from e-fedding. I even spoke to my admins about wanting to make a program when I learn coding (which I'm currently doing although I'm not quite there) that would input the coding to make show writing even easier.
Guys, writing and reading skills will help you in life. If you're into graphic design, Adobe programs are life relevant. Coding skills will help you in IT or programming fields. This is the best place to practice these skills. If you screw up in real life, you can lose your job. In e-fedding? At worst, you lose your match.
More about your character, one major thing I highly suggest is fleshing out your character. Here's a great tool to use:
www.novel-software.com/theultimatecharacterquestionnaire
Here, you can answer questions about your character. Some of the relevancy here is immediately important. How old are they? Where are they from? You don't need me to know you may need those to promo.
However, I advise you answer them all. A few reasons why:
1. It'll help deepen your character. You might go to a certain question and think more. Let's use a random question. "What is their worst childhood memory?" You could easily say, "I have no plans to make an origin story." That's cool. You don't need to do one. I've never done one for Kuroi. BUT - let's say you answer that question and say, "When I was eight, my older brother dressed up as Pennywise and scared me. Now I have an inherent aversion to clowns." Maybe it could manifest as anyone acting foolish, like a clown. Or act like comedy relief. Maybe someone dresses up as a clown for Halloween. You never know the possibilities.
Or as another example I heard from Teeps, for favorite alcoholic drink, what Chris Card drinks is often an indicator of what he's feeling at the time. Is he drinking something elegant? Full bodied? Or simply the harshest liquor he has? By the way, Teeps is the most insightful person regarding this. I'm sure you can ask him for further questions as well.
2. This can give you direction. Now let's imagine it like this. You found a character based loosely on yourself. His name is Joe Schmoe, he's thirty-two years old and he's going to be a hippie who wants to prove himself in wrestling, but loves world peace because that's who he is. Let's say that you feel like you can do that well. ...So what? What's he going to do in his promos? Well there's a love section in here. There's also a question asking, "What's your character's kryptonite?" My first thought is, "Joe Schmoe could have a love interest, let's say Jenny Frumdablok, that is the opposite of him. She doesn't care about world peace. She wants fame and suddenly, Joe Schmoe has a dilemma where he knows he couldn't have gotten to where he is without Jenny and loves her, but finds out that she's making him a terrible person.
That gives this more depth.
3. This gives your character a weakness. Now you might be asking, "I want my character to be strong! Why would they have a weakness?" Simple. Weakness makes your character stronger.
This sounds like an oxymoron, so I'll elaborate.
I didn't realize this until after the original XHF, but weaknesses are what makes your characters human. Without weaknesses, the readers can't empathize with them. I was surprised when my wife read my book and one of my characters, who were filled with flaws, died. And she told me she felt it was because they were relatable. She felt the fears they felt. She got sucked in through their causes, and their motivations were aligned.
Think you can't do this with a heel? Think again.
Michael Storm's biggest heel moment was after he came back from the dead. He was constantly tormented by his demons and felt that everyone was a monster. He wanted to bring out the monster in his opponent because he wanted to see himself be right. His flaws was that he couldn't see people as being legitimately good so he put himself in a situation where he'd either be right or completely blind to the truth, and that was made evident a few times.
And lastly (which I use loosely because honestly, you can go DAYS about how to create a good character), find an overarching storyline. I do this with all my main characters and for one specific reason, your characters are living, breathing bodies. We don't stop developing and neither should they. Also, don't think of them as episodes like The Simpsons or Family Guy where their development ends after an episode. Think of them as full out series where the single matches take you from Point A to Point B in the storyline not from beginning to end.
Give your character a journey. They don't want to merely exist. They want goals - both long and short term.
Anyways, that's me for right now. There are a lot of other things I can go over, but the rest I can think of are just small pointers. (Example: Not every character needs a nickname.) For now, this is enough.
