Those Small People!

[NomadGaia 924]

Those Small People

You’ve all seen them. Probably. Those insufferable little whine boxes that run around cities, screeching at the top of their lungs. You likely look at them and turn the other cheek, hoping they don’t come your way until someone comes along with a heart of pure gold to pluck them off the streets. It happens every day. 

Were you someone not familiar with LoTC, you’d probably think I was talking about some sort of monster or a ghost. But no, I’m talking about children. Now it’s all coming back to you, the Vietnam flashbacks of packs of roaming orphans with edgy backstories, the adults stuck in the bodies of 5-10 year olds, and even the people willing to drop everything in order to pluck a random kid off the street that they met that day to take into their home. For me, I have visions of elvish families with 15 kids. We’ve all had bad experiences with child characters. It’s very difficult to act out the role of a child without coming off as an insufferable little ragamuffin. But with the right pushes, a few changes, and a metric tonne of elbow grease, we can make child characters into something better. Something not to cringe at.

But how can we?

 

 

Children as People
    “Writing from the viewpoint of the child does not give us the right to make of our characters what we wish children were – but to consider them as they are.” - Anonymous
  

 As this anonymous person said, consider them as they are. And what are they? They’re simply people, just the same as you or me. The only difference between an adult and a child is that the child has only just been brought into the world. Thus, you must follow the same rules for character development as you do with an adult character.
The key here is perspective.
 I like to think that an adult would make very similar decisions to a child if they knew only what a child knew. We base our choices and live off of what we know, our experiences. A child is just emerging to the world, they lack experiences to guide them. Ideally, adults should be able to guide them through until they’ve created these experiences themselves. In other cases, a child without a guide is like a lost lamb. They make erratic choices, spun still from what they know. They’ll be lost, frustrated even.
Do not mistake ignorance for stupidity, mind you. As people, we are still ignorant of many things that still await us, but we’re not stupid (By our own standards at least). Nor are children. It is important to roleplay your character’s level of understanding properly because if you don’t, it can lead to unnecessarily dumb characters (Unless that is your character’s trait, but that applies to any character, child or not child.)

Children are Cement
“Children are like wet cement. Whatever falls on them makes an impression.” - Dr. Haim Ginott
 

The mind of a child, as Dr. Haim puts it, is much like wet cement or clay. It’s very easy to leave a lasting impression once it’s been impacted by the outside world. And after such, it’s very hard to reverse the impact, or rather to smooth out the clay, especially if it’s been left alone long enough to dry. In order to make your child characters come to life, they must act like cement. 
How can you bring this into your roleplay? Well, your character needs to be easily molded as well, taking in every experience that happens to them. Everything holds great sway in a child’s mind, that’s often why children seem to blow things out of proportion. To them, the smallest tasks can seem daunting, and events in our lives that seem small and insignificant mean the world to them.  Pay close attention to whatever happens to your characters, and get creative! As the creator, pick and choose what your character really takes in, and don’t be afraid to have your character be taken down a path different from the one you chose. After all, cement is usually made to be a foundation to build from.

 

Hey, Hearts of Gold!
People very severely underestimate the attention you need to give a child. They need to be taken care of most of the hours of the day and raised to be a decent member of society. At least that’s how it usually is supposed to be. In the real world, people often take years to decide if they need a child. They’re a massive physical, mental, and economic toll to any family. This holds even more true in a medieval society, where the world is much harsher and colder to the weak.
Which is why it physically pains me when people just go around and pick up orphans off the streets to bring them into their homes. It usually takes months of preparation and planning before you even think about adoption, and even more time before you actually do. Bringing in 5 random ass urchins into your home is a really unrealistic move. But that’s just my opinion.

 

Do’s and Dont’s; Tips and Tricks

• Find someone who needs a child character played, or ask someone to make their parents. Please, just do it. At this point, we could make a nation with the sheer number of little orphans running around.
• Something I’ve learned from the time I’ve spent with many of my little cousins. Children are honest, painfully so. If they don’t like you, you’ll know it. Everyone else will too. Children pay little attention to courtesy and they won’t sugar coat anything they say until they’re taught otherwise. 
• Naive and stupid are not interchangeable. You can be smart, without having experienced enough to make a proper judgment. And you can be stupid, but have experienced a lot. They are two entirely separate concepts.
• Dialogue: You’re going to make mistakes here. The key is to find a nice balance between making your character speak maturely, and not mature enough. Do your research here, see how some authors approach writing children, pay attention to how they use their words.
• Make sure you DEVELOP. Most of the development in our lives happens when we’re children, make that apparent in your roleplay. Show the cogs of the mind turning in your characters heads, it will only ever add to the experience. Write out those connections they’re making.
• Have fun with it! Experiment! Make mistakes, learn. You’ll only get better over time ^^

[WuHanXianShi14 0]

I can't emphasize the point "DEVELOP YOUR KIDS" enough. Seriously, it seems some people are hellbent on having their character exist to be a tragic heart-jerking empathy generator and will go out of their way to avoid positive character development like the plague so they can remain that "poor, oppressed little girl no one understands ;;;;;;;( "

[Fawb 557]

Great guide. It is painfully obvious when somebody is playing a child with an objective for what they want that character to become, rather than allowing their character's experiences to mould and develop their personality.

[Evangelli 83]

Another thing to remember is that you should have your view of a character, and others. 

 

Do not lose the view of your character for others, you only lose value then. It is very easy to lose value when a child, your image is moldable. 

[candlite 77]

I enjoy how you added the detail that 'children are like cement' rather than the usual 'children are like sponges'. It adds a similar sense of direction, but shows that you've done your research. c:

[Silverstatik 218]

Wonderful post, some great ideas here. Children are a wonderful gateway to sections of RP you haven't experienced before so its a shame to see people fall into the edgy orphan trope. If you are RPing with a child as a parent or close companion, give them things to go on, just posing some more mundane situations can really help flesh out their character significantly and be a lotta fun in the process. Don't go around adopting a child on a whim, that player is expecting some commitment on your part to some rp regularly, not just a chest in your house.

[ibraheemc2000 2608]

*cough cough* "any childern wanting to become Janissary come to haria.." *cough cough*

[rukio 8913]

On 10/16/2017 at 1:36 AM, WuHanXianShi14 said:

I can't emphasize the point "DEVELOP YOUR KIDS" enough. Seriously, it seems some people are hellbent on having their character exist to be a tragic heart-jerking empathy generator and will go out of their way to avoid positive character development like the plague so they can remain that "poor, oppressed little girl no one understands ;;;;;;;( "

8

Upvote

 

I tried to have a character grow up "normal" and "not tragic" and then her only family member PK'd, she was enslaved by an orc, then rescued and adopted, then befriended a lot of dark magic users somehow, ended up watching quite a few people die/be tortured (and helped in some of those), and then by 18 both of her adoptive parents PK'd while she was 1-2 months pregnant (by someone who also PK'd). I honestly went out of my way trying to get her to have SOME positive character development but that clearly wasn't about to happen. That being said, it was all good character development for Lily. I'm just not allowed to have a normal, non-tragic character I guess.

 

That being said, I disagree with the "you wouldn't adopt some random orphan it takes months of preparation." statement. This isn't the 21st century and adoptions aren't formal. The paperwork, et cetera is why it takes so long. Maybe my former street rat orphan pities her fellow street rat kids and wants them to be able to live a safer life. My complaint is kids who constantly wander off from home and get in danger. Which is why kids should probably be side characters and not mains, it gets /boring/. 

[WuHanXianShi14 0]

2 hours ago, rukio said:

I tried to have a character grow up "normal" and "not tragic" and then her only family member PK'd, she was enslaved by an orc, then rescued and adopted, then befriended a lot of dark magic users somehow, ended up watching quite a few people die/be tortured (and helped in some of those), and then by 18 both of her adoptive parents PK'd while she was 1-2 months pregnant (by someone who also PK'd). I honestly went out of my way trying to get her to have SOME positive character development but that clearly wasn't about to happen. That being said, it was all good character development for Lily. I'm just not allowed to have a normal, non-tragic character I guess.

0

Upvote

If fucked up **** happens to your char then naturally your char will become fucked up. Edginess isn't really edgy if the reason you're edgy can be justified by actual roleplay that actually happened

 

 

[Merkaken 516]

Speaking as the former leader of the Kha, I can tell you we had problems with children being rp'd as having no fear, super edgy, etc etc. sadly, there really isn't much to be done other than things like this and encourage people to RP children properly. I.E most recently I RP'd with a Kha child that I felt did an excellent job. We were surrounded by zombies and various spooky mobs, and rather than being the whole "me am no scare!" Type of child, he/she (I honestly can't remember ;-; I'm sorry) actually rpd the fear. Trembling, paralyzed, sobbing, clinging to others for help, not fighting. It was awesome. Shout out to whoever that was