[Grytpype]

Just wondering - does anybody have any tips or tried & true methods for getting their character dialogue completely 'in character'? The way I'm currently doing it is to write out a fairly comprehensive character profile which covers the major aspects of their personality, history, alignment, attitudes, etc.
I remember reading in FrozenEmu's tute about ensuring that your characters each had a distinct personality, otherwise they'll all end up acting like yourself. That's sorta the problem, even though I've got each of them down in black & white on paper - I'm still having to go over the dialogue again and again to try and get it sounding 100% natural for each of the characters. Like it's plain as day that it's what person x would say in situation y, rather than what I'm guessing they'd say.

The character profile points I'm using goes something like this:

Name
Age
Birthplace
Next of Kin
Early family-environment history
Later individual history
Current status (current frame of mind & situation)
End status (how they turn out at the end)
Motivation & Purpose (why are they there, and what they want to accomplish)
Alignment (protagonistic/antagonistic/neutral/etc.)
Base nature (what they're like underneath their motivation & purpose)
Purpose-dictated nature (what charater traits their purpose has caused - eg: a motivation for revenge has made them aggressive and hot-headed)
Attitudes towards other party members (if the character is a party member)
Language & vocabulary style (for base & purpose natures)
Personality-impacting circumstances (events or situations which alter their personality or cause one aspect of it to dominate)
Likes
Dislikes
Unique beliefs/values (be they personally founded or adopted from familial/religous affiliation - whatever)

I thought I had it pretty well sorted with all these, but I still can't put myself in their shoes totally. Am I barking up the wrong tree with the whole profile ideas to start with??? If anyone's got any helpful suggestions, I'd be eternally grateful. Thanks in advance.

[fingersmith]

I do not have any experience to offer you but I reckon you are on the right lines. Perhaps distinguishing between their personality traits might give you that edge? There is some work by Myers Briggs that maybe of interest. I did a google search for: theory personality traits introvert extrovert.

One fairly good looking result was:
http://www.freshmanseminar.appstate.edu/FS_Students/MBTI_overview.htm

Hope that helps.

[Bjorn]

I think the way we've handled this problem is mainly by using stereotype characters. What they say in any situation is much easier to come up with. Then again, we didn't do an awfull lot of serious writing and most conversations are short and meant to be a bit funny.
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[Grytpype]

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator might just do the trick - it actually helps define a small set of personality traits to go on, I've probably had trouble because I've tried to keep all of the points in the character profile in my head for each character as I write the dialogue. Narrowing it down to those four aspects will be a lot easier to handle, and pretty logical for doing all the spontaneous talking.
I'll see how it works out, thanks Fingersmith.

Bjorn - You're right about stereotype characters, they are a hell of a lot easier to write for. I've got one fairly stereotypical party character that I can rattle off the lines for without too much trouble. I've deliberately tried to avoid stereotype characters in general though, 'cause it's meant to be a fairly serious RPG with well-dimensioned characters (I hope). I suspected that making them all stereotypical would end up with the whole thing backfiring on me. There's a dose of humour in there to lighten the mood from time to time, but yeah, I'm mainly taking a serious angle for it. Fingers crossed it doesn't result in just sounding corny as f***.

[fingersmith]

np Grytpype, yes I guess the real trick is to put yourself in their shoes. It must be hard chopping and changing personalities, it takes time to "get into character".

Although the traits are good at identifying similar personalities and behaviours, you may find re-creating personalities from the traits more difficult.

Some more pronounced personalities that I can think of appearing in RPGs, going along the stereotypical lines: Helpful/Non-Helpful, Trustful/Distrustful, Patient/Impatient, Generous/Selfish, Happy/Sad, Courageous/Cowardice, Honourable/Dishonourable (inspiration from the Ultima series)

Also consider personal status: Rich/Poor, Liked/Disliked

You may want to scale traits, for example from 1 to 5 to avoid heavily contrasting.

[Guest]

I see what you mean, the traits are more associated with general similarities of type, rather than distinctive personal character. They would have to be scaled too, like you say, if a character gets classified in one or the other they'll end up contrasting so much, and run the risk of sounding like knee-jerk reaction types.

The personalities you've listed is a good way to easily identify the nature of a character while using the traits as indicative of behaviour. The only tricky part is toning their attitude according to the situation. For example, the Non-Helpful type of person wouldn't even think of assisting anyone for a minor problem (like a broken toe), but they'd awkwardly try to offer their help for a major one (like a broken leg).

The way it's contingent of the situation sorta reminds me of that Francis Bacon quote: "Prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue."

The personal status points are pretty static though - if you're rich, you're rich. If you're poor, you're poor, end of story. I can set that type of element in concrete.

Talking of Ultima, the Virtues system seems to be worth a try - giving a character a fitting level of Honour, Compassion, Valour, Sacrifice, etc.

Heheh... I can't wait until I get into the character changes for major story events. That's gonna open up a whole new can of worms.