The composure of our character is something that we tend to place a good deal of emphasis on: what are their stats, what are their skills, what are their motivations, their personality? We get a picture of who this person is in our heads, and then all hell breaks loose.

Sure, maybe those stats don’t change, and maybe their skills don’t. Often, a good practice is to have the players of a new system evaluate how their character felt after the first session and change a few things if they really need to, if the composure of their character didn’t line up with the actual activities in terms of their abilities and focus.

However, this carefully crafted idea of who the character is tends not to survive unscathed with actual play. Time and again, I have found that the actual personality of the character emerges without any conscious thought of mine. I had no idea that Terrence McSweeney was going to be such a jerk. I had no idea that Philippe Moreau was going to be such a hopeless romantic.

I’ve had characters hesitate who I thought were brave, and other characters rush headlong into danger in order to protect their friends. I’ve had characters display altruism or cruelty that I didn’t know was in them when I came up with the concept. It’s actually a very cool thing. I find that, regardless of our idea, the composure of our character Isn’t fully complete until play is over, and even then they can always evolve next session if we ever pick the game back up again.