Nikita
Werewolf

Hallow Nikita! Looks like we share the same Birthday! Only I am nearly twice your age! Thanks to Halloween - you will never grow old though! LOL. Happy Birthday and hope it is a great one! BOO!

Gefeliciteerd met je verjaardag! Geniet ervan!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Nikita!!!
Cathy

-- continued --



As a starting point, I would suggest that you sit down with each player and discuss what I've said here. Encourage them to take the time to let a history brew in their minds for at least a few days. tell them to imagine their character's appearance, then their mannerisms and habits, then their strengths and weaknesses. Tell them to regress that character back into humanity and imagine how the character developed into what he/she is now.
That should help to start them on the path to creating a history, and help them decide how to allot attributes, stengths and weaknesses when the time comes.
I think the imortant thing is that everyone (including you!) relax about it all and let it flow and evolve naturally...if you force anything from yourself or your players, nobody will have any fun and everyone will miss the true joy of being something (someone) else for awhile.
remember, the hidden blessing in all of this is that everyone has a chance to get to know themselves and each other on a much deeper level....without even being consciously aware of it.

I hope some of this helps. if I can help further, please let me know.

I don't know how much real help I can be, but I'll try. I guess the best advice I can give you is to ask your players to immerse themselves in their character. BE that character. tell them to think of it not as acting, but actually BEING. It requires a good, if not vivid, imagination. You have to learn to put aside your inhibitions and your day-to-day self to become a different person. That's where a very detailed pre-game history is so important and even vital to each character. The more detailed and vivid each character's history is, the more real he/she will be to the player controlling them. And...the easier it is to become immersed.
I think the trouble with role-playing games is that people think of them as just that, rather than an opportunity to become more than they are...to expand themselves and experience the freedom of limitless imagination.
Sure, there are elements of play where you have to do the mundane game-mechanical stuff, but the trick is to not break character. maybe you could encourage people to put together a costume (something comfortable), and wear it during game time. Maybe even suggest that everyone treat the time as if they are all character actors....you know, like some movie actors do...they ARE their character until the day's filming is done. You don't even call them by their real names.

-- more to follow --

Hello hello! I don't know how this friends thing works, or what the communication benefits are, but here I iz. Always very happy to have a new friend, too!!!

GEEEZZZZZ....I guess I better get off my dead lazy ass and git me an avatar!

I'm not a dude but thanks for saying I rule
I'm very lucky that my husband is a klusser. He makes most of what we have. For instance, we found that organ at a second hand store and ripped it open and used motors to make the keys play. The organist's head came from England. I ordered thru a hobby shop there. Hubby and a friend followed the directions on the forum for making a 3 axis skull.
The coffins are also self made. Hubby had found some extra wood at work. But you can also make coffins out of pallet wood. That's very cheap.
Because its so hard to find stuff here, we make most of our stuff. Xeno's has some cool skull flowers in stock right now. I bought up a bunch of them. We also have 2 feestwinkels here in Groningen that have a halloween selection that gets bigger each year. There's also an online feestwinkel in Eindhoven that has a pretty large selection and also ships.

I actually have 2 coffins but only one is going to be used as a bar hahaha The other one will have a pneumatic pop up corpse in it