Does deletion of a deceased character in a game remove or alter their previous posts in the game?

In reply to Jhaelin (msg # 1):

nope, you have to remove those yourself

It will, however, delete their character sheet/profile, so if you want to retain that I would suggest moving them to be a GM controlled NPC. That way the player no longer has control of them, but their information stays easily accessible.

That leaves many options open.

Depending on the turn-over rate in your game and the importance of the character, making it an NPC may or may not be a good choice.  I inherited, as co-GM, a game where the owner had fleshed out the cast list with NPCs, and now I can't do much with them, because he owns them and hasn't been online in years.  I prefer a less-cluttered cast list, so it makes me a little frustrated.

So, I'd recommend keeping important characters as NPCs, perhaps, or if you only have two or three players drop out...but I wouldn't suggest the 'NPC them' solution for every character.

 I never  keep characters once the  player  has left the game, Unless they 'earned' their  keep, and  use them as  a cameo from time to time..i hate having 'dead names' on the cast list.

Thanks to all who replied... I appreciate the help

In reply to facemaker329 (msg # 5):

facemaker -- Can you Z-list them?

In reply to Gaffer (msg # 8):

I'm in a situation similar to Facemaker's. (Not as severe. But the cast list needs a trim.) I gave Z group a shot, but it doesn't make a long, outdated cast list any shorter.

Yeah, putting them in Group Z wouldn't get them off the cast list.  Doesn't matter which group they're in...I'm the only one in the game that can do anything with them, and I'm not going to run twenty-some-odd NPCs for every active player in the game.  So, they sit there, idle...it's nice to have the names for reference, but I'd rather just have a clean cast list.

I originally wanted to rename them and give them to players as they came into the game (there haven't been many, which is good, because I don't enjoy GM'ing enough to put up with the intensity of several active players), but since they all belong to the game's owner, they don't even come up on my list of characters that I can alter, as a GM.  I'd also like to be able to delete them to give a sense of attrition, because the game is about a small force trying to hold a location against a much larger, better equipped force...but nope.  I may find some other option, yet...

Wait.. Which cast list, I thought it was possible to vanish NPCs from the public cast list by using the correct tag. or did that not transfer from beta?

Or are you just worried about clutter on the GM cast lists.

Actually typing "hidden" in the Characters Tag makes it disapear from the Both the public cast list and the GM cast list.  I believe it must belong to the a GM, and becomes an NPC. The character is still there, and can be used to post comments.


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This message was last edited by the user at 12:33, Thu 11 Feb 2016.

I didn't know that was a feature of the Beta. What's the tag?

For me, it's a cluttered cast list. It's a turn off for some gamers to see a long list of PCs that haven't logged in for months (or years). Even if you move old characters to the NPCs, that list gets long and full of characters that nobody plays or interacts with. I have some characters that I'd rather not delete, their players are taking a break from RPoL.

I'd also like to organize the characters by tag, then alphabetically. But that should be a separate topic.

the tag is "hidden" and yes it is a currently active tag in Alpha.
This message was last edited by the user at 12:35, Thu 11 Feb 2016.

Thank you! Off to try it.

That was great! I've whittled down the NPCs from about 90. Now there will be no more hurt feelings about the deletion of unused characters.

If you are storing player's Characters until their return.

you might create a GM character "-Looking for Stored PCs" then put a list of Players and their characters in the Character Discription.

Another good idea. After I hid the unused characters, I put up a notice letting the players know that these characters weren't deleted, just out of sight. I can easily make a list for their reference, but I'm sure I don't have to rush. Most of these characters and NPCs haven't made a post since 2011. Some of them, even before that.

For me, if I need to delete a character, I'll have a separate thread in a group the other players can't see in which I'll copy/paste old characters' information in case I ever need to go back and reference it. Then, once that is done, I can clean up the cast list without having to worry about losing important information.

Facemaker, if you've inherited a game, I'm sure you can ask the mods to make you the new owner, then you can delete any characters you want.

In reply to icosahedron152 (msg # 19):

That would depend.

For example: the original GM might have set the game to "sole ownership", in which case we would not transfer control, under any circumstances.

Which is precisely the case.  It's inconvenient...but not unworkable.

<carefully extracts foot from mouth...>