Creating your character.

Spoiler:

Beginning from top to bottom, I will explain the way that the character template works and how it should be filled out to be as accurate and for your application to get evaluated as quickly and as fluidly as possible.

At the top sits your basic personal character information. Your shinobi's name, age, gender, height, and weight. These are all very simple. Make up a name (nothing vulgar) and give it to your shinobi then fill out the other slots. Be reasonable, no thousand pound ninja please, it'll make things easier if you just make your character simple for people to understand.

Right below that section is the section known as your shinobi appearance. This spot is so that you and your peers will be able to understand what your shinobi character looks like and how he or she may be identified when seen. Of course anything described as hidden on your character will be hidden to everyone except you and anyone you tell while in character. Please describe their race, eye color, hair, body shape and at the bottom is their ethnicity. Ethnicity is the shinobi country that your character comes from, not the country in the real world.

After appearance comes personality. This can literally be anything you want it to be, as long as you are comfortable RPing it. We won't care if they take long walks along the beach or rape women in their past time, just make sure its something you can RP and it's something that you can explain in two paragraphs. Don't mistake this for the background. Don't explain why he is the way he is, just explain how he is.

The next section is dedicated to the career your ninja has. Your rank / title to begin with will always be Academy Student unless there is some sort of reason why it should not be under certain circumstances. Additionally, one can be a missing ninja and not be an academy student if they leave their village. The next slot is the village to which you belong. You can belong to a Major Village, a Minor Village, or even belong to no village at all. The next and final slot of this category tells what team or organization to which your character belongs. If he belongs to none, then simply put none.

This category is dedicated to your shinobi lineage. What elements does he or she have, does he belong to a Bloodline or Clan? Finally, what talents does he or she have? Starting elements are limited to Fire (Katon), Water (Suiton), Lightning (Raiton), Earth (Doton), and Wind (Fuuton). Only under very special circumstances may you start with anything aside from those five elements. Bloodlines are self explanatory, a RPC may start with a custom or canon bloodline. And Talents are abilities that must be created or learned, so more than often, this slot will be left blank.

The next section is dedicated to what weapons and tools your shinobi will start with. Be within reason with what he or she has. Also keep in mind some weapons are unavailable to certain shinobi ranks. If there's something that's not in your characters template, then your character does not have it. No ifs, ands, or buts.

The next sections are all self explanatory.

This is mostly a guide for those who don't actually know what a Mary Sue is, but want to make an awesome character, as generally, people who know what one is, don't particularly want to make one. For those who don't know what one is, a Mary Sue is a generic character who always gets what they want, always does the best at everything, and always wins, regardless of their situation. While winning all the time with legitimate reason or being good at something isn't necessarily a problem, it becomes one when the story you're writing becomes predictable and boring.

Don't worry, however, as creating a Mary Sue isn't the 8^th deadly sin! With this guide, I will teach the readers how to make a character that everyone can root for, but at the same time, is multifaceted and feels realistic to type a story for.

• Know what you're writing about! I know this is hypocritical for me to say, as I don't even actually watch Naruto! BUT If you're going to jump into a universe, one should at least know the parameters of what universe they're diving balls deep into! Don't make an Uchiha (Yes I'm calling them out) if their entire clan has been destroyed, and even worse! Don't make an Uchiha related to Sasuke or Itachi or Tobi! That's lame bro! This brings me to my second point!
  
  
• Don't make characters related to Canon Characters, I've worked really hard to make sure that all of the important canon characters have been killed or become unimportant. (Yes, I thought hard about what I was doing when I wrote out the site plot.) No characters in the show exist on this site. And if they do, they're little bitty babies with easily bruised skin. Deal with it.
  
  
• Give your character some real flaws! Sheesh, don't make your character have the best breasts and ass you've ever seen if she's a ninja. That's so illogical it's hilarious. How do you expect someone will all of that to go around bouncing from tree to tree kicking ass! With a life of a ninja, their skin shouldn't be absolutely free from blemish unless they're a particularly young character or they specialize in something that heals them. Those are the only times in which it would make sense! On top of that, don't say your characters personality is the "all around bad-ass" because honestly, I can guarantee they're not. Make flaws for them for example, sure they may be an amazing fighter, but when it comes to logical thought, maybe they took one too many blows to the head and now they don't think the same as everyone else? Maybe they're a little slow?
  
  
• Don't make your character the center of attention. Honestly, don't jump into a thread and talk about how everyone was in awe at how sexy you are. Get over yourself. Unless your character is a self centered dick (which would be flaw and totally okay) no one should be staring him or her up and down and drooling. I reaffirm my point that a shinobi would have many scars on their body due to fighting. I find it hard to believe that any shinobi that spends 24 hours in a bathroom sprucing up, can be considered a shinobi at all. Sheesh, be realistic about stuff.
  
  
• No one person here is the main character all of the time. The site as a whole is a cast and literally everyone is a part of the ensemble. Everyone has their time in the spot light and everyone has their time in the shadows. For example, the world does not revolve around your character and he or she shouldn't act like it unless it is one of their personality traits (which once again, is a very good personality flaw.) If you just left the academy, chances are, people don't even know who you are, much less kiss the ground that you walk on.
  
  
• Let people react to your character, do not say that "everyone loves him because he's awesome" because honestly, not everyone will like them. It's not imperative that everyone does. As a matter of fact, the plot will work a lot better if the character is disliked by everyone rather than if they're liked by everyone, at least then they'll have a rags to riches story rather than vice versa. Be different, let your character be them and just let things flow as the should.
  
  
• Make things hard for your character. Don't (for example) say that the character aced every test they ever took in their life while single handedly dragging their fallen allies by their collar and planting the American flag with their penis. There's a reason you're a character and not god. No one is the best. Make things easy to believe. Some times, every once in a while, characters go through hardship and at the end of it, the audience is more interested and far more intrigued by the situation than if you had immediately kicked every hardships ass.
  
  
• Don't be that guy that comes in, god-modes every war, then hogs the spotlight. Understand that, even as a Kage-Level shinobi, without something to make you abnormally quick, you're going to need the help of your subordinates to win a decisive battle. There's a reason I instituted a point system for the war rather than letting you all just go at it. It's a teamwork goal, not a one versus one fight. So build your character around helping others and being social, not around hogging jutsu and power-playing.
  
  
• One of the bigger ones I've seen in my day: Be careful when getting into a romance plot. There are some good ones, and there are some horribly bad ones where the two fall in love and thats it. Since they rushed everything from the beginning, there was no room to grow and as a result, the plot died quickly. It's okay for the girl to tease and it's okay for the guy to chase, thats generally how relationships start out in real life. As I've said before, make it believable and soon enough you'll have the readers on the edge of their seats, wishing you'd hurry up and make a move. No one gets the girl immediately (if shes a half decent girl/guy).
  
  
• This one is a funnier point. People, please stop killing off your family by some masked, unnamed, unheard of robber. Or if you want to do that, give that unnamed character a name and everything and make that NPC a pivotal person in your characters plot. Otherwise it becomes ridiculous.
  
  
• My final point, which I cannot stress enough! Take your time!!!! Let the character plot flow and ebb as it needs to like water in a river. If you push too hard, you'll ruin everything. Think about what you want to accomplish with the character and begin building up towards it. I understand some people just want to assist others plots, and thats fine too. I love when people just want to help move plots along!
  
  

I hope this guide helped you guys, if it didn't I'm sorry. Not much else I can say. I hope this guide will assist character development from here until the end of their stay on N:SoL!