Character Dossier Guidelines

A character dossier is the primary player-facing record of a character and their established place within StarForgeRP.

A useful dossier should help another player understand who the character is, where they fit within the shared setting, what circumstances shape their life, what relationships and history continue to matter, and where believable opportunities for roleplay may exist.

The goal is not to document everything. Preserve the information that explains the character, supports continuity, creates useful context for interaction, or records developments that future roleplay may need to remember.

A StarForgeRP character dossier serves three closely related purposes.

• Character reference — Someone unfamiliar with the character should be able to understand who they are without reconstructing their life from old scenes, conversations, or disconnected notes.

• Continuity record — Relationships, affiliations, responsibilities, injuries, discoveries, reputations, changing circumstances, and other lasting developments can remain relevant long after the roleplay in which they first appeared.

• Roleplay discovery — Other players should have enough context to recognize believable reasons their characters might meet, employ, investigate, oppose, assist, recruit, avoid, work beside, or otherwise become involved with the character.

These purposes matter more than completeness. When deciding whether something belongs on a dossier, ask whether it helps someone understand the character, preserves continuity that may matter later, or creates useful context for future roleplay.

Begin with the present

Establish the character before explaining their entire past. A new reader should be able to discover reasonably quickly who this person is, what they do, where they belong, which circumstances matter in their life, and what might give another character a reason to encounter them.

History can then explain how they reached that point.

If the character itself is still being developed or adapted, use the Character Creation Guide. When age, history, affiliations, or present circumstances depend upon StarForgeRP's shared chronology, consult Current Setting and the Timeline.

Use the template flexibly

The Blank Character Dossier provides a familiar starting structure, not a checklist that every character must complete.

Remove fields and sections that do not add useful information. Someone without meaningful Force involvement does not need a Force section. Ordinary possessions do not require an inventory. A short history should not be expanded simply because more space is available.

The reverse is also true. Add, combine, rename, rearrange, or expand sections when something genuinely important to the character does not fit naturally into the standard structure.

Comparable dossiers should feel related without becoming identical.

Ground the character in the shared setting

A dossier should make the character feel like someone who occupies the shared galaxy rather than someone whose biography exists separately from it.

Useful anchors may include a birthplace, homeworld, residence, workplace, profession, faction, organization, military unit, crew, family, cultural community, mentor, rival, employer, recurring location, historical event, or continuing story. One or two credible connections may be enough to begin; others can develop through roleplay.

Character dossiers are primarily player-facing reference pages. Unless a particular page deliberately uses another presentation, avoid requiring the entire dossier to read like an Imperial intelligence report, Jedi archive entry, military personnel file, criminal database, or other restricted in-universe document.

Those formats can be useful as supplementary material, but an in-universe author can only record what they could plausibly know. A player-facing dossier may need to preserve information that would never appear together in a single fictional record.

Clarity comes first. The writing can still reflect the character's profession, culture, circumstances, and personality without making the page difficult to use as a reference.

Player knowledge and character knowledge

Information appearing on a dossier does not automatically become information every character knows in-character.

A dossier may describe private motivations, concealed affiliations, family history, relationships, fears, secrets, disputed events, or other information because those details help players understand the character. Another character should still act according to what they could reasonably observe, have been told, research, recognize, remember, or discover through roleplay.

Where the distinction is useful, identify information as publicly known, familiar within particular circles, rumored or disputed, classified, deliberately concealed, or private.

If an important future reveal depends upon other players not knowing something at all, consider whether that information needs to appear on the public dossier yet.

Relationships belong to everyone involved

Record relationships that continue to affect the character: relatives, friends, partners, rivals, enemies, mentors, students, commanders, subordinates, clients, employers, professional contacts, creditors, debtors, former associates, and other recurring figures.

Describe the relationship as it has been established rather than deciding its future. Relationships can strengthen, deteriorate, end, resume, become complicated, or change meaning through roleplay.

Connections involving another player's character should reflect shared established continuity. Do not unilaterally assign another character significant feelings, obligations, family relationships, history, actions, decisions, agreements, or outcomes their player has not established.

When another character has a dossier, link to it. The Roleplay Guidelines contain the broader expectations concerning character agency, coordination, conflict, and shared developments.

Preserve relevant history

Background should explain the character's present rather than become an exhaustive chronology of everything that has happened to them.

Prioritize experiences that continue to influence something meaningful: occupation, training, affiliations, beliefs, relationships, injuries, reputation, responsibilities, resources, enemies, loyalties, fears, opportunities, or present circumstances.

Dates are most useful when timing affects continuity. Do not invent an exact date merely to create an appearance of precision. An approximate year, age, or broader period is preferable when that is all the character's history actually establishes.

A useful dossier does more than explain the character in isolation. It should reveal where their life intersects with other people.

Profession, affiliation, location, relationships, reputation, responsibilities, goals, contracts, debts, investigations, rivalries, rumors, interests, and unfinished problems can all provide believable points of contact.

A reputation can be especially useful because it gives another character something they might reasonably know before an encounter. That reputation does not need to be accurate: different communities may admire, distrust, misunderstand, blame, dismiss, or remember the same person differently.

Roleplay hooks should grow from circumstances already established on the dossier. They should offer another player somewhere to begin rather than prescribe what happens afterward. 

• A profession can create customers, colleagues, competitors, employers, clients, patients, passengers, suspects, or sources.

• An organization or recurring location can create shared contacts, responsibilities, access, rivalries, or obligations.

• A reputation or past event can give another character a reason to recognize, investigate, mistrust, approach, or seek out the character.

• A goal, debt, responsibility, unresolved problem, or unfinished investigation can create opportunities for cooperation or conflict.

Do not decide in advance that another character will trust them, oppose them, accept a job, reveal information, lose a conflict, enter a relationship, or respond in a particular way.

The hook establishes an opportunity. What develops afterward belongs to the participants.

A dossier is a living record. Update it when roleplay creates a lasting development that future scenes may need to account for.

A new affiliation, promotion, resignation, injury, relationship, rivalry, residence, responsibility, significant possession, reputation, discovery, legal problem, completed mission, altered allegiance, disappearance, death, or another substantial development may deserve an update.

Not every scene requires one. A useful test is whether forgetting the development could create confusion or contradict later roleplay. If so, it probably belongs somewhere in the continuing record.

Keep different kinds of status separate

• Current Status — The character's in-universe condition, such as alive, deceased, missing, imprisoned, or another circumstance that materially affects their place in the story.

• Archive Status — How the dossier is maintained within StarForgeRP, such as active, inactive, retired, or historical.

• RP Availability — Whether the player is presently seeking new scenes, connections, or story involvement involving that character.

These categories answer different questions. A living character can remain important to continuity while being unavailable for new roleplay, and an inactive or retired dossier can continue to document established history.

Preserve consequences, not every scene

A dossier should record what roleplay changed about the character without attempting to replace the Roleplay archive.

Link campaigns, missions, events, arcs, and completed stories when they materially affect the character. Preserve the consequence that remained important: a changed relationship, new responsibility, failed objective, discovery, injury, promotion, altered allegiance, acquired enemy, damaged reputation, new location, or unresolved problem.

Character dossiers become more useful when they connect naturally to the rest of StarForgeRP.

• Use the Character Directory and individual dossiers to connect family, allies, rivals, mentors, colleagues, and other recurring characters.

• Use Lore for factions, organizations, species, cultures, Force traditions, technologies, and other setting subjects.

• Use Galaxy for birthplaces, homeworlds, residences, workplaces, bases, settlements, strongholds, and other physical locations.

• Use the Timeline when an established historical event or StarForgeRP development directly affects the character's history.

• Use Roleplay for campaigns, missions, events, hooks, arcs, and archived stories involving the character.

A character dossier is part of StarForgeRP's public archive. Keep fictional character information separate from unnecessary real-world personal information.

A player handle, attribution name, preferred contact method, roleplay availability, or similar player-facing information should only be included when the person concerned intends for it to be publicly associated with the dossier.

The same care applies to portraits, artwork, screenshots, writing, and other contributed material. Provide only material you created, have appropriate permission to share, or are otherwise entitled to provide.

• Can a new reader quickly understand who the character is and what they are doing now?

• Does the character have a believable place within the shared setting?

• Are the most important affiliations, relationships, locations, responsibilities, and present circumstances clear?

• Does the history explain the present without documenting every minor event?

• Are unusual abilities, authority, resources, access, or background elements given enough context?

• Have important connections to established lore and StarForgeRP continuity been checked?

• Is player knowledge distinguishable from information other characters could reasonably know?

• Do relationships involving other players reflect established shared continuity?

• Are there believable opportunities for other characters to interact with this character?

• Have lasting consequences from completed stories been reflected where they remain relevant?

• Are unused fields and unnecessary template sections removed?

• Are useful Character, Lore, Galaxy, Timeline, and Roleplay entries linked where they provide meaningful context?

• Is any player-facing personal information appropriate for public publication?

• Are contributed artwork, images, writing, and other material appropriate to provide under the Terms of Use?

• Is the character's present situation still accurate?

A dossier does not need to contain the character's entire life before they can be useful in roleplay.

Establish enough to understand the person, their place in the galaxy, and the circumstances around them. Preserve what matters as their story develops.