What is a roster character in text-based games?
A roster character is a character that game staff have already created and written up, which a new player can apply to take over instead of building a character of their own.
A roster listing usually includes a name, an age, a short personality write-up, a background, and the character’s connections to families, factions, or other player characters. Staff write all of that before anyone plays the part, and they post the list where players can browse it, either on the game’s website or through an in-game command.
Games offer roster characters for two reasons. The setting often needs certain positions filled, such as a guild leader, a town official, or the sibling of an existing player character. New players also tend to struggle to find scenes when their character doesn’t know anyone, and a roster character arrives with those connections already in place, which is why staff often point newcomers toward the roster instead of chargen.
A player who takes a roster character is expected to respect the written history and the relationships that come with it. Most games will let you adjust smaller details with staff approval, and some invite you to add to the background once you have played the character for a while. What the character does from that point on is up to you.
The word is also used for characters that come back into circulation. If a player stops logging in or leaves the game, staff may return that character to the roster so someone else can pick them up, usually with a note about what the character has been doing lately. On fandom games, the roster is often the list of available canon characters rather than staff-written originals.
Roster Character: a brief history
Handing a player a character that someone else wrote is older than text games. Tabletop groups have used pre-generated characters since the 1970s, mostly for convention games and one-shots where nobody has time to roll up a character at the table.
Online, the practice is generally associated with MUSHes in the 1990s, especially themed and fandom games. Those games needed a specific cast to work, so staff wrote up the roles the setting required and opened applications for them. The word itself is borrowed from its ordinary meaning of a list of people on a team or in a unit, which is roughly how these lists read.
By the 2000s, forum and play-by-post communities were running much the same system under a range of names, including adoptables, wanted ads, and open characters. Roleplay-focused MUDs picked up a comparable idea in the form of sponsored or staff-assigned roles, though those are usually offered to established players rather than listed publicly.
How it's used today
You will hear players say a character is “on the roster”, that someone “apped a roster character”, or that a character was “returned to the roster” after their player left. Games that use the system tend to keep the list somewhere obvious, either on a wiki page or behind a command such as +roster, with a links leading to the full character sheet.
Taking one usually means filling out an application like any other character, though the questions can be different. Instead of asking you to invent a background, staff may ask how you read the character and what you plan to do with the connections and RP hooks already written into the character sheet. Some games add a trial period, and some ask you to check in with the players whose characters are tied to yours.
Rosters are most common where roleplay is the main activity and the setting depends on particular people existing. They are rare on games built around combat and advancement, where any character can fill any slot.
Types of games where the term is commonly used include:
MUSHes, play-by-post and forum roleplay, roleplay-focused MUDs, and fandom games.
Roster Character examples
- A game’s roster page lists “Mira Vashti, harbor master, late forties, on bad terms with the shipping guild.” A new player reads the write-up, decides she sounds interesting, and submits an application for her.
- In a MUSH, a player types +roster in-game, sees that three members of a noble family are open, and picks the one whose ties connect to a plot already running.
- On a fandom game, only one player at a time can hold each character from the source material, so the roster shows which of them are currently free to apply for.
- After six months without logging in, a player’s character is returned to the roster with a staff note covering what she has been doing since her last scene.
Myths and misconceptions
- Roster characters are for players who cannot come up with their own ideas. Games open them because the setting needs those roles filled, not as a fallback for people short on imagination. Plenty of experienced players take roster characters because a particular position in the world interests them, or because they want to be involved in an existing plot from the start.
- A roster character comes with a script you have to follow. The written background and the existing relationships are fixed, but nothing about the character’s future is decided. You make the same choices you would make with a character you built yourself, and staff on most games will discuss changes to the write-up if you have a reason for them.
- Every game means the same thing by “roster”. On some games the roster is a set of staff-written originals. On fandom games it is the list of canon characters currently free to apply for. On others it holds characters whose previous players left. Read the game’s own help files before assuming which one applies.
Roster Character FAQs
What is a roster character in a roleplaying game?
It’s a character that staff wrote in advance and made available for a player to adopt. The name, background, and relationships are already set, and the player takes over from there.
How do you get a roster character?
You apply for one, the same way you would apply for a character you made yourself. Most games ask how you understand the character and what you want to do with the ties in the write-up, then staff either approve you or ask for changes.
Can you change a roster character’s background?
Usually a little, with staff approval. The parts that connect the character to other players and to the setting are the reason the character is on the roster, so those tend to stay fixed. Smaller details are often negotiable, and many games let you add to the history once you have played for a while.
What happens to a roster character when the player quits?
It depends on the game. Many put the character back on the roster for someone else to pick up, sometimes with a summary of recent events. Others retire the character, turn them into an NPC, or write them out of the setting.
Is a roster character the same as a canon character?
No. A canon character comes from an existing book, show, or film, while a roster character is any character a game has made available for adoption. The two overlap on fandom games, where the roster is often the list of canon characters nobody is playing yet.
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