Topic: ownership of characters and writing.

[lillisa]

I may have completely overlooked this, but couldn't find a rule or guidelines.

I've noticed that quite often group games fizzle out because one or two players leave, leaving behind a hole that even new recruits chomping at the bits cannot repair. So I'm wondering, for sake of continuity, can I demand as a GM that if a PC has not been posted for a certain, realistic time it reverts to GM control, or would that be against forum rules (regarding artistic ownership and such)

[RedPhoenix]

There is no explicit rule about character ownership (whoops, thanks avis!) but the civility rule is very all-encompassing and should be considered.

As a GM who has been in that situation here is what my approach was:

Civility rules require that you make efforts to write out a character in a way that their author would be okay with. But if you can't have that conversation for whatever reason and you as a GM need to do something to accommodate other characters and the plot, then just try to do it in as benign a fashion as possible, consistent with the way they played the character as you can.

If you're talking about a game that you are going to put up an ad for consider making it part of the disclaimer and rules, "If you go inactive for x amount of time your character will revert to GM control." Or something like that. I don't think that would be a violation of anything.

[Avis habilis]

Our official policy on ownership of creative material is here: https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?topic=98597.msg4283531#msg4283531 (scroll down to the section titled Copyright).

Writers own the characters they create. However, nothing says that the players in a game can't agree ahead of time that if they drop out or fade away, the character becomes "communal property" as it were. I suppose there's nothing to say you couldn't establish that as a ground rule for participating in that particular game.