I was thinking, why dont we allow characters to have several offshoot characters which they can create and name, then select as an alternative to write roleplays (maybe letters too?) from. When writing roleplays it should make it clear that it's not the main character writing, maybe just something simple like "Roleplay from Johannes Kepler, Captain of Abraham Miller" where it would normally say "Roleplay from Abraham Miller".
I often don't "play" (write something for) a character because I'm not in the mood for that particular character, sometimes because he's too serious, sometimes because he's a joker and sometimes because what he would say brings consequences I don't want to deal with. I'm suggesting to allow players to add other kinds of outlets to their different characters, some could have a jester, others their captain (maybe make that one standard? How many times have you seen people rp their captain?), a drinking buddy, an old uncle or grandmother... Hell, it'd be a great way to introduce the heir! Either way, the player of that character now has different sorts of outlets in his realm, increasing incentive to say something. Many of the "entourage's" jibber jabber probably won't lead to (though some I believe could be very pertinent) anything but it is entertainment, for the player and the ones he plays with. And that's something we need more.
Of course we've all seen plenty of players roleplay a secondary character but how many of them have done it consistently? How many have developed the character or even truly focused on it in that roleplay? If you add this option and those links, you allow players to enshrine those characters in the game, to make them permanent, without having to clumsily mention them left and right to make sure others (and you) don't forget. You can then really start developing them and have them interact with eachother and with your main character. All of this could be done by normal roleplays and word documents but I'd think it's a good thing to encourage in this game, which could use with a little more chatter sometimes. Also, it would function as a sort of support group for the development of your main character, which would then encourage more of that.
Thoughts?
