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Your longest serving character?
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Ireth
Mythic Scribe
Not my oldest, but my longest-running character would probably be Vincent Hawk. His very first incarnation was in a pseudo-crossover-fanfic RP back in 2007 or so; I took V and gave him a past and a name, originally Vincent Broderick. When I joined a completely-unrelated fantasy RPing group in 2009, I brought Vincent over, stuffed him in a blender with the Phantom of the Opera, and got Vincent Hawk: music teacher, off-Broadway actor and martial artist. I gave him a long-deceased wife named Christine, a daughter named Ariel, and a girlfriend named Diana (who later became his second wife). Later on, my GM dumped magical powers on him as well.
When that RP died in 2010, shortly before I was to introduce Vincent's brother Dom, I teamed up with a former group member and we made our own version of the same setting, salvaging some of our old characters and adding new ones. Around 2011 I started working on Winter's Queen, starring Vincent, Dom and Ariel in a different setting and plot. WQ soon spawned a sequel, and that's in progress as well. The spinoff RP is still going strong, with a variety of plots and characters, including altered and crossed-over versions of ideas from WQ, just for fun. Some of the ideas that were changed and explored in the RP have been fitted back into the novel, mainly involving more minor Fae characters.
When that RP died in 2010, shortly before I was to introduce Vincent's brother Dom, I teamed up with a former group member and we made our own version of the same setting, salvaging some of our old characters and adding new ones. Around 2011 I started working on Winter's Queen, starring Vincent, Dom and Ariel in a different setting and plot. WQ soon spawned a sequel, and that's in progress as well. The spinoff RP is still going strong, with a variety of plots and characters, including altered and crossed-over versions of ideas from WQ, just for fun. Some of the ideas that were changed and explored in the RP have been fitted back into the novel, mainly involving more minor Fae characters.
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Wanara009
Lore Master
I worked with a lot of continuity, and every single one of them got a 'veteran', so to speak. However, I had three characters that make the most appearance and has the distinction of being amongst the first I created once I started writing seriously (characters I made before that points [mostly wish-fulfillment inserts of myself and my friends] are purged from my Characters Database and are considered my old shame)
The first character I create after purge is Raden Patah Hadiningrat. He's a 'canon immigrant' that first appeared in an unrealized project I titled "Naga Keraton" (a martial-art comic set in an alternate world where T. Roosevelt won that third presidency, thus changing the whole timeline).
He's main traits are blindness, skill in martial art, reputation as an competent leader popular amongst the tradesmen and scholars and soldiers but despised by clergymen and craftsmen and farmers, being so unpopular in nearly all minor countries bordering his own that he is basically demonized as a Genghis-Khanesque warlord out to destroy the world, being a closeted asexual, and insanity. Though the last is debatable: is he really insane, only believe that he is insane, or pretending to be insane?
The second oldest character is Prasetya Gatot Guntoro and Dewi Tetuka. They're 'recycled characters' ala Tezuka Star System that appears in many of my projects. In all incarnations, Prasetya is 'gentle, caring giant' while Dewi is the 'ferocious, jealous giantess'. They are also always appear as a married couple (or at least engaged) in all of their incarnation.
Fun Fact: The idea of Prasetya and Dewi actually came from one character. Prasetya is my interpretation on the Indian version of Ghatotkacha while Dewi is the gender-bent interpretation of the Javanese version of the character.
Before 2008, every single one of my character are wish-fulfillment for me and my friends, so I will be thrown the the 12th circle of hell before I admit having anything to do with them anymore
The first character I create after purge is Raden Patah Hadiningrat. He's a 'canon immigrant' that first appeared in an unrealized project I titled "Naga Keraton" (a martial-art comic set in an alternate world where T. Roosevelt won that third presidency, thus changing the whole timeline).
He's main traits are blindness, skill in martial art, reputation as an competent leader popular amongst the tradesmen and scholars and soldiers but despised by clergymen and craftsmen and farmers, being so unpopular in nearly all minor countries bordering his own that he is basically demonized as a Genghis-Khanesque warlord out to destroy the world, being a closeted asexual, and insanity. Though the last is debatable: is he really insane, only believe that he is insane, or pretending to be insane?
The second oldest character is Prasetya Gatot Guntoro and Dewi Tetuka. They're 'recycled characters' ala Tezuka Star System that appears in many of my projects. In all incarnations, Prasetya is 'gentle, caring giant' while Dewi is the 'ferocious, jealous giantess'. They are also always appear as a married couple (or at least engaged) in all of their incarnation.
Fun Fact: The idea of Prasetya and Dewi actually came from one character. Prasetya is my interpretation on the Indian version of Ghatotkacha while Dewi is the gender-bent interpretation of the Javanese version of the character.
Before 2008, every single one of my character are wish-fulfillment for me and my friends, so I will be thrown the the 12th circle of hell before I admit having anything to do with them anymore
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Feo Takahari
Dark Lord
Well, my oldest four characters who I keep saying I'll using in something, eventually, honest! are four mercenaries who're each parodies of a different variety of Mary Sue. Kyle's the physically and morally perfect prince (who's racist, sexist, and not nearly as bright as he thinks he is), Gail's the selfish, whiny sorceress with a tragic backstory (who rapidly discovers that her actions have consequences), Frederick's the seer who intervenes whenever the story needs to be railroaded towards a happy ending (and keeps making things worse), and Rose is the weak, clumsy noblewoman who gains an unusual magical ability and becomes an incredibly powerful warrior (at the cost of her identity and her self-respect.)
My oldest characters who I've actually used, and intend to use again, are Meg and Nika. Meg used to be the chief assistant in a Tyrant's personal research labs, conducting painful and frequently lethal experiments on political prisoners, until rebels killed the Tyrant and threw her into her own testing pits. Nika's a pickpocket whose life Meg once saved, half Meg's race and half the race of the Tyrant's soldiers, currently trying not to get killed by racist rebels. The experiment conditioned Meg to follow and defend someone, and she gets Nika to agree to be her commander, but Meg winds up giving Nika orders more often than not. Hilarity ensues.
My oldest characters who I've actually used, and intend to use again, are Meg and Nika. Meg used to be the chief assistant in a Tyrant's personal research labs, conducting painful and frequently lethal experiments on political prisoners, until rebels killed the Tyrant and threw her into her own testing pits. Nika's a pickpocket whose life Meg once saved, half Meg's race and half the race of the Tyrant's soldiers, currently trying not to get killed by racist rebels. The experiment conditioned Meg to follow and defend someone, and she gets Nika to agree to be her commander, but Meg winds up giving Nika orders more often than not. Hilarity ensues.
CupofJoe
Istari
I have one Character that has never made it out of First Draft Hell but I have been writing on and [mainly] off for 20+years...
Rick Blade - A Private Eye in the near future when cybernetics and on-line realities are commonplace. He is forced out of the Greater London Police for not wanting the "mods". He is currently the lead partner in a small detective agency where the Senior Partner was just murdered and another Partner seriously injured. He is overweight, has had several failed relationships and now lives with a full body change transsexual. He drinks and smokes too much. He started off in his late 30s and is now in his late 40s.
[There are so many flaws and clichés with Rick and the world he inhabits, that I think he is close to unusable but I still love him and keep on trying]
Rick Blade - A Private Eye in the near future when cybernetics and on-line realities are commonplace. He is forced out of the Greater London Police for not wanting the "mods". He is currently the lead partner in a small detective agency where the Senior Partner was just murdered and another Partner seriously injured. He is overweight, has had several failed relationships and now lives with a full body change transsexual. He drinks and smokes too much. He started off in his late 30s and is now in his late 40s.
[There are so many flaws and clichés with Rick and the world he inhabits, that I think he is close to unusable but I still love him and keep on trying]
WyrdMystic
Grandmaster
My oldest character is 3 years old now - he's the antagonist, a human twisted by magic that hides in shadows, becomes them and tries to influence the actions of others to get what he wants.....not saying what, sorry!
JCFarnham
Dark Lord
I tend to drop most of my characters after their individual projects are done with (finished, grind to a halt, forgotten about, etc.) so I don't technically have a longest "serving" character. I used to roleplay a lot on message boards back in the day and had thousands of chracters... one of them qualifies no doubt but I can't say I remember many, if any, of them.
One I do remember circa 2008, who I've been threatening to bring back, is Fionn Murphy the 30-something year old Irish immigrant with serious anti-social personality disorder along with just horrid behaviour toward most people. She was originally part of a superpowered rp, and had a set of mutations based on absolute stealth (soft foot falls, odourless, being able to dampen senses...) Now I think about it, she may in fact make a return as an antagonist in my on-and-off fictional superhero universe "Nightingale" (once a comic script/screen play, but now I plan to rewrite it in prose after being exposed to the Wild Cards universe.)
I'm loving the idea of recycled characters though! I may come up with a few myself as a little easter egg ala Sid of Final Fantasy fame.
Oldest character from a continually worked upon piece? That would be someone from Blitz my 2011 NaNo attempt, the likeliest contenders being either the mechanic, Myra Millar, or the "Dusker", Seth Noble.
One I do remember circa 2008, who I've been threatening to bring back, is Fionn Murphy the 30-something year old Irish immigrant with serious anti-social personality disorder along with just horrid behaviour toward most people. She was originally part of a superpowered rp, and had a set of mutations based on absolute stealth (soft foot falls, odourless, being able to dampen senses...) Now I think about it, she may in fact make a return as an antagonist in my on-and-off fictional superhero universe "Nightingale" (once a comic script/screen play, but now I plan to rewrite it in prose after being exposed to the Wild Cards universe.)
I'm loving the idea of recycled characters though! I may come up with a few myself as a little easter egg ala Sid of Final Fantasy fame.
Oldest character from a continually worked upon piece? That would be someone from Blitz my 2011 NaNo attempt, the likeliest contenders being either the mechanic, Myra Millar, or the "Dusker", Seth Noble.
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SeleneHime
Grandmaster
I have a couple characters that fall under this bracket. Since my first fanfiction, six years ago, I've kept the main characters active and been developing and redeveloping them. Selena Raho, and then the half brothers Kenneth (Kent) and Kain Sigurd. The main cast is actually about six people, but only recently have I started working on an original-verse for their story. Like with Ireth, I have several RPs on the side with them, and one of them tops five hundred pages. It's currently in the middle of a reboot, which looks like it'll easily double the length. ^^
Zero Angel
Dark Lord
That's an interesting question! Especially if you tend to cannibalize old works.
The first "novel" I wrote was called Vengeance. Originally it was a comic book co-created with a friend of mine, but he eventually dropped out and I switched it over to the novel format (they were supposed to be simultaneous, but oh well). Anyway, in there I had a character named Alexander who was a member of a race of "guardians" descended from a lunar species that had forcibly migrated to Earth.
The character eventually crossed over into the first short story written in WotA as a mysteriously powerful half-elf that was hiding his guardian-ness, the big change being that guardians in this world were dragons. I eventually abandoned this short story (read: set it about 40 years later into the timeline and went back to work on what I found more interesting) and the character came along as well, although I had to change his name because by this time the protagonist's name was Alastair, which is the Scottish variant of Alexander. Finally, the character became a recurring character in those stories (although I'll avoid sharing the name to avoid spoilers).
He's about 13 years old in our world (i.e. created circa 2000).
In terms of ACTUAL age of characters, the primary antagonist of the multiverse is 30 billion years old.
The first "novel" I wrote was called Vengeance. Originally it was a comic book co-created with a friend of mine, but he eventually dropped out and I switched it over to the novel format (they were supposed to be simultaneous, but oh well). Anyway, in there I had a character named Alexander who was a member of a race of "guardians" descended from a lunar species that had forcibly migrated to Earth.
The character eventually crossed over into the first short story written in WotA as a mysteriously powerful half-elf that was hiding his guardian-ness, the big change being that guardians in this world were dragons. I eventually abandoned this short story (read: set it about 40 years later into the timeline and went back to work on what I found more interesting) and the character came along as well, although I had to change his name because by this time the protagonist's name was Alastair, which is the Scottish variant of Alexander. Finally, the character became a recurring character in those stories (although I'll avoid sharing the name to avoid spoilers).
He's about 13 years old in our world (i.e. created circa 2000).
In terms of ACTUAL age of characters, the primary antagonist of the multiverse is 30 billion years old.
Aravelle
Mystagogue
My first character is... wait for it.. Aravelle. She was used in an MMORPG, and was essentially a Sue [her looks didn't help, straight black hair, blue eyes, large bosom, hourglass figure]. She was a vampire mermaid healer good with potions and an archer. Now.. she's a sassy dyslexic nymphomaniac who loves the colour blue.. but still just as pretty. XD I don't even know her race anymore, since I've scrapped every potential story she was going to be in. She will still probably be a mermaid, if not that some sort of non-human. We will see.
Anders Ämting
Dark Lord
Er, what do you mean by "serving"?
I mean, I don't keep a certain number of reusable characters, I make new ones for every story.
I mean, I don't keep a certain number of reusable characters, I make new ones for every story.
TheTdroid
Apprentice
My entire world is rather young, only a year old, and there are two characters who can compete for the oldest, in the sense of when I created them; Serenus, the Priest of Etram, and Samuel Octavien, a nobleman with a lot of strings attached.
If by age itself, it is definetly Samuel Octavien, and he seems to have a hand in most everything of importance of what goes on.
If by age itself, it is definetly Samuel Octavien, and he seems to have a hand in most everything of importance of what goes on.
Nihal
Valar Lord
I mostly do it with game characters. When I play a RPG and it's dropped I end getting haunted by my characters. They never met their full potential, this unfinished feeling really bothers me. I eventually end reusing them in a new game - changing a bunch of traits -, or, in some few cases, in stories.
Thaumicist
Apprentice
My first character ever was called Marindana, and starred in a completely weird fantasy story I wrote when I was eight.
My longest continuously serving character, both all-time and current, is one Zeth Reza, ne Zephyr Wyrd (don't look at me like that - I was twelve). He will shortly be six. He's gone through shades of snarky, shy and psychopathic in his time and has fulfilled such narrative roles as love interest, really really reluctant antihero, and murderous revolutionary leader.
Zeth's never been an MC. He's a quiet sort. So quiet I forgot about him until just now, in favour of his good friend and partner Arin Kett, nee Ariel Wyrd, who marched into my head as if she owned the place, broke a valuable crystal decanter, knocked on the inside of my skull, and demanded to be written, immediately, please, I haven't got all day and I've parked the flying castle on double yellow lines. Over the last five-and-five-sixths years she's ditched the flying castle for a poky flat, traded her upbringing as the rebellious eldest sprog of a jarl for a childhood of grinding poverty, and acquired an off-screen persona even more insufferably hammy than her written one used to be. It's not writer's block: it's Arin going on strike.
All of which explains why she blocked my view of Zeth there for a bit.
My longest continuously serving character, both all-time and current, is one Zeth Reza, ne Zephyr Wyrd (don't look at me like that - I was twelve). He will shortly be six. He's gone through shades of snarky, shy and psychopathic in his time and has fulfilled such narrative roles as love interest, really really reluctant antihero, and murderous revolutionary leader.
Zeth's never been an MC. He's a quiet sort. So quiet I forgot about him until just now, in favour of his good friend and partner Arin Kett, nee Ariel Wyrd, who marched into my head as if she owned the place, broke a valuable crystal decanter, knocked on the inside of my skull, and demanded to be written, immediately, please, I haven't got all day and I've parked the flying castle on double yellow lines. Over the last five-and-five-sixths years she's ditched the flying castle for a poky flat, traded her upbringing as the rebellious eldest sprog of a jarl for a childhood of grinding poverty, and acquired an off-screen persona even more insufferably hammy than her written one used to be. It's not writer's block: it's Arin going on strike.
All of which explains why she blocked my view of Zeth there for a bit.
Zero Angel
Dark Lord
Nice fraction use!
Androxine Vortex
Shadow Lord
My oldest character is Androxine Xetrov (guess what that spells backward?) He was originally designed to be my Warhammer 40k space marine chapter master but decided to take that storyline and set it in one of my own worlds and expand on it.