I wouldn't get too worked up over things, especially if it's to do with anything here. I'm noticing this because everyone is trying to delve deeper and deeper into the topic and finding their frustrations that they've experienced, both with players and RPs. If working retail has taught me one thing it's that no matter where you go there will always be arseholes, dumbasses and hinderances to hold you back. :rolleyes

[b]Off Topic Time (Cause I love stories from my work):[/b]
So I had another worker tell me at a store they worked at that they sold a lawn mower to a customer and said, [i]"Fill it with juice and oil and she'll be good to go."[/i] You know, typical Aussie talk.
Well... Customer came back a few hours later claiming that it didn't work. Turned out that orange juice does not make a suitable fuel source. They claimed they did exactly what the sales person told them to do, but apparently the book marked instruction manual is just meaningless. [b]*shrugs*[/b]

Anyways...

[@tsukune] Actually bought up a good point.
[quote=@tsukune]
Unlike some of the people who have commented on thread, I'm those who will double-check the CS numerous times as I write my IC responses for the sake of consistency, especially in advanced-level RPs where there's a lot of things going on to keep track (and my memory is horrible).
[/quote]
[b]*Raises hand*[/b]
I have a horrible memory for names and people, place in a few details and I'll forget some important details. So In a way having some of these details can aid with consistency. [@BrokenPromise] mentioned the idea of a long/short sleeve shirt mix-up and I myself have been on the receiving end of that. I had another player make an assumption about my character and how something worked until I pointed it out to them. If it had been a build-as-you-go roleplay than it would be a lot more harder to manage and if the CS didn't convey that information than it would have been confusing.

A lot of points mentioned above have good merits for a variety of reasons, so I can't say that one detail is correct and another is incorrect, but for a larger Roleplay a detailed CS seems to be more appropriate. My 1x1 [i](Which reminds me that I should reply to it... Whoops!)[/i] doesn't have a CS sheet and we use the occasional picture to set a theme or mood of the location/characters that we interact with. Not having a CS has actually made this particular RP quite fun, since we are free to throw in whatever we need, but it's a bit of a light hearted adventure.

Compare that to Gowi's NCQ and we all had quite detailed Character sheets. We had a large line up and we actually knew how the characters were going to interact, so when we wrote everything down it worked out quite well. We knew my character wore a jacket with an enemy logo on it (defected to another country), we knew that another character always wore her Russian ushanka (Landscape was cold and snowy).

When it does come to something like listing a mental disorder, I don't think that's necessarily a problem with the character or CS, but more a problem with the player. I've played mentally disturbed players before and it's hard, especially with some disorders (Try playing a character that has an active voice in her head and always refers to her and the voice as we... NOT EASY), but kudos to the player for at least trying to understand the disorder. I don't think building a character around it and using it for an RP is the best move but that also comes back to the GM who allowed it into the RP and how they failed to spot that it could be a problem.

Ultimately that's why I thought about this and wondered if anyone else had pondered over the same thought. A CS sheet should be an entrant form for any RP and maybe some GMs are asking the wrong questions and don't realise it. Age may not be important if you can only choose between "teen, young adult, adult, elderly", maybe the Appearance could be their favourite clothing setup rather than a bulk standard "this is what they always wear", and more effort placed into the biography rather than the personality so that players aren't locked into that mindset. Just a thought.