OOC: Poll Interpretation time!
Apr. 10th, 2006 07:46 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
5000yearold.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
hh_mirrorHey Everyone!
Thanks to all those who answered the poll. Since I have responses accounting for 115 of the players, I think I've got enough to get a fairly accurate idea of what's going on at Hogwarts Hocus!
The reason I had Stephen-mun make the poll is that it certainly seems like Hogwarts is over-run with people that aren't so human, whether they be gods, demons, or just plain preternatural. This is long and rambly and gods I am a geek, but at least my curiosity is satiated. :D
As a reminder, I broke up characters into the following groups:
Human--characters with no special traits outside ordinary wizards. I worded it this way for a reason. There are a lot of characters who have special traits, yet in JKR's world, they'd more or less still just be a wizard. The average witch or wizard obviously sees ghosts, and if you're willing enough to play with the Dark Arts you can do lots of things with the dead (inferi, You Know Who getting his body back). A lot of characters who might otherwise be special in their world would more likely just have a niche inside of the wizarding world.
Near-Human--characters with special traits that may or may not lead to significantly longer life-spans and have to be acquired at some point after-birth. Vampires and werewolves fit into this category, as would any character who was "gifted" or "cursed" with a particular trait). Originally, I was going to divide this poll strictly on basis of age, but different canons have different life-spans. This seemed to be a better way to classify characters who were still more-or-less mortal, albeit still imperfect.
Near-Immortal--characters whose innate traits mean they live for centuries (or millenia) on average, yet still be killed (or have a final death). Highlander-style Immortals fit in this group, and demi-gods.
I felt it important to sort out the mostly-immortal from the truly immortal. Methos is certainly an exception to the rule in Highlander, yet many of Duncan's friends are multiple centuries old (at least 200+) while others (like Ritchie) die a final death in canon rather young (I don't think Ritchie even lasted half a decade as an Immortal). Skill, will-to-live and luck all play a major role in how long these characters truly live, but they were all born to live way longer than the normal human.
Immortal--Gods, demons, Q from Star Trek. Anything that has existed forever or approximately as long and more or less can't be killed. This one was pretty self-explanatory, I thought. :D
At the point I made my graph I accounted for 115 characters in the game. I then figured out the percentage each group represented and a not-so-snazzy but perfectly functioning chart:
As you can see, mere mortals do in fact make up a majority of the population! If you want a break down of numbers..
And okay, yes. My graph is a little off. Near Immortals should be 17% and Humans 51% but I didn't want to make another graph and the variation isn't *that* drastic :p
At any rate, the question becomes: if human-type characters predominate, why can it sometimes appear that we have an abundance of the rest? We can't simply claim that having more characters means you're more likely to play a Near-Immortal or an Immortal. When you break down the character types by percentage of those having six or more characters we find the numbers are almost the same.
Of the fifty-eight characters played by the eight people with six or more characters:
On the other hand, of the ten people who reported playing one character...
Our single-character players do tend to play more powerful types!
Overall, the only thing that makes sense is it all comes down to who is actually active. People with single characters are more likely to be more visible because they have that single character. OTOH, people who have multiple characters have a tendency to play a couple of characters more often than others, mostly because everyone is on a time crunch, and there are different plots going on at different times. It's not easy and often not feasible to play six characters an equal amount! That said, I do think that people with multiple characters do tend to be rather active in the game as a whole, and they tend to be at least as active with (if not more so) their more extraordinary characters than their human ones. I can't say why that is, although I know personally I find it more fun to abuse a character when they can physically handle it without having to go to the hospital wing! (*cough*Methos*cough*)
In conclusion, while we don't have a majority of extra-powerful characters, those who are active just seem to be playing with their more powerful toys more often :D
Fun facts:
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m4rk_cohen is the only 6 character mun who has all human characters.
No one character has more than 2 Immortal characters, and most people don't have more than 3 characters of any one kind.
Thanks for putting up with my rambling, folks :D
Thanks to all those who answered the poll. Since I have responses accounting for 115 of the players, I think I've got enough to get a fairly accurate idea of what's going on at Hogwarts Hocus!
The reason I had Stephen-mun make the poll is that it certainly seems like Hogwarts is over-run with people that aren't so human, whether they be gods, demons, or just plain preternatural. This is long and rambly and gods I am a geek, but at least my curiosity is satiated. :D
As a reminder, I broke up characters into the following groups:
Human--characters with no special traits outside ordinary wizards. I worded it this way for a reason. There are a lot of characters who have special traits, yet in JKR's world, they'd more or less still just be a wizard. The average witch or wizard obviously sees ghosts, and if you're willing enough to play with the Dark Arts you can do lots of things with the dead (inferi, You Know Who getting his body back). A lot of characters who might otherwise be special in their world would more likely just have a niche inside of the wizarding world.
Near-Human--characters with special traits that may or may not lead to significantly longer life-spans and have to be acquired at some point after-birth. Vampires and werewolves fit into this category, as would any character who was "gifted" or "cursed" with a particular trait). Originally, I was going to divide this poll strictly on basis of age, but different canons have different life-spans. This seemed to be a better way to classify characters who were still more-or-less mortal, albeit still imperfect.
Near-Immortal--characters whose innate traits mean they live for centuries (or millenia) on average, yet still be killed (or have a final death). Highlander-style Immortals fit in this group, and demi-gods.
I felt it important to sort out the mostly-immortal from the truly immortal. Methos is certainly an exception to the rule in Highlander, yet many of Duncan's friends are multiple centuries old (at least 200+) while others (like Ritchie) die a final death in canon rather young (I don't think Ritchie even lasted half a decade as an Immortal). Skill, will-to-live and luck all play a major role in how long these characters truly live, but they were all born to live way longer than the normal human.
Immortal--Gods, demons, Q from Star Trek. Anything that has existed forever or approximately as long and more or less can't be killed. This one was pretty self-explanatory, I thought. :D
At the point I made my graph I accounted for 115 characters in the game. I then figured out the percentage each group represented and a not-so-snazzy but perfectly functioning chart:
As you can see, mere mortals do in fact make up a majority of the population! If you want a break down of numbers..
| Total Number of Characters | Humans | Near-Humans | Near-Immortals | Immortals |
| 115 | 59 | 25 | 19 | 12 |
And okay, yes. My graph is a little off. Near Immortals should be 17% and Humans 51% but I didn't want to make another graph and the variation isn't *that* drastic :p
At any rate, the question becomes: if human-type characters predominate, why can it sometimes appear that we have an abundance of the rest? We can't simply claim that having more characters means you're more likely to play a Near-Immortal or an Immortal. When you break down the character types by percentage of those having six or more characters we find the numbers are almost the same.
Of the fifty-eight characters played by the eight people with six or more characters:
| Human | Near-Human | Near Immortal | Immortal |
| 29 (50%) | 13 (22.4%) | 8 (13.8%) | 8 (13.8) |
On the other hand, of the ten people who reported playing one character...
| Human | Near-Human | Near-Immortal | Immortal |
| 0 (0%) | 3 (30%) | 7 (70%) | 0 (0%) |
Our single-character players do tend to play more powerful types!
Overall, the only thing that makes sense is it all comes down to who is actually active. People with single characters are more likely to be more visible because they have that single character. OTOH, people who have multiple characters have a tendency to play a couple of characters more often than others, mostly because everyone is on a time crunch, and there are different plots going on at different times. It's not easy and often not feasible to play six characters an equal amount! That said, I do think that people with multiple characters do tend to be rather active in the game as a whole, and they tend to be at least as active with (if not more so) their more extraordinary characters than their human ones. I can't say why that is, although I know personally I find it more fun to abuse a character when they can physically handle it without having to go to the hospital wing! (*cough*Methos*cough*)
In conclusion, while we don't have a majority of extra-powerful characters, those who are active just seem to be playing with their more powerful toys more often :D
Fun facts:
m4rk_cohen is the only 6 character mun who has all human characters.No one character has more than 2 Immortal characters, and most people don't have more than 3 characters of any one kind.
Thanks for putting up with my rambling, folks :D
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no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 04:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 04:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 06:53 pm (UTC)Aphrodite ... gods bless her, but after her Sorting, I'm going to need some serious mental mouthwash. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 04:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 07:04 am (UTC)Regarding playing the more powerful characters more than the less powerful ones, I guess that's true in my case because I certainly play Crowley more than the others. But I think that just may be because he's the easiest for me to write. (Scary, I know!) And I've been playing him the longest in multiple games. Second would probably be Bertie, who is the least powerful on your scale. I actually find him much harder to write than Adam, who is truly my most powerful character, but because of his omnipotence I have to be so very careful with him.
Dunno if it's at all helpful, but there's my two cents.
no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 03:21 pm (UTC)But *shrug* It's still just a guess at best and it's almost grasping at straws, because I really wasn't expecting things to turn out the way they did!
no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 07:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 08:41 am (UTC)*cough* sorry, that was completely silly and pointless, but it had to be said.
And thanks, that is interesting to see!
no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 08:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 03:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 06:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 05:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 08:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-12 03:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-04-11 09:44 pm (UTC)I don't think "near-human" necessarily translates as "powerful," though. Lupin isn't more powerful as a result of being a werewolf - if anything, he's weaker. (I'm sticking to HP canon, which doesn't mention any werewolf powers like invulnerability to non-silver weapons or special senses.) I've always seen Lupin as being the equivalent of someone with a debilitating chronic illness like cancer or AIDS. But he still doesn't count as being entirely human.