Does any doll you buy have to fit a story?

Not at all! I bond more when I do, but I just get what I want! The cutest doll wins

 

I have to say that I couldn't buy a doll without having the whole character first.
I not only have to have the character first, but it has to be a special character, that i want to have as a mini-RL-char, so to speak. I think my list of OCs nearly contains 100 characters, but only one of them, I could picture having as a doll (still searching/saving/arguing with self and bank-account). It's not that I like him more than the others. It's simply that his character and his appearance is something I've never seen before. So yeah... would be nice to take a look at that in RL.

 

I buy them for how they look, and I enjoy thinking of ways to dress them/buy and make things for them. As a result, I have a large collection of craft items I need to use...

 

That's always been my main criteria. If a doll appeals to my general taste in dolls I'll consider buying it. These days my collection is large enough that I do give some consideration to how the doll will look relative to the rest of my collection, but that's still an aesthetic consideration rather than a story/character one.

 

Nope! If I'd done that, I wouldn't have discovered the fun of making new characters through the dolls themselves. I've never worried too much about being unable to do so, because even if they don't seem like much to me right away, cleaning them and faceups usually do the trick. Some dolls I've seen are so unique that I'm sure I wouldn't have been able to come up with such a concept myself, so they inspire me to look deeper for what they could be and what their background could contain. That's not saying I haven't bought dolls for preconceived characters/stories, I just like doing it the other way better.

 

They don't have to, but... it's generally a lot harder for me to bond with a doll if it doesn't fit one of my stories, on account I've sold or am attempting to sell most of those. Soom Sov is my one story-less doll, but I appreciate her just being my green centaur (I have this weird obsession with green equines).

I sort of need to stick to my characters because it gives me a sense of direction when buying dolls and clothes and etc. Buying anything pretty sucks up all my funds pretty fast. x_x I always need to ask myself "but what will you do with it?!"

 

I think I tend to have a vague idea in mind and it develops more when I find a doll I like to fit it, then I build more character depth behind the doll after the fact. So, I get dolls that I like the look of, then the rest comes later! Though, I tend to like the look of dolls that will work well (story-wise) with my other dolls.

 

Not really! They're all part of a world with no particular cannon story line. Most new dolls that come kind of get "absorbed" by the world and get a place of their own somewhere!

 

I actually choose but what I like the look of. A doll's
"story" will come as you get to know him/her.

 

I try to make my dolls fit one story I was trying to write recently, yet it's really hard to find sculpts that fit my characters... Some of SWITCH dolls would fit, but they were limited, I missed ordering periods, etc...
And sometimes, even if it looks like the sculpt fits on promo photos, it may not be like that in real life.
My Iplehouse Ryushin is the best example - on company photos the doll looked exactly what I wanted, but then it arived, I realised that it is far from ideal.
So, I try to keep my doll family close to the story-characters, yet it isn't always possible - just because sometimes I start to like a doll completely different from my characters.
But mostly - yeah, my dolls have to fit the story and already existing chatracters.

 

It's weird - it's rather mutable in my case. I have a "world" that they all reside in, with a vague idea of the boundaries - but I'd say half the time I fall in love with the doll and a character emerges because of that, and the other half there's a character that I really want to shell and needs a suitable doll.

That's one of the reasons I love this hobby - the rather 2D world I had come up with has developed massively as new characters have barged their way in!

 

I have impulse bought dolls before, but now I need them to fit in one of my 3 stories. My main story is set in the modern human world, my secondary is in a steampunk fantasy world and the last is in ancient Egypt. Pretty decent variety, but if a doll simple does not make sense in any of those worlds, I won't buy it. I have to be able to bond, and if he has no connections, I know I won't, even if the doll is gorgeous. I also need the character at least started before the first payment, or I may end up rushing to create a character and then not liking it. I only have one doll who is on his second character. Usually revamping a doll into a new, more likeable character doesn't work for me. I still see the old character(s) and then I feel like OMG PERSONALITY CRISIS!!! haha

 

I think sometimes the bring their own story with them.

 

So far all of my dolls have fit a certain character. That might change in the future, but for right now I prefer knowing who the doll is going to be before they come home.

 

I find that even if it doesn't fit my current story line, I could probably use it to muse another story line or fit them in somewhere I didn't think of before. Almost all of my dolls are a character in one of four or five stories, and if they aren't, they're specific in purpose (I have some Norse gods all up in my apartment, as well as nature spirits). I find that if a doll wants me to give it a home, and the timing is right, things will work out somehow in character and so on. :3

 

I can fit any doll into my story. Every doll has one, its just up to me to understand it.
I know that all of my dolls are owned by me and Bartlebee. In my novel, Bartlebee owns a mansion that immortal beings congregate at and throw parties. All of my dolls are his guests.

 

Nope. I buy the dolls that call my attention. I'm not a writer and I don't create characters. When I get the doll I create the character, not before.

 

I have bought dolls before in the past, without having a character, and a few of them have worked, but most of the time I end up not liking the doll for one reason or another and selling them. It's a blast when it does work out though.

I have recently tried to limit myself to only characters these days, to avoid more impulse buys! It has been working so far. And I notice I do tend to take a faster liking to the doll, as it was a bit more planned I guess.

 

All of my dolls have very specific characters within a defined world that they all belong to. But I didn't buy the doll to fit the character... more like I loved the doll's aesthetic and made the character to fit him, as part of the 'design' that goes into choosing wig and eye colour, faceup style, etc. That creative process continues long after the doll has arrived.

I couldn't see myself owning a doll who didn't have a character of some kind. That just isn't me. I wouldn't be able to resist naming them, then maaaybe attaching some quirk or nuance of self that goes along with something very physical about the doll itself; the way it sits, its tendency to snap its arms around or inability to tip its head a certain way. Before I knew it, I'd have scribbled out their whole life story. x_x

 

None of my dolls were bought with a character in mind. I buy them because I like them. I allow their personalities to develop on their own.