Whats needed is not just good or bad, or necessarily just more 'character' oriented dialogue(but it does help), but as Mulciber hinted at, is a game mechanic that supports a character type.
- What does it mean to be a warrior? Whats the supported gameplay?
What does it mean to be a thief? Whats the supported gameplay?
These two are obvious, sure. If you're a thief but continue to fight soldiers face to face with a broadsword, regardless of skill level, you're rewarded less(rather not at all)...you're not playing a thief. A warrior slinking in shadows...no reward, and so on.
But these are too conventional...too obvious. What about:
- ... being a surly thief...
...or a bombastic fighter... <-- Saint insisted it had to be a fighter, not paladin!
...or the sorcerer with a heart of gold and strives to be immortal...
...or the royal guard that likes the ladies, and can't help but drink too much?
What are the 'gameplay conventions' that support these? For the most part it will boil down to dialogue...the real major outward expression of character...but is there more? Perhaps, when our royal guard passes a bar, he HAS to go in and have a drink. You as the player may not want to, and you dont HAVE to, but if you do, you're playing in character, and you get rewarded. NEVER punish the player of course, but encourage him if he plays to the character. The bombastic
fighter should strike poses of grandeur in front of people, despite perhaps being chastised by the local priest for being a pomous ass. His dialogue choices should reflect not only base, common responses, but ones that would MOST suit his character, EVEN if it meant it got him into trouble. The surly thief, despite the danger of getting into a fight with the surrounding rogues, can't help but be a bastard and making the off comments that will surely get him into a fight. He could choose the 'safe' dialogue and be done with it, but chosing the dialogue that, again despite being dangerous IS something he would say, would gleen him a great reward; in the face of danger, he still played in character.
Some of the best PnP sessions I ever had were actually just watching a bunch of 'experienced' players actually enjoying more doing the bizarre things their characters would do, even if they themselves would not. They relished those opportunities, and the DM would encourage it by placing them in situations that would give the strongest character reaction. With good players this is very fun. With CRPG's, we just need to fill the world with enough interaction density and solid core gameplay rules that maintain consistency and support character gameplay style. These are/were the tihngs I dealt with in my game designs, to help expand past powergaming, and getting into the meat of world and npc interaction.
Cheers
ADD: I forgot to talk of the Sorcerer with the heart of gold. He's interesting as he has potential conflict, if the story is designed around it as such. He's a good person, cares greatly for those around him, but has this aching ambition to be immortal. Being immortal is one thing, but doing things against his "gold heartedness" to achieve it is something entirely different. What if he has to sacrifice people? What if he has to commit his soul to evil? Perhaps no one would do this, but what if the greater long term good outweighed the immediate bad. What if his longevity allowed him to save the people of the land of a great evil that would arrive in several hundred years? His desire to want to save his people from a thousand years of horror could allow him to do regrettable things in order to achieve the power he needs to save the land. Could be cool if the player is allowed to make these choices, and how he could bob and weave his way through to perhaps find a way to satisfy two goals so opposite of eachother in morality.