Hello, Joychi! Remember - spoiler tag your posts. ;] It's not out everywhere yet, so let's keep the spoilers outside the spoiler discussion threads to a minimum — especially while the site is still in the beginning episodes!

First question: It depends on the character! We do not think we will be opening, say, Katara or Zuko, but Tahno would eventually open, as would Tarlok. For the characters with a more interesting plot twist, the Staff would be a lot pickier about who gets to play. For those characters, we need to pick a player that is not only capable, but someone we can trust.

Second: We are going to be sticking with canon this time around. There is some freedom of action, but certain characters — if their actions progress the plot forward — will be bound by them. One of the biggest issues we had converting to Korra —- or even trying to time skip between seasons during the gAang era —- was that we had gone so AU and allowed so much "freedom of action" that canon events were twisted out of the timeline, and we had a lot of difficulty continuing the plot.

So the long and short of it is yes, there will be freedom of action, but if their "fate" moves the plot along, they will be bound to its outcome.

Hope this helps!