I recently looked into a nWoD came that was advertising for players. It looked interesting, but I found myself intimidated that they not only required a complete character in the RTJ, but also story hooks.

It also left me wondering what is typical. I really only ask people to be willing to try, be flexible and active.

What do all you others want from people applying to play your games?

The only thing I demanded of my players when they joined any game I ran (On RPOL or in RL) is that their characetr had to have some sort of goal. It didn't matter if they wanted to be prince, or kil their sire, find golconda, whatever, but they needed some goal to work towards beyond "wake up the next evening." I usually asked that of my PCs so that I knew what I should try and tailor my story towards and what hooks I did need to put into my story.

Plus, asking my characters to have goals meant that their characters would have some sort of motivation to accomplish whatever I sent their way.

For me it depends on the game and what kind of roleplaying I'm going for, and whether I'm using the game to filter for good players for other games. ;)

The one I'm running now is intended to be reasonably good-quality writing with a highly narrative roleplaying style. I don't ask for much in an initial PM, just the very basics of what kind of character they want to play (vampire of what clan, werewolf of what breed/auspice/tribe, or mage of what sort of concept/paradigm). The first thing I want to do is check what kind of roleplayer and writer they are, and this is by looking at them in action in other games. It's not just a matter of good spelling/grammar/etc., but also how well they respond to other posts from other people, how well they provide feedback to their GMs to give them something to work with, whether they are proactive or reactive players, and other roleplay-type things.

After that... from a GM perspective, it's hard to see whether a character will fit well in the game without a certain critical mass of info, which is why we want to see a lot of info up front. On the other hand, it's not fair to make the player do all that work up front for something that might get rejected, especially if they end up having to do several submissions of full stats plus backstory before we find a workable characer. Finding the balance between those two can be tricky.

I prefer to start with a couple paragraphs of concept and work up from there. Then we develop the character gradually over several PMs so they can get my input on what will and won't work in the game, what setting elements already exist in the game that they can add in or work around, etc. Also, everyone has slightly different interpretations of the setting, and it can take a few posts to get on the same page.

Then when I do have full stats and completed backstory, I still nitpick it to death. ;) There's no getting around that, unfortunately, but at least by that point the character stands a much better chance of making it into the game.

Having said all of that, at some point I want to run a game that doesn't have such a high-grade filtering system for chargen - where I'll let in any concept anyone wants to play, and the plot setup will be such that anyone can disappear without drastically affecting it. Probably not soon, though... no time. ;)

As a player, I'm not really fond of games that requires a complete character sheet in the RTJ from start. If the GM says "No that char doesn't fit the game", all the work would have been in vain.
I prefer to give the concept and a bit of the background so the GM can say yes, no or "maybe if you change some". I don't mind tweaking a character that is merely a concept at that stage.

I see rtj'ing as a process just like Nerwen. Even if the GM says yes to the concept, he/she can still have questions about the character sheet or the background. I see that as a sign of devotion. That the GM really are interested in making the game a good one. A well created character contributes to making the game a good one.