Describe your "good" characters negatively...

...and your "evil" characters positively.

I mean, like, you'd say your good character is a "selfish coward who lies like a rug and is shameless about it", and your evil character is a "hard-working, well-meaning individual who likes helping people".

Just a fun little exercise for you guys.

I do this sort of thing a lot to make sure that I'm writing complex and interesting characters that are not too idealistic or... uh... whatever the equivalent is for evil characters. Trouble is, my evil characters don't meet the quota nearly as much as my good characters, even my evil protagonists, so this is still something I need to work on.

edited 24th Sep '11 4:24:28 PM by annebeeche

Sure! I'll just do the Akamuras first...

Shinji Akamura: A hardworking, resourceful single father who will eschew his family's suggestions in pursuit of his son's success.

Daisuke Akamura: An unfocused, wimpy smartass who tore his family apart over a childish disagreement.

Kagami Maki: A banshee of an ex-wife whose sole purpose in life is to disrupt Shinji's teachings to Daisuke and poison their son's mind.

I swear we had a forum games thread like this...

Corrupt priest, liar, hypocrite.

Almost-rapist with an attention span problem.

Wow, that was easy.

Since I can't write likable characters, or so I have been told, this probably comes a bit too easily.

Self absorbed condescending jerk who pushes all away who care about him with his poisonous attitude and his need to desperately cling to his preconceived notions and values.

A young precocious foreigner who pushes her value system on those around her, and refuses to see reason when brought up by others, and judges everyone around her based on her own Black-and-White Morality.

The Big Bad.

A lazy ass who gets everything handed to him on a silver platter.

The other Big Bad.

A girl who is only defined by her brother, and everyone likes for no good reason, and is also kind of a bitch.

A shallow boring character with no outside traits whatsoever.

Scarlett: An unrepentant liar, mass murderer, and traitor.

Okay, sure, why not?

Akiko: A selfish, thieving whore who only cares about drinking and how much money she can make off of whoever she's laying.

Mikami: A sadistic bitch who regularly manipulates others for her own gain and constantly takes advantage of young girls with whom she cheats on her husband.

Inagi: A hard-working man who was made a cuckold and severely displaced by a coup d' etat, he only wants to gain back a decent living and honest men's work.

Alexander Krons: An obsessed borderline-sociopathic paranoiac with a bad case of Save The Girl Screw The World.

Katherine Andyrm: A manipulative, mind-raping, spoiled princess with no concept of Mind over Manners.

Gravity: A dedicated and loyal man who is determined to stop the wars caused by the Great Houses.

I really can't figure a way to describe Lord Haargen positively...he's basically just obsessed with becoming King Of The World to stroke his own ego, and manipulating Gravity to help him.

• Bryan: A critical (and somewhat hypocritical), snarky, brutally blunt teenager that worries too much about his relationship with Finn, can't spit it out with Amy, and holds an unreasonable grudge with Scott. Plus, he can't stand back.
• Finn: A timid, clumsy, emotionally undeveloped teenager that shuts down in social situations, and gets carried away with his freedom and duty, pulling Bryan in.
• Antagonist: An affable, intelligent, observant, crafty, wise fifty-year old that is good crafting with a knife.

edited 24th Sep '11 4:39:40 PM by chihuahua0

I laughed.

Not sure if good thing or not. I sorta have a loose view of in-universe and out-universe, so I sometimes consider out-universe flaws to be just as bad as in-universe ones.

It was seeing it after a long list of in-story negativity that was funny. And I guess that must really be a boring character if you can't think of anything worse than "boring".

OIC.

Yeah. She is. Probably because she was such a late addition to the story (of course...she was still added a good few years ago...so I really have no excuse).

Well, if you think she's a boring character, it may be ripe time to spice her up, no?

edited 24th Sep '11 5:47:52 PM by annebeeche

Because clearly, that never occurred to me before.

She serves the purpose she's meant to, and I figure that since I never actually wrote her before, once I do, I'll figure out her nuances then.

edited 24th Sep '11 5:51:58 PM by MrAHR

-_-

Hmm, I never really thought of Arthur Dent as boring. He was plain, but not boring, and in fact, it was his plainness contrasted with the crazy universe that made him a lovable character to me.

I'm not sure I can describe my villains in a positive light. Even their loyalty is partially coerced.

Samuel al-Faddil: An overly pragmatic fighter with anger-management issues, the son of one of the most feared men in the setting.

Signum: An inhuman perfectionist with an inability to handle unstructured interaction unless it's violent.

You realize I was talking about the archetype not the actual character, yes?

-_- Your attitude makes you a difficult person to talk to.

—-

Okay, well, even the archetype isn't necessarily boring to me. Just because you act like the weird world around you is nothing does not mean that you are devoid of character traits. In fact, that relaxed attitude towards weirdness can be considered a character trait in and of itself.

Why not?

• Yuki: Reckless, untrusting, prone to violence.
• Amaya: overly trusting, unintentionally careless
• Leo: Slightly idiotic, prone to overthinking, let's his mouth get him into trouble a lot.
• Lena: Slutty, violent, self-destructive
• Mordecai: Greedy, manipulative, liar.
• Keaira: Repectful, loyal, a good leader.

Well, it's just that the character and archetype are two very different things, even if he is the (current) trope namer.

Also, I never said that the archetype was boring, just that she fills the position she is meant to, which is that. She just also happens to be rather vanilla.

edited 24th Sep '11 6:02:44 PM by MrAHR

It seems many people here consider sleeping around to be a bad thing?

It's an easy insult to use, regardless of the morality.

I mean, if you're describing people negatively, you'll paint any trait badly.

If I remember correctly, punkreader's first use might be a literal description.

(Also it's all dependent upon context.)

Okay, that's fine. It's just that since Arthur Dent is the name of the trope, I use him as the standard. I guess it can backfire.

edited 24th Sep '11 6:07:38 PM by annebeeche

It raises the question, actually

And he does accurately represent the trope, but he is NOT the trope. There is a difference.