Averting Good Is Impotent

That is because you are looking for a wish-fulfillment icon rather than an actual fleshed out character.

All I do, is sit down at the computer, and start hittin' the keys. Getting them in the right order, that's the trick.

No it's because I want a character who is intelligent enough not to let their emotions get the better of them when it's obviously the right thing to do, instead of a wangsty moron who is the living incarnation of Rule of Drama like every other hero out there.

edited 15th Dec '11 12:15:20 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

Neither characters nor people are bleep bloop robots who have logic circuits to prevent them from understanding emotion. (Not even Deboss) It is reasonable for a person to at least feel some regret after killing another person and it is good characterization to have a character feel that if it is fitting with their personality. I'd like to think that if I killed somebody, no matter how comically evil that person was, I'd still feel bad about it, so why shouldn't a character feel the same way where appropriate?

edited 15th Dec '11 12:20:01 AM by YeahBro

All I do, is sit down at the computer, and start hittin' the keys. Getting them in the right order, that's the trick.

There is a difference between feeling a bit bad about something and angsting about it for four books in a series, ignoring your friends who are telling you to stop your Heroic BSoD already because it's making you lose the fight against the Big Bad and if you don't wake the heck up the world is going to end. I am against the latter, not the former.

Also there are people who run more or less on logic. They aren't common but they exist. Also considering we are talking about the Heroic Fantasy genre, I would expect the main character to be a hardened warrior, per the requirements of the genre. You would expect a character to be desensitized to killing to a certain extent. You know, unless they're Kenshin Himura.

edited 15th Dec '11 12:25:08 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

Funnily enough, most people don't snap out of depression or what have you just because their friends tell them to sack up and quit whining. It really depends on the character and execution, if it seems out of character or is poorly written then it becomes a chore to read, but if it is done well and fits the character (Seeing as you are an anime fan, let's use Shinji as an example of this) then it can work as the prevailing element of that character's arc.

I would be more inclined to believe in the "people who pretend to be Spock" thing had anyone like that who I'd met not just been a nerd who thought they were edgy by believing in moral relativism and whatnot just to be a special snowflake. And your example of hardened warriors fits nicely in with my comment about it having to fit the character. So I'll end by saying that you kinda missed the point of Ruro Ken if you did not realise that that series was entirely about a "Hardened Warrior" who realised just how fucked up that mentality was and spent his entire life from then on trying to redeem himself and his past actions. It is literally 255 chapters of angsting about killing some people, and it is probably one of the best action manga because of it. (It and Trigun are very similar and both really show how action anime should be done)

All I do, is sit down at the computer, and start hittin' the keys. Getting them in the right order, that's the trick.

I love how you pulled all kinds of things out of nowhere that I didn't say on top of calling someone a nerd like it's a bad thing (especially since if you're on TV Tropes you are pretty much a nerd yourself).

I said I find characters angsting about killing someone who obviously needed to die both boring to read and very often badly executed. Shinji is also a terrible example because there are tons of people who believe him to be too angsty. He also doesn't fall into this anyway because his issues aren't with killing. He doesn't feel like the Angels are human, he doesn't have a problem with them dying, he's just scared to fight as well as suffering from depression from parental neglect bordering on psychological abuse. I don't have a problem with angst in general, just angst about killing that is entirely justified.

I don't get where I implied anything otherwise. All I implied was Kenshin wasn't desensitized to violence, which if anything agrees with everything you just said, I stated him as an exception. Also he didn't angst much, he went out and did stuff about it. Most of his angst is entirely private and it never stopped him from fighting bad guys. I wouldn't even call it angst because he wasn't brooding and whiny. Again Vash didn't angst all that much except for a few really short parts, he was acting the entire time on his beliefs. He didn't laze around whining about them without doing anything, which is what I have a problem with. Also the entire point of the show was pretty much about whether killing is justified in any case, so it had explicit reason to be in the story, whereas in most cases it's just tacked on as some attempt at drama that ends up just being annoying.

edited 15th Dec '11 1:05:36 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

I would invite you to read any book that has been written about war by a veteran of that war.

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

My point isn't that it doesn't happen, my point is that I find it boring and I'm tired of reading about it. Characters should be angsty about this sort of thing on their own time, it shouldn't be drawn out to the point that it's incredibly tiresome for me to read and feels like a broken record.

Besides rarely in Real Life is there the kind of justification I'm talking about, so any war stories have absolutely nothign to do with this. Fiction, however, is rife with this kind of situation.

edited 15th Dec '11 1:11:31 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

If I may clarify, vis-á-vis the nerd thing. I was not saying that being a nerd is a bad thing, I myself am one. What I was saying is that pretending to be Spock is a very nerd way of rebelling, whereas most people who rebel do it by listening to music their dad doesn't like and shagging people their family says are a "bad influence".

Vis-á-vis Shinji being a poor example: OK, you were referring to angsting aboot murder, so I guess Shinji was not great in that regard. (Though he still is a very good example of angsting due to social isolation and how that can lead to even further intentional social isolation, which combined with fears of having to accept responsibility. What I am saying is Shinji is a character whose angst makes sense) But really, I don't see the need to separate angsting about killing with angsting about accepting responsibility. Shinji needs to sack up and do his job, hypothetical character needs to sack up and murder some bitches. It is just about how they do that, I don't see why you have a blanket hate about one form of angst and are cool with the other.

---

Ruroken sperg time: Kenshin was desensitized to violence, whenever anyone was in danger of being killed he was reminded of this past him. It was not so much a sensitivity to violence, but rather a deep fear of falling back into his bad old ways where he would be willing to kill again. His angst, though hidden for the most part, was still a driving character motivation. If you remember the bit where he is in the city of outcasts and does not talk to others, that is an underlying regret and self-loathing bubbling to the surface and once the reader realises this aspect to Kenshin's character, it helps colour all the preceding events. A character should change as a result of angst, be it coming in the form of a character becoming a pacifist, or be it from a character becoming an amoral psychopath. But what matters is that the viewer sees how an event shapes that character.

(Also, Trigun is similar because it involves an easily relatable character with a strong moral core having to have that core tested against hardships that should shake his resolve. Much like the Kyoto arc of Ruro Ken)

All I do, is sit down at the computer, and start hittin' the keys. Getting them in the right order, that's the trick.

Oh. Then in what way is a killing which is so completely justified that doing it immediately and painlessly prevents the death of millions not also boring, lazy drama? Setting up a situation so that any possible emotion is drained from the scene doesn't make for a very interesting story.

You seem to be demanding wish fulfillment fantasy stories where nobody feels anything about anything that happens, because anything else is "boring".

edited 15th Dec '11 1:21:15 AM by AManInBlack

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

Again, I have a problem with reading Wangst about killing someone who obviously required killing, not anything else. Why just this form of angst? I don't know, I feel like it's overused, and I'm just sick of it. Also while I'm certainly not the wannabe-spock person you describe, I'm not a particularly demonstratively emotional person (I have the same emotions as other people obviously, I just don't show it much) so I often have trouble relating to characters who are visibly very emotional. To my mind big displays of emotion feel very superficial and unseemly, it's my personal mindset that mature individuals suppress emotional outbursts. Internal conflict that we get hints of throughout the story—a Stepford Smile here, a quickly wiped away and hidden tear there—I'm all for it. But the narration dwelling on how this person is so sad and feels so terrible, and that they are such a horrible person because they killed this person who so obviously needed killed and they are a mercenary so they should be used to this to at least some extent, feels very over the top to me, and any remotely admirable hero wouldn't let any feelings like that which they might have, get in the way of carrying on their mission or whatever it is they are doing. To do otherwise would be irresponsible and not very heroic. I have trouble respecting such a person.

I mostly agree with what you're saying about Kenshin and Trigun. Like I said, I don't have a problem with angst in general. And I'll admit even the form of angst I'm mostly against can serve a purpose, there is an exception to just about anything, I just think in most cases it doesn't.

I don't understand why you people seem to think I want Wish-Fulfillment characters. I don't see what you're basing this off of, or how just disliking characters who have long, drawn out angst about killing evil people means I must like Wish-Fulfillment characters. If you have read any of my other posts you'll find that's the furthest from the truth. I like characters with very good characterization, especially interesting characterization. I don't find the type of characters who openly angst about much of anything to be particularly interesting. I find Behind The Mask-type characters, who seem to have something we don't know about going on inside them, which he have to learn over time, to be much more compelling. personally I don't necessarily even like, much less prefer characters who kill other characters, but when I read them, I just prefer for them to be mature about the matter.

edited 15th Dec '11 1:39:24 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

Because neat, tidy, perfectly-justified, no-strings-attached killing is a fantasy. Even sociopaths feel something about killing people: it's just satisfaction instead of regret or remorse. There is a difference between showing how someone has been emotionally affected by something and "angst", whatever it is that you mean by angst in this context.

edited 15th Dec '11 2:03:13 AM by AManInBlack

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

I never said I disliked if they felt something about killing people, I said I disliked when characters angsted about it too dramatically for too long (your sociopaths wouldn't fall under this heading, obviously, I don't know why you brought them up). It's boring and repetitive. If it takes ten years for them to put it behind them, than time-skip already, I don't want to read about it.

edited 15th Dec '11 1:42:34 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

If you're not interested in reading about how people are affected by things that happen, I'm not sure what you would be interested in reading about.

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

You are completely over-generalizing what I'm saying. I didn't say that at all. I just said I don't want to read about a character who overly angst over killing people who obviously required it. As I read all sorts of things, obviously it hasn't hampered me to that extent. I mean, I don't think even the majority of literature has the main character kill someone. I mean why does someone have to kill people at all? Why does that have to be the automatic source of drama? That's the mindset that really annoys me. That something like killing someone is the only thing that can make someone have intense emotions. Doesn't real life have enough problems that make us sad and doubt ourselves? Why do we have to jump straight into someone dying. Like I said, it feels like a cheep way of making drama in most cases.

edited 15th Dec '11 1:50:24 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

I'd like to see good-aligned characters showing ruthlessness from time to time.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Or just plain practicality. When you are a good-aligned hero who has no choice but to kill a bunch of really bad people, it's just impractical to cry about it and mope in your bedroom for months on end every time it happens.

edited 15th Dec '11 1:50:01 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

And here we are back at the beginning, where nearly every book written about war by a soldier is about "angsting" over the need to kill people. You can get by on reading wish-fulfillment fantasy for a very, very long time, but it rings emotionally hollow if every character is...

Well, I was going to say the Punisher, but the best run of the Punisher is the Ennis/Dillon run, which spends as much time focusing on how Frank Castle is haunted by both the life he lives and the death of his family as it does on revenge fantasy, and it's the main reason it's far and away the best Punisher run ever.

Policemen. Veterans. Go and talk to them. There are real people who have had no choice but to kill bad people. Why don't you just ask them how they felt about it?

edited 15th Dec '11 2:02:59 AM by AManInBlack

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

I'd like good-aligned characters show ruthlessness/practicality only to show that they ARE capable of using force. This would show that they prefer more peaceful solution not because they are weak, but because they are more rational/noble.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

I've already told you. Just about any Real Life circumstance isn't going to come into this at all, you even agreed. I also told you I don't read Wish-Fulfillment. Also for every person who gets depressed from killing someone, there is going to be someone who is able to put it behind them relatively quickly. It's not a given that someone will become depressed over it. It's a scientific fact that some people are very easily depressed while some people aren't easily depressed at all and can go through terrible things and come out of them relatively stable. And I doubt these people who are incredibly depressed enjoy the situation, I'd rather not be put through it too by reading about it. I don't necessarily like reading about people who kill other people to begin with, I already said as much. Besides, these policemen and veterans you mention, however they feel on the matter, don't just breakdown and refuse to do their job for years on end, they keep going and keep their emotions under control. That's not angst, that's a perfect example of what a real hero should do, it's a personal sacrifice for the greater good. When you're a hero, you don't have the luxury of breaking down, you keep going regardless of the difficulties. Stop trying to suggest something I never said, or that I think something I never gave any indication of thinking. You obviously aren't listening to anything I'm saying. I think you just want to argue or turn this into some kind of slight about people who are effected by being in tragic situations such as war, which has nothing to do with what I'm talking about whatsoever.

Again, for like the umpteenth time, I merely find reading about characters who angst over-dramatically about killing people who are portrayed in the story as both very obviously deserving of and requiring death, especially if doing so saves countless amounts of people, to be very boring to read and very often a cheep, easy way of adding drama. It feels like this is the main kind of drama in Epic Fantasy, I'm frankly sick of it. Give me a different storyline already, angst about something else.

Now that sounds like an interesting character to me. Especially border-line sociopaths aren't often portrayed in a good light. That would be something different.

edited 15th Dec '11 2:15:09 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

"Good-aligned" isn't a description, dRoy. There are lots of people in history (and characters, I suppose) who keep demonstrate their ability to use force to show their ruthlessness and then offer kindness afterwards, but many people wouldn't call them "good".

This goes back to what Yeah Bro was talking about. Don't think in adjectives or tropes. That just leads to lousy, unrealistic cargo cult writing. Try and think the way the character would think, and construct their motivations for doing things. Do they think force is necessary because it's needed to prevent greater harm? To protect themselves and others? Because they're justified? Think in reasons and feelings, not tropes.

You seem to be under the misapprehension that "emotionally affected" automatically means "depressed", despite the fact that I even offered you an example of a fictional character that isn't depressed. If you don't want a story about a character who is depressed, then don't do that. There is a whole rainbow of emotional reaction; just don't pick indifferent grey.

edited 15th Dec '11 2:20:48 AM by AManInBlack

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

I never said either of those words (well, I said 'depressed' but it wasn't in that context). I said 'angst'. In particular, Wangst. I don't have a problem with a character being emotionally affected. Exhibit A:

What I have a problem with is a character being melodramatic in their emotional displays in this situation specifically. Not showing emotion in general. Especially not about feeling emotion, I never indicated otherwise. I merely said I prefer characters who are mature about their feelings and don't let them cloud their actions or judgement or let it hamper them when it comes to doing what's necessary and unavoidable.

And why are you suddenly saying I think in tropes? I don't. I never gave any indication I did, that I'm aware. You are just making things up now.

edited 15th Dec '11 2:24:04 AM by NoirGrimoir

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

That is not emotional maturity. That is stoicism. Even stoics get ground down by the world, and there's a great deal of writing that plays with that idea (not least because it's also delicious metatextually because what we know about the original Stoic philosophers only survives in fragments cited by their successors). Perfect stoicism is a fantasy... and then we're back at the wish fulfillment.

I didn't accuse you of thinking in tropes (I was speaking to dRoy), but the fact that you're confusing being emotionally affected by killing someone, however necessary, with a fairly specific trope seems to speak for itself, eh?

It's beautiful and so full of deep imagery that it doesn't surprise me to find that it has gone WAY over your head

To what specific trope are you referring?

I'm not talking about characters who are stoics especially (though admittedly I really like stoic characters), just people who continue on, despite the things they've been through. They don't have to do so stoically, necessarily, especially not by being completely stoic, I never said that at all (stop saying I've said things I haven't, it's not helping your arguement). I'm not against showing emotion, I've said this multiple times already, what I'm against is a character dropping everything in the middle of a huge fight for the world to go cry in a hole for a year, about something they've done that is entirely justified or acting like a total idiot after something like this happens when they have a world to save, regardless of whether it's a realistic reaction. I have little respect for such characters or people in general, so if one was the hero, I would personally dislike them and not want to read about them, regardless even of whether that character was a well-written character, because those types of characters do not interest me. This is entirely a personal preference of mine.

Also, my personal belief is that stoicism is preferable to brooding to the point it interferes with living your life. Getting on with your life and letting time and everyday activities heal the wound is more likely to help you get over a trauma than dwelling on it too excessively. Psychology tends to back this up.

SPATULA, Supporters of Page Altering To Urgently Lead to Amelioration (supports not going through TRS for tweaks and minor improvements.)

'Course, the question is whether it's possible to shrug off certain experiences like that. They're called psychological scars for a reason.

What's precedent ever done for us?