Your Recurring Berserk Buttons

Let's face it: At least one of your characters probably has one Berserk Button. But whether or not you realize it, there's probably a chance that there's a specific trigger that occurs quite often, no matter who the character.

For instance, with me, a recurring one is harm to children. Or, to put it in a more accurate way:

• Threaten a child in front of the character, and you'll get roughed up pretty badly (not a scene by Garth Ennis rough, but close).
• Actually HARM a child in front of the character, and you'll get to play "How Many Body Parts Can I Lose Before I Die?"

Bear in mind, many of my characters have Blood Knight status.

My hero really hates Deliberate Values Dissonance, Culture Justifies Anything, and Your Normal Is Our Taboo, and essentially only tolerates them for the sake of surviving. He's also a raging conservative who sometimes defines himself by his disdain for the current Presidential administration, who's a President Unmodified of Barack Obama. (Though he's Hispanic instead of black and was first elected in 2012 rather than 2008, President Ramirez is pretty much entirely President Obama, right down to the dopey old vice president gaffing all the time.) I feel that these things fit together fairly well, though the former is portrayed as a strength and the latter is portrayed as a flaw. (Despite the unsympathetic nature of the extremism with which the protagonist hates the president's administration, they do an incredibly poor job of handling the apocalypse. But then again, who would do better? The story takes place in an election year; the Democrat Ramirez is thrown out in favor of a young, rising Republican thanks to, you know, the fucking apocalypse kind of making people sick of the current state of things. The new president is assassinated by demons very shortly after his inauguration, but that's not really his fault, either; the world was just kind of ending by that point; he's not even succeeded by his VP, everyone just kind of agrees that the country's over at that point.)

edited 26th Jul '13 1:05:48 PM by DAStudent

My characters' responses to rapists are pretty typical, and their hatred of slavers is cultural; the Uelane started as a slave rebellion against psychotic masters.

But then there's how Memory Wiping Crews, usually the bread and butter of heroic Masquerade upholders, are treated. See, memory alteration has always been a Primal Fear of mine, and it shows. Every sympathetic and semi-sympathetic faction considers memory alteration unforgivable, and so memory wipers generally meet horrible deaths. Notably, it's the only non-sexual crime that makes Alice angry enough to take her time. (That said, it's generally implied the crews use their abilities to rape and steal with impunity as well, so she has the sort-of justification that they've likely done something to earn her wrath.)

Honestly, I think hurting children should hit everyone's berserk button, so it's pretty much a given for all of my good characters.

One of my characters is an assassin-ish mercenary. He will kill people for the right price, but never children. If you try to hire him to kill a child, it's quite likely he will hunt you down and kill you out of spite, making his probably the most intense version in my works of that particular button.

I actually think most, if not all of my character's berserk buttons come from things that I personally find reprehensible. There are a few exceptions, and some of my characters feel more strongly about certain issues, but most of their berserk buttons are bad things that would make any good person angry - like hurting children, threatening their family, justifying horrific atrocities, and so on.

The only difference between the various buttons is how strongly certain characters react to certain things. For example, if you hurt Alex in front of Jason, Jason wouldn't be happy but wouldn't totally lose it on you. On the other hand, if you hurt either Jason or Alez in front of Zuna, she would go into full-on berserker fury and beat the living snot out of you. And then, because she's a doctor, she would tend to your wounds. If you try to justify the horrible things you've done, Alex will walk away disgusted, but T'Kor might just kill you on the spot.

One of the characters I'm working on now Would Hurt a Child(He Would Also Hit A Girl), but that's because he doesn't discriminate anyone.

Actually, the whole trio would, the Team Pet too..

edited 27th Jul '13 6:54:06 AM by m8e

The heroine I'm working right now with is a queen, and as such she doesn't appreciate it when anything or anyone threatens her subjects' security, health, or general well-being. She has particular sympathy for the less fortunate and is willing to redistribute her own coffers' wealth to help them.

Also, she's a black woman, so obviously she doesn't appreciate slurs like the n-word either.

Ironically, one of my protagonists killed a child and provoked pretty much no in-universe comment...but one of the points of the setting is that children are often legitimately dangerous combatants.

The villains of my story Would Hurt a Child, and the heroes of my story Would Hurt a Child... under the same circumstances that they'd hurt anybody else. Such as, say, the child being the leader of an army/disease/swarm from Hell that's consuming the world. (Do fourteen-year-olds count as children? He's only a couple of years younger than the protagonists, regardless.)

With Matthew, do not screw with people's minds or believe that Screw the Rules, I Have Money! or Screw the Rules, I Make Them! applies to you.

With Cole, its generally unwise to hurt Moira, use people as test subjects, hurt children, or claim Values Dissonance as a "shield".

That's a bit different. I was referring to something more along the lines of somebody similar to Fagin, who decides that the Child Soldiers working for him are no longer needed.

Bigotry is a huge source of Berserk Button in my characters. I have a female character beheading a sexist character and spitting on him. It's fun.

I agree, beheading advocates of oppressive ideologies in fiction is cathartic.

Amen to that. I made a thinly veiled version of Hannity, and gave him Donald Pierce-style cybernetics. Purely to see how many ridiculous ways I can kill him.

The last death for Mr. Hannis involved giant killer squirrels. Long story. Long, funny story.

edited 27th Jul '13 10:20:47 AM by NickTheSwing

not just in fiction

My villains were really boring until I decided to make them religiously intolerant racist homophobes who are sexist. A bit over the top, but now it's funner to kill them.

edited 27th Jul '13 10:01:09 AM by VincentQuill

Usually my characters a Berserk Button related to Family. Fausto Cross has the emotional range of a mountain and across the entire story, he pretty much never smiles or demonstrates visible rage, but the closest he gets to actually losing his shit is when the soul of his dead brother is dragged to Hell. Like A Badass Out Of Hell backwards (i.e he invades Hell to retrieve the soul of his brother) ensues.

Capt. Tremble would flip his shit if his daughter was harmed, but he also demonstrated a heavy disdain towards bigotry and tyranny as well. Specially against the Irish (as his Only Friend is irish).

Does this trigger a beheading? They can be quite fun. Especially since bigotry against the Irish is particularly evil, which has nothing to do with me being Irish...

Knowing Tremble, less of a beheading, and more of unsheathing his sword cane, angrily waving the sword around and challenging the man to a fencing duel to the death on the spot. Granted, usually said irish friend, Sir Cook, doesn't let him get that far.

I try to avoid recurring berserk buttons, honestly. They seem like a sign of a cast with too many similar beliefs.

"Just following orders" tends to piss a lot of my characters off.

I feel really dumb because I have a character who beat up another character for pulling a fire alarm when she was reading and reading all these it sounds pretty dumb.

Youth criminals who play the race card. As in, those who would qualify as Teens Are Monsters and act as though they are untouchable because of their age or the color of their skin, or claim that they are only targeted because they're black. Now I don't go on and on about it, the police are more concerned about the murder that's taking place and the rise in youth crime than the fact they are aboriginal, but it's a fact it happens, same as it's a fact the police mess up (offering witness protection when they can't, intervention order but don't help in getting names) and it's something I try and address in what I write.

I have 1 character who's fatal flaw is that he can't tolerate fools or ignorance very well, and combined with his already choleric temper can lead to horrible things...

Another one has a mixture of confusion, disappointment and frustration when it comes to the criminally/murderously insane. He feels that on one level that they should face justice for their actions, but on another that they are VERY ill people, , and that this could have been avoided if they were just given some clarity or respect in life.

I have a lot of characters that tend to get pissed when their family is threatened, to the point of doing nasty/bad/illegal shit. It's actually a really bad habit of mine to write, since it's something I also hold. I like to think it's justified to the people I give it to, but eh, still feels fake to me.

I try to write stories as idealistically as I can, so anyone wearing Jade-Colored Glasses or being a Straw Nihilist can expect to get chewed out by everyone else in my stories. Including my "villains".