Coming up with characters for a plot?

As I reformed the outline to my ongoing WIP, I decided to purge most of the blank and pointless characters I had in mind for one of the plot threads. Which has left me in somewhat of a tricky situation; I have a plotline and setup and a world built, but not enough characters to properly use it.

This plot thread involves a Gandalf-style wizard (although the complete opposite in personality) journeying across the north of my Europe-based continent and recruiting another three similarly powerful people to prevent some pretty formidable vampire's from bringing about an apocalypse. I have it all pretty well planned out; where exactly he goes, how he intends to prevent it, his relationship with some of his allies, how not to make it completely dull and clichéd (hopefully).

At first he had somewhat of an entourage that came along for... no reason whatsoever. I removed these because they were awful characters and had no reason to want to go along with him nor did the wizard have a reason to want them with him. However this entourage was a useful eyepiece to see what was going on, as the wizard wouldn't really work as a viewpoint character.

So, what kind of people would want to go along on this incredibly risky journey for no reward (apart from the world not ending...)? What kind of people could actually help in this situation (the wizard knows the terrain and is more than capable of defending himself)? The 'going to help a friend' trick doesn't work here because the wizard is somewhat of a loner and is very difficult to get along with, not to mention being centuries old and so much older than any humans going along with him. (Also, humans only. Despite my synopsis it's actually a mostly low-magic setting).

Any suggestions as to what kind of people would get involved in this sort of thing would be much appreciated. From that I can create and flesh out a character, but for now I'm stuck.

I also have another plot thread with fleshed out characters but no plot, but that's a topic for another discussion....

The trickiest part is going to be figuring out just how they can help a powerful wizard. Two possibilities I can think of are:

A.) They can serve as a porter/carrier. Sure the wizard might know the terrain and can fend for himself pretty well, but he might still want someone to do the banal stuff: purchase goods, carry his supplies, prepare his meals, care for pack mules (or horses, donkeys, sled dogs...) set up/tear down camp, or (especially useful if he likes his privacy) serving as his eyes, ears, and voice among the locals he encounters on the trip.

B.) They are important to his plan in some way. Perhaps they are related to one of his three allies, and he brings them along as insurance for his plan? Or they might have one or two esoteric skills the wizard never bothered to master, and would prove useful.

As for why they're helping him maybe...

He hired them: Simple enough, they're a local in need of easy employment. Or, since you mention there'd be 'no reward' maybe he helped heal a injured or sick family member and this is their way of paying him back.

They admire him: they want to be his apprentice or something of the sort, and so are tagging along. He might be disgruntled by this, but decides to try to make them useful nonetheless.

They're on a pilgrimage, or perhaps a crusade: Either to consult with one of the other three allies, or to visit some spot of spiritual significance in the north. Or, if they're more the crusader type, they fear/hate the vampires and want to help defeat them, even in just the smallest way.

Hope this helps spark some ideas.

edited 17th Jan '14 8:48:03 PM by LittleBillyHaggardy

Thanks!

What if it wasn't by choice? Could there be some magical reason that the two have to stick together?

Hmmmm... Could be interesting, but I'm not sure how that would work in my setting. Worth thinking about, though. Thanks!

Why wouldn't the wizard work as a viewpoint character?

Well, I'm not sure how to help your story DIRECTLY since I'm not its author. However, I had a similar issue when putting together my cast.

To give a quick summary of my plot, a Young Man joins up with a rebellion to bolster the rebel forces before overthrowing the land's tyrannical leader and returning to the real world.

In my first rendition/iteration of the plot, the side characters were bland, didn't have much personality or backstory, only really existed to give the protagonist to talk to, and, to put it simply, my Bioware/Mass Effect/Dragon Age inspirations came though with very little of what made those casts charming and interesting.

Instead of removing them entirely, I looked at the various kinds of people involved in my conflict; The rebel forces, magic users, the everyday person who has to live in this world, the Assassins (under the Big Bad). And then went from there to use the characters to explain different perspectives and ideas about the world.

My mage couple act as someone who has been mostly a bystander and uninvolved in the conflict of the world and have only recently thrown in with the rebels. They give a very external perspective of the scene and act as the first view into this conflict. They also add as the first relationship in the cast shown and the first of which that is 'healthy'.

My thief like rogue character started as some Assassin/Prince but then changed significantly. He developed into a leader of the rebel forces who doesn't know exactly how to push back against the authority without risking the safety of the rebels Because I like to draw a lot, I came up with the idea of making him a handicapped badass who has a very complex sword-prosthetic. He also got upgraded to Love-Interest to show the Protagonists development to being open to others far more and healing from his prior abusive relationships.

My second witch character, who is actually the Wicked Witch of the West, delivers a more first hand perspective of the situation, who witnessed the tyrant's claim to authority and subsequent corruption. She is far more cynical, but pragmatic in her approach to situations. Her past is one that was also personally damaged by said tyrant so she, while most see him as a government authority, once called him a lover and got horribly screwed over for it.

And, my last side-character is one of the members of the Emerald City Assassins who work for the authority without question. Accidentally freed from his mental conditioning, he delivers a perspective from within the authority's own lines and knows how they think and see the world. His backstory delivers more on how much corruption and control Oz's regime has over his people; having his daughter held as leverage should he somehow switch sides and his lover unknown. With his mental conditioning causing him to give up his daughter himself amongst many other out of character things, his path is that of repentance.

So, to wrap this up, I'd recommend creating characters which add diversity amongst the cast in perspective, emotions, and etc on the current situations. I would also advise not creating two characters who could deliver the same lines unless there is a very particular explanation and the two characters can be defined apart very clearly.

edited 21st Jan '14 1:37:32 PM by LanceSolous13

Really helpful! I suppose I have a lot of the kind of stoic, dignified types, so some sort of outgoing character is probably a good choice.

He's somewhat of a Magnificent Bastard type, so the stuff he'd know and how is mind works is a) bloody difficult to write and b) much more interesting from an external POV. Basically, it's why Frodo's the POV for LOTR and not Gandalf. I did consider him being the POV character, but decided against it for those reasons.

Okay, here's how I see it.

As somebody has noted, the wizard could be powerful enough to make others feel useless in some way, so, to make up for it, let your characters have personal motives to join, possibly something someone else has stated. A very simple thing could be revenge, closure or redemption, or a combination. Another could be something the wizard has on him, or something somebody else requests, like a thief who needs an item from him, or an assassin hired to assassinate the wizard.

Then we have the most interesting of all, the one who chroniclizes the journey, the one who pens it all down. He has no other job than to write the tale of heroics. What could be especially interesting is if his vision of a hero clashes with that of reality.

Also helpful!

I still haven't come up with concrete characters yet, but the suggestions from all of you have helped enough that I now have a few ideas floating around that just need some fleshing out. Thanks!