Feb 2024
1 / 7
Feb 2024
Feb 2024
JoshRaed
Feb '24
1

The only way I could get this character in a room with the rest of the cast is to have them get knocked out and basically trapped in a room with them. But he can’t just be unconscious and trapped in rooms forever. And he has super-speed meaning any moment where he’s free is one where he can just bolt and be gone. So how do I make this character decide to actually stay with people?

I considered breaking his leg but then he couldn’t fight and run around.

I also considered doing a suicide squad neck band that will force him into it but the main character is too heroic to do that. I considered the hero giving himself the neck band to make the other character trust him but that’s a very drastic choice and the other character will probably just run anyway.

I considered changing his character to be a character who would do this, but there’s no real plot reason he’d want to even if he was okay with it so

I considered prolonging this choice somehow, but the super-speed, and the prophecy, and the fact that the plot hasn’t started until they go on their quest, that means it’s now or never honestly.

I also considered giving the hero a moment of ultimate selflessness to make the other character trust him, but the only moment to work to that end is one that has to happen later in the plot, and also wouldn’t work as well without the context. Honestly this level of trust has to be earned and it takes time for him to do that.

What do I do about this?

  • created

    Feb '24

  • last reply

    Feb '24
  • 6

    replies

  • 521

    views

  • 1

    user

  • 11

    likes

PapaDomAdvanced Gorilla
Feb '24

Maybe he has to jump over his own shadow and try working together with other people because all of them share the same goal?

Like in One Piece, they form alliances to take out bigger pirates they can't take down on their own. And after they achieved their goal, they jump at each others throat again. (Not in the case of the Strawhats.)

Maybe try that. :eyes:

KelheorRegular
Feb '24

You are working from the wrong point. It's not "how I make the character join the team", it's "the character is in the team, why are they?". He gains something from being in a team, what exactly - you decide. Could be money, vengeance, his life depends on being there, anything.

igneriss
Feb '24

Just some random ideas:

  • hero saves his life; even better if hero risks his life doing so. Then this avoidant character might want to stick around to repay the favour;
  • similar to the first point, but this time it's not saving life but helping in some other way. Maybe they help a person the avoidant character (I'll call him 'A' ) cares about?
  • A has a goal that aligns with hero's goal. It might not be the same, it might even be something quite opposite, but A sees that helping the hero will get himself closer to the goal;
  • A joins because he wants to betray the hero later on;
  • A gets inspired by the hero. While at first he avoids him, after he sees how the hero believes in his goal and how he acts towards people, A decides that he want to be a part of it;
  • someone else, who A trusts, convinces him to join hero's team. Want to make it more dramatic? It's the last thing they ask for before they die;
  • A doesn't have anything better to do. He loses everything and doesn't have better ideas of what to do now than joining the hero;
  • A joins because it's an order from someone he works for;
  • A joins because there's some bigger threat and he feels safer in a team.
kyupol
Feb '24

Joins the team because the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Once that's settled, time to part ways

JoshRaed
Feb '24

I guess he gets protection from the people who are after him and to potentially get rid of his whole chosen one status which are the two things he wants and can get from this.

Leyelle
Feb '24

You have to write him a reason to care about the mission. Nobody does anything unless they have a reason to want to, so unless you forge him a connection with the mission at hand, he's not going to go. If he doesn't like people. it could be to prevent something he's afraid of from happening, if he just doesn't like OTHER people, it could be to protect someone else he cares about, it could be to help him give the slip to some people who are hunting him down in whatever area he's currently in so that he can have some comparative safety.

There are a lot of options, but any character you write needs to have a motivation, and you'll feel stuck trying to write for them if they don't have one because then nothing they do will make sense.

Example:

  1. In "A Tale of Two Cities" Charles Darnay risks his life to return to France in the middle of the revolution, though doing so could cost him his life as an aristocrat. This has to happen for the story to reach it's climax, but no sane person would go for no reason. He's going because his servant, Gabelle, whom he left behind in France is in danger of being executed, as he currently runs Darnay's estate, and the people's fury with the aristocrats has trickled down to Gabelle, for his being willing to serve an aristocrat.

  2. In "Treasure Island" Jim Hawkins has been kidnapped by the pirates, but is given leave to talk to Doctor Livesy for a few minutes by the wall of the barricade. Why would John Silver allow him to do this? He's trying to have a foot in both camps, so that if the pirates fail and are defeated by the honest crew, the heroes will remember him doing some "good things" for them, and he'll have a better chance of them wanting to show him some mercy.

  3. In "Damsel in the Red Dress" Alicia is depressed with extreme social anxiety, and wants to go nowhere - talk to know one, but she agrees to go to a meeting, and get a job working for The Vegerra Foundation. Why would someone so scared who cared so little about her own life be willing to do this? Her motivation is a sort of penitence to her best friend Kattar, and his mother, because they've supported her in her artistic journey up until that point, and it almost cost Kattar his life. She feels like succeeding at the career they were always told her she was made for will show them that their sacrifice and loss wasn't in vain.