Headaches in the Form of Characters. Help!

Re-typing; let’s hope this works. XD

@rae To be fair, I’m a big fan of protective characters, so I may be a wee bit biased. But I don’t think it’s the end of the world, for a few main reasons:

• It provides a subtle yet cohesive theme. Just having all of these characters with these motivations that drive them will add an extra layer of theme.
• It makes sense within the world. Like you said, your culture sets these characters up to value protection. Especially if you contrast it with characters from other cultures who don’t value protection, that could be a cool world-building tool.
• Heroes are protectors. I’m still not sure if this is an always thing or just a sometimes thing, but actively protecting someone else makes us root for a character more than ever. (This is one reasons writers trying to make us sympathize with a villain give them someone they’re protecting.)

That said, I get your fear that it might be a bit too repetitive. On one hand, I don’t think this is the end of the world; it might just be part of your “author brand”. There’s a quote (that I sadly can’t find attribution for) about how pastors only preach one sermon, or artists only paint one picture, or singers only sing one song. While that’s a bit hyperbolic, I think there’s a grain of truth – all of us will have a theme that keeps popping up over and over, and that may just be part of the message God’s placed on our hearts.

But variety isn’t bad. Maybe you could throw in a more selfish character, or one who’s just a loner, or one from a culture that values fighting for yourself above all else? I’m not sure a lack of a less-protective character would break your story, but adding one couldn’t hurt.

Anyhow. I have the itching feeling that the original version of this was better, but I’m gonna push “submit” and hope it makes it through this time. xD

@rae

I think readers do tend to notice when an author writes about similar ideas.

I don’t think it’s necessarily bad for so many characters to have that motivation, but I would try to avoid having too many of them have it as their main motivation, especially main characters.

I know that all of these characters are from the same universe, but I don’t know where they all fall into different stories. From my understanding, Alpha’s is a direct sequel to Nahim’s, but aside from I don’t know at all.

So, it might be a good idea to differentiate this trait within these two characters especially. I’ve seen a lot of both, and I’ve definitely seen the motivation you’re talking about in both.

One thing I would be careful of from the start is that it seems to be by far the most dominant aspect of Nahim’s character. Admittedly, I’ve only seen him in an RP, so I’m not going to assume this is the case, but you definitely want to avoid having characters come off as one-note.

Alpha is a lot different from Nahim, I’ve seen the protecting thing from him, although only when it comes to Nar. It doesn’t feel like his primary motivation, but I couldn’t say what is. Alpha seems hard to read into. Regardless, I would suggest leaning away from the things that make him similar to Nahim, and possibly giving him some other primary motivation.

As far as the others go, I can’t say much, because I don’t know them well, but let me give you a generality:

Where you can, give them something else as primary motivation. Where you can’t, find a different way to deal with it. Nobody will have a problem with it unless two characters handle it the same way (or similarly.)

Hopefully that is helpful!

I agree with @jonas that I haven’t seen much of a difference between Nahim and Alpha, and maybe that’s why I have a hard time distinguishing between them. This is, of course, coming from someone who has only roleplayed with one of those characters and seen limited material based on the other… so that’s very likely a me problem. *shrug*

But I can say from the roleplay, Alpha seems like a “protect”-oriented person. I almost feel like that is his justification for anything he does, whether that be breaking the rules, threatening people, or just straight up trying to intimidate people. Like Jonas said about Nahim, it feels like Alpha’s most dominant trait.

I would say try giving them different ways of outwardly manifesting the trait :] 90% of hero characters are protective on some level or form, but most heroes act nothing like each other. Some are outwardly docile and peaceful, and focus on emotional protection. Some protect in healthy amounts, while others take it too far. And there are still more ways protectiveness can manifest, not just in physically strong male leads.

Plus, if you’re wondering how much the theme of protectiveness should show up in your story, it depends on the scale of your story… if you’re planning to write a longer series, it’s probably best to explore a variety of things, and tie them up with each other as you go. An overarching theme is great, but the more subtle it is, the better.

This is all my opinion and should be taken with a grain of salt… and maybe a grain of sugar if you feel like it 😛

@rae

To me, all of those have a distinct flavor, except maybe Igua. I think that Nahim and Alpha definitely are distinct enough. For Silvanis, the fact that he focuses on protecting a specific person, makes him a bit more distinct. So, as long as each character as their own interesting characteristics, I think this is fine.

@rae

Do you want help pinning down his traits? I’ve just noticed you mention how hard it is to write Alpha quite often.