Any ideas? Any ideas at all? I don’t want help for characters right now, just want to know what your methods of developing your main characters are. :)

Step 1. Do not make a character sheet

Step 2. DO NOT make a character sheet

Step 3. Think about the character

Step 4. Write the character

Step 5. Think about the character some more

Step 6. Rewrite the character

Step 7. Repeat steps 5 and 6

@TakuGifian Well, this was interesting. I remember studying about Maslow in business class but I never thought it could be applied to fictional characters. Then again, it’s pretty standard operating instructions for creating your own characters that don’t end up like Mary Sues (i.e. they have to be realistic with realistic goals, struggles and beliefs). When I write characters I try and follow a predetermined timeline and see how they react to the events on the timeline. Either that or going out to ‘examine’ people outside (hey, big cities are useful for something huh?) :P It helps a lot to see how other people think about mundane situations, it makes writing character thought processes more realistic and they end up flowing better.

I don’t like character sheets. They’re limiting and a bit weird, honestly. It’s like spinning a wheel of misfortune trying to get cardboard cutout traits for cardboard cutout characters. I prefer to take examples from real life. Like I used to have a really mean teacher once. He formed the basis for one of the characters in the novel I’m writing now.

Hey, that sounds pretty good. I hate stereotypes, but they can always surprise you when put into a non-stereotypical situation. I prefer creating fully developed characters beforehand and then inserting them into my story.

Unless you’re some kind of natural genius(spoiler: you aren’t), all aspects of writing are iterative, character building included. P. skeptical of this method.

Haha I’m no genius. No way. But what I mean is as fully developed as I can make them. They always develop even after I put them in the story, so I suppose they aren’t fully developed. Badly worded on my part, sorry.

DO NOT make a character sheet.

I tried to write a character sheet for a character I’ve had for years, just as a way to try to get down everything I “know” about her and maybe pull out some interesting things I hadn’t thought of before. It didn’t work. As soon as I started trying to fill in pre-composed questions, my mind just shut down and went durr durr durr.

A character sheet is honestly one of the most creatively stifling things I’ve ever come in contact with. I can’t really figure out why, other than perhaps trying to break a person down into single-line answers is impossible. Characters are more complex than that.

And never ever ever use a character sheet that separates strengths and weaknesses, because that is guaranteed going to end up with some impossible conflicts (“patient and gentle” as a strength, “tends to resort to violence quickly” as a flaw, for example)

As for how I develop characters…

I try to think of them in contexts outside my story. Obviously, for whatever plot you have, you can just have the character step through it and do all the right things at the right times, but that’s just because that’s how you want the story to go. So I like to pull them away from the story and think about their life in totally different circumstances. What’s an ordinary day for them? What do they do if they’re tired or hungry or whatever? What about when they go shopping for clothes or something? And I either write down or at least think through some different scenarios with them, just to see how they could react to different things.

Once you’ve got that, it’s much easier to look at the things that happen in your story and come up with a more realistic reaction for them—more realistic, because it’s not just what you think needs to happen, but rather is based on how that character is normally. And just in general, having a good feel for how characters react to different things will keep them consistent, because you’re not going to have them terrified into silence by a mugger one chapter, mouthing off to the Big Bad while simultaneously coming up with a devious plan in the next chapter.

There again, if they are consistently bipolar or irrational, that’s much better than one or two scenes of carrying the idiot ball.

that is guaranteed going to end up with some impossible conflicts (“patient and gentle” as a strength, “tends to resort to violence quickly” as a flaw, for example)

Now hold on, there. I am both patient and gentle, right up until I lose my temper. :P

The problem that I have with character sheets is that you are taking something that is supposed to be a complete, psychologically complex, developed character, and slicing it up into neat little portions like sushi into bento boxes. You’re effectively doing the opposite or character building, or worse, you’re reversing what has been built, reducing it to its basic raw materials again.

And just in general, having a good feel for how characters react

On that note, I think it was mentioned in a similar thread a few weeks (months?) ago, but one of the best ways of developing a ‘feel’ for how a character would react is to place them in various different situations and writing their reactions and/or actions. Don;‘t just do one or two common scenarios, but many of them, and odd little things that you might not think about. How does your character react to finding a hole in their favourite (or last) pair of socks? Do they ignore it, moan, fix it with a needle and thread, or just refuse to go anywhere until new socks have been brought to them? Or they lose a boot in a mudhole, how do they react to that? Does the fact that they’ve been walking for miles in the rain affect their reactions?

Uh, this may sound like a weird question, but how do I characterize a girl? I don’t mean to sound bad. I really don’t. I just don’t know if I’m being accurate or not. When girls read the novel they may think that it’s not how they act at all, and that’s not what I want. I want girls to be able to identify with my female protagonist.

Not using character sheets is something I’ve stumbled upon quite recently. I like to think of a character, maybe just based off someone I saw on the street and write them in the story. As I go over multiple drafts, I add more of those little nuances and get to develop their backstory more. Character sheets makes you think of that all at once, and that’s sort of hard to do. You don’t know what sort of music your character likes to listen to, and you probably shouldn’t, unless that’s one of the foundations of their story. And if you do, then you’re probably overthinking it, or making your character “Whisper, the goth girl who likes to listen to Black Veil Brides”.
I personally think even doing character sheets after you know your character well is a bad idea. For me it sort of flattens them, and then when I go to write them, they’re confined to that list of traits. Not saying that characters should be stubborn in chapters 1-6, and easily persuaded in chapters 7-8, and stubborn in chapters 9-10, etc., but sometimes people go against their personalities because they feel like they should, they have to for a certain reason, etc. When I write down, “Lilly, black hair, brown eyes, 130 lbs, happy”, she seems like a flat Bella Swan. You can’t sum up anyone in a list of character traits, no matter how hard you try.
And I love stealing from real life too, I usually take people I don’t know very well or met once or just seen in a car driving by and change them and add their story and build etc. That’s always a good method, stealing from real life.

And psychology books are good to read too. A lot of characters in books have different mental disorders that I don’t think the authors even knew what they were.

Interesting… I personally read through a bunch of different novels to see how other authors make their characters come to life. Of course, some are badly written but it still gives you a little window into how the author thought they should be written.

If you’re trying to figure out some kind of trick to writing female characters, you are probably not approaching it from a good angle. Do what SWQ said because it is good advice.

Of course, women are distinct from men- for that kind of nuance, I’d recommend actually talking to girls and getting to know them.

but whoa now let’s not get crazy here

But learning how a girl’s mind works is probably impossible for a guy.

Woah there. That attitude never flies if you’re going to try and write anything. While there’s always room for improvement on any subject, starting off with the mindset that girls are some alien creature is going to bite you. That’s how you get characters defined by being a girl and not defined by their personality. That also assumes that all girls have the same personality and mentality. Most differences you see in life and not in the media are social ones and the expectations they choose to either embrace or reject. The easy answer is to give them the same personality you’d give a male character with different expectations in life, the more time consuming answer is going to be look at some basic feminism articles to see what sort of silent expectations are there as a way to figure out how society influences women.

Here’s how I do it.

First, I think of a character’s role in a story. If their role is important, and the events involving them are important, then I make sure to flesh them out very well. After I’ve got the name/gender/race, I tend to try and make them physically unique and visually interesting (for example, one of my major characters always wears a tricorne hat). It just makes it more fun for me to write them. Next, I go deep into their past and think about what might affect how they act now. It’s not easy, but it’s worth it. I generally have a sense of how I want a character to be when I think them up, so I tend to make their past reflect how they act. For instance, a character who is bitterly resentful and likes to scowl and cross his arms may have been abused as a child, or perhaps had dealt with many people who showed him little respect, and so on.

Then, I write them. This is where it gets interesting. For at least half the characters in my series, they completely changed from how I wanted them. It mostly comes out in their dialogue, reactions, and thoughts, and a little bit from their demeanor. And once I’ve written a few chapters of them, I generally have a good sense of who they are. Now realize that this can be frustrating. Sometimes I really really really want the story to go this way, but my changed character won’t allow it, so they take the story that way. Damn those stupid characters.

In case you were wondering, the main focus of the events of my series have changed more than three times. Complete u-turns, just so that one character can make sense. People are complex, and never forget that when writing about them.

Also, I tend to write more female characters, simply because I find them more interesting to write about. I love the idea of seeing the world through a woman’s eyes, which is something I’ve never been able to do because I am not a female. Women were tricky to write at first, but I think I’ve gotten the hang of it. Now I think I’m even better at writing women than I am at writing men. It’s kinda like drawing. I’m better at drawing women because I have more practice at it.

I think Asha Greyjoy is a bit manly and sex-obsessed. But I suppose it was a different culture, a different time. Who really knows, right?

Sansa holds the title of Manliest Manly Man of Impish Idea, and I don’t recall ever questioning his lead woman character’s femaleness.

:3

You just have to put yourself in a the mindset of a A-Person-Who-Is-Not-You.

Bingo.

I think Asha Greyjoy is a bit manly and sex-obsessed. But I suppose it was a different culture, a different time. Who really knows, right?

what the fuck is this post

Damn those stupid characters.

LOL.

what the fuck is this post

Don’t get me wrong, I love Asha Greyjoy. She’s totally badass.

Also, I hate how the show changed her name to Yara to eliminate confusion between her and Osha the wildling… but that’s suggesting that Osha is more important to the story.

OT: I’ve never tried speaking dialogue out loud, mainly because I would feel uncomfortable.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Asha Greyjoy. She’s totally badass.

I am not taking issue with whether or not you like the character.