Original Characters (OCs)
-
Basically describe any original character you have made. You can describe I any way you want.
-
Now whenever I come up with a character idea I always think of them as the protagonist, and they are not neccesarily evil but more self serving (sometimes they are evil). I usually come up with a power or a goal/desire they have and then the rest comes after. For example I might make a wish fulfillment power where OC Grant's wishes for a price so I make him very have a "eye for eye" mind set like if he saves your life then you owe him your life now. That is the kind of approach I usually take when making OCs. I usually set them in an original world too and not something like an OC for a show I like.
I'll post an OC later.
-
This post is deleted! -
Here is a character that I though "how can I make him the most despicable and awful scum I can think of?" First I gave him a simple goal of "wants to be loved (by a girl)" made him isekaied with the power of Memory Control, the ability to control a person's memory however you want. Now this guy is very driven, he will take action toward his desires and goals. Now here is where the despicableness and awful scum comes to play. First of all he uses his power to get the deed to land with a big mansion. He goes into town finds a cute girl, makes the whole town forget about her and takes her to the mansion after changing her memory so that she believes she is his lover. He continues to do things like this. This guy is no hero, nor really a villain, he is just a criminal. This is what I came up with when I try to come up with a very very despicable, scummy character.
-
@drone205 said in Original Characters (OCs):
Here is a character that I though "how can I make him the most despicable and awful scum I can think of?" First I gave him a simple goal of "wants to be loved (by a girl)" made him isekaied with the power of Memory Control, the ability to control a person's memory however you want. Now this guy is very driven, he will take action toward his desires and goals. Now here is where the despicableness and awful scum comes to play. First of all he uses his power to get the deed to land with a big mansion. He goes into town finds a cute girl, makes the whole town forget about her and takes her to the mansion after changing her memory so that she believes she is his lover. He continues to do things like this. This guy is no hero, nor really a villain, he is just a criminal. This is what I came up with when I try to come up with a very very despicable, scummy character.
I just realized, this character I thought of is very much like the Mad Hatter from Batman, he kidnapped a woman and brainwashed her.
-
This post is deleted! -
@sinnoaria I think it is just a matter of context and the type of story. In stories where someone brainwashed a character to love them, there is almost a sense of either doll-ness or fakeness. The character I made with the memory control power I see easily getting bored (due to the fakeness of the love) of one girl thus discarding her to do the same to another ( as I said I made the most despicable character I could imagine). I think Stockholm Syndrome (in fiction) is probably more interesting overall as it takes more time and thus there is also higher stakes for the captor/abuser. It could also be interesting if the captor/abuser has a brainwashing power but chooses not to use it or use it as last resort.
-
This post is deleted! -
@sinnoaria said in Original Characters (OCs):
Sorry, I worded that badly. My dislike of brainwashing is more the fact that brainwashing/memory control as an ability tends to be way overpowered in stories. Like I wrote earlier, not many proper counters to it as a power. (There are a few counters as a technique).
I believe any power can be balanced if you do it right. Like for the Memory Control it could have certain conditions like you can only rewrite a person's memory when you are touching them. And even if you don't need to touch them to rewrite their memory you can never do a perfect rewrite like you might make a person lose memory of, in this case let's say, the experiences he had with his daughter but the emotions he felt still remain. The same memory is not all stored in one part of the brain; losing a part of your brain may make you lose memories but not EVERTHING related to those memories so logic dictates that you will not be able to do a perfect rewrite.
-
I had a similar issue on balancing over powered abilities with on race I wanted to create. The core concept was that they could manipulate perception, essentially having the ability to change how anyone in their range perceives the world. Not quite mind control, but perhaps a bit worse since the person is still otherwise of sound mind. Plus it's not just one person, but a whole population.
I balanced it out using social structures, both from within and without. I wanted to think on how things might evolve, especially since their powers also work on each other. From within, the race is deeply religious, with three religions that dictate how, when, and to what degree they use their abilities. One religion, worshiping truth and called seekers, all agree on a single interpretation of reality. Their abilities might alter perception, but never to a significant degree. The second, worshiping illusion and called weavers, tend to view the world from a personal lens, but they strongly respect others' perceptions as their own, and restrict any ability usage. The third worships both deities and finds a balance between them, but isn't particularly a focus in the narrative.
From without, things center around the fact that this entire race came from another world. The other races in the world are all terrified of them. So they walled the entire race in (literally) after a brief war, and established a police unit that babysat them whenever they left, using magic to make them immune to their abilities (but that has other side-effects). They also require them to be visibly marked in public. They're not particularly well tolerated so they rarely leave their designated land.
I've mostly stopped working on this stuff, but it amuses me to see so much of what I thought up come up in other stories. When I first though this story up (which is entirely several layers of isekai), I had never heard of the concept, and thought it rare. Clearly not so much any more! Plus I was floored reading Goblin Slayer and encountering the little side chapters with Illusion and Truth, because it was so similar to what I had thought up.
