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Okay, so I finally realized that Inconvenient Alliances was a puddle of predictable, disgusting, self-insert-filled, unimaginative slush.
Therefore, I am planning for something that's new. And better.
One problem: the villain has no flaws. Whatsoever. He isn't impulsive, or a coward, he doesn't even have a twisted sence of priority (which annoys me in villains). I don't like making my villains like that. But how do you stop a villain from being unbeatable?
Another: the other guy in the story. He used to have a personality, yes. But now, all of his personality is trickling away into somewhere and... And help!? Please? He needs a personality; that's where I went wrong with this one other guy!
submitted by Tiffany W., age Undefined
(July 30, 2012 - 8:58 am)
(July 30, 2012 - 8:58 am)
Unbeatable villains? Easy. A fatal flaw. Pouring their essence into something that can be destroyed. Like Sauron and the Ring. Or Voldy and the Horcruxes.
If your story isn't fantasy, then use the same idea, but different, like one back-up plan, or one confidante, or...something. Or perhaps a character flaw. If your villain has no flaws, well then give him some.
(July 30, 2012 - 7:43 pm)
Thank you and top!
(July 30, 2012 - 8:09 pm)
If the boy's personality is just going away, then change his personality so it's more easily noticable, that will make it easier for you to write his personality.
(July 31, 2012 - 11:31 am)
1. Villian
Is he hateable? Can he be hated not just by the protagonists, but does he work with anybody? Do they ever like him? Is he ever paranoid? Is he ever a control freak? Can he be shocked? Can his emotions be manipulated? Does he allow himself to feel anything (i.e. happiness after blowing something up?), or is he actually unable to feel emotions? What is he afraid of? It doesn't have to something simple and rational, like spiders, but something that might be more of a concept. Is he afraid to die? What does he want, and is he afraid of not getting that? He might be certain that he can get this and that or achieve something, but is some small part of him afraid of failing to do so and losing it?
2. Hero
Simple: Kill someone close to him. Shock him. He'll bring back his personality, or become so stone cold that being stone cold is his personality.
(July 31, 2012 - 11:46 am)
In response to the first point:
If you make your villain too hateable, (s)he becomes a flat character. You need to give all your characters (even the bad ones!) depth. Don't go completely to extremes and make them the best friend who betrays the protag at the end, because that's quickly becoming a cliché and I don't even think the story you have would work well with that kind of villain.
Also, I find this helps: If you find yourself referring to the antag as "villain" and the protag as "hero", you'll begin to stereotype them. Call them by their character names, or protagonist/antagonist. It helps. It really does.
~Ash out~
(August 2, 2012 - 8:06 am)
Uh... I never called him a hero, but thanks for the advice. Thanks for the antagonist advice, everyone! And I never said he had no depth or no motives either, he is NOT the MWAHAHA I BURN VILLAGES FOR THE HECK OF IT type of antagonist.
(August 2, 2012 - 3:55 pm)
For both: make them crave something ridiculous. Or give them one secret side that influences everything they do but the reader doesn't know what is motivating them.
(July 31, 2012 - 4:52 pm)
Ever watch Phineas and Ferb? Everything Doofenshmirtz does, he has some tragic backstory that is the reason he is doing this. Give your villain this tragic backstory.
(August 1, 2012 - 12:49 pm)
It doesn't even have to be a tragic backstory, necessarily, just the awareness that everything the character does is a direct result of everything that has happened so far in that character's past. EVERYTHING en does must be realistically motivated, or en will turn into a caricature.
(August 1, 2012 - 8:07 pm)
Give the villan one thing that keeps him human. A young child forced into his care. A dog. A horse. A griffin. A dragon. Then kill off that thing half way through the book. That should settle him.
Or give him something like a "true name" that makes him vulnerable, or that he can only be unbeatable while with a certain charm or within a certain area. Try to think of him as a good guy turned over to the Dark Side of the Force by a power hungry Emperor.
Hope this doesn't sound completely cliché.
(August 1, 2012 - 4:43 pm)
You could make your villain very forgetful, so he would forget where he put his sword at the last minute or forget an ingredient in a potion or something. That could be funny.
(August 14, 2012 - 4:19 pm)