If one in every of your characters feels flat or boring, maybe it’s since you haven’t given them sufficient ATTENTION. All relationships, even fictional ones, demand care. Character improvement comes by way of spending time together with your characters on the web page; listening to them discuss issues that matter to them, following them as they interact with troublesome issues, sharing in their feelings after they fail or succeed.
Consider the character improvement scenes on this article as if they had been dates together with your character.
Take your time! Benefit from the particulars as they unfold.
You could wish to develop your character intimately earlier than you start writing your story, or you could simply begin writing and see the place the story takes you.
Both manner, you want narrative alternatives to point out the reader what stuff your character is made from, and these scene concepts can match virtually anyplace in your story.
They’re additionally excellent for NaNoWriMo! Choose one to write down about day-after-day, and blend them up with plot improvement scenes and world improvement scenes!
Character improvement comes by way of…
- CONFLICT, TESTS & TRIALS – any time the character faces resistance of their world, there is a chance to disclose one thing new about them, or to bolster an present trait. The extra stress the character is underneath, the extra you’ll need to develop them to fulfill their difficulties.
- REACTION – significant and constant reactions to the occasions round them are what create characters. This may take the type of motion, reflection, interplay, decision-making, and even inaction.
- REFLECTION, SELF-ASSESSMENT – character doesn’t at all times must be developed by way of motion. Generally solitary reflection and evaluation might be a good way to decelerate and delve deeper.
- INTERACTION, RELATIONSHIPS – in some ways, the character is outlined by way of distinction and correlation to the opposite characters within the story. Relationships apply push and pull forces on the character that trigger them to react, make choices, and re-assess their very own id.
- CHANGE, PROGRESS – one of many principal variations between a flat character and a spherical one is {that a} spherical character modifications, whereas a flat character stays static. A personality’s response to vary is one in every of their most defining traits and can typically affect their different traits.
- DECISIONS, CHOICES – choices are the place the plot intersects the character’s thoughts most clearly. The kinds of choices characters are confronted with might be as telling as their later reactions to the trail they selected.
Scenes for Character Growth
- The character has a heart-to-heart with a Helper.
- The character trains with a Mentor.
- The character completes a mini quest to get previous a Threshold Guardian.
- The character questions their relationship to the Antagonist.
- The character receives dangerous information from a Herald.
- The character realises that they had been deceived by a Shapeshifter.
- The character recognises a side of themselves in one other character.
- The character is pressured to attend for somebody or one thing.
- The character is pressured to ask for assist from a personality they dislike.
- The character confesses their deepest concern or secret to a different character.
- The character should negotiate with a personality or group of characters.
- The character loses or sacrifices one thing they worth vastly.
- The character sees or hears one thing they weren’t speculated to.
- The character tries to grasp the motivation behind one other character’s actions.
- The character tries to evade or escape one other character.
- The character is pressured to make a troublesome resolution that may have an effect on others.
- The character is deserted by somebody they love or worth.
- The character tries to persuade one other character to behave.
- The character reacts to psychological or bodily ache.
- The character must work along with one other character.
- The character is rejected by one other character or group of characters.
- The character seems again at how far they’ve come.
- The character undergoes a ceremony of passage.
- The character turns into answerable for different characters.
- The character learns their true identify and origin.
- The character tries to grasp or conceal their ideas or feelings.
- The character faces their very own, or one other character’s demise.
- The character questions a perception that has formed their persona.
- The character loses all hope that they are going to succeed.
- The character contemplates their future.