Characters with personalities

[Blackout]

I have heard/read on multiple occasions that a good character must have a personality. For the longest time, I have no idea what that means. Can someone explain it to me?

 

[SailusGebel]

Yes.

 

[Agentt]

I have heard/read on multiple occasions that a good character must have a personality. For the longest time, I have no idea what that means. Can someone explain it to me?

Umm...i don't even know how to explain it.

I read such comments in regards to isekai, so that's how I am going to explain it, because in general, I mean...I don't understand the question.


So, isekai MC more often than not, lack a human personality. They have highest morals, they can be excessively perverse or excessively innocent. When faced with a moral predicament, they just punch their way through.

This is because isekai protagonists have to be an empty shell for the reader to project himself into, hence a conversation with them will go like this,

Q. What if your favourite flavour?
A. I don't really have a preference, I guess any would work.

Q. What is your favourite colour?
A. Uhh, I haven't really thought of that. I don't mind any, really.

Q. What's your favourite subject?
A. Ah, I was never much a smart kid. I would always had to scrape by through all exams.

Q. What's your favourite outdoor activity?
A. I really didn't do much, never was in any clubs, you see.


See? No preferences or opinions at all~

An MC with personality will have preferences, opinions, and realistic moral values. When faced with question, "will you kill your girlfriend or have the entire world die?" You cannot have MC immediately, "I don't care!" and then God comes down and says Congratulations, the world was never in danger.

 

[Linko]

You don't know what having personality is?

 

[ArcadiaBlade]

People with personality are like people that can act based on what they want or liked. Mainly, even high morals can be considered, depending how the actions are based on human emotions.

The main example for that are Isekai protagonist and his harem.

The protagonist must have a unique proposition that uses his emotions and based it on the actions on the events he is placed with.

In simple terms, they should have something they like, their actions that coincides with their morality and the events they are placed in, moving through their emotions.

However, isekai protagonist moves on with robotic feelings, unable to develop their likes and dislikes mainly due to how their personality can't match up with the scenarios they are placed in.

Ex: an OP isekai protagonist easily bulldoze through events without any consequences of their actions, even causing more problems later on, the act as their actions are on the moral side due to the author's plot convenience.

As for the heroines, it mainly just mashes up their actions basing on how they would soon be a part of the MC's collection without developing themselves into their own character. For the sake to fit into the collection, their actions and personality would be brainwashed to follow the role to the MC's actions to which every event they are placed in would soon fall into the collection cabinet the MC is collecting without creating their own characters.

 

[hauntedwritings]

A character having a personality is the same as saying that the character thinks and acts like a person would. This means that they have their own moral compass, strengths and weaknesses, quirks and flaws. And above all, they have emotions and make mistakes.

A character without a personality is not a person in the story. It merely exists to say and do whatever is needed for the plot to move in the right direction.

This is why (I believe) people (at least I do) have some issues with some (main) characters portrayed in some popular novels (that shall remain unnamed). The characters in question never act on feelings, only on 'what is the most logical and morally righteous choice' at that point in time. And that bores the readers. We want to read the journey of a person, not how the impersonation of a book of law would journey through a series of hypothetical scenarios.

 

[Kilolo]

I usually use Myers Briggs personality types as a base

is a character an introvert or an extrovert, does she the kind that leave things to intuition or observe before act, does she a level-headed or emotional driven, and does she a person who judge and enforcing his ideal or just the type who accept and negotiate.

after that, I put it on the spreadsheet beside the character name as a label and thinking to myself : she is this kind of person, what she's gonna do when she got this specific information.


doing all this is by no means making it perfect, but at least it's a start.

 

[K5Rakitan]

People start demonstrating their personalities very early in life. Your personality is not so much about your favorite colors or favorite foods but about how you react to situations. People read stories to see how the characters overcome obstacles. Do they do it carefully? Are they more reckless?

Baby Personality Quiz: Tips for Your Baby’s Unique Type

Take this WebMD quiz to discover your baby’s unique temperament (personality) type, and get tips on how to handle your one-of-a-kind baby.

www.webmd.com

 

[Gryphon]

I mean, this is kind of a strange question since everyone has a personality so it should be easy to identify what a personality is, but if you want an actual answer, a character with a personality is basically when the author writes a character with specific traits identifiable only to them.

Like this is really hard to explain, but take being happy for example. Now say that this character is happy a lot of the times of the day. Would you say that they have a personality? No, cause being happy in itself isn't enough to constitute one. There needs to be other things interacting with that emotion to make it work. Like say that they're happy most of the day, but they get upset once the sun goes down cause they hate the night. A personality is when everyone expresses emotions that coincide with each other and interact differently depending on their opinions, wants, needs, and psychology.

Here's a test to see if your character has a personality or not.

1. Does your character express more than three emotions.
2. Does your character interact differently depending on the character they're speaking to or the situation they're in
3. Does your character have any opinions that isn't just a copy paste popular opinion that practically everyone would agree with such as murder is bad.
4. Can your character justify their actions even when they may be in the wrong.
5. Can your character ever be in the wrong.
6. Does your character have needs, wants, likes, and dislikes specific only to them.
7. Does your character have a birthday. This may not seem like much, but giving a character a birthday can humanize them in both the author's and reader's eyes.

If you can't answer at least five of these, then your character probably has either a boring personality or no personality.

 

[bananapink]

How does your character view the world? How he treats people around him vs those who are strangers. What does he believed in? What kind of person is he, is he selfish, selfless, passive or aggressive kind? As to what extent would he fight for his principles?

 

[BigHoodieBoy]

Q. What if your favourite flavour?
A. I don't really have a preference, I guess any would work.

Q. What is your favourite colour?
A. Uhh, I haven't really thought of that. I don't mind any, really.

Q. What's your favourite subject?
A. Ah, I was never much a smart kid. I would always had to scrape by through all exams.

Q. What's your favourite outdoor activity?
A. I really didn't do much, never was in any clubs, you see.

All of those are legit my answers, just mine would be worded differently to make me seem cool

 

[BearlyAlive]

Is your character defined by more than a few tropes and their role in your story? If yes, congratulations. They have at least a bit of personality. If the answer is no, then you have a plot device that looks like a person.

 

[Blackout]

You don't know what having personality is?

Nope. I doubt I even have one.

 

[Bartun]

From the wiki:

Personality is the characteristic sets of behaviors, cognitions, and emotional patterns that evolve from biological and environmental factors. While there is no generally agreed-upon definition of personality, most theories focus on motivation and psychological interactions with the environment one is surrounded by.

I think readers refer to personality what they are trying to say is the capacity of a character to react realistically to events, from the logical to the emotional level. We have our own sense of what is wrong and what is right, and so do the characters, what bothers many people is when the characters bend their morals around the MC just for the sake of the plot, like "murder is bad" but then the MC kills a bunch of bad guys and then murder is suddenly justified.

 

[owotrucked]

Having personality means having big boobs

 

[BlackKnightX]

In real life, people’s personalities are more subtle. You can feel them—or maybe see them in plain sight—but most people are not gonna act out their personalities to the extreme. They just live them and naturally display them.

Someone’s shy? That’s personality. Someone’s very loud? That’s personality. Someone look like they’re sleepy all the time? That’s personality. Someone’s very serious? That’s also personality. I can go on and on, and so are you; you’ve seen all of these for your entire life.

But like I said, personalities in real life are more subtle than, let’s say, in fiction—especially in fiction that aims for pure entertainment, like: light novels, web novels, pulps, etc. In fictions that don’t focus on realism, the characters’ personalities will be exaggerated—because why not? Exaggeration is fun.

This is very common in anime. You know, those different deres—goudere, tsundere, yandere, deredere, kuudere, etc.

In fiction, if someone’s calm, they’ll be extremely calm—almost apathetic, even. If someone’s cheerful—they’ll be over the top. If someone’s sleepy all the time, they’ll be very listless—like a certain dude that sleeps all day and lets his friend carry him here and there.

So, if you wanna have your characters’ personalities be distinguishable, then just exaggerate them. Make it obvious.

 

[TheEldritchGod]

I have heard/read on multiple occasions that a good character must have a personality. For the longest time, I have no idea what that means. Can someone explain it to me?

Uh... Do YOU have a personality?

I'm not being sarcastic. Do you? What is it? How do you see yourself?

Now take that and put yourself in a story. How do you react to that story? That is why you need a personality for your character, so you know how they will act. I don't write stories. I work out personalities and they react to an environment and I describe what happens to the reader. For example, I introduced a character a while ago who is going to get someone killed. His personality will result in this outcome. He will make certain choices and those bad choices will get someone else killed.

Yes, I could change that, but that is interfering with the character's choices.

It is a far more organic way of writing. Much more work intensive, but the final result flows easier.

Nope. I doubt I even have one.

The absence of something is still something. Not making a choice is a choice. Not caring is a personality trait. Apathy is a character trait. Making a sarcastic reaction is a character trait. To even react with a post saying, "I doubt I have one" requires character and personality.

Are you an inanimate object? No? You have a personality. The QUALITY of a personality is different from it's existence.
---

For the longest time I hated everyone. I had reasons for this. I was a bill collector and I LOVED to hurt people. I ruined many a life.

Then an injury from when I was 18 caught up with me and my brain started deleting explicit memories. Well, we ALL do that as we get older. it happens between puberty and age 25. Then the process shuts off. For me, it never stopped. My mind is constantly editing out 'useless' memories. The problem is, I ran out of useless memories a long time ago. So it's pruining away the rest.

My childhood is gone. My mother is gone. Large sections of my life, GONE. However, I still retain IMPLICIT memories. So, I learned I can remember things if the memory is fictional. Personal experiences and fictional memories are stored separately. A story about getting beat up is a different memory from actually getting beat up.

And so, one day, I forgot the reason I hated everyone.

Any my personality went with it.

The Me of 1995 and today are nothing alike. I'd say we are actually different people entirely. You see, your emotions are like a painter's pallet. Every time you experience X if you feel Y, your mind takes all your interactions with X and Merges all the Y together. Your mind then gets a sort of 'color' for experience X. You always feel fear when you see dogs? You will reinforce your fear of dogs every time you see a dog and feel fear.

This is how we have phobias,. or PTSD, or the Christmas spirit.

Yes, the christmas spirit that everyone loves so much is actually a positive version of PTSD.

However, my mind looks back over the past half a century an goes, "Huh... we never felt ANYTHING when we had experience X. I guess we shouldn't feel anything when we encounter X.

I am capable of having feelings, its just my mind looks at all the empty space of deleted explicit memories and basically pours so much 'white paint' onto my painter's pallet that any color I might have in the moment is diluted to the point of being washed away. People have remarked how 'fearless' I am. I no longer experience fear of any sort, of things I encountered in the past. I can create NEW fears and emotions, but... alas, that experience will be deleted as well. Days, months, whatever, eventually the explicit memory will be deleted as the enzyme does it's job.

SO important stuff I store as stories. I can remember every episode of Start Trek, ToS I've ever seen, but I can't remember my mother's voice... what she looks like. I remember the hospital room she was in when she was dying, but when I try to remember what she looked like in the bed, there's a void.

Your mind stores memories in sections. It's modular. This is why memories are so unreliable. When you 'remember' something you are basically 'rebuilding' the experience. ACTUAL REAL WORLD experiences are usually stored in huge chunks, but fictional ones are... well... they are stored in Zip files and rebuilt as needed.

In a way, I have far less personality than you. I have the ability to feel, but my mind doesn't have any memories of feeling, so most of the time, I am quite... hollow. I'm a shell of what I was. A copy of a copy of a copy. A human version of the game of Chinese whispers. Everything I remember is a story about my life, not my life itself.

This is the difference between a character who is, as they say, two dimensional, and someone who has a personality. One is a flat ghost of a human, drifting through life, the other is someone the reader can relate to and understand because they act like they are... well...


Human.