Protagonist Issues

[BJ Swabb]

Hello there!

So my main character Damien is a young teen who has just been through puberty, and with this his body begins to develop different elements of magic. Damien is a half breed elf, who at the moment doesn't find out until way later down the series. Through out the series Damien finds out he has many abilities in which he contains. The problem is, is that he contains both dark and light magic which he is unsure how they develop or unable to control. For the light side of magic he is able to make his sword burst into flame, turn demonic beings into light creatures, controls and tames beasts at will and bring back the dead (though he's not sure how he does it). His dark side is he is able to conjure up blasts of light from his palm (like a fireball), speak to ghosts and shadow figures in their fluent tongue or whispers. He can cause pain and can such the soul out of one's body. I am determined to create more abilites for Damien as the journey continues so he can defeat the villain the Demon King Narlyx. What other powers light and dark should he obtain.

 

[Finchbearer]

Necromancy is classically one the dark arts so is confusing as a light type of magic (to me).

Perhaps telepathy, teleportation, seer, cypher, flying, elemental powers…

 

[Orc Knight]

Damn, dude sounds like he already won the magic power lottery, this coming from someone who has at least one character that's a reality warper, albeit one who doesn't really understand she has it and uses it subtly at the best of times. Mostly to get more drinks.

And I can see where you get that Finch. From what I've researched and all, necromancy mostly meant talking to the dead until pop culture turned it into what we know now. I've read a few books with good necromancers and even some of my own things in world building, not for them, the undead would be a much worse problem. Plus, for a few coins, they'll call up dead parents to work out those unexpected inheritance issues. Or banish one of the in laws that really doesn't want to stop berating you.

Also just how powerful is Narlyx that Damien needs so many powers? We talking Unicron level threat? Devourer of worlds? Or a threat to multiple dimensions and worlds? Or a more localized and general world ending sort of dude?

But if you want to give him the full buffet, yeah, there's always all the elemental sort of powers, flying, foresight and all the stuff I'm picking off from Finch. Powers of transformation? Polymorph? Dragonscale or steel skin? Got a fiery sword, maybe it's got a suit of armor and shield that goes with it?

 

[Logomancer]

Necromancy is classically one the dark arts so is confusing as a light type of magic (to me).

Eh, the way I see it, necromancers are just healers with bad timing.

In all honesty, BJ Swabb , Damien sounds too overpowered already. You might want to give him some weaknesses and limitations.

 

[J.MGreenhut]

I think you would be well served to limit Damien's powers. The reason being is: you are going to fall into the trap that David Farland cautioned young writers about. " Look at this over here."...."Then this over there."...."Then turn around and check out this thingamabob running after what's his name over there!" Before you know it your reader is just tired from trying to keep up with you and sadly your hero. Pity the reader and write like everyone has ADHD! They know your enthusiastic, that's why they're reading you to begin with.Keep all that great magic in a world-bible and only show the reader a percentage of what you conceived of. Let the reader fill in the blanks.

 

[Finchbearer]

Eh, the way I see it, necromancers are just healers with bad timing.

Haha, to be fair I agree, unless it’s used for malice. I have a character who is a master of the dark arts who uses his powers for good essentially.

 

[pmmg]

I am with those who think this dude already has enough powers. And I would caution that a list of powers does not a good story make.

What you have here is not the story. And the story should lead one to what is needed and what is not. If one has immense powers, his conflict has to be worthy of it. While I am sure I could pop up a list of dark and light powers...they are only window dressing. What does the story need?

I would also suggest, that rather than looking for what more he can do, look instead for how what he can do already hinders him, and the stuff he cant do.

 

[Queshire]

I can see lots of powers working if you tie it into the character not really knowing what they're doing and their powers being unstable.

That said, from personal experience, when you have a character with a wide variety of powers you want to make sure that you can have them use each power fully. I had a character that learned to create magic scrolls but then I struggled to have her actually use that because her sword skills and regular ice magic was generally enough to deal with the majority of enemies she came up against.

 

[ThinkerX]

Hello there!

So my main character Damien is a young teen who has just been through puberty, and with this his body begins to develop different elements of magic. Damien is a half breed elf, who at the moment doesn't find out until way later down the series. Through out the series Damien finds out he has many abilities in which he contains. The problem is, is that he contains both dark and light magic which he is unsure how they develop or unable to control. For the light side of magic he is able to make his sword burst into flame, turn demonic beings into light creatures, controls and tames beasts at will and bring back the dead (though he's not sure how he does it). His dark side is he is able to conjure up blasts of light from his palm (like a fireball), speak to ghosts and shadow figures in their fluent tongue or whispers. He can cause pain and can such the soul out of one's body. I am determined to create more abilites for Damien as the journey continues so he can defeat the villain the Demon King Narlyx. What other powers light and dark should he obtain.

To me, Damien seems overly powerful already. Furthermore, the dichotomy between his dark and light sides is a recipe for insanity.

Likewise, give the demon king some flaws and have some types of magic be beyond him.

 

[Rexenm]

Maybe Damien can turn into an animal, whilst Narlyx has the power to control animals, thus his weakness. Or he could be a Super Saiyan, as in DBZ.

 

[Prince of Spires]

Furthermore, the dichotomy between his dark and light sides is a recipe for insanity.

That would actually be a cool story. Watch an all-powerful character slowely decend into madness, and have him struggle with it...

To be fair, there is nothing wrong with a very powerful character. The insanity comment reminded me of Rand Al Thor from Wheel of Time. After the first few books he's pretty much all powerful, and going insane while doing so.

The story deal with this in 4 ways:
- He can't be everywhere at once. It's a continent spanning tale, and he can only be in one place at one time
- insanely powerful opponents. He's basically fighting the dark god himself and his vasals.
- his power has a downside. As mentioned, he slowly goes insane. And the more he uses his power the more insane he goes
- he runs into problems that his powers can't fix. It's nice that you can erase people from existence, but that doesn't help you deal with women, or actually governing a country or anything like that.

There are also other issues, like he's becoming isolated from other people because he's so powerful. He never knows if people are nice to him because they like him or because they want something from him.

 

[Logomancer]

his power has a downside. As mentioned, he slowly goes insane. And the more he uses his power the more insane he goes

Not to mention that he has to wrestle with his power every time he draws it, lest it destroys him on the spot. And the mixed feeling of exhilaration and revulsion he feels each time he uses the power makes it even more interesting.

 

[Rexenm]

It's nice that you can erase people from existence, but that doesn't help you deal with women, or actually governing a country or anything like that.

The power of occlumency, has often come up in regards to this. There is a trial based system, that ended in misery. This is true, but will the hero rise to some often regarded sin? To put a character in jail, for being omnipresent has always lead to occlumency. Does this regard the hero as evil however? To put the creator on this pedestal, has often lead to occlumency.

 

[Queshire]

The story deal with this in 4 ways:
- He can't be everywhere at once. It's a continent spanning tale, and he can only be in one place at one time
- insanely powerful opponents. He's basically fighting the dark god himself and his vasals.
- his power has a downside. As mentioned, he slowly goes insane. And the more he uses his power the more insane he goes
- he runs into problems that his powers can't fix. It's nice that you can erase people from existence, but that doesn't help you deal with women, or actually governing a country or anything like that.

I really want to focus on these three. Something like slowly going insane or some version of Kryptonite have their place, but you can get a lot of story mileage out of these less obvious restrictions.

 

[Gurkhal]

Eh, the way I see it, necromancers are just healers with bad timing.

This sounds like total BS to me. And I like it.

 

[Foxkeyes]

You have some great options here.

Perhaps too many powers is confusing to readers. Maybe he has the ability to choose one or two of these powers, and then the others fade away. And, over time, could he regret his decision and wish he'd held onto a different power because that's the one he really needs.

To me, having both light and dark powers suggests good vs evil. Readers may see it that way, too. By using both, he's in a middle place, which may confuse your audience because they'll want him to have one or the other type of power. Having him choose one direction, however, is a great opportunity for developing internal conflict. Which will he choose? And could there be external players trying to manipulate him into taking one side or another.

As for having more powers, maybe he could develop some powers to help with everyday things. This will help build out his character, and provide some balance for his stronger powers. And maybe it's one of these 'everyday' powers that helps him triumph over Narlyx.