The problem with some cultists

Thelos wrote:

"Alas! If I stay to fight in Troy I will die a hero, but if I return home I will live a long unheroic life!"

That's the thing though. that's the struggle. His entire life he was bred for this "destiny", to acquire fame, glory for all eternity. But he does not want that. He doesn't want to die in that scrap of sand and blood called Troy.

That's the tragedy. He wants to live, he wants children, he wants to be a good father, he wants peace, but on the other hand he wants to be a good son also. And sure you can claim that it was his despise of Aggamemnon that stayed his hand, since that's the more open option from the illiad, but I'd disagree.

in here, we have a man, that has such a clash of personality, right there. Do I live and be forgotten, or die and be remembered?

both choices, -SUCK- which makes the conflict in this character so endearing.

not because its his destiny to die so he does that.

Thelos wrote:
Reasons are overrated. Not everything in the human behavior should or can be fully explained with logic and reasons. On one hand, there's acting upon faith, which is by definition not motivated by reasons or logic. On the other, there's the element of unpredictability and chaos, brought forth by the gray areas of inter-subjectivity. We cannot ever fully understand why a character does what he does. We can only guess. And I'm guessing that it is this guessing itself what most people experience as depth: the posibility to search a work of fiction for extra meaning inthe open spaces. Just like we do in real life with real persons.

If that is what depth is then I concede that evil for the sake of evil and good for the sake of good is shallow. That's fair. Then I will just have to re-evaluate depth and change my statement from "Reasons are overrated" to "Depth is overrated", and "Purely evil characters / purely good characters are not shallow" to "Purely evil characters / purely good characters are shallow, but compelling regardless".

This seems like a fair reasoning. I can agree to most statements and the last statement to a certain degree.

Amaryl wrote:

Thelos wrote:

"Alas! If I stay to fight in Troy I will die a hero, but if I return home I will live a long unheroic life!"

That's the thing though. that's the struggle. His entire life he was bred for this "destiny", to acquire fame, glory for all eternity. But he does not want that. He doesn't want to die in that scrap of sand and blood called Troy.

That's the tragedy. He wants to live, he wants children, he wants to be a good father, he wants peace, but on the other hand he wants to be a good son also. And sure you can claim that it was his despise of Aggamemnon that stayed his hand, since that's the more open option from the illiad, but I'd disagree.

in here, we have a man, that has such a clash of personality, right there. Do I live and be forgotten, or die and be remembered?

both choices, -SUCK- which makes the conflict in this character so endearing.

not because its his destiny to die so he does that.

It isnt destiny tho, it was a command of the gods. Destiny suggests that from his birth Achilles had this fate where as it was his choices that made that choice be forced on to him.

Lexgrad/Dreth wrote:

It isnt destiny tho, it was a command of the gods. Destiny suggests that from his birth Achilles had this fate where as it was his choices that made that choice be forced on to him.

That's just being pedantic, since the resulting character conflict is exactly the same. and if you read my post you're quoting i'm saying it wasn't achilles destiny from the get go, to die in troy.

I do have some agreement with Thelos here.

It's worth noting that before I write this, I'm all for as much depth and conflict within a character as feasibly possible, I enjoy RP'ing those sort of characters, and I enjoy RP'ing with them.

However, sometimes the good for the sake of being good, and the evil for the sake of being evil characters are fascinating IF they aren't given too much power. Hence my Hatred of Captain America and Superman, A purely good character who isn't too strong is compelling, because they will fail as much if not more than they succeed, I hate purely good chars always winning, it sucks and is bad storytelling and well sucks! Exactly the same with Evil characters with too much power. If they are purely good or evil, tone down their ability so they aren't controlling the world/story with their ideals so much.

I love characters who have so much conflict, or have reasons for everything they do, because that's what I like to do, do I expect everyone else to, not at all, as much as I like them to.

I probably made no sense at all, i usually don't with these things.

It's still a lot more appealing to have a character base his/her moral code, principles and mentality on valid arguments, having reasons to be the way they are or behave/think the way they do. Merely because that's how most people function irl and because most of us can relate better to that than to a vague and seemingly irrational behavior. In addition, a stagnant personality becomes tiring for those having to endure it and probably boring for the one RPing it, since it offers little space for variety in itself. People do change during their lives, their personality is shaped through various factors and so is their morality. It's only natural to have the same happen to a character.

That's not to say that pure good or pure evil characters without such arguments are necessarily a failed concept of a character. But let's face it, the "I am like this because when I was a child..." option for example is a lot more realistic and believable than the "I'm evil/good because I was born like it!" one.