{"id":6833,"date":"2012-01-17T14:30:10","date_gmt":"2012-01-17T19:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/?p=6833"},"modified":"2012-01-17T14:45:30","modified_gmt":"2012-01-17T19:45:30","slug":"trope-tuesday-character-alignment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/trope-tuesday-character-alignment\/","title":{"rendered":"Trope Tuesday: Character Alignment"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Alternate versions put 20th Century Fox in the Lawful Evil slot.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I love personality tests. \u00a0There’s something immensely satisfying about putting yourself on a grid that tells you something new and insightful about yourself and the people around you. \u00a0My personal favorite is the Meyers-Briggs<\/a> test (I’m an ENTP<\/a>), but I like playing around with others as well.<\/p>\n

Character alignment<\/a> is what you get when you combine fictional characters with the role they’re supposed to play in the story. \u00a0It’s a way to categorize the different ways they react to problems and ethical dilemmas, and to see which are inclined to be enemies and \u00a0which are inclined to be allies.<\/p>\n

These systems initially arose out of RPG systems like Dungeons and Dragons, which use numbers, charts, and statistics to turn a story into a playable game. \u00a0There are many different kinds of alignments, but the most well-known is probably the one used by D&D, which charts characters along a good-evil axis and a lawful-chaotic axis. \u00a0In practice, the result looks a little like this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Of course, that’s a very simplified version. \u00a0The tvtropes page goes into much greater depth, but I’ve personally found that this page right here<\/a> does a much better job explaining the concepts behind the chart.<\/p>\n

The horizontal axis, law vs. chaos, describes how much the character values order and authority vs. their own independence and freedom. \u00a0Lawful characters value honor and obedience, while chaotic characters value innovation and rebelliousness. \u00a0Characters who are neutral with regards to law and chaos generally respect authority, but put their own interests first and go against the established norms when that’s the best way to further their own ends.<\/p>\n

The vertical axis, good vs. evil, describes how well (or poorly) characters tend to treat other people. \u00a0Good characters are altruistic and make sacrifices to protect the defenseless, whereas evil characters will kill, rob, or torture the innocent simply for the evulz<\/a>. \u00a0Characters who are neutral with regards to good and evil don’t like to hurt others, but are not above pursuing questionable means to achieve their own goals.<\/p>\n

Put together, the alignments create a 9-square chart, like the one at the top of the post. \u00a0While it’s certainly not obligatory to fill every slot, doing so can add a greater degree of depth to your story, as it certainly did with Firefly.<\/p>\n

As with any formula, however, there is danger in holding too closely to the chart and becoming inflexible. \u00a0In real life, people switch alignments all the time, just as personalities can change and evolve (in high school, for example, I was an INTP). \u00a0Not only that, but some characters even fulfill all<\/em>\u00a0the possible roles, depending on the incarnation and the story.<\/p>\n

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Because I'm BATMAN!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The point is, character alignment is just a tool, not a hard-and-fast rule that needs to be used with every story. \u00a0If it’s a helpful way to think about your characters and set them up with interesting conflicts, great. \u00a0If not, don’t sweat it; Homer and Shakespeare were telling great stories long before this chart.<\/p>\n

I’m going to be going overseas soon, so I expect my internet access is going to be spotty for the next couple of months. \u00a0Because of that, I’m going to write up a bunch of Trope Tuesday posts on each of the nine alignments and schedule them to post automatically. \u00a0So stay tuned for more!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I love personality tests. \u00a0There’s something immensely satisfying about putting yourself on a grid that tells you something new and insightful about yourself and the people around you. \u00a0My personal favorite is the Meyers-Briggs test (I’m an ENTP), but I like playing around with others as well. Character alignment is what you get when you… Continue reading Trope Tuesday: Character Alignment<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[687,112,111,688,458,686,73,685,344,641,565,626,689],"class_list":["post-6833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-batman","tag-character","tag-ethical-dilemmas","tag-firefly","tag-good-and-evil","tag-order-and-chaos","tag-planning","tag-personality-tests","tag-rpgs","tag-trope-tuesday","tag-tropes-and-cliches","tag-tvtropes","tag-writing-formulas","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iXK-1Md","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6833","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6833"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6833\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6839,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6833\/revisions\/6839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}