Why a hero without flaws may well be a better character for a game than the one you are creating

[Celebrim]

I recently got into a discussion about how you would go about writing interesting episodes and story arcs for CW’s Flash series, and it has clarified for me something I’ve long thought but never quite had the words to explain clearly.

The Flash is an early Silver Age hero and like many of the early Silver Age heroes, Barry in his iconic presentation is a pure paragon. He has absolutely no flaws. In fact, in many ways, he’s a more purely paragon character than even Superman. Barry isn’t conflicted about anything. He has no secret vices. He has no real angst. He’s not emo. He’s not dark. He’s not an outsider. He's not burdened by feelings of isolation. He's not uptight about anything. He's not a hypocrite. People relate to him. People like him. He likes people. Heck, Barry is so likeable, sincere, and respectful of others, often even his enemies like him. Superman has at least the internal conflict between his various identities as Superman, the Last Son of Krypton, and Clark Kent. He’s isolated by the fact he is an alien living among us, and it’s an isolation he often deeply feels as he tries to connect with humanity. Barry has none of these problems. If he ever dwells on the fact that he now lives a million lives for every one life lived by normal people around him, he never shows it. And if he did, I think if you were true to the character, Barry would approach the problem with good humor, grace, and gratitude for his situation. That’s just who he is.

This however presents a problem, or what I think actually isn’t a problem but which appears to be a problem at first glance. It’s become received wisdom that a hero is more interesting if he has flaws and internal conflicts to overcome that matter as much or more than the external conflicts he faces. The most successful current models of “How to make a modern Superhero drama” rely on the classic stable of anti-heroes. The Avengers for example in their modern incarnation are all about that. Iron Man/Tony Stark and The Hulk/Bruce Banner and even Batman/Bruce Wayne are characters that are often as much about exploring and walking the fine line between hero and villain as they are about overcoming the external threat. They explore the idea that evil has to first be confronted as a problem within, before you can hope to overcome it without. And that’s a good thing, and it can make for great story when handled well. CW’s other DC product – Arrow – presents Green Arrow in this classic mold.

But, that’s not really what The Flash is about, and even if you could move Barry into that model it would not only be a betrayal of his character but more importantly it would be redundant. We are already well exploring that ground. If you follow that conventional wisdom, you’ll end up with Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, Barry Allen, Tony Stark, Bruce Banner and every other character being pretty much exactly the same. Not only would this be dull, but it doesn’t explore the full palette of story possibilities. It would be like having all these varied colors and insisting that every painting is better when it’s done solely in various shades of gray.

There is a totally different approach available here, and it’s the one we see increasingly adopted over the course of the Silver Age story arcs. And that is, allow the Hero’s villains and foils to be the characters that carry the weight of being conflicted, highly troubled, dangerous, deeply flawed but often highly sympathetic characters. By having your Hero be such a high paragon, it opens up a range of depth to your villains that you don’t otherwise have. If your hero is highly troubled and living in morally gray areas, the only villains that are available to you in the storyline are for the most part one dimensional psychopaths that have write out killing babies and stomping on puppies to ensure that they stand in contrast to the hero. For example, this is probably why a character like the Joker has evolved from a capricious clown prince of crime in the Silver era, to the ultimate embodiment of evil who “just wants to watch the world burn” in more modern times. There is nothing wrong with having characters like that, but if there is nothing wrong with having characters like that then to at least an equal extent there is nothing wrong with having characters that well represent the better angels of our nature and exploring that.

If you look at the canon of Silver Age Flash, before they so messed up Barry’s life in the 1980’s that they had to kill off the character and then reboot the series, the real emotional weight of the story is carried by the victims. And what we see of the Flash is his often failing attempts to reform, heal and restore the stumbling hurting world around him. And the thing is, despite being seemingly ‘one dimensional’, The Flash isn’t actually diminished in any way by that. He suffers and he has hardship along with everyone else, it’s just that – because he’s legitimately a hero – he’s suffering on behalf of everyone else. It’s not suffering that leads him to wallow in his own problems. He tries to rise to the occasion. He tries to be the guy who can be there for everybody, because – that’s what his super power lets him do. If Barry could be summed up in one statement, it’s “He’s always there for you.”

And it’s that focus on his basic goodness that is the real strength of the character and why to a certain extent, he’s the stable core of the Justice League – and not the more famous Superman or Batman.

In RPGs, I see this untested assumption being made all the time. Every player I meet believes that he’s doing something deeper, more difficult, more original, more real, more mature, and more sophisticated and skilled if he portrays his hero as being this troubled and deeply flawed individual. But as a DM, I’m not just not usually seeing it pay any dividends. Deeply flawed individuals aren’t anything special. They are just ordinary. And while it’s interesting to explore the ordinary person as hero, with absolutely no one actually explore the Heroic and everyone focused on anti-heroes, not only does it get rather dull and one dimensional, but the range of characters I find I can have as villains is diminished as well. I find in my current campaign for example, that I’m not entirely sure as a ‘reader’ of the material the group is producing, whether I’m not actually more sympathetic to my villains than my heroes. To a certain extent, I’m finding that while there is often a lot of physical conflict between the factions, there isn’t a lot of intellectual conflict because fundamentally, the ‘heroes’ and the ‘villains’ have nothing to disagree over and little to distinguish them in behavior. The depth that could be there just isn’t.

So, I’m writing this essay to encourage players to go out and try something new – actually be a real hero. Try to create someone who doesn’t have flaws, and I’m betting you’ll find it’s a far more difficult exercise of your skill than creating one that has them in abundance.

 

[Janx]

I've never read any Flash comics, but I did watch a good chunk of the Justice League cartoon. In there, they seemed to protray the Flash as a bit to quick to react. Basically he'd act before thinking (because he's so quick), and that would get him in trouble.

Was that ever a trait in the Silver Age?

From a player's perspective, I've played one or two PCs that were deliberately flawed, angsty or dark. But I wouldn't say they were unstable personalities. Merely that I made them to have a flaw that might come up in play (ex. quick to anger).

For me, the point was to have a character that WAS different from my other characters. I don't want to play a new version of the same character from the last campaign. So playing a flawed character was just one variable I tried on a few PCs, though I tried to make the flaw different in those cases.

From a practical standpoint of game play, I am wary of making a truly flawed or debilitated character. Part of that is my own mindset. I am better at nearly every thing than somebody who sucks at a given thing. Except Horse Shoes. I suck at that. So even in Brain Surgery, where I have zero training or experience, I am probably better at it than a guy who totally sucks at it because I have pretty good hand-eye coordination and a really good ability to visualize and learn things. Note: see a real doctor before letting me do Brain Surgery on you, but if it's the Zombie Apocalypse and you have a bullet lodged in your noggin, let me get it out, not Bubba.

This mindset (and skillset) come into play with my characters. That doesn't mean my PC is going to be awesome at spell casting and weapons and thus my Wizard will outshine the Fighter, but it does mean that I will find a way that my lack of skills in an area won't be a problem.

The point then, is that I agree with Celebrim. I don't need to make a flawed or sucky character. Personality or ability-wise. In fact, that gets old. I'd rather make an effective character (though I'm not a Char Ops guy) and make sure he has an interesting personality thats different from the other PCs I've played.

 

[Umbran]

So, I’m writing this essay to encourage players to go out and try something new – actually be a real hero.

I'll put some thoughts, but they may not be in the order of your initial presentation...

The first thing I'll challenge is the idea that the perfect, unflawed character is the "real" hero. Ultimately, heroism isn't about your flaws, or lack thereof, but in the willingness to sacrifice and risk for sake of others. But I note the logical inconsistency - you note that people with flaws are ordinary, and therefore real. Truly unflawed people are not ordinary, rare to the point of nigh-unreality. How is this unflawed person more a "real" hero than one with flaws? Are they, by definition, more unreal?

There is a totally different approach available here, and it’s the one we see increasingly adopted over the course of the Silver Age story arcs. And that is, allow the Hero’s villains and foils to be the characters that carry the weight of being conflicted, highly troubled, dangerous, deeply flawed but often highly sympathetic characters. By having your Hero be such a high paragon, it opens up a range of depth to your villains that you don’t otherwise have.

And this is where we get to an issue, the difference between a comic or dramatic presentation, and a role playing game.

In the comics, or dramatic presentation, we have the author/actors and an audience, as separate entities. One creates content for the other to consume. This means the author can put the grey areas, emotional depth and complexity anywhere he or she likes, so long as it shows up somewhere.

The roles in an RPG are quite different. Everyone produces content for everyone else. Shoving the moral greys, and emotional or psychological complexities onto the NPCs and antagonists puts the burden for producing all that content on one participant - the GM. But, have you noted that typically each player has one character to worry about, while the GM has... everyone else? The GM's ability to concentrate and do a good job depicting the complexity is thus dwarfed by that of the players. If you want a *good* job of depicting those aspects of the world, the more of it you lump on one person, the lower the quality of the presentation is apt to be.

Moreover, maybe your players are different, but mine are not at the table to watch me wax rhapsodic in soliloquies by the NPCs to show their issues and suffering. Broadly, they are there to get *their* spotlights. As a GM, I should be taking only enough spotlight to set up the players for their turns, and no more. Nuance, greys, and complexity take screen time to depict. I want the players to have as much of that as possible.

And while it’s interesting to explore the ordinary person as hero, with absolutely no one actually explore the Heroic and everyone focused on anti-heroes, not only does it get rather dull and one dimensional, but the range of characters I find I can have as villains is diminished as well.

Hold on a second. Here's a problem. "Flawed person" does not equate to "anti-hero".

An anti-hero is a character that lacks specifically heroic qualities, like bravery, morality, or idealism. But there are a whole range of flaws a person can have that do not impinge upon those - you can be moral, brave, idealistic, and a sanctimonious boor all at the same time, for example.

More importantly, morality, idealism, and bravery and the other heroic traits are things demonstrated by testing - the anti-hero fails the moral tests, the hero succeeds. Having a flaw does not mean you have failed the test - it means that you have to work harder to pass! For the unflawed character, the perfect person, questions of their bravery, or the correctness of their choices are pretty much a done deal. The only remaining questions are whether they are physically adept and smart enough. This character thus represents the bare minimum of work required to pass a given challenge.

I find in my current campaign for example, that I’m not entirely sure as a ‘reader’ of the material the group is producing, whether I’m not actually more sympathetic to my villains than my heroes.

*shrug* Anecdotal. In a recent Star Wars game I played in, all the characters had significant flaws. All young Jedi - one was a barely reformed Sith that had to be restrained from excessive violence, one was cloistered, naive and oversimplified moral questions to the point of error, another arrogant, yet another bore the psychological scars of slavery, and the last was weak in the Force and thus feared inadequacy. But there was never a question of who were the good guys, and who were the bad guys, who you would root for in the movie of their adventures. For all our flaws and difficulties and internal strife, we weren't the ones trying to subjugate the galaxy!

Thus, I have to question whether the situation you describe is because the players in your game have created flawed characters, so much as maybe that while they want to be the main characters, they just don't want to be as heroic as you think.

Try to create someone who doesn’t have flaws, and I’m betting you’ll find it’s a far more difficult exercise of your skill than creating one that has them in abundance.

Non sequitur. Does not follow.

While I am not advocating for every PC to be a tortured soul best represented by taking the game system's upper limit of flaws in emotional or psychological disadvantages, absolutely nothing in your discussion above suggests that making a character without flaws will be terribly difficult for the player. You go on at length about how you feel it might be superior, but you show not a single instance of how it is any extra effort, or requires superior skill on the player's part to do so.

What you do say implies that it puts more work for the whole experience on the GM.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Actually, he DID have flaws. For example, he was always running late- no pun intended- in his civilian life & job before he gained his powers. This trait continued even afterwards. Someone who is perpetually late is often either a poor manager of time, using his tardiness as a means of psychological manipulating of others, or both.

And if you look closely, a lot of Silver and Golden age heroes had flaws that were simply not seen that way when they were initially created. Hal Jordan, the Green Lantern, routinely called his Asian buddy Thomas Kalmaku by a racist name until he was told not to in the 1980s.

Going further afield, Sherlock Homes had an addiction, and Hercule Poirot had some mild form of OCD (he once surprised a dinner gathering by refusing to eat a meal that was presented on an untidily arranged plate).

 

[Janx]

Umbran makes good points too.

I agree that generally, it's pretty obvious who the bad guys are and who the good guys are. I've never watched a Batman movie and thought "Bruce Wayne is the villain" despite what some moron in City Hall is saying to the press. Such instances are a caricature of the idiot bureaucrat impeding the solution to a problem because it didn't go through proper channels. That's like a hot button for Americans.

I'd quibble over the definition of hero. For a normal person, the one person who rushes into a burning building to rescue a kid is a Hero. He gets a parade and a round of trips to various talk shows. It is generally a one time deal.

For a Super Hero (or PC in an RPG), this is their job. It's not a one time thing. It's not even always a risk or sacrifice. But they still get called Heroes. I don't think you can declassify The Flash in perfect form as not a hero when he stops a purse snatcher, even though he himself wasn't in any real danger. Fact is, he took the time to help. He chose to help, instead of pursue other activities, unlike the 10 other people on that street who stopped to record a YouTube video instead. These types of characters are a different type of hero than the guy who landed a plane in the East River, as such the qualifications for the designation are different.

I do think, that at various points, the Super Hero trope requires a test of Risk or Sacrifice. For a "perfect" hero, that means the GM/writer comes up with something that overrides the "perfect" trait. But in the same time, just because his normal routine rescue antics are "easy' doesn't make him less a Hero.

 

[Janx]

Actually, he DID have flaws. For example, he was always running late- no pun intended- in his civilian life & job before he gained his powers. This trait continued even afterwards. Someone who is perpetually late is often either a poor manager of time, using his tardiness as a means of psychological manipulating of others, or both.

And if you look closely, a lot of Silver and Golden age heroes had flaws that were simply not seen that way when they were initially created. Hal Jordan, the Green Lantern, routinely called his Asian buddy Thomas Kalmaku by a racist name until he was told not to in the 1980s.

Going further afield, Sherlock Homes had an addiction, and Hercule Poirot had some mild form of OCD (he once surprised a dinner gathering by refusing to eat a meal that was presented on an untidily arranged plate).

that strikes me as the kind of thing Stan Lee would saddle a Hero with. Especially if it fits in the super power. A guy who has "all the time in the world" yet is always late in his real life.

It certainly seems an old trope that every hero has an Achilles Heel.

I wonder where the idea for that came from.

 

[Campbell]

I don't consider deeply flawed characters necessary, but internal conflict is something I highly value. The value of fiction, particularly participative fiction is that it provides a vehicle for us to reflect on our own values. It's a uniquely human endeavor. I don't really value fiction that is purely procedural. That being said I don't think you need deeply flawed characters for internal conflict. My favorite Superman stories are those in which he struggles with how much influence he should have on the wider world.

I just recently watched the entire run of Carnivale on Amazon Prime Instant Video and I think it provides a stellar example of a character who deals with inner conflict because of how noble he is rather than deep seated flaws. The show's lead character, Ben Hawkins, is thoroughly heroic and willing to pay the ultimate price for the people he cares about, but he spends much of the entire show denying his destiny and powers. He denies them not because he is a coward, but because of the price involved - he possess the ability to heal, but most hurt others in order to do so.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

Celebrim makes some good points. A related point is that a lot of people seem to think playing a flawed hero is "deeper" because it's more challenging. Not actually true at all. Trying to really be a totally good guy is a lot harder than playing a guy with a dominant flaw. The latter just has to think about doing the right thing, while the former has to deal with what is the best thing.

To me the rise of the flawed hero in modern literature seems to derive with society's discomfort with virtue. When someone realizes that there are truly good people out there then they can no longer believe that they're a louse because they just can't help it and it's human nature. It's far less work to convince oneself that virtue is impossible than it is to try to be virtuous.

 

[Janx]

Celebrim makes some good points. A related point is that a lot of people seem to think playing a flawed hero is "deeper" because it's more challenging. Not actually true at all. Trying to really be a totally good guy is a lot harder than playing a guy with a dominant flaw. The latter just has to think about doing the right thing, while the former has to deal with what is the best thing.

To me the rise of the flawed hero in modern literature seems to derive with society's discomfort with virtue. When someone realizes that there are truly good people out there then they can no longer believe that they're a louse because they just can't help it and it's human nature. It's far less work to convince oneself that virtue is impossible than it is to try to be virtuous.

Your example of the "totally good guy" reminds me of one way I look at roleplaying a character.

When I make a PC, I am creating artificial limits on what my PC. So when I say "he's a good guy", I am saying what he will do, but also what he won't do.

So being all Good isn't a flaw, but it does introduce a restriction. I can't burn down an orphanage of innocent children. Which for the most part won't come up in play. But by defining it, there are eventually going to be a situation that make me have to decide if I want to break character and do the "smart" thing. Or stick to my character's determined ethics. or have the character change. Or come up with away to work with the situation while not compromising the character.

That choice doesn't even exist for a PC that's got no definition and is just a game piece on the board.