#evalkyrie

How did your characters guardian(s) parent them? How did this affect their personality? It's important to think of a characters guardian as a real person- even if the character themselves has a flat view of their parents. Parents that lie to their kids produce kids that don't understand the weight of lying, parents that give their kids everything often produce kids who don't understand the true value of things, parents that rely on materialism produce kids who do not understand the importance or idea of sentimentality. And so on. It's a common trope to give a character an orphaned childhood- this shouldn't X this trait, a mentor, a close friend, a surrogate parent, these people can all influence a characters ideas of wealth, human connection, morality, friendship, etc.

How does your character want to be perceived? Why do they feel it is so important to become that person? Many people give their character a "role model"- an idol that they build themselves off of, but I feel what's more important is what kind of person do they think they OUGHT to be? If a character wanted to be perceived as a cool loner type person it might mean that they feel that they are fundamentally unlikable personality wise so they rely on people to be intrigued by their mysterious energy, is this persona a way to encourage people to ask them about themselves first? So that they don't feel that they've "trapped" a person into a friendship?

Doing something bad is maybe the most important character trait for me. Everyone has done something horrible in their life. Something they regret- or maybe don't. But almost everyone has something reprehensible. And this is the thing- many people include something that their character feels is their fault but really isn't (like an accidental death or a family separation). Which is fine but in character building it's really just angst without any substance. If you wanna make something REALLY interesting- a character should do something (really) bad. This doesn't mean they are a bad person now- absolutely not- a good character will grow from a mistake and will live to repent it. But it means that their company might not feel the same. Did your character kill a family pet out of curiosity? Did your character bully someone for social status? Did your character destroy something important for attention? It can be any number of things- but it's gotta be something that they genuinely shouldn't have done. It means that their guilt is REAL, their morality IS a question. No matter how many years go by- your character may wonder "why did i do that? am i still that person?"