31 Days of NaNoPrepMo: Day 16

Day 16: What character traits or talents will help your protagonist achieve their goals?

Your Protagonist. You know what your main character wants, now ask yourself what are the character’s strengths—the positive modifiers to their skill checks/dice rolls, if you will:

• What skills does the protagonist have in their arsenal that will help them accomplish their goal?
• Consider physical as well as emotional strengths: do they have excellent reflexes or impressive strength?
• What sorts of people skills or coping mechanisms do they already do well?
• Do they have any superpowers or magical spells?
• What are the limitations on their strengths, or exceptions to their powers?

Action Plan: Compile a list of traits and talents that will help your protagonist achieve their goals. For each trait or talent, consider how the protagonist learned or developed them in the first place. Consider also how you’ll convey those strengths to the readers in prose (SHOW! don’t tell), and how applying those skills will affect the outcome of the plot. Is the trait something you’ll want to illustrate early on in the story, to foreshadow its application later? Or is it a something the character will have to hone or practice as part of the story in order to address the obstacles between them and their goal?