Mary Sue of Doom!
Feb. 1st, 2005 03:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethThoughts on high level characters and how tricky it becomes to write for mixed level parties, specially if one of them is Willow. And also stuff about how some plot devices are problematically powerful, even in the hands of NPCs.
I have been thinking about my endless Mary Sue getting to sleep story (Of Doom!). It is Mary Sue partly because it is me, me, me running around in all my favourite stories, but by this point it is also because my story-me can do EVERYTHING. Levitation, lightning bolts, the other week I dreamed heat vision. Tons of powers. And I don't just write this while trying to get to sleep, I dream bits too. But the fun part is that my dream me develops - like, I can levitate in dreams. I didn't used to be able to but I have got the hang of it now. And it used to be I could call the lightning but not control it- kind of like a Quickening without killing anyone. But now dream-me gets to throw lightning bolts around, and if I roll a crit success make electronic devices dance to my tune.
When I invent characters to write about them, I tend to add them up as GURPS characters first. Some stories are fairly high points campaigns, and most fic has a variety of levels of character (Xander the sidekick is not the same level as a Slayer). This isn't a problem for the storytelling though because it is easy to get something for everyone to do when you are being all the parts.
So I've figured out why my Mary Sue Of Doom dreams are so uber powered these days- I've been playing the same character for 27 years, of course she's racked up the XP by now.
Thing is, if I want to write her, it gets really difficult. It is the usual high point campaign problem- what is an adequate challenge once you have a character that can wipe the floor with every monster in the DMG, even if you throw them all at it at once?
Buffy, despite being a really high points character, remains fun to play/watch because there is always sufficient challenge. Even a single vampire can still kill her if she crit-fails. If she is outnumbered she can be in really big trouble, even without introducing especially nasty new demons.
Willow, by the end of the series, is a whole other problem to write for. Her power levels are insanely high, with the point cost limited by that 'insane' modifier- she has a chance of going nuts if she uses the really cool stuff. But by the last episode of season 7 she seems to have bought that off. If so, that leaves her one of the most powerful people on the planet, able to alter reality to suit her whim (see what she did to the Bronze with Amy), and bring people back from the brink of death (Buffy, removing the bullet). It gets really, really difficult to come up with opponents of sufficiently high level to challenge her. Especially if this remains a mixed level game - anything that can challenge Willow can obliterate Xander or Dawn.
You would have to invent reasons why the new level doesn't mess with the humans, or even the champions. I mean even with existing Angel canon, it gets difficult to see why anyone can successfully fight back. There are guys working for W&H that can rewrite memory so completely you have a new person in that old body. They can give memories that make it impossible to live with yourself - like that politician they made think was a paedophile. Or they can wipe out all knowledge of The Good Fight. Connor would not have survived without Wesley's intervention, which makes for a great story, but leaves one with the question of *why* a bad guy wouldn't just do that to any and everyone that opposes them. We know with Angel, because he is written up in prophecy but so obscurely everyone is scared they'll screw it up and tip the scales to the other side. But why with everyone else? Or do they actually do that - is that why the Sunnydale Denial syndrome is so strong, and no one believes in demons despite there being easily available evidence? Then maybe some families are immune to such magic- Watcher bloodlines. Or random mutants. Except that doesn't quite fit the available evidence, because Cordelia goes from one camp to the other in the face of extreme and repeated strangeness.
To write Willow adventures I think I'd have to go to In Nomine and start inventing some Higher Powers, then have Willow play on that level. She is far too much the big fish for the human pond, send her to play with the gods and demons where she is still just a minnow. Trouble then becomes that Xander et al cannot play on that level at all. They would keep her grounded in humanity, be essential to the character level, but at the plot level? End of season six pretty much plays out what they can do for the plot.
Willow would also be kind of self regulating - she isn't going to wave her wand and make everyone happy, because she can learn from previous mistakes (probably. Or she could do a Charmed. Depends if you want to write her screwing up a lot or being a hero). But why wouldn't she do some big magic to, for instance, dump all vampires through a portal into a hell dimension, much as seems to have been done to ubervamps back in the day? The only reason I can think of is that it would short circuit the story. And, yeah, you could say that she isn't powerful enough, but if you combine a locator spell, a teleportation spell, and any part of the world with sunlight, you have instant vamp removal. We've seen her locate and teleport before. The rest would just take time.
So, reasons I don't write Willow - she is like the Star Trek transporters, too powerful. Her mere existence makes it rather difficult to back any character she knows into a corner.
Rather like if omniscient!Cordy was allowed to interact with her old friends - if she can see everything that is going on then she can sidestep the discovery process and just tell them exactly what to do.
Then you get the problem with the uber-powerful minority doing all the thinking and the rest of everyone being left to be babies. There is story mileage in that, but only very little. And also, Jasmine. The eating people was not the big problem.
Okay, that rambles. I'll post it and go away again.
I have been thinking about my endless Mary Sue getting to sleep story (Of Doom!). It is Mary Sue partly because it is me, me, me running around in all my favourite stories, but by this point it is also because my story-me can do EVERYTHING. Levitation, lightning bolts, the other week I dreamed heat vision. Tons of powers. And I don't just write this while trying to get to sleep, I dream bits too. But the fun part is that my dream me develops - like, I can levitate in dreams. I didn't used to be able to but I have got the hang of it now. And it used to be I could call the lightning but not control it- kind of like a Quickening without killing anyone. But now dream-me gets to throw lightning bolts around, and if I roll a crit success make electronic devices dance to my tune.
When I invent characters to write about them, I tend to add them up as GURPS characters first. Some stories are fairly high points campaigns, and most fic has a variety of levels of character (Xander the sidekick is not the same level as a Slayer). This isn't a problem for the storytelling though because it is easy to get something for everyone to do when you are being all the parts.
So I've figured out why my Mary Sue Of Doom dreams are so uber powered these days- I've been playing the same character for 27 years, of course she's racked up the XP by now.
Thing is, if I want to write her, it gets really difficult. It is the usual high point campaign problem- what is an adequate challenge once you have a character that can wipe the floor with every monster in the DMG, even if you throw them all at it at once?
Buffy, despite being a really high points character, remains fun to play/watch because there is always sufficient challenge. Even a single vampire can still kill her if she crit-fails. If she is outnumbered she can be in really big trouble, even without introducing especially nasty new demons.
Willow, by the end of the series, is a whole other problem to write for. Her power levels are insanely high, with the point cost limited by that 'insane' modifier- she has a chance of going nuts if she uses the really cool stuff. But by the last episode of season 7 she seems to have bought that off. If so, that leaves her one of the most powerful people on the planet, able to alter reality to suit her whim (see what she did to the Bronze with Amy), and bring people back from the brink of death (Buffy, removing the bullet). It gets really, really difficult to come up with opponents of sufficiently high level to challenge her. Especially if this remains a mixed level game - anything that can challenge Willow can obliterate Xander or Dawn.
You would have to invent reasons why the new level doesn't mess with the humans, or even the champions. I mean even with existing Angel canon, it gets difficult to see why anyone can successfully fight back. There are guys working for W&H that can rewrite memory so completely you have a new person in that old body. They can give memories that make it impossible to live with yourself - like that politician they made think was a paedophile. Or they can wipe out all knowledge of The Good Fight. Connor would not have survived without Wesley's intervention, which makes for a great story, but leaves one with the question of *why* a bad guy wouldn't just do that to any and everyone that opposes them. We know with Angel, because he is written up in prophecy but so obscurely everyone is scared they'll screw it up and tip the scales to the other side. But why with everyone else? Or do they actually do that - is that why the Sunnydale Denial syndrome is so strong, and no one believes in demons despite there being easily available evidence? Then maybe some families are immune to such magic- Watcher bloodlines. Or random mutants. Except that doesn't quite fit the available evidence, because Cordelia goes from one camp to the other in the face of extreme and repeated strangeness.
To write Willow adventures I think I'd have to go to In Nomine and start inventing some Higher Powers, then have Willow play on that level. She is far too much the big fish for the human pond, send her to play with the gods and demons where she is still just a minnow. Trouble then becomes that Xander et al cannot play on that level at all. They would keep her grounded in humanity, be essential to the character level, but at the plot level? End of season six pretty much plays out what they can do for the plot.
Willow would also be kind of self regulating - she isn't going to wave her wand and make everyone happy, because she can learn from previous mistakes (probably. Or she could do a Charmed. Depends if you want to write her screwing up a lot or being a hero). But why wouldn't she do some big magic to, for instance, dump all vampires through a portal into a hell dimension, much as seems to have been done to ubervamps back in the day? The only reason I can think of is that it would short circuit the story. And, yeah, you could say that she isn't powerful enough, but if you combine a locator spell, a teleportation spell, and any part of the world with sunlight, you have instant vamp removal. We've seen her locate and teleport before. The rest would just take time.
So, reasons I don't write Willow - she is like the Star Trek transporters, too powerful. Her mere existence makes it rather difficult to back any character she knows into a corner.
Rather like if omniscient!Cordy was allowed to interact with her old friends - if she can see everything that is going on then she can sidestep the discovery process and just tell them exactly what to do.
Then you get the problem with the uber-powerful minority doing all the thinking and the rest of everyone being left to be babies. There is story mileage in that, but only very little. And also, Jasmine. The eating people was not the big problem.
Okay, that rambles. I'll post it and go away again.