Does anyone have advice on writing a good Guile Hero? I'm worried that the rest of the characters will wind up with Idiot Balls.
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For me, my protagonist becomes a Guile Hero through character development, which can make for a more interesting character as well as help you get used to writing them so that, when they do pull of something spectacular, it is more believable and enjoyable.
The way I see it, a good Guile Hero can see other people's weaknesses and exploit or appeal to them to achieve their own goals. No matter how smart, capable, or invincible a person seems they have their own vulnerabilities, and giving characters these make them better-rounded and more enjoyable to write and read.
"They have no excuse to be dumb, the library is open to everyone."
Sorcerer in training
"Jacob straddles the line between this and Magnificent Bastard. While he is generally considered a good guy and the father of the Hebrew people, he was also a crafty con man who managed to trick his eldest brother Esau out of his birthright and father's blessing,"
Esau exchanged his birthright for one meal of soup and bread, because he was hungry right then. Jacob was sort of clever for asking that price, but Esau was a moron for accepting it. The rest applies, however.
Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving. -Terry Pratchett
Probably not a Guile Hero: not heroic.
- Odin is perfectly willing to con, lie, cheat, steal, and do whatever is necessary for the purpose of delaying or averting Ragnarok.
- Your Milage May Vary, specially considering that the notion he is "good" is a fairly recent interpretation, seeing as even the Norsemen considered him a sadistic backstabber.
- Perhaps AntiHero is a fitting description. He has delayed the final battle between the Gods and Giants after all...
Similarly, God (as in, the Judeo-Christian one) has been removed. Not for moral reasons (do I look like I want a flame war?) but because he A) has infinite power and B) tends to more generally deal with things via floods and fire. And plague. And just death. Lots and lots and lots of death. Not very big on the subtle.
There's a redundancy in paragraph 4 and the last line. I would probably remove the reference in paragraph 4.
Probably not an example:
- Jacob from Lost.
- Does he really qualify? He's not unambiguously good. LOTS of people get hurt because of his plans. And he doesn't seem to feel that badly about it. I mean, he "brought" everyone to the island, therefore in some way causing 815 to crash, which killed a ton of people. Not to mention the people who died on-island after the crash. If Jacob hadn't brought them there, they would have gone on living their normal lives.
Removed this example:
This tells me nothing about why the PC is a Guile Hero. Assuming it's correct in the first place; I've barely played NetHack but you choose your class from options like a hapless tourist, who could count, to a brutish caveman. Unless this is some kind of meta-example and the player at the keyboard has to be a Guile Hero to beat the game?
"But don't give up hope. Everyone is cured sooner or later. In the end we shall shoot you." - O'Brien, 1984