Marry-Sue characters how do you avoid them?

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Akisa
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Marry-Sue characters how do you avoid them?

*note at first I was going to post this in fanfic but it doesn't really fit there as it's mainly for fanfics*

I was creating a fanfic and then it donned on me that my character may be a little Mary-Sueish. I was creating my own gundam setting where newtypes have disappeared when the last known newtypes lost their powers 25 years ago. I created protagonist who is the heiress of the Monarchy or head of state of the Federation (a super power), a coordinator and is a newtype (about as strong as Kamille, but is not the only newtype on either side only the first to manifest on the Federation Side).


But then I thought to myself she may seem Mary-Sue, even though she doesn't start out as the best (the ship's CAG has that position). But she does get better and is eventually become an ace as she struggles with the first captain of the ship and later military willingness to send her to combat for fear of death or capture.

But how do you guys avoid marry sue characters?
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ShadowCell
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Moved to Fanfiction.
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Big B
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It sounds like there's a lot of eggs in the same basket. Having too many cliche bits is going to take a crap on your story.

Also, if you haven't tried it, I think the Fanfic writing resources in the Fanfic section has a link to a Mary-Sue test, if you haven't tried it already.
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ShadowCell
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The Mary Sue test, I should note, is hardly comprehensive. At best it will only give you a ballpark idea of how many of the most common cliches your character falls into.
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Looking at Akisa's set-up, I have to say quite a few warning flags come up. :(

1) Protagonist is immensely powerful, a princess or head of state. This suggests also considerable charismatic pull.

2) Protagonist is all of 1), yet wants to be a pilot in the heat of battle. This suggests she doesn't like "formalities" and wants to do her own part. Down-to-earth, humble, wants to be like everyone else and all that jazz.

3 ) Then it becomes apparent that she will do her own part and more, becoming an ace, struggling against authority and conservative superiors. No one really understands her, except maybe that one special someone?

4) Add to this gnarly super-powers (Coordinator and Newtype, you mean CE+UC superpowers both?).

I'm sorry to say that the odds are stacked against you. You give no apparent weakness, no fault of character, no real vulnerabilities. That doesn't mean she might not have a hard time, but with points 1-4, she is just too good to be true. Ditch some of those preconditions and you might be able to dodge the bullet. Otherwise you will have your work cut out for you. :)
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It helps to introduce flaws/character traits that some people would find to repulsive to feel easy with. Hideous scarring (and when I say hideous, I mean hideous, not sympathetic or bad-ass), a drug addiction, hypocracy, or even phobias/cowardliness. Or just have them do something that friends can never quite forgive them for; turning traitor, suspected of rape, maybe a criminal past (and not just petty crime).
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EinhanderAstraeaMk.I
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I wonder, would writing the initial story in such a way that the mentioned Monarchy is suffering from heavy accusations and losing support to the point that even the young princess is being given negative comments help reduce the Mary-Sue scenario? Maybe by forcing her to hide her identity and starting over as someone else could reduce the problem (it would add some level of 'traitor').

Though maybe one more negative would have to be introduced, such as a scarring event directly involving her to create a phobia ('trusted' friends/family members killing most of family and beating/selling her being the most 'common', completely hated by people she thought were friends due to major incident involving her family, or rape, which I do not recommend if your target audience isn't "T" or "M"). Be careful here though; you don't want to overdo it and result in "Angsty" Sue.

As for the powers of a Newtype Coordinator, it depends on how well you integrate it. If it always becomes the magic 'SEED Mode' that always pulls her rear out of the fire (or pulls too many others out), then it's overdone and would need some rethinking/rewriting if you wish to avoid some elements of the Mary Sue.

For some additional info, you can read it on Wikipedia! Just try for a flexible character with some flaws; if not built-in, a scenario creating one for them could work.


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ShadowCell
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If they deserve all the criticism they're getting, I guess that can work; if they don't, though (or even if they do and you just keep this princess insulated from whatever they did to earn this scorn), then it skates awfully close to being simply another unfair tribulation foisted upon this princess for which we must feel sorry.

Frankly, I think half of a Mary Sue is execution. I don't see why a reasonably diligent and skilled writer should not be able to write a story about a Newtype Coordinator princess who wants to pilot mobile suits and not come out with a Mary Sue. The antidote to Mary Sues is not necessarily flaws in their personalities--the antidote is to write them as believable people, not as stand-ins for the author or a girl you'd date or whatever.
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Areku
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I doubt we could convince you to drop one of those overkill attributes (it can be hard to "cripple" your character in that way), and if not you'd need to add a counterweight to that "awesomeness" (or simply do as ShadowCell describes).

Expanding on one of EinhanderAstraeaMk.I's ideas, perhaps her family's (well intentioned and peaceful/reformist/progressive) policies could be controversial and a source of civil unrest. Like many royal/public children, she yearns for "the normal life", but every time she goes out in public she receives several/many hateful and derisive responses by the common people. Tired of this, she selfishly throws away her responsibilities (if it's a hereditary authority) and abandons her family, even though she knows that what they're doing is the right thing and may even agree with them. She succeeds in blending in with common people, working toward achieving her own dream life in the normal world. But then terrorists, or reactionists in the government, or whatever, kill/assassinate her entire family. This triggers/leads to a civil war, or international war or whatever conflict you had planned, and she's swept up by the events into armed service (she volunteers, but only to preserve her own selfish dream, not out of her family's ideals; I would say she could be a compulsory conscript, but I doubt she'd ever become a pilot that way). As she fights in the war, she sees and experiences horrors that truly open her eyes to her family's ideals, and by the end of the story she's reasserted her inheritance and is fighting for those ideals, possibly even to the extent of becoming the primary leader of her nation at the war's conclusion.

tl;dr: Princess Saji runs away from responsibility for her own sake, is rapidly swept into war a la Amuro (fighting for herself and maybe a few others, nothing more) except through more traditional means, and through the horrors of her world gradually sees the error of her ways and assumes the responsibility she abandoned, like some complicated cross between Camille and Quattro/Char.
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Sorry to be a stick in the mud, but, she's a princess and a coordinator? Wouldn't modifying her genetics go against the whole "chosen bloodline" thing??

Given, it depends on the social atmosphere of your story and that sort of thing. And I guess if you think about it, some royal families would be glad to alter their children if it ensures a successful bloodline descendant. ...And there's that awful issue of inbreeding in royal bloodlines, so I guess introducing genetic variation, even if it is artificial, can be good? Too often in history, a country will be lead by some Incompetent Retard III. It just depends on what you hold sacred in your story, the divine right to rule or the practical uses of genetic modification. It might be a bit complex, but perhaps worth thinking about, or hell, even worth exploring a bit in the narrative.

And about "SEED mode" (a term is dislike so much) I remember hearing that even non-coordinators should be able to use it? If that is true, should it even be necessary for your character to be a coordinator? An interesting slant you can make on this is that the entire Royal Family can be composed of coordinators, but the daughter was born a natural and turns out to be a newtype because of it. That can serve to give her some contrast and some disadvantages compared to everyone else. Sure, she might not have artifical strength, genius, or reflexes, but she has the ability to understand people and predict. And those other things she can build up herself over time. Sound better yet?

She can also go the way of Lowe Gear and be the only real Coordinator in the whole damn universe.... By definition I think Lowe is the only coordinator in CE. But I'm just being mean and argumentative on that point, so no one needs to argue with me on that. I know. =)

I sure hope that helps in some ways. I'm sure others still have more to add, and be sure to ask if anything else comes up. Still, I agree most with Shadowcell. Execution is the hard part, but it's where everything pays off.

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EinhanderAstraeaMk.I
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Really, a Newtype Coordinator can be done if properly executed. But as for Seraphic's idea; how about a reversal? She's a coordinator in looks and genetics, but like Gai's fellow MS pilot who's name escapes me, doesn't really have much else to prove that she's a Coordinator (basically, is a Coordinator in looks and DNA, but a Natural otherwise). It could also work.

But if you really love your character with the Newtype Coordinator Princess aspect, then it'll have to be the setting and situation that would present a flaw/disadvantage for the princess.

As previously stated, it's in the execution and writing that help steer clear of a Mary Sue. Theoretically, you could leave her as is, but the writing involving her and her abilities/ideals must justify them as useful but not overwhelming nor Mary-Sue-ish.
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Areku
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EinhanderAstraeaMk.I wrote:She's a coordinator in looks and genetics, but like Gai's fellow MS pilot who's name escapes me, doesn't really have much else to prove that she's a Coordinator (basically, is a Coordinator in looks and DNA, but a Natural otherwise)
Bwuh? Isn't it the Coordinator DNA that makes a Coordinator a Coordinator?
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ShadowCell
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He's talking about Elijah Kiel, who was technically a Coordinator but possessed absolutely none of the combat skills that supposedly made Coordinators capable of piloting mobile suits.
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Areku
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By combat skills, do you mean Elijah was basically a Natural genetically modified to be handsome and healthy (but nothing like enhanced strength, intelligence, etc), or a full out Coordinator that isn't very coordinated?

The former... I could see that working in this work, depending on the family/politics. If the latter, why bother when she'll obviously be a pilot anyway?
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ShadowCell
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Elijah was formerly a Combat Coordinator, I think, but that's where my knowledge of Elijah Kiel's backstory runs dry. He was a terrible pilot and as the ASTRAY series progressed, he went from terrible to medicore, and only after Kaite Madigan trained him (I think it was Kaite, anyway).

Either way, the Coordinators were supposed to have genius intellects, lightning reflexes, powerful bodies...basically if Lelouch Lamperouge and Suzaku Kururugi did the Fusion Dance. Elijah did not portray anything but the looks.

I don't see why a royal family wouldn't turn to genetic tinkering, though. They can always say that their bloodline is still the same, it's just enhanced.
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Areku
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ShadowCell wrote:Either way, the Coordinators were supposed to have genius intellects, lightning reflexes, powerful bodies...basically if Lelouch Lamperouge and Suzaku Kururugi did the Fusion Dance. Elijah did not portray anything but the looks.
And out of the many Coordinators we saw, how many showed those traits? Lessee... George, Kira, Athrun, Shinn, Rey and Rau (half of whom had SEED and half had "Newtype" abilities), plus a handful of other people that were supposed to be gifted compared to other Coordinators anyway. Unless they were important to the plot, Coordinators didn't seem to have enhanced abilities beyond being able to pilot MS using user-hostile operating systems, and if they're as smart as they're supposed to be you'd think they'd be able to create a user-friendly OS and surpass Natural pilots again, but that never happened. So it sounds like Elijah was a true Coordinator after all, just not one of the main-cast Coordinators.

But, I think that's enough picking on CE's internal inconsistency. :P
Last edited by Areku on Thu Jan 08, 2009 6:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Dark Duel
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ShadowCell wrote:Either way, the Coordinators were supposed to have genius intellects, lightning reflexes, powerful bodies...basically if Lelouch Lamperouge and Suzaku Kururugi did the Fusion Dance. Elijah did not portray anything but the looks.
So in other words, Li Xingke without the illness.
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Areku
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Dark Duel wrote:So in other words, Li Xingke without the illness.
Nah, Li's skills were quickly forgotten, just like the Coordinators'. Otherwise, yes.
Akisa
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The way I originally had it was that the government was looking for ways to replace newtypes by creating artificial humans with excellent skills. However their attempts made no real success. When the first born was diagnosed with a rare genetic illness and soon died the king improved the funding and even offer to experiment in creating their next child so the illness won't happen again and/or returning his son back to life in spirit. After few years of experimentation they succeed in creating a child, but instead of creating a son they accidentally created a daughter. During delivery an unknown and unexplained complication occurred that caused the death of queen soon afterwords.

As result the king is has shun his daughter and treated her like red headed step child and pretended to be loving for the cameras. The king has since remarried and the son who was this born a natural is attempting to replace the protagonist for next in line. (Note the fanfic would take about 4-5 years to go through the war with skipping ahead. Like staying on a base for 2 months or so etc...).

Meanwhile the existence of coordinators has remain top secret but they were unable to duplicate the experiment. So instead the scientist have taken a few of the protagonist's eggs while she was still an infant and artificially matured them and produced genetic descendants whom inherit her coordinator abilities. The scientist have also lately created extender program similar to the Genome soldiers of metal gear solid 1.

When news break out of the coordinator project a similar reaction to what happen in seed happens. The civilians want the coordinators dead while others want coordinator child or turn themselves into coordinators.

In the midst of the huge war between two enemy sides the coordinators break off the federation claiming to be next step in human evolution not the newtypes which the Colonial Army of Zodiac (the original enemy) believes. The protagonist must then choose between remaining with federation or joining this off shoot branch and possibly fight her friends.
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The whole back story seems to have a fair amount of holes in it.

The rich and powerful don't usually experiment on their own. Sometimes it happens, but the usual idea is that the men with the money will work their way through the lower class--people that "no one cares about"--in search of guinea pigs. Granted, there's nothing wrong with going against storytelling conventions, but it might remove the protagonist's claim to the throne, which seems superfluous.

Furthemore, if all this research is going into creating the perfect child, you would think manipulating the gender would be a trifle compared to the enhancement and the removal of the genetic defect. It seems like something of a non-sequitur to succeed in all those fields and fail in that one. It's a designer baby project. Sex seems like one of the first things you would get out of the way.

You also mention that some people react to the Coordinator news by desiring to be made into Coordiantors themselves. That really wouldn't work. You're born with preprogrammed genes or you're not. At best, you might be able to mutate yourself with a retrovirus, but that's leaving the realm of "Coordinator" and delving into something closer to "Zoanoid," the hideous monsters of the Guyver franchise.

Really, though, the idea of a Coordinator-Newtype doesn't jive. Coordinators are engineered. Newtypes are evolved. They're at odds with one another. One is natural, while the other is a product of Man.
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