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This newsletter is for everyone who enjoys the magic and mystery of a good Fantasy, be it Tolkien, Jordan, Rowling, or a host of others. I will also be attempting to give some time to other types of fantasy, as written by the likes of Asimov, Wilson, Clarke and a galaxy of talent.
I hope to present some information that will be useful to other fantasy authors on site, and entertaining to all our subscribers.
So, let the wonder and glory of all that is fantasy engulf you.
The Fantasy Editors:
Colin Back on the Ghost Roads
billwilcox
John~Ashen 
rose_shadow
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Powers Beyond Those of Normal Fantasy Characters (Or Maybe Not)
Today I'm going to tackle a question received recently, from swirling_mist
I am in a dilemma. I would love to give my characters supernatural powers, but I don't want the same old ones that everyone uses, such as invisibility or reading minds. Do you have any new and interesting suggestions?
It's a very good question. Characters from both mythology and fantasy often have powers that normal men can only dream of. But they tend to come from a very limited stock. Strength, speed, invulnerability(hmmm...I seem to recall the combination from somewhere...can't remember where but I'm sure it was a super character. Max 's:' = 40, reading minds, turning invisible, flying, controlling the minds of other men; they've all been done night to death. So how can you come up with ideas that haven't been used before?
Well there are several ways to do it. First you can always use the old standbys but make the characters who posses them interesting. What if your flying character was afraid of heights? What if your inhumanly strong character was a total pacifist? Give them personalities that don't fit their gifts. Of course that can only be take so far before it becomes absurd, cliche or both. So let's look at some other possibilities.
1) Everything old is new again. You can make a new power for a character by simply adding some limitations or otherwise changing the nature of an over used power.
For example, with invisibility, suppose instead of being able to turn invisible, the character could only turn things she held or carried invisible? Very useful for someone who operates at odds with the law. "I'm not holding any stolen gems mi lord. See? Nothing in my hand." It would also be very useful in a fight. The best trained warrior in the land would still have a tough time defending against a sword he couldn't see.
With mind reading, how about if the character could only read the 'collective mind' of large groups. He wouldn't be able to ferret out specific information about any topic, but he would instinctively know the layout of any town or city he entered, the general populations feelings about any given subject, who the most influential people in the region were and so on.
This technique has an added advantage. If you make your power original by putting added limitations on it, then you don't have to worry so much about it becoming overly powerful in the story. So the characters will still have to rely on their other skills and their wits to get through most problems.
2) Lesser used powers. It's very hard to find abilities that have never been used, but it's easier to find some that are used less frequently. Some examples follow.
a) Speaking with the dead: This can be done by communing with a 'residual spirit' that inhabits a corpse, and thus accessing whatever the body knew in life, or by actually summoning the soul of the deceased. Either way it's not commonly used, and it can have great effect on a story. Brian Lumely based an entire series on this ability in the Necroscope books.
b) Communicating with things that don't talk: Animals, plants, rocks, buildings and other things that normally don't communicate with people can be fonts of information. You can also connect this with another infrequently seen power, seeing through another's eyes, so that the character can see and even hear everything the category of thing he can communicate with can see and hear. The Beastmaster of movies and TV, and Perrin Aybara of The Wheel of Time possess this ability.
c) Illusion. Not as powerful, perhaps, as regular magic, illusion is a fantasy staple and can be used to great effect by people with clear heads and good wit. To limit it, only let the character trick one sense, maybe hearing or smell. The character will need to think about how best to use the power.
3) What good is that? One good way of getting powers that are original and not often used is to think of an ability that would seem completely useless to a hero in a fantasy story, and then figure out how it could be used. For example,in the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons comic book, there was a character who could cause flowers to from out of thin air. Seemed not really useful, until she was abducted, and left a trail of her flowers on the ground for her rescuers to follow.
Here's some other examples. The power to summon a swarm of butterflies. Not only good at garden parties but also useful for creating a large obscuring cloud to baffle your enemies. The power to shatter glass and crystal, perfect for dropping shards of crystal on enemies standing under chandeliers as well as dropping a foe to his doom if he's leaning against a window. The power to transform gold into lead. Not a great get rich quick scheme, but when the evil wizard is about to finish the ritual to destroy everything, and has the gold chalice almost to his lips, it could come in handy.
The main thing to remember about such powers is fit them to the story and to the characters. Don't just drop in a power because it sounds good. Make sure there is a good reason for it to be there. Then whatever the power is, it will fit well with what is going on. |
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From yampuff
Hi! One this you forgot to mention is the lame side of dreams, the overuse or the lack of thought put into them. Sometimes the use of dreams is lame and way over-used. But Robert Jordan's dreamlands are excellent.
Any story device can be over used. That's why it's important to read what has been done before so that you don't do the same thing as everyone else. Fortunately, dreams are very open to originality. Just try not to do things exactly the same way as things you've read before.
From John~Ashen
As an author, I like to use a dream as a reason for my character to make a strange decision. Others in the story may see it as a rash action, but the reader will understand why the character did it.
This can be especially effective when dreams are prophetic or connected to someone or something else. The character and reader know something the other characters don't, and the character's actions are believable for the reader even if not for the other characters. It can be hard to justify this in a world where dreams are just weird things that happen while you sleep, although if a character has been portrayed as impulsive then it makes sense. In any case, dreams can provide excellent reasons for strange actions.
From bazilbob
Thanx for the ideas about how to use dreams, I'm actually thinking about writing a story/novel in which the protagonist's dreams are another life, as relevant as the 'real' world. I'm not yet sure if I'm going to link the 2 worlds so that they influence each otehr or not, probably, otehrwise it'll just be 2 plots for one character.
You might want to look at Lovecraft's "Dreamquest of Unknown Kadath" and if you can find it, a not too old TV series called VR5. In Dreamquest, the main character does most of his stuff in dreams, but has to return to the waking world periodlically to handle his day to day affairs. This doesn't show a lot of connection between the two worlds, but might give you some ideas. VR5 had a character that could enter people's dreams and by changing the nature of the dream, change the person in waking life. That might be more in line with what you're thinking about.
From billwilcox
Heya, Colin
Once again you demonstrate that dreams, like newsletters, are important to keep track of 
Actually in real life, dreams can be important to keep track of. They can give you excellent story ideas.
From dusktildawn
What a coincidence - my fantasy novel begins by a stranger coming in a dream. I received a review from someone once that said as soon as he read the dream portion, he stopped reading it. It was something, he said, that had been done too many times. I was a little shocked, to say the least, but I feel a "dream" can offer something very important aspects to a story - like the plot! Oh, well - to each their own. 
To be honest, I was the same way with Vampire stories for the longest time. But then I noticed that people were doing some different things with vampires and started reading them again.
Any plot device can get stale if overused, especially if it is used in the same way all the time. And some people just don't like certain devices and will be turned off by any story using them. No story written has ever appealed to everyone, to my knowledge. So, your best bet is to use the devices that are interesting to you, use them as originally as possible, and fit them well into the story you want to write. And yes, dreams can have a great impact on the plot of a story.
That's all from me for this week. Tune in next time.
Colin Neilson |
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Fantasy: April 26, 2006 Issue [#997]
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