*Praise Thor it’s Thursday. (Mostly because it makes for an awesome acronym).

AKA: Someone motivate us, please?
Previous titled: Stuff it

Why do our characters do stuff? Work they job they do, talk to the other characters, decide running away from the cops at nintey mph through the streets of Cheyanne is a good idea at two pm because we all know there aren’t any people there :-P. Any stuff.

Because they have what I am currently lacking…at least until the coffee kicks in. Motivation. You know how when you were little and your parents would tell you to do something and you’d be like “but why?” And they’d be like “because I said so?”

It might work in real life. It doesn’t fly so much in fiction. I mean, we don’t have to explain every bit of stuff our characters do, or even specifically tell ourselves we know why they did it. They drove to work because they had to work. They ate breakfast because it was morning and they were hungry.

But the big stuff. The unusual stuff. Or the stuff that moves the plot forward and exists for really no other reason? You have to give it a reason.

Morrock is from a long tribe of demon worshipers who lives in the woods and sacrifices as is appropriate to the evil beings they worship. He wears a long, dark cloak, as is expected of his station as a preist, and an amulet, and has tatoos on the side of his head.

Why does he wear all that stuff?

And if the answer is “because that’s what all weak allegories for evil devil worhispers do”

that’s not motivation.

If the answer is “because the thorns in the forest are cruel and the claws of the demons are sharp and it makes a good way to protect themselves that doesn’t require intense seamsmenship, and the amulet doubles as a weapon” then it’s a little contrived, but at least it’s a reason for stuff.

I’ve found my motivation. It was in the bottom of the cup. It just told me if I don’t get my butt in gear and finish some things, I’ll regret it in the next eight hours.

Not the best motivation, but at least it’s realistic ^_^

Are you guilty of making your characters do stuff without understanding why they do them? Or do you always know? What kind of stuff are they up to?