What is your protagonist(s) or antagonist(s)'s motive?

[l8rose]

Mostly my protagonists just want to live their lives. None of them really had the intention of being heroes but will do it because if they don't, things will suck for their lives. Whether they're thrust into unfamiliar worlds, situations or just weird things; they just want to get things done and get back to their happy (and occasionally mundane) lives.

My antagonists are kind of varied. Mostly they want power. A few want to rule their respective worlds/continents and others want to remake the world entirely.

Spoiler: From Specific Stories

Smith From Another Land

• Ara just wants to complete her "divine" task. Originally, it was to defeat Alduin in Skyrim but as she is now in Thedas, she's trying to figure out just how to do whatever in that world in order to get back to fighting Alduin. This has kind of degenerated into helping the protagonist of DAI to seal the breach and fight Corypheus.
• The Antagonists want to remake the world in their image. Literal remaking. One is better at it than the other.

The Princess and the Grand Duke

• Lia wants to figure out what her vision means and to ensure she doesn't live (or die) like she did in it. Calix just wants his wife, and to stop having nightmares where she dies.
• Antagonists want to unite the continent under their rule. They also want Lia to go to their country so she can produce an heir for their family that has her bloodline to further legitimize their claim to that throne.

Dead Gods Still Dream

• Ethara just wants to go home after she gets jettisoned through time and sealed behind a magical wall that won't let her interact with the real world. And then, even when she is close to getting home, crazy cultists show up and she has got to figure out how to deal with being their "chosen one".
• Cultists want to bring the incarnation of Chaos and Madness into the world and Ethara is the perfect host. Her boyfriend is also the perfect sacrifice.

Dead Gods Still Live

• After DGSD, Ethara just wants to live a peaceful life with her other half. Unfortunately, she's the most powerful being in existence and her friends keep needing her help to keep the world on track. It doesn't help that she realizes she can hear the prayers of normal people (which is totally weird and not cool).
• Antagonist Group 1 still wants to bring the incarnation of Chaos and Madness into the world but they figured out they need a new host and sacrifice as Ethara will now f them up if they try her. Group 2 wants more territory and to eliminate their greatest threat which is Ethara as the other powerful guy has apparently disappeared.

Black Veil

• Rachel just wants to get through this year of strange things and hopefully develop a better relationship with Elias (that isn't just based on sex). Elias wants to prevent a group of witches from doing something irreversibly stupid in a small town (he also wants to develop his relationship but he's definitely okay with the sex).
• Antagonists want to summon a demon into the world. Which means scoping out and testing people with the right bloodline (not Rachel). All this to gain power.

 

[Prince_Azmiran_Myrian]

Ultimate Antagonist: wants to rule the world and be worshipped like God.

Protagonist: To do what he knows is ultimately right.

 

[Glitched]

Mc is a villain :
Revenge + A home for herself/family

 

[RepresentingWrath]

Pussy.

 

[John_Owl]

1, reunite with the female dragon he met when he was a child (complete).
2, Rescue his mentor's race (elves) from the demons' enslavement.
3, grow old and have a family with aforementioned dragon.

Antagonist: Keep his elf slaves; have hot, steamy sex with his personal elf slave (she willingly volunteered to be HIS, in order to avoid being just an average worker elf, after she sold out her race to gain power.)

 

[RepresentingPride]

Protagonist : Protect his waifu
Antagonist :

Spoiler: Spoiler

Protect his waifu

Why the spoiler tag? In case a reader read this, well the probability of this are under 0,1%, but just in case.

1, reunite with the female dragon he met when he was a child (complete).
2, Rescue his mentor's race (elves) from the demons' enslavement.
3, grow old and have a family with aforementioned dragon.

Antagonist: Keep his elf slaves; have hot, steamy sex with his personal elf slave (she willingly volunteered to be HIS, in order to avoid being just an average worker elf, after she sold out her race to gain power.)

Your Antagonist seem to have more fun than the Protagonist

 

[georgelee5786]

Protagonist: protect his empire and its denizens

Antagonist: get vengeance

 

[dummycake]

1. Get rich, build a family
2. Selfcest
3. Not die

that's just common human nature

 

[crbrearley]

In Romance of the Sable Valiant


Demia: Having created Death and Destruction in the Garden of Eden, Demia feels she must stand in the path of the forces she set in motion. So she created Heroism: the power to be where she's needed when she's needed giving her at least a chance to save everyone


Melindra: She's a shapeshifter that has been confined into sword form by a ridiculously powerful pair of enchanters so she seeks release from her confinement. When Demia helps her, Melindra feels she'd better accompany Demia and help her resist her most dangerous heroic impulse.

Antagonists: Varies. Morgan in my first book believes if he reversed the ritual that killed him, he will live again and so tries to kill Demia three separate time (the characters in my series can survive the odd death).

In For Even the Gods Bleed:


Mackie: She's knocked out in an alley as an ordinary woman in her forties and wakes up as possibly the most beautiful woman in the world (and a hollywood actress). Mackie wants to understand what the Hell is going on with her life. Later, I feel she gets swept up in the tornado that her sister Helen creates.

Helen: Initially wants to find Mackie and kill her because she makes some pretty incorrect conclusions. Later, she's forced into becoming a white wizard a task for which the little sociopath seems incredibly unsuited. In the end, they have to kill a monster that Helen accidentally created.

Darren: Darren was created so he could ultimately find and kill white wizards and champions. But when he killed the last of the magi, he unravlled and died. Thanks to Helen's bad conclusions, he's resurrected and now he has the same task he always had: but now he can just hunt Helen and Mackie, two immortal Eden siblings, who cannot ever really die. So Darren must hunt and kill because that'ts the task that animated him in the first place.

Thank you for the question since I thought for a second my villains in both series had the same motivation (kill to come back to life). And that would have been an extreme bummer even though it does sound like the kind of thing that should happen to the Eden children quite often. "You want life, you want power? Kill the little demi-gods!"

 

[AstreiaNyx]

Maid of Curse
Protagonist’s Goal: To have a little chaotic fun and survive inconvenient shortcomings.
Antagonist’s Goal: To make the world a better place for humans.

 

[Hans.Trondheim]

I suddenly missed listening to Nico stuff.

 

[Nolff]

Characters' motives huh? Let's see...

A Hub:

-Protagonists:
-Keeping everything that exists on the internet safe. From the real world and disturbing interferences.
-Ham
-Antagonists:
-Causing chaos and generally amused by watching the protagonists struggle in different worlds.
-The last boss:
-Literally ordering the antagonists to wreak havoc and cause chaos all for a collab and reaction videos.

Detention For A Year:

-Protagonist:
-Sentenced for war crime and fraud to the world of MHA.
-Having fun.
-Keeps complaining about the nonsense and unlogical detention.
-Antagonists:
-Sending the protagonist to a world with the excuse of a detention.
-Lying about the detention and actually wanting to torture the protagonist.
- (Maybe) Accidentally tortures the protagonist more than they should.

 

[QuercusMalus]

Have you ever read anything on Four Corners Conflict?
In his book, The Anatomy of Story, John Truby says, “a simplistic opposition between two characters kills any chance at depth, complexity, or the reality of human life in your story. For that, you need a web of oppositions. … Think of each of the characters – hero and three opponents – as taking a corner of the box, meaning that each is as different from the others as possible.”

I have been working on applying this to the story I am working, creating a more elaborate story.

Aalis Coleprophete: Safety and a community. All she wanted was a family and a simple comfortable life as a servant in the castle. She had no sights of higher status or standing, and was fine with that. But a chance accident destroys everything leaving her friends dead, seeing the memory of her would be lover dying at her hands as she is hunted by the Queens Stoor(8ft tall demi-giants with a taste for flesh), with the power of a dead God that she neither understands or can use. Unprotected, friendless, alone she is a tasty morsel in a pond of predators. She will have to, quickly, find allies she can trust, or who at least will not kill her immediately, and try to come to terms with the 'gift' she was given, and realize that sometimes safety doesn't mean running from the danger.

Queen Rohesia of Zuria: Stability through control. For over two centuries she has reigned over an expanding empire. Under her rule, the state, and people therein, have prospered. But, fearing the truth of her unnatural lifespan getting out, and viewing any threat to her rule as a challenge to be met with overwhelming force, in her heart she knows there is always another enemy. Actively quashing threats, both foreign and domestic has created many enemies, and only reinforced her paranoia.

Bellovesus- Recognition and Acceptance. On the cusp of adulthood, barely tolerated outcast amongst his Teuta, he is on his Proving when he encounters Aalis, and believes, in her, he has a tool to both cement his place now and forever onward by allowing his people, the Etunaz, to reverse their millennium long slow decline and overthrow the usurper gods. Bitterly resentful of all humans he would still be hard pressed to tell you who he hates more- the Queen for her position as head of the largest human nation, or Thrinacria for their enslavement of many of his people.

Geron of Thrinacria: Power and prestige. A mere younger cousin of the First of Thrinacria, Geron sought prestige through Marshall strength. But against the Queens disciplined forces, successes are few and far between. Instead he finds himself chafing as he is reduced to a slaver- kidnapping anyone valuable they can to try to slow the Queens encroachment on their territory. An enemy of my enemy is a friend- or more accurately, anyone the Queen fears enough to try to capture is worth grabbing first. Well he doesn't believe her wild tale, Aalis is a potential pawn to help him wrench the Firsts Chair from his Cousin, or maybe even a seat at the Queens side as King over a soon to be greater Thinacrian Empire. Anyone that prevents his rise is a threat to be disposed of.