I am curious... What is the scope of your cast of characters?

I mean, how many major characters do you regularly handle in the course of a book?

Do you generally have a lot of minor people that you maybe only meet once, maybe never even knowing the name of them?

Do your major sub-plot drivers interact with the main character a lot, or are they usually working from a different angle?

Just some things I was wondering about.

I tend to have several major characters, and a lot of minor ones. So I guess I have a pretty big cast of characters. So far, major sub-plot drivers have been mixed as far as how involved they are with the MC.

An interesting question. In general, I tend to have one main character with multiple supporting characters that, while they are in the story most of the time, are still minor characters. Something I do like to try to do, if I can, is give names to the minor characters that you only see once (I call them stick-figure characters, since they're usually pretty flat). It always feels too easy to just make them nameless nobodies.

And to answer another part of your question, my major sub-plot drivers may not interact with my main character from the very beginning, but they always end up interacting (so far).

I..have a pretty big cast of characters. Typically, I'll have about three main characters with countless supporting characters, random background characters, and soldiers and then I'll have the deity...he can fall under main character or supporting character depending under the chapter of the book.

Usually, though, I do name all of my characters...which makes for a lot of name researching... But I do that because then the reader hardly ever has to deal with a nameless character.

And usually, my supporting characters are all crowded, in some way, around my MCs. I don't do well with making MCs that aren't in every scene of the book, but then again, that is why I have multiple MCs.

Yeah, sometimes it is hard to write parts where there are no main-ish type characters around. I try to have only one "Main" character, though, even though I do sometimes write form the perspective of supporting people.

I... think I have a very large cast of characters. Tierin is the main character, with Chalice and Airianna as close seconds. Then I have the supporting characters: Fledgrin, Latharian, Argon, Alonah, Eniya, and Agmar. My "minor" characters are the ones who get a few scenes, like Garth, Marmie, Kale, Endolf, Adjorham, and Jotham. Then you have the "Stick Figures" that Amanda talked about.

Dunndar, Volgarin, and the Shadow Beings are the bad guys.


So, yeah, large cast. Plus, book 2 gets some new faces. O.O

I try not to have more than three MCs, any reasonable number of major-minor characters, and as many people walking as I need.

I have had stick-figure MCs, but it's hard to to draw them box after box.

I tend to have one MC, then a couple of almost-main characters with which the MC is in most interaction with, and then a number of other minor-main characters that also contribute to the conflict of the book on different levels. The cast tends to get pretty large. Especially when you then consider all the relatives and onlookers and etc.

I haven't really gotten to the point where I can talk about anything "in the course of a book." But part of the problem of the scope of the-story-in-my-head, in addition to the amount of history to cover, is that I've got dozens-upon-dozens-upon-dozens of characters (mostly based on people I know, as changed by the experience of being translocated to the world in which the story is set), each with a name and eventually each with his or her own history in the story-world, that I want to use somewhere.

If a character isn't really important beyond one scene, I prefer to refer to that character by title---"the Sergeant-at-Arms" and "the Speaker pro tem", to pick two examples from the prologue of a current WIP. And I hope to make all the threads that I include in any given novel be pretty tightly interwound. But we'll see.

It looks to me like fantasy writers tend to have a large cast of characters!

Mine's HF. lol

HF?? Ohhh! Historical fiction! I LOVE HISTORICAL FICTION! I'm going to write some, someday. Soon.

Do! lol

I think your assesment is correct. It appears most Fantasy writers have a large cast.

I try to keep mine to 10 or less main characters. If you get much more you'll have a Dickens story on your hands.
(I'm almost finished with Barnaby Rudge and there are 28 named characters! )

In the current fan fiction I'm writing, it centers around two main characters with multiple side characters. Then I have those random other characters who you don't believe have anything to do with something when they do and it's super insane when the main characters find out. Yay, sub-plots!

Most of my stories tend to focus on 1-3 characters with random, one-show characters sprinkled in. Sometimes minor characters show up more than once of course, but you get my drift. I like focusing on the lives and emotions of the main characters best. ^^

I name all of my characters, for the most part, even if you only see them in one scene. I think it adds realism to the world.

Hmm, I try to not name characters that I don't have too, so that it doesn't bog down the reader with useless information.

Same; but at the same time I try to give unnamed characters a distinct quality or characteristic all their own by which they may seem real.

I think it really depends on what the one-time characters do or add to the scene. It may just be a crowd or a passer-by that they didn't even talk to, or it may be an important part of the story. Depends on the person.

~Aisha

I usually tend to have a rather diverse world, and so I usually have a diverse cast of characters. I also typically like to focus on relationships between characters, thus I have lots of characters so that I can build lots of relationship bridges. Which makes for a lot of fun "people" to work with ^.^

In other words, I usually have a big cast of characters, and I know each character's part of the story--both what is actually written, and what is not. I hold them by the same kind of guideline I hold world-building actually. Even if I don't incorporate a particular plant into the world, for example, I still have a mental list of all the plants/animals in the world so that it's real to me and I can accurately portray it to the reader.

Same with characters. Even if a character only shows up once in a scene, I still like knowing what brought him/her there, what his/her motivation is, and what role s/he plays in the story in case I ever want to bring him/her back later. Which results in a lot of face-playing with foreshadowing and backshadowing.

And then, of course, I have those Tom Bombadils, where they pop in as seemingly "random" but are still important to the story. Where I don't know where they come from, but I still know they're "real." They allow me, and the reader, to simply have the pleasant joy of wonder. Something we don't do enough in the real world.

All that said, I must end with one last note on this sheet of butchered music. No matter who the character is, I refuse to have a meatshield (or red shirt, or whatever else you want to call them) simply for the purpose of convenience. I refuse to make my characters flat or 2d. I don't mind making them minor, but they must still be human. They need to have reason, motivation, emotion. I might not understand everything about these minor characters, but they must still be round, 3d, real. They must, as I said earlier, still be human in attitude.

Anyway... to reel this back in. Yes, I have quite a large cast of characters, which is made up of the lovely folk I've described up above. In general, I usually focus around one real main characters, and then I have major characters, and then I have minor characters--where minor does not equal convenient. I don't like having too many big characters, however, since that just becomes too confusing and overwhelming for the reader... but I think I shall save that whole other can of worms for another time.

So, in answer to the questions... The scope of characters is pretty big for the majority of my stories considering that in some books I have battles, and the battles that I write about require a large number of characters. All the questions depend depend on the type of book I'm writing though, since I fluctuate a lot with different genres/settings. I generally like having every character play an important part to the main character's life--even if they do little to add to the "story"--since, in reality, every person we meet plays a special role in touching our lives whether we realize it or not :)