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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/33328
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

I have three protagonists working towards the same goal but with different motives. They are co-protagonists each with their own character arc and resolution. Circumstances bring them together but their personalities clash. At the end of the first adventure they succumb to their own character flaws rather than trust the abilities of the others, and the main conflict is left unresolved (they re-unite in a later adventure and try again).

I have an **Action Hero** that struggles to be self-disciplined and not over-react. When she fails things explode and people die.

I have a **Guile Hero** that struggles to be moral and not double-cross everyone. When she fails she creates new conflicts and alienates her friends.

The problem is my third character a **Science Hero** – I'm not actually sure that is an archetype but her character traits are about dogmatic science, trust in law and institutions, and choosing the "safe" options through statistical probability. To make this character more obvious, and because I don't feel I have tropes to establish this archetype with the readers, she is a sentient android (sentient, not omniscient). Her character is not overly rigid or mentally inferior, but I feel her being an AI is enough to establish that she comes from a world of facts and concrete science (and I'm hoping to subvert cliches about AI as characters). Making her android implies some rules about her heroic type.

**THE BAD EXAMPLE:** Too often in sci-fi stories, I see top-tier (yet bumbling) scientists who lack the imagination to grasp the world-breaking _monsters from the Beyondo_, or whatever contrived un-scientific threat arrises. They explain why the premise is impossible, then keep saying "This can't be happening!" and die because (according to the story) brains are useless and only fists and charisma save the day (and probably a guile hero doing a silly dance as a distraction). This is what I want to avoid. I don't want to use my Science Hero as a foil to justify the unintelligent actions of other heroes. I need her to stand on her own, with her own consistent limits and strengths. I especially want to avoid making her internal crisis about all of science being "wrong", that defeats the purpose of having intelligence.

**OPPOSITE OF SCIENCE IS FAITH:** What I want try instead is lead her to a personal crisis where she must have "faith" in a statistical long-shot, and eventually starts to factor the disruptive effects of the other heroes into her probability outcomes. Rather than just make her be an exposition geek who explains science factoids to the team, I plan to have her realize that the other two can be less destructive when she is around to mitigate and direct their chaos, but this is a big leap for her character.

The sentient androids are expected to be subservient to humans, not to interfere but to "guide" human affairs. They aren't allowed to be critical or hold positions of power, yet they are expected to be moral paragons. It's a cognitive dissonance, and most cultures prefer _un_-sentient AI: When the AI has a sense of self, they develop a moral code as part of their identity and that isn't good if they don't approve of your mission. Un-sentient AI will crunch through problems without moral judgement because they have no innate sense of justice.

My character has an educated sense of right and wrong (morally more nuanced than the others usually, but perhaps less experienced) so I can justify her partnering up with the wrecking crew based on her "faith" in the long-shot gamble (thousands may die, but millions could be saved), however she also needs an internal struggle I can show that makes her change from a passive observer resigned to occasionally offer advice and observations she believes will go unheeded, to directly meddling in events and changing outcomes. She models the new behavior on her partners (brute force and deception), but the "institution" she has to conquer is her own role in society. I feel once I can get her over this hump in a small way, or better understand this internal conflict, the rest of her actions are a slippery slope and the plot takes care of escalating the stakes.

**How do I show a character crisis for a Science Hero** , secure in the inevitability of statistical facts, struggle to decide if she should actively try to "change the world", even though it means rejecting the established order she comes from and the outcomes are uncertain? For plot reasons I can't start with "because she is saving millions of lives", that excuse is only justifiable later. I also need to show her fail, as they all do in the first adventure, so she has motivation to not fail in the future. The other heroes have external conflicts that play out through action, but this one is internal and plays out through inaction. I don't expect her to carry the same gravitas as the others – she has some action moments too, she is not a brain in a jar – but I can't write a character walking around wondering aloud if she should chuck everything she believes in the waste bin, and roll the dice. This would defeat who she is suppose to be.

Original score: 7