Warriors Fanfics: Specialized Writing Guide

Background Characters

August 21, 2019

This section specifically discusses background characters, the often nameless, faceless masses that are meant to fill space, and their purpose in literature. We are not discussing supporting or secondary characters.

In almost every fictional work, there are characters that seem to just exist for the sake of it. Those unnamed masses, the soldiers destined to die in the shadow of the charging protagonist, or the stranger who kindly gives our frantic character directions and is never seen again. These are background characters. And calling them 'characters' is a bit of a stretch, as they do not exist to be characters. They simply populate the world and fill space. But they do not have to be useless. When used right, they can convey a great deal of information with a few short sentences.

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BACKGROUND CHARACTERS IN WARRIORS

Warriors has an absolutely massive cast, hundreds of cats gracing the fictional universe with varying degrees of impact on it. Its main and supporting cast are quite a bit larger than other fictional works. And its background cast is by far one of the largest out there. I guarantee that not a single fan could name more than 50 without the wiki...

But that did not stop the Erins from doing so.

Most of Warriors' background characters have physical descriptions, and all of them are named. And that is a problem. There is a reason why they are the "nameless faceless masses". A good 90% of all named cats in canon are more or less useless. Those that are serve to hammer home a point for a supporting character or be used in shallow plot devices. There are better ways to use background characters, but this is by no means a bad use case. They are throwaways. If anyone is to be sacrificed to a plot device it should be them.

The problem comes in the fact that they, useless background characters, confuse the reader as to who is important or not because they are named and described (looking at you, 'Allegiances' page). If a character is going to have a name, even a bad one, and a description, even a shallow one, they had better be useful to some degree. If they show up only to get hit by a car or killed by a badger, then why even describe them? It makes the reader think they are important. They spend precious seconds remembering who that cat is and what they do, only for their efforts to go to waste when they are never seen again after calling the protagonist a coward or something.

Background characters make great subjects for fanfiction, however. Among fandoms, some background characters even rise to MC-level popularity due to some weird quark or appearance. Still, it is rare to see a fanfic written with one as the protagonist. That being said, there are many things we should not do with our background cast.

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WHAT NOT TO DO WITH BACKGROUND CHARACTERS

First and foremost, you must remember these characters' place. They are background characters. They are to be tucked away in the back, thrown into the jaws of dangerous plot devices, or used in an expository manner.

But of course, there will always be nay-sayers who think otherwise. Some of them may even be reading this guide, thinking:

"But Tyto, there are plenty of popular books like Harry Potter and A Song of Ice and Fire that are filled with named background characters. And some of them get really popular . Explain!"