Writing Tips and Reviews

Master Manipulators

There are many types of master manipulator characters. One I like is Lelouch vi Britannia. He manipulates people and makes his plans as if they were a chess game, which he's a master of.

Master manipulators are characters who succeed in manipulating their opponent. I've done research on this type of character and am using Lelouch as a basis. Remember, they have to succeed. If the opponent doesn't believe in the lies and continues to reject manipulator, then you've failed. You cannot claim a character has been manipulated if they didn't believe in any of the lies and pushed the manipulator away.

Good manipulation is typically done by knowing the opponent's backstory and personality type, then playing that to your advantage. Trying to rewrite history is not manipulating them. It makes them wonder if you're just pulling shit out of your ass, and in role playing, makes the person not want to role play with you anymore.

I remember role playing with a small child, they made a character, I suppose trying to be like Lelouch, but failed hard. The lies their character made up weren't believable and they're an idiot if they thought it was. They constantly told me "he's not lying!" As if trying to manipulate me instead of the character. I gave them a test to see if they were paying attention to what I was saying, and they weren't. They said it was a fire that destroyed the village, because I had said it then, but in my earlier explanation, I said it was tidal wave.

This goes into knowing the character's backstory. You can't say "he was there but your character didn't see him" or "I saw him start the fire" when it's clear the events happened before the "manipulator" was born, and a tidal wave destroyed the village.

Making up lies that aren't even close to the truth is not how to be a master manipulator. If someone came to you and said "your best friend is using you and is evil," sure you'd have some thoughts, but once they started telling some lie that wasn't even close to your childhood and saying "I was there, I know how you grew up so you have to believe me." Well, that's just being an idiot. Especially if you're, say, 26 and the person talking to you is 10.

What's wrong in this story? Well, the kid was being an asshole, and their character was a Mary Sue. The character said once "I was there, watching him, watching you, so you would be safe. He has tried to kill you, that is why he took you in." Disregarding everything I just told this kid. One being that my character is thousands of years old, with the appearance of about 35, and theirs was 14.

They kept playing their character as a guardian to mine to "manipulate" him, but what this moron didn't know, is that I have more than one brain cell, and I wrote my character. So, I would think I know the backstory of my character and wasn't happy about this "insert oc" crap with me getting yelled at for "being wrong." About a character I wrote.

Why is Lelouch such a good master manipulator? He's not an idiot to start off with. He played into the resistance's hatred and used it to create the Black Knights, which in turn, got the Japanese to see him as their savior as he continued to fight for their freedom. When Euphy ordered the massacre of all the Japanese, when he accidentally used his geass on her, he manipulated the situation to make it look like it was all planned by Euphy and he had to stop her. He manipulated the entire world into hating him so when he died, it could finally move on.

Lelouch manipulated people for the better of the world, he still wasn't a good person and what he did was straight up murder on a global scale, but he did what was right in the end. He wasn't a hero, he was what the world needed. Someone who sought the future and did everything to achieve one.

But master manipulators don't have to be like Lelouch to be good. I am making one in the character of Shinka Naturae. Shinka manipulates people to get what he wants, even if they don't want to at first. While he doesn't use pity like some, he still gets through to their compassion. He manipulates the love humans have for one another and makes them do his bidding. He gets into their heads and makes them think a certain way that still is right to them. If he knows someone's past, he'll use that against them, if he doesn't, he'll use what he does know about them. If he doesn't know anything about them, then he tries get to know them.