: Re: Can a useless protagonist be interesting? So, I was thinking about one of my little worlds, when I stumbled into an interesting problem. At first, this is a run-of-the-mill isekai (trapped in

@Odierno164

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Look at Indiana Jones. In Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jones doesn't really DO anything important to the plot, he is just chasing Nazis, getting himself into trouble, or trapped, or in a chase scene, but he doesn't actually DO anything to bring about the ending.

In other words, he is a dispensable character, but as the MC we see the adventure through his experiences, and sympathize with him when he uses his wits to escape the traps, or to find the next clue of where to go, or discovers wondrous things.

The kind of story you can write is called "Stranger in a Strange Land", in which somebody new to your Fantasy World just shows us the wonders of it, then somehow magically gets back home. An Example is Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. She is kind of brave when it comes to helping her friends, but she killed both the Wicked Witch of the East, and the Wicked Witch of the West, entirely by accident. And she did not even find her way home, herself: Glinda the Good Witch just told her the answer to getting home: Click your heels 3 times and say "There's No Place Like Home."

In your case, the MC has a similar problem, a mystery to solve, in how to get back home. He doesn't have to be a hero, what you want him to do is be a clueless know-nothing that needs everything explained to him.

I wouldn't make him a complete coward. Or perhaps to start, but you still need a personality-growth arc for this character. He still needs to step up in some way to solve his own problem of getting home.

If you want people to "get behind him," you have to make him likable and relatable, he doesn't have to be a battle hero, but he probably can't be a total wuss (unless you are writing a comedy). Think of Dorothy; she's far from any kind of action hero, but she steps up when it comes to her friends.

Dorothy's power is being faithful to her friends. She kills the Wicked Witch of the West by accident. The Witch sets the Scarecrow on fire, and Dorothy grabs a bucket of water to throw and put the fire out: the water splashes on the Witch and melts her.

Even getting home, she is going to join the Professor in his hot air balloon, but in the last second, Toto runs away after a cat. She cannot leave Toto behind, so she runs after Toto, and collects him, but misses her ride.

I'd change your story plan a little. Being a conduit for a God isn't much of anything. I'd try to make your MC's goal of getting home coincident with the aims of the group he falls into. So they rescue him, they are good guys and let him tag along, and you make him useful in a non-super power way, to earn his way. Maybe he is the one that is actually good at figuring out the clues of where to go next. A somewhat sedentary power, but fairly normal if he has a regular education and his group has a medieval education equivalent to a modern first grader.

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