A lot of the time flaws come from the dark side of humanity. A flaw can make a villain seem a bit human, or a good guy seem a bit despicable. A fear of fire in the antagonist due to watching his home burn down, or due to suffering burns in the past that left physical and emotional scars. You can really flush out a character with flaws. They truly draw on your reader's heartstrings.
Their world beliefs and moral sets are a good place to start. Giving a character a particular Moral set will make it easier for conflict to happen. Especially if another character has a different set and stuff.
In my latest WIP, I made my millionaire hero a transient day laborer in disguise. He suffers all the stigmas of lower class laborers, but turns out to be a really nice guy who just said "the heck with it" and stepped into his employees shoes for a change. So he doesn't really have "flaws" but readers don't figure that out until later in the story.
Because it sounds like you're going for romance, and my interpretation of the issue is that your MC fancies a guy. The guy is supposed to be "the one," but you need / want him to have a flaw like every normal person, but you still want him to be acceptable for the MC. Going to draw from real life stuff. It is not about whether or not the reader would date the guy, as long as he's the guy for your MC. That will probably be the most endearing quality of their romance. When I consider people for myself, I never sweep their flaws under the rug. I take them into account and make sure they're compatible with my own. (Not everyone does this, opposites may attract. That's cool too.) For instance, a total deal breaker for me would be anger problems. My overwhelming flaw is anxiety. That would be unbearable, I have dealt with people like that outside of romance and it was challenging. However, I can totally mesh with someone who worries too much or has non-controlling levels of insecurity. It can be annoying like any flaw, but it's something I can accept and help them through. As someone who also worries a ton, I get that and I can see their genuine concern when it may sound insane to other people. Now I have another main flaw that surfaces especially in relationship territory. I dabbled with someone that had the same problems, and I had to call it off for the both of us. It was fun, but it would have just gotten us both wrapped up in an unhealthy mess. So... I guess it comes down to knowing your MC. Play matchmaker, if you want it to last forever, don't always choose what's the most fun over what's the best for them. I hope that helps.
I played a number of flaws with my E&D characters. 1. My senator starts out as the stereotypically rich Roman politician, nice enough, a bit stuffy. But you learn that he is a big risktaker, in fact thrives on it, or he wouldn't be going on this wild trip. He is punctiliously honorable, and it is that sense of honor that at the main crisis causes him to chuck the whole mission, rather than let a girl be condemned to an unjust death. On the way out of China, he has to subordinate himself to the pirate who had hijacked one of his ships... he is not the person to be leading the crew out, evading patrols, sneaking past checkpoints. At one point, he is riding caravan security, taking orders from an illiterate 19 year old Bactrian youth... a lesson in humility. What matters here is his sword and good right arm, not the money and power he had on the other side of the world. Kind of like @newshirt' s millionaire, but he didn't make this choice entirely on his own. He returns to Rome 50 pounds lighter, a tested fighter, and rather than be intimidated by his political opponents, he is alternately disgusted and sorry for them. What was important to him when he left, matters not at all on his return. 2. The pirate starts out as a ruthless villain, but one quickly discovers that he is also urbane, self-educated, a meticulous planner who would have made a great general or businessman. He forms an unlikely alliance of necessity with his Roman hostages that evolves to companionship, and in the end, it is he who devises an ingenious escape to lead them back to Rome. In the end, he finds what he has never found before, true friends that he can die for. 3. The centurion is a great fighter, a natural trainer of men, but a total failure around women he feels are above his station... until he meets our heroine. 4. The Roman officer is also a great soldier, but a total failure at being a husband to his wife and parent to his children. In ten years of marriage, he has only been back long enough to get Camilla pregnant twice, but never be there for the birth and rearing of his children. Just as he was going to try to get back home for another conjugal visit, he is tapped to leave for China for several years instead. Will his wife be Penelope to his Odysseus, or will he find someone else sleeping in bed when (if?) he returns? And might it not be better for Camilla and his children if she found someone else? 5. The shipping master, ostensibly the the pirate's co-conspirator, turns out had watched the Romans crucify his uncle, who had raised him. This explains his motivation, though he goes on to descend deeper and deeper into evil. And so on. No one is perfectly good or perfectly bad, just human.
You can come up with interesting character flaws or interests in a number of ways. I often base them on myself or people I have known or heard about. But in my opinion you should also look at the type of story your putting them into. many flaws might never come to light or be applicable in any way in one setting where they could prove absolutely vital or detrimental in another. The same goes for merits or strengths. I tend to pick ones that will actually come into play a few times in a story instead of being totally irrelevant. Just to give you an example I personally dislike the sound of birdsong in the morning and am only slightly less annoyed by it most other times. This was caused by working a third shift job for several years in my twenties and living in a residence where the birds would often wake me up at some point in the morning shortly after I would fall asleep. I grew to hate the sound of their loud chirping and calling outside my bedroom window. I have had a couple different characters share my dislike of birdsong. If nothing is coming to you you can always ask some friends to write down three things they hate or fear and why and get some ideas. Once you have them take a look at the person and see if you can think of anytime that that manifested in your presence and how they acted. A fear of dogs is an examples I got from one of my friends when I did this and after thinking back I realized this was why he had acted the way he had a couple times when he was with me. Hope that helps you.
I think a flaw is something that grows out of the story itself. A 'flaw' shouldn't be tacked onto a character the way you decide height, weight and hair colour. I am very very leery of making personality 'lists' for characters before you write them. Then it often becomes a case of ticking the boxes, while the characters struggle to come to life. I'd imagine a character, then put the character in a story. See how this character reacts to the situations you give him or her to deal with. And above all, don't make everything easy for them. Give them things they'll struggle with. Maybe they aren't at ease with intimate personal relationships—or maybe they're at ease in a one-to-one encounter, but struggle with large groups of people. Maybe they don't like to make a decisive move very often, but would rather wait to see what others do before they make up their minds about things. Maybe they say things on impulse that they later regret ...even though some of the things they say on impulse actually turn out to be correct. Maybe they hide their feelings from others most of the time. Maybe they share feelings with others quite easily, but then become confused as to what they actually want. Maybe they aren't very patient with others who seem to be wasting their time. And etc. These are the kinds of things that can make a character seem human and come to life—and can be interesting when they meet up with people who have opposing or different kinds of personalities. They aren't always bad personality traits, nor are they the kinds of traits that everybody dislikes. Some people love loud, boisterous characters who are the life and soul of the party. Other people will run a mile and find a quiet corner and get into a meaningful conversation with the other quiet soul already occupying the corner. Lois of people love pets, but some people love to treat their pets like human 'babies' because they love them so much, while other people love their pets too, but don't dress them in cute clothes, etc. Certain personal characteristics may hamper your character when it comes to getting what they want, but can also end up being exactly the characteristics that DO get them exactly what they want. Just create a character, put them into a story, get them interacting with events and other people, and see what happens. This is where authors often say 'the characters just write themselves.' That makes it sound like magic, but it's not. It's your subliminal experience of what people are likely to do in given circumstances that will take over. This can derail a rigidly outlined plotline, if the character ends up not fitting the suit you originally intended them to wear, but it will also give you an imaginary character who feels real. Given a choice, I'd change the plotline and keep the character!
I usually just let my characters be who they are (in a story sense of course) and the flaws just come naturally as I write... for instance my current MC is a bit Brash, short tempered at times and tries to be arrogant.
Don't take me as anything other than a noob, but I figured I might as well throw in my two cents. Ask youself what the theme of your story is. What is the main question your story presents to your main character and by proxy your audience? This will help you figure out what your characters need to learn (or fail to learn) and thus what their flaws are. Example: In True Grit (the Coen Brothers version), Mattie Ross is an embittered kid focused on getting revenge for her dad above everything else. During the film, Mattie--and the audience--are presented a question: What happens to a person when they exact revenge on someone, no matter how justified they are? It isn't until the end of the film that she gets her answer and realizes what her flaw cost her. She got her revenge, but she lost a part of herself (literally) in the process.
Nobody's perfect but we still manage to love them anyway. Just look around and notice the flaws that the people you love posses. I guarantee you that if you attempt to write mr. perfect someone will find flaws in him, because what's perfect to you won't be so perfect to others. Imperfections are often perceived rather than real. What you see as a strength may be something I see as a weakness. For example you may write a character with dyslexia. I see that as a strength, because people with dyslexia have to be hyper vigilant with spelling and arithmetic. That in my opinion makes them stronger.
When I try to develop a character, I always try to use some of the flaws in real life. For example, if I want a character to have a bit of angst or is troubled a bit, I try to act out how the character would feel. I usually do it with my really close friends, as they understand my reason for doing so. I find it easier to express a flaw within a character when I express it myself in real time, if that makes sense. Best of luck! -Kins
Lots of good answers here! I'm on board with the people who've said "don't look at them as 'flaws". The idea of "my character needs flaws" makes it sound like they're something you tack on to a character. It puts emphasis on the wrong aspect of the character's development. Humans only have so much time in the day, and so much focus to give to what matters. When a human being pursues something, they do so at the cost of something else. If you want to give a character some 'flaws', give them a good look and figure out what they, during the span of their lives, haven't had enough time to focus on and develop, or else what they've failed to develop despite trying, and how they feel about it. For the record, that feeling will usually be 'regret'. So how does that regret manifest? For example, take the lone hero who is always off adventuring and rescuing people, protecting princesses and stopping wars. While he's happy he can help others, he has so much responsibility that there must be SOMETHING in his life that he WANTS to do that he hasn't been able to. There's got to be SOMETHING he's had to sacrifice to focus on saving people: it can be anything at all, as huge as 'I've never been able to fall in love', or as small as 'I never got to learn how to paint'. Because he hasn't been able to do that thing, he'll have some level of regret about it. It's your job as the author to put your character into a position where that regret can manifest into resentment, and then into ACTION: while this is not a perfect equation, it's at least something. Action motivated by resentment motivated by regret can reveal a character flaw. What happens when he watches a mob burn down an artist's workshop? What happens if his love interest is a famous artist, and he loves her for some reason but cant help but HATE the fact that she's been able to pursue the one thing he's always wanted? A flaw isn't 'my character has dark powers that threaten those he cares about', and it's not 'my character has a fear of the ocean': a flaw is 'my character is put in a position of stress, he reacts in 'x' way because of 'y', and it negatively impacts himself, those around him, or both'. You can make anything into a flaw if you really try: choose something, anything, and carry it to its relevant extreme. On a related note, here's a really good video from the School of Life about the deadly sins that might springboard some ideas about this. Hope it helps!
Well said. I'm a big fan of following the thread; how does everything connect? If your character flies in to a rage over a difficult crossword puzzle, why is that? I get frustrated when books have a character do something completely out of left field. They think it adds depth, but all it really does is take me out of the story while i wonder why the heck sweet-sunshiney Abigail just punched Travis in the jaw when in similar past situations she folded her hands in her lap and seemed pensive. There always needs to be a tie-in to something buried in his/her psyche to make it seem real. I recommend The Emotional Wound Thesaurus if you really want to root around in emotional trauma. It's a great point of reference.
My characters tend to have unusual pasts and unique traumas along with remarkable gifts. I attempt to make them relatable by showing the ways in which they learn to cope with a world that doesn't understand them.
Depending on the story, I often give a character a weakness that competes with their story-contributing strength. I was inspired to try this when watching reruns of the 1980s TV show Greatest American Hero. A superhero who can fly, but is afraid of heights, in that example. A master swordsman who faints at the sight of blood. A demolitions expert who is PTSD. A computer hacker who can never get the physical computers to work - where's the on switch?
