Dec 03 2008
To Lead By Inspiration
Yesterday, I talked about the three approaches to leadership. But just glancing over them isn’t going to be enough to get across how the individual types work, so let’s look into them a little more closely.
As I pointed out, the most commonly written leader is the leader by inspiration. This mainly comes from the fact that being a leader by inspiration doesn’t actually require personal leadership skill, just connections, stage presence, bloodline, Destiny, special powers, an admirable virtue, or something else that sets the leader apart from everyone else.
The inspirational leader’s advantage is that he is remembered. Game characters often go about this on purpose, doing something impressive to get people’s attention, for instance. Or they might step in front of a crowd and deliver a flashy speech full of epic simile, grand overarching metaphor, echoes of times past, or just enough pent-up emotion and determination to slam the listener against the wall and hold him an inch above the ground until the talking is over. (If you are or know someone who can pull this off—awesome!) The less rhetorically skilled often incorporate flashy displays of power or skill in other areas, depending on that rather than their oratory.
But then you have the accidental inspirational leaders. These guys are the most fun to write, at least in my opinion. They didn’t necessarily choose their path, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they aren’t going to stick to it. The scion of a noble line dragooned into being a figurehead, the bearer of a unique power (but please think before you do this!), the apparent subject of a Grand Prophecy (again, think, and maybe play a little)—or maybe they’re clustering around someone who displays a more subtle virtue, like patience and dedication. It also raises the question of how they’re going to deal with leading, who (if not they themselves) is actually in charge here, whether they’re going to stick to the job and if so why, and whether they plan on actually learning to lead or (particularly if someone else is really coordinating things) just sit down, hold tight and follow the script. Warning—if you give up the amazing potential this has for a character development arc and make them flash-learn everything they need to know, I will hunt you down. If you’re just not sure how, sit tight; I’ll get to learning to lead soon.
The most important feature of an inspiration-leader is there being something to admire about them, preferably that in some way captures the imagination. Now, most people approach this as them being really flashy, and again, that’s the easiest to write. So the inspiration-leader might acquire symbols, or dress distinctively. If his qualification is because of bloodline or being a spiritual successor to an impressive figure, his resemblance to said figure will likely be played up, and tales of the old will be as commonly heard around him as tales of the new. If he qualified by his own deeds, everyone’s likely to hear about that, and the tales will grow and adapt in the telling to better satisfy the audience. If what set him up is a Prophecy, expect it to be told and told and told again, until anyone with half an ear has heard it enough to recite it from memory. But they don’t all have to be larger than life. If you’ve got someone who’s admired for a quiet virtue, it’s more likely that his following will be quiet as well, small but dedicated, and if anyone’s talking him up it’s not going to be him but probably someone on the outskirts of the group.
A quick note about inspiration: While Prophecy, Destiny and bloodline can be good for creating a leader that people will follow Because of Who They Are, if you want someone people follow and look up to because they want to be like him (and similarly, if you want to run an inspiration-leader in a game group and the rest of the group hasn’t agreed on having one member and one alone destined to these things—honestly, I couldn’t blame them in the slightest), you’re going to want to make them admirable and worthy of emulation. Limyaael explains it better than I do.
So. Inspiring enough for you?
