What's more difficult than writing about a character? How about writing about multiple characters. This guide will help you understand how to write about multiple characters, whether they're a group or a team.
Characterization: One of the most important things in any story is decent characterization. Say you're writing about two, three, or even four characters. You're going to want them to all have different appearances and personalities. Each character (or at least most) should be different than the previous. Don't think of it as creating multiple characters, think of it as creating one character, then creating another character. Don't rush them. A good thing to do is to make sure that each character has a very strong and distinct personality. You want your reader to be able to tell which character it is, without openly revealing their name. A good way to do this is to give each character their own individual personality trait. Something that would distinguish one character from the others. Some characters talk differently, have different accents, etc. You'll want to create more diverse characters. Remember to treat each character as their own.
Viewpoints: You're probably going to want your story to be as convincing as possible. For this, you'll need convincing characters. Different people tend to have different views or opinions. You want your characters to be so different, yet so similar at the same time. Although they would normally have different personalities and viewpoints, it should also be similar. For example, one character eats meat, while the other is a vegetarian. Although they have different preferences, they accept each other because they understand that not everyone's the same. They may act differently, but they need to be able to relate to each other in order to function together.
Narrative Point of View: This is the tough part of any story. Who's point of view is the story based on? Is is centered around one character, or multiple? While both are challenging, they each have their own advantages. First person would require that each character has a very strong individual voice, which can be a challenge depending on how many characters you have and your own writing style. Third person allows you to use your own voice without worrying about whether it sounds too much the same for each character. Using the third person point of view, you could easily capture everyone's views, emotions, and (possibly) thoughts. However, first person allows you to choose a single central character and write the story from their perspective. So it would basically come down to the entire teams point of view, or a main characters (members) point of view.
Other Ways of Writing: Instead of sticking to the more traditional style, you could also present the story in different segments, each viewed through the eyes of a different character. One chapter could be centered around one character, while the other is centered around another. All together, it could make up pieces of the same story, just expressing the different views. This is a great way to utilize the first person point of view while making each perspective clear to the reader.
The Team: This is where it gets interesting.
Who?: Who are these people? Who are the members of the team? You created them, but who are they? Do they have a family? Do they work? Are they superheroes, or maybe supervillains? Ask yourself.
What?: What are they? Are they a group, a team, or just a bunch of random people together? What do they do?
When?: When did they meet? When did they decide to form this team? Is it before the story takes place?
Where?: Where do they live? Where do they work?
Why?: The most important question of all; why? Why are they together? Did someone bring them together? Did they decide to join in order to fight a common foe? This is very important to the story and should not be taken lightly. They should have a good reason as to why they formed this team or group.
Team Interactions and Development: This part is entirely left up to you. How well do they interact with each other? Some get along more than others. Maybe, some don't even get along. The teams attitudes towards each other should be explained at some point or another. Why do Wolverine and Cyclops always fight? Like characters, a teams development is crucial. Maybe something happens that causes them to disagree, or become closer. Show how they act towards each other and let it evolve.
I kind of rushed the guide, so excuse the fact that it's pretty short. I hope it helped somebody and I'm open to suggestions. Special thanks to for starting the How To Write Fan Fiction and everyone who participated in it. Thanks for reading.
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