Classifying OOTS characters by methods other than alignment

[CriticalFailure]

We know the alignment of a great many characters and people often debate the alignment of unknown or ambiguous ones. I’m curious how people classify the characters in other schemes?

Does anyone have any thoughts on how different characters rank on the OCEAN five factor model of personality, or what their Meyers-Briggs category is, or what their disposition is according to the four classical personality types (and can the undead be sanguine if they don’t have blood?), or whatever other methods of defining types of people are out there?

[Ruck]

There's a model for framing story roles that's often used in comedy-- Mitch Hurwitz of Arrested Development calls it "matriarch, patriarch, craftsman, clown," but I prefer the shorter (and half-rhymier) "mother, father, joker, scholar."

It can lead to some debate-- on Seinfeld, Kramer outwardly appears to be the joker and George the scholar, but comedically, I'd argue it's the other way around-- and it doesn't perfectly map to six characters, but I think it works well here:

Mother: Haley
Father: Roy
Joker: Elan, Belkar
Scholar: Vaarsuvius, Durkon

[DLcygnet]

Well if you go by TV Tropes (Plus Tarquin's astute evaluation of the team) - You'd use the Five Man Band classification while Belkar serves as either The Evil Teammate or....

The Leader - Roy
The Lancer - Haley
The Smart Guy - V
The Big Guy - Durkon
The Heart - Elan
The 6th Ranger - Belkar

All puns intended.

[Ruck]

Well if you go by TV Tropes (Plus Tarquin's astute evaluation of the team) - You'd use the Five Man Band classification while Belkar serves as either The Evil Teammate or....

The Leader - Roy
The Lancer - Haley
The Smart Guy - V
The Big Guy - Durkon
The Heart - Elan
The 6th Ranger - Belkar

All puns intended.

Makes sense to me. Durkon doesn't fit the "strong but dim" stereotype of "The Big Guy," but he does fit the "drummer" role-- a steady anchor.

[DLcygnet]

Drummer, yes. Also: Thor's Might. Big. Guy.

He fits the Gentle Giant subcategory well. Most of these, actually. Dumb brute isn't a requirement for the trope.

[Seward]

Drummer, yes. Also: Thor's Might. Big. Guy.

Yeah. "A giant dwarf!" "That's an Oxymoron".

The Big Guy in the 5 man band trope is often not the most effective fighter and is often the quietest person, a Gentle Giant type.

The Lancer is the one who is the go-to for violence in support of the leader's goals, and yeah, I think Haley qualifies, especially as she's also the one who is most likely after Roy to engage in social violence. (snark, insults, etc). Likewise her roguish ways contrast to Roy's more lawful approach, which fits the trope.

One of the defining characteristics of a rock band is often the interaction of the lead singer and lead guitar, where they kind of pass the music back and forth, sometimes in harmony, sometimes in rivalry and sometimes with their own spotlight. This trope comes from classic rock bands (which is why the "Heart" is called "The Chick" because lots of those bands had only one token women and she usually played tamborine or some other minor role + backup vocals but served as social glue to keep the band from imploding)

Naturally bands that defied the trope tended to do better. None of my favorite bands from my youth fitted that mold very well, but by the time I was a teenager the trope was starting to die with bands like Heart, Fleetwood Mac, Pat Benatar, Blondie, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Kate Bush etc making their own tropes, or making use of existing ones but ignoring gender.

[DLcygnet]

One of the defining characteristics of a rock band is often the interaction of the lead singer and lead guitar, where they kind of pass the music back and forth, sometimes in harmony, sometimes in rivalry and sometimes with their own spotlight. This trope comes from classic rock bands (which is why the "Heart" is called "The Chick" because lots of those bands had only one token women and she usually played tamborine or some other minor role + backup vocals but served as social glue to keep the band from imploding)

Since Haley and Elan are both Chaotic (vs Roy's Lawful), I thought about making Elan the Lancer and Haley the Chick/Heart. But this arrangement works better. We still maintain the 1 "chick" quota (Yes, I know I'm putting a lot of stock in the Giant's early Smurfette comment about the team.), Elan serves more of a peacekeeping/healer/support role anyway (Kazoo instead of tambourine anybody?), and Haley and Roy's leadership/combat hand offs are well documented in the comic (i.e. when Roy was Dead, Battle against Sandman, etc.).

[Ruck]

I mean, the "Lancer" is supposed to be the Leader's #2, in effect, right? Seems pretty clearly like Haley to me.

[The Pilgrim]

According to the Four Classical Humors:

Roy and Haley: Choleric
Durkon: Phlegmatic
Elan and Belkar: Sanguine
Vaarsuvius: Melancholic

[CriticalFailure]

Interesting choice! I would’ve assumed that Belkar would be choleric and Haley would be sanguine but my understanding of the humors is not very deep.

[RatElemental]

How about Futurama?

Roy: Leela
Haley: Amy
Vaarsuvius: The Professor
Belkar: Bender
Durkon: Hermes, or maybe Kif
Elan: Fry

[The Pilgrim]

Interesting choice! I would’ve assumed that Belkar would be choleric and Haley would be sanguine but my understanding of the humors is not very deep.

Well, almost all the philosophers have theorized about the Four Classical Humors for more than 2.000 years, until modern psychology consolidated in the XX Century. So there is no authority on the exact traits of each particular humor.

But well, what makes me mark Belkar as Sanguine instead of Choleric is that the halfling lacked the ambitious, leading and goal-focused personality that would mark a Choleric type. Old flavour Belkar, at least. New flavour Belkar is getting more Choleric and less Sanguine as the strip develops, though he's still basically drifting around without any greater purpose.

And what makes me mark Haley as Choleric instead of Sanguine was that she is ambitious, has long-term goals, and kepts almost all about herself secret. Untimately, she usually takes decissions based on reason rather than emotion. Her aphasia breakdown arc also is a very choleric trait for me. Choleric individuals tend to be very mentally resilient, but once broken down they are equally hard to patch up.

[CriticalFailure]

Oh, that's really interesting, I didn't know those things.

[LadyEowyn]

Well, you created an opening. I’m doing Hogwarts Sorting Hat.

Roy is a Gryffindor. He’s a Lawful Good Fighter because he wanted to protect people, and he doesn’t hesitate to risk his life for others’ benefit.

Haley is a Slytherin. She’s ambitious (she wants to be super-rich, it was part of the vision in Girard’s pyramid) and she’s certainly cunning (most of her victories are through guile).

Vaarsivius is a Slytherin. Ravenclaw’s the obvious one due to V’s intellect, but their desire for knowledge is as an avenue to power, not for its own sake. I can’t think of any moment when we’ve seen genuine intellectual curiosity from V, or joy in learning for learning’s sake.

Durkon is a Hufflepuff. He’s loyal, dutiful, and persevering.

Elan is trickier, but I’d say Gryffindor. The Dashing Swordsman class is practically tailor-made for Gryffindors. And none of the other houses fit him well.

Belkar doesn’t really fit any of them. He certainly has no interest in intellectual pursuits, he’s selfish but unambitious (“stab as many things as possible” isn’t much of an ambition), he certainly doesn’t care about justice or duty. He’s been willing to be fairly reckless with his life since his character development (fighting Tarquin’s army when anyone could one-hit-kill him, repeatedly taking on a vampire who was well out of his weight class), so I may have to go with Gryffindor.

Beyond the Order, I’d say O-Chul’s a definite Gryffindor. His line from GDGU about standing between wrongdoers and weaker people and saying, “Not them. If you have to hurt someone, hurt me instead” pretty much sums it up. (To dip into another fantasy universe, he’s also definite Windrunner material. He’s even the right colour (blue)!)

Redcloak is, at heart, a Ravenclaw. He’s not only smart, he’s enthusiastically intellectual. He enjoys knowledge. He is, as Xykon says, a nerd.

[CriticalFailure]

I completely agree. I wouldn't have thought of V being a Slytherin but now that you write it out, you are 100% right with that imo.

[Ruck]

How about Futurama?

Roy: Leela
Haley: Amy
Vaarsuvius: The Professor
Belkar: Bender
Durkon: Hermes, or maybe Kif
Elan: Fry

I can get on board with this. I like Durkon as Hermes because of his Lawfulness, although in D&D I would classify Hermes as Lawful Neutral.

My biggest quibble is with Haley as Amy, but I don't know who else she'd be. Maybe it's because Amy never got totally consistent characterization. But then, we've seen Haley both as a girly-girl (albeit mostly in early strips) and quite intelligent, so I suppose it fits.

Tarquin is Zapp Brannigan.

[RatElemental]

I can get on board with this. I like Durkon as Hermes because of his Lawfulness, although in D&D I would classify Hermes as Lawful Neutral.

Hermes also holds the company together more than anyone seems to realize, as evidenced by that one episode where he leaves and Leela takes over for him in the meantime.

My biggest quibble is with Haley as Amy, but I don't know who else she'd be. Maybe it's because Amy never got totally consistent characterization. But then, we've seen Haley both as a girly-girl (albeit mostly in early strips) and quite intelligent, so I suppose it fits.

Amy also has a bit of an on/off friendly rivalry thing with Leela going in some episodes, and if I recall correctly somewhat of a second in command (though it's to the professor, rather than to Leela, and again only sometimes).

Tarquin is Zapp Brannigan.

Totally agreed. Malack makes a goof Kif too, come to think of it.

[The Pilgrim]

The time has come to submit the OOTS to the Myers-Briggs Personality Test.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myer...Type_Indicator

The four axis of that model are:
- Extraversion vs Introversion
- Sensing vs Intuition
- Thinking vs Feeling
- Judging vs Perceiving

And my analysis is:

Roy: ESTJ - The Supervisor

Haley: ENFP - The Champion

Elan: ESFP - The Performer

Vaarsuvius: INTP - The Architect

Durkon: ISFJ - The Protector
(Pre-exile Durkon is a textbook example of ESFJ, but years in exile on an hostile environment have turned him towards Introvertness).

Belkar: ENTP - The Inventor
(Not surprisingly, he is the most diffult to categorize. But Roy has ofter credited him for his ability to come up with stuff, and Belkar has always been very innovative at inventing new creative ways to make people suffer. And when put to a good end, that ability has made him reinvent himself).

[DLcygnet]

Vaarsuvius: INTP - The Architect
Belkar: ENTP - The Inventor
(Not surprisingly, he is the most diffult to categorize. But Roy has ofter credited him for his ability to come up with stuff, and Belkar has always been very innovative at inventing new creative ways to make people suffer. And when put to a good end, that ability has made him reinvent himself).

I took a crack at this after reading the TV Tropes page on it. I agree with 4 out of 6.

INTJ - V (Simultaneously the Spock and a Byronic Hero)
ISFP - Belkar (Tsundere - Outwardly violent character who runs hot and cold. He's a go with the flow kind of character most of the time. Barbarian rage anybody? Clearly a cat person - typically introvert; also - his idea of happily ever after is a quiet meal at home with his cat and 1 friend (Shojo). "Live and let live, I always say.")

[Grey Watcher]

Totally agreed. Malack makes a goof Kif too, come to think of it.

I figured Kilkil is a better analogue for Kif. Tarquin respects Malack too much. Granted, Kilkil isn't as perpetually exasperated as Kif, but the power dynamic is closer.

[Ruck]

I figured Kilkil is a better analogue for Kif. Tarquin respects Malack too much. Granted, Kilkil isn't as perpetually exasperated as Kif, but the power dynamic is closer.

I think these are good reasons to make a case for either. I think Malack myself largely because Kilkil wasn't really well-developed, and even without the power dynamic / Kif's spinelessness, the perpetual exasperation works well.