Character Motivation Entry: Escaping Invaders

What does your character want? This is an important question to answer because it determines what your protagonist hopes to achieve by the story’s end. If the goal, or outer motivation, is written well, readers will identify fairly quickly what the overall story goal’s going to be and they’ll know what to root for. But how do you know what outer motivation to choose?

[image error]If you read enough books, you’ll see the same goals being used for different characters in new scenarios. Through this thesaurus, we’d like to explore these common outer motivations so you can see your options and what those goals might look like on a deeper level.

Character’s Goal (Outer Motivation): Escape Invaders

Forms This Might Take:

A foreign army seeking to claim territory
A group or organization seeking to take one’s assets, property, and resources by force
An alien invasion
An intelligent species intent on domination
A supernatural enemy (demons, malevolent forces, etc.)
Artificial intelligence seeking to overthrow humanity
A group of people or animals being controlled in some way (a drug, an implant, mind control, a virus, etc.) who pose a immediate threat

Human Need Driving the Goal (Inner Motivation): safety and security,

How the Character May Prepare for This Goal: 

Scouting escape routes
Monitoring the enemy’s movements and patterns to determine the best opportunity to escape
Arranging for transport (pay, steal, or acquire what one needs)
Gathering money or other items for trade to use as bribes or to pay for assistance
Keeping close tabs on one’s family so one can leave when an opportunity presents itself
Acquiring Intel about one’s enemy (routines, plans, their base of operations)
Understanding the invader’s strengths (their methods for finding people and capturing them, their weapons, resources, etc.)
Arranging for safe passage at pinch points
Communicating with others who are also looking to escape and collaborating
Stockpiling supplies
Procuring weapons
Procuring any specialized clothing or equipment (signal jammers, cloaking technology, heat-resistant suits, etc.)
Having false documentation made
Purchasing black market credentials, access cards, or pass codes if needed
Capturing and questioning an invader to obtain valuable information one needs for the escape
Gathering survival gear and medical supplies

Possible Sacrifices or Costs Associated With This Goal: 

Being injured
A family member being captured during the escape
Leaving behind one’s job, friends, and property
Having to leave a family member behind (who has been captured and is beyond rescue, who refuses to leave, etc.)
Giving up one’s old life for something uncertain
Losing all one’s wealth, status, and assets
Damaging one’s health during the escape (through exposure to chemicals, radiation, or another danger associated with the escape route)
Sacrificing one’s moral beliefs in “him or me” situations with others trying to survive
Emotional pain over any failures, guilt, or shame that results from fleeing
Having to live with the knowledge of what one did to survive (kill people, sacrifice others to live, fail to help others out of self-preservation, whatever fits)

Roadblocks Which Could Prevent This Goal from Being Achieved: 

One’s transportation being destroyed
A cave-in within a tunnel network one is using to escape, a bridge collapse, a train derailment, a capsized boat, a car breakdown
A checkpoint weakness being discovered and fortified
A traitor in one’s midst
Security being tightened, heavy patrols
A new weapon or technology being introduced to the mix that one cannot counteract
Someone in one’s party becoming injured or sick
A smuggler failing to show or being killed on route to the pick up
Running out of food and water
Not having anything worth bartering to secure safe passage or help
Having one’s equipment be destroyed or sabotaged in some way
Weather conditions that make safe passage impossible
A forest fire that cuts off one’s escape route
Pass codes or protocols at a checkpoint being changed without warning

Talents & Skills That Will Help the Character Achieve This Goal:

A Knack for Languages
A Way with Animals
Archery
Astral Projection
Basic First Aid
Good Listening Skills
Blending In
Carpentry
Gaining the Trust of Others
ESP (Clairvoyance)
Enhanced Hearing
Haggling
Charm
Hot-Wiring a Car
High Pain Tolerance
Knife Throwing
Knowledge of Explosives
Lip-Reading
Lying
Making People Laugh
Mechanically Inclined
Mentalism
A Knack for Making Money
Mimicking
Multitasking
Organization
Parkour
Photographic Memory
Psychokinesis
Reading People
Regeneration
Self-Defense
Sharpshooting
Sleight-of-Hand
Strategic Thinking
Super Strength
Survival Skills
Swift-footedness
Throwing One’s Voice
Wilderness Navigation
Wrestling

Possible Fallout For the Protagonist if This Goal Is Not Met:

Losing one’s home, property, and assets
Being captured and killed
Enslavement
Torture
Watching loved ones being captured and killed
Watching others be enslaved
Extinction of humanity


Click here for a list of our current entries for this thesaurus, along with a master post containing information on the individual fields.

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