Using The 5 Man Band In Your Stories

When your story has a main character, they are referred to as the protagonist of your story. A deuteragonist (a word a lot of us haven't heard a lot) is a term referring to a character who is secondary in a story. Sort of like how a superhero's sidekick is still an important character who contributes to the unfolding drama, but they aren't the one who's really in the spotlight. And for a lot of us, this is the traditional setup for our stories. We have our main character, a handful of support characters, the antagonists, and we're ready to roll!

But what about when you have multiple protagonists in a single story? Well, since they're all equally involved in the story, and they all have their own unique motivations and contributions, this is where you end up with a story about a team of individuals rather than any one person.

This is where we get into the 5 Man Band, which is a setup that I highly recommend you use for any team-based story you plan to tell.

Stay with me, and this will all make sense.

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Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more!

Who Makes Up The Five Man Band?

If you're a fan of tabletop RPGs (or my sister blog, Improved Initiative), then you're likely already familiar with the idea of the 5 Man Band, as it's used in the construction of the "ideal" adventuring party. And if you read a lot of military fiction, the 5 Man Band is your basic fireteam of 4, with a medic thrown in as number 5 in a lot of stories. However, generally speaking, the roles filled in a 5 Man Band include:

- The Leader: The team leader, generally the center of the team

- The Lancer: The foil to the Leader, and often a rival or antagonistic friend or colleague

- The Heart: The emotional center of the team. Often a medic or healer of some variety.

- The Smart Guy: The brains of the operation, often a tech savant, wizard, etc.

- The Big Guy: The tank, the Big Guy is strong, tough, or sometimes both.

This setup is extremely useful for stories with multiple protagonists, and especially when you need to rapidly differentiate them from each other even if there's a great deal of similarities between them. For example, consider Kill Team Errant, featured in my Warhammer 40K story Blackest Knights, which you should read if you haven't.

Our team features:

- Cadmus: Leader

- Phobos: Lancer

- Chiron: Heart

- Daedalus: Smart Guy

- Garm: Big Guy

Now, every member of the Kill Team is a space marine wearing the same, blank, gray armor. However, there are a variety of clues to let the audience know which member of the team is meant to fill which role, and to slot everyone in place in short order (this is a short story, after all, and I don't have infinite word count). If you're looking for easy, quick-fix solutions for your own stories, consider some of the following:

Names

Every member of the team has an alias taken from mythology, and the legends these names refer to are meant both as a signifier of their skill set, but also as a clue to their role in the 5 Man Band.

Cadmus was an ancient hero, and a slayer of monsters, making him a proud Leader. Phobos was a minor god of fear, making him the dark shadow to the sergeant, filling the role of the Lancer. Chiron was the centaur who taught philosophy and medicine to the ancient heroes, marking him as the team's apothecary (space marine medic), but also as the moral compass and heart. Daedalus was one of the great, learned minds of mythology who built the Labyrinth of the minotaur, and Garm was the hound of Hel who would drag back any souls that attempted to escape that realm.

Armament/Equipment

Weapons and armor (as well as other equipment) always has a symbolic representation in stories, in addition to any practical use it has for the characters in question.

For example, Cadmus carries a power sword of fine craftsmanship. This weapon is prestigious, as befits a leader, and it's clear that he is skilled with it. It also speaks to command, as officers have carried swords as sidearms both practically and ceremonially for centuries. Phobos, by contrast, uses a combat knife and a bolt pistol. Both of these are nasty weapons meant for up-close-and-personal killings, and they tend to work more for an ambusher and slayer than for a soldier or a warrior. Chiron only seems to have backup weapons, though we find by the end of the story that he's a psyker, a power which is extremely common for the Heart in this particular setup. Daedalus focuses on his bolt rifle and explosives, both of which are custom tooled to his exacting specifications, and which require a highly technical mind to make the most of in his particular fighting style. And Garm is equipped with a power fist, which allows him to strike devastating blows with one hand, and a boarding shield, which exacerbates his toughness, and ability to soak up punishment.

Manner of Speech

Every member of the Kill Team speaks differently, but the cadence and rhythm of their speech, as well as the choice of what they talk about, says a lot about them.

Phobos is irreverent, and cruel, which is a perfect opposite to Cadmus who focuses on the team, their goals, and coordination. Chiron attempts to solve problems with his words, and he is concerned with the morality of the actions his companions take. Daedalus speaks in an almost mechanical way, implying he's far more comfortable with facts, figures, and programs than he is with organic interaction with other people. And Garm... well, Garm barely speaks at all. Not an uncommon trait for a Big Guy, as the strong, silent type is a trope for a reason.

Show Your Audience Who Is Who

We're always saying, "show, don't tell," when it comes to our stories, but when it comes to tropes like the 5 Man Band it's extremely important to focus on that rule. Mostly because the trope exists as a meta-conceit. It's not part of the world itself (most of the time, anyway), but rather it's a tool for us as writers, and our audience as readers, to find a comfortable foothold to easily understand the mold a story fits into.

And it's also important to remember that all of these positions are flexible in terms of how they present to the audience, the traits that they have, etc. Your Big Guy might actually be the shortest member of the team, but he posses potent power as a psychic, or he's so dense nothing can truly hurt him. Your heart might be a gruff, foul-mouthed, stern parental figure who, underneath it all, truly cares for those around them. Your smart guy might be a gym rat who biohacks himself into the body he wants, in addition to being a multi-doctorate scientist, and your leader could be dark and brooding with their lancer a chipper, upbeat sort who always pushes them to do the most heroic thing.

If you haven't played around with this trope before, I highly recommend it... and that goes double if you're planning on writing squad-based military fiction, or party-based fantasy stories. It really saves you, and your audience, a lot of work!

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Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

You Always Have Room For Improvement

Every writer has that wincing experience of opening an old notebook, and seeing what a past iteration of them put down on the page. And if you stick with things long enough, you may even get to have that experience by picking up an old book you wrote, or an older collection you contributed to.

It's important to remember that no matter how good you think you are, there's always room for you to perfect your craft. The flip side of that is that no matter how bad you think your writing is, you can always use that last attempt as a ladder to climb a little higher.

Trust me, nobody's perfect.

Before we get started, remember to sign up for my weekly newsletter if you want to stay on top of all my latest releases. If you want to help me keep the wheels turning and the lights on, consider becoming a Patreon patron. And lastly, to follow all my followables check out my Linktree!

Now then, let's get to it!

Get Those Gains!

One of my favorite metaphors to describe writing, as my regular readers know, is to compare it to weightlifting. Because while your natural strength (talent) matters, it's only one component. There's also your discipline, the particular routine you do, your form, advice from more experienced lifters (mentors and other writers), your diet (what you read), and a hundred other factors!

Bro, do you even know Dostoyevsky?

Another similarity between writing and weightlifting, though, is that it can feel like you make a lot of progress when you start, but after a while you slow down. Even if you're still adding plates to the bar, it may not be as significant as the difference between your first month and your first quarter check in.

Because of that it's easy to get complacent. To go in and do the same routine, getting similar results every time. And even if what you're doing is good, you can still actively choose to make yourself better!

This doesn't mean you have to utterly change up your writing and do something completely different, though; as with the weight room, you can alter any number of factors as you see fit. Maybe you want to take a break from longer projects, and work on short stories for a bit to tighten up your plots and word choices. Perhaps you want to swap genres, switching out your blood and scares for some heartfelt romance. Or maybe you just change the media you consume and study, examining how other creators do things so you can take apart their tales and add useful tools to your box.

Sometimes these changes are going to go poorly. After all, just because you're a strong power lifter doesn't mean you're going to be good at endurance exercises. But no one is good at everything on their first try. Learning from your failures and mistakes is key, and all the lessons those previous attempts teach you will come in handy down the line.

Because if you never challenge yourself, and you never try anything different, then just like in the weight room you're going to plateau... and nobody wants that.

A Project That Put This On My Mind

The subject of learning and growing as a creator trying to do different things is on my mind because I've been working on making short audio dramas based on some of the fiction inside my various RPG supplements that have come out over the past few years. While my fledgling efforts could be called fine under the most generous of measures, I'm genuinely impressed by how much improvement has gone into the project in a relatively short period of time. They're still not perfect, of course, and I have a lot of improving still to do, but I find it encouraging to see things get a little better every time.

More on that process in Making Improvements Over Time (Progress on My RPG-Inspired Audio Stories) if that's something you'd like to take a closer look at!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!