In Seinen or Shounen, the main character who happens to get involve in a crisis, happens to possess a skill that can be harnessed to put to good use. But over time, that potential can either lead the main character to astray or salvation.

Talent is something the character is born with, while a side character's potential can one surpass the talented one, or vice versa. sometimes the one with potential can lead his skills to astray, then corruption will follow, and he/she can become an entirely new antagonist in the series.

A character who possess a secret that can either used to defeat the antagonist: a living weapon; or a god incarnate.

A character may not be able to surpass their rivals, or their predecessor, no matter how much power or training they possess. But as long they have a strong will and heart to keep going, their enemies will never let them defeat him/her. Because what they once lost, he/she found something else to fight for.

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i wanna say secrets. but secrets that he dont know. natsu, for example. or allen

Potential.
He doesn't need to be a superhero
or a ladiesman, but I don't want to see
any losers either. I don't need to sympathize
to those.

Potential, doesn't that go hand in hand with talent. Since all these protagonists actually do have the talent to draw out their potential. Nor can have someone real potential if he ain't talented. Non talented people reach the roof quite fast, at least imo.

And what a protagonist needs is a sad past or even a dark past. So if that falls under secrets then I'll go with secrets.

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Hmmm

Isn't this too general?

Anyway... depends, but I would say that potential works better on the average plot

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Potential.

I like a main character that's like a Jack of all trades. You see them using all of their skills to win against people that are better than them at either one, most, or all of their skills.

Quote from Klapzi

The cool part is that I never get tired of being deceived

Quote from tactics

Just because someone's head was chopped off doesn't mean they're dead. That's just silly.

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Heart, I like characters that never give up. I don't like it if the main character has too much special stuff going for them because then when they win it's like, well of course their so special.

Personality.

Rest is trivial. They can be as strong as they want, but with no personality, they'll still look lame. :/

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he should have a giant penis...like ippo!

i like comics as well
don't kill me

Potentiality means either unexposed talent or diligence, heart means devotion,and personality ,well, naturally , aside from innate talent, a main character needs all of them. Although i prefer a genius as a protagonist, "Genius is the result of long and enduring efforts and not something innate", and he probably was on a losing streak.=_=

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I prefer protagonists that have talent to begin with, as opposed to the generic kid-who-happens-to-have-ridiculous-potential-in-some-field-and-eventually-becomes-godlike.

That's boring. Better for the character to be skilled to begin with, and have to really work to overcome things that are difficult, rather than have a never ending supply of "potential" that he can tap into whenever things get tough.

The only example I can think of right now is Kenshin, though it's not great. It fits though. He was already the among greatest swordsmen in the country when the series started, and as it dragged on he was faced with more and more difficult opponents, forcing him to push his skills further, and eventually to their limit. In the end, he'd gone from walking over the weaklings in the beginning, to barely surviving against skilled foes in battles that could've easily gone either way.

The point is, rather than Kenshin miraculously getting stronger and stronger as the series went on, they had him be ridiculously talented from the beginning, and the challenges he was faced with simply got more difficult as the series went on.

You know what I mean? It wasn't the best example, because you could still maybe argue that he was actually getting stronger throughout the manga(I'd disagree, and propose that he was actually weaker than he was prior to the series, but persevered all the same), and there was one point where they did the training thing to teach him a new move, but on the whole, it wasn't one of those shonen stories where the protagonist is just constantly getting stronger to meet enemies he initially had no right facing. I find that rather unrealistic.

(Not that I expect manga to be realistic, it's just not great storytelling.)

Super Saiyan mode is lame. So lets throw out potential.

Talent as good, as long as its not the Ryouma Echizen talent.. Where anything he should have trouble overcoming, he can simply say, "Mada mada dane", and taps into his bottomless pool of talent/potential MAX.

Secrets... Umm, that really depends on how lame the secret is. I can't really even think of a 'secret' that isn't game breaking atm. Maybe if it's something like.. uhhh.... Hentai Kamen. That one worked out well.

Heart... No no no non on nononononononononononononononono... No. Heart is the lamest of all. If I wanted a protagonist that was useless, and just relied on spouting off cheesy lines and talking about how he could do it because his friends supported him (since he couldn't do anything by himself I guess,) then I'd watch care bears. At least with care bears, the heart is actually doing something physical, like launching laser beams that brain wash/blow up their enemy.

So I'll say Other:

My favorite protagonists would be those with room for real character development. They don't rely on deus ex machina, but rather, the rules for their abilities are laid out at the start. They can also lose, but will learn from their loss, and not go around moping. Cry babies are never fun to watch. They still need talent though, or at least to work harder than anyone else. And who knows, a little luck can go a long way. But they should keep their cool:

Vagabond, Full Metal Panic, Holyland, Beelzebub (for now I'll classify this one here, despite the fact the author could throw a curve ball and make the protagonist one of the above (except Heart thank God,) Historie, and Beck... Are a few examples.

😲 , you "throw out potential", say "no..." to heart, and still your main character has what you called "real character development"?

Don't oppose something you don't understand, IMO "Potentiality means either unexposed talent or diligence", "heart means devotion",not sloppy sentiment, suppose that the protagonist "has talent to begin with", but he has no devotion for what he does, no sympathy or understanding in his interaction with other characters,then there's no way he can have any development in any aspect, even in your examples, the main characters still have what i called "heart" and "potentiality", because they are fundamental elements.

The expression of those elements in each manga is different, but don't assume that an element should be left out just because you think the way it is used in a certain manga is lame.

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Without a heart, talent and potential will waste. So i think main character must have heart first

Without a heart, talent and potential will waste. So i think main character must have heart first

yep, heart is a big deal, even hero won't be able to live without it xD
the way they see this precious "heart" in most mangas it's an ability to shout out loud some stupid stuff and do nothing except it, so I don't buy it.

second most of other's "other" options. nor talent, nor potential makes a great protagonist, but a combination of these and many other things. sometimes lack of talent is a great deal to push yourself in order to surpass someone talented.

Paradise on my right, Hell on my left and the Angel of Death behind.
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