hopefully his character will solidify in my mind as I'm forced to write more if him. But even if it doesn't the simplest solution is to just relegate him to the mysterious wise elder role because well he's mysterious isn't he? Not like we're meant to know what he's thinking.
*shrugs* we'll all find out together.
Fair enough.
For whatever limited worth it may be I can only offer my own best guess at rationalizing the man. Which might be useful or might not but eh, might as well.
I think the two dominant traits for Dumbledore are that he's genuinely intelligent, and genuinely intelligent enough that he fundamentally can't bring himself to trust other people being in charge. He can see too many problems with their plans. Too many ways things could all go horribly wrong.
But he's simultaneously too traumatized by his past to really trust himself in charge either. Too aware of his own failures and his own darker impulses.
So he must be in charge, because otherwise he's sure that everything will go wrong. And everyone seems to push him into that role anyway. He can't let someone else take that responsibility, they might
make a terrible mistake.
And yet, he can't trust himself either, even if he has to preset a front of being confident and wise for his fellows. He "knows", deep in his bones, that if he truly followed his instincts that he would wind up like his old friend, committing monstrous atrocity in the name of necessity.
He might make a terrible mistake.
So he leads passively, seeking out the 'plans' which involve the least action, the least change. He can't trust himself to do more, and can't trust anyone else to do much at all. So that's all that's left. Perhaps it's not the best plan, and he's probably intelligent enough to realize that, deep in his soul. But it's the plan he can bear to follow, that has the least risk of sending him tumbling into the abyss he fears so very much.
