I think the different breeds and even strains within breeds still have their basic reputations when it comes to dispositions, but the individuality within those seems through the roof now! I started with purebreds, a few of those, a couple of these....mostly dual purpose and the common, easy bantams. I had good luck and the different breeds pretty much acted the way they were 'supposed' to. Barred Plymouth Rocks had a great reputation then and I wound up with the perfect rooster in the one I got...assertive, confident and dominant enough to rule as the chief rooster for eight years, yet so docile and friendly with people that I used to take him along to do pet visitations at seniors' homes. Ditto the chief banty rooster I wound up with, a tiny black-breasted red Old English game who bossed around all the bantams, yet he was also perfect for pet visitations...the nurses in particular used to love him because he'd strut around at their station, flap, and crow his little heart out while at the same time gratefully accepting bits of their sandwiches and donuts. On the OTHER hand, I also wound up with the one and only human-aggressive chicken I've yet had to date, a Cornish game cockeral, and he revealed that he was going to be a bad one long before he developed spurs so it wasn't a real problem. I just enjoyed an extra home-raised chicken dinner a few days after his fatal transgression. The Cornish game hen I wound up with and kept was fine, by the way, not overly aggressive at all. So individual variety even there within that first batch...
Personally, I make pets out of all my breeding roosters as a sort of 'test' of their personalities. Ideally, and strictly in my opinion, one ought to be able to walk out to any flock rooster at any time and be able to pick them up and instantly have them go limp in one's arms. Even better is if they shut their eyes, lay their heads against your shoulder, and even 'smack their lips', that mandible shifting thing they do, because it tells me that whatever bird I'm holding is really enjoying the attention in addition to simply accepting it. Never have I had a rooster that's become a pet go 'mean' on me. At the very worst, a subordinate rooster might come racing up to me for help if he's being chased by a dominant one, but so what? I'll just catch him in my arms if the subordinate's panicky enough to fly up and shoo the dominate one away and that's pretty much the end of it. Dominate goes off in a huff and subordinate gets a minute of petting to calm him down and I set him down and he toddles off and peace in the yard is restored. That's pretty much the way it's been between the two old dude roosters I currently still have for some time now...both staunch flock guardians...both lovable pets. Don't know about the seven new cockerals I have in residence right now. Still working with those guys yet! The two buff orpingtons both seem like dopes and immature babies yet...the five olive eggers run the full scale, from outrageously saucy and loving being handled to likewise babyish and scared to death. So it goes.
Other than that he alerts them to treats and such.
