An example of what not to do

theory
#1

I improvised a quick story in another thread, and upon reflection, it is absolutely terrible.

I’m going to put the story here, and give everyone 24 hours or so to figure out where I went wrong.

A guy falls into a well. (I’m going to write out a Mind:Contemplation story here.) He thinks of himself very highly, so much so that he can’t imagine people won’t come looking for him. But time passes and he starts to doubt. The problem, he realizes, is that he has reduced his understanding of the situation as something based entirely on his ego and how much he thinks other people like him. But after doing some reevaluation (“I did get rejected by Jennifer when I asked her out”) and some evaluation (“I think I’m getting hypothermic.”) he comes around to the idea that he’d really better start a new plan. Voila! He starts – Production – screaming! Someone hears him and saves him

Just to clarify, the answer I’m looking for is not “This is a Situation story”. There’s a different problem altogether.

2 Likes
#2

If Reduction is his problem, and he realizes it upfront, then there wouldn’t be any need to work through the symptom and response (Reevaluation and Evaluation).

#3

Good thought, possibly also true. The mistake is more fundamental than this. That is, the problem would still be true had he not realized anything about Reduction until the very end.

#4

I’ll take one more stab:

How did this guy arrive at the solution without an Influence Character to push him in that direction?

#5

Man! I’m going to have to keep a list of things that are wrong.

So, to be fair, this was presented as a stand-alone short story idea to make a separate point that never involved an IC. The player involved would probably be better thought of as an objective character. But, points to you regardless.

I appreciate your taking stabs at it.

Still, there is a larger mistake involved.

1 Like
#6

@MWollaeger first let me commend you on your humility. It’s inspiring. That said, from the get go there are a lot of things.

  1. Thinking of himself a certain way is more of Psychology.
  2. He can’t imagine people won’t come for him (conceiving, lol, Psychology again)
  3. Every other thing revolves around a “process” in his mind. And so he eventually starts to “Conceptualize” (screaming etc). And I think this has to be the last signpost for his throughline. Because if we look at the theory, each appreciation looks to the conflict and not storytelling. Lemme know how I did. Hehe…
#7

Most things that have been separated from their place in a complete storyform can be described as a different Domain. (I do the same thing, reframing this as a Situation in the original thread.) So I think you’re picking up on an artifact of an incomplete model and haven’t really pinpointed the problem.

What do you mean by this:

Is this why you think it has to be Conceptualizing at the end? Let me know!

1 Like
#8

@MWollaeger Partially. From your description he starts screaming then someone finds him. The End. From my understanding, each appreciation should be encoded with some sort of conflict. The theory points at sources of inequity. So permit me to add to the Throughline. The guy is at his wits end and he knows he doesn’t have enough energy left. He realizes it’s better to scream for help but it may sap all the energy he has left. Well, he decides to scream anyway and damn the consequences. He screams and screams, he feels his life slipping from him(the inequity creeping from that appreciation) but no one hears him. He passes out but it leads to success in the end. He awakes from a coma to find himself in the hospital. What do you think? Any good?

#9

Not every appreciation. Not the Solution for sure. Not the Goal.

2 Likes
#10

True. You are right. My bad. Almost every one. Thanks for clearing that up.

1 Like
#11

All righty @MWollaeger, it’s been 24+ hours! What’s the fundamental error we haven’t spotted yet?

#12

Here is the fundamental mistake: For the majority of this paragraph, I used the Theme Chart as a Subject Chart.

He starts to Doubt. This is neither problematic nor a measuring stick on the situation.
Reducing is used okay: it causes problems because it causes him to wait it out, instead of begin efforts to help himself, but I leave that fairly vague.
Production is the solution, so that’s okay as well.
But reevaluation and evaluation are things he is doing and that is just flat out poorly conceived. These would need to be expressed to 1) be problematic and 2) reduce conflict, since one is the symptom.

We all run into this problem in the reverse, too, when we are storyforming and look at the way things are in movies and not at the way things are problematic.

4 Likes
#13

I wondered for a bit whether it had anything to do with :muscle:, but I didn’t know how to articulate it, so I waited…

Oh interesting. Do you mean that the symptom reduces conflict because it takes focus away from the actual problem (i.e. justification)? Or do you mean the response reduces conflict by addressing the symptom?

#14

The Symptom actually does reduce conflict, and not via distraction. That’s why we focus on it!

But ultimately, it doesn’t actually deal with the problem, which is why problems persist. A very broad look at Dramatica is “people use the symptom until they get tired of problems continuing to show up, and then reassess what is going on and look around for another approach (the solution).”

It’s funny, this certainly is :muscle: but it’s deeper than that too, because it’s not enough to just say “reevaluating is a problem” because that is also just using the theme chart as a “subject + consequences” chart, and it’s so much more than that.

3 Likes
#15

I’ve been looking at symptoms wrong. I assumed when I first studied the theory that (for example) the MC was actively searching for a solution, but just looking in the wrong area – thus the symptom and response. That makes it sound like a “pad out the story” technique.

But you’re suggesting that the symptom is really a safe space for the character, like, “so long as I can believe that my problem is [symptom], then everything will be fine.” Focusing on the symptom allows the character to maintain the current status quo.

But then the story happens; the equilibrium is broken, and the character is forced to “look around for another approach.”

2 Likes
#16

I love this thread more than anything.

2 Likes
#17

I’m not really suggesting that everything will be fine if the character focuses on the symptom. (We may be having a semantic issue here.)

Scenario: You and I argue because I have given our life savings to someone you don’t trust. (The matter being that you and I have different understandings of what is required to trust people.) So there is a lot of tension in the house, and the actual argument we have is, “I think this huckster is a sociopath, and would just as soon steal our money and leave us to die.”
Now the things have been give a defining metric: will he leave us to die?
So, the next day, I invite us all out on a picnic. I go swimming and pretend to be drowning. The huckster saves me! He’s passed the test. You no longer believe he will leave us to die.
The next day, he comes back: I need more money from you to unlock the Nigerian bank account. Only another $550. And you get uncomfortable again. You want to know (again) if you can trust this guy. So you say, “hold on, I just have to get my plugged-in toaster out of the filled bathtub… why don’t you come with me.” He says, “Are you crazy? Unplug it!”
Phew, passed another test. Your tension goes down.
But this goes on and on. It’s unending! But you never noticed, because he kept passing your tests!
And now, you’ve got to deal with unending and not trust. So you stop the payments.

So, things weren’t fine for the duration of that, they were merely tolerable. But the inequity prevents them from ever being fine.

4 Likes
#18

@MWollaeger. Amazing! You’ve unlocked the 4th gate in my Storymind! This example you just gave has offered such clarity… Wow. Just… Wow. Thanks.

1 Like