Chocolate and Peanut Butter - how to combine storeforms

Consider a case where you created two storyforms. Neither one of them is really what you want. You like about half of one and about half of the other. You’d like to combine the two halves that you like.
Have you ever been in that situation and, if so, what have you done to approximate combining two halves (excluding the cases where two half storyforms are incompatible)?

Let’s say you have two maps to Boston. One puts you in New York, but it’s pretty, which you like. One lands you in Delaware, which has great chowder.

How do you use both maps to get to Boston?

Answer: you ditch both maps, and find a map to Boston.

You are in the awkward phase of not understanding Dramatica, so you’re misleading yourself somewhere. Better understanding is the key, not salvaging what you’ve already done.

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One thing you can is just to use the stuff you know for sure, starting from the top:

  • You seem pretty sure your MC is a Be-er
  • The Outcome is Success
  • The MC Resolve is Change (and the IC Resolve is Steadfast)
  • If you’re happy with the Domains & Concerns of the storyform from the other thread, I’d go ahead and use those. They seemed spot on to me, especially OS Obtaining. (and combine that with MC Be-er means you know all four Concerns: MC Subconscious, IC Future, RS Becoming)

Just that is a lot more than most writers know objectively about their stories. With that, you could go ahead and write your first draft (or your detailed outline). Eventually you’ll know more and you can use that to take your storyform further.

Another option is we could try to help you find the real map to Boston, or at least get as close as possible to it without misleading you. But one caveat here – you’re still in the awkward initial phase, so even the real map may sometimes give you trouble because for a while you’ll have trouble reading it.

And listen to Mike. He’s got a thousand times more experience than I do at teaching Dramatica.

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Now that the more experienced have answered, I feel more assured in writing out my response, especially since I’m still rather new to the application of the theory myself.

This is exactly the situation I found myself in only a few months ago. Or, at least, I thought I had found myself in this situation. The answer was quite as @MWollaeger put it: “ditch both maps”.

And, now to borrow ideas from @mlucas, while sprinkling in my experience and advice.

Instead, switch to focus on what you are certain of, which when you are new to Dramatica you might still not have as correct as is possible.* From that, though, you can use what you have so far to write an outline or draft and come back to storyforming after you finish that outline/draft.** Then, while actually working on that draft, refer back to the basic definitions if and only if you actually need them. [Hint: You don’t! You may think you do, but generally, you don’t, except in a few rare cases, and even then, you don’t, not really. (That hint was mostly for my personal benefit.)]

Most likely, in the process of finishing your outline/draft, you’ll get a far better idea of what you’re trying to say with your story, and you’ll intuit a number of areas that could be improved, and ways to improve them, without the need for Dramatica.

This is where my actual experience ends. Thus, the following is conjecture: After all of this, that is when to go back to the storyforming, if only to determine whether something is missing or if there are areas of your story that could be improved more.

That’s my take on it.

* I was convinced that my MC was a Change character, but I’m starting to see that he is actually a Steadfast character.

** This has been the hardest part for me, as I’m both a perfectionist and a mathematician, which when combined with such a theory as Dramatica, is a dangerous theory-hound combination.

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When this happened to me, I’d choose the one that most fit the MC or OS because I felt I had a better grasp on those. Once working through it, I usually realized I didn’t have a good handle on how the IC or RS worked and that’s why I would like a different storyform for those Throughlines. Other times I’d abandon both and start over and be just as happy. Sticking with one over another probably helped me understand the ICs influence over others a bit better.

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Thank you both @Hunter and @mlucas for following up with good advice.

Focus on what you know @YellowSuspenders and move forward from there. That is terrific advice.

You have two storyforms – lots of us end up there at some point. There is a difference between two storyforms where you can’t get the Domains, and two storyforms where you can’t figure out which is the Symptom and which is the Problem. I frequently get close to the element level, and then don’t worry about the final detail until later anyway. (And even then, how I think of the elements usually gets refined – the element stays the same, the illustration gets better.)

My guess is that your brain is having trouble treating the Theme Chart as themes, and is trying to treat it as subjects – and on top of that, it’s having trouble adding in the conflict. We’ve all been there, so you have a lot of supporters here. But this can lead to multiple storyforms, because you aren’t being guided by the right things (themes) and are being guided by the things in your movie that lie on top of the themes.

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I don’t know what I don’t know. If you all would be kind enough to offer your time (as you and others did so graciously recently) to help me get a map to Boston, it would go a long way towards me learning what it is I don’t know. Then, I’d have some sort of plan to get up to speed.

I just went through a new story form document and selected every issue that I thought might be applicable. Then, I spiraled round and round until I got down to one story form. Is that what you’re talking about doing?

Unfortunately, my Dramatica erred and shut down on me soon after I got down to one story form and before I could save it. So, I’ll have to go through that process all over again.

That is certainly how I did it, so I can’t knock the method.

But it’s really a question of separating the themes from the topics – the meaning of the scenes from the subject of conflict.

That just takes experience. It’s a trap we all still fall into.

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I ask this because I don’t know what your Dramatica level is, but are you familiar with what @MWollaeger means when he says you may be using the Theme Chart as subject matter? As many other things as there are to learn that are helpful and that I understood well before this point, I think this is probably the thing to understand to really start understanding Dramatica. Knowing the four throughlines and perspectives and the difference between a main character and protagonist are all super helpful on their own, but you can get that and still not get the meat of Dramatica–at least I feel like that’s what I did. But knowing how to use Obtaining or Pursuit, etc, to create conflict rather than subject matter is, I think, where understanding Dramatica really starts to be useful the way it was meant to be.

I’m guessing that what he means is to make sure the issues are properly selected for each through line.

I don’t mean to speak out of turn and hope I’m not putting words in Mikes mouth, especially since he didn’t say it, but I’ll be corrected if I’m wrong.

It’s kind of like this. Obtaining a first edition, signed copy of a YellowSuspenders novel is subject matter. But the MC making his wife mad because he missed their daughters play-the one he promised to attend-in order to attend the book signing is conflict. You want to use the chart not so you can have your MC getting a book, but so you can create conflict between him and his wife and daughter.

Does that make sense?

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Hey @Gregolas, nice follow up.

@YellowSuspenders, it’s pretty easy to fall into the trap of “Hey, this throughline is about Obtaining, so let’s say that this is where they get their hands on the dragon’s gold!”

That is using the chart as subject matter: the chart says “Obtain” so the characters obtain something. The chart says “probability” so here’s where they gamble away the dragon’s gold.

That is not what the theme chart is, nor actually, what any part of a storyform is.

If Obtaining is the signpost, or the OS Goal, or the MC Concern, then the inequity here is going to be about Obtaining. It could be that the MC has always wanted to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro, but here he is stuck in New Jersey with incurable dysentery. It could be that here he decides “I’m busting out of the hospital and figuring out how to get to Africa.” (He’s motivated by his goal of Obtaining.) So he breaks out of the jail, now they need to deal. (The hospital has lost their patient – they have un-Obtained him, so to speak.) So, this suddenly looks like it’s a subject, right? But, the conflict is not that he got out. The conflict is in the fallout: the guard who is going to lose his job (un-obtaining), the scientist who wanted to test out his cure and suddenly has to find someone else who is sick (obtaining a new patient), etc.

It’s super easy to lose track of what the chart is asking for because the subject often implies the conflict. But this gets less effective, I find, the closer you get to the element level.

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I understand you to be saying that it isn’t enough to just have an event that has something to do with Obtaining. Rather, obtaining must be tied to a dramatically significant event (which I, personally, have always taken to mean “a significant, irreversible failure event of such an extent that the only way to move forward from here is to change direction”). I believe that when you say “inequity” and I say “failure,” we are referencing the same thing.

I’m not 100% sure what you mean by dramatically significant. If you mean “it spins the story in a new way” then… not necessarily.

This is a good place to start, but I would take some time to watch a movie that has a podcast and see if you can relate your idea to the movie via the storyform.

Here is where I predict you are going to have to stretch: if a character has a symptom of Control, do you imagine that they are constantly failing vis a vis Control? Is their Response: Uncontrolled similarly a sequence of Failures, especially given that this is what they think the Solution is going to be?

As yourself, “When I say Failure, what am I talking about?” The plot? Characters? How does a “Theme” or “Genre” (also defined by the theme chart) fail?

My guess is that you see this a lot in college comedy movies where the hot female English professor who is the girlfriend of the anal retentive Dean of Students keeps trying to exert control, keeps failing at control, and eventually learns to stop trying to control everything (while the dean who doesn’t learn to let go ends up in a mental hospital or deeply humiliated in some way).
There are four possibilities:
1.) An effort to control succeeds (ex. “Van Wilder”)
2.) An effort to control fails (ex. “Revenge of the Nerds”)
3.) An effort to be uncontrolled succeeds (ex. “PCU”)
4.) An effort to be uncontrolled fails (ex “My Science Project”)
While 2 and 3 both lead to "Uncontrolled,"they are two different kinds of “Uncontrolled.” While 1 and 4 both lead to “Controlled,” they are two different kinds of “Controlled.”

I know these are educated, well-thought out guesses. But it’s time to test these thoughts against a movie that has a podcast.

Here is your assignment:
• Pick a movie we have done in the last three years. (Don’t do Big, Frozen, Z or Leviathan.)
• Get the storyform from dramatica.com
• Watch the movie.
• Write down what you think the storyform means. Try to illustrate as much of it as you can. (Do you know what “illustrate” means in this context?)
• Then listen to the podcast.

This will give you an honest assessment of where you are, and allow you to ask specific questions that we can answer.

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Here are the links to the podcasts:
http://dramatica.com/video/users-group
http://dramatica.com/audio/users-group-podcast

If it’s a toss-up choosing a film I’d go with a video one, especially for some of the more recent ones there was some really great splicing of Chris Huntley, the whiteboard, and the Dramatica app that made it easier to follow along (I remember this for E.T. and Zootopia for sure).

I want to select a movie which has a really thorough analysis done on it. That way, when I’m done with my analysis, I can maximize my learning experience. For that reason, I’ve selected Zootopia.

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You have the added benefit then of listening to us all scrambling to figure it out, because we are wrong for a long time! It was a learning experience for me too!

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