Once again, I am trying to analyze my story with Dramatica. The same confusion is about choices that Dramatica makes. Why “Doing” and no other choices when I barely made any decisions just yet? Why do I get Change for Resolve and have no way of choosing Steadfast? Why my MC is a Doer if I didn’t choose it?
You don’t have quite enough information to make it clear why Dramatica is making specific choices for you. Usually, it’s because you’ve put in information elsewhere. Dramatica Theory is a cluster of interlocked gears; one choice turns and forces other choices. That’s what makes it so “prophetic.” For example, if you’ve chosen the Domain of the MC Throughline, you’ve already defined the MC Approach. If you’ve chosen both the OS Problem and the MC Problem, you’ve already determined whether the MC is Steadfast or Changed.
Could you explain which choices you’ve made already? That would help us explain it better.
I think I was able to make only a couple of choices. Mostly, concerned with plot. But it looks like the program made choices for me, some of them I was unable to click.
Not sure what you already know, so I may be giving too much or not enough info, but …[quote=“Jenya, post:1, topic:895”]
Why “Doing” and no other choices when I barely made any decisions just yet?
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All Concerns will appear as the same type. So if one Concern is Impulsive Response, the others will be Playing a Role, How Things Are Changing, and Doing. If you put your OS in Activity and then choose any of the other Concerns I just mentioned, or even any of the items under any of those Concers, it should force your OS Concern into Doing. This has to do with making sure all four problems are looking at the same kind of problem from a different angle.
There are a couple of other ways to force Doing as well, but they’re not as easy to explain. For instance, if you choose MC Issue of Value (or anything under Impulsive Response) and a growth of Start, your OS Throughline will be put in Activity and the Concern in Doing. This has to do with how Growth is determined along with making sure all the Concerns match. [quote=“Jenya, post:1, topic:895”]
Why do I get Change for Resolve and have no way of choosing Steadfast?
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Dramatica is about giving you the process the human mind follows in order to solve a problem. Just as above, depending on what info you put into Dramatica, you will eventually reach a point that you force the story into Change or Steadfast. I’m not as clear here, but I presume the reason why it forces you into Change is because the only way to progress through the rest of the path you’ve chosen is for your character to Change.
Again, hard to explain in terms of Dramatica theory, but think of it like this. If your character is driving a car straight for a cliff with the goal of not going over the cliff, then in order to succeed he will be forced to change the direction the car is moving in, or even stop the car. He has no other choice because if he doesn’t change, he will fail to reach his goal of not going over the cliff.
You MC is a Do-er because s/he sees the problem as an external one. You’ve done something to put them into a problematic Situation or Activity. When your character sees the problem as external, they prefer to try to change the external to solve the problem rather than to make an internal change to try to solve the problem.
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Okay, my question wasn’t clear enough. Got it. I’m asking which answers specifically you’ve put in. Have you put in the MC Growth? The Problem-Solving Style? The OS Domain? The OS Concern? The OS Issue? The OS Problem? If you explain specifically which choices you’ve made, we can try to explain what relationships between terms exist that caused them to lock in for you. There are about 40 different terms which could reliably be called “about plot,” so that doesn’t really narrow it down. 
Hi @actingpower! Sorry I didn’t reply right away. Had some additions in my family 
. I think I am so inexperienced, I don’t even know what I did… I had some few attempts at working with Dramatica, and at this point I have maybe 2 or 3 diff. versions of the same story created in it. Should I start from the scratch once again? I am not sure.
@Jenya, I think you are deep in the learning phase here. My recollection of that phase: it is totally f***ing confusing. The only way to learn is to embrace the confusion. Stare at the things you are confused about, read about it in the book, come here and ask questions.
I want to make sure of one thing: do you understand the difference between the MC and the Protagonist?
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I am, @MWollaeger, I am. Yes, I do understand the difference. Dramatica brings lots of frustration though, but I can’t seem to let it go.
It’s worth fighting to understand.
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