RS Best Of (Relationship Throughline)

One of the difficulties with the RS is that sometimes it’s a conflict over a very specific thing, and sometimes it’s not, which is why I think I understand this:

Here is an example with a specific:
In Lord of the Flies both the MC and IC have a Fixed Mindset about the signal fire. One thinks it’s the most important thing on the island, the other doesn’t. They have arguments about it, so it’s extremely overt. (Though it’s not a topic, the fire is the topic.)

Here is an example with an intangible:
In The Accountant it is easy to see a clear relationship and trust building over the course of the movie. But there is no easy way to pinpoint when it happens and they never address it (except with how they act and feel).

So… like so many other things in Dramatica, what the RS is is clear but not specific.

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Yes, I did try that. But for some reason the drop down search function did not work (on ipad). Maybe I was just typing “relationship throughline.”

Now, I am able to access these articles through my desktop. Thanks.

On the “Emotional Ladder” article, you say

the impact of these emotions on the Premise is not yet fully understood.

I think this is the struggle I’m having. Trying to find the connection.

But in light of the Emotional Ladder article, I have a feeling RS feeds into OS solution. At least that’s how in my story the Solution is able to be achieved: because of how they dealt with the RS issue, with the final tip-angle of the Issue/Counterpoint they arrived at the RS Solution and so avoided the OS Consequence.

In fact, in the Re-Imagining the Key Relationships article, it seems that for each of the stories mentioned, also, until the RS gets to a certain point the OS Solution CANNOT kick in appropriately.

Luke: Until he starts to believe all the things Obiwan told him, he cannot shoot the Deathstar.

Will Hunting: Until he is willing to bend to the therapist and until he is willing to let his “brother” go, he cannot find resolution.

Rick/Ilsa: Until Rick is able to forgive Ilsa’s betrayal, he cannot give up the bar in order to let Ilsa leave.

Maybe I’m confusing the IC with the RS. On the other hand, maybe this is why for so many years, the RS was considered to be IC/MC. I think there is a balance-angle that needs to happen BETWEEN them (or even with an external non-IC romance character) that bolsters the MC or Protagonist to be able to reach the solution and not fold to the Consequence.

The IC is also compelling them, actively maneuvering to challenge them in that throughline. But maybe the “space between them” also has to be just-so.

If I recall, in Lord of the Flies, it’s not till the IC is killed that the OS is solved.

I’ve read both things. The RS is NOT related to OS, and then the quote above, that the RS connection in the story PREMISE is not understood. The Premise is a line from story goal to MC focus to OS Solution to Judgment. I think in there we need consequence/RS.

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So this doesn’t answer your question directly, but for me by far the biggest/most helpful shift in thinking on the RS came from @jhull and @JohnDusenberry 's insight that not only does the RS not have to be between the MC and IC players, it very often isn’t. Analyzing stories where the players for these throughlines are separated is best way to intuit the difference between the IC and RS in my opinion.

The difference is super clear in Back to the Future. Marty and George have completely opposed approaches to life; we see Marty’s influence on George (going from Avoid to Pursue) when George finally stands up for himself against Biff (change IC).

Marty and George do have a relationship; but so do Marty and Lorraine, and Marty and Doc. You really don’t see the IC throughline in these other relationships – especially Doc and Marty – but they provide the emotional resonance/tension of the story.

A more recent example is the psychological thriller/dark comedy Good Girls. In this story Beth (MC) and her friends are influenced by the gangbanger Dio (IC) to respond to their circumstances by becoming thieves and counterfeit smugglers. Dio is a classic Mind character whose bad attitude prods Beth toward unwise responses to her own Situation (trapped housewife, cheating husband, family on the verge of bankruptcy) .

But while Dio and Beth have a relationship of sorts, the real emotional heart of the story is between the two sisters and their friend (the girls), and it is driven by the crimes that they commit together (Activities). There is conflict between them obviously, but like in Back to the Future, it’s not hard to distinguish this from the strong influence that comes from the IC throughline.

Maybe…but in practice I’m not sure how easy this is to distinguish from the IC influence, especially when they are represented by the same players.

It would be interesting to tease this out in cases where the RS is not between the IC and MC.

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That’s actually not correct. The IC does not die.

However, there is an interesting connection between the fire and the Outcome of Success

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All of this:

describes the Main Character Throughline. That connection you’re sensing between the Relationship Story Throughline and the Overall Story Throughline/Story Outcome is really just the Crucial Element that connects the MC with OS.

Thinking that something cannot happen in the OS until something happens in another Throughline is another common misconception based in a Linear if…then appreciation of the storyform.

The Throughlines relate to one another, they’re not dependent on each other in a typical cause and effect relationship.

The cause and effect assumption is easier to make in regards to the Crucial Element because they appear as similar instances of storytelling.

The greatest hurdle to overcome with Dramatica is the pitch that the Relationship Story Throughline is an argument—it’s not. That part of the storyform describes a relationship as if it was a character in and of itself.

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If they don’t relate to each other, why does the hero need to bring the gift back from the extraordinary world after he almost dies?

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Maybe, part of the OS?

I’m poking fun at The Hero’s Journey here. Nothing I’m saying in that phrase has any bearing to Dramatica.

Ah, true wit and warm hearted funny … thanks

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Okay. Gotcha! Thanks!

Focus/Direction of both OS and RS. Crucial element of MC and IC.[quote=“didomachiatto, post:8, topic:2831”]
I think in there we need consequence/RS.
[/quote]

So @jhull, you would say the relationship between RS Concern and OS Consequence is only incidental or symmetrical not causal?

Chris has said these are not related.

In which case, that’s the final answer. Which I find strange since Dramatica is all about interconnectivity. Probably even why I’m drawn to it, I’m a chart and pattern girl. And this is why I want it to be related. But I’ve got to “let it go!”

Keep in mind everything is still connected holistically at the storyform/structure level, including the RS Concern and Story Consequences.

The lack of a required causal relationship between most/all story points is actually very freeing, if you think about it. In any particular story you still CAN create a cause/effect relationship between various things (at the storytelling level), if you want to and if it feels right for the story.

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If you think of the Storyform as an analogy to a single human mind then they are connected: a mind leaning towards one context as objective will see its “Failure” to resolve a matter of subjectivity—thus, the connection between the OS Goal and the OS Consequence, and the OS and the RS.

This is even more apparent in Holistic narratives, where terms like Goal and Consequence fail to adequately capture the direction of the mind in context of inequity resolution.

I would still avoid making any connections between the OS and the RS in terms of cause-and-effect within a story.

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Just to go into detail about what Chris said, IIRC, the math used to generate the Consequence is not the same math used to calculate the RS Concern. They just happen to turn out the same.

Similarly, the elements at the bottom of any Domain are equal to the Characteristics but are generated differently.

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The kind of thing I was thinking of was like:

  • Empire attacking consular ship causes princess to send plans, via droid, to ancient Jedi on desert planet (OS)
  • farm boy takes the droid to the ancient Jedi; now the two begin a master-student relationship (RS)

There is certainly some cause and effect at the storytelling level there. At least in terms of one providing the opportunity for the other.

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Okay, I can see subtle and sophisticated here.

At the end of my WIP (the first in a series), the way she maneuvers to solve the OS changes their relationship RS which enables the MC to accomplish the story goal.

Details of my story require too much background. Imagine this: an undercover Jewish doctor involved in resistance activities is avoiding to be caught and sent to the death camps OS, but he has special skills MC that make him desirable as a personal physician RS to an SS general (Obergruppenführer) OC who turns a blind eye to his possibly being Jewish if only to always have his expertise on hand to secretly help with his rare medical condition.

So, the doctor’s relationship with the Obergruppenführer reaches some point, from stranger to personal physician RS–but that also enables the doctor to be safe (and protected) from the death camps OS, for now.

That’s kind of how I’ve spun my story. Is it too causal? Or is it subtle and sophisticated?

It looks great to me! The key question is whether that relationship feels like it matters to you. Does it feel heartfelt in how it changes and grows?

Note when you say “personal physician RS” you probably want to describe the relationship more, as in “doctor-patient”. And honestly, I would guess that the relationship moves from initially strangers to doctor-patient and from there to something else that is different from, or tests the bounds of, a strict doctor-patient relationship? Because plain old doctor-patient isn’t very emotional; it’s not much different from strangers. (Unless to you doctor-patient entails a lot of caring and mutual respect.)

I don’t want to put words in @jhull 's mouth… But I’m guessing that when he said not to make cause-and-effect connections between OS and RS, he was talking more at the appreciation level? Obviously, the situations that your characters end up in because of the OS, can certainly have an impact on the RS. Sometimes even vice versa. But it’s an indirect thing – the causality is via the storytelling as opposed to going directly from an OS storypoint to an RS storypoint.

Yes, there is a high-stakes intimacy and two-way life and death trust of secrets in that relationship. Faithful care and dependency. But thanks for the heads-up. I do need to ratchet that up in the emotion department.

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It does seem to cross a threshold of risk, maybe great risk, being the doctor is a professional with automatic career cautions.

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