Character elements to illustrate

questions
#1

Hi,

I have a query about illustrating story points.

If, for example, my impact character throughline states faith is the impact character’s problem, I feel like I can illustrate this. It might be that their system of faith has them expect that hard work is ultimately rewarded by desired dividends (this becomes problematic when their hard work fails to yield the dividends they are anticipating).

But where it’s presently blurry for me is in that, while faith is my impact character’s problem, my main character also represents the basic motivation of faith. It’s blurry to me exactly how to synch these two points of illustration, or how the main character should be incorporated into the illustration of the problem.

Basically, the example of impact character’s problem of faith, is one that I gave without even considering the main character. I conceived it independent of the main character being the representation of faith.

So, I’m really blurry on the sense in which my main character could, should or would represent the basic motivation of faith in this scenario. Actually, I’m not interested in could. I’m more interested in specific examples of should and would.

This is really blurry to me because I’m wondering the following:

From my vantage point, it feels like the character could represent the basic motivation of faith in many different ways.

  1. He (he in my example) could prompt the impact character to question her faith, but be ambivalent about it.
  2. He could dispute the impact character’s faith. Or reinforce it for her.
  3. He could simply walk and pique he impact character’s interest in the subject of faith.
  4. He could operate on a system of faith but have no bearing on the impact character’s system of faith.
  5. He could be faith personified. Not sure what the personification of faith looks like right now, but just stating the possibility.
  6. The impact character’s problem of faith could be independent of the main character. But the main character could represent the basic motivation of faith.
  7. The impact character’s problem of faith could be dependent on the main character. The main character might have no interest in faith. They might never discuss it. But h might represent it to the impact in the sense that he prompts her to question her faith.

These are just a few examples of many more questions swimming around in my head. I don’t need to know that there are many possibilities and I have the option of going with what I feel is right or works best for me. What I’m looking for is concrete examples of best practice in action, with regard to this question. The more concrete and the more specific, the better. The more general and abstract, the more problematic.

It’s a really major question for me, because, obviously, at the elemental level, my characters “represent” everything and affect the weaving and encoding of my story points.

Thanks in advance. I’ve received some feedback to various questions to date and it’s always been much appreciated, constructive and valued.

Cheers,

Josh.

#2

Well firstly, Josh, it’s important to remember that Faith, in Dramatica, does not refer to any specific faith system or traditional religion. Dramatica’s Faith is defined as “accepting something as certain without proof.”

So, do both your MC and IC have this same Problem/Drive?

(And make sure you grasp Dramatica’s understanding that the trait causing trouble for the two subjective characters can be both a Problem and a personal Drive, depending on how each looks at it.)

Anyway, using Dramatica’s definitions, are both your MC and IC “accepting [an undefined] something as certain without proof?” (And this “thing” they accept doesn’t even have to be the same thing.)

For a clarification trial, I suggest you open a new Dramatica file and, in the Story Engine, select “Faith” as your Main Character’s Problem/Drive.

The dropdown menu below it will immediate offer a Solution of “Disbelief.” (Which of course doesn’t apply if your MC ends up Steadfast with a Success/Good ending; in such a case, “Disbelief” is the last thing your MC needs to try.)

Now move diagonally to the Influence Character’s options, and there select one of the following four offerings from the IC’s Problem dropdown menu:

— Consider
— Help
— Logic
— Support

So in your story, might it be that your MC does confidently accept “something as certain without proof,” while your IC’s Problem/Drive is something like “Logic”? (Which Dramatica defines as “a rational sense of how things are related,” or “the mental process of choosing the most efficient course or explanation based on reason.”)

Now, Dramatica’s basic definition here makes it sound like “Logic” would always be superior
to “Faith.”

But in the sub-definition of Logic, it states that “the Logic characteristic is very efficient, but has no understanding or tolerance that people do not live by reason alone. As a result, the character with the Logic characteristic often ignores how others’ ‘unreasonable’ feelings may cause a very real backlash to his approach” — or even an aching emptiness in his own heart?

In other words, two characters can mean quite different things by the word faith, and one man’s “logic” is another man’s emptiness (check Spock and Bones).

So all this is to say, understanding Dramatica’s specific definitions can, across the board, be a true aid in clarifying what your central conflict really is. They can also show you how the real issues in your story may be hiding behind confusing cover-up language that your characters use, whether in pretense or self-protection, until their true motives are fully revealed.

And of course there is a whole lot more to say on this “faith” subject… but I hope this gets you started toward clarity for your story. If not, chime back in and more-clearly tell us your need.

#3

My question isn’t intended to be interpreted as mulling the meaning of faith. It was a hypothetical example. The question could have been about a completely different thematic conflict. It was intended to raise questions about incorporating character elements as illustrations. It’s that stodgy that I’m too strapped to re-ask it. But am hopeful somebody will receive it and respond in a way that strikes a chord. I’m appreciative of your response Payton but it’s intensified my confusion; I’m hopeful somebody might be able to relieve it.

#4

Part of the point of his post was this: your Impact Character and Main Character can’t represent the same trait. If they do, then there’s no conflict. What is the Impact Character trying to influence the Main Character into becoming? They already agree!

I think the closest thing would be your number 7. The Main Character should represent something (their Problem or “drive”), and the Impact Character attempts to affect that drive due to their strong sense of faith. In a Steadfast story, the Impact Character fails to change the Main Character and instead is changed to match the Main Character. So in @keypayton’s example, we have an Overall Problem of Faith, a Main Character Problem of Logic, and an Impact Character Problem of Faith. So in the Overall Throughline, we see that all of the characters struggle because they try to be moral and keep faith in a baseless system. The Main Character is driven by logic and reasons that the system can’t work like it’s supposed to, so he makes tough choices that some might see as unethical or heretical. The Impact Character tries to reel him back in by reminding him of the dream they all share of a beautiful world once all their work comes to fruition.

Do you see how there’s a strong conflict there? “You fool! Logically, your work is all pointless.” “No, just hold strong and have faith that everything will turn out!” “But it won’t turn out! It’s all falling apart!” “Only if you lose hope!” The Main Character sees it as a Logic-Feelings thing, but the Impact Character sees it as a Faith-Disbelief thing. The disconnect is what causes the argument!

#5

It’s probably worth me re-writing my question. I’ll try to get to the crux.

Let’s say my impact character’s problem is faith (remember, this is just an example; use whatever example you like). This is established in story points. With my current story form, in the character “tile”, let’s say it states that the main character represents the basic motivation of faith.

I feel like I’m fine with devising why the character’s problem is faith. Let’s say it’s because they are choosing to accept or give the benefit of the doubt to faith in the idea that hard work is rewarded with dividends XYZ. It doesn’t matter what the example is but let’s just say faith is problematic in the sense that they have elected to operate on this system of faith, but it’s a problem because the truth is it doesn’t. Thus they’re not getting desired dividends - again, it’s just an example, and only background to the crux of the question.

Then in the characters tile, it says that the main character represents the basic motivation of faith. In what sense? Probably in many senses, it could be, but what are examples of the best sense.

I say, the faith/problem example is not the focus because, I could be asking this question about whatever. The impact character’s symptom is conscience, for another of many examples. How is this affected by the sceptic character representing conscience? Because I could come up with the sense in which the impact character’s symptom is conscience independent without taking the sceptic character representing conscience into consideration. And yet, since the sceptic character represents conscience, I should take this into consideration. I should resolve how they SHOULD represent conscience.

I hope the gist of my questions is cutting through.

Surely there are more justifiable ways for a character to represent an element that is also a problem, solution etc. than other ways? If so, what’s to be considered in this justification? What makes a strong justification versus a weak one? What’s a concrete example? Why do I need to know the character that “represents” the element that is identified as my main character’s problem? I’m cloudy on why. I know I could make the problem independent of this character representing the problem at the elemental level. But presume I should not. But I’m in the dark as to specifically why.

#6

Josh, do you have the version of Dramatica that contains Gists (Dramatica Story Expert)? That could help you enormously with “incorporating character elements as illustrations”! Because with DSE, each time you select a term in the Story Guide, the software will give you dozens (or even hundreds) of exemplary ways to illustrate that term.

Further in the Story Guide, all versions of the Dramatica software contain “Contextual Examples” like the following:

CONTEXTUAL EXAMPLE: Faith as the Problem — The source of the main character’s drive is faith. For example:
— a knight driven to have faith in his king performs evil deeds under the king’s command;
— a Hindu woman driven to have faith in her religious doctrines splits with her Muslim lover;
— a woman lacking the drive to have faith that her husband will return from war remarries and is caught in a bind when her first husband does return;
— a cleric lacking the drive to have faith in his religion’s deity find that his deity has laid a curse upon him to teach him a lesson;
— a priest’s insufficient faith causes him to feel that he must renounce the church;
— a man’s faith in his own martial prowess causes him to enter a martial arts tournament to the death;
— a dog’s faith in his master’s love drives him to cross the country in order to return home;
— etc.

And if you don’t have Dramatica Story Expert, there is tons of stuff here (in this discussion forum) about how to come up with your own ample gists for any term in the storyform. Simply click on the Search tool (a magnifying glass on the top toolbar of this page), then type in “Gist.”

You’ll get dozens of links to places where this online group has discussed gists and how to use them (or how to create your own).

#7

Sorry I wasn’t responding to your latest post, Josh.

But I did find a good page in this Discuss.Dramatica forum that deals with some of the “Character Motivation” stuff you’re questioning here. It ends with especially good comments from Dramatica guru Jim Hull and Dramatica co-creator Chris Huntley.

Here’s the URL: Motivation and Objective Story Characters

Best wishes!

#8

I’m pretty sure this is just a problem of perspective. It sounds like your Influence Character’s Problem is Faith and that you’ve put the Main Character in Faith within the Character Elements page (the tiles) – I think. Your question is not very clear (and why you’re getting different answers).

If that is the case understand that this seemingly incongruent behavior (where both maintain Faith) is not inaccurate. Looking at the Influence Character the problem will look like Faith. Looking at all of them from an Objective perspective the MC is faith.

If this isn’t the case and you’re trying to have them both come from a place of faith you’ll need to move one of them to a different element and show faith from that perspective (lower case faith). Show how the MCs Pursuit of causes problems or how the MCs need to be in Control because of faith causes problems and so on …

You can’t have both. It may seem like you can in your head but that’s because your mind is playing tricks on you. The fact that you use words like “should” or “could” or “would” (really want) indicates that you’re justifiying as youre trying to write – which is exactly what Dramatica was designed to fix!