Question about Relationship Throughline

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#21

Some great ideas there. Out of curiosity, does this have reasonable parallels to your story?

For the IC througlhine, try to make it all about that character’s impact instead of their personal issues. So maybe IC is driven to get into a good college despite the rejections and keeps trying things (hopefully more than just filling out forms) that impact people around him, including the MC. Basically what you wrote, except focusing on their impact and drive.

I like the simple RS of MC and IC becoming friends, although the ambassador and exchange student might fit Situation better. Regardless, both are a great shorthand, and since the RS throughline might be giving you the most trouble, you can pencil those in and when you have your whole storyform set you can really add the details by doing some RS playground exercises.

As far as the MC overlapping the OS … hmm … maybe the best way to put it is, if you can picture the MC’s personal issues as their own thing, separate from the OS, I think you are good. Once you are confident with your storyform, you can rely on that (and certain techniques of story-encoding) to make sure everything works properly, i.e. the conflict in each throughline is coming from the right place.

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#22

Yeah, there are parallels. I ignored the Domains in those latest examples since I recently came to question my story form. Everyone in my story’s OS is motivated towards the Story Goal of stopping their anxiety (could be Obtaining, Innermost Desires, or Developing a Plan. Maybe wanting to stop anxiety is a Response or Solution of Avoidance instead and the Goal is Obtaining various things they think will make them feel better like love. I don’t know). The end result is Failure, Good since their original Goals had been about avoiding their fears instead of facing them (learning how to face them being the “correct” way in my argument), but MC learns his lesson. I’d always imagined the MC throughline as being a subjective struggle with anxiety and the focus of the story, but now I’m thinking that maybe his struggle and IC’s helping him (what I thought was IC and/or RS) belong in OS, leaving the MC as being about something like low self-worth and RS about them becoming friends or working on something.

#23

Ignoring the Domains in those examples helped I think.

I’d like to poke at your Story Goal and Outcome a bit. Just want to make sure you really see it as a bittersweet ending? In another thread which Jim blogged about, @MWollaeger’s advice was to consider it more from the author’s point of view. So, maybe you are doing that and still see them working to avoid their fears as the Goal. Just want to make sure.

Another way to express the Goal might be “dealing with fears” or “figuring out how to deal with fears” or even “figuring out how to function with anxiety”. Not sure if those resonate with you. They sort of take the specific method (avoiding vs. facing fears) out of it, allowing Failure to mean they were going about it the wrong way.

How do you see the other characters (besides the MC) feeling emotionally at the end of the story? Does everyone still have a lot of angst or do they all learn their lesson a bit?

#24

these still feel a bit vague, but…
If your OS is everyone wants to belong in the same group (school, club, etc) and the MC hang up of not believing in himself is only related to not believing he’s capable enough to get into the school or club or whatever, then that still feels to me like part of the OS.

But if your MC hang up is that he doesn’t believe in himself in that he’s a space slug and doesn’t have the speed of the earthlings, or fingers, or whatever, and thus is just not able to perform certain feats at the same level as others, then it begins to feel like a separate throughline to me.

Not sure if that helps.

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#25

Yeah, that’s my intent. I want them to pursue peace of mind the wrong way-- I don’t know if that’s shown by Response, pursuing the wrong Goals, both, the whole story form or what. Then they have to give up some things (the Response? The wrong Goals? Pay a Cost?) and feel loss over it but they realize that it’s kind of for the best (like the end of “Rainman”) and that although they’ll have to muddle through difficult things that cause unpleasant emotions, they see that they can handle it, sometimes the Dividends are worth the risks, and that it’s better to face those things than not.

I’m confused about how to view the Goal. I keep thinking of the concepts of Solution and Response (I started another thread about that) because the characters want something emotionally (which is peace of mind… or would that be considered a given if the story’s inequity is solved?), then have goals that they think will get that like avoiding fears, or repairing a relationship.

Those sound like good ideas, but wouldn’t those be Success if attained even a little, or Failure if they didn’t learn how to 100% deal with anxiety?

I’ve wondered if I should change the Goal to something like peace of mind and switch the outcome to Success because they get some (though not by getting what they thought would give it to them, but maybe that’s intrinsic to having a Change/Good story form), but make it only a small success or incur Costs to balance it. Maybe I’m just biased towards wanting Failure/Good from reading about and agreeing with how bittersweet endings are more realistic/relatable/sophisticated, but it makes sense since dealing with anxiety or similar aspects of the human condition is a lifelong pursuit of glacial progress and the change at the end of my story (at least regarding MC) is like taking that first of many steps into the sunlight. In general, the characters experience in increase in peace of mind.

Anyway, an imbalance makes the characters afraid and unhappy, so is the Goal:

1. Peace of mind (Outcome: Success, but tempered by Costs. Not sure if valid Goal or assumed result if inequity is resolved)

2. Peace of mind, but in the form of a cure for their fear, a quick fix, or a guarantee against their fears coming true (which is not how life works, so Fail)

3. Avoiding or preventing anxiety (an impossible Goal to complete, which is part of the “lesson,” but I’m not sure we’re “allowed” to use unattainable Goals)

4. Obtaining the things they desire which they think will help them feel better. (Fail. I don’t know if you’d consider this being a Goal as seen from their POV and the objective POV Goal as peace of mind)

#26

Since you’ve come to question your storyform, i’d like to ask about some of your ideas to see if we can figure out what you’ve got going on. About your OS, you say[quote=“SharkCat, post:15, topic:810”]
OS (Fixed Attitude, Innermost Desires) - Fears about growing up and leaving behind home and the familiar?
[/quote]

and

The only domain you don’t seem to think it could be is Situation. So let me ask, (note* i’m including internal, external, state, and process in parentheses to help me keep track. Also, I’m trying to do here what i’ve seen others do elsewhere and may not be nailing it.)

  1. Do the problems stem from how everyone in the story will be growing up and leaving home (external)? Or do the problems actually stem from the anxiety/fear that everyone feels about growing up and leaving home (internal)? In other words, if the characters in your story decided not to grow up and leave home, would there still be problems (maybe they’d still be anxious about what kind of job they’d get or how long they’d have to live with their parents - internal), or if the characters in your story were no longer anxious about it, would would there still be a problem (they still have to get accepted into the right college, pay for tuition - external)?
    This one is hard to word the way I’d like because I can see how anxiety could be the problem itself or the reaction to growing up, and i can see how growing up and leaving home could be a problem, but I’m not sure how it would be a reaction/symptom of anxiety.

  2. If the problems are external, do they stem from things like packing up and moving out and trying to get into a certain college, and filling out applications and figuring out how to deal with dorm life and studying (process) or do they stem from how the characters will have to be away from of home and will lack an ever-present helping hand from the family (state)?
    If the problems are internal, do they stem from things like thinking they must get into a certain school and thinking that there is no place like home and that everything about growing up and moving out is awful (state) or do they stem from things like trying to handle problems like a grownup and getting used to living outside of the home (process)?

I know you’ve mentioned several times that your OS is about the fear and anxiety everyone is feeling, but keep in mind that just because the “leaving home” may not have happened yet, it doesn’t mean it can’t be your characters main source of conflict. It doesn’t mean your characters problems have to be about the fear of leaving home. Not trying to talk you out of an internal OS problem or make things more difficult, but a concern of what will happen in the Future is as valid a position to take as having an innermost desire for what will happen. Also, in asking about it, I wanted to make sure all 4 throughlines were available to the OS. Second also, if the problem feels more external and less about fear/anxiety, remember that your MC or IC and the M/I can still have all the fear and anxiety that is making you want to explore this problem.

I hope trying to break everything down into an internal/external state/process helps you think about where to place your OS. If it does, let me know and we can move on to the other throughlines. But if I just confused everything, feel free to ignore or tell me to butt out!

#27

Hi SharkCat,
I re-read your post like 10 times because you are struggling with something that is both difficult and very important to understanding your story (Story Goal and Outcome). However, I think you wrote some stuff that provides some good clues.

First, this:

Because attainment of the Goal is binary – Success/Failure – the Goal should be something concrete enough in your head that it makes sense they could attain it and you could say “yep, Success” or “no, nice try, but Failure”. It can still be a little vague, like “figuring out how to be a family” (Eat Drink Man Woman), “figuring out how to survive life in suburbia” (American Beauty), or even “showing we can resist the Empire by fighting back” (Star Wars). In those stories, despite the slightly vague goals, it’s pretty clear whether the Goal was achieved or not: Failure for American Beauty, Success for the other two.

All that to say, I think you can be reasonable about the Outcome, no need to worry about percentages – if in general the story shows the characters figuring out X, or doing X, or attaining X, and that was the Goal, then it’s Success. Not sure if you have seen this: What if you can’t decide on success or failure?

The Heart of Your Story

Now this part I felt like you’re really getting to the heart of your story:

And it seemed to fit well with your option 2:

2. Peace of mind, but in the form of a cure for their fear, a quick fix, or a guarantee against their fears coming true (which is not how life works, so Fail)

But can you separate the concept of “peace of mind” from “quick fix” and just make the Goal “quick fix cure/guarantee against fears”? If you can, then you can make the Outcome be Failure, but still have them achieve the peace of mind. They’ll sort of learn that they have to take that first step into the sunlight themselves, it’s no quick fix because they have to keep working at for a long time, maybe forever, but that’s a Good thing. (And you can see how it’s bittersweet because it’s like, darn we’re going to have to keep working at this our whole lives.)

I think when you say it’s “not how life works”, that is something you are illustrating with your story? Part of your argument, not something that the characters are aware of at the beginning, right?

Unattainable Goals

As for the question about unattainable goals, this is from the Story Goal definition:

the Goal which a Protagonist seeks is not necessarily a good thing for him nor is it certainly attainable

So I think you have a fair amount of leeway on how attainable the goal is, especially because it’s from author’s point of view.

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#28

Thanks for reading all that stuff I posted.

My older story forms use Future since everyone wants to attain certain “better” futures (who doesn’t?) before I experimented with Fixed Attitude and Manipulation.

I’ve never been quite sure what to do for OS. I’ve had a lot of ideas, but most have ended up feeling like incomplete filler because I’ve been most interested in the subjective stuff of MC’s conflict: wanting to reach out and do more with his life so he can truly be happy, but is hamstrung by an anxiety disorder and a lack of faith in himself to succeed. IC finds him and tries to help (which may be partly motivated by selfish ulterior motives-- not sure if that would fall under IC or OS) by dragging him into activities. Although they struggle with some difficulties (MC accidentally screws IC over sometimes trying to avoid things that IC wants help with, but I guess that would be an MC problem, not an RS problem, which is confusing to me), they have a relationship that grows in a positive direction. I’ve tried starting with the other throughlines first, hoping to have the OS holes filled, but I was unable to settle on a story form. Then I wondered if I could change Domains and make the events in OS be sparked by anxiety so I could get to the good stuff. I’m not sure if that’s trying to cheat my way out of coming up with a proper objective throughline.

The leaving home thing was just an example. My actual story has just the MC leaving home early on. I suppose you could say that there are some problematic situations for objective characters, but I don’t think they’d be quite so problematic if not for fears. Fixed Attitudes is good since it has the fears and desires under Innermost Desires, but Manipulation has gists that apply to my characters.

I was wondering if peace of mind was a given as far as desired results anyway, since why would any characters act at all if they weren’t trying to attain that by fixing the inequity? I wish I knew a better way to phrase my Goal idea in a more concise, but still accurate way.

Right. They wouldn’t be aware of that… unless maybe there was one who was wiser than the others, but that would be an exception.

#29

i get that the leaving home stuff was just an example. I was just trying to use material from this thread. If you’re more interested in starting with your RS, does it help you to try to look at the RS problems as internal/external process/state to determine the throughline?

You keep bringing up how an event might be in one story, or it might be in another, like when you say, “they struggle with some difficulties…but I guess that would be an MC problem, not an RS problem”. My advice would be to forget all the other perspectives and throughlines while you’re trying to pin down a story form. If you want to focus on the RS, try to get a good idea of what the relationship is. Then only deal with that.

This may not be very helpful, but I imagine it like i’m trying to pick up one specific noodle (RS) out of a bowl of spaghetti (OS, MC, IC), and as i’m untangling it from the rest i have to see if the knots are part of the same noodle or a different noodle. If it’s a different noodle, I cut it away and forget about it until later.

With this next statement, again, I’m trying to walk through the ideas as well and not trying to talk you into a different story, but I wonder if the fear and anxiety you want to write about are on the Domain level at all. For example, with Batman Begins it seems like the first ideas for that movie could have been about justice and revenge, but I don’t feel like they appear at a domain level. They seem like more of a thematic conflict.

#30

One thing that might help is to try to focus on the other characters, the ones who aren’t MC and IC. Often an antagonist fits this bill but it could be anyone who has a role besides illustrating the MC’s personal issues or showing the IC’s impact on them.

How much do you know about those characters? What’s driving them, what are their goals, what causes them trouble in your story?

The MC screwing the IC over can still be an RS thing, and probably has to be! An event like that can have ties into multiple throughlines. Maybe in the MC throughline it’s another instance of the MC’s lack of faith in himself. While in the RS it shows the conflict in their relationship, maybe gives them a challenge which if they move past it will allow the relationship to grow (onto the next challenge), or remains as a problem through most of the story.

e.g. if RS Issue was Self Interest, maybe they both feel like the other is using the relationship, putting their own interests ahead of the relationship. And at the RS Problem/Symptom/Response level they might have conflict around trying to avoid each other or avoid the relationship’s expectations, or trying to control the relationship, etc. Even pursuing the relationship too hard can cause conflict when it’s under the shadow of Self Interest.

#31

I figured that, but wanted to be sure we were on the same page.

That’s a good idea. I’d like to start off with MC, which is likely Fixed Attitude (to gain self-confidence/worth and thus happiness) or Manipulation (get rid of anxiety disorder, which is also in the service of gaining confidence/happiness) or whatever would cover this wish to start a new life (gain companionship, a job and sense of usefulness, etc) after hiding from it for so long, but that’s also part of those other things. I’ve usually assigned “Changing One’s Nature” as MC Concern. I just wonder if it’s wise to leave OS as the leftover since if everyone is also having issues with Manipulation, then my story form will end up wrong. MC does want to Obtain various things, but if a Be-er is the type of character who worries before acting, then that wouldn’t fit.

I’ve usually assigned IC to Activity since he tries to drag MC into doing things, forcing MC to face situations that he fears (ex. performing in public) and Obtaining works since he’s partly personally interested in using MC to get some things (external and internal), but I don’t know if I can set the IC TL as Activity if the activities aren’t causing IC the problem-- he has no problem performing in public, but if I’m supposed to pick what about IC is causing MC problems, then it works since MC is afraid of things like that and doesn’t like being pushed into them.

That leaves OS and RS as Future or Innermost Desires. I don’t know what the correct RS if the IC TL is actually supposed to be about IC helping MC, and their conflict over whether it’s better to take risks or play it safe is supposed to be played out in MC and IC. If RS is about something else, then it could be about things like friendship and I guess dependency (although MC depending too much on IC is a problem of MC or IC trying to stop that) or give and take, etc. Self-Interest could also work for RS.

I’ve toyed with some decent-sounding OS ideas like IC wants to figure out a historical mystery, or this other character related to MC has a business that’s in trouble and MC and IC try to fix it to prove MC’s worth, or maybe MC and IC want to invent something, or they try to help a has-been movie star get a cool-sounding movie going, or a better one involves struggling to care for a relative with dementia who can no longer run her business and the people involved have conflicting feelings of love and resentment (good stuff, but likely not an entire OS), but something about most of these ideas being OS seems… pointless? Boring? Like filler?

Say they tried to save this character’s restaurant, the good parts are the subjective things like MC being forced to face an old fear of cooking related to traumatic past failure, not, say, the process of figuring out how to run a restaurant. I don’t know how to run and/or save a restaurant and learning about it sounds boring as sin. This reminds me of the Dramatica stuff I’ve read about writers ignoring the important objective stuff for just those reasons. Anyone have ideas about how to deal with that? I mean, I’m sure there are writers that can handle those OS ideas wonderfully (speaking of restaurant stories, “Bob’s Burgers” is a really funny show and not boring at all), so I don’t know if it’s me just not finding the right OS or if I’m falling into the trap of objective = boring.

Potential Concerns:

OS - Future
MC - Changing One’s Nature
IC - Obtaining
RS - Innermost Desires

#32

I think the hardest thing for me about figuring out which perspective to tie to which domain is that I always feel like all the problems I see can go in any domain depending on which way you tweak them. With the example of gaining self-confidence/worth/companionship/happiness, they all seem to me to still be able to go into any throughline depending on the context. For example, those could be concerns about the Future, something the MC wants to Obtain, or something for which the MC has to Do something to achieve. It could be Innermost Desires, Changing One’s Nature, or Playing a Role. Just depends on what else is going on. In fact, I’ve seen articles from both @jhull and Melanie that say that the element level of the chart will be illustrated through Situation, Activity, Manipulation, and Fixed Attitude. So all four throughlines will end up being illustrated in ways that look like all four throughlines. Turns out there are a lot of tangled up noodles in the bowl of spaghetti that is Dramatica.

So try to talk me through what’s going on with your MC if you can.

  1. You talk about self-confidence, worth, anxiety, happiness. What’s causing him (or her) to feel a lack of confidence or worth, or causing him to be anxious or unhappy? Is it something about his environment, like the space slugs inability to push buttons without earthling fingers (external)? Or is it something to do with his mind, like maybe the space slug doesn’t know which buttons to push (internal)?

  2. If it’s external, is it something he has no ability to change, like the buttons can only be pushed with fingers and the space slug will never grow fingers (state) or is it something he can change, like the space slug learning to use his eye stalks in place of fingers, or holding a stick in his mouth to push buttons (process)?
    If it’s internal, do his problems come from what he thinks, like maybe he’s afraid he’s going to mess something up if he starts pushing buttons(state)? Or does it come from how he thinks, like maybe he’s always getting confused about the order in which to push the buttons, or maybe slugs use numbered buttons, so he has to get used to the way humans use colored buttons.

I know these probably aren’t great examples and have no parallel to your story. If you want to offer something else as an example to work through, go ahead.

EDIT:

I just caught this part. Is this wish for a new life where you really see all of the MCs problems emanating from? We can gear examples toward this idea rather than space slugs if you want. We just need to figure out if this wish leads to internal or external problems that are states or processes in the same way as above.

#33

I’m currently working on a story with an MC that is a heart surgeon, but it’s really about his own fear of death. I have no clue how to perform a heart surgery or what it’s like to be a surgeon. My plan is to avoid tying surgery or other job related activity directly to the story I’m telling. When a patient dies, rather than discuss a cardio infarction or aortic valves or whatnot, I try to mention a minimal amount of surgery related stuff in order to give the effect that I might know more than nothing about it, and then move on to how the death affects the main character.

In your example about the restaurant, I suspect you could avoid discussions of financials and profit margins and health code violations and just stick with how one characters cooking might be enough to save the restaurant if only they could let go of the past or whatever. You don’t have to know about accounting and health codes and ordering and keeping veggies stocked and fresh and whatever else might be involved with running a restaurant. You can simply mention them as problems that might be fixed if only a great, creative, inventive cook could get beyond the fear caused by a previous trauma.

If it’s boring to write, it’s probably boring to read. When you’re faced with something like that, I thinks it’s okay to put just enough for the audience to get it. If you don’t know how to save a restaurant through management and try to write about someone managing a restaurant, I think you risk exposing your lack of knowledge to your audience and ruining the story. However, if you don’t know how to save a restaurant through management, but you do know about how to cook, and you write about a restaurant being saved by its acquisition of a great chef and how it helped that great chef to get back to cooking again, then I think the audience can put it together that the acquisition of the chef led to the solution of the other issues.

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#34

Have you considered putting Dramatica aside for a bit and trying to develop your story ideas further without it? Not sure if you may have tried that already. You might find it freeing, and come to realize some things about your story that would make it easier to identify the throughlines later, when you try to storyform again.

What you said about making up stuff that seems like pointless filler, that’s not a good feeling. The Overall Story should be exciting – maybe it’s from an objective point of view but you can still get wrapped up in it, it still has drama, conflict, etc. Think of all the awesome scenes with only OS characters in them!

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#35

Yes! That’s how I’ve ended up with countless story forms. It’s so annoying and then I wonder if it’s my fault for not being decisive enough.

He’s very curious about the world around him, but an undiagnosed anxiety disorder has made him miserably cautious and withdrawn. He Speculates all kinds of terrible potential outcomes, which can make trivial decisions feel life or death, and feels a duty to prevent them (which is why I usually choose an Issue of Responsibility. I’ve considered Obligation, but I don’t know what I’d do with having to compare it with Rationalization), and he judges himself harshly for perceived failure. He should have contradictory beliefs as to whether his fears are justified or excessive (which is a good source of some conflict), but I worry about him coming off as inconsistent due to lazy writing rather than a realistic depiction of how a person’s insight into a disorder varies. I’ve read that sometimes being realistic can undermine a story’s argument.

He does fear messing things up, but I re-read that thread on the difference between what vs how someone thinks, and if I look at it as stuck vs ongoing, the Domain must be Manipulation since he’s got a problem with obsessive thoughts like “If I don’t X, Y might happen and Z could die and it’ll be all my fault!” Then he gives in to his fears and does X, feels relief, then feels like a weak-willed coward for giving in, depending on how much insight he has at the time. He needs to stop giving in. It’s keeping him from living the kind of life he wants.
Wait… couldn’t you also say that a Fixed Attitude of “if I don’t obey my fears and something bad happens, it’ll be all my fault” is a problem?

Yes, I’ve done that on and off, but I like some degree of restriction so I’m not left with that staring-at-a-blank-page feeling. Every OS I’ve tried has some kind of problem and it’s very frustrating. There have been some particularly interesting ones, but I couldn’t reconcile holes in logic (ex. time travel problems) or I keep thinking “why doesn’t the character just {do this sensible thing that ruins cool stuff}?” Even something that sounds like it could be interesting makes me feel… resistant somehow. I’ve had ideas for some decent setups, but I either have little idea where to go with them and/or I can’t come up with decent stakes to make it matter. Saving a business in the family could work well due to solid, emotional stakes and the potential to do it in interesting ways, but it’s a matter of figuring out where to go with it and how to make it not boring-- I think I need a story form for guidance.

I don’t know if trying to start a new life for MC could be some kind of OS (imagine something like, to use the school example, REG making space slug go on a comically awkward crash course on how Earth people live by going on an blind date, raising a pet, getting a job, avoiding political arguments during Thanksgiving dinner), but I can’t come up with any stakes to bring in the other characters.

If you mean non-MC/IC characters, I don’t think I have any right now outside of backstory. There’s some cool backstory, but no reason to put it in.

#36

It feels like we’re getting somewhere, I think. So you see the MC as being in the internal Domains, but still have questions about whether it’s a state or process. I’m not sure how anxiety disorders work on the mind or where having any particular disorder would put your characters domain. But from what you say, it sounds like the MCs fear of what his actions/decisions will cause that is his problem. To me, that feels like a state, but, as you read in the other thread, i’m not particularly good with the internal side of things just yet. I’m going to think about it this morning to see if I can come up with something to make this more clear. But I do want to say that if he’s afraid that his doing X is going to lead to tragedy, and it’s all about him giving in to that or not, my first instinct is he seems to be concerned about his present considerations, or Contemplation.

Just a note, you mention choosing Obligation as part of the MCs thematic concern because he feels obligated to prevent the tragedies he fears he’s causing. But do you as the author feel he is obligated to prevent these tragedies? I feel like you don’t. With that in mind, I went to the Dramatica story engine and told it I wanted an MC in the Fixed Attitude Domain with a Concern of Contemplation. Then I picked a couple other points that i thought you might be leaning toward and had Dramatica randomly fill in the rest. Finally, I went to the Plot Sequence Report, which I understand is supposed to tell you how your story feels from the inside (from the characters perspectives rather than the authors). When I went to the MC section of the report, it said the Sign Post dealing with Innermost Desires would be explored through Rationalization, Responsibility, Obligation, and Commitment. So again, not bringing that up to make it more difficult, but just as something to think about. If your MC story does end up being about his fears and contemplations, it won’t keep you from writing about how he feels an obligation to give in to his fears. Hopefully that frees you up to look at other areas if his problem isn’t actually Obligation.

Anyway, I have children wanting some breakfast, so i’m going to do like I said now, and try to figure out a way to clear up whether this MC has a process or a state on his hands and come back later.

#37

I’m trying to figure out what state you’re in, in terms of your story…

For me, when I took the approach of assuming that buried in all my ideas was a proper grand argument story, I was able to find the right storyform. (Well I got Driver and PS Style wrong, but those are minor tweaks.) To do that, I had to concentrate on my most important ideas, the stuff that felt like the backbone and the heart and soul of my story.

Even after that, I had too many ideas many of which didn’t fit, and had some problems with OS kind of like you. I was trying to use Dramatica to help me invent some stuff to fit the storyform but that didn’t really work – in hindsight I think I had everything I needed, just needed to trim the fat and develop what I had more, not invent new stuff. What helped was just biting the bullet and writing a rough outline of stuff that I knew had to be in there, and putting notes in like “here I’m not sure what happens”. And then Jim (through his mentorship program) was able to help me identify the Drivers / Act Turns. At first I was like “why does he care so much about the Drivers?” but once there was a structure of Acts suddenly I could see how everything fit together. Guided by signposts, I knew where to put everything, and what stuff to just leave out. It’s an incredible feeling.

Your feeling resistant and like things are useless filler actually remind me of the feelings I had before I found Dramatica, when I was trying to use other advice to outline my story. I would feel literally sick to the stomach, and it was because I was trying to shoehorn my story into the wrong pattern. Like “what is the lie your main character believes?”, “what is the truth she needs to embrace?” – that might work for a Change MC, but it turns out mine is Steadfast.

So I wonder:

  1. Is it possible you have a full GAS / storyform buried in your subconscious, in your ideas for this story? And that those feelings you have are basically your muse telling you you’re going in the wrong direction?
  2. Or perhaps (and I hesitate here because it’s not something I have experience with), you have the full MC throughline buried in your ideas… And if the storyform you’re trying to use to invent OS stuff doesn’t fit with the true MC throughline structure, again your muse is telling you you’re going in the wrong direction?
  3. What is the target format for this story – novel, screenplay, short story? If it’s a shorter work it’s entirely possible it’s not a GAS, but a slice of a GAS (like just MC throughline). See: The Structure of a Short Story

Anyway, I feel for you!

Oh, regarding the “awesome scenes with only OS characters” I meant like in movies or books. e.g. off the top of my head, Inigo facing off against Count Rugen in The Princess Bride, almost losing (“Sorry father, I tried…”) and then coming through in the end. His whole story from beginning to end is all objective.

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#38

Okay, so it didn’t take as long as I thought to think about this one. I feel like an MC internal state would simply be your MC fearing something bad happening with a chain of events that tracks back to him. But I don’t think that’s what you’re going for. Your MCs fear of trouble isn’t just a fear he has, but something that causes him to behave differently. Like maybe he thinks I don’t want to wash my hands 18 times, but if I don’t, everyone in the house will get a flesh-eating bacteria, so I guess I’d better do it. That feels to me more like an internal process rather than a state. So going by that, I’d say your MC would be in Manipulation and your IC in Activity.

Regarding your conversation with @mlucas, I think he has a good point about making an outline. Since Dramatica can allow you keep all your work and put it into different Domains with just a few tweaks, I don’t think you have to start with a perfect storyform. If you just pick what feels close for now and start outlining your story, I think you’ll get a sense of where the wrinkles are and then you can iron them out from there. Sometimes it’s about trusting yourself to tell the story you want to tell. I once started with a storyform, came up with a story to go along with it, and wrote the entire first draft of the story. I put it aside for a couple of months to get a bit disconnected from it so i could look for holes and such in it. When I went back to it, I decided the storyform I used, and the storyform the story actually has are very different. The IC and MC should probably have been switched. Maybe even the OS and RS. I’m not really sure. But the story I ended up with still feels like a complete story and I think I can write a second draft using ideas from what I think the storyform should be now and make it a lot better.

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#39

“Being obsessive-compulsive” is a Manipulation gist, so hopefully it’s right! :slight_smile:

What I don’t understand about the definition of Contemplation is “present considerations.” Isn’t considering something about weighing potential future consequences?

That sounds right.

The most difficult lesson of all! I struggle with putting faith in unknown outcomes, so I wrote an MC struggling with the same thing, and that’s why the story ends with a small step in the right direction rather than a cure. He wants a quick fix like I or anyone would, but will fail to get one since that’s not how these things work.

It’s good to know that an imperfect storyform doesn’t mean a story is ruined.

If I choose my MC throughline, I get:

Domain: Manipulation (Being obsessive-compulsive)

Concern: Changing One’s Nature (Becoming a citizen, a loved one, someone better)

Issue: Responsibility (Blames himself for things he shouldn’t, like it’s his responsibility to protect everyone. Also avoids positions of responsibility for fear of messing up. If he wants to become a productive member of society and try new things, he needs to take responsibility when appropriate.) Interesting how both presence and lack of responsibilities causes him trouble.

Counterpoint: Commitment (Needs to commit to trying new things even if he might fail. Works hand in hand with healthy forms of Responsibility. Needs to stop committing to letting obsessions control him)
If Commitment and Responsibility are supposed to be compared, I don’t know which “wins” since it depends on context since there are good and bad aspects to both. In my story about taking healthy risks, I’d say that Commitment comes out a little ahead. Is MC Issue about what I think or what MC thinks?

I’m not sure how to sort Problem and Symptom, especially since it affects OS and RS domains and the quad of Elements are so closely related. It’s hard to figure out since his Temptation is to act on his hyperactive Conscience (so which element is the problem?)-- to give in to the compulsion is a quick fix that only temporarily relieves anxiety, but makes it worse, sensitizing the brain to keep fearing it. Maybe figuring which is which hinges on, as the program says, a belief in whether or not there will be negative consequences. I could go with:

Problem: Conscience (“I don’t want to do X, but if I don’t, Z might die and I don’t want that!”)
Solution: Temptation (“I don’t want to do X, so… I’ll try abstaining from that”)
Symptom: Uncontrolled (“The world is out of control and dangerous”-- is that a legit interpretation of Uncontrolled? and “My anxiety is rampant and I’ve got to do something to stop it!”)
Response: Control (“I must try to control outcomes as much as I can to make the world safer and stop my anxiety”-- so, “I must do X to make sure Z doesn’t die.” MC is Change, so this doesn’t solve problems)

OR I can reverse them:

Problem: Temptation (“I want anxiety go away fast, so I’ll act on this unpleasant compulsion. What harm will that do?” Later, he realizes that the problem was that giving in wasn’t as harmless as he thought and had the negative consequence of strengthening his fears)

Solution: Conscience (I need to abstain from my compulsions because giving in will make my fears worse)

Either of those gives me:

Growth: Start (I was thinking he must Stop acting on compulsions, but I guess he could Start doing things despite fears)
OS: Future (the characters are interested in particular futures for themselves)
RS: Innermost Desires

I could make control the problem instead

Problem: Control (being controlling-- expressed by preventing, avoiding, seeking certainty)
Solution: Uncontrolled (the world can’t be controlled, so let go of need to control fate)
Symptom: Conscience (because I want to control everything, conscience says to do X or else!-- not sure how much he thinks of his conscience as his problem, thus, a Symptom, or necessary evil.)
Response: Temptation (“If I act on compulsion and do X, it’ll make my anxiety go away”-- unaware that giving in will reinforce anxiety.)

That gives me:

Growth: Stop - (stop giving in to compulsions, let control go)
OS: Innermost Desires - They’ve gotten into some ruts, but maybe their fixed attitudes are what keeps them stuck
RS: Future - They conflict over what they think will happen, or is that too much MC vs. IC? They are both concerned with their futures, but I can’t help but think of individual concerns.

#40

Keep in mind, i’m not suggesting that any story form will work or that you want to stumble through a story form every time. I did it and it worked because I kept everything consistent. But the point is I don’t think it will hurt you to start with what you’ve got and figure the storyform out as you go.

I think this one’s up to you. Whichever one you want to win wins. Or maybe they tie. If you don’t know, you can always try writing the story and see which one ends up winning. As long as you follow the form and follow the theme throughout, I think you’re good. Then you can punch up the theme with a clearer message on the second draft once you’ve got it written and seen where you went with it.

As for the problems and symptoms, as long as you’re working on the MC, i’d say just figure out what you can without worrying about how they affect the OS and RS. Worry about those later.

I’m not sure how to figure this set of problems and symptoms out. I think I’d see it as his conscience is causing him to decide to do things he’d rather not do in order to help others. Maybe he responds to this by trying to give in to his temptation to not do these things.
I think I’d somehow have control and uncontrolled be about his inability to control what happens and his attempts to control them anyway. I don’t know which one would be a problem and which the symptom. I think that’s something you would have to play with until you could figure it out. If you can’t decide for now, just plug in what you have and move on to another throughline for now.

I want to reiterate as well that i’m not an expert on this and some of the ways i’ve used Dramatica have worked for me, but are not necessarily good ways to use it!