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novlr · 9 months

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How to create an effective plot?

How to Quickly Craft an Effective Plot

Crafting an effective plot is no easy task. It's a delicate balance of character development, dramatic tension, and narrative progression that, when done right, can turn your story into an unforgettable journey. It’s easy to get lost and overwhelmed with plot development, so here’s a quick guide to help you quickly and easily craft an effective plot that will hit all the main narrative beats.

1. Start with your protagonist

Start by creating a well-rounded protagonist. Consider their strengths, weaknesses, aspirations, fears, and quirks. Each of these characteristics can be woven into the plot and will shape how your story unfolds. The most fundamental part of any character development is determining their goal, motivation, and conflict. It’s the backbone of any good story.

Goal

Your protagonist should have a clear goal they want to achieve by the end of the novel. This goal can be tangibly external (like winning a competition) or internal (like overcoming a fear). In fact, a well-rounded character should have both an internal and external goal.

Motivation

Your protagonist’s motivation to reach their goal will be the driving force of your plot. While a clear goal gives your character a direction, their motivation is what fuels their journey. Their goal is what they want, and their motivation is why they want it.

Conflict

Conflict is what prevents your protagonist from easily achieving their goal. It increases the stakes and propels your story forward. This can come in many forms, from a physical adversary to a personal flaw or external circumstances. Whatever the conflict, it should challenge your protagonist in a way that pushes them towards growth.

2. Establish the Ordinary World

Establishing the ordinary world is an essential first step in crafting an effective plot. You sety the scene for your readers, providing a glimpse into your protagonist's daily life before the main plot takes off.

The Ordinary World is the comfortable, familiar environment your hero inhabits, acting as a baseline for their normality. Use this stage to introduce the protagonist's routine, their relationships, their hopes and frustrations, as well as any prevailing societal norms or conditions of their world.

3. The inciting incident

The inciting incident is a crucial event that sets the whole plot in motion. It disrupts the comfort of the protagonists' ordinary world, bringing a problem or situation that makes them take action.

The incident you choose will depend entirely on the kind of story you want to tell and could be anything from a personal catastrophe to an intriguing mystery or an unexpected opportunity. No matter your genre, however, the inciting incident’s critical function is to permanently disrupt the status quo and set your protagonist on their journey. It's the spark that ignites the story

4. Build your story

With your set-up complete, you enter the stage of your story where you have the most freedom and can explore your chosen genre. Your characters will grapple with the challenges and obstacles that your story presents and forms the bulk of your story, spanning from the inciting incident to the climax.

During this phase, you want to introduce conflict to raise the stakes, increase tension and keep readers engrossed. As your characters navigate their way through these trials, they grow and evolve, adding depth to their personalities. It's in this section that your characters' motivations are tested, and their true natures are revealed. It's also where plot twists and turns come into play, and you can start developing subplots.

5. The crisis

The crisis, often known as the climax, is the most intense point of your story and serves as the turning point in your plot. It's a crucial moment where the protagonist confronts the main conflict head-on, and the tension reaches its peak.

The stakes are highest at this point, and the outcome is uncertain. It often forces your protagonist to make a critical decision or take decisive action, which will ultimately determine their fate. Whether that's an epic battle, a heartfelt confrontation, or a shocking revelation, the crisis should be a moment of high drama that pushes your characters to their limits.

6. The resolution

The resolution is where all loose ends are tied up, and your characters’ journey concludes. By the time your plot resolves, all your character’s initial goals, motivations, and conflicts should be resolved despite, or perhaps because of, the conflict and obstacles faced.

The resolution should provide satisfaction to your readers, offering both a sense of closure and an insight into what the future holds for the characters. Whether it's a happy ending, a tragic one, or something ambiguous, it's crucial that the resolution ties in with the story's overarching narrative and themes, and marked the end of your character’s personal journey.

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waitingforthesunrise · 11 months

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All my writer friends…if you like plotting and world building on paper, E. A. Deverell has INCREDIBLE free worksheets on literally everything from politics to geography to character building.

#writers on tumblr #plotting and planning #writer problems #writer plotting #writerscommunity #writing resources

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vintage-tigre · 8 months

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#riddler #aesthetic #vintage #old school cool #60s tv series #60s Batman #big mood #cheeky #devilish #plotting and planning

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iamamythologicalcreature · 9 months

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1. Last three days have been kinda hectic and I have catching up to do!

2. This Fandom is the best Fandom with the coolest people. Seriously. You all rock.

3. Still planning to write my "stolen voice" fanfic, but I'm doing research and development. I'm going to try this new technique all the hepcats are doing these days called "Plotting." Sounds a little suspicious, but I'm keeping an open mind XD

4. I signed up to write for the @carryon-reverse-bang and will be cowriting with @ileadacharmedlife (who I hope doesn't mind me announcing this is totally okay with me announcing this, yay!) … I just feel the need to announce it, as I find peer pressure I mean peer encouragement very motivating. XD

5. Nice hat.

#status update #Even more gushing about the Simon Snow Fandom #plotting and planning #carry on reverse bang

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oraclememehacker · 20 days

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I crave duplicate rps but nobody wants to :(

#Looking into the Source Code (OOC)#it's sad #who doesn't want multiple gremlins talking to each other #plotting and planning #making the world a better and worse place

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valmare · 11 months

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thinking maybe when i hit 300 followers i may just have to do a val kilmer celebration. only 40 followers to go, ya'll who's in

#my val kilmer era #300 followers #let's do it #ya'll get it done #top gun roostette #plotting and planning #maybe? who knows? we'll see #honestly i have no idea

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askstevella · 5 months

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Ok Bruce ( @rickb-chaos ) you, Natasha and me might have to have a little chat. Don’t worry, I am not upset or anything, I mean have a half brother too no one told me about until my adult years, so i understand Rick’s newfound feelings towards having a siblings.

But I gotta ask, did you know about this? I’m trying to look at this from a parent perspective and at the same time as someone who didn’t know they had siblings laying around god knows where. Still sometimes glare at Dad for that one, so you might get a few glares from Rick and unresponsive attuned views from too. You will need to prepare yourselves for any questions you might from Rick too.

At this point I would not be surprised if the rest of the team had secret siblings lying around 😂 WHO ELSE GOT SIBLINGS?!

Tag list: @gcthvile @mallowbee4 @luna-d-marsh @ask-missparker @purpleprincessonfyre @meiramel @missstrawbs2001 and etc

#stevella #answered asks #askstevella #marvel rp #mcu x oc #plotting and planning #sibling things #sibling trouble with the avengers fam #strange siblings

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cepheusgalaxy · 8 months

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🔆Ein Plotline🔆

Ein is one of my trhee current projects

Kaiki sucks (initial situation)

Ari saves Kaiki (spark)

Kaiki goes to infirmary (hurt)

Kaiko goes onemia (magical landscape)

Kaiki goes training (magic school)

Meets Lis

Kaiki and Lis get in trouble. QG wants to see them (Ari has to go too)

Alli gets in Kaiki's mind (villain manipulations)

Kaiki meets Simba (the prince)

Shit goes crazy (?)

Kaiki has to go get shit fixed

Ari gotta fix the shit. They end up in this together

Lis sees it *smashes window* gotta help *grins*

Simba joins

Gotta find Villain

Who's Villain (spoiler, it's Allen)

Villain kills

Another country (traveling around da world)

Kaiki sucks (fall)

Okay I kind of that love u (that's Simba)

Gotta rise

Lis shines (Lis rocks)

Gotta kick everybody's ass (rise, pt 3)

Goes to Villain

Gets a little cocky with Alli

Rocks

Open up new thing (new begining potential)

This may seem a little crazy

(Because it is)

Kaiki uses he/him

Ari (Arielle) uses she/them

Lis uses she/her

Allen (Alli/Villain) uses they and he

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vacantgodling · 1 year

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i need to make y’all simps for some of my ocs as hard as i simp for them…..

#plotting and planning #talking

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freesidexjunkie · 7 months

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nothing feels better than when you have no idea where the story needs to go but you just keep writing and then more ideas pop up as you go until you have an acTUAL PLAUSIBLE PLOT AND EVEN A RESOUTION i just crave that feeling of like

#writing #plotting and planning #fanfic plotting #when the bg3 writers said 'that's the creative process #agony and ecstacy' and they were so right!

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novlr · 6 months

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trapped-inadystopianovel · 1 year

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PROVIDENCE UPDATE

The completion of the Original Plotting of Providence vs The completion of the Current Plotting.

What started out as a single first-person POV following Cicely for 29 chapters will now be a four POV in third-person following not only Cicely but also Galib, Sumayl, and Zoya for 64 chapters.

I actually finished the replotting a couple of weeks ago and I have started typing up the official outline, I'm 15 chapters deep; would be farther along but I haven't worked on it for almost a week after I fucked my sleep schedule the week prior.

#writeblr #writblr #writing #providence #eminence series #update #plotting and planning #outlining #attempt two of creating this book

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mantleoflight · 10 months

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Echo gazed down at the two circles in her hand, one black with a white "X" in the middle of it, and the other a white circle with a blue "A" at its center. On her belt, identical smaller disks lined a belt attachment like a score card. "(X)", "(X)", "(A)", "(A)", "(X)", "(A)", "(A)", "(A)"...

She leaned back against the wall and let out a sigh.

"Still thinking about that report?" Whisper asked, drifting from her red cushion over to her guardian.

"Yeah," Echo murmured, "Everything about it makes. The light and darkness fitting together like one of those old black and white talismans from the Golden Age."

"The taijitu?"

Echo looked up and raised a brow-ridge.

"It's the symbol for an ancient philosophy of Taiji or Tai Chi. Something about duality, harmony, and universal beginnings."

A smirk crossed the exo's face as she looked at her ghost. "You've been doing studies haven't you? You've actually been looking this up!"

Whisper bristled, gyrating her goose-toothed shell irritably. "Even I have to find something to do when bored in down time. What do you think I do when you sleep when I don't need a defrag?"

Echo chuckled and shrugged. "Fair enough," she said and looked back down at the disks with a frown.

Her ghost glanced down at the disks and then at her Risen. “What are you thinking about?”

"They're still out there..." she murmured somberly. "All those new light hive looking for a leader and blundering their way through like we did in the dark ages. They're so desperate, they tried to revive Oryx!"

Whisper shook her shell in disbelief. "You're still going on about them? Echo, they're HIVE! The longer they're without leadership, the longer we keep them as a minor disorganized threat!"

"Yeah! And they will always be a threat unless we change things!" Echo argued back. "Unless we change the board, show them a BETTER way like Shaw, Ikora, and Zavala showed us! We can show them a better way - a way that ends the fighting, that turns our Light from each other toward the real enemy!"

Neither of them had to say who that real enemy was as the mere reference of it seemed to bring a weight to the conversation, like covering them a heavy blanket.

"What do you plan on doing?" Whisper asked, her shell flicking tensely.

"I'm going to figure out how to right a wrong," Echo replied, pushing herself to her feet. "And I'm going make sure the grace of mercy I extend isn't used to stab me in the back...."

#drabble #destiny drabble #echo #ehco-17 #whisper #echo & Whisper #plotting and planning

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paultrosleftthigh · 1 year

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I finally did the evil villain thing. Staring out my glass pane window whilst swirling a hard drink. Only I was watching the cool heat lightning instead of brooding or plotting.

#villian vibes #midwest things #clechee #plotting and planning #This feels pretty nice #calmingvibes

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nvrtrust-naims · 7 months

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400TH POST CELEBRATION !!!!

#400th post #400 #danger #plotting and planning #sillyposting

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raepliica · 2 months

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i think they should take turns cuddling for healing purposes

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