Plot Structure

Here's the structure we're using to create the plots for our audience participation workshops. You can use this to continue the story!


ACT ONE
  • Set up ORDINARY WORLD
  • Create an INCITING INCIDENT to CALL the hero TO ACTION.
  • The hero REFUSES THE CALL or shows reluctance.
  • What are the STAKES FOR REFUSING?
  • What are the STAKES FOR ACCEPTING?
  • The hero reaches a TURNING POINT OF NO RETURN, where she must commit. 
  • THE STAKES GET HIGHER, and she does something she wouldn’t have done or been able to do at the beginning.

ACT TWO
  • THE NEW REALITY is vastly different from previous. Character makes a plan and amasses helpers and resources.
  • BUT WAIT, things are even worse than they seem.
  • The hero shows NEW DETERMINATION as she overcomes five or six increasingly harder obstacles that prepare her for the midpoint ordeal.
  • THE MIDPOINT TEST shifts the hero’s understanding. Things are more complicated and dangerous than they seem, and they’re about to get worse.
  • THE STAKES GO UP AGAIN.

ACT THREE
  • At THE CLIMAX, the hero attacks the villain head on in a gamble for all or nothing. They fight and only one of them emerges victorious.
  • LOOSE ENDS ARE TIED, and there’s a glimpse of the new world order, either positive or negative, that suggests how things will fare for the hero in the ever-after.

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