Archetypes - software question
Posted: Mar 27, 2012 2:04 pm
Hello All - new user here.
Started using Dramatica to help with an existing story/screenplay. Created characters and assigned some archetypes, but not Protagonist or Impact character (guardian). Left these fields blank. Assigned main character/protagonist and guardian/impact character in later fields, but these archetypes keep showing up as blank unassigned fields. I thought of deleting them, but worried that they were tied to the software architecture so didn't.
I did one version where the guardian was the impact character, but found that this led me to a version that dealt with a subplot. I reworked things where the impact character is the contagonist. This is better and makes more sense, but I still have these unassigned fields for main character and impact character. I was not worried until I went to build characters. It's very complicated.
The motivation quad is not like the example in the book. I have different archetypes represented. Is this because of choices I have made regarding my characters or a bug in the software? Some of my characters will represent more than one archetype - the contagonist and the antogonist share the emotion archetype, and two characters function as the guardian/sidekick and guardian /skeptic. At present I do not have any character assigned to the emotion archetype.
I have not done anything yet about creating these complex characters because I'm not sure if there is a bug.
Should I replace all the info for my main character/protagonist in the unassigned field? If so, how should I rename it? If I do the same for my impact character, but want them to be the contagonist not guardian how should I proceed? It seems you cannot have more than one file open at a time. How do you transfer previously entered info when making major changes?
I've learned a lot about my story and my characters by using the software and am very pleased with the results, but I've hit a bit of a snag when it comes to using the software. Would really appreciate any advice.
Thanks
K
Started using Dramatica to help with an existing story/screenplay. Created characters and assigned some archetypes, but not Protagonist or Impact character (guardian). Left these fields blank. Assigned main character/protagonist and guardian/impact character in later fields, but these archetypes keep showing up as blank unassigned fields. I thought of deleting them, but worried that they were tied to the software architecture so didn't.
I did one version where the guardian was the impact character, but found that this led me to a version that dealt with a subplot. I reworked things where the impact character is the contagonist. This is better and makes more sense, but I still have these unassigned fields for main character and impact character. I was not worried until I went to build characters. It's very complicated.
The motivation quad is not like the example in the book. I have different archetypes represented. Is this because of choices I have made regarding my characters or a bug in the software? Some of my characters will represent more than one archetype - the contagonist and the antogonist share the emotion archetype, and two characters function as the guardian/sidekick and guardian /skeptic. At present I do not have any character assigned to the emotion archetype.
I have not done anything yet about creating these complex characters because I'm not sure if there is a bug.
Should I replace all the info for my main character/protagonist in the unassigned field? If so, how should I rename it? If I do the same for my impact character, but want them to be the contagonist not guardian how should I proceed? It seems you cannot have more than one file open at a time. How do you transfer previously entered info when making major changes?
I've learned a lot about my story and my characters by using the software and am very pleased with the results, but I've hit a bit of a snag when it comes to using the software. Would really appreciate any advice.
Thanks
K