Question: Theme/Counterpoint in a 4-Act Story

Discuss the practical use of Dramatica. Have questions about how throughlines should be used, how to create Complex Characters or even the various combinations of the 12 Essential Questions and how they will affect your story go here.
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Geoff1975
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Question: Theme/Counterpoint in a 4-Act Story

Postby Geoff1975 » Oct 22, 2012 8:04 pm

Uncovering this put quite a bit into perspective.
I found I had actually posted a question earlier related to this. Chris was gave an encouraging reply. After writing what's below, I'm coming to realize both 4-act and 3-act methods have elements you'd want to skillfully meld together. It's not just favoring one instead of the other.

If I understand correctly, there are two kinds of setups: 24 and 28. The 28-scene is just for initial story development. The 24-scene one comes from 6 balance scales within one quad * 4 quads. These 24 scenes can become 3-acts or 4-acts. The 3-acts are subjective, journey-focused, and holistic. The 4-act method is objective, signpost-focused, and more linear.

My question deals with sequences. I interpret that two variations compared make a sequence. Possible total of 6 pairs for the story. This divides nicely in 3-act method, but not 4-act. So, for 4-act, each variation is applied directly to the Type per act.

Then I wonder how to input Theme and Counterpoint. That'd be crucial, especially with such a linear story. In a 3-Act method it's easy to use sequence pairings, but I want a more linear feeling story, so I go for 4-Act. I could take just the variations under the Concern quad then apply them to one Type per act. That's possible. It seemed for a while that "How Sequences Relate to Acts" was suggesting I just go to a new set of Variations in each Act, which feels like it would wither any author's message. Was there a method described in "How Sequences Relate to Acts" that I missed... or somewhere else?

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