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Generating Good Conflict



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Tue Sep 23, 2014 3:25 pm
PrehistoricEchoes says...



So I was working on Elementary the other day when I realized that the story had a serious problem: nothing was happening. The main conflict of the plot isn't scheduled to begin for a few chapters, and not much other than some preliminary character development and introduction is going on. And from what I know, a lack of conflict is pretty much the cardinal sin of writing.

So basically, I need advice on how to make these early chapters interesting enough to lead into the main conflict of the story, since I want it to feel like something's going to happen and not just like the reader is watching the main characters go about their daily lives.
My life was described in the Halo 3 Machinima, Flag Campers: "The last two hours of travel are confined to a small, hilly area. And it's all squiggly..."
  





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Tue Sep 23, 2014 11:43 pm
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Rosendorn says...



What can go wrong?

^ There's a fantastic source of conflict.

You don't have to have it be particularly big, especially if the plot isn't particularly big. A fight with a romantic partner? Something went wrong. Family member died? Something went wrong. Late for school and got a detention? Something went wrong.

Sometimes, another great source of conflict is tossing another character into the mix as a relatively important character. Suddenly, you have to figure out their lives and how they interact with the MC. This adds conflict because more things have to happen in order to include that character.

In general, your best bets are to find as many ways to cause the character trouble as you possibly can.
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo

Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
  








If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.
— Henry David Thoreau, "Walden"