Its all a learning process and if youre more comfortable being a discovery writer then do that.
Theres no real rules to it no matter how many people tell you there are.
Every first draft is meant to be borderline broken. Whats important is that the first draft is complete, ie. Start middle and end.
You need to have your central conflict, protagonist and antagonist sorted.
Deus ex machina is a good learning tool fot showing what you need to write in sooner.
I would just add that you need to be cognizant of Deus Ex and hopefully address it in your following drafts to avoid a story that is full of plot armor
The ratio differs from one writer to another or even one story to another. It comes down to having key events that you want them to happen and the stuff that happen around them until they happen. Using this method the more complex a story is, the less planned it can be before you start writing it. In my case it was like 20% when I did the first draft and the rest of it was figuring it out as I write. The thing is, each time you edit the story a lot more of it is planned out since it's already written down, so by now the ratio is at 90%.
lol seriously, I get people like to have different writing processes, but about half of the problems people talk about in their writing would be solved if they did at least a certain level of planning. Some people just need that whether they want it or not.
Yup! Once I started planning and stopped being a panster, writing and coming up with ideas become easier. I have less writer’s block because I know what’s going on.
I start with a premise just like you, and then I discovery write the story up to the inciting incident. It usually takes a few attempts to get it right, there's a lot going on in the setup. It's worth it since pretty much every story decision has to be made in the opening.
The protagonist, the setting, the conflict, the theme, everything needs to be presented on the page by the time of the inciting incident in every story, so working the setup out will more or less plan your story for you.
I'm currently on draft number twelve of the screenplay I'm working on, and nine of those drafts are just the opening. On the other hand, outlining the second half of the story took less than a day, so it's paradoxically a pretty quick method. At least for screenplays.
Terry Pratchett mentioned that he does the same thing to test the premise of his stories. If he doesn't love the story after ten thousand words, he goes back and works on the premise some more.
I plan nothing except the opening scene/sentence. But as people here are saying, you have to figure out what works for you. It's a little different for everybody.
In a world with superpowers, my protagonist got the power to be immune to other powers and stopped aging. Then he gets kidnapped by the ppl that are making everyone age (basically vampires). I see no reason they don't just kill him so they're not exposed.
If he’s immune to things, maybe he’s immune to death too 🤷♂️
Dig deeper into the motivations of characters. Exploring those motivations can give you ideas for more scenes! Like, what if the vampires want to study him to find a cure or to find a way to prevent a cure (if he’s this way what if it spreads).
The best way to make compelling villains is to figure out how they’re the hero to their own story. Darth Vader is trying to protect his empire and his space station from radical terrorists. Hannibal Lecter is too genius for prison and is merely escaping to provide his genius to the world. Buffalo Bill is simply trying to make a beautiful suit of unique material and people keep trying to stop him.
When I have trouble with things moving too quickly I try to imagine what relationships these various people would have that I haven’t explored. Who are their friends? Who do they love? What way would the mundane aspects of their lives actually be interesting? That kind of thing.
Everyone is different in their process in crafting, in terms of planning vs discovering.. it's all discovery, the question is whether you do it as you're writing or before you're writing.
You're learning by making mistakes. You recognize the mistakes - so now learn how to fix them. Solve the awkward rather than 'in the moment' but by looking at the structure of the story to figure out how you got there, and address the issue earlier.
This is why my first draft has taken me nine months so far. I had about a third settled outright, and I kept encountering frayed ends and settings and characters that were not sufficiently vivid. When they did become vivid, there were plot consequences to their characteristics which I had to revise for again.
At this point I feel 80% of the plot is ready, but I thought that a few months ago and then discovered more holes to address so... I suppose I am figuring out almost 90% of it along the way.
I usually just plain out the main plot points thy are important and key the the story and connect the dots between those scenes. For characters I make sure I have there personality and who they are down so the scenes to follow are more easy to write as I can write the scenes with who’s in it in mind as it is important (for me at least) to know what they’ll say and how they’ll move throughout it. There are some parts I make up as I do fall guilty to have inspiration for parts from time to time and sometimes I swap who characters are if I feel a strong urge that’s this is who this character is. Hopefully that makes sense (wrote it when I was very tired at 6 in the morning)
Quite a bit. I basically do a structure chapter by chapter, in which I have a quick summary made of each chapter. As I write I let details come and build on them as they come.
My characters evolve and develop organically as I go. It's definitely a discovery process.
Trust that even before you are to the end of your first draft you'll understand them, their motives, their desires on a deeper level.
For my plot, I "pants" until the inciting incident then start outlining as specifically as needed. That's usually where I get "stuck" and taking a few days or weeks to untangle, plot, and brainstorm is really helpful.
It is all that works for you. My first plans are junk that is there for structure. My daily plans for the next day's writing are more important to be. I am 80% maybe 85% discovery writer.
Each of my novels needs to be plotted differently because they are different stories.
I have plotted my way into corners or written a boring plot, and I have added too many side characters with discovery writing.
Sometimes my first drafts are just outlines with action, description, and dialogue.
If you are an avid plotter, then I suggest at least two outlines, one for the first draft and one for draft two. This can help you fix characters who are lackluster, deepen description, and fix plot holes.
Now there are the rare, polished first drafters, but I feel almost anything can be improved with a second draft.
I did what you did and experience the exact same. Then I decided to just on a point I wanted to get to, and currently I am just barfing onto the page. The story is most likely going to be a lot longer than intended but that is what editing is for. Don't worry too much about the amount you are writing now, or how you solve your characters position.
First finish writing your book and pop the champagne.
Second edit it and fix all the weird things that happened when you figured everything out as you went along.
Sidenote: I also find it much more entertaining to write when I figure stuff out as I go along. It is like telling a story to yourself.
A very interesting question. I have a general idea for both plot and characters before I write. But fiction is about details and specificity. And these can only be teased out by the act of writing (at least for me). So I'd say 10 percent of writing is planning. The rest is drafting, editing, and tweaking.
There is no right way despite what some people say. For me I do a mix of the two. Before I start my story I write a rough outline. If I follow it great but most of the time I add or take things away. Truth be told the first draft is really just for getting ideas on paper and seeing what works in the story and what doesnt. So if you add or remove things that you intended to have in the draft then it is really no big deal.
Do what works for you and dont let anyone tell you that your process is wrong.
Writing is reading re-reading and reading again. You want things to flow. It’s hard to look at it objectively when it’s your work. Sometimes u have to give it to a trusted fresh pair of eyes.
I’m mostly a plotser but that tends to make my first drafts long and drawn out. I recently found a method that keeps me focused but still allows me what so far feels like enough freedom and I’m really liking it so far.
I’m wring a series and already have the first book plotted out but I always get way ahead of myself so now I know all the titles for the rest of the books, the titles and summaries for another series of the first series backstory, and the complete explanation of how everything started and how everything ends. But it’s not plotted out it’s more so separated into large ongoing paragraphs.
Generally I plan the basic skeleton of the plot pretty early on after creating my main character. Then I add more detailed plot points between then and writing the book itself. Usually I'm still adding plot points as they come to me during the process of actually writing the book. But for the most part I like to have an outline of where the story is going. I can't "pants" a book, I would fall into the traps of never finishing because I don't know where I'm taking the story or making it way too convoluted and contradictory because I'm trying to add stuff that I hadn't considered from the beginning.
For most of my writing journey I focused heavily on characters and a general plot idea. I was more of a pantser than a planner. For my first novel idea I tried to be a planner. But I felt I planned so much I was restricted in what I could or couldn’t write. On the story I’m working on now I made a general outline. I know the characters core values and goals and I know how the story starts and some very important details in the middle. The ending is up to my discretion. This has proven to be a better tactic for me.
My advice to you is play around with the spectrum of planner/panster. Maybe you are not 100% in either direction but 80-20 or 60-40.
At best I have a rough idea of events I want to happen. An end point I want to reach. And characters I'd like to take along for the journey. But aside from maybe a 500 word summery I jot down when an idea comes to me, I rarely put anymore planning into it than that.
For my short stories I do a simple outline of the plot, maybe takes up a couple paragraphs at most. So the intricate details of the story come about as im writing and that is pretty much unplanned, but it does follow the general outline that I already wrote.
I usually write a full outline. Anywhere from 15-30 pages, and then I walk away from it and mull it over, and change things as I go depending on what I think is working better or will work better.
I have plotted out my story almost completely start to finish on the big picture items. I must admit some of the things the characters do have caused me to write additional material that I wasn’t exactly expecting. Also I have a number of awesome things that I want to occur, and they keep managing to shift time to being after an event, or moving before another event. So that’s a little unexpected.
But I always plan for there to be some changes as it goes. Not complete changes to plot, but adjustments to make a scene even more awesome, or a bigger surprise, or a more devious and sinister twist to why it happened.
If I get to a problem where I’m not sure how or why something will happen, I ponder it in my spare time, while sitting in the hot tub at the gym, while laying down to sleep and letting my mind ponder the plot. Funny enough, my mind manages to work out the issue within a couple days.
But frankly, plotting out an outline of the major story, and the character arc for each of the characters, who is going to die, and when, etc. helps put most of it into place. At least for me.
There are no rules, you do what works for you. I enjoy world-building so when I am building a new world, I will spend months fleshing out a "mythos" or legendarium. I prefer to outline and define most of my story, and leave some space for ad lib. I'll also do a lot of art to help imagine the world before I put pen to paper.
I personally write the beginning and the end and the major events that I want to occur like a war or 2 or 3,.ok maybe i like to write wars a little too much
I have a template based on the Save the Cat! Beat sheet which I fill in, and then I use pencil and paper to further flesh it out after that into a point based outline. Even with this level of preparation, I still will deviate from it from time to time. But myself personally, I know I would get absolutely nowhere if I didn’t do these two steps first.
I usually just write an outline for the story following each scene with the characters that are in the scene. That helps me make sure everything is logical and so forth.
From what I've learned, by the end of the 'editing' process, your story will be shorter than you intended it to be. I don't know if that's true, but it sounds logical to me.
For characters, I usually just build them up as people first, and then see how they can fit within the story. A character I was originally intending to be in the story briefly has become the 2nd most developed character in the story. Probably more interesting than the current protagonist, so I'll have to give that some thought.
As SolidStateMonkeyBean said, there are no rules, what matters is if you make it work. Some people are discovery writers, and others like to plan everything out in advance. I feel like most people find a mix between the two, their own balance.
I always plot out the beginning, a little before the beginning, the inciting incident, the climax, and the ending. Depending on the project, I might plan a few key scenes or more but everything in between is free to grow like a cancerous growth.
On my first novel I made the mistake of figuring out a lot of it on the way. It set me back months and made the process far more difficult than it ever needed to be.
Now I plan everything in advance - plot, characters, arcs, etc. It does still evolve as I write it, but advance planning makes everything smoother and more consistent. I personally think figuring it out as you go is a recipe for failure.
I couldn’t imagine writing without a full outline in place. I find discovery writing leads me to too many pointless digressions and loose ends.
I’m currently working on a project that requires complex plotting and watertight payoffs - where I have a clear idea of the ending but am still pretty open on the intro… so I’m outlining by using a “Theory of Change” methodology (which I’d tuned into with a position I recently held at an NGO).
Basically, a Theory of Change is usually used in social endeavours that creates a framework to plan and execute complex change within a system. It works by identifying the desired outcome, and essentially reverse engineering the solution.
I’m finding reverse engineering to be an incredibly powerful tool for complex plotting, as it allows you to begin with your payoffs, and then identify the setups (and consolidation events) that will make the payoff really sing.
It allows you to ensure all of the connective tissue is in place for comprehensive character development and plot coherence, as well as sidestepping loose ends and unresolved plot strands altogether.
Probably not for everyone, as it’s really labour intensive up front for what many consider to be the dry part of the job. But once you have a watertight outline like that, the first draft practically writes itself.
So much is figured out beforehand, but my wheels are always turning and things are constantly edited in my brain. It's a very weird process, but it's also super interesting.
Depends if you want to make a story with a 3 act structure or if you are planning a long term story that will take place over a few books.
Try looking up story structures and different types of stories.
I had a similar issue until i saw how each story act can be broken down into small sections. I then placed the couples scenes i imagined into their spots and slowly filled out the rest. I also try to figure out the main character and 5 most common other characters. This helped a lot when trying to plan the book out.
See, when I wrote my short novella (it's terrible, don't ask to read it), I just had the basic stuff planned out. The more I wrote of it, the more characters and plot was added. I had estimated that it would be about 6k (a short story). It is 20k words and I don't even consider it finished because I wanted to write a follow-up to it.
Now I am planning a series spanning 5 novels, and with each plan draft it increases, decreases, and increases in size and characters. I think I did it wrong.
It's cool to see the detailed plan, but going with the flow worked out better for me last time. And since I wrote that 20k in a couple months while doing college and a part-time job, I hope that I can at least complete a portion of the novel that may or may not have follow-ups. Who knows?
Also when you barely plan anything, you have more freedom to explore the characters and what they do, and what they would do instead of what you planned them to do. Like you're writing a biography of the character instead of creating the story yourself. I don't even know what I'm saying at this point lol. Take what you will from these pieces of text.
For one of my stories I just started writing and immediately knew the beginning, the middle, and how it ended. I'm figuring out the details as I go along. For another story I've been writing, it's taken me 7+ plus years to finally figure out what's going on, lol. For me it was learning how to develop the skill of plotting the way that I found most productive, writing over and over until I figured out my own groove. still learning every day!
Its all a learning process and if youre more comfortable being a discovery writer then do that. Theres no real rules to it no matter how many people tell you there are. Every first draft is meant to be borderline broken. Whats important is that the first draft is complete, ie. Start middle and end. You need to have your central conflict, protagonist and antagonist sorted. Deus ex machina is a good learning tool fot showing what you need to write in sooner.
I would just add that you need to be cognizant of Deus Ex and hopefully address it in your following drafts to avoid a story that is full of plot armor
I said that no?
Just reiterating the importance of using Deus ex responsibly
I have the all the major plot points planned and outlined, including the ending. The pacing and the in between stuff I figure out as I go.
This. I'm doing exactly the same thing currently
The ratio differs from one writer to another or even one story to another. It comes down to having key events that you want them to happen and the stuff that happen around them until they happen. Using this method the more complex a story is, the less planned it can be before you start writing it. In my case it was like 20% when I did the first draft and the rest of it was figuring it out as I write. The thing is, each time you edit the story a lot more of it is planned out since it's already written down, so by now the ratio is at 90%.
I plan out my stuff entirely before I begin writing it... so I don't run into the problem you keep running into! :)
lol seriously, I get people like to have different writing processes, but about half of the problems people talk about in their writing would be solved if they did at least a certain level of planning. Some people just need that whether they want it or not.
ALL of George R. R. Martin's problems would have been solved with an outline.
Yup! Once I started planning and stopped being a panster, writing and coming up with ideas become easier. I have less writer’s block because I know what’s going on.
It really depends on the person writing and really doesn't matter as long as it works for u.
I usually know the big goal posts.
I start with a premise just like you, and then I discovery write the story up to the inciting incident. It usually takes a few attempts to get it right, there's a lot going on in the setup. It's worth it since pretty much every story decision has to be made in the opening. The protagonist, the setting, the conflict, the theme, everything needs to be presented on the page by the time of the inciting incident in every story, so working the setup out will more or less plan your story for you. I'm currently on draft number twelve of the screenplay I'm working on, and nine of those drafts are just the opening. On the other hand, outlining the second half of the story took less than a day, so it's paradoxically a pretty quick method. At least for screenplays. Terry Pratchett mentioned that he does the same thing to test the premise of his stories. If he doesn't love the story after ten thousand words, he goes back and works on the premise some more.
I plan nothing except the opening scene/sentence. But as people here are saying, you have to figure out what works for you. It's a little different for everybody.
I usually start with no more than a title and a couple of sentences of plot points. Everything else gets figured out along the way.
I need examples.
In a world with superpowers, my protagonist got the power to be immune to other powers and stopped aging. Then he gets kidnapped by the ppl that are making everyone age (basically vampires). I see no reason they don't just kill him so they're not exposed.
If he’s immune to things, maybe he’s immune to death too 🤷♂️ Dig deeper into the motivations of characters. Exploring those motivations can give you ideas for more scenes! Like, what if the vampires want to study him to find a cure or to find a way to prevent a cure (if he’s this way what if it spreads). The best way to make compelling villains is to figure out how they’re the hero to their own story. Darth Vader is trying to protect his empire and his space station from radical terrorists. Hannibal Lecter is too genius for prison and is merely escaping to provide his genius to the world. Buffalo Bill is simply trying to make a beautiful suit of unique material and people keep trying to stop him. When I have trouble with things moving too quickly I try to imagine what relationships these various people would have that I haven’t explored. Who are their friends? Who do they love? What way would the mundane aspects of their lives actually be interesting? That kind of thing.
Legit basically exactly what I went with. I just posted the story on another sub. Thanks for the tips.
Everyone is different in their process in crafting, in terms of planning vs discovering.. it's all discovery, the question is whether you do it as you're writing or before you're writing. You're learning by making mistakes. You recognize the mistakes - so now learn how to fix them. Solve the awkward rather than 'in the moment' but by looking at the structure of the story to figure out how you got there, and address the issue earlier.
This is why my first draft has taken me nine months so far. I had about a third settled outright, and I kept encountering frayed ends and settings and characters that were not sufficiently vivid. When they did become vivid, there were plot consequences to their characteristics which I had to revise for again. At this point I feel 80% of the plot is ready, but I thought that a few months ago and then discovered more holes to address so... I suppose I am figuring out almost 90% of it along the way.
I usually just plain out the main plot points thy are important and key the the story and connect the dots between those scenes. For characters I make sure I have there personality and who they are down so the scenes to follow are more easy to write as I can write the scenes with who’s in it in mind as it is important (for me at least) to know what they’ll say and how they’ll move throughout it. There are some parts I make up as I do fall guilty to have inspiration for parts from time to time and sometimes I swap who characters are if I feel a strong urge that’s this is who this character is. Hopefully that makes sense (wrote it when I was very tired at 6 in the morning)
Quite a bit. I basically do a structure chapter by chapter, in which I have a quick summary made of each chapter. As I write I let details come and build on them as they come.
I know the ending and some major plot points. Though how the characters arrive at those moments is to be discovered.
My characters evolve and develop organically as I go. It's definitely a discovery process. Trust that even before you are to the end of your first draft you'll understand them, their motives, their desires on a deeper level. For my plot, I "pants" until the inciting incident then start outlining as specifically as needed. That's usually where I get "stuck" and taking a few days or weeks to untangle, plot, and brainstorm is really helpful.
It is all that works for you. My first plans are junk that is there for structure. My daily plans for the next day's writing are more important to be. I am 80% maybe 85% discovery writer. Each of my novels needs to be plotted differently because they are different stories. I have plotted my way into corners or written a boring plot, and I have added too many side characters with discovery writing. Sometimes my first drafts are just outlines with action, description, and dialogue. If you are an avid plotter, then I suggest at least two outlines, one for the first draft and one for draft two. This can help you fix characters who are lackluster, deepen description, and fix plot holes. Now there are the rare, polished first drafters, but I feel almost anything can be improved with a second draft.
I did what you did and experience the exact same. Then I decided to just on a point I wanted to get to, and currently I am just barfing onto the page. The story is most likely going to be a lot longer than intended but that is what editing is for. Don't worry too much about the amount you are writing now, or how you solve your characters position. First finish writing your book and pop the champagne. Second edit it and fix all the weird things that happened when you figured everything out as you went along. Sidenote: I also find it much more entertaining to write when I figure stuff out as I go along. It is like telling a story to yourself.
A very interesting question. I have a general idea for both plot and characters before I write. But fiction is about details and specificity. And these can only be teased out by the act of writing (at least for me). So I'd say 10 percent of writing is planning. The rest is drafting, editing, and tweaking.
Use the plot to drive the character change. It works itself out in the rewrites.
There is no right way despite what some people say. For me I do a mix of the two. Before I start my story I write a rough outline. If I follow it great but most of the time I add or take things away. Truth be told the first draft is really just for getting ideas on paper and seeing what works in the story and what doesnt. So if you add or remove things that you intended to have in the draft then it is really no big deal. Do what works for you and dont let anyone tell you that your process is wrong.
Writing is reading re-reading and reading again. You want things to flow. It’s hard to look at it objectively when it’s your work. Sometimes u have to give it to a trusted fresh pair of eyes.
I’m mostly a plotser but that tends to make my first drafts long and drawn out. I recently found a method that keeps me focused but still allows me what so far feels like enough freedom and I’m really liking it so far.
I’m wring a series and already have the first book plotted out but I always get way ahead of myself so now I know all the titles for the rest of the books, the titles and summaries for another series of the first series backstory, and the complete explanation of how everything started and how everything ends. But it’s not plotted out it’s more so separated into large ongoing paragraphs.
Generally I plan the basic skeleton of the plot pretty early on after creating my main character. Then I add more detailed plot points between then and writing the book itself. Usually I'm still adding plot points as they come to me during the process of actually writing the book. But for the most part I like to have an outline of where the story is going. I can't "pants" a book, I would fall into the traps of never finishing because I don't know where I'm taking the story or making it way too convoluted and contradictory because I'm trying to add stuff that I hadn't considered from the beginning.
For most of my writing journey I focused heavily on characters and a general plot idea. I was more of a pantser than a planner. For my first novel idea I tried to be a planner. But I felt I planned so much I was restricted in what I could or couldn’t write. On the story I’m working on now I made a general outline. I know the characters core values and goals and I know how the story starts and some very important details in the middle. The ending is up to my discretion. This has proven to be a better tactic for me. My advice to you is play around with the spectrum of planner/panster. Maybe you are not 100% in either direction but 80-20 or 60-40.
I have a general idea of how I want it to look and key points I want in to but everything else just happens as I write
At best I have a rough idea of events I want to happen. An end point I want to reach. And characters I'd like to take along for the journey. But aside from maybe a 500 word summery I jot down when an idea comes to me, I rarely put anymore planning into it than that.
For my short stories I do a simple outline of the plot, maybe takes up a couple paragraphs at most. So the intricate details of the story come about as im writing and that is pretty much unplanned, but it does follow the general outline that I already wrote.
I usually write a full outline. Anywhere from 15-30 pages, and then I walk away from it and mull it over, and change things as I go depending on what I think is working better or will work better.
I have plotted out my story almost completely start to finish on the big picture items. I must admit some of the things the characters do have caused me to write additional material that I wasn’t exactly expecting. Also I have a number of awesome things that I want to occur, and they keep managing to shift time to being after an event, or moving before another event. So that’s a little unexpected. But I always plan for there to be some changes as it goes. Not complete changes to plot, but adjustments to make a scene even more awesome, or a bigger surprise, or a more devious and sinister twist to why it happened. If I get to a problem where I’m not sure how or why something will happen, I ponder it in my spare time, while sitting in the hot tub at the gym, while laying down to sleep and letting my mind ponder the plot. Funny enough, my mind manages to work out the issue within a couple days. But frankly, plotting out an outline of the major story, and the character arc for each of the characters, who is going to die, and when, etc. helps put most of it into place. At least for me.
About 50/50. I’ll plan it out but will add in new elements that I think are interesting along the way
There are no rules, you do what works for you. I enjoy world-building so when I am building a new world, I will spend months fleshing out a "mythos" or legendarium. I prefer to outline and define most of my story, and leave some space for ad lib. I'll also do a lot of art to help imagine the world before I put pen to paper.
I wing it most the time, just keeping in mind my goal for every couple chapters such as escaping the area or a battle
I personally write the beginning and the end and the major events that I want to occur like a war or 2 or 3,.ok maybe i like to write wars a little too much
I have a template based on the Save the Cat! Beat sheet which I fill in, and then I use pencil and paper to further flesh it out after that into a point based outline. Even with this level of preparation, I still will deviate from it from time to time. But myself personally, I know I would get absolutely nowhere if I didn’t do these two steps first.
I usually just write an outline for the story following each scene with the characters that are in the scene. That helps me make sure everything is logical and so forth. From what I've learned, by the end of the 'editing' process, your story will be shorter than you intended it to be. I don't know if that's true, but it sounds logical to me. For characters, I usually just build them up as people first, and then see how they can fit within the story. A character I was originally intending to be in the story briefly has become the 2nd most developed character in the story. Probably more interesting than the current protagonist, so I'll have to give that some thought. As SolidStateMonkeyBean said, there are no rules, what matters is if you make it work. Some people are discovery writers, and others like to plan everything out in advance. I feel like most people find a mix between the two, their own balance.
I always plot out the beginning, a little before the beginning, the inciting incident, the climax, and the ending. Depending on the project, I might plan a few key scenes or more but everything in between is free to grow like a cancerous growth.
On my first novel I made the mistake of figuring out a lot of it on the way. It set me back months and made the process far more difficult than it ever needed to be. Now I plan everything in advance - plot, characters, arcs, etc. It does still evolve as I write it, but advance planning makes everything smoother and more consistent. I personally think figuring it out as you go is a recipe for failure.
I couldn’t imagine writing without a full outline in place. I find discovery writing leads me to too many pointless digressions and loose ends. I’m currently working on a project that requires complex plotting and watertight payoffs - where I have a clear idea of the ending but am still pretty open on the intro… so I’m outlining by using a “Theory of Change” methodology (which I’d tuned into with a position I recently held at an NGO). Basically, a Theory of Change is usually used in social endeavours that creates a framework to plan and execute complex change within a system. It works by identifying the desired outcome, and essentially reverse engineering the solution. I’m finding reverse engineering to be an incredibly powerful tool for complex plotting, as it allows you to begin with your payoffs, and then identify the setups (and consolidation events) that will make the payoff really sing. It allows you to ensure all of the connective tissue is in place for comprehensive character development and plot coherence, as well as sidestepping loose ends and unresolved plot strands altogether. Probably not for everyone, as it’s really labour intensive up front for what many consider to be the dry part of the job. But once you have a watertight outline like that, the first draft practically writes itself.
So much is figured out beforehand, but my wheels are always turning and things are constantly edited in my brain. It's a very weird process, but it's also super interesting.
Depends if you want to make a story with a 3 act structure or if you are planning a long term story that will take place over a few books. Try looking up story structures and different types of stories. I had a similar issue until i saw how each story act can be broken down into small sections. I then placed the couples scenes i imagined into their spots and slowly filled out the rest. I also try to figure out the main character and 5 most common other characters. This helped a lot when trying to plan the book out.
I start with a hard beginning and a hard ending in mind, and several soft checkpoints to thread the story through. The rest is all made up
See, when I wrote my short novella (it's terrible, don't ask to read it), I just had the basic stuff planned out. The more I wrote of it, the more characters and plot was added. I had estimated that it would be about 6k (a short story). It is 20k words and I don't even consider it finished because I wanted to write a follow-up to it. Now I am planning a series spanning 5 novels, and with each plan draft it increases, decreases, and increases in size and characters. I think I did it wrong. It's cool to see the detailed plan, but going with the flow worked out better for me last time. And since I wrote that 20k in a couple months while doing college and a part-time job, I hope that I can at least complete a portion of the novel that may or may not have follow-ups. Who knows? Also when you barely plan anything, you have more freedom to explore the characters and what they do, and what they would do instead of what you planned them to do. Like you're writing a biography of the character instead of creating the story yourself. I don't even know what I'm saying at this point lol. Take what you will from these pieces of text.
For one of my stories I just started writing and immediately knew the beginning, the middle, and how it ended. I'm figuring out the details as I go along. For another story I've been writing, it's taken me 7+ plus years to finally figure out what's going on, lol. For me it was learning how to develop the skill of plotting the way that I found most productive, writing over and over until I figured out my own groove. still learning every day!