I got this idea to try to do a sort of play off a choose your own adventure. Chapters will end in a choice of Go to Ch A or Go to Ch B.

Depending on the choice of the reader they will read one of two different outcomes from the previous plot line. And so on and so forth. All the chapters are full, at least 1,500 words or more. At the moment I think the biggest is 5,000 so far.

Eventually all choices converge into endings. I haven't figured out how many I will have yet. I just know the entire monster will need to be finished all at once before any of it is posted for the idea to work.

What I'm having issues with would be keeping continuity and structure after making all these choices. I'm looking at the document wondering how I'm going to keep up with each plot line and make sure the choices are all making sense and matching up.

So far my organization consists of one giant document with each choice color coded for each chapter it's linked to. I've been doing this just to keep track of what I need to write and where, but it's not working very well.

My organization is deplorable, and I'm not sure how to fix it. Any advice on keeping something like this from turning into a hydra?

I thought of trying to find a beta to help keep track of things but part of me feels like it's too much to ask of someone else, and I've never had a beta before.

Er, links to the next chapter etc, probably aren't going to help you keep track of everything very well.

The only thing I can think if that might help is a decision tree, basically with YES and NO branches based on the person's choice, of where they go in each chapter. That's assuming you only have two outcomes per chapter. Like a person can go either left or right. If you have more than two options, well, it'll get more complicated.

~ Pyre

P.S: I actually think putting that kind of workload on a beta is unfair, since the story is yours and not theirs. A beta is really there to function as an editor or proofreader, not so much as a person that takes the reins of whatever plot devices you can't keep track of. If you did give them that kind of responsibility, well then your story would be more of an active collaboration rather than something written solely by you.

A co-authorship if you will.

The more involved they are, the more acknowledgement you'd have to give them, in due fairness to the significance of their role in helping you.

Heyyy,

Wow I've actually considered what you set out to do. In my own internal monologue I would draw out a tree of possibilities.

I.e. She's lost in the woods, should she head towards the river or up the mountain? If she chooses river, then she meets Person A, if she goes up the mountain she meets Person B. So sum it all up via a sentence or two on paper.

So when things collide at the end she'll have the same knowledge? I guess? It'll take some trial and error on paper, just keep drawing arrows etc and adding any discrepancies or more info. Decide if you want the plots to coincide at one point or not. I.e. Make it so that eventually she'll also meet Person B and Person A respectively.

Obviously if you keep dividing the stories then there's going to be more possible outcomes, at one point you might even want to do something like: After choosing to go to the river, upstream/downstream, she travels with this new companion and meets someone else entirely. Person B possibly doesn't occur at all or is/becomes a stranger. Meaning depending on the reader the person they travel with is different but meets the same situations, which continues the plot. So you can keep 1-2 reoccurring factor while changing the rest.

I hope that helps? I'm guessing at a stretch you can update 3-5 chapters at a time depending on the directions chosen but you should keep the story/plot rather simple... Having complexity might confuse you more and make it even harder to write.

Be prepared to have a hydra somewhat lol. I've dabbled on this idea and did my own chart but realised the insane effort needed. Unless it's in drabble form. Good luck!

Pyreite wrote:
Er, links to the next chapter etc, probably aren't going to help you keep track of everything very well.

The only thing I can think if that might help is a decision tree, basically with YES and NO branches based on the person's choice, of where they go in each chapter. That's assuming you only have two outcomes per chapter. Like a person can go either left or right. If you have more than two options, well, it'll get more complicated.

~ Pyre

P.S: I actually think putting that kind of workload on a beta is unfair, since the story is yours and not theirs. A beta is really there to function as an editor or proofreader, not so much as a person that takes the reins of whatever plot devices you can't keep track of. If you did give them that kind of responsibility, well then your story would be more of an active collaboration rather than something written solely by you.

A co-authorship if you will.

The more involved they are, the more acknowledgement you'd have to give them, in due fairness to the significance of their role in helping you.

I agree, it would be too much to ask. Thanks for explaining their function a bit more to me though, like I said I've never used one before so I wasn't entirely sure.

The decision tree idea is something I'm excited to try out! I really hope it will help me get everything all orderly or at least keep the continuity together. Thank you!!


Alon wrote:
Heyyy,

Wow I've actually considered what you set out to do. In my own internal monologue I would draw out a tree of possibilities.

I.e. She's lost in the woods, should she head towards the river or up the mountain? If she chooses river, then she meets Person A, if she goes up the mountain she meets Person B. So sum it all up via a sentence or two on paper.

So when things collide at the end she'll have the same knowledge? I guess? It'll take some trial and error on paper, just keep drawing arrows etc and adding any discrepancies or more info. Decide if you want the plots to coincide at one point or not. I.e. Make it so that eventually she'll also meet Person B and Person A respectively.

Obviously if you keep dividing the stories then there's going to be more possible outcomes, at one point you might even want to do something like: After choosing to go to the river, upstream/downstream, she travels with this new companion and meets someone else entirely. Person B possibly doesn't occur at all or is/becomes a stranger. Meaning depending on the reader the person they travel with is different but meets the same situations, which continues the plot. So you can keep 1-2 reoccurring factor while changing the rest.

I hope that helps? I'm guessing at a stretch you can update 3-5 chapters at a time depending on the directions chosen but you should keep the story/plot rather simple... Having complexity might confuse you more and make it even harder to write.

Be prepared to have a hydra somewhat lol. I've dabbled on this idea and did my own chart but realised the insane effort needed. Unless it's in drabble form. Good luck!


I told myself to keep it simple but I don't think I've kept my promise. It's already pretty much out of hand plot wise. I'm going to try the tree idea Pyre and you have suggested. I think there are some sites that might help with this, maybe. I have some research to get into now.

oh, if you do happen to try something like this out later I'd love to read it.

Np,

Glad to help.

~ Pyre

OH! So, I'm really (really) bad at organization, so my boyfriend introduced me to this app that is literally a godsend for when I'm trying to manage a project with many moving parts.

It's called trello, you can see it here

What trello does, is it allows you to separate different ideas under one project, and flesh out those ideas using different kinds of media. So, in your case, you'd have one project, which is the story you're working on (Let's call it, Kagome falls asleep and Sessho finds her) Now, on the first section, you'd have Option A - Sessho kicks her and on the second section, you'd have Option B - He leans down to investigate

Now, in both sections, you have cards. On the cards, you can write what the future plot options are following that road.

(Eg: Sessho kicks her and she doesn't move. Option A-Sessho thinks she's dead and decides to bring her to camp to eat her Option B- Her yukata falls a bit and Sessho has naughty thoughts. Both option A and option B are on different cards, so you can continue fleshing the plot out for those options on those cards, without getting mixed up.)

EHHH im not very good at explaining this and rereading it looks v confusing when its actually really easy to use. I recommend you give it a look, it's really helped me a lot!

Best of luck with your story!!

Ah, I looked at Trello. I don't think I could handle using it, lol. I scrolled down on the main page and got all intimidated.

I'm using lucidchart right now and it seems to be going pretty well, so far anyway. Thanks to Pyre I figured out a way to mix a tree diagram with a thought web type thing (My brain is so weird I know) and still keep my thoughts in order. It's like a hectic type of organization, but I think it's working, for me at least.

Part of me wants to post a screen shot but the other part is too self conscious about it. XD