The Story Corner » Discussions


How do you come up with your stories?

  • Member
    September 14, 2017

    What it says on the tin. Do you have a brainstorming process? Does inspiration strike at random intervals? Do you fish old stories out of the bin and rework them? Do characters come first, and then plot? I'm curious, as I'm sure others are. Let's share our secrets. 

  • Member
    September 14, 2017

    I'd say it's more a case of inspiration striking, and brainstorming around that. I don't usually think "I want to tell a story about X, how should I go about it," but more often, "Huh, X is a cool concept, is there a story there?" Usually plot comes first, often specific scenes, like little cinematics that play out in my mind, and I build bridges between them, and then develop characters to take the journey.

  • Member
    September 14, 2017

    Sounds like how it happens with me! Usually I'll think of the plot before the characters or setting. I admit this makes things difficult when the plot ends up not quite fitting in either the ES or FO universe, usually because the plot at its most basic has no magic or gods in it. I enjoy writing about the latter and often purposefully try to brainstorm those so that I make sure whatever I post here is actually somewhat recognizably in-universe. 

  • September 14, 2017

    My brainstorming process is that I usually get an idea and begin to write it down and making as many concepts, ideas, and such as possible until I can no longer think of anymore. Inspiration does strike me randomly it can be as random as hearing a song or watching something on tv and it triggers something inside. The characters come first and the plot and that is just because usually, my characters embodied ideas and concepts and I try to weave that into the plot.

  • Member
    September 14, 2017

    For me, plots come to me with a flourish moments. I tend to write those ideas down and brainstrorm which plots can be used for a story. Characters comes next along with their backgrounds and such.Then it's more brainstorming and fleshing out the whole plot.

    Inspiration might strike at any time, but there are gaps between writing and brainstorming.

    I have few old stories to rework, too.

  • September 21, 2017

    I'm cheating, Albee came through my experience with his playthrough, though I think I can safely say I am beyond that now. 

  • Member
    September 21, 2017

    Damn, I completely forgot about this post. Was going to comment when it first popped out, but it felt awkward typing using mobile.

    Anyways, most of my stories (or concepts) comes from a sudden strike of idea everytime I see, read, or watch something. Usually it ends up being a character concept or a plot. How I expand that plot is a challenge of its own. 

  • Member
    October 13, 2017

    My story started with a flash of insight of a conversation between two characters, which I wrote a short story of, then I asked (after some prodding), ‘What led to this moment? What shaped the characters to behave this way?’ and that in turn shaped the plot. I’ve gone off on many tangents since that first short story, so I’m excited to see how different the long story equivalent of that moment will be when I finally reach it.

    P.S. I love the fox drawing, and he's left-pawed too <3

  • December 15, 2017

    My inspiration comes to me in intervals and it is typical for inspiration to be fueled by music. I usually flesh out my characters first, then decide what it is that I want to do with them.

     

    I've...tried outlines before but in all honesty, I find writing blindly and letting it all out works better since I feel less restrictive. If I focus too much on notes and outlines I'll get stuck doing just that. Notes and outlines. Research is important for my stories, but for me, boing in blind first then going back to spruce up what I've done works better for me. 

  • Member
    February 3, 2018

    I was just writing a little chapter for a WIP story earlier, it's fate is currently unknown right now and it may or may not make it here but anyway, back to the discussion. Long before writing I kept having ideas that could add to this chapter. Just now I decided to put words to a document and at some points I just took certain situations and series of events and made them more... interesting. I think of it like connecting the dots with a little doodling in between.