Typically a story will be like a chain of domino's one event comes after another. This typically provides a guiding hand in deciding what comes next in a story. If a enemies storm the base of the heroes, a fight starts. If a comrade dies, the heroes will mourn him. Cause and effect. But in my story the inciting incident entails my protagonist receiving a vision from the future through his future vision. In this vision another student in his high school, who declares him self “psycho” uses his telekinetic powers to kill everyone in the school. He tries to create another vision to simulate what would happen if he reports this to the government and in this vision the he’s kidnapped and forced to use his future vision to predict the stock market. Sense in my setting powers are illegal and those with powers are often used as slaves for corporations and he dies on his death bed. After the vision ends he is knocked into a coma from over use of his power that lasts a few months. And the circumstances are that it would be to dangerous to use his future vision power on such a high level so through out the book he uses his future vison in a different way. This event gives our main character two goals, live his life to the fullest in the face of how limited it might be after reflecting upon his death in his vision (which he can prevent). And Prepare for the battle with “psycho” using the main character’s other power of creating advanced technological tools and traps. This entails the protagonist being faced with a “to do list” of various tasks which can almost be completed in any order. Which is a problem sense “cause and effect” guides story telling, writing and “flow”. And as a consequence I often find myself having trouble, staring at my scrivener file. And asking myself what to write in my story even though I have lots of ideas. There’s a entire assortment of gear I envision him taking into the battle, and for the most part I could have him make these devices in any order sense there’s a lack of cause and effect. But I instead decided to have him make the various devices in order of least complex to most complex and then have him move on to the traps near the end. Let’s say the main character builds a helmet that let’s him see the telekinetic energy of “psycho”. It’s hard to create a event that leads into that or follows the creation of the helmet because, the helmet becomes important when he goes and fights psycho which is near the end of the book. Now in another story about super hero fiction involving tech based powers, the devices he would construct would be made off screen. What would go into them would be a after thought, he would have the devices and they would be explained before use in the battle at best. But in my book “prep time” is a big portion of the novel. Now I have many ideas to flesh out this side of the story. Such as him being inspired to cerate the devices by the people around him in his life, the friends that he’s all of sudden made, and the emotions he feels about them. Like for example where I am right now, the main character invents a special boots that allow him to retain the momentum of jumps and fall without hurting himself. He creates it to go along with his “booster” invention which can push him around in a unstable way. And it’s also inspired by the boots his goth girlfriend wears, the protagonist is also currently considering whether or not to show them off to her but disusing them as a "fancy toy", sense she's bored with living in a boring mid western town. Perhaps he even struggles constructing and it sends him into a freak out but i'm not sure what specifically would trigger that. And despite all this details in the moment I still don't feel that the creation of these boots is important on the page. And they are ways for me to make obtaining the resources for the devices compelling. For example he has to hire some hobos to carry around the junk to his work shop, after he sustains a injury from his future vision and one of the hobos drops something he needed, that’s a conflict and development. He can obtain better resources from his war vet janitor who has connections to a military surplus store owner allowing him to get better resources. He finds a way to black mail the school principle into initiating renovations in the school to give him a advantage in battle. This plot point has allot of potential, but I’m not sure what to do with it beyond giving the protagonist ramps to launch himself off, and removing stuff “pyscho” could telekinetically control, various compartments for traps and making various much larger doors throughout the school for escape routes. He stumbles into some tech from someone else with a tech based power and finds a opportunity to steal it. ( If he has to steal again, there should be a “twist” to it and he should be stealing something that would be hard to find beyond the military surplus he already has) I am detailing this to show that I am not bereft of ideas yet this is still something I’m struggling with. Maybe I have everything I need to proceeded with my story but I’m just anxious or lack confidence about it who knows ? Or perhaps it's something else besides ideas I am missing ? There’s also his other goal, the fact that he is not only preparing for someone who will kill everyone in his school, but also trying to make friends. Which also adds “slice of life” into the story. Adding genre concerns sense later the series will be defined by fighting and violence. But for book one there will be a bit of delayed gratification for readers coming into the book for fighting though there will be some violence sprinkled through out the book they won’t get a full throttle super power fight until the end of the book. And “slice of life” also shares the problem that while chatting and hanging out with your friends is important to the main character in a fulfillment level, it’s not important in the way that invites “cause and effect”.
I think there would still be cause and effect, but rather than being about events it would be about the hero's predictions and his efforts to prepare for them. Since (it's spelled since, not sense) the hero needs to try to outwit the villain, he's making predictions of his own, but of course his are normal predictions, based on thinking things through, like we all can do. So the real combat is between his predictions or preparedness and the psychic predictions of the villain. So the hero comes up with some ideas and starts building his weapons or traps, then something occurs to him—he realizes the villain must be able to predict what he's doing right now—his own preparations. So he has to think of some way to outsmart him. Yeah, I see the problem. If the villain can really see the future in full detail with no error, then there's no way to beat him. So his power needs to be limited in some way(s). But the main point I'm trying to make is that the real action in the story isn't the future fight, it's the preparations for it on the part of both villain and hero. Each is trying to figure out what the other will do and prepare for it. That's the real conflict taking place.
So really the conflict is internal—man against himself. The hero needs to try to figurre out what weaknesses or blind spots the villain has so he can take advantage of them, and he's struggling inside his own mind to figure this all out. Then when the physical conflict arrives it plays out and he discovers whether his planning has been effective or not.
it's actually the hero who has the ability to see the future, i really hoped i didn't poorly explain this thing.
It's well-established that stories don't have to follow cause-and-effect. Or even contain any events at all. And good stories are structured around the character, not the extraneous objects and devices in the storyworld around them. It's only the psychological cause-and-effect inside the character that needs to make sense sequentially. And that might help the OP - if the problem can be approached from the angle of how to get the plot holes past the reader without them noticing. But I worry that the "inciting incident" isn't described as inciting any character change. I suppose he gains an awareness of his own mortality - but that isn't relatable since (i) in real life nobody has to worry about it and (ii) it's been done to death (e.g. Aeschylus' Cassandra, Queequeg, the cyclops in Krull...) This story seems like it's at some risk of becoming bogged down in extraneous fantasy detail, but essentially the OP's problem is if Popeye eats the spinach at the start of the story there isn't a story. Most fantasy elements have some inconvenient side effects that would break the reader's immersion if they thought about them too much. But it's necessary to paper over it with fine wordplay so the reader can enjoy the ride. Some of the fantasy elements here in the OP are quite high-concept or leveraged: trying to make them believable has lots of potential to distract from the flight of fancy. I'd suggest to pick the three or four best inventions - ones where the prep time will underline the mc's limited lifespan or other conflicts - and write the final confrontation using those ones. The vision needs to be tightly-written too as it's really a starting-point for character development. And the character arcs hanging off each invention can't have this structure or it will bore everyone:- BEGINNING: in a vision of the End the baddie doesn't have a helmet MIDDLE: goodie makes rocket-powered mallet END: goodie hits baddie with mallet (exploiting his lack of protective headwear) The final confrontation will only matter to readers if it's externalizing character conflicts - so the structure of the fight scene and the prep all derives from the character development. Which isn't really described in the OP, even though it should be the only thing to worry about for the story structure. But before starting to write character, I'd worry about grammar and vocab (sense twice used for since)
You don't know the half of it, There's a lot of details i didn't mention for the sake of simplicity and sometimes it's hard to process all the details, but i do feel they're all important
fwiw, as just one outside person's perspective, I didn't get the feeling it was a simple post about a tightly-conceived story! Details are only helpful if they reveal character - and the OP has three characters but underneath all the fantasy clutter who are they and how will they change over the course of the story? he sustains a injury from his future vision and one of the hobos drops something he needed, that’s a conflict and development. I'd suggest it's neither. Things developing in an imaginary-pretend world outside of a character aren't interesting to readers - only relatable changes inside the character are interesting. Sustaining an injury might be interesting - the character's body doesn't interest readers because it isn't real, it's only the internal and emotional reactions to coping with disabilities or disfigurements that can potentially inform character development. Listing what I picked up from the OP but crossing out anything extraneous 1 - main character. has visions. invents things. wants to make friends. wants to make the most of life. in relationship with 1. wants to share inventions with 1. 2 - goth girlfriend. has boots. seeks adventure. in relationship with 2 3 - psycho. has telekinesis This isn't enough to reveal a story structure so as to make any suggestions on structure. It could be that the wrong details have gone into the short summary in the OP - or with fantasy writers it's extremely common to find that underneath it all they're writing a fantasy rather than a story. A sort of mind-burp. It can happen to anyone and the fix is to urgently make sure that each character has an internal character arc. It strikes me that the sharing-or-not of the inventions is the only character conflict so far - so I'd suggest to build on that. Probably it's important to avoid the over-worn superhero schtick of someone revealing their powers to their significant other or not. How does he decide what to make? What does it mean for their relationship - is he making things as love-offerings or childishly goofing around and the objects need to start performing functions useful to a committed relationship (he made some rocket-boots / she wanted a teasmade - we can all relate to that) Psycho seems like a disposable villain so far, who wants to kill everyone for no reason. The name 'psycho' isn't suggestive of a thorough and relatable character-portrait. So I would suggest to give Psycho a satisfying character conflict with the main character: something about Psycho's personality that causes them to violently misunderstand each other every time they meet. He finds a way to black mail the school principle into initiating renovations in the school to give him a advantage in battle. This plot point has allot of potential, but I’m not sure what to do with it beyond giving the protagonist ramps to launch himself off The reader doesn't care if the main character has ramps or not in the final battle or if he grows jet boosters out of his forehead: because it's a battle that isn't real. It isn't El Alamein, it isn't Tyson versus Jones - it's some make-believe battle in a fantasy story. But there is potential for interest value in blackmailing the school principal - because the reader also has to gain influence over authority figures and might be tempted to blackmail them: so how does the experience of blackmailing someone change the main character in the story (and therefore how might it change me the reader). The character's internal world is real to the reader, not the external world. Only an idea that develops the character is an idea. Everything else about anything else wasn't an idea. The OP doesn't mention what stage the story is at - if the writing hasn't started I'd suggest to re-plot it as pure character arcs without mentioning anything external to the characters. The story only has a solid enough structure if it still works without the school, the powers, the corporations, etc. If it doesn't stand without those things, it isn't strong enough to carry the weight of them. On the other hand if the story is already at a first draft stage or over (I guess) 30k words, I'd suggest to do a 500w synopsis and to check whether all the extraneous elements can be removed from the synopsis without it leading to confusion.
If you want to see examples of a couple of superhero movies (ok, one's a Netflix series) that do this really well (the character arc creates the plot) I have some notes on both Jessica Jones and Iron Man going into some detail. Here's a brief follow-up on Iron Man.
... And I realize in those notes for Jessica Jones I neglected to discuss the main theme—the question what makes someone a hero? Each character has a very different take on it—some claim to be heroes, Jessica denies that's what she is (though her actions tell a different story). In fact, it seems the people most adamant that they are heroes really aren't or are in fact quite the opposite. One big aspect of heroism in the show's world seems to be empathy, and another humility. Jessica does possess both of those traits, and some of the more gung-ho people calling themselves heroes lack them to varying degrees. Luke Cage specifically states he's no hero, and at this point in his arc he isn't (though later he becomes one). Simpson isn't a hero, he's a mercenary and dangerously unstable, though his patriotic fervor makes him believe he must be one of the good guys and indeed a hero. In the 1st season Trish (Jessica's only friend and adopted sister) is jealous of Jessica's powers and desperately wants powers of her own. She's always trying various schemes to attain them, which in later seasons results in her becoming Hellcat, all fired up on playing vigilante, but she likes to kill and she lacks the good judgement Jessica seems to have naturally. In fact in season 3 Trish is handcuffed to a table in the police interrogation room and finally realizes with a shock "I'm the bad guy... " The show never gives a definitive answer to the question of what makes someone a hero, or who is and who isn't—it leaves those answers up to the viewers to decide for themselves. But the entire show is an extended exploration on the theme. Another trait Jessica has that makes her a hero is that she's always willing to sacrifice whatever is necessary in order to save the innocent and to stop the bad people.
First off I will preface this by saying I deeply believe that any explanation can't do any story any justice because stories were meant to be experienced not explained. Or maybe this is just because it's hard for me to get a feeling on what of the many countless details are important for a "explanation" to find a answer to a question i am not sure how to even ask and if i could explain everything that happens such a effort would be better used on the story. and structure is something hard to explain because it envelopes the entire story. the last time i checked the word count it was around 51 k words right now i think it's probably at least 60 k words twice your initial estimate To some extent he is, but there's a reason to why he's doing what he's doing that I can't reveal due to spoiler reasons. Though the reason isn't necessarily a "character motivation". But I might incorporate the idea of a "narcissistic insult" into him which is common among school shooters. I do plan on having the protagonist encounter him once before the fight but they don't know about each other at the moment. I will say that they are character arcs, mainly the main character trying to become more confident and overcome his anxiety, learn about his power, and his place in the world in order to do what needs to be done and to defeat pyscho while gathering friends along the way who can support him in his mission while simultaneously being alienated from those of his friends who he has to hide the secret of his powers and the pyscho attack from. It's out of the question for him to reveal his power to her because he wants to keep their relationship light hearted he has some one else to talk about pyscho with someone a up in coming super villain whose robbed a few banks, (a old friend named zach who happened to rescue him when he over used his power) .I think he does decide that they are to dangerous sense for her to try out. he is having trouble using him despite that the fact that his power is supposed to also help him use the tech. Right now he's deciding wheatear or not to just cerate a video of himself showing off the boots in a video since it might lead to more questions that might leads toward the wrong direction. When the main character finds the black mail worthy material perhaps he doesn't know what to do because he's shocked by it then his friend Zach who I've previously mentioned, tells him he should obviously black mail him. And he goes with it sense the main character heavily wants to earn the approval of this figure. Also the principle previously suspends him for getting into a fight with a school bully, even though he wasn't able to throw a punch. But I'm thinking I'm going to need to put more effort into making the reader dislike him before that. sense Calvin doesn't seem to mind the suspension much sense he just uses the time to work on his inventions.
Reading through my notes for Jessica Jones, I see I never mentioned her arc. I didn't know about it at the time, but she has a flat character arc—she doesn't change, instead she causes the world around her to change. She quite literally knows the story's Truth while the world around her believes in a Lie—the Truth being that Kilgrave has telepathic mind-control powers and can force anyone to do whatever he wants them to. The main difficulty she faces is that it's impossible to make anyone believe something so bizarre, especially a judge and jury. It's only after Hope kills herself (ironic and doubtless powerfully thematic) that she's free to finally kill Kilgrave, and in the big climax police themselves get mind controlled, and the testimony of so many officers as well as witnesses provides enough evidence that the jury is forced to accept his strange powers. Sorry, just patching up my write-up to include the character arc. More links to info on the flat character arc: How to Write a Flat Character Arc, Pt. 2: The Second Act Why Doubt Is the Key to Flat Character Arcs Master Class With K.M. Weiland
Then what's critique? If it's over 30k my suggestion was to see if it can reduce to a 500w synopsis without any fantasy elements or woo The synopsis would show the story structure relative to the characters, and not the genre-cruft that's attached to them Without the ending it's harder to be helpful - there are spoiler tags in case anyone in the target audience comes to the page In a novel the characters drive the story, so I'd suggest deeper characterization than this is probably needed to carry the length. In a kids' comic or saturday morning cartoon villains are just villains and heroes have simple coming-of-age arcs, but most comics and graphic novels have a lot more going on. And if this aimed at such small children it seems like there might be a lot of violence for them. @Xoic has the comics covered so I'll pick out the go-to literary school shooter: 'We Need to Talk About Kevin' (Lionel Shriver, 2003). Shriver invites the reader to consider narcissistic insults but instead decides to place the blame somewhere much more interesting - a moment of kindness when Kevin's parents give him a crossbow as an acceptable outlet for his aggression. Sensitivity: school shootings are a real problem with tragedies affecting more families every year. At the same time they have become kitsch. Will the OP's novel justify itself like WNTTA-Kevin, or will it exploit the lapse in publishers' judgement 22 years ago that lumbered us with Battle Royale? Spelling: pyscho and principle
