Rivalry, Underdog and Temptation Plots

Rivalry, Underdog and Temptation plots

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Rivalry: choosing and setting up

• Rivalry means two parties compete for the same goal. The goal can be a lover, an army, a title or a chess game, and each rival has their own motivation.
• Make the rivals equally matched overall. Strengths need not be identical: give one brawn and the other wit, so each has a compensating strength.
• Test each rival on their own strength, and let the pendulum swing so that sometimes one wins and sometimes the other. This keeps the reader unsure who will win.
• Avoid the obvious outcome. Let the physically stronger character lose a contest of strength to the cleverer one.
• Give each rival a motivation (anger, jealousy, fear, etc.). Show the source of the obsession, not just the contest.
• A love triangle is a rivalry plot.

Rivalry: Phase 1 (status quo, conflict, antagonist ascends)

• Open at the point of initial conflict. Show the status quo only briefly, and do not spend long reconstructing the past.
• Show first that the rivals share common ground, are perceived as equals, and are friendly or competing lightly. Plant a gift or action that can be echoed later (e.g. a thrown spear, a horse).
• Then introduce the conflict. A refusal or an ultimatum ("with me or against me") makes the sides take positions.
• Follow with a catalyst episode: the rivals clash in action, not just in threats. The antagonist instigates against the protagonist's will.
• The antagonist makes the first move, exploiting circumstance and manipulating events and people.
• Track each rival's "power curve". The curves are usually inversely related: as the antagonist rises, the protagonist falls.
• Phase 1 must separate the rivals, with the protagonist at the bottom and the antagonist at the top.
• Clarify the moral issues so that sympathy and sides are clear. The antagonist is typically unscrupulous or ambitious, the protagonist conscientious or honest.

Rivalry: Phase 2 (reversal)

• Use a reversal of fortune (a rescue, an adoption, a windfall) to reverse the protagonist's descent.
• The protagonist gains power or skill until the rivals reach parity. Parity is required before a challenge is possible.
• The direction of initiative flips. In Phase 1 the antagonist challenges; in Phase 2 the protagonist does.
• The protagonist often puts their own house in order first (e.g. searching for lost family).
• The antagonist is often aware of the protagonist's empowerment. Having them look over their shoulder raises tension.

Rivalry: Phase 3 and resolution

• Phase 3 is the final confrontation between the rivals. Raise the stakes first (e.g. the antagonist wagers everything) and give the protagonist a morally justified motive.
• After the resolution, the protagonist restores order for himself and his world.
• Rivalry can widen beyond the two individuals to cultures, religions or ways of life. A third party can form the third point of a triangle and influence only one rival.

Underdog: how it differs from Rivalry

• Underdog is a variant of Rivalry with the same three-phase, power-curve structure. The difference is that the strengths are not matched.
• The antagonist may be a person, place or thing (e.g. a bureaucracy or a system) with clearly far greater power.
• The underdog usually, but not always, overcomes the opposition.
• Reader empathy: keep the protagonist's emotional and intellectual plane equal to or lower than the reader's. If the reader feels the protagonist is superior, the psychic connection fails. Make them an ordinary, relatable person.
• Give the underdog tenacity, native shrewdness and virtue rather than genius.
• Give the antagonists a mirror-opposite character to the protagonist (e.g. vain, selfish, cruel against humble).

Underdog: structure

• Phase 1: open at the point of interruption (a death, a loss) that changes the protagonist's life, with a glimpse of life before it.
• The antagonists gain the upper hand and the protagonist is disempowered. This descent is the new status quo, and the protagonist is forced into a lower, suppressed state.
• The protagonist's nature is to resist, so next supply a reversing action that gives strength and allies (a magical or symbolic source of help).
• Phase 2: the empowered protagonist challenges the rival.
• Use the rule of three. The first two attempts fail, e.g. the antagonist breaks a promise and escalates the task (twice the load, half the time).
• The third attempt works, after the protagonist adjusts thinking and action. This is the real turning point, from weakness toward greater strength.
• Repeat the success pattern in threes, with escapes and a scheme to catch the protagonist. The protagonist visibly rises on the power curve.
• End Phase 2 with the contest unresolved and the protagonist living a dual life (lowly by day, elevated by night) that must be reconciled.
• Phase 3: the rivals compete openly on equal terms.
• Expose the false claimants through a test (e.g. the fitting of the slipper), with allies tipping off the judge.
• Close on the antagonists' comeuppance, not only on the reward or romance. The focus at the end is the defeat of wickedness.
• The Grimm version of Cinderella ("Aschenputtel") is the model. Its core is the rivalry with the stepsisters, not the romance. The slipper there is gold or fur, never glass, and there is no fairy godmother.

Underdog: pitfalls

• Do not make the odds so lopsided and unrealistic that the underdog has no reasonable chance. That makes the characters cartoons.
• The final competition must be a real, head-to-head contest.
• The antagonist may cheat, but the underdog keeps to the true course of courage, honor and strength. The underdog may turn the antagonist's dirty tricks against him.
• Ask what motivates the underdog and what winning costs him or others. Do not show only the contest.
• Track what the reader feels (frustration, anger, exhilaration) and play toward it. Deliver the triumph at the finish line.

Temptation: nature of the plot

• Temptation is a character plot, a plot of the mind rather than the body. Action exists to develop motives, needs and impulses.
• The conflict is interior: the protagonist knows what to do and does not do it. It shows through outward behavior.
• An antagonist is optional. It can be the protagonist's own two moral selves, or a concrete tempter (the serpent, Satan, a temptress).
• Cost is central. Define the "crime", the gain, the loss, and the price paid. The plot works like a parable about behavior.
• The character should end on a higher moral plane than where they gave in, through learning the lesson.

Temptation: structure

• Phase 1: establish the protagonist first, then the antagonist (if any).
• Next, introduce the nature of the temptation, show its effect, and show the protagonist struggling over the decision.
• The protagonist gives in. There may be short-term gratification.
• She often rationalizes ("I'll only peek") and may go through a period of denial after the act.
• Use a forbidden-thing setup: a promise, then a prohibition (e.g. the thirteenth door), then a growing obsession, then a private act ("no one will know").
• Phase 2: show the effects. Short-term benefits sour and the bill comes due.
• The protagonist tries to escape responsibility. Denial compounds the sin, e.g. lying when given repeated chances to confess.
• Let the negative effects reverberate with increasing intensity. The more she wriggles, the more the burden oppresses her, until it is unbearable.
• Phase 3: the crisis is forced and the inner conflicts resolve.
• Pile on losses (family, love, public fury) like a snowball, then break the denial at the peak of pressure (confession or repentance at the stake).
• End with atonement, reconciliation and forgiveness. The resolution can be happy.
• Variant (Faust): the temptation continues through the story and the protagonist yields only in Phase 3. The tempter escalates, from cheap tricks to a more serious temptation and then to an unworldly one.
• Variant (Faust): yielding can be for a seemingly good end, so the tempter wins by the letter but not the spirit of the bargain.
• Variant (Faust): the protagonist still pays emotionally along the way.

Temptation: character work

• Do not focus only on the temptation and its cost. Focus on the character who gives in.
• Define the internal struggle (guilt, or anger at oneself) and how it shows in behavior.
• Give the character a range of emotional states, not one note.
• End with the character's realization: the conclusion about giving in, the lesson learned, and whether he has matured.

Quick checklists

• Rivalry:
  • equal opposing forces
  • struggle for power
  • compensating strengths
  • start at initial conflict
  • antagonist instigates (catalyst)
  • inverse power curves
  • antagonist ahead in Phase 1
  • moral sides clear
  • Phase 2 reversal
  • antagonist aware
  • parity before challenge
  • Phase 3 confrontation
  • protagonist restores order
• Underdog:
  • all rivalry points except equal matching
  • far stronger antagonist
  • same power-curve phases
  • usually wins
• Temptation:
  • interior conflict
  • give in
  • rationalize and deny
  • effects escalate
  • escape attempts
  • crisis
  • atonement and forgiveness
  • moral growth