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Zyephen
Jan '19

I'm writing on a new series' story outline, and I was hoping for a bit of feedback from my fellow comic writers.

So I have 5 main characters, but I was wondering, do you guys like the idea of each character having their own introductory chapter, where they have a bit of stand alone story that is sort of independent of the main plot, albeit effected by it, or should I find a way to incorporate their back stories without diverging from the main plot line, which focuses more on war?
Here's one of the concepts:


Chaeren
Bastari Clan
Age: 20
Growing up in a Bastari nursery, Chaeren did not have parents, but he was never lonely with all the other children. It is forbidden for Bastari half breeds to marry or have children, so as babies they are sent to live with others of their kind and sterilized before reaching adulthood. Despite his upbringing, Chaeren became a proficient member of the clan, proving himself a skillful hunter. However, when he contracts Crow’s kiss, a deadly illness common amongst Bastari clans, he resigns himself to his shortened life, and distances himself from his loved ones. When a mountain beast attacks his friends, he sacrifices himself to help them escape, but instead of dying, he becomes the chosen of guardian goddess, Nimilitzli.

Thanks much,
Feel free to post your own writing issues if you want.

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Rodimus13
Jan '19

Personal OP, have their stories come up naturally as the story progresses. It's fine (I think) to have us thrown into things a bit and not know as readers the backgrounds right away.

punkarsenic
Jan '19

id worry about this being pretty episodic and struggling with maintaining momentum - you would have to have a plot thread running through all of them that continues to build and intrigue, and have to make sure all your characters are equally charismatic and engaging. we dont want to wait through five different intros to get to the actual story, we have to get moving immediately - if you can move the plot forward five chapters but from five slightly different perspectives, that could be cool?

itd be a challenge - if you pulled it off, youd be a champ. if you didnt, youd have a pretty wobbly start.

maybe look at some episodic stories with ensemble casts to see different ways of handling individual arcs - i think cucumber and banana by russell t davis is an interesting example; a personal drama centring around the LGBT community of manchester, cucumber was the primary series where we focused on the MC every episode, and each episode had a corresponding episode of banana where we got a short story focusing on a corresponding side character. it culminated in a world that felt full and connected, without detracting from the drive of the A plot. it also meant they could be pretty playful with tone; banana was almost an anthology series, some episodes far lighter than others, while cucumber remained consistent in tone and drive.

im not saying you should do that (itd also be difficult to pull off), but its an example of how playful you can be with individual arcs within an ensemble cast.

Zyephen
Jan '19

nod First, thanks for the feedback. I think if i did it with the individual character focused chapters, I wouldn't have them be back to back with each other, but I do like the idea of the continuous narrative as seen through each character's perspective idea. I might try to work that in if I decide to go that route. Thanks a lot for your input :slight_smile: Really intriguing idea.

Inspector_Spinda
Jan '19

i think each with their own chapter is too slow, but one chapter where they're all introduced and meet would work. or you could introduce two first and the others over time

punkarsenic
Jan '19
Zyephen

ooooh so youre thinking filler episodes of downtime with a character? now thats good, i like it! i was thinking youd be frontloading them all bc thats what i did on an old old project and it flopped. id still worry - bc of how slow webcomics come out - about maintaining momentum, although so long as the episode is structured well that wouldnt really be a problem.

oh, awesome! i wish you luck with it, ill be keeping an eye out to see what you produce :smiley: