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Q&A Is there a formula for creating stakes?

There is a formula! Mechanically, stakes are rather straightforward; The protagonist has a goal. The antagonist (or antagonistic force) is doing something that gets in the way of said goal. In th...

posted 4y ago by Kevin‭ · edited 4y ago by Kevin‭

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#3: Post edited by

Kevin‭ · 2020-02-26T23:36:23Z (over 4 years ago)

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~~There is! Mechanically, stakes are rather straightforward;~~
- The protagonist has a goal.
- The antagonist (or antagonistic force) is doing something that gets in the way of said goal.
- In the conflict that ensues, there is a real possibility that the protagonist will fail to achieve their goal.
That possibility of failure is your stakes. And you raise the stakes by finding a way to make the consequences of failure more severe.
In the movie The Incredibles, Mr. Incredible has two primary goals throughout: He wants to be a respectable family man, but he also wants to get to relive the glory days of openly being a superhero. In the first act of the movie, he receives a mysterious message from an unknown benefactor promising to make him into a proper hero again. He does what they tell him to, slipping away from his family to go on a secretive mission... At this point, the biggest risk is that he has to hide all of this from his family. The stakes are that if he's found out, his marriage will be in jeopardy. These stakes are real, but they're not very high at all. This is a good place for the movie to start - we're invested enough to care, but the stakes have plenty of room to be pushed further.
In the second act of the movie, we find out that Mr. Incredible's mysterious benefactor is the supervillain Syndrome. At the same time, Mr. Incredible's family finds out what he's been up to and follows after him. When Mr. Incredible is captured and Syndrome nearly kills his family, we realize that the stakes have been raised dramatically. Our hero no longer merely risks having his family fall apart - they are in grave danger and could be _killed_! And more painfully, Bob has to come face-to-face with the fact that had he never gone behind his wife's back, his family never would have gotten caught up in this mess. The conflict presses against Mr. Incredible's two main goals far more painfully.
At the movie's climax, the stakes are raised even further. Syndrome drops a giant robot in the middle of a city. When he loses control of it, thousands of innocents' lives are in danger. Now, the Incredible family has a chance to openly be superheros once more, if only for a moment - but to be successful, they'll have to put all of the built-up distrust and miscommunication from the rest of the movie aside to work together as a true team. The stakes still relate to the core goals, but they've been raised to the point where failure means countless people die.
To brainstorm stakes, hone in on exactly what your protagonists' goals are. Then, figure out what can go wrong if those goals aren't met. Figure out how to start with moderately serious consequences at the beginning of your story, then snowball those consequences into worse and worse outcomes to match the pace of your rising action.

There is a formula! Mechanically, stakes are rather straightforward;
- The protagonist has a goal.
- The antagonist (or antagonistic force) is doing something that gets in the way of said goal.
- In the conflict that ensues, there is a real possibility that the protagonist will fail to achieve their goal.
That possibility of failure is your stakes. And you raise the stakes by finding a way to make the consequences of failure more severe.
In the movie The Incredibles, Mr. Incredible has two primary goals throughout: He wants to be a respectable family man, but he also wants to get to relive the glory days of openly being a superhero. In the first act of the movie, he receives a mysterious message from an unknown benefactor promising to make him into a proper hero again. He does what they tell him to, slipping away from his family to go on a secretive mission... At this point, the biggest risk is that he has to hide all of this from his family. The stakes are that if he's found out, his marriage will be in jeopardy. These stakes are real, but they're not very high at all. This is a good place for the movie to start - we're invested enough to care, but the stakes have plenty of room to be pushed further.
In the second act of the movie, we find out that Mr. Incredible's mysterious benefactor is the supervillain Syndrome. At the same time, Mr. Incredible's family finds out what he's been up to and follows after him. When Mr. Incredible is captured and Syndrome nearly kills his family, we realize that the stakes have been raised dramatically. Our hero no longer merely risks having his family fall apart - they are in grave danger and could be _killed_! And more painfully, Bob has to come face-to-face with the fact that had he never gone behind his wife's back, his family never would have gotten caught up in this mess. The conflict presses against Mr. Incredible's two main goals far more painfully.
At the movie's climax, the stakes are raised even further. Syndrome drops a giant robot in the middle of a city. When he loses control of it, thousands of innocents' lives are in danger. Now, the Incredible family has a chance to openly be superheros once more, if only for a moment - but to be successful, they'll have to put all of the built-up distrust and miscommunication from the rest of the movie aside to work together as a true team. The stakes still relate to the core goals, but they've been raised to the point where failure means countless people die.
To brainstorm stakes, hone in on exactly what your protagonists' goals are. Then, figure out what can go wrong if those goals aren't met. Figure out how to start with moderately serious consequences at the beginning of your story, then snowball those consequences into worse and worse outcomes to match the pace of your rising action.

#2: Post edited by

Kevin‭ · 2020-02-26T23:36:11Z (over 4 years ago)

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There is! Mechanically, stakes are rather straightforward;
- The protagonist has a goal.
- The antagonist (or antagonistic force) is doing something that gets in the way of said goal.
- In the conflict that ensues, there is a real possibility that the protagonist will fail to achieve their goal.
That possibility of failure is your stakes. And you raise the stakes by finding a way to make the consequences of failure more severe.
In the movie The Incredibles, Mr. Incredible has two primary goals throughout: He wants to be a respectable family man, but he also wants to get to relive the glory days of openly being a superhero. In the first act of the movie, he receives a mysterious message from an unknown benefactor promising to make him into a proper hero again. He does what they tell him to, slipping away from his family to go on a secretive mission... At this point, the biggest risk is that he has to hide all of this from his family. The stakes are that if he's found out, his marriage will be in jeopardy. These stakes are real, but they're not very high at all. This is a good place for the movie to start - we're invested enough to care, but the stakes have plenty of room to be pushed further.
In the second act of the movie, we find out that Mr. Incredible's mysterious benefactor is the supervillain Syndrome. At the same time, Mr. Incredible's family finds out what he's been up to and follows after him. When Mr. Incredible is captured and Syndrome nearly kills his family, we realize that the stakes have been raised dramatically. Our hero no longer merely risks having his family fall apart - they are in grave danger and could be _killed_! And more painfully, Bob has to come face-to-face with the fact that had he never gone behind his wife's back, his family never would have gotten caught up in this mess. The conflict presses against Mr. Incredible's two main goals far more painfully.
At the movie's climax, the stakes are raised even further. Syndrome drops a giant robot in the middle of a city. When he loses control of it, thousands of innocents' lives are in danger. Now, the Incredible family has a chance to openly be superheros once more, if only for a moment - but to be successful, they'll have to put all of the built-up distrust and miscommunication from the rest of the movie aside to work together as a true team. The stakes still relate to the core goals, but they've been raised to the point where failure means countless people die.

There is! Mechanically, stakes are rather straightforward;
- The protagonist has a goal.
- The antagonist (or antagonistic force) is doing something that gets in the way of said goal.
- In the conflict that ensues, there is a real possibility that the protagonist will fail to achieve their goal.
That possibility of failure is your stakes. And you raise the stakes by finding a way to make the consequences of failure more severe.
In the movie The Incredibles, Mr. Incredible has two primary goals throughout: He wants to be a respectable family man, but he also wants to get to relive the glory days of openly being a superhero. In the first act of the movie, he receives a mysterious message from an unknown benefactor promising to make him into a proper hero again. He does what they tell him to, slipping away from his family to go on a secretive mission... At this point, the biggest risk is that he has to hide all of this from his family. The stakes are that if he's found out, his marriage will be in jeopardy. These stakes are real, but they're not very high at all. This is a good place for the movie to start - we're invested enough to care, but the stakes have plenty of room to be pushed further.
In the second act of the movie, we find out that Mr. Incredible's mysterious benefactor is the supervillain Syndrome. At the same time, Mr. Incredible's family finds out what he's been up to and follows after him. When Mr. Incredible is captured and Syndrome nearly kills his family, we realize that the stakes have been raised dramatically. Our hero no longer merely risks having his family fall apart - they are in grave danger and could be _killed_! And more painfully, Bob has to come face-to-face with the fact that had he never gone behind his wife's back, his family never would have gotten caught up in this mess. The conflict presses against Mr. Incredible's two main goals far more painfully.
At the movie's climax, the stakes are raised even further. Syndrome drops a giant robot in the middle of a city. When he loses control of it, thousands of innocents' lives are in danger. Now, the Incredible family has a chance to openly be superheros once more, if only for a moment - but to be successful, they'll have to put all of the built-up distrust and miscommunication from the rest of the movie aside to work together as a true team. The stakes still relate to the core goals, but they've been raised to the point where failure means countless people die.
To brainstorm stakes, hone in on exactly what your protagonists' goals are. Then, figure out what can go wrong if those goals aren't met. Figure out how to start with moderately serious consequences at the beginning of your story, then snowball those consequences into worse and worse outcomes to match the pace of your rising action.

#1: Initial revision by

Kevin‭ · 2020-02-26T23:34:37Z (over 4 years ago)

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There is! Mechanically, stakes are rather straightforward;

- The protagonist has a goal.
- The antagonist (or antagonistic force) is doing something that gets in the way of said goal.
- In the conflict that ensues, there is a real possibility that the protagonist will fail to achieve their goal.

That possibility of failure is your stakes. And you raise the stakes by finding a way to make the consequences of failure more severe.

In the movie The Incredibles, Mr. Incredible has two primary goals throughout: He wants to be a respectable family man, but he also wants to get to relive the glory days of openly being a superhero. In the first act of the movie, he receives a mysterious message from an unknown benefactor promising to make him into a proper hero again. He does what they tell him to, slipping away from his family to go on a secretive mission... At this point, the biggest risk is that he has to hide all of this from his family. The stakes are that if he's found out, his marriage will be in jeopardy. These stakes are real, but they're not very high at all. This is a good place for the movie to start - we're invested enough to care, but the stakes have plenty of room to be pushed further.

In the second act of the movie, we find out that Mr. Incredible's mysterious benefactor is the supervillain Syndrome. At the same time, Mr. Incredible's family finds out what he's been up to and follows after him. When Mr. Incredible is captured and Syndrome nearly kills his family, we realize that the stakes have been raised dramatically. Our hero no longer merely risks having his family fall apart - they are in grave danger and could be _killed_! And more painfully, Bob has to come face-to-face with the fact that had he never gone behind his wife's back, his family never would have gotten caught up in this mess. The conflict presses against Mr. Incredible's two main goals far more painfully.

At the movie's climax, the stakes are raised even further. Syndrome drops a giant robot in the middle of a city. When he loses control of it, thousands of innocents' lives are in danger. Now, the Incredible family has a chance to openly be superheros once more, if only for a moment - but to be successful, they'll have to put all of the built-up distrust and miscommunication from the rest of the movie aside to work together as a true team. The stakes still relate to the core goals, but they've been raised to the point where failure means countless people die.

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