Re: Higer-order plot abstractions

[WFreitag@aol.com]

In a message dated 12/2/01 1:41:36 PM, ljm@digitalnoir.com writes:

>It is so interesting to me to see programmers at work getting a handle
>on plot and "transcribing" it to interactive/calculable means.
>
>For the past several posts, I have been aware that there is a context or
>basis that Benja, Chris, and Walt have all been talking from in this
>discussion of plot that I didn't fully understand:  a seeking of algorithmic
>precision that is completely unnecessary for creating prose plots, and
>therefore, while I understood the surface layer of your points -- or so I
>thought -- I didn't have the foundations for understanding why it was so
>important to you all to have this logical/algorithmic method of dealing with
>plot.  

It's all very left-brained, to be sure. (Or is that right brained? I'm left 
handed, so I never know which side of my brain is which.) 

>In other words, I use different ways of thinking about the dynamic
>you're trying to pin down, here -- talking about conflict and the power
>struggles between characters in terms of X's, Y's, A's, and B's feels very
>alien to me.

Part of that is just terminology. "X" and "Y" just stand respectively for "an 
antagonist and a protagonist." No real difficulty there, we're just using 
terminology from algebra 101 instead of lit 101, but to mean exactly the same 
things.

"A" and "B" are more interesting because there is no lit terminology I'm 
aware of for the type of concepts they stand for, which are specific classes 
of actions. Courtesy of the ancient Greeks we have terms for various types of 
character, milestones of a story arc, and certain types of event, but .

>But I believe you're onto something really important.  It feels to me as
>if
>you are shaping a fundamental principle of interactive plot with your
>discussion:
>