Character + Situation = Condition that generates story.
To solve for that X, your characters need to be more than protagonist templates and personality profiles.
They need to be packed with contradictions, secrets, and wounds that detonate when the story squeezes hard enough.
This document helps you scribble characters who create problems, not just solve them.
The questions move through layers. What the character shows the world. What they’re hiding. The lies they tell themselves. The skills that define them. The relationships that own them. The contradictions that make them break when it counts.
Use at different phases. Early on? It stops you from scribbling plot puppets who only exist to move the story from A to B. Mid-draft? It’s a diagnostic. If your character isn’t generating conflict on their own, if they’re just reacting to external events, these questions will show you why. Late game? It helps manage information. What does the audience see on the surface? What comes out under duress? What’s buried until the third act?
Works for anything. Screenplays, pilots, novels, games, shared universes. The more contradictions you pack inside a character, the more story they’ll generate when their intentions face challenging obstacles and their expectations are reversed.
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