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sigrunixia edited this page Dec 1, 2022 · 4 revisions

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ABT

The ABT story structure is a way of telling a story in four simple parts:

  • a need
  • (And) the first attempt to fulfil the need
  • (But) a challenge
  • (Therefore) a resolution

I need something

AND I try to get it

BUT there is an unexpected issue in the process

THEREFORE I need to change the way I am to fulfil my need

This wave of need/try/fail/succeed is the perfect structure to keep high the interest in your players.

Example of an ABT Adventure Plot

After arriving on Tatooine in search for a Jedi Master who is rumoured to hide in the desolate planet, Kith-shan
sees her contact being killed in front of her eyes.

AND decides to investigate the reasons behind the murder

BUT when she finds the Tusken Raider who killed her, she realises her connection with the Force has weakened

THEREFORE she fights the Tusken Raider without the Force and learns that the rumours are true: there is a Force
User in the Dune Sea of Tatooine.

In the short example above, you can see that there is tension. The Jedi Padawan needs something (talking to an old contact, finding a master, understanding why her contact was killed) and goes through some hurdles to get to something tangible. But she fails in the middle, there is a moment of despair when she can't use the Force as she was used to, but she resorts to changing her life, and is rewarded with the thing she dreams the most: finding a Jedi Master.

Where do I use the ABT structure?

I use it to draft my initial campaign plot, each adventure structure and each session structure. The goal is to simplify the creation of a story in a few lines. The challenge is to learn to do it in such a way you give yourself ample space to expand your structure to contain interesting things for the player characters to do.

Act

Act Element

An Act is a segment of an Adventure and it should focus on a specific moment in the story of the Adventure. In a structured plotting approach, each Act should identify one of the four moments in an Adventure:

  • Discover of the need
  • Quest to fulfil the need
  • Reach of the initial result
  • Change and completion of the Adventure

Each Act should contain one or more Scenes.

Ideally an Act should be run in a single Session, but this is not a hard and fast rule.

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