Breadth or Depth?

spentbob

Virgin
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Mar 9, 2011
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I'm working on expanding one of my stories, and was wondering what people preferred more in chyoo, breath or depth of a story. By which I mean, should I keep on expanding one thread line, which would lead to a longer tale with less interaction and hoping other authors will add sprouting threads, or work on giving lots of different possible encounters and interactions, and hoping that someone will pick one of them up and expand it?

Which is more annoying to read?

Which would you be more likely to add to?
 
Having different paths and more options would be better in my opinion. Potential writers are more likely to find something they like.

Also the girls in your story are more specific than in most stories. You might like Indian women, older women or goths but especially near the start of the story you should include more typical young sexy women.

Could you use immersive text so the reader can choose the character's name?
 
One of my pet peeves are stories that don't sufficiently differentiate themselves, like where it takes ten threads for you to choose the various characteristics of the protaganist before the plot is even addressed. If you have a strong narrative intention for your story, go ahead and lead with that, as it will help to signal to potential contributors where you see it going. If they don't like some aspect of it, they can make their own or (more likely) branch it off of your options anyway.

At the same time, be careful not to determine the narrative so that you have a linear story proceeding with threads as mini-chapters, and in which branching threads would not make much sense.
 
I like to focus on breadth a good bit when writing, although I will also follow a particular thread path for a while if I do have a certain outcome I would like to write about. As a reader, I want to be able to feel like I am actually a participant in the story, which more breadth helps accomplish. But without depth, you don't actually get to do anything with your participation.
 
I like a combination of both. To start with, have some breadth, but take a couple possible threads deeper.
 
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