Low-Stake Conflict

Not every story is about big stakes, about the adventures of big heroes with a lot of skills and a lot of experience who take on evil masterminds, dragons, or alien invaders all by themselves. No, there are also stories with low stakes and everyday people in them. Such as the ‘Slice of Life’ type of story, which can be a very good read, but often isn’t. This is an article about why those stories often fail and what to keep in mind about a story, its plot, and its conflict.

First let me make one thing clear before you stomp off angrily, because you want to write a ‘Slice of Life’ story and not something full of violence and murder. ‘Conflict’ in the case of storytelling doesn’t mean a violent conflict of any sorts. It means a situation which needs to be resolved in some way, forcing a character to get active and do something. It can be a fight, it can be a heist, it can also simply be getting to an appointment in time. Conflict means making sure that something in your main character’s life isn’t going as it should - something is disturbing their routine. That can be an evil mastermind, a dragon, or an alien invasion, but it can also be something mundane like a closed diner, a broken-down car, or an overdue library book. For a ‘Slice of Life’ story, you’ll rather want that diner, car, or book, of course.

Let us talk about stakes next. They’re part of the conflict and can even be called that which makes a conflict a conflict. The stakes determine how important it is to resolve the conflict well. Low stakes mean it’s not so horribly important on a large scale - whether or not one person gets to that important appointment in time isn’t important for world politics or when compared to those invading aliens. That doesn’t mean they’re not important on a personal or individual level. For the person currently sweating over how to make that appointment, it is very important indeed.

We’ve all had days when it felt as if the world had conspired against us getting to work on time, from the alarm failing over the coffeemaker on strike, the flat tire, and the late bus right up to the elevator which took ages to come down to the lobby. We’ve all had that one time when we totally forgot that library book and it was well overdue by the time we remembered it again. Such situations disturb our regular lives - and often not in a good way. They have conflict, though - a problem which needs to be resolved, be it getting to work or handing in that book without having to pay a fee. The stakes of that conflict are relatively low, but they’re there and people will be interested to see how the conflict is resolved. The higher the stakes, the higher usually the interest, but if written well, low stakes can be highly interesting, too.

Low stakes are good for particular kinds of stories. ‘Slice of Life’ has been mentioned often enough already, but comedy is also a good genre for low stakes - there, it’s more about the complications and the weird situations than about the horrible things which might happen when things go wrong. Stakes also don’t have to be so horribly high in romance stories, where they are usually highly personal.

Stakes and conflict are necessary to create interest in a story. A story where nothing happens is boring. A story where the character can master all troubles without breaking a sweat is also boring. Stakes have to be appropriate for both the conflict and the wants and needs of the character (meaning the character’s goals and what they need to learn). If the character is a powerful hero, the stakes have to match that (unless you’re looking for a comedic take, where the powerful hero suddenly finds themselves failing at some mundane task). If the character is just an everyday person, stakes can be much lower without making the story boring. Nobody expects a guy working at the office to defeat the world from an alien invasion, but he is expected to come to work on time - even on a day when everything goes wrong.

The stakes also need to fit the character. Someone who regularly comes in late for work doesn’t have a reason to worry about being late again. But someone who has either already been reprimanded and threatened with being fired or someone who is always on time will feel under pressure when everything goes wrong and it seems they just can’t get there in time. So the stakes need to be established. Some stakes, the very high ones, establish themselves - when a character’s life or the lives of their loved ones are threatened, there is no question whether or not those stakes will motivate the main character.

Once you have your conflict and stakes sorted out, the plot can develop. How can you raise the motivation of the main character and make their lives harder? Because that, as horrible as it sounds, is how writing often works. It’s about finding out what else you can throw in your character’s way to make their lives more difficult and to make them work harder. Of course, it can very well end with them succeeding, but the hard work has to come first. That is how you make things interesting for the reader, which is the ultimate job for every writer.

A low-stake conflict doesn’t need to be boring. A conflict can always be interesting, depending on how well it is crafted and how well it fits with the character. Keep that in mind and make sure that your low-stake stories have enough of a challenge, then they will be just as interesting for the reader as stories about people who save the world.