Why at least three escalation turns?

Because a conflict that never rises reads as flat. Three turns is the minimum the tool asks for to show a rise, and each one should change the situation rather than restate it — the checks flag turns that repeat or are too short to describe a change.

What does it mean that a resolution needs a cost?

That a conflict whose resolution takes nothing from anyone usually reads as a collapse rather than a win. The tool asks you to name what the resolution costs, and flags a resolution where nothing is given up.

Are the conflict types exhaustive?

No. Person against person, self, society, nature, fate and technology are the conventional labels, and a story often carries several at once. They are a starting point for naming the conflict, not a complete system.

Does it write the scenes?

No. It provides the slots, checks the shape of the escalation and the cost of the resolution, and exports the plan as markdown. The turns and the resolution are yours to write.

Conflict & Resolution Planner

Conflict

Working nameTypeWho opposes whomWhat is at stakeResolutionWhat it costs

Escalation

one turn per line

The turns that raise the conflict, in orderat least three

Shape

Parts decided

4/8

50% · 3 turn(s)

Turns

Open parts

Still open: Parties, Stakes, Resolution, Cost

Shape notes

Three or more distinct turns, each a change, and a resolution with a cost. That is the shape.

Plan

# Unnamed conflict

## Type
Person vs person

## Parties
_not decided yet_

## Stakes
_not decided yet_

## Resolution
_not decided yet_

## Cost
_not decided yet_

## Escalation
1. Mara copies the harbour master's key.
2. Dev changes the lock and moves the ledger.
3. Mara breaks in anyway, with the wrong key and the truth.

Scope and limits

The checks are structural: at least three escalation turns, each long enough to describe a change, no two turns saying the same thing, and a resolution that names a cost. They ask about the shape, not the idea.

The types listed (person versus person, self, society, nature, fate, technology) are the conventional labels, not a complete taxonomy, and a story can carry several at once. The planner writes nothing for you and keeps nothing beyond this tab.

The conflict planner shapes one story conflict as a structure — who opposes whom, over what, at what cost — checks that the escalation turns actually change the situation, and asks what the resolution costs.

What is Conflict & Resolution Planner?

The conflict and resolution planner treats a conflict as a structure to be built, not a feeling to be described. You name the conflict, its type, the parties involved, the stakes, the resolution and what the resolution costs, and then list the escalation turns — the things that happen in order, each raising the pressure toward the end. The result is a small document that makes a conflict checkable: it either has a shape that rises, or it does not, and that is visible on one page.

The escalation turns are the heart of it. A conflict that stays at one level of pressure for a whole story is not really escalating, and a reader feels the flatness even when they cannot name it. The tool asks for at least three turns and checks each one: a turn too short to describe a change is flagged, and two turns that say the same thing are flagged, because each turn should change the situation rather than repeat it. Counting turns and reading them in order is a fast way to see whether a middle section is doing its job or marking time.

The stakes and the cost are the other half. Naming what is at stake forces the conflict into concrete terms — not "their relationship" but "the ledger that clears her father" — and naming what the resolution costs is what separates a resolution from a collapse. A conflict that ends with everything simply working out has usually lost its tension before the end, and the tool says so in exactly those words rather than leaving you to discover it in a reader's notes.

The types listed are the conventional labels — person against person, self, society, nature, fate or technology — and they are a starting point rather than a taxonomy, since a story often carries several at once. The planner does not decide which type your conflict is, does not generate the turns and does not write the scene; it provides the slots, checks the shape and exports the plan as a markdown document to keep beside the draft.

Keeping the plan in one place also makes it easy to check a drafted scene against it. A conflict planner is only useful if it is consulted, so the plan exports as plain markdown and reads top to bottom: the parties, the stakes, the turns in order, the resolution and its cost. Reading a scene with those fields beside it makes a missing turn, or a resolution that arrived from nowhere, visible — which is the difference between a plan that guides a revision and one that sits unread in a folder. None of it is generated, and the planner never edits a scene.

Conflicts are the engine of a story, and the most common reason a promising one stalls is that the middle stopped escalating or the ending stopped costing anything. Making both explicit on one page is the cheapest way to catch that before a reader does, and it is all this tool claims to do.

How to use Conflict & Resolution Planner

Name the conflict and choose a type; then say who opposes whom.
Write what is at stake and what the resolution costs, in concrete terms.
List the escalation turns, one per line, in order — at least three.
Read the shape notes for turns that repeat, turns too short to change anything, or a resolution with no cost.
Copy or download the plan and keep it beside the draft.

When to use Conflict & Resolution Planner vs related tools

Use the conflict planner when a story's central trouble needs shaping into turns that rise, or when a middle section has gone flat. When the conflict is between characters who need deciding first, the Character Profile Builder works out what each of them wants, and when the conflict has to land at a particular point in the story the Plot Point Mapper shows where it falls.

If the conflict is really a beat in a larger structure, the Story Beat Builder tracks progress through the sheet around it.

Privacy & Security

This tool runs entirely in your browser — no data ever leaves your device. There is no server round-trip, no upload, no logging, and no account required. Your input is processed locally using client-side JavaScript and is never stored, transmitted, or accessible to anyone else. When you close the tab, everything disappears.