subplot ideas to float your boat (or sink it)
the good old fetch quest. when your characters realize that they need to get this one thing in order to move on, but also they are doing something else to further the main plot. fetch quest subplots are hard to put in without things feeling like they’re just traveling from point a to point b–take advantage of the space in between to explore your characters, the world, etc.
there’s some tension between character a and character b. it doesn’t need to be super obvious at first. maybe it’s been kind of growing at the edge of your mind this entire time, and it just explodes. regardless of what kind of tension it is, your story will have to pause to address it.
character a actually wants to stab character b. well, that’s a problem.
figure from a character’s past returns (and turns into a major plot point instead oops). a la jesper fahey and colm fahey. they just appear, and they bring a whole lot of baggage with them for the character to resolve before they can even think about moving on. perhaps they also help the main plot, or perhaps they’re just there to help develop your characters. either way, it’s a good way to get more insight on who your character is, how they are perceived by the people around them, and perhaps even a glimpse into a different part of the world.
put in a new pov for a side character, accidentally flesh them out and make them a main character with their own personal problems and motivations to further your main plot. yeah. sometimes it happens.
other notes about subplots
subplots should tie into the larger story–or be interwoven enough that when it gets resolved, it doesn’t feel as though there was no consequence to the bigger picture.
they don’t actually have to be that big of a deal! you can have smaller subplots littered throughout your story. maybe there’s this minor rivalry between two of your characters that always appears at certain moments. maybe there’s some development to that rivalry that the main characters notice (occasionally) but don’t comment on because that’s…just their thing. it seems like there’s no consequence to it, but it does serve to further flesh out what might have been minor, flat characters beforehand.
but if you do want to make them a big deal, integrate them well. drop some foreshadowing about the subplot to ensure that it doesn’t seem like it’s coming out of nowhere. how you want to do this is up to you.
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