The most beautifully crafted characters in the world are missing a large part of their reality if they are devoid of conflict. The same piece of advice extends equally well to the plot of your story. Why? Conflict is what breeds motivation, what defines drama, and what draws in readers.

So, what is conflict?

The definition of conflict encompasses both the obstacle which stands between a character and their desire, and much of the process the character undergoes in overcoming it. It’s a bit of a cumbersome concept, so perhaps it is a bit easier to understand by looking at the broad classifications commonly assigned to conflict.

Internal Conflict

Internal conflict is more commonly referred to as “Man vs. Self” and, as the name suggests, deals with a character having to overcome and change something about his or her being that they are struggling with. Common types of internal conflicts include overcoming fears, will, and ego-flaws. These types of conflicts are often difficult to pin down and rely heavily on emotion.

The External Conflicts

Once the conflict moves outside of the character, identifying it becomes a much easier process. The pure variety of conflicts, when external, also expands.

Man vs. Man

Man vs. Man is the common terminology for any conflict in which a character is directly opposed by another character or characters. The most common form of this conflict is the protagonist-antagonist relationship. Or, in the case of what seems to be every action movie made in the past few decades, the protagonist versus the antagonist … and his entire army.

Man vs. Nature

Man vs. Nature is the third in what is known as the classic conflicts, dating back to days of the sailing Greeks and perhaps earlier. In Man vs. Nature conflicts, it is some facet of the world—be it inclement weather, a great distance, or harsh terrain—that is the source of the conflict. A perfect modern example would be the storm in A Perfect Storm, which provided the external conflict for those aboard the fishing vessel.

Man vs. Other

There are three other minor conflict types which should be noted, though they are most often found in genre and niche works. Lumped under the Man vs. Other banner, the two conflicts are those of Society, the Supernatural and Technology. These types of conflicts can largely lump in any other type of conflict from the religious to the dystopian society.

More than One

The trick for the writer isn’t often which conflict to use, but rather, how to mix and match your conflicts. Conflict is by no means something that is limited to one at a time. The steadying building of conflicts is an effective tool for creating drama in a story. Vonnegut perhaps said it best with his sixth rule of short story writing, “Be a sadist. No matter sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them—in order that the reader may see what they are made of.” In other words, layer on a steady stream of conflict which is ever-increasing in difficulty.

The operative word is character

No matter what mixture of conflicts you choose for you story, the operative word in the definition of the tool is “character.”  As noted in each of the examples, a conflict is classified not by what it is, but by how the character relates to it. The conflict can, and ultimately should, help to define the character. And defining the character is both what conflict, and writing, is all about.

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