47
votes
Accepted
Is there such a thing as too inconvenient?
The twin tropes you are referring to are Deus ex Machina and Diabolus es Machina. In both cases an event comes out of nowhere, not foreshadowed, to effect a drastic change.
Both tropes are frowned ...
41
votes
Accepted
What's the difference between Deus Ex Machina and coincidence?
There is no clear line. If everything else is going well, people won't notice that your coincidence is far fetched. The same plot resolution in another story might be considered "too much" ...
- 4,037
20
votes
Accepted
Deus Ex Machina -- How to identify?
There is a difference between plot building and plot resolution.
First 20-25% of the book is almost always the part where plot is still under construction. In there, unusual happenstances can be ...
- 6,153
18
votes
Accepted
Is a stroke of luck acceptable after a series of unfavorable events?
Short answer: yes, with measure and forethought.
Note #1: unless karma and universal balance is a defining characteristic of your world, previous bad luck does not count. That's just how our world ...
- 10.6k
17
votes
Is a stroke of luck acceptable after a series of unfavorable events?
I really like the answer @NofP gave.
I can add one more condition that would make it acceptable to the reader:
Fourth: The character did something in the past that directly made the luck possible ...
- 1,291
14
votes
Accepted
How do you make random chance/happenstance not seem like deus ex machina?
Finding the sword of Godric Gryffindor would have been a DeM had the individual elements of that type of event not been introduced before hand.
Luke (a farm boy who has never flown a space ship) ...
- 23.8k
13
votes
Is there such a thing as too inconvenient?
I would say anything that seems to come out of nowhere is unrealistic fiction, unless the fact that it comes out of nowhere is fairly concealed.
For example, I can make my protagonist's father a ...
- 104k
13
votes
How to plausibly write a character with a hidden skill
Sometimes characters surprise you.
And that's okay.
You're absolutely right to worry about a deus ex machina situation where a solution comes out of the blue with no rhyme or reason. This is the ...
- 32.4k
13
votes
What's the difference between Deus Ex Machina and coincidence?
All Plots are Contrived
All stories are contrived. By this, I mean that they have been created by their authors. However, some writing is contrived well, and some poorly.
The key to contriving well is ...
- 1,549
10
votes
Deus Ex Machina -- How to identify?
The issue with Deus Ex Machina (DEM), regardless of when it occurs, is when you have led the reader (by whatever means) to expect your character to solve her own problem, and she gets a win by the ...
- 104k
10
votes
What's the difference between Deus Ex Machina and coincidence?
The other answers cover the general idea of something being "too much", but don't really talk about the distinction between DEM and coincidence; this answer addresses that.
One way to think ...
- 101
9
votes
Accepted
How to foreshadow to avoid a 'deus ex machina'-construction
You needn't reveal that the character has the ability, but you need to reveal the fact that the ability exists. Otherwise, indeed, this is a Deus ex Machina.
How you reveal the existence of the ...
9
votes
Is a stroke of luck acceptable after a series of unfavorable events?
I'd rather make the luck indirect, I think it works out better that way. So if my character is hungry, the lucky thing is they find a piece of discarded stiff wire, but THEN they sharpen the wire on a ...
- 104k
8
votes
Is there such a thing as too inconvenient?
I would fall back on Sanderson's First Law of Magicks
Sanderson’s First Law of Magics: An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands ...
- 1,442
7
votes
Is it a deus ex machina if the alternative is illogical?
I'd say for this to work, there should be sufficient information before this point for the readers not to see the antagonist as a bad guy. Machiavellian perhaps, but not evil.
Then, for the ...
7
votes
Is there such a thing as too inconvenient?
"Too convenient" and "too inconvenient" may be polar opposites for the characters but they are both symptoms of the same problem in the writing. The author is relying on coincidence to solve writing ...
- 56.5k
7
votes
When does a partially random event go from reasonably possible to contrived "deus ex machina"?
I'd say this isn't a deus ex machina - those usually occur suddenly, resolve the story's conflict/dramatic tension, and in many cases occur from outside the narrative context.
Here you've essentially ...
- 7,263
7
votes
What's the difference between Deus Ex Machina and coincidence?
The difference boils down to character arcs and agency.
To run with your "lost in the woods" example:
You could write a very satisfying story about being lost in the woods. You could ...
- 2,124
6
votes
From a writing standpoint, what is the value of Deus Ex Machina?
One dichotomy in writing is to balance surprising the reader with their suspension of disbelief. If you fail to surprise they will get bored, if they stop believing you they will stop caring. If there ...
- 126
6
votes
How to plausibly write a character with a hidden skill
I'm going to pose to you that most of your question (especially all of the magic stuff and who your character is) is superfulous and could be summed up as:
Question: How can I have a surprising ...
- 7,610
6
votes
How to plausibly write a character with a hidden skill
I think you don't have to show her USING the dagger, you can hide the skill in plain sight: She knows about daggers, she knows about dagger-fighting, the terminology, the stances, the holds, the moves....
- 104k
5
votes
Is a stroke of luck acceptable after a series of unfavorable events?
So, when I was in college learning to code and was stuck on a bug that I could not fix, and was spending hours looking at it without any solution, the best course of action was for me to take a break (...
- 13.5k
5
votes
Is there a term for (bad) plot twists that rely on information not yet available to the audience?
This is called Deus Ex Machina (lit. God From the Machine) and generally occurs when the mechanism for solving the conflict is not hinted at in the story at any point prior to the result.
From your ...
- 13.5k
5
votes
Is there such a thing as too inconvenient?
Oppositely, if the characters are winning the fight, but that same dragon swoops down and makes them lose, that would be too inconvenient, at least in my opinion.
It depends where in the story you ...
- 3,137
4
votes
Is there a term for (bad) plot twists that rely on information not yet available to the audience?
I call this a "reverse Chekov's Gun violation".
The playwright Anton Chekov is often quoted as saying:
If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or ...
- 1,720
4
votes
Is a stroke of luck acceptable after a series of unfavorable events?
As a comment has stated, luck cannot have a direct implication towards the solution itself. Otherwise at best it'll be a Deus Ex Machina event, and at worst it will bore the reader.
With that in mind,...
- 160
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible