Does Not Illustrate: Exponential Plot Delay

My reading of the trope description may be wrong, but as I understand it, the weighting towards the end is directly from the second to last paragraph in the trope description. That when these series finally do end, they Wrap It Up and go warp speed on plot progress to get to the finish line; that's why I had the picture give +80% plot progress in the last of 99 chapters. Basically 97 chapters had all of +15% plot progression combined.

I was toying with adding "+1% / total loops" to make the exponential delay really stark, but thought it was a bit wordy already.

Thanks, I did actually have to give it several long thinks regarding the "plot progression" angle before settling on this. I'd tried a similiar graph plateuing towards infinity in gsheets but could never get it to look nice. >_<

Edited by Earnest on May 11th 2024 at 4:08:14 AM

It looks like you're referring to this sentence:

In this case, the word "sometimes" means that Wrap It Up isn't part of the Exponential Plot Delay trope at all, and putting it in the diagram would be misleading.

Welcome to Corneria!

Yeah, an important part of the trope that your diagram is missing is that progression starts normal, and then slows down. 50% in, let's say, the first 10 chapters, but then the next 10 only add another 25% so you're 25% short and expecting another 10 are needed... but the next 10 still don't reach the end, and so on. Which is why it's associated with serial works where you don't have a fixed length from the outset.

I'd thought the "sometimes" was modifying "profitable", as a cause for why a series is given a swift Wrap It Up, rather than on the frequency of it happening.

More generally, that paragraph lists 3 ways for this trope to play out: The show is cancelled without ending, it gets "defrosted" and has a normal pace before ending, or the one I used, the express wrap up. I don't see the rapid progress ending as incompatible with the trope, it's just illustrating a variant, much like the picture for Barrier Maiden has a dude.

I suppose my question is "what is a good way to illustrate the conclusion of this trope?" I'd rather stick to 1 to avoid over-complicating things, but I could add all 3 as branching options, or have the line fade out with a large "Ending?" after.

Ok... I think the simplest way to add that without making it too busy, is a line at the bottom with "Plot progression %", with the segments having a chapter number, halving until the last segment is chapter 99 (or whatever) with 20% or so of the plot progression. I'll give it a try when I get back home.

Edited by Earnest on May 11th 2024 at 5:47:19 AM

This was harder than expected, but I think it came out better for it. I decided to go for broke and just add the "divide by chapter $" to the loops, too.

30.1

In the process of making the above, I remembered another way to show the paradox is with a ball bouncing. I'd been wanting to do something with Inuyasha, and thought of doing the Shikon jewel shattering on a bounce and each subsequent bounce it got bigger before no longer bouncing and just rolling— it didn't pan out, but it did lead to this.
30.2

If y'all will allow the conceit of making the second to last bar with Shippo and the head bump longer, it's just for sake of visibility, hopefully the zero to the right clarifies.

Edited by Earnest on May 13th 2024 at 7:50:23 AM

30.2 is pretty good. Or if we want a more concise one, the first half of 30.1. I don't get the second part of it and it seems that it just needlessly complicates things.

The universe is under no obligation to make sense to us.

Thanks, and fair enough. I had that same feeling but didn't want to ditch the bottom outright.
32.1

32.2 — Here's also a slightly better cropped version of 30.2 as well, with the chapter numbers made vertical.

Edited by Earnest on May 12th 2024 at 11:18:19 AM

32.2

I really don't like those diagrams. They're just not interesting to look at since it's a bunch of numbers and text. And the vertically tilted text makes it bad for reading.

I think this reddit chart embodies the trope better. It actually shows how each part exponentially increases in terms of volume, chapter and years of run, meaning more and more time is dedicated to each part. It doesn't need to explain more.

Edited by Drope on May 12th 2024 at 12:14:02 PM

Nah, 32.2 is way better than that as it shows plot events related to the text rather just pictures of each arcs protagonist.

Thank you!

Thanks for the feedback, we work with the limitations before us and try to be creative. The graph is nice, but it does need to say more; while there are more chapters, volumes and years per book, that doesn't mean the rate of plot advancement changed. Since it's not anchored to something showing plot progression, what it shows is the creative team increased their output, not that the plot progression per unit got lower.

For all we know, book 1 has less overall plot than 2, but its relayed at the same speed, and so on for 3 and 4.

to 30.2.

Everybody loves the me! I’m a great athlete!

32.1

I'm just a psycho, babe! Come and go out my mind. I didn't lose it, babe! There wasn't much to find.

32.1

Welcome to Corneria!

32.1

I don't want to brag or anything but when it comes to being the worst, I'm always at the top!

You know, I rather like the current. I got it at first glance, but we can add a good caption to make it clearer. Current + caption.

But since I'm clearly in the minority there, let me add that I like 34 as well.

Edited by Spark9 on May 13th 2024 at 11:09:42 AM

Has there been enough consensus on this, or do we need a crowner?

Everybody loves the me! I’m a great athlete!

Counting only expressed sentiment:

30.2 has 3 in favor, 1 against, for a 2:1 ratio.
32.1 has 3 in favor, 1 against, for a 2:1 ratio.
32.2 has 6 votes in favor, 1 against, for a 5:1 ratio.
34 has 2 votes in favor, 2 against, for a 1:1 ratio. Edit: includes

Edited by Earnest on May 17th 2024 at 3:02:30 AM

To 32.1

31.1 could work.

Join the Five-Man Band cleanup project!

32.1

The universe is under no obligation to make sense to us.

Crowner's hooked. "No pic for now" and BUPKIS are options along with the pics.

BUPKIS crowner option is linked to the page for JJBA

EDIT: now fixed.

Edited by taotruths on May 23rd 2024 at 12:05:09 PM

Fixed, thanks for catching that.

Votes bump, multiple options in green.