Trope Compendium

Every story you love
has a shape.

This is a compendium of story tropes — the recurring shapes stories take — catalogued as structure, not as spoilers.

Each trope is a small, named pattern: what pulls the characters, what stands in the way, how the pressure resolves. The compendium sorts them into four suits, each with a full pole and an empty one — the same shape read in hope, and read in loss.

Hourglass · time Star · guidance Mountain · obstacle Heart · bond
Tropes in motion
Meant to Be
hourglass · full
Two agents converge toward a union that was destined before either chose it.
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Dark Star
star · empty
A guiding signal is corrupted and misleads the agent who follows it.
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Out of Time
hourglass · empty
An agent's deadline is exceeded; the window for action closes.
read the record →
Browse the full compendium →
Search, filter by suit, and follow the threads between tropes.