Ability to see the future: Loose plot thread?

[RyuDragnier]

I really hope if they use it, to at least put a "border color" for it. Red for a future that can be changed. Blue for one that cannot be changed. And then throw us curve balls, where we get red and think we can change it...but it didn't change because somebody else needed to do something for it to do so. Or have red around a good event, so we try to prevent it from changing. Future sight can be interesting if done well, but most writers can't really do it well.

[Iscah]

I really hope if they use it, to at least put a "border color" for it. Red for a future that can be changed. Blue for one that cannot be changed.

That's just unnecessarily complicating it, and not how it's shown to work so far.

Mikoto's future sight is strictly about things that will happen. The foreseen event cannot be changed, though the events around it can be manipulated.

It's something that needs strict limitations to not be a boring plot device that solves their problems for them in advance.

[RyuDragnier]

That's just unnecessarily complicating it, and not how it's shown to work so far.

Mikoto's future sight is strictly about things that will happen. The foreseen event cannot be changed, though the events around it can be manipulated.

It's something that needs strict limitations to not be a boring plot device that solves their problems for them in advance.

Well here's an example for you. A vision is obtained of people panicking, houses burning in a response to a plague. It's in blue, it's going to happen. So of course we go about trying to warn and prepare in advance. The problem? Us doing that CAUSES the events to unfurl. We saw it was going to happen no matter what, but we set the events in motion.

Or a red vision where we see the supposed villain dying in front of a high profile individual. We go about to try to make it happen...and then discover said official has horrid plans of murdering people and making it look like another nation did it to start a war, and the supposed villain actually found out completely on accident and has been trying to stop it. This forces us to prevent him from dying and kill the official instead.

Visions can make for good drama if written correctly. I just would prefer a writer capable of doing them right being the one doing the actual writing.

[Iscah]

Visions can make for good drama if written correctly. I just would prefer a writer capable of doing them right being the one doing the actual writing.

Yes, you can do interesting things with visions, but that doesn't mean you have try to fit both unalterable and alterable visions into the same plot or the same person's skillset.

Also, I don't think either of those scenarios are good ones, especially if we already know whether they can be averted or not. The first one shouldn't have us trying to stop it at all, if we know the disaster is inevitable, because the audience can see a mile off that if we can't stop it then meddling is probably going to cause it – so I don't think that's the sort of vision you would portray in the first place to make for a good story.

And the second plot doesn't need to be an alterable vision to carry out that drama, and indeed there would be more point to it if the vision can't be prevented: if you see the victim not already dead but about to be killed, then you have a fixed event that the plot can pivot around. You can't avert it but you have control over what happens before and after.