character-management

Character Management

Overview

Create and manage rich character profiles for a story project. Each character is a markdown file with YAML frontmatter in the characters/ directory. Characters are cross-referenced with other story elements through kebab-case identifiers.

Prerequisites

A story project must already exist (created via the story-init skill). Verify by checking for story.md in the project root.

Creating a Character

1. Read story.md for genre, themes, and tone context
2. Read characters/_index.md for existing characters
3. Ask for the character's name and role (protagonist, antagonist, supporting, minor, narrator, deuteragonist). Before settling the name, run story names "{Name}" (several candidates can be checked at once): it errors on an exact clash with any existing character, alias, location, faction, artifact, system, or glossary term, and warns about look-alikes and names sharing an initial with a major character. Invented names from a culture should follow its naming rules (see references/naming-languages.md in the worldbuilding skill)
4. Build the profile through conversation, exploring:

• Appearance and distinguishing features
• Personality, traits, and quirks
• Backstory and formative events
• Motivations (external wants vs internal needs)
• Voice and speech patterns (ask for example dialogue), plus voice-words (words and phrases they reach for) and voice-avoid (words they would never say)
• Pronunciation, when the name is invented or easily misread (pronunciation: "SEER-sha")
• Character arc (starting state, turning points, ending state)
• Key life events for the timeline

1. Write the character file using the template in references/character-template.md
2. Save to characters/{name-kebab}.md, or use story add character "{Name}" --role "{role}" when the CLI is available. Cyrillic and Greek names are transliterated (Пётр gives characters/petr.md). When the name is in a script with no transliteration table (李明), or the user wants a different spelling, choose the ASCII id yourself and pass it: story add character "李明" --id li-ming --role supporting keeps name: 李明 in the file
3. Update characters/_index.md registry table
4. If relationships reference existing characters, update those character files too
5. When CLI access is available, run the maintenance pass in the story root:

story reindex .
story links .
story validate .

Updating a Character

1. Read the existing character file
2. Read characters/_index.md for context on other characters
3. Make the requested changes. If the change happens partway through the story (a scar, a new title, a turn to the other side), add a progression instead of editing the opening value (see Changes Over the Story)
4. If relationships changed, update the other character's file (bidirectional)
5. Update characters/_index.md if role or status changed
6. When CLI access is available, run story reindex ., story links ., and story validate .

Changes Over the Story

A character file describes the character as the story opens. Record a change that happens in a later chapter as a progression, so an agent drafting an earlier chapter does not write it in too soon:

progressions:
  - from: chapter-10
    field: scar
    value: "Jaw to collarbone, taken holding a door"
  - from: chapter-14
    field: role
    value: antagonist

• from is the first chapter where the new value holds. It may be a planned chapter-NN with no file yet
• field is kebab-case. It can be an existing single-value field (status, role, arc) or a new one (scar, title). List fields (aliases, relationships, locations, tags, voice lists) cannot change this way; record a shifted relationship as a progression on its own field, such as field: standing-with-kael with value: estranged under progressions, never as a top-level field (that would show from chapter 1)
• value is one value. role and status values must be ones the character file allows
• Keep entries in story order. Do not use a progression alone for a death: set died-in (see below). A status progression is still checked against the story: story continuity warns when a progression to deceased with no died-in is followed by the character in a cast or learning something, when a status progression brings them back between died-in and revived-in, and when a progression to deceased still holds at revived-in
• Before drafting or revising a chapter, run story knowledge {id} --at chapter-NN. It lists what the character knows at that chapter in story time (by date when both chapters are dated, otherwise by chapter number), the same rule as story context, and which progressions already apply. Write to that state rather than the opening frontmatter alone
• A line marked reader-knowledge is already on the page, or known before the book, and may appear in the prose. A line marked character-knowledge and do not reveal is something the character knows from a flashback the reader has not reached: the character may act on it, and the fact itself must not be stated. Do not drop those lines, and do not write them in as if the reader had already learned them

After adding or editing progressions, run story validate ., story links ., and story continuity ..

Renaming or Killing Off a Character

To rename, run story rename character {id} "{New Name}". It sets name, renames the file when the id changes, and rewrites the id in every frontmatter field and markdown link target. Prose and hand-written registry sections (such as Family Trees in characters/_index.md) keep the old display name: search for it (grep -rn "Old Name" .) and update each hit by hand, including chapter text and link labels.

To kill a character off:

1. Set status: deceased and died-in: chapter-NN in the character file
2. In every later chapter and scene, move the id from characters (and pov) to mentions where they appear only in memory, letters, or flashback
3. Run story continuity .: it reports any later chapter or scene that still lists them in its cast

Variants:

• Planned death: set died-in to an outline chapter and keep status: alive; set status: deceased when that chapter is drafted
• Dead narrator (ghost, posthumous POV): keep them as pov and also list them in mentions; that is not a posthumous appearance
• Resurrection: add revived-in: chapter-NN; casts from that chapter on are allowed again, and once it is drafted set status: alive. If a progression made them deceased, add a status progression from the revival chapter too
• Non-linear books: give chapters a date so deaths compare by story time, and give a dual-timeline book's chapters a strand so each timeline keeps its own clock and its own route check
• Drop the character's character-state entry in continuity/state.md once the death is drafted and at or before current-chapter

After either change, run story reindex ., story links ., and story validate ..

Managing Relationships

Reference references/relationship-types.md for the full list of relationship types and inverse pairs.

When adding a relationship:

• Add the relationship entry to the character's frontmatter
• Add the inverse relationship to the other character's frontmatter
• Update the Relationship Map section in characters/_index.md

Family Trees and Relationship Graphs

Generate the relationship graph from character frontmatter instead of drawing it by hand:

story diagram relationships
story diagram relationships --out dist/relationships.mmd

It prints Mermaid source built from every character's relationships, with family edges styled distinctly so the family tree stands out from alliances and rivalries. Each pair gets one edge: parent, grandparent, aunt, and uncle draw an arrow from the elder side, other types draw an undirected line, and child-side types (child, grandchild, niece, nephew) are skipped, so the diagram cannot show a one-way relationship. GitHub, many editors, and mermaid.live render it. Use it to spot isolated characters and families missing a generation, and run story links to find one-way relationships and missing backlinks; regenerate it after relationship changes rather than editing the output.

Family trees are also maintained in the characters/_index.md under the "Family Trees" section. Format:

## Family Trees

### {Family Name}
- **{Character Name}** ({status}) - [{Name}]({name-kebab}.md)
  - **{Child Name}** - [{Name}]({name-kebab}.md)
  - **{Child Name}** - [{Name}]({name-kebab}.md)

Indent children under parents. Note marriages/partnerships inline.

Voice Fields

voice-words and voice-avoid are optional lists in character frontmatter that make a speaker's voice checkable:

voice-words:
  - "reckon"
  - "love"
voice-avoid:
  - "awesome"
  - "literally"

Here "love" is a term of address ("all right, love"). Keep notes like that in prose, not as # comments in frontmatter; the parser keeps them as part of the value.

story voices . fingerprints each character's attributed dialogue (see the voice-style skill for how lines are attributed) and warns when they say a voice-avoid word, when a voice-words entry never appears, and when two characters' voices are near-identical. Keep these lists short (three to eight entries) and consistent with the Voice & Speech Patterns section and the style sheet's Character Voices line (see the voice-style skill).

Cross-Referencing

• When a character is referenced in worldbuilding (e.g., a location's notable-characters), ensure the link exists both ways
• Character-location backlinks live in the character file's locations frontmatter list
• Faction memberships live in worldbuilding/factions/{faction-kebab}.md under members
• Artifact ownership can reference a character id in worldbuilding/artifacts/{artifact-kebab}.md
• When a character appears in a plot arc, ensure they're listed in the arc's characters frontmatter
• Character tags should be consistent across the project (e.g., if magic-user is used, always use that exact tag)

CLI Maintenance

Use the Story CLI when it is available. If story is not installed, use bun run story -- from the Story Skills repository checkout or the bundled fallback node ../story-maintenance/scripts/story.js with the same arguments, resolving the path relative to this skill folder. If no CLI is available, perform the registry, backlink, and word-count checks manually.

Reference Files

• `references/character-template.md` - Full blank template for character profiles, including arc-type, lie/truth/ghost-wound fields and the Antagonist Design section
• `references/relationship-types.md` - Complete relationship type reference with inverse pairs
• `references/ensemble-cast.md` - Managing multi-character casts: anchor character, A/B/C story braiding, thematic relevance, merge-characters discipline
• `references/supporting-characters.md` - Role vocabulary (mentor, foil, confidant, love interest, comic relief, threshold guardian) and requirements for supporting roles