A single story may have both Archetypal and Complex Characters. Deciding how to group the functions is open to an author's storytelling desires. The problem is, until one is aware of exactly what these functions are and how they interact, it is difficult to know how to combine them. These essential functions are at such a basic level that they form the elementary building blocks of Overall Story Characters. Therefore, we refer to these functions as character Elements. Listing the character Elements gives little feel for the characters created from them. Similarly, listing the Periodic Chart of Elements in chemistry gives no feel for the natures of the compounds engineered by combining them.

As a result, the best way to present the character Elements with meaning is to start with the Archetypal Characters. By definition, Dramatica Archetypal Characters collectively contain all the Elements. We then break the Archetypal Characters down, step-by-step, level-by-level, until we expose their elemental ingredients. In this manner, understanding is carried down to the Elements, which may then be combined in non-archetypal ways to create Complex Characters.