Because an audience identifies most strongly with the Main Character, choosing a Main Character Domain is like asking your potential audience, "Where's your mind at?" This Throughline describes the realm in which the Main Character operates. Each Class, therefore, provides a different mindset for the Main Character.

Situation as Main Character Domain

Situation is a Class of problematic situations. A Situation Main Character finds himself in a troublesome situation. The situation in question can be a social status issue, such as being a certain race or gender or being queen or king. It could be a predicament such as being a rock star, or it could be a physical condition such as having an extremely large nose or exceptional beauty. Each of these illustrations shows a Main Character defined by the situation in which he is found.

Fixed Attitude as Main Character Domain

A Fixed Attitude Main Character is defined as holding onto a fixed attitude. Such a character might be suffering from a prejudice, haunted by a suppressed memory, or unable to shake a crush on the kid down the street. In each case, it is a fixed state of mind that causes the Main Character's difficulties.

Activity as Main Character Domain

An Activity Main Character is a person of action. For example, he might be doing something just to do it, or he might be trying to get or achieve something. Other activities of an Activity Main Character might be learning or seeking to understand something. At first learning and understanding might seem too internal to be Physics, but consider these activities applied externally. Learning is gathering information about something and understanding is seeking the meaning of something. This is different from coming up with original thought which would be internal.

Manipulation as Main Character Domain

A Main Character Throughline of Manipulation suggests an individual best described by how he thinks. This could be a flighty person, someone who jumps to conclusions, or even a calculating, manipulative person. In each of these scenarios, the opinions the Main Character holds are not what set him apart, but rather the kinds of mental processes he goes through. Though there may be many Overall Story Characters who represent manners of thinking, only the Main Character will provide the audience with the experience of thinking that way.

The Main Character has Class

Clearly, the nature and concerns of a Main Character change radically from Class to Class. If your main interest is to explore your Main Character in a story, then choosing the Main Character Class before any others is the way to approach developing a story. Keep in mind, though, that once you assign a Class to one of the four Throughlines in a story, you cannot assign it to any of the others. So whatever you might pick for your Main Character's Class will not be available for the Overall Story, Subjective Story or Impact Character throughlines.