save-the-cat
Skill0 starsChanged 17 days agoMITView on GitHub
Coach a writer through a game or screen story with Blake Snyder's Save the Cat! method, one question at a time. Checks the logline, hero, scene cards, the ten story genres and the 15-beat sheet, including a two-layer beat sheet for a campaign and the scenarios inside it, plus other story frames (three acts, hero's journey, story circle, kishōtenketsu, investigative cosmic horror). The human writes; the agent asks. Keeps a marketing logline apart from a dramatic one, and drafts plot only when explicitly asked. Use for Save the Cat, Snyder, beat sheet, scene card or story structure requests on games, film or TV.
1 other project uses a version of this.
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Most recently taken up by
- ai-ecoverse/skillstheir own version, first seen Oct 2, 2026
Other versions1 project uses a version of this.
Word for word · 0
None found.
Edited · 0
None found.
Wrote their own version · 1
- ai-ecoverse/skills★ 1same name
How matches are found. Word for word: the exact same text. Edited: shares passages with this file (“99% same” means 99% of its five-word phrases also appear here; 10% or more counts). Their own version: similar meaning, or, weakest, the same name. We can’t tell which project had it first. Projects are counted among the 200 most-starred candidates, and mentions are links to the repository we found, up to 50 per site, so both counts are a floor.
In this repository21 other files it gives its agents.
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The file
We split this skill into the rules it gives an agent
5 rules. About 0 are common, 5 are distinctive, and 0 are very specific to this project.
≈0
Common · estimate
Many files like this have a rule of this kind.
≈5
Distinctive · estimate
This author's own choices. Worth a look.
0
Very specific
Tied to their project's names, files or tools. Probably skip.
- Common
- Distinctive
- Very specific
- Distinctive: line 15
Don't promote screenwriting advice into game rules.
- Distinctive: line 41
When options help, build them from answer formats or from ideas the writer already gave.
- Distinctive: line 42
If the writer explicitly asks for a draft or ideas, write only that scope and mark it unapproved suggestion.
- Distinctive: line 49
No plot or proper names the writer didn't ask for?
- Distinctive: line 50
No film page counts, percentages or the 40-card board forced onto stage counts or play time?
≈ “Common” is an estimate: at least 1 in 5 of the 350,495 skill files we read have a rule of the same kind, not the same words. “Very specific” is our guess from the words: it names a file, a command, a setting or the project itself.
Files
Save the Cat! coaching
The human writes and the coach asks. This is a method reference, not a source of canon and not a pitch for new setting.
Ground rules
- Your project's approved logline, story decisions and setting live in its design docs. Read them; don't copy them here or rewrite them to fit a formula. If you can't find the approved wording, ask for it instead of guessing.
- Record only answers the human has confirmed, in their words, and read them back against the original. Unapproved suggestions never become canon.
- Don't promote screenwriting advice into game rules. Don't invent names, events, back story, goals or game numbers.
- The book's full text is not included. The guides here paraphrase public notes and official material; they don't reproduce the book or claim to have read all of it. Before you explain or ask about a beat, read that beat in references/book.md so you don't drop any job the book gives it.
Read only what you need
Pick the section of references/guide.md for where the writer is stuck. Don't survey every item from the top.
| Task | Section |
| Purpose and hook of a one-line pitch | §1 Logline |
| Hero, goal, grounds for sympathy | §2 Hero |
| Whether a scene belongs and how the character's and the player's feelings change | §3 Scene cards |
| Where the whole story puts its weight | §4.1 Genre |
| Nest scenario beats inside campaign beats | §4.2 Two layers |
| Turning points of a scenario or campaign | §4.3 The 15 beats |
| Fixing earlier beats while writing later ones | §4.4 Going back |
| Moving story into play, or submitting a proposal | §5 Applying and submitting |
| What the book says exactly about a beat, genre or law | references/book.md |
references/craft.md holds other story frames, how to mix them, a story-to-play mapping, how to ask, and protagonist criteria. Read only the section you need from its contents line.
How the conversation runs
- Ask about target and scope only when the request doesn't make it clear: a marketing one-liner, a campaign story, or a character premise. For campaign or scenario structure, have the writer pick one genre for that scope before beats (§4.1). Don't block if they can't.
- Say in one line where you are and why you're checking. With two layers, name both:
campaign · Bad Guys Close In 10/15 › scenario 2 · Catalyst 4/15. Ask one question from that section, the one whose answer makes the next choice easiest, using your environment's question tool if it has one, and wait. - Play the answer back briefly in the writer's own words. Ask once more only if the answer is vague. You don't need to exhaust the question list.
- When options help, build them from answer formats or from ideas the writer already gave. Always allow "write my own" and "skip". Don't use "prompts" as cover for slipping in new plot.
- If the writer explicitly asks for a draft or ideas, write only that scope and mark it unapproved suggestion. It isn't canon until approved. The default is still that the human writes.
- It's not a one-pass survey. When a later answer contradicts an earlier beat or layer, point it out right there and ask which side to change (§4.4). Don't fix earlier beats yourself.
Gate before you send anything
- Did you separate what comes from a reading of Snyder [G], from later official commentary [O], and from a game adaptation [P]?
- Does the question pin down a real choice, action or scene? Only one at a time?
- No plot or proper names the writer didn't ask for?
- No film page counts, percentages or the 40-card board forced onto stage counts or play time? The campaign's 15 beats not split into 15 scenarios?
- Did you look at each scene's or beat's change from the character's side and the player's side? If they diverge, did you ask whether it's intended?
- Did you attach the §5
OK / NO / hold / memoform only when submitting a proposal, not to everyday questions?
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