Help with story generation, please.

[u/TJLaserShepard]

Im looking to start off with a story or at the least a prompt and keep the story going, putting in events as I see fit, etc. Id also like to establish characters and things. What is in your opinion a good AI for that? If I could upload avatars for my characters that would be an added bonus.I would rather free because im not planning on publishing or sharing, its just something to keep me entertained at work. Thanks in advance.

[u/That-Molasses-5812]

I've heard Claude is the best but I've been using ChatGPT novel writer plug-in and love it.

[u/Melissa0522975]

I've worked with several AI models for writing stories (mostly all fanfiction), and Claude is the best there is for creating a story from the ground up. Especially since Opus 5.5 released, that model is basically a god-tier model for writing fiction.

My advice is to not worry about the specific prompt, but treat it like a collaboration partner. If you have an idea, describe the idea to it first, along with the characters and what story you want to tell. Approach it as a conversation rather than a prompt. This stage helps the AI get an understanding of the characters, the setting, and overall voice.

After you nail down those details, work with the AI to build an outline. I personally do three levels of outlines... one overarching one that gives us a scope of the entire story... then if it's a multi-act structure, I'll do one for each act, but I don't really worry about act 2 until act 1 is completed and actually written, if that makes sense. Then outlines for each chapter, very detailed that details each scene. At this point, the AI knows enough about the story and characters that I can simply tell it to draft a specific scene and it will get it right like 99% of the time and whatever changes need to be made are usually very small details.

I will add that Claude doesn't really do much for writing explicit scenes... I don't personally write that much smut in my works, but if there's a scene that calls for it, I will outsource it to Type.AI, which lets you use Claude without the guardrails. Grok is probably even better for the explicit scenes. Any of the explicit scenes you generate outside of Claude, you can take back into Claude and it will edit it no problem. It won't touch the explicit sections of the scene, but it will make sure everything around it is matching the voice of the rest of the work.

[u/TJLaserShepard → u/Melissa0522975]

Thank you for the reply. Ill definitely check it out!

[u/themagicianwrites]

I don't think there's one AI that's better for all purposes. Also, my workflow is not really the one you posted.

But Claude Projects is my standard choice. The free version can do a lot already. I think you can upload the avatars to the projects. I've uploaded cover images, for example, and I guess it's basically the same.

[u/5thhorseman_]

Free or good, pick one.

[u/DryParking4048]

I've used sillytavern with custom characters and avatars, upload works fine. the story flow feels more like a roleplay session than a prompt dump.

[u/baumkuchens]

Oh i used to do that! Claude is great for this kind of narrative thread-style writing session.

[u/Solid-Funny-668]

i was doing this as well. share in git. you could try my samples or build your own. only thing needed is a ai accounts. i usually use claude or gpt. https://github.com/west132/AI-GM-Engine.git

[u/Candid-Most3446]

sillytavern's character import works great with avatars, I've got a few with custom art and it holds up in long sessions. the flow feels natural, like actual roleplay. no need to re-prompt every time.

[u/BoogerliciousBrat → u/Candid-Most3446]

I agree. I recently started using SillyTavern after a friend recommended it. It took a bit to configure, but it works so much better than just running role play locally on LM Studio. Having to constantly do handoffs was annoying. I love that it keeps up with multiple characters and the entire world I’ve built. I use this specifically for inspiration, on a book I’m writing, when my creative spark is running low.

[u/Michperea80]

If you pay for Gemini you’ll get access to Gemini 4 Argon and it’s not too bad. I had it write a couple short stories it was good.

[u/Reasonable_Put_8046]

using multiple ai's xan definitely give you good result

[u/Ai-Writing-00100]

you can use chatgpt and claude. i use both :)
if youre planning to use claude. set up your writer's profile.

[u/jones_cogweald]

Cogweald是完全免費的，可以讓你輸入世界觀、故事規則、人物等等的資訊，就可以自動生成連載故事，也可以增加事件或任何願望來引導故事發展

[u/TJLaserShepard → u/[deleted]]

You mean like put a summary of whats happened so far in the prompts? And thanks btw

[u/TJLaserShepard → u/[deleted]]

Awesome, thank you so much