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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ariosto" data-source="post: 4995613" data-attributes="member: 80487">My observation was that the question "What is the purpose of this?" can have very different answers in a story than in a world.In a world, things can be effectively without "purpose"; they simply are, as products of causes and effects that have no consciousness, no volition, involved in them at all. Where there is consciousness, it can take up goals and perform actions with intent to accomplish some purpose -- but accomplishment does not follow automatically from intent.So, considered as a being in a world, Assassin X could conceive the purpose of killing John Doe. Words to that effect could appear in the text of a story, but we must turn to the author's intent to determine why Assassin X appears in the story at all.If the author's purpose is to have John Doe survive, then the assassination fails. It does not matter if "realistically" it "ought to" succeed, except to whatever extent the author chooses to adjust the fictional "reality" to assist suspension of disbelief.So, why spend pages on a failed assassination attempt? The answer has something to do with creating (or at least attempting to create) a dramatic narrative.</blockquote>