Character Bible

Workflow

1. Read core contract, CHARACTER_PROFILE.md, style rules, brief, story architecture, existing canon, and current story state when present.
2. Assign stable CHAR-### IDs. Work one consequential character at a time when the cast or context is large.
3. Resolve story function before biography. Record objective, fear or limit, contradiction, pressure behavior, private knowledge, and only backstory that changes present behavior.
4. Build canonical identity with physical identifiers, must_preserve, explicit must_not_be exclusions when useful, and may_vary scene-state traits.
5. Keep speech, movement, and stillness as separate performance signatures. Do not turn acoustic TTS settings into a speech-writing profile.
6. Record recurring pair behavior as canonical relationship_baselines. Put chronology-specific trust, hostility, power, knowledge, injury, possession, and other current state in story_state.json instead.
7. Preserve strong user wording. If a consequential creative fact is unresolved, keep it open or use decision-tree-interview; do not invent detailed canon to fill a template.
8. Write 01_story/characters.md and update 00_project/canon.json with only locked identity, performance, relationship-baseline, and continuity facts.
9. Run scripts/character_profiles.py <project> and the project validator.

Done

Every recurring character can be recognized by durable identity and behavior, current story state remains separate from baseline canon, and downstream writing/directing/generation work can use the saved profile without reconstructing it from chat.