Err...Characters!!!

I thought I'd finally be finished with a story I've been working on for a year now but No! the characters introduce a new plot point that has to be integrated thoroughly during edits. Errr!!!

That's why I stick to uncomplicated stories for now. It's too easy to forget what plot points you've already put in, then if you don't tie it all up, the reader gets left hanging. Also, if I have several people in a story, I have to make a list of names, and relationships.

Kind of depends on how you write, whether you're an outliner or a pantser

All my favourite stories had characters who just grew (like Topsy)
I just let them have their head and went wherever my imagination took me.
I then left them for a week or so and finally edited. Some I liked and published, some are still loitering in a file and others have been drastically edited.

Seegee

I hope you don't mean this definition of pantser.

"Clap upon, clap off, clap on clap off...The Clapper."A Pantser is some one of either gender who is a significant slut, to such an extent that their particular tasks are summed up as "pants on, jeans off, pants on jeans off...The Pantser!" by Dinah Report definition. noun: a person who executes a pantsing on a pantsie.

In writing terms a pantser is someone who doesn't really work with an outline for their story. It's short for flying by the seat of their pantser. It's largely how I write. I have the basic outline sketched in my head, it has a beginning and an end, but the rest I have to fill in as I go. The most famous 'pantser' is Stephen King. In his book about writing 'On Writing' he describes outliners as frustrated college lecturers.

Geed ... I am immediately putting my resume into the local college/university with Mr King's recommendation how can I fail. LMAO

CS

I don't use an outline, I never was able to. Even in college, I'd write the paper first, then if the prof. required an outline, I'd make one from the paper. I guess it worked, I made it through a Masters Degree. I generally start with an idea, and from that the story kind of writes itself.

Pantsing can work. King is evidence of it. George Martin kind of writes that way, too. He describes it as being gardening as opposed to architecture.

Me, when I write best, I just let it flow from my brain into my fingers. I only analyze when editing.