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Could this be considered a convoluted premise?

@SingSongKV group forum 2 comments schedule
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@SingSongKV group

Hi! So i don't know if there's a rule or anything against making posts in separate categories about the same thing, but here i go!

I'm personally wondering if there's any meaningful critique you all could provide this W.I.P. premise of my fantasy story.

Ex: "5 years ago, two rivaling royal families were fitted to merge after an adoption was made. But shortly after peace was broken as one half attempted to seize the power of the other, and this started a multi-generational family feud that recently was ended via a treaty. But tensions begin to rise as it turns out the designated princess of the family is afflicted with a curse that threatens her life and those she's closest to."

This (possibly) complicated plot came from me trying to make a sustainable story out of the ideas i wanted to shove into it, such as: "a fighting princess with a curse" "a villain with a close connection to the younger princess protagonist" and "potential royal teen drama stuff as this princess has to learn to wrangle her curse".

I'm genuinely curious if there's anything i could do to improve my story…

@ninja_violinist

I don't think this is inherently convoluted - or, rather, I think that doesn't have to be a problem depending on the execution (probably not the most helpful critique of a premise haha). I think each of these elements are super interesting, and I think they all fit together pretty coherently - the curse and its wrangling, the villain with a close connection, the political intrigue, it all sounds like it could plausibly happen in the same story! I think the key here would be to strategically decide when and how the audience learns all of the information about the adoption, conflict, feud, and treaty, and how much relative narrative significance each of these things has. There is a risk of either overwhelming the audience with information in the beginning, or dragging out the exposition to the point that it hampers the flow of the story. So deciding these things early on would be a good way to mitigate that risk, if that makes sense.

a wee question I have is about the time frame and chronology - 5 years ago from when? how long was the multi-generational feud? how recently would there have been direct conflict? I think all of these things could have a bearing on how you're able to expand on this information over time, and which elements you pick out to focus on.

so yeah!! I think this sounds really cool!! there is some danger of this becoming too convoluted to follow, as there is with any premise, but I think if you face that early on you drastically decrease the odds of getting lost in the sauce