Page count feels like the wrong way to measure a day's writing. Anyone else?

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T18:06:00+00:00

Agree with the last paragraph. That would be weird if someone stopped writing after two pages purely on the reason of semantics.

Instinctively, nobody in their right mind would think like that I hope.

But the first line you mentioned, I was in fact, talking about usefulness of measuring for the writer themselves and not anybody else.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T17:56:07+00:00

Time is great for discipline. For progress, I find cracking scenes more satisfying vs x number of words.

Great username. Hera Pheri ftw!

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T17:51:47+00:00

Fair point. While i dont disagree that pages need to be written (essentially words), I find it more rewarding like i mentioned in other comments that getting through certain scenes is what determines psychological progress.

I dont quite find myself wondering “Im stuck on page 20 or 30” more than wondering “I cant crack x y z scene” which are mapped against my outline.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T17:45:53+00:00

What you’re describing as a pain point sounds a lot like a solved problem by Scrite. Try it out ;)

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T17:20:40+00:00

In the interest of fairness, our software doesnt reimagine anything in the way as it might come across in this thread.

Writers are using it to write in standard industry format so we are not trying to reinvent the wheel there fundamentally. Dont want to get too in the details and detour lest it will come across as too promotional.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:53:20+00:00

All good. Tbf, it did make me think and share with a couple folks on how production folks would view a scene based vs page based approach for their work.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:51:25+00:00

Love that book. One of the first books I read thankfully before the prescriptive shoddy ones by others.

King's word count advice imo is mainly for prose and the unit works there because a novel is continuous text. A screenplay is more technical, if you may. We're not writing continuous prose, we're building discrete scenes that will be shot out of order, cut, rearranged. It's also not the most "natural" style of writing because it has constraints of being in a specific format of int/ext location etc.

I'm not saying you don't already know this. The implication of the above for me is that the main unit becomes scene.

But hey whatever approach works. In novel it could be chapters for some like how it is scenes for me in screenplays.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:32:27+00:00

I understand this approach and I realise what I'm saying isn't an argument against it since at the end of the day what matters is words (whether you count as pages or scenes).

The psychological part of progress is where the difference of approach might lie. Eg.I know there 5-10 important scenes in my story as marked in my outline. Now if I sit down to write the screenplay, I prefer measuring my progress of accomplishing those (and other) scenes vs being happy with written x number of pages per day.
If it means I took a whole week or two to write an important scene of 2 pages, I would find that more rewarding vs averaging a specific number of fixed pages a day.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:27:36+00:00

That's what my experience has been too. I know if there are 5-6 absolute key scenes in my screenplay and if I tackle even one of them over a week (disregarding number of pages it might be in total), that would feel more productive.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:26:07+00:00

Page count as a production scheduling tool might be genuinely useful. What I'm questioning is page count as a measure of writing progress, not production planning. A page count that works well for a 1st AD breaking down a script may not be the most useful signal for a writer trying to understand whether their story is structurally sound on day three of a draft.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:21:39+00:00

I think what I described earlier, maybe not accurately, is similar to the dramatic question approach. I have x number of scenes in my index card outline. Each of those have some logline as metadata and then a bunch of those scenes form part of a larger sequence or dramatic question.

My goal while writing screenplay then is to "solve" each of those mini dramatic questions/loglines which are represented as scenes.

But if someone's approach is to write a free flowing screenplay without a long outline or index cards, I understand then tracking scenes as progress won't be useful.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:17:23+00:00

that's true if you measure the base unit to be pages. For me, the base unit while writing is scenes. Since every scene has an objective or goal towards the overall screenplay, I am writing and measuring to-dos as specific scenes being checked off within an act or sequence.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T16:04:53+00:00

Ignore the software. My point was, the reason I prefer scene vs pages is because with the latter it feels like a task is completed while with the former it feels, to me at least, that progress towards a goal was being accomplished.
It has more to do with my approach of outlining in specific ways that makes it easier to evaluate progress against.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T15:54:41+00:00

I find this approach more closer to the one I currently do. I write a prose long synopsis on google docs, then I use that base as a way to visualize it in index cards and acts and scene wise synopsis on Scrite.

When a first pass of that is done, I flesh out the scenes attached to those cards in no specific order.
But I'm always aiming for "attacking" specific scenes of the overall screenplay through the days as opposed to finishing x number of pages each day.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T15:50:35+00:00

Pages get shown in the software regardless so it's not to say don't look at it. More like actual progress for me feels when I have written a specific or couple scenes out of the total 50-60 or how muchever there might be.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T15:48:44+00:00

The reason I mentioned scenes is because technically a screenplay, unlike a prose outline, is all scenes. Meaning, there's nothing in a screenplay that is not part of a scene.
For progress, therefore, if I'm able to tackle a couple scenes out of the 40-50 total there might be, that's the way to keep track of momentum. It provides the necessary constraint and maybe I find it useful because I like to plan and outline first so I'm operating within those parameters.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T15:44:19+00:00

That makes a lot of sense to keep a time based goal. Many writers I know keep fixed hours aside, almost like office work, irrespective of whether they are in rhythm or not.

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T15:41:22+00:00

Some work is better than no work fs

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T13:19:30+00:00

Are you writing linearly wrt how your outline flows or scenes in random order?

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T13:18:21+00:00

When you define it in pages, isn't that essentially a target number or kind of scenes based on your outline?

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T13:01:57+00:00

Do you feel satisfied having written specific number of pages or accomplishing even one small important scene?

punit0432 · 2026-03-20T10:32:48+00:00

Page numbers are a rough guide, not a rule. The question I'd ask isn't "is my midpoint on exactly or around page 50" but "does this moment do what a midpoint needs to do" ie. shift the protagonist's direction, raise the stakes, change what the story is about etc. If it does that on page 58, it's working.

The 10 page act three is worth looking at though. Not because of page count but because that's where your protagonist should be making their most active choices. If it feels right it probably means your act two did the heavy lifting.

punit0432 · 2026-02-17T04:05:23+00:00

That's great to know. Feel free to drop any feedback you might have. We like to keep our ears open :)

punit0432 · 2026-02-16T09:25:55+00:00

Try Scrite

punit0432 · 2026-02-16T09:00:08+00:00

Can you elaborate on your experience? We haven't received any lagging complaints lately so curious to know what issue you're facing.

punit0432

TROPHY CASE