ReelForge
Home Tools Scripting & Story

Scripting & Story tools

Five tools that turn a script from raw draft to a publishable opening, middle, and close. Score the hook, see pacing as a waveform, find the right moment for a CTA, time the voiceover, and count pattern interrupts before you record.

Tool 1 ~30 seconds to run

Hook Strength Analyzer

Paste your opening 1–3 lines. We score them across five axes: curiosity gap, specificity, opening-3-second promise, pattern interrupt, and emotional trigger. The output is a primary score plus a written diagnosis of which lever is weakest.

What's different here: Most hook scorers give you one number. We break it into 5 sub-scores and tell you the cheapest fix first.

The score breakdown will appear here.

What this solves

You have a draft opening and a vague feeling that it could be better. The analyzer surfaces which dimension is weak — promise, specificity, emotion — so you don't waste an hour rewriting the wrong thing.

How to interpret

A score of 75+ across all five axes is a strong short-form opening. The single most predictive axis is opening-3-second promise — if it's below 60, the viewer is leaving before your second sentence. Fix that first.

FAQ

Does long copy win?

No. Short specific hooks outperform long vague ones in 80% of niches.

Does it analyze hashtags?

No — hashtags belong on Thumbnail & Title tools.

Tool 2 ~10 seconds to run

Script Pacing Visualizer

Paste your full script. We plot a waveform of words-per-second across the duration, then highlight stretches that are too dense (the "wall of words" problem) or too slow (the "awkward pause" problem). Also computes estimated total runtime.

What's different here: Pacing tools usually return an average WPM. We show the variance — and where it spikes or dips — which is the actual predictor of retention loss.

The pacing waveform will appear here.

What this solves

YouTube retention curves drop most steeply between seconds 8 and 18. The Visualizer predicts whether your script will trigger that drop by checking for a "dead zone" — an 8-second stretch under 1.8 words/sec.

How to interpret

A healthy short-form script averages 2.5–3.2 words/sec. The 3-second mobile viewing window means each "beat" should land in 8–14 words. Bars below that range (orange/red) are your rewrite targets.

FAQ

Why seconds and not words-per-minute?

WPM averages hide variance. A 200-WPM script with one 6-second silence loses retention just like a 120-WPM script with one 12-second silence — WPM can't show that.

Does it include B-roll cues?

No. B-roll planning is a separate tool. Use Pacing for spoken-word density.

Tool 3 ~15 seconds to run

CTA Placement Advisor

Paste your script + the CTA you want to drop in (subscribe, comment, link in bio, etc). We mark the three highest-attention moments based on pacing, sentence boundaries, and a published attention-by-second model. Also flags if your CTA is too early or too late.

What's different here: Most advice says "put CTA at the end". That's wrong for short-form. We model where attention is highest, not where it's easiest to write.

Placement analysis will appear here.

What this solves

Dropping "smash that like button" in the first 5 seconds is the most common CTA mistake in short-form. The advisor tells you whether your CTA is too early, redundant, or in a dead zone.

How to interpret

Three green markers are the recommended drop windows. Red markers are dead zones (use for scene transitions, not asks). The advisor also returns the predicted "ask attention" % at each spot.

FAQ

Can I have more than one CTA?

Yes — but at most two. Three or more CTAs in a 60-second video triggers "ask fatigue" and reduces click-through on all of them.

Should the CTA be verbal or on-screen?

Both. Verbal CTA targets audio-only listeners (1 in 4 short-form viewers). On-screen text targets muted scrollers.

Tool 4 ~5 seconds to run

Voiceover Duration Estimator

Paste your voiceover script. Pick a delivery pace (from meditative to hard-sell). Returns total seconds, total minutes, and a duration-by-pace comparison so you can see whether "faster" actually gets you under the algorithm-friendly threshold.

What's different here: Most word counters assume 150 WPM. We use pace-by-delivery-style, which matters — a TikTok finance voiceover at 180 WPM sounds calm; at 130 it sounds tired.

Duration estimate will appear here.

What this solves

TikTok and Shorts both reward videos under 34 seconds (Shorts) and 60 seconds (TikTok) with longer average view duration. If your script naturally runs 75 seconds, you need to know whether re-cutting or re-recording is the cheaper fix.

How to interpret

A green check means you'll fit under the platform's "short-loop" threshold. Yellow means you'll likely need to cut 10–15%. Red means you should rewrite, not just re-record.

FAQ

Does it count pauses?

No — pauses are baked into the WPM constants. A "thoughtful" pace already assumes ~12% pause time.

Should I match my actual speaking rate?

Yes — re-run with the pace closest to how you actually deliver the script in the booth.

Tool 5 ~5 seconds to run

Pattern Interrupt Counter

Paste your script. We count the number of meaningful shifts in topic, camera, or visual cue that break viewer habituation. Also computes the "interrupt density" per minute and flags segments where you go too long without a shift.

What's different here: Most pacing advice treats pattern interrupts as a vibe. We make them countable — with a target density (12–18/min for short-form).

Interrupt map will appear here.

What this solves

Viewer attention drifts after the first 7 seconds. Without a pattern interrupt every 4–6 seconds, you fall off the retention curve. This tool counts how many you have and where you need more.

How to interpret

Aim for 12–18 interrupts per minute. Each marker on the timeline is a shift; red gaps are 8+ second stretches with no shift — those are your "dead air" candidates.

FAQ

What counts as an interrupt?

A camera change, a new B-roll shot, a graphic overlay, a sound effect, a hard cut on a punchline. Anything that resets the viewer's frame of reference.

Are text overlays interrupts?

Yes, when they appear mid-frame, not as burned-in captions.