If my opening sequence features the antagonist, do the same rules of conflict and tension arising from obstacles apply?

I don't necessarily want the audience to root for the antagonist in this sequence but I feel that its necessary for him to encounter and overcome some obstacles to demonstrate his prowess to the audience.

I agree with everything you've said, except I don't understand the question part. What are the rules of conflict and tension? I do think giving your antagonist goals, obstacles, an arc is good, very good. The more powerful your antagonist, the more sharp will be the journey of the protag. A respectable antagonist is a great part of a story, I think.

It depends . . . not all antagonists are pure evils, they are shades of grey and the more complex they are shown to be on screen, the more interesting they are. X men opened with a young Magneto being seperated from his parents at a concentration camp. Magneto does not believe himself to be evil, he believes his motives are perfectly justified. We are shown what has happened to him to shape him and his views.

Shaping your antagonist is a good idea, but don't let it take precedence over your main story. One well crafted scene can be used to give the audience an insight into who the antagonist is. People will feel betrayed if they invest 10 pages/minutes in a character at the start of a film if he's the antagonist, unless of course it's a thriller and we're not supposed to know if he/she is good or bad.

Eoin's point is spot on. I came back to kind of say the same thing since I had more time, but he said it better than I would have.

I think, and I hope, that there's flexibility on these things, Kurt. I am finishing a draft of a feature that has a complicated scenario between the protag and the antag. I would say that it's the antagonistic force that you want to be powerful, and that might be one character, a combination of characters, or just some strong outside obstacle, like the tornado in Twister.

I am still curious what rules you had in mind. If want to know them so I can use them!

One way of doing it would be to let the audience know up front why he's bad...what's so dangerous about him and why he needs to be stopped.

You can then a top notch force against him and show just how dangerous he is without people necessarly identifying with him.

This would work particularly well if what he's trying to do is someting the audience would vehemently disagree with.

Think The Joker from Batman. In the first 10 minutes, you knew not to fuck with this guy

Quoted from leitskev What are the rules of conflict and tension?

Basically having some form of conflict in every scene to keep it going. Because it's not the main character I'm starting with in the opening sequence, is it a good move for the antagonist to be given several dramatic obstacles to overcome in this sequence to demonstrate his prowess (and help keep the reader/audience engaged) or would that be a waste of energy/pages? Could it work better if I instead save all dramatic obstacles in general for the protagonist so that the antagonist "commits" the opening inciting incident said without obstacles and tension?

Quoted from Eoin It depends . . . not all antagonists are pure evils, they are shades of grey and the more complex they are shown to be on screen, the more interesting they are. X men opened with a young Magneto being seperated from his parents at a concentration camp. Magneto does not believe himself to be evil, he believes his motives are perfectly justified. We are shown what has happened to him to shape him and his views. Shaping your antagonist is a good idea, but don't let it take precedence over your main story. One well crafted scene can be used to give the audience an insight into who the antagonist is. People will feel betrayed if they invest 10 pages/minutes in a character at the start of a film if he's the antagonist, unless of course it's a thriller and we're not supposed to know if he/she is good or bad.

The opening sequence I'm looking at takes up 5-10 pages, hopefully somewhere nicely inbetween. I did try starting off with the main character finding out about an offscreen inciting incident but that opening seemed boring and had significantly less impact. From what the antagonist is doing in the inciting incident, you know immediately know he's the antagonist.

Going ten minutes into a film to meet the protag is risky. Not saying there is an absolute rule or anything, but that's a long time. If you do have a long opening with the antag, you should make sure the protag is in focus for a while after.

I have one other trick you might consider. If it fits your story, try to keep the protag in view in this opening scene by alluding to him in some way. Let me make up an example.

Let's say Stallone chose to open Rocky with a scene involving the champ instead of Rocky. We know from the title that the movie will be about an underdog white boxer. So the black champ could mention they are looking for a white boxer, someone has been they can build into something, but beat easily in the ring. In this way, the scene is pointing toward the protag even though he is not in the scene and we haven't met him yet.

I wouldn't distort your story to achieve this. But if you fit it in naturally, you might consider it. Good to keep the spotlight on the protag, even when he's not in the scene.

Quoted from leitskev If you do have a long opening with the antag, you should make sure the protag is in focus for a while after.

Strangely, the way I have plotted it up to now, with absolutely no concious connection or consideration to the length of his appearance in the opening sequence, the antagonist is portrayed as a shadowy, elusive figure who rarely appears again bar one or two brief "execute the plan" appearances until about the mid point. I have done it that way to starve the reader/audience of the antagonist so they share to protagonist's need to catch up to them and to preserve their mystery.