What's the stake?

Identify the primary value at stake in a story.

It's a good phrase, but does it mean anything?

The protagonist usually represents the positive side of this value and the antagonist the negative side.

Now, can one have a heroine who is both protagonist and antagonist? Would that make life interesting? I think it happens often enough in real life. When there is a problem, then the heroine struggles to solve the problem. In my current work, honesty is at stake. If a successful outcome means she must lie, or do something dishonest, then the two sides of her nature will argue with each other - or against each other - in the story.

How successful will it be for the readers?

I suppose that will depend on how good the exposition is - facts, info about  the character that is necessary for the reader to understand her motivation, for her story and desperation to be understood. The skill is to make it invisible and usually  the dreaded words Show dont Tell creep in at this point. The author should dramatize the exposition if possible. Look at it this way - the charachter knows their world, their history and themselves  - or we hope they do.  Let them use what they know  to get what they want. Think of self-knowledge as a gun and let them shoot it out. Reveal your character slowly; let unimportant facts come first, the most critical facts last.