Whenever I format my TOC for the paperback version of my novel, the lines leading to each corresponding page are all out of whack. I have twelve chapters, and it looks wavy.
Here is what I did.
Highlighted all of the chapter content in my manuscript.
Then I went to copy special.
From there I selected the option for TOC.
When I placed the contents in position in my manuscript, it looks fine.
Then I compile to a PDF, because I want to see the format. When I do, that is when the resulting TOC looks wavy. Some of the dotted lines that connect the chapter title to the page number are shorter and others are longer.
What you are describing is a case where the tab stops for the numbers are too far over to the right, falling off the page and wrapping around to the next line.
In my testing there may be a very slight flaw in the default “Page width” setting that is available when pasting a ToC. Try setting that to manual, and calculating the width of the text block from the format’s Page Settings tab, that you are using.
For example, with the “Paperback (5.06" x 7.81")” format, the margins are 0.75 + 0.5ins, subtracted from the overall paper width: 3.81ins. Points are 72 per inch, so to get the right indent amount for pasting the ToC, you’d want a little bit less than the exact width (274.32). I’d try 273 points for example.
The “Page Width” setting is using 274pts, which theoretically should fit within 274.32, but evidently that’s not good enough. We’ll have to take a look at tweaking that, or investigating if the actual text block is narrower than numerically stipulated in the settings.