Greg,(posted 9146 days ago)Basically, development will have a lesser impact upon the shadow areas of your image (those that are light or clear on the negative.) Exposure of the negative will determine how much detail, if any, will occur in the shadows. Development makes its impactin the highlights, something that exposure won't impact as much.
Giving your film proper exposure is essential -- no amount of development nor printing will be able to create deatil where there is none on the negative. You have to put some meat on the bones, and give the developer something to work with.
Giving your negative plenty of development make make for a contrasty negative, but then you will be able to print it on lower grades of paper (or lower filter settings if you are using variable contrast paper.) The advantage of using the lower setting/grades (0 and 1) will offer you the greatest range of greys, something that the higher grades cannot do. You can always print down the blacks. Just expose your paper for the highlights and adjust your contrast control for the blacks, if printing them down is not an option.
Check out Ansel Adams "The Negative" for information on how to make proper exposure and development tests. It sounds complicated, but it is easy, if only time consuming. This way you will know exactly how your film and paper will respond to certain exposure and development situations. It takes the guesswork out of it.
Good luck.