Poll Result and Planning

[Joel P.]

Okay, so I know I'm late with this post, but the poll is complete. High Fantasy seems to be the genre of choice, so let's get some planning done.

I'm addressing this primarily to the folks who responded to the poll:
Ranger Varon
Stormiel
rjj7
Kessie
choosybeggar

So....
Do we want to get all the worldbuilding and character design done here on the boards, then switch over to email or GoogleDocs to start writing or do we want to do it all over email?
How long of a work are we aiming for?
Are we going to take turns writing sections, or are we going to have something like two people plotting, two writing, and two editing?

Objections, suggestions, and opinions welcome!

[rjj7]

I've got no objections to working here on the boards for a bit for the initial setup. For the actual writing part, there is a third option, which is some sort of file-sharing system. A real-life writing group that I work with uses Dropbox for quick and easy distribution of written work. But GoogleDocs or email are fine with me as well.

As far as organizing the writing process, I don't think its essential to nail that down until we've got more of an idea of the plot, but proper planning never hurt anyone, so I'm going to throw out the suggestion that we start by giving everyone a section to write, with a week or two (or more; people have other projects to work on) to get as much done as possible on it. This will give us an idea of how fast everyone is going to be at churning out material for this particular story. It will also give us an idea of things like writing style, writing ability, ability to let go and write (very important for first drafts, though possibly will send false flags w/respect to writing ability), quality of ideas 'on the fly' (some people can't come up with good ideas unless they're actually writing it), and other stuff which I can't think of at the time. We'll then be able to divide up the team more intelligently, as we'll all have a bit of exposure to the other's style.


I also think we need to have one person the designated leader, who will have absolute authority to call the shots. This includes accepting, rejecting, and twisting any ideas presented, accepting a written section or sending it out for more work, switching people out on sections, dividing roles, and so forth. Most of these hopefully won't ever come up in a manner that needs authority intervention; I guess what I'm after is a benevolent dictator. Someone who has absolute authority, but doesn't mind sitting back and letting the people resolve their own differences. This view may be a bit more extreme than some folks want, but we're here for discussion, so that's what I'm doing. [It goes without saying that Joel P. gets first shot at position of benevolent dictator, or whatever authority position we eventually establish ]


Oh, and with regard to worldbuilding, I'm just going to throw out a random sentence or two that encapsulates some concept/idea as my first contribution. I suggest that everyone else do likewise, without looking at anyone else's sentence. We'll then have a solid base of 6+ completely unconnected ideas to mold, meld, weld, and bake together (so feel free to have your concept be anything from character to world related; even a different genre maybe? I know that we were open to the idea of mixing them).

My spoiler's in brown text, size 10 font.



The clouds bring more than weather; something has disturbed the heavens, and each day brings a fresh new doom

[Joel P.]

Yea, verily, that makes sense. Perhaps we could just write randomly in the world (once we get done creating it) for that week or two, instead of writing material which would end up in the story. That way we can determine skill and speed and whatnot w/out having stuff we'd have to edit later.

Heh, yeah, just call me Ventinari. ;D

Okay....your sentence is still too readable, though. I put mine in size 0, subscript, strikethrough.

_{When night fell, we fell. Where the evil spread, we were consumed. Now we return to take back what once was ours.}
.

[rjj7]

Well, I thought it was fine, but I didn't know you could do size 0. Secrets rendered duly secure, captain.

I actually like the idea of writing random stuff in the world. It would potentially allow us all to introduce character ideas as well, which could later be molded in 'phase 2 plotting'.

[Kessie]

You guys aren't going to do a round robin-style story here on the board? I've done those before and they're really fun. It'll be really rough and random, but it'll be a good "first story" to establish things. You just need some rough characters and a point of conflict. Like,

"Dragons are invading the kingdom. Heroes go to deal with them."

Or, "The king is deathly ill and the heroes must go on a Quest for a cure."

Or, "The heroes are on a quest for the Mystical Artifacts to beat the bad guy."

Or, "The prince has been kidnapped by people unknown (probably dragons), and the heroes must save him."

Or, "People have been turned to stone all over the kingdom. The heroes must seek out and destroy the source of the dark magic."

You know, the typical cliche story summary that you can completely run with once you start writing. :-)

[rjj7]

Well that's certainly a possibility, so let's talk about it.

Upon examining my thought processes and motivations, I have realized that I have been operating on the understanding that this was going to be a serious story with the intent of creating something as high quality as possible on the first run through (while recognizing that first drafts are always first drafts). But this may be at odds with other people's views, who were thinking of this primarily as a fun exercise to freestyle for a bit. Nothing inherently wrong with either idea, but this is something that's going to have to be threshed out right at the start.

What is the goal?

Is the goal the journey? The writing along the way and the practice and fun of working together to get something slapped out there? Or is it more on the end? The finished product and the work involved in making it as cohesive and meaningful as possible?


I'm more in favor of taking this serious to the max, which includes as much outlining, world-building, plotting, and so forth ahead of time as possible. Naturally, I don't want to extinguish personal creativity; but even after extensive outlining on my own stories, I always end up throwing in random stuff along the way, some of which becomes quite significant. So there will always be room for improvisation.

What do others think?

[Joel P.]

'You guys'? You're not joining us, Kessie?

My opinions: as a worldbuilding exercise, I'd say a round-robin story would be both fun and useful. But for the actual, big story, I agree with Randy; I was thinking about maybe having this new world be something we (those of us who're interested) continue to write in separately even after we've finished this first story. Maybe we could even coordinate with TC2 to have a story from one of us, set in this world, every issue.

But that's in the future. For now, I think its safe to say we were looking to do something reasonably serious and....dare I say...important?

[Kessie]

Have any of you guys ever written a round-robin on a messageboard like this? You need very loose structure, if at all. Round robins go all over the place. Everybody has different ideas of stuff to include. Writing a rigid outline is fine for a personal project, or even a two-person collab, but it won't work with five or more people writing.

Figure out a topic and some basic characters and leave it at that. I've done this sort of thing (and it's FUN), but structuring it so rigidly means that only one or two people will ever work on it. Unless that's what you want, of course.

[rjj7]

I think we'll have to define "rigid outline". I don't know that anyone is thinking of a scene-by-scene layout of the story. Nor do I think that anyone is even necessarily calling for all major events to be planned ahead of time; just some of them. Rather, what I am envisioning of is more of a flexible flow chart. We come up with initial conflict, eventual conflict resolution, and a general map of the directions that characters are going in and what everyone's "personal quest" is (where appropriate). If we have several storylines, a rough idea of how they merge would be helpful. A few major events can be discussed and thrown around so that everyone is at least keeping up with the direction other people are working towards.

The flexible part comes in because of course people will come up with ideas on the fly, and everyone needs to be ready to adapt the vision to what comes up. I'm now imagining a series of 'cycles', where we go round and everyone takes a turn writing a piece, then we break for a quick discussion of new ideas/concepts/characters that were brought in, fit them into the overall vision (or discard them if necessary), then begin the next cycle. This might even result in some previous passages declared as 'non-canon'.

You are absolutely correct about everyone having different (read: conflicting) ideas about what to include. It is for precisely that reason that I was moving to have an Evil Overlord to make final calls if disagreements are irreconcilable.

Does this sound a little more feasible to you Kessie, or do you really think that a 'no rules' approach is the only way to work this?

Also, I'm getting a bit of a vibe from your posts that says that you're interested in the idea of a free-form round-robin, but not necessarily in anything more structured than that. Am I correct in inferring that if we did adopt a more rigid structure that you would rather not participate?


In the interest of further enlightenment, the discussion continues!

[Kessie]

I think we'll have to define "rigid outline". I don't know that anyone is thinking of a scene-by-scene layout of the story. Nor do I think that anyone is even necessarily calling for all major events to be planned ahead of time; just some of them.

I thought that's exactly what you meant! I'm glad you clarified.

I'm not sure if I can participate. I'd like to, but I'm also up to my earlobes in revisions.

It sounds like now, we just need some ideas. So ...

What kind of world is this? Medieval fantasy? Asian fantasy? Something set in a world like the Incas and Mayans, just to change it up?

What's the Big Problem? The land dying? A bad king coming to power? Plots to assassinate the king? A conquering army approaching? Rampaging dragons?

Once we know the first two, we'll have an idea of what kind of heroes to build and their goals. Between those points lies the plot. :-)

[Joel P.]

Yeah....I'm still agreeing with Randy. Great minds think alike, right?

I'd also like to mention the fact that, if you can join us, Kessie, it seems we'll be the only three people working on this. I'm gonna shoot stormiel a PM to see if she wants to join in; but I've never encountered or really talked with the other two who voted. Maybe they'll show up.

As for the world....I had been thinking kind of a typical med. fantasy, but with elements of Japanese culture (since it's interesting and I've never done it before). Especially as this great line (probably a title/subtitle for a short story) occurred to me:
NINJA
Silent. Deadly. Socially Awkward.

Yeah. Anyway. Working out random bits of the world and plot was the goal behind Randy's idea of the random little sentences. Would you care to contribute one or three, Kessie?

I came up with another one:
_{"Who is king in the world of the dead? Who leads the armies of the lost to battle?" The silence I hear when I ask this question gives me the answer. Holy Father, what have we created?}

[stormiel]

Hey Everyone,

Sorry to chime in so late, things have been ridiculously busy lately with work, youth group, meetings, birthdays, sick family members, and working on my own writing project. I lead the mid-school girls in our youth group and camp fundraisers are about to kick in to full swing along with a ton of activities so it looks like its about to get busier.

I don't know if I'm going to be able to write much for the next few months but if you all are cool with it I could try to participate on the message board in world building and ideas (I can research some things if you like, within reason of course.). I'm usually pretty good at combining different ideas, maybe I could help with that or character creation. Coming up with characters is my strong point, maybe I could help with character profiles or personalities and such (only if anyone wants me too). I may be limited in how much time I have so writing chapters of the story may not be something I can do. However, if I can help in any of the ways I mentioned above I'll do my best. I would prefer to work through the message board though.

[Kessie]

Ooh, if we're going to do an Asian story, can we have Youkai characters? en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youkai

In anime and such, Youkai are typically shapeshifters and catgirls. Hee. But it's also just the term for "fantasy creatures" like ogres and goblins. They have a very different mythology, and their dragons are wise, benevolent, and good luck.

Also, a lot of the Western fantasy tropes don't work in an Asian context. Like, if the villain is searching for immortality--that's completely permissible in Asian cultures, since Enlightenment is what it's all about. He wouldn't be a bad guy.

[Joel P.]

Sure, stormiel, feel free to participate! Could you do the exercise Randy suggested? we'll keep you posted as to whether or not we need you to research stuff.

Hmmm....I think we could find a use for shapeshifting Japanese demons. What I meant about having Japanese elements was more culture and technology, not so much mythology. Still, the mythology might be a nice change from standard English fantasy.

[rjj7]

I know next to nothing about oriental stuff, so don't expect anything of that flavor to come out of me. But as long as everyone else supplies, I can certainly lend a hand weaving it all together.

Something Kessie said provided the inspiration for this idea.

Immortality. Is that such an evil goal for oneself? No; it is merely the natural progression of man to a higher state. The sacrifice of dozens of lives to achieve it is the loss of some few hundred years of human life in exchange for thousands. (the idea behind this is that the villain will be an upstanding member of society, and his quest for immortality will be well known; if not the exact means)