Character Development Thread--Discussion

I just prefer to write one post for both because it's more organized for me to do so.

Well if I did introduce this prospective new character, it wouldn't be straight away. Introducing this person would quite probably sidetrack and/or eventually stop the search effort altogether. Which would probably be for the best because I have, in fact retired Joseph from the thread and he is in some other timeline/reality/whateveryouwannacallit and all there is to find of him are the old clothes he left in room 204's bathroom.

...

...when I put it like that, it seems kinda mandatory to introduce this character. They probably won't stick around for the whole thread, but yeah, they'll show up eventually.

edited 5th Feb '16 6:17:23 PM by Ryuhza

Allllrighty then.

Well now John's gonna be heartbroken that his 'son' is gone. D:

Yeah, sorry to have to do that. I just felt like I wasn't getting anything new out of Joseph using this incarnation again, and I didn't see how it was going to change with day 2. I like writing for him, it's really easy, but I think I was just treading water.

It's alright. James and John's interactions with him were pretty fun, though.

edited 5th Feb '16 9:53:38 PM by Masterofchaos

I'm planning on having Moreena run into the Lauren-Demo-Dives-Warden group soon enough. (Or maybe the other way around. We'll see.)

It would probably be fun to have her meet the Dark Caller later on though.

Glad to hear it. I'm sure he'll show back up in the threads eventually, just... maybe a bit older, with a bit more understanding of why and how his life got flipped turned upside down. But I've got a lot of other characters that need fleshing out, so...



Slow day?

Over here in Viking-land it's time for the local Eurovision Song Contest representative-choosing thingie, which everyone is legally required to watch on the penalty of death really loves.

I suppose. I should be working on a take-home test today, but my sister needs her paper critiqued... sigh, I've been critiquing her papers for over a year now and offering reasons for all of the changes I make, from grammar to concepts to organization, and she's still not getting it. She doesn't actually read and internalize most of my comments unless my mom sits her down and verbally takes the time to convince her that I'm right. Standard can't-take-criticism newbie writer problems, I guess.

I also have a headache, so that's awesome.

edited 6th Feb '16 1:10:56 PM by CrystalGlacia

What kind of paper?

Just a casual, non-academic paper about a personal experience in her sociology class. She was trying to satisfy the page requirement by almost repeating herself word-for-word instead of adding more detail, and she still makes sloppy grammar and usage mistakes.

Whatever, I did my usual, it's all done. I guess I should go downstairs and take some Motrin for this headache, but I don't feel like moving... I'm also waiting on other people, too. Who I'm sure are busy.

I'm working on posts a little at at time because my partner and I are taking turns writing lines for our Chinese script, but realistically I'm probably not going to be done until evening. And when I say "evening" I mean California evening, which is more like bedtime for a lot of you. What's it like living in the future? Is everything made of chrome yet?

@Slysheen: The only ones that went to the Mountain Resort were Teri, Kris and Wolfe and they weren't calling themselves the "Mad Bastards" at the time but I can spin it that they, over the course of drinking and talking, mentioned the others in their group and that they were viewed as "mad bastards" by the people who knew them back "home" on Terra Nova - it makes it funnier that even Katya, who's met them only once, refers to them as "mad bastards".

California evening is the next day for me - the future's fine, no ubiquitous chrome yet.

edited 6th Feb '16 2:44:32 PM by Wolf1066

I'm at the mall and I'm waiting for Scents in Frontier and The Dark Caller in Dream 2 Electric Boogaloo.

What's it like three hours from California time? I just feel like I've wasted more time screwing around than getting anything productive done.

Double post to mention something quick- Snowy, I don't know if you're working on Arthur yet, but I've added a sentence to the near-end of my last post for Tsadro. Just wanted to bring it up in case it changes things.

The rest of the post was actually really hard to write, kept me up until 2 AM- it's in-character for him to be pissed right now, but I don't want him to show so much anger he shuts Arthur down and we have to use a contrivance to keep them from splitting. Anger is the result of betrayal, of course.

edited 6th Feb '16 3:51:07 PM by CrystalGlacia

@wolf

It was cut short, mostly due to bad stuff. I figure more that since she works at an agency where a large branch of it is investigative, she'd have access to dossiers, records, the like. They kind of stand out after all.

Cool as. Hope the bad stuff is all sorted now.

Pretty much, now it's just the standard irritations of everyday living. Looking back it could've been much worse but the car accident is always worse when you're in it, metaphorically speaking.

@Snowy Foxes, living in the future is pretty cool. I got to play XCOM 2 before everyone else.

Might not post today.

So I'm super close to being done writing for Arthur, but I'm not really sure how to have him address this bit:

because it really just boils down to me deciding to I was going to focus on Arthur for this thread. But if you want Tsadro to press that point for realism I'll see what I can come up with.

As for the part of the post I did finish, it was probably the most difficult so far. The self-deprecation and doom and gloom is in character but I'm thinking I might have to tone it down for readers' sake. It's kind of a drag to write, too. Aphelion in general has an air of hopelessness and futility that I've never actually tried writing before. I mean, bad shit happens in Entropy too, but it's not as... relentless, I guess.

edited 7th Feb '16 2:36:10 AM by SnowyFoxes

I respect that you wanted to focus on just Arthur, but it is also unrealistic and super-risky for not even one of them who happens to compliment some strength of Arthur's to not accompany him. Tsadro's thinking of the fact that Arthur needs two hands free to communicate, and something else I also just now realized is that is that it's fairly irresponsible of them to trust that Tsadro, this super-powerful dude they picked up in a bar with an easily exploitable weakness who they've known for less than 24 hours, isn't going to suddenly turn on Arthur for his own amusement. (And there's no way for them to verify that anything Tsadro's said so far is actually true... which he knows, and is why he hasn't mentioned that he's technically retired, or that even non-retired Rivari technically only need to listen to their oath-holder.)

I suppose I could take the line out if it's really causing a problem, but it also addresses the biggest reason Tsadro's pissed at Unit Psi as a whole, and why he's afraid the team's going to implode if he doesn't do something.

But since the problem is that we don't want a second character and that it would be out-of-character for Tsadro to not be wondering the whole time why someone isn't here with Arthur, he could try convincing Tsadro that he doesn't actually want them physically here today, and that the two will be worse off. Based on what you've shown of the rest of the team, Gwen sounds like one of the only reasonable members who still cares about her work and maintaining the team, and the rest are fighting amongst themselves when they aren't undermining Arthur's authority. Arthur could tell Tsadro that, yes, his team acts like a bunch of children, that he's man enough to deal with them himself, that he's professional enough to not make Tsadro babysit or drag his bullshit out here in the open where the public can see it (unknowingly addressing professionalism issues Tsadro had with Nymue), and that he needed a damn break anyways.

But if that wouldn't actually fit in with the rest of what Arthur says, Plan B is taking the line out.

And, yeah, you may need to tone down some source of hopelessness/futility, or you may not need to once Arthur's back in-context with the rest of the plot. Yeah, it really speaks to someone who has dealt with depression- I'm one of those, and Unit Psi bothers me a lot less than it bothers Tsadro. He's been depressed before, but it didn't relate that much to or interfere with his condition of being an authority figure... hence why he's more angry than anything. Tsadro's last post was hard for me to write primarily because I can't remember the last time I was so angry about something I blew up like how he did.

edited 7th Feb '16 10:38:46 AM by CrystalGlacia

Well, since Lord Greyjoy posted, I'll be able to make a post. I won't be able to until later though, I'm having breakfast at the moment.

@Gault - How are the Vipers? I don't think I've expressed my mixed, mostly negative, emotions on their design.

Because this pot needs stirring... I'm going to guess the negative opinion at least partially involves their, as Dr. Tygan so tactfully puts it, "obvious humanoid characteristics"?

edited 7th Feb '16 7:58:07 AM by KillerClowns