Explicit Time I’ve already decided that chapters are going to be my unit of story/plot/logical time. My goal is to have each chapter be approximately the same page count, which is right now about six 8.5×11 pages, and cover approximately the same amount of story/plot, which is right now about one level. It’s nothing asContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – XIII”
Category Archives: Writing
History Repeating
First off, I just love the song. It’s not actually repeating. It’s definitely rhyming. This should be familiar: When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands that have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equalContinue reading “History Repeating”
Dungeons
What is a dungeon? From a utilitarian perspective: A training ground. One can run about in the real world killing things (monsters, humans, random animals), but there are consequences. Even systemized worlds need ecosystems. If people wander around killing everything, the ecosystem will collapse. Dungeons are for training. One can kill everything inside without worryingContinue reading “Dungeons”
Enlightened, Monsters, and Animals
I’m not a big fan of the term “enlightened races”, but it exists and it’s convenient, so I’m adopting it. This refers to those races who naturally (without system fuckery) form societies. Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Aliens, etc… This is not quite synonymous with “sapient”. Leaving aside the offspring question (i.e. are human babies sapient? It’sContinue reading “Enlightened, Monsters, and Animals”
How Does Magic Work?
This comes up in the context of a fight scene in Industrial Mage. Our intrepid hero casts a tornado-ish air shield around himself and it moves with him. Instead of a fireball, he creates a fire-whip, which behaves mostly like an actual whip. He casts water bullets at the bad spider creature, targeting the joints,Continue reading “How Does Magic Work?”
Learning 2 Write – XII
Scope Continuing the post on Endings – the irony of which does not escape me – I had a thought: It’s not (usually) that I get tired of a series, it’s that the series changes out from under me. Many stories (not just LitRPG) start with the struggles of our intrepid hero. As he overcomesContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – XII”
Learning 2 Write – XI
Titles It occurs to me that I need both series and book titles. I have only one criterion: Book Title + Series Title + book number MUST be readable. Browsing through my Kindle for examples… Jack of All: LitRPG, Isekai, Survival Adventure (Book 1) fails in two ways. If one is looking at multiple books,Continue reading “Learning 2 Write – XI”
Learning 2 Write – X
Endings I just finished Ithria Book 15. It ended as I feared: Cliff-hanger. Sort-of. There’s enough said that there is no doubt whatsoever about what will happen (the bad guys are going to get their ass severely kicked), but the actual happening will be in book 16. This is more a case of “the lastContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – X”
Learning 2 Write – IX
Paragraphs Already at nine? I see VIII, but I don’t see VII. Anyway… I’m reading Book V of Matter Destructor. It has very (very, very) short paragraphs. For example: When Hunter said it, the noise didn’t just dip. It died. Like someone had cut a cord. Heads snapped toward him in a wave, and forContinue reading “Learning 2 Write – IX”
Learning 2 Write
Continuous Chapter Numbers I found one: The Matter Destructor. I just downloaded books three and four. I’ve read book three, but I don’t remember any details, so I wanted to re-read it before reading book four. The book opened on Chapter 62. It’s nice that Amazon remembers my place – especially when it doesn’t tellContinue reading “Learning 2 Write”
Marked Up 