POPULAR: Simple Questions, Simple Answers

[Beth Pavell]

Well. I've already established them as strangers, unfortunately. I suppose the problem I've got is that they're both essentially sportsmen, ambitious perhaps, but with no real emotional investment in each other. The Tourney does carry a substantial cash prize, I don't know if that would make much of a difference to people's thoughts on this

 

[CrystaI]

Just a question. Why an emotional rivalry between the two characters is needed? Why the two strangers must meet each other before the actual competition? Will it produce a big story plot problem if they never met before, only met each other the first time on the stage?

Since you said it, they are established as strangers with no real emotional investment on each other. Then mind as well just goes to that route, with only the acknowledgement of characters' high level competitive skills and abilities, regardless of the characters' background and personalities. You only need to establish a sportsmanlike emotional warning to either side where because the opponent is super strong, one need to dealt this competition seriously, or else one will lose easily, where then the winning prize will be gone forever. And then, without that cash prize, the character cannot pay for the surgery fees to heal the severely sicked family where he/she will die within the next month (OK, I made up this last part. But I think you may understand the point here, is to build up the emotional urge that one side must win no matter what).

Or, if prize is not the focus point in here, how about the pride of the characters? Sportsmanship in another meaning is the dignity in one's competitive ability. A character with high self-esteem shall be emotionally reluctant to lose simply because it damages his/her pride. Doesn't matter at the end of the day one side must accept the lose cheerfully yet grudgingly, loss is still something difficult to swallow, especially for the character with large ego.

 

[AceTrainer14]

If I may do a shameless plug, there is a lesson out there right now about dealing with villains and rivalries

I'm not sure if you have already written any of this character of it's too late for this, but you could perhaps have some sort of incident or series of them spark a feud that boils over into the tournament. Think of where the characters are at when they arrive for the tournament, and then stress them out or dent their confidence by having an obnoxious, rude, blunt, ignorant or a combination of those things trainer get in their way a few times: they could cut in line, make several rude remarks, perhaps has a gang of people around them they are playing up for. You could even tie the pettiness of the feud into the story: Josh/Evalina is stressed out, this person is rude to them, they decide to focus on beating them to help get them throguh the tournament, potentially for their downfall. You could even do it through their Pokemon: wasn't there one fight in the Johto League that involved Bulbasaur and Squirtle sparring with the opponent's Pokemon pre battle?

Whatever the reason, as I stress in my lesson, you should give this rival a reason for targeting them as well. The prize money would be a useful way of building up stress.

 

[RuinExplorer]

I'm currently working on a Pokemon fanfic and I was planning to use a sort of racism against Dark, Poison, and Ghost types considering they tend to be protray as evil or tricksters. I'm not planning to go overboard as there will just be a sort of wariness to Pokemon of these types. It adds more of a challenge to the heroes both of whom are Ghost type.

Is this sort of thing ok or should I scrap the idea?

 

[AceTrainer14]

I'm currently working on a Pokemon fanfic and I was planning to use a sort of racism against Dark, Poison, and Ghost types considering they tend to be protray as evil or tricksters. I'm not planning to go overboard as there will just be a sort of wariness to Pokemon of these types. It adds more of a challenge to the heroes both of whom are Ghost type.

Is this sort of thing ok or should I scrap the idea?

If it is a PMD type fic, that sort of thing does make some sense and would probably fit in the world. It really depends on what type of story you are writing.

 

[RuinExplorer]

I have come across a setback in my fanfic during the planning stages. The major climax in the chronicles is a massive battle with one or two legendaries, armies of Pokemon and the massive King Pokemon that have been such a huge fixture of the fanfic.

Just for background information, King Pokemon are incredibly large and insanely powerful Pokemon usually in a state of mega evolution. (Though not always like with King Golurk).

Do I switch point of views to show the tactics between each squadron as they clash with these Titans and their armies? Or do I stick to one point of view? I've read up on smaller battles but I need some tips for pulling off this epic scene.

 

[AceTrainer14]

I have come across a setback in my fanfic during the planning stages. The major climax in the chronicles is a massive battle with one or two legendaries, armies of Pokemon and the massive King Pokemon that have been such a huge fixture of the fanfic.

Just for background information, King Pokemon are incredibly large and insanely powerful Pokemon usually in a state of mega evolution. (Though not always like with King Golurk).

Do I switch point of views to show the tactics between each squadron as they clash with these Titans and their armies? Or do I stick to one point of view? I've read up on smaller battles but I need some tips for pulling off this epic scene.

The bst examples of battle writing I've read have been in the Song of Ice and Fire books, which usually focus on one person per battle or chapter. I think the easiest thing is to focus on only one or two POV's from either side, but it would depend on how many central characters you have on both sides of the army.

 

[Beth Pavell]

Best battle writing I've read is invariably Dan Abnett. He tends to stick to one point of view per scene, usually chaining several long scenes together over the course of the battle. Generally speaking I'd say it's ok to swap around with points of view, or to pull the narrative back and narrate what's going on, but don't jump around like a flea on amphetamine.

When it doubt, stick to a point of view. And don't be afraid to let the battle narrative be incomplete - it's the atmosphere of the battle that's more important than the details of what's moving where. I point towards the Battle of Pelennor Fields from The Return of the King here - Tolkien makes the narrative of the battle itself quite simple, instead focusing on the moments of confusion, desperation, despair, eucatastrophe and sometimes just plain tragic slaughter

 

[Beth Pavell]

Ok, here's something I've been rolling around in my mind and can't come to a conclusion on - battle commentary

I think it's fairly obvious how not to do it, and that's the anime way, with dumb statements that don't sound like any real pundit would actually say them and repeat what's already obvious in the narrative.

What I want to do with the idea is add a layer of atmosphere to the battle and to the world in general. I can't decide whether commentary to the crowd (I.e: that the point-of-view character could actually hear) really makes sense, or whether it really adds enough to justify the wordcount

 

[Lord Kyuubi]

I think the actual responses of the crowd themselves often works better than commentary in this situation. From my (admittedly limited) experience of sports commentary, it does mostly seem to consist of just what you're saying you want to avoid, that is, redundant statements, and explanations that would be made redundant by the narrative - and all of that tends to be delivered with a somewhat unhealthy level of cheese. Just from what I've heard myself, that is. Regardless, I think comments and cheers from the crowd would add rather more to the battle, since as well as not needing to suffer the same problems as commentary, they tend to be more partial and give more opinions, which can make them more interesting to listen to. I recall you've done crowds pretty well in The Long Walk before, and I reckon sticking to that sort of thing's a better bet than putting any significant focus on adding in commentators.

 

[AetherX]

Since you're doing most things from the point of view of people on the field or in the stands, commentary doesn't make much sense. Real life sports don't have commentators talking the entire time except on TV or the radio. In person they mostly just introduce the athletes, maybe sum up plays after the fact, read out stuff on the scoreboard, or advertise stuff during breaks.

If you're just looking to add another layer of realism, that kind of minimalistic commentary might help, but I'm not sure how much there would be in a Pokemon battle. You could, however, add in sound effects or visual effects on the scoreboard to accentuate big events in the fight, which is what real life sports do. Like when a Pokemon goes down there's a big sound effect and music and a replay or animation on the scoreboard. Something like that. Loud music whenever the battle's not actively happening is a must in a stadium. Another thing that stadiums do is make fun of the visiting team, but again I'm not sure how that would work in Pokemon battles.

Go to a local match some time and take notes

Hope that helps.

 

[Misfit Angel]

I'm having a bit of a dilemma in regards to a writing style. For something I'm working on, I've decided to go with point of view characters, where entire chapters are told from the point of view of a specific character. I've gotten fairly comfortable with working within these boundaries. However, I've run into a pickle.

A crucial event that sets up the entirety of the story takes place out of eyesight of every major character present in the area. The only witness to the event is the perpetrator, and he dies during the event. How do I let readers know what happened? I thought about making the perpetrator of the event the point of view character, but if he dies, the chapter would end with him. To end the chapter in the middle of the action seems like a poor choice.

Basically, what I want is the readers to be clued in on what's happening, while none of the characters are. It will be up to the characters to investigate what happened, while the reader always knows a little more than they do. I want the reader to think "you're on the wrong path, that's not what happened!" when conclusions start to be drawn.

Or should I just drop the point of view nonsense and return to a more traditional format? I wouldn't have to rewrite large sections, so this is an option this early on.

In general, what are peoples' thoughts on the 'point of view character' writing style? It's something I've wanted to try for quite awhile, but I'm starting to see the limitations of it.

 

[CrystaI]

In my second fanfic project that I'm currently working on, I use 1st person POV narrative to tell the story, where the focus character changes for each chapter. For one character, I use it to told the story of another character, so you may say 2nd person POV narrative is also included. Of course I do acknowledged that in some of the future chapters, a very diverse and dynamic scene changes might come up so restricted to perspective of only one character to limit not only the story-writing but also plot-planning.

And for such chapter, I think I will choose to use 3rd person POV narrative, limited or omnipotent, depending on the chapter.

It might seems like a break from the general narrative trend if the fic was always told from 1st/2nd person, and now suddenly becomes 3rd person. Yeah this may not be a very good resolution, but I think it is better than using 1st person narrative and changes focus character several times within one chapter, where that might seems align with the long-established narrative style, but atmospherically read very awkward within that chapter.

 

[Beth Pavell]

I generally prefer sticking quite close to a viewpoint character. As an author, it stops you from being tempted to move the point of view around for your own convenience and makes you think a little harder about how to convey what's going out outside of the viewpoint character's head.

I think it's acceptable to use a characters as a temporary viewpoint if it's sparingly and for a very specific plot reason. It sounds like this event is supposed to be setting up a mystery, so I think it's ok if we get most of the details before the perpetrator dies. Given that it's supposed to be an event that triggers a plot thread, I ending in the middle of the action would probably work in your favour. The important event has already happened, so you may well get right on with telling the story

 

[Misfit Angel]

Given that it's supposed to be an event that triggers a plot thread, I ending in the middle of the action would probably work in your favour. The important event has already happened, so you may well get right on with telling the story

Well, since it's unlikely that I'll be posting the chapter here, I can probably spill the beans of what actually happens, and why I'm concerned about ending the chapter as the perpetrator is killed.

The plan is for the perpetrator to wait until the late hours of the night, and then set fire to a nobleman's manor. The intent is to kill the head of the household, while any extra family members who parish would be icing on the cake. The fire is set, but before much damage is seen by the perpetrator, his head his reduced to a pile of goo by the local blacksmith, who saw the man enter the manor unannounced. Try as he might, the blacksmith is unable to put the fire out.

So while the action has started, I don't feel like it's progressed enough to justify closing off the chapter and moving onto the next one, where the consequences of the fire are realized and the investigation into who hired the arsonist begins.

Perhaps I could just make the blacksmith the PoV character? I could probably have him detail what happens as he tries to evacuate the noble family from the manor, which would allow for the action to play out unabated.

 

[Beth Pavell]

This is probably going to sound bizarrely picky, but here goes ...

So I've been reading a lot about trains. And consequently, thinking a bit about how the rail system in The Long Walk would work, about the history of it, etc etc. So far I've written the story hinting that the Magnet Train has major branch lines to the other Johto cities, at least (And I had the idea in my head that the same would be true of Kanto as well). The problem is, I have this description from Chapter Eighteen:

The train swayed rhythmically from side-to-side as it hurtled through the night. Eve was feeling sleepy. She always did, on train journeys. It was the gentle rocking on the tracks that did it, the hissing white noise of the rails.

Which really describes the movement of a conventional electric train, not the maglev that the Magnet Train is supposed to be. I can't find much in the way of personal experiences in riding maglev trains since there's only two operational lines in the world, so I'm not sure just how smooth the ride should be.

The question is, do I rewrite it? The description is pretty important as far as the waffy atmosphere of the scene is concerned ... I'm toying with the idea that the lines were built by the Magnet Company, planned as maglevs but ended up as high-speed electric. Which I wouldn't go out of my way to write into the story anyway ... I guess the point is, can I get away with half-rewriting the canon in this instance?

 

[Lord Kyuubi]

Well, I don't see any reason the Magnet Train should need to necessarily be maglev - there're plenty of other reasons you could use to keep the name and not change a thing, such as the company being named for some previous business, or after the manager or something (though admittedly, 'Magnet' would be a very strange surname), or just the reason you suggest here.

Overall someone debating or questioning a detail this incidental would be nitpicking at the best... I don't really think it's something worth worrying over too much.

 

[VeniaSilente]

The question is, do I rewrite it?

No need to.

Pokémon is a world of, basically, technological zeerust - the levels and branches of technology are all over the place and there's a lot of things that can be thought of anachronistic, like the rocking of the train, but when you stop think about why would they not have to be like that in such a society, you see... people in the Pokémon world can pretty much do anything thanks to the power and capabilities Pokémon and tech offer. Electric, or even Maglev train, with a rocking back-and-forth feeling and other elements "of back then"? Why not? It could be tradition. It could be nostalgia. Heck, it could be legal mandate ("Trains shall make noise so as to warn pedestrians or wildlife ahead on the road"), etc.

It can't be that difficult or out-of-place anyway, not in a world of floating cities, massful orb/drone defense systems and airship prisons with capability for interdimensional travel.

Nostalgia is a lovable, powerful motivator.

(We all love trains, don't we~?)

 

[0bs1d1an_kn1ght]

In Explorers of Destruction, I want to base the region, Unido, off of Spain. Does anyone know any good websites I can research from?

 

[Beth Pavell]

I'd start with Wikipedia - yes, really, because the geography articles are fine. Also, try going to your library, if you can - again, yes, really, because travel writing and travel guides will highlight some of the main cultural points of Spain