Re: [GRIMDARK] Fallout Equestria: Project Horizons Discussion

[SilentCarto]

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Oogh. I'd say yes in theory, but the sheer magnitude of the undertaking makes me tack on a giant asterisk that says, "If they can seriously commit to doing the entire story." I mean, Scorch Mechanic has been stalled out for over a year less than halfway through the original FOE, and PH is well over double that length.

A reflection: May I just say how happy I am that this story was released in serial form? If it were actually published as a book series, we'd have been sitting on Black for close to a year before we got Birthday.
 

[Silver136]

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Yeah, that would be a rather massive project. It would probably take well over a year just to record it all. I would go insane listening that long...

[Scienza]

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Oogh. I'd say yes in theory, but the sheer magnitude of the undertaking makes me tack on a giant asterisk that says, "If they can seriously commit to doing the entire story." I mean, Scorch Mechanic has been stalled out for over a year less than halfway through the original FOE, and PH is well over double that length.

Alas, you're right. Using the time it takes the FOE radioplay to produce an episode (~6 months) as a base for how long a fan-group working in their spare time can produce a high-quality adaptation of a single chapter, it'll take approximately 32.5 years to get to where we are now in PH. This isn't accounting chapters that would need to be split into parts to create multiple episodes, and it isn't accounting for abridging (which the FOE radio play is really going to have to do), but it's still a massive endeavor. 

Even an audiobook adaptation would be ridiculously hard (CrazedRambling only got to 19 before he was overcome with college, and that was after he got through the original)

A reflection: May I just say how happy I am that this story was released in serial form? If it were actually published as a book series, we'd have been sitting on Black for close to a year before we got Birthday.
 

That would be torture. I mean, it does tend to break itself up nicely into arcs (hence the volumes) but the wait would just kill me.

[O. Hinds]

Oh, Somber, I hope you start feeling better and that the taxes work out and that the SSN thing doesn't go any further. Those are two things nobody needs, let alone coming at the same time.

Moving on to happier matters, I'll just say that until today the high point of my week probably involved a grammar discussion in which I thought about and retaught myself indirect objects for the first time in years, and that was blown away by reading Lucidity today. So thank you.

Chapter Forty Three Running Thoughts:

Chapter Forty Three Overall Thoughts:

Chapter Forty Three Editing:

Hope for next week: having the time to keep up with the forum in real time!

Ah, thank you very much as always.

"comma after "roses"?"
…"enjoying the roses, in bloom or taking"?

[Icy Shake]

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Oogh. I'd say yes in theory, but the sheer magnitude of the undertaking makes me tack on a giant asterisk that says, "If they can seriously commit to doing the entire story." I mean, Scorch Mechanic has been stalled out for over a year less than halfway through the original FOE, and PH is well over double that length.

A reflection: May I just say how happy I am that this story was released in serial form? If it were actually published as a book series, we'd have been sitting on Black for close to a year before we got Birthday.
 

I frankly think a radio play is too big of an undertaking to have any hope of completion, or, for that matter, proceeding very far at all. I think I'd be happier with a more limited version, essentially taking individual scenes or chapter segments and doing them independently of each other. And I think that from a word count/playtime standpoint, the end of chapter twenty five takes you to under two fifths of the way through the book, so even if he'd continued from 25 at the average rate he'd been going he wouldn't finish until around May 2015.

I agree with the serial form point, and would add that it also enables PH's episodic structure where in many ways the full-scale narrative is the continuous progression built over the course of pretty discrete segments. Granted, the same can be done within novel series or even in a single one, but I don't think I've seen anything that operated quite that way while also sticking to a single focal character and in near-continuous time.

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Oogh. I'd say yes in theory, but the sheer magnitude of the undertaking makes me tack on a giant asterisk that says, "If they can seriously commit to doing the entire story." I mean, Scorch Mechanic has been stalled out for over a year less than halfway through the original FOE, and PH is well over double that length.

Alas, you're right. Using the time it takes the FOE radioplay to produce an episode (~6 months) as a base for how long a fan-group working in their spare time can produce a high-quality adaptation of a single chapter, it'll take approximately 32.5 years to get to where we are now in PH. This isn't accounting chapters that would need to be split into parts to create multiple episodes, and it isn't accounting for abridging (which the FOE radio play is really going to have to do), but it's still a massive endeavor. 

Even an audiobook adaptation would be ridiculously hard (CrazedRambling only got to 19 before he was overcome with college, and that was after he got through the original)

Frankly I think the solution most likely to result in a finished product would be a collaboration in which each person or group participating arranged to take a block of chapters and released in parallel as each was completed or, if enough participated and didn't drop out, as a simultaneous big-bang event. There's the downside that there'd be inhomogenous quality, and even barring that, the oddity of the changeover between segments, but at least there would be a product and there'd be a higher probability  that there'd still be an audience by the time it's done. Individual or small group production would also minimize the problem of players abandoning the project midstream.

In fact, that's how I've treated the Fallout Equestria audiobook: I use Scorch's up to the point it ends, since it's a somewhat higher quality production, then continue with CrazedRambling's. From what I've heard, of course, the existence of the overlap gave CR a chance to ascend the learning curve, which unfortunately wouldn't be a feature of the purely distributed model.

Oh, Somber, I hope you start feeling better and that the taxes work out and that the SSN thing doesn't go any further. Those are two things nobody needs, let alone coming at the same time.

Moving on to happier matters, I'll just say that until today the high point of my week probably involved a grammar discussion in which I thought about and retaught myself indirect objects for the first time in years, and that was blown away by reading Lucidity today. So thank you.

Chapter Forty Three Running Thoughts:

Chapter Forty Three Overall Thoughts:

Chapter Forty Three Editing:

Hope for next week: having the time to keep up with the forum in real time!

Ah, thank you very much as always.

"comma after "roses"?"
…"enjoying the roses, in bloom or taking"?

Oops. Typed the wrong word there; it should have been after "taking": "There were others talking, laughing, enjoying the roses in bloom, or taking in the music on the stage."

[Scienza]

But then you'd also run into issues with quality and consistency ("What, you mean Littlepip was supposed to be gay? What will happen to my Red-Eye romantic subplot?!"). The question of whether you'd rather have a quality production that dies after three-five chapters or a finished patchwork that's kinda all-over-the-place is a difficult one.

On an unrelated note, can you imagine how hilarious it would be if we wrote "Dear Princess Celestia" letters for every chapter of PH?

Dear Princess Celestia,

Today I learned that things don't always go as you planned. Sometimes, you don't get laid like you expected. The buck you were going to terminate doesn't get terminated. You get chased from the only home you've ever known by a pair of guns with severe unresolved issues. No matter what happens though, the most important thing is learning to play out the hand you're dealt and go with the flow. Life is pretty deep that way.

Your faithful student,

Blackjack

[Caoimhe]

Dear Princess Celestia,

I haven't been good this year, (or ever but everyone keeps telling me I have!!!!!!!!) but please give me some ammo and my old bod and some wild peggy and some answers and make Scoodle alive again and a vacation. That's how this works, right? How do I make the sparky things happen that make the letter go? Why is it writing what I'm saying and why does it all just look like squiggly lines? I am not a smart pony.

Your faithful something something,

Blackja-oh wait fuck can I add one more th-

[O. Hinds]

Oops. Typed the wrong word there; it should have been after "taking": "There were others talking, laughing, enjoying the roses in bloom, or taking in the music on the stage."

Ah, thank you. Though, ah, you still typed the wrong word, as your example indicates. :)

[SilentCarto]

Frankly I think the solution most likely to result in a finished product would be a collaboration in which each person or group participating arranged to take a block of chapters and released in parallel as each was completed or, if enough participated and didn't drop out, as a simultaneous big-bang event. There's the downside that there'd be inhomogenous quality, and even barring that, the oddity of the changeover between segments, but at least there would be a product and there'd be a higher probability  that there'd still be an audience by the time it's done. Individual or small group production would also minimize the problem of players abandoning the project midstream.

While that's true, you kind of have to keep the same voices throughout. It's actually not unlike the show itself... you could have many writers, producers, and sound editors working in parallel, making the process as efficient as possible for the VAs, but they're still something of a bottleneck. I mean, there's no physical reason you couldn't use multiple actors per role, but it would be awfully confusing unless you had each character addressing each other by name just about every time.

If only they could somehow manage to pay the VAs to work on it full time...

[Icy Shake]

Frankly I think the solution most likely to result in a finished product would be a collaboration in which each person or group participating arranged to take a block of chapters and released in parallel as each was completed or, if enough participated and didn't drop out, as a simultaneous big-bang event. There's the downside that there'd be inhomogenous quality, and even barring that, the oddity of the changeover between segments, but at least there would be a product and there'd be a higher probability  that there'd still be an audience by the time it's done. Individual or small group production would also minimize the problem of players abandoning the project midstream.

While that's true, you kind of have to keep the same voices throughout. It's actually not unlike the show itself... you could have many writers, producers, and sound editors working in parallel, making the process as efficient as possible for the VAs, but they're still something of a bottleneck. I mean, there's no physical reason you couldn't use multiple actors per role, but it would be awfully confusing unless you had each character addressing each other by name just about every time.

If only they could somehow manage to pay the VAs to work on it full time...

I was talking strictly about an audiobook at that point, which wouldn't be quite as affected by the changeover due to speech tags and clearer context, but any possible clarity that that was the case was obscured by the embarrassingly bad construction of the post. For a radio drama, I entirely agree.

"And I think that from a word count/playtime standpoint, the end of chapter twenty five takes you to under two fifths of the way through the book, so even if he'd continued from 25 at the average rate he'd been going he wouldn't finish until around May 2015" should have been paragraph quoted above, not a non-sequitur component of my response to you.

[SilentCarto]

"And I think that from a word count/playtime standpoint, the end of chapter twenty five takes you to under two fifths of the way through the book, so even if he'd continued from 25 at the average rate he'd been going he wouldn't finish until around May 2015" should have been paragraph quoted above, not a non-sequitur component of my response to you.

I... don't know what this means. I quoted the paragraph I was responding to.

[SilentCarto]

Dear Princess Celestia,
I've spent the last few weeks in a computer simulation of an asylum. Well, I mean, it was just overnight, but it seemed like a few weeks to me. I'll bet Glory knows a good word for this. Anyway, today (or over the last couple of weeks, whatever) I learned that when somepony cares about you and tries their very best to help you, you have to meet them halfway.

It's not easy to ask for help. I like to think of myself as the one who gets hurt so others don't have to. But a two-hundred-year-old computer helped me realize that refusing the help that my friends offer doesn't protect them, it hurts them. It's the same as if I kicked P-21 for saving my ass in a fight, or threw Glory's cooking back in her face. In short, I've been a real jerk.

So what I learned is this: when you're scared to let somepony help, when you'd really rather just look away and not think about your problems, that's when you have to work the hardest to let them help you. You have to be brave enough to let yourself be weak.

I have a lot of apologies to make.

Your faithful student,
Blackjack

P.S. Hey, that actually sounded pretty deep, didn't it? I know, I'm shocked too.

...I'm worried I may still be in the computer.

[Icy Shake]

"And I think that from a word count/playtime standpoint, the end of chapter twenty five takes you to under two fifths of the way through the book, so even if he'd continued from 25 at the average rate he'd been going he wouldn't finish until around May 2015" should have been paragraph quoted above, not a non-sequitur component of my response to you.

I... don't know what this means. I quoted the paragraph I was responding to.

I'm apparently really out of it today. Let's just try the whole post again.

A reflection: May I just say how happy I am that this story was released in serial form? If it were actually published as a book series, we'd have been sitting on Black for close to a year before we got Birthday.

I agree with the serial form point, and would add that it also enables PH's episodic structure where in many ways the full-scale narrative is the continuous progression built over the course of pretty discrete segments. Granted, the same can be done within novel series or even in a single one, but I don't think I've seen anything that operated quite that way while also sticking to a single focal character and in near-continuous time.

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Oogh. I'd say yes in theory, but the sheer magnitude of the undertaking makes me tack on a giant asterisk that says, "If they can seriously commit to doing the entire story." I mean, Scorch Mechanic has been stalled out for over a year less than halfway through the original FOE, and PH is well over double that length.

A reflection: May I just say how happy I am that this story was released in serial form? If it were actually published as a book series, we'd have been sitting on Black for close to a year before we got Birthday.

I frankly think a radio play is too big of an undertaking to have any hope of completion, or, for that matter, proceeding very far at all. I think I'd be happier with a more limited version, essentially taking individual scenes or chapter segments and doing them independently of each other. And I think that from a word count/playtime standpoint, the end of chapter twenty five takes you to under two fifths of the way through the book, so even if he'd continued from 25 at the average rate he'd been going he wouldn't finish until around May 2015. [Okay, it wasn't a non-sequitur, but the placement didn't help clarify the later point.

I agree with the serial form point, and would add that it also enables PH's episodic structure where in many ways the full-scale narrative is the continuous progression built over the course of pretty discrete segments. Granted, the same can be done within novel series or even in a single one, but I don't think I've seen anything that operated quite that way while also sticking to a single focal character and in near-continuous time.

btw Project Horizons needs a radio play. who agrees?

Oogh. I'd say yes in theory, but the sheer magnitude of the undertaking makes me tack on a giant asterisk that says, "If they can seriously commit to doing the entire story." I mean, Scorch Mechanic has been stalled out for over a year less than halfway through the original FOE, and PH is well over double that length.

Alas, you're right. Using the time it takes the FOE radioplay to produce an episode (~6 months) as a base for how long a fan-group working in their spare time can produce a high-quality adaptation of a single chapter, it'll take approximately 32.5 years to get to where we are now in PH. This isn't accounting chapters that would need to be split into parts to create multiple episodes, and it isn't accounting for abridging (which the FOE radio play is really going to have to do), but it's still a massive endeavor.

Even an audiobook adaptation would be ridiculously hard (CrazedRambling only got to 19 before he was overcome with college, and that was after he got through the original)

As you say, even an audiobook is really hard; I had high hopes for CrazedRambling, and Scorch burned out/shifted his efforts after far less. Frankly I think the solution most likely to result in a finished productaudiobook would be a collaboration in which each person or group participating arranged to take a block of chapters and released in parallel as each was completed or, if enough participated and didn't drop out, as a simultaneous big-bang event. There's the downside that there'd be inhomogenous quality, and even barring that, the oddity of the changeover between segments, but at least there would be a product and there'd be a higher probability  that there'd still be an audience by the time it's done. Individual or small group production would also minimize the problem of players abandoning the project midstream.

In fact, that's how I've treated the Fallout Equestria audiobook: I use Scorch's up to the point it ends, since it's a somewhat higher quality production, then continue with CrazedRambling's. From what I've heard, of course, the existence of the overlap gave CR a chance to ascend the learning curve, which unfortunately wouldn't be a feature of the purely distributed model.

Oh, Somber, I hope you start feeling better and that the taxes work out and that the SSN thing doesn't go any further. Those are two things nobody needs, let alone coming at the same time.

Moving on to happier matters, I'll just say that until today the high point of my week probably involved a grammar discussion in which I thought about and retaught myself indirect objects for the first time in years, and that was blown away by reading Lucidity today. So thank you.

. . .

"comma after "roses"?"
…"enjoying the roses, in bloom or taking"?

Oops. Typed the wrong word there; it should have been after "taking""bloom": "There were others talking, laughing, enjoying the roses in bloom, or taking in the music on the stage."

[FeatherDust]

"There were others talking, laughing, enjoying the roses in bloom, or taking in the music on the stage."

Technically you don't have to do a comma before the or. It's American standard to use the "oxford comma" before the last element of a list, but in the UK it's standard to leave it out (with the conjunction acting as the element delimiter). There are good arguments for and against the Oxford Comma, and I'm not gonna jump into that holy war.

(By the way, Oxford Comma sounds like a really horrible superhero who corrects peoples' grammar.)

...

Meh. Commas. Too many rules.. Even leaving aside the Oxford debate, the one that always trips me up is when to use a comma with a conjunction and when not to. The trick being, use a comma when you're linking two statements but not when providing multiple paths through the sentence. Er.. that is to say, uh...

"There were some ponies walking, and others were sitting down." -- Use a comma. It's two thoughts ("There were some ponies walking." "Others were sitting down.") which you're linking with a conjunction.

"There were ponies laughing and singing." -- No comma. "There were ponies laughing" and "There were ponies singing", but they aren't independent phrases.

But then you'll get some convoluted sentence with conjunctions, alternatives, lists, and apositives all mixed up together, and I might as well just grab the punctuation shotgun, 'cause I'm out.

[Guest]

When writing fiction, one should know the rules as best as one can, but ignore them whenever they get in the way of your communication with the reader, IMO.

[OneMoreDaySK]

<i>*In a comic book narrator tone*</i>: The Oxford Comma, fighting his/her/its dreaded nemesis the Grammar Nazi!

Um... I'll just go now.

[Icy Shake]

Leaving aside the fact that I'm a staunch partisan on the side of the terminal serial comma, in this case it's a matter of stylistic consistency: the style used in PH is to employ it, just as its style is to use two spaces after terminal punctuation, not to capitalize following non-diegetic colons, and to use American quotation mark placement and double quotation marks for speech but British placement and single quotation marks for most other uses*.

*I don't know these are policy, but they're what I've observed and I don't think I've ever been told otherwise after making suggestions based on this set of assumptions.

[SilentCarto]

<i>*In a comic book narrator tone*</i>: The Oxford Comma, fighting his/her/its dreaded nemesis the Grammar Nazi!

Um... I'll just go now.

I... kind of want this to be a thing. I'm picturing Captain America and Red Skull with appropriately altered symbology...

("Surrender?! You think this punctuation on my head stands for 'question'?")

[Dutcher]

Ok quick dumb theory.
Is there any chance that Amadi is actually Orion?
I mean Discord said that they were fighting for a very long time.
Mabey Amadi is loyal to the EoS and trying to revive him?

Edit: almost forgot to say, the story is amazing and  one of the best i ever red.
Cant wait for the next chapter

[Silver136]

Ok quick dumb theory.
Is there any chance that Amadi is actually Orion?
I mean Discord said that they were fighting for a very long time.
Mabey Amadi is loyal to the EoS and trying to revive him?

Edit: almost forgot to say, the story is amazing and  one of the best i ever red.
Cant wait for the next chapter

Orion is the zebra that made a deal with the stars to make himself powerful right? If that's who you're talking about then yes, most of the evidence points towards him being the immortal zebra of legend.

[Scienza]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

[Silver136]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

[Dutcher]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

[Silver136]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

I'm of the opinion that she had recovered Folly and had promised to use that on her, but later recovered the star sword and decided to use it knowing without a doubt that it can destroy soul jars.


However I still see the idea of Snips soul magic entirely possible as well.

[Dutcher]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

I'm of the opinion that she had recovered Folly and had promised to use that on her, but later recovered the star sword and decided to use it knowing without a doubt that it can destroy soul jars.


However I still see the idea of Snips soul magic entirely possible as well.

Wait BJ lost it? i was sure she still had it.

[Silver136]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

I'm of the opinion that she had recovered Folly and had promised to use that on her, but later recovered the star sword and decided to use it knowing without a doubt that it can destroy soul jars.


However I still see the idea of Snips soul magic entirely possible as well.

Wait BJ lost it? i was sure she still had it.

Back when she was storming shadowbolt tower the sword fell off the edge (I do believe it was because her levitation imploded but I don't remember) so if it wasn't consumed by the mega spell I believe it's in the core.

[Dutcher]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

I'm of the opinion that she had recovered Folly and had promised to use that on her, but later recovered the star sword and decided to use it knowing without a doubt that it can destroy soul jars.


However I still see the idea of Snips soul magic entirely possible as well.

Wait BJ lost it? i was sure she still had it.

Back when she was storming shadowbolt tower the sword fell off the edge (I do believe it was because her levitation imploded but I don't remember) so if it wasn't consumed by the mega spell I believe it's in the core.

i was speaking about Folly since you said that Luna found it.
Still i guess its not hard for her to find some way to kill Rampage hell even the Tokomare might do it.
edit: Oh right Luna is in BJ body now  

[Silver136]

I just realized that Snips' soul-rending/removing magic is what Cogs promised to Rampage.

It could also be a star metal weapon. We know star metal rends soul jars, and BJs star sword went missing. I wouldn't be surprised if cogs had some drone come over with it having found it when it fell.

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

I'm of the opinion that she had recovered Folly and had promised to use that on her, but later recovered the star sword and decided to use it knowing without a doubt that it can destroy soul jars.


However I still see the idea of Snips soul magic entirely possible as well.

Wait BJ lost it? i was sure she still had it.

Back when she was storming shadowbolt tower the sword fell off the edge (I do believe it was because her levitation imploded but I don't remember) so if it wasn't consumed by the mega spell I believe it's in the core.

i was speaking about Folly since you said that Luna found it.
Still i guess its not hard for her to find some way to kill Rampage hell even the Tokomare might do it.
edit: Oh right Luna is in BJ body now  

Ah. Well Folly was lost way back before cyberization. Blackjack used it to sink the Celestia when she was blinded by shrapnel. It fell into the bottom of the ocean lost in the muck and wreckage.

[SilentCarto]

But she made the deal with Rampage back in Thunderhead where BJ still possessed the sword, perhaps she was lying?

She ripped chunks out of the Tokomare to build supports to shore up the cavern. I think she can make a starmetal knife any time she needs it.

Ah. Well Folly was lost way back before cyberization. Blackjack used it to sink the Celestia when she was blinded by shrapnel. It fell into the bottom of the ocean lost in the muck and wreckage.

Shoo be doo.

(Okay, that was smug. Point is, Pisces and Capricorn primarily work as aquatic salvagers, and I don't think they'd let a fresh wreck lay around for long before they started scooping up all the awesome tech the Rangers kept on board. And any odd, large-caliber pistols that may or may not have fallen into the mud at the bottom of the bay.)

[Somber]

Folly will make a reappearance.

66 is... sigh... bleugh... some folks said it was okay so far but I dunno... u.u

I really wanted the story finished by chapter 70 but now I dunno about that either.

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