The Twelve Labours: General Discussion

[shylarah]

@PlatinumSkink Try going to ACEN, man. I've been nothing but busy all week, since I'm visiting family and friends I see twice a year, then heading to the convention. =P But there'll be another nine days after to write, so we should be good.

[PlatinumSkink]

My personal opinion is that this seems to be way more difficult than the last labour. I say without actually understanding the last labour. I mean, with the previous labour, at least I could whip up something amusing that could still have an interesting ending. This one... this one will be extremely hard to write while still maintaining that standard quality of good story-telling. How do you even write something that the reader will find interesting with this basis? I'll have to spend a while on that. This may be the hardest and most depressing one yet.

Edit: *three minutes later* ... *ping* ... I could do THAT... Oh, well... Heh...

[mdk]

I smell a very very long one coming. As in, I started work immediately and I've got four pages down. Probably adding more before the night's out...... this is an epic labor and I really wanna clear it.

Only downside is, if I make the length I'm envisioning, that's gonna leave very little time for editing and clean-up and prose-ification. Less big words. But that's worth it, if I'm doing what I think I'm doing....... very excited.

next day edit -- this is either amazingly bad or it has potential. I can't tell which.

[Blitz]

*appears suddenly*

Interesting Labor, this one is. Or is it Labour? I'm not British. IT'S A FREE INTERNET!

Er, but yea. Blitz gon' be craffin' up summin real nice 'n' purty fer dis here lay-bur. _{I hope.}

...I'll be starting tomorrow.

EDIT: Oh, I just knew it was Labour. Oh well.

EDIT2: Oh my god. I have a really simple idea and it might just work. I just don't know if I have the gall to do it. Eeeeeeeeep.

...Ok I'm just gonna go now bye omg

[mdk]

4500 words in. It still feels like I'm just getting started..... but I'm leaving town on Friday, so really this has to be ready to go by Thursday. I'm getting past the uncomfortable part and getting TO the juicy stuff, but I think I've made you people some very interesting characters, dare I say, not like anything I've read around here (for better or for, more likely, worse).

But when the juicy stuff really gets going, it's gonna be insane. If I do it right. I'm really worried that this is an entirely flawed concept but at this point I'm just gonna see it through to the end regardless. And for once, if I fail the challenge, I *think* it'll be because the writing sucks, instead of me just flailing wildly off the Labor guidelines.

[PlatinumSkink]

I have a plan. I believe it more or less completes the challenge requirements. Not sure if it'll be an interesting read, but it'll definitely be PlatinumSkink certified out there. Yupp.

[Holmishire]

Well, I've a general idea for what to do with my entry.

But I shan't start writing until I finish those RPGC reviews! Only way I'll ever get those done, and I oftimes work better under pressure anyways.

@mdk, it's a shame we won't be able to benefit from your normally flawless prose. I hope the story will make up for it.

[Blitz]

...but I think I've made you people some very interesting characters, dare I say, not like anything I've read around here (for better or for, more likely, worse).

@mdk

I can name two types of characters that I never have seen on any level here... It'd be interesting to see if your story features these characters.

[mdk]

<Snipped quote by mdk>

I can name two types of characters that I never have seen on any level here... It'd be interesting to see if your story features these characters.

@Blitz

Dunno. I'm, like, out there right now. This is some stupidly heavy shit and if I was half as smart as I think I am, I'd find a much easier way to tell this story. This is a stupid thing I'm doing. But also, I can barely tear myself away to eat, so...... ugh, such mixed feelings. Don't get your hopes too high though, I'm pretty sure everyone is going to hate this.

[mdk]

Great progress today. One of my characters is surprising me and adding a dimension to the ending -- I think it's good, you'll all be the judge of that. If the pace keeps up I might have time to do a LITTLE cleanup...... but either way I think I'm gonna have a laundry-list of 'did this aspect work' questions for anyone with the patience to read the whole thing. Which I imagine is going to be a small number..... it's not exactly fireworks right off the bat. Meh. Anyway I feel good about it right now.

[PlatinumSkink]

My entry is getting longer than I intended. Now, let's see. As I was writing, I realized a little detail that I think that this story may fail the labour for.

Then I reread the challenge parameters, and it doesn't actually actively specifically state that this isn't allowed, even if it might be supposed to be implied and so understood by anyone who reads it, so with that it should still technically be okay, right? XD

[Blitz]

Same with mine... It was kind of like how with Holmishire's TTL3 entry, his character's goal was maintaining his humanity not collecting souls with his sword. (I just recently re-read the old entries, that's why I remember this). So anyway, yeah. Mine may need some deeper reading???? Idk lol

[mdk]

....shit.

I'm making amazing progress and super happy about the story, but I don't know if I'm going to get as far as I need to. Lots to do.... gonna see how far I get tomorrow, since things are really starting to pick up, Idunno, might surprise myself. But uh.... heads up to all readers, I'm sitting on 14k words in three days. I don't think I've ever done that much that quickly before. If these characters don't resonate with you the way they're resonating with me, then uh..... this is going to be an absolutely brutal read. I mean Melville, 'how to skin a whale for fifty pages' brutal. And if I don't get enough down tomorrow, then I'm gonna be in scramble mode on Thursday since I leave town on Friday. Scramble mode would be a monumentally bad thing in this case.

The struggle is real. If you catch me in Spam then please kick my ass back to the drawing board, I'll thank you for it.

[mdk]

Wellp. I had a really good thing going, but in the interest of time and having *some* length-wise mercy on the poor reviewers (sorry @Terminal), I've had to speed things along rather suddenly. You'll know the spot when you hit it -- it's the four fucking pages of solid exposition in the middle of an otherwise decently-paced narrative.

Mostly in the interest of time, because you know how much mercy I have. With any luck I'll actually finish tomorrow and have a little edit time, but I'm not holding my breath.

[PlatinumSkink]

@mdk I'll partly be looking forward to it. XD

[@normal post directed at nobody] So. I'm mildly proud of my entry. It's not necessarily a master-piece, but I like it. I think, from my general experience with submitting entries (which I dare claim I have a significant amount of), that this should be a mildly entertaining read. I'm also done way before the deadline, which partly gives me no excuse to have grammatical errors or misspellings or anything in my text. Whelp. Better re-read it once a day before finally submitting on the final day. Haha.

[mdk]

Done.

Ish.

I wrapped it up a little early which gives me time to MAYBE address the gigantic bothersome section towards the end that I hate.... but fixing that means a WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLE lot more writing, and honestly, I'm spent. 26k words in like four days.... Obviously the writing suffered a bit, especially towards the end, but overall I'm happy with the concept and more-or-less-okay with the result, as first drafts go. Desperately need people to tell me their reactions to everything, before I can really nail down my feelings.... I should shut up and stop spamming the thread.

I need a fuckin' beer.

But, it's done. Basically. My fingers hurt. Damn it, okay, shutting up.

[Blitz]

Twenty... Um... Twenty-six... Thousand? WORDS?

I'm only at sixteen thousand... characters... WITH SPACES.

[PlatinumSkink]

*private chuckle*

[mdk]

Twenty... Um... Twenty-six... Thousand? WORDS?

I'm only at sixteen thousand... characters... WITH SPACES.

@Blitz

I mean yeah, but remember a lot of my words probably suck.

[Gwynbleidd]

<Snipped quote by Blitz>

I mean yeah, but remember a lot of my words probably suck.

@mdk

I may not be entering this one (unless I get a surprise in thanks to motivation) but... I'll be the judge of that (well, Terminal will be but you know what I mean).

I'll also leave the verbal termination to Terminal, he be good like that.