Zeroth

~DAWN OF HEROES~

~Zetta Man~

---

Location: Near Metropolitan Oval, Bronx, NY
Interactions: @Einherjar 906

---

The supernatural flames disappeared, and as Zetta Man held the criminal at arm's length---now minus the extra lengths of their own crystalline limbs---he watched the fashion-abominable man duck into hiding. The older hero blew air through his nose, then looked around.

No one else nearby. So only one source for those flames. And considering how distinct an ability it was---unusual color, the ability to cut instead of burn---it only matched up to one registered hero he knew of.

I'll see if the Association can contact him for me later. He turned back to the villain, who was trying to "grow" new crystals to replace their damaged limbs.

"I advise you to stop here. Look, I know a lawyer who takes villain defense cases. He's helped other people turn their lives around. If you--"

A sword made of green diamond came for his neck, and he let go as he twisted away. With a growl, he brought his Zetta Field closer to his body and increased the charge. His durability increased further than it had against Nimbus's flames. Again, the criminal tried to decapitate him.

The blade snapped in half over his skin. But, if that had been a civilian, or a police officer, or even some other hero without this kind of defense...

Zetta Man's fist lashed out like a boxer. He struck the crystal villain directly where the solar plexus would be, over their shell. The blow shattered the entire construct, sending the superhuman inside tumbling out of the back of their broken suit.

"You. Cannot. Beat me." The hero took a step towards the villain, clenching his other fist. But before he raised his hand again, sirens blared behind him.

"Eyes on suspect! Zetta Man has him in custody!" The hero gave his opponent a very hard glare. The criminal finally raised both hands in surrender. The police ran in as soon as they saw Zetta Man step aside, and in moments had the perp on the ground and cuffed.

"He can grow crystals with the hardness and sharpness of diamond from his skin." the hero said to an officer, who nodded and spoke into their radio. Law enforcement had developed a few methods of at least temporarily disabling superhuman abilities, so Zetta Man trusted they had it in hand from here. "The Chief has my number. If I don't hear from him, I'll try to get my statement to you as soon as possible."

So saying, he lifted into the air, and was soon above the buildings and streets. Then the Zetta Field's sound transmission crackled in his ear: the Hero Association's frequency.

"All avail...heroes! Villain atta...in progr... on HAHQ, Brooklyn branch! Believed...related to...operation--" Zetta Man placed two fingers on his throat, adjusting his own frequency, and spoke through the same radio signal.

"This is Zetta Man! I'm currently free in the Bronx, ETA less than ten minutes!" With the field on full blast, he launched into the distance...

---

Location: Near Brooklyn Hero Association
Interactions: @Sky Blue@McNephelim@Timuir

---

As Nitro struggled to hold his own power in check and prepared to strike the villainous mecha, it seemed Keeper, and the Fooly/Cooly Twins were at a loss as to which actions to take. But, if any of them happened to look skyward, they might see a shockwave rip through a faraway cloud an instant before a distant sonic boom reached their ears...

Wannabe Writer Needs Help

@Charley You're right lol, I'm not a big fan of King as a person, and some of his stories have rubbed me the wrong way. But I've definitely taken cues from him in the past simply because, even without his coke-binging, the man still produces a book every 3 to 6 months like clockwork.

But that excerpt was very reassuring, and makes me feel a lot better about the struggle! Thank you again!

@mickilennial I agree with this completely! Like I pointed out in the OP, I know I'm not going to make some big "paradigm shattering" masterpiece that changes the world or starts some kind of movement (and given history's track record with that thing, I definitely have no desire to ever do so). Thank you for your encouragement! I share your view in that I've been trying to break things down to "just get it done," whether that's one short story, one chapter, or some days even just one paragraph at a time.

@ERode I did read the rambling, so there was a point to it! Yeah, self-publishing/serializing on something like Royal Road is one of my goals at the moment, I've been trying to keep myself on track towards building a large enough buffer that I wouldn't be struggling to get chapters out on a regular basis. And yes, I'm certainly trying to avoid being "preachy" or letting the message overcome the story. Thank you for your help!

smithcasts

@LegendBegins Got another one for you, alexsharmaa01

Thanks for staying on top of things!

Wannabe Writer Needs Help

@Charley Thank you, I really appreciate the encouragement! I really love the way you worded that feeling, "like waking up from a surreal dream," and I can definitely understand that sense of an immersive trance when I've got a good flow going.

But, if you'll forgive me, I think I'm still searching for something that's a little more..."concrete?" I feel like I understand your advice to some degree: "I should finish the draft, and once it's fully fleshed out on the paper I can look back and see what themes have emerged out of it. Then I can rewrite and edit while solidifying that theme and connecting the different parts of the story to it. But I've got to buckle down and slog through the writing first and have a full story on the page."

However, I'm still left trying to figure out how to try and entice a reader to "care" about what's going on within the story. I've had others tell me "make your main characters suffer," and "use strong emotional language, because people can't always relate to a fictional scenario, but everyone remembers feeling a strong emotion like anger." But is there anything else at all that might keep a reader from deciding, "I don't really care enough to see how this ends" and putting the book down?

I know some people just aren't going to like my books just like there are certain authors I don't like reading, but I guess I'm just trying to make sure everything I'm doing is "structurally sound," I guess? Like, eliminate all the logical reasons someone wouldn't like a story that aren't purely based on personal preference. If they read it and decide "this isn't my cup of tea," I still want to do everything I can to see that they finish it in the first place in order to make that informed decision.

Wannabe Writer Needs Help

So like a lot of us in the narrative roleplaying community, I've made numerous attempts to write my own stuff. Novels, short stories, tabletop campaigns, etc. Recently, though, a recurring problem I've been wrestling with really just has me doubting, on the whole, my ability to ever make any of it successful. I've always felt that I have a lot of strengths in different areas of writing. I feel confident in worldbuilding, designing stuff like magic systems, making characters, and writing direct action (like arguments or combat). I think my ability to describe things and pace events is okay.

But when it comes to an "overall plot," especially one that has a strong meaning or theme, I feel like I'm falling short. I always reach a point in my writing where I'm asking myself "Why would the reader care about these characters? Or about what they're doing? And what value does this story really have to anyone who's not me?" I can sometimes come up with smaller scale plots, that basically boil down to "Character A wants something really badly, but can't have it for reasons. So they do XYZ about it." But then, when I start trying to string those plots together with some kind of overarching structure, it feels really slapdash even if I try to keep all the events focused around the same thing.

I don't feel like I can really "grab" a reader, or give them an experience that leaves them with the "just finished a book blues." I don't feel like there's any "point" to reading a particular story I, specifically, wrote versus any number of other stories out there on the shelves. I'm not sure "why" I'm writing these things beyond just a "wouldn't it be cool if..." idea that pops into my head. Like, I'm not trying to change the world with some ground-shaking philosophy or anything, but I feel like there needs to be some kind of strong message that serves as a kind of glue to really make everything else in the story fit together.

Has anybody else experienced this struggle, or gotten past it? Those of you who have successfully published your writing, or at least finished a draft or two, do you have any advice? Anyone else feel free to chime in of course, but I'd be especially interested to hear from those who have become "pros," in a sense.

~DAWN OF HEROES~

I was gonna wait for a few others to post before I posted again, but where's everyone gone?

smithcasts

@LegendBegins And another one, DTC Express.

I don't know if I'll be seen in any particular light for saying this, but I may have a suggestion to significantly cut down on spam traffic. A particular website I've used in the past for memes and such has an admin that's fairly open about some of the stuff they do system-side, and they revealed at one point that, based on their detection methods, they believed 90+% of bot, spam, and fake-ad traffic was coming from India and China (possibly a few others, I don't remember). I'm not sure how they did it, but they implemented some method of automatically banning, or just not allowing, any and all accounts/IP addresses from those countries and now the problem is quite literally non-existent on that site.

I don't know if RPG has any members from those countries who would be affected, but it seems to me it'd be a pretty clear cut way to give you guys some relief from the constant battle. These seem to be popping up a lot more often than they used to.

smithcasts

@LegendBegins User Astrobaba, another spambot

~DAWN OF HEROES~

~Zetta Man~

---

Location: Near Metropolitan Oval, Bronx, NY
Interactions: @Einherjar 906

---

"Right now, you can still turn things around!" Zetta Man shouted. Taking the wallets instead of raiding the teller drawers probably meant they'd gotten less than a thousand dollars. If they gave up peacefully, they might get off with only petty theft or a class-1 misdemeanor despite the assaults. "But if you run from the police, or attack anyone, you're going--"

The garish shirt caught his attention first---a civilian! The thug couldn't be allowed to endanger anyone else. He pushed faster. The thief's lead had shrunk to less than a hundred feet, and in an instant he was within arm's reach---

A fiery blast rocked the ground beneath the criminal, and the conflagration writhed around them like living serpents! Zetta Man veered off, twisting against the recoil, his thoughts racing. No one else was here besides that civilian--and no non-hero/villain would act that nonchalant upon seeing a super-battle, no matter how many times it's happened to them.

"Hold your fire!" Zetta Man shouted, his voice booming like thunder. Pieces of the crystalline shell were splitting apart, from the extremities inward as the blue flames circled the villain like a cloud of angry wasps. The blue-and-orange suited hero reached into the eruption, grabbing the villain by their armored shoulder to try and yank them out of the fiery column. In the process, his super suit---normally impervious to your average mugger's knife or box cutter--was slashed several times from the forearm down to his fingertips. His Zetta Field, focused over his skin, shielded him as if his body was wrapped in steel, yet even so thin red lines traced over his flesh...

smithcasts

User smithcasts spamming those magic spell threads. This is apparently a consistent thing now, though I don't know if it's possible to IP block wherever they're coming from or something of that nature to prevent new bots.