The PPC Posting Board - Latest posts

Mind, I've been trying to sort internet issues at my house—we're in the middle of an ice storm and connection will randomly drop sometimes. I guess I'll open my island for you and we'll see what happens?

Netflix is making a TV series and feature film based on Redwall!

This isn't the first time there's been an attempt at bringing Redwall to screens, but the previous goes were, er... let's be charitable and say "of their time". With Netflix money we might get something interesting and good out of it! =]

I know there's quite a lot of Redwall fanbeings around these parts, so I thought I'd let y'all know. =]

Down to UK-evening - probably anything past 10pm GMT is pushing it. Prod me on the Board or by email and we'll hunt the Switch down.

We got access to terraforming about 4 days ago, so my time is currently "ARGH waterfall go where I want you to!"

hS

I haven't really been feeling very talkative lately, at least not on the Board. No excuse though - this is the PPC, and I'm an oldbie now. Officially. I got my Secret Terrifying Oldbie Agenda in the post this morning. That means, to me at least, I should be posting interesting stuff for people to talk about to spur Board discussion. It's not an opinion I expect anyone to share necessarily, but I still feel kinda bad about that.

Also, while I'm here: hS, I have yet to marshal and organise my thoughts on The Thing You Sent Me, but I'm getting there. If you like, I can ask my mum if she knows any Tudor specialists who could help with the counterfactual history bits to make it more true to life. =]

Since the PPC inspiration has struck again, I'm writing a new mission in the second Fatal Frame game's world. Fatal Frame is a Japanese horror game franchise about fighting ghosts by using a special camera that can repel them by taking photos of them. They're very good, if slightly squicky in some ways (mostly implications of... less than wholesome relationships).

Now, the fic I'm missioning misspelled a canonical Fatal Frame 2 name, so it created a mini. As far as I can tell I'm the only one who's written any missions in this continuum, so I thought I'd ask what the proper procedure would be. The Fatal Frame franchise doesn't have any monsters it could mini-fy, only ghosts of humans. But the second game has the Kusabi, a one-hit kill ghost who's one of the boss battles, and more monsterlike in the way he looks and behaves than any of the other game villains. I figured he'd be the best choice for making a mini. Here's his Wikia page: https://fatalframe.fandom.com/wiki/Kusabi [EDIT: this is a horror game page, so beware of some disturbing imagery/storytelling if you check it out.]

What's the consensus, should I go ahead and make a mini-Kusabi? I'd love to have my agents adopt one. Also, the sight of one of the game characters leading a tiny Kusabi around by the hand instead of his little sister is a very good mental image I'd like to use in my mission.

P.S.: If we're on the topic of video games, I might also write a mission in the Silent Hill continuum if I find a bad enough badfic. Would Pyramid Head be a suitable contender for a mini? He's easily the most recognizable monster in the series.

I'm still waiting for Midnight's verdict.

There would be multiple ways to do it. Off the top of my head, one could add a bit of activated charcoal powder, squid ink (works with pasta!), or plain old food coloring to the dough. There are probably other options, too--heck, black rice exists. Assuming anyone might make flour out of it, you could use that. I don't know what was used in what you linked, though--even if I could read it, or had a minute to feed it through a translator, it doesn't look like there's a recipe in the text. Could be wrong, though!

~Z

It's very reassuring to hear that you did enjoy this mission, even if it could use some improvement. I'm personally not that happy with it myself (you're entirely right about the lack of analysis - I wasn't at the height of writing inspiration when I wrote this, and I didn't quite remember the fic itself enough to rewrite by the time I came around to posting it), but my insecurity about it has shrunk a little thanks to your feedback. The "that's the sound a horse makes" bit is one of my better jokes, I think. : D Thank you for the encouragement about my writing journey. Hopefully I'll be able to live up to my standards a little better in the future. And I can absolutely relate to the current events being difficult to adjust to at first. I wrote my favorite piece of my own PPC writing in quarantine, personally, but at first it really was a challenge to get used to the new situation. I wish you a lot of luck and inspiration in continuing with your writing, too. :)

No, it's not the black bread you think of when you hear "black bread", this is black bread, as in totally coal black. I'm still puzzled as to how that can be made.

Hi!

Yeah, I feel that. And am hopeful that the feeling of a never-ending list of tasks to be done will fade now that I've, well, done a whole bunch of them. That would be nice.

Glad to hear you've reached the point of having some more time and energy for fun things :) May it continue!

~Zzzz, amused at "hSleepy" and slowly wondering if other people's signatures can lend themselves to similar adaptation

I don't know, Mirage...I opened up the mission to remind myself what it was, and am now skimming, and I keep laughing aloud at bits. Things like "okay, so Elrond and his canonical kids have green hair, then?" and the concept of Elrond ruling all the Elves in Middle-earth with, apparently, no objections from the people who likely would object (including Elrond himself!) I'm familiar with that feeling of suddenly realizing that your older writing isn't quite your style anymore and trying to move forward without entirely being sure how to do it; in my case, I found my writing style had changed and I wanted to write new things rather than continue the old, but was struggling to come up with new ideas and sustain confidence in their quality. The solution has basically been...time and self-reflection and continuing to write this and that as I figured out where to go? And then the ongoing situation upended things a bit, including writing-wise, and I adopted a policy of "write anything that interests or amuses you even if it's very silly" because, well, I spent a good bit of March and a chunk of April barely managing to write anything at all (going into lockdown and having to suddenly figure out how to order everything online and generally just reshape most of how you do things will do that, as it turns out). At this point...I'm not entirely back to what I was doing pre-March 2020, in large part because the themes of my original fiction project of the time still don't quite appeal to me in the midst of all this, but I'm more in the stages of "let me finish up some of these things I began last year and share them, maybe" than "write whatever new idea shows up and amuses you". And...behold more self-reflection, I guess? Though the type I was talking about earlier was more to do with slowly analyzing how my writing style had changed and using that to try to start building new ideas. Anyway. I think the point of this was to say that I sympathize, and to share my version of it in case there's something helpful there? (With a little detour into "hm, where am I at in 2021, this is useful information for me"?) I don't know. It's early. Hopefully you got something from it.

A more specific comment, for fun:

Apparently he had met the Sue at an archery contest some decades ago, since she was as talented with a bow (of course) as any elf or god.

“Ah, yes, all those gods roaming the streets of Middle-earth,” Melissa said, and May chuckled.

I am quite likely repeating a beta comment, but hey, I suppose Maiar could potentially be considered gods? Demi-gods? Although, uh, I just can't see most of them taking an interest in archery. I mean, Gandalf and Saruman facing off in an archery contest would be hilarious, but I can't see it happening. Perhaps she's just bringing in the Valar--if I remember correctly, Tulkas and/or Nessa might have something to do with hunting/war that could include archery?

Anyway. Overall, good luck, Mirage :) It may be frustrating right now, but it's always good to grow as a writer (and, iirc, age-wise you're around a time when it tends to happen, so you're not alone. If anything, you're probably following in grand tradition!). I doubt your old writing is as bad as you might think (even if you've reached a point where it makes you cringe), and I'm sure you'll write great things in the future. Just keep at it! :)

~Z

PS: I gave the rest of the mission a quick (re)read too. I can kind of see what you mean (possibly down, in part, to beta comments I would make note but possibly didn't think of at the time?), but at the same time, I did keep laughing out loud. "Iniih - the sound a horse makes?" got me, for instance, and the writing quality itself is fine. Most of what I was tilting my head at was...pacing, a bit, and what feels like some missed opportunities for analysis/remarks about canon. Maybe there could be more description of the agents' general movements/interactions with their surroundings? Though that might just be a casualty of semi-skimming.

Anyway. I can see why you might now feel there's room for improvement, but you really aren't starting from nothing, especially with the comedy. Do some reflection, think about what you want to change/enhance (or what already has changed!) about the way you write, and I think you'll come out the other side stronger. Quite possibly you're already emerging. Either way, I think you'll be okay :)

PPS: Also, it's very much okay to scrap a bunch of stories! I've done it a number of times, including but not limited to an entire arc for Jacques (the concept got thoroughly reworked a few times and then made kind of obsolete; the current plan is to fold the characters and some pieces of the plot into what replaced it, I think) and just about my entire planned first set of ~5 missions back in 2013 :D I had a plan! It was going to use my permission piece characters and everything, and introduce others as I went! I had fics and a timeline and everything! And...then I think I went off and started writing a bunch of stuff for Dawn, or something like that, and RL took over my timing, and then I brought the Reader in earlier than planned, and, well, suffice it to say that there's a whole set of events planned for 2013 that will never be written. Although, now that I'm talking about it, I'm a bit curious to see if it could maybe work folded into an interlude, maybe fill in some more pieces for Brenda and Charlie (don't recognize them? That was my permission pair and I had plans, I tell you) and probably also Edgar and Agen----t and Dawn...hmm. We'll see. Not a priority, though, given I have other stuff I'm finishing/trying to finish. Anyway, tangent aside, scrapping missions happens, and can even work out for the better. If you're feeling guilty about it, or something, there's no need :)

...I can open my island for you (and anyone else interested!) to come visit. Like I said, it's a bit of a lot of a mess right now, but I've got fruit and I have some nice DIY recipes I've been saving for others to pick up.

Next chapter should be out in a few years, going off my usual rate of actually doing writing projects.

And yes, you're right.

Still trying to figure out how this all works... I'm not sure these dodos have genuine pilots' licenses!

hS

Interesting lineup.

…and with that, I should have reached 9 posts

Friend code is SW-4781-0062-9625, which should be named Huinesoron; David down on the island, but I wouldn't be surprised if something had gotten scrambled.

hS

Huh. Guess my honor classes weren't working me that hard until lately.

And I surprisingly don't have any homework, unless it's on a different site, which I'll check.

I'll try and be more active posting-wise. I was planning on replying to the AC thread even though I only have NL.

Kittyauthor

Except for the cast list.

I noticed that a few stories that seemed to belong to the End of the Beginning series aren't there, but are on the Non-Missions page under Becomings (and are Gdocs rather than being hosted on-site). Most of them are Selene stories, IIRC. I guess that's because they became canon?

Also, while the Rest of the Beginning hub exists and I updated the link, I think all the stories there appear on the main End of the Beginning title page. Not sure how you want to handle that.

Also also, at least some of the banners still link to Webs.

~Neshomeh

I'm really glad that you liked these pieces - I'm slightly more partial to them than my older writing. And I suppose we'll see what the future brings.

Just here to say that I like what I read of this mission and the Interlude - so wherever you think you'll end up in your writing next, I can agree it's going to be a good choice!

Mind, my island is currently undergoing some major renovations—I've recently started bulldozing the place to rebuild it from the ground up so it's not very nice to look at yet, but the museum is nearly complete!

Friend code is SW-0286-9528-2307. I'm Iximaz on the Switch, Fern in ACNH. :)

Edit: I've got all the different fruits up for grabs as well.

Here goes.

Since I'm scrapping the mission this interlude was originally attached to, I figured I could post it on its own so it wouldn't get lost to time - I like it slightly better than most of my writing I've been complaining about. Cicada gave me feedback on it sometime last year and I took a look at it again before posting, so I figured we'd be good to go.

Warning for language, but it's SFW and SFB otherwise.

Enjoy! ^_^

In keeping with our habit of being late to any trend, Team HuineLyn got the lockdown classic Animal Crossing just this Christmas. Our island of Aeaea (^_^) is festooned with pears, apples, and cherries - but our friendly neighbourhood lion keeps giving me recipes involving a weird fruit called "Or-anges". I talked to the airport staff, but they tell me I need to look in Ternet...

So does anyone have the game, and a friend code or whatever it is that they'd be willing to share? We'll reciprocate once we've, er, actually set up the whole online thing, but we don't want to start until we have somewhere to go.

hS, wondering who this Pea Ché the koala keeps going on about is.