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And also, you need to stop posting Fate-related stuff outside of fate_salt.

One: I need to stop bringing my depression and anxieties to the chat. To that end, I’ve muted the generic salt channel (where such things are usually discussed); you’re not going to hear me bitching and moaning any more.

Two: some subjects are simply inappropriate to bring into the PPC chat. None of my lewd or explicit thoughts belong on the Discord server, even if mentioned obliquely or censored.

Three: I need to recognize when a conversation has ended, and figure out how not to stick so hard on a subject when everyone else is on a new one.

In short, I need to be a lot more careful about what thoughts and feelings I present in the public space of the Discord server and which ones I need to keep in more private discussions.

I fully intend for many more Sprout references going forward. Well, technically they'll be Bud references, at least until Lyndsey is eight.

First off, thanks for the typos, I'll be correcting those in the morning. Also thanks for the interlude/mission feedback too, I've been a little in two minds about it, so it's nice to get the feedback. I've got plans for it in the next mission too, wasn't sure if I'd keep it up after that.

Rebecca is Monty's daughter, she did appear once or twice in my first run as a nurse, but she was only ever a bit part so you can be forgiven for forgetting her after possibly eight years since her last appearance. I have vague plans for a Monty cameo at some point, but given he's in his late sixties now he will likely remain firmly retired.

In terms of the easily observable formal rules, Voyd's had a tendency to wander past the line of acceptable levels of sex talk and similar NSFW things, even if it's all duly spoilered so people aren't necessarily exposed to it. Previous attempts to address this have only been somewhat effective, hence this thread. Consensus also indicates, however, that this behavior (libido oversharing and similar) isn't malicious or (given context) a bannable offense, but that it's something we'd like to see stopped and so we're clearly laying out tho problem here.

More broadly, there are aspects of Voyd's behavior that, while not against Da Rules, have caused several people to be uncomfortable with him and/or have had negative impacts on the community. These aspects include tending to try to force the conversation topic, seeming difficulty listening to what other people are saying, trouble changing his behavior in response to feedback, and a pattern of responding to certain pushback with extreme self-deprecation that frequently shifts the conversation to trying to reassure him out of that state. These things aren't being done maliciously, nor do they make Voyd a bad person. They do indicate that there are social (or mental) skills that Voyd should work on improving so that both he and the community at large have better experiences.

A lot of said work, if undertaken, will need to happen elsewhere, since the PPC isn't a group therapy session.

There's also significant support for the idea that Voyd should take a break of some kind from the chat to reflect on the situation and/or take some steps to address people's concerns (and since all the details of that would be Voyd's call, there haven't been proposals).

Please feel free to jump in if it looks like I missed something important.

Agree with this very much.

I confess to a certain bewilderment over why anyone would stick an Axon into a fanfic; they're not the most thrilling creatures ever. :) Given what's currently on my own writing schedule, it was actually very helpful to see a Crossover mission, so thank you!

But we all know the mission is a sideshow to the main attraction: casual mention of the Sprout Movement! It's incredible and I love it. ^_^ Small children in the PPC have charmed me for a while now, and Marcus' interactions with Lady are great.

hS, still not got a reviewing head

Nice! I’m really enjoying these mission + interlude pairs. It’s fun getting a feel for what normally off-screen characters continue doing during the “main action.” (Not that either story feels less “main” than the other.) Urge to plagiarize . . . rising

I feel so bad for poor Wallis and Steven! At least hair and fur grow back eventually. And I suppose it would be worth it to remove all that goop, though Wallis doesn’t seem to have agreed. As a zookeeper, I appreciate that you portrayed the cute little fluffball wreaking havoc. Too many people equate “cute” with “friendly.” I also like that the first thing you put the creepy monster lady through is getting her a check-up with doctors. Just goes to show how accepting and accommodating HQ is to any creature under the sun(s)!

Nice job showing a dead canon getting dropped off from the nurses’ perspective, for once. It’s too easy to forget the work that goes on in Medical when we mostly just see characters getting shoved through one portal and coming out another later. And having a well-known character like Legolas just collapse in as a corpse really drives home the stressful situations the nurses must have dropped on them with no notice throughout their shifts. Rebecca was right not to be amused by Steven’s crack about not noticing how hectic her day was.

Speaking of whom, I assume Rebecca is related to Monty in some way? I don’t recall Monty having family, but maybe I’ve just forgotten. I also like seeing the Sprouts making a comeback! Yay!

I was amused by the gag where Shawn used the TARDIS to meet back up with Sasha. I was getting a little concerned about Sasha’s radio silence, so I’m glad the fic provided a way for Shawn to keep monitoring the canons and still check up on her. (I guess the static interference was due to two Shawns being active at the same time, and their doubled equipment getting confused?)

Ready for typos?

Both stories have a sentence that mentions Shawn being “wide eyed.” But when used as an adjective like this, it needs to get a hyphen in the middle to become a single word: “wide-eyed”

There are also a few instances of “FicPsyche” across both stories, but the abbreviation is “FicPsych.”

One line in “Cleaning Avoidance” seems to be missing something, and feels like a run-on:
“’Who knows it may prove useful, although I doubt it.’”
I’m not sure if you were intending more of a “Who knows? It may prove useful . . .” or a “Who knows if it may prove useful . . .” But I’ll leave that up to you.

Also in “Cleaning Avoidance,” I noticed it never mentions Steven leaving the call, so it feels like he’s just left hanging on the line while Sasha and Shawn get ready for the mission. “50 Ways” reveals that Sasha hung up on him, but that doesn’t come across in “Cleaning” at all.

—doctorlit also liked the term “Things-That-Go-Bing”

So I've put the cave on the northern tip of the cove, where the cliffs looked highest. This is roughly what it looks like:

(This is actually a different headland on the far side of Nepoui, which is why the landscape is completely different. But the geology is going to be similar.)

hS

You said 'one of the beaches (I never ended up specifying which)'. Has the RP scene been using the named bays in the area, or specifying them in some other way? I only stuck pins in Mueo, Nekoro, and Poya a few days ago, so if they need to move to account for what already exists I'm happy to do that. :)

hS

And like many lovely things, it is also difficult. ^_~

Okay. Forgive the patchwork map, but:

The three yellow icons are the local beaches: Mueo Bay, Nekoro Bay, and Poya Bay. Yellow and blue lines are paths down to them (yellow exist on OpenStreetMap, blue are plausible additions; 'blue' may be 'purple', forgive my colourblindness). Green thick lines are roughly the outlines of the mangrove swamps.

The two white loops are the best I can find for your cove. In the west, we have a hill right on the seashore, and right on Mueo Bay. There could plausibly be a cave in that hillside, which could plausibly be cliff-y. The downside is that the 'cove' is just the mouth of the Mueo, and is mangroves on most of the other sides.

In the east, there's a long stretch of what do appear to be cliffs running down the headland, and towards the top is a (semi-artificial, semi-open) cove-ish thing. It's not perfect (the geology really isn't right), but it's plausible.

My problem with that one is that it's 2 km down the beach! I mean, the beach itself is a good 12km from the city centre, so maybe that doesn't make much difference? I can tell you from experience that walking 2 km over sand and shingle would probably take closer to two hours than one, but if you're moving around in quicker ways, or don't mind the occasional temporal lacuna, I think this is your best bet.

The other problem is that walking to Poya Bay takes you right through the village of Nepou, whose people may want to use the beach too. Though... maybe those two problems solve themselves? If you're avoiding people, moving further down the beach is probably a good move.

It also allows for distinguishing the three beaches a bit more: Poya is the one with the cove, Nekoro is the one with the islands, and Mueo is the one with a decent-sized town (if you want to go shopping or whatnot). They all have their share of mangroves, mudflats, and sand.

Okay, I've convinced myself; I'll note the cove on the map. (We can always move it later if it's problematic.)

hS

I've got a small addition to propose that's been batted around in RP a while back: somewhere on one of the beaches (I never ended up specifying which) there's a sheltered cove with small cliffs along the water's edge. One of the cliffs has a sea cave in it; it's about the size of a small room and mostly full of ankle-deep water, but has a decent-sized dry shelf at the back. Someone's left a lantern on that dry shelf for visitors to use.

The cave doesn't have a name, and it's usually a pretty secluded place. It's a nice spot if, for whatever reason, you want some privacy on the beach, whether for a seaside tryst, an important conversation, or just a chance to relax.

I don't have much to say - I left my review brain somewhere and can't find it - but I read this, and it was... fun? Sort of fun? I'm not sure 'fun' is the right word for something so bewilderingly bizarre.

hS

It's not even been a full year, somehow. Wait, does that mean the Gathering was last summer? That really doesn't sound right, but I promise it's true.

Anyway, I've got loads of projects that have sat idle for much longer than that. Don't fret about it. :)

I'm glad you enjoyed it. Out of curiousity, whose section did you enjoy the most? I had a lot of fun trying to write in different styles.

hS

I am flailing, man, flailing, okay? It's amazing, as usual.

So I just reread that all-caps introduction before the flashpatch symbol, and as tongue-in-cheek as it read initially, it basically foreshadows the entire story, doesn't it? Even the line about stock brokers, which seems like a throw-away gag line on the first read-through, turns out to be the actual conflict of the story. Brilliant. Genius. Even the title, calling it "The Angsty Story," is brilliant misdirection, because the story can only be said to be angsty in the most superficial way. It's about angst; it doesn't actually contain any! If anything, this is "The Sincere Story," considering the shift finally acknowledges both how ineffectual and lazy they are compared to most of HQ, and also the fact that they actually do care about each other, even though they're rarely so honest with each other about it.

Okay, now I'm rereading that first scene with the stock brokers, and am I seeing a hidden meaning here as well? "We must not retro-unlearn the problematics of incising with a Flower . . ." Does this actually take place after all the rest of the story?

I love that you focus so much on Ninetwo's state of mind in the janitors' first scene that you manage to sneak the Local Unraveller right by us, with no indication it's going to be important later. I also love the detail that Ninetwo, finding herself suddenly feeling angst, has been studying how to angst correctly rather than recognizing that there's a problem.

Oh man. I took it for granted that all of Medical's staff had to be, like good at their jobs, and have bedside manner. Indrid has opened my eyes to what Medical has been lacking: a doctor with as much professionalism as most field agents have. I'm also amused the cat was somehow developing an angsty backstory before the doctor caught it.

And some of the next part of the story gets downright spooky, and I am in awe that you managed to continue with your usual surreal unseriousness, while still giving us a gravestone that arises from nothing with unreadable gibberish text, Ninetwo having a legitimate existential break-down in a graveyard, and an entire dream plane of featureless humanoids that seem to only speak in business buzzword jargon and manipulate people's emotions in the name of profit margins. It's all very unsettling, but never actually dips into scary or dark territory.

Finally, I have to say I love that you finally really showed off Bingle's magical potential, while still keeping him Bingle and making him largely useless. It was nice seeing Ninetwo get to flex her thought muscles for some actual combat, as well.

But no matter how well you write, you can never escape . . . doctorlit's typo lists!

"‘Your mites are perfectly content with the--frankly ridiculous--ambient levels of angst emananting, constantly, from yourself.’"

"‘Suppose they-re mites so strong, they eat and kill angst mites. And they move fast the doctor can-t even see them.'"
I think you wanted "there're" (or "there-re" I guess). Also, the "so" is missing from "move so fast".

"‘Good Heavens,’ Bingle said, briefly horrified . ‘Well. Thank you, Ninetwo!’"
One of the periods is horrified, too. It is so horrified, it's sliding away from the word "horrified".

—doctorlit thanks Larfen for teaching him the new word "abseiling"

Lack of knowledge on my part, then--I hadn't realized (or didn't remember...?) he'd left and come back, so I saw "since you've gotten here" and took it to mean his initial arrival. Whoops. Sorry about that, Cal.

~Z

I said since he got back. I don't remember exactly when Voyd hopped into the Discord, but unless he came back way, way earlier than I think he did, there hasn't been the sort of drama where people were genuinely arguing at high volume their points. That may well just be me going ostrich on Board stuff, but I don't think it is.

I wasn't really involved in this particular incident, so I don't have much to say. However, I can attest that Voyd has repeatedly had problems altering his outlook and behaviors. He doesn't seem to stop doing things, no matter how may times he's asked. He's not very good at changing his perspective, even when new information comes to light. I've had literally the exact same conversation with him dozens of times on various subjects. And he always seems surprised when I bring up the same points.

I don't think this is malicious. I don't think Voyd is a bad person, and I don't think any of this is by intent. But it is a problem, and at this point it kind of needs to be a addressed.

This thread is about getting everyone up to speed on what's happening with Voyd and finding a solution that shows progress.

That being said, it doesn't seem like whatever problems you have have gotten to the point that they need addressing in this manner. Keep an eye on your own actions and filters, and ask for second/third/etc opinions if you don't trust your own judgement.

I'm not about to go dig up specifics, because quite frankly I don't want to and I should hope no one else really wants to, either, but I'm pretty sure we've had bits of that (internal 'drama' where opinions were divided) since 2014 (especially counting some more minor issues that warranted serious discussion but didn't really blow up). Actually, there was arguably some in 2014, maybe.

~Z

My experience with things that actually solve these problems is... limited, so that's why I was being so harsh.

Also, I've noticed some similarities between the qualities causing this and my own, so if anyone has any similar concerns about me, now would be a good time to voice them.

Here is my evidence:

• Exhibit A: Larf openly admits that he held on to this story for 1 year, despite repeatedly being told to release it.
• Exhibit B: The characterization in this story truly is amazing. Larf's capability to convey what all of his characters are about, even those who only appear once like Doctor Indrid, through actions and dialogue alone, even to someone who hasn't read any other Flaming Broomsticks stories, is unparalleled anywhere in the PPC. The characters themselves are all strong caricatures, but in the Ace Attorney way rather than the "Lazy Writer" way: They have depth, they aren't stock characters, and Larf clearly put a lot of effort into creating them and fleshing out their thoughts, yet a single conversation with them instantly reveals in general what they are about.
• Exhibit C: The character development in this story is also amazing. It was heartwarming to see Shift Twentieth grow closer together, to hear even someone as grumpy as Finch try to help Ninetwo. I can't wait to see their character dynamics in the future.
• Exhibit D: The humor is truly spectacular. I am immune to all forms of PPC humor, sadly, but even I could tell that the jokes are well-made and land well when reading this. The meta-joke about the angst-mites was funny and fit well into the context of the PPC.
• Exhibit E: Finally, Larf's excuse for withholding this story doesn't hold up. Although it is a different type of story than one normally writes in the PPC universe, Larf is a different type of person than the rest of us. Varied voices are required to truly flesh out a collaborative setting like the PPC, and all of us contribute something important. As mentioned before, the angst-mites are a concept that fit well into the setting of the PPC and succeed in delivering an effective meta-joke about the setting.

In conclusion, it is abundantly clear that Larf has not only withheld good writing from us that could have helped the setting, but failed to provide a proper excuse to do so. There is simply no way that this can go unpunished. It is untenable. It sets bad precedent. If we let this go, soon everyone will be keeping perfectly good missions, interludes, and RP logs to themselves! Nothing will ever be published in the PPC again! Larf must be swiftly and harshly punished to show future writers what happens when you withhold good writing from a writing group.

I opened the document and immediately saw the drawing you did of the village—which I've left half-digitised for, um. Oh god, years now? Oof. >.> Might have to finish that now that I've been reminded!

Excellent writeup (I loved the commentary by the agents :D) and I'll definitely be referring to this in the future.