Fortress of Perpetual Midnight

My readership appears to be at an all-time high (apparently at least two regulars!), but I've accumulated quite a lot of stuff during its absence, to say nothing of my sloth and the fact that I've built up a lot of new things due to year's-end-and-beginning splurging. So, I'd like to see if you have any requests or suggestions. What I've got in the works is as follows:

( Ridiculously long notes )

A while back, I asked for help finding a book on world-building on an intraplanetary scale to supplement the big one. Unfortunately, none of my readers give a damn about creating fictional settings, so no one had any suggestions. So I gave up on that. However, a month or so ago, I fortuitously ran across exactly what I wanted at Castle Comics & Cards (which still doesn't have any presence on the Internet, as far as I know). It took me a while to wade through all that un-spell-checked text, but I'm ready to share my thoughts now.

Despite the lack of editing, the content itself is virtually beyond reproach. It's made for the d20 System, but that's probably only to boost sales, as it doesn't even include rules except in the appendix. The main body of the book is devoted to determining how Earthlike worlds (virtually the only choice in swords and sorcery) develop their geography, both topographical and cultural. The former is all based on real-world geology, except that they have rules for how magic works (which seems odd, since it's supposed to be non-setting-specific). I don't much like the illustration style, but that's not the point of the book.

Here are updates to a few planets using my new knowledge:

Asgard (Project Artificer): As I've mentioned before, I prefer to make settings in the Southern Hemispheres of their respective planets, just to counteract the usual pointless prejudice and make things a little less identical to Earth. Unfortunately, I also put the sea on the east and the mountains on the west for much the same reason. This means that for the region to have wind blowing off the sea (so it can be as wet and populous as I intended), it would have to be within the equator and 30° S, or between 60° S and the South Pole. I chose the former, because, as I noted last time, the planet is entering an ice age, and I wanted the mammoths, woolly rhinos, and all to have already evolved. This way, we can just say they've immigrated from farther south. The plate activity that created the Iron Peaks died down some time ago, but the volcanism was reactivated by the Revenant's Rending.

I've also looked more carefully at infrared light and found that it is radiated by objects in proportion to the heat they give off. In any case, the world would look pretty weird if it was viewed in that manner most of the time, so I'll assume that creatures are just better at picking up what little visible spectrum there is, or perhaps they get light from a star around which the brown dwarf orbits (which would result in a very complicated circadian rhythm). There may be occasions where I show the viewpoint of creatures with infrared vision, but for aesthetic purposes, I'd prefer that to be the exception rather than the rule.

Mannheim (Project Homuncupunk): As the land has all sunken beneath the sea and the City covers the planet, geography isn't as important as it is in many settings. I'll have to study underground settings a bit more carefully. I might give it a very small axial tilt since most people don't ever see the sun anyway, but that would make the year less interesting.

Nolav (Project Mése'ta): The focus area has much the same geographical characteristics as Alfheim on Asgard. In this case, just for variety, I chose to put this one below the 60th parallel. Presumably, the Sea of Empires doesn't stretch out too far to the east, so most of the polar easterlies get caught on the Teeth and don't get their moisture to the Wake—or the desolation might entirely be caused by lingering magic from the Pantheon Wars. I did have a problem with the fact that I had previously established that the day-night schedule was not hugely changed by the season, contrary to what you might expect from such a high latitude, but after further research, it appears that the 60° mark is fixed, regardless of axial tilt. Thus, if I put the tilt at 13° (just for good luck), there are still 17° of polar easterlies outside the Antarctic Circle. Below the Circle, on the Isle of Berserkers and the like, things get interesting, because there are long periods without daylight in the winter. This means that most deities favored there have prayer times at noon or midnight, not dawn or dusk, as the latter would cause their clerics to be unable to restore their spells as often. Whether due to fate or chance, there appears to be a hot spot on the North Bank, as there is not much volcanism in the Teeth.

The normal geological history does not work as well in this case, as (much contrary to most swords-and-sorcery settings) the world was only created 2,200 years ago. This means that all the tall mountains and deep oceans were scratch-built. (I don't know why the gods always make organic, natural-looking geography, but Earth's creation myths wouldn't work too well if they didn't. In Babylonian and Norse mythology, it's just because the world was made from the shattered body of a slain predecessor deity, but that won't work as well here, with the forces of law bringing order to Chaos. Perhaps they couldn't overcome it entirely, or perhaps the Pantheon Wars broke up the neat lines a bit.) There may not be interesting fossils, but there are areas where the primal Chaos from which genesis occurred may still remain or break through in some spots, which can be at least as interesting.

Ryttyr (Project FOBE OGL): The seasonal wars for territory are no doubt due to a severe axial tilt. If there were too much land along the equator, the two races would be able to live there all the time, so presumably their lands are connected only by a narrow isthmus, or even not at all, meaning both races must be seaworthy—or, even more interestingly, that when one end is winter and thus uninhabitable, the planet moves far enough from the star that the polar ice caps thicken and a landbridge rises from the sea. The cultural differences between the peoples of the two hemispheres are likely environmentally motivated. For instance, the continent in the Ryttyr's hemisphere might be experiencing large amounts of volcanism, causing mountainous terrain, where crossbows are more useful and mineral resources more plentiful, while the Rog lands are stable enough to grow thick forests, where they focus on mêlée combat. These are of course generalizations, but as long as a good proportion of the habitable space is such terrain, their societies as a whole will be strongly impacted.

It says something about my style that I already have eight posts with the tag for Irregular Webcomic!, yet I haven't posted my general comments yet. So, here we go:

Irregular Webcomic!, by David Morgan-Mar, is a very unusual Webcomic. In terms of topic, it mostly covers stereotypes about Hollywood, gaming, and Wikipedia. Unlike Order of the Stick, its gamer jokes are less about ridiculing rules (often ones that the author hasn't read) than joking about gamers and how they act. Quite in contrast to Burlew, Morgan-Mar actually researches everything he does in detail, and there's a lot to be learned by reading the annotations if you're willing to wade through them. Some interesting notes: the meaning of "Cockney" and the design triangle, similar to the idea I discussed way back here—and the design strategy for my OGL system too.

Morgan-Mar is also a big fan of LEGO stuff, so that's his main medium. I haven't paid attention to the franchise for over a decade, so it's pretty amazing how much variety there is in what's available, and the author is skilled enough in image editing to further expand his horizons. Even so, a lot of people end up with the generic smiley faces. It's also amusing to see the goofy grins that LEGO black guys have—although they can't measure up to the author's expressions.

For the gamer themes, though, he uses the more standard system of using 25–30mm miniatures—although he's old-school enough that he paints his own, so he doesn't have as much variety there. However, it is fun to see all the really old minis. I happen to have the ones he uses for most of the fantasy crew, as Lambert, Mordekai, Kyros, and Dwalin are all old GW miniatures from Warhammer Quest, and it's easy to identify Ms. Alvissa as an old REAPER miniature by Ms. Sandra Garrity. The space gang's real miniatures are harder to identify (and are not parts of my collection), but Ms. Paris is just a Sister of Battle with an odd paint job, and Quercus is an old Treeman. They also ran into a Photoshopped Frateris Militia at one point. For some reason, it took me quite a while to realize that Iki Piki is just a Van Saar Juve with a head swap.

Meanwhile, the comic also helped me to get into the Cthulhu Mythos and MYTHBUSTERS, both of which quite entertaining franchises. It was also from a reference here that I decided to check out Legostar Galactica, another geeky comic of similar composition, but I couldn't even bear to read half a dozen comics due to the awful punctuation.

I thought I was being all original and stuff when I came up with my highly-lawful, five-axised-radially-symmetric alien race—until today. You can see what I missed on page 38 of DRAGON 354, courtesy of Ms. Julie Dillon.

Well, last time I was online, I was so engrossed in reading Caucus (it would never have occurred to me that a wild surge might spontaneously create a Y-chromosome) that I didn't get around to typing any of the posts I had planned—just this one that I made up on the spot. So, let's see how much motivation I have tonight. I hate doing this stuff in the evenings.

First of all, I actually did upload the latest version of Project FOBE OGL while I was working on that post. The changes are in the attributes (formerly "ability scores," which I changed because they aren't specific abilities). There are numerous games that use versions of the six-stat system (which I assume was pioneered by Basic D&D), including Shadowrun and all d20 and Coda games—which is why it came to mind, since I had borrowed this core book from the library. I tried to change the names and type up a bit of the descriptions to show how they differ from standard d20 stats. I'm not too sure about the name of "Drive". In any case, there's no use in working on this system anyway because even if I did work on it, there'd be no one to playtest it.

I've also made a few cosmetic changes to the Project Homuncupunk City and comparison pages. I just did that as an aside while I was adding a few plot details that you don't get to see yet. I thought of a few ideas for set pieces (?) (to change the pace from design sketches), but I've naturally been far too lazy to actually draw any. It's rather sad to think that I'm stuck here, even though if I had an illustrator I could have the comic ready to start in a matter of weeks from this point.

It was mentioned to me a while back that it would help if I put some basic descriptions of each of my projects so that people could have a context for all the background material. So, here we go:

Project AnthraXX (Type A): When a faithful minister's daughter enrolled in a private women's college to escape the horrors of coeducational life, she hardly expected the situation she found at Anthorpe Women's. The campus is controlled by Lily Canina, daughter of downtown's biggest crime boss and the gunslinger known as "the fastest hands in the Midwest"; Raven Faust, perhaps the greatest witch the college's secret Occult Studies program has ever known; and Meg O'Meaney, a mad scientist bent on taking over the world. These three enthusiastically protect the school from the foul touch of the Y-chromosome, but they may very well be more dangerous themselves. . . . [Well, that would have been less awkward if I had ever bothered to figure out a proper name for Ms. Benedict. I also managed to avoid talking about all the sex.]

Project Artificer (Type B): The Pale Kingdom survived the seismic cataclysm of the Revenant's Rending itself, but collapsed when the capital was sacked by orcs stirred up by the quakes. Now it is a land of four city-states, separated by vast expanses of land spiked by rocky crags and infested with orcs, lizardmen, and brigands. The twilight elf Nuádha'alán, however, finds this just to his taste. The elves' time ended thousands of years ago, and they are now reduced to a mere handful of nomadic rangers in the lands of humans. Alan, born a hybrid of the two estranged elven peoples, is even more an outcast, keeping the company of a motley bunch of iconoclasts. He works as a prospector, looting the ruins of past ages while honing his skills as a journeyman artificer. [Well, that certainly jumped from topic to topic, didn't it? I was trying to avoid what happened in Homuncupunk below, but it ended up being even more awkward. I didn't mention Alan's partners, either, because I haven't thought up a proper name for Ms. Melanie. It also doesn't say anything about the larger plot, which is really messed up at this point anyway.]

Project Deathshead (Type B): By the draconian codes of Machiavelli, a soldier must never be so indiscreet as to show his emotions in public. Only in the privacy of his own home can he remove his filter mask and allow his face to be scrutinized by his closest kin. But there is one emotion that is taboo even amongst one's own, and thus it is that all Machiavellians bottle up hatred within themselves, training their wills so that it can never be released. When Cecilio Beretta is betrayed by his liege, resulting in the death of a dea in machina, the manmade goddess to whom he devoted his life, his anger is so great that he has no choice but to abandon his honor and become one of the tattooed outcasts known as Deathsheads. To have his revenge, he turns to Machiavelli's mortal enemies, the Foundation for Galactic Peace. With his combat prowess, ferocity, and knowledge of the ways of his former comrades, Beretta is granted a commission as a Lieutenant Junior Grade in a squad of the super-élite Peacemaker Grenadiers. Even having turned his back on his people's ways, Beretta is shocked at the disorganized ways of the Terrans, and most of all by the confirmation of the rumor that they treat their artificial psyches as less than human! [Wow. I covered a fair amount of the story there—didn't realize such a small project had so much fluff, even if it is part of a much larger setting. Some sex here too.]

Project Homuncupunk (Type B): When the daimons first came to this realm 3000 years past, they brought with them the supernatural powers of animism. With their new mental abilities, subsequent generations of humans covered the entire surface of the world with bone spires and connecting bridges. To modern man, it is as if the City has always been there, and it is difficult to imagine that it could ever cease to be. After the great war three and a half centuries ago, the ruling powers of the City were shattered, but from the ashes rose a new force: the Mikazuki Corporation. Through the talents of the genius shaper Yoriko and her brother, the administrator Otohiko, the company made its name by developing homunculus weaponry for both sides. In the new peace, Mikazuki has turned to the research of enhancing humanity—for a certain fee, a citizen can live for hundreds of years, as the siblings at the head of the company have lived. There are rumors, though, that Mikazuki has been capturing unwilling human test subjects, and that the company is behind the creation of threats to the City, such as ghouls and vampires. Now, one of Yoriko's latest creations turns against Mikazuki, allying himself with the Bounty Hunters' Guild to fight against the corporation. [Damn, that was a lot of history before the actual plot came up, wasn't it? Well, that's what happens when you have such an alien setting—it needs a little explanation. Didn't think of any way to talk about Jûzaburô's personality.]

Project Maddie's Maids (Type A): HomeMaid is a fabled, heavenly place whence beautiful housekeepers are dispatched to warm the lives of good-hearted but lonely youths—which was exactly why Adrian's therapist and parole officer assigned her to volunteer there as a way to soften her misandry. She perked up when she met her equally attractive coworkers, Beatrix and Cynthia, but Adrian was hardly looking forward to working for her new master. She was in for a pleasant surprise (which can be found by comparing the series' title with the list of characters). . . . Meanwhile, behind the scenes, a shadowy administrator is working toward HomeMaid's true agenda. . . . [This time I hinted a bit at the risqué parts, but this blurb really doesn't give you an idea of the massive scale thereof.]

Project .slice (Type A): Über and Falsetto built the MMORPG with their own hands into a cult favorite. With this popularity, though, come players who want to change the rules for their own purposes. . . . [Yeah, it's not much. What do you expect from something I randomly dreamed up when I was completely off-kilter? There's a fair amount of innuendo in my mental picture of this one too.]

Project Umbra (Type B): Long ago, in a time of cruel and unrelenting light, an evil race known as humans ruled over all civilization. It was only when they murdered the Lady Srutt's sisters that they bit off more than they could chew. To replace the tainted world she destroyed, the Lady Srutt created we borycel and the lesser races to populate the Eternal Night. Exhausted by her undertaking, the Lady Srutt descended beneath the new land to recuperate, promising to return to rule over her progeny. And so two millennia passed. But at the time of the return, there was nothing. It fell to Tora-sath to act as the avatar of our Goddess to bring peace to the tribes. But now her consort, the young Mi-an, begins to notice something amiss. . . . [This is a lot older than the other projects—I originally designed it in middle school to be a video game, back when I had some delusion that I could make video games. Consequently, it had a really pointless plot, and I still haven't gone back to work it out. All I have is the background here. At least I added some yuri elements. And yes, sex too.]

As you can see, I've separated the projects into two broad categories. To oversimplify, these are sex (A) and violence (B). There is a bit of overlap. More distinctly, Type Bs are the action/adventure stories that are what I really do and what I can theoretically be proud of doing. Type As are the more goofy (not comedic—as you'll remember, I don't have anything that can be rightly called a sense of humor) stuff that I've thought up on the side, and it just ends up all gravitating towards sex. This is of course why that stuff is completely certain never to be published, while the Type Bs just probably won't.

So, I could logically post these as index.html pages on the projects site. The problem, of course, is I'd then have to put links to every file available in the folder, as you can't access them directly if there's an index page. (Obviously, that's only a problem with Artificer and Homuncupunk, which actually have more than one file each.)

I mentioned before that I was getting a comparatively good amount of stuff done on my projects. In the case of Project .slice (which really needs a better name, if I'm even going to use it at all), this was just because I was having really weird dreams. For Projects AnthraXX and Deathshead, it's because my sleep-wake schedule was mixed up and I was thinking about sex too much.

On Homuncupunk, however, I've come up with a lot of current plot details. Of course, I don't tell you what's going to happen in the plot, so you won't see much of that on the site. More obvious are the additions of last names (other than the Hebrew and Norse ones, because I haven't thought of a good way to find those yet) just so the way people address each other won't be as weird (as I mentioned before) and the addition of more data on the Feds (who still have no connection to the rest of the plot) at the bottom of the page. More importantly, I've added Ms. Chikata to the list of characters. I was previously not going to put her in until the second story arc, but I figured out a way to strengthen her relationships to the other characters (mainly Otohiko, Ms. Bethel, and Ms. Hinaki) by introducing her from the beginning. There's also more between Ms. Terese and Betzalel, and Ms. Terese and Ms. Hinaki, but that's not coming out too soon.

One side effect of all the development I've added to the plot is that the second story arc is weird. All the characters have reasons to love and hate various others, and the possibilities of cloning, vampirism, inter-body anima transfer, and so on just complicate things. It certainly isn't a happy story in any case, although I'd like to have some of that in the end (which would be at least the third arc). Another thing that somewhat worries me is that, as ever, the supporting characters are stealing the show. I should have known that would be how my tendency would be since I insisted on making the hero a bloody male human (or a reasonable facsimile thereof, in this case). It also is rather difficult because, at the start of the storyline, he's only two years old, so there's not a lot of space for background and previous relationships. That's why the others tend to dominate the flashbacks, vendettas, traumatic experiences, and so on. Also, the big turning point at the end of the first story arc changes Jûzaburô into a much more one-dimensional character, so he doesn't motivate or fit into the convoluted plot as easily. Hopefully that will all come together in the last leg, at least. There also ends up being a fair amount of sex in the second story arc, and some of it involves a male character, unfortunate as it may be—but I needed someone to be the villain. It's still not nearly as bad as AnthraXX or Maddie's Maids.

Meanwhile, I didn't do a single drawing the entire week. It's just so overwhelming. I need an illustrator, dammit!

Incidentally, I also slightly updated Projects FOBE OGL and Maddie's Maids before I left, and am just uploading the files now.

. . . or at least under consideration for being entered into the Works. These are a few subjects I've been pondering but about which I have been too lazy/apathetic to type an entry (ahh, sentence not ending in preposition!):