Lol, I don’t know about anyone else, but I get around this by only writing short stories!

I'm not sure if suffer from this. I don't think I do. I rarely get stuck with writing, maybe my stories and updates would be different (better, even) if I did!

You are putting tons of research and thought into Fallout Florida, which is good in a way. Nobody will find any plot holes or stuff which doesn't make sense in your story (not that we'd try). If I think about one of my stories too deeply, especially months after stuff is written, I always find stuff which inconsistent, or doesn't make sense!

Anyway, good luck Rader.

I think I understand what you are meaning. I make extensive notes about what I want to do in the future, often 2-3 chapters in advance (by chapter I am talking 30,000 words and up, not a single post here). I mostly deal with it by getting up to that point where I am stuck and like you said, just hammer at it until I work it out. Because I am not worried about forgetting other things in the future.

I have been doing that these last few weeks with a supervillain who will be appearing in Chapter 7 of the Stormcrow Fic. I want to get her just right. So I have not written anything, and instead I am doing research hoping to spark ideas, writing them all down, and turning them over in my head. Thankfully I just about have it figured out.

I have another, bigger block waiting for me in Chapter 8. I don't know if I can solve that one, and might end up scrapping most of it.

I guess that is my other piece of advice. Don't be afraid of throwing out what you originally intended and doing something completely different. I have a folder full of discards like this. I copy and paste them there so I still have the writing I did. I hope that someday I might be able to use it somewhere else.

I do know what you are saying--- I have found myself held up trying to write important moments because I get paralyzed by wanting it to be... "the best [insert description here] that I have ever written."

Not saying that is what happens in your case--- just the point at which I can relate to the problem you describe.

My solution is to simply write around the sticking point. My process--- such as it is, is to "Write what I know." And I mean more than the usual idea of that being things with which I am familiar. I ALSO take it to mean- "Write what you know you want to have somewhere in the story, even if it is not what happens next."

And my reason for that is the fear of losing some really good scene or bit of dialogue, all because I tie myself up in concern about chronology. That has happened to me; an excellent idea occurs; I think- "Yes, that's great, but it doesn't 'fit' with what I am doing (or need to do). I will remember it when the time comes." Except I don't.

So now, I write the parts that are in my head while I have access to them. Then I make notes to remind myself where they need to be included. There are several benefits to this- first, I do not lose the idea. Second, that accomplishes the goal of writing something on that day. And finally, it often happens that the act of writing the "good stuff" gives me the key to resolve the part that I was blocked on.

It likely doesn't work like that for most folks; I am avowedly weird.

Coming back to this topic., now that I've thought about it more. I definitely don't get stuck, if anything, I usually have too many ideas, and then I need to decide which ones I'd like to go with. Sometimes this creates probs with inconsistencies, but it's not like I've got editors and publishers to worry about. Everything is one-way with me, like train on rails. Just get it done, Renee.

I'd say my 'problem' is more to do with motivation. I sometimes go "ah geez, gotta write today" when sometimes I just want to get buzzed, kick back, and game. But then once I am writing, everything's fine of course. I also get insecure sometimes, which I think is why I write outside of Fan Fiction. One of the reasons, anyway.

Wow, trey uses the word "paralyzed". That sounds rather frightening.

I am getting to a point where Jan is ready to abandon wearing her armor. (about two chapters ahead of where I am posting right now). She needed the extra confidence it gave her to start as a superhero. But by now she has long since come to realize that she does not need it, and that she should instead be relying on her own natural abilities. So my stumbling block is, what is a girl to wear?

Shortly before this she stops transforming her cape into a pair of wings. Instead she just creates them entirely from her magic. They are a living part of her body. Until she dispels them at least. So I have thought about continuing in that vein. Maybe she could just cover her body in feathers? But when I picture it in my head, it just seems kind of silly.

I looked up some similar suits of armor from the Aztecs.

It looks ok if it is just a shirt

But when it is the entire body it just looks like pajamas

While this is a superhero setting, I have been avoiding describing people wearing spandex or tights. I try to go more for utilitarian things like armor, but with some style and panache that is definitely not ordinary. So she could just wear some kind of clothing. Maybe like gore tex that is at least warm in the winter.

I like the look of this. But again, it is armor, that she does not need.

I am kind of out of ideas right now. So any thoughts might help get my juices flowing.


Edit: Or maybe I should create a character like Edna from the Incredibles movies: a fashion designer for supers. Someone who makes armored and unarmored costumes out of meta-materials (that is a catchy sounding name that does not require a lot of explanation about how it really works)? They would be able to provide something that does not look as silly as spandex, while also not being as bland as overalls or jeans and a hoodie. Now I am suddenly thinking of the arena outfits from the second Hunger Games film.

I think the hunger games suit at the end is best of the ones you are considering. I'm guessing you don't want to use a 'distract 'em with your girlish figure' outfit like Wonder Woman. I'm also thinking Jan is quite acrobatic so robes, skirts, capes, etc could be problematic. I'm also thinking Jan wants to obscure her identity so some sort of hood/mask may be appropriate.

Yes, I am thinking she might keep her old helmet. She would still want to keep Sága as well. Though I could see it transforming into a sort of hand held tablet rather than a wrist computer.

Question, is she still wearing a cape? If not perhaps she could go with something kinda noir inspired like a black trench coat or field jacket?

At this point she will have stopped wearing the cape entirely. Most of the time she will have her wings folded up on her back when she is in superhero mode.

Something like a trenchcoat or jacket sounds a little too mundane. I realize that it is a real tight-rope I am trying to walk here. On one hand I don't want to be too comcic-booky with sprayed on spandex outfits. OTOH I don't want to be ordinary either. I am looking for the kinds of things you see in superhero movies. They stopped trying the old tights thing a long time ago because while it looks good on a page, it looks silly in real life. Normally in films you see people wearing some kind of high-tech kevlar or other sort of armor instead now. I am thinking of the X-Men movies in particular. Even Deadpool's outfit in the films looks like it is made of some sort of woven fiber armor like kevlar.

It is funny, because some of the searches I did for ideas led me to a Skyrim mod that I already have.

So I am now leaning more and more towards the idea of a Super Mr. Blackwell, who designs costumes for heroes and villains both. Someone like Michael Caine from Miss Congeniality. He probably lives on some sovereign island sate like Sea Land, so he cannot be prosecuted by any government. But someplace warm, like the Caribbean or Azores. Or maybe just the RL Cayman Islands. Everyone launders their money there already.

I am thinking Mr. Blackwell might provide a whole gamut of outfits. From just an unarmored suit done up in your chosen colors and insignias, to full on armor. Everything short of actual powered armor. His basic suit might be some kind of metatech fiber that is not armored. But stain and spill resistant, waterproof, self-repairing, and most importantly, machine washable. So a super like Jan who has invulnerability can have something to wear, without it being ruined in their first battle. I the later chapters, Jan tends to come home with holes in her outfit.

Eh, yeah I’m probably a bad person to be putting his two cents in on this. I’m not really a fan of superhero stuff. Except maybe Batman, but I don’t really consider him a “super” hero, and his suit is basically armor which you’ve already said you want to get away from. Now maybe a Michelle Pfifer Catwoman style outfit...

Ooo yeah! With maybe a bird motif instead of the cat!

Since I came into this particular subforum very late, I'm almost completely lost on how your story is playing out, what your main character exactly looks like, etc. But I'll try to give some ideas.

When you say "suit of armor," what kind of armor are we talking about exactly? Something like what Batman typically has? If so, I don't think you need to completely get rid of armor, unless your character can somehow cast a sort of bound armor like in Morrowind or Oblivion or oakflesh, etc. in Skyrim (or even some of the armor abilities in ESO). Otherwise, she can still have pieces of armor on her outfit, as even some of the toughest superheroes need it. I do agree that a trenchcoat or jacket isn't a good route. Trenchcoats often are a bad guy motif--though obviously not exclusively--but I think you'll want something more original.

If you're going to scan through other cultures like the Aztecs for ideas, how about some other flight- or bird-related mythology from other cultures. Maybe something related to Ra for the Egyptians for real-life inspiration, or Kyne/Khenarthi (versions of Kynareth) in the Elder Scrolls, for example. Is there anything or anyone that she takes particular inspiration from as a superhero (e.g. like how Batman chose his bat motif)?

Also, a quick search for "birds in mythology" led me to this Wikipedia list. Perhaps the look of one of them here will give you ideas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Legendary_birds

Something that I sometimes struggle with is the balance between well-worded dialogue and not being excessive or pretentious about vocabulary. I'm not trying to write flowery or academic stuff here, but I feel like I have good or even great ideas for how to phrase something far more often when I'm NOT writing, or I'm not at a point I can write something down, than when I actually sit down to write. Even when I would jot a note down, the idea tends to leave my head before I can get it down. I'm already awful at remembering things or writing ideas down right when I have them, so this just makes it worse. Maybe it's just my usual extreme self-criticism. I don't know.

Of course, sometimes the writing depends on the character. Is it somebody who is straight to the point? Someone who pretentiously feels the need to lord over people with their real or perceived intelligence? Are they somewhere in the middle of this? So on and so forth. But sometimes the problem isn't the choice of words but how to actually structure what they say. I'm having this trouble again with this new character that pops up in chapter 14 of Fallout: Florida. I'm writing the dialogue as I'm posting this. And I'm still poor at just stopping where I'm having a writer's block and going to somewhere later in the chapter to make progress.

So, how do these kind of issues affect others here? Do you even feel like you have trouble with it? How do you address it?

Can only speak to a couple aspects of your question.

Since I write only in first person, it is essential that Buffy have an educational background that allows her to effectively tell a story - since it is she who not only does her dialogue but narrates her story (rather like a journal/diary) as well. As an avid reader and graduate of the Arcane University, she's got that covered so I can get as elaborate/elegant with her descriptions as I like. In dialogue, you already know that you want whoever speaks to really portray the 'voice' of the speaker in their dialogue choices and manner of speech.

As you also know, 'showing' is generally regarded as the best way to convey something in fiction but is also the most elaborate/wordy. Dialogue is very good also and a bit less wordy. Most concise is simply telling in narration, though it is less favorably regarded and, if much is conveyed, risks feeling like a data dump.

I write so much of Buffy's dialogue that her voice comes completely naturally to me. I do have to spend quite a bit of time crafting and reviewing the dialogue of others she speaks with to make sure their dialogue accurately reflects their voice. A character with a distinct accent or speech mannerisms can be very challenging to consistently write so is best limited to minor characters that don't have excessive speaking roles. One little trick I use is to impart a degree of formality/informality by how readily the speaker uses contractions. Though Buffy is very capable of speaking formally when needed, her nature is quite informal so she readily embraces the use of contractions in her own dialogue. Some of her mage colleagues are quite a bit more formal in their manner and one way I convey this is by rarely or never using contractions in their speech.

As far as refining things to hit upon the 'right' wording, the technique I use is massive editing. Any episode I post has generally been written months before posting and has undergone countless edits. Very time consuming, but I find that is the best way to eventually craft the most effective/elegant words for my purpose.

Like Acadian, I make each character's dialogue match who they are, and where they are from. January is a bookworm, working on an English Lit degree. But she is also a modern American. So while she can use flowery language when she wants to, it is often laced with contractions. And of course, modern slang. Since she is a nerd, she will pop out terms from sci-fi and gaming like frak, feldercarb, or chummer as well.

Blood Raven, OTOH, is 250 years old. Keeping up with language is a challenge for her. So she tends to speak with the formality of her youth, only occasionally peppering in slang. I looked at books written in the early 1800s, and copied and pasted a lot of dialogue from them. I use that as a general guidepost in how her speech should be. She is a very challenging person to write dialogue for. I never get it right on the first pass, so I don't try to very hard. Like Acadian, I go back and concentrate on it more deeply in later drafts.

Since January is a writer, and Blood Raven a different sort of writer, they have developed a running banter about vocabulary itself. January might say that something is dope, and Blood Raven observe that she remembered when that word meant something else.

I also look at the use of contractions when writing characters. Women in general tend to use fewer contractions then men. Though that is less so than it used to be. Given Blood Raven's era, she never uses them. That is not actually a conscious choice on my part. Rather it is just a side effect of writing someone speaking form a bygone age.

I have another character named Ryo who also never uses contractions. It is one of many side-effects of him having Asperger's Syndrome. He is very precise in everything he does, down to the smallest detail. That includes his speech.

Basically, you don't have to get it right in the first draft. When writing the first draft, I think the most important thing is just to get it on the page, even if you are not satisfied with what you have. You can fix it later. Just keep moving, and keep writing.

Gah, never mind.

Unfortunately, I don't have the patience for that and time constraints prevent that, but I can still use it on a smaller scale. I have before, to some extent, but sometimes I start to feel overwhelmed or anxious about how much I am changing. I always find something to be worried about, no matter what I do.




This is one of my biggest struggles. I did it a lot when I was writing papers in undergrad and grad school, too. Doesn't matter what it is I'm writing. Even though I know, from a logic and efficiency standpoint, that it makes sense to just write something down and move to other places in the story, paper, etc. that I know I can write something for, my penchant for anxiety and second-guessing often overrules that part of me. It's incredibly frustrating.

As for changing dialogue based on character, that's what I mean. Even when I am having them speak a certain way, my anxiety makes me question whether I am sufficiently portraying that character the right way.

I know that feeling. It's difficult for me to make characters sound like they are truly different. When writing dialog, to me it sounds flat like I'm talking to myself.

For what it's worth, I think you all are doing just fine.

I edited out my reply above because it sounded sort of pretentious or something (it's hard to say the right thing over the 'net sometimes, without visual / facial cues). But otherwise, I'd just say just keep telling the story. I'd hate to see somebody's story come to some sort of end due to mental wrangling.

There's a guy here online, not around much these days, who was constantly starting stories, but never finishing them. Over the years, I kept trying to encourage the guy to keep writing, but he'd always come up with some excuse why the story "won't work" or the character won't work or whatever. I never could see these problems myself, though! "Just keep writing it" I'd tell him. Because in my opinion, his opening chapters always blew my mind. I'd get way into his storytelling, but then it would just *end*, which I found disappointing.

Just keep on, that's what I say. Make the story a priority. Any mental wrangling shouldn't defeat this priority.

Thank you *sits down*.

Ok….So, sitting in a circle of candles and chanting arcane…I thought I might necromance this thread
Well, it’s not too long dead, I think

Interesting. I do have a proper tale with some different characters in it and so this rang bells for me. Hardest was a young twenty something lad I befriended in a Victorian’esque setting, almost Vernian with many steampunk elements. The wretched rascal was a poor thief like one of Fagan’s mob from Oliver Twist. Since I had hit hard times, Mouse (so called because he squeezed in anywhere to pilfer) took me under his wing to keep me safe on the rogue filled streets. Now his dialect matched a London Eastend kid with a yesteryear vocab…
Like: ”Gor blimey mister I ain’t gonna lie, cross me ‘art, I found this ring all proper and ‘onest see”

Well, you get the picture…a lot of replacin’ gees with apostrophes and dropping aitches to get the feel. The problem is…done to maximum effect anyone not familiar with the dialect would find it near unreadable! …and no, I chose not to litter it with quaint Cockney rhyming slang, not that I wasn’t tempted, but it would have been indecipherable to many….me ‘ol china!

Then in the same setting…we had Bill Brookes (think Bill Sykes even nastier twin). A rough bulldog of a man, with an eye for the ladies (with or without consent) and a taste for cheap strong liquor. He ran the Downtown slum area with a violent iron fist and a retinue of thugs. So he needed the same accent, but a more mature turn of phrase, a bit creepy and nasty with it. “Now my dear. What’s a sweet little thing like you doin’ in a dangerous place like this?”

Bill hurt Mouse badly and endangered me…so I had to dispatch him. Quite the emotional moment.

George, the better spoken volunteer gentleman running the mobile charity soup kitchen was a bit easier…and much nicer, with far fewer dropped aitches and apostrophise

As for myself, well I do use a fair few contractions, often consciously so as not to sound pompous, but my diction is far more refined than my unfortunate host. My human half sounds more at home in a pub, whereas I would rather frequent a wine bar. This strikes a chord with Acadian’s relationship to Buffy…When one has a very long term character they may become a true personality…and maybe even a wearable persona complete with an entirely different way of speaking and phrasing.
Not to be confused with a multiple personality disorder of course…I am not an illness sweetie, Lol.

A.

In case anyone asks…yes I would love to feature the 400 page tale of fairytale magic and high adventure here…However, sadly my character is a kind of succubus or sex vampire, and intrinsic to the unfolding story causes many deaths in…well the way a Succubus causes death….very hot and extremely explicit. So unless I either redact chunks of it or radically rewrite it all….it can’t come to an age 13 forum. Shame really because the pure adventuring aspects are clean fun. Maybe one day with a lot of reworking huh!

I guess it's an advantage that my characters are all in Tamriel. I just need to worry about Tamrielic... none of that Cockney dropping stuff.

Tamrielic is huge challenge….apart from the difficulties of writing Khajiit or Saxhleel speech, one has Imperial city speak, then perhaps a rural flavour (farmer) in the country side and presumably regional differences from map corner to corner. Out of Cyrodiil…well we know the Nordic sound, but I assume Hammerfel, Valenwood etc all have differences.

Beth has made some obvious and writer licence grants others….but gosh what a lot to cope with hmmm.

A.

I just don't think about it. The Elder Council will take care of everything, sooner or later.

That's the trick - I truly don't think about it. I just listen to the character talk and write down what they are saying. In all their different Oblivion/Skyrim voices.

What I have found best for me is when writing distinctive accents is to use the guidance that the more distinctive/challenging the accent is to write, the smaller the role character needs to play. That is, it is easy to overdo a good thing. Several major characters in Buffy's fiction have minor speech mannorisms (like not using contractions for example) but they are fairly easy to write. One character who has a very distinctive manner of speech in Buffy's 3rd Era Cyrodiil is Thernd, who is the old stablemaster at Equestria - the stable that serves the mages at the Arcane University and is located in the 'Valley of Horses' beneath the bridge between the IC and the University. Thernd is a delight to write but only in small doses - perfect for his fairly rare and short appearances.

"An' what be bringin' the wee wisp o' a magey lass an' 'er precious mare ta visit ol' Thernd?"

I must admit I avoid such complex accents. I find them very hard to read... To the point that I tend to skip them in books when I encounter them - they break up the flow for me.

Accents are a really difficult thing to do in prose. It is too easy to end up with what looks like gobbledy gook. HP Lovecraft used to do it, and it was not a plus:

“Ketched in the rain, be ye?” he greeted. “Glad ye was nigh the haouse en’ hed the sense ta come right in. I calc’late I was asleep, else I’d a heerd ye—I ain’t as young as I uster be, an’ I need a paowerful sight o’ naps naowadays. Trav’lin’ fur? I hain’t seed many folks ’long this rud sence they tuk off the Arkham stage.”

So instead I just note that a particular character speaks in a noticeable accent. Beyond that I will try to remind people of that subtly by using slang or other terms from their culture. I recently had a character from the UK use terms like "cracking" and "blokes". While Lighthammer will say "Aight" and of course his signature "Hooah" battlecry (since he was in the Air Force). Blood Raven speaks in a very distinctive, old world style, given that she is 250 years old. She will say things such as: "But consider that there is no shortage of windmills to tilt at in this world. Pick and choose the battles you invest yourself in with care."

Reading one of Robert Burns Scottish dialect poems can be a struggle:

Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim’rous beastie,
O, what a panic’s in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi’ bickerin brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an’ chase thee
Wi’ murd’ring pattle!

[Note: this is the first stanza of the poem that gave us the famous lines: "The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men/Gang aft agley". There are eight stanzas in all, and they will likely give a person a headache by the time they reach the last line.]

So much so that at Schaffely's Burn's Night celebration at the end of each stanza of the poem the crowd lifts their pints to the reader and with hearty yell of Scotch Ale they take a big swallow.

Does anyone know how to spell "the soches"? I mean the shortened, plural form of "social medias". I hear the term for people referring to Twitter, Facebook, etc combined. Especially from people plugging their soches at the end of a podcast they guested on. But I have never known how to spell it.

Soches
Soshes
Soces
Soc'es
Soc's

???

In S.E. Hinton's "The Outsiders" it is spelled "socs". (Which I would have thought was "socks", but there ya go).

Wow, I haven't come across that term in decades. The dominant cliques in my high school were divided into "socs" (which we pronounced "sosh-es) and "greasers". A lot of drama revolved around those terms and the people who identified with them. And then there were people like me who did not fit into either group. I was an outsider even among outsiders.

Since "socs" is an abbreviation of "socials" I would assume that is a good spelling.

Wow, I had not thought about the Outsiders in a long, long time. I read it back in Junior High School. And saw the movie of course. Thanks guys!

Here is another thing I am coming across. I write the Stormcrow fic in Third Person, Limited point of view. Usually from the POV of the main character January. Her parents show up a lot lately. So far I keep referring to them as "January's Mom" and "January's Dad". But it is starting to feel cumbersome. OTOH, it feels weird writing from her POV and also saying "Barbara said this" or "Romulus said that".

Has anyone ever seen this done before, in either way, and how has it worked?

Here's a little trick: insert a short sentence of description identifying a character before a line of dialogue. Once the speakers have been established in the reader's mind there is no need to bother with "Barbara said this". The following lines are awkward but they illustrate the point:

Barbara poured herself a glass of milk. "Are you going to work tomorrow?"
Romulus narrowed his eyes. "Why wouldn't I go to work?"
"Your boss called this morning. He wanted to know where you were."
"I had to visit a sick friend. Yes, that's it. I was at the hospital."
"I see. And exactly which hospital would that be, Romulus?"
"The one over on 12th street, I forget the name."

This illustrates another trick: one character identifies another character within the dialogue itself.

Have January give the parents nicknames. This not only side-steps the awkwardness of "Barbara" and "Romulus" but does double duty telling us how she feels about the parents. Here are nicknames that give dialogue a sarcastic tone:
Her Highness poured a glass of milk. "Are you going to work tomorrow?"
His Majesty narrowed his eyes. "Why wouldn't I go to work?"

Or a more affectionate tone:
Didi poured herself a glass of milk. "Are you going to work tomorrow?"
Gogo narrowed his eyes. "Why wouldn't I go to work?"

Interesting discussion going on here! Hope I have time to read it all; maybe this weekend.

I just don't want my characters to wind up sounding like me. Unless they are supposed to sound like somebody from suburban mid-Atlantic America, and I do have a character in Oblivion (Renee Gade III) who does. Otherwise, if they speak with some extreme inflection or accent, or don't use English properly, or they speak some other language entirely, so be it. I'd rather read something (or hear something in a movie) and not be able to understand 100% what they're saying than have everything read or sound like it's obviously been filtered for the masses.

I often use Free Writing *Link* when trying to get a feel how my character is speaking. Just open my mind to what's being said. And then in some cases I'll edit what was just written, just for fine-tuning purposes.

... Or not. I can remember with one of my Skyrim characters (Mycharonna) I'd almost never edit her bizarre poetry. I fact, half the time even I had no idea what the heck she was trying to communicate!

Thank you. Time for some Stormcrow.

Since there are not loads of parents in the story, I see no problem while in Jan's PoV of referring to them as Mom and Dad. The capital letters differentiate that she is referring to them in the manner of proper nouns and it is clear she is talking about her own parents.

A much more minor change would be to, when contextually clear, mix in use of 'her mom' to avoid overuse of 'January's mom'.

I expect as avid writers everyone knows this…..but just in case I shall offer it anyway.

On You Tube if you search “Writer Tube” or “author tube” it will open an entire community of writing advisors.

Some are professionals, some are published, some trying, some post grad students mastering in English and some just wannabes with unpubbed drafts (me…only I’m not on there ha!).

Names like Alexa Donne, Jenna Moreci, Shaelin and many others provide oodles of good advice on how to approach every aspect of writing in First/Third Omniscient etc and dialogue help that impresses editors if you want to be published instead of binned.

They also cover structuring, plot planning, character arcs time and world building. You’ll find videos by successful pros like Brandon Sanderson teaching how to write like the best of them and pitfalls to avoid.

In short…..advice to turn any story idea into something indistinguishable in quality to a tome you might have picked off a shop bookshelf by a famous author.

Take a look, a few enjoyable hours self education and you will never be stuck on how to dialogue nicely ever again.

My problem….Is remembering it all

Adella

Thanks for this. As you may have guessed by reading anything I've written my formal training was short and a very long time ago.


Remembering is a growing issue.

Did not know that Adella, and that does sound neat about the writing advisors. We do have our own advisors here too. I've asked Trey and Acadian about this and that on occasion.

Hey, which is more correct?

By 1966, Gygax was active in the wargame hobby world and was writing many magazine articles on the subject.

By 1966 Gygax was active in the wargame hobby world, and was writing many magazine articles on the subject.

Only difference is the comma after the year 1966. The first sentence is how it's written on Gary's Wikipedia page, the second is how I would actually speak that sentence. I wouldn't put a pause between 1966 and Gygax, but I would put one between "world" and "and".

English class with Sister Mary Frances was a long time ago but for reading clarity and to emphasis the date of the action I would use the first line with the comma after 1966. I may not be correct but no chalk board erasure has bounced off my head so I don’t think I’m totally wrong.

I still have dents in the head from many erasure direct hits.

Sister Mary Francis was a real pacifist then!

So much so that I still remember 7th and 8th grade after nearly 60 years. Deadly accutate, she was feared by all.

Renee:
I didn't want to lecture but if you want a more detailed explanation as to why I chose line #1, I will attempt to. Haven’t tried to diagram a sentence in years.

edit: spelling correction changed deasly to deadly

My opinions:

For the first comma, the decision is whether the "By 1966" is part of what you're saying in the rest, or separate from it. Both versions could be correct, but they'd mean something slightly different. The comma adds emphasis to the date as a milestone, and the other implies it's an arbitrary start point where the observation began.

The second comma is just wrong. If you add it, then it should read "... world, and he was ..."

Eats, shoots, and leaves, or he doesn't.

nrvsidr o esd s fi,,uq

There are some occasions when the poor little comma can really make a world of difference as epitomized in the following sentence:

"Let's eat Grandma."

"Let's eat, Grandma."

But may be it's ok to eat gradma.

My turn to complain write about the writer's block! I am blocked.

How do you deal with being less excited to play your own mods than to make them? Well, it isn't exactly like that, but I found that making mods, especially with quests, especially now that I've figured out how to do them and how to synthesize voice lines, well, I find it's like telling stories already... I mean, you've got to have a story in your mind before you even start on a quest mod, right? I do, anyway. A story that calls for a new dungeon or two, a few new characters, complete with background stories and a forward projection, houses for them to live in, houses that reside in a village of some description, perhaps a new one, which resides on an island that we haven't seen before, with woods full of new creatures that drop new loot that... AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!

So I get so embroiled in this new story and all its connections to the existing world (because I like them connected), that I find it difficult to get back to where I was in my actual story. Which is exactly what is happening now. Poor Lucien is sitting somewhere in a cave in Morrowind waiting for me to get back to him and take him to Mournhold in order to try and prevent another war of assassins, all while the Tribunal DLC is playing in the background... I can't write about it because I haven't played it yet. So it isn't so much a writer's block, but a player's block! Anyone suffering from one of those?

Yes, but in reverse. Clark’s story stalled becasuse he’s so far past that point in the game, I can’t remember enough. Since this is ESO, he doesn’t get the chance to replay some parts, and another character would do something different. And the story doesn’t quite follow ZOS’s version, so remembering how is twice as hard.

Initially, I tried to match Buffy's story to her playing but gradually became frustrated with that for a couple reasons. First, she is a voracious player (4k hours in Ob, 4k hours in Sky, 12k hours in ESO), yet I am a slow writer. So we long ago gave up trying to keep the writing matched up to her game. Rather, what has worked for us is that her writing reflects her memoirs - many long behind her. Secondly, she's taught me to listen to her - if she wants to play instead of writing, that is what we do. When she feels like writing, that becomes our focus until her current project is fully drafted.

Trey had a similar experience to Clark... by the time I started describing his exploits, he was a long way into Morrowind. Add to that the fact that I was sticking as close to in-game dialogue and events as possible, AND that I had made some mistakes.... Long story later- "Trey's" adventures were actually completed by a character named "Klone," who had the same stats, but avoided most of the errors.

After realizing that trying to stick to "canon" is incredibly stifling to creativity, as well as meaning "my story" was going to be identical to almost everyone else's story... I believe Acadian/Buffy have the right idea. Lena is her own person, a unique individual. She may "remember" events somewhat differently than someone else, but that doesn't make her wrong.

In the end- do that which gives you the most joy. If it is creating mods- good. If it is writing- also good. Play when playing is what you feel like doing. If you are not in a place where you want to move Lena's story forward right then, play a different character. Doing that may give you a feel for the atmosphere and the events- and perhaps you can even use that alternate reality to think about "How would Lena respond to this?"

My 4 Septims, at any rate (darned inflation).