Chapter Reorganization · 11:12am Oct 10th, 2011
New Pegas is my first attempt at a major literary project in over a decade. In large part, it is intended to serve as practice for getting "back on the horse", so to speak.
My first big lesson: 4k-5k chapters don't seem to provide enough space to properly cover a given segment of the tale. Chapters One and Two are both essentially set in Goodsprings, Three and Four are mostly about the situation in Slimm, and Five is the Dance Hall reveal. The last goes over eight thousand words, while all of its predecessors are around half its size. Plus, a number of folks have (properly) complained that spending four chapters on what looks at first like a straight ponification of the game may put a number of readers off.
So I've decided to reorganize by compressing the first four chapters into two. Literally, it's just cutting and pasting Two into One and then Four into Three, plus renumbering. What this does is give me the opportunity to tell a story roughly twice as big as I'd been planning on. In paying too much attention to word count, I was missing opportunities to do things like expand upon events and descriptions, such as Rango's death. Honestly, I thought I'd dealt him too dismissive of a card there.
Cupcakes! Don't be too hasty!
However, this also lops two levels off of Dead-Shot, plus the "Clever Pony" perk. That'd been intended to eventually let me throw him a "Bonus Level" from time to time in order to let his Perk and skill progressions more neatly fit the flow of the story, but I can always do that later anyways.
So, once I get this reorganized (and give Rango his due), expect Chapter Six (er, FOUR! "Three, sir!" Shut up, you!) in short order.
