• Member Since 28th Dec, 2014
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BNuts


Library Clerk who enjoys anime, manga, fantasy, sci-fi, comics, GNs, Gunpla, and 'FiM.'

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Jun
7th
2015

Behind the Scenes: June · 2:43pm Jun 7th, 2015

A New Arrival In Ponyville - A New Phase

Yay, the chapter where Snowbelle is born! I can finally start talking about her without spoiling... too much. Considering 'Blizzard' gave Gearhead her egg way back in First Gear, this certainly took more than long enough to happen.

Originally I wanted Snowbelle to hatch during 'May the Best Pet Win,' but it bugged me that this might make some people consider her status as being equal to the pets, rather than being equal to Spike. That isn't to say that some pets don't enjoy consideration as family members, because some, like Tank, obviously do. The 'Dusty Arc' also completely derailed this, as Gearhead could not be a colt and Snowbelle's adoptive father, not without having to give an explanation he did not want to give. Can you imagine how the other ponies would have interacted with 'Dusty' if they knew he was Gearhead? So Snowbelle's hatching had to wait.

With the psychic link, I just wanted to go a level up from imprinting, but I also thought it would be a cool concept to explore the link as a method of wordless communication. I draw my inspiration for this idea from Orson Scott Card's Ender Series: when he's trying to communicate with the Formics and the species they use, Ender finds that he has to use translatable images or impressions of things, rather than the words, because the Formics don't have words like Humans do. That is why the Formics misunderstood so much about our nature during the first and second invasions of Earth.

In this way, Gearhead and Snowbelle also start talking to each other through impressions, until the latter can learn enough of a vocabulary to use words. Later they also learn to take advantage of their link to hold whole conversations at the speed of thought. But I also thought I could use the idea of impression and pictographs to cut down Gearhead's incantation time later on. I know I have to be careful with this, since his casting time is one of the major ways he avoids being OP. Mind you, not many readers seemed to mind when he didn't have these weaknesses as Dusty.

In fact, looking at my statistics the period of time during which I got the most readers for both of the available books in The Gear Series happened on March 30th. It was the day I published 'Scholastic Specials,' the second chapter in the 'Dusty Arc.' That chapter earned me 82 reads of Second Gear, and 103 reads of First Gear, so obviously you guys enjoyed seeing Gearhead as an Alicorn colt for a bit. Mind you, he was also powerless back then, so I'm not sure exactly how to read these statistics.

What I'm hoping these stats are showing me is that you enjoy it when I take big risks, like making Gearhead so epicly different and giving him different magic, the Alicorn Engine and its coming upgrades, changing Gearhead's tribe, physical age, and even gender -- and now the addition of Snowbelle. These are all things I think of as being risk, but I think they make things more interesting.

Progress With Third Gear

Also an update for you here. As I was writing my chapter corresponding to 'Wonderbolts Academy' I wondered why it was taking so much longer than previous chapters. Then I looked at the page count for it. Yikes! I knew I had t split it into multiple chapters. By the time I finished it off last night, I had made 'Basic Training' into its own mini-arc.

I knew it was important to include 'Wonderbolts Academy' in Third Gear, not only because I find it one of the more enjoyable episodes of season three, but also because it's a huge step forward for Rainbow Dash as a character, and I wanted her to have the same sort of character progression. But I also thought that 'Wonderbolts Academy' spent too little time showing what Basic in a military institution would likely be like (I have to assume based on what I've seen and read, since I haven't experienced it for myself. Maybe joshscorcher or BlackGryph0n would be kind enough to furnish me with some details).

Things I changed included adding some original content, the treatment of Lightning Dust (whom you'll probably have already realized I introduced in a recent chapter) both as a character and as a trainee, and of course, I involved more characters in the arc. Not only is Gearhead here, but Prism, Rook, and Contrail. I also bring Fluttershy into the fold, because in my version she is steadily becoming a stronger flyer. Well, given my theory that she may be one of the strongest members of the Mane6 without showing it very often, she could have already been a strong flyer. But she's even stronger now because Gearhead has been encouraging her. I still have the exercises that were originally used in the episode, but I also added squadron-scale war games because I believe this is the sort of thing one might encounter in training -- especially with a military organization that it seems should put a strong emphasis on teamwork.

So this mini-arc is four chapters long now. Following it, my original plan was to put a magic training chapter for Gearhead, where the princesses take a personal interest in re-evaluating his abilities in the wake of recent events. Like Prism, they also want to encourage him to stop holding back and deliver the coupe de grace if he has the power and opportunity. Well, as with Snowbelle's hatching, I believe I'll table this chapter for later, since another training chapter so soon after four chapters of training could be overwhelming for many. It's time for a change of pace. It's time for Gearhead to return to the shop. It's time... for 'Spike At Your Service.'

Again, this is an episode I wish to improve greatly. Spike doesn't get a lot of good episodes, and this one turned a lot of what we know about him on its head: he goes from an extremely competent assistant / butler to oblivious in his incompetence despite the fact that Applejack already didn't want him to serve her. There was no point in writing Spike so out of character. Heck, I think it'd be more interesting to see the conflict in AJ's mind as Spike proves himself to be indispensable around the farm -- and yet AJ knows that Spike will have to go back to helping Twilight, because they're as much family as anything else.

Well, I plan on dong something about this. It starts with Gearhead actually having a reason to be in the Everfree Forest. It's his usual reason: he's gathering resources. And Spike will have additional conflict because Gearhead already has a few employees helping him out, and we know how Spike can get around competition -- although I won't go as far as the show did in 'Owls Well That Ends Well.' You ever notice how many strange episodes I managed to skip simply by starting this series late in season 1? 'Cause I just noticed.


6/29/2015 - Statistical Update

Here is something interesting: June 24, 2015 was the day knighty transferred the site to the new server, right? According to my statistics it's also the day First Gear earned 185 unique reads -- a new record for me, but I'm choosing to take it with a grain of salt because I don't know if it was real. Then again, none of my other stories received a similar boost.

As to Second Gear, yesterday's chapter, 'Visible Hearts,' brought in a record 89 unique reads! It's not as impressive, but still very nice, and I figure this one is 100% real because it's more realistic. It's nice to see people reacting to my work. It would be even nicer to have some more feedback on how I'm doing.

And Back To Third Gear

My current chapter is taking a little longer than expected. It's the original chapter just before 'Keep Calm and Flutter On,' and it's the first time Gearhead encounters an armoured unit comparable to his Alicorn Engine. What's taking longer, other than real life, is considering how both conversation and combat should be approached. Hopefully, though, you will enjoy this chapter as well.

I have determined that 'Journey Through the Rift' will kick off in the closing page of 'Taming Chaos.' This is because of the nature of the catalyst in the event, which I will not spoil for you now. Discord himself has surprisingly little to do with it. I'll just say that this has been building for some time, like many aspect of this series's story.

I used to believe that the way I broke the books down, First Gear could be read as a discardable prologue. While it is still the story prologue if you, as a reader, want to know all there is to know and understand every situation, you have to read it as it includes establishing details for characters like Shadow Wright, Snowbelle and her mother, and the Goblin Pony King, who is crucial later. Without such details you may be left scratching your head on certain things, so it's best to read everything -- not that First Gear is prohibitively long to read anyway. It just feels strange having it so short compared to the other books. But the main reason for that is simple: I started First Gear most of the way through season 1. I also started it as close to the initiating event (The Return of Harmony) as I dared. That said, I had a fair amount of establishing to do, so I did it as quickly as possible to keep you, my readers, engaged. It is as simple as that.

Second Gear is full-length, with over 30 chapters due to the mix of original and canon material. Still, I avoid extending it for longer than seems reasonable, in my opinion.

Third Gear will likely be more than 26 chapters as well, because my original material often takes more than a single chapter to unfold. There is also a pivot point where the changes will probably make your jaw drop (let me know if it does). I figure the more I change the status quo by the end of Third Gear, the greater the impact when you get to The Dark Wars, which changes everything again. If you come out of the 'A Canterlot Wedding' and 'The Crystal Empire' chapters reflecting on the level of Epic they contain, the rest of Third Gear and the start of The Dark Wars will likely blow your mind -- at least the way I have them planned. I guess we'll have to see whether my own hype ends up working for me here.

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