Ask Us - 8/7/15 · 2:27pm Aug 7th, 2015
When Crystal and I launched Ask Us I wasn't sure how much traction we'd get. Ask Silent Knight had been popular on Tumblr but these things are still hard to gauge. Suffice to say this was popular. Our form has been flooded with questions in a very short period of time. That is exciting!
Each Friday I'll take a few moments to answer some of the questions. Crystal will be setting her own schedule too. As always feel free to continue to Ask Us.
Answers
Click-Clack asked:
Silent Knight, Is it true that most griffins are skilled in the art of balisong flipping at a very young age?
I'm honestly not sure. To be fair I don't know much about the culture of the gryphons that live in their own Kingdoms. For Equestrian gryphons, however, I think that is an old mare's tale.
Dracone asked:
Anzel, When you get to just before the Wedding arc will you pause the updates on Secrets until Crystal is caught up to you?
We're getting a little ahead of ourselves here. They just got engaged. A wedding comes later. On the topic of parity, however, the answer is yes and no. My commitment is to put out two content updates a week and I intend to do that regardless. Crystal has committed to one but has been consistently putting out two each week and has been narrowing the gap between the stories dramatically.
When I launch Diamonds in a few weeks Secrets will be going down to one update a week with Diamonds filling in the second slot. That should allow Crystal to end the gap but, if she doesn't, we'll continue on as we have.
Billybob asked:
Silent Knight, I'm sure that the question that is on everypony'so mind is.... how far have you and Crystal gotten?
A gentlepony would never boast about such things. What Crystal and I do in private is between us and us alone.
Posted asked:
Anzel, Was it the plan all along to have Silent Knight start falling back into the ways of Stratus who he didn't particularly care for after seemingly breaking out of the mold for a time?
No, it wasn't the plan from the get go. To be honest, the outline was pretty loose at the start of Memoirs. I hadn't written in a while and had no idea whether or not the story would be popular. I more or less wrote a chapter and put it out in an episodic fashion to match the show. Then the story took off and I wanted to do more.
I started getting into my old habit of planning, plotting, and leaving breadcrumbs. I went back and did some rewrites on the first 15 chapters to make them match the continuity. I strengthened the themes and, most importantly, I took some of the seemingly random mentions from early on and focused on them.
The main one from earlier being "Stratus was never the same after he came back." I knew this would be important in the later parts of the story.
That is very much one of the pillars of Secrets. Silent wasn't the same after he came back. Very few veterans are. PTSD is an extremely serious condition and in an authentic military tale I felt like that was something I should cover. Additionally, it offered a new avenue for Silent Knight's growth. After all, the pony he is at the start and end of Memoirs is very different.
Now he has to grow in other ways: dealing with his PTSD, figuring out how relationships work, and navigating the complex nature of having a well rounded life. He can't be "just a guard" anymore.
A Question For You
It has been a while since Crystal and I set up our Patreon and got it moving. It has also been very popular and we are so thankful to those of you that are supporting our work. This went well past what we imagined it would.
With that said, we're always curious about how we can improve things. We set the Patreon up with what we thought was best. Now we'd like to hear from you. What do you like about it? What do you dislike about it? What would you like to see? What would make you more likely to support (it is fine even if you wouldn't, you can still answer)?
Thanks all!
I have nothing to say about the Patreon, since it's more a way to reward you for the time you invest of writing stories with so much updates :)
Reading between the lines it appears that Silent Knight by the end of Secrets will be a playboy sailing the skies in his new airship with Crystal, Velvet, and Luna as they conquer new territory for the glory of the Empire of the Night.
My theory is that Crystal and Anzel are married (we know Anzel has a wife but he's awfully cryptic abaut her) and they will reveal it after the wedding chapter for all of us to go insane and dupt the existance of the world. Repeatively.
That's was a theory. A pony theory. Thanks for reading and we'l see ourselfes on the next angry ponies show.