CGL's Stories: A Reexamination And Reboot · 4:11am Feb 28th, 2018
It's been a while. In the past year and a half, despite occasionally crawling back here to whine about the show's direction, I've largely stayed away from Pony and spent a lot of time in other fandoms. My writing and my understanding of writing has been improved in important ways, and I've come to realize certain bad habits I used to have, (primarily in jumping in before properly fleshing out my ideas.) Furthermore, this time away from Pony has extended to my own multi-chapter stories, which I've not thought about much at all for a while - while potentially a problem for motivation, this distance also gives me an opportunity to look back on my ideas and reconsider how I feel about them; to decide what's still worth pursuing, what's got some core good but needs serious improvement, and what I should just give up on altogether.
Destiny Is Magic: My oldest story, and the age shows now more than ever. It's not that I don't think the concept is unworkable, but it would take a lot more effort than I have interest in expending. Ultimately, I think it was Cancelled for the best, and will remain that way indefinitely.
Of Responsibility: The most popular of my ongoing fics, I think. I've had kind of an interesting relationship with this one and sometimes even resented it a bit, but despite my mocking of it a mere few days ago, I feel it holds up better than I used to think it did. The initial concept was kind of alright, mainly meant to combat some of the more common and annoying tropes in the utter flood of Chrysalis Redemption(tm) fics at the time, but since then my concepts for it have developed and deepened, and while there is certainly room for further improvement, I think it's headed in a pretty good direction overall. The main issue is getting past the slow setup phase, and the fact that of the three main plots, two are well fleshed-out but the third (and ironically, most immediately relevant) one could still use some more planning. Overall, though, I'm confident in saying this one is still very much In Progress.
The Atlantis Scenario: Probably the single most detailed of my early ideas, this one is going places. I do feel like the execution of certain plot points could stand to be improved upon a little bit now, but overall the skeleton is still pretty solid. Definitely still going to work on this piece In Progress.
Room Three-Fourteen: This one is definitely a victim of my early inclinations to write first, plan and flesh out later. I do think there were some interesting ideas I had with this one, but overall it just does not hold up, and so it's perhaps for the best that I didn't get too far on it anyway. I may try to rework it eventually, but for now it is Cancelled.
Temptation Waits: This is a bit of a tough one to figure out what to do with. Starting as a mere oneshot based on a crack ship, I've since laid out a loose yet solid plan for it. I love some of the ideas I had here, while others I'm less fond of, and I'm of mixed opinion on the overall rather edgy tone. I feel like there's merit to continuing with this, but it may require some reworking and even potentially a rewrite of what I've already produced for it. So I'll go ahead and say it's On Hiatus.
EDIT: After actually reading back through Temptation Waits, I've decided to move it back into "Incomplete/In Progress" status, on the grounds that the issues I had with it weren't actually as big as I thought they were, and don't necessarily impact the story's actual quality so much as just being kind of... weird. Plus, the whole fic is a bit on the outlandish/experimental end of things, so it's really not that out of place.
OMEGA TREE HUGGER - REVENGEANCE OF NATURE'S WRATH: I... uh... maybe I'll continue with this one? If ever I'm feeling as silly as I was then, but I don't see that a continuation is strictly necessary. I'll go ahead and mark this one as Complete.
The Shore Of Infinity (And sequels, AKA The Wardens Trilogy): This was going to be big. The start of a grandiose trilogy of epics that would redefine everything... Now, looking back, I see it as very much the product of my burgeoning dissatisfaction with the direction of the show and a desire to return to the more mythical-feeling vibes of the early fandom's view of Equestria. I'm in a weird spot now, where I feel like I had some good ideas there, and don't necessarily disagree with my overall aims with this concept... but still can't quite get behind it in full anymore, though I'm not sure exactly why. This is going to require some further thought and examination, and even if the scope isn't necessarily diminished, I feel there was definitely some of that "it's epic so it's gotta be super long and have a zillion things going on all at once" fat that needs to be trimmed. Ultimately, it may work better as a duology than a trilogy, with the latter two installments combined into one. Just on its own, The Shore Of Infinity may also require some trimming. I'll go ahead and put this On Hiatus.
Harbingers: A definite victim of my poorer writing habits, this is one that I can take one look at and say "Yeah, this is going to need some work." My plans for this one were loose to begin with, and while I think the concept overall is a fun one, I'm not so certain how best to handle the direction of it going forward. I'm putting it On Hiatus.
Contrast: Hubristic and contradictory, are the two best words I can find to describe what I wanted for this one, and though it is a very different approach from The Wardens Trilogy, it is similarly born of my disgruntlement with FIM and the desire to return to the Season 1 roots while doing something very new and different. (Particularly, from the typical 'Nightmare Moon BUT DIFFERENT' plot.)
But the problem is that certain aspects of it are overly based on Author Appeal, with me bending over backwards to include characters and concepts that don't necessarily fit into the roles I had in mind for them. Furthermore, the episodic format I intended for it... I'll be honest, doesn't play well with my typical writing pace. I am not fast. It may make more sense for me to approach this like my Shadowbolts Continuity, as a series of shorter interrelated fics.
In addition to that, the idea of giving it a stronger connected storyline in contrast to the show's lack of real arcs or aim... well, I'm torn on that, as the broader plotline I had in mind has, I think, some solid ideas in some spots, but some really weak ones in others, and is in general rather restrictive on Contrast as a whole. It'll definitely take some further thought, yet all the same, I do really love this AU for the most part and think it can work, so I'll put this On Hiatus.
So that's that. In conclusion, we have Of Responsibility and The Atlantis Scenario still on-track with a minimum of changes required. Meanwhile, Temptation Waits, The Wardens Trilogy, Harbingers, and Contrast are on the backburner pending some conceptual polishing. And Destiny Is Magic is still rightfully dead, with Room Three-Fourteen finally joining it.
EDIT: Again, moved Temptation Waits back into 'In Progress'.
I should also look at my unpublished stories in a similar manner, fairly soon. Some of them I remember, some of them I've completely forgotten what I was going to do with, and a few too many of them make me shake my head in disappointment at my younger self. Dunno how public I'll make that half of the reboot process, but it should be interesting nonetheless.
Anywho. Gonna watch more of Season 7 over Spring Break, so that'll be fun.
I thought Temptation Waits was the most promising one, with the subtle view of how it feels to be under a siren's spell
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Yeah, I really like the Trixie side of things, and want to explore it further. It's more weirdness like the Sirens' weaponry and some of the Sunlight stuff I'm not so sure about - Like I said, I'm not sure exactly how much or how little I actually want to change it, and I may decide to just keep going as is once I've looked it over again.
4807108 I haven't read it for at least a year, so I don't remember the SunLight angle, but, there's loads and loads of SunLight on the site to begin with, so that sounds like something that could be safely axed to concentrate on Trixie?
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Most likely, yeah.
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I actually changed my mind on TW, and edited this blog post to reflect that. Just FYI.
4807143 This is very good to hear! That perspective, of seeing how it feels to be under a siren's spell, but still thinking, and not just a mindless zombie, feels like something that really should have been explored more in siren stories on this site, and yet hasn't been. So to know TW will one day be filling that void more fully is great
Precisely the same is true of Adagio x Trixie stories, of which there is only one other good one I remember, despite it being the closest thing to an Adagio ship mentioned in canon.
Thanks for all eight read it later listings!
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Thanks! I'm hopeful you'll still be interested in the story after Chapter 5 but still.
Very much so; the full repercussions of this will be interesting to explore as the story progresses.
Ooh, do you have a link? I'm intrigued.
No problem; I realized I hadn't really given your profile a look despite our correspondence, and decided to fix that. You've definitely got some interesting stuff there, and I'm looking forward to giving it a read!
4807251 There's lots more already written than is currently published then, if there's a chapter 5? Or are those just in note form?
Sure, this is the other Adagio x Trixie story, that's the story that made me like Trixie in the first place, having only been irritated by her before.
Thanks! Yesterday was the first time I published something in five months, so it's a good time to be joining that train!