Royal Blood retrospective · 5:40pm Dec 22nd, 2021
I thought about putting this all in an author's note at first, but perhaps this would be better served as a blog post. Besides, I might as well make actual use out of this blogging feature, even if I never really got the hang of it. The following rambling nonsense will contain some spoilers, so if you're worried about that make sure you catch up before reading this.
Anyway, after two years of writing and a surprisingly consistent posting schedule of one chapter per month, Royal Blood is finally complete. So, I thought I'd write down my thoughts over the past two years of writing it. First, I like to think that I've gotten better at planning out stories, and having a clearer idea of how I knew it was going to end, even if the specifics were still up in the air, certainly helped to keep me from slipping from that monthly schedule.
The second thing is that perhaps unlike my previous Blueblood stories, I identified a theme that I wanted to stick to with Royal Blood. Well, I like to think that there are common themes behind this series - war is hell, it changes people for the better or worse, and there's an awful lot of bureaucracy and arguing that goes on behind it. Being an amateur armchair general, I was always more fascinated by the personalities of the people involved and how they affected the conduct of war, as opposed to tactics and technology as the stereotype often goes, and I certainly hope that pervades in my writing. This time, however, I aimed to focus on the theme of escalation. Wars, particularly those of a certain scale, have tended to have moments of escalation, as one side pushes past a limit to achieve victory, whether it's technological, strategic, tactical, or even moral, and the other catches up.
Yet despite this escalation in savagery, I had to make sure that I did not fall into the trap of making everything so utterly bleak that the audience stops caring. While I did have a firm idea of the ending, I still agonised it over the months in the lead-up of having to actually write it - could I truly write about ponies committing a war crime without it coming across as exploitative? It was a tricky balancing act, for I had to make sure that the escalation to that point felt natural, and I like to think that I achieved that both with portraying the worsening conditions of the war and with a character like Second Fiddle. The other thing I knew I had to nail was Blueblood's reaction, as the point-of-view character, and I realised the only way that I could pull that off was to make sure that he was thoroughly outraged by it and, in contrast to his usual way of doing things, enough to actually do something about it - 'OOC is Serious Business' as TVTropes likes to put it.
Anyway, enough preening, what do I think I could have done differently? Despite my attempts at having a tighter plan, it's still a long and rambly tract. It's a peril of the format and my writing style tends towards the wordier side anyway, but there are probably a few things that could have been trimmed away - the subplot with the griffons didn't particularly go anywhere, for example, and I don't know if I could have glossed over the political stuff at the beginning. Then again, as I said, it's a peril of the format: it's a character describing what he personally went through, and life generally doesn't have neat little starts and finishes where everything is wrapped up neatly as we expect out of fiction. I don't know - is this a flaw or a feature of my writing?
Nevertheless, overall I'm proud of what I'd written there. I'll take a short break over Christmas and New Year to recharge, and then think about the next story in the series. It also occurs to me that next year will be the ten year anniversary of when I started writing this series, which is a slightly terrifying prospect. However, right now, all that's left for me to do is to say thank you, whether you've been with this since 2012 or you're a newcomer, and Merry Christmas and all that. Blueblood will return in 2022 in Captive Blood.
It would be funny if Blueblood became entangled in a centuries spanning plot that l, wether intentionally or not by the whims of fate, places him around or at the very epicenter of it all.
Doc Smith said that his stories rarely followed their outline, the characters kept going off on tangents of their own.
Oooh! Now I need to reread this and read the ending!
Just thought I'd say, I enjoy the wordier style of your stories. I tend to read on my kindle, where the dictionary is just a tap away, and it is always fascinating to learn new words!
Merry Christmas! I hope the holidays go well for you. Keep up the amazing work.
Your story is excellent. I was riveted start to finish. Even the waiting around in offices felt fantastic. Hell, this story was one of the only reasons I still go on to this site, and it's criminally underappreciated. You perfectly blend Ciaphas Cain, grimdark, Victorian Britain and the unironic magic of friendship together through a thoroughly unflinching portrayal of war. I mean war, ponies and friendship? Who would've thought?
My gripes were minor at best. The sub plot of Blueblood finding armour was unsatisfying and no conclusion was made. Commissar Gliding Moth effectively died because Luna insisted Commissars don't wear armour. Luna is too obtuse to realise and further suffers no consequences. I felt that was a long drawn out plot point, but it did serve to draw out more nuances of Rarity's character. I feel the ending was abrupt, as in there was a lot more war hinted at before this conclusion, but perhaps you've left plot points for the sequel. What happens to Twilight Sparkle and her one night stand? How does Saguaro go? What's the fallout from the natives due to the massacre?
Still, again, minor quibbles. I love everything you write and I can't wait for more. I'd happily pay money for a book of this calibre honestly
It's a Ciaphas Kaine novel with ponies....I'm still sad I can only give a story a single like....
I think your planning did improve, the arcs within the story flow and connect better with each others, events from throughout the story to the end, even from previous installment.
Like TinyPlaidNinja, I agree that there seems to be some minor plot points that seems to have fallen off the side that should have been pushed further or resolved. Maybe you are keeping things for a later story but it always felt that Blueblood connection all three Alicorn Princess should have made him able to at least mention his worry about the lack of armor for Commissar or the raise of religious fanatism amongst new commissars.
Of course I understand that Like for Ciaphas, his personal armor he was able to acquire partially due to luck is something that will stick with your character from now on and will help him survive stuff he shouldn't and thus continue to build-up his legend but it felt like there was indeed a lot of fuss given to acquire it with not much pay off. Yes, when the armor saved him in Royal Blood it was satisfying but over all it felt like it should have played a bigger part given how much importance it had in the narrative early on.
You really managed the theme of escalation and I hope you will continue to give us details innovation in all kind of field, be it transportation, weapons, magic, MLP races magic, tactics, etc. I know Blueblood isn't very focused on that but it's always nice to get details.
And I hope you do more maps of the conflict in the future too.
And I look forward to proofreading and editing for you when you get started again. ^_^ Thank you for giving me one of my favorite series of all time to read!
Cheers for another amazing story. An amazing arc and looking forward to the next one. You deserve every single view you've gotten and more. The Blueblood Paper is a 1000+ upvote story that needs a feature.
While late to reply here. I think you’ve done an excellent job in combining the “personalised” touch of a memoir - they never come off as fully telling, will always side track and forget something they mentioned previously (as being wrote afterwards most are mainly from memory or small notes and trinkets they kept - even Eugene Sledges With the Old Breed has notable jumps and misses of people he was talking about only days earlier)
Plus while you tact yourself for your wordy writing - tho going off the writers your inspired by (Sandy Mitchell and Cornwall to say a couple - I know where you got that Bridge scene with Moth and the portrayal of the breech, Eagle and Company are two of my favourite in the series) your in good company for your writing.
And yes your portrayal of escalation in war - in attitude, tech and fighting - is very well handled. It never felt people were going to far at any point outside of there character. It also helps show the slow mix of a modern perspective of a generation/era mix with another and the continuous slow growth of it - even those who see themselves as the progressive new generation can still have much of the old tied into them and fall into the same old pits and tropes, while even the older generation still have a few things they can pass on which get overlooked or thought of as unneeded or dumb until the time arises in which they are.
Tho for all the praise you also seem to like some critic too as you wish to improve on your writing and skills - highly commendable coming from this era of Tv and movie writers who prefer to keep their ears down and locked - as such here are a couple improvement points.
1. Scaling - note this point is something most military fiction writers struggle with. Many will have a large flex in numbers and scaling of units for whenever the story requires - tho you aren’t too bad at it (not like GWs 300 man platoons that accompany Gaunt wherever he goes) - however I occasionally do see a shift in unit size and scaling when your attempting to portray a large scale engagement whilst also having your solo character keep close to the carnage and have a few accompanying men. It’s nothing to major but to someone like myself who reads and loved military history to the point I can name off the battalion and company structure of the French and British Napoleonic Regiments… it can be noticeable.
My best way to suggest help with this is to write out a table or note of what structure a regiment is using - say it’s the French 6 Company Battalion (1 Gren, 4 Light, 1 Volt) - then write down a selection of Officets, NCOs and rankers assigned to it - say Company 3 has, 3 Officers (insert name and rank here), 11 NCO’s and 72 men; you can then use this on a small paper map to plan out engagements and where people scatter so that what sounds like a small company of 100 ain’t fending off what sounds like thousands (while brave the KGL showed that even in square, only so much can be taken before even a regiment can break in and ride it down, and they broke a French square with a couple determined squadrons of men and horse).
2. As you already picked up you like blue blood can seem to forget characters and entities you introduce. Again while not major in a memoir story, it can be still be something to improve on - maybe having Celestia use memoirs or letters recovered from families or personal memoirs from characters like Sunshine or Blitzkrieg to reflect on the situation of the Night Guard or the battle itself (an example from your recent chapter, an excerpt taken from Blitzkrieg talking about the clash of the Light and Heavy Pegasus would give more insight into the character, engagement and as a “hello” from said character too).
In addition these can be used greatly to help retire characters you wish to either pass on in the memoirs or maybe hold for later - noting a damaged wound or loss of limb that puts them out the fight for a while or an extended time.
Another small choice would be for even Blueblood to maybe reflect on some of these characters he notes being close to - Blitzkrieg the Rainbow Dash of the NG he turned from a commoners to a Gentleman or Sunshine who he again made more the gentleman and himself learned things from and spent much time with in the officers mess and battle. It doesn’t have to be major, but notes of which company they may be part or or him looking out for there body coming down from the sky - or hoping not to see - or as your newest chapter, relating on where the veterans of the Nighg Guard during the calm time may have retreated to within the squares and if they are ok.
And while we know Blueblood to only reflect on himself, it does stay in character for him to reflect on others and there conditions out of hand - even if only thinking to the hard work he’d have wasted seeing them lost like Red.
PS. Keep up the amazing work.
PSS. Sorry for the over lengthy post