Infinite Potential chapter is ALMOST done... also, Happy Holidays^^ · 10:10am Dec 24th, 2021
Hi, sorry for being silent for so long 
Was busy, had minor health issues both myself and in family, then tried focusing on getting the chapter done...
Anyway, let's get the important stuff out of the way; the chapter is ALMOST done. It should be a matter of days before it's finally finished, so hopefully I'll get it done over the weekend. Of course, my team will have to go over it, so it's unlikely it would be published before the end of the year. Sorry, I know I said I would try to improve my writing pace, heck, I said I would give you 4 Infinite Potential chapters this year, and it will look like technically I only gave you two; gonna count chapter 20 for this year's, obviously, but still. And even aside from IP, only other thing I wrote were 2 chapters for Rebirth of the Damned!
Ugh... after this chapter I'll take short break, then gotta write Stars in the Making and 2-3 chapters for Rebirth of the Damned before going after next IP chapters. Sorry, hopefully 2022 will be better writing year for me.
And on that cheerful note, Happy Holidays^^ Whichever one you are celebrating, Chrismas, Hanuka, Kwanza, Hearth's Warming, hope you all have happy time, whether you spend them with family or alone^^
I myself I'm spending them with my mom and brother, and his two cats, but not doing really anything too special, just gonna have dinner, exchange gifts, keep the cats away from the Christmas Tree and other plants, lazy about the next day, pretty standard stuff.
Oh right, last time I wrote blog post I was writing about Pokemon Platinum Nuzlocke. I forgot to tell y'all, I won^^ Managed to beat the Elite Four and Cynthia without losing anybody, too^^ Surprisingly Lucian was the toughest, not Cynthia, my strategy with Dragon Dancing Gyarados worked way too well 
Been playing WoW Classic again, got my hunter alt up to max level and even started taking him out to my guild's raids more often than my main. In fact I was thinking about making him my main instead of the warlock, it's just much more fun playing as hunter.
Unfortunately my guild broke up, all the top players decided to leave, as they were tired of practically doing everything instead of our guild master that I myself barely saw in the game since I joined them in March.
So yeah, that was pretty sad, but those things happen. I could find a new guild, but honestly, got tired of WoW again... the stuff revealed on the PTR for retail's 9.2 patch helps with that. I was beyond livid what they've done with Sylvanas, but now, with what little we learned about motherf***ing Arthas, aka the best villain of the game, the most tragic character, one of the BEST characters in the franchise and favorite of many, the star of that crossover fic that got me started here and 9 years later is still going... This expansion should have been about HIM, like Legion was about Illidan. But instead, he hadn't appeared, and now with 9.2 stuff...
It wasn't shown what exactly they're gonna do this his soul, but if we destroy it, if we cast him out forever into oblivion, if Arthas, for all that he had suffered because of Frostmourne and Jailor, who was APPARENTLY behind EVERYTHING, will be now gone forever... I am quitting the game and never coming back -_- I might not delete my account because I do not like doing stuff like that in general (look above for my outrage about Arthas being gone forever), but I doubt anything after this wasted expansion would make me return. Arthas' stuff isn't the only thing I have about the current story, this would be the final nail in the coffin for me.
On happier note... been into DC lately. Finished my Crisis on Infinite Earths comic finally (took me a while because I didn't know almost any of the characters it starts with). Afterwards I ordered Death of Superman and Batman: Hush comics, LOVED them, and now I am waiting for A Funeral for a Friend, Flashpoint, Batman: A Death in the Family and Batman: Arkham Asylum.
Speaking of Batman: Arkham Asylum, I finally played through Batman Arkham Asylum (bought the entire trilogy about 2 years ago for PS4), it was amazing. Currently somewhere in the middle of Arkham City, had to take break to better focus on writing. But I'll finish the trilogy, those games are great^^ So far I liked Asylum better than City, because while it is fun to run around a whole city, Asylum had better... climate, you know? I liked being locked up in the asylum trying to get out. Heck, the game had a whole Bioshock feel to it. Being surrounded by violent crazy people, chasing after an asshole, and while it's not underwater it's so much raining over Gotham that it might as well be
But that's not the only thing I got very into, recently. After about 4 years, I finally got back into Warriors again^^ To those who don't know this amazing series, it's a series of books written by Erin Hunter (pseudonym of three authors working in this series) about cats living in the wild, in 4 clans, each with its own territory they guard from each other and fight for. It's an amazing series that is about 19 years old at this point and counts... I dunno, about 70 books? Hard to tell, they're divided into:
- 7 series, each with 6 books, in Spring starts the 8th series
- special editions, long books that focus on specific cat and events from outside of the series, like distant past
- novellas stories, each only a few chapters long, come out on ebooks but eventually they get published in groups of 3 to make an entire book.
- a few mangas
My favorite series is the first one, even though a lot of my favorite characters (including THE favorite one) aren't in it, and the series is riddled with silly inconsistencies the authors made by mistake, but it holds a special place in my heart^^ The favorite book though would be Crookedstar's Promise special edition, it's just amazing, with Bluestar's Prophecy being close second^^
Anyway, if I love this series so much, why did I stop reading it? Well, in 2017 came out special edition Tigerheart's Shadow, which focuses about Tigerheart and Dovewing and their relationship... two cats I despise on their own, let alone their relationship
I could not get through the entire book, I got stuck in the middle, and was never able to finish it. And since I hadn't finished it, I didn't want to buy the next book, and so I stopped paying attention of the books as the were coming out.
Now I wanted to get back into it, so I looked up online how many books came out since then... about 18 
I was at 3rd book of 6th series, since then they finished 6th series and went through entire 7th! And 4 special edition books came out, and several novellas and mangas even! I thought they stopped making the mangas several years ago!
Anyway, bought a books 4, 5 and 6 of series 6, one of the special editions, and two novellas books (so 6 novella stories). I wanted to get one more Special Edition, Leopardstar's Honor, as it happens in the past so order doesn't really matter and she's, um, sort of my "Cat waifu", I guess you could call her?
Well not exactly, but she is one of my favorites. But I can't get it because that book came out only a few months ago, and my borderline OCD won't let me get it before all the other special editions and 7th series
Anyway, I need to catch up quickly, I already have like 5 or 6 big spoilers for the books, the only saving grace being that in most cases I don't know when those things I got spoiled will happen. And yeah, I need to finish Tigerheart's Shadow, ugh... If I ever have a cat and will have to get them spayed I will reread this book, because that book actually made me wanna hurt a cat! (Tigerheart and Dovewing, obviously)
Currently rereading the first series though, as it's my favorite and I would rather read it for 10th time than Tigerheart's Shadow. Heck, been considering reading through the entire series (by that I mean the "series books", no special editions or novellas) before starting the new books, considering how long it will take for them to arrive I might even make it.
Oh, and I got myself Nintendo Switch finally^^ Got ShiningPearl, doing a Nuzlocke run on it, but between writing and playing other stuff I only got past 3rd gym so far ^^; Aaaaand managed to lose Kimba the Luxio. Why I keep losing Luxios in Nuzlockes?! 
Was planning to get Zelda Breath of the Wild but between everything I don't think I'll finish ShiningPearl soon, and Arceus game comes in a month so I'll probably get THAT first, then Zelda.
Lastly gonna talk about a thing I discovered recently... did you know there's a Russian rock opera about Tolkien's story?!
Not Lord of the Rings, but The Lay of Leithian, the tale of Beren and Luthien, the first human elf couple in history of Tolkien's world, ancestors of Aragorn and Arwen^^
It's called "Finrod the Rock Opera", not quite sure why they named it after an elf that is essentially a secondary character in this tale (I mean, he was an awesome character within Silmarillion, but in this story specifically...), but who cares. There are some changes from Tolkien's story, for example I don't remember Thingol, Luthien's father, being THAT much of a d*ck, Curufin and Celegorm are suggested to be the last sons of Feanor when all of them were alive at this point (minutes one in some versions of Tolkien's notes), Sauron and Morgoth seem to be fused into same character in this, and the wolfhound Huan, the real MVP of this story, does not appear. But I think as an adaptation it still works. Of course it's in Russian, but there are english subtitles and the whole thing is on youtube!
Of course, it's a bit long, so maybe you would rather check out some of the songs, so here are my favorite three:
Beren arriving in Nargothrond:
The duel of Sauron and Finrod Felagund (aka, possibly the first Epic Rap Battle of History; they fought with "songs of powers" as Tolkien wrote it):
The duel of Sauron and Luthien:
Love those songs, and many more from this opera, it's great^^
Okay, that's about all from me, gonna make another blog post when I'll finally finish writing the chapter and move it forward to my team, so, you know, you'll know to bother THEM instead of me 
Happy Holidays^^
I am very low on time so might not have much in the way of a detailed reply, but Happy Holidays in return. :)
Ah, and good luck with your and your family's health, and in general.
(Also, no idea when I'll get to the chapter, sorry; I already have a very large backlog, argh...)
(...Wait, I'm on the editing team as final looker-over, aren't I, if I remember correctly? Sorry, been a bit, and I think the previous chapter was my first? :D Okay, so, yeah, then that wouldn't be in the same queue as the rest of the stuff. I still have other demands on my time, chores, work, etc., but hopefully one way or another, by the time the chapter gets to me, I'll be able to not keep you waiting too long.)
Ah, congratulations on that win. :)
Sorry about the WoW difficulties. As I recall, my dad recently lost interest, too, with the way the current expansion is going.
Oh, though as a point of information, I did pick up CKII on sale a bit ago, and have found the Guardians of Azeroth mod fun, what I've played of it. Not perfect, but I can now say with personal experience that it might be worth you checking out if you ever feel like it and have the opportunity.
(And I continue to recommend Travels through Azeroth and Outland, though, of course, no pressure, still, if you've not gotten to it yet, don't want to, etc.)
Oh, and in other gaming, it's been a bit since I played (other things coming up, argh...), but my current NV playthrough has passed meeting Caesar. I'm not sure whether or not he regretted his arrogance in thinking I'd work for him, after everything I'd already done against the Legion; it depends on how quickly the realization of defeat would have set in relative to the laser-induced disintegration... (Actually, as it was a bit ago, I'm not sure he disintegrated -- but it's quite possible, and in any case he definitely got lasered to death.) Anyway, so yeah, Caesar and the entire command staff and elite guard unit in his tent, plus a variety of other soldiers in the area, wiped out in a single night by the woman he invited in, who'd already single-handedly cleared out Nelson and Cottonwood Cove. Seems pretty likely I'm rivalling the Burned Man for whispered infamy at this point.
(And for roleplaying purposes, among other things, I was using stealth boys in the attack, took out one lot of soldiers, then went in to the vault... then took out another lot, still in stealth, and only then snuck out. So I imagine that, for a while, they couldn't be sure I was actually really gone, and not going to pop up again once they let their guard down. :D)
Good luck with the reading!
"minutes one"
I'm failing to parse this, sorry. ..."minus one", did you mean?
Anyway, re the rock opera: neat. :) Glad you found and enjoyed that.
...And from your tags briefly sparked in my brain the idea "Pokemon as written by Tolkien?". :D
Don't know what that would be like, though.
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Thanks^^
Thanks^^
(Yeah, you're on the team as the final proofreader^^ And yeah, it's been a while
And yep, the previous chapter was your first^^ Anyway, no worries with schedule, it will probably take about 2 weeks for everybody else to go over the chapter - it turned out 22k words long - so hopefully you'll have a bit more time by then 
)
Thanks^^ Was trying to get a Nuzlocke done for about 10 years, I would always lose interest before making it to the end, so it was really satisfying to win finally^^
Ah, sorry to hear he lost interest in WoW, although I obviously understand. It really is a pity what Blizzard is doing with this game. The current expansion was so promising, I remember being excited when I played through the new zones the first time... Heck, I even catch myself thinking about making a new character (void elf warlock named Sauron
) and completing the storyline of one of the remaining two covenants, but when I think about the main storyline and how awful it is, how...disrespecting to so many characters, how they're pulling stuff out their asses... No, as fan as some elements of the current game are, the negatives outweigh them this time for me.
Yeah, still planning to check it out, been busy with some other games
Always fun to kill Caesar xD Actually started a new New Vegas game a few weeks ago played a few hours on a new character, needed to get myself into Fallout mood when I started writing the chapter. Not saying yet what kind of character it was yet, as I was channeling a certain character from Infinite Potential for it to better write this current chapter xD
Thanks, just finished the chapter^^
Yep, meant minus
Thanks, I usually don't like stuff like that but it's pretty great^^
Hm, well he probably would not let people catch a god into a Pokeball, that's a given, and would make the story more "epic", you know? Probably would be happening in the past, without modern age/future tech, maybe he would cover something like that big war in the Kalos region that kept being brought up?
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:)
:)
(Thanks! I mostly replied to this in the PM, though the additional information here about the timeframe being ~2 weeks was useful.
And hopefully so, yes!)
Ah, with that length of attempts behind it, extra congratulations, then. :)
Aye, sorry.
(The various things bringing WoW back to my mind recently got me wondering, among other things, when a good place to cut it off, either for an end or another direction, might have been. So far, though I've not thought/researched on it extensively, I'm thinking the end of MoP might be a good candidate. The war plotline starting at the Wrathgate is resolved, Vol'jin seems likely to be a good warchief, and there are a lot of directions things could have gone from here. Granted, I never got to the end of MoP myself in playing, so might be missing something, but from my reading it looks like it'd be a fairly clean break point. Also, at that point flight is available pretty much everywhere one would logically expect it to be, and the five continents available, and their contents, provide a lot of space and variety.
The end of WotLK seems like a good second choice. A lot less content available, but it also seems like a pretty clean break; importantly, it's also the last time there was a straight-through chronological progression in levelling. The fact that the 60-80 areas were in the past of the 1-60 areas, and then 80+ jumped forward again is... not the most convenient from a roleplaying perspective.
(Also, ending/diverging after the end of WotLK would have even less time for... character development in perhaps iffy directions, though who was doing that and how is a subject of debate, of course, I expect.)
After MoP, though, was the... alternate universe time travel thing, which raises all sorts of questions which, granted, I never got there, but I got the impression weren't answered to what would have been my satisfaction. And then further developments I'm mostly less clear on but have vague feelings of disapproval of, thouuuuugh admittedly some of that might be a bit of neophobia and "WoW's golden age just so happened to coincide with when I was playing it most!". :D
So, yeah, I don't know, and obviously there's a fair bit of subjectivity in here. Just something I found myself pondering.
(Though I do think that there's a particular problem with focusing too much on the Horde/Alliance conflict, at the higher levels, at least if the game wants to portray the player as a mighty hero rather than relegating the levels more firmly towards just game mechanics. Namely, in PvE, the world can at least give the appearance that you've made a major change in things. Sure, you may know that Raid Boss X has respawned, may even go back and farm them regularly, but storywise, you've moved on to the next zone or expansion, and now in that bit of spacetime, Raid Boss X is dead and you're dealing with something new. But if the Big Enemy against which Epic Battles are happening is the other playable faction... it becomes increasingly hard to ignore the knowledge that there is basically no chance that the balance of power will really shift. One side might gain a temporary minor dominance, at most the two sides might permanently exchange territory (as I heard happened in a later expansion), but neither can ever actually win. Oh, in theory, they could; one faction or the other could just outright lose, be destroyed. PvP maintained by adding a new faction, or letting players join guerrilla bands, or something. Maybe the victorious faction, suddenly bereft of external pressure, splinters, and we get two (or more!) new factions, with different mixes of PC races. There's a lot of interested stuff that could be done there, I think.
But, come on, exactly how likely is Blizzard to say "Okay, and in this expansion, the Horde just loses. Completely, no more Horde, gone."? Or the same for the Alliance? With how risky a decision that would be, and how much money they make off the status quo? Yeah.
So you go out, and you be a hero, and it becomes increasingly hard to ignore that none of it matters, and all seeming progress towards making a fundamental change in that aspect of the world is illusory. The Horde is never going to use that big cannon to wipe out Stormwind and ever other major surface Alliance settlement in the Eastern Kingdoms and provide backstory for Fallout: Khaz Modan. The Alliance is never going to conquer the Horde, with all PC races then being in the Alliance and plotlines about dealing with or being the occupiers in former Horde lands. The tauren are never going to decide they've paid their debts and leave a Horde they're increasingly at odds with to form a third faction with the kaldorei increasingly concerned with the sort of magic the rest of the Alliance is using. Etc., etc.))
(...Argh, and I did not have time for all the typing I just did. Seem to have gotten going a bit, there; sorry.)
"Yeah, still planning to check it out, been busy with some other games
"
Oh, no worries. I, too, have a list of things I'd like to check out/do, buuut time...
(...Wait, though do you mean Travels through Azeroth and Outland or the CKII mod? Or both? Though the answer above applies to any of those.)
"Always fun to kill Caesar xD"
Yeeeeah, he apparently didn't realize that maybe inviting to stand right in front of him someone who'd single-handedly wiped out multiple Legion military bases, ferreted out and killed a major Legion spy, and diplomatically broken a Legion "alliance", and then reciting her list of accomplishments against him back to her, might end badly for him! I guess he was really confident in his guards' ability to search me for weapons. Given they missed the laser pistol, the explosives, the stealth boys, that the chems for my ""heart condition"" just happen to have some combat applications... Well.
"Actually started a new New Vegas game a few weeks ago played a few hours on a new character, needed to get myself into Fallout mood when I started writing the chapter. Not saying yet what kind of character it was yet, as I was channeling a certain character from Infinite Potential for it to better write this current chapter xD"
Oh, interesting. :)
Well, I hope that goes well for you!
:)
Ah, thanks.
:)
Sounds plausible, at least.
Though I don't recall anything about a big war in the Kalos region, or indeed a Kalos region; that may have been after I wasn't doing much with Pokemon anymore.