Lunarmane
Any chance of an Orthos hat?
Rebecca
I'm gonna pass that along, take a note of that. We'll see if we might be able to make that happen one day here soon. So, I've got my eye on you Orthos hat.
Any chance of an Orthos hat?
I'm gonna pass that along, take a note of that. We'll see if we might be able to make that happen one day here soon. So, I've got my eye on you Orthos hat.
Are all the books going to be signed from the Kickstarter?
Yes, all of the books will be signed.
Why do you still live in Florida?
Well look, I made a pact long ago with the Swamp Spirits of Florida, and if I move now it would just, it would cost me way too much of my power. It's taken me years of practice to learn how to create Manga, uh, mangroves out of nothing. So, I don't want to give that up. I'll be honest, if I moved somewhere else, you know if I moved to Georgia, do you know how long it would take me to create Red Clay? I mean, years. Years. I don't want to have to get to know knew spirits, and find new witches buried in the swamps, I just want, it's a whole thing.
Which doll of Simon's is your favorite?
That's a great question, I like a lot of the dolls, (Rebecca slides into camera frame next to Will's head) but of course my favorite one is Rebecca. (Rebecca slides back off camera) Rebecca is my favorite doll.
Is the new series planned to be as long as Cradle?
No. That is not the plan, I'm planning on doing it shorter than Cradle. I'm thinking 5 books right now, but that's very very early in the process. It could easily change, but that kind of range.
When will the Cradle D&D Kickstarter be up?
I don't think Wizards of the Coast would like me doing that.
What is your favorite Star Wars character?
Who is my favorite Star Wars character....? Uh, Sam said Jar Jar Binks. Even in jest, I can't do it. It's got to be Yoda. I feel like, I was trying to think of one that's not like, taken by everyone, but it's probably Yoda. (Rebecca from off screen 'I think one day I'm going to do a house tour to show off our Star Wars living room.') It's Ewen McGregor. Not Obi Wan, Ewen McGregor.
Make the glowy stuff different colors.
Alright so Trent, is responding to my magic system design notes, and I want to address that. Color coding is a great way to create a shortcut to distinguishing between paths, and any varieties in your magic system. I think color coding is, Territories as you might remember.
Would you ever consider streaming a DnD one shot?
No, but Rebecca is very excited by that idea. Look, (Rebecca from off camera, 'Come on! a Cradle DnD 1 shot...) Alright, I mean I could, streaming it is hard. Look, for one thing I'm, I don't, I do these things to have fun with the other people at the table or that are in the game. So it's less about being performative and also I don't really care about the rules. So I know the DnD rules pretty well, but I don't care about them very much. It's one of those things where I'm like, the rule of cool is supreme and if people are having a good time it's working.
Yeeesassssssss!!!!!
Haha, Hannah says yes to the DnD thing. Yeah of course she does, because Hannah is in my DnD group right now; and so is my sister Rebecca. So I've been running a group for about a year now, or something like that, and we're on a pause because one of the group members had a baby. Yeah, it wasn't me.
Do you have any personal writing goals, what do you want to accomplish as a writer?
You know I was asked this recently, what I really want to accomplish as a writer is to tell stories. I like telling stories, I like doing it. I like telling a lot of stories, I just enjoy it. So, kind of what I'm doing now, is sort of my writing goal. I guess what I want to keep doing is getting more efficient, more effective, and maybe not taking such an emotional beating during the writing process. Every time I write a book, it's kind of an emotional roller coaster for me. I sort of, it's kind of like a crushing huge disappointment followed by a peak of 'oh my gosh, this is amazing' and everybody saying I'm great, and then, but I'm not, I'm terrible; and its just this emotional wringer that really sucks, and I crash from every time. I'm trying to kind of maybe minimize that, maybe I can keep the enjoyable parts and all that.
Favorite magic system?
My favorite magic system is probably Hunter x Hunter. So, that's the nen system of the Hunter x Hunter anime and manga, I think it's great. I think it's a great way of developing individual powers so it's kind of like they took their normal shonen anime thing where everyone has their own specific highly detailed power, and then they created a system for making, super detailed shonen powers. I think that's super cool. (Takes sip.)
What's a good way to make a magic system have a wide variety, without still not being overly complicated?
So what you're looking for is of course, is the holy grail of a magic system. Is, easy to learn, hard to master. Just like a game, it's easy to understand in a conceptual level, but there's a lot of flexibility in it. Man, I have a lot of thoughts on magic systems. So the broad strokes are, you want to decide what kind of thing you want, so what sort of idea or aesthetic you want for the magic system. So do they look like, cultivation, you know martial artists throwing fire balls? Do they look like wizards? Do they look like high tech mad science technicians? What is the general concept, right? Then after that, you go into what can it do? So that defines what kind of features you do want it to have; and then, kind of what can't it do? What are it's restrictions? How does it actually work in real life? Implement it. So if you are really doing this, give me some practical way of how you're doing it. It doesn't just happen. So then how does that work? That implies other restrictions and limitations; and then you kind of go back and forth as you refine it into something specific that people can really work on.
How fixed is time in the Willverse? Seems there's an emphasis on fate.
Okay, actually, good question. So, time, in the multiverse, is kind of fixed; but it's flexible. So, there is one central time that the Way maintains, it keeps time from being 'too' relative. Which I'm not going into that; but it keeps time sort of relevant to one another, but worlds swing one way or the other. So, it is...
Will is heavily inspired by Saya No Uta.
... No, I am not. (...) Anyway, but time, in the different worlds, flex, a large way, but if you flex to one way either something else has to flex the other way or you yourself would have to go on a cycle. Typically if you're in a world, that is doing that, you don't notice; because you're not paying attention to the time of other worlds, right? So, one of the people that do notice are Amalgam. So the Territories have different relationships to time, but that changes over long spans of time. The Territories flex and change and their relationship to Amalgam. So one Territory might have certain time dilation now, and then it change gradually.
Will you be attending any conventions in the coming year?
Yeah, I'll be at DragonCon this August, like always. So, DragonCon. I'll be there.
What's the most obscure place you've drawn inspiration from?
I was thinking about this earlier and I, it's very hard for me to, say, because I kind of, everything goes in the hopper. You know what I mean? Everything, you pop everything into your brain. So it's hard for me to say where I get, most things don't have a specific, easily identifiable inspiration for them. It's hard for me to say what the most obscure place I've drawn inspiration from, because I draw inspiration from everything. So, yeah, that's just hard for me to, I don't know if I have a good answer for that question.
When you inevitably write Traveller's Blade, as an Akura Harmony, an Amalgam spin off series, how many Oreos will you eat during the production of the first chapter?
You're in my mind. Let's see, I would say about a quarter of a package.
Will you marry me?
I'm sorry Carson, I think we ought to just be friends.
On a scale of 1-10, what is your favorite color of the Alphabet?
Blue.
What are the relationships that you find most difficult to explore as a writer, and how do you incorporate them into your stories?
So, obviously I've been open about the fact that romance is hard for me to write. There's a lot of reasons for that, but one of the major ones is. I'm writing these action focused fantasy, action stories; and I don't like shallow romances. I find it annoying and distracting. So, in most action focused fantasy, it is, the characters just fell in love because they're both attractive and sort of in the same general zip code; and that's not; I would prefer it not to be there than to be that, that adds nothing for me. That is common, so I know how to write those, those are easy to write; but a real fleshed out relationship between two characters develops over the course of a series. It's a lot harder to write, it's difficult, it requires a lot of page space. Obviously I'm a big fan of pacing very quickly, and you slow down the pacing to develop romance stories. So it is hard to do both, so because of that it is hard for me to write. Now, a lot of people go, 'I dont like romance at all'. That's not really true, a lot of series I read, Manga mostly, are romantic comedies. When its an emotional story line, and it's an emotional conflict, primarily it's the way it progresses. Then romance fits in that quite well. I can easily imagine myself going, yeah, if I were writing a series that was all about the emotional ups and downs of relationships of the characters, it would be very easy for there to be romance in that, as a dimension; because primarily what we're dealing with is the characters who have emotions and relationships between one another while going out and killing Lazer Monsters. It's hard to work that in, kind of like how it's hard to work in a human story line while you've got, in a Godzilla movie. So, it's just like... It doesn't mesh well. So because of that, because I'm not willing to just say, just have romance for the sake of romance, that's the hardest thing for me to write. (Takes sip.)
Has working on your non Cradle story helped your overall productivity?
I guess. It's hard to tell, I know that I feel better. Going, working on other things. I like having a break, working on other ideas. I like stretching myself I like trying new things. In terms of hopping back and forth, does it help my over all productivity? I don't know. I mean, that's, I was pretty productive before, I'm pretty productive now.