A Fledgling Season: 2019 Retrospective

Alright, folks. We're here at the end of a season, and, while I don't necessarily have experience of past seasons to measure this one against, I can still evaluate what went well and what I would have done a tad differently, were I given the chance. I don't have too many plots to run through, courtesy of me wanting this to be a season of easing into things. I'd rather take things slow and run into a handful of pitfalls once or twice each than overshoot and run into the same few problems over and over. Part of that process meant that all of my dayplots this season ended up as a part of Curseplot - something I'm not keen to complain about. That the season I climbed on board in happened to be the one with the massive collaboration anyone could contribute to worked well in my favor. I was able to run a few dayplots in an existing framework while I was still getting a feel for things on the whole. We'll see if we can't build off of that progress and get a small independent plot put together for next year. Ah, but, dear me, I'm getting ahead of myself. 

While I don't have many dayplots to discuss, I do have a cast of both protagonists and villains who ended up with some fairly involved stories - and sometimes some significant entanglements - that probably deserve at least some reflection. It doesn't hurt that I had a fairly small cast that it's actually reasonable to run through, which is something worth addressing in and of itself. I'm sure at some times, it felt constraining - as it did to myself - to see the same few characters over and over again in plots. There were times where I thought it wouldn't have hurt to have a slightly larger cast for some variety, but, then, much of the reason I went in with such a small cast this season came down to concerns over time and concerns over how much I could reasonably develop these folks. It's no secret that one of my biggest obstacles is that I just can't be around as much as I wish. There's a number of factors behind it, but none of them are things I ought to burden you all with. I think that one thing which shook out near the end of the season is that aiming to attend two to three plots a week is a fairly good baseline for me. With any luck, I can push that up next season, but I think one thing I'm going to do is focus on using that as a baseline and focus on better communicating what days I'll be around rather than just randomly showing up. I took a slight digression there, but, really, that issue of time is at the heart of why I kept my cast limited. I didn't want to leave anyone out on the periphery to receive no development and do nothing of significance. With some more clarity in terms of how much time I have and a sense that I'll better be able to hit the ground running next season, I think things might work out for having a slightly expanded - if still a tad constrained - cast next season. 

Oh, but there I am, already with a longer introduction that I intended upon. I best get to the characters and the plots before this becomes an essay. I think I'll follow the lead of Goops and Chao and try to limit most of these to between one and three paragraphs. If I didn't… well, I fear I could be here all day writing this, and I doubt anyone wants to spend all day reading that much. That said, I'm happy to go into more detail for the curious or for those who have additional comments - just ask me sometime. I'm always available via Forum PM or Discord.

Main Cast

 

 

We'll start with the Argyris sisters, those three who seemed like - even to me - they would be the core of my cast at the outset of this season. That they did end up being the major characters they were intended to might make it all the more surprising to hear that, about halfway through season 9, I was already considering how to best retire them for season 10. Goops is partially right in saying they fell out of focus mid-season because much of my time was spent making sure Pitohui's development kept moving along, but a more significant component of it was that I was finding them less effective characters and less enjoyable to roleplay during that period. I recall thinking that the sisters just didn't seem to… fit, for lack of a better term, with ZFRP. That's poor wording, though, so please allow me to elaborate. What it comes down to is that I realized it was sometimes difficult to send them on plots. They, as characters, just aren't interested in getting involved with the more unusual or dangerous happenings. Amber will volunteer herself for things, sometimes without really acknowledging what she's signing up for, and Ainthe will sometimes join the right thing if she happens to be in that right place, but Aurora wouldn't have - for most of the season - ever involved herself in anything out of the norm if she could avoid it. The other key piece of the puzzle is that they've been kind of weak characters, too. They had these elemental powers, but they could barely use them for almost the whole of the season! Add on to that the fact I was worrying that their nature as a trio who mostly played off each other was holding them back from having significant interactions with any other characters out there and that they were just generally taking up a fair portion of a cast that could have gone to more usable and interesting solo characters and… well, you might see why even halfway through Preston's plot my major concern was "what exactly am I going to do with these three once this scenario with Preston wraps up?"

Thankfully, things changed as the season went on! First, I broke myself out of the "these characters don't really fit" mentality I had slipped into at the time. I can't attribute that change to anything in particular, but I think that much of it was just a change in perspective as their development continued. I kept running with their shared character arc as felt natural for the rest of the season. From the major pieces like their late-season conflict (thanks to Harps for the magic festival, which was more or less what led to it as I thought about how they would react) to the minor pieces like Amber discovering more of her powers by accident on Giovanni's plot, everything fell together in a way that helped me realize both that I still enjoyed playing the roles of these three and that they were far from being out of potential as characters. That some of that development has them more willing and able to involve themselves in some of the plots that crop up around the Kobbers doesn't hurt, either. It's even proceeded in a direction that we'll see more of a mix of them spending time on their own and spending time together next season, which should open them up to more interactions with more of the cast. I feel like Ainthe might benefit from some more time to herself, too. We didn't get to see too much of her when she's apart from her sisters, which means, to some extent, we didn't get quite as much of a sense of her as the other two. 

Finally, I want to give a special shout-out to Chao. When he initially proposed giving them an exclusive villain in the form of Polonaise, I was onboa- ... wow, that pun was not at all intended… Anyhow, on his end, things changed to Keith Preston, which ended up working better anyways. I know that plot underwent some fair changes as we went along and that, owing to my time constraints, it ended up remaining ongoing longer than we intended, so thanks for putting up with it, Chao! On the bright side, it did end up giving each sister a chance to shine and gave them some nice moments as a trio. Oh, and I should shout-out to JRM, as well, since his writing of them in the Brawl (particularly the pre-Brawl show), so left an impression on me that (some) of their bonding in the early season ended up moving on an accelerated schedule. 

Moving on to Pitohui, who had, arguably, the most overt character arc of my cast this season. I knew I had to include Pitohui in ZFRP, because, well, without her, I wouldn't be here. It was taking a crack at roleplaying her for something on another site (it's also the reason that I now have extensive collections of Pitohui art and screencaps) that led me to have an interest in exploring roleplay more and that, subsequently, led Chao and I to talk about this place. There were about only two things of which I was certain coming in, though. First (the trivial point), I knew that Elsa Kanzaki was going to have to be taller in ZFRP than she is in canon. In other words, I knew that it wouldn't do much justice to the character to have her be, like she is in her home series, virtual or even some kind of projection. Between that and the fact I didn't feel like it worked to leave behind her real identity, either, led to the development of the disguise and alter-ego concept for her. I'm happy that Elsa did end up being a part of ZFRP, too, since she has the opportunities for some interactions Pitohui doesn't and vice versa. The second, more consequential, piece of information I knew was that she was going to need some serious character development over the course of the season. I mean, she's a death-seeker whose only concern is the thrill of fatal battles and who has no concern for the well-being of anyone around her. If that weren't off-putting in a protagonist as is (there's a reason she's effectively the villain of two arcs in her home series!), it would rather quickly get tiring stretched out over six months. I didn't know exactly how that development would progress or what form it would take, but I knew it had to happen. 

And happen it did! One of the best things about the collaborative nature of ZFRP is the way events and input from other users direct plans. From collaborations with Cornwind revolving around Joy and, later, Ash, to interactions with Frost and the way the timing worked out so well for Pito to join the ZFPD rehabilitation program at the same time as Goops wanted to get Frost into it, to Kanade, there were numerous pieces of her arc that came together only because of what other folks were doing. I want to give a special shout out to Cornwind for being really flexible when we worked on collaborations together. Often, we would discuss one plan before, for some reason or another, I'd have to come to him and suggest some changes, and he was quite receptive of them. Notably, it was originally supposed to be Joy to deliver the curbstomping that finished arc two of her development, but the idea to use Kanade for that concurrently developed as Chao and I kept entangling other ideas into the concert event. I still liked the idea of Cornwind and I had spoken about of Pitohui showing how desperate she was and how out of her right mind she was by essentially hunting down Joy and the idea of having Joy, an established rival, provide some of the impetus for Pito to realize she needed to make changes, but it didn't make sense to have two different characters both tear her down in battle. So, we found a way to achieve the same goals with a different ending to that encounter. There were other changes which came with our other collaborations, too, but Cornwind was very accommodating towards all of them. I could devote an entire blogpost to going into detail on the different pieces of Pitohui's development over the season, so, to keep this concise, I want to skip to the end. The rematch against Kanade was definitely not in the original plans, and it wasn't even on the periphery of my mind back during the concert event. But, thankfully, Draco put a suggestion out into the world, and Chao embraced it as eagerly as I did, so we made it happen. It's true that the outcome was predetermined, but, in this case, I feel that was for the best. On the whole, it's been established that Pitohui is the far more experienced battler of the duo, and it worked well as a final victory for her after all of the work she put into bettering herself, one more indicative of her actual combat skill. Of course, I don't think it would have worked quite as well as a capstone to her arc this season if not for the post-script. If she had just beaten Kanade and we left it there, we wouldn't have been too far from where we started this season. That it ended with the two of them genuinely bonding some after the fight proved to be a much more impactful ending. 

I know that I'm going to break my three paragraph rule here, but I think it's worth giving this little character arc a bit more of an in-depth discussion. While numerous people contributed to the specific path the arc ended up taking, most of the broad stroke details and some of the major story beats were decided upon early. About the time I started to fully grasp just what the Big Bar Brawl was and how significant of an event it is, I decided that the broadest strokes of Pito's story arc would pretty naturally fall into three acts. The first act was all about establishing her as a character, which I knew was going to have its capstone in the biggest, deadliest battle royale event out there. Fite Yer Mates and Viva Bass Vegas ended up being rather significant pieces of this first arc. Pitohui's proper introduction was always going to be a deathmatch - I just didn't expect it was going to be her actual introduction, too. When the slot for a match with Joy opened up and Cornwind confirmed she was open to a fatal battle, I had to jump at it, and, once that lined up, I minimized what we saw of Pito very early in the season because it felt best to go all in on making the first Fite the focus of her introduction. It doesn't hurt that it was essentially a win-win situation for me. If she had won, it would have gone towards establishing her credentials as a fighter. When she lost, though, it made for an excellent opportunity to show her, ah - shall we call it euphoric obsession? Lust, perhaps? - with near-death experiences and actually dying (that the fandom has rendered its judgement on the best word to describe her experience is something we'll leave to Archive of Our Own, ehehe...). It had to come up somewhere, and it worked better there than to have to come up with something contrived later on. I mention Viva Bass Vegas on account of it being her first proper plot, one which did well to establish her attitude towards working "with" other people and ended up unintentionally planting the seeds of a dynamic with Tressa that became an informal measuring stick of her progress throughout the season. Of course, the climax of her first act was undeniably the Big Bar Brawl, and that she ended up fighting her way to 4th (and racking up a fairly high kill count on her way there) made it more of an effective climax than I could have hoped for going into it.

The second act was essentially the descent. There were two components to this act which I knew would play out. First, Pito would push herself as close to heel territory as possible without (hopefully) going full on past the moral event horizon. Around the time, I was aware that there were already concerns around her personality, and some thoughts that she was already more of a heel than any protagonist had a right to be. That wasn't a universal attitude, though, it seemed. That made this act the most difficult balancing act. On one hand, Pitohui has (or, came in with, at least) a personality that tends to push everyone away and she has a history of doing just that by treating the people around her awfully. It wasn't an unnatural slide towards rock bottom, then, which dovetailed well with the thought that she needed some comeuppance to help release some of the heelish heat she'd built up. Yet, at the same time, it was inevitable that there'd be disagreements on the degree and severity of comeuppance needed, perhaps even whether it was necessary at all. It truly was a nerve-wracking balancing act at times, trying to get this right and figuring out how far to push it. In the end, this ended up being a fairly extensive portion of the arc. I tried to make it a reasonable progression that ended with the second necessary component - a true rock bottom point. It more or less ended up following a progression of increasing desperation, increasing mental fragility, and, most importantly, an increasing range of people which her actions negatively affected. It progressed from mostly just being a jerk to a handful of people in the Underdome when they wouldn't give her what she wanted, to hurting her own physical and mental health with her deep dive into the Brawl Simulator, to seriously going after Joy and becoming a threat to someone besides just herself, to causing a scene and a minor inconvenience for an entire nightclub of people with her attempted drunken attack on Ol' Skool, to finally putting a large number of people at real risk with her concert attack - all of which were underscored by her single-minded selfish pursuit of personal pleasure. Seeing that progression was something I thought was very important. I didn't want this to come out of nowhere with her jumping off the deep end, which, while she's a character who has a history of multiple mental breakdowns, didn't feel natural to go that far that fast. It resulted in her receiving quite a bit of mid-season attention, so I do hope that it made for a logical progression and one which made the comeuppance and act three feel justified.

Act three, of course, was the redemption arc, where she actually had to put some effort into bettering herself as a person and showing improvement and self-reflection. There were numerous events which ended up playing significant roles in this, including the Bonechill fight (or, more properly for her, the Ol' Skool fight), and the Genie tower assault, so I don't think I'll go into them all for the sake of brevity. I do want to shout-out to some major influences in this portion, though. I'm thankful that Niftu was putting up with none of it from her, but, when it comes to the ZFPD, the biggest influence, and the one I wasn't expecting at all, ended up being Clawhauser. He really did serve as the perfect commanding officer for her because of their differences in personality. That he was physically stronger than her and yet unflaggingly kind and helpful played a key role in unsettling her enough to drop some of the bravado and attitude early on, and later on, well, who wouldn't warm up to that kind of genuineness? Of course, Frost ended up being a key player in this arc, too. Similar experiences made her a fine companion for Pito, someone to get close to and to work with in battle. I hope that we might see the two of them together a tad more in season 10, both on and off the battlefield. It would be nice to get some of the casual interactions in that weren't always possible in this plot-heavy year and to, sometime, get more emphasis on the combination of the cautious and strategic approach to battles and the frantic and furious approach. Finally, I again have to mention Kanade Amou here. I was never expecting them to start becoming close at the end of the season. The only reason they initially interacted was because Chao suggested that, since Elsa is an idol, too, they could have a scene together to introduce Kanade. Yet, here we are, and I'm thrilled to see what Kanade and Pitohui get up to next season together. 

That's enough about Pitohui for the overview, eh? If you feel that way, too, you might want to skip this paragraph…  I'm not quite done. I want to, just for fun, give a second thanks for Cornwind for asking, late into the season, what exactly we knew about Pitohui's personal philosophy. The answer is "not that much in detail!"... at least in the original light novels and the anime. His question caused me to delve into an analysis of the songs on both the the Elza album and the Prologue album, which not only led to some really interesting findings about common themes and imagery in her music (that then had a major influence on the sequence with her and Ash), but also led me to find out that there was a short story included with limited editions preorder copies of the Prologue album which went into detail on Elsa Kanzaki's backstory. Earlier this week, I found a fan translation of that very story! That doesn't have much to do with ZFRP directly, but I was so excited by that finding that I can't help but share it and give credit to the guy who led me down that path. As long as I'm sharing fun facts, I feel like I should say, as much as it must have felt like I was just pulling new weapons for her out of nowhere at times, I actually have an entire list of her weapons (read: it's overwhelmingly different models of guns) that I've been keeping so her armory in RP remains consistent. As I find out about more guns she owns and uses in canon and when I stumble upon notable guns in other contexts, I add them to the list. Of course, not all of them are necessarily weapons she has on hand - she wouldn't have taken her entire arsenal to Olympia, and, sometimes, I explicitly remove ones she has on her person, like when she gave away some as post-Brawl gifts to folks she explicitly deemed worthy opponents. 

Anyhow, let's talk about Yuka Suzuki. Yuka has an interesting story of her own, in that she ended up being a bit more of a major character than I expected. When you have a small cast, you expect that most of the characters will receive a fair amount of attention, but I wasn't expecting her to get the kind of development she did. Compared to Tressa and Cyrus, she had a more significant character arc, even if it wasn't quite on the level of Pitohui or the sisters. The reason why that happened? It all came down to the fact that she had a late start. Originally, Yuka was going to end up with a nearly complete team by the end of the season and her development would have been more condensed. She would have more or less achieved her ending by the season's end, and whether or not she would have returned would have depended on if I felt like there were new ideas I felt were worth exploring with her in season 10. Then, she ended up not actually joining the season until right around the Big Bar Brawl, and, well, I both had to make up lost time and realized that the condensed character arc would be too condensed if I tried to plow ahead with it. With that in mind, she ended up having much slower progress this season and her overall arc has been extended into season 10. In the end, I'm pleased with how it turned out, because we've been able to see Yuka find her confidence and some direction this season, and now we should see her capitalize on that next season.

It also proved a minor boon to Isabela and Pepta, too, since the two of them being her only team members this season meant they both had some opportunities to show their personalities. With a trainer character, I felt it was important that their Pokémon had personality and character, too. Isabela is the one always raring to go and the type to get excited watching something like the Brawl, while Pepta… well, Pepta doesn't care much about anything as long as she's fed and can sleep in peace. Distinct personalities something we'll see with more of her team members in season 10, too. Salazzle was a natural choice for a partner for someone who specialized in researching Poison-types, since its ability naturally sets apart its toxins. As for Gulpin? Well, once I started thinking about what Poison-types would actually be found in Olympia, that the species I settled upon. While, yes, there could conceivably be some polluted areas on the Undercity harboring something like Grimer, I felt like Olympia would be the type of city to drive potentially harmful pests like that out before they became a major problem - and if they weren't doing it, then surely the Crites were. Gulpin, though? They're generalists. They're relatively harmless so long as they're kept away from food stocks, and they could easily adapt to eating whatever they could find in the Undercity. Crites would definitely put pressure on them to become more skittish and defensive, but they could still persist because of their wide niche. 

...It's true I'm a biologist, but ecology has never been my primary area of interest in the field. I've been delving into ecology over these past three months or so, though. Might we see some of that reflected in Yuka's tale next season? Perhaps, though, not to the extent that anyone is bored and bogged down in ecological theory and talk about equilibrium points.

Now, as for Tressa and Cyrus, I don't feel like I have much to say about them. There were times at which I felt I wanted to do more with giving them character arcs, but, ultimately, they were comparatively minor characters on my cast. They did sometimes make for a good crutch early in the season, being the types to want to get involved in plot events and possessing the capabilities to actually fight effectively… even if Tressa ended up, being young and relatively inexperienced, the jobber fairly often. Still, everything said and done, they still did have some subtle developments, even if they lacked the explicit arcs of other cast members. That Tressa was the early season jobber and ended up being less of a jobber near the end of the season is one example of that more subtle development. Ultimately, however, it all boils down to the fact that I wish I had created a stronger plan for these two going into the season and that I had done more of note with both of them. That's something I've improved for my planned cast for next season, though - everyone coming in has a general plan. I feel like I did injustice to poor Tressa Colzione, though. Octopath Traveler is filled with a collection of good characters, and she's my favorite of the bunch. Perhaps we'll eventually see her again, even if she's retiring for now. 

Finally, I'm only going to give a brief mention to Myuri Kraft, because she's really a part of next season's cast, and that's where we'll get to know her and see her develop. She's always been planned as a part of season 10, the first character I selected for it, actually, The only reason she ended up in this season at all was because, when the Secret Fiter came up, I decided it was a good chance for a cameo for her and I thought she was a fairly solid pick for someone no one had used (actually, as you'll see more when we discuss Curse members, there was a significant portion of the season where, even after searching the forum to make sure I didn't find them anywhere on there, I was extremely paranoid I was going to pull a character someone else had used in the past). I had considered using Holo, but using Holo without Lawrence didn't feel right, so Myuri became my Spice and Wolf representative instead. When she didn't get lucky enough to be the Secret Fiter, I thought that was it, and she'd rest until season 10… then the Scuffle happened, and she appeared there, anyway. After that, I decided that - since fate (the Scuffle) seemed to will an early-bird appearance - it wouldn't hurt for her to have a few cameos in the late season, so she ended up making some appearances early, sometimes taking a few cues from Rexy in doing so…

Curse Members

Now, moving on to Curse members, we might as well start this section off by looking at Lovrina (and Naps). Lovrina was my first Curse member and my first villain in general, and she made for a fairly simply "this bad person is doing something bad, go and beat 'em" villain that worked just fine for a first plot. Lovrina is a character I've always liked and Cipher (across both games) was the first experience I had with a villainous group that had its act together and had a structure which aided its goals, but those aren't the sole reasons I used her. See, I had the thought that my first Curse member would have a somewhat comedic bend while still being a clear villain, and I had even started writing an introduction for my first Curse member… Popple, the Shadow Thief. Why did I change? Well, even after searching the forum, I had cold feet at the last minute worrying that Popple was too well-known and fit too well as a villain to have not been used at some point in the past. Needless to say, when Hot Wind Blowing came around, Goops had me laughing. Anyway, I thought that maybe I should do something with the InGen connection, too, and Lovrina worked about perfectly for that, so that's how she came together. Oh, and, as for the Pachycephalosaurus? Well, simply put, I needed dinosaurs that could be a big enough threat without being too large and more suited for a boss. I know about birds, not traditional dinosaurs, so I just searched up everything in Goops' list of examples until I found one I felt would work.

My next Curse member would go on to have a much bigger impact than Lovrina, though. I think Chao has shared the story before, but it's still strange to look back on Natasha Nielsen and realize that the only reason she became a part of the season is because Chao sent me a reaction image, I misinterpreted it as him talking about a new Curse idea, and then I went "I like the energy this picture has" and turned it into a character. I think I mentioned before, as well, but I initially envisioned Natasha as a character who was a part of "Curse middle management," as I called it. She was a high-ranking member with significant influence over other members and key control over a Curse asset, but she was, at that stage, still someone who took orders from the Curse elite and wanted desperately to impress them to be promoted among their ranks. Then Goops went and made her a part of the Big Seven (much to my pleasure, mind you!). She was given that promotion, after all. Perhaps I'm biased, but I felt like outright making her a member of the Big Seven was a good move, given the influence she had and the role she played for the Curse. 

One thing that was a core of Natasha's character from the start was her intelligence and strategizing. One thing I think you'll find with me is that I'm fond of intelligent major villains. If you're going to come up with a big evil plot, it ought to be a good one, yeah? I don't mean to say villains need to be geniuses, but that the leadership should be able to produce a thorough and reasonable plan and structure for their organizations. Of course, when I say that, I don't want anyone reading that as a prescription or as a command. I say all of this in the sense that, when I'm personally thinking up a major villain, my thinking usually starts with the structure of their plans - I like to think through what it would realistically take to pull the plan off and achieve their goals. For Natasha, one of the results of that process was that, right from the start, she wasn't going to be trying to malign the Kobbers or use the media to demonize them. Why would she do that? She's running a legitimate front. Olympia TV would have only tipped its hand if it went and did that. It would have made her a target when she was flying below the radar. In addition, it simply wasn't a good plan. These people are actively involved in the city's life. Unlike the Ravage, people could talk to them, they could see they were doing good for the city. If Olympia TV's reporting didn't match up with people's actual experiences, all it would do is erode public trust in Olympia TV. So, what did she do? She went with the much safer method of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer. I recall waking up and immediately hopping on the computer one morning, because I had been thinking about Kaede and her Brawl performance, and the thought popped into my head that Natasha would see the pianist as such a useful repository of information, and so I couldn't wait at all to type up Natasha's offer to Kaede. It's that kind of thoroughness of thought that's the most fun attribute in a villain. We won't be seeing any outright copies of Natasha anytime soon (unless Elliott has something to say about that…), but I'll be upfront in saying that future villains from me are likely to be similarly careful and calculated in their planning, showing some of that shrewdness, albeit tailored to their circumstances and goals. 

Natasha ended up serving as a good foil for Kennedy Wilson, given their very different approaches to the truth, and made for a good villain for him to go up against. That developed later on, well after she had been introduced, but I was quite glad she was able to play such a role in another character's story!

I won't go into detail about it here, but, through some snippets of conversations with Chao, Natasha ended up having a fairly fleshed-out backstory for one of my Curse members, actually. Oh, and, well, Natasha isn't her real name. I mean, it is, but she anglicized it because she felt doing so would be better for her career early on when she was just a reporter. Nielsen is a Danish surname, and she had a Danish first name, too. Her name was originally spelled Natasja. This never once came up in RP, but I thought it would be a fun fact to share for those of you who have already read this far down. Actually, between her and the sisters, there was a lot of alliteration this year in my cast members… That wasn't quite intended, it just happened with how last names and first names lined up!

My final "proper" Curse member of the year was the Mean Emcee, and there were, essentially, three reasons he appeared. First, I thought it would be good to capitalize on Natasha's role as a Curse moneymaker by giving her an underling directly (he was far from the only one, of course, thanks to contributions like Lance Banson), and "game show host" was one of the entertainment niches yet unfilled. Secondly, I decided to ride the Wario World kick I was on after introducing Red-Brief J as a throwaway Underdome opponent. I started revisiting Wario World a ways through the season in part because of that early concern about pulling characters other folks had pulled. I took a look at the numerous whacky and oft-forgotten bosses and enemies in that game, and I thought it was a pretty safe bet that I could actually pull a lot of inspiration from. Initially, I wanted to use the Brawl Doll or the Winter Windster as a major Curse member because for the creepiness factor those two have, but I couldn't find a good niche for either of them. Then I looked at the Mean Emcee, thought he looked good as an entertainer, and rolled with him. The fact that I still wanted to use the Brawl Doll is why he ultimately was able to summon Brawl Dolls and Ankirons as part of his attacks. The Winter Windster made a cameo in the Emcee's plot as a "default" option, which I'll elaborate on shortly, but I'm glad he never made a proper appearance, since I still think there's potential. There's actually a fair bit of potential left in Wario World in general, come to think of it. The third reason I chose the Emcee dovetails with the first reason, and it's because I wanted to get one noncombat plot under my belt this season, too, and his niche made him perfect for it. 

Tamaki Kotatsu was added only because she filled a joke with Sheep (who unfortunately didn't get to beat her!) and because, when I mulled it over, I figured that, yeah, she could reasonably have a role in Olympia TV. I don't know much about her, since I only gave her fanwiki page and a few associated webpages a look-through a few days before her appearance and didn't know about her prior. Chris McLean was the only other new garbage Curse member I had to provide myself for Natasha's event, so perhaps it'll come as a surprise to find out he was nearly a major Curse member. There was actually a significant period where I was planning on bringing Chris in as a proper full member of the Curse, and I had the general sketch of his plot event planned out. I also had a fair bit of his character and significance in mind, all planned out. He was supposed to be presented as a rising star producer in both Olympia TV and the Curse, one whose sadism and ruthlessness in his pursuit of ratings was leading to shows proving popular with the public. Natasha would have recognized his talent, but also been extremely distrustful of him - for good reason, mind you, since his goal was to replace her in the Curse's Big Seven and at the helm of Olympia TV. In the end, their mutual distrust and his general awfulness would have been his undoing, with his event ending with - if all went well - everyone hating him and Natasha undermining his plans to ruin his event and ruin his name by ousting him. In return, he would have dealt a blow by providing a major hint at a deeper problem in Olympia TV. So, why didn't it happen? Well, you might think it's because the Mean Emcee was introduced earlier, and that his event and Chris' event (which would have consisted of - in some form - a series of extremely dangerous challenges which would eliminate contestants each round) would have overlapped too much. That was a concern I had when I was planning this, and I was thinking hard about how to make them feel distinct. Ultimately, that ended up not being a concern, though, because timing killed the idea first. I was deadset on making sure Natasha could be eliminated somewhere in the middle of the Big Seven dominoes, and, with the calendar filling fast and the days I could be sure I could have undisturbed focus running a plot already constrained, I didn't want to push her event back to try and squeeze this one in, too. I'd like to offer special thanks to those Crites who relished in this man's defeat, though. I understand the feeling. 

Finally, there's my last-minute addition, who ended up being very fun. Ivan Borisov nearly appeared for Natasha's event, but I ended up having enough villains on the roster to cover it, so he did not. He was inspired by two things. First, and most obviously, he was my way of personifying The Complete History of the Soviet Union Arranged to the Melody of Tetris as a character. The other component that made me decide to use him was thinking about his Niche during Hot Wind Blowing. I liked the idea that he's the guy who goes around HQ fixing things up, maybe the guy working on and overseeing repairs of the Underdome. I know there's the Shrapnel for that, but I figured he probably took on more and more of a role in that work as the Curse dwindled away, and, with his attitude, he was probably right there doing the work even when there were plenty of Shrapnel. In the end, I just liked the idea of Reaper having to scrape so far down the bottom of the barrel that he's asking the guy who fixes leaks to come and help with the bank robbery. Ivan's a tad misguided, but he has a good heart and he believes in doing right by the common men who built Olympia and keep it running. I like to think that he's joined the Cure, continuing on with maintenance and construction for the group and in the Undercity in general. Oh, and his name was almost Ivan Ivanovsky. I wanted to pull his name from a joke image (right) I had found, but then, I realized that Ivan Ivanovitch Ivanovsky was an actual character someone might want to use someday. So, I looked at the first part of the pictured post, and I decided to mash the two names together. Alliteration was narrowly avoided!

Now, let's move on to talking about events!

Dayplots

5/29: In the Shadow of the Cretaceous - I was a bit surprised when Chao started pushing for me to try my hand at a plot all the way back in May, but, you know, I was willing to give it a try, and, heavens am I glad I did so. I'm the type of person who always reads the entire manual for a new device or appliance when I get it. I'm the type who gives the terms and conditions a good and thorough skimming to look for anything out of the norm before I click agree. I like structure, framework, and knowing the rules. I'm that type of person, but even I have to admit there are just times in life where you can conceptually grasp everything, but it doesn't make sense until you do it for yourself. That's how this plot felt to me. I was participating in a few plots here and there in early May, and, with some assistance, I was making my way through them, but I admit this was the period where I conceptually understood everything that was going on but I sometimes felt like I didn't know what I "should" be doing. Stepping onto the other side and running the plot brought that all into clarity. It's difficult to explain, and I'm not articulating the experience well, but what I mean to say is I think it turned out to be a critical move that I tried my hand at a dayplot so early. That change in perspective helped thinks to click, and this is an example where I think learning by doing is more effective than learning by reading and watching. 

That said, I intentionally kept this event very simple and small in scope. I wanted it to have a clear villain, simple opponents, and a structure that would progress rapidly. I just wanted to, on my end, be able to focus on getting a feel for thinking about how to string together attacks to form a cohesive narrative (considering tractor rolls in that process, too), keeping track of everything that was going on, all of the basics. I will say, I was a big fan of the round structure for this plot. I eagerly adopted that as a way to give it structure and a clear progression. The drones were an addition I initially worried about. I wasn't sure if they would be too much or if they would be ill-received, but, ultimately, with the experience of a season behind me, I think it was a good move. It gave some characters other targets than the dinos, so folks weren't just dogpiling on the poor critters. Overall, there's not much I can say to this one because of its simplicity. I do wish I had done something more distinct and interesting as the finishing round, to give it a sense of closure. We went from one Pachy, to two Pachys, and the idea was the final one was more powerful, the proper "Shadow Pachy", if you will. I don't think I handled that as well as I should have, though. I was glad people were okay with letting Naps off the hook, though. I was prepared to play that either way, whether his offer was accepted or rejected, but it felt better he wasn't punished for the sake of having an awful sister. 

8/5: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings - This was not my event, but I'm going to talk about it anyways. While this was always Chao's idea and was, at its core, the Lance Banson (and originally Ol' Skool) elimination event, he and I spoke about it and connection after connection started building up that turned it into something bigger than just that. I don't recall exactly how the ideas progressed, but I know much of it came down to connections between characters, especially once we decided that the impetus for Banson and Ol' Skool outing themselves would be Pitohui crashing the party in search of a fight. That Banson in particular was under the thumb of Natasha was easy enough to work out, which is how she ended up involved. I asked Chao if I could bring Mean Emcee in to fight the other two Curse members while Pitohui was split off from the fight by Kanade, and he was fine with it. I wanted to do that because, well, in part, I just liked the idea of playing a Curse member on the opposite side of a fight, but mainly because it made for a good demonstration of how Natasha would be willing to sacrifice a lost asset and even turn her remaining assets on them. With the Kanade and Pitohui fight worked out early on, it became an extra bonus that Elsa already had some brief interactions with Kanade, a connection which became crucial in setting up this event. Of course, part of the setup included having Pitohui meet Ol' Skool in advance, too, a connection which became more significant than was expected at the time...

I know the connection is entirely coincidental because the event was named for other reasons, but, once again, Goops proves adept at making me laugh… You recall the short story about Elsa Kanzaki's backstory I mentioned early, yes? Well, at a few critical junctures, it specifically calls Elsa a… caged bird. Once again, this has little to do with RP directly, but was humorous enough it was worth mentioning. 

8/25: Mean Emcee's Exhilarating Extravaganza - It's a tad odd to say that noncombat events are more difficult to pull off than combat events, but that was certainly my feeling before and after this event. Ultimately, this event was the one I was the most ambivalent about after it happened. I almost think it would have worked better if I leaned harder into the "fun and wacky" side of things and have given people more room to run with the ideas they had and gloss over the pieces they were struggling with. You know, you have to have a trivia portion of a gameshow, but that was something people struggled with, I think, and I'd blame a portion of that just on the limitations of the format. If I ever did something similar, I'd spend a good amount of time thinking of how to make that work with RP's format. Who should ask the questions? How do you know if a character can reasonably answer the question or not? It's those kinds of questions that led me to leave that open-ended for people to come up with the questions and answers themselves. I similarly pulled the open-ended structure with the "unveil your fears" component of the third round, which was primarily designed to show that, yes, Olympia TV has been leveraging Kaede's Kobber Talk to gather information on their foes. In that case, though, I at least made sure I had some default options for people who didn't want to have to come up with something like that on the fly. Overall, this event ended up relying heavily on people coming up with their own ideas in the framework I set up, and while I tried to give as much guidance as I could, I worry I didn't refine the structure well enough to make the necessary individual freedom in interpretation work like it should have. It's something to consider heavily for the future, how to ensure the event and the format mesh. 

On the bright side, that room for freedom and experimentation resulted in Chao and Harpy contributing some fun ideas that changed this event as it went along! Alberto was an excellent addition and I was so fond of the major role he ended up having, and Chao's simple decision to have the Mean Emcee let information about the Curse's Big Seven and the Curse members within Olympia TV slip during the trivia round with Futo changed the entire ending to the event. With the Emcee infuriating Natasha and proving too much of a liability, she ended up cutting him off and outing him. The original idea for how we'd get from "fun gameshow" to "taking down the Emcee" relied more on his personal eccentricities. In the end, the Emcee is dedicated to the best show possible over everything else, and this was marketed as a Kobber-themed gameshow. What could the grand prize in the bonus round possibly be in a competition among Kobbers? It could only reasonably be the chance to take down a member of the Curse! Making himself the central focus of the bonus round was originally how the Emcee was going to out himself. 

9/20 : Showstopper - I really managed to hit the big three practice plots with the Curse, didn't I? We had a combat plot, a noncombat plot, and finally a collaboration plot. I call this one a collaboration because, not only did a number of folks contribute to the roster of villains, but because Sheep essentially co-ran the plot with me and his additions gave it most of its personality. All in all, I was pretty happy with the combat portions (even working the Elite Four in there for an appearance before Genie's tower worked out once Chao and I worked out the idea of them being there but Natasha intentionally pairing them with characters and putting them in environments which would undermine them), but it was the ending that I walked away unsure of. It's almost like this plot suffered from 1.5 day syndrome. I felt like we didn't really get to have a true confrontation with Natasha herself because the clock was running down, but there's no way it could have conceivably been extended to have an entire second day set aside just for Natasha. The upshot was that Kennedy did get to have his big spotlight moment and carried the load of confronting and cornering Natasha, but I had originally envisioned that final confrontation as having more room for other characters and users to have a role. If I could go back and redo it, I think I would have put less eggs in the basket of a confrontation with Natasha and have kept the focus on the slog through the waves of ineffectual villains to get to her. By which I mean, I think I would put more emphasis on the sense that "something's not right here," drop some evidence as folks progressed through Olympia TV that something was off about the Curse's "attack"  on the studio. I think, if I had emphasized that more during the event and had combined that with the hints we had already received in the Emcee's events and the general sense that the growing string of Curse members exposed with an association to Olympia TV couldn't be explain away as a coincidence, that might have been enough to offset that "hanging half-day" sense. In that case, the idea would have been that the more savvy characters would have picked up enough solid evidence on the way through Olympia to be veeeeery suspicious of Natasha by the time they met her and then Kennedy could have come in to seal the deal. 

I feel like that perhaps I've overdone it in talking about what I was dissatisfied with in regards to these events… This blogpost might be a bit hypercritical of them compared to my overall feelings which is that they went well overall and I'm happy with them, but I recognize there's pieces I would have improved and I'll be keeping those lessons in mind in the future.

Deleted Scenes 

I've mentioned plenty of ideas which were left on the cutting room floor already, and there's plenty more which have gone unmentioned here, but there's one more piece of cut content that's worth recording somewhere. Ever since we learned about Skywire, I was waiting for the moment when JRM was going to give us a chance to see the hunter in action! I just had a feeling that he'd give us the instructions and set us off to have it hunt down our casts. I was waiting all week for it, and then, when JRM finally did confirm it and set us off... I was busy! I was all tied up with other happenings for a good few hours. I kept watching the time tick closer to the plot's start time (I wanted to be a part of the plot, of course, but I also knew that I wouldn't be able to give it any focus as much as was going on that evening), and thinking I missed my chance. Nevertheless, in a vehicle at about 5:45, I had a brief chance to do something, and I was going to try and do it! I, unfortunately, did not. I overestimated the time it would take me to push out even a short post on my phone and while still having other people distract me. I finished it anyway, but the plot was underway by that time, so it was a lost cause. Nevertheless, I still have the raw, unedited post I threw together - BBCode included!

This post was originally supposed to be the final Myuri cameo for the season, actually. I thought it worked well for showing that, when things are serious, she actually does have enough compassion and focus to help people in need, especially when it comes to protecting animal or animal-like creatures like Salandit. Of course, it didn't hurt that it also made for a good chance to show her putting her sensory advantage to good use. Ah well, it's a shame it didn't work out - I think it would have been my favorite of her cameos this season. Anyhow, without further ado, here's the raw post that never was:

[i]In one portion of the Outer City, Isabela scurries a few feet ahead of Yuka and Tressa, the duo walking together and chatting as part of Yuka's efforts to better acquaint herself with the merchant girl who had been making the motel room uncomfortably cramped for the past few days.[/i]

[color=MediumPurple]So, if I understand correctly, Mr. Albright said you both would be departing Olympia soon. Returning to Orsterra, it was? You mentioned you were hoping to find a treasure to return with. Were you successful in, er, I mean to say, did you find what you were looking to obtain? [/color]

[color=MediumSeaGreen]Leaving? Oh, uh, I guess we do have to leave soon… We weren't going to stay here forever. Buuuut, did I find a treasure? Well, I'd sa-[/color]

[i]Tressa is interrupted by a loud, panicked hiss from Isabela, one which catches both girls' attention immediately. Looking ahead at Isabela, they see the Salandit hissing at a strange girl with… what appears to be wolf ears? She crouches over the Salandit, leaning in uncomfortably close and running her nose over Isabela's raised tail.[/i]

[color=Silver]Oooh! Hi! Hi! Who are you? You smell really good![/color]

[i]Yuka and Tressa look on awkwardly, Yuka completely unsure of what to make of the strange girl and not wanting to escalate a situation which didn't yet seem dangerous while Tressa resists intervening and surprising either her friend from the Scuffle voting or the little lizard she was unwittingly terrorizing. 

Then the duo sees Myuri's ears twitch. 

In less than a few seconds' span, Myuri scoops the Salandit into her arms and leaps out of the way, just a miniscule fraction of time before a long, barbed wire pierced the ground where the wolf girl had been standing. The next few moments are pure chaos. Her desire to protect Isabela overwhelming her trepidation, Yuka rushes forward, not registering the situation quickly enough to know whether the threat lay with the strange black wire or the wolf girl or both. For her trouble, she runs straight into the path of another wire descending from the skies, this one running right through her chest. Tressa and Isabela alike cry out as they watch the toxinologist sputter and crumple to the ground, the lizard struggling desperately to leap out of Myuri's arms but failing to break the girl's grip. Soon, Myuri again dodges another wire with just seconds to spare, her tail bristling as she sees the incoming wire out of the corner of her eyes, while Tressa, too concerned with rushing to the aid of her fallen companion to even try and defend herself, takes a piercing blow to her own chest. 

Seeing both the merchant and her trainer collapsed on the street, Isabela, still firmly clasped in Myuriy's arms, looks up at the wolf girl with desperation in her eyes, pleading as best she can with her limited vocalizations. Myuri seems to actually understand the lizard, dodging one more wire as before, she morphs into her wolf form, tossing the Salandit up in the air so Isabela lands on her back. Myuri gently picks up the two defeated girls in her mouth, and speeds off to find them aid.[/i]

Like xkcd's Beret Guy, I'm now almost out of words… by which I mean, this is already longer than it has any right to be and I'm getting physically tired of typing. Unfortunately, I actually have a lot more words… many, many more words… which I can't include in this post. There's a lot of ideas which were left off of this post to keep it of a reasonable length, and there's probably many more thoughts and ideas which I didn't even think of while I was writing it. That said, that's a wrap on season 9, so here's to looking forward to season 10 and the plans I already have for it (and, perhaps more importantly, the plans I don't yet know about). If anything piques your interest enough that you want to ask about it, I'm more than happy to answer questions or discuss things in more detail.