Alastor15243 Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 (edited) Hey everyone! So I'm extremely excited for Fates and I can't wait for it to come out in half a month! I have a plan to do a sort of roleplay/ironman let's play of all three paths of Fates once it finally comes out in English, essentially writing a war journal from the perspective of my planned Fates Avatar, Dakota, a deranged, narcissistic, creepily pragmatic and downright depraved individual who nevertheless loves their family deeply no matter what they may claim. But until then, and as practice, I'm thinking of trying this sort of thing out with Awakening first, practicing with this sort of writing style and setting up a backstory for Dakota's War Journal in the process. My plan is to finish this by the time Fates arrives on my doorstep. This will also serve as a chance for me to poke some light-hearted fun at this fun game's admittedly rather shoddy plot. Lemme know if you enjoy and would like to see more of this: Entry 1 Dear War Journal, I have metaphorically brought you to life to serve as a record of my thoughts, as well as something resembling a sympathetic ear to my current plight in an effort to maintain my sanity, which I'm going to say, right now for the record, is probably going to be a taxing and difficult struggle. I have no idea what the future has in store for me, but if what I've seen so far is any indication, it will likely be infuriating, terrifying and bizarre. I suppose if I'm going to keep up the pretense of you being alive (and if this is to be most useful to the first real person years down the line who winds up reading it), I should probably introduce myself. That's fairly easy to do: My name is Robin, and that's pretty much it. Let me elaborate: I only have about 16 hours total of conscious memory. From looking at myself in the mirror I can assume I'm in my early twenties, but what happened over those two decades I can't even begin to tell you. I woke up in an open grassy field yesterday evening, an hour or so before sunset, with no memory of anything except the basics of swords and sorcery and my own name, and in less than a day I somehow found myself appointed chief tactician and strategist for some kind of elite vanguard of the armed forces of a theocracy known as Ylisse. My head is absolutely spinning from this turn of events and I feel my first priority is to get everything down on paper. As I said, I awoke less than a day ago with no memory of my past. The first thing I remember seeing is the face of a young man I would soon discover to be the prince of Ylisse. His name is Chrom, and for reasons totally unknown to me, I somehow knew his name before he told me. This was incredibly awkward and instantly earned me the suspicion of Chrom's bodyguard, Frederick... and nobody else. Chrom and his little sister Lissa instantly believed my awkward and bizarre story, and while it made things much easier for me, I'm inclined to agree with Frederick that this was... how shall I put this... ...Completely batshit insane. But before Frederick could raise any further objections, Lissa alerted everyone to the fact that the nearby town was on fire. We investigated, and it turned out to be the work of bandits. Chrom, being the dashing hero type apparently, decided we needed to help them, and having nothing whatsoever better to do and no leads on, well, anything, I decided to help out. ...It became painfully clear within about thirty seconds that nobody knew what the hell they were doing. Everyone began setting about their jobs with extremely short-sighted tunnelvision, focused only on the immediate battle and with no regard for strategic placement or even self-preservation. Had I not intervened and started knocking some basic common sense into the three of them, they would have surely perished, starting with the princess. Looking back it strikes me as odd just how poorly-protected the two younger royal family members were, with only a single soldier on duty. I immediately made the best of our meager troops by setting up a buddy system with Chrom, switching whenever was convenient, and telling Frederick to get Lissa on his horse for protection and faster healing. This simple strategy won the day, as the enemy was just as strategically incompetent as my allies were, and the royal siblings were so taken with my implementation of basic common sense that Chrom appointed me chief tactician of his little group of “Shepherds” essentially on the spot. Having nowhere else to go and not the slightest idea of how else to make a living, I accepted. My new comrades then began discussing the accent of the bandits, and apparently the bandits weren't locals, but from the less-than-friendly neighboring country, Plegia. Thankfully showing common sense for a change, they all agreed that it was best to get this information to the capital of Ylisse, Ylisstol, straight away, so we were unfortunately forced to decline the village's offer to spend the night, much to Lissa's dismay. On our way to the capital we camped out in the woods, impaled a bear on a few sharp sticks, and roasted it around a fire. Being at this point incredibly grateful to Chrom and Lissa for trusting me far more than the situation would call for, I thought I'd try to get to know them better. The three of us talked at length for several hours while Frederick sat around scowling, but not once during that entire conversation, somehow, did either of them mention the fact that they were royalty. I've since learned enough about Lissa to suspect she was doing this on purpose as a joke, but looking back on this situation, I find it frankly bizarre how it never came up with Chrom. The plan was to get some rest, alternating watch, and continue our march in the morning, but these plans were halted, some time after midnight. ...By the forest exploding. This is not a joke. The four of us were woken up by the rustling of trees, followed by the sounds of explosions, before the earth itself cleaved in two and red hot molten rock spewed forth from the ground. The grass wobbled and waved like a rug being flapped by a maid, and as I leapt to join Frederick on his horse and the four of us made our mad dash for safety, I... ...Had my new companions not confirmed this I would have sworn I had gone mad. I saw a massive eye, the size of four houses in a square, materialize high in the sky, above the tallest tree, and blink open. And through the eye's viscous center, I saw dozens of wretched creatures pour out of it, flop to the ground with an unsettling lack of grace, intelligence, or, dare I say it, even life, and begin charging after us. I now know at least one fact about my life before waking up in that field: I never saw anything like that. For if I had, I am certain no force on this earth, no trauma ever experienced by man or beast, could ever allow me to unsee the sight that is now burned forever into my retinas. In the confusion Frederick and I lagged behind Chrom and Lissa when a tree fell in the path and we had to spend precious seconds navigating around it. We eventually caught up with them in a clearing that for the time being seemed to be safe from the lava, and we made our stand against them. We were soon aided by one of the other Shepherds, a young lady on horseback named Sully, and... some guy... who was apparently just sorta stalking her. We're not sure where he came from, but he could use a bow, so we accepted his help, and in time we managed to vanquish the vile beasts. Afterwards we encountered a young woman making a shockingly weak attempt to disguise herself as a man, an attempt... that everyone seems to have taken at face value. Huh. It became obvious that the young woman was hiding more than her gender, however, as when I started to ask her questions about the eye in the sky and if she had any idea where it came from, her voice noticeably faltered and she began to fall back on vaguely ominous waffling before she took her leave. We immediately searched for a more secure part of the forest and tried to get as much sleep as possible before morning, then we continued our march for Ylisstol. The entire journey I could not stop thinking about those horrific undead beasts we encountered, and all sorts of unpleasant thoughts crept into my mind: what was that portal? Will there be more? Are the creatures that came out of it contagious? Could they spread and infect nearby villages and create a vicious chain reaction that could possibly end all life? All of these questions and more... did not seem to occur to my new allies, who alternated between brushing them off, pretending not to hear me, and changing the subject with pointlessly droll anecdotes. Eventually we reached Ylisstol, whereupon I was finally told the truth about Chrom and Lissa's lineage, and was promptly brought before their leader, Exalt Emmeryn. Emmeryn turned out to be everything one might expect upon being told she's Chrom and Lissa's older sister. She's benevolent and extremely trusting, possibly even more so than Chrom, and immediately approved Chrom's appointment of me as chief tactician and strategist of the Shepherds. Depending on how savvy she is in the matter of politics, she could very well make a good peacetime leader, but from what I've seen, she doesn't seem well suited to rule in a time of war, let alone, gods forbid, the zombie apocalypse scenario that's been going through my mind. But she did at least have the sense to realize that it would be wise to form an alliance to help fend off the undead menace at our doorstep, and so we're going to speak with our northern neighbors immediately. I was taken to a guest hall, and upon requesting a blank book and some writing implements, I was presented with you, War Journal, and it was only as I raised my quill over the first page that the terror, confusion and anger began to brew within me as it truly began to sink in what has just happened to me. I have just been appointed, based on less than a day of performance, to the highest conceivable office a strategist can possibly find themselves in, an office that, somehow, had not already been occupied by anyone. The thought of hiring a strategist for their army apparently had not occurred to anybody in charge in this entire country before Chrom laid eyes upon me. From my viewpoint, it seems there are only two possible explanations for this: either I, without knowing it myself, am an unparalleled tactical mastermind destined to revolutionize the world of battle strategy for eons to come in spite of my crippling case of amnesia, or... or... ...Or everyone in this entire country is out of their goddamned minds. And I've just been put in charge of leading them into battle against an army of the undead. ...I think I'm going to excuse myself to cry into a pillow for an hour or three. Lissa tells me that tomorrow she's going to introduce me to the Shepherds, and then we shall set out for Regna Ferox to attempt to forge an alliance. Gods help me. Edited February 3, 2016 by Alastor15243 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flamy Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 This is magnificent. Please, continue this magnificence. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Czar_Yoshi Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 Looks cool! Do you want (possibly lengthy) advice, or just another reader? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastor15243 Posted February 3, 2016 Author Share Posted February 3, 2016 Looks cool! Do you want (possibly lengthy) advice, or just another reader? Advice please, I'd like to make this as good as possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moblin Major General Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 Advice from a writer: Don't mix older slang and new. "Trolling" felt out of place, I would edit with "leading me on" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastor15243 Posted February 3, 2016 Author Share Posted February 3, 2016 Advice from a writer: Don't mix older slang and new. "Trolling" felt out of place, I would edit with "leading me on" Huh. I could've sworn that that usage of the word predated the internet. I'll fix it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eclipse Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 This reads more like a fanfic than a proper play log. Mind if I ship this to Written Works? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastor15243 Posted February 3, 2016 Author Share Posted February 3, 2016 This reads more like a fanfic than a proper play log. Mind if I ship this to Written Works? I haven't fully decided which it'll turn out to be. The first few chapters are basically almost completely uneventful so it was mostly just narration, I'm thinking it might be more of a playlog in future updates depending on what I feel comfortable doing and how interesting my playlog documentation is. But you're the boss. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eclipse Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 I'll wait until your next submission, but if it's still has a lot of story and no actual play-through strategy, it goes off to Written Works. For a (really bad) idea of how I pulled it off, check the links in my sig. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Czar_Yoshi Posted February 4, 2016 Share Posted February 4, 2016 Huh. I could've sworn that that usage of the word predated the internet. I'll fix it. Well, the term it's based on does, but not that usage of it. Advice please, I'd like to make this as good as possible. Right then. Mechanically, the main issues I see are large run-on sentences, often caused by redundancy and/or stating the obvious. For example, in the very first sentence you've got "which I'm going to say, right now for the record"- since you're saying it already, you probably don't need to announce your intent to speak, so "which for the record" has exactly the same tone while taking less time to say. Other than that, there are times when you say stuff like awkward or bizarre a lot. I'd advise trying to cut down on adjectives in general and have Robin express his emotions some other way. Stylistically, you described your Avatar as "a deranged, narcissistic, creepily pragmatic and downright depraved individual". The only trait I'm getting from this Robin, though, is snark- he feels more like he's designed to do nothing but provide (unflattering) commentary on the surrounding events. Now, there's nothing wrong with a snarky protagonist, but there are two notable risks you run in doing so: people who happen to like whatever you're insulting won't like it, and people who feel they could do a better job at insulting it themselves won't get anything out of it (and thus will see your character as completely empty if there's nothing else there). A great example of Robin being snarky for no payoff is in insulting Marth's disguise: those deductive abilities aren't impressing anyone (which is what deductive abilities are meant to do), but that's not even the point of this Robin anyway. I'm assuming your purpose is to make an artistic interpretation and not have a rant, so let's see about getting Robin's character slightly more on track. Right now, his general responses to events generally consist of skepticism and cowardice (see: being appointed to grand tactician, the sky portal appearing, etc). The focus instead should be on missing the point in egotistical ways (ex: hear Virion and Cherche's description of Walhart, zone out a little, think they're talking about him instead), or suggesting good ideas and then being completely ignored (ex: in Valm Robin wants to exploit the empire's size to bring it down, but Chrom doesn't even acknowledge him and orders a charge on Steiger instead). Those aren't must-dos, they're just ideas for how you could approach this from angles that can be milked much more. But since you have pointing out absurdities in the story as one of your goals, being able to milk things for all they're worth is important. Going back to Lucina's gender as an example, you've currently got Robin straight-up identifying her as a girl and being annoyed nobody else does. What you could do instead is have him suspect something's off (but never say what)... Then have him bring it up with her later (long after her reveal) by asking her if she's really a dude in disguise. It has the same implication (he saw right through her initial disguise) but has far more potential as a brick joke or even a running gag. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastor15243 Posted February 4, 2016 Author Share Posted February 4, 2016 Stylistically, you described your Avatar as "a deranged, narcissistic, creepily pragmatic and downright depraved individual". Oh no, that's Dakota, my planned Fates Avatar. I'm going to do something similar to this war Journal thing when Fates comes out in two weeks called "Dakota's War Journal", and that will be the deranged, narcissistic and depraved one. This is a prequel where I use a Robin who's more of a slightly terrified, snarky "only sane man" who's put in an extremely awkward situation and tries to make the best of it, only to become increasingly put off and disturbed by the decidedly "off" behavior of his comrades and, well, to say more would be spoilers. Thanks for the advice though (I definitely do use run-on sentences a lot), I've got a second part mostly ready so I'll look through it with your stuff in mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastor15243 Posted February 4, 2016 Author Share Posted February 4, 2016 (edited) ...Yeah, I'm thinking I'm going to have to postpone this. Sorry if anyone enjoyed this and was getting their hopes up, but it's occurred to me that writing a prequel to what I plan to be a largely improvised reaction to a game I haven't played yet is probably not the best idea. I'm just going to start with Dakota's War Journal when Fates comes out, and if I still think this prequel would be worthwhile, THEN I'll start this up again. Edited February 4, 2016 by Alastor15243 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Julius Posted July 3, 2016 Share Posted July 3, 2016 If you ever start this back up again, I'd love to read it. I've thoroughly enjoyed your trek through Nohr and Hoshido, so if Robin gets a chance to shine, I think it would be definitely worthwhile. I loved Awakening, so please, make more war journals of the Ylissean Shepards! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts