Yeah that’s the biggest wildcard for me now. I have a good idea of where the path will go, but it’s about the execution.
I have to keep reminding myself that the folks here who have played the Part 2 beta (alpha?) are like .001 % of the total audience (roughly 25,000 sales after a year! woot!) and most readers won’t have put too much emphasis on the one or two times where I mention your “dream power” in Part 1. Sure, some might vaguely remember it, but most won’t. I should not necessarily let that tiny part of the game commit me to tackle too much moving forward.
The more I think about it…
Dr. Stench is Zap/Thud
Tactician with battle computer will be Hmmm/Shhh
I could round out the builds with just a classic Pow/Whoosh (poor man’s Superman/Thor) build for Zenith
I know some people would be disappointed, but frankly this is still more customization than most games allow. As someone said earlier, I can’t make everyone happy. Ever. (not even in my own house sometimes ) Some games would just set you on a single path, and there would be nothing wrong with that, but I prefer giving the three different options for more replay value.
I’ll continue to think about this, but I’m leaning towards this “fix.” MCs who want ranged attacks still have the Dr. Stench path, and MCs who want to focus on a more cerebral style still have the Tactician path. After all of that, if a reader still feels “limited,” I will just shrug and say I did my best.
I think that it may have to do with that keeping Hedonist means keeping the favor of his school. Even when his crime is arguably bigger than hers. Although Dean’s reason is presented to be that there isn’t enough evidence for his crimes, but that is not true. Given how he made that offer to everyone, there would be enough people to testify against him (simple probability shows that atleast few of them would want to do it), not just MC. And as it was already stated, they couldn’t fire both of them if they wanted to keep the school running. So far it seems that none of the “hero” schools, including Speck Community College, are much of the “good guys”.
Downfall, even with her powers being greater, still isn’t the best teacher. She seems like trying some kind of military-like training, but it looks like someone who isn’t really experienced in that field to do it. For one, she encourages distrust and selfishness when teaming up. As the students are rather lower powered than bigger villains, the real strength of them would be like in the military - trust your squad and have eachother’s backs. Strength in numbers. And how you can be sure others have your back, if she encourages to sacrifice your teammates if it means helping yourself? It may have to do with how she looks like quite a loner, so she doesn’t understand how it works. Still, as a teacher, she should know that. If it would be a better school than a community college, that is . But, as a single fighter she does seem to be more powerfull and usefull in confrontation, than Hedonist.
My MC ofcourse don’t like her mostly for the reason that she injured her Girfriend
I don’t think Downfall should’ve stayed over the Herdonist. For one she broke Tress’s arm and almost killed a student. I don’t see how that’s not worse than the Herdonist. Yes, he is bad, but you can tell him no and I can assume so could anyone else he offered it to. Tress didn’t get to say “wait, no, I don’t want you to break my arm.” Origami probably didn’t want to be almost torn in half.
I don’t see how consensual(ish) sex with an adult is worse than someone almost dying.
Plus, at best they had one student’s word and rumors when it came to what the Hedonist was doing where they had absolute proof about Downfall. (I mean, maybe his sectary could step in but considering she makes fun of you for taking his offer I don’t see her being much help.)
Well, i would need to replay the game to give mroe detailed answer of what i think about them, it’s been some time since i played, and they haven’t stayed in my memory as much as Downfall or Hedonist
Nil does seemed to be quite mysterious (well, that’s his “thing”) On one hand that’s his subject, to teach and learn secrets, but still what he was doing was against school rules. So we are not sure how much of it he done because that was his way of teaching about it, and how much was because of his own agenda. He also encourages students to spy on eachother, which is another means to spread distrust among potential teammates.
McCormick does look like the most “normal” teacher in the school, and that is not because she doesn’t have powers. She just teach her thing and look to care for her students (if i remember correctly she was quite angry at Hedonist?) And as only one so far she isn’t doing or teaching anything potentialy harmfull to the students. Who knows? Maybe she is too “normal” how a teacher should be, and there is something secret going on with her too?
The thing is that this is not entirely consensual. Like there was already explained, students may feel compelled to give in to his abuse because of his position of power. It’s not about single sexual act, but about his proceder. Technically being able to say “no” doesn’t negate the validity of the crime. I know it’s not the same level ofcourse, but for example blackmailing someone to have sex is considered a rape - even if technically you can just say “no”.
So we have physicall assault vs sexual abuse. For me, sexual crime is worse than assaulting someone.
That is not actually true. He makes that offer to everyone. The probability that the MC is the only one that would want to report him is veery slim. There are a lot of students who dislikes his advances and would be very likely to testify against him. Testimony of a group of students is a proof enough for investigation, and given his reputation (and he even admiting it later when he tries to justify himself) that’s enough evidence to punish him. Why you assume only the MC would want to report him?
I always felt that, nasty though she was, Downfall at least was trying to help us survive (or at least, help us become more efficient at beating villains and thus at saving people). Hedonist’s “favouritism” doesn’t help anyone but Hedonist, and it certainly doesn’t help the students, whichever way they choose (and I get the feeling that he probably doesn’t even offer it to all students).
@MockTurtle: Well, that would just complicate everything…
I love it! It gives me something to post on FB during the slumpy mid-January dreariness.
And as I enjoyed this, I realized that the only bad thing about coding all the NPCs’ sexuality as “MC-centric” is that it’s hard, almost impossible, for me to hook the NPCs up with each other. If a reader viewed Mob as gay, for example, it would sorta break immersion if I later wrote Mob and DG as a couple (well that would never happen for many reasons!) I would have to hook up the NPCs based on the specific combination of orientations the reader viewed them to have, OR just have everyone bi (which is fine when done in a subtle way, but I think would be sorta jarring if done more overtly.)
So no one can have romantic love other than the MC and whoever the MC is involved with. How sad.
Yo forgot that Crook has a wife, also CW has a crush on Tress (unrequited, but still).
So maybe you could hook up some characters, not all of them, and mostly, those who aren’t romanceable by the MC.
[quote=“Nancie, post:2013, topic:12179, full:true”]
I understand the everyone has strong feelings about The Hedonist , but all this happened in the first book and it has already been published so there is no changing what already happened. Eric is not going to kill him off, so if you don’t like him just stay away from him.[/quote]
Aww… crummy plot armour… Oh well… that’s what fanfics are for, right?
She didn’t teach them not to trust teammates. That was Nil, not her. The whole point of the final exam was to incourage team work. All she did was encourage using brutal force and taught students that there is no guarantee that all the fights they’ll have in the future will be fair. Which is justified given the fact most of these students would get clobbered in field if they don’t toughen up fast. I’m glad DF didn’t start with lessons relating to Zenith powers but focused on actual combat training. This way Students rely more on their skills than their powers.
) Some games would just set you on a single path, and there would be nothing wrong with that, but I prefer giving the three different options for more replay value.
(That said, MobXShine would be cute. 
)
Oh well… that’s what fanfics are for, right? 