You can let some ideas stew in the back of the brain. Let the subconscious do some work while you eat, exercise, etc. I find that it even helps when I’m coding, I go for a walk and come back with a better idea of how to code something. (maybe it’s not good for the “mindfulness”, but as a “creative”, the brain is always working on odd ideas here and there 
)
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I can’t talk for other people but this month I started to write for the halloween jam and now I’m writing parts of the first chapter of my WIP instead. Sometimes I write things that doesn’t really work or even make sense. Yet I don’t feel that it is a complete lost of time.
Many times you can work, edit or revist the idea. When you write something (even if its chaotic and doesn’t make sense), you can read it latter. Then you can ask yourself, what did I wanted for this scene? What is not working? And add or take things until is not that bad. Also, perfection is your enemy because it is an illusion. It is better to try for “better” and “good enough”. Every improvement, no matters how little counts. And failure might teach you things for other writing.
I think that sometimes we can be our worst critics. Be kind to yourself.
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@brushmen Agreed. A lot of my spur of the moment ideas - that I’m quite proud of and that I want to have in the final cut of the story - have come from when I’m just doing chores or something else entirely.
@TheGhost Yup. Now I just need to tell my perfectionism and self critical tendencies to shush. Cause when I go easy on myself/not force myself to write and rationalize it I feel like I’m allowing myself to be lazy/just making excuses for myself.
All in all, I feel like my story should have a couple of plot twists to make it interesting and have all these NPCs storylines to get the reader more engaged, but I know that’s just me being silly. The movie Stardust is still an enjoyable movie with a simple plot and relatively ‘simple’ character motivations.
The second portion w/ the NPC storylines? That’s just a matter of me wrestling with if it’s feasible to have these storylines in play/let the MC participate or would it detract from the main story sort of thing.
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Speaking of scrapping, I had to erase two ROs and multiple good scenes when I realized they serve no real purpose in the narrative, they were just dead weight. I save the scenes and the other RO for another story, but it hurts just the same lol.
Really feels like I’m making no progress due to the word count going down, it can be a bit disheartening. 
But it’s getting there, and this needs to be done.
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But that is improvement. You have increased the effect. A high word count might be detracting if the scene doesn’t work or add something. The leader might get confused or bored.
I understand the feeling that “it was for nothing”. But it might be one step necesary for you to give shape to the plot in your head.
I’ve several ROs an until I gave them plots and past writing them was the worst. Until I had write something about them (that probably wont make the cut), it was difficult to fit them in the story or make them interact among themselves. Now still can be changes, but the characters feel more organic.
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What I’d normally advice is to always write to music, any tempo would do. Just take a shower, wear some fresh clothes and open choicescript. If you don’t have a plot at the beginning I’d recommend planning your book using Chronicler so you’d know where each choice leads to and what part of your story does what. Als0 do that with music. I mostly listen to Sales anytime I write. Don’t forget to eat and drink your water.
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Several writers I know recommend that you park the car downhill: stop before you run out of things to write, so you can roll forward much more easily the next time you start writing.
Due to life circumstances, I parked the car uphill on a sand dune.
I’ll try not to spin out the tires too much getting the car rolling once more.
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Welcome to the thread @Sargent –
Hopefully you’ll be able to find some inspiration here. Sometimes changing up something will help you get rolling again. Imagine your car magically transformed into a dune buggy and I’m sure you’ll be flying around those dunes soon enough
I’m still waiting to see how much more my rival can torture me in your game … I think you created one of my least liked characters in years. Well done.
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Thanks! Writing them is a lot of fun.
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I’ve finally gotten some writing done this month and with a little luck (translating to a god damn miracle) I might finish chapter 2 this month.
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Well my 30,000-word August apparently just wiped me out.
I’m taking at least a few days, maybe a week, totally off. I’m reading a couple books I’ve been meaning to get to for a while, playing Battlefront with my youngest, and working on getting our pup to heel on walks. Will get some writing done this month, but not worried about a specific word count.
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managed to get all my major and minor scenes blocked out, now I just need to tie them all together 
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I’m definitely struggling with writing at the moment - finding time, finding energy, and having confidence that what I’m writing is any good.
But with help from @HannahPS I’ve managed to turn a corner into the nihilistic vibe of “Well, this may not be any good but I’m going to write the heck out of it anyway”, which is a big step up for me! And now I’m setting up to write my next chapter.
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You are an awesome writer, I love your work. And I am sure that with Hannah help you will improve yourself as a writer even more.
Both of you are a model for me, and I am sure that I am not the only one.
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Oh that’s really lovely, thank you 
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@poison_mara that’s so kind and means a huge amount 
I did a bit of tweaks and fixes to the first bit of the starting chapter of Royal Affairs, which I’m pleased with. Hoping to get some more code done on Chapter 3, either tonight or tomorrow.
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And as always, What I said is completely true, I loved your mods of old Bioware games, even before knowing you. Fallen London… Blood money … Is a good game but It showed that you were new to the Cog code. And I loved your last game so much.
Fayl game was thrilling and engaging with great replay value. Only needs more interaction between crew members and deep relationships. But that’s was the best game of Cog next one will be great I am sure.
I wish to be 1% of the great both of you are
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I’ve been… slow so far this month, at least compared to last, but here’s a 10-day check-in for accountability!
Word Count: currently says 3280. I’m working on the code skeleton though, so most of what’s happening isn’t counted in any significant way by this metric. I’m a little over halfway done with the code skeleton; I’m hoping to speed the pace a bit and be done with it by the 15th, but I could feasibly not be done until the 20th and still be on track for this month’s goals.
Daily writing: My sleep schedule has been really whack, so I’m not 100% sure about this actually, but I’ve been writing fairly consistently. I’m going to guesstimate this at about 8/10.
Happy to see some new faces/names on the thread; welcome to all. I hope everyone’s got a nice weekend ahead of them! 
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Well I just cranked out - literally just copy and pasting - 273 words of pure code.
I took a note from Breach and how you can’t share a name with nearly all of the NPCs since I read Vampire Regent with a Regent that shared the same name as the NPC I romanced. That was pretty awkward.
Earlier I jotted down to Eiwynn two portions of my story where I’d like the player to have agency and I’m glad I got them down on paper, mainly cause I know if I didn’t I’d forget them later.
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