Imperium Insectum END OF (ENTERING DOON VATEL ARC)
What were the main goals of this arc
- Introduce the characters and events that will be important going on.
- Deepen the relationship of Apollinaris and Diva.
- Elaborate and deepen the lore of the world.
Were these Goals met Y/N?
- Introduce the characters and events that will be important going on. Y
- Deepen the relationship of Apollinaris and Diva. Y
- Elaborate and deepen the lore of the world. Y
If no. Why?
- N/A
What were the writing goals of this arc?
- Improve spelling and Grammar.
- Improve the flow of paragraphs and make them more interesting to read.
- Reduce word count.
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Were these Goals met Y/N?
- Improve spelling and Grammar. ( Y, but there is always room to improve)
- Improve the flow of paragraphs and make them more interesting to read. (Y, but there is always room to improve)
- Reduce word count. N
If no. Why?
- Reduce word count. My original aim with this goal was to reduce chapters from 3k words to around 1.5k to 2k words. The idea was to have shorter chapters, but more meaningful stuff happens in those chapters. The reason I feel this goal hasn’t been achieved is because my chapter length is still around 2.5k to 3k words. Having lots of words is not necessarily a bad thing it can be good to help keep the story pace.
Readers don’t seem to mind the longer length, so maintaining it shouldn’t be a problem. However, the downside is that editing the chapters is very time-consuming. That is why the release rate dropped from 3 times a week to 1 time a week. I'll keep writing as I am for now, and we will see in the future.
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Goals for the next arc
- Actually, start building the Hive. This is a pain point I have with his story. Whilst I have no issue with what happened story-wise, the hive part of this story is sorely lacking to the point that it's comical. This is at the top of my to-do list
- Power up Diva and her crew even more.
- Focus more on the lit RPG elements.
Writing goals for the next arc
- Improve My action writing. I feel like my action/fight writing is very stiff to read. I want to improve it. It is an area I have not done much of. Also, the structure of the fight scenes and sequences is better. No more long action sequences. (its very fatiguing to write.)
- Improve Smut writing. There is always room to improve. I feel like it has gotten better, but that is just my opinion.
- Improve spelling and Grammar (Ongoing)
- Look into wordcount
To do list
- Update the glossary (PAAAAAAIIIIINNNNNNNN)
- Apollinaris artwork commission
- New cover for the story
Comments and concerns.
Maintaining scope in arcs. A problem this arc has is that it grew to be bigger than expected. What was supposed to be a slower slice-of-life arc where we learn about the world grew into something else entirely. I do not hate this arc for it. It was a lot of fun to write, and I learned A LOT from it. But going forward, I want arc’s to stay as I planned them. However, the problem is when you have a cool idea, it's hard to keep it bottled up sometimes; the idea is so cool that you just have to roll with it. However, this is definitely a me thing and something I have to work on.
Honestly I think that the big problem you have had is that the story has barely advanced, and you have changed the theme and tone completely with the arc of the city, which in my opinion has hardly contributed anything significant to the story.
Another thing to improve is the system, apart from the swarm management it barely has any effect on the story itself. For example, what good are all those traits and achievements if the protagonist just puts on a mask and cancels them out?
Also it is necessary to mention that the lore, the history of the world is quite scarce and that practically the only thing that is known is that the gods had a fight and the loser is resentful and the background of the city of the spirits.
My proposal would be that the Lore is disclosed as the story progresses through secondary characters (whether friends or enemies) that the protagonist will find, a perfect example would be the story of Appolinaris and the city of spirits. Leaving the interactions and negotiations with external elements of the hive to agents (whether they are parasitized, brainwashed or volunteers) [side chapters] and treating Diva more like an hive queen organizing and fighting frontally protected by the army than infiltrating behind enemy lines.
As for the s*x scenes, I think they are perfect for the moment, just enough to be an interesting book but not so much as to be entirely po*n.
A lot of what you have said is what I agree with. This arc has really through a spanner in a lot of things it's why I mentioned maintaining scope as one of the things I need to work on. (can you tell this arc grew to be larger than I wanted it to be)
As for the traits and abilities being cancelled out by the mask. Is honestly something I've been annoyed with but couldn't really fix until we got to the end. It's why divas evolution was so drastic even with the mask she can't fit in with humans now and the mask itself has been given away to someone else.
And tone is something I plan to fix once we get out of this city. I to hate the tonal shift from the earlier chapters to this one. The problem is that the city is just so limiting with what you can do with it. If I could go back in time my approach to this chapter would be completely different
Thank you for the feedback it's always appreciated
@LORD_SHAXX
Sincerely it seems that in the previous comment I have beaten you up with the criticisms and I feel bad.
I also consider that there are some things quite well done and that I loved. The personality of Diva and Apollonis have enchanted me especially as little by little they are changing. Also another thing well done is the management of the hive and the system is quite well done. The combat is also very well done and I liked the theme of switching between PoV to show different parts of the action. An example would be the bandits' camp at the beginning or the horror chapters in the orphanage. However, it needs to be improved, since last chapters of the kidnappers were quite confusing.
Reduce word count. My original aim with this goal was to reduce chapters from 3k words to around 1.5k to 2k words. The idea was to have shorter chapters, but more meaningful stuff happens in those chapters.
I really don't mind the size of the chapters and I would tell you to write as you feel more comfortable. One thing you can do is to write the chapter as normal and when you publish the chapter divide it in half and publish it as: "Chapter X part 1 and Chapter X part 2."
But publish them together (Same day) so as not to leave you with a cliffhanger.
@Hollex honestly don't feel bad. A lot of your opinions mirror my own. I appreciate all feed back. Especially stuff like this. If I don't get this feed back I just have to assume everything is okay
you may aswell add retconning and properly redefining of the litrpg system to the list. Ive mostly ignored the litrpg elements because the mad very little sense. If you want them to be more of a focus then the overall quality would benefit from you taking a 2 week break soon and reading through your own story entirely, not in a content sense but rather only focus on the litrpg mechanics and then focus on designing the system so that her choices do make more sense. Cough rock throwing Cough.
What I personally dont want is a dumb case of number goes up the power level is over 9000.
Dont reduce the word count? Increase it rather! Not with filler mind you, sure provide more detail and debth to some scenes sure couldnt hurt, but for me the personal sweet spot is about 8k words per week. (Note: per week not per chapter) I fully understand that this will not be possible to achieve given that you work full time but dont be afraid because you write more words. Unless you begin to write filler where mc talks 200 words about the weather more will only be better!I really enjoyed the last ch in this sense.
The world building is meh in my opinion. Not meh as in unfixable and full of contradictions but rather still very much a blank slate. In my opinion you did mot suceed in your goal of fleshing out the world.
I do not read (well i skim/skip through) your smut. So I can guess given that growing the hive involves it that there will be more of a need for diva to do the do. I am not advocating removal of it but rather id recommend keeping it at the same amount. For this purpose it may be a good idea to background some of the smut after a certain point just to forgo this turning into a 50% smut novel just to grow the hive. (I guess as fan service one or two big orgy chapters are inevitable) I guess the readers that like this in your story as the main aspect may also enjoy it more if you focus the interactions on diva with for ex. appolinaris. That way you can keep the amount of smut mostly the same.
You action writing would benefit from less confusion. The last action scene with sally/diva vs the goons was just so confusing that even now I dont know how many goons there actually were.
I have near 0 complaints about grammar aside from the occasional typo.
Thank you for the feedback. It's a lot to think about but you are right about a few things
vg