[Report This]Date: July 31 2022 4:51 PM Title: Chapter 9:
One of my favorite writers
[Report This]Date: July 31 2022 4:36 PM Title: Chapter 9:
One of my favorite writers
[Report This]Date: July 16 2022 2:05 AM Title: Chapter 5: Night Watch
I think my favorite part of this story has been the worldbuilding. The way we naturally and gradually learn about their world has been nothing short of great and keeps me entertained despite the relatively low action. Right now the only thing I think could use some clearing up is just how secretive Super society is from a Natural perspective, especially regarding the detective and his daughter, as I assumed they knew about Steve being a student from the academy, but his reaction at the end of Chapter 5 makes me doubt that assumption.
Anyways! Keep up the good work, and I look forward to more!
Author's Response:
Thanks for the comment, Babulbi. I'm glad you feel the level of detail is working. When there's a lot of worldbuilding it's hard to know how much to explain without exposition dumping, which I really want to try an avoid.
Most Supers are fairly covert. Brandon and Tori guessed Steve was a student, the stuff in Ch 5 about the secret basement and AI, etc, is not related to the academy. That's a personal project of Steve's and Tripp's (which Tripp abandoned), so Brandon and Tori didn't know about it.
[Report This]Date: July 14 2022 11:46 AM Title: Chapter 5: Night Watch
You're probably my fav writer on the site rn. Everything you write is super good and natural especially. All character interactions I read just feel so realistic.
Why did Zamira assume Steve could make himself bigger again? Can Reducers who can reduce themselves do that?
Author's Response:
Thanks for the kind review, Iunno, I really appreciate it.
Reducers can 'unreduce' themselves but not others.
The rules sound really strange and confusing; I was using some odd metaphors to 'ground' how powers worked generally. For instance, if someone had the Human Torch's ability to combust, they could also extinguish themselves without being burned. But if they touched another, that person would burn and the Human Torch could not extinguish them the same way. The person would have to be extinguished externally, like with water. It's like using your powers through the medium of your own body is different to using your powers on others. So a reducer can reduce themselves and 'cancel' the power to grow back, but they can't grow back another.
I'll try to edit somewhere to clear this up in the story.
[Report This]Date: June 09 2022 9:09 AM Title: Chapter 1: Exam Night
This was plain great. I've been having a resurging interest in superheroes since I started looking into Mutants and Masterminds, so this hit me just right. The characterization and worldbuilding were great, and my only nitpick would be that what happened in a scene was sometimes lost, although that is partly due to our narrator feeling differently from what he actually does. An example would be Venus' entrance, where, while I did get Rodney died, I remained unsure about Lucy for quite a while.
Looking forward to more.
Author's Response:
Thanks for your comment, Babulbi, I'm glad you like the story so far. You raise a valid point about some details not being clear. The scene is meant to be a little disconcerting and confusing, even freakish, and the characters aren't acting their usual selves. Later chapters will hopefully clear some of this up.
[Report This]Date: May 22 2022 4:10 PM Title: Chapter 3: Visit from Venus
Good start to this story. A few random thoughts:
That's an incredibly high mortality rate for naturals let into the academy. I'm surprised they let naturals in, unless there's a general disdain for them in this world and they don't really care about them dying. Is having a power in this world the norm or the exception?
I wonder is Summer abandoned Steve because she was panicking or because he's a natural, which makes him not worth saving in her eyes.
Superpowers in this world are really strong. Reconstructors seem pretty ridiculous and absolutely horrific. How long do people retain their consciousness when transformed? Would Steve even be able to die if he was turned into a bubble? Society must be a mess if there's a non-negligible amount of people with these sorts of powers running around.
I wonder what Locketopia's actually like. Probably a dystopia considering who made it, but it would be an amusing twist if everything actually was great in there.
Why did Steve lie to Venus? I understand he's scared after seeing Rodney get killed, but what's the harm in being honest about his situation here? I'm genuinely confused, to the point where I feel like I must be misreading.
Is reducing a one way trip? Venus talks about bringing Steve to a hospital to try and fix his condition. I guess they can't just grab another reducer to regrow him?
I wonder what the blue mark she put on Steve actually does. It's hard to imagine it's just for decoration.
Venus has a hell of a lot of different powers. Feels Superman-esque. Her personality feels decidedly not very superhero-ish.
Author's Response:
Thanks for your comment! The story is still being figured out as I write it and hopefully many of these issues will be resolved in future updates, but I will try to answer as many of your questions as possible at this stage.
Being a Super is very rare. The Academy has a Natural stream as goodwill towards Naturals, and demystify the workings of Super training to avoid Natural conspiracy theories (e.g. that the Academy is a big training camp for some radical Super army). I would think this happened in the past, maybe with a protest, and the Academy tacked on extra streams to pacify it, which is a band-aid measure. In general there are a lot of flaws and hypocrisies with how this world works, because I find that more interesting to write about.
Reconstructors are definitely OP. It's a problem with superheroes in general. I'm not sure what the answer is, apart from just nerfing them somehow. People retain their consciousness (that's part of the macro appeal here). Maybe Steve will get reconstructed and it'll be described directly.
Lucy selects law-abiding or obedient people to go into Locketopia, so it's probably nice, but maybe too nice and uncanny and bland. Maybe like Stepford without robots. So yeah, there is some irony there.
Steve is desperate to save face in front of Venus and not be typecast as just some civilian who needs rescuing. He idolizes her and wants to be seen as special, not just another Natural fan (Venus has a lot of Natural fans).
I could be shooting myself in the foot at this early stage in the story, but the way powers work is very specific. Reducers can only reduce, they can't grow. There would have to be a counterpart super, an 'Increaser' to grow things.
Venus is the type to flourish her power for no other reason than pure decoration, but in this case the blue mark does have another purpose. She was also partly inspired by Superman and Wonder Woman but lacks the experience of either.
[Report This]Date: May 22 2022 3:30 PM Title: Chapter 3: Visit from Venus
Good story so far!! I feel like Summer would probably be more embarrassed cause she left him behind and he's more defenseless. Hopefully they don't forget about the locket too lol
Since you're the author and creator of this, I wanna ask you what DOES happen when someone is reconstructed? Fate worse than death? Consciousness and soul leaves the body and they're effectively dead once transformed?
Also couldn't a Reducer help him out? Or is there no one who can grow others?
Again good work so far! You're an amazing writer!
Author's Response:
Thanks for the kind words! Summer was very embarrassed. She's not as flexible as she claims and was actually very thrown by Steve admitting he's not a Super. She also recognized Rodney as a Supervillain and completely lost her composure.
There might be a couple of different uncertain outcomes for people who get reconstructed. One is possibly death if the new form can't hold together (e.g. water, air) or gets neutralized (e.g. fire extinguishment). If the form holds together the person will remain conscious and eventually even transform back on their own -- which would be like naturally healing from an injury, I guess. Steve would have to be regrown by a Super who can grow things.
[Report This]Date: May 22 2022 10:29 AM Title: Chapter 3: Visit from Venus
Not really into superheroes, but Venus and how she interacted with Steve reeled me in, big time. Reminds me a bit of Jen and Jerry. Def want to see more, albeit after Jen and Jerry lol ;)
Author's Response:
This story is in an experimental kind of place right now in between writing Jen and Jerry. I definitely want to carry on with Jen and Jerry and finish that, and as for this story it's more seeing what happens, if good ideas strike.