Currently at 35,588. By the end of today I should be at 40,000. Didn’t get as much writing done over the weekend. Feeling increasingly sort of unsure about whether I’m on the right path, which is making it harder to focus on writing. I’ve been getting closer to 1000 words a day than 2000. And I need a bit over 2000 a day to get through.
Part of my problem with plot has to do with me revising my outline last minute on 10/31 and not being entirely finished. So I had lots of good plot hooks early on that need more chapters later on that weren’t on the outline. I’ve also learned that my chapter summaries were a little too brief and narrow for what I needed for a full chapter. Blargh.
The other challenge? Part of my story involves a sort of comedy of errors involving people in love with someone that doesn’t reciprocate their feelings. (It’s less of a love triangle and more of a love Z.) And it takes place over the span of about 20 years. Which I guess can happen, but on a certain level feels like, “Really? Are they all that belligerently stupid?” So I’ve veered off of my original plan a bit. We’ll see how it goes.
I don’t know why people aren’t willing to work for you, though I have no idea what you’re asking for, etc. I’ve been fairly lucky to find collaborators for my work, given that I have no money and offer only back-end percentages, but then I’ve tried to float only the best, most compelling ideas I can come up with, and that helps make me a bit more attractive.
Now that I’m thinking clearly, and not just having knee jerk annoyance towards Hopcroft, I think it comes down to two aspects:
– I don’t generally solicit assistance. Each person I recruit is on a case-by-case basis. I don’t go after other game companies or post adds on industry message boards.
– I make people sign NDAs.
The first lowers the numbers of people I talk to about work. The second usually screens out the total flakes.
I don’t include NDAs in my contracts. Rather I simply remind the signee about the confidentiality of work product. That’s more than enough. And actually expecting work and defining what that means also does a good job of screening out flakes.
This isn’t even the NDA in the contract. I have an NDA for any serious discussion of work, before a contract is even discussed. I’ve been trying to play my hand pretty close to my chest with this whole DCO venture.
I see. Because there’s a lot of industrial espionage in the roleplaying business, or…?
I don’t know if I’d go that far…
The core of it comes down to the simple fact that when I was considering this whole crazy thing, I had a friend do a tarot reading. From her tarot reading, she advised me to be careful about being too liberal with information.
Really, the entire gaming industry is just an industry of ideas. I don’t know that any of my ideas are so brilliant that people are lining up to steal them, but the simple fact is I could come upon something ingenious, blab about it, and see someone else making a living off of it.
Game companies like Guardians of Order, Eos Press, Mongoose Publishing… They all take their business seriously and pretty hush hush. In order to talk to any of these companies about working for them, I had to sign an NDA. When in Rome…
Seraphim Guard never had me sign an NDA. Note how much I blab about SG to how much I blab about Eos or Guardians.