Motivation
Wanderers
Wherever I May Roam, which I tend to call Wanderers instead, is a setting where monsters roam beyond civilization's reach. Called Beasts, these animals are fought by various kinds of adventurers.
Wanderers is all about how people deal with threats when they're living on the edge of civilization, and the challenges in dealing with all different forms of monsters. Already featured in my Settlement on the Edge and Tavern entries, this setting is my attempt at a setting that heavily features Adventurers for hire, though with very limited if any magic.
Stormfarers
Stormfarers is a soft scifi setting that is all about the stars. Hyperspace acts like a sea in many ways, which brings the whole sailing vibe to an interstellar environment. Humanity is spreading far and wide, and like in many scifi settings, at the edge of their reach the dark stuff happens.
Imagine a spaceship that actually has to dance between asteroids. Space battles that are more like dogfights rather than long-distance bombardments. Space pirates with actual culture and civilization. Those aspects are what I want to explore in Stormfarers.
Themes
Expanse
With both settings all about the edges of civilization and what dwells there, there's plenty of expanses to go around. Large lakes, massive plains filled with Beasts, dangerous forests stretching as far as the eye can see. But also the Hypersea itself, Dark Matter mining fields, as well as large planetary bases designed to keep out intruders and survive solar flares.
Leadership
No matter whether you're a town next to Beast Lands, or a newly pioneered planet run by a company aiming to make a profit, your leaders are what either keeps you standing or causes your demise. But there's also the central civilizations that still influence those far away, as well as the raiders and pirates that make a living preying on people.
Discovery
What lies past those Beast Lands? Are there other Folks out there, or great treasures to be gained? How does one best take out this newly discovered Beast? This new planet, what can be mined there, what lives there? What secrets do the Via Solaris and other parts of the Hypersea hold? And how far can we push these Hyperdrives?
Monstrous
It's not just space pirates and raiders that prey on people. Governments, companies, leaders, ready to exploit the people and kill to make a profit. There's malicious Beasts that enjoy the thrill of massacre. But worst of all there's the scary vastness of space, an unrelenting storm battering your ship while the Hypersea is threatening to collapse underneath you...
Inspiration
Wanderers
In many fantasy settings, when you fight big monsters, it's done through lots of combat magic. And while that's fun and all, I'm also intrigued by what happens if that's not an option. How do you fight a large beast with mundane weaponry? What about using monster parts? The whole 'dismantling monsters and using their parts' is what I want to see back in Wanderers.
There's several media that are more mundane when it comes to fighting large beasts, which I picture in my head when thinking of Wanderers. Monster Hunter I've seen an animated series and the western movie of, where they need to use traps and tricks. The Tomb Raider movies nicely display using terrain and weapons. Lastly, there's Rune Factory with its fights as well, which also has the scenarios of beating up a big monster while evading their attacks.
Starfarers
I've read plenty of old scifi in the past, which had its weaknesses but still are classics. Ignoring the masculinity in Planets for Sale, the whole robber barons at the edge of starfaring civilization is one of my biggest inspiration sources for scifi cultures.
Meanwhile, Witches of Karres helped display that planets develop way different civilizations over time. Plus I loved the whole 'we're transporting to make a living and flying in a rush all over the place', which Firefly reminded me of. There you get the inspiration for my Stormfarers from.
One last inspiration source: Infinite Space. The game had spaceship battles, a large variety of ship classes, plus a lot of various planet civilization sizes.
Quotes
Some inspirational quotes for the themes of Discovery, Leadership, and most importantly Monstrous...
May you find what you are looking for.— Chinese curse
You must answer the devil in his own language.— Indian proverb
We're all stories in the end.— The Doctor, Doctor Who
There is nothing like the thrill of walking through the jungle looking for a tiger and knowing they could be watching you already.— Ashlan Gorse Cousteau.
When temptation knocks, imagination usually answers.— Dan Bennett
The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.— Antonio Gramsci
We're all mad here.— Cheshire Cat, Alice in Wonderland
What we fight against defines us as clearly as all we embrace.— English Proverb
One may smile and smile and be a villain.— William Shakespeare, Hamlet
No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity, but I know none, therefore am no beast.— William Shakespeare, Richard III
The Writing Plan
Where & When
I got my small office at home, which I'm clearing out so everything is clean and orderly. That way there's nothing to distract me when I ponder and stretch. Added bonus: Second monitor means being able to have research on the side-screen and the writing on the main screen.
As for when I'll write: Mondays, Thursdays, Sundays. I'll primarily write from 20:00 to 23:00 (that's 7pm-10pm UK time). That gives me a minimum of 39h during summer camp, which will be a tight fit for 16 prompts, but doable. Now I might write outside those hours, but no guarantees.
Support
For support, I will follow the writing sprints of the
Anvilite Streamer Corps, as well as the WA write-ins on sunday. Procrastination is hard to overcome, but from experience I know the streams help. And once I'm in a groove, the words tend to keep coming.
And of course there's all the amazing beans on Discord, which I tend to bounce ideas off as if they're sentient rubber duckies. The feedback always helps, and sometimes merely writing out the ideas is enough to get the creative juices flowing.
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