In regards to the sexuality thing that was being talked about here, I have noticed a prevailing attitude of "sex = relationship complete" amongst suggesters here. Don't get me wrong, sex is awesome, but are there any quests that actually deal with couple stuff once the clothes go back on? You don't build up romantic interest with somebody, have a night of crazy sex, and go "sweet, I win this relationship" in real life.

To be fair, quest characters in general lead pretty hectic lives and probably see more life-or-death situations in a day than most of us will see in a lifetime, so I can understand a certain amount of "we are gonna survive this ordeal and then we are gonna fuck like rabbits" attitude. And, I dunno, maybe I am imagining it. Thoughts?

>You don't build up romantic interest with somebody, have a night of crazy sex, and go "sweet, I win this relationship" in real life.

Well, not me personally no. Some people totally do that though. I mean, they write strategy guides and everything.

Serious Relationship wise though, uh... pretty sure that's more common than not with quests, actually. Least with the ones I end up keeping up with. Tone of the story is a big factor there too.

To a certain extent though, suggesters are going to skew one night stand-y, because, as a hive-mind, the great suggestion collective has a REALLY short attention span. Just the nature of the beast.

>>362158
The generalization of that is to be a fanboy of Sid Meier by quoting him again:
A game is a series of interesting choices.

I think the almost Choose-Your-Own-Adventure prompting from, say, some recent Tozol Quest updates has been a little heavy-handed at this sometimes (and tends to result in "all of the above" anyway), but conversely an update with the protagonist paralysed and bleeding out doesn't really give much scope for suggesting. Likewise the recent black screen in Tales of Meigara. Hell, just so it doesn't look like I'm ragging on everyone else, likewise Buswald's trek back ot the mansion in DFQ2.

An update should either end with some kind of decision point, or some kind of break, like a chapter end, else people aren't going to have much more to contribute than "=>" and the usual derping. Dramatic pauses don't really work at quest update speeds.

>>362160
I think you just described the romance subplot of every action film. Add onto that thick cultural basting that half the userbase here are probably Forever Alone and it's not entirely surprising. Plus, writing normal characters having subtle interactions is harder than slightly exaggerated ones fucking and fighting.

>>362171
Brom had relationships continue past fucking. I uh, technically did, but I don't know that anyone wants to talk about the nature of the "romantic" relationships in Crowmanticar in any serious way.

I have tended to just avoid sex in the quests I've had that have even had a romantic subtext, and just save that for the very end. I personally think sex is distracting for the suggesters in a quest, and when it becomes a viable option, some set of the suggesters are going to ignore other plot elements and focus on that.

The exception would be Neo Sex Mall, where the sex scenes are obviously done for humor, and Crowmanticar, where they were obviously done for humor/to be gross.

I do agree with the person up there who said that part of the problem is the nature of /quest's short attention span, because that's definitely an issue. Of course, I've also never done a quest that was focused on romance or relationships.

>>362172
>the nature of the "romantic" relationships in Crowmanticar
Poor Dogtits ;_;

>>362172

I would like to add at this point that reading Crowmanticar has made me a better person.

>>362171

I intend to avoid this, but I hate to make updates with more than three posts, specially if there's a change of scenery in them. It feels so rushed to me.

Crowmanticar actually influenced a scene in Tezakia. It's probably easy to guess which scene and how it was influenced, probably!

>>362183
>No space whale sex
>No crows and dogs fucking
>No "quick lick this all this jizz off my crotch"

...Call me stupid but I don't know what you're talking about.

>>362186
It's more subtle than that... probably made more so by the fact that it was a scene guindo wanted me to completely rewrite.

If you're curious... The scene when the dog is coming onto the crow inspired the scene where Dilia regained her memories and jumped on Sekani. The fact that the dog (if I remember right) seemed like it was lost and confused and in pain, and it wanted the bird to take the pain away... inspired me writing about Dilia wanting Sekani to take her own pain away.

>>362192
Ahaha! It was dogtits' sluttyness!
><LionsPhil> Also an explanation of how Dilia is ponywife or whatever you were alluding to.
><@Slinkoboy> i never said dilia is ponywife!
><LionsPhil> 1) Slut: check. 2) Horse: check.
><LionsPhil> SEEMS PRETTY DAMNING TO ME
><LionsPhil> No, wait, dogtits was the slut. Damn.
><LionsPhil> My careful theory, ruined.

Anonymous 2012/05/10(Thu)17:38 No. 52564 ID: 2563d4
File 133669673564.png - (38.71KB , 640x480 , the-ultimate-upgrade.png )

>>361793
><LionsPhil> Cockhole update your quest or the plague of bad handlebar moustaches continues.

>>362364
Nice tits.

I don't run any quests, tho.

Gnoll 2012/05/10(Thu)18:06 No. 52566 ID: 14a1d0
File 133669840996.png - (44.55KB , 323x308 , Rynhstache.png )

>>362364
It will never end.

Kobold 2012/05/10(Thu)23:06 No. 52587 ID: b0d1a8
File 133671638250.png - (63.90KB , 512x512 , boldstash.png )

>>362366
Ever.

WHERE IS THAT QUEST WITH THE HAREM OF ELVES AND SPIRITS AND GOLEMS AND GHOSTS

>>364572
The author of Prequel is very busy with finals right now.

>>364572
Where is YOUR quest, huh?! HUH?!?

>>364574

didn't think anyone missed it.

>>362387
why did you ruin such a cute ladybold's face with such an unsightly moustache?

>>364603
I do!

>>52566
I think I may be gay for hir..wait...

That Protector thing has some pretty dang good quest art.
>>/quest/414761 DYNAMIC ROBES!

>>55057
I gotta agree.

Test Pattern 2012/05/23(Wed)14:08 No. 55165 ID: ce4a4d
File 133780730590.png - (52.30KB , 881x365 , short_version.png )

Auto-Summarized

Anonymous 2012/07/16(Mon)13:56 No. 57227 ID: 4a20fa
File 134247217129.png - (36.89KB , 640x480 , nobody-is-safe.png )

It's that time again.

>>57227

Mustache Day?

Anonymous 2012/07/16(Mon)15:59 No. 57230 ID: 4a20fa
File 134247955221.png - (9.12KB , 245x262 , even-on-oc-they-grow.png )

>>57229
Not everything has to be a "day".

Some people just need to update their quests.

>>57230
No, I think it's mustache day.

>It's a rape cave
>In an SDF quest
>Let's go inside!

>>57856
You should see some of the early instructions in the original JOANQUEST.

Anonymous 2012/08/29(Wed)00:34 No. 59673 ID: 4a20fa
File 134622569360.jpg - (35.47KB , 300x400 , sad-bear11.jpg )

>Protector has not updated in over two months

Nahkh!7BHo7QtR6I 2012/08/29(Wed)10:54 No. 59766 ID: c44286
File 134626286126.png - (41.00KB , 500x600 , its that time again.png )

This is why we don't have threads just for talking about quests in general. Every time we do, a new X DAY is created.

>>59766
And then the spirit of the event (Cockhole needs to update his quest) is inevitably lost in the shameless commercialization of it. ;_;

>>51973
I agree, but then again I am shy and not in IRC often.

I have to wonder how many people I've turned off my quests with my erratic and infrequent update rate. I already know some people are asking about whether my other quests are ever going to resurface, but the current (never stated directly to more than like two people) plan is stick with the one I'm doing now and never deviate. Which, looking at my history with such plans, is inevitably doomed to failure.

This self-indulgent ramble aside, let me get to my point.

How tolerant are people on the board in general of erratic update schedules? How do you keep track of the quests you like and when do you start thinking it's about time to give up on following a quest?

And here's probably the biggest question I have of all:

Would you consider frequent updates of lower quality to be much better than infrequent updates that had more time spent on them?

>>59790
we can deal with irregular once the idea has built up that that is common, otherwise it leads to thoughts of the quest being dead quickly. and feel speed is better, but quality shouldn't suffer too much.

>>59790
I'm comfortable continuing to participate in Reformation at the current pace. I've come to expect it as a maybe once a week thing, and I'm not likely to be turned off if that continues.

I think it's about expectations though. I'd be somewhat more childish if something I expected to update constantly did not.

>when do you start thinking it's about time to give up on following a quest?
Slow pace alone wouldn't do it for me. The story or character(s) would have to go someplace I'm really not comfortable with, or that I was bored with. That or if the suggestions broke down into bitter angry fighting I couldn't stand to be part of.

>Quality v speed
That's really hard to say, it really depends on how much you sacrifice. I wouldn't cut corners on the dialog or writing, at least. You do have a lot of wiggle room with the art in the combat sequences though.

>>59790
I don't mind erratic schedules too much for quests that update slowly. If a quest sessions, though, it's nice to be able to have an idea of when that is occurring so instead of noticing late that there's been an update on a quest you like, you notice that there's been twenty and now you've been unable to help influence some important choices and you have no idea what's going on. I don't think you're in any danger of that, though.

I tend to only stop following quests if I get bored of them. If they stop updating, I might get sad or lose hope that it's coming back, but I won't get put off the quest if it miraculously returns.

As for quality vs quantity, unless you plan to do something insanely extensive that's going to make you feel terrible and possibly put you off of the idea of ever finishing it, I think making an update as good as you can make it, especially in the story and writing, is the best thing to do. If you update weekly or less, a slight delay to improve the update isn't going to be a huge issue and will likely make the update a lot better. Again, though, improving the writing and planning is going to get a lot more gains than stressing out over making sure every single body part of everything is the perfect shape.

I drip-fed people "=>" updates in DFQ2 a month apart before it finally imploded, and still got suggestions. Update rate is not actually all that relevant. (Squirrel tits are.)

Well, in my experience people are surprisingly forgiving of spotty update speeds. I've had god knows how many months-long hiatuses (hiati?) but I still get tons of suggestions. Maybe it's just battered reader syndrome or something, but...

>>59838
Hiatus' etymology is apparently Latin, so I think it would indeed be hiati.

Also, people like your quests, I'd assume, and most people also recognize the fact that artists a) have lives and b) don't get paid for doing quests, so no one expects you to update very consistently. It's great if you update as often as Lagotrope does, but no one expects it of you.

>>59841
Ah, but not all Latin nouns pluralize that way.

The proper Latin plural of hiatus, rather uselessly, is also hiatus.

>>59805

Yes squirrel tails are always relevant.

>>59843
Ah, fourth declension? I thought it might have been second, but I wasn't sure. The accent over the u doesn't really matter, correct?

We're using nominative plurals, correct?

Also, I'm not sure if I should be glad I went back to studying my Latin textbook during summer vacation.

>>59841
(I'd actually say Lago updates too frequently. I can't F5 that often, and if you miss a few updates you've had it---forget about ever catching up, or ever making sense of the new characters/mechanics/relationships etc. introduced while you were away.)

(The number of suggestions kind of show that lots of people can, though.)

I'm gonna disagree with some of the folks here and say that if you have to choose between speed vs quality, always go for speed.

Quests that update frequently are more appealing to follow, people will check on the thread more often and discuss it. The longer the breaks between updates are, the more relaxed people feel about suggesting in it. "There's no hurry, I can suggest later. Or tomorrow. It's not like the quest is going to be updated anytime soon."

The thing is, most folks don't care that much about art quality as long as you keep a good pace and they like the quest. Not only that, sacrificing speed to get more quality is not very rewarding. Very rarely people are going to say "Hey man, that update looks really nice."

Also even more important, with slow updates, the author is more likely to get bored and abandon it. I mean, depends on the author, but keeping a steady pace impulses you to keep doing it. While if after a month the protagonist is still leaving their home and packing stuff to go on an adventure, it's more likely that you, the author, is going to get tired and start thinking about starting new projects.

It all depends on you, and ultimately, you should just work out what pace are you more comfortable with, and fuck everyone and everything else. But I think that, if you have to choose between more speed or more quality, go for speed. Besides, practicing speed painting is good too.

Considering my laments about updates are often met with "WELL JUST DON'T SPEND SO MUCH TIME ON ART", I'm almost inclined to agree. Most people don't seem to sweat low level art much at all. Hell-- the famous Ruby Quest was one step removed from stick figures!

But the reason for its fame was its writing. Writing is very important, so even if you shoot for speed in art, make sure you take your time with writing.

That's not to say there isn't some merit to art. A style that sticks out and is pleasing can sometimes carry a quest that has less than stellar writing. But from what I've seen it's less about actual art quality, and more about stylizing it to be pleasing in its simplicity.


But it's hard to avoid the art version of cerberus syndrome sometimes. I tend to make it worse for myself because some random thing will delay me for a day or two, and then I'll feel guilty making people wait so long for a low quality low image update, so suddenly the quest is doing a billion images at high quality

and i can never not use suggestions cause i don't like people feeling left out and oh god what have i done

>>60588
>If anyone will read their quest(s) to me, or record them for the quest reading thread

So, this whole reading-quests thing, which I shall discuss here so as to not dilute the /meep/ thread's high concentration of actual recordings.

How do you deal with/want it to be dealt with (as an author, as a reader) that quests just aren't very audiobook-style readable? If you just take all the words in the updates and spew them out in sequence, you're going to miss context from the images, and for many quests get clips from the suggestions, possibly which can't just be dropped because the update text is a direct reply to them. Trying to rewrite, even minimally, as prose, both seems to defeat the point for the accessability argument, and also kind of mangling what the author did.

>>60589

Usually people read the chapters/threads. If the current thread is active I do not expect a reading of it to be available. I will tredge through and suggest.

Update by Update is not something that can be or should be expected for all quests. It would be too tedious to do, and very scattered to document.