The Martian Royals confuse me. Who inherits and why? First it was sis can't because no fertile kids, but with her new youngest in this timeline it seems possible that she could, so why does her state change cause changes for Teri and Pas?

It's not me rereading the archives this time, though I'm likely to soon. I do the binge reread thing.

James Resoldier found the place a few months ago, and John Connell and Bob in the last few weeks. So I have hopes for some fresh perspectives.

Order of inheritance: Any and all Wisdoms (oldest to youngest), any and all Trumales, any and all Trufems, Pseudomales, Pseudofems, then finally, children (male first, now that they can do chromosome checks).

Edited to add, and then any out-of-wedlock offspring. So if Xaero and Trev reproduce, their kids will be way, way at the end of a long list. Unless they get married. Even I don't know if they are that insane.

It used to be Fensteri as the only trumale, then Ferita as the only Trufem. Now they've swapped, as Feritu has achieved wisdom. In theory, Fensteri could mature into wisdom, but Feritu is the Empress's oldest chick, so she's stuck with it.

This is why Trev was pissed to find out he'd matured, back in the first story. He instantly vaulted into third place in the line up, ahead of his numerous siblings and even Feritu's children, until they mature.

Martians _expect_ a regular reshuffling of the order of succession, and do a bit of the same in the larger, richer, families.

I'll find a spot to drop all that in.

Edited at 2016-02-26 07:13 pm (UTC)

I trust that Xaero is still giggling about the whole thing?

I binged through about two years worth last summer, only dailies since then.

A writing process question:
I think you tend to push stuff through about three stages.
Stage one is a great idea that mostly doesn't connect with other great ideas. (and this ignores stuff like nanowrimo, which might jump stages). You sometimes post fragments, presumably sometimes not.
Stage two is a serious write through of the story line, trying to get details linked together. You seem to have a good idea of the general points to include, what info you want to cover. This changes as you get comments, but is still really this stage as you include more details.
Stage Three is where you go back into continuity order and try to get things done in the order you want them presented (published). Where we keep asking about "what happened to ...." and you say "I have to get this other story done first."

So, in general, have the number of stories you have at each stage kept pace with each other? Are you getting lots more fragments than you'll ever get to completion? or are you managing to keep the explosions under control, so we can expect stuff you posted last year to eventually get to publication stage?

Darqref

I'm nearing being able to kick three stories out the door.

Then Embassy, which is mostly written. Once I've got Disco up and operating, I can start publishing all the One World stories I've accumulated. Both the Rael stories, and the Directorate School stories. Despite my back brain trying to fill in the gaps.

I'm currently writing "How did Ra'd wind up in jail, anyway?" for instance.

How does Ra'd "usually" end up in jail... He beats someone up for being dishonorable. Or for wanting HIM to do something dishonorable.

Well, yeah. But it's interesting writing up the run up to it. You guys are going to be the wrong test readers for the story, since you know the end results, but, what the heck, I'll inflict it on you anyway.

Stages of writing . . .

The initial creation is the most fun. And some times just results in a fun scene or two. And some times it just keeps on going to a suitable end.

Beating it into shape is a chore, which gets lighter as I see the final thing taking shape.

The last year has been mostly chore, due to tearing apart two novel length works that were too complicated and included too many things not relevant to the main story plot. Lots and lots of work I didn't enjoy, interspersed with a series of sinus infections and family crises. So everything took much too long, and really isn't my best work. But I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and with luck and healthy sinuses, will be more productive of better quality stuff later this year.

One issue. If witches source from gravity, and wizards source from heat (or static electricity in the atmosphere in one case), what do mages source from? It's mentioned that what a mage can do is dependent on other genes, but it never really talks about a power source. Power is generated, passed to someone else in a compass, built up, then used. But then in Spy Wars Oscar (a mage) pulls in kinetic heat around himself (like a wizard) and used it, while in a 2 man compass. Are the genes just very similar? If an 8 man compass in a basement (or barn) are all sourcing from the same closed environment, wouldn't they just freeze to death? You figure they would all be sourcing from a series of bonfires or from a steam boiler or a river. The Sea King with an ocean of kinetic heat to source from always seemed like an awesome steady & renewable power source.

Mages and wizards are quite similar in their sourceing. Vibrations, from low level physical waves and basic kinetic energy through the electromagnetic spectrum.

Mages tend to be low, and wizards high, with a lot of overlap around the IR heat frequencies. It's very variable due to genetics, training in tapping a specific range, and psychological belief that one can actually do it. The One gene is also similar, not generally able to go as low as mages, nor as high as wizards, but tapping the same energy, for the most part.

The witch gene is completely different, gaining energy from gravity.

And yes, the Sea Kings, being able to tap the low frequency humongous volume of sea waves' energy were very powerful mages. Unfortunately the specific training that made them so powerful has been lost, and the new generation has been poorly trained in magic. I really need to get Oscar back, and get him together with some mermaids to work it all out again.

Edited at 2016-02-27 01:35 am (UTC)

BTW, the binge read was likely me again, when someone told me specifically where Rael and Xen got back together again in "Embassy". Once I'd restarted there, I had to hit the rest, too. It's addictive!

Hi
Could also be me binge reading....the index that was posted at the beginning of the yearjust made the page too addictive. Big thanks for all the posting by the way