Sad news, and Glad news

[LoA]

Hello fellow world-builders!

It will probably sadden you guys to hear that as of this moment i give up on trying to make campaign settings. I dunno, it's just that i don't really have anybody to play with right now, but if i did get somebody to play with i would definitely jump back in. But that doesn't mean i have given up on world building, far from it, I'm just going going to channel it into something else, specifically comics. Heck I've got paper, I've got pencils, I've got ideas, i don't have a functioning scanner at my disposal but that could be rectified by Christmas.

So basically here's what I've got so far.

A Pokemon Fancomic!
[ic]
So i was reading Super Effective by the guy who does VG cats.... and it got me to thinking "What would it be like if i were a pokemon trainer?" and that sparked an idea where i go on my very own pokemon quest! Armed with nothing but my starter, and my eagle scout skills i embark on a journey that i have no idea where it ends.... I'm certainly not going to catch them all, i'm not insane! I'm just doing this because my mother made me! I wanted to be an orthodontist (not in real life) and the thought of having a miniature army of super monsters at my disposal is actually pretty cool...

But then i remembered my attempt at a steampunk Pokemon setting, and since that would be a comic i would totally read, i thought "why not draw a steampunk Pokemon comic?" Will a few issues, one i don't feel like doing two pokemon fan dribblings at once... two i'm not that into steampunk. I mean i like it, but as i've stated earlier my true lovepunk is dieselpunk! Although then again a detective saga from the perspective of a PI with a Houndoom companion would totally kick all kinds of donkey! Number three, I'm already two strips into my first fancomic idea, and even began designing other characters so if I'm gonna switch ideas, it better be now.

This would just be a fan comic i showed to my friends, and stuff, i''m never going to feel comfortable sticking this on the internet. I don't know enough about the laws behind this stuff.
[/ic]

A Dynama Comic!
[ic]What, did you honestly think I've given up on my baby? No! I'm just going to have to use a different venue i guess. This also gives me the opportunity to do some hardcore experimenting. I've always been a huge fan of the sunday newspaper format that Bill Watterson used in his final years of Calvin and Hobbes, and i've been recently looking into old Adventure Comic Strips.
But here's some significant changes to the setting, first off, i'm dialing back the races down to three, humans, kobolds, and the poppies. Maybe use drow and Duerger as bad guys and stuff, but no more gremlins and  catfolk. Also Dynama's not a world it's a land, and i'm thinking about having city states instead of fullblown nations, sort of like Athas. [/ic]

[LordVreeg]

I am alos a huge Watterson fan; I look forward to see where you go here.

[Xathan]

Color me intrigued. As for the Pokemon comic, why limit yourself? If you want to post it or share it with a wider audience, make it a monster trainer comic, have the 'Pokemon' stored in magic gems, and create your own monsters - anything else that is pokemonish is not unique enough to run into legal problems unless you try and turn it into a video game. :P

[beejazz]

I'll second that you can do a mons comic without being pokemon. Take this chance to make the creatures work with the dieselpunk-themed setting, maybe strip out the bits you don't like or include ideas you'd like better. I've thought about doing something like this... myself, I'd ditch the pretense of "friendship" between trainer and mons, have fights to the death, allow catching unconscious, let people and mons fight each other (why would a wild whatever leave the kid alone?) have bad guys use multiple mons or cheat other ways... stuff like that. And of course my creatures would be dangerous and terrifying.

[LoA]

You know i've been screwing around with the idea of a hyper-advanced Druidic magiteknology that creates super-animal weapons for warfare, sort of like the Leviathan trilogy by Scott Westerfeld. Maybe I could make "mons" an integral part of the setting. Minor young bioficers? Druidicists?.... create monsters for sporty battles. This is encouraged so that there are always a flood of young talent ready to take the mantle when there older.

[SabrWolf]

The Druidic idea is pretty cool IMO. Especially since it will basically mean that everyone will have unique creatures to deal with. Which, of course, means that you'll have a lot of room for creating TONS of stuff!

Do this one.

EDIT: removed some stuff at the request of the mods.

[beejazz]

Ooh... I'm liking the engineered creature concept. Would you keep the concept of wild versions and capturing or would they all be artificial? Also, would the evolution through battle concept be there, or would the "trainers" tinker with their own? And how alien/animal would they be?

[sparkletwist]

Copyright infringement is copyright infringement, regardless of whether you make money.

You will have a lot more creative flexibility as well as more pride in your work with an original creation. So, find inspiration wherever you want, be shameless about your inspiration, but at the end of the day-- be original! :D

[LoA]

Ooh... I'm liking the engineered creature concept. Would you keep the concept of wild versions and capturing or would they all be artificial? Also, would the evolution through battle concept be there, or would the "trainers" tinker with their own? And how alien/animal would they be?

Will this is still a fantasy setting so there are fantasy monsters and everything. I suppose in theory you could have a trainer who has a pet unicorn, but this would be frowned upon. Artificial creatures can be made to obey every command you give it, and to repel some of it's more undesirable traits. Actual creatures from the wild would have to be trained, tamed, and even then there is still a level of unpredictability. And no, there wouldn't be any sort of "evolution" as there would be "enhancement", giving your creatures magical properties, like making it part elemental so that it has some command of fire, water, earth, or air. imbuing it with size shifting spells to make them gigantic when you need to or turn them back small.

As for wild versions. Eh. I like the idea that Scott Westerfeld presented in Leviathan. The darwinists made there animals so that they could reproduce, and therefore have an artillary that will build itself, but that would be a double edged sword if you ask me. Say some of them got loose and made babies in the wild. Pretty soon you would probably have a population of wild animals capable of tearing highly advanced automatonry the size of houses apart with there bare claws. How could you stop them other than trying to introduce something bigger and scarier into the wild?

So this would be something that the military would try to avoid, and therefore there war animals would probably be sterile. On the other hand i don't see why designer pets wouldn't be allowed to reproduce. Or heck why not an experimental creature of great power accidentally set loose into the wild?

[LoA]

I've done some deep digging and for the time being, i think i'm just going to cut out for the most part the hyper advanced druidic magic. It feels too much like Scott Westerfeld's work to me, and i feel like that would be in poor taste. And i don't know how to make a halfway descent "mon" concept. For some reason the idea of a (Insert)punk "mon" setting keeps hanging in the back of my mind.

I dunno my root problem with the whole "mon" genre, is the shallowness of it. I mean don't get me wrong the idea of having a fleet of super monsters at my command is awesome, it's just that what people do with there biological superweapons is so stupid! I mean if i had a Typhlosion, Tyranitar, Aggron, Gyarodos, Umbreon, and Lugia in real life, I wouldn't exactly be out there trying to get eight badges and be declared the best.... At best i would be atop my super undersea psychic bird leading my personal army bent on world domination from the sky. I've heard that a comic called Narutaru (not the ninja comic..) has toyed with this concept but i'm still reading it.

Advice is wanted by the way.

[beejazz]

I dunno my root problem with the whole "mon" genre, is the shallowness of it. I mean don't get me wrong the idea of having a fleet of super monsters at my command is awesome, it's just that what people do with there biological superweapons is so stupid! I mean if i had a Typhlosion, Tyranitar, Aggron, Gyarodos, Umbreon, and Lugia in real life, I wouldn't exactly be out there trying to get eight badges and be declared the best.... At best i would be atop my super undersea psychic bird leading my personal army bent on world domination from the sky. I've heard that a comic called Narutaru (not the ninja comic..) has toyed with this concept but i'm still reading it.

This is what I was getting at earlier. Take the really basic assumptions (exploration, collection, training, cockfighting) and nix the stuff that made no damn sense while substituting "what would you do" in that setting in place of the old artificial logic. For visual design, given that this is a comic and not a game you don't need to sweat over a full list of 150. It might be enough to start with a few basic types / categories and learn a thing or two about monster design. Or just cheat and find someone to do that part for you / develop a table with themes and features.

It might be nice to think of a good tone or genre for your story first and foremost. Will it be light, dark, somewhere in between? As a story, will there be a theme? Will the action be driven by particular goals or will there be a mystery to solve? Will it work like a puzzle film? Once you've got that, it can't be hard to just research, brainstorm, mix and match.

[LoA]

So I've done some more self digging and decided to just go ahead and make a pokemon comic for practicing. Not to stick on the internet of course, just to show to friends and family. This is just an experimental phase thing to see where my strengths and weaknesses lie and what to work on and so that i don't get bored fast i'll be using a series that i'm a fan of. Don't worry i've got plenty of original ideas cooking up in my brain. I just need to do more research.