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Oh yeah, I get it and I appreciate the care. I try to elaborate and break down my perspective because in my experience there's some murky waters you can get into as a creator when you've got a budding community of really excited fans and you're really active engaging with the fan works. I've been through the ringer in that regard, from the ground up, so my approach is based on those years of experience.

I think a fandom of any sort should just be able to fool around and do their thing. While I have things I do and don't love........that shit ain't really my business, and no one should be creating anything on the basis of me seeing or feeling some type of way about their stuff. While the cozy we're all friends/family community vibes are fun and can be awesome, that shit will eventually lead to headaches that I don't want to deal with. That doesn't mean I don't appreciate or am not interested or anything, but I'm very wary of how excitable fans might react if one person gets "attention" and they do not, etc.

Which to a lot of folks might sound silly and like something that doesn't happen. Bubba, I promise you it has, it could, and it will again. Forever. Especially for something as personal and intimate as this particular niche.

90% of folks have always been excellent but the 10% has been nuclear and gross and not a great time. After a few trips around that block, I don't have the time and energy for any of that.

That might be a jarring change of pace for newer followers who might have other experiences and expectations from other communities and junk. Might even look like I'm a dick because I'm not falling over myself to engage with every post, but I've been in the trenches, have had uncomfortable parasocial interactions, have had people get weirdly possessive jealous and intense, have had a long list of shit that I now have very particular personal policies in place to ward off.

Saying all that to say, I don't concern myself with what people are up to so long as they aren't outright stealing shit without credit and passing it off as their own, or doing really obscene shit to harass folks. Otherwise, I think it's healthiest for all parties involved if I'm not stressing over what strangers on the internet want to make and they're not worried they'll upset me.

Obviously every creator is different and your mileage may vary from case to case. Shoutout to the folks who haven't had to deal with that and those who are chill. Perhaps I'm overly cautious at this point but I'm cool with that.

Basically, I get why folks would worry, and I'm trying to make it clear why that ain't a thing around here. It's one thing when people very specifically bring stuff TO me, or ask me something anonymously etc, but if you're just posting? You should be free to do whatever, that's not my business and you should be posting because you're having fun...not wondering what my dumb ass is gonna think about it. 😂

Hope yall are taking a real close look at the thumbnail. Thoo cooked.

I have played BG3 and you should check out the Alphonse streams we did! I did at one point try to make Lucien but it just wasn't really hitting right.

Folks who know me know that the first character was a half elf warlock fiend patron with brown hair and a habit for making questionable decisions. 😂

I haven't entirely written WITH people on projects really, the closest I've come is presenting an outline and letting people cook. It seems like it would be fun to collaborate in that way but at the same time I am a creature of comfort.

I'm not sure, guess we'll have to see!

I can not emphasize this enough: yall can do what you wanna do with your fanart. I've been getting people asking for permission to write fanfics, make very standard fanart, etc. and I dunno who hurt y'all but unless you're making offensive shit designed to offend, upset, or disrespect folks...it ain't my business what you're up to. You're free to have fun and create!

As much as I appreciate people being considerate, at the same time I trust y'all to be cool and you can trust me not to be peeking over your shoulder like Big Brother. I promise that nothing you cook up will shock me or something innocent like "more demonic Lucien" would somehow bug me.

I also want to avoid making this regular check-in with me for how I feel about something thing a THING because I lowkey feel like it can be weaponized by someone who thinks they'll be clever and tattle on folks doing things they don't like or approve of. So it's best that we all just sorta know that unless someone is specifically doing something that super duper requires my attention...you can assume it's cool.

I remember a year or so ago some folks got trolled all to hell by someone making questionable fic with some of the boys and someone came to scream in my inbox about it without considering that it was an obvious troll job, and me answering that ask would draw significantly more attention to it than if they just...didn't look at it? 😂 Maybe I'm just old, but shit ain't that serious and I'm no one's dad.

Long story short: I appreciate the care folks take to keep me comfortable, but you ain't gotta tiptoe. 🙏💖

No, I feel very very very strong negative feelings about that idea and I'm going to spare y'all the rant.

The entire appeal, for me, is that he is a big red dipshit in a world of humans, and how he engages with those unique circumstances. It's already very slice of life, but if he were to become just a guy.......I would be extremely bored. So bored. Not saying that the visual concept is bad, or people shouldn't draw fanart of him with a human form, but...me? Actually making it a thing? Not even once.

That's something I've become more and more conscious of as I've added characters and sometimes it's not the easiest thing! Sometimes I actually think it's a weak point of mine I need to focus on getting better at and am actively conscious of as I'm writing nowadays.

We run into the "creative vs. worker" situation I'm in where as much as I want to be really good about that sort of thing, sometimes I just need to get the fucking work done if I wanna eat so I better stow my ego and perfectionism and trust that it's fine and I'll get another crack at doing a better job of it next time around. There are times where I'll be deep into a recording session, second guess myself, and want to re-write or do another take of the WHOLE THING and it's like...no dude we gotta go. lol

Familiarity with characters matters a ton. I think I did a great job with the most recent Faust stuff, where he felt really unique among the roster of boys. His speech, mannerisms, and character in general gets me further away from what I'm familiar with. I knew it was something I wanted to nail with him, and I think just being aware helped a ton as I worked through it.

Alphonse and Charlie suffer from my unbearable enjoyment of having that accent say big words. It's just fuckin funny to me and will never not get me to giggle, even if it shouldn't really be in their everyday vernacular. Charlie has the added lore excuse of being lowkey smart (Jessie mentions he should have stayed in school) and being Auron's beta reader. Alphonse isn't necessarily well read, but he knows words. Perhaps too many at times, but it's something I'm aware of.

Auron is right in the sweet spot, him being a bit arrogant + desperately romantic allows me to go directions that don't necessarily fit with the rest of the roster.

Seth is similar in that the southern sweetheart approach opens up its own language opportunities.

Finn is one that I'm still playing with. I like when he gets poetic and thoughtful. I think the sweet spot with him was in the hiking/bug audio. Shoutout to that commissioner btw, because I really tucked some lore in that thing years ago. He gets the most "dreamy" of the lot, I think? He romanticizes the mundane the most, and I don't think that was even a conscious choice at first.

As I tackle Echoes and other projects that involve more characters and variety I'm definitely becoming more and more aware of my habits. I actually think that aside from "cook with this mf narrative", ensuring that my individual character voices are distinct and strong is priority number one in the writing room for me right now.

Saying ALL OF THAT to say thank you for thinking that, I'm a tough critic when it comes to myself, but if I've managed to make someone think I'm decent at what I've identified as a weakness, I can at least know that I don't have to beat myself up over it lmfao.

Maybe! It's just not a huge priority or anything. It's a fun scenario but I also think that the novelty wears off real quick.

I'll preface this by saying I don't think there's a right or wrong way to do this, just what works best for an individual.

For me, I don't really know a character well enough to remember or look out for anything until I'm in the thick of writing them. I don't do such a deep exploration of their character in my own head that I then have to follow notes or a checklist when writing, because that feels like a huge chore, and I would rather let my brain and the character guide me as it feels natural instead of trying to force a character I've only just begun to know in a box.

Seth is a good example of this. I had a million ideas for how Seth was going to be this actual asshole, really toxic, antagonistic character. Then when I sat down to write, we ended up with someone entirely different!

My method is a whole mess, and creates its own unique set of problems for me that could be avoided with thorough planning and preparation, but it just isn't as fun as discovering a character as I go. There are obviously themes and ideas that I go into it with, but I'm not so tied to it that I let it dictate who a character has to be. That shit is magical to me, and I wouldn't enjoy creating nearly as much if I tried to follow a more rigid process.

I will say early on, find some foundational pieces. Answer a few key questions about the character. What is their motivation, and why are they compelled to chase it? What has occurred to them that made that motivation a thing in the first place? How does the world view them? How do they view themselves?

You can learn those key things pretty early on and let the blanks start to fill in themselves, which typically happens when you let that character out into the wild and they interact with your world and the other people in it.

Seth is once again a good example, because I knew he was connected to Alphonse, they were gang buddies, Seth took the fall for him. But why? Well, their relationship was sour but Seth didn't want Alphonse to get locked up. Why? Because Seth doesn't hate him. Why not?

...because he loved him?

Oh.

That's exactly how it played out while I was writing, and set me off on this big journey that is now BitterSweet! I then discovered why their relationship crashed and burned, the whole "I was forcing you to stay because I was stealing money so we could run away, but it cost us our relationship" thing was another discovery.

Other writers have other methods, and some people thrive with much more structure and direction. I tend to do my best somewhere in the middle. But I think what's fun about my method is that if I am logically jumping from why, to why, to how, to why, etc. the audience will also LOGICALLY reach those same questions that are fulfilling to have answered. Set ups and pay offs are inherently built into the narrative because that's what I'm actively chasing for my own enjoyment, rather than creating a massive scenario that I then try to paint by numbers.

The biggest thing for me is not getting so married to an idea that I then feel friction when I can't force the narrative in the direction it wants to go. But that's a whole other thing.

Great question!

There is no "this point in the story" for a random audio about getting high and banging, so I wouldn't overthink it.

You'll know when it's time to be thinking about the raccoon. Otherwise, it's not a thing I'll be incorporating in one-shot style content.

At some point we'll pick up with Charlie and the Dude on their adventure while Casper is at work, tentatively my plan is to pick up on that same day, whether it'll be just the two of them or later in the day when Casper comes home. The Dude will get his name and it'll be very sweet and good.

Then we'll see what happens next. :3

Not a whole lot to report, really. Things have been good, I've been productive, and lots of fun things are on the horizon. Trying to keep a lot of work related things close to the vest for the time being because I don't like yapping too much about what's cooking because surprises are fun.

I've got a lot of friends with birthdays coming up so we'll be doing fun shit and having a good time. I get to see my mom next month so that's cool. Been working with a finance dude to get my business in order, finally, after years of needing help in that department.

Lots of being responsible and taking care of myself, really. The cats have been lovely, and haven't harassed me whenever I step into the booth lately so that's been appreciated.

Going to the gym has been great, that's been going well! Should hit my goal for 2024 by the time the Summer is through, barring any setbacks. If I was better at being motivated to cook this diet shit would be a breeze, but that's my biggest hurdle tbh. I'm finding ways around it though.

YouTube shit is going great right now, lots of improvements centered around the changes I looked into at the end of last year have translated to tangible bumps in numbers so that's cool. The rest boils down to consistency, which is all on me.

All in all, very excited for the next few months and making up for time I lost at the start of the year!

Both of the recent Charlie/Alphonse videos were improvised!

I think getting comfortable just going in and bullshitting for 10+ minutes is a huge skill to add to the toolbelt as an audio person. Not only does it make life easier by removing an entire step from the process, it lets you familiarize yourself with a character in the moment and break free of what might be some writing/performance habits. Plus, with me doing more and more in-character streams, being able to improvise is a huge part of that and it's great practice!

So long as whatever I do passes the sniff test quality-wise, I've loved my improv audios. They're usually just indulgent fluff, but sometimes indulgent fluff is exactly what folks want to hear! If that's the case, it's a win-win for everyone.

There are also cases where an audio might be 70% scripted, but includes a few sections where I'll make a note like "improvised fluff here" and I know that means I need to just bullshit for a couple of minutes. It helps because when you've been at this for long as I have, there really are only so many times you can write generalized mush, or comfort, or things like that before you want to slam your head into the keyboard because you've written this same sort of dialog hundreds of times and it becomes tiresome. But the fact is just because I'VE seen/heard the dialog hundreds of times, there are thousands of people every day who haven't heard that from me before, or haven't heard it from that character before, etc. so I can't just bash myself over the head worrying about BUT I'VE DONE THIS BEFORE, I'M A BROKEN RECORD, THIS IS TIRESOME!

Improvisation allows me to side step my own creative frustrations and boredom while satisfying the needs of the premise!

It's all good! Definitely didn't think it was a question asked in poor taste or anything, and was mostly a preventative measure because sometimes folks might see one question get answered and take it as an invite to start asking progressively more and more prodding questions.

It took me many years to even realize that sort of thing could be a thing at all, because being an internet person is weird like that lol. So don't feel like you made some sort of massive faux pas or missed an internet etiquette memo. You're doing great!

Thank you for the good vibes!

Every good idea I've ever had came to me while driving and daydreaming, listening to music. Those AMVs in my head go crazyyyyyyy bro. LMFAO

That's honestly more truth than a joke, I do a lot of my visualizing and playing around in my head with concepts and scenarios. However, they're more like the massive story beats and not the in between. The actual meat of the story happens once I've jotted down all of those beats and start to figure out how I get from A to B to C.

And sometimes those big moments get thrown out as I realize it was just a funky lil daydream and not actually coherent, but if it gets me excited enough to get to work, I'm cool with the process of refining things at the keyboard.

A lot of the work happens in my head first, and it doesn't become a cohesive thing until I'm writing and exploring as I go. I'm very bad at sitting down and just dumping out an outline from scratch, and usually when I do that I have to take a second or third pass to really turn it into something that doesn't look like I was just trying to get my homework done.

I've been doing too much thinking with recent stuff. Situations where I'm left thinking "but if it goes THIS way how will I get to that thing I thought of years ago????" and the truth is fuck whatever I was thinking two years ago, let's see where this new thing leads me and if it ties back into what I thought was going to work back then, cool! If not, let's see what happens if I dig and find something even more exciting!

Then if that doesn't pan out, revisit the old roadmap. I don't want to get married to ideas that might not still be fresh and fun and creative now that I'm crossing these bridges and actually getting into the thick of things.

tldr: It's a fuckin mess.

Don't particularly like the idea of having kids or portraying someone who does. Creates several questions about listener's sex and gender that I do not trust a stranger to handle in the same ways that I would. The audience for that content is minimal and in one way or another it won't meet every individual's expectations or needs.

So it's a subject I'm not comfortable with that won't perform well and there isn't a ton of demand for. There is no upside and I am thankfully in a position where I can go do a hundred other things that actually interest me and will meet the expectations of my audience.

I generally try to avoid very specific subjects in general because in some way or another it is exclusionary, and I try to cast a wide net.

If it was something I specifically wanted to pursue for creative reasons, then numbers and demand matter less, but I'm definitely not doing that for any subject that makes me uncomfortable.

Also, no issues with the question but we're getting awfully close to "hey you said you don't like this, elaborate?" and the chances are getting higher that you're going to stumble onto something that is either trauma related, or deeply uncomfortable. Sometimes it's best to trust that a boundary is established for a reason that is someone's own, rather than poking it and hoping it doesn't happen to be keeping you away from a landmine.

Again, no problem with the question as it relates to the context of the earlier question you referenced, but probably worth mentioning that it isn't an invitation to pry. 🙏

If it happened in plot, it's a non issue and I wouldn't mind it. What would annoy the shit outta me is if there was a one-off proposal scenario then people constantly would bring up questions regarding the status of the "upcoming" wedding, or how it impacts various other cases, etc. and so forth.

It creates a whole lot of little annoyances in addition to what I've mentioned and doesn't really contribute anything meaningful other than a niche wish fulfilment.

I don't view a marriage scenario as a "game over" screen for the characters, but I do feel it is an additional mental leap you're asking listener's to make who might not want to make that leap, nor do I want to make.

That's all!