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I would write of the universal, not the provincial, in human nature... I would write of characters, not of characteristics. -- Ellen Glasgow Juliane: Abdiel, who normally conducts the NNFPL interviews, is turning the tables and letting me (and a very sizable gathering of kibitzers) give him an interview today. . . He's had five characters make it to the Main Event, all of whom won, and Sphere took last year's Contest of Champions. He's always willing to lend a hand with a bit of advice, and has served as an fpl admin on occasion. His pieces, in a grand style but always with personality, lend their own particular grace to the fpl. Here he gives his take on the fpl, writing in general, and a few other things along the way. Note from Abdiel: MrKite was kind enough to edit this interview. Juliane First off, thanks go to Abdiel. As most of ye ken, he first began running the interviews, and has agreed to be interviewed himself, yay. I've borrowed the position of questioner for the time, so everyone please be patient with me, as I'm not nearly so experienced as he. Abdiel Hmm... now that the interview has actually started, I wish I had taken the time to consider my questions as I was asking them. Sir-Christopher Ab's in the hot seat now. Sir-Christopher lights a fire under the chair Juliane First off, so as not to ignore tradition, which of your characters do you feel has been your greatest success, and why? Abdiel In terms of overall success, wins wise, my choice would be Sphere . He won the Main Event, and the Contest of Champions for 2001/2002. He's near and dear to me because he was a character in many a story I had written before I joined the FPL (naturally with modifications). In terms of most personally satisfying, I'll give an odd answer. After all the characters I've created, I think I can safely say that I feel my best execution of a concept is The Flayer, who went 5-3 (losing mostly to Guardians, heh). Maybe not my best idea, but I feel that he came across the strongest. Btw, he was my second character, before I had notions of grandeur and decided to become uber-longwinded Juliane By strongest, you mean in quality of writing? Abdiel I mean, I feel like he was the most complete, the most well-formed. I didn't shirk on the writing, but it wasn't as flowery and poetic as some other stuff I've tried. And yet, he had personality. (Of course I'd like to think some of my other characters have had personality too, but... that's how it goes.) Juliane Then, what is it that makes a character 'good'? And connected to this, what is the most important aspect of the character, as in writing, powers, style, originality, and so on? Abdiel Hmm... First and foremost, a 'good' character has to be one I want to read from beginning to end. Usually by the third or fourth sentence of the bio I'll know if the character meets this criterion. There are other elements, of course, but that's the primary one. If you have to force yourself to read through the char's sheet, you're going to see the remainder of it (powers, etc) in a negative light. Writing is, of course, the most important out of the four you've listed. Much more so now than before, but I feel that was always the case. Originality is a subjective term. Kinda funny, like saying "mostly unique" it's important, but by no means necessary. Everything is derivative somehow. Devi Writing's rather subjective as well... quality that is. Abdiel But I do have one addendum to that... Basically, what I want to say is this: Powers can and do matter. They aren't nothing at all. Combos are cool. Illumas YAY COMBOS! Abdiel And people who think Powers are just a tool are being naive or arrogant. Illumas Or stupid. Abdiel It's part of the system, and we shouldn't abandon it. Juliane You think standards have changed then, since the fpl started? Abdiel Standards have changed since I've come here, but most of the important changes came before my time. The-Zodiac I dunno, I think you were part of a wave of changes Abdiel Like so many other of my interviewees have said, this place has gone from a fights-powers-based site, with ones imagination filling in the pertinent (and necessarily shallow) details, to a character driven site. Like I told you before, Jo, I think before, we used to be sketching out ideas for comic book one shots. Now, we're writing protagonists for novels. In a sense I may have been part of these changes. I'm not sure if I've really influenced creators the way Pie or Landon have, but I'd like to think I've helped nudge the average in one direction. Juliane And would you say the change is a good thing? Abdiel Yes, the change is a good thing, in nearly every sense of the word. I'm sure there are people who'd rather see a more direct, powers based rockem sockem version of the FPL, but I'm not among them. That's what we have RPGs and Fighter games for. And Freedom Force. And tamed Midget wrestling. Juliane When you create characters, what are you wanting out of them? Votes, personally being pleased with them, approval of certain people. . . Abdiel Hmm... this is a tricky one. I don't look for support from individual creators, in a sense I'm above that, although I do like it when people I respect compliment my work. However, in a sense I'm also beneath that in terms of sophistication. Even with my status as a mostly-vet, I still care about wins. I've been trying to rid myself of this habit, but I can't fully shake it. I care about my own creations, and it hurts when they lose. Or feels good when they win... natural, right? I want every character I make to succeed on its own terms. There's no obvious cutoff... Sir-Christopher If it didn't matter, then this wouldn't be the FPL. Just a fic archive. Abdiel Avast crashed and burned - it hurt. Failure made it to 7 wins... and I was frustrated because I felt he kinda stalled in the middle. Nathan Moebius made it to 9 wins... and that hurt a lot too because he was 1 away from the ME queue. Juliane What do you see as success, then? Abdiel Wins are success, or at least a very large part of it. I'm not so existential that I can tell you that all I want out of my characters is to see them created and "released into the wild" of the UCs, so to speak. I want each of them to do the best they can, and in most cases I feel they're strong enough to do great things, or I wouldn't have submitted them. I realize I might be coming across as arrogant - that's not my intention. It's just how I see my own work. Juliane What would you say is the hardest thing about writing, either in general or for the fpl? Easiest? Abdiel In general, for any kind of story, the hardest part of writing is the details. The details matter - they're small but if you don't have them your world/character/whatever has no depth at all. I mean, sure, you can come up with one or two cool atmospheric touches, but that simply doesn't cut it 90% of the time. The Easiest part is plotting the course of the story, dreaming up the idea. For me, at least. Plotting is like relaxation; you bring in all your previous experiences and all your idle thoughts and "ooh, that'd be cool" dreams. Actually writing and going from A to B to C is the hard part. The FPL is much the same way, although inspiration for a truly great character is sometimes hard to come by. Devi So, ever find yourself wanting to plot more than actually create or write? Abdiel Don't we all? We're slackers, naturally. But ultimately if we don't use our plotting skills in some kind of concrete fashion we'll have nothing to show for our ingenuity. So yes, I do want to plot, often. It just gets frustrating if nothing comes of it. Juliane To go from generals to specifics. . . What are your top three favourite fpl characters of all time? Abdiel Hmm, this is a toughie. There are a whole group of characters who could easily take my #1 spot. They're not just sheets, they're full fledged, walking talking slaying images in my mind. But if I have to pick one character that most exemplifies my ideal of an FPL character, I'd pick Mr. Graves. IC support out the wazoo (and well done, too), ingenuity in a new power, and general badassness. You can just read his sheet and like him, too, so he's not 100% dependent on his stories. ThreeDark You have to pick Three. Er... lower caps that :D The-Zodiac Freudian slip, eh Josh? Abdiel For #2... I think I'll say Sophia DeMeddici. My favorite HexxJo character of all time, and one of the most startlingly visual images I have in my mind of an FPL character in action, which is funny, because a lot of her powers are very very vague. For #3, appropriately so, I'll say a tie between Toc Darkon and The Extra (surprise surprise). Toc has a great back-story and just oozes personality, and The Extra is the epitome of the FPL humor character. Not too long, but it genuinely made me smile, and has enough depth to avoid being a one trick pony. Too many humor characters are great the first two times you read them, then fall apart afterwards Devi Or just not that humorous to begin with Abdiel Heh, that too. MightMeatMan Nate, do you feel that an IC-based character or series (read SoM, COMING, etc.) stand more of a chance in the UCs as opposed to single shot characters that came from single ideas? Abdiel Well, in a sense that's many questions in one. Do I think IC support for a character helps? Potentially, but only if a) it's good, b) there's a lot of it, and c) you can get people to read it. Ultimately you have to make people care about your character. They don't have to sympathize with it, but they have to be interested in its fate. Juliane Do you have any opinions on the various collaborative works recently? Day Shift, the NN tourney, John's random collab. . . Abdiel Recently? Juliane Or older, if you prefer. Abdiel Well, the Day Shift sounds like a great idea on paper, something that I genuinely do want to be a part of, despite the fact that that style of hero isn't my usual deal. The problem is that it's a huge time investment, and it's so grand and somewhat unwieldy I'm afraid it might not get off the ground. I hate to be an ass, but I want to see it actually soar with my own eyes. Because if it does, I'm so there. The NN tourney is a great idea, lighthearted, and not too complex. I'm glad it got the response it did. John's random collab was a cool idea but came at a bad time for me, glad it spawned a few good chars. As for older stuff, I'll gloss over the bunch of them and say that collabs in general are a great thing, but I'm actually more a fan of two creators working on the same character. What I really want to see out of a collaboration is not two great ideas, but the mixing and merging of styles. Devi So... best product from a collaborative effort? Abdiel Best product from a collab, off the top of my head, is probably Sacriel . But that's just because I'm evil. Devi Heh, well, my ego's satisfied, but anyhow... any particular reason? Abdiel Why? Because he's so twisted, and yet he successfully fit into the big jig saw puzzle that was the Guardians. And because we've had so much fun with him since. ThreeDark Before we get too off topic, if Nate's finished with his last answer (it's hard to tell with Nate) Top Three Creators, just off hand? Abdiel The best creators in the FPL right now are Landon and Pie. No surprise there. If I have to elaborate, you haven't been paying attention, or are brain dead. As for #3... hmm, that's harder. I'm actually going to go out on a limb and say Mediaman. It's a tough decision, but I think he's been consistently evil, which is always a requirement. Juliane Are there any particular creators you want to work with, or collabs you'd be interested in having a hand in, at the moment? Abdiel I've always wanted to do a 3 character collaboration with Darth Maxx and Mediaman. I think we could come up with something... truly evil. I enjoy working with Josh because our ideas go along the same lines quite often and because he's an amiable person. ThreeDark GRINS Abdiel I'd also like to do a collab with Paula (Eloa) one of these days. A joint character, I mean. Fong and Fong, twin terrors of the FPL. Devi So, any reason joint characters are preferred in the collab exp? Less work? Like the mix of styles? Abdiel Oh, because I think that joint characters are a purer form of collaboration. I think they're actually more work. If it's one character a creator, then you can just throw together some ties and call it a day. If it's one character, then the conflict and similarities of styles are brought to the forefront. Devi Enough to offset the possibility of not meshing perfectly? Abdiel Well, it's a hotter crucible, hence: greater chance for miserable failure, and greater chance for gleaming success Devi So, fav collab? Either worked on or saw? Abdiel Favorite collab I worked on, is probably Troubleshooters. We had a lot of fun, and Polemarchus came out of it, so it can't be a bad thing, can it? ThreeDark Yes it Can, Short little Stringer. :D Abdiel Favorite I've seen... probably the COMING, if only because it's lasted this long. Something must have gone right. The-Zodiac Or horribly horribly wrong... ThreeDark Or we're all just REALLY Stubborn and can't take a Hint. Illumas That or we're just too lazy to end it. Juliane Do you have any bits of advice for the newer creators in the fpl? Abdiel The best advice I can give is to read. Read, then read some more, and when you think you've had it up to here *signifies neck*, read some more. You can never read enough, and you can never finish all the material you can. This place is a library. Mr.Graves -insert links to NN Archive and Fic Archive The-Zodiac That's the singular most common piece of advice given in the FPL, Ab. Why do you think a lot of people ignore it? Abdiel People don't read because they're lazy. MrKite We prefer the term slackers. Abdiel Then they blame it on us when their characters don't do well, because obviously we don't recognize their genius. People also don't read because they don't realize that we have some damn good writers here in the FPL Juliane Speaking of newer creators. . . Do you think the fpl needs to be more or less hostile to newbies in general, or is it even hostile at all? Abdiel It is hostile, most of the time for good reason. We're not begging for new creators here, people. We can afford to winnow out the chaff. If people can't take a bit of polite hazing, they shouldn't be here. If they receive anything harsher than that, it's because they were acting stupid, or they didn't read up before they opened their mouths. Some people go overboard, yes. But I'm willing to take one lost "good egg" newbie as a sacrifice, in return for all the idiots and morons and 'tards we've chased out. Juliane Are there any particular fpl fics that you'd recommend reading? Abdiel Apoc is the obvious choice, and not a very fun answer. I was getting a lot of good mileage out of Changes before a certain, unnamed author pulled the plug (it even featured one of my characters). Reunion is another excellent unfinished saga. Also, go the FPL Fanfic archive and read anything by Pie. You'll be glad you did. MrGraves wonders when Reunion is going to be picked up again Juliane If you could change something about the fpl, what would it be? Abdiel I think the FPL system is more or less balanced as is, no big revelations from me as far as changes to the system. However, I would like to see things tightened up around here. Power costs balanced, descriptions put in working order, links fixed, easier access to team pages, and a spiffying up of the Newbie FAQ. But those are all minor details. The basics are all there. It's up to us to make good stuff come out of it. Juliane So a bit of an all-over spring cleaning, then, but no more? Abdiel Well, anything else I'd want would be out of the question. If I could I'd hire 10 professional artists and strap them to chairs and force them to come up with original graphics for every FPL character (even the crappy ones). And I'd install an auto-spell check in the creator. Juliane Set to American English or British? (: Abdiel With multiple settings. Also, I'd make line breaks and bold tags available in the creator. MrGraves Note: If there are bold tags available, make it a rule that any character with more than x% in bold gets instant denial. Juliane Would you say that the fpl is at a high tide or low just now, and why? Abdiel The FPL right now... well, I'm ashamed to say that I can't be totally sure. There's about half a gallery out there that I haven't read thoroughly. I've scanned... but not really read a lot of characters. I admit it, I'm lazy. My general impression is that the FPL is about middling, as far as overall quality goes. Abdiel We don't have a dearth of good characters, but it's not like we just unleashed the Guardians on a bunch of otherwise good characters and had a slaughter. Abdiel weeps for the good ideas that died during those dark days Juliane Not even just the characters, though, but of the boards and chat as of late; any opinions on the way things have been? Abdiel The boards are such as they are. No use trying to characterize them. Chat is another story, but I'll save my FPLNP rant for another day, since many here have already heard it Juliane Are there any matches that you wished had happened, or that did happen but you would want to do over? Abdiel Hmm... None off the top of my head, although I liked the little rivalry between Mr Hero and Sphere The CoC took a lot of that out of my system, although I'm sure once the interview is over I'll smack my head and remember some awesome match I had in mind. Ooooh, I'd like to see Glaucon vs Quietus. I'd also like to see Devyn vs any number of my characters. He's an interesting match with a lot of my creations, or so I'd like to think. Devi Any kind of chars you'd like to see? Or wouldn't mind never seeing ever? As in, genres. More vampires/angels? A cannibal mayhaps? hehe Abdiel I'd like to see more robots done well. Not mechs, robots/cyborgs/etc. Hunted rocked, more stuff like him. Poe ARRRGGGHHH!!! No More Angel Characters!! Abdiel I'd also like to see a classic mage type character that somehow managed to NOT be clichفE And yes, NO MORE ANGELS. None. Zero, zilch. ThreeDark Nathan - How do you feel about characters that are made just for their stupid factor. Not Humor characters, but characters that could be called "Novelty" characters in the way that Monster Mash is a cult classic. Characters like Rika, Munch Monster, Turkeyzilla, and The Son Of The Pumpkin That Time Forgot? Abdiel Novelty characters get no automatic respect from me. If you're going to go that route, then you'd better be able to hold your own. If you write a tragic hero character, even if I don't like it at least I'll be able to see what you were TRYING to do. That being said, some Novelty characters were great, and made me laugh. Out Loud. Under no circumstances should a novelty character win the ME, though, imo. No matter how good he/she/it is. There may be an exception to this rule, but I haven't come across it. LoN DMIDF! Sir-Christopher LoN just mentioned the closest thing to an exception, but no dice. Abdiel The closest thing to a novelty char (created in the last couple years) that has won the ME is Deadman in Dean's Fridge, imo. And as much as I like the character, I wish it hadn't. MrGraves hides Abdiel DiaB isn't really a novelty character. MrGraves Okie. :) Juliane And now, the one that of course had to go in. . .The historical question. You've done several interviews in the past, starting with Poe I believe and covering several different creators. What brought about the interviews originally? Abdiel It was a suggestion from Landon, I believe, and Devi was the one who suggested I be the interviewer. I was the one who picked Poe to go first, because I figured he'd draw a lot of readers. Poe Bah. Abdiel Little did I know it'd prove so popular (thanks in no small part to a lot of people wanting and wishing for an interview about THEM, you egomaniacs). Little did I know that my interviewing skills sucked. Poe tried to save the interview with humor, but my suckitude damned the whole venture. Sorry Poe. You're the first on my "to be interviewed a second time" list. Poe Yay. Juliane Thanks go to Landon and Devi then. ^^ The interviews are very popular then, you think? How about with the newer creators? Abdiel I think a lot of the newer creators read the interviews, even if they don't admit it. If you have 400 posts, you have enough time on your hands to waste reading through 12 pages of old interviews. I don't have a counter on the page because I detest counters, but I suspect we've gotten at least several thousand page views. So, in a sense, for the FPL (given the population) that's popular. The-Zodiac How can they have enough time to read interviews when they keep having to check to board for new posts to respond to with "Yeah!" Abdiel Zodiac so true. ThreeDark Yeah! Abdiel kills Josh Devi Ah, so... who would you like to interview for the FPL sometime? Abdiel Who would I like to interview? Well, I think I've gotten a lot of the big targets. I still need to redo Maxx's interview, and interview Devi himself. I'd also like to interview MrGraves and Chakos at some point. MrKite Abdiel, what's your biggest influence? Abdiel In terms of creating FPL characters, I have to say that my most frequent and most valuable source of inspiration are the creations of my friends here in the FPL itself. I read characters, and then ideas just click and tumble into my brain. Other than that... I'd say that dreams are also a source of inspiration for me. I'm not sure what inspires them, but they often imprint vivid pictures of a hero or a villain in action; I find these pictures translate well into deeper characters if I scratch the surface. MrGraves Ab: Any hints on what's in store? Abdiel Well, I have a story in the works that will translate to a character that I hope will be one of my best, and my first "true" hero. His name's Kepler, and the story is a little bit noir/detective-y I have an interesting format for the story too. It'll be a whodunit, and I'll post parts till I hit the cliffhanger. And whoever guesses the culprit right will get... something. Probably just a free CA. Depends on how things go as I write. Also: Glaucon is coming back one final time. I won't say how, when, or where, but his story is not over. MrKite What's kept you in the FPL over all this time? Abdiel The chance to create and have my work critiqued, and then see it compete. Simple as that. I don't feel I've "conquered" this medium yet (and no that doesn't mean you should vote against me to make me stay, it's a purely personal thing). LoN Do you think that the FPL has helped your writing? Abdiel Yes, the FPL has helped my writing but it's also hurt it, in a sense. It's like doing one exercise over and over again. That's why I've tried to experiment with different styles over the years, with varying degrees of success. LoN Do you consider the FPL an addictive drug? Abdiel It's not addictive, or a drug, so no. This place is like any other - it can become the object of obsession, which is never healthy. But that's on the heads of the obsessed. PERSONAL RESPONSIBLITY, people! MrKite Ab: Bush or Gore? *j/k* Sdude groans Abdiel Bush, duh. ThreeDark Nathan: Personal prediction as to the completion of Heisen? Abdiel July 2003 it'll go live. Chance for it to be earlier, but not likely. Devi Who is your fav creator and why is it me? hehehehe, couldn't resist old joke... Abdiel Because you have yon gun pointed at my head. MrGraves I could destroy you with a thought! (Hehe, sorry). Abdiel No time for that now, suffice it to say that, together, we could rule the universe! MrGraves Hehe. Floyd Who are the most overrated and underrated chars or creators? Abdiel Underrated creators: Exta and Nony and Luciferhawk. Overrated: Me and a few newbies who shall remain nameless. Juliane Anything in outside mediums you'd care to give a light to? Music, movies, books? Abdiel Music: Still a big fan of Radiohead, but I'm getting into Opera and Jazz recently. I may come off as a sissy man, but Diana Krall rocks, as does Ella Fitzgerald. Movies: Watch Chinatown. Great, great movie. Jack Nicholson's best (One Flew... notwithstanding) Books: Read Le Petit Prince by St Exupery; it's appropriate for both children and adults, and outlines much of my outlook on life, I like it so much ;) Other stuff I might want to plug... um... Errant Story, once it goes up. Poe's a great artist who's only getting better with time and experience. Also, NWN rocks! ;) Also Heisen! once it's done! Juliane Yay Heisen. ^^ Next question, who would you consider to be a personal hero, or role model, to you? Abdiel I know I'm going to get pelted for this, but I have to say that I greatly admire Barry Goldwater. Also Camus, and Galileo Galilei. Heh, and Kafka, and Kierkegaard Heh, these should have gone in my "books" section Juliane If you could off any one person, past or present, who would it be? Abdiel I'd probably do my homework and find the one person directly responsible for the most human carnage without just cause and kill him. Juliane Thanks much for switching seats for a bit and allowing an interview; much appreciated, and thank you for your time and words of wisdom. ^^ And of course, the last word is yours. Abdiel Be Faithful to what you believe in, even if it's only yourself, and you'll be good to go. Stray from this path, and much sorrow awaits you. 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