Questionable Questing

Not much sexy and you need your head not hurting for the sexy, but not the serious?

Well I'm reading one update, it's not like I'm reading an entire book or anything. But with the sexy stuff, I have to actually really focus to get into it while the serious stuff I focus more on what their say and the emotions rather than needing to get lost in the details if that makes sense.

When I read I actually imagine the scene out in my head like a play or a theater, with the character acting out the role or dialogue they've been chosen for and with any lengthy scene where it's all internal I imagine it as a lengthy monologue like in Hamlet. When I read sexy stuff, I can't do that since a play isn't really that sexy. So I have to read it normally. lol. If that makes sense at all.

Somewhat. You have to use more visual brain for sexy

It's actually the opposite. I do have a very visual imagination, but when I'm reading sexy stuff that gets in the way since it's limited to my own imagination rather than the author's. So I have to kind of selectively ignore it.

And Ilryo. I like the nostalgic he has for his youth and the love he has for his son, wanting him to have the freedom to be who ever he wants no matter how humble or boring it might be, which contrasts quite nicely with his wife, but he's also a bit of a prick. lol

Which also kind of neatly matches another problem I have with your story, which is the causal depravity.

Go on? I stand by the surreal porn logic idea I've embraced but I like other perspectives

Oh the surreal porn spectacle is half the fun, but you know how people say the lewdest thing is hand holding? The reason why people say that, is the same reason causal depravity is so much fun. It's the reason incest pron is fun. It's the twisting of a formerly wholesome relationship. It's the test of boundaries from society. it's the taboo nature of it all. That you're doing something worth or immoral.

But if every girls a slut. if every mom fuck her son and every dad fuck his daughter, then it's no longer taboo. It's no longer something dark or wrong. You take away all that drama and emotion from the relationship entirely. its the same as when I called Illryo a prick. A good chunk of your characters are assholes or have these darker sides to them,

And if everyone's like that then it's no longer that special or unique. It ties back in with hand holding. If you live in a society where everything is debraved and sexual, what becomes taboo and special? Wholesomeness, virginity, non-sexual displays of love. These are the weirdos in this society. These are the perverts. And that's the problem your stories facing go forward.

You've already broken all the taboo's, you've already made incest the normal and moral option. What boundaries are their left to cross? What sexual deviancy can you use to push the envelope even further? Half the fun in this quest is seeing everything become more sexualized and deviant, but at this point it already is. Where do you go from here?

The darker sides bit I don't think needs adjustment as it does fit Game of Thrones and other works with similar tones. The depravity bit is the porn is a side hustle. The core of the story is the fantasy elements with the smut put on top.

Next quest? More focus on the fantasy adventure and politics with smut as seasoning.

I was going to say for the sequel, you should add hand holding and wholesomeness. You should have Lyanna and Hurrik genuinely falling in love and their relationship growing far beyond the sex and depravity, and most importantly you should have him over time become a traditional, and someone would say, stereotypical fantasy hero.

I'm interested in this. I will say it depends on player choices. I don't shy from the cynical reality of fedual lords

If the first is about depravity and magic changing Westeros while other things stay the same, the gritty nature and greed or cruelty of its users, the second should be about how despite these changes certain traits retain power and value. Love, honor, courage, show how these things, and the more traditional high fantasy aspects, trump the blood and guts.

Show how they clash and mold together, and since your building up to the drow and the WhiteWalker's being these ultimate evils, show how a gritty blood and guts world like Westeros struggles with that and needs a traditional hero to fix these kinds of problems. And you can still keep player choices and Hurrik inner struggle over it.

Its funny you say traditional high fantasy because my roots in high fantasy aren't in that honor and noble values vein. I like that aspect of art and I push for it with characters like Lucan and even a little with Hamish in his way, but to me High Fantasy has been more about the epic than the good

Since players usually want to at least pick the semi heroic options when given the chance, and you can show that through Hurrik eternal struggle with pride, greed, and trying to find himself as the backdrop to the standard hero journey.