01/08/25
• changed page url from /changelog to /thochangelog
• added RECENT CHANGES section to INTRO (you're reading it right now!)
• added notes on alchemical arrays to LORE
• added entry on jeremy's family backstory to UPDATES under 09/28/24
• added entry on ron's tattoo to UPDATES under 09/30/24
• added entry on the spellcasting/alchemy cultural dichotomy to UPDATES under 10/06/24

10/25/24

mel is an older sibling now. not sure how many siblings she has yet or what their situation is, but it felt like the right choice.

09/30/24

i decided to give ron a pretentious hipster tattoo on the inside of her left wrist. it's an arcane array using extremely archaic arcane language, and when activated it provides a calming, stabilizing effect.

on that note, i also decided on some things about arcane arrays and alchemy. physically inscribed arrays, aka alchemical arrays take the place of a volvelle in the usual sequence of spellcasting, although unlike a volvelle, the array in question can only cast the spell it describes. it is activated when a spellcasting individual makes contact with it and imbues it with intention, allowing the array to draw MP from the object upon which it is inscribed. usually the MP is just whatever inherent MP the object possesses, but alchemical arrays can also be arranged to draw power from a specific source built into the object, like a magical crystal attached to a door rather than the wood of the door itself.

in the case of tattoos, tattooed arrays draw their MP from the person upon whom they are inscribed.

10/01/24

after reviewing some bits and pieces of the original tally ho, i realized that something missing from this iteration is the underlying throughline of humor, so i think i might have to lighten up the overall proceedings of some of the earlier chapters to really kick that cerebus syndrome into full effect. can't have every scene be some kind of big, impactful realization, after all.

10/04/24

to expand on the last update, i'm specifically restoring the anticlimactic and overly violent end of the original greener plot. i have to save some of his personal drama for later, so theodore can't have all of his character development in his first chapter.

in my mind, there's a particular cultural dichotomy between arcana and alchemy, one which reflects the dichotomy between academics and the trades in the real world. the practices of alchemy and artisanry require just as much skill and knowledge as spellcasting, but they're generally undervalued compared to spellcasting or specific niches of alchemical work that are more focused on design than actual craft and production.

though the average populace does tend to have access to a few rudimentary spells, the percentage of everyday people who incorporate alchemy or artisanry into their everyday lives is proportionally lower than those who utilize spellcasting. at the same time, those who do use alchemy or artisanry are usually more advanced in their arcana than the average uneducated spellcaster.

09/28/24

decided on the gist of jeremy's backstory:

their mother was an adventurer of the catholepistemiad kind of prestige, and their father was more of a traditional and down-to-earth homebody. jeremy's father convinced their mother to settle down with him and start a Traditional Family. she agreed, and in doing so she completely left her adventuring life behind. when it came to the question of family vs career, jeremy's mother figured it was only ever one or the other, though somewhat with the attitude that this situation was doomed to fail because she could never be anything but Herself (i.e. a free and inexorably independent adventurer).

eventually, she left to return to her career. jeremy's father subsequently fell into a bit of a depressed wallowing state, where he withdrew from the rest of the world out of a feeling of betrayal. he tried to raise jeremy on his own, though he was so caught up in his own sorrow that jeremy ended up being a pretty lonely kid.

both jeremy and their father see him as a rather disappointing person with a lot of wasted potential. jeremy's father thought this first, and then jeremy got it from him. at the same time, the rest of jeremy's family on both sides are constantly lamenting and bemoaning jeremy's mother and her decision to leave, but this has only led jeremy to idolize her. they see her as kind of their idol in a sort of "i surmounted societal disapproval against all odds by becoming really good at what i want to do" way. i.e. you can compensate for rejection just by succeeding at Being You enough without compromise, even if the person asking for compromise is doing it in good faith and is not being unreasonable and you love them. which was the case for their mother as well, who did love their father and want to have a child and a family, but just thought. well. it's the way i am. nothing i can do about it. my epic tragedy now.

09/12/24

it never really made sense within jeremy's character that, in the beginning of chapter 4, they would argue against ron about whether or not to go after mel. i think it would make more sense that they do share ron's desire to keep following after mel, but roshan thinks they should settle down (making himself the spokesperson for the more subdued interests of theodore and shelby). jeremy is passionate for adventure, but their motivation in this scene is not entirely incompatible with roshan's reasoning, so they end up agreeing with roshan's suggestion in the end. ron's motivation, however, is incompatible, so she keeps arguing.

i also thought that chapter 4 was a bit bare on what i could include in the actual events of the plot. i couldn't really think of any ways to further expand on the action (dreamscape train cars leading up to fight against the carriagemen) that i was actually satisfied with, so i instead expanded on the team interactions earlier in the chapter.

first, the scene with them chasing after mel has been expanded into more of a parkour-based one-sided chase scene through the environmental hazards of the dilapidated train station. second, i fleshed out the team interactions that happen afterward: not just what i added to the aforementioned argument, but also some team bonding conversations while they're hunkering down on the train.

i think a major problem with the original draft of tally ho was that the accumulation of knowledge was entirely on the nondiegetic creator end. characters didn't act on information they had at any given moment, but on information that i had and simply allowed them to act on different parts of in different scenes. not much to this update but an appraisal of my previous work, but i do think i have been improving on this and building an actual functional slow cascade of information that the characters pick up over the course of the story.

oh my god. this was so obvious. i should split the party in chapter 5. it would be so fun to split the party in chapter 5. how did i not realize this sooner?

i've decided to split the party along the successful/unsuccessful lines i outlined in the very first update here. ron and roshan, theodore and jeremy…though i haven't quite decided who should get saved by the C.A.W. and who should end up in prison.

basically, what i've been imagining is that instead of the entire party getting saved and all meeting harper, diotima, and the C.A.W. proper, two of the party members actually get apprehended by the town guards. they do end up in the auction scene anyway, but they are coerced into doing it by the auction house government as a means of regaining good favor in the wake of their transgressions against the town.

i haven't mentioned this before, but i've been developing more of a side character story for chapter 5 in the form of harper and her relationship with her younger sister mabel.

harper has always been, in my mind, the one diotima considers to be her successor as the leader to the C.A.W., though harper has a few character flaws that diotima would really like her to iron out first. she's an excellent leader but also has a lot of high expectations for others, expectations which they rarely meet, which leads her to see them as more of responsibilities to deal with than as actual people whose needs she must consider and whose skills might be valuable to her plans.

harper has a wonder (the specifics of which i still need to determine) and has also been caring for the more dysfunctional mabel since the two of them were young. she has a lot of complicated feelings about mabel getting arrested after failing in the auction system. harper loves her sister and is going to save her, obviously, but she also feels a bit like this is mabel's fault and resents her for not trying harder. after all, harper came up with a plan to lavender-marry marco*; mabel could've easily done something similar (at least in harper's eyes) if she made an effort to get out more and befriend the C.A.W.

in reality, harper and the C.A.W. haven't done enough to assuage mabel's fears, both of auction house and her own inherent lack of self-worth. to mabel, if she did what harper was asking, it would be exactly the same: she would be just as much of a dependent deadweight as ever. it's in this way that harper and mabel also fall along the success/failure matrix i outlined for the members of the main cast.

i think it would be more compelling to have the "failures" (jeremy and theodore) end up with harper and the "successes" (ron and roshan) end up with mabel in prison. this does somewhat complicate ron taking theodore's place in the auction scene, but i figure i can alter that to be improvisation on ron's part after hearing of the plan on the spot.

some other notes on harper:

• i see her motivations as being the same as roshan's and her personality as being a mix of jeremy and ron.
• roshan gets along well with her and can really empathize with her due to their similarities. this complicates things somewhat, since he meets mabel first and has been confronted firsthand with the reasons why harper's motivations and actions are flawed.
• jeremy is obsessed with harper and thinks she is the coolest, since she is basically the embodiment of what jeremy wishes they could be. because of this and the fact that they meet harper before mabel, they start off believing harper can do no wrong.
• also, jeremy is very much attracted to women.
• ron does not like harper, at least not at first. i thought this would outline a more interesting ron trajectory leading up to her aggressively demanding that harper hand over the gear near the end of the chapter, since it would make her behavior in that moment even more jarring and confusing if she had already had a character arc where she began to understand and like harper more. some other notes:
• ron and harper also both have a sort of superiority/independence complex related to the people with which they surround themselves.
• it makes sense that ron would hate harper in the beginning, partially because she starts off meeting mabel and learning about the schism between the sisters from mabel's point of view, but also partially because ron unconsciously realizes the problems with the way she herself behaves and hates it.
• there is also a third reason why ron dislikes harper at first. i'll just leave that implied, because it's not a reason i consider to be a meaningful part of the text. but there is a third reason.

*on the mention of marco, i also have some ideas i'm turning over in my mind for him, but they're not so solid yet. i imagine they will arise as i work more on chapter 5, which is what i'm going to be doing next.

just for fun, some main cast superlatives.

• jeremy is the character whose characterization slotted into place most naturally.
• roshan is the character whom i think would be the most fun to hang out with in person.
• theodore is the character who is most personal and comforting to me.
• ron is my favorite character to write. because she's annoying and awful.
• shelby is the character who was the most challenging for me to figure out how to write, and i do love a challenge.
• mel is the character i think is the coolest and most aspirational. i deliberately added characteristics that i don't normally find as personally aspirational (like being compassionate and focused on other people's needs) to her to add dimension to it.
• MARVXIVN is the most useful character, narratively speaking. for a long time he was the main point of connection for a lot of different elements i was struggling to tie together: characterization, relationships, and worldbuilding.

i will admit that the primary color protagonists are the most fun for me to write, mostly because they are all the type to react to conflict by pushing even harder and causing more conflict, at least compared to the others. i love characters that cause problems.

i decided to put a little more thought and emphasis into how i can apply elements as a tally ho "game mechanic" also in the realm of characterization. here's a loose idea of what themes each of the elements/associated luminaires represent in regards to characters:

• water - change, fluidity
• wind - communication, clarity
• life - connection, balance
• light - vision, singularity
• fire - determination, dismantling
• lightning - strength, empowerment
• earth - inevitability, certainty

it's pretty much the same as what each of the luminaires signifies, but more specific to characters and identity. a character's elemental affiliation is not necessarily about what they are, but what they need or are capable of.

09/05/24

i created a framework for how to understand and distinguish the five main characters ideologically. it's similar to the organization of the four temperaments + leukine, but more useful for me in this particular scenario. it goes like this:

there is an "inner" alignment and an "outer" alignment, somewhat comparable to the "idea" vs "action" parts of doohan's tieagram, though simplified and cutting out "leadership" because there is no purple in the story to even it out. inner alignment is more about philosophy, and outer is more about methodology.

in addition to that x-axis, the y-axis is "success" vs "failure". keep in mind that both characters in the inner alignment do have the same ideology, it's just that one has succeeded within their ideology and the other has failed, giving them different perspectives. also keep in mind that the ideology is fundamentally flawed whether you won within its boundaries or not.

with that in mind, here is how the framework applies:

• jeremy and roshan both occupy the outer alignment, with jeremy as the failure and roshan as the success.
• theodore and veronica both occupy the inner alignment, with theodore as the failure and ron as the success.
• shelby is neutral and the mediator. they have yet to either succeed or fail, and they do not have any ideological predilections between philosophy and methodology.

inner alignment is also associated with independence, and outer alignment is associated with ideas of cooperation/coexistence. all of these are tied back to catholepistemiad ideology of being able to, without fail, triumph over emotions/the unknowable with logic and reason.

a new question that i've been considering: why does ron join the team in the beginning? ron is very focused on material, objective fulfillment, such as the acquisition of new information and resources, and not so much on emotional/interpersonal fulfillment. she does have subconscious desires toward emotional fulfillment, but i need to think of how the team would fulfill those for her too.

this also ties back into ron's damage, where she alienates herself from others out of a very real but not helpful perception that their goals are just not as lofty or cerebral as hers.

another consideration is that the scene where jeremy and roshan are introduced to theodore should have something else happening in it aside from just a talk inside the treehouse. it should begin in the treehouse, but then shift to jeremy and roshan following theodore around while he attends to his plants.

theodore chooses to bow out of the conversation early and go, "i already saved you people so you don't need to bother with me anymore. do what you want," before choosing to head out himself, which gives him a touch of extra agency in the choice to actively do something. jeremy and roshan follow after him.

another change for more agency is that jeremy, roshan, and theodore all actively initiate the kingsguard's defense/prophecy trial protocol in some way, which is what leads to them attacking. i decided the kingsguard should be affected significantly in some meaningful way beyond just attacking people due to the wonder gear. thus, i landed on them being strong fighters capable of handling the wonder gear given to them by aristarchus in order to prevent the prophecy from being fulfilled, but ultimately falling into corruption after defeating generations upon generations of catholepistemiad adventurers and giving in entirely to the idea that the prophecy is too challenging for anyone to actually fulfill. thus, they attack partially because they are compelled and partially out of a need to warn people away.

i figured the protagonists' involvement in the prophecy would be more meaningful if it was a horrible mistake that resulted from the consequence of the choices they made, rather than resulting from them getting herded toward the prophetwatch by the kingsguard. also, i've been trying to reconfigure each individual chapter into its own three-act structure, so there aren't any chapters that feel like their only purpose is to bridge the chapters before and after them. i think the whole world and you is a particularly problematic chapter in this regard.

i already changed my mind about the mel thing.

well, not entirely. i do still want to rework her motivations and drives, but i don't think people-pleasing is exactly the path forward. i think i misremembered something i wrote hastily in my notes a few hours back and then went from there.

the crux of this issue is, why in particular does mel feel like their own grief and their own feelings are a flaw that needs to be suppressed? what need does this pattern of behavior serve for them over the course of the story?

extremely minor thought, perhaps not even worth an update in this thing, but i've slightly reconfigured or reaffirmed my understanding of in-universe magic systems in tally ho. they're like zodiac signs, or love languages, or any personality type bullshit. they are not the truth; they are a system for interfacing with a truth that is impossible to truly understand — the shadows on the wall of plato's cave. it doesn't matter if they're true or false; it matters that enough people find them useful, and their use etches their realness into the world.

magic systems in the peninsula are not inherently bad. they are bad when they are overextended, when people try to apply them universally and refuse to account for exceptions.

09/06/24

even though i haven't yet broken up my continued consciousness with sleep, this update technically counts as taking place in the new day. i have decided to go back to mel people-pleaser. originally i retracted it because i thought it made her too similar to MARVXIVN (i was going off of enneagram types, and i had MARVXIVN pegged as a 9, and i forgot that mel wasn't a 9. but being a 9 isn't about having a people-pleasing urge necessarily; it's about avoiding feeling like you are dissatisfied or ill at ease. so mel is a 2).

mel sees being needed by other people as an affirmation that she is capable, has agency, has control over her life and will be able to solve the problems and fears that arise. other people's problems are mel's to solve in order to assert their own personal meaningfulness against a cold and uncaring world. when other people are happy, it means she is useful. their key desire, while very emotional, is expressed in very logical and methodical means.

thus, the reason mel feels it isn't right to acknowledge or linger on their own grief is because it makes them feel like they aren't being productive. it stops the positive feedback loop they get from being able to make a positive difference in other people's lives.

i will figure out how this manifests in practice after i sleep. it will have something to do with MARVXIVN being generally ambivalent and apathetic toward other people's emotional feedback (unless it's extreme enough to be unavoidable) contrasted with mel's insistence on making sure people are happy even if they don't remember how to be happy anymore. something to do with a town that MARVXIVN and mel stop by sometime around good day and greener's 15 seconds of meltem sections…

09/08/24

i'm going to list a seemingly extremely minor, superficial, and tangential update here as a sort of obfuscated version of a larger, overarching change i've made to all the different character arcs in this story. i settled on all the main characters' enneagram types.

these are the types i originally listed:

• jeremy is an 8.
• roshan is a 3.
• theodore is a 5.
• ron is a 4.
• shelby is a 5.
• mel is a 1.
• MARVXIVN is a 9.

this was based off of a different, more superficial personality-based usage of the enneagram. i refocused onto a version of the enneagram more focused on each type as representing a flaw/unhealthy coping mechanism and settled on these types, as well as what they mean for each character:

jeremy is a 4. they want to feel special and emphasize their individuality. jeremy believes their individuality, as visible in their many annoying idiosyncrasies, is a failure of theirs, but they also understand it as an inexorable part of themself. what they want is to be able to preserve that individuality specifically by justifying it with other skills and accomplishments.

roshan is a 1. he wants to feel like he is correct, and that he has the power to make everything around him correct as well. roshan adheres strictly to his code of conduct (inherited from the catholepistemiad) and enforces it because he was able to succeed through it and thinks everyone else can succeed as well. he believes it is infallible and universal.

theodore is a 7. he wants to feel good, simply put. theodore loves to learn, discover, and hoard information, but he does it for the joy and fantasy it provides. he likes a contextlessness to his hobbies and vehemently avoids any reminder of the context that led him to pursue them in the first place. this leads to circular efforts, because he has no reason to do what he does except avoid responsibility and fear.

ron is a 5. she wants to feel capable and knowledgeable, as she believes she can control the world around her and ensure her wellbeing through understanding. like roshan, ron has arranged the world in accordance with a system in her head, though she is more pragmatic and not dogmatic. she values independence and does not want to depend on other people, believing that only absolute sense is dependable.

shelby is a 6. they want to feel reassured. shelby wants to be seen as any number of things — smart, valuable, dependable, useful — and especially in accordance with the catholepistemiad's idea of what constitutes any of those traits. unlike roshan, shelby is more willing to leave that idea behind if it seems like it is no longer reliable, but will quickly go off the rails in pursuit of a new system to follow.

mel is a 2. she wants to feel needed and helpful. this is outlined in the update below (09/06/24). mel loves solving problems, something which can get in the way of identifying what the root cause of the problem even is. if she actually got rid of those problems, she wouldn't have anything to solve, and that would be horrifying.

MARVXIVN is a 9 (still). he wants to feel satisfied, and this can involving changing himself to be satisfied by the world just as much as it can involve changing the world to satisfy him. he's a defeatist who is prone to accepting reality, but the drawback that results from this is that he is not easily convinced to change it. he and mel are similar in some ways, though mel is active and MARVXIVN is passive.

the overall progression of chapter 3 has been altered to include more character-driven actions and moments, in addition to having the kingsguard's defense be tied to the prophecy and activated by jeremy. theodore consistently wanders off to follow his own interests and explore the heritage hall on his own, ron is even more smug and mysterious, shelby is more shelby, and there is some more sensical application of worldbuilding.

the most potent change of the chapter is the progression of events involving the shade. after all five party members finally meet up in the food court and are chased by the blue guard, shelby consults their map and suggests that they can shake the blue guard off their trail via multiple paths to the prophetwatch, one of which is through the hall of shadows. he dismisses this as the least viable idea, even though it would be the most effective for their purposes, but ron insists (without explaining anything, as per usual) that she has a way to deal with the inexorable darkness and strong-arms shelby (and the team) into agreeing to take that route.

there, ron uses her wonder to summon a prism which enables her to see through the magic permeating the hall of shadows, which is lined by dormant timepiece troopers. these particular troopers are of the variety known as gallerians and pedagogues, which are stationary clock beings resembling gallery clocks and schoolhouse wall clocks. ron, having traveled the museum more extensively than anyone else, warns everyone to avoid them, but theodore is not paying attention and has lagged behind the group during the point at which she says this.

their navigation is extremely slow for three reasons. first, ron's summoned prism is extremely small due to the limitations of her wonder. second, though the shade muffles all light and sound, they still need to be subtle and careful to avoid both the blue guard and environmental hazards in the hall. third, ron is not that good at doing this. as a result, everyone complains constantly about the fact that they're going extremely slowly (jeremy) or that they keep bumping into things and should probably find a better way to do this (roshan).

their marching order is as follows: ron, jeremy, shelby, roshan, theodore. due to their inconsistent pace (mostly caused by jeremy complaining about how slowly they're going and the fact that ron refuses to not rise to jeremy's antagonism), roshan ends up having to hold onto shelby with both hands, which means it takes him a while to realize that theodore is no longer holding onto him.

theodore, meanwhile, has begun investigating the timepiece troopers on the walls. he pulls out his wonder gear (the one attached to the greenest seedling) to compare them to the workings of the timepiece trooper in front of him, only for the trooper to awaken, startled and deeply upset by the fact that theodore has a wonder gear. the troopers throughout the hall also awaken, somehow sensing that jeremy and roshan (and ron) have wonder gears as well. they are outraged at the group for having "taken something that does not belong to them, something which must be returned to its rightful place at all costs" and grow hostile.

a vast majority of timepiece troopers are not discrete, conscious beings, only extensions of aristarchus' will. these ones aren't conscious either; they're possessed by the shade, which is just as corrupted as everything else in the heritage hall by the wonder gear in the prophetwatch. (ron surmises that this is the case as they flee.) the troopers invoke the name and will of the grandfather of clocks as they attack.

the same navigation problems as before are now compounded. before, the darkness in the hall allowed everyone to see a few feet around them, but it now consumes everything in complete darkness but for the view that ron's prism provides. at the same time, the party can feel the shade slowly draining their life force as they move. the rest of the party's complaints about ron's method frustrate her more and more, until she finally gives in and pulls out the staff of the parrot, using the parrot's magic to dispel the shade entirely. this reveals that the entirety of the kingsguard are now pursuing them all at once, and the rest of the chapter ensues.

the legendary sword and shield mary-kate and ashley are now both sentient and sapient objects. i haven't decided what their characterizations should be like, but i'm working on it.

trying and failing repeatedly to nail down how i want to capitalize things. we will see if i get to any sort of consistent system.

currently looking over the chapters, and the ones i anticipate needing the most iterations or reworking in general to satisfy me in order of most to least difficult are:

• chapters 13 & 14: ruler of everything
• chapter 5: the bidding
• chapter 12: the whole world and you
• chapter 9: spring and a storm
• chapter 10: two wuv
• chapter 8: just apathy

some, like tww&y and two wuv, are difficult because i just didn't put that much thought into them in the first place, while others, like the bidding, are more difficult because they have way more moving parts. RoE is at the top just because it's the big finale and thus the most important, with a lot of loose ends to tie up.

one change i have been considering is making aristarchus grow increasingly aware of the party's activities and thus increasingly involved in trying to stymie their efforts as they move through the museum. this was already mentioned in the wtth update below (the timepiece troopers (i might end up capitalizing those in the final edition because that feels wrong) in the hall of shadows serve as a means for aristarchus to monitor the heritage hall), but aristarchus gets alerted to the fact that several wonder gears have been removed from their proper place and then begins to send more troopers after the party.

trying to further consider how to distinguish between ron and theodore. i keep bringing up localscriptman but he just released the video on type 5s, and the description of type 5s in the video is very superficially similar to theodore while actually being ron.

the difference is that theodore hoards knowledge because it's fun and stimulating, and ron hoards knowledge because she hoards knowledge. theodore isolates himself because he wants to avoid his problems, and ron isolates herself because she wants to solve them by herself. theodore's methodology is the same as ron's, but his ideology is different. this distinction is mostly so i can have the framework in my mind for distinguishing the motives of these two characters when i write them.

also, jesus christ, i just realized i'm the same age as ron now. this is horrifying.

Messy, rudimentary map of the relevant locations. The yellow shape represents the current boundaries of the Museum. The star represents the Catholepistemiad, and the X represents the castle at the center of the Museum. The notches and their respective numbers represent where the protagonists are at during each chapter of the story.

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