The Quest for the Legends

Welcome to the Quest Blog. Today, we ponder the question, "Should some future Quest for the Legends rewrite strive to actually get to the point reasonably soon instead of it taking until chapter 25 to introduce the actual plot?"

Which is a better question than you'd think. Obviously, it makes little sense to write a story such that the plot doesn't start until somewhere in the middle; I'm all too aware of that. Where the matter gets hairy is, given a story that for some reason does only properly start somewhere in the middle for some reason, could it necessarily be improved by cutting off what comes before that?

Thing is, sure, I could write the story of Mark Greenlet, a young boy in the middle of his badge journey who is killed and involved in a plot to save the world by capturing all the legendary Pokémon. But by cutting off everything before Chaletwo's arrival at the Pokémon festival, while the main plot wouldn't be harmed, everything else would be, fatally so.

The badge journey? Well, it would be mighty lame to start a story with the protagonist being recruited on an epic mission, only to then have him decide to first continue this routine badge journey that's been happening off-screen and we have no reason to give a damn about. That would pretty much have to be cut in its entirety. But what about May? Would she honestly come with Mark if that meant abandoning her attempt at the Ouen League? Eh, I might be able to make her somehow, but she would still inevitably lose most of her character development. But who cares about that, right? It's not like it's relevant to the plot.

Scyther? To make him join Mark, something like the Mew Hunter chapter is needed, and that wouldn't happen unless the Mew Hunter saw Mark release Mew, which in turn can't happen unless Mark did release Mew, which he obviously can't do at any point after he is recruited on his legendary quest. Thus, it would pretty much necessarily happen before the start of the story. But honestly, how lame is that? "Oh, by the way, the main character actually obtained Mew off-screen, and released it, and was kidnapped and threatened by this Scyther, but we're just going to be telling you about it while he goes around battling legendary Pokémon"? There is a limit to how interesting the events that happen off-screen in a story can be before it just gets ridiculous. I'd end up having to introduce gratuitous flashbacks to stuff that's too interesting to leave out altogether but too unimportant to the main plot to actually happen chronologically in the story, and it would be horribly awkward. That or, of course, I just cut Scyther out altogether or change his backstory to something simpler. He's irrelevant to the plot anyway; who needs him?

I could go on. In general, the rule is that either the first chapters of that fic would have to be stuffed with "Also by the way Gyarados has been able to use this move Dragon Beam the whole time, and Mark's really been wondering about that, and also on his badge journey this happened, and that also happened because of this," or all sorts of elements and characters that don't directly have to do with the main plot would have to be cut out altogether. Either it would feel very, very obviously like being dumped into the middle of a much longer story (and how much would that honestly help?), or, more sensibly, it would just strip out all the stuff that doesn't directly matter to the main plot in order to get to the point.

And sure, I could make that story. But it would not be this fic, and I really would have absolutely no interest in writing it. After all, since when am I writing this because I want to make Mark Greenlet battle a bunch of legendaries? It would be some silly battlefest fic with an interesting ending but not much more, and I don't even like writing battles. No thanks.

Obviously I am not saying that the late introduction of the main plot isn't problematic for this fic anyway, or that anyone ever ought to write a fic the way I did. I am simply saying that, given I'm going to be writing this fic to begin with, it really wouldn't help to try to get to the point. This fic wouldn't work if I just got to the point. If I'm going to write something with a more sensibly structured plot, I'll write some other fic, but I think this one will just have to remain this way. And sure, that makes it awkward and odd and too long, but it's not as if I'm still writing this because it's perfect. I'm writing it because I love it, and I couldn't possibly continue love it the same way if it were cut down to get to the point.


I've been writing a bit more of chapter 52, by the way. Yay.

That certainly was a relevant rant. Obviously, this fic is not a Trainer-earns-badges-and-goes-to-League fic, despite the early parts mainly centering on it. There would be no logical way to be more to-the-point if you rewrote the story to meet the actual Legendary-centered plot quicker, since so many details and pre-Legendary-part characters, relevant to the overall plot or not, would be what drives you to keep going in the fic.

The only alternative I can think of would be to produce a 'teaser' (suspense/and or exposition-providing moments outside of Mark's perception) intermittedly in or between chapters, possibly correlating somehow with the setting Mark currently is in or plans to go to or events Mark is, has, or will witness or initiate.

Although, this would probably be 'cheesy', tacky, or just not your style (in which case it would negate the conditions that must be in order for you to progress with writing the chapter in the first place—namely, that you like—that you are obssessed with— and/or are compelled to write further). So, I am not sure how, considering this is a troublesome issue, you could possibly deal with this.

Foreshadowing!

I think that if you cut off the beginning, the story would be terrible, unless you start his journey at that point, like him getting his starter in the festival, but then he'll have to train plenty to be able to battle legendarys, basiclly its better the way it is.

This rant, I wonder what on Earth could have inspired it?

(You do seem to be assuming that in order to get to the point you would need to start the 'fic off around the time that Mark died which is, agreed, a bad place to get started given the current story's structure. That wouldn't be the logical place to start anyway if you really did want to condense the 'fic, though, IMO.)

I guess the best thing you can do is just make the Festival come as early as it can. You wouldn't actually have to cut anything if you, I dunno, put the Festival in a town Mark comes across earlier.

Then again, I dunno if it would work with each town having their own thing going on.

Alternatively, you can push back this decision as far as you can until you or someone else gets a magical brainwave.

To be honest, I don't mind that the plot starts mid-story. However, I do understand that the plot comes on suddenly, too, which sticks out a bit.

Perhaps, foreshadowing is the best way to go here. Maybe little subtle hints at the plot that get the reader thinking, such as Mark seeing a program where scientists are noticing a power drop in Moltres. Horrible example, I know, but that sort of idea.

Of course, Ice's idea, making the festival occur earlier, is perhaps the best idea… as long as you are ok with redoing Ouen. Green town would work best at the third gym, with Mark being relatively strong enough to be believable for Chaletwo to choose, as well as the festival, and plot, appearing earlier in the story. Green Town is kind of in the wrong place to be the third gym though, requiring a rework of the map.

I like the foreshadowing idea better, considering that a major overall of Ouen won't be necessary.

This rant, I wonder what on Earth could have inspired it?

Interestingly, it's in fact not what you think. Or more accurately, only in part.

What would you think is the logical place to start it if it were condensed, though? No particular part before the Pokémon Festival strikes me as a very natural starting point at a glance, and as far as I can tell the potential starting places are more or less on a continuum of having either the problem of the current fic, the one described in the entry, or both.

The problem with the idea of just shortening the chronological gap between Mark starting out and the Pokémon Festival by moving the location of the event to a place he'd encounter earlier is that Mark and May's Pokémon being strong enough to take down legendaries to begin with, even all working together, is already kind of borderline in believability right now and has the Pokémon leveling up very fast by the standards of most better trainer fics to get them to something like level forty before the legendary plot comes in. If they were just, say, in the twenties, let alone earlier, the legendary battles would all have to wait until around the time they happen now anyway, which would pretty much take the "starting too late" problem and turn it into a "pretends to start early but really starts too late" problem. And before you suggest powering down the legendaries, that would leave the question of why an experienced trainer like Leah isn't just taking them down in a couple of hits.

Foreshadowing is the most viable way of making the wait work out better than it currently does as far as I can tell, yes, but it's still only a "there will be something interesting way in the far future!" thing; it doesn't exactly make the problem go away so much as put a bandage on it.

This 'fic doesn't really have a lot of fat to cut off the front unless you want to significantly rearrange the sideplots. If it were me and I was determined to take a chunk off the front, I would start in either directly before or directly after Mark captures Gyarados, which only eliminates five to six chapters. I don't feel the earlier chapters are unnecessary per se, but for the most part they contain information that could be conveyed easily later on. The encounter with Gyarados strikes me as the first plot-critical event, although I am very foggy on what exactly goes on in the earliest chapters besides "Mark gets Charmander."

Condensing the 'fic in the middle would simply require focusing less on sideplots, travel time, or training; the answer would not be to make Mark and May's pokémon grow at a ridiculous rate, but only to make less of their training time explicit. I don't remember very well what happens in the earlier chapters, so I couldn't say anything specific.

I wouldn't have considered lowering the power levels of the legendaries as a solution, although given that they're supposed to be weakening it could be viable. The obvious response to your rebuttal, though, is "then make Leah less experienced," although it raises the question of why she would be chosen if she wasn't pretty good. Then again, I don't remember why Mark was picked in the first place; he seems like an odd choice for the job, given the number of highly qualified trainers that would have showed up for the Festival.

tl;dr I don't think you have issues so much in where you start; condensing the length of the 'fic would primarily come in the middle chapters, I think. Really, plot-relevant things that would be difficult to explain retrospectively begin to appear fairly early. I do not think that "slowness" is a major worry for this 'fic, but if you wanted to cut it down a bit, again, reducing sideplots and training stuff in the middle and moving the start up to around where Gyarados is encountered would be how I would go about it.

I take it the foreshadowing thing was directed at opal.

I basically feel the same way - although the plot of TQfTL is really what I love best, it was still a fairly interesting fanfic before the plot. And I really didn't mind at all that the plot started midway through - my basic thoughts were "Oh, so that's why the title's like that." Besides, this is a pokemon fic - you could do this plot with something else - not the characters, but the plot, yes. But it wouldn't be the same. It is a pokemon fic after all, and seeing Mark in his endeavors to gain Sandshrew's trust and dealing with Eevee's naivety. Moving the plot up also wouldn't be viable, for the previously stated legendary strength reasons. And you've already have to seemingly increase the powers of the legendaries - three fully trained teams at pokemon league level, all taking on Entei at the same time? In the games, this obviously would be a very one sided battle. It seems foreshadowing is definitely the best way to go.
However, I have one other suggestion - reading the character bios, what really seems like it could help is expanding on the ideas in there. In fact, it would do exactly the opposite of what's suggested - it would extend the time till plot came into affect. But it would extend the subplots. Like Rick. I am dying to see more of Rick after reading his character rambles. =] Of course, you could always go with the approach of making Mark's beginning the same as the original. That would cut out loads of time.=)

OMG LEAVE SCYTHER IN THERE! Take him out, and I'll. I'll, I'll hit you with a peice of turkey and say it wasn't me!

But, yeah. Leave Razor in there, or I WILL find you.

Hmm…..Tough…..You…Could move Mark? If you DID re-do Ouen, move Sailence a bit closer to Green Town. Would that work, or am I just being too much my idiot self? Or maybe Move the second Gym to Green Town? But I kinda like zeh long beginning. There were some parts of the story that could be taken out altogether, (Mark's weird dreams, for instance) but that is just my opinion. Of course it's late here so my brain probably just can't think of something to say.

Condensing the 'fic in the middle would simply require focusing less on sideplots, travel time, or training; the answer would not be to make Mark and May's pokémon grow at a ridiculous rate, but only to make less of their training time explicit.

There really isn't a lot of training in this fic as is, though. I believe the only wild Pokémon battles prior to the Pokémon Festival that don't end in capture are Rattata and Pidgeotto in chapter five, the Scorplack in chapter thirteen, and the brief encounter with Sharpedo (which barely even counts as a battle) in chapter seventeen. Likewise, the only non-necessary trainer battles before chapter 25 are Rick's junior trainers (though Mewtwo^2 kind of needs to be introduced), Victor (and since that's an excuse to introduce him and I'm irrationally fond of him, I doubt that's going anywhere), the random sailor in chapter 17, and Ash in chapter 22 (both of which are probably getting cut in the IALCOTN, but would not exactly chop entire chapters off the fic).

Cutting down on unnecessary sideplots is definitely on the to-do list; there is no need for the entire silly ordeal with Mark not being a legal trainer, for instance (which, admittedly, I didn't really realize until I had already gone to elaborate lengths setting it up in the IALCOTN), the Attack Approval should probably be eliminated altogether because, let's face it, it's something I just lengthily wrote in and have then never mentioned again. Others are more questionable; I'd like to take out the encounter with Taylor in Scorpio City altogether, for instance, but something setting up Mewtwo^2's hypnotic powers and Taylor's character prior to the League is pretty important and I like to have something establishing Charmander's identity to May without making Mark tell her (could probably be shortened by a lot, at least). The Scyther/Charmeleon subplot is generally not very well executed or relevant at any point, but it's one of those things that are so integral to the history of the fic I couldn't quite just take it out. Likewise, the Scyther focus of chapters 27/28/29 is probably way too much, but damn it, it's Scyther. (I can partly excuse it with the fact it's after Chaletwo anyway so it doesn't affect things much in this discussion.)

The obvious response to your rebuttal, though, is "then make Leah less experienced," although it raises the question of why she would be chosen if she wasn't pretty good.

But she was picked five years ago, which means she has inevitably been training for at least that long, and given Mark and May's Pokémon go from the single digits to the sixties in level during the course of three months, that pretty much has to leave her pretty darn good. They were both picked less for their actual ability than for their general enthusiasm about the idea of capturing legendaries, since before Chaletwo started doing it this way, they had a hard time getting the randomly picked recruits to agree to helping them with this, but just the time she's been training necessarily leaves her magnitudes more experienced than Mark and May and logically she should be able to wipe the floor with anything that a bunch of level twenties could take down.

However, I have one other suggestion - reading the character bios, what really seems like it could help is expanding on the ideas in there. In fact, it would do exactly the opposite of what's suggested - it would extend the time till plot came into affect. But it would extend the subplots. Like Rick. I am dying to see more of Rick after reading his character rambles. =]

Oh, there will be more Rick. It's just not there at the beginning.

OMG LEAVE SCYTHER IN THERE! Take him out, and I'll. I'll, I'll hit you with a peice of turkey and say it wasn't me!

Relax; of course I'm not writing my favorite character out of the fic. The whole point of those examples was to demonstrate where trying to cut to the chase would lead me and why I just wouldn't do that.

Hmm…..Tough…..You…Could move Mark? If you DID re-do Ouen, move Sailence a bit closer to Green Town. Would that work, or am I just being too much my idiot self? Or maybe Move the second Gym to Green Town?

Already addressed; see my comments on shortening the chronological gap between Mark setting out and Chaletwo's arrival above.

There were some parts of the story that could be taken out altogether, (Mark's weird dreams, for instance) but that is just my opinion.

I doubt Mark's weird dreams over the course of the fic add up to much more than a page in total; it wouldn't help the length issue much. :P

I don't mind the slow build-up. It really helps develop the characters, and the plot isn't the only thing that matters. (Although I think you knew that judging from the large amounts of sarcasm…)

Personally, I couldn't imagine the fic being structured much differently. Those twenty-some chapters prior to where the "real" plot comes in seem essential to characterization and the leveling of the Pokémon, and I love the majority of the sub-plots that take place in those chapters. Besides foreshadowing, you could always change the title (I recall you saying you never liked the name) to something that's a little less "they're going to hunt some legendaries", which would leave the "real" plot as more of a twist than it is now. Of course, that could just as easily turn readers off, thinking they're reading a generic trainer journey that suddenly does a 180° halfway through. I understand that the entire fic should have a more logical structure, but I think there's simply too much that would be negatively impacted if it were changed.

And on a barely related note, since it hasn't been seen since Chapter 17, what is Monarking's significance to the plot? Will it make a reappearance in the League perhaps? (Or you could always take it out to cut down the fic's size by a few paragraps :P)

No, Monarking is definitely going; I had vague ideas of going somewhere with it, but they were silly and had nothing to do with anything and I don't even remember them anymore.

Ah, I probably was just thinking of a larger number of battles/more training because of how relatively fast the League itself goes–eight gym leaders in forty chapters or so, plus the whole tournament thing in the middle, already means that you're pushing battles pretty frequently, whether or not they're plot-relevant. As for sideplots, then yeah, taking out some of the ones you mentioned will certainly help the length, but I would encourage you to not go overboard on ripping them out; they lend the 'fic a lot of its character. Not that I think you're likely to, but still.

Something else you might consider is that your chapters, except the ones that involve really big battles, tend to be fairly short, so while the number of chapters before the plot gets cranking may be large, the actual mass of text isn't so much, really.

But she was picked five years ago, which means she has inevitably been training for at least that long, and given Mark and May's Pokémon go from the single digits to the sixties in level during the course of three months, that pretty much has to leave her pretty darn good. They were both picked less for their actual ability than for their general enthusiasm about the idea of capturing legendaries, since before Chaletwo started doing it this way, they had a hard time getting the randomly picked recruits to agree to helping them with this, but just the time she's been training necessarily leaves her magnitudes more experienced than Mark and May and logically she should be able to wipe the floor with anything that a bunch of level twenties could take down.

Ah, okay, I realized she was picked earlier but must not have picked up on the fact that it was five years earlier. If that's the case, though, why did she need to call in anybody else for help? Given that you can switch fainted pokémon out for ones in your PC without penalty, after five years, assuming a training rate relatively similar to that of Mark and May, by this point she could easily have amassed something like twenty-five high-level pokémon to throw out at Entei six at a time. Around that many were enough to deal with any of the legendaries Mark and May have seen so far. Either that, or her pokémon would be colossal in terms of level by this point, and if Entei was able to take them out without too much apparent difficulty (he was eruptioning away when Mark and May showed up for a lot of damage, after all), he should have been able to squash their combined teams without much trouble. In the end it didn't quite come to that, but still…

If that's the case, though, why did she need to call in anybody else for help?

Entei had used several Calm Minds (which was touched upon when he took Dragonite out in one hit with Extrasensory), and that gave him a lot of extra power; combined with Eruption, that was what allowed him to take out Leah's team anyway. Nonetheless they were still able to hurt him considerably, and that Eruption he used after Mark and May got there was so powerful more thanks to Calm Mind than his health at the time.

Yeah, I got the calm mind thing, but it seems like something you ought to be able to stop pretty easily if you're an experienced trainer and have a fair number of pokémon around… all you need is one thing with taunt or haze or psych up etc.

Shush, you. Don't examine throwaway off-screen events in this fic too closely. <_< Let's just say Entei took them all out before they'd managed to do anything about it.

All right, I'll let it drop, though I think you might want to try and come up with an alternate explanation in a later revision. After all, CM is something that takes a while to set up.

(BTW using Unown as a spam confirmation pokémon is a little confusing; it's not clear whether you just want "unown" or "unown *letter*" as an answer.)