gemmser

[gemmser]

Alright, this is a short version of what could probably be a longer post, on what (IMO) defines a "Worm-like" power and the things that Wildbow did when writing Worm that worked well.

I think the thing that makes a power Worm-like is that it's heavily constrained in some specific and interesting way. This means that the superheroes are immediately faced with limitations, which is generally a good thing, and it also means that they have to attempt to use their power in an interesting and clever way to get out of whatever situation they're in. The highly constrained power creates the opportunity for a lot of tricks, for reveals, for gimmicks, etc. The fact that two (or more) people with highly constrained powers are going against each other leaves even more room for there to be unique interactions. And this means that it's often creative and tactical thinking that wins the day, rather than simple brute strength.

So you get little puzzles in each of the fights, at least ideally, and little obvious-in-retrospect surprises, and this is something that you'd never get when the power is extremely broad.

I think when I was first reading Worm, the thing that struck me is that this seemed really close to how our groups used to play D&D. You get given something very specific, an immovable rod that will not move from where it is when the button is pressed, and this is very fun and exciting because you have this very unusual hammer and are very much on the lookout for nails, or anything that could be construed as a nail.

There's probably a lot more to be written on what makes for a good constraint, what makes a power interesting through limitations instead of boring. It's pretty easy to come up with boring limitations! A power that works only after dark is just either always on or always off, and there's not much way to interact with that or make it better.

But I wanted to get the main thing down now, before I have time to write a proper essay on the lessons I took from Worm.

[gemmser]

I have a soft-spot for the original Age of Apocalypse maxiseries from the 90s. One beat that's stuck with me is that after the X-Men in the bad timeline learn that their current apocalyptically-bad situation is the result of time travelers fucking everything up, they belatedly realize that this explains Apocalypse's regime's apparent unspoken policy of murdering any mutant who exhibits time travel powers- he's fully aware of how he himself was able to come to power, and he's pulling up the ladder behind him. News to us, but for the X-Men it's a known pattern about their world abruptly being contextualized.

This, in turn, reminds me of the noted-in-universe quirks of Worm's power system- no kitchen-sink psychics in the classic mold, no healing that isn't the byproduct of something else, everything having some combat application no matter what- and the creeping reveal that although none of the speculation as to why all of these limits on the impossible exist is totally accurate, absolutely none of it is an accident and none of it means anything good. And to an extent I'm thinking about something I still enjoy about the Mistborn series all these years later, where a significant chunk of the unrevealed magic system feels at least somewhat predictable as an inverse or mirror of what's shown to exist from the word go- suppresed by the powers that be for the sake of keeping the wheels on the tyranny wagon.

Overall I'm thinking about the use of quietly absent powersets to characterize a setting, and I guess an interesting follow-up question to that is how aggressively you can draw attention to what's considered "absent" in-universe. If you telegraph too hard that something is thought impossible, then yeah, you're telegraphing that it probably is possible and we're gonna find out about it later. In AoA there's no build-up to the reveal that all the time-travelling characters have been eliminated even though that's somewhat known already in-universe- It's just something mentioned in the course of planning, closing off a fast way to resolve the entire plot with ease. I'm wondering if you could run a kitchen-sink pastiche setting for just long enough for it to become clear that some obvious expected element of the genre arbitrarily doesn't seem to be there, or if that kind of thing would simply take too much runtime to establish purely through negation.

[gemmser]

If you're gonna try to do a "child superheroes are child soldiers/child celebrities" angle on a superhero deconstruction, I think there are roughly two ways to go about that.

Method number one is that you portray the child superheroes as fundamentally manufactured, in the same way that real life child stars are manufactured, and reflective of the way that the characters are manufactured out-of-universe to appeal to a child audience- they're made to exist because there's a market demand, in and out of universe, and that fucks them up. Biggest example of this ATM is The Boys, but it's far from the only one to hit upon this take.

Option two is that you presuppose that unrelated to anything anyone did on purpose children with superpowers are just kind of a thing that happens, and very likely a thing to which there's no good societal response; all the ethical questions inherent to child-rearing kicked up to eleven and with mass-casualties as a very real possible consequence of mismanaging the usual pain points of growing up; the potential utility that you can extract from these disproportionately powerful children, the incentive to mold them to your noble ideology or selfish ends, coloring every interaction and creating hilariously fucked power dynamics that simply aren't comparable to anything that can actually happen in real life.

They've both got their strengths and weaknesses, it's all in the execution, but personally I'm drawn to the second one in an "astronauts on the moon with a rock" kind of way. Would that be fucked up or what

[gemmser]

Hmmm, Taylor wasn’t bullied before Emma turned on her though? She was quite extraverted before then, even.

As for the superhero stuff, fair. She was no cape groupie, but I think there was still a strong want to do good driving her actions through out the story.

Thanks for reading my rambling btw

Worm x BNHA

It is honestly fascinating how easily some of Worm's characters can be transposed to their counterparts in BNHA.

The backstories of Taylor Hebert and Izuku Midoriya are very similar: both are betrayed and bullied by their until then childhood BFFs because of a need to appear and feel strong, soon after they start to interact with superpowers (manifesting a quirk and making a cooler superhero friend). Katsuki Bakugo in this case is a bizarre fusion of Emma and Sophia. Furthermore, both have an absent parent in their lives, with the other always having to worry about their safety, both protagonists care little about their own well-being, both have a martyr complex, both get at one point mistaken for a villain because of their appearance. Hell, both even get to rescue a captive child from an underground gang-leader's complex.

Now, I understand that some of these similarities come from the shared DNA of Standard Superhero Teenage Protagonist™, as well as having been made in roughly similar times ("Worm ended in 2013, BNHA started in 2014. Welcome back Worm."). Still, it's remarkable how much these characters mirror each other, yet serve as foils in other ways.

This all leads to my thesis that a bnhaAU! of Worm would be very interesting to read. You could have Taylor enter a superhero academy whose principal is a short, blood-lusted, hyper-intelligent mastermind (Nezu to Accord); have her homeroom teacher be a gruff, rationality/efficiency obsessed mentor (Eraserhead to Armsmaster/Defiant) who's constantly bothered by an unserious jokester (Present Mic to Assault); there would also be a female comic relief teacher who gets killed of mid-story to show how dangerous the threat is (Midnight to Mouse Protector). I could go on and on placing various characters in roles that fit them very well, yet are subtly different and cause delicious character interaction. And that's just the Vanilla BNHA setup, you could also employ popular BNHA fanfic tropes (afo!Midoriya Hisashi to glaistig uaine!Annete Hebert, anyone?!)

The two biggest uncertainties I have are:

Where to place the Undersiders? You could have them as fellow students, or maybe as sympathetic villains like in canon. Depends what you want to do with the story and how much you want Taylor to suffer.

What are Taylor's powers? Still bug control, or is she powerless at the start? If she's powerless, there is a lot of story potential in having her be the Inheritor of a kinder, more heroic Butcher. Mmm, the angst of having to consensually euthanize your mentor in order to pursue your dream of heroism...

...This is a plea for someone more talented than me to write this, by the way.

[gemmser]

Oh wow, nice to see someone else has also thought a bunch about the similarities! Thank you for seeing the vision.

I think Taylor's descent to villainy is not such a self-evident conclusion as it seems at first glance. If she has bug-powers, why would she be bullied? Like... pre-schoolers thinking bug are gross maybe?? I just don't think it would make much sense, when there are quirks just as or even more gross and their users face little discrimination (the eye-pulling guy from the first BNHA episode being the archetypical example). I wouldn't be confident enough to try and write something like that, as it would veer of into the comically-evil-bullying-slash-abuse-villainous-quirk fanfiction vortex.

If she's quirkless, then that would tie everything together with a neat little bow. I think that Taylor is, at heart, heroic. And while I agree that her first outing in Worm could be read to have suicidal undertones, that is far from her only motivation. She loved heroes long before getting powers, as can be seen from her Alexandria and Armsmaster merch.

If you feel that removing bug powers and having her be a hero with some other ability takes away Taylor's uniqueness in this scenario, then how about... getting her quirk from an All For One type figure? It could even still be controlling bugs, but would still keep her isolation from being quirkless, add a deal with a devil for the "greater good" ("spying a little bit on my classmates is fine if I save many people as a hero, right?"), and even give an easy way to introduce the Undersiders.

P.S. I think Coil is more of an Overhaul type of guy. Thinks he's hot shit, really isn't. Both are also pretty similar in many other ways.

Worm x BNHA

It is honestly fascinating how easily some of Worm's characters can be transposed to their counterparts in BNHA.

The backstories of Taylor Hebert and Izuku Midoriya are very similar: both are betrayed and bullied by their until then childhood BFFs because of a need to appear and feel strong, soon after they start to interact with superpowers (manifesting a quirk and making a cooler superhero friend). Katsuki Bakugo in this case is a bizarre fusion of Emma and Sophia. Furthermore, both have an absent parent in their lives, with the other always having to worry about their safety, both protagonists care little about their own well-being, both have a martyr complex, both get at one point mistaken for a villain because of their appearance. Hell, both even get to rescue a captive child from an underground gang-leader's complex.

Now, I understand that some of these similarities come from the shared DNA of Standard Superhero Teenage Protagonist™, as well as having been made in roughly similar times ("Worm ended in 2013, BNHA started in 2014. Welcome back Worm."). Still, it's remarkable how much these characters mirror each other, yet serve as foils in other ways.

This all leads to my thesis that a bnhaAU! of Worm would be very interesting to read. You could have Taylor enter a superhero academy whose principal is a short, blood-lusted, hyper-intelligent mastermind (Nezu to Accord); have her homeroom teacher be a gruff, rationality/efficiency obsessed mentor (Eraserhead to Armsmaster/Defiant) who's constantly bothered by an unserious jokester (Present Mic to Assault); there would also be a female comic relief teacher who gets killed of mid-story to show how dangerous the threat is (Midnight to Mouse Protector). I could go on and on placing various characters in roles that fit them very well, yet are subtly different and cause delicious character interaction. And that's just the Vanilla BNHA setup, you could also employ popular BNHA fanfic tropes (afo!Midoriya Hisashi to glaistig uaine!Annete Hebert, anyone?!)

The two biggest uncertainties I have are:

Where to place the Undersiders? You could have them as fellow students, or maybe as sympathetic villains like in canon. Depends what you want to do with the story and how much you want Taylor to suffer.

What are Taylor's powers? Still bug control, or is she powerless at the start? If she's powerless, there is a lot of story potential in having her be the Inheritor of a kinder, more heroic Butcher. Mmm, the angst of having to consensually euthanize your mentor in order to pursue your dream of heroism...

...This is a plea for someone more talented than me to write this, by the way.

[gemmser]

Worm x BNHA

It is honestly fascinating how easily some of Worm's characters can be transposed to their counterparts in BNHA.

The backstories of Taylor Hebert and Izuku Midoriya are very similar: both are betrayed and bullied by their until then childhood BFFs because of a need to appear and feel strong, soon after they start to interact with superpowers (manifesting a quirk and making a cooler superhero friend). Katsuki Bakugo in this case is a bizarre fusion of Emma and Sophia. Furthermore, both have an absent parent in their lives, with the other always having to worry about their safety, both protagonists care little about their own well-being, both have a martyr complex, both get at one point mistaken for a villain because of their appearance. Hell, both even get to rescue a captive child from an underground gang-leader's complex.

Now, I understand that some of these similarities come from the shared DNA of Standard Superhero Teenage Protagonist™, as well as having been made in roughly similar times ("Worm ended in 2013, BNHA started in 2014. Welcome back Worm."). Still, it's remarkable how much these characters mirror each other, yet serve as foils in other ways.

This all leads to my thesis that a bnhaAU! of Worm would be very interesting to read. You could have Taylor enter a superhero academy whose principal is a short, blood-lusted, hyper-intelligent mastermind (Nezu to Accord); have her homeroom teacher be a gruff, rationality/efficiency obsessed mentor (Eraserhead to Armsmaster/Defiant) who's constantly bothered by an unserious jokester (Present Mic to Assault); there would also be a female comic relief teacher who gets killed of mid-story to show how dangerous the threat is (Midnight to Mouse Protector). I could go on and on placing various characters in roles that fit them very well, yet are subtly different and cause delicious character interaction. And that's just the Vanilla BNHA setup, you could also employ popular BNHA fanfic tropes (afo!Midoriya Hisashi to glaistig uaine!Annete Hebert, anyone?!)

The two biggest uncertainties I have are:

Where to place the Undersiders? You could have them as fellow students, or maybe as sympathetic villains like in canon. Depends what you want to do with the story and how much you want Taylor to suffer.

What are Taylor's powers? Still bug control, or is she powerless at the start? If she's powerless, there is a lot of story potential in having her be the Inheritor of a kinder, more heroic Butcher. Mmm, the angst of having to consensually euthanize your mentor in order to pursue your dream of heroism...

...This is a plea for someone more talented than me to write this, by the way.

[gemmser]

Literary Greebling

Greebling is this thing from model-making where a flat expanse looks boring and unrealistic, so you add on some little bits and bobs (greebles) to break up the surface and make it seem "more".

I think this is a great concept to port over to writing.

For characters: You've got your backstory, your motivation, your emotional beats, all that stuff, right? Add in some quirks, some contradictions, some small, seemingly irrelevant details that make them feel textured and authentic. They don't drive the plot, they're probably not relevant to the story, they're not necessarily going to come up again, but they break up the surface and make everything feel like it exists at a higher resolution.

A character makes sure not to step on the cracks in the sidewalk, not out of superstition, but because he's just been doing it for a long time and likes being on a streak. A character carries around coins from different countries, fiddling with them while waiting in line. A character always knocks on doors to the tune of "shave and a haircut". Someone hums a song from a movie soundtrack.

For settings: It's pretty common for us to build up a setting in simplified terms, to have everything be a result of one thing or another, huge clashing forces. Real settings aren't like that, or aren't wholly like that. A city can have a unified architecture while also having a couple buildings that come from different traditions. A kingdom can have a tiny semi-autonomous zone inside it. You have, in theory, three branches of government, but in practice, there are edge cases where they're putting on each other's hats, and there are independent agencies which only answer to one of the three branches in a limited way, and you don't need too many of these things to have it feel rich and complex.

For magic systems: There's a beginner magic system where four to six elements are all perfectly set into a lattice, balanced against each other, perfectly mirroring each other. This works for certain applications, but I will submit to you that this is much better with greebles. You can have your lattice and your system of elemental weaknesses, but they need the little differences, the things that break up the flat expanse. Give your water magic a connection to the moon, let your fire magic affect rust, have it all have little knots and whorls and complications when you look closer.

Again, the point isn't that these things are plot relevant, they don't have to be, and maybe it's better if they're not. But the little non-conforming details help sell whatever you're trying to do.

[gemmser]

Unreliable narrator who's trying to manipulate the audience

Unreliable narrator who's engaging in self-deception

Unreliable narrator with intense biases

Unreliable narrator who lacks crucial context on the situation

Unreliable narrator trapped in a specific sociocultural worldview

Unreliable narrator slowly losing his grip on reality

Unreliable narrator who's been deliberately fed false information by other characters

Unreliable narrator who keeps getting distracted by irrelevant details while missing major plot points

Unreliable narrator who perceives the world through the lens of genre

Unreliable narrator who keeps accidentally narrating possible futures instead of the present

Unreliable narrator who's unknowingly a character in someone else's unreliable narration

[gemmser]

Really fucked up that the Entities gave extremely societally taboo mind control powers to the people who trigerred from societal isolation