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That time a retired copywriter told me my fantasy setting was 'too neat'

Met him at a coffee shop in Portland last spring and he said I was polishing every corner of my world before letting a single character walk through it. Has anyone else had a stranger call out a bad habit you didn't even know you had?
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keith943
keith94319d ago
...and that's funny because I had almost the same thing happen with an old Dungeons & Dragons player who saw my campaign notes and said I was building a museum, not a world. He told me the best cities in fantasy have a few ugly corners where the plumbing leaks and the guard captain takes bribes. Honestly took me a year to realize he was right about letting the rough edges show.
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leo567
leo56718d ago
Read an article recently about how Japanese pottery repairs broken ceramics with gold to make the cracks part of the design, @keith943. Same thing applies here, those rough spots and broken corners make the whole thing feel lived in and real. A perfect world just ends up feeling hollow no matter how detailed you get.
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