Note:  This is part one.  Will add part 2-5 (and zero) soon.

Dictation by knnn

2008 Comic-Con Q&A session Part 1

Hey Mr. Butcher.  I am a big fan although I am a new fan.  I only discovered you about a month ago, so I’m only on book five. But uh, Harry Dresden - love him {Jim Smiles} and I went and I saw all the TV shows, and I’m out.  Are we going to get any more?  Because I want more. {cheering in the background}

Of the series as it existed on Syfy, I don’t see how it can possibly happen.  Even if somebody wanted it to happen which I’m not sure anyone beyond like the fans want.  On the other hand, if they don’t make anything else, then the rights will eventually revert back to me and I’ll have the chance to see if I can do anything else with it with somebody else.  That doesn’t happen though for another three years, eight months and six days ...not that I’m keeping track. {laughter}  

Thank you.

You’re welcome.

{Next person}

Hey, how are you doing?

All right.  Back to the Aleria [he pronounced wrong, so I'm spelling it this way], I understand that you plan on writing only six books in this series.

Yes.

Have you thought about writing other characters in the same world, because the world is very rich, and a lot of fun?

I’ve given thought to it in several different places.  There’s a lot of things I could do with it.  I’ve kind of vaguely had in mind of the whole “Good Cop, Bad Cop” thing,  with a pair of characters who are formed when the first Marat accidentally bonds to one of Canim.  Which would just be hilarious.  You know it’s like “ The barbarian, and his partner - the nine foot werewolf”.   But,  I don’t know if I’m ever going to get a chance to do that any time soon.  We’ll have to see.  Because I have a lot of other ideas that I want to write, that are cool stories that I could go tell.  I want to write some actual science-ficition science fiction.   With spaceships and gravity and robots and plasma.  You know, I’ve got to think of these science fiction things.  But, we’ll have to see what happens.  Yeah, there’s plenty of room for storytelling in Alera still.  I’m basically just kind of talking about one specific portion of Aleran history, so it’s possible I could do more in the future.  

Thank you.

No problem.

{next person}

Hey.  How are you doing?

How’s it going?

Um, pretty good.

I figured you realize I’m not going to ask you about Aleria.

You didn’t look like, are you dressed as a specific character sir? {Jim Butcher grin}

Oh yeah.  Absolutely.  I would hope you’d know.
My question is about the comic books.  What gave you the idea to step into that genre, and now that they are in comic book form?  I know there’s a four part arc, “welcome to the Jungle”.  Is it going to continue beyond that?  Are we going to continue to see more new characters?


As far as “what gave me the idea”, they called me and said “do you want to do a comic book”? And I said “ok.” {Butcher Grin.  Laughter.}    And, it was about that complicated.  I’ve been a comic book fan for a long time.  I collected a lot when I was younger, and a buddy of mine, Cam Banks who is actually here, I haven’t seen him in a while - there he is {points} actually bought me a copy of a Spiderman issue that got me back into comics again a few years ago.  When the Dabel Brothers came and said “hey.  Do you want to do something”, I said “great”.  And they’re like “OK, we want to do a novelization, here’s what we’ve done with this writer and this writer and that writer”, and I was like “oh, that’s really cool.  Can I get to help?”.  And they’re like “Yeah, you’re going to work with the artist and help approve the characters and scripts and so on.”  “Excellent”.  And they’re like “And we’d really like you to write a 22-page introductory issue before we start Storm Front.”.  “That’s super”.   And then “We talked to some people and they said maybe we should do a 36-page issue.  How would that be?”  and I’m like “Yeah.  Ok”.  And then they’re like “Ok, a 36-page issue, you couldn’t get much of a story in, but if you do two 36-page issues, then it will be like really awesome.”,  and I’m like “Um… ok”  {laughter} And then a couple of days later: “What we really need to do is a full four-issue 32 page each issue story.  And then you could do a whole thing, and how would that be?”  And I’m like “Um…” {laughter} “… this was 22 pages of writing not long ago, and now…  ok.  But no more.  That’s as long a it gets. “  And they’re like “ok”.   So I wrote “Welcome to the Jungle” which is a prequel that takes place just before the beginning of the events of Storm Front.  It was actually inspired by an episode of the TV show.  In the original Pilot, Murphy is talking to Harry at one point, and she is going on about “Ok Dresden, you need a little love.  Look, you’ve helped us out before, you solved this kidnapping at Kilyamet [not sure of the word] Heights, you helped us with the mess at the zoo”, and I went “oooh, that mess at the zoo.  That’s so vague.”  I wanted to call it “that mess at the zoo”, but I’m hampered by an English literature degree, so I dropped some Upton Sinclair quotes into  it, and called it “Welcome to the Jungle”.  That’s where it came from.  And then Storm Front, they’re going to do about 16 issues per novel, and then they’re going to try and sucker me to write another four-issue in between.    Which is kind of convenient, because Harry at the beginning of Fool Moon is talking to Murphy, is like “WE tried to find you last month, but somebody said you were in Minnesota”.  And Harry’s like “Somebody saw something in a lake”.  Now I get to write the story “Somebody saw something in a lake”, that will be in the comics.  But, there we go.  That’s pretty much how it goes.  I’m not actually writing the actual translation of Storm Front, but I’m approving it.   I have to read over all the scripts.  I’m working with the artist where I go, “hey you did this”.  We’ve actually got some brave fan volunteers from the fan boards who get sent art and get to say things like, yeah, like Priscilla right here {points} who gets to say things like “you forgot to put the force ring on his hand”, and “this other detail is gone”, “fix this”, “do that”.  They actually had to send the artist a picture. “Look, Harry’s like six foot seven, or a little bit taller.  Murhpy’s five foot nothing.”  They took a picture of Harry, and had to draw a red line next to his elbow.  “This is how tall Murphy is on Harry” {laughter}, for the artist to go “oh, right, got it.”  Because Murphy had become a six-foot amazon somehow in the initial draft.  That’s what’s going on with that.  There you are.

Thank you very much.

{next person}

Hey, how are you doin?

Hi.  I asked you yesterday at the signing about whether or not Lasciel’s Shadow gets to go to Haven because she redeemed herself, and you said no.  I want to ask you why.

What I said was, that the answer to that is so much more complicated than is easy to give, especially without giving away extra story and ruining the fun.  No.  Lasciel’s spirit didn’t go to heaven.  And now {Singsong voice} I’m not gonna tell you {laugther}.  UOOOH.  That’s like heroin for writers.  That really is.  But it will come out.  It might be a little while.  Be patient, and the story will be there.

{next person}

Hey.  How are you doing?

Hello.  I actually had a question regarding Harry’s growth throughout the Dresden series.  I know how he used to be really, not quite sexist, but sort of pigheaded and chivalrous, and that sort of drains out during the series.  Is that like a growth you just felt had to happen or was that fan mail, or where did it come from?


That’s been fairly organic.  Harry is still way too knee-jerk reactive that way for his own good, but I think being beaten half to death by a number of females as well as having them bail him out of the fire several times, that will do wonders for you.  It doesn’t take too many of those experiences to change your world view a little bit.  Plus, the just development of his relationships with people like Charity and Murphy has sort of changed the way he looks at things.  Plus, he just gets less stupid as he gets older.  Which I think parallels myself.  I really don’t feel like I get all that much smarter, but I do feel I manage to become somewhat less stupid on a steady basis.  So hopefully, that’s what Dresden is doing as well.  

Thank you.

You’re welcome.

{next person}

Hi.

Hi.  How are you?

Good.  A little sweaty.  It’s hot up here.  

Yeah.  Looks like it.

{Lots of laughter as Jim runs his hands through his hair and shakes his head.}

I have a question about did you like the [TV] series.  Because a lot of the fan were not impressed with the series.  I liked it a lot, but what did you think.

Probably about 80% of the episodes I really liked.  I enjoyed a lot.  Generally speaking I enjoyed the series  a lot.  There were some issues, changes they made, quibbles that I was just “yeah, ok.  Somebody got off the line”.  Some of them had very good reasons that disappeared because you never go to see the reason on the screen like Harry’s hockey stick instead of a staff.  Some of the changes they made were like “well, we could do a Blue Beetle, but if we did, we’d have to have a Beetle that came apart in several different pieces. “  To be able to film it you have to have a trick Beetle that falls to bits.  Otherwise,  if you’re in a Volkswagen, you can only shoot somebody from straight ahead or from directly on the side.  “So instead, we’re going to use an open-top Jeep, cause we can use that for anything in the long run and we can’t afford to do a Herbie Car”.  They had like a zillion different Herbies for the Herbie movies.  But, generally speaking I liked it.  My attitude looking back at it is “That could have gone a whole lot worse”.  There were some things they did very well.  Some things not so well.  Some things look better on the DVD than they did on TV because they had more time to do the special effects, and somebody said “you know, we can just make this look better, so let’s do that for the DVD”, and did.  Over all, it could have gone a whole lot worse than it did.  I’m hoping that another time, somebody will do something that is a little bit more like I like, but yeah.   The only thing I really had an issue with was what they did to Bob, but Terrance Mann kind of sold me on it.  Plus, I met him and he’s just a really nice guy, so it was really hard for me to hold that against him.  But he kind of sold me on it by the end of it.  They just kind of rolled Bob and Ebenezer into the same character and said there he is.  Other than that I didn’t have too much of a problem.  Everybody is like “they had a brunette Murphy instead of a blond Murhpy.”  But on the other hand, Valerie Cruz was the only one on the set who’d actually read the entire series .  As far as I was concerned, she was golden in my book.

Thank you.

...and don't forget the chance of the gas tank exploding.   

Makes you wonder how powerful that ward the Merlin raised in Dead Beat to stop the entire Red Court + Demons/Outsiders was.

On Castle   

Heh.  

I'm actually using exactly that idea in my write-up of Jerusalem.   99% of these count as 0-level thresholds, and cannot support more than the tiniest amount of power.  However, there are dozens of them around the city (every group has their own), and they intertwine with each other.  This makes it really hard to track someone who's walking around town by magic.  

Actually, if you think about it from a DV point of view, it actually makes a little sense.  It could be a reasonable example of "the evolution of religion".  Thresholds work "in real life", so somewhere along the last 3000 years, the notion of putting up these "virtual walls" made it into the Jewish religion (possibly influenced by people "in the know").  This might even give it a bit more power as a threshold as it is in some sense "faith powered".

Edit: Note that Harry mentions something similar about walls around cemeteries in GP.

METHOD TO GET RICH
Smuggle via the NN.  Guns, drugs, slaves, etc.   Every country has those pesky border crossings in order to block or tax incoming goodies.  

Example:
A pound of pure cocaine is worth $20,000-$50,000 in the US, depending on quality.  You can buy the same quantity for under $1000 in certain places in South America.  

Find the correct Ways, and you can make your millions in moments

WHY IT WONT WORK
How do you think the Red Court are financing all their operations?  Any Wizard trying to work in South America will get his "staff" fed to him.  Also, finding buyers/sellers is not so simple.  Gangs are involved, etc.

STORY IDEA
Diego Barnella is by all accounts a bad person.  He has been a drug-dealing Wizard for the last 30 years (it was guns, explosives and slaves beforehand).  He has his own gang that peddles his stuff for him, and even owns some field in Ecuador.

Recently, his interests have been hammered by Red Court drug dealers, and a price has been put on his head.  Unfortunately, his personal wealth and connections, and especially his knowledge of the Ways are very important for the war, so the White Council needs to protect him...

...He might even be a "hero".

Have I ?... now i'm confused. I thought i'd pretty much refuted the original idea of using Fate and declarations.

Heh.  I meant that you captured exactly why using the normal "fate points for declarations of things that are reality" is not correct, and that something different was needed to explain this power.  I agree with you totally on this, just that my OP didn't not explain it well enough, and you clarified the point beautifully.

He obviously isn't, or maybe he is, but lets go with he isn't because the other Players want their chars to be real too .

I'm not interested in playing a solo game   

The severity of the change determines how hard you have to believe. And that's where fate points come in. You can spend them on the conviction roll as normal.

Now I understand what you're saying.  This makes it fall within the mechanics of the game more easily.  It simply a power that changes reality temporarily - similar to magical bolts of fire.

Maybe model it off of sponsored magic, call it solipsism, and give it Thaum at Evo Speed(Transformations)
Follow the same rules, and now you can actually change someone and give them aspects as consequences.

Nice!

I haven't quite fleshed it out, so any suggestions welcome:

The idea behind Solipsism is that you are the only "real" person in the universe.  Everything else is figments of your imagination.  Sort of "I think therefore I am" on an extreme scale.  Less extreme versions include "head in a jar" or "Matrix" realities where there's a shared belief.

The premise of the character would be that he believes in things so strongly that he can actually change reality in a limited way.  Sort of a "true believer" on steroids.  The way I'm thinking of playing him is as a mediocre character, saving as many Fate Points as possible to spend on placing aspects on enemies/locations.

Examples:
1.  Fighting an evil spell caster, this guys believes that this particular necromancer is trying not to break the first law for fear of being obviously tainted.  He spends a fate-point (with the GM's agreement) to place that aspect on the necromancer, and is less worried about being killed (can tag that aspect with another fate point later on).

2.  Tracking someone.  He believes this guy always goes to a bar to "calm down".  Door-to-door checking of bars follows (tagging that aspect with another fate point).
 
3.  He believes that this building has a back door/ the key was under the mat/someone left the door unlocked.

-----

This guy would be something of a target for various deities, faeries, powers, because his extreme belief/convictions would be a source of power for their divinity/magic.  He would also be something of a paranoid nutcase - his beliefs jumping in all directions.  Maybe he's also lucky in a weird way:  "If this coin came up heads three times in a row, it must come up tails next".  He would be both a loner (It's hard to believe you are the center of the world if you care too much about your friends), but also afraid of being lonely.  Not sure yet if he should get any kinds of wizard talents (evocation or thaumatugry could both be useful, but I think would start taking up too many fate points).


Possible aspects:
It's true because I said so.
"I disbelieve"
Don't leave me.
If I close my eyes it will all go away.