Thread:Crowsoul50/@comment-33229352-20190519042725/@comment-33229352-20190525055354

I'm just gonna talk about "beta" versions of the Masked Ones plot

Fun fact, one of my first concepts for the Masked Ones had the masks move when the wearer talked and expressed like an actual face but I thought that would have been really unsettling

I still kind of envision them moving when they speak, especially with the Jackal

Speaking of, when I was first building out the plot, the Jackal was supposed to be Orphos harvesting mortal souls in disguise because he can't leave well enough alone and wanted to contact Val again. Losing Eglantine would make him fall back into his old patterns  of bad coping mechanisms and even worse decision making. He would have built the cult devoted to him to fly under the radar because most deities would try to stop him if they knew he was doing it. This version kind of lives on with the Jackal and Orphos sharing some similarities. Ultimately Orphos was supposed to [Redacted because Im using a variation of this for the plot hee hee]

Ishmael was also going to be taken instead of Oswin because I like putting him in situations that challenge his core values as a person and deity. I think that's residual regret for not making him a very complex character from the start. I decided to use Oswin because it made more sense for the Masked Ones to take him, he fit the spot of the Hyena (Ishmael would have replaced the Eagle) and I don't like just scrapping characters if I don't use them, and I never really used him. I try to give them a proper send-off when I can. Also the Eagle is one of the few female characters I have and I didn't want to get rid of her. I could also avoid having to tackle the implications of a deity being a Masked One, and it gave him a stake in the plot in a less literal and more natural way.

Masks were originally going to be able to be taken off for short periods of time (24-48 hours) before the user would have to put it back on to maintain their immortality. This was the early version of Limbo. This arguably makes more logical sense in the grand scheme of things about how they can move around and kill without being recognized, and I kind of wish I kept it in for that purpose. There's a lot of stuff with them that doesn't really make sense when you think about it but I don't think it would be fair to others if I start changing fundamental things that their character might be built around :// I come up with a lot of stuff on the fly because I don't like having plans and I low-key feel like the plot suffers for it but oh well. Alot of the reasoning for why the Jackal does things is what I come up with on the spot too and I scare myself with how quickly and easily I can settle into a cult leader mindset to figure it out

I've had an end goal with this plot from the start and that hasn't changed in any way since I first started to come up with the plot >:) I've alluded to it, but I like keeping stuff pretty secret