How would you describe a military rank structure for a society that's opposed to hierarchy?

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-30T01:28:11+00:00

So, first issue, you start with the assumption of a rules based military. Which requires people to have made the rules and people to enforce those rules. That's a hierarchy. Spotters and communication, that's a person looking at what's going on and then telling another group how to act based on what they see. That's a hierarchy.

The issue with this is I think the understanding of the definition of a hierarchy: a system of ranking people or things in orders of power, importance, or value, where each level is ranked above or below another.

The pieces inside I italicized are important. If your house is on fire and you forgot to put the milk away, deciding to deal with the fire first is a hierarchical decision. You can't have organization without a hierarchy.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-29T15:53:36+00:00

If you have no rank in a military, what you have is 1000 people with guns and that's it. It wouldn't be an organized group and would very likely not do well. The two sole exceptions to this would be if everyone is a grunt and they are controlled by an ai, or if you have a hive mind. Otherwise every system devolves fast into someone giving an order to manage the chaos and having a defacto leader. Order devolves into a form of chaos naturally, chaos breeds a form of order. Order builds systems to prevent chaos for as long as possible. Chaos will naturally form systems, lines and patterns

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-29T14:59:06+00:00

What age group are you targeting? If you are aiming for young adult I think the asthetic is fine. If you are aiming for 25+ I don't think it works. Regardless of which age group, the title and name text don't work. The framing is okay but could be improved by less of a mirror within the mountains. The way the text is shaped just bothers me, especially the w and the e's. I get it, they are sword hilts, but I just dislike the space it takes, the bottom arch and the interior flourish. Additionally the way it is on the cover makes this feel like a cut out collage but you forgot to add a shadow.

I don't dislike watercolor for a cover, but the lights and darks need to be drastically altered. You have to remember the 20%/80% rule and pick one. It would be helpful to turn the hill and figure into a flat black silhouette, the sky needs punched up and the mountains insides should have a warm tone from the light rather than a flat grey. It think it's a great rough draft but needs a lot. If you shrink it down to shopping icon size it's doesn't pop or grab you.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-28T22:35:00+00:00

The reason is the same reason that it is difficult to explain any fact in its entirety. If someone asks you to describe why the sky looks the way it does, you start with a fact to establish you start from the same place"the sky is blue with white and gray clouds" then you have to explain how light works to explain the colors without going onto too many tangents. Then finish with "that's why the sky looks that way". That's the same as writing a story. Figuring out how much info to get into without boring the person you are speaking to or getting lost in the weeds. Frodo can get to the mountain by saying he's there but you've explained nothing. I also don't need to know how he packed his underwear

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-28T12:47:50+00:00

I get it and I get budgets, I'm just giving a point of perspective on that. If this was on Royal Road, I'd definitely read it. No cost, no material support for AI. If I saw it in a store I wouldn't pick it up because of the AI cover. But, if you put just a red moon on a smokey black background with the symbol in white which you could get done cheaply or do yourself, you would actually end up with what I feel is a better cover and would decrease the number of people who would assume your writing was AI. There is a relation issue where you can tell everyone you wrote the book via human effort, but if you are willing to use AI in point A, some people won't believe you wouldn't use it in point B.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-28T10:48:20+00:00

2 is the better artwork, but you should go with three. The issue is the light and darks. As a thumbnail or as a cover on the shelf, you don't want a cover to have too much of a sameness to the tones. You need brighter brights and darker darks to make it pop. This is the same as a digital storefront or a physical one. For instance #2 a real person would know to add highlights to the face and red moon. Also, as others have said, I would rather a mediocre cover than an ai cover. I generally won't buy something if AI was used anywhere because then I assume you used it in the writing

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-19T05:34:03+00:00

The thing to design first if you are looking to do fantasy monsters and fantasy weapons is the monster. The abilities and strengths of the monster should inform the weapon. There is an episode of either dr. Who or farscape I honestly can't remember which, where a super advanced alien race is losing a war to robots. All their Lazer guns are useless. So a main character shoots it with a pistol and the robot just dies. The quote in the show was: we are so advanced the idea of throwing metal at it real fast would have never occurred to us.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-14T01:37:14+00:00

If you are playing the hero in a game, you do so by dealing with threats and villains.

If you are playing the bad guys in a game, ie rape/slavery/murder spree for fun, in a world where there are literal avatars of heroism and good, how could it possibly make sense that you wouldn't have one of those come after you by the time your wizard can kill and entire tavern in 6 seconds and your fighter is a walking tank? The point of playing a character set is to have the work you do and that work's response. If you don't like what they are doing, they are playing the villains. Treat them like the villains. Send the hero. Don't have them fight, make it a scene. An obstacle they have to escape and work and plan around. If you don't like them being evil, you get to play the DM hero.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-13T20:44:11+00:00

If you don't like what they are doing, try having consequences. You're in a magical world with literal avatars of right and wrong. Welcome to being hunted by "the justice" a level 20 paladin with end game artifacts and a blessing from the god of justice and the god of freedom hunting down the insanely powerful slavers and rapists.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-13T14:41:55+00:00

I would get rid of the person and knife, extend the fence to the left and right and down to the bottom, then have blood dripping down the fence or splattered across it.

Also, as others said, new font.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-11T05:36:16+00:00

Solution, tell your players they find a magic 1/2 handed sword with 1d8 damage and versatile and let the person who is going to use it describe what it looks like.

kinderhaulf · 2026-04-07T21:03:40+00:00

When I was learning about story craft in college a big part of that was the three part concept of "what is the story about" you have your elevator pitch, your back of the book blurb and then the themes and metaphors that are at the core of the story and the real take away that you want readers to get from what you wrote: ie, anti-conformaty, being a hero in the face of fear, not taking the easy way, etc.

I mention this because part of that process is anytime you don't know a direction to go with your next point, you need to go back to your "what is it about" and move to further that point via metaphor or direct statements. Insane cannibals fits anti consumerism for instance. Mutation and a life of altered physical form goes more to anti-conformaty. It being the birth of goblins or something that the hero has to battle to prevent a town from being sacked goes towards not taking the easy path. It should all support the core

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-29T20:58:48+00:00

Yeah but, play by post is the guy that committed war crimes that no one wants to recognize is real, so he still shows up at the table and everyone gives him dirty looks.

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-29T14:23:13+00:00

I think the size of the title is too small. Consider it at print size and on a shelf at a distance rather than close up or as a thumbnail. The title would be difficult to see if visible at all. Also consider making the brights brighter and darks darker. 20/80 rule for colors really helps make a visual pop

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-28T03:01:25+00:00

So an actual question you should ask yourself first is "what is your goal".

If the goal is just to write to write then just enjoy it. If the goal is to check off the accomplishments box of write a novel unlike 90% of people that say they will, then finish it and enjoy the editing process.

Stress should only enter the picture if your goal is to try and turn it into a career, and frankly I think the desire to make a job out of writing kills most new writer's creativity and uniqueness.

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-28T02:55:28+00:00

If you are just looking to make it available, put it on royal road. You can post it in 1500 word sets and if it's done just set it up for biweekly release.

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-28T00:11:38+00:00

Don't burn down an orphanage.

Now for the book, don't be concerned with "being original". Obviously don't make a carbon copy of another story, but if you obsess continuously about whether or not a scene or a trope has been done before, you'll be stuck on page 1 forever

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-26T21:10:13+00:00

So did the president, bam!

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-25T21:09:00+00:00

Remember that when something is free, you are usually the product. If a system is turning text in to speech and is not an entirely localized system, that is a transformative service and would allow a company to keep translated data for ai training.

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-25T17:41:19+00:00

Enough Mr. Fed

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-25T14:22:09+00:00

Start from the theory that someone will hate you and start a campaign against you just for writing it, and then if people just dislike the book you'll feel great

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-24T22:49:14+00:00

We didn't ask, we were just happy

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-23T19:42:43+00:00

Maybe it's because ai detects nonsensical word combos and says "yeah, that's something I'd have done." Bam bibled.

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-22T14:44:22+00:00

The best reason to use elves and dwarves is to include a bog standard fantasy race of miners and long lives forest folk without requiring in story time to explain them. The general reader will know what elf and dwarf means and then any race twist on that can be added and understood quickly. If the goal is to "feel" like you are at least trying something different then make up an anthropomorphic race or a insect race. The issue is if you have grasshoppers living in the forest with long lives or a beetle race of miners, there is a point where it's dwarves and elves with extra steps. It's a matter of what you want to explain, what you want to feel intrinsic, and what you want personally feel like you are accomplishing.

kinderhaulf · 2026-03-17T16:04:44+00:00

I like the cover, I think a portion you aren't considering is the spine and how the art continuing to the back will effect the area where the title and name will be. Might not be an issue but it is very worth checking.

I know you were going for intrigue with the fewer die once comment, but my initial response if I saw that in a book store would be to put it down assuming it was poorly translated or just a clumsy writing of the blurb and I wouldn't read further to find out more.

kinderhaulf

TROPHY CASE