Gary Kleppe wrote:

Larry Fontenot <larryf@members-advantage.com> wrote:

I will gladly listen to any comments and criticism that is offered in the
spirit of helpfulness, either listed or private, and of course I encourage it!
After all, that's what we post this stuff for.

Okay... biggest problem I have with this is the lack of conflict.
Everything's going smoothly, and while that's nice for our heroes, it's
not as interesting to read about. Conflict doesn't necessarily have to
be physical -- it could be Genma's desire to see Ranma become a powerful
martial artist vs. his wanting to do what's best for the boy. But there
should be conflict of some type, because that's what keeps readers
wondering what's going to happen next.

Also, most of this chapter went by in a sort of quick summary mode. I
think it might be good to show at least a few of the scenes in detail.

Gary Kleppe
http://www.execpc.com/~kleppe/comics.html

    Fair enough comments.  There isn't much conflict at this point because I'm
mainly just getting the characters together.  More will happen in the next chapter,
when they start wandering again.  If this was a story I was writing completely on
my own, everything up to this point would probably have been ONE chapter.  As it
is, I am setting these up as short chapters just to get them done and out of the
way.  I noted in the first chapter that there wasn't much fill material because I
am in the process of changing the basic idea Metro had into the framework I want to
work around.  My intent was to go back later and put in more detail.  You noticed
that the fights are only mentioned in passing; when I do a major rewrite those will
be scenes of their own.

As for the kind of character conflict you are mentioning, I haven't thought too
much about that sort of thing yet.  The closest thing I've done to it is touching
very briefly on Nodoka's conflict between being a mother and raising a "manly man"
in this chapter.  I will probably do more with that idea too.

...and if you think THIS is sparse, remember that Metro's original idea was just
about 80k from start to finish! Now THAT was bare bone!

Ja ne,
Larry F