Behind the Curtains: Radical Dreamer Cutting Room Floor and Thoughts

 Welcome to the first ever documented "Harpyplot Cutting Room Floor"! I normally don't do these because I keep forgetting details and certain elements might be reused, but I figured I might as well try to condense my thoughts here and outline my thought process for the whole shebang!

When coming up with the Radical Dreamers, I had MAGIC on the mind, and I was rewatching runs of NiGHTs into Dreams. That led to me looking at the wiki for lore, delving right in and what do you know? Wizeman's a nightmare guy. Oh, he used to be human? Wow, there's a good motive in that! It spiraled out from there, developing a whole organization that wanted the "best" for Agama. It helped that I was always fascinated by dreams and what they could imply, further helped by the sudden influx of strange dreams I had in the past couple of months. It was supposed to be a MAGIC focused plot, but when you're hosting the plot itself, it's a bit harder to focus on your own character. 

And what's an organization without the people? I had been on a small Pokemon hype trip, but it was enough for me to grab two of the more prominent members of a Team that hadn't been featured in RP yet, Mars and Jupiter from Team Galactic! They played off well against each other, Mars being the more spunky, hotheaded, and somehow more reasonable one of the two, while Jupiter was more refined, easily bored, and eager to cause destruction without thinking of the consequences. 

Klara and Avery were lumped in to enhance the two dualities, Klara being as plucky as Mars but unwilling to get into the thick of things, prefering to be a spy so that she could find a way to spin it well into her pop star career, while Avery... Admitedly, I just turned his smuggery all the way up to 11 because I clearly do not like him. Both Klara and Avery had their reasons to be in the Isle of Armor, mostly due to self-confidence issues brought on by societal expectations, and those same things were the things that drew them into the Radical Dreamers. Granted, one was more successful than the other, but I have made my bias quiiite clear: I love Mars and Klara so much more than Jupiter and Avery. 

Megumu was not originally a part of the crew, but once I started piecing together how they were going to gather money for their operations and Unconnected Marketeers dropped in like a meteor to claim Chao's heart enough for Chimata to rise from it like a rainbow-colored goddess, I knew she would be the best one to facilitate the end of the first arc. Smug tengu, already had a grudge against Chimata, clever enough to help instigate the original UM incident? Oh, yep, she fits in like a charm. I almost considered throwing in the forest kappa for the scalper event, but Mike fit in a whole lot better with her powers and admitedly sad backstory. Kuroji was also always part of this equation, as she's a money grubbing scammer in Len'en, so she was a good fit for the Scalper Shakedown. The Black Mage thing came in later when I talked with Chao, and considering Kuroji is smart, of course she'd have contingency plans to make a fair bit of money even if she gets arrested. I toned her down greatly from her original character, because 1. why would I even go that far and 2. someone had to be conscious enough to rat Megumu out!

Silver was more of a late addition to the crew with Zinnia, and only because there were fan theories about him being related to Giovanni and Mars. We always need some sort of pure asshole in the gang, especially when a large part was more sympathetic than usual. Zinnia was intended to be harassing the Regis all year long, thinking them incompetent and even going as far as to steal and destroy artifacts to destroy their history. That didn't really work out for reasons I'll give out later, but ultimately I'm happy with how they both turned out. Butch and Cassidy? Well, we all need some sort of extra fodder, and I figured that'd be a fun duo to try to capture that damn Pikachu- er, dream guardian.

Hooaka is a strange addition. First, I thought it was natural Kuroji would try to get her siblings involved. Then, thinking harder, I figured Kuroji actually didn't want to involve her siblings. I called Hooaka "the nuke" in my notes, but how would they stay if their sister left? Easy: geas, because Wizeman needed a nuclear option, and he wasn't about to let them get away. They were supposed to be in the Brawl as the Radical Dreamer rep, and not as a Secret Fiter, either! Full blown character slot. I backed down once I thought of better reps and knew Wizeman wouldn't let his nuke get blown up prematurely.

Finally, we have Alejandro, aka Lance! I always intended, even before he turned out to be Lance after outside influence, to have some sort of sensible evil leader, someone who knows what they're up against and knows when to back down. We had plenty for Salvagerplot for the most part, but it was fun writing a villain who tries to keep their opponents in mind. The lance bit didn't come until after the balan wonderworld mishaps. I was so frustrated that this game had such potential narrative-wise, but forgot that show, don't tell needs at least some sort of balance! I had other ideas for Wizeman's nightmare gang, such as Nightmare from Kirby's Adventure and Reala from NiGHTs, but 1. I didn't want to drag the plot out like I usually do, especially once the plot changed drastically from my former plans and 2. Lance is perfect for this sorta thing. Just the one is fine, thank you.

Mechagodzilla was one of the last ones added, since I hadn't watched Kong vs Godzilla until earlier this year. Without getting into spoilers, he left a lasting impression, and the way he came about was interesting enough that he could fit right in. His first appearance in Boston was to make a lasting impression, a beast to reckoned with. He turned out to be more of a good person in the end, given that the dreams fueling him were ultimately good people. Nooot so much for the finale, when Wizeman pulled his trick to fuel this bastard with fearsome nightmares.

That's our cast we're working with, now let's move onto...

ACT 1: Marketplace Madness

In typical Harpy fashion, this particular act rose up from sheer, utter spite, evolving from just one silly Mayplot to a full blown vendetta. Scalpers had not only made finding rare exclusive dinosaurs harder than it needed to be, but also made buying the gen 5 consoles a huge pain in the ass, and even going as far as to scalp football cards and pokemon cards! I knew that I wanted to channel that righteous fury in a way that was constructive, and what better way to do that than make a plot about it!

At first, it was just going to be Kuroji's little shop, her handling all these faux Kobber merch while the real money came from a nightmaren disguised as an old woman with huge glasses and an outfit that made her stand out, like a fake psychic or witch. She'd lure in customers and scare them with their deepest fears and nightmares before selling them a solution to all of those in the form of dream crystals, which would have absorbed some of the negative energy and channeled it right into Wizeman and his goons. Carla was supposed to be the original target, this woman preying on the loss of her family and lingering fear of flames, though Sonia would have stepped in and ripped her a new one before Carla's will gave in to get one of these crystals. I considered Carla running off if Sonia was being too overbearing and meeting Doremy at her Dream Parlor.

The main reason it didn't get in? I didn't have the energy nor the creativity to put that on paper. It's one thing to get thoughts about it, but another to put it into words and actually describe it. The struggle has eased up once I started to deal with my anxiety and ADHD, but I just couldn't push myself to make that post. So I needed a new angle, and fast.

Mike came to mind after I watched the hell out of Unconnected Marketeers and learned about her, and so, she became the first enemy to get bonked for her scalper troubles. One thing led to another as I thought about it, and soon enough, it turned into Mike ratting on Kuroji, Kuroji ratting on Megumu, and Megumu facing off with the Kobbers with some of her allies who were dreaming along with her. https://youtu.be/Udn3r030Wic Where's that Bustling Marketplace Now was a huge inspiration for that final battle, whimsical but still carrying some dangerous undertones. It fit, especially since Chimata played a huge role in defeating Megumu!

Involving the ConjureArms competition wasn't intended up until the conflict flared up, Megumu seizing that opportunity to discourage Saturn and Ravio and get some of that sweet, sweet negativity to Wizeman. It didn't work out as she intended, but I wanted my plot in general to be impacted by the things that happened around them, the villains changing their plans accordingly.

Post-Brawl, after all was said and done, things drastically changed: Zinnia's reason for being kinda flopped and I couldn't justify her harassing the Regis after their high ranking. Mars already left, Klara was feeling more and more alone with a whole bunch of assholes, and Alejandro was seeing for himself that if they continued the way they were going, they didn't stand a chance.

Fortunately for them, Wizeman had one way to distract them.

ACT II: Rise of Darkrai

This act was originally supposed to be based around Jupiter. Earlier, I thought that maybe Jupiter failed so hard that Wizeman or Alejandro would trap her in a nightmare with what she truly wanted, and like Mars, she'd deal with this boring, spiritless world that was the ideal for their original boss, Cyrus. She would have ended up hospitalized, Skuntank would have pled with Mars and Purugly for help without understanding why Jupiter was sleeping for so long. Could you imagine, Juniper doing all this boring paperwork? Mars hating Jupiter's guts, but not enough to just leave her in that state? 

Yeah, that got tossed out the window when I couldn't find a good way to segue into it. Mars left, ready to take on the Brawl and seize it by the horns!

Then Mars died in the Brawl very early on.

After panicking for like two seconds, I realized that the segue just fell right into my lap, and instead of inflicting Jupiter, Mars would be the target instead. Kinda sucked since I kinda wanted to use her, and watching our girl suffer like this was painful. So I had my way to pull off this part of the plot like I imagined: it was just about filling the middle bits with some meat.

It was about the time Doremy needed to be introduced anyway, playing a part in this whole Dream World plot. The Dream World Gimmicks were pretty fun to mess around with, everyone's ideas of what to do blooming in the spur of the moment. Cassidy and Butch (and Gillwing I guess?) proved to be some good enemies  to face, keeping up with the Pokemon theme of this particular arc without resorting to nameless Galactic Grunts. Though, I intended the cave sequence to break into an underground water sequence so I could use a robo gyarados, buuut ehhhh, naaaah. 

In another true Harpism, I realized I also didn't have a way to wake Mars up. So what did I do? Bullshit and make Klara hella important. And what happened? Klara almost died because she was the key to derailing all these plans Wizeman had and cutting him off from a consistent source of energy. Writing Jupiter as she went from refined to deranged was fantastic, and I especially appreciated Mephita vs Skuntank in this battle of stinky. I would have thrown more than just Weavile at Lucina after she disrupted the assasination attempt on Jenny LeClue, but I realized I had some time constraints and didn't want to juggle everything around.

Facing off with Darkrai basically went off without any major changes! I didn't have anything solidly planned, just enough to have a general idea of what was to happen. Threw in some Dream World mechanics with a twist for an explosive last round, some crazy Dimension Rift shit, and Cyrus being a lifeless husk of a man who somehow has a Crobat, regarding his pokemon as means to an end than any friend he had. All in all, this segment went great, and I wouldn't change a thing if I had to do it again.

ACT III: A WISE MAN, OR A FOOLISH ONE?

This was an act I was hoping to hold off until later, but with the pace we were going, there was no way to justify Bubba sitting on his ass til later to rip the Dreamers a new one. Not much to say here: most of this was improv, with the dream mist summoning Negati and galactic grunts being fodder before the real juicy fight against Silver and the Johto Starters began. Hooaka was going to be a smartass no matter what, and they could have been a threat! Could have. Just like Lance: he could have turned into his phase 3 form and caused some mayhem, but all that was cut due to time constraints. No biggie, three shadow-ified Johto Starters would still prove a problem, and did!

The finale could have ended in several different ways. Back when Tsubakura was supposed to be more involved, there was the traveling train segment beating up nightmares along the way to face off with Wizeman's generals. Back when I was trying to think more on how to integrate this with Boss's past, the big boss tanuki would have been helping Wizeman and went crazy with Dream Magic to summon a monster, which then put his people to sleep in nightmares and terrified the shit out of him. Kobbers would have needed to come in to stop the expanding rift of the Dream World from taking over and using that as their way into Train Craziness. It also could have been infiltrating several Nightmarian cities, taking out head honchos and reclaiming territory as they made their way to Wizeman's Castle.

Doremy was actually supposed to die before the finale, gone in some way so that Wizeman could get away with whatever grandiose plan he had. However, Annie's character arc and the Demon Cede plot were too important to her, especially since Annie was in a rut, and nobody wants to find out what a CW and Harpy final boss collab is gonna be like. So instead, she lived, but downgraded. I do have some ideas for her to use a lesser version of her usual dream magic, maybe some adjacent sleep magic. And this way, we might be able to squeeze some backstory out of her! And for that, I'm thankful.

As plans fell through, the finale that was to be clicked into place as I learned more and more about the Negati Bosses. They were wasted potential, and I, a human being powered by spite and the need to occasionally 1-Up AAA studios, dropped all 12 of those suckers in with the Nightmare Powered Mechagodzilla for one helluva army plot! It was a good way to showcase some Harpchars helping, too, because just describing 12 bosses and what they could do? Too boring for my brain, let's show how they work with a few examples! I added a few flairs to them instead of relying entirely on their skills in game, though the Wiki was lacking in details. I threw in Lance's Shadow Form, seizing an opportunity to use it now when I couldn't in the HQ raid. Mechagodzilla? Always going to be there, and always going to be angry.

There's no better harpism than making shit up on the fly, though, thinking back to something I was collaborating on... and figuring, "hey, Wizeman could be a dream robot thing piloted by a Brume!" I'm sorry the first brume I make is an evil one, but I'll repent later. I think.

CONCLUSION

While some things were integrated better than others and this plot turned out to be "short" in that it didn't drag out through the entire year like a true megaplot, this is perhaps the most solid plot I've made in recent history, taking notes from what I did from Rejectplot and applying juuuust a baseline of things, a general structure without solidifying it entirely. It worked out very well for this three act structure, especially since time was always going to be an issue with my topsy-turvy work schedule. Working within those constraints was a bit difficult, and sometimes I felt like I had 0 energy after work to pull some of them off, but I wanted to break away from pushing plots back over and over again and push through.

I'll probably aim for this sort of 3 act structure for any longer plot I want to pull off in the near future and keep things relatively structured. Hey, if it worked, it worked! It also helped to workshop some ideas with others to make sure the motives made sense, to boot! I might not attempt the villain flexibility thing again, though. Then I'd probably run out of villains... or I end up with Brinegirl sympathy syndrome, which is terminally cute.  :V

Aaand... that's it! All the thoughts I could think up of at this time. Before I leave you all, there's just one last thing I want to share: A list of all the music that inspired huge chunks of this plot! 

THE RADICAL DREAMER PLAYLIST!

Where is that Bustling Marketplace Now? ~ Immemorial Marketeers

Fortunate Kitten

Ruby Illusions

Drawcia Sorceress/Drawcia Soul (GaMetal Remix)

Negati Boss Theme Compilation

The Darkness Brought in by Swallowstone - Naturalis Historia

Lunatic Dreamer

Nightmare Diary

The Princess Who Slays Dragon Kings (Ten Desires Remix)

Surprisingly, a big lack of NiGHTs music, but they kinda aren't my style? The new touhous have definitely played a big part, and Momoyo's theme actually inspired the Underground Battle! Drawcia was definitely introduced at the end, when Inkabelle had the greatest potential to use some of Drawcia's moves! Ruby Illusions inspired the way the Finale turned out, impacted by how intense Kal-Vec ended up being and its strong ties to The Void. The Red just won't stop. 

There's more to this, but that's for offseason. There's still much to be discovered, after all! What do I mean? Well, we'll find out~!