Because ClassicDrogn asked about it a few days ago, here's a capsule summary of the action in DW1. Please be aware that this is one of my earliest works, and also never got nearly as much brainshare as the other Steps did. As a result, it's somewhat skimpy compared to the other plots that are in active development, and has big "need idea here" holes.
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Drunkard's Walk I: A Horse Ain't A Horse, Of Course, Of Course
Summary copyright (C) 1996-2003, Robert M. Schroeck.

The local timeframe for the story is a year or two before the Valdemaran portions of "By The Sword". Elspeth would be in her early teens, long out of her "Brat" phase.
Doug awakens in the Companions' Grove in Haven, Valdemar. His arrival and attempts at diplomacy alarm the Companions, but the subsequent appearance of Heralds helps calm things down a bit. During this time he first meets Delandra ("Dee") vel'Devarn, late-teens Herald-Trainee and sole orphaned child of a noble family whose holdings lie on the Hardorn border. Dee is obsessively intense and prone to overworking herself; her Companion Sylvath is even more distrustful of Doug than most of the other Companions.
Doug establishes his bona fides, gets a bit of an orientation, and eventually is presented to the Queen, who declares him an honored guest and grants him quarters at the Collegium until he can find a way home. A magical accident involving (unknown to anyone involved) Vanyel's heartstone exchanges language skills between Dee and Doug, and for this reason she is assigned as his semi-permanent guide and aide; this relationship eventually blossoms into a deep friendship, becoming the first of the "brother-sister" relationships Doug acquires on the Walk.
To avoid going stir-crazy from lack of activity, Doug ends up teaching unarmed combat to Trainees, and trades some of his advanced techniques to Alberich for advanced training in various weapons.
While Doug settles in, we explore Dee's backstory, which centers around border disputes over her lands, which butt up against Hardorn. The death of her parents seems to be cut-and-dried, but there is something that makes her wonder; were they murdered? Who would benefit from destabilizing the area?
We meet some of the main cast from the books, including a 12-year-old Elspeth, who gets some specialized -- and deadly -- self-defense training from Doug. Doug grows increasingly depressed as he tries to find a way home and repeatedly fails.
In exploring the Collegium and the Palace, Doug discovers a forgotten part of the library holding many books on magic, and really notices for the first time the compulsion that keeps the Valdemarans from thinking much about magic. Unable to do anything about it, he studies the texts he found and learns about node magic.
Around this time he also encounters the vrondi for the first time. He can see them in magesight, and is more amused by them than anything else. Being the egotist he is, he enjoys being watched, and does some silly stuff just to get a reaction from them.
Dee suffers an accident or two that might have been intentional attempts on her. Or not.
Growing desperately lonely and homesick, Doug tries to create a gate on the site of his arrival. It backfires in a subtle and devastating way: he does little but create a massive magestorm and an illusion of Shadowwalker that breaks his heart before he realizes what it is. Dee and Sylvath have to go out, find him, and drag him back in, but not before he falls ill from a combination of exposure, his depression, and burning all his strength to force a gate.
Dee nurses him back to health, and during that time he tells her more about his homeworld than he's told anyone else.
(...)
Dee goes on leave/holiday/whatever to her family home on the Hardorn border. Doug goes with her.
Visit to Demsbury, a city (ie, large town) in Dee's home district -- it's under attack by a suspiciously large and well-equipped band of bandits. Doug and Dee fight the attackers. He uses "This Corrosion" to destroy the attackers' armor and siege weapons. In the midst of the attackers' confusion and retreat, Doug and Dee get inside the town
Doug fixes and improves the town's wooden palisade wall, using "We Built This City". Doug (using "I'm Alive") and Dee minister to the wounded of the city, as they have no healers left... including a "mole", who, after healing, attacks and critically wounds Dee; Doug kills him with his bare hands, then, over Sylvath's obvious but unvoiced objections, flies her back to Haven and the Healers' Collegium, who stabilize her.
Right after midnight, he is able to heal her, and the next day they return together to the town, which has by now discovered that their fields are absolutely devastated -- first by the battle, and then by "This Corrosion" -- most of their crop is gone. Doug tries to jumpstart the fields using "Sowing the Seeds of Love" by Tears for Fears. Meanwhile, Sylvath throws a hissy fit about Doug while Dee is amused.
Doug and Dee finally make it to Dee's estates, discover the band of mercs wasn't an isolated incident. Somebody wants the land and they're wearing down at the defenses. The fellow overseeing the lands in Dee's absence is old and to a certain degree willfully blind about the severity of matters. He didn't want to alarm her, so he hasn't been telling her (or the Crown, for that matter) about the troubles.
(...)
Doug and Dee's defense of Demsbury seems to have stemmed the tide; regular dispatches from her estates indicate that the attacks and whatnot have dwindled to almost nothing since the big defeat. After several months, they relax and begin prepping Dee for her graduation to full Herald.
(...)
Dee is kidnapped right out of Haven just as she's leaving on some pre-arranged trip (her internship?), so her disappearance is unnoticed for a while. (Sylvath is disabled somehow.)
When they discover her kidnapping (kidnappers' demands?), he tries a new song (Radar Love, by Golden Earring) to see if he can locate her; to his surprise, it not only allows him to home in on her, it physically drags him there at mach speeds, leaving an arrow-straight swath of shockwave-caused destruction in his wake.
Dee is imprisoned in a keep on the Hardornen frontier, despairing. Feedback from song (lyrics specify two-way linkage) alerts Dee that he's coming; she's languishing in a cell of some sort. She decides that she's not going to be stuck there waiting to be rescued, and figures out a way to spring herself.
(...)
Kidnappers include a mage -- they're a hit team from Hardorn, intended to destabilize the region so it can be politically annexed. Doug faces the mage, detects a nearby node he's using. Not knowing how to handle a node properly (the books really don't say much except "don't"), Doug sucks the entire thing down in one gulp as he's triggering a song, and turns into something like a fire elemental by accident... bye-bye mage.
Dee is somehow instrumental in bringing him back, as he's lost in the welter of power.
(...)
Weeks later.
Doug moves on with a song he thinks will get him home. Tearful parting between him and Dee, cool one from Sylvath. Before he goes, he takes Dee on an illusionary tour of his home world.
(...)
Two years later, Dee is caught up in a vision -- a communication from Doug. Make it a touching coda that provides a neat closure.
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As you can see, it's pretty crude. Delandra doesn't get nearly as much to do as she should, and is in fact more passive than she should be. Furthermore, I set up hooks for her at the beginning and never follow through on most of them. Of course, this is mostly because I abandoned it in deference to Lackey's views on fanfiction, but if I were to ever pick it up again, I'd rebuild Dee's part from scratch, almost.
So there you go.

-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

In the wake of a shopping trip...
I gave her a thorough once-over. Low-heeled ankle boots that had a pattern of piecework and color that would have made them something like saddle shoes had there been more than a hair's contrast between the two shades of leather. Red spandex biker shorts. Black leather jerkin-like top with a military cut to it. Surmounting it all was that trenchcoat -- Australian-made, matte black leather, hanging nearly to her heels. She wore it slipped over her shoulders like a cape, a single button at the top of the chest holding it in place like a cloakpin. Between its swirls I thought I could see the end of her scabbard. She stopped a couple of feet away from me, planted her fists on her hips, and gave me that artless, confident grin of hers. "What do you think?"I looked her over a second time, and shook my head. "I knew Ishouldn't have let you stay up all night watching 'Highlander'."She laughed. "I can't wait to let Akio know that there can beonly *one* prince."

-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

I just received a comp copy of Shapeshifters by Fedex last night, direct from the printer. It looks pretty good, except for a number of errata I'm going to have to send off to SJG. Some of those are probably my fault, but there are several which were clearly caused in-house: dropped words in heavily-edited passages, a couple internal cross-references to the the wrong pages, things like that. I'm still making my way through the final book, but overall I'm very pleased -- so far.

-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

too bad it's too new for the Walk
I see this as putting the subject (whether only Doug or by touch or ranged or whatever) into a trance state that stops them from getting any worse off than they already are (from shock, blood loss, etc) and possibly heals them... slowly. Once activated, the trance lasts until they are healed or some negation song/power is used - maybe Lita Ford's "Your Wakeup Call" suggested before? About the only line that doesn't directly fit this is the one about avoiding cliches, but perhaps as a side effect, the person never, EVER wakes up 'just in the nick of time...' Oh, I forgot the 'destroy my ego' bit. I dunno about that one, but it's not like Doug's metatalent hasn't skipped words that don't fit the theme before.
- CD

Madonna - Die Another Day
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I'm gonna wake up, yes and no
I'm gonna kiss some part of
I'm gonna keep this secret
I'm gonna close my body
Guess, die another day
Guess, die another day
Guess, die another day
Guess, die another day
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll die another day
Analyze this
Analyze this
Analyze this...this...this...this...this...
I'm break the cycle
I'm gonna shake up the system
I'm gonna destroy my ego
I'm gonna close my body now
I think I'll find another way
There's so much more to know
I guess I'll die another day
It's not my time to go
For every sin I'll have to pay
I've come to work, I've come to play
I think I'll find another way
It's not my time to go
I'm gonna avoid the cliche
I'm gonna suspend my senses
I'm gonna delay my pressure
I'm gonna close my body now
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll just die another day
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll just die another day
I think I'll find another way
There's so much more to know
I guess I'll die another day
It's not my time to go
Uh
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll just die another day
I guess I'll die another day
I guess I'll just die another day
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

"Louie the Rune Soldier".
If only to spare poor Melissa's nerves.
-- Bob
(Edit: Spelling. Louie is a warrior, not a piece of melted lead and tin.)
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

Could you do me (and anyone else with a really big monitor who goes to your website) a big (pun intended!) favor? Widen your bacground image by at least 100 pixels of white on the right? at 1500p wide, I get a second green strip down the right as it tiles over... (Yes, I run 1600x1200 - I like a lot of screen real estate
Thanks bunches!
Offsides
Drunkard's Walk Forum Moderator and Prereader At Large

There's been a few suggestions for settings that might merit a scene or two as Doug interacts with the inhabitants, but not a full step. Well, I just thought of another: The Spelljammer setting from AD&D2E.
Specifically, I think he should pop in abourd a Gnomish Dreadnever, their five-year mission a Moby Dick-esque hunt for Furry Norman, the Giant Intelligent Phase Space Hamster of Ill Omen (and to seek out ideas and new grand inventions)... Mainly because I can't imagine a doubletake wild enough for his reaction to the traditional space hamster hunting chant (Spaham, spaham, SPAHAM, spaham, SPAHAMMITY SPAHAM! SPAHAMITY SPAHAM!) and the service anthem of the Gnomish Space Marines, the chorus of which was noted in a sidebar. A reconstruction of the entirety follows, thoguh the last verse is less than certain.
In the town where I was born
lived a gnome with a flying machine
and he told us of his life
in the Gnomish Space Marines
So we sailed into the sun
on flapping wings driven by steam
and we lived in Wildspace
in our gnomish sky machine
We're all part of the Gnomish Space Marines
Gnomish Space Marines
Gnomish Space Marines
We're all part of the Gnomish Space Marines
Gnomish Space Marines
Gnomish Space Marines
Lots of gnomes are here on board
building daily inventions galore
Hamsters replace steam today
(chorus)
DesignerofmanyingeniousdevicesforspeedcontrolnotrelyinguponvariationintherotationofSpaceHamsterwheels!
Full speed ahead, now!
Ready the Speciallymodifiedhighpenetrationautomaticallyrelaodingdualballistarequiringonlyonegnomeforoperation!
Aye aye, sir! Fire!
Workshop! Workshop!
As we live a life that's free
Every one of us (every gnome ingeniuslyinventiveandmechanicallybrilliant of us)
has all we need (has a completeexpandedtoolkitincludingmetalandwoodcraftingtoolsnottomentionstonecuttingandtextileequipmentavailableonrequestandaholdfullofpartsandmaterialsforalltoaccess--)
Phlogiston (--experimentscontinuewithfindingamethodtocontainthegasoutsideCrystalSpheresforuseasafuelorpropellantliketheKlik'lik'klakshipsdespite--)
and in the Spheres (--althoughsofarnomethodshavebeendeterminedforworkingwiththematerialcomposingthesesphereswhichsurround--)
in the Gnomish (--andofcoursenoonewouldeverwanttousesuchaphlogistonbombexceptforreallyevilpeopleofcoursebutitstheGnomishSpaceMarines'jobtobe--)
Space Marines (--andsowehavetobepreparedtomakesurethattheonlyoneslaughingoverthefallenremainsoffoesisusthoguhofcoursewewouldn'treallylaughunlesstheyhadsomefunnylastwordsbutthentheyprobablywouldn'thavebeen--)
(chorus)
(chorus)
(chorus)
(chorus)
(... chorus)
(poke the spoken-part gnome to remind him the song is over)
- CD
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

The DW Gallery page has been updated with two new pieces by Dave Menard, who thanks to his incredible industry might as well be christened the official visual chronicler of DW and Warriors' World. Look for new images of both Hexe and Silverbolt, if you haven't already.

-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

The DW Gallery page has been updated with two new pieces by Dave Menard, who thanks to his incredible industry might as well be christened the official visual chronicler of DW and Warriors' World. Look for new images of both Hexe and Silverbolt, if you haven't already.

-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

Hey, long time for me to not post . . .

So anyway, I've decided that I wanted to try my hand at a Drunkard's Walk on the Macross 7. I thought *maybe* on the Macross or even during Macross Zero, but figured that not only are there enough happy-go-lucky-yet-serious-in-combat guys in both series, but also that the character interactions would be better.
Again, I am following the model laid-down in DWII, wherein a peripheral character would be the "in" for the rest of the cast, and here I have chosen Rex, the leader of the Macross 7's bike gang who follow Fire Bomber around. Rex and Doug's relationship is going to be platonic and only that. Rex is, at first, too hung up on Basara and then too used to thinking of Doug as "a guy I know, kind of a friend, i guess *scratch head in anime befuddlement*" to go with Doug. There'd be the sort of easy camaradery that having a common interest would bring in.
Doug, of course, has the primary super-hero duty of defending the citizens of the fleet from the attacks of the Proto-devlin, particularly the most powerful ones. Though he has some successful offensive encounters, he's mostly defensives since he can only go toe-to-toe with Syvil, and even then she could probably beat him in space. Frankly, I think that he'd serve better in a defensive mode, trying to limit the damage the fleets and big ships do. Also, he could try to break up the "vampires" that infiltrate the ship in the beginning of the series.
CHARACTER INTERACTIONS:
Basara and Doug: this is, frankly, an explosive combination. Despite his happy-go-lucky attitude, Doug (it seems to me) *enjoys* teaching and LECTURING. Whether it's magic, tactics, or other, Doug enjoys lecturing on subjects. And Basara would ever and always either a) ignore him, b) walk past him, or c) tell doug to shut up. Doug would probably, to my mind, make it seem as if basara's rejection of his expertise as unimportant, but he'd be really annoyed and after a while would not bother to hide it. Basara *never* listens to other people, always does what he thinks best, and is both surly and stubborn about doing it. The annoying thing for Doug, as it is for everyone else, is that Basara is so often right. Eventually they would come to a truce and even get along in a certain way.
Mylene and Doug: they have a much easier relationship. Doug falls into the big brother role easily, something that Mylene never had (as all of her many siblings are all sisters), but she does chafe at times at the "big" part sometimes. He teases her about her relationship with Basara and Gamlin, while trying to convince her mother that Mylene doesn't need to get married quite so early (big mistake.)
Vifidas and Doug: Uhh . . . next.
Ray and Doug: Ray and Doug get along as mostly equals. Both easy going men. Nothing new here.
Milia and Doug: Depending on which story direction I want, this could go any way. Certainly antagonistic on her part, particularly as it relates to Mylene and her engagment.
Gamlin and Doug: Much like his relationship with Basara, Gamlin is greatly annoyed by Doug's unauthorized interference with the defense of the Macross 7 fleet. Not sure where to go yet there . . . maybe Gamlin, Doug and Basara form a sort of spectrum of personality types. Speaking of which, one wonders how much Doug likes being the lone vigilante.
Now, I am arguing with myself about whether Doug's abilities should be revealed or not. It could lead to some interesting avenues in the story, but then again I may be treading the same waters. At any rate, the real question is what to do with Anima-Spiritia. Anima-Spiritia, or rather Song Energy, has been shown to be a great power source, energizes people and frees their minds from mind control, and in fact promotes the growth and health of plant life (and other life, presumably.) So how does Doug's powers interact with Song energy? Does his powers get super-charged or what? And what would happen if he was hit with a pure dose of Song Energy? Some things to think about.
So, suggestions, comments, discouragments, and answers to questions are all welcomed.
-murmur
obviously insane