Every time you start to see the light at the end of the tunnel, you build your tunnel longer, LOL. In all seriousness tho, this project became so much bigger than you originally planned (word wise for sure) so you deserve to celebrate how far you have come. When the first chapter does finally make it to the light of day, I will greet it with screaming (as usual).
I'm just really bad at estimating stuff.
It's also just the route structure itself. In Gilded Shadows and Changeling I did try to keep the routes roughly the same length. But if one route is like 7000 words or 10,000 longer than another it's not that noticeable because the routes are all self contained.
But in Stars, that's not the case, unfortunately. If one route is significantly longer than the others it's really apparent. So initially I thought the routes would be 60,000 words each. So that's 360,000 words. But then Asher's route was 70,000 words drafted. That immediately bumps the total up - not by 10,000 words but by 60,000 words because I have to increase everyone's route by the same (roughly) amount. So then it was 420,000 words of route content (just route content - that isn't even including the "common" content). And then I edit Asher's route and it goes up by another 10k...which is really another 60k. And now it's 480,000 words of route content (+ common route content).
In GS I didn't have to do that so when Maggie's route was a little bit on the longer side compared to, say Ari or Caissa...it wasn't that big a deal. I just rolled with it.
But in Stars, that little bit sextuples every time because otherwise it's really noticeable that some characters have less content. That's really where the struggle to estimate has come in.
Although I'm also just bad at estimating. 🤣
Changeling estimate: 300,000 words
Reality: 686,000 words
Gilded Shadows estimate: 650,000 words
Reality: 1,370,000 words
When Stars Collide estimate: 300,000 words (lol), then 450,000 words
Reality: ...Probably just over 600,000 words.
At some point I need to just stop trying to estimate. Rofl. The truth is, they will be how long they need to be. LoL
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