Just thought I’d jump in to correct the other asker, Taylor’s odd were no better or worse than anyone elses. Aegis was indeed a likely second protagonist, but there was nothing to guarantee they wouldn’t both die. Wildbow did not plan for Taylor to die, but he was prepared for the possibility.

I think a lot of people are misinterpreting/misunderstanding WoG on the die rolls. Wildbow definitely didn’t *plan* to have Taylor die there. A lot of people miss the fact that very little of Worm was planned out in advance. I think the “seat of your pants” writer thing has been pointed out in the past, which ties in really well with the die rolls. Wildbow has given various descriptions of how the story might have played out if different sets of characters had died (including Taylor). Unfortunately, a lot of people seem to misinterpret that and think that those descriptions were his original plan for the story. They weren’t, because he didn’t have one! I think he’s said that he didn’t bias things *in favor* of Taylor surviving, but that’s very from saying he biased them towards her dying. Assuming the death rate did end up around ¼, that means she probably had better than even odds of surviving.

I see. I do think it makes sense that he would give the characters modifiers, and that Taylor’s modifier would be low because she is, as someone described her, a “squishy bug girl”, but yeah, this all makes a lot of sense too.

(Incidentally, re: “seat of your pants” tying in with the dice rolls, recall that when I first learned of this, I called it “the ultimate seat-of-your-pants writing technique”.)

Hopefully this doesn’t count as spoilery, but your guess as to what’s up with Zigzag is as good as ours. As far as I know, Wildbow has never commented on that. Whoever they were, they’re dead now, so it’s not really relevant to the story.

Yeah, that’s fair enough.

I kinda like this, honestly. The fact that Wildbow puts in things like these that are intriguing, but not relevant and not promising to be relevant (which would make them an annoying violation of Chekhov’s gun and conservation of detail)… details that indicate that there’s a story here, a story we might not ever learn, much like how we see traces of strangers’ stories all the time in real life. It makes the world feel more real.

To clarify the section numbering thing a bit, Interlude 3 ½ actually was NOT a donation bonus. Wildbow didn’t even set up a donation button until after he’d left college and committed to writing full time (around Arc 6 or 7). Back during Arc 4, he had buffer of unpublished chapters, and he accidentally posted the wrong one at some point, and spoiled some people. Interlude 3 ½ was an apology for that. At the time, he didn’t know that wasn’t going to be the only mid-arc interlude in the story.

Ah, interesting!

I’m not sure this does clarify the numbering, except maybe by indicating that Wildbow didn’t know he’d eventually have to figure out a system that allowed for the potential of multiple mid-Arc Interludes in the same Arc, just in case that issue came up. (That much I’d already figured.) It’s nice to know nonetheless, though.