I've seen many other creators chase the numbers and regret it because they generally feel like they were less creative and liked the content creation process less as a result. I personally only do things that spark joy because I generally care more about them being better quality.

I tend to ask questions about the character and how they "respond" fleshes out their personality and behaviors until I know how they're going to react to any circumstance. For a villain, specifically, it's important to really think about what morals they stick to and which do they break. How far?

Generally, I work characters in last cuz I'm a worldbuilder first. No world/system is perfect. People fall through the cracks. If you place a character in an extremely affluent family, that environment shapes the character as well as their personality and relationships.

Definitely not a bad author to be compared to. Definitely can see the similarities in terms of how you've constructed your magic system. You both also tied your current world's state to a singular event/resource in the past. He just put that event much further back than you have.

Brandon Sanderson has a whole thing on his "3 Rules of Magic," and this is one of his rules. Limits are more important than powers. He talks more about "hard magic," which is explicitly defined and explained, but you can apply the rules universally to soft magic, which is more vibe-based

Togekiss

Yeah. Twice. Each for about 15 minutes

The spiciest duck

Glaceon is my all-time fav. Also, ice and snow vibes are kinda my whole aesthetic