#Disgruntled Shae teaches the dsmp fandom to use AO3 tags

[anarchy-and-piglins]

Legit tho. All I want are Captain Puffy fics and all I get are "and Tommy's therapist is also here" =_=

Jup, and the problem isn't with those Tommy fics existing. It's the atrocious tagging in this fandom.

In fact, here's an impromptu AO3 tag guide

People seem to have started treating AO3 like other (algorithm driven) socmed and it's led them to thinking more tags is always better. This is a lie. AO3 works best if people only tag what's relevant.

As a general rule for tagging on AO3, the most important thing to keep in mind is asking yourself 'if somebody was specifically browsing this tag, to find this type of content, would my fic satisfy them?'

For example, a tag I use a lot is 'hurt Technoblade' because I enjoy writing angst and whump. I know that somebody who is in that tag, will like a lot of my fic. In one of my recent, more fluffy fics, Techno gets hit by an arrow. It's a short scene in a 8k fic and isn't too important to the overall plot. I did not tag that fic as 'hurt Technoblade' because I know people browsing that tag aren't interested in a fic where he's hurt for three seconds max. In other words: just because a specific thing is technically in the fic, doesn't mean I need to tag it.

Character tags are no different and should be reserved only for main characters and important side characters. If a character only cameos in a few scenes and has little to no influence on the plot, you shouldn't tag them.

(Again, ask yourself 'hey if somebody was looking for fic about this character, is their role within my narrative big enough to count?'. Swap the blorbos in your head and imagine you were reading your fic to get content of your fav. Would those few scenes they appear in be enough to satisfy you?)

Unless your fic is a huge one-shot collection, I don't want to see 20 different character tags on your damn story. Because you're either tagging every bitch with a single speaking line, or if you've actually tried to divide your narrative focus over 20 characters, the result is probably as cohesive as a bad LSD trip.

In the extra tags, you can specifically put '(character name) mentioned' and '(character name) cameo'. Use those if you want. But only tag characters (and relationships and other things) if they play a significant major role within the plot.

[anarchy-and-piglins]

different anon here, it's gotten to the point where I dont even bother going through the techno tag on ao3 anymore. I have to stick to the techno-centric tag otherwise it's all tommy, and even then sometimes the fics are /still/ centered on tommy. its exhausting

Yeah, character tags are a hopeless mess but so are character-centric tags because newsflash: this fandom doesn’t know how those work either. Hold onto your boots kids, I’m doing a second impromptu AO3 tag guide: character-centric edition. And after that I have some advice for you Anon, but I’m forcing you to read my rant first because I’m thriving.

Let’s start with the basic thing that everybody gets wrong:

Character-centric =/= pov character =/= all the main characters.

Character-centric = the one character the plot centers around.

Now, obviously a centric character and the pov character can often overlap. However, not always. A pov character is just the character whose head we’re in, so to speak. A centric character is the character the fic is about, the One Main Character. For example: if you write a fic that is from Techno’s pov but is all about him finding Tommy after exile and taking care of Tommy and such, then the chances are high that it’s just a Tommy-centric fic.

Which leads me into the second thing: not all fic need to have a character-centric tag. And if they do: one or two MAX will suffice.

You’ll notice that a lot of AO3 fic doesn’t have a character-centric tag. That’s because you should see ‘character-centric’ almost more like its own subgenre, it’s an additional tag used to filter content and say to people “hey, this fic is very much disproportionately focused on this character”. This character is the center of the universe in this fic, so to speak.

Your fic can have one centric character, you can maybe have two if you’re writing about a specific dynamic. (Be wary of examples such as the above post-exile fic though. A fic can certainly be Technoblade-centric and Tommy-centric if it gives them both equal weight of importance in the plot and focuses on them individually as well as together. Not if Techno is just being a Big Brother (tm) who does nothing but care for Tommy and feel guilty about not being better for Tommy the entire story.)

You should not have more than two character-centric tags. The exception is if your fic focuses on a pre-established group in the source material, those often have their own centric tags (SBI-centric, dteam-centric) though AGAIN: only use that one if your fic actually focuses on the different dynamics within this group and on the members as individuals that have a life and agency outside of the other members. Do not tag a Tommy angst fic where the other three SBI guys are only there to take care of him or interact with him as SBI-centric.

“But Shae,” you scream desperately, “what if I write a fic that DOES focus equally on three or more people who aren’t an established group with their own tag???”

That’s great. Just use a combination of character tags, relationship tags, other additional tags and your summary to make it clear who the fic is about. It’s that easy.

As I mentioned above, character-centric tags are used for filtering by people looking for content of their favs, where they’re the MAIN main character. Just like how you shouldn’t tag a character that only appears for a few scenes because people looking for that character’s content will be disappointed, somebody looking for character-centric content will be dissatisfied with a fic where that character is not present for large chunks at a time because you’re focusing on other people for a bit.

There’s nothing wrong with an ensemble cast fic, those are fun to write and read! They’re just not character-centric.

So that was my rant. Now Anon, my advice for you? Sort fic by additional tags + filter out other tags generously. How do you do that? It’s very simple:

Step 1) find a character specific tag for your blorbo. Preferably something you enjoy reading. For example, I frequent tags such as ‘Technoblade needs a hug’ or ‘Technoblade angst’ or ‘hurt Technoblade’.

Step 2) While sorting, exclude the ‘Tommyinnit-centric’ tag. As mentioned above, this fandom doesn’t use tags correctly so this is not a foolproof plan. But I guarantee it makes a HUGE difference. You can proceed to also filter out other tags you don’t like or those that are often used by Tommy-centric writers (’traumatized Tommyinnit’ for example). Theoretically, you can even sort out Tommy’s character tag. Tada!

Disclaimer: Be aware that this is a double-edged sword. The more tags you exclude, the higher the chances are you’re also accidentally excluding fics that would appeal to you and just happen to use Tommy tags. Some of my fics are tagged ‘traumatized Tommyinnit’ or ‘Tommyinnit needs a hug’. My recommendation is to see what your mood is like. Do you want to get a fic to read as fast as possible with minimal scrolling? Exclude away! But if you want to do a more thorough fic scavenger hunt, I usually feel like just excluding Tommyinnit-centric already makes a world of difference even if it doesn’t solve the problem completely.