#i have an idea of the general plot already but i just dont feel like. writing it out LMAO

[kiwibirdlafayette]

hello my sillies!! since there was a bit of interest in more ab the nonsense that is my take on godswap mianite AU i went and dug up some of the brainrot I wrote last year but never shared outside of a private discord server + new stuff that I've recently came up with :D Enjoy! ❤️

- Jordan was born to parents who are priests of Mianite and raised in the temple- and ultimately was meant to be Mia's champion, and was trained as such for the majority of his life. However, being around mianite for most of his life made him cynical of the god and his principles, and went he got older, he left to seek out the god's brother, pledging himself to Dianite and wanting to bring about chaos. Amused and flattered by the man's near blind loyalty, Dia makes Jordan his champion

- His primary weapon is a firework crossbow gifted to him by Dianite himself (has piercing 8, mending, quick charge and unbreaking V (and flame on it, for use with arrows)) Plays off the sparkly and the fact that this man is a goddamn amazing sharpshooter no matter what universe he's in

- Mianite instead finds his champion in Tom Syndicate, the formerly deceased son of lighthouse keepers in the realm- and is brought back to life by the god (Mia never explains why specifically Tom was chosen, is described to people as just a "godly omnipotence" kinda thing)

- Shortly after Jordan, Tom, and the priests (aka FyreUK, with Wag and Matt under Dia, K.Tom under Mia) arrive and start making a mess of the realm with their shenanigans, a pirate ship captained by a 4th priest named BruteAlmighty "Phil" and two people- a parrot shapeshifter by the name of Sonja OmgitsVoidparrot and Tucker Jeriicho (normal human... allegedly)

- Sonja and Tucker both grew up in Ianarea, and with Phil's arrival from the End, have been searching across the realm for their missing goddess, and their messages led them to the Spawn Island (which I wish was canonically named istg) where supposedly a ruins containing information is hiding (Jordan and Tom both claim they know where this is. they dont)

- When Sonja was younger she was named Ianite's champion at a ceremony in Ianarea and was gifted her shapeshifting abilities as a way to hide from forces of evil and get into places more secretly

- Idk how canonically Nadeshot/The Modesteps enter the realm in character but basically at some point a flying ship appears and from it drops Captain Engine Failure and Skipper Coppereyes, more Dianitees (probably there to mess with Jordan) because Dianite having the most members is hilarious to me

(I got an ask about EF so I'll elaborate on her dynamic with everyone in a separate post >:] But bottom line put two chaos makers and an explosives enthusiast (Copper) in the same room it never ends well xD)

- I'm still thinking on this but with FyreUK, their priestlyness was given to them as a group due to the presence of the shadows from the get-go. When the Darkness began encroaching, the gods all sought out their respective priests and gifted them with powers to protect their respective domains (Dianite took in two- one to look over his temple in the nether, one to keep in the overworld because. chaos agenda- that one's Wag) and guide their champions when they found them

- Wag takes Dec's place by this logic i guess, he lives by the nether portal and will be anyone's personal tour guide because he likes doin it. and yes he absolutely uses any excuse to mess with people to mess with people he can be a menace a lot if he wants to

- Also Dec is a Wizard, I haven't developed him yet (he also has no design dont worry about it) but yes. Mans took on Athar himself he's just built different

- Syndisparklez and Foxxsize agenda always love me a good enemies to friends to lovers kinda shit. most of it is Capsize/EF flirting horribly with Sonja (and her not sure how to reciprocate but wants to) and Tom and Jordan with their usual "i fucking hate you i wish you were dead (read: i want to kiss you so bad)"

[silverislander]

prof said congrats for writing up a proposal so early i am going to get a good grade in. well this is literally going to be graded. but yk the meme

[solisaureus]

how do you write a fic and make it like

long?

ok actually i did give a brief workshop in a fandom server on this once. Here’s the sparknotes:

Stage 1: brainstorming

- decide the topic of your story. write down the idea that sparked your inspiration and start there. this is your core concept from which everything else arises. write down everything that you come up with when thinking about your story, even if you don’t end up incorporating it.

- if you don’t have ideas, most of my fic ideas arise when talking about my fav characters with friends who also love them.

- pin down a few essential aspects of your core concept. is it an AU or canon compliant? ship vs gen? is it going to focus on an overarching plot or a particular character’s personal journey? what ao3 rating do you expect it to be? what trope tags do you think you’ll add?

- make a pinterest board and a playlist for your fic concept. i’m serious this helps you solidify the tone, setting, and mood of your story and can provide more inspiration

Stage 2: outlining

- now that you know what your fic is gonna be about, it’s time to break down the story and make it a complete narrative. Your outline can be as detailed or as bare bones as you want. some writers don’t make an outline at all, but i cannot even begin to comprehend their power, and if you’ve never written a long work before i highly recommend starting with an outline.

- the two most important things to keep in mind during this stage are PACING and STRUCTURE. Characterization is secondary in this stage but still important. Now is the time to establish the setting and the major plot beats.

- decide the narrator, point of view, and tense during this stage

- if you’re stuck for ideas, here’s a cheat for pacing — come up with just 3 things: a goal, a time limit, and stakes. What does your protagonist want to accomplish, how long do they have to do it, and what are the consequences if they don’t achieve it in the time limit? Character A is in love with Character B and wants to be with them (goal), but Character B is moving away at the end of the summer (time limit). Character B risks rejection, and losing their friendship with Character A (stakes). Boom, you already have the skeleton of a story. Try to identify these elements in your favorite stories, it helps you practice this and can give you ideas for your own story. Frodo has to deliver the Ring to Mt. Doom (goal) before Sauron’s armies overwhelm Gondor (time limit) or else the world will fall into shadow (stakes). Obviously, this is just one plot formula among a wide variety and there’s no one right way to write a story, but it can get you started.

- Another way you can start is by detailing some exposition events, some rising actions, a climax, and resolution. If you already have a climactic scene in mind, you just need to figure out how your characters get there and what they do afterwards.

- once your outline is done, you should have a general feel for how long the project will be

Stage 3: drafting

- now it’s time to write the damn thing. sounds simple but it’s not

- practice getting into Da Writing Zone. when it’s time for me to get serious, I have a few video game soundtracks i’ll put on through my noise cancelling headphones, i’ll make myself some tea, and i’ll light a candle. i have basically conditioned myself to write when i hear the journey soundtrack or when i smell my pomegranate candle.

- Each scene that you write should serve a purpose in the overall narrative. I personally determine whether each scene contributes to at least one of the following: worldbuilding, progressing the plot, or characterization. a good scene will accomplish two or even all three.

- consider the voice, whether you’re writing from first or third person. are you telling the story with stern reverence, poetic wonder, snarky indifference? consistency in voice strengthens the story.

- keep suspense in mind, too. you dont want the protagonist to know everything right away — be intentional about what information they learn and when. what the protagonist knows and what the reader knows can differ, too — this is the source of dramatic irony. or you can keep the reader ignorant and have them discover plot elements at the same time as your protag. the intrigue!

- take your time. pace yourself. writing is hard and you don’t have a deadline when it comes to fanfiction. if you’re in a rut, something that i do is that i force myself to write 200 words — if i do that and i’m still not feeling it, i stop there and try again in a few days, but a lot of the time i just keep writing once i get past that hurdle of just starting.

- beginnings are always hard. keep in mind that this is just your draft — whatever you write doesn’t have to be the final version. just start at a point that seems interesting to you.

- as a general rule of thumb, if you’re bored writing something, it’ll be boring to read, too. you may tell yourself that you HAVE to write this dry section about worldbuilding or write how the characters get from one place to another, but do you really? how much would it affect the story if you skipped that? can you approach it another way, or work it in in another scene?

stage 4: editing

- kill your darlings. if something you wrote is out of place or unnecessary for the story, but you like it anyway, get rid of it. save it in another document for outtakes, but don’t give into the idea that a section is valuable just because you spent time on it.

- having a second set of eyes on your draft is a game changer. if you can get a friend (ideally another writer) to beta read your draft and make comments, it can make a huge difference. i always like to thank my beta readers when i post a fic because i appreciate their input so much!

- now is a good time to decide whether you want to post chapters as you write them or write everything first and post it all at once (or on a posting schedule). there are benefits and drawbacks to both but you know yourself best!

- once you are happy with your draft, post it! :)

stage 5: stamina

- writing is hard, and writing a long fic is really hard. even if you’re super passionate about a project when you start it, you will probably lose steam at some point depending on how long it is. at times you will be discouraged and unmotivated. it helps to have a friend who has volunteered to be your designated hype man for this fic. i like to have at least one person who i KNOW is awaiting my next chapter.

- the fact that you don’t get paid for writing fic means you have to balance your writing time with your life and responsibilities. you might have to take a hiatus. coming back to the project after a while can be hard — this is where those pinterest boards and playlists you made back in stage 1 come in. they help get you back into the groove of the story when you’ve lost inspiration!

- when all else fails, try reading books or fanfiction. it counts as writing. words in > words out. bonus points if you journal/leave ao3 comments about things you noticed and enjoyed about it (or, if you didn’t like something, what about it left you dissatisfied. don’t write this in an ao3 comment though keep it to yourself), it genuinely helps you get better at writing. like it makes writing easier

- believe in yourself!!! believe in me who believes in you!!!!

[astroels]

hey, i just wanna make sure this will be okay with you! i wanna send in a request where the reader has HEAVY symptoms of/like borderline personality disorder and farmhouse!ellie helps and understands, etc!! because ive shown ALOT of symptoms of it, but i haven’t been able to go to doctors about it :( i am totally down with helping you with this request (only if you are comfortable doing this!)

(anyone who’s sees this, pls DONT take offense to this and please don’t have a go at me (cause it won’t end well, & obviously, it will just send me in to a deeper and darker hole, that im already in!!) and to this kind human who’s writing this!! just be kind, im currently experiencing this for such a long ass time now and it’s such a tough battle, and it’s a heavy and deep journey).

here’s some topics i can help with:

(this is what i experience personally)

- splitting // seeing someone or something (like a situation) either good or bad, it can NEVER be seen in between). this makes asking for advice or reading someone or the situation to be dealt with A LOT more harder… cause i only want one answer, it can be in the middle. it MUST be a yes or no, i hope that makes sense?

- dissociation // feeling disconnected with your senses, can’t tell which is which and it’s incredibly hard to snap out of it.

- heavy feelings of emptiness // having a lack of purpose in general, it’s irritating when you can’t properly and very physically feel your intense emotions :(

- fear of abandonment // scared of ending up alone, just like what ellie said (that’s what ellie and reader can bond over w? or understand about the reader).

- emotional instability - disturbed patterns of thinking or perception – "cognitive distortions" or "perceptual distortions" impulsive behaviour. intense but unstable relationships with others.

- paranoid ideation // when im constantly scared or suspicious being secretly followed, plotted against, always in a constant state of deep anxiety.

- unstable/intense relationship // with me experiencing such intense emotions, etc. this can creat so much short, unstable and intense relationships with anyone i come across in life. // the readers first actual long healthy loving relationship with ellie is her first :(

- sh behaviors… (pls dont do this, if this triggers you)

could you possibly add in about ellies drawings/journal about the reader and bpd… to help her understand and help around the farmhouse for the reader. ellie and tlou helps me so much in so many ways. (abt me and my mind) bc i feel like her drawing about reader and the symptoms/memories of ellie being here can help me so much :)

𝐄𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐞 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐚𝐦𝐬 𝐱 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

a/n: I tried to touch on topics that you mentioned and with information I'm aware of since I have a friend with bpd, if anyone has a problem with this, do let me know, I am in no means writing this to be disrespectful or stereotypical, I just hope someone is able to find comfort in this :)

cw: arguments, mentions of sh (i will mark when it shows up), joel is dead in this (sorry joel)

apocalyptic!au

At first, having to hide your disorder from Ellie was a struggle. There was an intense fear that came with the idea that Ellie would back off as soon as she found out it. It was hard enough to mask the feeling, and even harder when you felt the symptoms that ruined previous relationships ooze into your current one with Ellie. Eventually, you just couldn't hide it anymore. You had to be honest even if rejection was a likely path.

"Ellie, I really need to talk to you." It'd come out in a burst of impulsiveness, no longer being able to keep it from her. From where you were laying on her lap, you'd straighten, looked down, besides her, anywhere where you didn't have to face her.

"What's up?" She'd be looking at you intently, with the shine in her eyes that showed she was curious as to what was to come and her voice gentle, as she naturally was with you.

"I really can't hold it together anymore, I struggle." You paused, didn't everyone? The words felt thick in your throat. You continued after cleaning your throat. "Mentally, 'm pretty sure it's borderline personality disorder, and theres no way to help it." Ellie stared at you, expressionless, waiting for you to continue. "It's always been there, before you, these past few weeks, and when I'm alone. I feel so trapped, Ellie." Everything you said came out rushed, in raspiness, in choked sobs that this was the end of a relationship that could've been something better in your life. "I'm not okay and I'm probably not something you want to deal with." You didn't think she wanted more baggage in this already ruined world.

Ellie didn't speak. Were you too honest? Were you too blunt? Too clingy in such a short time? What was wrong with you? A second passed by with you left in thought. "Oh, baby." Ellie pulled you in, letting you breathe in the slight dirt scent that lingered on her shirt.

She held you for awhile, allowing your tears to ease into falters before speaking again. She pulled away, her hands on your cheek, wiping the last of your tears. "You've never felt like someone I've had to deal with. Disorder or not, I'm going to stay with you, okay?"

Incredible doubt still filled your mind, her words seeming to just sink into you and not touch where it mattered. "What if you realize I'm not worth it? What if you leave? I can't handle that Ellie." You said in almost a whisper, her love was too good to be true, everyone always left when they found out the reality of your behaviors and emotions.

"You're worth more than you realize, baby. I promise you, as long as you need me, I'll always need you. We're going to do this and learn together." She'd caress your cheek, calming you with the sensation of her touch. "And besides, I'm just as scared of losing you." She'd give you a slight smile followed by a kiss on the cheek to lighten the mood. Ellie wouldn't dare make you feel like something she'd have to "deal" with. After your first mention, she picked up books from Jackson to further look into it.

Even if you knew the farm was strayed away from any communities, and it was very unlikely that any infected would stray towards the farm, the anxiety swelled up in you. It was so easy to lose Ellie and everything you've grown together, just by a simple mistake of overestimating your safety. It happened often when you'd hear a noise at night and couldn't sleep, saw something move quickly in the corner of your eye, or even when Ellie was gone for too long. Your fear would turn into forms of skin picking and eventually lead into panics that induced loss of breath and worry. Ellie, of course, did her best to help you through these panics.

You hated bothering Ellie with how you felt, but you promised her you'd be more open and try to be communicative instead of shutting off when something was happening. You kept hearing it, the clicking noise that was going to cause your death any second now.

"Ellie," you whispered, rocking her arm a bit to wake her. Her eyebrows slightly furrowed in sudden wake. Her green eyes looked pretty hazy, but she quickly rose when she saw the shakiness your body was in.

" 's the noise again, baby?" She leaned to her side to pick up her glass of water, offering it to you. Supposedly, fresh water was supposed to cool the body, along with the scent of herbs. Ellie had you trying natural supplements while she found a trader who had medication. All you could form was a simple nod after you drank from her water, your throat burning from anxiousness.

That was all Ellie needed to understand what to do. It'd happened before, and she was glad you woke her up this time. Ellie scootched closer to you, allowing your head to fall on her lap. There was no way to block the noise but to fill the silence.

Ellie took it upon herself to play with your hair, leaving tingles all across your head, and singing for you, songs she created, songs she found, songs Joel had sang for her. She filled the room with her voice to block the outside noises that burdened their mark in your mind. " 's gonna be okay, baby." Her sensation eventually soothed you. Even on rough nights, she didn't give up on helping you.

With BPD, there were empty days, days where you couldn't reciprocate anything, days where everything seemed challenging, it wasn't something you felt you could do. Completing any farm task became a haze. You mentally weren't present in the day. The things you could do seemed to be done messily, which made your helplessness feel even worse.

You knew it was time to get up, time to water the plants, fetch the clothing from the line, and prepare lunch, but you couldn't. If you tried in a state like this, everything would go bad and end up sending you into spiral. Ellie's words passed through your mind. " 'ts alright babe, only do what you can, when you can." She made sure to tell you it was okay, but you still felt useless tucked into bed while she was out hunting and fetching things from Jackson.

You decided to go downstairs and start on some laundry. It's the least you could do to stay organized at such a time. Ellie had been gone for a while now, the hallow feeling inside you carved deeper each moment you felt the absence of her. She couldn't fix you, but the knowledge that she was around made it the tiniest bit better.

A load of laundry was done when you decided to just get back in bed. There was no use fighting what was inevitable. Time passed as if you were watching a train, you weren't moving, but time surely was. You spent the rest of the day wating for Ellie, growing impatient in the increasing grayness.

While looking at the window, the sound of a door rattling burst your train of thought. Ellie's voice of letting you know she was home was faint. Would she notice that today was an off day? Would she be as caring as the other days? You heard her making her way upstairs momentarily.

The moment she walked in, she glanced at you and spoke with a gentle tone, pushing you into a cloud. "Hey baby, how're 'y holding up?" She continued around the room to change, leaving herself in a tank top and pj shorts. Your silence spoke volumes, you just couldn't respond. Your voice didn't want to be heard, it felt trapped in your throat. You nodded at her, making eye contact as reassurance you weren't mad, just drained.

Ellie grew understanding of these times, whether they lasted for days to weeks, she was there. She got into bed with you, seeking your warmth for a little while before she had to make dinner. She knew you didn't take care of yourself properly these days, so it was most obvious that she'd be right at your service, asked or not.

Arguments were not a likely thing to happen, but that didn't remove the possibility of it. Sometimes, you just couldn't help the feelings that bubbled up and were unstoppable. It came from stress, irritation, or just something Ellie said that sounded off putting. This part was the hardest for Ellie to communicate through, as she has her own communication issues; However both of you shared a fear factor of being abandoned. This alone gave the courage to work through the outbursts. Hard to handle, but ultimately manageable. (Tw for sh starts here, head to next section to skip)

Ellie had traded some time ago for pills, they were supposed to stabilize your mood, they really just made you unable to think as much and light headed. It wasn't the best medication, but it's as far as a post-apocalyptic world could provide. At first you took them daily as suggested, but when you learned Ellie had given one of her knives joel had crafted before he died, immense guilt filled you everytime you took one or even looked at them. The thought Ellie gave up something so special for you, made you nauseous.

In guilt of her action, you "forgot" to take them for several days, possible weeks. You thought if you were less dependent on them, Ellie wouldn't have to trade something like that again. What didn't cross your mind was Ellie noticing the difference of you on and off the meds. She noticed the way your irritation and mood swings became intense, noticed the way you pushed her away more often. The truth would come crashing down once the both of you made a wrong tone.

You were putting away dishes when Ellie approached you. "Tommys' invited me over tomorrow, said he's gonna talk to me about something." You usually wouldn't be annoyed at Ellie's absence but she'd hardly been home all week and you felt discarded. "Okay." Was all you could form in a rude tone. The actions of you putting away the glasses became unconsciously harsher. "Okay?" Ellie eyed you. You gave her a look and continued with the dishes.

The silence rung in your ear, you felt hot, the warmth crawling up your neck. Before you realized, a glass shatterd on the floor and made you wince. You cursed under your breathe while Ellie spoke out. "What the fuck is up with you?" Her eyebrows were furrowed and her tone was slightly impatient. "Nothins' up." You made your way to the kitchen doorway to grab a broom. "Look, I can't be doing this." You heard Ellie sigh. "You're gonna have to speak up." You hated the way your heart felt so heavy, you didn't want to "speak up", you wanted everything to end already.

You turned to look at her. "I know about the pills, Ellie." Ellie looked like she had an arrow of shock hit her. You continued to speak after a moment. "I don't want to take them if it means you'll be sacrificing things like that."

Ellie was biting the inside of her cheek, her face looking frustrated above anything. "I don't want to exhaust you any longer, I can't do it to you, Ellie." You stared at her for any signs of reading how she felt. No effort could ever tell you what she was thinking. "What's done is done, just take the fucking pills." Her tone seemed increasingly harsh. "No, Ellie, I don't want to burden you any longer."

"You've already become a fucking burden, 's too late to worry about that now." Your heart dropped. Out of everything she could've said, you never thought it'd come to that. You could tell she regretted it by the way she gasped and immediately started attempting to apologize, but you couldn't anymore. You had already began to run up the stairs into the bathroom, your mind ringing with her words. If you were a burden, it'd be better to stay in there and rot away.

You were left alone in the bathroom with your thoughts, alone with your hidden "safety" kit, if you could call a box that held such a harmful purpose, safe. But it's okay because this never left you, this was always there for you. It would just be this time you told yourself; you needed the comfort.

You knew how to clean up well, the only way Ellie would notice is if she really looked. She would probably check, considering she knew your destructive behavior. You wish you could feel pity over yourself for relapsing, but it just felt so numbing, It took no effect.

A sudden knock frightened you as you scrambled to put away all your materials. "Baby, will you please come out." You didn't know how to respond. Now that she was here, you knew how disappointed she'd be about what you did. Not telling her wasn't an option, you'd feel like a liar. "You're not a burden babe, I promise you you're not." She sounded stuffy as if she'd been crying. You couldn't ignore her for long, simply unlocking the door as an invitation.

Ellie quickly opened the door and brought you into a hug. You didn't hug back, but she understood. You stood there wondering if she'd hate you. Would she finally let you go? No, you couldn't keep doing this to yourself. You let yourself sink in her arms, crying. Her words are the last thing you remembered for the next days that passed like a fever dream. "I love you, my angel."

You never understood how quickly Ellie was able to adapt to your mania and depressive episodes. It was quite a lot to deal with and retain. You never understood until you found her journal she'd left out. You were cleaning up the table as your eyes found their way to her open words and drawings. She had thoughts, lists, notes about what was okay, not okay, what helped you, what hadn't. It was awfully sweet, she really cared and it showed. You didn't know how you manged to make her your girlfriend, her beauty and love always made your heart flutter.

Ellie once asked you to be the star of her nude drawing, as hesitant as you were, you trusted her with all your insecurities. She never showed you the drawing though, not until you came across it yourself. She portrayed your body lovingly, the curves of your skin rolled naturally, your stretch marks defining the growth you've gone through, your scars drawn fluidly. Did she really picture you like this? Did she really think you were this worth drawing for? Your heart felt warm, knowing this was how she thought of you.

The other drawings were full of you doing activities, playing with a stray cat that lingered your farm for a few months, watering the plants, petting the sheep, dancing with music, and laying on the grass. Every moment you could picture with her was sketched right in front of you.

Along the pages, there were separate sections that divided different things about your bpd.

What makes it worse

Being too touchy when she's irritated

The smell of cinnamon (oddly specific)

The pink pills

When a straight answer isn't given

What helps

Occasional weed usage (don't overuse !!)

Baths (most of the time)

The texture of her favorite sweater ( W symbol)

Treating her gentle (not too gentle)

Things to mention (that might help)

The new pill

Herbs for sleeping tea

New hobbies

Music record I found

Chore separation (on a normal day)

E- Herding sheep, hunting, fetching supplies, organizing imports

R- washing clothes, watering plants, hunting, feeding sheep

Both- Making food, cleaning, looking out for infected

surprise plans

Candlelit picnic dinner while watching meteor shower (Wednesday)

sensual massage ;)

bath with the relaxant oils I found

dancing to the record she liked but we broke (found another)

giving her the ring

[suffarustuffaru]

What's your thoughts on Wish Upon a Sin by HoboWizard

like all the other times people have asked me for my opinions on fics, im gonna link the author/fic and explain the fic’s plot really quick - so the link to hobowizard's ao3 profile is here if youre interested in reading his stuff!!

so wish upon a sin, for those who dont know, is a fic where every time subaru dies, he goes back in time (like canon, yes) only - his save point never updates. it's stuck at when he first got isekaied into the fantasy world, meaning that every time he dies he loses a Shit Ton Of Progress. which is an Extremely fascinating plot and hobowizard is one of if not the most qualified writer for an idea That Ambitious HAH.

and that being said. i really really recommend reading hobo's fics in general for sure. ive read the first couple chapters for wish upon a sin Ages ago and 1. i dont have much time for everything anymore rip :< and 2. i struggle with focusing on things sometimes so i often dont read or finish longfics, so thats just the case for me with wish upon a sin and hobo's other longfic (so maybe im not 100% the target audience), but yes ive read the first couple chapters for each of those longfics a while back!! and i cannot recommend them enough.

wish upon a sin is absolutely gonna be the fic for you if you want a Very long fic thats plotty and centered around subaru that Really explores all the different avenues he can take - like this fic has a very strong premise and then explores it to the Absolute fullest!! i cannot praise it enough hah. its really good!!! and ill always be impressed with hobo's work.

i think my only real criticism (and like all the criticism i give for fics i mean it very Lightly, and also hobo's work is really good already so HAH) is that hobo's biggest strength is plot. he's really really good at complex plot and writing very plotty fics!! but there were a few times in the first chapters of wish upon a sin where i personally wished that the story got to slow down a bit and explore subaru's feelings more in depth. its touched on over and over in the story of course, which is great!! but for my own personal taste i couldnt Feel the full emotional impact bc the plot had to keep moving and moving, if that makes sense? :o and this is a pretty small criticism imo too haaah bc hobo's grammar, writing style, plot beats, general characterization, etc are all very solid. and im sure that, as with a lot of long fics, hobo's writing improves even more with every chapter of wish upon a sin so <3 and i can definitely attest to that given hobo's recent fic!!

anyway i know this ask is mainly about wish upon a sin but id like to also shoutout hobo's recent fic, which is a collab with rajvir - people who've been Around on rezero ao3 mightve seen rajvir a bit (he's commented on several fics in the past!) but yeah their fic return of the lion king is a long fic centered on the fourier, felix, crusch trio. which is a rarity in terms of english fic!! its also been updating pretty regularly so if youve liked hobo's work before and you find this fic interesting id recommend checking that out too :o theres soo so many characters in rezero and id love to keep seeing more in depth fic for more of the cast, so this fic is great to see!! :o

[sporksaber]

This idea has not fully formed in my brain yet, but dpxdc time reversal isekai. This'll be a bit disjointed so bear with me.

Danny phantom and DC are the same universe to start with. Danny goes darkest timeline (not in the dan way. Dan is boring. He does not exist for this purpose) after years of being legally not human and trying to run from the giw while the organizations that should of helped didn't.

In the original timeline he is found out in some horrible way and has to run. He is kidnapped by the giw. He frees himself and finds himself entangled with the batfam. Everything goes wrong, his tenuous relationship with them gets super messed up as none of them are in a good place, and danny is slowly dying. Eventually it all gets broken off.

Danny, completing his journey into insanity, kind of destroyes the universe. And on a little related tangent, when writing these kind of stories all powerful characters are hard to deal with. Characters like clockwork give me the ick because their pulling at the strings robs the characters of their agency and they often fall apart when you look at them critically. So I'm nerfing clockwork. He can see all the timelines, he can watch over them and prevent major fuckery, but he isn't just able to meddle as he pleases.

Like I said, Dan doesn't exist and the whole bit never happened (originally I said that because it's a lame plotline but now it has real reasons) so Danny's never met clockwork. Clockwork takes the burst of power from danny going nuclear and reverses the time stream.

Danny wakes up on the day the event that leads his parents to find out happens. He's unable to avoid it as he's confused and dissriented with a bunch of strange thoughts and images making his head feel fit to burst, but does avoid the giw while running away.

Onto discussions of a main plot point: the romance bc it's always there with time reversal isekais (and with my fics in general tbh). As I'm thinking about it it's hard to decide bc I recently read a bunch that annoyed me into disliking them all and made me step away from the cross over for awhile. But as I was thinking of what to write I came to a decision. I already have one of these for Tim, having it be damian would make all the other characters older than him and it doesn't fit the vibe I'm going for to have danny surrounded by a bunch of adults when he isn't quite one, Jason just isn't fitting in my head rn, so I'm making it Dick. (I did also consider bruce, but I didn't...

The ages I'm going off of: bruce 37 (27), dick 21 (11), Jason 18 (8), Tim 15 (5), Damien 10 (fetus.)

I'm torn. I like the concept of Bruce being the love interest better but i dont know if i like it more than Dick. Like I said, this idea came to me and I immidiently opened a a draft. The idea is not solidified. And as I think more about it, maybe bruce would be better. Because with crossover ships you can slap the timelines together however you want you can change the ages and ship characters as you see fit. My initial reason for not considering bruce was the ages and wanting all the kids to be around for the plot. So I'm going to do the math.

Danny gets his powers at 14. Gets away with only monsters of the week to deal with for the first year. Giw gets new funding and becomes a consistent problem into when he's 16. It's manageable for awhile. I'm going to say he deals with it well enough for them to pull back and regroup around when he turns 17. Six months later and The Incident happens and he's outed. He runs and in his panicked gets captured by the giw.

My initial plan (initial meaning first thought that occurred less than an hour ago) was for him to be kidnapped long enough to be thoroughly traumatized but not super long. Like a few months. And I'd thought his freeing himself might have somthing to do with them kidnapping Jason or somthing. And if I stick to that Dick works really well and I feel like there's some really good content in dick and danny ending up together.

With Bruce I'd have to adjust the timeline more. Both for my batfam agenda and to make it not icky. If bruce is going to be in his mid thirties danny needs to be a minimum of his mid 20s. So I think if I were to go with Bruce I'd extend the kidnapped time to like 2 years (so Danny's like 20) and have him spend some time in the ghost zone before coming back to mess up the giw? I don't know. I'm going to have to write some stuff physically.

This has gotten out of hand and now I'm confused and my head hurts. I think the difference in the decision in unstable young adult danny vs unhinged adult danny in the original time line.

And the other thing I have to consider is not just main timeline but post rewind attempt 2 timeline and how those ages fall.

Dick is easier because it'd be easier to not have to handle that mess. I could have what I want without worrying about an age gap. And I think they could be really compelling. Especially with the idea of Dick seeking out Danny to help Jason, the brother he thinks he failed. Their relationship is originally a will they won't they as Dick has to deal with his family being a mess and desperately not wanting to lose anyone again while danny is in a limbo between who he is and if he's human. And it doesn't work out. It blows up in their faces as circumstances tear them apart and force them to let go of eachother. And you get the forbidden romance trope as batman doesn't trust danny. And then danny loses his shit and everyone dies before the rewind.

I think after the rewind they'd restart quieter. Danny searches out a familiar person after running away. Dick had just become nightwing and set up in bludhaven. Jason is 14 and hasn't died yet. Maybe they'd meet organically. Danny is drawn to Gotham and ends up in bludhaven while skirting around it. He meets the new vigilante who he knows but he also knows he doesn't (his core remembers. The core always remembers). Dick finds himself drawn to this haunted guy he keeps running into, maybe it's his savior complex, maybe it's somthing else entirely. He figures he's some kind of meta, jumpy from escaping someone's experiments.

Eventually Danny will remember Jason. Dick brings him up and Danny's filled with dread. Dick thinks his reaction is wierd. But Jason is eventually saved.

If I were to write it this way I think I'd have a couple of different mystery plot likes that connect thematically but aren't actually connected. (A nightwing vigilante based one of mob bosses or whatever, Danny's whole deal, what the giw is up to, where their money comes from and how that's gotten on the jl radar). But that's all on that for now.

To summarize: they have a very turbulent relationship initially. Dick will eventually be forced to chose the bats over danny. Danny has not properly healed from the giw and slowly spins out of control. After the rewind it's a lot of Dick solving mysteries as Danny tries to heal. The plot would be majorly driven by Dick, Danny's is mostly internal.

Back to the bruce concept (reminder that these two concepts are not connected at all).

The thing with time reversals is that you have to decide in the beginning whether or not the reversal is seperate from the main characters original timeline or if it's continuous. Are they the age they were pre reversal or the age they were reversed to? How much of it do they retain?

With the Bruce option I matched it to bruce being like 6 years older than danny. So pre reversal danny shows up to investigate bruce when his connection to the al ghuls (10yo damien) is established. Danny is 30, jaded, and less human than the other version. He's been warped in a way. The torture was longer and he recovered in the zone. A lot of his friends and family died.

Some relationship stuff happens, some al ghul caused demon stuff happens, the world is destroyed, time is reversed.

I'm fudging the previous timeline a bit. Danny's reveal happens at 19 while he's still in amity taking a gap year to weigh his dreams against his responsibilities. The Incident happens. He's kidnapped for a few years. Escapes durring an expierenment that allows him to slip into the zone. Dedicates himself to destroying the giw.

Danny post reversal retains skills and knowledge but is still his 19 year old self. He returns to the day of the incident, is confused, gets outed, dips but escapes the giw. Goes to Vlad and demands money, resources, and a contract that makes him heir without the downsides of his shady practices. It's important to not at this point, danny is basically bluffing. The kid has no idea what's going on or if it'll work, but he spooks vlad enough for him to agree now, plan how to spin it in his favor later.

So Danny takes a bit to decompress from that shitshow.

Flash forward, bruce wayne notices he has a bit of a (new) stalker problem. Some guy he doesn't know (and Brucie Wayne knows everyone) starts showing up at all his galas and the charity events he goes to. 20 year old Danny Fenton, heir to Masters Enterprises.

Cue Romcom.

This would have a drastically different tone from the other version. Very fun and much lower stakes.

Anyway I'm done for now. I hope you enjoyed this 2 hour unedited rant. Might expand on both separately, I like them both.

[ganondoodle]

so, i have thought more about what we now know about botw2 and honestly, setting aside the smaller things i am not a fan of (like the building aspect) my biggest gripes about it are the plot looking like its gonna be very generic, especially regarding ganondorf, while i hoped it would perhaps finally give us a little more interesting take instead good vs evil; and the oh so mysterious figure you see in in the trailer very likely to be hylia, since shes mentioned constantly in the first game (among other things like her design being pretty much a carbon copy of zelda for the most boring reasons imaginable)

and no its not just bc of my stupid little fanworks (that i do bc i love the franchise, as much as i am critical of it, it comes from being very passionate about it, hence me working my fan lore around the canon so it doesnt disturb it much, its more meant to expand it on parts i think are a little lacking without me trying to sound superior, literally just as an act of love (and a little spite ill admit that) to add something to it)- BUT bc i have little hope they would do anything more than just going full blown "this monstrous beast is pure inherently evil, and this is the pure inherently good white little girl goddess whos just protecting her god given perfect and unshakable good tm monarchy" with no little to no nuance (theres also alot more to be critical of the general structure and implications like racism, orientalism, nationalism, that while i can see alot of wrong or questionable things in the games i lack the eloquence to talk about in its full range) yes i am personally biased bc i just .. hate that kind of story/worldbuilding structure, but i dont think im the only one who would think of it as boring and .. disappointing?

i dont need ganondorf to be redeemed, i dont need him to be the good himbo bf that some people think all ganondorf stans want, i just want him to be more than to shout "i will conquor this kingdom bc i am evil and want it" and send a horde of monsters after you, at the very least id want the game to just aknowledge that there must be a reason for it, why it turned out like this

the zelda series and its world has so much potential, which is probably a reason for its popularity in fanworks, but also keeps not using it, no i dont expect a company like nintendo to deliver on all my hopes, of course not, im not that delusional, but the further i think and learn about this universe and concepts they created i find myself asking "why" more and more where the games never elaborate, never question

i like a clear structure, i like when your choices dont have a big or any impact on the story bc i want to live the story, not worry about every decision like i already do every second of my life IRL, i want to partake in a movie, in a theater piece i can influence the pace of but not change the outcome, yet i feel kind of ... ignored? let down? asking why and how, how do they know this is right and this is wrong, how do they keep enacting this seeing it never works out, keep saying defeat this evil, but evil yet returns stronger than before over and over, how do they never ask "is this the right way?", they say "we need to kill it more next time"

i know they are fictional little characters made up to sell a game, with a convevient plot point to ever repeat the same structure, but it cant be wrong to say "i love this world, i want to see and know more, i want to see it grow and change, break the cycle and be better, show me characters not puppets"

theres very surely nuances and ideas i am sorely missing bc i lack the knowledge of japanese as a language, culture, and mythology, but i dont think it invalidates all that i feel for it ..

.. right?

[basil-appreciation-comic]

IMPORTANT UPDATE!!

the comic is cancelled. you probably already assumed that since i havent posted anything about it in a while but yeah the things dead now lol. mainly because i dont care much about omori anymore, the comic sucked, and it was too much effort. i feel kinda bad about leaving you guys in the dark for this long tho, so i thought id go ahead and include all the scrapped stuff for the comic that never got finished

while i was writing the comic i started a google doc that laid out ideas i had for future pages. heres that if you wanna know how the story ends

it was written over several months and (most) things are in order of where they go on the timeline not when i wrote them so it might be a little hard to follow

also some art i never posted

(at least i dont think ive posted the last one)

i quoted not liking this comic as one of the reasons i stopped so let me explain that with a list of things id change about this if i were to remake it (which i wont)

remove the swearing that was so stupid

make omori mute (and probably use sign language)

omori does not express fear or stress in-game, thats sunnys job. quit it

he also does not cry and generally shows emotions (even the big ones) in more subtle ways (which i think i was trying to shift towards later in the doc) idk why he was so emotional all the time

literally everything about how i portrayed omori actually that was all just awful

the panic attack scene is fucking embarrassing i have no clue what i was thinking. im so sorry for writing it like that i did 0 research beforehand

make it shorter why did i think that would work out

id probably just make it a fic, comics take way too much outta me compared to just writing things

it does not need a big epic ending and probably shouldve ended not long after they escaped black space

the romance is horrible but thats the foundation of the comic so idek what id do about that

stop making everyone talk like therapists 24/7

and yeah it has a lot of problems but i still do care about this due to the ammount of effort and love ive put into it, i just cant and dont want to continue it

so yeah thats where this story ends ig. i had a lot of fun along the way, and thank you so much for all the support. bigger thanks to that one sunflower discord server (if you came from there you know which one) for being my main motivation and support throughout this journey. sucks this comic never got to see its full potential but im relieved to finally lay it to rest. the blog will stay up for archival purposes but i will not continue the comic any further obviously. the ask box will remain open if you wanna say anything or if you have a question about the story or whatever. thanks for reading.

[uglypastels]

Right

I thought this was over but then i saw it pop up in my notifications again and truly had a face crack moment

Because that's all you give by leaving these kinds of comments. A very sad and empty feeling in my chest that makes me want to scream. Of course, it doesn't help that the comment was left on a fic where these were literally all the comments before it

(The last one i cut off because it just was a suggestion of where the story should go)

Now, i removed the urls bc i do not have anything against these people. It's not about them. This type of stuff shows up in almost every fic of mine.

And yes, obviously I appreciate the thought behind the fact someone wants to read more of my writing but I also cannot stop the feeling of how little the work i actually have put out is valued.

Maybe it is a short fic of not even a thousand words (although I have also gotten these demands on fics reaching 15k in word count) but it still takes time and effort and energy. Especially with requests, its difficult to write something you know another person has thought of, has expectations for... There is always doubt in my mind when I post a request that I failed the person who wanted the story because it's not what they expected. It's nervewrecking. So yeah, seeing people enjoy the story and wanting more definitely dissipates that constant worry But (there's always a but y'all)

A writer has their own ideas of how a story should go. Even if its a request, you get to interpret that in your own way (previously mentioned anxieties follow up later) and hopefully those interpretations will be appreciated. That includes the plot. And the plot includes, you guessed it, a beginning and an ending.

As the writer, I decide when and how the story ends.

By getting comments such as the ones I put above, I just get constant reminders shot in my face that no one really cares. Not just about me- hell, i dont care about myself- but about writers in general. No one cares about the actual creativity of the writing or the processes. Yall just want your free content, which is understandable in this economy, and then move on.

I could blame this on the Story Time/Like for Part Two internet culture and maybe I am. Hopefully you can see the comparison, especially with how on Tiktok all content constantly seems to be accumulating into series and parts and just never ending. All a person has to do is comment "pt 2 pls" and like it and done.

Just consider that, you get to enjoy something that is given to you completely for free, no questions asked. So why dont you actually enjoy it? Why does there have to always be more? (And if so, why cant the "more" be the already existing catalogues of the writers on here? Or did you skim through all that already -sorry im getting pissed off now, sleep deprivation)

Anyway, i'm tired and dont make any sense. Besides, i cant and wont police people around on here. read the stuff you want, comment all you want, but dont forget that the people writing the stories you like are also human with their own ideas and emotions. Not machines who can print out words at any given command.

[kijosakka]

how. how would i even write out a proper fic of dramaturgy au,,

cutting this off bc i got too caught up in myself and rambled

ok umm,, dramaturgy as an au is just so character study-ish and generally character-focused,, plus the initial developments made on island are kiinda important to the cast dynamic?? so as i see it there are a few options:

A: rehash/go through the unchanged plot of island, the TDDDDI special, some eps of WT, using it to develop the Situation from other characters perspectives while maybe having one or two to emphasize noahs characterization

it gives a lot of time for character developments outside of noah himself, and time to reinforce noahs own characterization using that outside perspective,, but could potentially get boring/long-winded, since nothing different happens and its literally just Characters Having Screentime

^ maybe sub a full going-through with character vignettes and specific scenarios throughout island/the special/celeb. manhunt or after TD/eps of WT??? i guess you could also slot smth like this in with the other ideas aswell

B: begin the hypothetical fic post-jamaica challenge and leading into london, use it to exposition some minor things and generally establish characterization before getting into challenges and actual canon divergence

it doesnt drag on (as much atleast), gives you enough time with enough cast members to establish what the others think of noah and what noah thinks/how he behaves and why (probably slot in his distrust of alejandro here??), more challenges gives noah more chances (and reasons) to break character, though the character development has to be slow and conflict should probably be built up (but im kinda partial to this one ngl)

C: kindof half-baked but beginning in london (i’m imagining literally at his eel line), where hes eliminated that episode, but comes back via comeback challenge; arc kicked off by being so pissed off that he has to come back and do the Same Shit yet again (and probably because of producer-rigging. again.)

the conflict/character dynamics would move a little faster, its less to trudge through and figure out canon changes like the butterfly effect of noah staying in the game in london, but having less characters to have relationships/interactions with (but making the ones had can be more developed/rounded as a result), less Time in general, the original idea of noah ‘unmasking’ alejandro is kiiinda less impactful this late into the game?? slightly i feel like

or D: even more half-baked than C and kinda just 'possible' and feeling out of place, but you could have noahs arc happen in all-stars instead (smth smth the audience was vv dissatisfied with how he ranked in WT and so he gets brought back)

^ this is mostly bc i like the motif of noah having eel-pond related scars and seeing it as a physical reminder of where 'acting like the camera isn't there' can get him (but you could potentially fit this into the C idea, posing it more as a bitter feeling/theme rather than a motivation to continue his facade)

i dont really like this one from a storytelling standpoint, and it doesnt make much sense since theres no character motivation via unmasking alejandro since everyone already knows at this point?? idk it is there though

umm yeah thats all ive got, i guess you could also mismatch ideas like B&C so the fic starts post-jamaica but noah still gets eliminated, or have noah eliminated after london but still winning the comeback challenge and coming back swearing vengeance (within his own head mostly) or smth like that

i kinda wanted to just put this Out in the World and let it simmer before i start combing through WT to make the allotted ‘official’ canon changes of this au lol

(and not to mention theres still the issue of the actual Ending,, does he win?? is his winning both symbolic and the first genuine, intentional break of character he makes, to the audience and his peers beyond the unintentional ones hes made along the way???

smth smth character growth, hes learned how to let himself break character but now hes learning to do it intentionally too??? < im partial to that but im also biased towards noah and any hypothetical win of his

^ or does he lose?? and his ending watching the finalists parallel the island bit where he Did Not Care but now??? idk idk the longer i think the more i like the whole symbolic win thing but in terms of storytelling/the Themes, does it Work. i do like to think so

the original draft of this idea has noah not in fact winning but it also had a strangely,,,,, vindictive tone?? that might not be the word but the Themes were different and noah was more scheme-ish rather than defense mechanism-having so im thinking the ending should change as well)

[no-shxme]

since ive had people asking about it, here's

an overview of my writing process:

its very long (but split into 4 sections) so i will be posting it below the read-more. i fr threw up all over the post and it covers my writing process specifically. because i write unreliable narration >> canonic characters, etc this will prolly not be as useful for like, idk, crack fic writers or whatever else. basically this is what works for me. it might not work for you, but feel free to peruse, im sure no 2 writer's processes are exactly the same. (AND THATS COOL)

Step 1: The Idea & Start

usually my fic starts with a single scene/mood/line, and the whole fic is started around that. (for ex: my fic Teeth started bc of 1 set of lines that we haven't even gotten to yet. [sob]) this also helps me be more motivated, as i become pretty desperate to get that scene/mood/etc written. (as i write i often find new goalposts to write to, which helps keep me motivated, yeah)

occasionally i will write out an initial drabble (like 1 or 2 paragraphs) set in the story idea i have, just to see if i like whatever's going on before i commit.

before i start i decide my setting or at least whatever parts of the setting are relevant. (i wont go into it here bc that's not exactly process.) then i'm game to start.

i've heard a lot of writers struggle with starting a fic and ending it. starting a fic isn't usually a problem for me but if i don't like how the beginning is looking it's usually because i've started it too far away from relevant plot. i don't want to write too much beginning set up, so my solution is always to delete what i have and restart the scene closer to when something happens.

(for ex: when writing everything that went wrong over the summer, the story started earlier and was going to have kayn discover rhaast at the end of the first chapter. but halfway through i decided it was bad. i didnt want to reveal too much and it was kinda boring, became a slog of wordlbuilding. i hated it so i deleted it and instead we meet rhaast in literally the second paragraph.)

imo if you are having trouble with starting stories, literally just throw yourself into the action, its the best way to jog a stuck start. move up the timeline, make things move faster. ask yourself if you really need all the space before the action happens. this method also be used on other scenes, not just beginnings.

it's generally a good idea to figure out what the minimum amount of time you need to complete your story. (this plot that takes place over three weeks, can it be done in three days instead?) but i dont always do that for fanfiction, more my personal writing. fanfiction can be loose and slimy, thats okay. i'm not gonna stress myself over it like i do with my book lol. for me fanfiction is like a vacation. since the characters are already established i can be free to experiment stylistically and try new things.

Step 2: The Writing (The Slog)

(The longest section of this post)

I actually have SO many notes for my writing process so this will be all over the place.

Whenever I write ANYTHING my goals are the following:

keep things concise, without crazy exposition or information overloads.

to me writing is kinda like a puzzle, or a combination lock. i have a line or thought and i just continuously swap words around in my head or on a doc until something clicks. my goal is not just something that fits, it's something that fits BEST. (i am not always successful at this.) so yeah sometimes a line sounds good, but how do i make it sound BETTER. i am always thinking about lines. all the time. i am always turning a scene in my head trying to find the best angle. im literally doing it right now.

this is a stylistic choice that might not apply to everyone, but i love writing unreliable narrators and therefore always write them. in fanfiction i like trying to keep the characters close to their canon personalities, so a lot of the following advice is through that lens.

WHEN IT COMES TO PLOT:

by the time i write my first scene i usually have an idea of the ending. i'm not too terribly focused on it but i definitely prefer to know it. its just something i have to reach eventually. usually little plot ideas will start sprouting up like checkpoints between the start and the end, and then it's just the matter of figuring out how to bridge the gaps between them. one of my favorite tricks i like to use for longer or difficult plots is work backwards. (i call it Keyframing)

(for ex: let's say i'm writing a story about a knight who marries a dragon, but i can't figure out how the hell that's gonna happen. an easy way to come up with ideas is think: what's 1 thing that has to happen between the start goal (there's a knight) and the ending (married to a dragon)? it could be something simple. the knight has to get to the dragon's lair before he can get married. okay, great, there's another plot checkpoint. now what's 1 thing that has to happen between the start and getting to the lair? and also what's 1 thing that has to happen between getting to the lair and getting married?

as you keep adding 1 thing to the plot between points, it basically writes itself, or gives you a very good list of things that HAVE to happen in order to progress the story. then you can add embellishments and tweak it, but its a good method i use for avoiding over-complicated plot. periodically i also ask myself: can this be simplified further?

in cases where i don't have an ending in mind (about 35% of the time) i let my characters drive the plot. this is very easy because i write unreliable, character focused narration. all i think is: ok what're they gonna do. how would they do xyz. hows this affect them. i'll also think about my end goal for the character as it slowly develops and ask myself if it's realistic for them. i don't write crack so if it's something a character won't do then i just won't write it. i'll figure out some other goal or method to achieve the same effect, even if the scrapped idea is cute. :C the end result is usually a more convincing character. (once again this is literally just how i write ff. you DONT have to write like this) in many cases the goal is fine but the method isn't, so i have to rethink how the character realistically reaches that goal. (this was very much the case in my fic, One Promise)

WHEN IT COMES TO WRITER'S BLOCK:

here's my methods for getting over writer's block in no particular order:

taking a break. (or a nap)

reading poetry (this helps bc i try to write poetic) or just read, if im in a pickle.

changing location. (if you write on your phone/laptop. just go somewhere else)

delete the scene and restart from a diff angle. (not advised tbh. i dont think this is a good method, even if it works for me. im only listing it bc its something i do.)

to a lesser degree: changing the font, listening to music i would never listen to normally. or not listening to music at all.

walking around in circles talking to myself about whatever line im chewing on. :/

Okay now im just gonna list a mixed bag of shit that pertains to my literal writing process:

i use google docs because i like to write on my phone and my tablet. i will write in bed before sleeping or in the car. ill write wherever. occasionally i will also use scrivener on my pc for writing assistance. or ms paint. (dont make me go into it)

i almost always try to write what the CHARACTER sees or experiences, versus what a narrator would see. (for example, in my fic Teeth, sett's ears are mentioned a lot. it's because talon keeps noticing them.) this is super important in my writing as it also serves meaning and makes things more concise. oh a character is an artist? so they might notice the technique in a painting. versus the same painting viewed by a carpenter, who might focus more on describing the picture frame. i have specific thoughts on (confident) character voice/unreliable narration, but this post is long lol. if anyone wants to hear it lemme know.

for the most part i only try to describe what's necessary. im not trying to introduce too many characters BY NAME or too many places or too much detailed description-dumping, unless im trying to hide something. ESPECIALLY IN FAN FICTION. one thing i keep in mind is that the reader will fill in the gap. like i could write 'a kitchen with green walls and one window' and boom you already have an idea of what the kitchen could look like. i could write a character using a stove and different readers might imagine that stove in two different places, as pertaining to their imaginary kitchen. that's fine. as long as the location of the stove is unimportant then i dont need to describe it. basically if it's not Vital to my vision then i often don't bother writing it. (this also allows me to push themes and sneak things, but this post is too long)

often while i write im thinking ahead, so ill start noting future lines/plot ideas to use at the bottom of the document so i dont forget them. if it's a long fic my lines-to-be-used will be like, pages long lol.

JUST WRITE. I JUST WRITE. sometimes its slop, that okay. i try to write every single day.

whenever i return to a wip i reread it to get in the Groove.

as i write i sometimes make comments (in google docs) on some words that i know are placeholders. like i'll write a sentence and think: i need to change that word, but im too in the flow to do that now, so i just make a quick note so i dont miss it when editing. i have shorthand for it too, like for example, WC stands for 'word choice' and REP stands for 'too much repetition.' sometimes im lazy and dont do this ._.

speaking of repetition, one of my lil tricks is to start a list of repetitive words as i write. i will often throw in the names of characters, and some common pitfall words for me (words that i have a tendency to use too often). this is helpful for....

Step 3: The Editing

okay first i take a break. the length often depends on how long the fic is. if its a shortie then i just play a game or 2 of league or smth. i must banish the story from my brain.

when i come back i give it a read over and edit whatever issues i see, reword, blah blah. i also use Ctrl + F with my list of repetitive words! this way i can clearly see problem areas where i've used the same word too close together. i will also Ctrl + F grammar missteps, namely double spaces, double periods, and double commas.

for word choice ideas i use wordhippo :3c sometimes i recognize that a line needs to cook so ill come back to it.

i also do character checks where needed. (Would they REALLY do that?) at this point i can identify a problem area pretty easily so i dont do it that much anymore.

then as my final editing step i read the whole thing aloud. this step is so important that i never skip it, even on long ass docs. reading it aloud to myself is vital. when i read it aloud i can actually test the dialogue and see cadence issues and random mistakes that i never catch anywhere else. for longer stories this is done chapter by chapter as finished, which is,,, thank god lol.

if im unsure about a story then i'll let it ferment for a while (days, weeks) before i come back and edit, just to make sure im not crazy or smth.

Step 4: The Posting

i post in ao3's rich text format, so it keeps some of the formatting. then i hit PREVIEW and then i hit EDIT again. bc ao3 is finicky about italics and will add weird ugly spaces bc of that. so to get rid of them i use my CTRL + F method again to check for space + periods (literally a space then a period), space + commas, double spaces (again), etc. i also center those *** things that people use as scene breaks bc they're never centered. takes like 5 minutes.

then i post and try not to feel immediately awful lol.

anyway that's my writing process. this ended up super fucking long holy shit. sorry i like, rambled and blabbed. i try to be thorough. there's a lot more that i can talk about not pertaining to the process itself but like, yeahhhh. thanks if you read all this, hopefully its not terribly boring.

[locuas642]

I have watched more than half of Critical Role Vox Machina

"I Heard Campaign 1 starts mid-campaign, is it hard to follow?"

It's only hard depending of how familiar you are with D&D in general and how resilient you are to the awkwardness of "We are still trying to see how this streaming thing goes." In terms of the story and plot it's easy to follow, if you can get over the way it is being told.

Despite the claims that it starts mid-campaign, it in fact starts right after a major Time-Skip, so the first episodes does establish plenty of things. You just have to accept this is a story that starts in the middle rather than the beginning. If you ever had to deal with having to find a starting point for Doctor Who or COmicbooks, you can deal with Vox Machina. Just accept that there were off-screen adventures.

if that is still an issue, the show eventually does offer a video narrating the pre-stream adventures that is shown during episode 36. If that is too long for you to wait, I think someone has uploaded it to youtube as it's own thing.

"I heard of Tiberius/Orion Acaba and how he eventually left because he was toxic. can I jump straight to the epsidoe when he leaves?"

You can easily skip most of the pre-Briarwood stuff and just pretend that also happened off-screen. tho there are some major plot points present that you will not get to see. The Briarwood arc is a bit more complicated, because he is present for the first four episodes and you will start with the arc already started, but if you watched the animated series and then jump to episode 28 (which while not the episode when officially announced, it is the first episode after his departure. SPoilers: The quality of the show increases immediatly) as long as you understand the show did some tweaks and should, you will not be lost.

If you think you can tolerate Toxic People, you can watch episodes 24, 25 and 26, skip 27 (seriously, even if you can tolerate Orion, it is at best a dull, boring episode. There is a reason why whenever anyone talks about this episode, the only thing they can mention is Orion and his goddamn mirrors) and go ahead with episode 28.

"I heard Tiberius was a Good Character with an Awful Player, is it true?"

In my perosnal opinion, Tiberius was a good baseline for an interesting arc. But he was also the kind of character who can become annoying. I personally think people are more enamored with the idea of what Tiberius could have been than him being a pretty fleshed out character (bear in mind, for the first 20 or so episodes, most of Vox Machina doesnt feel very fleshed out, again part of the initialy awkward first phase). Likewise, this might be a possible unpopular opinion but... I dont feel Tiberius had as close a friendship as Vox Machina as some might think? this comes back to the player and stuff, but by the end I felt Tiberius saw Vox Machina more like a professional partnership than the family the rest of the characters became.

In terms of Orion, yes he becomes increasingly annoying as the show goes. Initially you dont notice it, but as the show goes, he becomes harder and harder to ignore. He eventually tries to take part in every. single. scene the rest of the cast is doing and tries to steal the spotlight. He tries to force his storyline even when other things are going down. etc. etc. (and this is not counting the stuff regarding him as a person). Tiberius is tolerable in small doses, but Orion cant shut the ef up.

"I heard because of her job, Ashley Johnson's Pike had to leave the show and the animated show expanded her role."

This is a half-truth. Because of Ashley's commitments, she could not consistently be in the show and, in the pre-Briarwood stuff Pike is given a send-off.

BUT Pike continues to show up after that and shows up a solid number of times, it's just she cant be there consistently. In fact, Pike showing up in the middle of the Briarwood arc to save everyone's ass and take part in the final battle? Pike was present in the show and played by Ashley via skype. the thing they changed was that they gave Pike an arc that wasnt present in the show.

Pike is the Gandalf of Vox Machina. She constantly has to leave to do something else, tho in this case it's because of the unpoken rule of trying to not use a player's character if the player is not present.

ETA: Another way you can REALLY tell Orion was no longer welcome is that, whenever Ashley had an open slot in her schedule, the rest of the cast would immediatly jump at the chance to have her join them for the session.

Here be (minor) Spoilers

Now here is an interesting thing I noticed. Which is that because of the Chroma Conclave events, Whitestone sorta becomes Vox Machina's base of operations, replacing the keep they had been given by the king of Emon. In the main show, this is a simple change in Status quo. but for the animated show it would mean they got that old keep and are about to abandon it merely like a few weeks after obtaining it, and that's kinda funny.

Other than that, it is interesting to see how the actors do become more comfortable portraiyng their characters and get past that initial awkwardness where it still feels like Players first.

it's also interesting how often a huge narrative moment will have a Natural 20, either saving the characters or fitting the narrative so well.

it is a difficult medium for one to adapt. and there are moments in which the characters will scre-up easy tasks because of the rolls, which can be funny or frustrating. But the high points are really good. and there were some moments and battles that felt as engaging as in any other medium. The Dragon attack in Emon was more tense than The hobbit's use of Smaug. I was genuinely cheering when Grog delivered justice on the tribe that abandoned him.

And the story feels as High Fantasy Epic as you can get from more "normal" storytelling mediums. and Critical Role is a great example of how D&D can be a game, but it's also a form of collective storytelling.

[blazehedgehog]

As an outsider looking in, it seems to me that up to adventure 2 there was actually atleast a vague direction of the story and plot of Sonic, with the first one introducing the franchise, then sloy adding tails, then by third there is the whole mural that gets brought up in adventure with more echidna lore, ending with Sonic realising he was the ultimate lifeform and stopping and redeeming Eggmans bad past and with the working together maybe being an oportunity for Eggman to start reforming himself instead of trying to destroy the world again like his grandfather tried.

But after, all the game storys (or what I heard and saw in youtube clips) seem to just be one of things and gimmicks that just dont really stick, especially since Unleashed wich if I am correct just threw another world ending thing into the lore that came out of nowhere and was forgoten after only for the next games to do the same.

ldk maybe Im totally wrong, thats why Im asking a Sonic expert

From my perspective, there was no definitive "lore" in Sonic until Sonic 3. I'm sure Sonic 1 and 2 had ideas and a direction they were aiming for, a concept they were forming, but Sonic 3 established a lot of key ideas that reverberated for a long time: the existence of a master emerald, the purpose of the master emerald, and the keepers of the master emerald.

Sonic 1 was just, like, "Here's what we settled on for who Sonic is and some of the rules of his world." A first draft.

Sonic 2 says "Here's all the ideas we had in Sonic 1, but they're bigger, better, and more cohesive now."

Sonic 3 & Knuckles is when it starts to feel like A Story. The Japanese manual opens with Sonic recalling the legend of a lost civilization and their downfall. We start getting cutscenes that tie in to that intro. It references events (really, the only one) from the previous game.

Sonic Adventure doubles down on all of that. It is deeply entwined in its narrative. Over an hour of fully voiced cutscenes. Explores the dangling plot threads established by Sonic 3. References multiple past games.

Sonic Adventure 2 is a little more oblique and you have to read between the lines a lot more, but it still connects to Sonic Adventure and the overall lore that had been established in 1994.

From there, Sonic games started trying to move on, and things became a lot more disjointed. Heroes and Shadow tried to connect to Sonic Adventure 2, but those waters became muddied very quickly thanks to poor characterization and rushed storytelling. Sonic 06 wanted to balance being a soft reboot with picking up with the story of Shadow the Hedgehog.

And from Sonic Unleashed onwards, Sonic games basically became self-contained until basically Sonic Frontiers.

Though I'm sure some nitpicky pedant will tell me about how Sonic Forces and Sonic Generations were full of ton of references to this and that and whatever as if I don't already know that, completely not understanding the concept of summary and generalization.

[starlightkun]

genuine question, how do you write so fast? 😭 i feel like you’re so quick with your works, both writing and putting them out!!

also i found your tumblr on ao3 and i have to say that you are carrying nct fics on ao3. i hope you never stop writing cause i could be 40 and i would still read your stuff 🫶

i think a big thing has been getting out of my head abt writing! like i only write when i want to, i don't stick to word counts (minimums or maximums), and i dont compare myself to other writers (not that i read a whole lot of fic anymore, but there's a few that i still keep up with and one of them churns out fics way faster than i do, and another who posts like maybe two or three times a year but i still love them!) like i've def said this before, but for me, writing fic is fun, it's something i do bc i want to and if i open a word doc and i'm genuinely dreading it, i'm not gonna do it (my adhd brain simply will not make me lol--tho that is a double edged sword bc i do have to chase myself into doing something i like sometimes, but the ritalin has helped a lot xx)

i also dont go into my fics completely clueless anymore. like, i for sure don't know everything, i learn a lot along the way, and tend to change stuff (and get surprised by my own fics, which is always fun!), but i definitely have more of an outline and general sort of sketch of the fic in my brain and in my word doc before i start actually writing real scenes of any sort, which has definitely helped. like, starting with one little idea isn't bad at all (strawberry sunday literally just started w the fact that i liked the title of a song that i hadn't even heard yet and it turned into like 10 fics??), but i dont just start writing head empty anymore (i used to get a tiny spark of inspiration and try to write everything start to finish immediately because i thought i'd lose it if i didn't, and it'd burn really short. now i sort of just sit with it and slowly tend to it like fire instead and it lasts a lot longer and gets a lot bigger). i ruminate a lot before anything that looks remotely like a story leaves my ideas doc and gets its own doc

idk if this necessarily makes me write faster, but i also edit as i write? like, sometimes i open a fic and i don't have anything in me to write, but i'll reread what's in the draft so far and edit, make little changes, fix continuity errors, etc. not only does it keep the whole plot so far fresh in my mind as i continue writing, but then i have a lot less to proof myself when i finally finish the whole thing because i've already caught a lot of spelling, grammatical, and plot errors! i used to find editing a slog to do bc when i finished my first draft i would be so excited and wanted to just post it! and didn't want to reread all this stuff i just wrote several times to try to find typos, and now it's usually a breeze bc my first draft isn't really my first draft, it's been continually revised as it was drafted. and sometimes i open a doc, won't feel like writing, tinker around with some editing, then suddenly have a lightbulb moment while i'm editing and jump into writing

[amiibo-king]

i think the other thing that bothers me about the whole "asra/mc is power imbalanced" take that bothers me, besides the kind of ableist implication that mc having the magical equivalent of a TBI makes them basically a child, as well as the pretty flagrant mischaracterization of asra and general disregard for canon, is that it kind of pushes a specific characterization of MC that feels very presumptuous.

what i mean is, you can certainly argue that the mc and asra's situation *has the potential* for an unhealthy, imbalanced dynamic. certainly, all of the routes have that potential, its part of the point of their reversed ends. but, when it comes to two adults with equal political/social authority, whether or not a dynamic is unhealthy relies heavily on the personalities of the people involved. Just because a situation has the potential for an unhealthy dynamic doesnt mean one is automatically going to be there, and whether or not one forms is going to depend entirely on how both parties' personalities interact. in the same sort of way you can get an upright or a reversed end depending on the kind of mentalities you choose to encourage in your LI.

now, i would thoroughly disagree with anyone who claims that asra exhibits any sort of power over or manipulative behavior towards the MC even in his reversed end! but even putting that aside, the fact that the health of a dynamic is dependent on both parties personalities means that whether or not your MC's dynamic would be unhealthily balanced is going to vary from person to person.

Everyone brings their own personality to the MC, and I dont know about anyone else, but I personally have my own ways that I mentally bend the canon actions and reactions of the MC in my head as I read to better fit how I would react to things (because often i think, i would not react that way, but instead this other way!) and I think everyone does that to some degree. and I think where the people who make this argument are probably coming from is that they look at asra, and they look at their own MC, and they think, well, my MC would not have a healthy dynamic with them. which is fine, and they are allowed to feel that way! I frequently feel that way about Nadia's route because I have some discomfort with the idea of dating someone with that level of political power. but the problem is, instead of realizing that that is a function of their own MC's personality, and saying, "his route is not for me" they project that onto everyone else's MCs as well, and assume that everyone else's MC would have the same dynamic with asra that they personally would have.

And that bothers me, because you're welcome to have your own interpretation of the canon, even if I disagree with it. And you're allowed to have your own idea of your own MC's personality and dynamic with the LIs. But I would prefer if you didnt then try to tell me what the dynamic between *my* MC and their chosen LI looks like, because you can't know that.

there's more i could talk about, like the fact that the entire plot of asra's upright route revolves around mc and asra learning to flourish as individual equals, (to the point that i have to wonder if the people making this argument read his route all the way through) or my confusion about why the fandom latched on to asra/mc as the supposedly inherently unhealthy one when there are other routes with much worse potential for such imbalances, but this post is already so long as it is, so i'll end it here.

[fipindustries]

in media res

there is a quality to certain stories where you can tell this world was chewed over a thousand times by the author before the first chapter was written. but what im talking about is not just chewed over, for the quality im thinking of is often the case that the author has in fact written other stories in this world previously, maybe even with these very same characters.

there is a fullness to everything you encounter when you read these stories. the characters show up with a certain kind of iconic weight to them. they already are what they are supposed to be, they spring forth fully formed. the MCU for a while was the master at this. every time they introduced a "new" character to the franchise you could feel the weight of that character behind them, you could hear the drumroll, the trumpets, the fanfare. spiderman shows up in civil war and the soundtrack swells to let you know. yeah, this is the guy, you know the guy, you are aware of the 60 years of history behind this guy, you can sense the profound cultural weight of this guy here, he is almost like a sun, bending space and time and making everything orbit around them because of that weight.

now of course this is easy to do with characters like spiderman or wolverine or whatever. but the MCU would also manage to do this with guys that the general audiences were not familiar with, for whom the collective unconcious did not have quite as strong a grasp on. when they introduce t'challa for the first time, also in civil war, you know this guy means bussiness, you know this is a VIP. same thing when they introduce thanos in that avengers after credits scene. even if you dont read comics you are aware of the concept of comics having these big larger than life characters with thousands of stories to their name. when at the aftercredits of infinity war we see nick fury contact captain marvel, you might not know who the fuck carol danvers is but by the sheer fact that you know that logo has to have meaning, then it HAS meaning.

another great example of this is arcane. i imagine that to watch arcane if you are a fan of league of legends is quite the treat, but watching arcane without having any idea what is hextech, what is noxus or who he fuck is hermeindinger, is an experience. at every moment you see the camera linger on something, a completly mundane thing or a cool looking clock or a sword that is shaped in a more memorable way than others and you feel that tingle. that feeling of "this is something, im watching ancient runes imbued with ancient lore, there are old magics being invoked here"

but truly, the one medium that has done this multiple times to great success, and the one i want to put particular focus on, is webserials/web novels. i have already burned your ears off talking about these, i will quickly rattle off the typical examples, worm, after the hero, worth the candle.

what these have in common is that they are based on previous stories the authors were writing privately before, for years. and then polished and repackaged in a final form that works as a sorts of spinoff to all those stories that you never read. in a sense you are stepping into a huge franchise, as the title of this post says, "in media res".

now, naive wisdom would tell you this is a bad idea, right? imagine starting the lord of the rings in book two of the two towers. or starting a song of ice and fire in a storm of swords. or the dark tower series in the wasteland. it would be confusing, it would be annoying. you would be constantly feeling like you are missing out on stuff. you wouldnt be able to fully grasp the plot because you are trying to hastily reconstruct the events that happened before out of vague clues and references and in-jokes.

but i will say two things to this.

thing number one, quick tangent into my personal past, i was always a bit neurodivergent as a kid. never got properly diagnosed of anything but, whatever i had, it was strong enough that it made really hard for me to socialize with other kids. i remember going to primary school and being convinced that all my class mates already knew each other from kindergarden. people always seemed to find out about things through "the grapevine", whatever that was and i was always the last to find out. but even beyond that, being a kid is being thrown into the great history of humanity in media res and desperatly trying to keep up. after a while, out of sheer necessity, i learned to just sort of roll with the flow. to sort of act like you know what's going on simply because it made things easier. you learn to pick up things quickly from context clues and try not to ask too many questions.

remember this scene in rick and morty? i *did* laugh at the redgreen grumble reference, simply because i understood it was a reference to something and the instinct of trying to fit in kicked in.

thing number two, dialing back to the main topic, i have read stories starting on the middle book of a saga and actually quite enjoyed myself. the two greatest examples i can think of are the infinity code from the artemis fowl series and the dark flight down from the dead days series. they were written in such a way that, even if i didnt understand everything, by virtue of being children's books, they explained everything carefully and were filled with reminders of past events and the relationships between the characters.

and i think this is what these web stories do that makes them work, that makes them feel alive and lived in and its world well trodden without feeling confusing or overwhelming. its a tough needle to thread because, unlike with childrens books, you cant just stop the story and have the narrator infodump everything on your lap. if you want to do this with any kind of craft and artistry you have to make it seem seamless and organic. worm has taylor start the story with an essay about the story of capes and later uses the fact that she is a cape geek to make her long diatribes explaining who leet and uber are or what is an endbringer or what is alexandria's place in the world natural. in worth the candle there is the excuse that joon already knows the elements of his campaigns and so when he explains them he is actually sharing intel with his team. in prelude to after the hero... honestly i dont know what alchemy josh conjured, but somehow as i read the story and new characters where introduced it just felt like reuniting with old friends, and whatever we saw of ieik, it felt like going back to your childhood home, so props to that.

my point to all of this is that i really really enjoy this style of storytelling and i would love to see more of it. it makes everything feel so meaningful, behind every rock, every name, every place there could be a whole cool backstory you are not even aware of, behind every weird awkward phrase there could bee some profound in-joke or oblique reference. it makes everything pop when i am put in that mental space where i have to stay on my toes because i could be expected to be familiar with whatever is thrown my way.

of course it would be silly to demand that a writer writes an entire story, doesnt publish it and then writes a spinoff filled with references to the original book and then publishes that. and im not about to start reading books halfway on a series trying to capture that feeling because, as i said, this is the kind of thing that takes deliberate finesse to execute well.

but it is something i will keep my eyes open for.