#i'm trying to get the general plot of the first chunk written down first

[schwender-exe]

Devlog #1

Well, I promised a devlog and here it is!

Howdy folks, it's been a while of radio silence but hopefully it's well worth the wait! since the last time I've posted I took a break to think over what I wanted to do with the game. The reason for that is because originally, I basically started with a vague idea of the story without any plot-points or anything tangible. I basically started development with nothing more than the basic setting and a few random area and character ideas, which obviously won't get me far.

So. What did I do about it? well.. not much. Since last I posted, I quit my old job and got a new job which is a much calmer atmosphere compared to my last which is helping with my sanity, drafted a few story plot points and talked to a few artists, which, speaking of:

Say hello to Yo_Hokki, the game's new artist! you can check out Hokki's awesome work here!

Hokki will be taking the sprites I've done so far and giving them more of a polish to them than I could ever do (and shading! ooo!). as much as I enjoy doing pixel art, I don't think mine is exactly at a level I feel proud of and I'm lacking in a lot of skill, which is why I wanted to find an artist in the first place. (Plus it's nice to have someone else's opinion if I ever get stuck!)

Here's a little gif of the new character sprites in action! Hokki's new sprites also come with a new palette which, honestly I think these colors pop more and in general are nicer / more interesting to look at than the palette I had before.

On the more technical side, I've been working on some back-end parts of the game to make it easier to produce new content. I've written a dialogue script reader which lets me write out dialogue like so:

And have it convert that into my EventSystem script which-- well long story short it means I don't have to write a lot to have long conversations between characters. It also allows me to add keywords modularly which is a huge help if I ever decide to add more to the dialogue system later on. If anyone would like a breakdown of the Dialogue system, feel free to shoot me a question and I'll try my best to explain!

I've also been reworking the original stage I had for Chloe (the mushroom headed character) and breaking it into smaller chunks to make it more interesting and have more to it than simply running over and talking to Chloe. One of the big reasons it took me so long to add on to the game (outside of being busy with IRL things) was that I had trouble thinking of new mechanics which really fit with the game and kept the game feeling "chill", which is the goal. I won't get into much specifics, otherwise this'll be one hell of a long devlog- but to keep it simple: It takes me a long time to really nail down something that I feel is a good fit for the setting, the game and will be enjoyable from a player's perspective... which is tough because I am an overthinker :') (If any devs have any tips on this, please do dm me! I could use the help!)

Well, that's it for this devlog! thanks for reading! hopefully next devlog won't be too far off..

#godot engine #gamedev #pixelart #pixel #pixel aesthetic #art #indiedev #gaming #artists on tumblr #indiegamedev #devlog

[zyrafowe-sny]

#6 and #7 of fic writer asks, please? :)

Thanks for the ask! There's a reasonable chance that I will go through all of these at some point before the end of the year, but we'll see if I manage it! :)

I'm generally answering these as a writer, not a reader/media consumer, since there are definitely things I enjoy that I don't feel inspired to write myself.

6. What ship(s) captured your heart?

This question is a little funny to me because I was so much less interested in reading or writing romance in 2022 and much of 2023 compared to my historical reading habits (or 2020/2021 when I regularly read actual modern romance novels). Like, I always enjoyed genfic, but for so much of 2022 and a good chunk of 2023 I was rarely in the mood for shippy fic. Background relationships were fine, but I didn't really want to read or write much that was romance-centric.

Nimona (both the movie and graphic novel) got me interested in Ballister/Ambrosius, but so far I have only posted fic for the movie versions. I appreciate that their estrangement happened *after* they were happily together for a while and that they had to reconcile.

Speaking of couples that had to reconcile... While I always casually enjoyed Raeda (Eda the Owl Lady/Raine Whispers), it wasn't until a multi-fandom smubbles challenge that I felt inspired to write anything for them. (It feels extremely on brand that my first attempts at writing smut were 100 word drabbles.)

Huh. Aladarius is another ship that's been percolating in my brain (nothing written) and they also give off previously divorced vibes.

And [redacted] for [redacted] upcoming challenge.

I am having epiphanies.

7. What character(s) captured your heart?

This is roughly chronological:

a minor OC from a fic I betaed gave me plot bunnies, and eventually I will finish writing them

Dys from I Was a Teenage Exo-Colonist — he makes my heart hurt and has made it harder for me to explore other friendships in that game

Elliott from the game Stardew Valley — not my first or necessarily favorite SDV spouse, but there were a few months in 2023 when I couldn't read/write/game much because of my new glasses but I could sort of manage SDV on a tablet because it was familiar, so I invented a good chunk of Elliott backstory in my head and wrote a tiny bit down

Nimona — her suicidal ideation in the movie is...ooooph

Ballister Boldheart — movie!Ballister is giving me more plot bunnies now, but I am also a comic!Ballister enjoyer

Ambrosius Goldenloin — movie!Ambrosius with his little internal breakdown and all that implies about masking/expectations/etc

Meredith Blitzmeyer from the Nimona graphic novel — a good chunk of my Nimona writing agenda is getting her into the movieverse

Luz Noceda — I only wrote a tiny bit from her POV in 2022, but wrote more this year and get to project about executive dysfunction, depression, and grief

Camila Noceda — I've been writing more grieving and trying-but-not-entirely-succeeding Camila this year, and that's also been cathartic

Vee and Hunter aren't new for 2023, but remain special to me

#thanks for the ask! #sometimes I write #fanfic

[jamietwat]

I am so curious about your writing process. I’m reading Bizarre Love Triangle and I’m absolutely bewildered by both how cohesive it is and how fast you post.

Like when Keeley asked to go running with Roy and Jamie last chapter, several chapters after Jamie initially invited her in Amsterdam. Did you know that was coming when you wrote the Amsterdam scene, thus making it work on two levels to establish that Keeley needed space and to set up this later scene? Or was it a coincidence?

Do you outline? In detail? Or just have a general vibe for what happens in each chapter. Or do you figure out plot points as you go? How do you write so fast? Do you write throughout the day or sit down at a certain time and just bang out a bunch of words?

Feel free to entirely ignore this ask. I’m just so fascinated about your entire process and I know I love gushing about writing so if you want to share anything about your process, I would be interested in reading about it

Okay, I absolutely love this question and an excuse to get into it 👀

Like all of my writing, this turned out far longer than I anticipated so my apologies in advance and I'm gonna pop a read more in now

Sometimes I sit down to specifically try to write and finish off a chapter, but a lot of the progress before that is from writing stuff on my phone throughout the day when my brain is on it or when I have a minute. Also, after almost every chapter there's like a day where I don't write at all or write like 100 words and then a point when I go into super writing mode. Almost all of what I write is written in a not necessarily chronological order within the chapter itself but most chapters I work on when I'm on them without jumping ahead with a few exceptions when something wouldn't get out of my head enough that I ended up writing it before going to the chapter I was actually on

Most things are intentionally dropped knowing that I'm coming back to them and when and there are still a bunch of setups hanging all over the place for things we're still coming to. Some things set up stuff pretty close to them (like Colin's aren't you worried Roy's going to cut your dick off now that you're both dating Keeley and Jamie being like no vs when they're sharing a bed the same night and Jamie's internally like Roy is so going to cut my dick off if he finds out I'm bi after this). But lots of them are for things further off and generally, I already know that I'm going to drop the hint at that point before I even get to that point

There's a lot of stuff I put in on purpose and laughed thinking about how it would come back up later. I've already gotten back around to a good chunk of them, but I still have lots of those left to get back to too. The first thing that comes to mind for one that I still have left open is how this is going to come back around later and make a liar of Roy when the team finds out about Roy and Jamie

Occasionally, I think oh this would work with that and throw it in later on without it having originally been foreshadowing, but most of it is intentionally there with the intention of coming back to it

There's the rare time where something's a coincidence (like something next chapter that I realized fit very well with something in the first chapter when rereading some of the older sections without realizing how well it connected before then)

And then ironically, the Jamie asking Keeley to run thing is kind of the exception where originally I was going to have her go at one point with them in Amsterdam and have it contribute more to her being like oh my god I need alone time when suddenly they're inviting her along every day and she's like absolutely not but instead the first chapter of it went how it did and the second chapter skipped ahead to her needing a break and her not going fit so much better but I knew I was also leaving it open for her to go with them later at some point

I just didn't realize it would be last chapter until I was already writing it and saw the direction the morning sections were going and went okay, this is a good time to add this in

And then in terms of outlining, I've reached a point where I end up having to do some level of outline for the chapters but I didn't do that at the start. And how detailed the outline is depends on how hard it is to make sure things go in the right order. But a whole lot of what happens in what order is still just in my head

Since the very start, it's been a lot of holding everything in my head and knowing a lot of what was coming in the long run and short run. And at that point, I wasn't writing things down as a plan but I could benchmark where things happened on the calendar in my head for the June stuff easily like

which weekend was Father's Day meant the team had to find out about them at Sam's restaurant the weekend before

Phoebe had to already know about the Roy and Keeley part before that because of the Cora and Roy conversation before they went to Sam's restaurant

Pride had to come after Father's Day and before the end of school

The end of school had to be where stuff like Leanne asking Roy out showed up

Then off-season stuff was more vaguely in my head like

the stuff with Phoebe around a lot has to go in there and be there some before they go on the trip

but they have to go early enough that Jamie's piercings have time to start healing before pre-season training

And I kind of knew what had to happen before pre-season training, during it, and during actual season

And I generally know the order that the big stuff happens but some of the stuff I moved around in a swapping around the order of plot points kind of way but still keeping them mostly the same (like originally Roy was not going to find out about the pegging thing before the Pride game and it was going to be a chunk after but that worked better when I got going)

Also, some stuff changed in a bigger way longer ago where I decided against the original plan for whatever reason (like originally Keeley was going to meet Cora at the first game of the season, but then that was too long of a wait and Roy bringing around her before then intentionally made more sense so it made way more sense to put her in the Father's Day chapter)

And as far as an organization system goes, I have like 4 systems on the go tbh and I have used some combination of them for each of the chapters since about chapter 7

Chapter 7 (the one where they make the group chat and then later go to Sam's restaurant and tell everybody and like a million things happen there) is the first one where I won't oh fuck I need to write some things down to remember what else needs put in here so it got a list like this in the notes app when I was a good chunk in and was trying to hold in my head all the stuff that had to happen still and how to make it flow in a logical order and then I did not go in that order but checked them off as I went to keep track of what I still needed to get to:

(Also some things blatantly changed between making the list and actually writing them to make them fit better with how things were moving around or to cut them because a different endpoint for the chapter was better):

And for a while it was a lot of holding things in my head and that with the chunks I needed to figure out the order to put in still

And then there was the woefully mislabelled chapters plan for where the things before the season went (with things we aren't yet or that got moved to later redacted). This was useful for a while for not forgetting things but also I don't use anymore because I remember where things are going beyond it and it was missing things past where I cut this off because it got vaguer on timeline the further off the benchmark events were

(the scratched out part there is actually happening in the next update now because it really wasn't a priority to get put there)

(also the chapter 17 part is so long because I remembered shit that had to come between what I had there and what I had as chapter 18 and added it in there and didn't bother to change the numbers even though clearly it was not going to be one chapter anymore)

The sharing the same bed casually thing got moved around for reasons also, partly keeping moving wise and partly working better a different way wise, but mostly this was just a rough estimate of where that would happen anway

Also, why is this also labelled chapter 17? Idk I probably forgot about stuff that needed to go in (which was kind of the whole point of making the list so I would hopefully remember things and add them in there and be able to refer back and not later go oh fuck this should have happened) and put them in later that day between and forgot to relabel things underneath because I was going to do it later and then made a separate note for what actually was chapter 17 and what was chapter 18

Also, there's a lot of stuff that was planned for not quite that long like Colin figuring Jamie out that still was planned for a long time before we got to them but either got missed on this list or weren't planned quite yet or didn't have a spot in the timeline yet and then everything after this on the list is spoilers for the future while also it doesn't really have that much left anyway because that was mostly sorting out the how to get from pre-Amsterdam to the start of the season without losing something important

Also, fun fact, I'm pretty sure this used to be labelled worse and that this is after I had already reworked Amsterdam being 3 chapters but maybe this is the original version. Who knows? Certainly not me... Maybe that's how there ended up being two chapter 17s

And then phone notes ended up not cutting it for trying to keep track of all the parts of a chapter and whose POV each part should be and trying to make it fairly even (except for when there was a reason not to with Keeley having a break from them) and make sure one person isn't disappearing from having a POV forever for no reason so notes app lists became less common unless I was jotting down scenes before putting them into the actual plan when I was really stuck but since chapter 16, it's mostly been

Sorting out what happens into whose POV it is and moving things around or adding in a vague something to put in if someone had way more or less in a thing like this and then adding the numbers for what order things go in and sometimes it ended up changing from this but it was mostly accurate. Also, some chapters don't have this. Some have it from before I started writing. Some have to sort it out after I have some stuff down and then went wait I've gotta figure this out

And then most also have this as a more clear what order things happen thing and making sure that one colour isn't missing for forever (also I highkey don't write their names anymore and just have the colours) (also this is a short ass list, usually there's 17-23 things on there at the start and then how long the scenes themselves end up typically determines if I end up splitting things up again)

The X there means I went never mind I don't need this and then the rest were checked off as I finished the scene. Also, usually I don't have what days things happen, that's just because I was trying to keep track of them specifically because it had to start on a Monday when Keeley was back at work after the trip and end with Roy and Keeley seeing Jamie's dad on the Saturday

Also sometimes the second part is just numbers in the colours. Sometimes there is no other system and it's just the list and what happens. Sometimes scenes get cut or added after that anyway. How much I outline or rely on the outline really depends on how confusing it is to keep track of the POVs switching to make it work out fairly evenly and without too much of someone at a time and someone else dropping off the map for too long. The Pride game one was pretty easy to keep track of because there was almost always a reason why it had to be that character's POV for that part but sometimes sorting out like this is the only way I know whose POV to use for a scene without having to change it later instead

#This is so long I am so sorry #BLT #Bizarre Love Triangle #threewaywithdelusion #Ask #Mine

[musical-chick-13]

5. What’s a fic idea you’ve had that you will never write?

13. How much planning do you do before writing?

21. Have you ever deleted an entire scene after spending hours laboring over it? If so, why?

25. Have you ever upset yourself with your own writing?

5. What’s a fic idea you’ve had that you will never write?

I do genuinely want to, at some point, get to all of my ideas, but since I only have so much time on this earth, probably I'd have to say the random Good Omens AU rattling around in my brain where everybody is a Shakespearean actor. Instead of heaven vs hell, it's different schools of thought in interpreting the text. Instead of the apocalypse it's, "This theatre is going to close down."

13. How much planning do you do before writing?

It really depends. If it's something rather complex or that spans a lot of in-story time, I'll usually make some little notes or write down first-draft dialogue for important scenes/developments; and I'll spend a lot of time thinking about how the general plot will unfold before actually sitting down to write anything. If it's anything under like. 10,000 words though, there is basically no planning at all, lmao.

21. Have you ever deleted an entire scene after spending hours laboring over it? If so, why?

I don't remember doing this? That doesn't mean it hasn't happened, though. I will say, there ARE large chunks of dialogue/internal monologue I've deleted from closer to god. Not whole scenes, but certainly decent-sized parts of them. This fic, more than anything else I've written, is a story where I want to make sure that what I'm trying to communicate is getting across as clearly as possible. The subject matter is...complicated, and it's important to me to both represent that complexity and to make the characters work within the subject matter in a way that feels organic and authentic. When I've cut something, it's always been because I didn't think the passage was successfully meeting those ends.

25. Have you ever upset yourself with your own writing?

Yes, absolutely. Not really so much in the sense of, "I wrote this and it made me sad," but in the sense of, "Oh, I wrote this line because there is an Underlying Personal Issue™ that I didn't realize I had until now."

I have on more than one occasional gotten emotional working on my Aki/Himeno WIP, just because it requires me remembering that she's dead. And I'm never going to be okay about that.

Fic writer asks!!

#c2g #The Fic That's A Lot #(because it shows up) #multi t(ASK)ing #thank you!!!

[dandelion-wings]

1, 12, and 15?

Thank you for the ask! <3

1. what's the fic youre most proud of?

There's a handful of contenders, but honestly, overall, probably An Open Hand. I managed to accomplish multiple things with it that I wanted to do and hadn't pulled off before, and it's the first fic of that length I've seen to completion (the longest I'd written and edited to posting-level satisfaction before that was 45k). Also it's an "everything and the kitchen sink" of elements and tropes I just plain like.

12. What’s your perfect environment to create/write?

One that doesn't have a lot of other inputs! I struggle with distractions a lot, and fare best when I have a large chunk of time ahead of me (so I don't have to fear getting really into my work and then being pulled abruptly out) and minimal distractions. At home I try to create that by working on my laptop instead of my big computer (the new laptop is not as helpful as the old one in this respect because it can actually have more than one program and/or two tabs open at a time, but the trade-off is it doesn't take 15-20 minutes to open a program or new tab), down in the sunroom where the only potential physical distraction is the cat. I also tend to write quite a lot when traveling because travel naturally creates those conditions for me--plane rides, spurts of not-driving on road trips, boring hotel rooms, etc.

A mug of tea helps a lot regardless of location and circumstance, of course. :>

15. How do you think your writing as improved over time?

Hmmm. I mean, over time in general, it's improved in a lot of ways. Over the last couple of years (a.k.a. the time I've been in the Genshin fandom), I think I've done a lot of improvements on plotting and pacing, though for anyone who hasn't seen my original/older work then those improvements may not be obvious? Fanfic turns out to be a good low-stress space to play with that stuff. (One of the reasons I am so proud of An Open Hand is that I tried a lot of things around pacing in revisions, not just writing, that taught me new tricks, and I was able to bring those into play in the year following as I revised an original novel I'm working on.)

I don't think my prose has improved that much in the sentence level, and in fact I have a number of what I consider Known Bugs in my fanfic prose at present that I'm not putting effort into fixing when I write or revise because I, honestly, like my current prose flow even if it isn't ideal, and so that's the sort of killing-my-darlings I only worry about with my original work. I like purple prose, both reading and writing, and fanfic is where I can just do what's fun instead of what's Good.

But yeah, from a personal perspective, my pacing and to a lesser extent my plot flows have leveled up a fair bit from where I was in early 2020! As an example, I have a novel I wrote the first draft of as my 2020 Nano and obviously a first draft is going to be rough and a Nano one very much so, but I can hold it up against my current longfic and even with the WIPs, sheerly on the planning levels, I can see where I know more and have more of a toolbox than I did when I was slamming that out.

#asked and answered #why not meme i guess

[maple-seed]

Alexandrite + Pearl for the gemstone asks!

ALEXANDRITE  Alexandrite are known to change colour and believed to possess magic and bring balance . What part of the creative process do you feel brings balance to you? What is the most magical part of creating for you?

I love editing. I firmly believe in the philosophy of "a first draft's purpose is to exist" so the writing part I'm just getting stuff out onto the page and sometimes that feels like I'm trying to pull my guts out through my belly button.

Editing, though? Taking that rough chunk of story and polishing it into a nice, smooth, shiny piece of narrative? Ooh, can't beat it.

I love rearranging passages, rewording phrases, and even cutting bits out entirely until things flow the way they should. Finding a nice, succinct wording to get your meaning across is the most satisfying feeling. When you have the time to sand it all down and all the pieces click into place and the story just drips from one sentence to the next. Mmmm. Perfection.

PEARL  Pearls can take any amount of time from six months to years to form. What does the typical creative process look like for you, from clam to shining pearl?

"Process" is a very generous term for what I do. 😂

I've only really written the one story, so this pertains entirely to that. I've had all the main plot points of the story planned out in my head from the beginning, and lots of individual scenes. I start each chapter with what I call a "seed", which is basically the purpose of the chapter, a scene I want to include or a feeling I want to convey. I have a draft where I laid out the chapters and how I wanted them to flow, with a vague reminder of what the point of the chapter is and the date the chapter will be posted. It looks like this:

Look at that. It's ridiculous. 🤣 That is the extent to my planning on paper. I am a fool. A charlatan. I am merely masquerading as a writer.

I use it to rearrange things for pacing purposes or to align chapters with real-world events (like Christmas or seasons). I basically put down the major points where they needed to go and arranged the rest as they made sense. (For my readers, yes, this does mean I know the exact date they are going to kiss.)

From there I just went down the list, writing chronologically. I open a file and start writing the first draft and when that's done I do the next chapter. I average about a chapter a week. Sometimes I'll knock out the first draft of a chapter in a few days. Sometimes it fights me for a couple weeks. Sometimes real life gets in the way and slows me down. That's why I keep a buffer and write a few chapters ahead of what I'm posting. I highly recommend that for anyone trying to post to a regular schedule.

After the rough draft is done I edit as many times as possible. And still miss typos.

#gemstone asks #fic writing

[wander-wren]

Ok, here goes! I wanna preface this by saying that I've been in a serious writing rut for like the past six months, to the point where I've pretty much given up on my WIPs. It's not that I don't want to write, or that I don't have ideas, but the actual work of sitting down and getting words on the page feels like pulling my own teeth out. So I'm conducting research on writers I admire to see if I can learn anything from their processes. And so, without further ado:

How long have you been writing?

Do you start out knowing what's gonna happen in the story, like with a plot chart and everything, or does the story take shape as you go along?

Do you write in big chunks or a little bit at a time?

How many drafts do you typically do? Is your first draft usually like word vomit or something a little more polished?

Do you have a beta reader?

What's your editing process like?

Is there a certain time or place where you prefer to write?

What do you consider the hardest part of writing?

Have you ever struggled with perfectionism in your writing? Do you have any tricks for bypassing that "EVERYTHING MUST BE PERFECT" wall in your brain and just get words on the page?

That was a lot lol. Of course you don't have to answer all of them, but any insight you're willing to give will be greatly appreciated!

Thank you very much <3

woo okay let’s tackle this!! under the cut bc Long. strap in folks

How Long Have You Been Writing?

in any shape or form: since maybe 6 years old? but i started writing fanfiction at 12, started getting serious about writing in general at 15, and threw myself full tilt into fanfic at 17, so currently i haven’t written original fiction Really since june. which is a complicated answer. you didn’t specify if this is about original stuff or fic, but i’ll try to answer from both perspectives bc my process for each is wildly different.

Plotter or Pantser?

for both original fiction and longfics, i’m solidly in the middle; i usually start with a list of things i want to happen, and i always need some idea of where i’m going to end, even if it changes later. from there, i start writing the first few chapters. when i feel like i have a more solid grasp of where i’m going, i outline chapter-by-chapter through one “section” of the story, however i define that. once im done that section, i outline again. this gives me a lot more freedom to change things as i go and adapt to new decisions i make. i also add random ideas to my masterlist of stuff that i might want to include further down the line as i go.

with oneshots i never, or almost never, have a plan beyond the premise/summary, so they frequently get away from me and do all kinds of random things.

Big Chunks or Little At a Time?

i’m gonna say big chunks? i have adhd so i frequently hyperfixate on my projects and can work on them for hours and hours on end, which i don’t exactly recommend, but it happens. at any given time i have a “main” wip or two that i work on pretty much daily, and then others scattered around that i might pick up for a few hours if i get bored. but i try to finish fics as fast as possible bc if i move on there’s a 50% chance i won’t come back, at least not for months.

How Many Drafts?

for fanfic? one. every once in a while if something is REALLY not working i’ll rewrite sections, so that’s like 1.5 drafts, but it’s free labor i do for fun so while i take pride in it and want it to be good, i’m not going to expend THAT much energy, yknow?

for original stuff, like if we’re talking novels…at least three drafts? i haven’t gotten that far with most of my projects so i’m still learning about myself, but my general process seems to be that the first draft is about getting the main story beats and the emotions down. my first draft is always very heavy on the angst and catharsis, sometimes overdramatically so, bc there’s less plot to hold it up. then my second draft is more about plot and realism and structure, but i tend to lose some emotions in trying to do that. my third draft is about combining the two and continuing to polish stories/characters. i haven’t written any fourth drafts, so i’m not sure whats beyond that.

and my first drafts tend to be very polished. i wrote a little rant explaining the history of that aspect of my writing not long ago, so i won’t get into it again. part of that is just how i’ve always been, part of it is practice. i do feel sometimes that i write pretty enough to cover up structural/realism/continuity issues, which can be frustrating when looking for critique from people who can’t see past it.

Beta Reader?

yes! i have a small group of writer friends that i share things with, but that is pretty much always for cheer-betaing and minor critiques unless i ask for actual criticism, which i only do with my original stuff when i get to the second/third draft, partly bc it’s not ready before then, and partly because it’s a lot of mental work for the other people. shoutout to my main bnha betas, @rangerlexi and @spacetime-enthusiast, who are, as i said, mainly cheer betas, tho mav is also my resident bakugo expert bc he’s very hard for me to write sometimes. getting better tho!

can’t recommend finding betas enough, even if just to cheer you on. hell, i can’t make promises about super long works or original fic, but i’m always down to read fanfiction. i don’t even bite, i swear. obligatory note that you do gotta trust ppl tho yada yada thieves exist and mean people exist etc etc

Editing Process?

for fanfic: typically i reread one or two times right away while all my thought processes are fresh in my head. i’ll make spot edits and add or delete things here and there. then depending on how impatient i am, i wait a day or a few to send it to my betas and/or reread and edit again myself. then i post and i’m done!

for original works: i don’t bother to edit first drafts, or even second drafts sometimes. when it’s time to prep for a second draft, i reread and make notes on what i want to keep and what i want to change, then use those notes to make my next skeletal outline. usually my stories change drastically from one draft to the next, but the last time i did a third draft, i wanted it to be pretty close to the structure of the second, so instead of outlining at all i just did splitscreen and wrote the whole third draft while looking at the second, sometimes basically retyping a page word for word, sometimes going “well, that chapter is pointless” and skipping it entirely. when it came to line editing, i used hemingway bc i don’t trust computers to do my editing, BUT the different colored highlights were helpful to break up the monotony. hemingway is a lot more focused on concise/readable sentences and cutting adverbs than anything else, which was good for me as an overwriter. i cut 22k words the last time i used it, from a 130k draft.

Best Time or Place?

not really? i write everywhere and constantly. the advice about finding your niche of productive time never seemed to work for me because, as long as i’m not blocked/stuck, i pretty much always kind of want to write.

Hardest Part?

DEVELOPING RELATIONSHIPS OH MY GOD IT’S THE WORST. sorry. i hate. doing that. becoming friends? becoming family? falling in love? god. kill me. i love all [thing] to lovers in reading but in writing i tend to drift toward best friends to lovers bc then it’s kind of close. i love writing about people in relationships, tension and banter and softness and fights, but getting there is so awful.

Are You a Perfectionist? Tips?

hm. gonna try to answer this honestly and in the least asshole-ish sounding way possible lmao.

i’m not really a perfectionist? not in writing, anyway, idk about other stuff. but also it’s just like…i know i’m good at what i do. not perfect—i can see flaws in things i wrote even a few months ago—but good. More Than Satisfactory. sometimes fics just don’t work and i abandon them, sometimes it takes me a while to figure out what i’m doing, but i’m not generally paralyzed by the need for anything to be perfect because i’m happy where i am?

that’s a hard mindset to get to, though. and you will for sure feel good about something and then dislike it in a few months or years. that’s just the nature of improving your craft. i think if i had any tips, though, i would say a few things.

watch this video essay, the whole thing but specifically 5:39-9:20. i love cj the x and i agree with many of his takes on art, so. some of his other essays might be helpful as well but that one i know talks specifically about perfectionism.

or if you don’t want to, just have this quote that melted my brain a little when i heard it. “perfectionism is not an inherently bad impulse. but you have to earn that. you don’t get to be a perfectionist if it is unproven up to this point if you can even make a thing.”

read bad stories. like genuinely i’m such a petty spiteful person oops so. i don’t really seek them out much but reading like, really really badly written work is like “well, if that’s the bar, at least i’ve cleared it.” obviously don’t go attacking creators or posting the work to make fun of it, but read it. maybe make notes of exactly why it’s bad for yourself, even, it might help you get better at identifying problems in your own work if you can figure out why things are bad beyond just “i don’t like it.” there, that sounds less mean, right?

just post your shit, tbh. put it out there. most people on the internet, in fandoms, they’re nice, if you curate your space properly. it’s a confidence boost! put something out there that’s less-than-perfect, get a couple of kudos and realize the world didn’t implode, and maybe, maybe it’ll be easier to start/finish next time.

you kinda just gotta accept that you need practice, my dude. like. you can’t closer to perfect without work!! we know this!! just do it. i know i just said to post things but also if you hate what you made no one!! else!! has!! to!! know!! it can be a secret. it’s okay. this coming from a chronic oversharer lol i have the worst time trying not to shove my stuff at people….which, actually, kinda worked better as motivation for me, bc i couldn’t share something unfinished, so i had to Do The Thing in order to get validation/feedback/critique like i wanted. so either way, whatever works better for you.

The End

so yeah, those are my answers, i guess? i hope that makes sense and helps and everything!! i’m really sorry you’re in a rut, that’s the worst. if you have any more questions or just wanna chat about what you’re writing feel free to come say hi again!

#a little birdie asked me #wooo this was fun #i love talking about writing and as such ive already infodumped to most of my friends :(( #i love how my approach to og stuff is like so much more meticulous and then fanfic is like #it exists? cool my work here is done #not that i dont care a shitton about my fic. i absolutely do #but i got better things in life (read: more fanfiction) to be working on #i cant be agonizing over here #esp for 0 american dollars lol #wren wrambles #always forget the longpost tag

[corvidcrybaby]

12, 22, 69 (lol) for the fanfic ask game 👀

SCREEEEEEEEE HERE WE GO

12. Do you outline your fics?  If yes, how detailed are your outlines?  How far do you stray from them?

It's an even fifty-fifty. I outline my fics when I begin to have a lot of plot elements, narrative threads or allegorical references I want to work into it - if I don't, I'm liable to forget something relatively important and have to either shoehorn that thread in later, or do the Edit Of Shame where I go back and include something as a throwaway line. If you're curious as to what they look like, here's an example from when I was working on Formulas Fatal To the Flesh:

Some of these beats ended up in the final cut, while others didn't. I usually try to break it down based on "okay, what is The Moment I want Character X and Character Y to have together" and from there I build backwards and forwards. How they got there and where it takes them - I'll often keep a "scrap heap" of ideas or lines of dialogue (especially with Zemi since I entertain the fuck outta myself with writing her inane bullshit one-liners) on a spare sheet somewhere that I will pull from to weave into the story. This does look a bit like a mad scientist's scrawlings, and I like it that way! My trick is to outline and be thorough about it but not get too rigid. This is why I typically only plan fics in chunks at a time, with general ideas of where I want the story to go. Stories morph and evolve as one writes them, and I am the type who KNOWS that if I make the outline too demanding and rigid I'll get all up my own ass about it. Outlining too hard and trying too viciously to stick to it tends to shoot me in the foot so I avoid it.

Additionally, I particularly enjoy structuring stories based on conversations. Dialogue is often the first thing I write, and the rest comes after that. This comes from my background studying theatre - a thespian scholar bitch like me knows better than anybody that you can build a whole world around little more than a few words between two characters, so I like to let the rest of the work bloom from that organically. Not always, but these are common methods I use.

22. Do you title your fics before, during, or after the writing process?  How do you come up with titles?

Fuck yeah so glad somebody asked this one. I develop titles for chapters after I'm done writing them. I make it a point to title pretty much EVERY CHAPTER I WRITE for everything I've written publicly so far based on the title of a death metal track or album. I'll branch out into other genres like black metal and whatnot but I try to stick to death metal specifically. This mostly comes from my personal annoyance that there's so little decent media content based on extreme metal. Part of why I love Hellsing so much is just based on the fact I think it gets the closest to the aesthetic of the deepest bowels of extreme metal in its art style, themes, visuals, and so on. So when I need a new title, I deadass will just leaf through my music catalogue and pick a title I think fits the themes of the chapter in some allegorical sense - ditto for the little lyrical blurbs I put at the front of each chapter. Is it corny? Fuck yeah, man, but so am I. Sometimes I just say "fuck it, I'll put TWO songs names in the title, who will stop me?" When it comes to the entire fic titles, I put more thought into it and play process of elimination until I settle on one I think rolls off the tongue best. See: Formulas Fatal to the Flesh (Morbid Angel), Lesions of A Different Kind (Undeath), etc.

69. What are your favorite fics at the moment?

Aw shit man, puttin' me on the spot as I've been off my fic reading game for a minute but I'll plug what I can remember!

First off, shout out to the homie @neet0 with their work Revelations. Absolutely love this piece, I reread chapters from it a lot and feel like I learn something new about writing every time.

I'm also really into this My Hero Academia fic, In The End (We Are Left Bereft). Only halfway through, and some of the elements may not be for me personally, but first of all, anything that examines Bakugo as a closeted trans woman is gonna make me come running because I just ADORE that as a concept. Second, the issues this take on Bakugo deals with regarding identity and belonging, being touch-starved and alienated, etc? A bitch relates, what can I say. Good MHA fics are so hard to find in my experience so this one has been a delight to read thus far.

I also eat up almost everything that BirdOfHermes ever does. Because, listen mate, sometimes a bitch just wants that sweet, sweet cheesy wish fulfillment with fictional men. That, and their writing is so easy to read for me that it hooks me into stories about characters from series I haven't even watched or read. Never thought Harry Dresden would be hot to me, but, oops, they made it happen. Also, forever awaiting the glorious day they decide to finish Tame. One of my favorite Alucard/Reader fics of all time, I've reread it probably a dozen times by now.

Beyond this, I've been in a bit of a fic rut as of late, so if you got recs, send them my way!

Thank you so much for the ask it made my day for real <3

#fanfic writing #writing quibbles #ask box

[poststormjitters]

Consolidated story progress 2022-23

I'm bringing my updates onto one post instead of taking up most of what I have on this blog. Art should be the majority! Not repeated walls of text as I try to track some data. Having it all on one post should also make it easier for my brain to look back at my patterns from *checks notes* nearly two years ago (whoof). I haven't really been writing for myself very much this past year, but I would like to get back to it (and more art) soon. The blogger may be constantly tired, but the blog isn't abandoned!

Thank you to anyone who reads my notes, much appreciated :)

---

Dec 21 2023 (today as of writing): 46334 total. 105 pages.

<2023: no updates b/c very little writing. Did not, in fact, finish this draft and start second draft this year>

Dec 19 2022: +443 words. 44544 total. Notes: It’s been kind of a while since I’ve sat down with intention, though I’ve caught some opportunities for a few sentences here and there. I’m trying a new POV and having some extra free time helps. I am on (I believe) the final third and I have my outline in a good place. Resolutions and wrap-ups, ~50 pages left. All the respect to nanowimo writers. There’s only a few more days left in December, but I hope to finish this draft and start my second draft next year. 

July 18 2022: +5,236 words since last update (plus uncounted planning). 33,565 total (more than 30k, woah!). 75 pages. Notes: Not sure how much I'll sick to it, but I've been thinking the story will be "segmented" into three parts. The first 50 is my setup, the next 50 is the body and building off the set ups, the final 50 will be the climax and payoffs/end. I'm halfway through the second "arc." I recently read that 30k is about a third of a novel, which is validating and puts me right about on track. They're small enough chunks that I can have goals and planning, but they're big enough that I don't feel constrained so I can still stretch and play. I stopped reading to my friend about 50 pages in because we just caught up to where my writing left off, and I do so infrequently enough that it seemed silly to read to them only every couple of nights (and have the pressure to keep up with it like that). We agreed that where we left of was actually a really good place. “Like a season cliffhanger” and thinking about it like that-- three sections with their own arcs set within an overall story--has been super helpful to how I’m choosing to pace. It’s just my first draft, so it only has to exist, but this way of thinking about it is new for me and I like the way it sits in my brain.

June 22 2022: +1,909 words. 28,329 total (almost 30k, wow!). +5 pages. Notes: this is from two days, but they’re getting one update because I forgot. Working title achieved!

June 10 2022: +1204 words +3 pages :)

June 6 2022: +617 words. 52 pages.

May 18 2022: +499 words. 24019 total.

May 9 2022: +1,472 words in planning. Notes: Wanted to put down the progress :) Reading to my friend has caught up with how far I’ve written, and I’ve been a little stuck on what comes next. But I think I have a direction again. It’s still a little rough on what’s directly next, but I’m feeling good for what’s generally after. 

April 25 2022: +608 words. 22,055 total. 51 pages. Notes: I deleted a couple paragraphs. Things are amping *up*! 

April 25 2022: +972 words. 21,331 total. 50 pages. Notes: I just did a crush scene and I feel all blushy, aw

April 18 2022: +3,979 since last update. 20,337 total (20k!). 48 pages. Notes: Plot is coming together. I don't quite know what is coming after this next bit, but it's the first draft and we'll figure it out as we go. It just has to exist. We’re gonna get dramatic slice-of-life-y here soon!  Reading to a friend is definitely helping me be motivated. The internal sense of "needing to write more because we're going to run out of story to read" keeps a deadline feeling going. Plus, though there's a lot that's still up in the air (ha), it’s fun and encouraging to share with someone and re-read things without the time or intention to edit.

March 4 2022: +594 words. 38 pages. 

Feb 21 2022: +459 words. 36 pages.

Feb 5 2022: +958 words. Notes: Also character work/ brainstorming.

Feb 2 2022: +613 words. 33 pages.

Feb 1 2022: +359 words. 13,734 total. 32 pages.

#my writing #jitter's writing #writers on tumblr #writing #tfotdhs

[zoryany]

WIP Wednesday - Feb 19, 2020

From a story called Ash and Ember, as of yet unpublished, but will definitely be my darkest -- and possibly most ambitious -- piece so far. lots of good skywalker angst to be found in this one hehe.

For the entirety of his existence, Darth Vader had been intimately familiar with pain. It was what fueled his very being, fed his hatred and stoked his connection to the Dark Side. He was in pain now, as he’d always been.

So why was this pain so different?

It was, in a sense, familiar, but connected to a distant, rejected part of himself. It dug deeper than the scarring that coated what remained of his flesh and it hurt far more profoundly. It reminded him of a woman who lay broken in his arms, whispering assurances to him even as the life drained from her eyes. It reminded him of a vast, sprawling emptiness scorched beneath two suns. It reminded him of a woman collapsing onto the rocks as boiling lakes of molten rock swirled around them. This was a pain he did not want but was uncertain how to stop.

The boy was screaming. His son was screaming. All around him, the Force was screaming.

#wip wednesday #star wars fic #darth vader #skywalker angst #skywalker pain #I'm definitely excited about this one ngl #it is in very rough form right now #i'm trying to get the general plot of the first chunk written down first #then go back and edit it mercilessly #plus... titles lol #but! I think it's gonna be a good one heheheh #my writing

[harpersplay]

Genuine non-troll white woman here - you wrote "So I already knew that Good Girls was a white feminism phantasmagoria...But, jesus fucking christ, y'all are just showing your true colours lately. The way you talk about a MOC in relation to a white woman is disgusting." Not asking you to call out specific people or posts or start any kind of flame war but what would be a general example of what you are talking about? I follow a good chunk of people and I'm not seeing this maybe b/c I'm not following the same people, maybe out of willful blindness, maybe I'm not recognizing it - again, b/c of ignorance, etc. Just trying to understand what you mean - and not do it obviously, if I am doing it.

I apologise for taking a longish time to answer this. Honestly, I wasn't sure I wanted to get into it. Anyway, I'd first like to say that this is all my opinion. What bothers me might not bother someone else. BIPOC are not a monolith. Even subsections aren't. Not all Mexican trans men are a monolith. Neither are all Japanese lesbians. You get the idea. And that's not even including people like Ben Carson or Caitlyn Jenner—people who support and work for policies that actively harm the marginalised group of which they are a part. Secondly, I know this isn't your intention, but asking POC to tell you what is ok to do and what is not is a slippery slope to "my [blank] friend said this was ok." Finally, the fandom is quite small so it is pretty hard to give general examples. I don't know if it's more trouble to quote specific posts or not, because some will think it is about them anyway. Anything I'm going to mention I've seen on Tumblr, Instagram, Reddit and/or Twitter. But there are definitely popular Tumblr blogs that all push the same narrative. Oh, and one last thing, I haven't seen any of what I'm referring to from people I follow.

Ok, let's go. For a very long time, mainly WOC have pointed out the racial problems within the show and the extremely dismissive attitude about those problems from mainly white women. And while these same women have written thousands (even tens of thousands) or words about Beth (it's always Beth) and her struggles and the amazingness of such a complex female character (ymmv), they brush aside commentary about racism as either nitpicking, not understanding the show is about the 3 women (tell that to all the white men with fleshed-out storylines), or misogyny. The last is especially hostile because they are often talking over Black women and misogynoir is a very real fucking thing that couples the fun of being hated for being a woman with the delight of good old-fashioned racism. They espouse the idea that people having a problem with Beth are all covert & overt misogynists. But talk out the other side of their mouths that they can't possibly be racist even when they support racism in the show or ignore concerns brought up by fans of colour. And that is just the absolute height of hypocrisy. Because by the former they acknowledge that people in a marginalised group (women) can still be anti- that group (a phenomenon with which I agree). But in the latter, suddenly they don't understand that concept.

Specific to the post you are responding to, fans that purport to like Brio write about the relationship in ways that reveal how much of their enjoyment comes from Rio being inferior to Beth. It's all about what he can do for her, how he acts against his best interests for her, how he literally denies himself sexual pleasure for her. Those are all meant to show how in love he is with her. But the show never bothers to tell us why. And, no, this is not because the show is so deep. Other romantic relationships they have scenes that are explicit about the characters' feelings. But Rio, after being shot, after being betrayed, after being mocked, is just so in love with Beth....because. (MYSTERIOUS!) And the Beth stans are more than fine with this because they think everyone should be as obsessed with Beth as they are. But it's bad storytelling. And, in this particular case, it gets into very dicey racist tropes. A white women treating her Latino lover like an afterthought is not the same as a white women treating her white lover like an afterthought. It just isn't. And if some of these fans are as smart as they pretend to be, they know that. They just don't care. Much like the showrunners.

There was so much talk defending the drawn-out Boland marriage because why can't we understand how hard it is for Beth—who is, at various times, claimed to be emotionally abused by Dean or staying with him because it is safe and comfortable—and we don't appreciate how difficult it is for her (I may be one of the few divorced people talking about this show on Tumblr, so this has always made me laugh). Yet there was nothing but glee when Rio flipped on his brousin (who was written as both abusive and safe) for Beth. Where was the empathy for Rio and how hard it was for him? Especially because, unlike Beth, he didn't even have one parent? Hadn't the Beth stans used her very tragical history™️ to explain away her every shitty act? idk, not having any parents and going to jail (as a minor?) and being betrayed by your family seems pretty tragic. But I didn't see them all of a sudden excusing Rio's bad behaviour. Because, feminism or something?

What about Beth's feelings? Last season she spent trying to have him killed. This season she spent looking annoyed by him. Throughout both she talked down to him in a specific white woman way that every BIPOC has experienced, even if some of them are cool with it. There were multiple opportunites for Beth to talk about her feelings with Ruby and/or Annie, but the writers made the deliberate choice to always make it about sex (and god, the immature way they had these three grown women talk was fucking obnoxious). She spent the last 2 seasons also wanting him out of her life to the point that a majority of her actions in S4 were motivated by getting to Nevada with her husband and kids. Beth doesn't care about Rio but Rio needs to put Beth above everything because he's just so in love like he's never been before (which is blatant Marcus & Rhea erasure). And anyone who doesn't think Beth would have just as happily been sitting on that bench plotting how to "run the city" (hahahahaha!) with Nick if the situation worked out differently hasn't been paying attention.

So, what do we have? A white woman who is constantly excused (by the loudest portion of the fandom) for all her ill treatment to her Black BFF & her Black husband, her Asian coworker, her Latina "friend," and Rio (among others) because her life is hard and who is not required to even be nice to her supposed "endgame". And a MOC who is expected to accept being treated poorly by the white woman because he loves her.

And, a last thing, this attitude grossly crossed over into talk about real people when the fans—who self-righteously claimed to be above anon sources or talking about the actors—latched on to the narrative and enjoyed blaming the MOC actor for the cancellation of the show, even dragging his insignificant (in terms of influence) Black wife into it. All while conveniently ignoring that the creator/showrunner is a white woman. The star & producer is a white woman. The people making the decisions at NBCU & Netflix were white women. All white women with so much more power than the Latino actor.

Shit, did I answer your question? I know this is a lot. But I could honestly make mulitple posts on each issue I touched on here. Basically, white people ain't slick, be they content creators or fans. We see how & what y'all talk about. We see that Rio not having a last name is not a big deal to you and we know why that is. So we're fucking tired. And we're over a show that had so much potential crapping all over their POC characters to prop up a white woman. And we're repulsed by the white women in the fandom who use their tears to seem oppressed and who toss around the word misogynist because POC dare call a Karen a Karen.

#nbc good girls #good girls nbc #racism in the text #racism in fandom #fragile whiteness #white feminism #what fandom chooses to talk about #and what it chooses to ignore #anon asks

[sparxwrites]

dude loved the dsmp fic u did with technoblade and quackity. The second part of the series where quackitys trauma with schlatt came up in the most unexpected way near the end- cool af. if u ever have time and the desire I'm sure many other people would love to see more dream smp stuff from u 💜💜😳💜💜!!! I'm so curious what made u think of such a raw scene b/een Q and techno in the aftermath of the butcher army execution in the first part

okay, so- context for this is that i wrote the redux because a friend threatened promised to actually fuckin pay me to watch techno's pov of the execution, and to write an alternate version where techno's braid got cut off. i genuinely enjoyed the video, ended up doing the fic for funsies and writing a lot more than intended, and got brainworms about doing a sequel.

however. that meant that basically i was working on a) two hours of footage, mainly of techno, and b) snippets i had picked up from fanart, animatics etc. for characterisation. so i wrote 2k of relatively generic "bully asshole guy dubcons woobie asshole guy into sex that he totally definitely doesn't want but kind of secretly does", because that's a solid chunk of my brand, just as a "haha smutty fic machine go brrr" kind of thing.

and then i actually watched some more content. and went, oh, whoops, hmm, this Absolutely Doesn't Work At All with the actual characterisation of these two.

because techno is an asshole, but he's a joy-of-the-hunt, intimidating-you-is-kind-of-funny asshole, not a sleazy dubcon asshole. and because quackity is... i was going to say "the complete opposite of a woobie", but actually he's kind of a woobie in function (victimised constantly), but the diametric opposite of one in form (responds by attempting to take chunks out of anyone that so much as looks at him kindly, as opposed to weeping in a corner somewhere).

so then i had 1k+ of smut machine go brr (i had written up to abt the first time techno pulls out, i think), and a suddenly really interesting character dynamic that didn't really work with the plot i'd had in mind. which is probably why it ended up so "raw", as you put it - because the only way out of the corner i'd written myself into, without discarding the whole thing, was to lean into how bad this would end up being for both parties involved. so it became instead techno throwing his weight around as an intimidation tactic (death is relatively cheap in minecraft; as far as he's concerned, if quackity really really didn't want this, he'd have taken the loss of inventory and opted for a quick kill/respawn) and ending up in over his head/doing something he wouldn't normally do but wasn't overly concerned about; and quackity acquiescing because schlatt (whilst mostly never outright "pin you down as you beg me to stop") was extremely bad at taking no for an answer, and so he got used to just taking whatever he was given because he'd otherwise be called a pussy for it and/or ground down until he agreed.

which is why everything falls apart at the end, and the dynamic flips - the minute techno realises this isn't hatesex-ish with quackity being a bitter mouthy shit as usual, he's like "uhhh Nope Nope Nope" and wants to get the fuck out of there asap, because sexual assault is really not part of his whole "good clean kill, joy of the hunt" thing. except quackity, laden down with trauma about this kind of shit and probably dissociating out of his fucking skull/in the middle of a flashback, interprets this as "he thinks i can't take it", and is absolutely desperately trying to avoid the verbal abuse and humiliation he associates with not being """strong enough""" to take whatever abuse his partner wants to dish out prove he's a big boy and doesn't need to be coddled.

so! that's how i accidentally ended up with plot and/or actual emotions in what was meant to be some fun, dubiously-consensual porn lmao. and now i'm slightly obsessed w this dynamic between quackity and techno, and the potential follow-through of them dealing with the fallout from it. watch this space maybe??? or don't, because i'm bad at following through on writing stuff, but we'll see.

(and thank u for the compliments as well! glad u liked the fics :3c more fucked up nonsense with quackity to come shortly, i promise~)

#anonymous #ask #the turning point was me realising that technoblade probably has sex in the missionary position w the lights out mostly hrghgh #dsmp tag #sparx chats #dubcon // #rape // #only obliquely mentioned but to be safe............... #i need to watch more quackity n schlatt content SO BAD bc their dynamic is already my favourite fuckin thing #so many LAYERS here #something something quackity as a bad victim and schlatt as a very sympathetic abuser #i'm gonna have so much fun playing around w that particular hot potato tbh

[my-star-shine]

You’re very detailed when it comes to storytelling, and I find it really impressive. Does it take you lots of time to plot because of it? And generally, how much time do you take to fully flush out a story in order to be confident enough to start writing it?

Oh, Thank you! It can, in a way. I think I need an idea of where I'm going before I start writing. First, I need to be comfortable enough in my knowledge in the fandom. Then I need a beginning/middle/end in mind before I do anything. So with Heart of Gold, I know what my ending is already, I just have to get there. Where everything else comes together is in my note doc. I put down just general ideas, quotes, dialogue I think might fit. I can't write a chapter until I have it time-lined, then I go back to my notes and pick and choose what I need to fit what I want, and wing the rest. I'm sure everyone here knows already that I lost my original note doc for it and that it really took a chunk out of me, but I'm trying to build it back up to get the next chapter written.

[corvixa]

I have this thing, that when an idea gets in my head, I either get it out on paper or it will create a traffic jam in my head and bugger up everything. So, not including my ongoing Fics, which includes the Gold Universe as part 4 is still nearly finished, I just need that last push on it. These are Ideas that can have anything from a few scenes, an idea, plots, or several chapters.

So I call this -

Winteriron WIP

(because what else 😅, I have a problem.)

In Fire & Flames - In this universe, Phoenixes and Humans live together, if one species dies then the other will too. When a Phoenix does for good, lots of natural disasters happen, starts with Tony'parents dying and then Rhodey, who is also a Phoenix, finds Tony. Who is now familyless and dying as lone phoenixes tend to die. There are several different kinds, and they come in pairs general. Golden and Ice, for example, Golden are high in magic, Ice tends to protect, especially the rare Golden, it's more tribes than individuals, there is no requirement for who likes who. It's surprising how much making a few other Avengers phoenixes tweaks things here and there, this actually goes up to the fight in Siberia and is one of the bigger WIP's. (26k)

Flash of Gold - Avengers are shifters or humans with magic, and they think they know what Tony is. They believe he is a human with magic, but they notice that he has some shifter traits, which is odd as shifters can't have magic in this AU. Only in very old stories and myth. Tony, however, is a dragon, which are myth. Instead of being like most shifters a, a human that shifts to something, he is the reverse. It only has a few scenes. Full shebang, team as Family. Steve is even a good guy. James is brought to the tower after being found and slowly integrated into the group and is wondering wtf Tony is. (13k)

The Operative Program - Howard was never meant to be a father; he was a weaponsmith. So he took the red room and the wolf spider programs and decided to create himself an Operative that he hoped would be the darker side to help Steve when he found him. Two sides of the same coin, one for the light and one to work in the shadows, Tony would be under Steve's control, he would be a weapon for the man who only picked up a shield. (Also assassin Tony is just fun.) Tony in this is a mash-up really, Tony traits, like Gold but different as he has been trained his entire life, the only reason he has developed a sense of self is Rhodey and the fact his parents died at 17. Rhodey got there first after the car crash, getting to Tony before anyone else who knew what he was could potentially claim him. Tony definitely collects people. Yinsen and Vanko for example. Chapters from Ironman up to Avengers (not complete). But enjoyed myself rewriting some out of sequence chapters, so there is a nice big scene in Siberia. (15k)

Another Persons Wish - Now this was based on a post I saw going around. Person A is married to Person B. Person A is looking back at their life and wondering if they should have married B, etc. So, A is offered a wish. Poof. Goodbye Marriage. Person A is Steve, and the story is from Tony, person B's POV. It goes from Tony planning his anniversary(because I was apparently extremely angsty when I started this!) to waking up in the past, alone and wondering what the fuck has happened. 6 chapters entirely written. Chapter 7 is in a different file and in progress when I dabble on it. (30k)

Tarnished Gold - This is an AU from my AU AU XD. Basically similar set up to the Gold Universe, Tony escapes Hydra Captivity but is brought in by Rhodey instead of spending 2 years on his own cleaning up Hydra. He only spends about 7 months before Rhodey convinces him to come in. Few other tweaks here and there but that is just side. Rhodey and James are pals too. The plot here is Howard and Maria are brought back from the Dead and Rhodey is trying to work out how to tell them what has happened and that he can't just bring them to Tony, because he doesn't know if Tony will remember them yet. Tony is a little less 'give me orders, and I'll gut you, and more 'orders made things easier'. I basically flipped his and James reactions from the original Gold universe. Tony is more in need of a hug. It's very loosely put together. I wanted something where Howard was a good dad to offset the fact I kind of made him Hydra in the next piece, and I wanted a good family man Howard with the bringing the parents back because I love reading fics that bring Howard and Maria back. (9k)

Sins of The Father - Arno has just buried his father. His mother is in a coma, he is 20 and mourning his life now he's expected to take on the business when a visitor flips his work upside down worse than the phone call about the crash. His Father? Part of a program that summoned a creature known as a Void Walker. (A creature from the Void Loki fell into, the only native species to that area, most others can't survive the void, so Loki will read as Void Touched and is 'To Be Protected' because I think that could shake up the Avengers section nicely.) Oh and he has Howards DNA. So Arno is freaked that he has a brother, that someone released and sent to him and Arno is 100% sure he is not meant to deal with severe traumatised half-human assassins that could be his kid brother. That is how Arno meets Tony and becomes very invested and turns up big brother protective instinct to 13. When summoned they're tired to a person and has to obey orders, that person was chosen as The Asset under the idea he can't disobey, which obviously fails as Winter does everything to protect Tony, including freeing him and sending him to Arno. His last order is that Tony is not allowed to go looking for or rescue Winter, which I think will be some nice drama when Bucky gets brought in (I really like this one) It has mostly set up but 2 scenes for in the future, Tony finding Coulson threatening Arno in IM2 and the data dump. (21k) (in this S/S Helped is Yelped, I'd fix it, but I've been working on this post forreeever)

Blood and an Arc - This came about from reading the Tony is a vampire fic and noticing that when he gets turned, generally Tony hates being a vampire. There aren't many where he comes back from Afghanistan a vampire and goes, huh... Well. This could be interesting. Loosely based on Vamp the Masquerade but I've tweaked it because my brain takes ideas and then runs off madly into the sunset. It is however utterly all over the place, some from Ironman and then random out of sequence chapters that I'm unsure about as I hadn't slept in a very long time on writing them and Tony went kind of Spike-ish calling James 'Pet'. I do like the idea of Tony fully embracing his changes. Yinsen never intended Tony to live, so he did something extra whilst turning him, so he is not an ordinary baby vampire and is convinced (justifiably so) that if he meets any other vamps, they'll try to kill him. In notes have Sam considering being a werewolf who works out Tony is a vamp and freaks out, because Vampires vs Werewolves and Tony is utterly confused and tells Sam he smells of mint (seriously, insomnia) Sam is baffled to find out the centuries of hatred that is claimed to be instinctual is actually taught. Sam gets kind happy he has a Vamp friend. (20k)

The Original Plan - This sets up around the end of the Mandarin (because honestly, I prefer working with Tony that has powered, especially because James has the serum and I personally think it would expand life span more than shown in Endgame. So I like evening things out and powered Tony is my jam) Tony has a bunch of plans, and they go awry. He doesn't see why and has zero clue what's going on. It's because no matter how well he plans this out, he's caught up in other people's plans. Steve is a little more "End goal justify the anything and everything." In other words, getting Bucky back is his plan and everyone are just pawns in said plan. I've taken that tactical genius title and also pushed him a little darker. After Ultron, he brings Wanda on for 3 reasons. 1 Precedence. 2 Fixing Bucky. 3 Making sure Tony doesn't find out about his parents and making sure he is on the team and available to fix Bucky's arm. That last bit changes things as instead of pulling away from the Avengers, Tony fully moves into the compound(just after AOU, it's not good). There will be no accords and Steve will find Bucky and just move him in and general plans on telling no one about the Winter Soldier. I summed up a chunk of AOU in this format, and I liked it (in an angst and pain fashion.) But it's quite long for a screenshot, so here's a chunk. Bucky is being brought in soon, but as it is, Tony is not having a good time, there might be Wanda conditions in his mind that Steve can use to convince Tony to do things... Also, because he is living there, I couldn't justify Sam not noticing there is something very wrong, so he is asking questions he didn't in canon as Tony's PTSD is more in his face living together you know? (16k)

#writing #tony stark/bucky barnes #winteriron #WIP #Some of these are more detailed than others! #easily excitable autistic woman

[jojotier]

how about N Y O (o) M for the writing meme? :3c you can pick whatever fandom you want but you know i'm here for the jojo

Well hey, a good chunk of my year was jojo, so i dont blame ya ;)

N. Anything you were planning to write that never got written?

Oh GOD do I- I was actually glancing through my WIPs earlier and jesus christ, there’s so much that hasn’t been touched on or even put out into the world. The Forgotten Monarchs series for one, which is already gunning for technically 12 oneshots interconnected within vague plot related quartets, not even including the intermissions. Even among all that, there’s one chapter in particular I want to get to, all the way in Fic 3, Chapter 1… That’s the biggest one.

If there is something I do wanna try and write out by the end of the year, it’s this lil oneshot idea I have kicking around as part of Emerald is Unbreakable- namely, Rohan being able to relive the memory of Reimi’s murder and all the memories he had with Reimi through the use of a Special Guest Stand User who’s actually an antagonist later down the line in FM! 

If you remember Slow Dance with Me, then you might recall the passing mention of a certain case in Brazil, involving a stand user by the name of Asha…

Y. Why did you write? For fun, for a friend, for acclaim?

It’s a bit of a mix of the first two! I write mainly what I myself find fun to write, which ends up including a fair bit of spite fueled ideas that I push out for the sole purpose of my own personal fun, but I also really love writing things for close friends and to see the reactions I can get from a reader when I try out something more experimental with my writing style!

O. Do you believe in outlines? Show us one! (or two in this case,)

Listen, I try to outline for my big, convoluted projects, but it just. Never works. For the most part, I either forget any big long documents I make or I start going so off model from the original plan that I just toss out the entire thing! I have two outlining states- Pre-Realization and Fuck It Let The Story Flow Mode, 

Like the original document for the Forgotten Monarch’s series is really cluttered with possible symbolisms and plans and things I’d like to happen in the fic, like so:

which i haven’t actually edited or looked at in months vfufukg

the second state is more lax and loose, with less structured plot points and more general goals that i kinda wanna reach but dont necessarily need to be. More focus is actually set on little worldbuilding bits, like what does this and this spell mean, or what do i want the background to be. like have a look at this possible plan for a p5 inclusion of my myth au, Stella:

See? Much more balanced and to the point, with a lot of wiggle room when I get around to it!! I just gotta…….. watch p5………………….

M. Meta! Have any meta about a story you’re dying to throw out there?

I’ve done nothing but listen to Hadestown for hours on end to get my ass in gear for some articles, but I can say this- some of the songs have some real Myth AU feel to them! I’m actually planning to listen to Doubt Comes In (from the original album, not the musical one) for a particularly tense scene at the end of the Death’s Heart arc, as Kakyoin smuggles Jotaro’s still warm gem of a heart past his father, finding a darkness not even his own fire can penetrate….. left alone, claustrophobic, with nothing to hold onto except…

#my writing #joka #jjba #im just.... love jotakak even now.......

[elizabethrobertajones]

Why do you think that when seemingly funny thing happen, they happen to Dean? Like the fear thing in Yellow Fever or the age thing in 5.07 and 10.12 (both old and young!) or the memory thing in Regarding Dean. I'm sure I'm missing a lot of others (and also the not so funny like the vampire thing in 6.05 and of course Demon!Dean in S10). But I can't really picture Sam on those situation tho, Dean is perfect xD

And this is why Plucky’s is my favourite episode, because the thing happened to Sam and it was also perfect but in a completely different way :P 

If you’ve seen the gifset ever of that con where they were talking somewhat seriously about this, before someone said Sam was the straight man to Dean and then Jared imploded… I mean, I need someone to turn that up for me so I can stick it in the “thanks Jared” section of my massive bi dean meta etc resource… But also they WERE making a serious point before they derailed it :P 

The show has a lot of quietly set in stone dynamics. I mean, well, they’re stuff that can get subverted or a particular arc or season will try to explore things from a different angle, but even when they try to do that they still work within certain rules. 

I should probably just make a gif of it for myself, but my favourite visual for this is in 11x04… actually it’s 2am and I have the Sleep Madness so I’ll just do that… 

It’s such a wonderful image of the 2 of them, with Sam wearing red and Dean wearing blue, and top and tail like that. They’re 2 parts of a whole but they’re utterly different people and they’re often mirror images to each other in ways where when something applies to one, the direct opposite is shown in the other. 

(Sidebar: it’s why I’m so delighted that Sam was like blah blah Cas is family and then Dean was like you may be able to forget Cas but I can’t!!!!1 in 13x03… But on the other hand there are things where the nuances get lost and people make weird wrong assumptions like us having to endlessly prove Dean is the smart one because of the lingering first impression that doesn’t let anyone create any nuance after “sam went to college and dean didn’t”)

Anyway, setting up a straight man and comedy sidekick duo drops that all on Dean because from the first episode Sam’s all serious and has epic angst, while Dean tries to lighten the mood and clearly has the snarky sort of attitude that lends itself towards being the comedic one. Even when they make Dean angsty, Sam is serious and Dean big brother picks on him a bit sometimes (in a nice way) and teases him a lot - this is all broad strokes season 1 characterisation I’m talking about, really. But yeah, even if they go super deep or make Dean super angsty, he’s established as the character who can deal with it. And sometimes dealing with it is shouldering a cracky episode’s concept because they know his reactions are going to be easier to sell the thing.

The other thing is emotional POV and Dean’s largely established as the character who has that. Sam spends a lot of time unavailable as the emotional POV and Dean has shouldered entire SEASONS of it (season 6 especially where he was the ONLY viable emotional POV character for large chunks of it). Emotional POV is not really who the episode is ABOUT but what character is reacting to it and filtering how we should feel about a thing for us. In 6x03 when Cas wants to read the kid’s soul to get info, Dean steps in like wtf we don’t torture kids, but Sam and Cas outweigh him because utilitarian means to an end for the greater good blah blah. It makes it clear if we’d missed it that Dean is the only person whose judgement can be trusted until further notice. So until then, we always have to check in with Dean to get the read on a thing. 

Anyway because Dean is the emotional POV we cry and suffer along with him, but we also laugh along with him.

In 7x14 even when Sam gets a funny episode about him, the clowns aren’t really revealing anything about him - we knew about the clown fear since 2x02, it’s explored before the fight but largely for Dean’s benefit, and Sam getting the crap kicked out of him by clowns makes him a hilarious object for us - the fight scene is ridiculously funny but it IS just Sam having the snot beaten out of him while they come up with creative ways clowns would WRECK you in a fight. Dean gets an emotional showdown with the guy controlling the fears, and is the one who learns a lesson from it, while Sam had never really been set up for anything other than being the centre of attention of all the nonsense because it was really really funny that he was scared of clowns. It’s like the “the ball washer” “the what?” exchange explains Sam’s entire role in the episode. 

(Which was Dean doing big brother teasing but like the entire narrative decided to torture him :P)

And meanwhile when Dean gets the hilarious episodes which turn out to be really really painful, we get deep explorations of his psyche. 4x06 explores his hell trauma and reveals a lot about what he went through, and his fears about what Sam will become (LOVE THAT DABB EXPOSITION :D)… Idk about the old man Dean episode but he had some DEEP scenes with Bobby in it I seem to recall… I think @thejabberwock was probably giffing it recently and putting it on my dash for me to scroll past without really looking the moment I recognised what episode it was :P) but it was an episode that let them sort of relate to each other a bit better I think. Or Dean to feel for Bobby some more. Idk, I think there is a super important conversation between them? This is what happens when you put an episode on your “eeeeh skip it unless you’re being weirdly thorough” list :P

But yeah young!Dean was a massively important Dean episode exploring deep down in his character, but just delivered through silly moments about cake and Taylor Swift and complaining about puberty. Or the CAR THING with Sam where it’s a huge description of their relationship that Dean hops in the car seat even though he might not be old enough to even legally DRIVE her, and then Sam gets in the front seat and Dean just squishes him, hauling the seat forward for his tiny legs to reach the pedals. Like, Sam didn’t argue and it didn’t occur to Dean and they only swapped AFTER this bad dynamic caused a stupid mess and crushed Sam? Hello entire codependency metaphor :P 

(And I don’t think I need to explain 12x11 since it was so recent and so so awful about Dean D: Oh gosh, you could have just given us the Larry riding montage and no episode and that would have been enough :P)

Anyway as the emotional POV this stuff happens to Dean because changes to his self is the plot idea to help with stuff that’s to come or to explain things that already happened in the main plot, or really OTT situations they want for their own sake, that push the boundaries of his character but seem more to do with the main plot unfolding, make sense to explore through Dean, because his emotional landscape is often plot relevant, and the exploration even if it’s wrapped up in a silly concept, usually makes a lot more sense to apply to him because we already have a vast playground of his characterisation to mess around in. 10x12 and 12x11 especially were calling on everything about Dean. I think the writer even went on Twitter I guess when he was writing it and polled everyone on the most Dean-like things they could think of, and clearly got the answers “music, pie, car and girls” because those were the main metaphors of subverting Dean’s character that he offered.

I don’t think this is to reflect negatively on Sam - he gets some fascinating character stuff but connected to the main plot and not delving him in the same way Dean is delved (I think the imbalance and not understanding how they’re written can make people sad on Sam’s behalf he doesn’t get enough development in the same way Dean gets it, which is often by default when we care about character stuff over plot. I also think the writing falls into ruts of this which HAVE favoured Dean and his emotional arcs over Sam’s plot stuff). But Sam can get some incredible character stuff out of the plot things - I think Sam in Berens episodes is a great example because I’m still reeling from 13x03 and the stuff he said to Jack, because that’s all using the main plot to explore Sam - even if a lot of it was saying obvious stuff we knew about Sam, he doesn’t really say it too often and forcing him to say it out loud in episode THREE means the season is going to have to build on that or fail Sam (and he’s so wrapped up in what happens to Jack I can’t see his character stuff connected to that disappearing :P) 

But yeah, him being the “straight man” means that Dean is bouncing off him to be the funny one, and that really reflects on every level of the show, especially when you take humour and replace it with the emotional connection we have to the show in general and humour is just a great way to game that to get the reaction in a positive way, and Sam’s not the serious one so much as he’s dealing with the big stuff, usually, and that can wander off to all sorts of places like his habit of completely hammering down any other feelings to deal with the things that have to be done. Or to do the opposite of scaling up Dean, he can scale down to be the more serious one in a silly episode. Which doesn’t mean it doesn’t affect him - all the episodes where he had to deal with something happening to Dean that put him in charge it really messes him up. Or makes him really good at poker that one time :P 

…

Ah, my neighbours have stopped having a 4 way screaming match outside in the street, I’m going to stop typing and go to bed, so no tl;dr here… it’s turning 2am :D

#Asks #WOAH after I hit post a police car showed up #dean analysis #filed under #7x14 #for my own amusement #and #12x11 #for practical reasons