#I've started some things but gave up after 2 paragraphs

[cinnamontails-ff]

The incredible @kittenintheden tagged me for this, so I'll give it my best shot!

1) How many works do you have on AO3?

Four.

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

224,051 - which, honestly, is insane because that means I've written (and edited) pretty much two entire novels over the course of last 12 months. The vampire elf is too powerful, guys.

3) What fandoms do you write for?

BG3

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

I'm a fandom newbie, so I don't even have 5, but here are my babies:

Accountant's Guide - Pre-Canon Astarion teams up with a human accountant to frame Cazador for tax fraud. It's exactly as whacky as it sounds.

Magistrate's Advocate - The Magistrate Astarion longfic someone had to write.

Vampire Stay-at-Home Trophy Husband - Reverse Isekai EA oneshot

An Empirical Science - My contribution to the Holy Rolan Empire

5) Do you respond to comments?

Always. Obsessively so. Love responding to comments and chatting with readers.

6) What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

My fics have a good bit of angst and tension and heartbreak, but I always strive for an overall "warm" feeling in my writing, so those moments tend to get resolved at some point. No angsty endings in my portfolio (yet).

7) What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Accountant's Guide is where I gave Astarion everything I wish he could have. Zero regrets.

8) Do you get hate on fics?

Occasionally, but it's pretty rare. Not to make excuses for people hating on fics (because that is despicable; we're working for free here), but I don't think my fics are controversial enough to attract a lot of hate. They're cute. They're wholesome. They don't take themselves too seriously, so I think it's pretty difficult to hate on them.

Although someone once called Scarlett a b**** and sometimes I remember that and I become wrath.

9) Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Explicit smut is something I've really only started doing when I got into fanfiction this past year. I like incorporating it into my longfics to emphasize key moments for my characters and their development, so it's part porn, part plot.

It can get kinky, but it will always be consensual. Dubcon/noncon is a big no for me, personally.

10) Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

No crossovers, but An Empirical Science is where I have a lot of fun butchering adapting Pride & Prejudice lines. I mean, it's a Rolan fic. How could you not?

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know, but I have seen coincidences of very similar concepts and ideas popping up after I've introduced them in my fics.

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, there's an ongoing Ukrainian translation for Accountant's Guide! I translate the comments every now and then and readers are really praising the language skills of the translator, so that's awesome!

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No, but we chat a lot about my stories on my Discord server, so that's often a little like writing together.

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

Shalladin (Kaladin x Shallan from Stormlight Archive). I love Brandon Sanderson with all my heart, but for this, I will never forgive him.

15) What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I get very hyperfocused on my stories and rarely work on more than 1 project at a time, so I tend to finish what I start.

16) What are your writing strengths?

Look, my social anxiety makes me a pretty rizzless person to talk to in real life, but my writing is funny. It's charming. I am great at character voice. I keep things real. My OCs don't need to be perfect flawless beauty goddesses to woo the guy; they recite a few paragraphs and swing their fountain pen and the guy is on. the. floor.

Sometimes literally.

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

According to a rather charming public bookmark on my fic, I struggle with "pacing issues" and "questionable narrative choices". Clearly, this person knows what they're talking about, so let's accept it as fact.

18) Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I think this is generally really difficult to pull off without being confusing (check out "The Wee Free Men" by Sir Terry Pratchett for a really good example how to do it). So unless I had a very specific reason for it, I would prefer to write around it as I've done with Infernal in An Empirical Science.

19) First fandom you wrote for?

Still BG3. First and last? Who knows.

20) Favorite fic you’ve written?

Accountant's Guide. It's the story I wrote when I hit rock bottom and thought I couldn't write anymore. It's the story that made me believe again. My first story in English and by far the easiest thing I've ever written. It's the story I reread when I'm sad, when I'm happy, when I want a hug that reaches all the way into my soul. I am never happier than when people tell me this is a comfort read for them, just as it is for me.

I'm tagging @thedreamlessnights, @purdledooturt, @larvasmoon, @karinamay and @davenswitcher if they feel like sharing their answers!

#tag game #astarion fanfic #rolan fanfic #holy rolan empire #bg3 #cinnamontails

[welcome-to-my-bullshitery]

Things that i've noticed that no one ever talks about in LoTR

This is a huge post by the way so im putting it under a cut

you have been warned

TFotR - Book 1

'A day or two later a rumor (probably started by the knowledgeable SAM) YES. SAMWISE GAMGEE. OUR LITTLE CINNAMON ROLL STARTED A RUMOR. idk it's so funny to me

The entire paragraph about hobbits and gift giving is too ADORABLE.

Bilbo put INSTRUMENTS in PARTY CRACKERS. AND LIKE NEW ONES.

Bilbo calling Gandalf 'an interfering old busybody'

Bilbo: "You'll keep an eye on Frodo, won't you?" Gandalf: "Two eyes as often as I can spare them."

All the gifts Bilbo gave out and they all had meaning AND ITS ADORABLE

Lobelia, to Frodo: "...you're no Baggins - you - you're a Brandybuck!" Frodo: "Did you hear that Merry? That was an insult if you like." Meriadoc (Merry) BRANDYBUCK: "It was a compliment, and so, of course, not true."

Gandalf, shoving his head through Frodo's WINDOW: "If you don't let me in, Frodo, I SHALL BLOW YOUR DOOR RIGHT DOWN YOUR HOLE AND OUT THROUGH THE HILL."

That one Hobbit who had seen Ents IN CHAPTER TWO. HAL. HAL SAW ENTS AND IT WAS MENTIONED IN CHAPTER TWO. TWO.

"Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them?" GANDALF. WHAT THE FUCK.

Sam, freaking tf out about just being caught 'dropping eaves' by Gandalf: "DON'T LET HIM HURT ME MR. FRODO!" Frodo, hardly able to keep from laughing: "He won't hurt you."

Sam being all excited about being able to go on the adventure and then he just. bursts into tears. like.

Gildor (AN ELF) calling Frodo ELF FRIEND. ITS TOO CUTE.

Frodo, in elvish: Thanks for the food :). The Elves: HERE IS A JEWEL AMONG HOBBITS

Pippin just flat out saying he didn't want to leave Frodo any food but Sam insisted.

Frodo, about who's taking a bath first: "Eldest or Quickest first? You'll be last either way PIPPIN." GEE

Pippin, talking about Sam: He would jump down a dragons throat to save you, if he did not trip over his own feet." GEE

The ridiculous bath song. And it's Bilbos favorite. Of course it's ridiculous if it was Bilbos favorite.

Gandalf, writing in a letter to Frodo: If he forgets, I shall roast him. Frodo, four seconds later: He deserves roasting.

Sam getting mad at Ferny or someone and throwing an apple at him. AND AFTER IT KNOCKS THE IDIOT FERNY SQUARE IN THE FACE AND HE FALLS DOWN CURSING SAM JUST GOES "Waste of a good apple." AND KEEPS WALKING.

Sam, an intellectual: "What do they live on when they can't get hobbit?" AND REFUSED TO CALL THEM THEIR ACTUAL NAME AND JUST CALLS THEM 'NEEKERBREEKERS' BECAUSE ITS THE SOUND THEY MAKE

They found the trolls from The Hobbit. About the middle of Chapter 12, Flight to the Ford. The whole group thought they were real until they saw they were actually stone.

Frodo, after discovering more about Sam: "He'll end up by becoming a wizard - or a warrior!" Sam: "I don't want to be neither." OF COURSE YOU DON'T YOU JUST WANNA LIVE IN THE SHIRE AND GARDEN ALL YOUR LIFE. OH SAM.

TFotR - Book 2

At the very beginning of chapter 1 - PF COURSE SAM WAS ALWAYS THERE AND OF COURSE HE HAD TO BE TOLD TO GO AWAY AND REST. YOU ADORABLE LITTLE SHIT.

Frodo calling the Big People 'Big and rather stupid' Accurate though.

Sam holding Frodo's hand and then blushing and thEN JUST SAYS 'It's warm! Meaning your hand, Mr. Frodo. It has felt so cold through the long nights!" SAM YOU GAY LITTLE SHIT I LOVE YOU.

Aragorn: Gollum is safely kept by the Elves of Mirkwood. Legolas: *sweats*

Elrond, to Sam: "It is hardly possible to separate you from him (Frodo) even when he is summoned to a secret council and you are not!" Sam, blushing (ITS SAYS IT IN THE BOOK THE LAST SENTENCES OF COUNCIL OF ELROND): "A nice pickle we have ourselves in, Mr. Frodo!" Me: Does Samwise is gay? Does SamwISE IS GAY??

Pippin, hasn't even done anything remotely wrong yet: "There must be someone with intelligence in this party!" Gandalf: "Then you most certainly won't be chosen, Peregrin Took!" Pippin: D:

Gimli: "His (Sauruman's) arm has grown long indeed if he can draw snow down from the north to trouble us here three hundred leagues away." Gandalf, channeling his inner sassy bitch(bilbo): "His arm has grown long."

>TBC im not even close to being done yet< ^^

#lord of the rings #lotr #tfotr #the fellowship of the ring #samwise gamgee #frodo baggins #bilbo baggins #gandalf #merry brandybuck #pippin took #aragorn #legolas #gimli #gimli son of gloin

[naranjapetrificada]

Fanfic Friday!

I still don't completely understand it, so this week I'm just gonna reflect on things that happened while writing this arranged marriage longfic, some of which I posted about on here and some of which I didn't.

I gave up on the Soup Paragraphs that were haunting me and realized I can introduce them later if I must.

I got in some "let go and let god" practice when I realized I don't have to get every little throwaway detail right, especially when it slows down my progress/makes writing miserable.

My therapist wants me to see about applying this Free Yourself skill in my non-writing life, to which I say I know you are but what am I

Characters put themselves in situations without my input and it was great!

Ceremonies are hard to write but at least I now know what Ed and Stede would be like if they were kids in a school play.

I started watching Rome again after thinking about it last week in the wake of the cancelation (I've had it on DVD for years). Still problematic in the way something made in 2005 will be, but otherwise it holds up incredibly well.

I've also stopped caring as much about all the people using the world's problems as a bludgeon against OFMD fans and the campaign to to save the show. For all the reasons other people have already articulated well but also, on a personal note, because of what this show has done for my relationship with writing.

I won't get into too much detail but suffice it to say I have a lot of baggage around writing, because of all the "gifted" nonsense of my childhood and my MFA experience as an adult. I don't blame anyone per se, but unhelpful social frameworks were unhelpful. Let's just say that when Pop-Pop said "if you were ever good at anything go do that" to Ed, it didn't not remind me of feeling obligated to do something that used to be rewarding but isn't anymore because it's what you're "supposed" to do. Anyway.

I wrote three short (<2000 word) fics between seasons 1&2, the first fic I've felt like writing in over a decade. It was liberating as hell to write again in a low-stakes environment, and with blorbo motivation to power me through the difficult parts. I never, ever thought I would write anything longer than 2000 words, but for the past (several?) weeks now I've been alternating between two drafts in tropes I can't get enough of, the shortest of which is around 10,000 (admittedly unedited) words.

The other is longer, and every time I work on it I keep having to break shit up so the chapters stay under 5000 words. This is unprecedented for me, and I've wanted to share it so much that I'm running out of shit to post on WIP Wednesday that won't reveal the plot or require too much context. I've never been in a fandom as creative (and creatively inspiring) as this one, nor have I every written so much in a single fandom before.

My relationship with writing wouldn't be healing like this at all if it weren't for this show and this fandom, and in particular I want to highlight the freedom in embracing the "David Jenkins School of Historical Inaccuracy." In fact, I've been keeping a running list of AO3 tags for the fic I've made the most progress on, and there are several "David Jenkins School of ________" tags, including Archaeology, Theology, and Comparative Politics. Thanks to seeing DJ's philosophy at work it's now possible for me to move on from certain details when I get stuck because they're "inaccurate" for the setting or whatever in a way I never could before. Now I feel empowered to move on from tricky details by asking myself:

Is it funny?

Is it related to the plot?

Is it character-building?

And if the answer to all of those is no, then so is the answer to question 4: "does it matter?"

Assuming I finish these longfics they'll be the longest creative pieces I've ever written and beyond the longest works of fiction I ever thought I would write, and for that I'm eternally grateful. Even if the world we live in is a crumbling disaster. Especially if the world we live in is a crumbling disaster.

#ofmd #our flag means death #renew as a crew #save ofmd #fanfic friday #WIP it good #edward teach #ofmd meta #fandom meta #writing process #writing woes #fic writing #arranged marriage AU #ancient rome AU (sorta)

[bizarre-blorbo-bracket]

Round 2 poll 8: Submitter's guitar vs Davis (Juror 8) from Twelve Angry Men

Propaganda under the cut:

Cherry (guitar)

Her name is cherry and she is a cherry red epiphone sg . i got her used for cheap. i like to personify objects, and like to have conversations with her. in my mind she has a personality, age, gender, favorite things ect. sometimes i mention her as "my friend cherry" to people i know i wont meet again.

Davis (Juror 8) (these are all from the single submitter)

a quick lil list babes, and I apologise for all of this in advance:

He's from the fucking film 12 angry men. like, aside from letterbox bootlickers and middle school hass students NO ONE has watched this film let alone care about it, it was made in 1957, is shot almost exclusively in one room and the entire film is just middle aged white men yelling at each other over whether some not white poor kid should be sent to the electric chair. what the fuck.

Henry Fonda, the actor, was 52 years old at the time of filming

Henry Fonda is the father of Jane Fonda, the woman who would revolutionise the 80's with her home workouts and her blindingly neon leg warmers.

His name wasn't revealed until the very end of the film and even then it's just "Davis."

I could honestly give him a lil smooch

He's absolutely not girlypop but he's the ally-iest ally who's ever allied

He's categorised as a "Benevolent Leader" on the Heroes Wiki

instead of the overwhelming urge for me to coddle him like most all other blorbos, i would appreciate it switched

I have a photo of him inside my saxophone case and sometimes i forget he's in there, then he creeps into my saxophone bell and when I play it he shoots out like a ballistic missile

Dude, on ao3 there's more fanfiction about the real life 80's British punk band The Clash than the entire film of 12 angry men, let alone Davis (80 fics come up under the clash, while 10 come up for 12 angry men)

I have a counter, and I've watched 12 Angry men a total of 145 times. The figure is up on my wall in tallies. whenever the number goes up, I like to watch it in 5's so then I can put another full group of tallies on my wall.

I have incredibly detailed stories about how Davis would boogie down to ringo starr's solo career, and they're written within the margins of a book called Tobruk written by Peter Fitzsimons. The only reason I reread that book is to wonder at my elaborate works of fiction

My HASS teacher was the one to introduce me to 12 Angry Men as he played it for the entire class. He gave us a set of questions to complete on the film and a few Law based questions as a little treat, and he expected it to be handed in the next day. What he didn't expect was an 11 page monster of a response that included social commentary, 4 paragraphs dissecting the character of Davis alone, deeply discussed comparisons between the landscapes of politics and law in the 50's to the present, and basically an entire point-for-point summarisation of the film, completed with obscure quotes from Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon and Presley (Elvis). He presented the printed masterpiece in front of the entire class to shame me.

After class he explained how his favourite Juror would either be 6 or 5, because 6 seems like a big dumb teddybear and he just liked 5. I explained how I liked Davis because he didn't want to send a kid to die, then he told me how Davis would make a good cowboy (at this point in time I was unaware of Henry Fonda's role in Once Upon A Time in The West) and I proceeded to go home and write a 3 part orchestral composition that I could pretend would play as the soundtrack to Juror 8: A Cowboy's Tale or something like that

I had started to make an animation meme starring Davis but only gave up when photoshop literally deleted itself from my laptop

I didn't even hear that Juror 8's name was Davis when I first watched it in class, somehow I only heard it on my 6th rewatch but when I did I literally got so excited I literally got winded and cried a little bit, I had to take a panadol because I got so lightheaded

I have learned the musical motif that plays throughout the film on saxophone, clarinet, recorder, guitar, bass, ukulele, piano and trumpet

I have visions of him

One of Davis' 3 children HAS to be gay and nothing can convince me otherwise

honest to god I'd be a home wrecker if it came to him

I quote not only Davis but the film a lot, and sometimes in the dead silence of all my friends I go on about how the old man couldn't have possibly made it to the door in such a short amount of time to see the kid running down the stairs (because the old man has a limp, and Davis proved it my limping around the room, which I have to say was incredibly attractive of him)

He's literally an architect

I once had a dream where Davis was in my bass guitar case when I opened it, and i literally just picked him up and started picking him like a bass guitar until I tried to play a full chord and he bit the hand that was meant to be on the fretboard. I dropped him and he fell on his ass, and when I said "what the hell dude what was that for" he said bass chords are lowkey ugly to listen to, and since then i don't like playing bass chords because now they're lowkey ugly to listen to. before this ordeal, i enjoyed them, but alas

i once got my romantic partner to write me a davis x reader fanfiction as a birthday present

my parents believe that Davis is my first celebrity crush, and while they're actually wrong it's still actually so embarrassing they believe that because OH MY GOD it's literally JUROR 8 FROM 12 ANGRY MEN

I've attempted slam poetry about him

I've eaten a paper printed full a4 size photo of his hand

I would also not mind him to be literally my father, but given the rest of the things I've just said about him that's really weird and I recognise that

#Davis (Juror 8) #12 angry men #guitar #polls #round 2 polls

[remidyal]

End of Year Game - Writer's Edition

Pick out five different passages you wrote this year that you really like and share them, saying as much or as little as you want about what you like about them. This is a chance to show off! You can reblog this or start your own post, up to you.

All mine are going to be from D20 fics - 1, 3, and 5 are FH fics, but 2 is ASO and 4 is Never After and both of those contain spoilers so watch out if you're not yet seen them.

First, from Twelve Hours, it's Aelwyn learning completely the wrong lesson from the experience:

Aelwyn looked over, tears in her eyes.  "...Aah.  Adaine.  It's fine.  I've learned.. I've learned a lot of really important things, these past few years.  About how important it is to have others helping you, and about how much I might have hurt.. you and others.  And I am sorry for that.  I do love you.  But most importantly, I've learned... I've learned from Arthur Aguefort that if you're a powerful enough wizard and you have enough wards on your house, you can get away with any number of crimes and the government can't really stop you."

Adaine made at least a half-hearted attempt at a counterspell of the Teleport that followed - none of the others had gotten that far in wizarding - but Aelwyn was ready with a counterspell back of her own, and maybe it really was for the best.  They had the information they needed, and they had Ostentatia's palimpsest, and if Aelwyn wanted to find somewhere to hide from Kalvaxus other than a jail cell, that did seem fair enough in exchange.

Next up, from Gallivant's End, the initial two paragraphs which I think do a really nice job of setting up the interior conflict the piece is about:

Being deep underwater and finding a current that leads you swiftly and perfectly to where you need to get to, Riva for short, did not even know the name of the ship they had hopped onto, nor the two before that since leaving the Wurst.  It was information that could easily be found, of course, plucked from the minds of any of those on the ship around them, but all they really wanted to know was whether they were headed in the right general direction to get to home eventually, and they were.

Gallivant had been lovely, of course, and by the end full of love, and in fact the only person of the crew that Riva could no longer be certain they fully loved was themself.

Third, from Locate Creatures, Riz and Penny interrogating a responsible adult, showing my usual level of respect for Gilear:

"I do not have your money, as I have...  Oh.  Riz.  It's you."  Gilear said, sitting up.  "Is there something that you require, or have I offended you in some way?"

"We need to know who this is and what their address is right now, and if anyone asks why you gave out an address you can say it was at gunpoint."  Riz said, Penny adding "And knifepoint!" from behind, holding the sketch out with one hand and her knife with the other.

"Aah.  Yes.  I do recognize this student.  I trust you have a good reason for this, Riz?  Do I need to talk to your mother again?"  Gilear said, and Riz shook his head.

"No, it's just a kidnapping case.  We'll have it resolved first thing in the morning, I promise.  Just get me the address." 

Four, from Glass, Cinderella preparing to do what she wants and doesn't want to do:

Unfortunately, they weren't as fast as they could have been.  A bare twenty seconds after they'd gotten started on the ritual, the doors behind them had opened, the six of Rosamund's group with their own seventh impossibly in the form of the Baba Yaga bursting through them, and Cinderella felt ill to the very core of her soul.  She had convinced herself that she would be able to do Rosamund the kindness of an ending she was unaware was coming, wherever the girl and her group had retreated to, and yet...

She raised a javelin in salute to her sister of the Crown, before shutting the visor of her armor that would render herself completely unseen.  She could put Sleeping Beauty to rest, one last time.

How much it hurt her to do would not matter.  The End drew near.  Cinderella would make certain of that.

Last, from Missing, a completely wild paragraph in a completely crazy stretch of choices from our protagonist Aelwyn:

Aelwyn swerved, scraping against a car with a horrifying sound, yanking the wheel to and froe and trying to save it, and there was an awful noise from the tires, and...  she definitely didn't have control, now, and the time had come to abandon this plan.

Moments before the police car plowed into the side of a building, Aelwyn Misty Stepped out of it and thirty feet away, dropping the Disguise Self as well - it was close to expiring anyway - and just hurrying along towards the docks on foot, trying to ignore the screaming and sirens behind her.  She couldn't do anything about those now; hopefully nobody was hurt, but the important thing was to not get caught.

#fanfic #dimension 20 #fantasy high #a starstruck odyssey #never after

[aidaronan]

ASK GAME! 🍓🦷🌿🏜️🦋

🍓 - how did you get into writing fanfiction? I think to some degree I always wrote it. I've been writing since I was about 7. One of my earliest things I remember writing at like 9 was NOT Indiana Jones fanfic, but it wasn't not Indiana Jones fanfic. Lol Funny enough, I think this was inspired more by a game we played in gym than any real love of Indy. Writing it on purpose though? How does any hopeless sapphic get into writing fanfic? A girl I was crushing on (even though I didn't realize it was a crush at the time) was super into bandfic. So I started writing bandfic in hs on Quizilla. One thing led to another and blah blah... 🦷 - share some personal wisdom or a life hack you swear on I forgot all my wisdom immediately after reading this. lmao Uh.... Remember that life is ephemeral. Not in a morbid way. Just in a "this thing you are very stressed about today will not matter in a [time period]. breathe." way. And in a "try your best to fully live this moment and internalize this memory" way. Also. If you want that job, apply for it. You aren't qualified? Apply anyway. Worst case, your resume goes in virtual recycle bin somewhere. Oooh not a fake trash can. APPLY. Which I guess leads into a thing that is true for jobs, submitting to lit mags/antho calls, dating, and a whole lot of other things that can feel so scary: don't self-reject. Life hacks? ADHDs, keep the floss of your choice somewhere you tend to hang out the most (bedside table, coffee/side table) and maybe you'll do that shit. 🌿 - give some advice on writer's block/low creativity 1. Re-read what you have so far or at least a big chunk up to the point where you're stuck. Sometimes just re-reading gets the ball rolling again on momentum. 2. Back up. Cut a few sentences or paragraphs. See if those were what was actually in your way. 3. Commit to writing something super short. One whole sentence. Three. If you do more than those? Swell. ;) 4. Keep signing up for fandom events so that there's always a deadline to get your ADHD to behave. 🏜️ - what's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work? Any of them? lol I think we all love to see we got a comment that is just massive and full of a lot of analysis and general screaming. At the same time, some short comments can be so impactful. I also love when people comment on every chapter of a work and leave their hopes and theories and I get to be like "ehehehe" if they're right OR if they're wrong. But ultimately, I think it's any comment that shows that I made them feel something or/and gave them something to really think about. And these don't always have to be super serious. Amusement is a feeling. :) 🦋 - share something that has been on your heart and mind lately  I miss my mom and hope I get to see her again soon but I'm not sure when it'll actually be possible.

#ask game #asks

[authorangelita]

I was tagged by @rosieblogstuff 😃

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

259.  I really want to hit 100 stories in both MacGyver and White Collar fandoms.   😁

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

594,984.  That averages out to 2,297 words per work, which is actually better than I thought it would be.  I write a lot of short pieces. 

3. What fandoms do you write for?

In order of most fics to least: White Collar, MacGyver 2016, Teen Wolf, White Collar RPF, Dark Angel, Supernatural.  There are a few other fandoms, but they're related to an event I did on LJ where you wrote down 15 characters from various fandoms, and people gave you random numbers, and you had to write a drabble/ficlet that included those characters. 

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Redraw the Lines (White Collar)

Letter T: Tired (Teen Wolf)

Letter Q: Quilt (Teen Wolf)

Letter K: Kidfic (Teen Wolf)

Friendly Advice and Family Dinner (White Collar)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I always plan to respond, but I'm super behind at the moment.  One of these days, I'm going to catch up!

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Listen, I'm not proud of it, but I did once write the death of Peter and Elizabeth's dog Satchmo in White Collar fic.

On the MacGyver front, it's hard to tell.  Maybe Regrets (Jack) where Jack decides they all need to leave the Phoenix. 

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I don't know that I would classify many of my fics as having a happy ending. I think Altered Course, the AU where Jack and Diane decide to foster Mac after his grandfather dies, has a pretty happy ending. 

8. Do you get hate on fics?

No, not really.  There are a couple of White Collar fics that I wrote that some people didn't like, but I still didn't get hate for them. 

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Nope.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I haven't finished one, but I've tried a couple of White Collar/Teen Wolf crossovers.  That event I did with the 15 characters included crossovers, but they were so short, I don't know that they really counted. 

The craziest one from that was probably Luc Johnston (Tru Calling), Peyton Sawyer (One Tree Hill), and Peter Burke (White Collar) In a love triangle.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I don't think so.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don't think so.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes, back in the post-Dark Angel days.  A friend and I did a kind of role-playing thing where we wrote a bunch of Dark Angel fic that was mostly never posted, and several Dawson's Creek fics that were CJ/Jen-centric.

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

Is the Ever Given too obvious?

15. What's a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

I have a whole folder of fics called Limbo.  I've talked about this one before, but I have this idea (and I posted a ficlet of it during an event last year, I think) where Mac spirals after Jack "dies", becomes addicted to pain pills, and pushes everyone away until Jack comes back.  I would love to write it, but the amount of research needed boggles my brain. 

Another one that I probably won't finish is the one post-Regrets (Jack) where (post-Phoenix) Team Improv becomes an elite Search and Rescue team where Jack flies the helicopter, Mac gets winched down to rescue people, etc.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Oh, this is a good question!  And also a tough question.  Umm, Jack's voice, finding unique ways to twist an h/c story,  and the occasional zinger dialogue. 

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Also a good question and another tough one.  Fully fleshing out scenes, not starting paragraphs with someone's name, and coming up with endings that aren't cheesy.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I'm uncomfortable with it because I don't speak any other languages, and everything I know about translation apps/sites makes me nervous.  I named a fic with a word from another language, and I often think about changing it because I'm worried it means something terrible in a different language.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

General Hospital.  Those fics are lost to time (or the secret FFN account that I will never share).  I was 14/15, and they were terrible.  But I'm so glad I had that brief fandom experience.

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

For White Collar, it's Redraw the Lines.  I really don't think that answer will ever change.  For MacGyver, that answer changes often, and I'm still writing stuff, so maybe I haven't written it yet.  Today, it's Wearing Your Wounds.

I'm not sure who's been tagged so far, so if you want to play, please say you were tagged by me! 😃

#ask games #20 fic/author questions #this was a lot of fun!

[lamarckianenterprises]

Sucks to be Me But I'm built Different Now

My work got accepted in a Litmag (technically a Zine, CoinOperated Press to be precise) for the first time today, and outside of being thoroughly excited to announce that my humble flier will be included in their next Zine, Dungeons and Dragons Part 2. (Learn more about it on the following link)

I just want to say that looking back, I think a lot of my opinions about my own creative work is based off of like, no one really praising me for my writing. Like I didn't keep writing because people said that I was doing great or good or was talented or whatever, I kept writing because I wanted to get to that point, in spite of the lack of praise not because of it.

Hell, my mother was basically radio silent on my writing after noting that my very first work, the weird fugue state nanowrimo novel that's lost to the sands of time was, and I'm quoting here, "At least he has good grammar." Admittedly I kinda avoided showing her stuff after that, but still.

Outside of her and my even less present father there was my brother who was barely present in my teenage years, and so I basically had jack all for validation outside of an RPing community I immediately antagonized by being an attention seeking edgy teenager who fired out a self insert the GM immediately recognized somehow.

So while it gave me an easy way to keep writing and a sense of community which genuinely helped me practice and learn the craft among other things, it also meant that I didn't really get praise? Or when I did it was from someone close enough to me personally that my brain could immediately dismiss them and their opinions as being invalid as they are tainted by other people's impressions of me as a person.

I think the one bit of praise I registered as genuine was when people said they had fun in the complete mess of a Shadowrun world plot I ran in that RP which is really just a high I've been chasing ever since with every tabletop game I have ever run.

And I couldn't rely on internal validation either because I spent literal years thinking that I was somehow getting worse over time because for some fucking reason I measured that shit based off of output as in the amount of words and paragraphs written down on (virtual) paper as opposed to like, actual quality.

And how hard it was to write, which uhhh, honestly writing has never really gotten easier for me, like I am far more aware of what constitutes 'good' writing now, but it's not like the actual process has gotten much easier, and honestly as the years went on I ended up constraining my own creativity more in vague pursuit of 'better, more respectable and praiseworthy writing'.

Which meant that on top of the tyranny of time eating away at my ability to remember how difficult it was to write in the first place, I had a growing list of hangups and fears that meant that I could always refer back to some past paragraphs I think are real zingers and go, "Damn, where did I go wrong? How am I worse than I use to be?" while ignoring the veritable sea of word vomit, every little thing I did to piss other people off, and the fact that I unironically just naturally obtained more responsibilities as I grew up and obtained a job that slowly crushed my will to live that just made it harder to sit down and write LMAO.

Now I'd love to say that I've thrown of all of my chains, learned to write the proper way, and focused my life entirely towards mastering the craft without interruptions, or that this one acceptance has fulfilled my lifelong desire for validation from a complete stranger once and for all.

Really all I have to say about all this is what you read at the top, "man it sucks to be me but I'm built different," I am in more ways than one no longer the same man who started writing just to have something to do in November, nor am I the man who sat down and chose to make himself when told to make absolutely anything he could want to be.

But then again I am the woman who started whooping and whollering and going, "OLE OLE OLE" and praising God after reading this so like, maybe I'm not that different after all.

#writing #on writing #writer things #journaling #creative writing

[ghoooooooooooooooost]

i had to reread n edit this before posting like i was going over an essay jesus christ ((tristamp spoilers))

tldr; i was honestly disappointed but i still don't think it was completely awful + i hope if they do a 2nd season it's better *wants to see milly*.... fuck the director though

EDIT!!! 2nd season was confirmed so you can ignore the points where i question if it will happen lol

EDIT 2 actually idt i'll watch the 2nd season... for reasons that just hit me so.... + fuck night*w as well

most of this was written before the finale eek

the major problems were that the pacing was soooooo weird n some of the changes (both story wise and design wise) they made were questionable esp towards the latter half

my positive points:

i do still think individual eps at the first half were really good

i loved the animation + how they used colors

the backgrounds are cool

the artstyle shift in wolfwood's flashback was cool

i've always been "ok" abt vashwood honestly (sorry) but i will acknowledge they were very yaoiful here. i saw a person who didn't ship vashwood say the ep in tristamp where they literally just met made them ship it which was really funny bc how did that change your mind so fast

i'm ngl the milly + eriks name drops made me *JAWDROP* but that's something that only matters to ppl who watched/read the ogs first

my negative points (uh oh):

white washed wolfwood (+ his skintone is soo inconsistent in merch)

they gave vash no room to breathe n he doesn't get big sillay moments after ep 3

^ this is true for every character except i guess roberto? more on roberto later

^^^ goes with the previous too points but it felt like they were way too focused on the drama n sadness without enough (long lasting) happy or hopeful moments to contrast or balance it out overall - to the point were the characterization of our main cast suffered for it bc there wasn't enough there with them to make that properly work. and THEN the silly moments ended up suffering too bc they start feeling out of place. the drama beats kept happening one after the other at breakneck speed without breaks, messing up the pacing as well (i can kinda blame this at least partially on the fact they only had 12 eps when the og was 26 eps but i've watched plenty of 12 ep series with great pacing so i don't really know what happened here?)

i disagreed with this at first, but the lore with vash being front-loaded really did hurt the story a bit in the long run. obviously they did still spread the full details out over the course of the show but it was :\

specific to "the running man"- it's my fav ep tbh but it was strange how all the townsfolk were partying w the nebraskas with no indication they'd arrest them after they did so much damage n vash didn't even get to fix the damaged plant?? so why were they so joyous when the initial problem wasn't solved?

roberto.... was such a weird character... he managed to be both a dick n a guy w no personality, he was there to give exposition + attempt to be funny? n then die. also the marketing staff fucking hates him he's never in any merch wtf ((edited after the finale: well now we know he wasn't meant to replace milly (i had a whole paragraph complaining abt that lol) + now i feel like they added him just to kill someone other than wolfwood off))

i can't speak much on elendria bc i had so much trouble reading trimax forever ago that i never retained anything abt her other than she's trans, but everything involving her in tristamp felt strange/ like it didn't work. i have essentially same feeling about livio here. they threw legato to the side??

what the fuck was the thing with the plants towards the end. it just hit me what the hell

minor nitpicks:

i miss the old anime's ost :( tristamp's ost isn't bad by any means n there are tracks that i really like it's just idk man. especially with the the op song, i couldn't get myself to not skip the op SORRY. could you imagine how hype it would've been if a new rendition of H.T. or NO-BEAT started playing

i'm fine with stamp vash's design (blasphemous i know) but man would'n've one of his og coat designs worked well in 3d? i feel like it would've ((added after the finale: the new coat did look nice in black + they brought back his old hair in the last ep tho so. MAYBE... IN SEASON 2.... CLASSIC COAT....? *delusional*))

NO LOVE & PEACE?!?!?!?!

one of my nitpick points was that they technically didn't give vash the black hair bc i really wanna see it animated one day but assuming they are teasing a season 2 maybe they will eventually. but then how...?

#maybe my standards are too low after getting burnt by higurashi gou/sotsu idk #this post is long as hell also watch out #new vash thoughts #- da last one(?)

[golmac]

Inform Basics (Disambiguation 2)

[I've decided to stop numbering each post sequentially. I'll label them by subject instead. These aren't meant to be read as a book.]

Last time, we talked about how Inform 7 tries to handle incomplete player commands. By "incomplete," I mean that they are missing one or more nouns. For instance, Inform 7 expects...

move [something]

...so if the player just inputs...

>move

...Inform 7 will attempt to determine which noun the player might have meant based on set rules (we went over these rules in detail last time). Beginning authors sometimes get odd disambiguation results after bypassing the locale description processes. There may be a good reason to declare a person scenery, for instance, or say that a door is UNDESCRIBED, but beginners like us are unlikely to make such fine distinctions.

Let's look at what happens when we have an apple and a door in a room:

Lab You can see an ostentatious door and an apple here.

>open What do you want to open? >door You open the ostentatious door.

That all seems pretty normal, right? But we don't like the door in the locale description; that's rather ostentatious. Let's say we go about things in a less than optimal way (the numbers in brackets are modifiers to the item's disambiguation score):

ostentatious door is undescribed. [-100]

or

ostentatious door is scenery. [-10]

In either case, these declarations are enough to bump the other object in the room (an apple) to the top of the pile. That leads to behavior like this:

Lab You can see an apple here.

>open (the apple) It isn't something you can open.

Players hate this kind of thing! This may sound strange, but a polished parser game does its best to minimize typing. The craft expectation is that unnecessary typing is busywork. For a good player experience, handle what you can in code.

Let's assume we've done things just the way we've discussed: we've taken the door out of the locale description:

Rule for writing a paragraph about the ostentatious door: now the ostentatious door is mentioned.

We are back to having our game ask what we would like to open. Maybe that's not what we want. What if we want our game to assume that we mean opening the door? We can do that:

does the player mean opening a door: it is likely.

These rules (casually referred to as DTPM rules) can be used to override the usual disambiguation math. The possibilities are: very unlikely (-2000 ish), unlikely (-1000), likely (+1000), very likely (+2000 ish). The "very" options are usually overkill unless we want to override another rule.

The rule above is rather broad, isn't it? We know how to be more specific, since the construction resembles the rules we've been writing for actions. If we didn't want to affect every door in every room, we could say:

does the player mean opening a closed door while the player is in lab (this is the always prefer opening doors rule): it is likely.

A few points:

This defaults to opening the ostentatious door as hoped.

I decided to specify only open doors, because that makes sense to me.

While I named a room in this example, I could name a region or practically any other condition (refer to a variable, something in inventory, etc).

If we really wanted to get fancy, we could create a kind of door (a "preferred door" or some such) and apply the rule to that kind specifically.

It's always good to start with likely/unlikely over "very" likely/unlikely so that you have a way to override your rule if needed.

I gave the rule a name "(this is the always prefer opening doors rule)" because that can help with troubleshooting rules and action processing, which, surprise, is what we are getting up to next week!

I'm open to suggestions for improving the content here or dealing with specific cases. As always, feel free to AMA.

Have a good weekend 🐱

#inform 7 #i7 for beginners #i7 disambiguation #parser #interactive fiction #i7 #i am not a programmer irl

[fountainpenguin]

If you were given the opportunity to reboot FOP from the ground up, what would you change, shake up, or put your own spin on?

I'll have to give this a short answer, I no joke spent over 2 hours replying to this, then added a Read More and Tumblr told me that my post was too out of this world and it broke the editor. It kicked me out in a split second without any opportunity to save. Sorry to everyone who has to scroll past my stuff in the future, but I'm not living through this again. Read Mores have no place on my blog.

I'm furious because 1) I tried to copy-paste out of this editor like I always do and save in an external place, but the new editor is busted and only copies one paragraph when you do CTRL-A so I gave up, and 2) literally the last sentence I wrote before typing that was "Before my hiatus, Read Mores broke stuff, but I'm willing to give this another try." It's not even the same error it used to be. I can't. I can't.

At least we're friends and I think you know a lot of my thoughts anyway. Sorry it took so long to write an answer to this message, but I've already let it sit for so long that I HAVE to get it out of my inbox now or I'll never go back to it after losing everything :/ I can't believe that just happened. How ironic that one of the main reasons I went on hiatus was because stuff kept breaking and then it's worse when I return. Bleh.

So... Here's the short version of things I can remember talking about:

Update world lore, especially regarding Anti-Fairies. Anti-Fairies debuted in Season 2 and didn't reappear until Season 5; Anti-Fairy World itself made its first appearance in Season 6 because the Anti-Fairies were only seen in jail before that. Anti-Fairy World is kind of barren and stereotypical, and the general vibe of Anti-Fairies is that they are all evil because their magic revolves around bad luck. I'd prefer some gray area. I also feel like the characterizations for Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda were rushed and we should say it.

Logically I know that Anti-Wanda can be said to parallel Wanda's high-class mafia upbringing, but I doubt that was planned since Wanda's family only showed up in Season 5. In another universe, we could have had a classy evil queen. I love the grubby gal, but there are so many cool aesthetics she could have had instead. The Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda vibe doesn't bring anything to the table that Cosmo and Wanda didn't already have unless you take creative liberties.

Maps. Maps would have been great.

Designs. Cosmo, Crocker, and Dad really don't need the same shirt. Wanda's outfit is pretty bland too, and it's honestly a shame that Anti-Cosmo got a unique outfit but Anti-Wanda's is just a recolor of Wanda's. See also, classy queen.

Also I've never liked Timmy's Channel Chasers adult design; I just don't think it's in character. I feel like his body type would be much closer to his parents, and the existing one is just too extreme for my preferences. Doesn't say "Timmy the average kid" to me.

"Fairly Odd Baby" - As much as I enjoy the idea of Fairies placing a ban on babies because they're destructive and Fairy World likes to push away its problems, I'd have introduced Poof as part of an announcement that Cosmo and Wanda had been expecting a baby for 100 to 1000 years. Their lifespans are so long, it wouldn't be out of the question. A reveal episode could have been fun.

I also don't think I would have chosen to leave Poof a baby who can't speak for that long; I think he has a fun personality (Sasses Foop, deliberately puts Foop in harm's way, but also he's super chill and nice and likes sports) and I would have liked to see more episodes where he talks. I don't love how he was shipped to boarding school as soon as he was able to talk and dialogue was needed.

Vicky takes Mark back onscreen. She canonically decided she wanted to start dating him again, after she found out he was an alien and she broke up with him. She made the choice to take back her alien boyfriend and she loves him and we should talk about it. I'm obsessed with them and will forever treasure the deleted "Foul Balled" scene of them holding hands at the senior home while Mark is in his squid form. I support Vicky becoming the shapeshifting queen of a violent planet and being extremely in love with her squid husband.

Chloe / A.J. friendship. A.J. ended world hunger in Season 2 and he built a time machine a few seasons later, I feel like those two would have really hit it off.

More episodes of Timmy playing soccer. I will not re-elaborate.

More of side characters I love, like Molly and Kevin. I love them. I love Kevin falling farther and farther behind his uncle when they walk together, I love Timmy introducing himself to Molly's fairy by shaking her hand... They might be side characters but I feel like they add a lot more to the world and character dynamics in their few scenes than many of the characters do.

Sharing fairies. Timmy sharing fairies with Chloe (or Kevin) as part of a temporary program (like she was just here for one school year before her parents moved again). I think one of the issues people have with Chloe is that it feels like she's here for the rest of Timmy's fairy-related life, and I think a few months of hanging out with her would have been plenty and then there would have been a reason for her to leave the canon afterwards.

Make Chloe Dinkleberg's niece. My favorite headcanon. Also a perfect explanation for why Chloe's family would move to Timmy's street. Also a hilarious parallel of Timmy seething with frustration at his "perfect" neighbor despite spending the entire series making fun of his dad for doing the same thing.

More Timmy/Chloe "step-sibling" interactions. I support Timmy "I will sit with you while you have an hour-long panic attack" Turner in "The Booby Trap" but I cannot emphasize enough that I equally support Timmy "Will take a call from Chloe, listen to her explain that she vaporized a juice box, then hang up and go to bed" Turner. They are step-siblings...

Timmy, Chloe, and Kevin. I support Timmy - Chloe - Kevin trio interactions in general. They're a comedic trio and I want them to support each other.

Gary and Betty. Unironically, we need to talk more about Gary and Betty canonically being aware of the magical world. Or at least they adjusted really fast to being teleported from California to Florida and back again. Also we should talk about that time Gary rang Sanderson on his cell phone, which gets funnier the longer you think about it. Also I love them and we should talk about the deleted "Totally Spaced Out" scene where they tried to flee to Mexico together.

Ending the series with a proper send-off. I'm not a fan of Timmy keeping his magical memories after losing Cosmo and Wanda. Being the protagonist doesn't make him immune. I feel like there are so many ways this could have been done in a sentimental way that people would have loved... I'm sad we didn't get a proper send-off.

On the list of things we don't need to change - Imaginary Gary, Norm, Mark, Molly, Jorgen, the Pixies, Flappy Bob, Foop, and Ed Leadly. They are flawless, 10 of 10. We also do not need to change Chloe casually swearing, but meanwhile Timmy will call you out for saying "Moron" on the radio, and we definitely don't need to change "This isn't a fancy French restaurant- this is a black hole!"

I love the Pixies. If they didn't exist, I would have come along and prepped some worldbuilding about characters who maintain magical paperwork. I love my snarky monotone wasp boys.

Also I just want to shout-out Chloe and Kevin and their personalities being hilarious. I think there are several Chloe-centric episodes that have flawed storytelling, but I do genuinely enjoy the character you're left with after brushing off some of her exaggerated perfectionism.

Kevin has some of the best dialogue in the entire series, and those two just seem to write themselves when you pit them together. I like the mental image of Chloe venting to Timmy about how unfair it is that Crocker shows him favoritism and then it slowly dawns on her that she also has a history of getting a lot of favoritism.

Thanks for the ask! I'm sad I lost the full responses, but I think I've learned my lesson and will draft in an external doc first. Please learn from my mistakes, I will not take back my venting >:(

Even if I lost it, it's nice to take some time and think about some answers to these things. I'm also pretty satisfied that I was able to make this post long enough to feel like a good answer. Yay.

#FAIRIES! #ridwriting #asks #I am so so paranoid now that if I edit an old long post Tumblr will decide to kill it yiiiiikes #Perfect pink beaver boy #Bat cube and associates #Little Crock #Gary and Betty #Rebellious golden child #The best bat queen #The bat with the hat #We're Pixies! #Sanderson is neat #I'm wasp dad trash

[thelaithlyworm]

🎢 Which of your fics would you call your wildest ride? 😈 Has there been a point in a story where you did something just to be playfully mean to your readers? 🛠What tools/programs/apps do you use to write? 🤗 What advice would you give to new fanfic writers that are just getting started?

🤩 Who is your favorite character to write?

🎢 Which of your fics would you call your wildest ride?

The "Lion and the Serpent" series, hands down. It started with a series of short-short fics about a villain and a hero who individually retired after season 2 of a show (The Musketeers), and in my fics had started working together. Then some of the backstory hints I'd been dropping hit a big reveal and I started dragging in more characters and some unsolvable problems and Drama and... there was a point where I thought I'd written myself into a corner, then History Itself gave me an opening. Amazing, all around.

😈 Has there been a point in a story where you did something just to be playfully mean to your readers?

Yes, when I was writing "Bright Soul" (Nirvana in Fire Daemon AU). A lot of readers had been making some guesses about What's Going On With Mei Changsu's Daemon, and I threw in an entirely new counter-explanation halfway through to confound them. (And there's honestly some interesting plot involved with Pigeon so I'm glad I did it.) I really need to get my NiF writing spoons back and finish that.

🛠What tools/programs/apps do you use to write?

Google Docs, usually - very basic. Then I paste it into the AO3 Rich Text box and tweak out all the extra spaces it adds before hitting Post.

Though - with the Big Meta I've been writing on Time Raiders, with all that image hosting, it ended up being less stress to write each chapter in html, down to the <p>paragraph breaks</p> (I'm not crying, honest.)

🤗 What advice would you give to new fanfic writers that are just getting started?

Have fun. Love the things you love and write them down.

Try for short projects when you start - or if it's a long story you want to write, try to chunk that down into related short things with their own start and ending. The point is - you're training yourself into a new skill, and the more comfortable successes when you're still learning how the tools work, the better foundation you have when things get challenging.

Be kind: to yourself; to other people.

🤩 Who is your favorite character to write?

Whoever I'm writing at the time, I guess. Hmm. Looking at my Works section, I've gone really hard on Aramis d'Herblay (The Musketeers), Mei Changsu (Nirvana in Fire), and Wu Xie (Daomu Biji).

I'd say what they have in common is they're all Hero characters. Genuinely heroic. They're also tricksy, sad little shits with questionable self-care skills, so I get a nice balance between, 'This person is Awesome', 'you horrible little man', and, 'I really need to wrap this guy in a blanket, stat'

#ask meme #asks and answers

[dreadnotau]

Big (but sort of not big) announcement time! (At the bottom is a TL;DR if you don’t have time to read paragraphs of my ramblings.)

First thing’s first, I got into college!!! A lot of you probably don’t know, but it’s been a massive uphill battle to practice for the exams to enter the art college I wanted. It’s why I haven’t been posting basically anywhere but here since the year started. It was a lot of work and stress, but it paid off! I’m gonna be studying subjects and doing art things that I’m ACTUALLY interested in! No more are the days of dreading the next German test or pulling my hair out because of some bullshit math equations, from now on it’s just blood, sweat and tears poured into canvases, baby!

Joking aside, this is genuinely monumental for me. Though it DOES mean I’m gonna be pulled thin on my time and creative juices the moment the first semester starts, I’m still excited to keep working on Dread Not alongside the schoolwork I’ll inevitably have to do, too. This comic is, as I’ve said many times, my biggest passion project yet, and the fact that I stuck with it for over a year now is another thing I have to be very proud of.

But, in all honesty, this project wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for my best friend, Meow! As some of you may know (or maybe noticed the changed bio), Meowchela is the co-author of Dread Not, and is the one who encouraged me to go through with a full comic telling of the story, (instead of just letting it sit idly in my brain like most of my Deltarune and Undertale AUs do, whoops) so, again, you have her to thank for all of this. She’s not directly involved with the creation of the pages (yet?), but she is the one who helped add many characters, sideplots, and satisfying conclusions to what was, originally, just an AU about Toriel, Asgore, Spade, Gaster, and Kris, as well as helping with designing characters both that appear later on and have appeared already (Rouxls’ fabulous design was made by her!)

The reason I bring this all up in detail now is because she is now OFFICIALLY credited as a co-author. I used to just mention her in posts and tags, as well as give her a special role in the discord server, but now she’s credited alongside me in the bios of both the Twitter and the Tumblr accounts! The reasons why she didn’t want to be credited until recently are her own, but I hope you all give her as warm a welcome as you gave me as a fellow author of Dread Not! She knows this story better than anyone (better than even me sometimes, whoops x2) and I hope we can all see it through to the end!

Don't take my word for it all, though, here's a statement from Meow:

Hello everyone! I'm Meow, who you now know as the co-author for Dread Not! I've been around for this project since the concept stages, and seeing all of your love and support for it means so much more than I can reliably say. You may now be wondering why I've been so silent despite being around for so long, and the answer to that is very personal. All I'll say is that it took a while to build up the courage to allow Kooki to even mention me by name (and trust me, he's wanted to since we made the blog!) and so having a proper credit like this is monumental. I'm happy to finally be more front and center for the project, even if still a litle nervous! =w=;;

Thank you for reading from the bottom of my heart. Seeing everyone being so kind about the comic is half the reason I came out of my shell in the first place. While it's true that without me the comic wouldn't exist, in turn my efforts would never have been realized had it not been for all of you! So thank you again, and I hope you're as excited for what's to come as I am!

And, lastly, and kind of least importantly (to me), I’ll be postponing this week’s page. Both so I can relax for 2 seconds after my exams, and so I can have more ready for the week after this one. I’m gonna be going on vacation soon, too, so I’ll try to have a page ready for posting while I’m away from home. And, if it’s not ready, it’ll just be postponed for a week, too. You guys have dealt with longer hiatuses, it shouldn’t be a big deal, right?

TL;DR: Kooki is in college now and October is gonna kick his ass. Meowchela is now officially credited as a co-author of Dread Not. This week’s page will be postponed so I can actually go touch grass for once.

Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for your continued support of this comic! Act 1 is in it’s last third, and progress on Act 2 is looking promising. Stay tuned!

#dread not #dreadnot #dread not au #dreadnotau #not comic #not a hiatus announcement thankfully #this is just a post basically bringing to the spotlight some recent developments #seriously tho i wish i could give meow more credit but shes like nooo ur the one drawing the pages dont put my name on those #and like i get where shes coming from but also? she def deserves more credit for helping as much as she has already #maybe i'll get to include her name on some future pages who knows #for now though im gonna go like. lie down. exams were HELL

[teeth-collecter]

Things in the first SGE book that confuse/piss me off

1. The pacing

Some parts of the book just take way too long. Like, how it takes five chapters just for Agatha and Sophie just to see the Schoolmaster and get the riddle. Also, Sophie trying to get Tedros to fall in love with her takes up most of the book, leaving hardly any room for the ending. Speaking of the ending, there was WAY too much that happened all at once near the end of that book and not enough time to explain it AT ALL. The book ended so abruptly that it left me going "...what?"

2. Agatha's character arc

This also ties in with the pacing problem, but I just feel like the book focuses way too much on Sophie, that it leaves little room for Agatha to grow. Agatha spends the whole book bending over backwards trying to get them home, only to not want to go home by the end of the book? The whole "I've been beautiful all along" thing was fine, but why did her realizing she was beautiful change her personality entirely? Not only that, but this whole personality change happens in like, two paragraphs. She goes from hating the school for good, and the people in it (for good reasons too), and being home sick, to suddenly "appreciating what good could do" and forgetting the sound of her mother's voice? Was I supposed to think that was a good thing? Agatha hated the school and wanted to go home for good reasons. She missed her mother and her cat, not to mention everyone (including the teachers) bullied and harassed her for the entire book. She SHOULD hate that school. I just think all of that really flattened her as a character. She started out the book having a strange interest towards death, a darker outlook on life, and she enjoyed using Never spells! But after this moment those things are never brought up again, and it just makes me sad.

3. Sophie

when I say Sophie, I'm mostly talking about her relationship with Agatha, and how she was such a terrible friend. We're supposed to believe that Sophie and Agatha are best friend's and understand each other more than anyone else, but we don't get to actually see that. The entire book, Sophie is just betraying Agatha left and right. Every time Tedros gave her the time of day she would IMMEDIATELY forget about Agatha and pretend they weren't even friends in the first place. Not to mention, Sophie blamed ALL her problems on Agatha. She blamed Agatha for being in "her" school even though it was the Schoolmaster who put them in the schools in the first place and it was the Schoolmaster who told her they could not switch. She blamed Agatha for her relationship with Tedros not working out, despite the fact that Tedros only showed interest in Sophie because of Agatha. Sophie's whole attitude towards Agatha after the trial by tale just pissed me off so much. She was mad at Agatha for... saving Tedros's life? After she refused to? Not to mention Agatha also saved Sophie's life in the trial, and never even received a thank you? That's why I don't get Agatha being Sophie's "nemesis" because a nemesis is supposed to be somebody who wronged you, and Sophie's problems have really only ever been Sophie's fault.

4. Agatha & Tedros

I'm not saying these two shouldn't have gotten together at all, but I am saying them getting together in book 1 made no sense. Tedros spent the entire book bullying Agatha along with everyone else, it's even implied that he wanted to kill her at some point. And yeah, I know it was implied throughout the entire book that they were going to get together, but you still need to develop a relationship. They spend the entire book hating each other, and then they are suddenly making heart eyes at each other for no reason. When Tedros actually realizes that he had picked Agatha in all of those "pick the princess" challenges, it actually scares him, and he wanted to tell Agatha to stay away from him. But when Agatha "realizes she's beautiful" Tedros starts flirting with her, even though she doesn't actually look different, and he has no reason to do so. And why should Agatha's love interest be the guy who harassed her the entire book? And then when they actually do get together (for a couple of days at least) they fight, he locks Agatha in a tower, and then almost actually kills her. And I know its because "Sophie manipulated him" but if you actually read how Sophie manipulates him, she convinces Tedros to kill Agatha because...she didn't obey him? She didn't stay locked up in the tower that he forced her in against her will? She questioned his manliness? Is that a good reason to kill someone?

5. The silver uniforms

If its been a long time since you've reread the first book, you're probably thinking; "what are you talking about?" and that's my point EXACTLY. At the end of the first book, after the schoolmaster "dies" the silver swans on everyone's uniform fade away, turning everybody's uniform silver. Representing the divide between good and evil being erased, the unnecessary competition between Evers and Nevers is finally over. And then the books ends shortly after. I LOVED this idea when a read it, and was curious to see what the author was going to do with it in future books, and what the school was going to become. But then it NEVER gets mentioned again. Seriously, in the second book, the school becomes girls vs. boys, in the third book its old evil vs. new evil, and in books 4-6, it goes right back to being good vs. evil! What happened? Why was this concept never brought up again? This is probably THE most confusing plot hole in the entire series, hands down.

I know this sounds like an angry rant (probably because it is) but I really loved this series when I was younger, and I feel like this series could of had so much potential, if it had been executed properly.

#sge #the school for good and evil

[goldenpark28]

WIP: Buddie Fic

I haven't completed a fic in months. So many drafts with just a few lines or paragraphs. I've been in an emotional slump.I don't know if this will go anywhere but I had an idea and the words just started flowing.

Based on Louis Tomlinson's Only For The Brave

Synopsis: Buck is on cloud nine when him and Eddie are finally get together. Everything is almost right in the world. Life can't be perfect, he's working on accepting that. As Hen would say, "Our little Buck is growing up." He just didn't expect life to throw him a teenage daughter he's never met while he's falling in true love for the first time. Neither of them could have been prepared for what's about to happen.

Chapter 1: Cloud Nine

You know how they say, "when it rains, it pours?"

Well, this tale is gonna be whole new level of what-the-actual-fuck universe.

Buck had finally told Eddie how he was feeling. It wasn't dramatic. It was actually quite spontaneous and soft.

After a particularly weird call and only a week long sexuality crisis , Buck just couldn't keep it in anymore. He didn't keep secrets from Eddie, that was a promise they made.

If they were gonna live together, he had the right to know how he felt so he could call it off if it made him uncomfortable. So Buck could leave town, change is name, and try not to die of a literal broken heart.

And okay, maybe the crisis came from something his therapist had said about how he needed to open his eyes and accept himself for who he was. Maddie making comments about how she never thought she'd get married again before 'you two idiots' do.

It was in Eddie's kitchen where he professed. Eddie was going on about the phone call he had with his sister about the crazy teenage drama his niece had found herself in while they were doing the dishes. He handed Buck a plate to dry but he just stared at him.

"What? Is something wrong?"

"It's either very wrong or very good. Kind of depends how you feel."

"What ridiculous thing did you buy for the house without asking?"

The house in question was also not planned. Neither was the two of them living together. But, it was a great price. In a great neighborhood near Chris's school. Buck was getting tired of living in an apartment. He showed Eddie the property online consisting of the main house, back yard, and guesthouse. They both fell in love with it.

Eddie was also in need of a new place after his landlord had weirdly joined what he believes is a cult. Decided to sell all his belongings and live with some friends in the woods. He has so many questions and so little answers. They were all given a generous 6 months to find somewhere new (as well as brochures for these new hippie homes they were building.) Buck said he'd found a property with a guest house that they could stay in if they ever needed it. His trust fund would surely cover it.

The previous owners, partners of 55 years, were very particular about who got their place. Wanted it to go to a nice family. The 2 women were skeptical when Buck had toured the place alone and said he didn't have a wife or kids of his own.

But when he came back with Eddie, who apologized for being late after dropping Chris off at a friend's, they gave one look at each other and said the house could be theirs. They owned a furniture store so they threw in a free couch with the offer.

It was here Buck set the dish down and lazily tossed the drying towel on the counter. "I need to tell you something."

Can be continued right here:

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Hope you like it!

#buddie 911 #911 abc #fanfic #archive of our own #louis tomlinson #only for the brave #eddie diaz #evan buck buckley #spotify #Spotify

[practically-an-x-man]

Ask game!

🌻🌈✨️💎💖💌

(Those might be a little out of order, I just remembered the emojis, not what order they were listed in lol)

thank you!! And don't worry about it being out of order, it's not a problem

(also apologies in advance because this turned into some MAJOR rambling)

🌻what makes you want to give up on writing? what makes you keep going?

I thrive off of feedback, and so I tend to get discouraged when I write something I'm proud of and it gets little/no response. It starts to feel like I'm putting a lot of effort into something that's just going to float aimlessly through the void, and I have other hobbies that I could spend my time on.

And admittedly, this happens sometimes when I swap read with a friend too - I put a lot of effort into commenting, marking lines and making note of all the little things I liked, since I always love getting those sorts of comments on my own writing, and then my writer friend either won't read my writing in exchange, or won't comment on it so I don't even know what they thought. That's not meant to be a callout and I'm not upset with anyone in particular, it's just a fairly consistent thing I've noticed and it makes sustaining motivation difficult.

Generally this is resolved by either receiving a surprise comment or two (I literally got a two-line comment on A Love Once New and it pulled me out of 2 months of uninspired dormancy), or simply pressing myself through the hard parts because I know there's a scene I've been dying to write coming up.

🌈is there a fic that you worked *really fucking hard on* that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

Okay, so I have a bad habit of starting fics in the most underused fandoms or with the most underappreciated characters, so it's kind of a tossup. But I'm actually gonna go with A Love Once New for this one, for one particular reason.

That fic is LONG. Over 200k words at this point. And given I started it over two years ago at this point, my writing's a lot better now than it was when I began. I worry that people will click onto it, but the old writing style will chase them away (it's not bad, but certainly not great) and they won't bother sifting through 60-something chapters to get to the new, well-written stuff.

I've put so much love and thought into that fic, but I feel like it just doesn't get appreciated the way I want it to.

(but also I work really fucking hard on everything I write so they all kinda fall into that category)

✨What's a fic you've posted you wish you could breathe life into again and have people talking about it? (or simply a fic you wish got more credit)

I used to have a longtime consistent reader on Smoke and Mirrors, who left these really great, multi-paragraph comments on every chapter, and it gave me so much joy to write that one. And then I had a second reader who came in after a while, and left slightly shorter but still really wonderful comments. But they disappeared, and the only comment I got on the most recent chapter was along the lines of "I don't really like being left in suspense, I hope Madison's okay. Nice update though." I'm grateful for the comment, but... not the most inspiring, y'know? It reads to me almost like a warning, like "you're losing my attention, please resolve this plot before I leave too"

I really wish I could get a few of those readers back, honestly. Smoke and Mirrors has some of my most dynamic characterization, a great slowburn, and I feel like I've struck a really good blend of angst and softness. I'm genuinely very proud of what I've built with that one and my writing keeps improving each chapter, but it feels like my readers have just been trickling away despite that.

💎why is writing important to you?

In a general sense, I feel like writing is an incredibly good way to showcase different perspectives and generate compassion and understanding in a way that other forms of media can't. Writing helps showcase not only a character's actions but their thoughts and worldview, which is an excellent tool for representation.

In a personal sense, writing is important to me because I feel more understood myself. I can incorporate my thoughts and perspectives or even rant about some of my personal pains through the lens of the story, and usually turn it into something compelling and interesting to the reader. I can channel my emotions into the words, and actually make something positive and creative out of them. It helps me keep the rampant ideas from piling up on me, helps me focus my thoughts, and makes me more articulate when I need to express something in the real world.

💝what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

I wasn't expecting Who Waits Forever Anyway? to get so much attention! I knew there was a standing Night at the Museum fandom since everyone loves Jed and Octavius, but I was surprised that so many people actually engaged with my Ahkmenrah-centered fic too! I've had three or four consistent readers (non-writer friends, people who genuinely just stumbled into the story and decided to stick with it) since the beginning, and that fic probably gets as many comments as the others combined. Catch and Release has more hits and bookmarks, but doesn't seem to have as many consistently engaged readers.

And on the opposite side of things, I'm surprised Secret Worlds and (Farewell) Wanderlust got so little attention. The Sandman is popular, the fandom appears to be pretty active, and the Corinthian is a well-liked character as a whole. Plus, I feel like those two pieces are some of my better bits of writing. Logically, I'd have thought it would get more attention.

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

Okay, so recently my motivation has been almost entirely devoted to this new fic called Taking Flight (thank you ADHD, I literally can't focus on any of my other WIPs right now), but I've been trying to work on the next chapter of Desert Song! I don't want to spoil too much, but I'll give you two things: it starts and ends with flashbacks, and the focus song for this chapter is The History of Wrong Guys from Kinky Boots.

The history of wrong guys:

Chapter one, he’s a bum. 

Two, he’s not into you.

Three, he’s a sleaze.

Four, loves the girl next door.

#my friends!!! #answered asks #ask game #my writing #writing asks