Prince of Time (Girl Genius)

[Simonbob]

My incomplete jumpchain "As A Consequence Of Your Action" on SB has an extensive and completed Girl Genius sequence, followed by an extensive and completed Buffy sequence, before it stalls out at the third one because repeated and blatant fan trolling drove me to the point where I hated writing it and hated the entire idea of writing for a while before I cooled off. But it is basically my other completed Girl Genius story, even if (like all Jumpchains) the MC is an SI. Although it's also one of my only Jumpchains where I managed to keep the MC at 'he's another member of the canon ensemble cast' and not 'the entire plot is his bitch', so hopefully you'll still like it.

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Well.

Now I've read that, that was pretty damm good. A little much was glossed over, fro my tastes, but it still flowed well, the good guys and bad guys were in chariter, and while your OC was over powered, he still fit. There were still challenges, there were things that he missed, there were butterflys that made things both better and worse.....


Yeah, I'm a little anoyed I missed that one till now.



(Oh, and as for a handful of assholes screwing up a fic until the author rage quits? I've seen that before. It's getting slowly more common, it seems. I'm not happy about it, either. Next time, if there is one, I suggest just blocking them, and getting some icecream. Life's too short.)

 

[SemiSaneAuthor]

(Oh, and as for a handful of assholes screwing up a fic until the author rage quits? I've seen that before. It's getting slowly more common, it seems. I'm not happy about it, either. Next time, if there is one, I suggest just blocking them, and getting some icecream. Life's too short.)

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Half the problem is that half the people causing it aren't arseholes, it's the innate, "Theorise the fuck about what could happen," that is part of SB and SB descended Boards. I can remember resisting the urge to talk about Lightning at the end of the Buffy Verse part.

Then you have the arseholes mixed in. Because people are going to theorise so you have a mix of honest theories and then you have the bastards who delibrately cause trouble. False positives are an annoying thing.

 

[cliffc999]

Half the problem is that half the people causing it aren't arseholes, it's the innate, "Theorise the fuck about what could happen," that is part of SB and SB descended Boards.

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Then there's the culture clash. I write on the style of 'Characters must always have strong internal reasons for decisions they make whenever possible', while a whole lot of SB seems to believe that if your MC is not hardcore munchkining for a tool-assisted speedrun, even if that would be entirely OOC under the circumstances, then they're doing it wrong.

And yeah, this means my characters often spend time deliberately not choosing the fastest or most logical route to power. Jesus fuck, have you ever TRIED to write a story for a perfectly rational protagonist who never fucks up? I have, and you're lucky to get a one-shot out of it. I didn't really start succeeding at long multi-chapter stories until I realized that it's impossible to have one of those if there's no character arc, and you can't have a character arc unless the character has something about them that needs to change.

(add) Now, it's not always necessary for the MC to have that arc if the point is to show how his presence is changing the lives of others for the better, but somebody on the main cast has to be imperfect, preferably several somebodies. But nope, there's just these people on SB who don't grasp that fanfic shouldn't be about Rationality Elementals in human skinsuits.

And that's among the honest ones, let alone the heckler brigade.

 

[Aleh]

Then there's the culture clash. I write on the style of 'Characters must always have strong internal reasons for decisions they make whenever possible', while a whole lot of SB seems to believe that if your MC is not hardcore munchkining for a tool-assisted speedrun, even if that would be entirely OOC under the circumstances, then they're doing it wrong.

And yeah, this means my characters often spend time deliberately not choosing the fastest or most logical route to power. Jesus fuck, have you ever TRIED to write a story for a perfectly rational protagonist who never fucks up? I have, and you're lucky to get a one-shot out of it. I didn't really start succeeding at long multi-chapter stories until I realized that it's impossible to have one of those if there's no character arc, and you can't have a character arc unless the MC has something about them that needs to change.

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Jesus fuck yes. I mean, I can do a multi-chapter fic that way, and maybe even make it somewhat compelling (there's room in there to work with consequences and subverted expectations even if I don't just go the Medaka Box route), but the reactions I get -- even here -- to characters with actual flaws...

 

[Simonbob]

I write on the style of 'Characters must always have strong internal reasons for decisions they make whenever possible', while a whole lot of SB seems to believe that if your MC is not hardcore munchkining for a tool-assisted speedrun, even if that would be entirely OOC under the circumstances, then they're doing it wrong.

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Jesus fuck yes. I mean, I can do a multi-chapter fic that way, and maybe even make it somewhat compelling (there's room in there to work with consequences and subverted expectations even if I don't just go the Medaka Box route), but the reactions I get -- even here -- to characters with actual flaws...

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I just....

I just don't get that. It's just insane. Every sucessful TV show, movie? There's always issues, limits, flaws. If there isn't, it just doesn't work.


Just nuts.

 

[Aleh]

I just....

I just don't get that. It's just insane. Every sucessful TV show, movie? There's always issues, limits, flaws. If there isn't, it just doesn't work.


Just nuts.

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A lot of it's just a sort of lowest-common-denominator effect. People tend to read into things in odd ways and miss various bits of hinting and foreshadowing, especially when it comes to things like characters being conflicted or having, well, flaws -- especially if they're supposed to be good guys overall. They develop their own head-canons full of these things... and then get upset when the story doesn't match what they were expecting.

Consider Forrest Moon -- my current writing project. It's been bad enough in the thread that I've thrown in a rather large misunderstandings FAQ, covering everything from characters' emotions ("No, Moira isn't romantically in love with Forrest") to explanations that a character's expressed political views aren't the same thing as an objective description of the setting.

And yet I still get some rather bizarre reactions when aspects of the situation -- ones I foreshadowed so blatantly that multiple people guessed them -- start showing up. It's -- with me admittedly paraphrasing and oversimplifying to highlight the silliness as much as possible -- on the level of, "How dare that character who openly admitted having plans that she was putting off to help Forrest, who pretty much introduced herself by saying that he wasn't first in her heart, and who actively rejected a marriage offer because of its potential impact on her relationship with her best friend put her feelings for said best friend from childhood ahead of her boyfriend?! Forrest dodged a bullet there: In modern parlance, she belongs to the streets!"

That's not even all that much of a paraphrase, by the way. Sure, I'm leaving out a lot of the context of the story, and the author of that particular complaint would probably say I missed the actual thrust of his argument -- but really.

Tangents and griping aside, this makes it very difficult for an author to deal with. I mean, we can anticipate and address some issues, but we're not fucking telepaths, and that means that we can't anticipate everything... even if trying wouldn't bloat our stories to absurdity.

And then there's the issue of people's headcanons about, well, canon when we're writing fanfic... gyah.

 

[Simonbob]

And then there's the issue of people's headcanons about, well, canon when we're writing fanfic... gyah.

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Being human means I've had occasional issues that way, as well. There was a Ranma 1/2 fic.... I really shouldn't even think about that one. It'll piss me off again.


The obvious thing about a story you don't like, is don't read it. If it's not going the way you want, badgering the author isn't going to get you much. Point out you issues once, give your reason in a way that the author can see why you care, and then step back. Reasonable conversation might help, but....



You guys know, better than I, that an author can only deal with so much before they go looking for something that doesn't piss them off so much.



There's a lot of self-centered small minded folk out there. They just don't think.

 

[Ashley9469]

This was awesome. I'll say you stopped the reaction right when it was getting interesting.

 

[Leafy503]

Then there's the culture clash. I write on the style of 'Characters must always have strong internal reasons for decisions they make whenever possible',

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I'd say this is good and bad for your writing since it seems you kinda "put yourself in the protag's shoes."
It's good since most stories you write have that good adventurer or uplifting type of story. It's bad as you can't really write a story when the protag is evil and commits heinous acts.
Which is fine. Gotta play to your strengths.

 

[Kyrin Fireheart]

Not sure how I missed this story the first go around since I found you here FROM SB but I'm glad you reposted this here. First off, loved the story. Sad it was short but the side stories gave some nice closure. Then I got to the part where you had the actual characters read it. Utter genius. No, seriously. That was fantastic. And it definitely scratched the itch as I was (im)patiently waiting for you to start up another story or go back to maybe Unconquerable. Hell, even one of your unfinished jumpchains on SB you could port over here and start again would be amazing. Since most of us here aren't assholes and there's quite a few of us that would jump down the throats of the couple that are in order to ensure you can write in semi-relative peace. Whatever works for you. After all, I always enjoy your stories.

 

[cliffc999]

As I'd mentioned it earlier in this thread, I'll post a notice here too:

It gives me more pleasure than I can express to announce that my long-abandoned jumpchain "As A Consequence Of Your Action" on SB, the abandoned story that I have most regretted abandoning, has not only been successfully reactivated but completed.

 

[Simonbob]

As I'd mentioned it earlier in this thread, I'll post a notice here too:

It gives me more pleasure than I can express to announce that my long-abandoned jumpchain "As A Consequence Of Your Action" on SB, the abandoned story that I have most regretted abandoning, has not only been successfully reactivated but completed.

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Glad you did.

Hope we helped.