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A big flaming stink posted:also i marathoned katalepsis this weekend and holy poo poo that story owns bones Thank you! So much, really. I can't put it into words well, but knowing that my writing brings people joy is why I keep doing this. Also, holy poo poo, you read the whole thing in a weekend? I just checked and it currently clocks in at 360k words. I thought I was a fast reader, but I doubt I could manage that.
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Feb 24, 2020 03:46
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Hungry posted:Thank you! So much, really. I can't put it into words well, but knowing that my writing brings people joy is why I keep doing this. The story was a lot shorter when I jumped on, but I think I saw one of your posts here when it was starting arc #4, and I marathoned the crap out of it- well worth it, disaster lesbians bring to joy to everyone, especially readers. 
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Feb 24, 2020 04:08
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Hungry posted:Thank you! So much, really. I can't put it into words well, but knowing that my writing brings people joy is why I keep doing this. i mean, your story isn't even as long as vol 1 of TWI, so it aint no big deal lol meanwhile pirateaba is literally averaging 30k words per chapter while she's attending physical therapy for her arms  e: i've actually been proselytizing katalepsis to TWI discord pretty hard and i've gotten 3 people to read it already (one of whom even subbed patreon) im trying to get pirateaba herself read it and give it a shoutout but that might be a bit overly ambitious A big flaming stink fucked around with this message at 07:42 on Feb 24, 2020 |
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Feb 24, 2020 07:40
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Peachfart posted:So, just wondering, but why are 99% of these stories about real life leveling or superheroes? Broadly speaking, most people who want that just read novels. Serials tend to be where weird stuff publishers won't touch end up.
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Feb 24, 2020 08:59
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Peachfart posted:So, just wondering, but why are 99% of these stories about real life leveling or superheroes? Something that hasn't been mentioned so far is there's a lot of bandwagoning and trend chasing here. People see something they like/hate/is popular and go, "I'm going to write my own version of that". The prevalence of superheroes in the format is 90% down to the fact that Worm was huge, I'm fairly certain. The other 10% is the mind-obliterating juggernaut that is the MCU. With the LitRPG stuff, it's big in the Japanese WN scene, and as Milkfred notes it's like brain taffy for a lot of people. But there's plenty of more standard SF/F stuff anyway, I don't think either is as dominant as you're making out. Ytlaya posted:Milkfred E. Moore's post summed things up pretty well (even if I think that post did a poor job of hiding their strong dislike of the popular web serials). They're allowed to not like things they don't like, I think? It's fine? Myriad Truths posted:Thus far I have read/mostly caught up on Worm, Pact, Twig, Mother of Learning, Ward, Forge/Threads of Destiny, Practical Guide to Evil, Wandering Inn, Not All Heroes, Worth the Candle, Into the Mire, The Gods are Bastards, and Katalepsis. So a lot of the OP. Still going through that though. How's Ra? The stuff about the ending being changed struck me as odd. Also, anything popular ATM that's not in the OP? Ra is  . As is Unsong. I haven't checked out Ra since its ending got rewritten, but I'm sure whatever they ended up with there is better (I didn't hate the original, but I agree with the author that it was weak and kind of a weird swerve). I don't know if they're popular or not but if you've any interest in SF I had fun with these
I'm at work so I can't track down links right now.
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Feb 24, 2020 12:49
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:Something that hasn't been mentioned so far is there's a lot of bandwagoning and trend chasing here. People see something they like/hate/is popular and go, "I'm going to write my own version of that". The prevalence of superheroes in the format is 90% down to the fact that Worm was huge, I'm fairly certain. The other 10% is the mind-obliterating juggernaut that is the MCU. Last angel is the only sci fi I can read basically. It’s good!
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Feb 24, 2020 14:37
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Kaja Rainbow posted:I recently found a story that I quite like: To Play With Magic The first line in this caught me offguard given I just started today. I read "Remember, the world ends on a Tuesday. An especially cold and dreary Tuesday. February, 25th, 2020 at 6:12pm PST if you want to be precise." then glanced over at the clock and went "Okay, I'm gonna be honest, that creeped me out a bit"
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Feb 24, 2020 14:58
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thank god
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Feb 24, 2020 15:08
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Unsong is also written by a neoreactionary racist so y'know keep that in mind while reading it
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Feb 24, 2020 17:42
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Sampatrick posted:Unsong is also written by a neoreactionary racist so y'know keep that in mind while reading it What, really? When did that come out?
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Feb 24, 2020 17:48
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It's not a secret, he writes a bunch of blog crap.
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Feb 24, 2020 18:06
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Unfortunately the webfic world has quite a few of those. I really enjoyed some novellas that were serialised by an author I found as a "friends of x" on WFG. His work was entertaining, well written, said a lot of thoughtful things about capitalism, internet culture, etc and then when I looked at his Twitter he declared the culprit for all the stuff he'd written about fairly astutely was... the mixing of the races!  I suppose a genre packed full of power/leveling and revenge fantasies is probably a fertile breeding ground for Bad Opinions the longer I think on it.
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Feb 24, 2020 18:23
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:What, really? When did that come out? He's not, unless you're so left anyone outside of Chapo or Jezebel is a neoreactionary racist to you. He's, like, a 'rationalist' neckbeard.
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Feb 24, 2020 18:36
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Megazver posted:He's not, unless you're so left anyone outside of Chapo or Jezebel is a neoreactionary racist to you. He's, like, a 'rationalist' neckbeard. he's carefully curated a following of truly awful people to the point where he had to ask the literal 1488 jewish question group to set up a new subreddit and not just hang out in his fan-sub all day, posting rational takes about the *culture war*.
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Feb 24, 2020 18:48
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Megazver posted:He's, like, a 'rationalist' neckbeard. So a neoreactionary racist that hides it under a thin veneer of smug pseudo-intellectualism? For what it's worth I think Unsong is a hilarious masterpiece, its author is just kinda awful. Sadly this is true of a lot of great works.
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Feb 24, 2020 18:58
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Ż\_(ツ)_/Ż You guys are kind of demonstrating why politics in the West are such a shitshow these days. (As an Eastern Euro, I am somewhat of an outside observer for now, thankfully.) Good luck with it, I suppose.
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Feb 24, 2020 19:01
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I remember coming across Scott Alexander because of his (fairly decent) non-libertarian faq, I read a couple of his blog posts and thought they were interesting. Then I got to the one where he was against Mencious Moldburg losing his conference spot because (paraphrasing) "the left is already winning the culture war and soon there will be real consequences for anyone on the right. People are already losing their jobs for homophobia!" as if homophobia had no consequence for other people. People aren't losing their lives, jobs, or getting beaten up because of homophobia and transphobia. It would be a thousand times worse if people like the ones he defends got their way. He's a POS. Also the protagonist of Unsong seemed like a self insert so I could never get into it, though I've been told it's good anyway and the protagonist isn't that important.
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Feb 24, 2020 21:11
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Megazver posted:Ż\_(ツ)_/Ż Politics in the West are a shitshow because the ultra rich are plundering the public goods for everything while inciting racial hatred to use as cover. quite similar to contemporary Eastern European politics, actually! I think you really missed the point of Disco Elysium and should forfeit your tag in penance.
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Feb 24, 2020 21:54
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Smiling Knight posted:Politics in the West are a shitshow because the ultra rich are plundering the public goods for everything while inciting racial hatred to use as cover. quite similar to contemporary Eastern European politics, actually! I think you really missed the point of Disco Elysium and should forfeit your tag in penance. Oh sure, that too, but I was referring to the online discourse specifically, not to your actual society's accelerating disintegration. If you're in the US, good luck with Bernie, hopefully they don't RFK him. I bet money on him winning presidency 14:1, lol.
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Feb 24, 2020 22:12
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Megazver posted:He's not, unless you're so left anyone outside of Chapo or Jezebel is a neoreactionary racist to you. He's, like, a 'rationalist' neckbeard. He literally platforms and promotes people that believe in phrenology lmao
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Feb 24, 2020 23:33
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Sampatrick posted:He literally platforms and promotes people that believe in phrenology lmao He's a coordination point for the sane.
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Feb 25, 2020 00:24
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:Something that hasn't been mentioned so far is there's a lot of bandwagoning and trend chasing here. People see something they like/hate/is popular and go, "I'm going to write my own version of that". The prevalence of superheroes in the format is 90% down to the fact that Worm was huge, I'm fairly certain. The other 10% is the mind-obliterating juggernaut that is the MCU. The web serial audience is so small in number and so focused on particular things that going with what works is just a survival strategy. For example, when Peachfart says 'Why don't we see more stories in different genres?' there's a few things to figure out there. The first and obvious one is why Peachfart hasn't read the ones that are listed under those genres on WebFictionGuide. Because of the demographics of the audience, most people who try to write things that are different end up with an audience in the double digits (if that) and very quickly burn out and stop posting. Fantasy is also one of the safer choices, but even I've overestimated how many people visit the big name fantasy serials compared to my own superhero statistics (and even then, the fantasy serials are pretty much GameLit, not genre fantasy novels.) Sci-fi doesn't really exist, and I think part of that is attributable to old boy politics on WFG (they tag sci-fi stories as fantasy to avoid LoN losing the #1 spot in sci-fi.) There's more that goes into it, really. For example, the divide between 'Western' and 'Eastern' web fiction audiences*, the way /r/parahumans exerts a powerful effect on the web serial ecosystem, the death of WebFictionGuide, the rise of Kindle self-publishing, the changing demographics of the audience itself, the outrageous financial success of stories like Defiance of the Fall, and so on. But basically, you're going to see a lot more bandwagoning and trend-chasing in the near future. There're a lot less writers entering the serial space, and those that are entering are basically trying to hit up a bubble before it bursts by exploiting RoyalRoad's audience. Even Wildbow has mentioned that his next project might be a LitRPG. * - Western means your Worms and Wards and NAHs and INHs and Mires and so on. Eastern is your LitRPGs, isekai, xianxia, and so on. The Western audience is crumbling while the Eastern audience is rising and they don't really cross-pollinate. In fact, they kind of hate each other. The apex of Western web fiction was probably 2-3 years ago and the community's healthiest days were even before that. quote:They're allowed to not like things they don't like, I think? It's fine? I have left the thread with many lingering psychic wounds. Milkfred E. Moore fucked around with this message at 00:43 on Feb 25, 2020 |
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Feb 25, 2020 00:33
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Milkfred E. Moore posted:4. Game the algorithms - RoyalRoad's trending system is absurdly easy to game and they seem to have no desire to patch it even though it seems most people know about it. If you're launching on RoyalRoad without knowing this, then you're fighting blind.
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Feb 25, 2020 01:36
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lurksion posted:Curious as to what this is exactly? Rankings/recommendations based on unique daily visitors I’d assume.
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Feb 25, 2020 01:50
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I don't understand where some webserial authors get their energy. Some of these people put out 10k+ updates multiple times per week. How do you even have that many ideas to write about.
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Feb 25, 2020 06:55
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You know what's even more nuts? Apparently Wildbow writes his chapters in 48-hour sprints. Multiple people have told him it's dumb and crazy, but apparently his standard schedule is to write till he drops on Friday, nap for a few hours, write until Saturday night, post, and repeat.
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Feb 25, 2020 07:48
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Omi no Kami posted:You know what's even more nuts? Apparently Wildbow writes his chapters in 48-hour sprints. Multiple people have told him it's dumb and crazy, but apparently his standard schedule is to write till he drops on Friday, nap for a few hours, write until Saturday night, post, and repeat. that's pretty much what pirateaba does, and im pretty sure her output eclipses even wildbow at this point.
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Feb 25, 2020 11:28
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A big flaming stink posted:that's pretty much what pirateaba does, and im pretty sure her output eclipses even wildbow at this point. I know I've heard from a few authors that it's way harder than it sounds, but I'm honestly surprised that more serial mammals don't strive to get and stay ahead of their current chapter- if it works it works, but that kinda burst/slump seems like it would be hilariously unhealthy and counterproductive in the long run.
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Feb 25, 2020 12:10
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:Something that hasn't been mentioned so far is there's a lot of bandwagoning and trend chasing here. People see something they like/hate/is popular and go, "I'm going to write my own version of that". The prevalence of superheroes in the format is 90% down to the fact that Worm was huge, I'm fairly certain. The other 10% is the mind-obliterating juggernaut that is the MCU. At this point my webfiction consumption has mostly trasferred to to lurking on sufficient velocity sampling random quests and fanfiction for properties that I've never read/watched/played the originals for. There's some surprisingly okayish stuff to be found there. (I'd even go so far as to say good, but I don't trust my own taste enough to go that far.) On phone so no links, and some names might not be exact. "But doctor, I am Pagliacci" is dc fanfic about Joker recovering from insanity to discover that Batman has somehow been removed from the timeline and deciding to do something about it. "Devourer of Worlds" Somehow manages to make me invested in a world eating eldritch abomination learning how to people and becoming a magic teacher, despite never watching a single episode of RWBY or making it further in Chrono Trigger than finding Robo. "Conflicting Loyalties" or something, don't remember the name exactly, is a quest about Mathilde Weber going from smug fledgling journeyman wizard to a smug secret agent Gandalf in the Warhammer Fantasy world. Lots of intrigue, hijinks, magical bullshit, assassinating enemy generals and wildly improbable victories against undead, skaven and orcs. "Battle Action Highschool Harem Anime Side Character Quest" or however you write the overly long name is deceptive in that the titular harem anime gimmick never amounts to anything. And instead it's a heartwarming story of a PTSD posthuman child supersoldier reintegrating into society after being discovered doomguying her way through the interdimensional alien invaders in the postapocalyptic ruins of Canada. Biggest problem with it is that it basically has no schedule and instead updates about once or twice a year with novel length updates.
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Feb 25, 2020 13:43
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Warhammer has always given me the same sort of racist vibes as Shadowrun but I might check that out based on the concept alone
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Feb 25, 2020 15:13
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Oo Koo posted:"Conflicting Loyalties" or something, don't remember the name exactly, is a quest about Mathilde Weber going from smug fledgling journeyman wizard to a smug secret agent Gandalf in the Warhammer Fantasy world. Lots of intrigue, hijinks, magical bullshit, assassinating enemy generals and wildly improbable victories against undead, skaven and orcs. I'll second both of these. But it's Divided Loyalties. Also To Play With Magic is fun too. Recently, I've gotten addicted to the Cannon Fodder's Record, which is a take on a trend in Chinese webnovels called quick transmigration. Quick transmigration reminds me of jump chains because it's all about jumping into various universes but it has the otome villain twist. That is, Ning Su's job is to be a "task taker." She's given tasks by souls who despair after some horrible event has happened to them, and her job is to enter into the soul / host at a point in time to (usually) prevent that tragedy and solve the soul's tasks. Then she exits, having left the world (hopefully) a better place for the soul in question (or at least, having completed the quests) and is "paid," which is usually some form of soul power and sometimes, merit or blessing if the task giver is super happy. The soul in question resumes life from when the task taker leaves. The types of hosts she jumps into are usually some "cannon fodder" that exists to basically be kicked aside for the Male Lead and Female Lead to get together, and the arcs are basically a bunch of different types of settings and stereotypical Chinese story lines. I will warn that although it's not graphically described nor does it linger on the suffering, but uh, apparently at least some Chinese story lines go full bore into some crazy excessive punishments. I didn't find it hard to push through but apparently, in reviews, people say that the first arc is hard to read so people should skip ahead to the second arc to see if it clicks. Katreus fucked around with this message at 16:55 on Feb 25, 2020 |
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Feb 25, 2020 16:06
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A big flaming stink posted:i mean, your story isn't even as long as vol 1 of TWI, so it aint no big deal lol pirateaba is an absolute machine and I have the utmost respect for her, I don't know how she manages it. Oh geeze, thanks so much for passing the story around!
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Feb 25, 2020 20:56
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She could seriously just write one of her 35000 word chapters, cut it in two and then be ahead. Its insanely unhealthy and she's probably going to die soon.
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Feb 25, 2020 21:02
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Pirateaba could also improve her health and her prose with some brevity. She does this sort of thing all the time (7.07) The other two Drakes stared at the [Alchemist]. ‘Annoyed’ was a mild word to describe how they felt about Saliss. Resigned, aggravated—you had to combine descriptors. But the Named Adventurer was the best [Alchemist] in all of Pallass, perhaps the world. He was more useful than he looked. And—well, he was also hard to get rid of. Moreover, he was amid equals, in a sense. Grimalkin, the [Sinew Magus], and Chaldion, [Grand Strategist] in charge of Pallass’ armies were both famed and influential. If anything, Grimalkin was the lesser figure here. If anyone was being a stickler for the exact nuance of rank. But no one was. And the three Drakes outranked and mattered more than anyone else in the inn in which they stood. And yet—they stood in a corner, talking. They were here, having taken time out of their incredibly busy schedules—again, Saliss being a sort of exception—to come here. Because of a Human. Erin Solstice. And at this moment, Chaldion and Saliss were experiencing a phenomenon Grimalkin in his personal notes was dubbing the ‘Erin-chaos effect’. Everything said here are things we know already. All of it has been shown to us and doesn't need to be told to us, much less in such a wordy way that doesn't even show off their personalities or add detail to the world. This is stylistic fluff, and it accounts for a significant fraction of the words she writes.
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Feb 25, 2020 21:54
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Oo Koo posted:"But doctor, I am Pagliacci" is dc fanfic about Joker recovering from insanity to discover that Batman has somehow been removed from the timeline and deciding to do something about it. can confirm that this one is a lot of fun. sane joker feels like an idea that should have been explored a million times over by now but somehow it hasn't
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Feb 25, 2020 21:59
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A big flaming stink posted:there's also Epilogue which was pretty okay, though its been finished for a while. From last page but thanks for recommending this. Read it on Sunday and enjoyed it quite a bit overall. About halfway in I was hoping their way back wouldn't work or only Carl would get sent back to wrap up lose ends. Instead everyone focused on their own issues and left Carl to spiral down by himself. I wonder if that was part of having a teenager body/brain again or just their own personalities reacting to stress. I wish there were more stories that dealt with the aftereffects like this.
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Feb 25, 2020 22:54
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Tom Clancy is Dead posted:Pirateaba could also improve her health and her prose with some brevity. Web serials in general tend towards "I wrote a long story because I didn't have time to write a short one". Sitting down and just typing whatever comes to mind until you finish a chapter results in a lot of fluff that should be edited out, but if you don't have time in your schedule to do that editing... Kyoujin posted:From last page but thanks for recommending this. Read it on Sunday and enjoyed it quite a bit overall. Epilogue: Jen was a big ball of PTSD and Matt saw Carl as a useful tool during the war who needed to be disposed of afterwards. None of the three were even slightly equipped to help the other two. The story opens with Matt talking about how now things can finally go back to normal because it's a refutation of that idea; at first just in that they won't be able to go back to their old lives, but as the story progresses it also becomes obvious that they aren't even friends any more. With the uniting force of the Big Bad gone, they're inevitably going to turn on each other. Matt and Jen turn on Carl during the story, and after they return to Cyraveil Jen and Matt are eventually going to end up on opposite sides of a conflict between the humans and sylvans.
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Feb 25, 2020 23:14
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Pirateaba's writing is as bad as it is because having long chapters is part of their brand
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Feb 25, 2020 23:24
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Sampatrick posted:Pirateaba's writing is as bad as it is because having long chapters is part of their brand disagree, IMO. i won't dare say that her prose is beyond reproach but minimalism is but one style amongst many to choose from.
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Feb 25, 2020 23:58
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Plorkyeran posted:Web serials in general tend towards "I wrote a long story because I didn't have time to write a short one". Sitting down and just typing whatever comes to mind until you finish a chapter results in a lot of fluff that should be edited out, but if you don't have time in your schedule to do that editing... Sure. And at the point where the physical act of typing all that is costing you your health, it’s time to spend some more thought on what’s getting typed up in the first place.
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Feb 26, 2020 00:11
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