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frenchibi · 8 years ago

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1/2) Hi! I'd just like some advice some a seasoned writer who has a pretty damn consistent track record *Pokes*. I very recently starting writing, its the first time I've actually contributed to a fandom. With my first upload I was very nervous and feeling down right vulnerable, I remember thinking "If people don't like it, I'll probably take it down" but hallelujah, reception has been positive. TOO POSITIVE for me. It's a first world problem, but now I feel I can't measure up to expectations,

Hey there, friend!!

First of all, thank you for messaging me! I’m going to try and give you a bit of advice as best I can, though all I have to go on here is my own experience so I’m not sure how well that will translate into anything helpful :’D

I’d just like some advice some a seasoned writer who has a pretty damn consistent track record

Haha, thank you. The whole thing feels a little surreal to me. While it is true that I’ve been writing for… uh, 15 years now (what the fuck) and fanfiction specifically for at least 6 of those, I still wouldn’t consider myself a “seasoned writer” because, well… truth be told, a tiny bit of that nervousness doesn’t go away no matter how long you’ve been writing. Also, “consistent” – well. One of my resolutions for this year has been to post one fic every week. So far I’ve managed, more or less (if we disregard my own time zone a bit), but most of the time I’m flailing and wondering how the hell I’m even still doing this. It may look consistent, but tbh I’m struggling with that every week xD

I feel I can’t measure up to expectations

What you have to understand about writing fics in particular is that it is incredibly unpredictable. Putting something out there that you’ve poured your heart and soul into does not guarantee that anyone will click on it, read it or like it (and even then, they might not leave a comment, or reblog if we’re talking tumblr). There is no formula to follow for a “fic that will be liked”, and there are infinite factors why people click on fics and why they don’t. What are you tagging, what’s your summary, is your work complete or not, at what time did you post it, etc etc etc – and people are incredibly picky. So as a rule I’d say it’s… dangerous to put too much value in the feedback you get or don’t get, because not getting any hits, kudos or comments doesn’t necessarily mean that your writing is bad. Those numbers have little to no correlation to the quality of your work, and that’s… a hard concept to wrap your head around.

Now, that said, in your situation… you’ve gotten very positive feedback and maybe even a few subscriptions, you might be able to assume that people will come back to your writing – and of course they will expect something similar (in quality, though that is incredibly subjective as well) to what you’ve written before. These expectations can be terrifying, and I get that. (And they can also make you afraid to try new things, maybe even to write for different fandoms, for fear of losing the audience you’re building. I know this, too. I’ve been there often enough).

This might sound a little harsh, but, with respect to quality – I think if you could do it once, you can do it again. I feel like faith in one’s own abilities is a difficult thing to have, especially with how unreliable feedback is for fic writers. (I don’t mean to sound ungrateful here for the wonderful responses I’ve received for my own writing, but at the same time I’m aware of many, many times I’ve been bitter and unhappy about getting little to no meaningful feedback for something that I personally thought was pretty damn great or something I really enjoyed writing. Putting your writing out for people (people you don’t know, mostly, and people who can be very opinionated, too) to judge is grueling and not always rewarding.) Also - the more you write, the more you’re going to improve with experience!However, the first and most important opinion on your work is your own. If you don’t like what you’re writing, it’s unlikely that other people will, either. You’re not writing to please other people. First and foremost, you should be writing things that you would enjoy to read, as well.

Now, as for your questions:

How do you stay motivated?

I feel like this is a very subjective question and depending on which writer you ask, you will get different answers. I also feel it has a lot to do with personality? Also everyone struggles with different aspects of being creative.

For me, it’s like this: I get inspired all the time. Hear a new song? Potential AU. See interesting people in the street? AU. Watch a movie? AU. Have an interesting conversation? Hc for a character. The sun’s shining? Fic idea. It’s raining? Fic idea. Snow? Idea. Feeling sad? Idea. Feeling happy? Idea. Feeling empty and unmotivated? Okay but what if I project this onto xy character? - you get the picture.

So for me, there’s never a shortage of ideas – my problem is focus. With 50k ideas, how do you pick one to focus on? My answer is: You don’t. You write whatever the hell you feel like writing. Forcing something that you’re not 100% into never really works out to anyone’s satisfaction. At least it’s never worked in my case, because my writing heavily depends on my emotional state. (An attitude that @josai taught me, by the way. I am always WAY too worried about “pleasing my readers” by writing what they want. No. It’s your writing. You’re the one sharing ideas, here.) If this means that it takes longer to update a certain AU, then I guess that’s how it is. But since I’m very excitable, if my readers want a particular update, all they gotta do is scream at me about a particular fic, I guess, and I’ll immediately be inclined to jump on it again. I’m… very easy that way.

As a general rule, if you’re finding it hard to motivate yourself to write, I can suggest several options:

1) Clear your schedule for an hour (or half) every day, find a quiet corner, get a cup of [hot beverage of choice] and just write. If you don’t have any ideas, look up prompts and write drabbles. Experiment with your style. Mine is dialogue-heavy, for example, so on occasion when nothing is working I try for something more descriptive. Or: minimalist. Tell a story in as few words as possible. OR the drastic opposite – how overboard can you go, describing every tiny detail? These kind of exercises can help you find a style you’re comfortable with and also expand your repertoire, so to speak. (btw, I have posted some of these more experimental fics of mine, hmu if you want to know which ones they are)

Alternatively, if no prompts are helping: do a writing exercise. One I particularly like is to give yourself a time limit (say, 5 or 10 minutes) and then force yourself to write without stopping, no matter what. No ideas? Tough luck. You gotta keep writing. Even if you’re just writing about not having ideas. Fill a page. Maybe fill two. I find that getting started is the most difficult thing, and this sort of exercise can help you with that.

2) Get yourself an accountability group – a reliable one, not “just” the commenters from your first fic. WRITER FRIENDS! Most of my ideas are fleshed out by talking about them to other people in the fandom, and having someone else get excited with you can really boost your motivation. Also, of course not everyone just has writer friends – they’re surprisingly easy to make, though. I’d say 90% of the people in this fandom that I talk to who are writers became my friends after I yelled at them about how much I love their work. It goes both ways, of course, but that’s just a bonus?? You get to see what people you admire are working on, and maybe get their input for some of your works!! Jackpot! Excitement is incredibly contagious, and I feel like that’s what makes fanfiction writing so rewarding. The “sharing” part of it. That’s why I do it. And even if one of my fics doesn’t get as many responses as I might’ve liked, at least I got to yell about it with a couple friends. This ties in to your next question:

How do you not get so invested in other people’s opinions on your writing?

See, anon – you’re under the misconception that I’m not invested in people’s opinions :’) On the contrary. I check notes and comments religiously, read the tags of every reblog I get, and scream when someone leaves me a comment that’s longer than one line. I don’t think it’s possible to get over caring so much for feedback – at least not for a person like me. Maybe there are ways. Maybe there are people who are just so incredibly confident in their abilities that it doesn’t matter to them at all. I am not one of those people xD

What helps, though, is having the above mentioned Trusted Writer Friend(s). Put your value in their opinions instead of the opinions of “the broader readership” because everyone is different and there’s no way you can please everyone. And if you’re not sure you can trust/value another writer’s opinions that much (we’re all different, too, after all) – have some faith in yourself. I know that’s the most difficult thing ever, but it’s not a problem anyone can solve for you.

How do you get over those feelings of self-embarrassment (self-consciousness?) when you write?

Those fade. I may care a lot about people’s opinions, but when I write something, I have a pretty good idea of whether I think it’s “good” or not, by my standards. I know my own style well enough by now to know what I want it to be – and if it’s not, I scrap or rewrite. As simple as that. And if none of it helps – take a leap of faith and just post. It might not be as bad as you think it is, because we’re overly critical of ourselves. There’s got to be a point when you stop revising and just post the thing, otherwise you’ll drive yourself crazy with worry and perfectionism.

I am very prone to doing this, and what helps here is an opinion from outside, from someone you can trust. I always shove my writing into one of my friends’ faces before I post, because two pairs of eyes are more likely to spot typos and mistakes and stuff like that, and it makes me feel a bit better about posting it. There’ve been disagreements there too, though, of course. For example, I’m very particular about rhythm in my own fics, but I’m never able to explain exactly what I mean by that? Sometimes a sentence just doesn’t read well, to me, and I have to rewrite it until it feels right, which can be… tedious and questionable if seen from anyone else’s perspective but my own. It’s hard.

That said – sometimes I just… have a feeling, about my writing. This is a very subjective thing, again, and ties into what your focus is when you write and post – are you telling a story, conveying a feeling, an idea, a relationship? That differs from fic to fic, and your approach to different areas of focus might be different. For some of my fics, I didn’t want anyone else to read them before I posted them, because I felt that if I made changes that someone else suggested, it might take away from the impact that I wanted to convey in my own words.

It also ties into why you want to write – and this might sound, I don’t know, arrogant, maybe? But. In general, I write because I have stories to tell. I write because I am excited about ideas and about my interpretations of the characters and I kind of… want to expose them and see what people feel. I’m… ambitious about them, in a way, because I tend to like my own ideas a lot? So I want to know if I can make people agree with me, convince them of my interpretation, in a way. Get them just as excited as I am. I know it’s not a contest, but I’m competitive. That gives me the drive to keep writing, because I want to be better. That’s a huge part of what drives me to keep writing and posting, even if my most recent fic didn’t get as many responses as I would have liked.

It’s like… why write another coffee shop AU, if there are already so many? Well, because mine would be different. I don’t know about better, but I’d still want to tell a story my way. Have you ever read a book and thought “I would have worded that differently”? That’s why I write. Because sometimes I like my own words better than those of other people.

All this, of course, not to say that I don’t get super excited about other people’s writing! On the contrary. I see works on a daily basis that I feel have a better grasp of the characters and of the English language that I do, and those make me want to improve.

QWESADLFJNSKJDB

I agree. That’s… generally what writing makes me feel xD

I guess, in conclusion – there’s no right way to do these things. I can just tell you what works for me, and hope it helps you a bit. If you feel like I didn’t answer your questions to your satisfaction, feel free to shoot me another ask, or twenty. I love talking about this, and I know everyone has different opinions/tips/advice here so hmu anytime!!

#French speaks #anon #answered #this got really long I'm sorry?? D:#I hope it still kind of makes sense #anyway thank you so much for asking #this was really interesting to think and write about #I hope I was able to help you a little!#my writing #writing #advice

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weyoun · 8 years ago

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I know you are religious(Mormon I think) and was simply wondering what exactly it is you believe? I'm a Christian ,not Catholic just Christian and I don't know much about Mormons. I was hoping you could enlighten me. You don't have to answer if you feel uncomfortable. Thank you.

Hello!!I am Mormon, correct!^_^ and no worries, I actually love talking about my religion with folks who are genuinely interested

Let’s see, well…first off we are also Christian. It’s a wide misconception that we aren’t (?) but my church’s full name is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. So you will also see the acronym “LDS” too , and that’s us. XD

To put it shortly, we believe in a restored gospel. What does that mean? Well, we believe that once the last of the original Apostles were killed, the organized church as established by Christ was taken from the earth. The Priesthood was also taken away as those who were given it were also killed or died off. More on why this is important in a moment.

Fast forward to the modern day. In the year of 1820, a 14 year old kid named Joseph Smith is chillin in the state of New York. He comes from a kind, hardworking religious family, so even at a young age he reads his Bible and now wants to seriously join a church and be baptized. But the real pickle he finds is that all the churches he visits don’t quite sit in his heart as the one right for him. They all bicker and don’t agree on how the gospels should be taught. It’s super confusing. And that’s annoying tbh lol, but Joseph is like “well okay…let me ponder this some more” so one day he’s reading in his Bible and in James 1:5 he read the following:

“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” [KJV]

With this promise, Joseph set out to pray as to which church he ought to join. He knelt in what we now call the Sacred Grove, but was back then just a normal part in the forest near his home.

There are longer, more detailed reenacted versions of this part of the story, but here is a link to the newest and shortest of them, to give you a gist of the encounter. ^^

If you watched the 6 minute film, you saw that we believe Joseph was visited by God and the Savior. He was told that none of the established churches had a fullness of the truth. And that later (when he was older) the complete truth would be revealed to him, Joseph.

This truth, we now know, is the basic foundation of our religion. The Book of Mormon was given to Joseph to translate (he did NOT write it as some mistakenly say) so we may read it along with our Bibles. The book is a record of God’s people in the Americas, to put it shortly, but more importantly it is Another Testament of Jesus Christ. Joseph reorganized the church as it was in the time of Christ, given that Priesthood (and thereby able to give it to those worthy to receive and use it for good) and established temples. Today, there millions of us throughout the world.

That’s the main story of what we believe, but other LDS beliefs of interest (to just name a few):

We believe God, Christ and the Holy Ghost are separate beings. Some religions believe they are all one person/being, but we do not.

We believe that those unable to have heard or accepted Christ as their Savior will have a chance to do so in the spirit world (what we call the afterlife, or also Heaven, in a manner of speaking). This is partly what we do in temples, baptize for the dead of our ancestors. All this means is that we do baptism by proxy (ie. in place of) for those who have died before getting the chance to do so themselves. (Baptism is an important ordinance in our faith.) I once heard a woman say that those who were unable to accept Christ or did not now about Him went to hell, and we do NOT believe that at all. God is merciful and His plan is based on agency, our right to choice. Even with our baptisms, these spirits have the choice to still accept that or not.

We believe in Eternal Families. This is another thing we do in the temple. When we marry, it is not “till death do we part”. We marry to last on earth and in Heaven. And when you add members to the family, they too can become a part of this covenant into eternity. We call this “sealing”, to put it very, very simply lol.

We do not drink alcohol, coffee or non-herbal teas. We do not smoke, do drugs to get high or anything of the sort. We aren’t even supposed to drink energy drinks tbh. XD (If you follow my art or Batman blog you may have noticed me specifically avoid any use of these substances lol this is why haha)

We believe in “levels” of Heaven and hell. Not like purgatory or anything. I mean like, once we are finally judged, according to our lives, beliefs and goodness of heart (or lack thereof) we will go to one of them. For example, a serial killer isn’t going to the same place as a regular thief. A man who ridiculed those with a faith is not going to the same place as a man who treated others in love, even though he also did not believe in an afterlife. You see where I’m getting?

This links up with the concept of Grace. We believe in Grace, but in a different way than most do. Normally, traditional Christians believe Grace to be the end-all of “Being Saved”. That because you accept Christ as your Savior, you automatically go to Heaven, no matter what you do really. We do not believe this definition, and I’ll explain. We believe that Grace is given to us all as the triumph over death and a way to repent while doing away with the Law of Moses. Because Christ in his purity and innocence and love, died for us, He was the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of the world. This did away with the Law of Moses. The next part, when Christ was resurrected, signified our triumph over death as He led the way for us all to be resurrected again one day. Because of Him, we all have this right regardless on if we are faithful or not. This leads into Immortality vs. Eternal Life.

Because of Christ, we will all have the ability of Immortality when we are resurrected. Eternal Life however is living forever in the presence of God. There is a difference, in our belief system. Eternal Death, or death of the spirit, is the other side of this spectrum. It is not the literal death of a spirit (that means the spirit does not die and cease to exist) but eternity living out of God’s presence and influence. And that is the worst existence imaginable.

We believe God loves and values all of His children (us) and we should try to do the same with one another, regardless of belief (or lack of it).

We do not believe in the Rapture. We believe the righteous will endure the last days with everyone else.

We believe in Modern Revelation (ie. that God still talks to or reveals His will to us today via a Prophet).

So, in short, we believe most of what basic fundamental points all Christians believe. We are children of God, Christ is our Savior, and so forth. But we also believe in other, more detailed truths (as we believe them) due to modern revelation and a restored gospel.

I hope that helps! If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask.^^ I’m not an expert nor perfect, but I will try my best!

~Ronnie

#ron answers!#anon #mormon stuff #lds #latter day saint #mormon #religion #tumblrstake

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juudaimes-true-form · 2 years ago

Text

Thanks for tagging me, @hopeswriting! I had so much fun answering all the questions and made me realize just how much I think about Kyoko xD All the links are in green for ease for finding!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

1, yep, one.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

1,092~

3. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

I have one fic so xD (Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re Drunk?)

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

I don’t really get comments (since I don’t publish much of my writing and when I do, I publish it to tumblr.) But if I did get comments, I’d enjoy responding. I like talking about stuff I do and seeing new/different perspectives on things. On the other hand, I just like to talk to people. Especially when I get the time to choose my words! I’d like knowing what people liked the best and even what they didn’t like.

5. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

I don’t like angst. I hesitantly read it and I very much don’t write it. There are a couple exceptions like if it has a happy ending but generally I don’t write it. It just makes me so sad and wishing things went differently.

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

It’s on my blog (Sleepy Mornings With Sawada). It’s a slow fic, more like a slice of a day really. I wouldn’t call it a happy ending per se, but a content one.

7. Do you write crossovers?

I think of crossovers 24/7. KHR brainrot makes me insert flames into every piece of media I watch/read. Honestly, I’m more surprised that I haven’t written a crossover yet. I definitely should xD

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Nope! Everyone’s pretty nice and my fics have never gotten that big to attract haters I suppose.

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

I don’t publish it, yes, but I have written it. I’m not sure of the classifications, but I suppose it’s kinky stuff. Bondage, pet play, etc etc

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not to my knowledge.

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope!

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

Yes. Back when I was on Wattpad 24/7 in my early fandom days. My friends invited me to help write an original story (titled The Spectrum). And one of my friends and I was working on another original work though we never published any part of it D:

13. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Ah, difficult one! I don’t have an ‘all-time’ favorite ship. I ship pretty much everyone with everyone and don’t have anything against any ship in specific but I was really into 1827 when I first entered the khr fandom though. I like all of them and anything can pull my heartstrings if written convincingly enough!

14. What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

It isn’t a fic but a world. I’m a newbie worldbuilder who’s left several worlds incomplete and is currently working on another… (yes, yes side eye me but the desire to create overpowers my ability to complete 🤷‍♀️) My very first world, a little island where outcasts from the mainland are sent who created their own culture and flourish despite the harsh conditions they endure as ‘outsiders’ of their main culture. School decked me and by the time I came back everything was a mess of ideas that didn’t make sense to me anymore. I look at it fondly but I don’t think I’ll ever complete it.

15. What are your writing strengths?

Mood setting! I do a pretty good job setting the right mood through tone, action, sentence length. I do my best to make the reader feel the same way the characters do whether it be despair, hope, distrust! I just love doing it!

Also description in general. I find I tend to actually over describe things or do too much research for small stuff but it helps me understand what I want to describe and describe it well. Call it arrogance but I have a rock solid faith in my ability to describe things ^^

Intertwining thoughts and actions to keep the story moving is another thing. It’s not my greatest skill but I’m pretty good at it! I learned to do it to curb my habit of writing paragraph after paragraph (which nothing wrong with it, I just prefer flow over function. Wanted my writing to read like a natural flowing river and all the paragraphs just chunked it up instead.)

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

Info dumping, I suck at not throwing information all in the first couple of scenes and even what to describe first. Like I wanna let y’all know everything but y’all won’t know everything if I just toss info after info without letting you absorb the first bit. I’m working on it but it’s a uphill fight xD

Endings for multichapter fics. It’s probably why I prefer one-shots. They’re just so much easier for me to go from beginning to end. Plotting in general sucks for me. I like structure too much that free writing = not know what to write = no writing while trying to outline and plot = all my time planning every single moment of my story = no actual writing. Frustration all around

C L O T H E S. I pride myself on description but clothing? Clothing makes me want to make all my characters naked. I want to be able to describe it succinctly, graphically, whatever and sometimes I just don’t know what stuff is called and finding out is three lifetimes worth of nightmares. Which sucks because clothing is important to me. I like describing it for visualization purposes and because it can help understand the character more! Loose clothing, structured clothing, tight clothing, shiny, dull, shapeless all of them are so fun but can be such a challenge for me to describe 😅

17. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I tend to avoid it unless it’s very short phrases that I don’t think google translate can mess up that bad or from a language I know. I can write/read some spanish so I don’t worry too much about Spanish phrases (I am shit at hearing or listening to it). For my native tongue, Igbo, I can hear it but not read/write/speak it so sometimes I use google translate or just ask my parents xD

If it falls outside of those parameters, eh, I might get around actually writing it and just mention that something was said in a different language. Lazy approach, yes, but saves me the worry of ‘is this right? Is it not?’

18. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Percy Jackson and the Olympians. That was my very first fandom and I wrote the cringiest shit you can imagine. Middle school me ended almost every chapter with a wolf emoji cuz I thought it was the best thing ever and I used so many emojis for timeskips. It’s hilarious to read through now and I think they’re still up for reads…

19. What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to?

Fandom? Postknights. It’s a mobile game that I’ve had for the longest time and so wanted to write some stuff for it, just cute stuff from my character's perspective. Ship? Kyoko and Hana, hands down. I just like their dynamic and wished that there was more if it in the anime/manga. So many things about them intrigue me. How’d they meet? How do they stay close? Their dynamic? There’s little canon to work off (not that I’m complaining~) that I can’t help but run my imagination wild.

20. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

Easy! There’s Nothing Fun About Disharmony Probably my most planned out fanfic for khr. I love it, love it, love it. I never finished it but I did write quite a bit for it. It’s Kyoko-centric (if you think Kyoko is my brainrot character, you’d be absolutely correct) and follows her in finding someone who’ll teach her to fight! I’ve rewritten the outline, plot, chapters god knows how many times before I dropped it so I have quite a few versions of it out there. Again, I didn’t publish everything I’d written since I went a lot of directions that I couldn’t decide which I liked best.

In return, I'm tagging @social-muffin, @96percentdone, and anyone else who wants to join! feel free to tag me (if tumblr will let you :')) so that I won't miss your responses!

Fic Writer Interview

[Plain text: “Fic Writer Interview” in big text. /End PT]

i saw this tag game on my dash and thought it’d be fun to do, so here we go!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

[Plain text: “1. How many works do you have on AO3?“ in bold. /End PT]

78!

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

[Plain text: “2. What’s your total AO3 word count?“ in bold. /End PT]

569,922!

3. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

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1. Whose Murderous Toddlers are These?? (822 kudos - khr)

2. i love you (you never say it back, but that’s not the point) (698 kudos - khr)

3. Take your Hands off our Cloud (662 kudos - khr)

4. Local Immortal Meal Near You (531 kudos - khr)

5. this can’t be happening (it is) (520 kudos - khr)

(i have always been and still am surprised of how well Take your Hands off our Cloud and Local Immortal Meal Near You do. i mean, top 5?? damn, thanks so much guys. 🙏🏽💖)

(Whose Murderous Toddlers are These?? also tbh, but in a different way where i can see exactly why it does so well at the same time.)

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

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yeah i do, always and to all of them!! i’m always super grateful for them and to people taking the time to leave me one, so i feel like the least i can do to show that gratefulness is taking the time myself to acknowledge them by answering them!

5. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

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When does a Saint Become a Monster? hands down. and tho the fic was always gonna be angsty, it wasn’t planned at all to make it that angsty, but then that’s just where the fic ended up taking me haha. anyway, i still am and will forever be incredibly proud of this tragedy in three acts.

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

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it’s gotta be this can’t be happening (it is), i think. like generally speaking all my fluff stories have happy endings, and i wrote many of those, but i think tcbh just really takes the cake by being the superior good arco timeline/skull being showered in love fic i’ve written so far.

7. Do you write crossovers?

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i do! i wrote two of them so far, a khr x tua one and a khr x hp one. i’d also like to try my hands at a khr x atla crossover one of these days, but i don’t think crossovers will ever become something i’ll do on a regular basis at all.

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

[Plain text: “8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?“ in bold. /End PT]

thankfully no, i haven’t.

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

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just the once, yeah! as such i have no idea what kind it was because i’m a complete beginner at them lol. but idk, i guess it was the average kind? the kind with average smuttiness in it. the vanilla kind, maybe? anyway, you get it lol.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

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not that i’m aware of.

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

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yeah, twice!! Please, be (one of) my fake partner has been translated both in Vietnamese and Spanish!

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

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nope, tho i think it’d be a real fun thing to do. and if one day i ever feel comfortable enough and ready to try it, i’d love to!

13. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

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hmm, i don’t think i have one? i kind of, well, not exactly move on from them because they’ll always pull at my heartstrings and i’ll always hold them close to my heart, but i shipped different ships at different times of my life i could have called my all-time favorite ships (did that just make sense lol?). so right now i’d say colonnello/skull (khr) is my all-time favorite ship!

14. What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

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honestly, none of them. like genuinely, both the wips i already published and the ones i have yet to alike, i fully intend to finish them eventually and really don’t feel at all like i’ll never succeed in doing so. now some of them will take time to finish, for sure, will take years and maybe even decades to finish, but as of now i’m confident i’ll be able to finish all of them anyway!

15. What are your writing strengths?

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characterization, i think! i like to write the characters the same way they were written and that made me fall in love with them as much as possible, and i seem to be quite successful at it haha. or at least, so far no one thought i failed badly at it enough to let me know about it.

i’m really good at showing feelings/emotions too, at really diving into them and into how it affects the characters and why and how they came to feel that way to begin with. it’s also one of my absolute favorite thing to do when it comes to writing, so i guess it’s fortunate i happen to be good at it too lol.

on that note i think i’m not too bad at writing and portraying dynamics between the characters either. so basically i guess i feel quite confident with things that come to characters? i’m definitely a character-driven stories type of writer for sure!

oh wait, humor also! and it never fails to surprise and delight me whenever i’m told it hit the mark because i’d definitely wouldn’t call myself a funny person. outside writing, that is, apparently, and maybe i’m a little proud of it haha.

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

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description was the first thing that came to mind lol. and, well, as much as i don’t think i necessarily fail at them, they’re for sure nothing worth talking about, that’s for sure lol.

dialogues too, tho i came a long way from being reluctant to write them and from not being confident i managed to write them well. as of now i’m actually comfortable writing them and even like writing them, but they still sometimes make me pause and wrestle with them lol, and i know i have a long way to go still when it comes to them.

pacing is also probably one of my writing weaknesses. or i guess more like transitions? but either way sometimes i’m very aware the pacing/transitions of my stories are wonky, and yet i can’t manage to make them any better lol.

17. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

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i don’t mind at all. personally i think it’s a nice touch to immerse you more in the story and put you more in the shoes of the characters.

18. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

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i can’t say for sure, but either naruto or bleach! i’m pretty sure it’s naruto tho, and then i switched to naruto x bleach crossover fics. i wrote fics with an oc-si as the main protagonist, who was heavily based on ryuzaki sakuno (pot) before evolving into a proper oc, so i guess technically pot is also among the first fandoms i wrote for lol.

(i still have and hold that oc close to my heart btw! she’s just for my daydreams before i fall asleep tho, so i strongly doubt i’ll ever publish anything about her. she feels way too personal for that haha.)

19. What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to?

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i have this one fic for saiki kusuo no psi nan i plan to write eventually, and i even have some vague outline for it, but i can’t think of anything else otherwise.

20. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

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ahhh, this is such a hard question! i think… hand in hand (blood in between), maybe. i reread it so many times after i first published it, and i was honestly a little obsessed with it at the time haha (still am actually tbh).

Love is… did quite badly, but it’s also among the fics i couldn’t help but reread a lot after i first published it and was a little obsessed with (also still am tbh lol). i really love it a lot and i’m super proud of it, and tho i think it’s the second pov that puts people off from giving it a try, i’d really say it’s that same second pov that really makes the story.

most recently i wrote let someone else stay (oh, please, let him leave too, let him leave too) and, you guessed it, i also reread it a bunch of time after i first published it and was a little obsessed with it haha. love this one a lot too!

tagging all my writer friends: @chierry @mortysanchez @masterdisastre @echtach-messy-place @cloudspark @loneliestmuffin @ravensilversea @sorugao-bandgeek @rupko @byakuwan @juudaimes-true-form and anyone else who wants to (yes even you, and yes tag me so i can read your answers!)! but no pressure to do it of course!

list of the questions under the cut!

Keep reading

#reblog #khr #ask game #writer interview

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tumblunni · 7 years ago

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Bunni continues to play Monster Rancher Advance 2! And generally not enjoy it as much as the first advance, though i can kinda blame it on the fact the first advance trained me to get used to a bunch of differences from regular monster rancher and now thats all gone again :P ANYWAY, ONWARD!

* Its a shame that the training coach system’s revamp makes it so much harder to actually achieve it now. i feel so guilty that my first monster Wrigley didnt quite make it! And like.. fusion isnt even WORTH it anymore! if I fused my high stats Wrigley with another high stats monster then all I get is the base stats version of that fusion, it doesnt carry over AT ALL! And it doesnt even let you carry over Traits like MRA1 did. And retiring a monster just seems to be like another name for deleting them, so I just have Wrigley frozen in the hibernation lab forevermore now. I DONT WANNA LET HIM GO! I do feel guilty for giggling slightly at the fact he’s got that cold minty freshness now XD

* Oh, and the ‘nobody dies anymore’ thing has been rebalanced now. In MRA1 you could just continue going forever with your retired monster, you just couldnt raise its stats anymore. (Tho you could still LOSE stats, so that was kinda awkward) Now you cant do anything with your retired monster except rest and give it items, and then send it to retirement/coaching class. BUT because of that change, I didnt realise Wrigley had as little time as he did, and I didnt manage to do that final tournement in time. :(

* For some reason the ‘SPECIAL’ training has been renamed to ‘Sparring’ training even though its exactly the same thing. And its called Errantry in every other game. I DUNNO LOL Also Loyalty has become Reliance, and now the E rank tournement has returned from Monster Rancher 2. (This is part of why its harder to reach teacher rank now)

* A funny glitch that may have possibly fucked up my ability to complete the main story, I HONESTLY DON’T KNOW?? Okay, so.. in MRA1 there was an annoying thing where you could still ‘use’ unuseable items, and they’d be gone forever with no effect to your monster. I lost 5000 gold due to this, the badly translated item descriptions meant I didnt even know that the Silver Cup passively reduces stress when you keep it in your inventory... In MRA2 you now actually get a ‘this is unuseable’ message when you select them! BUT... there’s one random specific circumstance where the game doesnt check for this. Sometimes when your monster is upset with a choice you’re making, it’ll say ‘[Name] would rather [suggested action]’. This time it SOMEHOW came out with ‘Wrigley would rather eat [magic amulet key item]’?? And I was just mashing thru the text and didnt realise it until I’d already hit yes! I really hope this doesnt come back to bite me in the ass later...

* Oh and there’s now a cool rival guy character! I’ve gained three rivals so far but he’s the most actually a rival. Can I just say the plot works a LOT better with actual other monster trainers as characters?? Seriously. THANKE! Why on earth was I even fighting in these tournements last time, lol... Anyway, here’s Mr Bishie Mysterious Jerk Rival:

* There’s also another rival who has more of a story role.. or uhh.. maybe I’m not able to get bishie man story scenes anymore cos i lost the key item, lol Anyway, he’s a younger cutie patoot rival who’s actually on your level as another rookie, rather than being an asshole adult randomly picking on kids. (No seriously, bishie man is introduced as a dude who’s ATTACKING OTHER RANCHES and then he’s just instantly forgiven??) lil rival boy is a bit competitive and grumpy but its just cos he (understandably) feels like you’re cheating by having the legendary holly as your mentor. But then when you battle him he realises youre actually a worthy rival and then you become Kinda Friends I Guess? I like him!

* Also your third rival is GRANDPA Seriously, you literally just fuckin.. find a wild grandpa starving in the cold and take him in. And he says he’s gonna repay you by giving his monsters as free tutors for a certain period of time, but for the life of me I COULD NOT FIND any way to unlock them in the tutor screen! But this was back when I was first learning all these new systems to maybe I just messed up somewhere? Anyway, after a certain amount of time he’s all ‘I’m proud of you, you dont need me anymore, i’m gonna go join the tourneys too cos you inspired me to get back out of retirement’. And its kinda sad that he leaves :( I WILL MAKE U MO PROUD, MYSTERY FOREST GRANDPA I STILL DONT KNOW WHERE DE FUCK U CAME FROM

(Clarification: he is not saying this about you but about the jerkass bandit you just fought off.)

(This is the jerkass bandit you just fought off)

(It is TOTALLY unfair how the game throws you immediately into a battle with him as a tutorial to the exploration system! I literally got this as the first thing with my new monster after Wrigley, I just got lucky enough with the RNG that all his attacks missed and I somehow survived!)

* Random fun highlight of Wrigley’s short career: winning an all bunnies league.

* I really don’t like the random addition they made of a ��counter system’, though. Apparantly this was an addition made in Monster Rancher 4 for the PS2? It wasnt very liked there either, but this is an absolutely TERRIBLE port of it into a modified game engine that was never designed to include it. In the PS2 game each move is assigned to the four face buttons, and you press one of those to choose which move to counter. Its still not very good cos you only have a 1 in 4 chance of it working, and the AI is completely random anyway so it’s only predictable in 2 player mode. but they somehow made it EVEN WORSE in this version, cos the moves ARENT mapped to buttons yet you still have to input a button combination with a 1 in 4 chance! You have to awkwardly try and hit B and one of the directional buttons simultaneously, and there’s no way to know which random direction the AI picked, and just... GAHHH The only good thing is that you can still play the game perfectly fine without ever using it, and the AI is equally likely to fuck up. I only saw a successful AI counter ONCE after raising three monsters! Anyway, look at this dumbass who failed a counter and smacked himself in the head for 220 damage as soon as the fight started.

* My second monster was kinda awesome, i lucked out and got a rare monster from random tablet regeneration! Its the only Antlan type that I actually like, cos its unique colouration makes it look more like a giant skull thingie. Woo!

* His name was Heartbreak! He didnt have many spectacular adventures along his way, just managing to become a coach for future generations. I mean, he didnt break my heart, so it turned out better than expected XD I’m sorry i didnt have faith in you, lil buddy! THIS GAME IS STILL REALLY DAMN HARD THO

* i haaaaaaate the changes to the coaching system I HAAAAAAAAATE dear fuckin GODDDDDD now you have to keep paying a salary every half a year or you lose your coaches forever all your memories of your past monsters dont have enough for one payment and they NEVER COME BACK T_________T I’ve been savescumming a lot more in this version of the game, there’s a lot of bullshit chances to lose everything... And like.. they kinda wanted to make a good change by letting you hire governement-funded coaches if you cant train your own. but their prices are so ludicrously high and the most powerful one just has 300 in two stats and 600 in one. Your own monsters are always gonna be better than that, and you’d need to raise a few monsters to even get enough money anyway! So yeah just.. fuck this system, seriously, dear god. I still had complaints about it last time, but i was more forgiving cos it was a new change to the formula and all, but this is just making it worse in every possible way...

* Its also very annoying that we have a lot more items in the game but all their descriptions are badly translated. I have NO CLUE what the whole second page is about! ‘Its a cake’, ‘its a candy’, ‘its a meat dish’. Even stuff that had descriptions last time doesnt! You’d never know that ‘smoked newt’ lowers your monster’s ‘spoiled’ status! I mean, at least you could kinda assume that the cake raises it, if you’re getting too strict? I think? Cos I thought maybe the cake is for raising weight like the diet pills are for lowering it, but I can never get it to actually do that. the weight system is so unintuitively awkward! Any choice you make will change it wildly while your monster is a baby, and then as soon as they hit maturity its nigh impossible to change it! And its really hard to keep pushing it back and forth to keep the middle for whenever the maturity flag pops up, cos its not even set to happen on their birthday or anything. And being fat or thin causes gigantic debuffs because WHY NOT! Weirdly enough the raising style doesnt seem to do that anymore, its just like the chance of them running away, and a (never actually explained) small chance of lowering their overall lifespan every time you drift away from the medium.

* But anyway, I AM glad that now your strict/spoiled meter actually does exist in the menu again! It was definately still actually a part of the mechanics in MRA1, you’d still get stress and disobedience and stuff and just not be able to know when you were getting close to it. But MAN is it unforgiving this time... its always been the most difficult thing to manage but seriously... but seriously I am glad its at least in the menu...

* HOWEVER... i have no idea what the personalities do!! There’s now a thing on the menu above the spoilt/strict menu that says stuff like ‘hot headed’ or ‘medium’. And it never seems to change throughout their whole lifespan, so it seems to be like a personality or nature value? Does it actually affec anything? is it like pokemon and it means its easier to train a certain stat?

* Also there’s now the ability to get ill and go to the doctor. Its mostly pointless as its just like.. okay now you get TWO potential punishments for being too strict- monster can run away OR get sick. And running away just means you have to wait a few months and lose training time til they return, but instead sickness is like a debuff that halves your gains in a certain training. Its surprisingly in-depth, they give you a full diagonosis of a random illness and some made up medicines you need to take to fix it.

* ...do you really get anemia from being malnourished? i thought it was genetic only?

* And then ALAS I didnt manage to get any screenshots of my third monster while I was actually training her. I coulda sworn I did?? But it seems I forgot, so have a pic of her as a training coach

(for some reason special monsters get an ugly red background in status screens)

* She was actually surprisingly useful as my designated Explorer monster! It just sucks that you have to rank up in combat tourneys to unlock exploration areas, and you have to do it AGAIN every time you get a new monster. I didnt realise this so i trained her with an exploration-focused moveset and had to blunder thru the tourneys like a total mess. Errantry/Special/Sparring is now also based around combat stats, your chance of gaining a skill is greatly reduced if your stats are lower than the tutor, even if you win the fight! And if you dont, its fuckin impossibleeeee! So I couldnt even gain more skills to fight the skill tutor to gain more skills, GAH! Am I supposed to assign my own tutors here who have terrible stats?? But then the stat gains I get would be low too! So yeah, an intelligence based monster and I never managed to get a single intelligence skill in her entire lifespan. ALAS!

* Oh and Exploration is also REALLY WAY TOO HARD AND UNBALANCED AND HARD Well I mean.. its not??? But it is??? Its actually got much smaller stat requirements than in MR on PS1, and the chance of getting nothing when you inspect a ruin is much lower. But the odds of the MOST HATED STUPID MECHANIC are way higher, and it seems that there isnt ANY stat that affects it, its totally random with no way to avoid! See, sometimes randomly when you’re exploring you can get lost. this ends the exploration immediately and you lose every item you’d collected. COMPLETELY AT RANDOM. NO WAY TO AVOID. keeps fuckin happening at the end of my 500 HP long 50 items gathered super sessions with super Rina the kitty of joy and hugs so I just ended up savescumming every time it happened, its too bullshit to be allowed to exist! Rina earned around 30000 or so Gold during her lifespan, and I was able to get the barn upgrade to keep bigger mons. And she also found the item that unlocks Monol monsters. Yay!

* So yeah thats the end of my gameplay today, and I didnt really enjoy it as much as the last one. The weird new gameplay decisions are a part of it, but also because of just HOW MANY monsters are locked behind various sidequests, and how you have no clue how to get half of them. Last time they were all just tournements you had to beat, now there’s bullshit like raising five monsters of specific species to master rank and sending them to certain exploration areas to find orbs... And like, with the inability to carry over traits and stuff, and the smaller amount of fusions, you cant even make a particularly customized monster out of the ones you can start with. So its just les fun to wait to open up all the options. And there doesnt feel like much incentive to even do it anyway, its not like most of them were locked away because theyre stronger. There’s loads of stuff that was a starter monster last time and there’s just no reason you have to save up a titanic amount of 20000 just to get the weird rhino motorcycle i got by typing my own name in the game last time... But ehh, I might play again anyway? I dunno. Later. Much later.

* BUT I STILL LOVE MY SWEET MONSTER FRIENDOS love and hugs list of all the bebs: Jade the Golem/Lesione, Carole the Momo/Zan, Kyubi the Zan/Mocchi, Dandelion the special albino Lesione, and Diva the special albino Dragon and now Wrigley the Hare/Lesione, Heartbreak the special albino/halloween variant Antlan, and Rina the special albino Mew that looks more like nidorina hence the name ...I’m only just realizing that I tend to like the albino variants the best. I guess maybe its cos they look more normal and dont tend to have overpowered stats or anything. Except the albino dragon which was the strongest one in the first game, hence why I picked it when I just gave up and wanted to brute force my way to the ending... ANYWAY THEY ARE ALL CUTE AND YOU WILL APPRECIATE THEM

* ok bunni go play different games now

* also bunni go try and learn how to draw these monsters, yo

#bunni plays mra2

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