#dracoria talks

[dracoria-nebulae]

I apologize, but I think there won't be an update this week either. I'm so damn tired of late and still in the depths of writer's block. I've gotten some things finished, but I'm still not quite there. I'm so sorry for taking so long.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Having gotten a 'criticism' type comment recently, at the very least? BE NICE. For fuck's sake. Consider, if you have to add the 'not to be rude, but' or 'no offense or anything, but' or any variation, have you considered that the only reason you need that qualifier is because it is in fact rude or offensive?

A lot of writers are still learning themselves! I've written for a long time now, but it's only the past few years here I've started to share it. I'm still figuring out what works best for me, what reads best, but I don't need people coming in like that. It takes enough out of me to write as much as I do with my issues and that makes it even harder.

Here's the rule so many of us learned as kids. If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. You have every right to not like what I've made! But you can also walk away and find something you do like! The statistics of things tend to give me a good idea of what's working well on it's own.

AO3 Etiquette

It would seem a whole new kind of AO3 reader/writer is emerging and it is becoming clear not everyone quite understands how the website community works. Here is some basic guidance on how most people expect you to go about using AO3 to keep this a fun community archive that funtions correctly:

Kudos is for when the story was interesting enough to make you finish reading. If it sucked or was badly written, you probably left. If you finished - you kudos.

If you liked it, you should comment. It can be long and detailed or a literal keysmash. Writers don't care, we just love comments.

No critisism unless the author has specifically asked or agreed to hear it. Even constructive critisism is a no-no unless an author note tells you it's okay. Many people write as a fun hobby or a way to cope with, among other things, insecurity. Don't ruin that for them.

Do not comment to ask the author to write/update something else. It's tacky and off-putting and will probably have the opposite effect than the one you want.

There is no algorithm, it's an archive. Use the search and filter function to add/remove the pairings/characters/tropes etc. you want to read about and it will find you the fics that fit the bill.

For this to work, writers must tag and rate stories. This avoids readers finding the wrong things and missing the stuff they want. I don't care how cringy that trope is in your eyes - it gets tagged.

Character A/Character B means a ROMANTIC or SEXUAL relationship of some kind. Character A&Character B is PLANTONIC, like friendship or family.

Nothing is banned. This is an implicit rule because banning one thing is a slipperly slope to banning another and another, until nothing is allowed anymore. Do not expect anyone to censor for you. Because of the tags system, you are responsible for your own reading experience.

People can create new chapters and sequels/fic series any time after they "complete" a story. So it's considered perfectly normal to subscribe, even to a finished story. You can even subscribe to the author instead just to cover your bases.

Do not repost stories or change the publishing date without an extremely good reason (like a complete top to bottom rewrite). It's an archive, not social media. No one cares what's the most recent, only what fits their tag needs.

Avoid deleting a story you wrote if you hate it - orphan it so others can still enjoy it, without it being connected to you anymore.

This is a creative fanfiction archive. No essays on your insights or theories please. There are other places for that.

I KNOW there's plenty more I missed but I'm trying to cover most of the basics that people seem to be struggling with.

I invite anyone to add to this, but please explain, don't berate.

[caycanteven]

Steel, Lilac, affectionately Apricot (I'm poisoning you with my stupid fics hah), Sapphire for all my moots honestly hah.

You are poisoning me....your fics have me in a choke hold right now and I would die happy that way LOL.

and fECK you're too kind aaaah <3

[sinfulsagev]

On Liam and Saccharina

So I’m browsing the tags and listening to the Adventuring Party stream and I’m seeing a lot of people being dicks to Emily and accusing Saccharina of “stealing” Cinnamon from Liam. There was a break in the stream where Emily was talking about Saccharina being a polarizing “Robin Hood” type of character and how above all she was in the temple for the egg, which Brennan was nodding his head in agreement with. The egg had a fire damage threshold and had to be melted to hatch it, which is a damage type Liam is incapable of dealing. While A Crown of Candy is a difficult, gritty game; we all know by now through watching other seasons of Dimension 20 that Brennan wouldn’t make the resolution to Liam’s own subplot inaccessible to Ally or dependent on another PC.  What people aren’t realizing is the egg was for Saccharina, not Liam. Liam’s arc is gonna come to a head with the nest of the older Dracoria Azucar that the cliffhanger was delivered on. TLDR; The egg was meant for Saccharina, the nest was meant for Liam.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Hah! Oh I've violently fended off those thoughts because I can't draw lol. Brain has been full of empty of late. The pirates thing is great but man I cannot write this kind of speech hah. Also those time periods, much like westerns, are pretty gross hah. Like, no real sanitation. But...

If I made a pirate au character it would probably be some sort of monster, perhaps even a half or full siren. They wouldn't be part of the crew per say, instead more of a danger that follows under the water. Perhaps even originally from the same seas as the black fiend roams heh. A siren swept out of her home after getting injured and hitting a nasty storm, finding Motti's boat by pure luck and following alongside it after hearing they were trying to find him for romance of all things instead of trying to kill him. A dark dangerous shadow that is intent on ensuring their boat arrives safely now. She trusts that if they do find Nightmare, she can help be rid of them if they were lying, or they would have helped bring them together. Probably digs her claws into the bottom of the boat and holds on when sleeping~ Not all the folk of the sea harbor hatred towards humans and other surface dwellers. I don't know too much about Nightmare's story, but if he helped save the siren once before, he probably earned a dangerous ally out of gratitude for saving her. Crew yet not. Of course, if it doesn't fit that universe, whoops. It's just a thought~ hahaha The symbiote? Maybe I'll ponder on that one another time hah. I'm trying not to think too hard about it and drive myself crazy. I need to try my best to write my fics~ (Lack a proper sona still so even the pirate thoughts are a bit iffy.)

pirate brainrot has been readmored and also added some to it (●'◡'●)

[dracoria-nebulae]

Writing update

Haha, I'm having a bit of a hard time writing these past few weeks. There quite possibly won't be an update this weekend. I'm trying but writer's block is a real problem. I'm so sorry!

[dracoria-nebulae]

No updates this week either, I'm really sorry, I've had a rash of nasty migraines the past few days and writing is incredibly difficult when that happens. I know what I plan to do, I just can't stare at a screen that long and write. T_T

[dracoria-nebulae]

Fic stuff

Writing has been awful the last two weeks. Things just don't want to work. I have enough to upload technically but I think I'll wait until next weekend. Sorry everyone. I hope the next week is better for writing and I feel comfortable posting again. Nothing is going on hiatus or anything, I'm just taking another week to try and get some chapters out!

[dracoria-nebulae]

Bro same. For all my fics. But also, don't stress too much about how quickly you put out. God only knows I do and it's a terrible idea hahaha.

Btw, i wanted to say that my ask box is always open for questions about my fics- including the yet unnamed standard au Fic. It is taking me a while to get chapters out, and I apologize for that, but I am always down to talk about my silly lil AUS. If it's anything too spoiler-y, I'll try and give y'all the best answer I can <3

[dracoria-nebulae]

Sorry if this was mentioned in Abyssal Lights but do you have a compilation of the physical description of the reader in your fic?? Or maybe photo references if you can??? I keep on imagining them differently every time I lovingly reread your fic (this is more of a me thing tho lol, i promise it's not your writing!)

Hi hi! So, while bits of the siren's appearance is directly mentioned, it's not entirely set in stone. I'm sadly not an artist, else I'd make her reference myself! There's some room for interpretation in there for her. I do apologize for her description being slightly vague, it's a little harder for me too without a proper reference hehe. I would definitely advise checking out @caycanteven 's interpretation of the siren! I know I love looking at it heh.

I'll try and put it together here to a degree from what I've mentioned. The siren is huge, though I've not fully settled on a total length. Her torso/upper half alone is larger than the skeletons, even the taller ones. Her tail would be easily more than 3x the length of her upper half, probably even more due to being a deep sea eel species! Oh and her torso is mostly androgynous, only vaguely feminine heh. Her tail is shaped like an eel of course, however unlike actual eels she has a lot more variety of fins, most flowing and when healthy quite attractive. For a species like sirens, their appearance is important too for mating. She has more than one set of gills, some on her humanoid half and some on her tail due to the size of her body. Facially she is a lot flatter than a human. She has a slight nasal ridge with somewhat hidden nostrils. I'd almost think a lot like some Undyne fanart. Her mouth is unusually wide, it almost makes it look like she's smiling all the time and towards the ends there's bands of fibrous tissue that's more of her teal-y glow color, giving her a look almost like she's blushing. This is all part of her ability to open her mouth incredibly wide and eat things a lot larger than you'd expect. She has large eyes that have vertical pupils, with two sets of eyelids. One like normal and secondary clear ones. She doesn't usually blink or close her eyes unless sleeping so it gives her an eerie intensity and sort of innocence. She has no brows hah. Like a lot of mers or sirens, she has ear fins, helps her emote where her face lacks a lot of motion. There are the exit holes for her nostrils hidden behind her ear fins too! Since fish don't exactly use nostrils for anything other than smelling, they aren't connected to other parts of her internals. This is the more important one, where humans have hair, she has a 'hair' like growth of something between jellyfish lappets/tentacles and barbels. They are prehensile and work as sensory organs and more. (Though at the current time of the fic they are short and dirtied as she hasn't cared for them at all. Much like her fins.) Her scales when healthy are a black+purple so dark that it becomes iridescent, though right now they are closer to an ashy black/grey. Her body, fins, hair, face, are covered in markings that are capable of glowing a bright teal, having usually a blue-ish tint to them when not lit up. Patterns are up to interpretation but I imagine a mixture of stripes and spots. Her whole body is mostly scaled actually, even though eels typically aren't scaled hahaha.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Brain hasn't felt like writing, I'm wondering if I should swap to an every other week for both sets of fics. Not sure. It's quite hard to keep up with 6 of them, 12 chapters in a month hah. Not sure the most recent chapters are up to snuff quality wise. I take a week break here and there but I'm not actually taking any breaks when I do. I really gotta try and do better. God I wish I could just pound out 10k a day. I might go on a little bit of a hiatus, I'm struggling to get even a third of a chapter done in a day. And by hiatus I mean like, maybe take a two week break hahaha.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Could we get a little insight on the ‘sexual slavery’ tag on TBTB? Normally I’m iffy with these types of tags and was just wondering on how in depth it would go for future reference?

Oh! I'm glad you asked. Though it's a bit spoilery it should be ok as it's a genuine concern and despite the nasty tag it's not as bad thankfully. I would say that the tag is more implied and referenced, we won't be going into it overly explicitly! Thank you for the question <3. Not sure why I didn't see this question until recently... Despite being may now... Hm.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Definitely not posting this week, sorry! I just, need a little time to chill. I got super stressed and miserable and a break is much needed hah. Plus, things aren't quite finished this week so, such is life. Hopefully will be posting next week.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Might take something of a break this coming week, been feeling my depression creeping up and struggling to write enough. And who knows what else but definitely the depression nipping at my back. Still going to update tomorrow though. I doubt anyone will see or respond buuut... I'd absolutely love it if anyone wanted to talk about any of my fics, theories, thoughts, anything. I especially love theories. I'm curious what everyone thinks is coming or hopes to see hah.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Looking at my feed is a bit much rn hah. I might miss a bunch of things but I just wanna play games and exist.

[dracoria-nebulae]

Am I feeling burnt out? Or just struggling to get my brain to focus on one thing instead of the other thing it wants to do? Not sure but god damn has it been unreasonably hard to write the past few days... I have things that need writing and they just don't want to write hah.