OTP Challenge Day 4 (AU)

OTP challenge day 4 (AU)

“You wanna be the best? Then you gotta BEAT the best, little girl.”

“You’re gonna be screamin’ my name by the time I’m done with you, grampa~”

Fuck yeah, I'd give anything to have some kind of FE mixed into my other favorite franchise, Pokémon! So we’ve got Champion Gunther and challenger Nerr. Pokémon needs more sexy oyajii champions. Alder was my game crush until… actually, fuck; who said I ever stopped loving Alder? That crazy awesome bastard is ALL my turn ons. In this Pokéverse, Nerr is not the friendly player character- that would be Azura. Nerr is the rival you name “Douchebag” who’s always three steps ahead of you and exists to mock your shitty Pokémon with her cheating-AI, perfect-IV team. You beat the Elite Four only to discover she’s already become the Champion.

Also, the Champion is the leader of the villan team, and you don't get to take down the villans until the post game, because the admins are OP as fuck and would laugh before curbstomping you. After pc Azura beats rival Nerr and takes her Champion title, she joins the villans, cuz fuck that playing fair bullshit. “Psh, nothing personal, nerd…” Oh, I hate her so much, and that makes me love her even more~

They both have balanced teams, but Nerr would specialize in Dragon and Fairy types while Gunther specializes in Dark and Poison types.

Yes. You have no idea how much every single comment means to a writer. I cannot tell you how disheartening it is to see a fanfic with dozens, if not hundreds of comments, and then look at my paltry reviews. The only fics I've even gotten reviews on are my 32 chapter, 44k+ word epic (and almost half of them were complaints), and my sexy yandere oneshot. When I realized the only thing people deem worth their time to comment on are hastily written smut fics, it makes me want to just throw my hands in the air and quit. Guess what- if I didn't want feedback, I wouldn't post this stuff online.

The only real feedback I ever got was people complaining, and I even appreciated that (not when it was annoymous, tho, because that made it hard to respond) because it let me gauge what the readers thought. When no one says anything (or gives a one sentence review like "this is good"), I have no fucking clue what to think. Do they like it? Hate it? Was there some characterization that wasn't clear? Is anyone even READING this, or did they just stop in, read one paragraph, then say fuck this shit? Another thing is, lots of readers of fanfiction tend to gravitate towards the stories with the most reviews, because if so many people are leaving comments, it MUST be good. If you like something someone writes, leave some reviews so other people can notice it to.

I started posting fanfiction dreaming I could be like my favorite authors, with people leaving insightful, uplifting reviews every chapter and dying to know what happens next. Now, posting chapters is just another tedious chore for me, like waking up. I have so little drive and motivation now that if I didn't have a backlog of completed chapters, I'd just stop posting all together. And on ao3, kudos are okay, but comments mean much, MUCH more. If you could take the time to read something from begining to end, surely you could take a few more seconds to tell the author if you enjoyed it or not.

Why Commenting On FanFiction Is Important

Alright kids, Boo here with a hopefully non-arrogant PSA.

I’m a writer of FanFiction because I like it and it’s my preferred genre (also a great way to receive feedback on writing that I can use on originals, bref). But like with most artistic work posted online, I have very little feedback.

When I was in a slightly writing rut, I cranked one shots left and right, nothing out of the ordinary. But instead of people commenting with their thoughts and good feedback, they just gave me requests.

I don’t think I could ever put into words what that felt like, but I’ll try (the irony of being a writer). It suddenly felt tiring, being a writer, and very quickly I stopped writing altogether. I only ever showed my friend what I wrote and left it at that. I haven’t published anything for a while after. It felt like people were treating me like a mule wanting me to do work for them, and I just wasn’t up for that. I lost my will to write, and then I began to think, “If I post something else other than what was requested, will people even read it?”

Then you get the infamous comments, “You haven’t forgotten about my request right??? Here’s another.”

That just adds anxiety and guilt. I’m purposely ignoring the comments to save my own uncreative ass, at least that’s what it feels like.

After weeks of convincing myself that my stories are worth sharing no matter how many people read them, I started writing and publishing again while working on some longer pieces. Slowly it got better.

Now this week, I remembered I joined another fanfiction platform, and realized I had never published anything on it. I had an idea, and so I started writing. It didn’t come out as I imagined it would, but I was so proud? Like, I started feeling happy about what I created again. Like genuine happiness that I haven’t felt in months since my last published work.

A few hours later, I get this comment:

I cranked out three 3k stories after reading this.

In four days.

It never happened before, and I don’t know how many times it will happen again. It was one comment, but it gave me so much fighting spirit that I think I’m on my way to regaining my initial writer mindset.

Fanfiction writers depend on feedback as a validation that their stories matter to people. If you’re wondering why your favourite author hasn’t updated/posted in a while, ask yourself, “Did I do everything that would convince them to continue writing this?”

The worst thing is, his Sacred Stones art had SOOOOO much more character. Like, when I look at that art, I swoon. This? This is just another generic, plastic, baby-faced bishonen. He looks JUST like this horrible, awful character from Cinderella Contract (Cyrill, I think his name was?), and I loathe that...

But it's Seth, so I don't give a damn.

Honestly, this is why I just don't post multichapter fics until I've completed (that means written, proofread, edited, proofread, rewritten, and proofread again) at least 20 chapters. I honestly am not sure why other people don't do the same. It's YOUR story- feedback from the audience is secondary at best, and should not influence you too greatly if you have a clear vision of what to write. I wrote the five chapter prologue as well as 15 chapters of the main fic before I even created an account. I was done with my first fic and working on my second before I had posted half the chapters. Even now, I've just posted chapter 8 of my current fic and am writing chapter 22.

Why do I make such a backlog of chapters? Because shit happens. You get sick, you get fired, you have no idea what to write (I have been working on ch22 for more than a month because I have no idea where I'm going with it). When you build up a fanbase, I honestly think they deserve a little consistancy. People who are actual fans of your work will understand if shit happens and you need a hiatus (especially if you actually TELL them that's what's happening so they don't think you've abandoned the story they've become invested in). Think about how upset and disappointed you get when a game or movie you were really excited for is delayed.

Back when I used to read a lot of fanfics, my favorite author would tell her loyal fanbase whenever there was going to be a delay, so we would know why there was no update (she also responded to longtime reviewers like myself in every chapter, but that's a different subject).

TL;DR- if you want a work of yours to be popular, then prepare for people who treat it like something popular- hungry for/demanding more. This is FAN FICTION. You are not on a schedual, people. You don't have to have chapters on your editor's desk every week. Write a sizeable chunk of your story, a few chapters at least, and then... wait. Don't post it online as soon as you hit save. Just wait a few days, maybe a week. Reread it, see if you still like it (chances are you won't). Do your rewrites and editing BEFORE you hit submit. Why are you all in such a rush? If your answer is "I have to post before the fandom moves on!", then you're clearly just in it for the reviews and really don't care what people are saying just as long as that number gets bigger.

Writing is a process that often undergoes heavy edits… that includes responding to feedback. 

I finally saved another 20k feathers. These are the units I'm considering 5*ing (my last 5* was Sharena, and she's amazing, but considering I have Camus, I keep forgetting about her). This has nothing to do with ideal ivs or optimized movesets (except maybe in Legion and Gunther's case) because I don't have enough units to nitpick over minmaxing. These are just units that have been useful, and deserve a reward. One day, I'll 5* them all, but that could take years at this rate... Lissa- Goddess of the Tempest. She was a lv20 3* during the first tempest, and has been the cornerstone of every tempest team since. Great at debuffs/ deep heals. I would totally sink a Genny into her for Wrathful Staff if I ever got one. Olivia- Goddess of the Arena. She was a 2*, but I needed a fucking refresh unit, and I will never get Ninian or Azura. She's my buffer. I won't put a ruby sword on her like some people do, cuz sometimes, I need her to finish off blue units. Mae- Unexpectedly Awesome. I actually hate Mae as a character and was going to scrap her for feathers before it was revealed she was a 40% bonus unit for the last tempest. She started at lv20, and as you can see, I poured A LOT into her because she was just that good. As a note, I DO have a 5* Delthea now, so I'm not desperate for blue mages. Legion- Delicate Cinnamon Roll. I brought him to the last tempest just because I like to have a different, unique team each time. He was surprisingly amazing, especially when Lissa was there to bring him back from 1hp all the way to full health. I left his slots save Fury open because I'm not sure how I want to build him. I don't have another vantage yet, so I'm just just stockpiling his sp. Cecilia- 😑 I... have nothing to say about Cecilia except that she's my only green mage (I just rolled Merric, but... eh). People say she's amazing, so I TRIED to use her, but... yeeeeeaaah... She's so damn average, and that speed really kills her viability. I have NO idea how I got her to level 40 considering she dies to everything but blue mages. I'm hoping I can get a Boey or Sonya one day, but I'm also hoping for summer Corrin, and you all see how that's working... Gunter- His Summoner's True Love. He's +atk/-res, but I wouldn't care if he was -all; he's my baby. I would feed my summer Xander to him if I thought it would make me smile (but I like his sprite looking all serious and handsome). I am not above feeding 5*s to him if I don't personally like them, tier lists be damned. So, who is worthy of my feathers? As a note, I have Ryouma, Tharja, Lilina, Camus, Sharena, Delthea, Nowi, Raven and Summer Xander as 5*, so aside from a green mages, I don't really NEED another 5*, but... I want one. I didn't include my potential colorless units because I literally never use them unless they were already a 5*

When bish be so proud of the sketch she don't wanna ruin it with ink (I'm still gonna ink it cuz my sketches are messy and illegible)