Okay, the OT guide plan
Feb. 1st, 2010 10:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
farlaSince it's hard to rearrange or discuss stuff posted on the FFN forums, I'm thinking I'll post stuff here and see if people think there's anything that needs changing beforehand.
101 Guide
This guide intended is to walk new authors through writing a story. The focus is on original trainer stories, because they're the most common thing people have trouble with.
This is not meant to be the only or best way of doing things. It is meant to be reliable and avoid the major problems writers run into.
For the purpose of this guide, you need to follow my advice. Not all of it may work for you, but you won't know what does and what doesn't until you try. It can be very tempting to say that you don't need to bother doing something, but it's a mistake. It's also very easy to say that you don't see any reason it has to be done my way - again, try it anyway, and you'll see why.
Before we begin, a couple points:
1) Writing an OT fic is harder than it seems. If this is your first story, you're better off trying something shorter. This guide is meant to help you avoid major problems because I assume you're going to want to try it anyway, but I can't honestly tell you the guide is going to do enough.
If you want to jump right into OT fic, I strongly advise writing short stories as well.
2) Your story needs to be in third person, not first. Third person works better and runs into fewer problems.
3) Your story needs to stick with canon areas. You can still include new pokemon/locations/people/gyms/types or whatever else you've thought of, but no new regions. It's just one more thing to trip you up.
4) You can't include every good idea you have right now in this story. You have to pick the major one and go with that. That's okay - you can always write more stories.
5) This guide is going to involve planning, not just writing. Actually do the planning, or you're going to spend most of your chapters trying to explain away the problems in your other chapters, instead of writing about your story. It's not that hard.
6) Your story will not involve filler. If you can't think of anything interesting happening between point A and point B, you do what absolutely everyone else does: You skip the damn thing.
201 Guide
So you've written stories before and are looking to try out original trainer stories, or possibly already started one.
We still start out with certain points before we begin.
1) It really can't be repeated too often: OT fic is hard. Before you say that you can do it because you're not the sort of person that abandons a story, understand I mean that it's very easy to write something in the first chapter that will screw up the next forty chapters you write. It's also going to mean a pretty big investment of your time.
If the thing you want to write about is a non-journey, non-badge plot, you really should just write that. It's a better idea on every level.
2) First person is still a bad idea. Don't use it unless you understand why I would say this, have already written in first person for shorter stories, are absolutely certain you won't need to switch perspectives or write about something that won't have observers, and are extremely good at description and narrative voice.
Don't think that picking the harder option is going to automatically make your story better. The harder option is not the advanced version, it's not the better writing version, it's just the version that's more likely to make you unhappy and your story bad.
3) The only good reason to have a new region is if you have a major plot point that conflicts with the canon regions. Look at the canon region maps. See all that vast empty space? That's where your new additions belong, instead being used to make an equally (or even more) empty new region. If you really want to write a full OT fic, you're going to want as much stuff jammed in there as possible.
Remember how in GS you went to Kanto, and there was a radio tower in Lavender, and new gym leaders? And there were all those new pokemon around? It's canon that canon regions are not static. You can mess around with them, you don't need to invent a completely new area to justify new gym leaders or pokemon or anything.
4) Seriously, don't include every idea you have. Especially if they're conflicting, or fighting for space, or have nothing to do with the story and are just there to tell people that your own opinion on how the pokeworld functions is X.
Subplots are different than plots, and just because you can juggle thirty successfully doesn't mean you should or that it's good writing to do so. For the most part, subplots need to have a similar arc to your main story. They can begin later on and end sooner on, but mostly they should be around at the same time. Constantly adding and resolving subplots is bad - subplots are not supposed to be separate, they're supposed to all be part of the story's main progression.
5) This guide is going to involve a lot of planning. You're still going to have to do it. When I say it's important for writers, I don't mean "for those stupid other guys, not for awesome people like you". I mean it's important for writers. If you skip ten minutes of planning now, you'll regret it three chapters when you're starting to realize it would have worked better if you'd done it differently and spend a half hour trying to figure out how to fix things, and you'll really regret it thirteen chapters in when your continual attempts to fix things keep writing your further and further into a corner. You may have not needed much planning for other stories. Don't try it with an OT fic.
6) I do not care what you heard. No fucking filler. No beach episodes. No random flashbacks, no stream of consciousness padding, no villain-of-the-day, no spending ten paragraphs on what the trees looked like, none of it. You are not getting paid by the word and your readers aren't either.
Anything I missed or that you don't think is necessary?
Second part.
101 Guide
This guide intended is to walk new authors through writing a story. The focus is on original trainer stories, because they're the most common thing people have trouble with.
This is not meant to be the only or best way of doing things. It is meant to be reliable and avoid the major problems writers run into.
For the purpose of this guide, you need to follow my advice. Not all of it may work for you, but you won't know what does and what doesn't until you try. It can be very tempting to say that you don't need to bother doing something, but it's a mistake. It's also very easy to say that you don't see any reason it has to be done my way - again, try it anyway, and you'll see why.
Before we begin, a couple points:
1) Writing an OT fic is harder than it seems. If this is your first story, you're better off trying something shorter. This guide is meant to help you avoid major problems because I assume you're going to want to try it anyway, but I can't honestly tell you the guide is going to do enough.
If you want to jump right into OT fic, I strongly advise writing short stories as well.
2) Your story needs to be in third person, not first. Third person works better and runs into fewer problems.
3) Your story needs to stick with canon areas. You can still include new pokemon/locations/people/gyms/types or whatever else you've thought of, but no new regions. It's just one more thing to trip you up.
4) You can't include every good idea you have right now in this story. You have to pick the major one and go with that. That's okay - you can always write more stories.
5) This guide is going to involve planning, not just writing. Actually do the planning, or you're going to spend most of your chapters trying to explain away the problems in your other chapters, instead of writing about your story. It's not that hard.
6) Your story will not involve filler. If you can't think of anything interesting happening between point A and point B, you do what absolutely everyone else does: You skip the damn thing.
201 Guide
So you've written stories before and are looking to try out original trainer stories, or possibly already started one.
We still start out with certain points before we begin.
1) It really can't be repeated too often: OT fic is hard. Before you say that you can do it because you're not the sort of person that abandons a story, understand I mean that it's very easy to write something in the first chapter that will screw up the next forty chapters you write. It's also going to mean a pretty big investment of your time.
If the thing you want to write about is a non-journey, non-badge plot, you really should just write that. It's a better idea on every level.
2) First person is still a bad idea. Don't use it unless you understand why I would say this, have already written in first person for shorter stories, are absolutely certain you won't need to switch perspectives or write about something that won't have observers, and are extremely good at description and narrative voice.
Don't think that picking the harder option is going to automatically make your story better. The harder option is not the advanced version, it's not the better writing version, it's just the version that's more likely to make you unhappy and your story bad.
3) The only good reason to have a new region is if you have a major plot point that conflicts with the canon regions. Look at the canon region maps. See all that vast empty space? That's where your new additions belong, instead being used to make an equally (or even more) empty new region. If you really want to write a full OT fic, you're going to want as much stuff jammed in there as possible.
Remember how in GS you went to Kanto, and there was a radio tower in Lavender, and new gym leaders? And there were all those new pokemon around? It's canon that canon regions are not static. You can mess around with them, you don't need to invent a completely new area to justify new gym leaders or pokemon or anything.
4) Seriously, don't include every idea you have. Especially if they're conflicting, or fighting for space, or have nothing to do with the story and are just there to tell people that your own opinion on how the pokeworld functions is X.
Subplots are different than plots, and just because you can juggle thirty successfully doesn't mean you should or that it's good writing to do so. For the most part, subplots need to have a similar arc to your main story. They can begin later on and end sooner on, but mostly they should be around at the same time. Constantly adding and resolving subplots is bad - subplots are not supposed to be separate, they're supposed to all be part of the story's main progression.
5) This guide is going to involve a lot of planning. You're still going to have to do it. When I say it's important for writers, I don't mean "for those stupid other guys, not for awesome people like you". I mean it's important for writers. If you skip ten minutes of planning now, you'll regret it three chapters when you're starting to realize it would have worked better if you'd done it differently and spend a half hour trying to figure out how to fix things, and you'll really regret it thirteen chapters in when your continual attempts to fix things keep writing your further and further into a corner. You may have not needed much planning for other stories. Don't try it with an OT fic.
6) I do not care what you heard. No fucking filler. No beach episodes. No random flashbacks, no stream of consciousness padding, no villain-of-the-day, no spending ten paragraphs on what the trees looked like, none of it. You are not getting paid by the word and your readers aren't either.
Anything I missed or that you don't think is necessary?
Second part.
