Just posted a new chapter, making about 5400 words over two chapters uploaded today.

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Burgerpunk revolution soon, brothers.

>>24704937
I have the Gempunk keyword locked down on RR.

>>24704937
This is just cyberpunk but with none of the cool technology to make up for corporations fucking us in the ass. Proto is peak btw

Alright, I just tried reading FFF-Class 'Unlucky Antagonist'. I had to stop because there are too many fucking em dashes.
Do you seriously think 100+ em dashes in the first chapter is acceptable? Also, why is there a random triple dash instead of an em dash?
Who is JR btw? Rewrite this shit and I'll try it again.

>>24704995
it's kino

>>24704937
burger, and burger and burger, feeds these petty tastes from day to day, to the last patty of grilling time; and all our yesterdays have lighted Ms the way to greasy death. eat, eat obese burger! life but walks under the shadow, a poor frycook, that struts and frets his shift before the fryer, and then works no more. it is a meal fried by an idiot, full burnt and bitter, satisfying nothing.

>>24704995
>Em-Dashes
The fun part is that there aren't any of them. I just use — instead of : and () for its aesthetic.

>--- instead of —
I'm not ChatGPT, so I don't have an em dash on my keyboard. Hence, use "---" so that my editor turns it into an em —.

>>24704995
I use --- in place of em dashes.

>>24704859
How did you manage to get your cover up here?

>>24705021
Anons love me.

>>24705015
Fuck you're retarded

I just finished 30k words. That's right I'm 1/4th of the way to finishing my first book. Better fucking keep your eyes open

>>24704859
cool cover but it's false advertising

>>24705029
Congratulation, anon. Post it here.

>>24704948
it had better be actual punk though

>>24705073
If you mean anti-establishment, then its other sky pirates, which I think of as punk.
Though I regularly discuss this topic of punk, in referring to "x-punk" genres, as being incorrectly attributed.
The punk anti-establishment subculture is not what defines "punk". Punking actually refers to the hacker subculture, a type of modification to a technology or device; related to the "Phreaking" subculture of hacking phones in the 80's.
The first use of -punk to describe the in fiction modification of a technology was 1987 describing neuromancer's "punking" of the human body with advanced technology. As with a phoneline.
Punking comes from the early internet hacking BBS culture, and not necessarily anti-establishment retoric.
Taken literally -punk describes genres which modify and existing technological framework with a new branch of understanding in that technology.
>Steampunk - powered by steam
>Gempunk - powered by gems
>Ecopunk - powered by ecology
>Cyberpunk - powered by cybernetics
Powered in this case is the figurative use of powered, as in something "powered by intel technology" is not having its power supplied by the CPU cores.

>>24705038
FFF-Class is LitRPG's dialectics.

>>24705092
what would evilpunk, as used in hacker subculture look like

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>>24705095
>"powered by evil"
Which could be a number of things. I could be literal power supplied by the dark energy, or what not. However, I feel interpretively its better as "sourced from evil technology".
Just as "faschypunk" is not hooking the nipples of fascists up to generators, it is technology based on the principles and foundations of a fascistic society.
>pic related

>>24705095
omelas

>>24705049
I think I want to finish my next arc of the story then draft and edit it before I get any feedback. I'm a terribly inconsistent author so I don't plan on publishing until I've finished my story, which I think would be two books worth of content.

>>24705173
Try not to fall into the trap of endless backlogging, though.

>>24705174
I was thinking of doing a 'limited' release in parts to people who I think would give me good advice. But my story has a plan where it's going to go, I highly doubt I'll ever get more than 150 chapters before I actually finish the story. After I finish I'll just upload on RR. This is my first extensive writing project I've kept to, so all I really want to do is finish it and if people read it that's nice.

>>24704401
>Nah don't pander to that guy, your original idea is good. He even admits it.
>Better would be to have him do alchemy and he gets a sidekick who does talismans that get him out of otherwise unwinnable situations.
That's a good idea too.
>>24704410
>Every time an autistic virgin tries to write a "cool" playboy character it's the most cringe inducing shit in existence, please spare your imaginary audience from your misguided attempt at writing a philanderer.
MC doesn't have to be a cool playboy on screen. He could find a woman that wants to come with him and be good talisman master. It would be them against the world.
The previous philandering just adds some potential conflict.

>It was a dark and stormy night...
lemme guess....... you need more?

>>24704859
FFF tier novel edition

>>24705005
Not even great Ronald's soda fountains will wash this literary crime from your hands.

Today I wrote 1600 words of an outline for the start of the story. Proactiveness, character motivations etc. Then I wrote another 1000 words on the main character and his sidekicks. It felt effortless.

If only writing the story itself were this easy.

Lately I have been perusing the 4ish star tier of RR offerings, the results? Expected.

Why even bother coming up with a title? The tags are the only thing that readers care about. It's not a coincidence the evolution meme works are arranged in order of genre popularity
>[Cultivation Litprg]
>[Progression Litrpg]
>[Portal Fantasy/Isekai]
>[Dungeon Litrpg]

>>24705478
I always get confuse with the dungeon litrpg tag. Like is it about dungeon delving or life as a dungeon core? Either way I'm somehow always disappointed.

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>>24705393
Sometimes inspiration hits and I'll finish a chapter in a single day, but usually I meander around and take a few days to crank it out, even worse when you don't know what the fuck to actually write in the chapter (like right now)

>>24705356
>Once upon a time in a land far, far away...
Kino.

>>24705532
how big are your chapters then

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I really like the FFF-Class cover, but anons said he didn't make it himself. Is the person he commissioned it from in these threads, or is it AI? I think something similar would be rad for the mercenary dark fantasy I'm working on.

>>24705543
Just about 2.5k. I'm a lazy nigga

>>24705556
It's AI though he does the slopping himself

I’m bored with writing futa erotica and now want to dip my toe into chick lit/Wattpad stuff. Problem is my idea doesn’t seem very chick lit.
ALL [INSERT NAME HERE] WANTED was to lie around and do absolutely nothing. But when his unemployment checks dried up, he signed on for a six-month stint aboard a long-haul space freighter.
The job was idiot-proof: show up, stay alive, and let the AI handle everything. It was the perfect assignment for someone whose most marketable skill was inertia.
He didn’t count on all twelve of his crewmates being women.
Half a year trapped in close quarters with a dozen beautiful women sounded like a dream come true. But in the 23rd century, regulations require all-female crew members on long-haul missions to undergo temporary sex reassignment—standard protocol to minimize interpersonal complications and maintain professional decorum.
But decorum evaporated the moment those twelve muscle-bound, hormone-fueled artificial men set eyes on him.
The way they tracked his skinny frame around like gorillas in heat made him regret not reading the fine print. And the contrast between their pretty faces and their chiselled, glistening bodies made him feel things he wasn’t supposed to.
Could he make it to the destination unscathed, or would he lose something more precious than his fragile heterosexuality?

>>24705575
Well, at least you admit it's gay to like futa.

>>24705575
Muscle futa is gay and not the good kind either

I've read masses of this stuff and nothing has touched me as remotely good. In fact most of it is a headache of confused grammar and stolen plotlines. Why these authors continue to whirl out masses of this stuff, when there's no improvement from one book to the next, defies understanding; what unseen motor drives them? Don't they want to improve, or do they think the key lies in a mindless flow of words? Sure, sure, call me a spoilsport and it's not that serious, but think of the sum time spent on these books and what little is accomplished. AI in its current infancy could put out a book no worse than most and be snappy about it. It depresses me.

>>24705582
yaas saar ai doing the writings goodly

>>24705095
Amazon.

>>24705532
I have the opposite problem: I know what I want to happen in the story. This is really easy for me, but I can't write it like a novel. The prose doesn't work at all. I don't even know how to describe the scene I want to describe quite often. The words just don't flow at all.

The other day I tried describing a wizard blowing up a mountain and I just couldn't come up with a description that worked.

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>>24705556
This is the original.
Then, an anon here fixed it in a previous thread.

>>24705590
Did I touch a nerve? Are you finally coming to terms that the unrelieved ghastliness of your writing is unhelped by more ghastly writing? The brute force strategy is not making inroads on your vast lack of talent. Oh dear.

>>24705639
saar we are writings of the ai, we make big BIG money
ai is future okay india world superpower 2026

>>24705630
fixed? both are still the worst covers I've ever seen on RR.

>>24705590
it was kinda funny seeing a guy who's actually honest about being an indian try an indian cultivation series that made it to rising stars and then vanished five seconds later

>>24705654
Indian mythos would unironically be an extremely good cultivation setting, ancient poos loved their powerscaling

>>24705645
It's a shame insecurity has forced you behind this shield of broken English. If this thread glimpsed the true rhythms of your writing, would we all draw the same, much-afeared conclusion? As it is, there's no telling how little daylight spans this minstrel act you're doing and your actual published work. I'd guess much less than you'd like.

>>24705684
stfu, dumb retard

>>24705608
You now the first pass is what I call "tard writing", just put down everything that happens in the scene/chapter, it doesn't matter that it's looks like an esl 4chan post like this one. Get all the tardness out of your system. When that's done start to refine it and iterate over and over until it looks like a burger in Tennesee with 4 genders wrote it. Then you just wait for the patreon bux.

>>24705682
That's what I was thinking. Last I saw that guy was starting a new series, though.

>>24702790
>start this and end up with a list of online handles
>realize they're perfect names for the pilots in a sports anime inspired mecha story I've had in mind but haven't done any real work on
>end up writing the first chapter introducing the team
Forgive me /wng/, I am now backlogging three vastly different stories.

>>24705697
I don't think I'm there yet. I don't mean that I wrote poorly, I mean that I described it in the form of "First this happened, then that happened, followed by this again. After that the sexy elf swooped in and saved the day."
Well, not exactly like that, but I just wrote a description of what happened, not like an actual story.

I seem to have some kind of mental block that stops be from writing something like this:
>He swung the door open and paused, the ugly goblin face staring at him. He slammed the door shut with all his might and reached for the shotgun. He pumped it, pointed it at the door, and blasted. The door exploded outward, pained cries following, but that hadn't stopped him.

>Pump. Blast. Pump. Blast.

>The door had turned to ribbons. With half its body missing, the goblin was a splattered mess spread around the corridor.

>The man stepped through the doorway shotgun first and advanced through the corridor to the next door. He fished out his keys from around his neck and unlocked the door, not putting his shotgun down this time.
I just can't do it when I need to do it.

>>24705608
>>24705758
I recommend reading airport novels/boomer thrillers. Their prose is as simple as it gets.
The other day, I randomly picked one off the shelf, and they literally used to word “cringe” in the first page. They do not care.

What the fuck is it about /lit/ that attracts these "I've never read or written anything and never went to school and am missing 3/4 of my brain but want to be a writer, what to do?"-people? Because they just keep coming, year after year. Who sends them here?

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>>24705756
>sports anime inspired mecha story
You're forgiven, but only if you give me the gist of it. Like GuP but with mecha?

>>24705780
Maladaptive daydreaming usually
>Have an idea for a story/setting but can't draw, direct, animate, code, or compose
>Assume writing is easy despite hating reading and having nothing but contempt for the medium

>>24705769
Thanks, I'll give it a try.
>>24705780
Sorry. I was more interested in math and sciences back then.

>>24705780
It's the same way on reddit, they think it's the easiest "artform" to master since it's just words. My hobbies are art, music and writing. Of those writing is by far the hardest one to make something that feels "pro".

I mean I've read hundreds of web novels the last decade and was an avid reader in my teens. Without this I wouldn't even try to write a web novel now.

But at the same time I remember reading a few pages in a typical low brow scandinavian crime thriller 10 years ago and having a tard laugh about how bad it was, it really felt like the author was having an active stroke while writing that shit. And now there's femcel goonerslop everywhere so perhaps we are the ones that are wrong and the ones who just write like a 3rd grader are right.

>>24705780
happens everywhere online

>>24705784
I've never actually watched GuP, but from what I know I'm not against the comparison.
Ping Pong, Initial D, and Mo Ippon and the first influences that come to mind, but there's a lot more to it as I've been watching all sorts of them as they've released for the past couple years.
Team is mixed gender, which goes against tropes, but gives me some more flexibility.

>>24705792
>I was more interested in math
Is this an FFF-Class Unlucky Antagonist reference?

>>24705844
Will you shut up man?

>>24705804
Femcel goonerslop has been a thing since Lady Chatterley's Lover back in the 1800s or whatever.

I must disappoint you all by saying that people here do in fact read. Some read prodigiously, all to some degree. They may not go beyond the bound and simple stanzas that rule these threads, but reading that certainly is, and it's hardly eclipsed in artistry by the horsetwaddle published on RR. What you guys do, however, is a lot more pernicious. You draw webs of conspiracies, and draw them again and again against toppling gusts of reason. I don't see any lasting art accredited to this group, although by your pompous pronouncements you'd think it was a late-day revival of the Bloomsbury crowd. Tush.

the worst part of reading is having to read the stuff you say in this thread

>>24706019
Give me my (You), you little pissant.

/wg/cuck is melting down hard kek

the final posts last thread must have really struck a nerve

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>Get good idea and write chapter inbetween two others ones
>Now have to redo and warp those chapters to accommodate it
>One great chapter sandwiched between two crappy ones now
I keep doing this. I really need to write an outline.

>>24706034
No one knows what you're talking about, whom you're referring to, and chief of all what hospital granted you computer access, pigboy.

>>24706018
those words are too big for my enlightened sloppa brain. try again

>>24706047
>People on /lit/ read
>As much as /wng/
>But it's as shit as shit written on Royal Road
>But you fags keep making conspiracy theories
>That don't hold the smallest application of reason
>You haven't written anything good
>Even if by your posts, it sounds like you were writing kino

>>24706057
.5 stars

>>24706057
i see
we definitely read a lot more than /lit/. absolutely no doubt in my mind.
there's a reason slop genres are what fill the bookshelves (digital and otherwise) and it's cuz us degenerates are the ones actually reading. even reading one long sloppa serial is like 20 large books, and i've burned through dozens of them. so have many other anons in this thread, because we talk about them

Constantly whining about people reading genre fiction and web novels must be tiring, no?

threadwarring is gay
stop being gay

>>24706085
You don't understand, I'm a really uninteresting person without ideas, being a stuck up litfag is the only thing I have. I'm very deep, I promise.

well in web novel news, then: the author of Katalepsis has put the story on indefinite hiatus
pour one out for one of the greats

To the various writer anons: I'm curious about something. How many words have you written TOTAL as an author, and how many followers does your story have? People say experience correlates with success, wondering if that holds true for the slopsmiths in this thread.

>>24706125
based
katalepsis feels like an early draft of necroepilogos. random ideas show up and disappear in katalepsis which are then fully coherent and incorporated in necroepilogos
katalepsis starts out taking itself seriously, then somewhere along the way it turns into a quirky cringe memefest. I bet the author just has no interest in it anymore

>>24706143
>People say experience correlates with success
I have never heard anyone say this.

>>24706153
What? Is this a shitpost?

>>24706148
>I bet the author just has no interest in it anymore
That is definitely not the case, Katalepsis is obviously a passion project of hers lol. The short of it is that she feels like her continuation (part 2 of the overarching serial) works better as a series of novels from different POVs and doesn't really make sense as a serial. She says she intends to finish it though, just maybe not as a serial.

Her next serial is going to be a Magical Girl (w/ cosmic horror and lesbians, classic Hungry style) thing apparently.

>>24706166
>her
hmmmmmmm
xhieys a good writer. well wishes to the troonking
looking forward to their next work

>>24706166
>she
>her

>>24706143
On my profile? 12,600 words.
If you count all the shit I've written this year? It must amount to something like 40~50k words. Lastest project is stuck in ~14k words right now for the last two days (I've been moody).

I'm on the lower end of the sloppers desu.

>>24706181
>>24706183
rent free

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>>24706166
>Magical Girl (w/ cosmic horror and lesbians
The mahou shoujo genre will never recover from Madoka.

>>24706143
about 300k~ of short stories, novellas, and flash fiction
maybe 30k of slop
I read tons of slop and want to write some but long form eludes me

>>24706187
I was just pointing out your typo, don't have a cow

>>24706195
I was gonna say "Magical Girl with cosmic horror and lesbians" is just regular Magical Girl. I would even say Futariwa Precure kinda falls under it. Lyrical Nanoha perhaps not but it gets brutal at parts.

>>24706296
When I think of Magical Girl genre, when it's not Madoka, Cardcaptor or Sailor Moon. But I'm not very knowledgeable of it. Beyond Madoka, the only one that kinda-fits-but-maybe-not was the first season of Symphogear, or maybe Attack Lily (but that's streching it).

>>24706315
It's been some time since I watched Symphogear but I could swear the reality warping bullshit enemies only ramp up throughout the seasons, as does the yuri

>>24706143
not on RR but another WN site. I have a chart that shows all my words and words broken down by book. I went over a million words and that's just the catalog that's there. I have a few other things not up.

>>24706143
I wrote 400k on a 3volume story I deleted but I may restore on rr when I publish it's spirtuall successor. Current story that is up has 16follows 7 fav, but it'd also a really brief finished short story just under 11k words.

>>24706322
I meant that I watched, never watched the other seasons. And it was "Assault Lily" not "Attack", I'm retarded. There's also Machikado Kazoku? idk, I really don't know much about that genre, but there's a few novels already pulling Madoka on RR.

>>24705608
How to Write the Easy Way
HOOK
Start with a punchy sentence or a brief paragraph that sparks curiosity.
SCENE SETTING
Ground the story in a time and place.
BRIEF EXPOSITION
Introduce characters and their immediate goal in one or two paragraphs. Skip lore dumps and information that the reader can infer.
ACTION & DIALOGUE
Let characters drive the narrative through what they say and do. He said, she said, he shot, they ran. Screw the narrator. The readers came here for the characters, not a tour guide.
DESCRIPTION
Weave in sensory details. Cut the filter words: I saw, I heard, I tasted, I felt, I smelled.
I saw the girl wearing a red shirt and short shorts. The girl wore a red shirt and short shorts.
I tasted iron in the air. The taste of iron permeated the air.
I smelled jasmine in her hair. Jasmine drifted from her hair.
I felt sharp pebbles beneath my feet. Sharp pebbles dug into my soles.
How to describe an inanimate object: Don’t.
Have the object do something.
The building stood at the end of the street.
The oak tree perched over a dead patch of grass.
The flag fluttered in the storm.
The silver river slithered between the canyon walls.
The grand piano sat at the far end of the room.
The church loomed over the town, its gargoyles leering at the bustle below.
The gray walls boxed me in.
HARD MODE: METAPHOR (the superior description)
Painters use color. Writers use figurative language. Invent similes and metaphors that capture your reader’s imagination. Watch any Low Tier God clip to see how powerful inventive metaphors can be.
If you can’t write a fresh one, skip it. Never settle for clichés: cheeks red as tomatoes, she’s an angel, etc.
BONUS: WRITING DIALOGUE
DON’Ts
“B-B-B-B-But I d-d-didn’t k-k-k-kill him!”
“Um … yeah … I mean … ah …”
“That is—!”
“GET BACK HERE!!!”
“Wha’ chu lookin’ a,’ white boi?”
“Nooooo!”
“What?!”
“I love you,” he whispered lovingly.
“Did you say something?” inquired the lady.
“...” He refused to say anything and gazed out the window.
And then she said, “Really, girl?”
DOs
“But I didn’t k-kill him!”
“Um, yeah…”
“That is—”
“Get back here!”
“What you looking at, white boy?”
“No!”
“What?”
“I love you,” he said.
“Did you say something?” she asked.
He gazed out the window.
She said, “Really, girl?”

>>24706419
...?

>>24706419
thank you, Tina
very cool!

>>24706419
[Continue]
Bringing It All Together
A book is made of chapters. Chapters are made of scenes. And every scene must advance the story.
Think about telling a story to a friend. You wouldn’t start with your morning routine or the Big Bang. You’d jump straight to the part where things got interesting.
“Did I ever tell you about the time I was stalked at an anime convention? No? So, it was about a year ago. I went with Josh—you know Josh, right? Tall guy, man bun, came to your party once. Yeah, him. Anyway, this cross-dresser started following me. Not just casually—like, full-on following me. He looked almost exactly like the ‘It’s ma’am!’ guy, only with pink cat ears and a Hello Kitty backpack. At first, I couldn’t tell if he liked me or what, but he kept tailing me until I started getting seriously creeped out. Finally, I turned around and said, ‘Um, excuse me, ma’am. Can I help you?’ He looked me dead in the eyes and said, ‘Ma’am? The fuck you talkin’ about, bitch? It’s sir!’ Then he decked me, grabbed my bag, and ran… I heard he got tased a few days later… but I never did get my bag back.”
A novel is a story told with confidence: no awkward pauses, no pointless rambling.
Every scene has to matter. And every new scene should build on the last. If you can’t figure out what happens next, it probably means the previous scene didn’t end strongly enough.
Ending a scene with your character limping through the woods, blood pouring from a bullet wound in his leg as he tries to escape a serial killer, is always more gripping than ending it with him safe and sound at home, drifting off to sleep.
Ideally, your character should never get a moment of peace until the story ends. Then again, slice-of-life stories do exist, so you may disagree.
At the end of the day, it’s your story. Just make sure you put something on the page and worry about making it good later.

The secret to creating perfect sense of internal continuity is not to hang a chekhov's gun on the wall.

It's to incorporate mentioning elements of setting in your writing so it feels natural, fleshing out the story and world.

This will create a sense of the world being lived-in, and it will have the consequence that no matter where in the plot you are, there is always a gun on the wall for you to grab, figuratively speaking.

Wow, that's a lotta words.

Too bad I ain't readin' 'em.

>>24706455
I read them for you, it was embarrassing
The literary equivalent of watching someone shitting their pants in public

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>>24706419
>>24706439
All good advice worth noting. Here's some structure for keeping a story fast paced.

Fuck slow openers that are about establishing a normal life before it all goes to shit. If your hero gets isekai'd the earliest your story should start is when the truck meets their face.
When everything seems resolved something should immediately catch fire.
If your character has to be satisfied for a time there's no need for us to spend that time with them. Skip ahead to when shit hits the fan again.

>>24706143
I have 74.9k words on RR and 22 followers
I've written a non-fiction book that sold about 200 copies.
I have about 1 million words of unpublished tabletop RPG books.

>>24706474
this person doesn't know what tension is

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>>24706451
"Just keep hanging more guns on the walls"

>>24706474
see this is what I was talking about. The comic book style of editing. he day in the life that goes to shit when the premise starts to hit is meant to be jarring. You wanna just throw a haymaker. You gotta move around a little and jab a few times first.

>>24706427
>thank you, Tina
>very cool!
tina-anon checking in. I went and looked. I did not make that.

>>24706474
>When everything seems resolved something should immediately catch fire.
this is so kitsch
it can work but just as often it ends up tiring. there's no tension or impact if you're constantly jumping from crises to crises

I don't think good teachers of writing need their own accolades to be legitimate but nobody here is qualified to give good writing advice. At best, it'll consist of diluted and/or bastardised platitudes from other authors and teachers minus the experience and understanding it took to formulate the original advice.

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>Just cut my WN from 28,000 words to 20,000 in one afternoon
Why did I write so much SLOP that DOESN'T FIT? Arrrghhh! Stupid! I am a retard!

>>24706585
My MC's love interest has a thick bush but this will never come up in the story

>>24706596
My MC's love interest belongs to a tribe of women and her bush is practically steel wool.

>>24706474
I read a story like that, it was "Worlds’ Apocalypse Online"
I started writing what was wrong with the story's pacing but before i could finish describing all the "fires" that happened in the first 100 chapters i ended with a wall of text and ran out of space
Instead of making you read all that I'll just say: No, constant fires aren't good

>>24706531
People are pretending to be you now, Tina.

>>24706584
not everyone here is a beginner. i have plenty of experience

>>24706652
very cool, esoterictempo

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>>24706143
I was a retard when RR was still new and posted each "book" of my story on its separate fiction page instead of just continuing on the same (volumes weren't a thing yet at the time). Then I was a double retard and merged the old books onto the newest page with the least followers instead of the oldest page with over 800 followers and deleted the rest. So now I have a million words posted and barely 500 followers and abandoned my account

>>24706682
just relaunch

>>24706682
Can I see it? You don't care since it's abandoned yeah?

All of you writers are hacks, and the doctors among you are quacks, and if you don't agree you can kiss my sweaty sack. How's that?

>>24706682
That hurt to read

>>24706713
All i know is that the Primal Hunter author makes $72,130 a month and i want a slice of that

>>24706739
Self rubbing? Ridiculous. You're not a real author unless you sign away all your rights to a publisher only so they can make a singular shitty Instagram post with 20 likes.

>>24706713
I'm a simple retard. I just wanna roll out of bed, write 2,500 words of slop a day, and earn maybe 2-3k.

NEW FFF I REPEAT A NEW FFF CHAPTER HAS HIT THE SITE

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FFF-Class 'Unlucky Antagonist' returns with the first chapter(just half of it, sorry) of Volume 4: Leitmotif.

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/119783/fff-class-unlucky-antagonist-villains-origin-story/chapter/2582639/sinful-blade-part-one-draft

>>24706791
kys
>>24706790
I notice sometimes lolcows get hanger ons like this
are you his friend? do you think it's funny to ironically promote him? what goes on in the mind of someone like yourself?

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Funny filename post

>>24706791
Honestly was surprised by how much I enjoyed this. Left a comment to help with engagement.

>>24706817
>spill a bit of spaghetti and the crabs swarm in
pottery.jpg

>>24706823
Based Zucchini.
Right now, I’m kinda busy, but I plan to read all of yours.
Let me know if you’d like a review, and if so, tell me how many chapters I should read to give a fair one.

>>24706792
>do you think it's funny to ironically promote him?
not him but i ironically promote FFF, it absolutely is funny

>>24706836
Thanks, dude. I wouldn't mind a review, Conquest of Agentia is the best place to end because it's where the first proper story arc ends

Also I'll make sure to give you a review in return. What chapter do I need to read up too in FFF to give it a fair shake?

>>24706863
Finish Volume One.
But if that’s too long for you, then just read Scarecrow: Part Three.

>>24706873
I'll give scarecrow a look. Considering I'm also planning on reading crow and rabbit.

>>24706879
Read Rabbit first.
He is a better anon than me.

>>24706885
I'll get to both. Btw I do actually respect how into your own story you are. Though I do think you should advertise it on Reddit too

>>24706895
Tried it once, but I got shadow-banned after the first post.

>>24706901
Oh that sucks, dude.

Close your eyes, spin around and point. Whatever you're pointing at becomes

>[OBJECT]: EVOLUTION

>>24706913
Couch: EVOLUTION

>>24706901
which subreddit? progfantasy doesn't let you advertise unless you have posting history there, but litrpg does

>>24706932
LitRPG

>>24706938
what did you write?

>>24706913
Hatsune Miku 70% Full Cum Jar: Evolution

>>24706938
unlikely the mods banned you then. more likely your account was auto-banned by reddit in general for suspicious behavior or whatever

>>24706942
+1 follower = +1 cum

>>24706941
I've just posted my story.
Anyway, I think this anon is right
>>24706950
New account = suspect to filters.

>>24706913
Bookstack: Evolution

coming of sentience story of a mimic which can only eat books. as it eats more books it becomes more of well rounded person. when it accidentally eats too many tragedies, it becomes like an arrogant prince, when it eats too many melodramas it becomes a weepy woman, when it eats horrors it becomes a monster that wants to torment people, etc etc
it can eat spellbooks to learn spells and martial art tomes to learn fighting techniques. occasionally it eats the writings of enlightened monks, schizophrenic scholars, and deranged madmen and begins to see the true nature of reality
the story concludes with it eating the very story its written in

>>24706960
Pure cinema...

book about an isekai protagonist with the usual faggy ennui personality
he smokes looking out a window and says he will kill himself in response to any small inconvenience

halfway through volume one it's revealed that it's because he's french and the expression is a euphemism for jacking off

>>24706957
If that's the case then you should make a new account, make some filler posts and then advertise FFF. No reason not too.

>>24706986
I'll try, thanks Zuck.

>>24706986
no reason not to, that's true. but reddit advertisement is actually kind of ass. very little traffic there

>>24706984
there's that LN/manga where a suicidal novelist gets isekai'd after his suicide and he searches the world for the woman he killed himself with

>>24706989
Seriously? Prog fantasy, litrpg and humanity fuck yeah all seem to be decent active subs.

>>24707008
HFY is a sub you actually post to so yeah, post there if relevant
progfant and litrpg do get traffic, but i mean conversion into followers from ad posts is very very low and basically not really worth the hassle

>>24707014
That's true. It's a huge slog getting anywhere when it comes to advertising, but I've found you have to do it because the WN market is just so oversaturated at the moment.

Im looking for inspiration for my cultivation progression system
Yes, i am going to steal some of their good ideas
What are the best power progression systems you have read?

>>24707025
eh only actual site ads and shout outs are worth the time. the rest is noise tbqh

>>24707065
Oh yeah the site ad I've got going is doing well. I will need to do shout outs as well, honestly

>>24707077
shouts are kinda gey but don't hate the player, hate the game etc
you launch recently and trying to get onto rs rn?

>>24707045
I liked how cradle did the realms, with spiritsigns and the lord advancement methods.

>>24706644
>People are pretending to be you now, Tina.
that's scary.

>>24707081
Yeah that's the plan. Trying to get onto rs though it is a hurdle, lol.

>>24707095
RS has been more competitive as of late so you'll need 250-300 followers within like 30 days of posting. you even close to being on track for that?
unfortunately RS really is everything if you're aspiring to serious follower counts, so i would pull out every stop. run a second ad for example. you avoiding association with 4chan or you wanna drop your link so I can look it over?

>>24707045
I'll give you this one for free:

Building up various spiritual organs and patterns inside (spiritual cultivation vessel of choice eg dantian). Your cultivation foundation is like a factorio factory, countless different small parts that individually do simple things to start with. Cultivators encounter issues because the "factory" runs into bottlenecks, so stuff like fixing your foundation is related to figuring out how to fix the problem and the materials you need if applicable.

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>>24707081
>shouts are kinda gey
Trying to interact with fellow authors on Discord just reminds me of how much of a sperg I am.
I'll take a rate bomb any day if it means that I don't have to talk to people.

But if you don't game problems talking with people, shoutous are basically free advertising. If you're feeling balsy, skip the pleasantries and drop on the appropiate channel.

>>24707144
>game
have
>balsy
ballsy
>appropiate
appropriate

Been having more and more lately. Probably brain cancer or something.

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>>24706143
102,000 words, 366 followers

>>24707045
Why not just start with the basics?
Cultivation comes in stages:
>1. Qi Gathering
You suck in Qi from the world. You have rudimentary access to Qi techniques. Once you feel full you will start compressing that Qi into a foundation. Sometimes literally inside you in some spiritual space, other times infusing it into your body. The first of this levels you up.
Minor lifespan increase.
>2. Foundation Establishment
You keep building up your foundation by gathering more Qi and compressing it or infusing more of your body parts: tendons, bone, skin, heart, brain etc. once you're done with the whole body and have a solid foundation you will try to form a core in your dantian. It draws upon everything you did in foundation building and more. If you form a rudimentary core then you level up.
Minor lifespan increase.
>3. Golden Core/Revolving Core
You keep refining your core to become a "perfect golden core" by infusing more spiritual energy into it and removing impurities. Once you've reached the height of your golden core you will feel that you are ready. You then shatter your golden core to birth a nascent soul to level up. If you fail then you're either crippled or go back to Qi gathering. This is the first threshold that holds people back.
Minor lifespan increase.
>4. Nascent Soul
Your nascent soul successfully emerged from your golden core. Now you can do more spiritual (and soul?) attacks. You keep improving your soul to become stronger by infusing qi into it and learning to use it more. You keep strengthening this nascent soul. To level up you need to get your nascent soul beyond some strength threshold.
Large lifespan increase.
>5. Spirit Transformation
You have a strong nascent soul. You keep improving and strengthening it. Your goal is to forge your soul to become immortal in this stage. At the end of it you will feel when you are ready. Trying to make your soul immortal triggers a heavenly tribulation. If you pass through it you will have an immortal soul and will have leveled up.
You might get an inkling of a dao here.
Large lifespan increase.
>6. Immortal
You cannot die of old age anymore and your soul has become immortal. Your body is still that of an unaging mortal though. The cultivation at this stage is about changing your body to become immortal level itself.

>>24707222
Continued:

>7. True Immortal
Your body and soul are both immortal. You've done it, but it turns out there's a long path to go yet. It is time to start dedicating yourself to a dao. To level up you need to increase your comprehension of a dao beyond some threshold. You merge your dao with the world.
>8. Earth Immortal
You are a master of a dao. You are the most powerful form of any earthly being. The next step is moving towards ascension - to leave behind mortality (not really, but that's what they say). You improve your dao further and merge it with the heavens (idk come up with something). This triggers a heavenly tribulation that you have to pass.
>9. Heavenly Immortal
Few make it this far. You embody heavenly daos and rule across all immortals. Your body and soul are perfection, your dao is accepted by the world, yet there is even further still to go: to come up with a new dao and enforce it on the world. Once you do that you will level up and become an Empyrean (probably some heavenly tribulation too).
>10. Empyrean
The ultimate level. The dao comes as naturally as breathing to you. The world is your oyster. You are perfection, but there are still rumors that there is a level beyond where you are. You've never met anyone like that or even heard of anyone having met anyone like that, but the rumors still exist. Through some process nobody knows it might be possible to ascend further, to understand and feel the world better.
>11. Some ultimate level you come up with like "Divine King" or something
Turns out you were just a frog in a well. There are other universes out there and a Divine King is really no different from a foundation Establishment cultivator in the parent universe or something. Should've spent your time dual cultivating instead.

You can squish the immortal ranks and make the regular immortal be an earth immortal and the true immortal could be a heavenly immortal.

I'm >>24705608. I can write stuff like this easily. 800 words like it's nothing, but I can't write it as a story.
>>24705515
It's both and I get disappointed too.

>>24707088
Okay, seriously, what the fuck is cradle? I searched RR and it gave me 6 chapter story from 9 years ago, its not in the OP pastebin either, but it keeps getting recommended
>>24707126
I like the custom organs idea, but making it my sole gimmick? Its not familiar enough for the readers

>>24707045
I really like the Undying Immortal System’s way of treating advancement, the first three levels are basically free if you know how to cultivate but the next three require ‘karma’ from ruling a city, kingdom then empire. And when you want you advance past that you need karma produced from your clan members. It’s all supposed to make cultivation restrictive and give the feeling that ascending to immortality is actually difficult and nearly impossible. One of the main points is that the MC has to develop a form of karma less cultivation in order to advance the world and bypass these systems eventually

I've always wanted to be a creative ever since I was young. I've day dreamed about being one and tried working my ass off trying to write ever since I was around 12. My parents tried pushing me towards it for school assignments. I also wanted to draw but never got into it seriously.

I've been wanting to write again for nearly 2 years now and have barely made any progress towards that goal. I've only done one little drabble like 2 years ago and haven't done any exercises since then. I've been trying to get myself to write, but all of it looks too complicated and exhausting for me. I've tried multiple different strategies, but they never seem to work. I've tried forcing myself to write, but can only make myself write a couple of sentences for barely 30 seconds before stopping and looking at my phone again.

I've never been able to complete a single multichapter story in my entire life and actually coming up with stories isn't much better. I can't think anything through and everything about trying to make an entire story looks too hard for me. I want to be a creative really badly, but nothing I've done seems to have amounted to much of anything. I want to become one so badly, and I want to stop wasting my life doing nothing.

Should I try writing a web novel instead?

>>24707229
>what the fuck is cradle?
https://www.goodreads.com/series/192821-cradle
Book series—not a web novel. It's a cultivation story with western lens. It's written well enough and has likeable characters, people like it, so they recommend.

>>24707229
> Cradle
That's because it's not strictly a wns, it just has a lot of the style and tropes so it often gets mentioned since it was also very successful.

>>24707239
you should kill yourself, howie. that's what you should do
you are a known 4chan lolcow which is genuinely the bottom 0.0001% of humans. just off yourself

>>24707222
What is the actual origin of these?

>>24707263
This is what I commonly saw in cultivation novels. It's mostly made up, because Chinese myth itself treated golden core already as a legendary level and it probably didn't even go beyond nascent soul.

>>24707222
>>24707226
Thanks chatGPT

>>24707222
>>24707226
The problem with this power system is that every transformation after Nascent Soul is mechanically and aesthetically the same
In your own description, Qi Gathering is the start, a martial artists with some super powers
In Foundation Establishment you're actively augmenting your body to become superhuman
In Golden Core you create a new organ preparing to upgrade your soul
In Nascent Soul you can project your soul out of your body
And from Spirit Transformation its just direct upgrades without much diferences
The "Dao" is not much different mechanically than saying "High level Techniques"
Im trying to have something unique at every level, i think i have it covered up to "Stage 6", but i need more ideas

>>24707263
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_alchemy#Inner_alchemy_(Neidan)
I think it's from chinese alchemy and daoism. But if a chinese trope exists, it probably appeared in Journey to the West.

Tell me why the fuck I am having to tell people in /wg/ how to read. Is their reading comprehension really that bad?
>>24707274
>>24707279
>>24707288

>>24707229
Regarding >>24707126
I'm not suggesting to make it your sole gimmick, but it's a good way of handling the nebulous concept of "Cultivation Foundation" and to have a framework to fit all the actual detail of your cultivation into.

Think of it this way, different schools of cultivation have different foundation-building methodology, and different manuals let you use different "parts" for different effects.

You don't even have to get too much into the weeds of the specific "parts" besides the notable ones, readers who appreciate getting into the specifics of cultivation are much more easily satiated than you might think.

As for specific realms I suggest at least using something that can be directly compared to the usual realms (gathering to nascent soul) OR to make sure your system has very clear realm hierarchy (like using a generic "Tier 1-Tier Whatever" system and having different methods reach different stages on that tiering system)

>>24707294
kinda skimmed but if you're the one saying commas are necessary you are wrong

>>24707294
>smug
>incorrect
threadwar posters are so retarded

>>24707313
i generally try to support fellow sloptards but in this instance yeah. never be smug if you're wrong. even being smug and right makes me want to type kys

>>24707310
>>24707313
>>24707317
You have to go back.

>>24707344
look man im a friendly slopper. if you want to talk about why you're actually wrong im happy to.

>>24707267
Fuck. I really could've asked ChatGPT to write this rather than type it out myself on a phone. Fuck.
>>24707280
Then add those mechanical and aesthetic differences. Immortals infuse "immortal light" into things they use. Earth Immortals are so attuned to the natural world that they blend into it. They Heavenly Immortals project a domain around them that changes the world to fit their desires.
Spirit Transformation masters have the scent of heavenly tribulation on them. Whenever they do something remotely skillful the heavens react, as though they are about to drop a tribulation on him. This effect gets stronger the closer they get to immortality.
True Immortals become basically impervious to physical harm by anything below True Immortal level.
You could also use Immortal King and Immortal Emperor as some of the immortal levels. Tie their expression of power into something kingly.
>The Emperor beckons, the world attends.

>>24707347
Okay /wg/tard, spell ot out for me.

>>24707347
pretty sure you're wasting your energy and good will
I'm coming to conclude that /wng/'s good posters are anime posters, young masters, and lowercase posters
everyone else is FFF and tina or their derivatives

>>24707360
if you show even the slightest indicator you want to actually talk about this and not just flame each other sure. because i am the anon who made the very first /wng/ and you're kinda giving us a bad name rn

Somebody please read Nowhere Stars and tell me what I thought about it.

it's not even worth a whole conversation. strict grammar rules don't apply to creative writing and commas can easily be excluded in all sorts of scenarios, but especially the "X if Y" sentence construction

>>24707373
I quite liked it
creative ideas, well written visuals, cool powers, decent characters. there's a (villain) relationship I found compelling and charming. action is a bit iffy, some of it's pretty good, some a bit clunky. prosaically clean to good, has the occasional striking line
madoka magic X capeslop x lovecraft. the eldritch horror stuff is actually creative and interesting rather than the standard "aahhh, not the tentacles save me niggerman"
a bit female brained at times. I'm not sure if the author is actually female or just taking a lot of estrogen but the character reflections, while mostly good and interesting, can be a bit much

>>24707239
Nigga just write it’s literally that easy

>>24707369
My dad also works at Nintendo.

>>24707294
Most people on /lit/ cannot read. /wg/ is just on par with the average.

>>24707123
>you even close to being on track for that?
Absolutely not, desu.
>you avoiding association with 4chan or you wanna drop your link so I can look it over?
I think its fine associating with /wng/. Here's my current fic
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/128319/labours-of-zucchini-progression-fantasy-sci-fi

>>24707398
zucchiniGOD

>>24707350
>Whenever they do something remotely skillful the heavens react, as though they are about to drop a tribulation on him. This effect gets stronger the closer they get to immortality.
You know, before saying else, i want to say this is cool, im stealing this

>Then add those mechanical and aesthetic differences.
I did up to stage 6, kind of, im trying to have 3 different branches of cultivation in place, body, mind and soul, all with their own innate superpowers attached at each level
Soul is more or less traditional cultivation
Body is training, refining and upgrading your body until your have a bloodline evolution
And Mind is a more nebulous thing where emotions, the senses, psychic abilities, and the more mechanical brain related abilities (like reflexes and thought speed) are trained
Every branch have their own exclusive spells and abilities and intersect, meaning many HAVE to train more than one branch
But double cultivation means double the time needed for breakthrough, double the resources, double the manuals and so on, if you don't have a dedicated sponsor or from a rich family then it might be a huge waste of time, specially because you can't breakthrough the next level if the other cultivation is lagging

>>24707393
would be a very weird thing for me to lie about.

>>24707391
i was thinking madoka too when i read the blurb

You guys will write volumes in this thread but nothing toward your book. I'm the same, but it's still pathetic.

>>24707432
a cope to be sure

>>24707398
hmm the blurb is okay, the title and cover are kinda bad (from perspective of marketability, i hate having to clarify this each time)
how recently did you start running your ad?
it might be that the issue is your chap 1 + writing ability in general. haven't looked yet
if your ad has been running for a bit and you're still at 16 followers that means your story isn't vibing with RR for one reason or another. if you like writing this for writing it, keep going, but if you want patreonbux, mentally prepare yourself to go next

>>24707432
as one of the most constant posters in this thread, i also write a lot too. 2k+ avg. being a full time writer gives you a lot of shitposting hours. i figure this holds for other prolific /wng/ tards

>>24707438
>the title and cover are kinda bad (from perspective of marketability, i hate having to clarify this each time)
Imo yeah, I was planning on changing the cover but trying to wrangle commissions out of artists is surprisingly a pain in the ass.
>how recently did you start running your ad?
Ad went up 3 days ago, already gotten 5 follows and 7 read laters. Which is kinda eh.

>>24707449
1.5 follower a day from an ad is pretty bad yeah. unfortunately. you aiming for full time slop status, or is this a hobby? i just don't want to start slopdumping if you don't even care

>>24707455
I am ultimately aiming for full-time slop status, so hit me up. I basically have no clue what I'm doing atm, lol.

>read eastern xianxia
>mcs and characters harvest rare, exotic, and endangered/makes plants/species extinct in order to extract their gallbladder or penis or whatever to make pills to extract their bloodline
>read western xianxias
>same thing but either only criticize it, lampoon, or ignore it
>many such cases of otherworld Chinese acting like such
is it just me or do xianxia novels depict chinamen, whether of Earth or in fantasyland, as a roving band of devouring locusts that consume all nearby creatures thus driving them to extinction, only to be consumed themselves as food by either their own kind or spiritual animals?

>>24707490
western xianxias are mostly shallow parodies

>>24706739
Man, I’ve never clicked on the Patreon button before. Didn’t realize the ridiculous amount of money some of these authors are making. Guess this is what seeing dollar signs feels like.
So based on the OP’s link, I need to publish 2K words five times a week for two months, and only continue if the follower counts exceed 3K, otherwise cut the loss, right?

>>24707496
the prince of greed claims another

Where do Kindle novels go? Here or /sffg/? Quality wise I feel like they should go here.

Anyway, I read The Wandering Magus King and it was good. MC is a trucker from Earth that got isekai'd. He becomes a Caravan Mage, running his own caravan to trade between cities. Trade is fucked in that world though - at night silvery ghosts appear that possess people that are caught outside warded cities. It's a death sentence. Caravans and barges typically hire mages to protect them on multi-day trips. MC is a very effective mage at that and he goes around trading, getting richer, and increasing the size of his caravan.
There are a bunch of plots surrounding the people on the caravan and the kingdom they're in and they're alright.
The story barely qualifies as a harem story. MC fucked 3 women. He married a woman at the start to get her out of a legal obligation. They're supposed to be casual. Another woman MC had a casual fling with once. The last woman MC seems like he's in an actual relationship with. The author could've easily cut out the other two.

The second story I recently read is Magic's Mantle (Ard's Oath). It's good too. It has the best magic system I've seen in fantasy. Magic is in 4 spheres that each correspond to two opposing elements:
Wolf: lightning, earth
Serpent: life, death
Fox: fire, water
Raven: light, dark

When a mage casts a lightning spell, then their body gets flooded with the opposite element - earth mana. After casting some lightning spells a mage is full of earth mana. If they don't discharge it somehow then the earth mana will start slowly giving them animal characteristics based on the sphere of magic. With earth mana that would mean they start getting wolf traits. Mages usually discharge their magic into anchors by kissing them. This gives the mana to the anchor who can use it to reinforce their physical capabilities. Anchors and mages are a team.
The story is a harem, but so far MC has done nothing more than kiss 2 girls to discharge mana.

>>24707462
>He'd had been on the beast's trail, but when the storm hit, he'd lost it. He'd thought he'd
im reading through your chap 1 and there's a general lack of polish (your dialogue tag punctuation is wrong more often than not) that I would personally condemn. surely you can see the 'd spam. this means you need restructuring (often you can omit further 'hads' since they're implied)
but that said, RR readers don't actually care much for polish and grammar, only flow. (BOC proves this; it's the most followed fiction on the site and the author doesn't know how to punctuate either, but he has a natural ear for sentence flow)
still, i would recommend you learn the basics, especially with the bar raising since litrpg slop is slowly going mainstream and thus becoming more competitive. writing smooth sentences will never hurt, and it's a personal autismpoint of mine

hm. but real analysis. rr readers want dopamine. anyone does, society is fucked, but especially when it comes to the slopsite, rr wants dopamine. i think the most important part of grabbing a reader's attention is making a promise that dopamine will come, which means executing on (some scenario that will provide dopamine). this actually covers a lot of different situations, whether smut, face-slapping and other aura-farming, dramatic scenario payoff, or idk, whatever. but point being nothing about your story from cover, title, blurb, to 33% of chapter 1 gave me the impression i would get dopamine from this story.
and that's kinda a bleak perspective to condemn your writing for, but i'm very deep in the slop and am pretty confident that's why you aren't performing. the writing isn't the best but it isn't that bad either, and it has topical tags. so i think failure comes from failure to provide dopamine.

put it in your own words: what is supposed to excite me about this story? what, specifically, is the hook that should get me pumped to read? Many stories can provide one simple line. For example, the proto-typical example: the stomped-on weakest, pitiful MC grows in strength and gets revenge on his bullies. If you have any creative impulse, that single sentence has sparks flying in your brain, no?
i think more artistic, skillful stories can get away with not brain-hacking. like katalepsis. but you didn't blow me away with your writing straight off the bat. so you aren't in that group, i think

i will say just now that i've been drinking so this was maybe more of a sloppy dump that usual. but i read it over and stand by it

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>>24707490
>endangered/makes plants/species extinct in order to extract their gallbladder or penis or whatever
Isn't it quite the known stereotype of Chinese making traditional medicine? I think it's quite the cautionary tale if you stop to think about it. Much of China's natural beauty or other countries are/were torn apart for medicine/prosperity/status.
Like supporting a civil war in Burma for jade, or killing an entire species of fish for a dam.

>>24707492
They're boring, because the authors sanded off all the interesting pieces.
>no harem
>villains aren't over the top evil
>MC isn't cruel to his enemies
>no extreme power
>no aphrodisiac scenes
>no damsels in distress
>no grandpa
>no loli

The authors are just writing too safe.

>>24707502
Tbh the awkward secret with the fic is that it wasn't meant to be a web novel. And that the first couple "arcs" were one off stories written awhile ago.

>but point being nothing about your story from cover, title, blurb, to 33% of chapter 1 gave me the impression i would get dopamine from this story.
Don't worry dude, I'm thankful you broke this down for me because it is needed.

>but i read it over and stand by it
No you're right, it wasn't a good first chapter. Honestly. It shouldn't have been the first chapter in the first place but I wanted more of a backlog so I cobbled it together.

>>24707506
>no aphrodisiac scenes
Coming out of A Will Eternal recently, I think I'm personally good on those for this cycle of the wheel. I follow one fun western xianxia but it gets a lot of backlash on /lit/ because the femMC gets raped then unraped lol

>>24707499
>Where do Kindle novels go? Here or /sffg/?
I would say: if they started as web novels, they should go here. But anons talk about whatever.
>The Wandering Magus King
Not much to say about this one, cover looks kinda trashy. Stories like these don't do well on RR as far as I know, but ScribbleHub has a market for these. Did you liked it?
>he goes around trading, getting richer, and increasing the size of his caravan.
Like the progression version of Spice and Wolf? I can see the appeal (beyond the harem).
>Magic's Mantle (Ard's Oath)
So mages become furries if they don't kiss girls?
>The story is a harem, but so far MC has done nothing more than kiss 2 girls to discharge mana.
Sounds kinda lame, but these sort of stories really depend on the character chemistry imo.

>>24707492
This was mostly true like five years ago when xianxia was new to the west
You only feel this way now because you are still mostly familiar with the most popular westoid cultivation (which was written over five years ago for the most part)
Read Virtuous Sons

Biggest learning part of getting published through the partner program:

It basically kills your natural growth as far as RR goes, because of stubbing. The moment that book is locked up in the contract, 70% of its revenue will come from amazon and it basically becomes a "normal" book in that sense, you won't get many new patrons from it.

I was originally planning to do at least two volumes a year, but now I think I'll slow down and start a new one with what I've learned and try to slopatreonmaxx this one.

>>24707546
not reading that because it's not even the right setting

>>24707490
but chinxia also criticizes overharvesting and overhunting and often has systems to manage it in the setting

>>24707549
>western xianxia
>western setting
real thinker

>>24707556
reinventing the wheel when the wheel hasn't even been built yet

>>24707548
Are you the published enjoyer of muscle women?

>>24707553
>mc goes to secret realm
>finds herb garden
>herb garden contains x integer year old herb or plant
>narration and mc recognize it as a valuable herb, now extinct
>instead of trying to propagate it or otherwise preserve it, the mc or other characters immediately uproot it and either eat it it raw or turn it into a pill
>thus returning said herb or plant to extinction
many such cases

>>24707530
>Did you liked it?
I did. It really reminded me of a fantasy web novel.
>cover looks kinda trashy
It is bad. I'm not even sure who that is on the cover. Only one of the women in the story used a knife and magic, but she doesn't look like the woman on the cover.
>Like the progression version of Spice and Wolf?
Well, kind of. It's not entirely focused about trading. He's still a force to be reckoned with and does odd jobs here and there to earn extra money, like kill monsters when they're close by.
>So mages become furries if they don't kiss girls?
Yes, and they seem to be shunned by the kingdom when they become corrupted by the magic, so they flee. They also became mentally unstable over time. Mages are in short supply compared to Anchors, so the kingdom tries to accommodate mages. Anchors basically swear their life to a mage. They don't generate their own mana, all their power comes from a mage.
MC is a very rare 4 sphere mage that can cast magic from all 4 of them. But he's also an 18 year old orphan whose love of his life ran off on him a few years ago and became an anchor. She came back to him when he awakened as a mage and it's been awkward.
I haven't finished the book, so I'm unsure how far they progress. I assume he'll get an anchor for each of his spheres and that's where the harem comes from.

>>24707561
Yeah. To elaborate, what actually killed Cherno Caster's RR growth was me completely eating shit and cratering my output for months at a time, HOWEVER prior to the aforementioned output loss, I experienced a surge of new followers from MQ's advertising campaign, which petered off and then died out, afterwards my follower growth not only stagnated but began regressing. I've also asked others who published and stubbed (and didn't shit the bed and get massive writer's block like I did) and they agreed with me, so I'm just saying it like it's a fact now because it feels like it makes sense.

As I see it a story being stubbed is naturally a filter for a RR novel's ability to gain new readers, say you have 10 "potential followers" who click. 2 of them just drop the novel for whatever reason, leaving 8. 2 more just don't remember to follow, leaving 5. 5 follow (optimistic estimate) but ah, it's stubbed, 4 aren't invested enough from the 10 preview chapters so they don't buy, leaving only 2, an 80% reduction.

The real numbers aren't like this but you get my point.

>>24707576
>2 more just don't remember to follow, leaving 5
6. I meant 6.

>>24707523
Sure, but some people like them. They add spice that doesn't usually exist in other stories. (They might be in other cultivation novels, but aren't in non-cultivation novels.) I'm saying that western cultivation novels have sanded off all these sharp edges and they become boring.

>>24707523
how do unraping

>>24707585
Do it, but you’re probably too afraid of being accused of using AI.
Stop being paranoid, people can tell the difference between AI and real writing.

>>24707574
Thanks for your thoughts. Gonna put Magic's Mantle in my read list (it may take a year for me to get to it though).
>Well, kind of. It's not entirely focused about trading. He's still a force to be reckoned with and does odd jobs here and there to earn extra money, like kill monsters when they're close by.
I see. I suppose it's hard to write a story that's about trading and come up compeling for the average reader.
>>24707576
Yeah, stopping the slop machine seems to be the main reason for fiction popularity death. But I do think that stubbing may do more harm if you aren't careful about it. Also, Moonquill's campaing on the site is quite shit to be honest—I saw your fiction a bunch of times and yet I wasn't compelled enough to click it (as a reader). No tying theme for the fictions there, except the publisher.
I do agree with your filter point: people click, see if it's their taste and then decide to follow or keep reading; most won't make it.
In my naive (and unsuccessful author) opinion, stubbing can be lucrative, but it seems to be better when your novel has reached a 'mature' state of growth—when it has slowed down.

Hope it goes better on your next work, and thanks for sharing your experience about it.

>>24707604
>In my naive (and unsuccessful author) opinion, stubbing can be lucrative, but it seems to be better when your novel has reached a 'mature' state of growth—when it has slowed down.

Hard agree with this. I think they were hoping Cherno would blow up (so was I to be fair) and it just didn't. Such is life.

>>24707548
I think I'll go through this route for my first fic once its done.

>>24707605
I'm sure you can recover from it, you already have a following and can easily reach RS. Get behind that keyboard grind and you're gold.

>>24707604
>I see. I suppose it's hard to write a story that's about trading and come up compeling for the average reader.
In the setting you basically need mages to do long distance trading. Ghosts seem to only possess humans (or maybe humanoids), so all the monsters roam freely.

I forgot to mention earlier: I like that mana is limited in that world. Mana is counted in knots and MC and most of the mages we've seen so far have mana in the single digits. Fighting doesn't consist of throwing lots of spells around, rather one very effective spell and then regular combat.
MC is an OP healer (because he got isekai'd), but even he can only heal like 1-2 people a day with all his mana. That also means he isn't casting any other spells for the day. This kind of scarcity is really cool.

If there's something i absolutely fucking hate in cultivation novels is having to memorize all the chink names
There's got to be to a long LONG line of "Long"s (Dragon)
Like Long Tian and Long Ma and you have to remember who the fuck are these people and what they do in the story
Everything eventually becomes a blur, i imagine for many readers too
So much so im thinking to have it not set in China at all, i might even go full weaboo and set it in Japan, at least those names are a bit more legible

>>24707615
i await the vancian webnovel

>>24707616
set it in modern L.A
drug dealer cultivation

Anybody here using this method? If so, how's it working for you?

https://www.royalroad.com/forums/thread/132239

>>24707613
On a new novel, yeah I'm sure I can hit RS no problem. Hard part is actually doing it of course.

>>24707616
This is also my most common reason for dropping translated chinese stuff. I just can't remember or differentiate the names.

>>24707618
That's just cultivation

>>24707623
way too long to read through. looks like typical royalroad forum nonsense with tons of pointless buzzwords
the general idea that you shouldn't dump your whole story at once is braindead obvious and the fact he's presenting it as revolutionary advice kinda disgusts me
stop getting advice from unsuccessful retards pls

>>24707616
Just read more and you'll get used to it.

which would MC archetype is generally better received on RR?

The Classic Hero, ala Del Ray
>Young, inexperienced
>Heroic but unpolished character
>Will be guided by a supernatural/elder mentor figure
>Hero’s Journey

The Unhinged Autist:
>So aggressively one dimensional it becomes 3D
>Cannot comprehend the concept of other perspectives existing
>Indirectly responsible for most of the conflict faced throughout the story
>Doesn’t care to adjust behavior, will continue the pursuit to kill Chaos or whatever

The Well-Meaning OPMC Stuck in Politics
>An OPMC, with all that entails
>Stuck in position of power that necessitates scheming and plotting and general management skills
>IQ is average to lower than average, thus crashes through delicate political situations through strength
>Constantly struggling over the temptation to just kill every figure of power in the local sphere the MC is beholden to and abandoning the many responsibilities the circumstances of birth bring

>>24707644
the woman (80 iq hyper sexualized bimbo)

>>24707636
i read a little more closely and can see he's actually saying not to use a ""hare"" strategy over a ""tortoise"" strategy (fucking kill me) and there's some nuance there, at least. no shot im reading the whole rambling dump of a post, but no, posting faster is definitely better, especially when you start out, because your goal is to hit rising stars and as a new author your only traffic comes through new updates (unless you're doing shout outs and ads)

i was going to type more but realized there's too much "yes, but" "well, sort of" etc to this whole situation, and it's really not that complicated, i honestly would've figured it's common sense but i guess not. go read my quick start guide in the OP. im drunk and going to sleep now, good night anons

>>24707658
goodnight lowercase i anon
one of the good ones

>>24707644
#2 being the mentor figure to #1 is kino

>>24707666
elevated taste

>>24707653
That's the love interest

>>24707644
Make #3 smart instead, he just doesn't have patience. He knows he should do better, but the situation just pisses him off all the time.

>>24707741
it's cooler when they're an unga retard
characterizes the strength and being a person defined by simple principle

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there has to be someone here that's gone from the anime to pseud and back to anime again pipeline, right? how do you get over the pretentious sort of shame that follows writing things that are YA or webnovel ish? I let anons influence my thinking here a few years back and want to return to what I was doing before because it was so much more fun to write without any sense of seriousness. I need to get out of pseudbrain please help me

>>24707919
Sort of, yeah. I had a HFY phase for a few years where I was trying to write it more or less as serious SF and then I got into tokusatsu and realized gonzo bullshit played as serious as a funeral is the way to do

>>24707919
the pseud mind virus relies on a craftsman-like perspective. if it's caught you in its claws then it's probably an issue of values
I've got terminal pseud brain rot and want to be a slopper. for me, I want to write something good. and that means fulfilling my personal value system which determines what is good
to correct this, I think the best approach is to adjust your value system to praise fun at the expense of everything else. stop reading literary work and binge slop. feed the inner child
when you write and start overworking something, stop yourself and ask "does this make my story more fun?" and if you get tempted to think making a perfectly wrought phrase would be fun, then tell yourself it'd be more fun to get to the next exciting plot beat or reveal sooner than to mire in this moment

>>24707919
Be sincere. I have no reason to be ashamed about anything I write

Imagine you had a litrpg world where everyone had 6 stats and you can put points into them after leveling up:
>Strength
>Dexterity
>Constitution
>Intelligence
>Wisdom
>Charisma
However, in this world everyone gets a divine boon that copies all the points you put into a specific stat into another stat. Which stat differs from person to person.

For example, all the points John puts into Strength also get added to his Constitution.

What would be the most useless stat combination?


(Intelligence doesn't make you smarter, Wisdom doesn't make you wiser, and Charisma doesn't make you prettier.)

>>24708017
do the points you specifically add to a stat get mirrored onto the base total of the stat you're mirroring onto or are both stats just made forcibly equal

>>24708021
They get added.
Let's say John has 10 Vitality and 12 Strength starting out. He levels up and adds a point into Strength. His STR is now 13 and his CON 11.

If he had put the point into CON instead then he would have 11 CON and 12 STR.

Intelligence increases magical power.
Wisdom increases mana capacity.
Charisma increases how charming you are.

>>24708029
By vitality on the first line I mean constitution.

>>24708017
without knowing the rest of your system, it isn't clear what "useless" means.
I guess on the surface it'd be stuff like mages getting additional unnecessary strength and martial classes getting additional mana or magic power (but then that'd surely mean the potential for hybrid classes and more utility/breadth etc at no extra cost)

>>24708017
Constitution + wisdom seems pretty useless since it increases passive potential without any way to actively use it. But what narrative purpose does this system serve?

>>24708048
that's only if higher-tier physical attacks don't use mana somehow I guess

>>24708052
Why would physical attacks use mana? Strength growth is fucked anyway, so it doesn't matter.

>>24708064
I guess this is a simple way for anon to set up his shoelacer story
>impossible! he can convert mana into attack power with the secret techniques of the asspull school!? but he was supposed to be useless!

>>24708064
Infusing your attacks with mana seems like a good way to get extra damage.
>>24708047
I was mostly just thinking. On closer thought I don't think any combination is actually bad. It would always offer some kind of niche to go for. At the same time though, this blessing seems to basically lock your future path.

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>the better the rank the less potential there is for repeating digits

>>24708077
if this mechanic and the class-locking implications it entails isn't going to be a big part of the narrative and characterisation, you might be overthinking it

>>24707919
Strangle the voice that tells you to delete 70% of what you wrote and rewrite it.

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>constantly shifting between waves of "it's shit, just stop" and "no, it's actually pretty fun"

>>24708017
>Intelligence doesn't make you smarter, Wisdom doesn't make you wiser
I hate when authors do this. Either change the names to mana control, power, throughput, or whatever the fuck you actually mean, or actually give an impact to brain speed/memory and such. Otherwise, if I read your shit, I will just think you were too dumb to write smarter characters.

>>24708186
Try explaining that to Wizards of the Coast.

>>24708186
I agree
I think intelligence, wisdom, even charisma generally makes for bad stats

>>24708186
You think that's dumb, but eat up bullshit like
>nooo you can't do push-ups to increase your STR, you have to use stat points from level up

>>24708239
OK, write a litRPG where people can level up by going to the gym instead of grinding dungeons. That's would be a pretty novel concept.
Gymrat Journal - I Reach Max Level by Bulking up

>>24708258
Level Up by Dan Sugralinov

>>24708258
I would, but I'm 100% sure it's been done already. This genre is so spent

>>24708258
Gymrat Bro Evolution [Cultivation LitRPG]

>>24708258
This is why stats themselves are stupid

LitRPG is just so lazy...

>>24707432
My webnovel is pretty much done. I'm just prepping for launch.

litRPG where your stats are an actual representation of your physical health and stats
>hit a bench PR, STR goes up by +1 as you finish the rep
>bad night's sleep, 20% debuff to all stats
>read a textbook, +1 to wisdom
>jerk off, 100/130 mana, -5 'unwanted' debuff to charisma
>accept a job offer, class changes to developer
>grow old, watch as all your stats but wisdom decay

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>have to change my magic school setting from high school level to college so I wouldn't get b& for implied underage romance
>have to redesign the entire curriculum and implement more advanced subjects
fuck my life, why do I even bother? It's going to flop anyway

>change entire plot
or
>not have the two adolescents fuck
what do I do guys

>>24708328
Why can't the two adolescents just hold hands?

dude is too stupid to figure out the "btw all characters depicted are 18 :^)" figleaf that VNs figured out 20 years ago lol

>>24708322
FFF-Anon here. Just make the flow of time confusing, and it will work.

My characters are 14, but since each day has 36 hours and each week has 12 days, their age is vague enough for readers to assume whatever they want.

>>24708341
>each day has 36 hours and each week has 12 days
if you aren't a qualified physicist+chronologist+horologist you shouldn't be doing stuff like this
writers who aren't qualified linguists and anthropologists shouldn't be creating conlangs either

>>24708353
But, I'm.

>>24708328
There's no sex planned, but I don't want to hear any whining about "the characters are 16 years and 10 months old YIKES the undertones in this scene made me really uncomfortable, btw 0.5 stars"

>>24708374
Are the whiners in the room with you right now

>>24708341
Amazing. Everything you tell me about your story only puts me off more.

>>24708379
My previous story had a 34-year-old guy ask a 19-year-old out (rejected), and it was followed by an exchange in the comments about what a scummy guy he was and how weird that I would portray him in a positive light before

>>24708385
How are those two situations even comparable?

>>24708385
yeah no shit my dude

>>24708389
>romance with grown adults is bad
>romance with actual children is fine
I forgot where I am

>>24708380
36 hours day
12 days week
3 weeks month
12 months year for a total of 37 weeks.

KINO

>>24708396
You should know how it goes, 14-year-olds fucking around with other 14-year-olds is fine with the RR audience but if there is an age gap involved it becomes DISGUSTING even if they are chastely courting each other before marriage.

>>24708403
how does this interact with the narrative?otherwise this is just weird arbitrary wiki entry world building

>>24708411
For example, my magic academy divides its hours into three main blocks.

Study hours: from 6 a.m. to 6 m.m.
Training, club, and working hours: from 6 m.m. to 6 p.m.
Resting hours---students can’t leave the school’s perimeter: from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.

>>24708417
Right, it would have been too hard to divide 24 by 3 otherwise

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Should I unironically take my fantasy novel and just add 'it's a video game' to the plot, and then after every fight put in 'he went from level 1 to 2'? if I want to raise my chances of being noticed?

>>24708437
noticed? maybe but if all you're doing is shoehorning litrpg systems to your failed tradpub pet project then it's going to be shit.

I exclusively read Google-translated Chinese slop, so I’m out of touch with the RR side of webnovels.
Have any of them ripped off the whole big bad is about to die, but then the good guys got to see his memories and realize he’s the true hero all along, yet?

>>24707583
Restoration of virgin yin + memory edit of the actual rape itself. She still remembers that the rape occurred but she doesn't remember the actual rape itself. This was during a subplot about the maleMC being ruthless enough to survive in a cultivator's world since he was kind and easygoing; of course he immediately sought out and killed his waifu's rapist of his own volition when it happened since we all love our power fantasies.

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>Protagonist is a loser
>Reads vampire fiction
>Goes out at night larping like a retard
>Runs into a real vampire and becomes her ghoul
>He thinks it's gonna be like r64 Interview With A Vampire
>In reality she's a lazy retarded slob who needs someone to do the dishes
I really love writing this but I'm already running out of steam desu. Please give me ideas.

For the retard who was telling me nobody posts short chapters on RR and that 1,5k was too short, Second Life as a Soldier is currently climbing RS with whopping 600-word chapters and stellar ratings

>>24708639
>Tiny chapters
>AI art
He's doing it...

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>>24708639
Remove all the levelling and it's half that.

>Protagonist is a loser
>No friends, no family
>Dead-end job
>Life filled with regret
At least half the isekais start like this. Do people really?

>>24708653
was ready to be your patreon by the 3rd line

>>24708616
Introduce an incompetent vampire hunter.

>>24708639
Damn. Shoul've stuck with my 1k chapters then.
>>24708653
As someone writing one, there's the uncomfortable trope of 'going back home' that's rather imcompatible with the usual isekai=better life setup. So you just say that there's nothing for them to reminisce or mop about and carry on.

>>24708652
>Guard Duty
>Geography
>Soldier's Breathing
>Journaling
>Pattern Recognition
>Soldier's March
>Map Reading
>Combat Journaling
>Tactical Memory
>Siege Rigging
This has got to be a joke. Why are there so many filler skills

>>24708660
Why didn't I think of this? Thanks, man.

>>24708652
This isn't anything. This is seriously just sentence after sentence of "I did thing. It worked. Level up!"

>>24708662
>>24708653
19th century isekai - I want to go home.
20th century isekai - I want to tame this strange new world.
21th century isekai - I want to die and do it all over.
22th century isekai - I want to die.

>>24708681
*21st
*22nd
I can't spell. I want to die.

>>24708639
nobody did post chapters that short. and if you disagreed you should have provided counter examples when we were arguing. i would still recommend against small chapters because 1 out of the top 25 doing it doesn't change my very sensible advice that you should have chapters that fit the norm of the site

on an unrelated note: that story clearly has AI prose and is even labeled as such. the fact it's performing so well is a horrifying omen