Are there any good horror WNs?

DON'T read Clara Casewell, Attorney to the Villainess by cocopi
it's pee

>>25389099
>I just struggle to believe anyone actually cares about the details
That's your problem. If you treat your lore as irrelevant trivia, it stays as irrelevant trivia.
>>25389134
Hello, Kinoman.

the time has come to write the final chapter
i don't want to do it

>>25389050
Now tell me about their trade economies, anon. Give me the details about their cultural exchanges with their neighbors, their immigration and emigration, their agriculture, their weather, their art, their theatre, their legislation, their medical technology, their war heroes, their royal scandals, their underground crime syndicates, their festivals, the folklore that inspired their festivals, their religion, their literature, their zeitgeist, their architecture, their political dissidents, their geopolitics, their domestic customs, their explorers, their national identity.

Then tell me how some aspects of the country conflict with others in your story. You are absorbed in the character of the landmass and not the people that gave the landmass its character.

>>25389168
fuck off george

You should put the effort you invest in defining the Asfsjahf kingdom's tax policies into fleshing out your main characters and maybe your story could be worth reading.

>>25389168
It's great to write this up for a setting but there's almost never reason to bring 95% of it up during a story. It's more like a reference for the author.

>>25389143
>Are there any good horror WNs?
Yes. Yandere harem WNs.

>>25389300
I'd prefer non-romance horror WNs.

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>>25389168
I'm not honestly sure if it will serve any sort of story purpose beyond explaining how kingdoms came into being.

only the most annoying kind of readers (that you dont even want as readers) care about boring worldbuilding logistics bs
1 gold coin equals 100 silver equal 100 bronze. throw it in early to filter the schizos so they leave. thank me later

>>25389345
This isn't how kingdoms are formed. You play too many map painting games

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>>25389381
Bait, but I'll bite

>>25389302
There are non-romance yandere harem WNs, but I don't recommend them on account of them being broadly depressing, generally landing somewhere between angstfests and torture porn.

>>25389140
I started reading Murim Psychopath and then I made the mistake of reading the manhwa.

>>25389376
>1 gold coin equals 100 silver equal 100 bronze
why would this filter anyone?

>>25389423
because to be historically accurate it should be
>1 silver coin = 12 bronze coin = 20 copper coin

Honeslty, I don't even know why fantasy has gold coins, medieval gold coins didn't have it until late medieval period when Florestines did their gold coins.
So, Romans used to have gold coins, but by 5th century they had replaced them with silver coins, because emperor had debated value of gold coins for short term profit, so gold no longer had much value.
In 14th century, Republic of Florence brought them back, because had excessive wealth.
Kingdom of England tried to have their own gold coin but because they couldn't guarantee its value like Florence, the gold in those coins was valued more than the coins themselves, so people would re-forge those gold coins into something more valuable.

>>25389441
Dumb ass gay nigger. Youre in a webnovel thread so your coin autism should be based on those shiny chinese boats.

>>25389441
>Honeslty, I don't even know why fantasy has gold coins
Because they are awesome, you sperg. Yes, sensible currencies are wonderful but as long as people don't actually carry gold coins that would weigh far too much around like they are worthless printed money, it's fine. Best reason to have them is that dungeons drop them as loot, anyway.

>>25389441
pretty sure the 1g = 100s, 1s = 100c convention comes from WoW or some other boomer MMO
D&D uses 1g = 10s, 1s = 10c

>>25389140
Read The Legends of Ren Zhu to my girlfriend as a bedtime story

fun

>>25389489
>Read The Legends of Ren Zhu to my girlfriend as a bedtime story
Aren't you worried that she will tell her friends in elementary school about you?

>>25389496
Then they too will know peak

Reminder to NEVER EVER do business with family or friends.

I've come to terms with letting go of a current project (emotionally), but I'm still tied by familial obligation to finish the project at some point and pay out for utterly subpar work and a horrible commissioning experience. The last month has been hell trying to juggle that unproductive, unsuccessful, unprofitable nonsense at the expense of my other more successful and profitable story.

I never should have done this from the start. Oh well. The nice thing is that after a day and a half of raging about it (quietly to myself) I've let go emotionally and now the entire world seems much brighter and I don't care what happens. There was never any reason to spend money to make myself miserable to throw a bone to family. I should have just gifted him the money instead. We'd all be much happier.

Never go into business with family or friends.

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>>25389441
This is why you are a shit writer. You think your shithole is the entire world.

Hint: more of the planet and generally civilizations exist outside of INGERLAND and Western Europe.

>>25389229
Hemmingway says to write only 1/8th of the story, the tip of the iceberg. He's right. Otherwise, you have the author writing too many things that the reader can assume and will skim over.

>>25389402
>Reading about history from a wiki
ngmi

>>25389573
You can do it so long as you keep your lines firmly set, and you don't give them a goddamn dollar 'til it's done. If they bitch, you tell them you pay for finished work.

>>25389573
mom and pop shops eternally BTFO

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>>25389489
>>25389496

>>25389441
>because to be historically accurate it should be
>1 silver coin = 12 bronze coin = 20 copper coin
Exchange rates between metals were never historically consistent and coin values depended as much on weight and purity as anything.

>>25389662
See I haven't paid anything for unfinished work, but at this point I'd RATHER pay for the unfinished work and write it off as a total loss than continue to be tortured with updates on how it's coming.

Well, I've already made my decision to stick it out until the full project is finished, but I'm not going to play the deadline game anymore, and I'm going to ask for quality cuts to get to an MVP and call it good enough. The next three covers are going to be massively simplified, basically just a character portrait and that's it. Anything more complicated makes me just want to kill myself.

>>25389679
that was the point of Pepin the Short's economic reform

>MC gets isekai'd into xianxia world into the body of a young master
>Shit grammar, but interesting setup
>Twist 30 chapters later: MC isn't isekai'd at all
>He just grabbed some memories from another universe after he lost his own
Why are authors retarded like this?
The story started with MC getting a blowjob from a servant after being isekai'd. I was hoping for more of that, but the isekai'd MC is too nice for that. He treats everyone courteously etc. And then on top of that the author goes "this isn't even an Isekai lmao."

In what universe is it a good idea to bait and switch readers? It's already hard enough to find a male MC power fantasy story in English that doesn't involve some leftist virtue signaling. Even rarer for it to be xianxia. But then authors just rug pull you too.

Is Cradle like the only English xianxia story? Ave Xia Rem Y did a rug pull. This one did a rug pull. What the fuck is wrong with western authors?

>>25389704
They're irony-pilled. It's terminal

>>25389184
What does "fleshing out your main characters" mean here? Can you elaborate?

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>>25389723
fleshing out a character is cosplay by uyuy

>>25389723
Tell us about their tits and asses, along with any prominent moles.

>>25389702
>that was the point of Pepin the Short's economic reform
Protip: Economic reforms for metal coins all failed until fiat currency was introduced.

I should be advertising my new release on reddit right now.

I'm on my fourth Kuva Lich of the day instead.

I should kill myself (smug tone)

Should I make THE National Destiny webnovel that makes the genre famous in the West?

>>25389704
>Is Cradle like the only English xianxia story?
Virtuous Sons.

>>25389704
Memories of the Fall is great, if you can handle the dozen povs, slow setup, and glacial pace

>>25389781
From the description this sounds like a disguised RWBY fanfic

>At a very climactic, major fight between two incredibly important characters
>Fucking worm in my brain wants to do an alt-POV chapter describing the fight instead
My readers are going to have to cope with getting Baki'd because I will just write the fucking fight twice from the main POV angle then the alt-POV angle (the latter will still move the plot forward)

>>25389737
Are you a masochist?

>>25389797
I've been frying my brain trying to get through my backlog of vaulted relics for so long that Liching my shit is enjoyable.

>>25389785
It better have crazy weapon designs and over-the-top fights or else what's the fucking point?

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>>25389781
Brain had the wires crossed and I thought you were talking about the Brad Pitt movie.

Anyone in the web novel patreon leak discord got an invite?

What a fucking disappointment. The author is just another hack writing chinaslop, I can't believe I thought this idiot actually read a real book before.

The prose at the beginning actually felt a little like a real book, even if it was a little shit -at least the structure was there, but it transformed into another RI halfway through, actually using some of the same phrases sometimes. Just terrible.

The real killer was how amateurish it came together. Almost all the climaxes were flattened by the author in the most retarded way possible. Like the end of the first volume: why the fuck did his revival need to happen at the same chapter? Where's the fucking suspense? The worst thing about it is how easy it is to fix.

The lovecraftian shit fell off hard too. Like I said, he flattened every climax like a retard, didn't build up shit, just dropped "cosmos" on the page and that was it. From how much he likes Bloodborne you would think he would know how to build some suspense, but no, it's just there.

At least the lore was interesting, and the parts about the Forgotten lands were actually good.

>>25389841
I'm talking about Lord of the mysteries. Forgot the image. Also, the translation is trash.

>>25389837
Yeah sure here you go https://discord.com/invite/7r8S2fV6WZ

>>25389841
Honestly thought you were passive-aggressively shitting on (Me, the Main Character)'s work until the bit about dropping cosmos on the page.

>>25389862
lmao

>>25389841
I feel like your expectations for a translated, Chinese web novel are a little high. You're basically signing up for lore dissertations and an endless stream of content, the method of delivery is where the corners are cut.

>>25389841
>The prose at the beginning actually felt a little like a real book, even if it was a little shit -at least the structure was there
That's because the beginning was rewritten by translators (or I should say localizers) after the entire story was finished some number of years ago.
There was some nuance that was lost in the new translation that would have tied the way the scene was set to some revelations near the end.

The truth is that when you're dealing with translations, of Asian media especially, you're going to get a shit version no matter which way you slice it. It's either a direct and literal translation which is essentially unreadable or straight fan-fiction. Finding that middle ground of acceptable jank and readability is where the skill from a translator comes in.

>>25389841
Well obviously LotM is chinaslop it's written by a Chinese guy.
>Forgotten Lands
If you didn't drop it already stick with it to Volume 6
Also check out Deathblades (Jeremy Bai) localization of Beyond the Timescape by Er Gen. This is the best anyone could hope for from a localization/translation of a Chinese work as it's done by a former diplomat. Entire work is localized and they handled stuff like Chinese idioms and titles that look awkward in English.

>>25389737
Space ninja biopunk web novel when

Books with an actual intelligent/genius MC? Not ones where we’re just told they’re incredibly smart etc, but one where they actually are. Preferably non translated.

I am ESL, can you beautiful people read and tell me how bad it is? Can you actually read through it all and understand what's going on? I really want to write more of it but not being English speaker stops me dead. I have tried to write in American English as hard as I could.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wJlU7OTcrDQ3nlYTXUt7LnBJqu2xMDRcKZnnMZTOab0/edit?tab=t.j3rqxeb5o620

>>25389140
I want to include a scene where characters talk about vaginal fisting. Think it's cringe on principle?

>>25389935
Define intelligent/genius MC.

>>25389936
None of it looks terribly bad, but I just scrolled through.
Disdain for litRPGslop.

>>25390003
Those words are self explanatory.

>>25389786
What drives you people to do this?

>>25390012
They're not. What satisfies the "genius" label for you?

I hope you understand a genuine genius MC can only be written by a genius writer. Everything else is smoke and mirrors.

>>25390015
Too much Itagaki.

I hate isekai stories that conveniently edit the MC's memories. What the fuck is the point of isekai if he forgets about Earth?! It's like writing a fantasy story without magic.

>>25390108
My fantasy story is without magic

>>25390108
>what is the point
easy tag with built in audience
a way to have a modern minded self insert
great way for easy exposition that doesnt sound maid and butler
etc

their actual backstory doesn't matter, that is not why isekai is popular among authors and readers. I think it's kinda based when an author discards the pretense and makes them an amnesiac. it's being honest about what the story is

>>25390108
>MC not only remembers (wasn't supposed to), but is actively pissed the fuck off that he was isekai'd
Now what?

>>25390128
Acts spitefully to anyone he suspects is responsible for the isekai

>>25390128
Now I shake your hand because you are a fellow man of culture.

LitRPGs are such a slop genre. I don't understand how anyone could read them without feeling like they're licking from the absolute bottom of the barrel

>>25390114
Then it's not fantasy.
>>25390127
You'll just annoy people who want to read an isekai though. This is the kind of shit that gets you deserved 0.5 scores.
>>25390128
That's great. This would make me even more interested in your story.

>>25390164
>Then it's not fantasy
Its got elves tho

>>25390163
My take on it is that there's stories where the LitRPG is the narrative and there's stories that are using LitRPG to tell a narrative. Sometimes when you find the latter they're not too bad.

>>25389704
It's what happens when you have to conform to the conventions of a genre you don't like to stay relevant.

>>25390017
I’m not looking for genuine genius because what you said is correct. But the smoke and mirrors should be enough to at least not come off as stupid while everyone in the story is glazing their intellect. Reasonably intelligent and rational.
An example would be Kellhus or Conphas, the way they stands apart from everyone else. Those are characters from the Second Apocalypse.
For reasonably intelligent, look at Zorian from MoL. Hope that answers your query.

If there are some actual genius writers out there, I’d love to know too. Regardless of genre.

>>25390164
Check out FFF-rank Trashero. It's pretty damn good during the time that it actually follows the premise. You'll know to drop it when it starts going off the deep end.

>>25389143
Burgess O'Bannon's Superhero Saga, Volume 1.

What stories are autistic in the best way possible? Interpret that however you wish.

>>25390183
>actual genius writers
Gu Zhen Ren

mao ni has a rather literary writing style
it's entirely wasted on xianxia

>>25390163
>LitRPGs are such a slop genre. I don't understand how anyone could read them without feeling like they're licking from the absolute bottom of the barrel
LitRPGs are overhated. Yes, there are a lot of bad LitRPGs, but that's just because it's a popular genre among amateur writers. There isn't actually anything fundamentally wrong with the genre itself, and most people bitching about LitRPGs aren't actually bitching about LitRPGs that are both bad and significantly worse off because they are a LitRPG. Most people are either bitching about stories that would be terrible even if you ripped out all the RPG shit and/or are bitching about minor shit like the stat pages (that you do not have to read) taking up too much space in the work.

That is not to say there aren't stories that are made worse by being LitRPGs. Slave Harem in the Labyrinth of the Other World is the poster child for that. However, generally being a LitRPG is at worst harmless to a story. Also, working within an RPG framework can help new writers keep from doing shit like coming up with a dogshit poorly defined magic system or letting their powerscaling get out of control like you see all over the fucking place in non-LitRPG fantasy.

>>25390196
Farming isekais

>>25390212
NTA but I know you're having a gaff with that but I genuinely believe it. The guy wrote some poignant commentary in a repressed authoritarian country and actually got away with it for the bulk of the plot.
Ironically, it was a bitter slop-poster that was his undoing.

>>25389704
>The story started with MC getting a blowjob from a servant after being isekai'd
Oh, that one. Young Master Xian Sure Has Changed.

What are gu?

>>25390265
the essence of heaven and earth

>>25390265
Don't worry your pretty little head about it, love.

>>25390284
I just started Reverend Insanity.

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I fucking suck at writing dialogue and proper conflict. Every conflict I write feels like to me like a one-chapter villain of the week. like their menace doesn't extend beyond a chapter or two. I suck at writing this conflict in dialogue, I can't think of a way to write it so it feels like there is a real problem. How do I stop being so shit

>>25389381
This is how Germany and France formed, albeit far more violently and over a far longer period of time. In the nearly 40 years after the death of Louis the Pious, his sons fought over the empire and never thought of themselves ruling separate states. For their entire lives they fought and and made alliances with each other for ultimate dominance. Even after Charles the Bald died and the end of this generation, the kingdom was still united under Charles the Fat, and after him, with no obvious heirs, the kingdom split once again, were East Frankia fell under Arnulf, who was an illegitimate Carolingian and West under Odo. It would still take another century for their political communities to finally split for good, when the Ottonians invaded France, there was a good chance the kingdom would just fold into them because of how interconnected they were at that point.

>turning a trash review into a positive review through conversation
Sometimes, it pays off being a diplomat.

>>25390350
Isn't that ideal for winnies? I have the opposite problem where I can only write bigger long-term conflicts, but setting them up and resolving them tends to take too long for the attention span of modern readers

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>>25390370
But I didn't expect the reader who was just calling my story dogshit have a sudden and total change of heart, become a follower and keep reading. When I told him the story wasn't what he thought it was, I ACTUALLY LIED, FFFFUUUUUCK!!

>>25390373
A good conflict should be long-term. Why read when the protagonist just rolls over their problems so quickly? I can do vague long-term conflict but I struggle to really get the point across.

>>25390395
>Why read when the protagonist just rolls over their problems so quickly?
Ask the billion readers of those archmage stories. I don't know, but that's what they want

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>>25390397
I just think it makes for a bad story. I know we are here to make slop for the piggies but I'd like to at least try to write something where real conflict exists and impacts the story, I want to be happy with what I write at the end of the day.

>>25389659
old man...

>>25389935
Cultivation nerd

>>25390436
The MC is not intelligent though

>>25389704
Nameless Sovereign is pretty good, it seems to be getting frequent updates again too

>>25390436
for someone claiming to be rational the protagonist goes bugfuck for crazy bitches all the time

>>25390458
Many such cases!

>>25390458
Thanks, I will not be reading that.

>>25390223
Which is the best one?

Funny how there are these "schizo waves" on RR. Like months can pass with readers being all nice and friendly, and then out of nowhere multiple people have an episode on the same day and start to sperg about unrelated things. Is it an american thing?

>>25390677
Lunar cycles

>>25390677
Never happened to me, chief.

>>25390677
astrological ages
we have now moved into the age of aquarius

>>25390719
Let the sun shine

Is Royalroad still the best selfpublishing platform?

>>25390762
are there any web novels that feature astrology autism? i.e apocalyptic system cancer arrives on earth at the end of the age of pisces and it arrives in a triumphant chorus declaring the death of the ichthys and the dawning of the age of aquarius

>>25390764
Yes. Unfortunately.
At least for serials.
You can make it on amazon if you're smart. But Starting on RR makes even that easier.

>>25390764
for a certain niche yes
otherwise no

>>25390764
yes for all kinds of English web novels

>>25390773
I mean, Koreans tend to go hard on the concept of "constellations", but in practice those are mostly just twitch viewers that hand out gift subs a lot.

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>>25390773

>>25390894
>Femslop
Never mind.

I just wanna make a fantasy story about a slinger going on an adventure with weird monsters based off of medieval misconceptions. Can I really not make it unless I turn it into
>That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Peasant and Took Down An Evil Empire With My Harem of Weird Monster Girls

>>25390977
Get on with the times, neptunian. That Time I Started An Evil Empire With My Harem of Weird Monster Girls is the current thing

>>25390977
>I just wanna
>Can I really not make it
You're being dishonest with yourself

>>25390977
sufficient writing skill can overcome a lack of marketability
but no you won't get free undeserved patreonbux despite being a shitty or mediocre writer. you will need to be actually good

>>25391008
what does it mean to be a "good" writer

>>25391080
Read Reverend Insanity and find out

>>25391080
dumb question, try again

>>25391095
retard

>>25390350
Is your protagonist too competent or is your villain too weak? Is your protagonist too agreeable or is your villain too shallow and shortsighted? Can you actually imagine any of your villains succeeding or being unpersuadable? Can you imagine their desires after they get what they immediately want, and are you willing to write the world affected by them? Does your villain truly believe their goals are achievable? If so, why?

>>25391101
dont ask stupid questions and you won't get your feelings hurt

>>25391087
This

>>25391157
retard

>>25391213
meltie

Here's an actually important piece of advice.

Readers like to see the protagonist struggling.

They don't like to see the protagonist actually lose.

They think they do. They will insist they want to see it. And they will drop off like flies if you write it.

Make your protagonist like John Wick. Your protagonist must struggle, he must get beaten up and wounded, but he must ultimately prevail nine times out of ten. It's better to pull some self-destructive powerup out of your ass than to lose.

Except tournaments, those permit for losses by their nature, but even then don't do too many losses.

>>25391219
The only exception to this rule is miserysloppa fiction. And, well, you would be in /wg/ instead of /wng/ if you were writing "le heckin ebin reddit real litfic that will definitely be the new classic after I kill myself anons you'll see"
If you want to write miseryslop and get readers, you'll have to do fanfic. Or time travel to like, 2017 when GoT was big and normgoys slurped up anything miserable.

>>25390945
You were expecting something else? Woman are the only people that believe in astrology and horoscopes.

>>25391219
I agree

>>25390576
Isekai Nonbiri Nouka

>>25391219
>Bro doesn't know about the meta where the MC narrowly gets away from a new threat by pulling out all the stops and then comes up with a perfect counter to them while in hiding and curbstomps them next go around
Losing is fine. *Failing* is what readers don't like to see. If the MC didn't initiate the fight, they're allowed to lose. Just make sure their family isn't slaughtered in the process or something if it's not the inciting incident.

Oh, the failing exception is lifted for situations without stakes.

>>25391219
It's when it feels like backtracking that people lose interest. If the character loses and learns the wrong lesson or no lesson at all, the reader will feel like they wasted as much time as the protagonist. "Do we really gotta go over all of this again?"

Only let them lose if that outcome is more interesting and has more potential. Otherwise, the reader is just gonna be waiting for their investment for reasons that seem arbitrary to the point of storytelling

Have your MC randomly lose to jobbers.
Like, they easily kill big threats but some guy named "Bruce the Bandit" easily takes them down and then slaughters half their party for fun.

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Is 22,000 words (45 pages) over the span of seven chapters enough to start? I was thinking of dumping the first five chapters all at once, then one every day after that

>>25391477
Dump five chapters daily for a week, and after the weekend switch to one every other day I'd say, unless you think you can really output 3000~ words a day with that small a backlog built up

>>25391477
launch schedule only matters if you are also running ads or doing shoutouts, i.e. going for rising stars
if you are just posting and praying, do whatever fits your schedule. it won't affect things much. the age of new story discoverability is dead on RR

>>25391526
I browsed new releases the other day and gave up on trying to read anything after going through like 15 pages of nothing that seemed remotely appealing. And that's after filtering all litrpg and gamelit too.

are these for retardo long novels that never end or are there successful series here that are about as long as real novels (about 80,000-120,000 words)?

>>25391568
Sadly, it's the former in general. Being on the Ink and the Writers Guild (apparently this blew up after I left it, kek) most dread the idea of actually ENDING their stories and so they drag them on forever since money is all these authors ever think about. There's stories that have ended and are in the top rated of all time, but they're outliers. I just ended the first part of my story which came up at a nice round 80k words and frankly I don't expect the next 2 parts to be all that longer.

>>25391568
there are exceptions for everything but 99.9% of web novels are way longer than 100k words
the length is a core appeal. tightly edited professional works belong in tradpub

>>25391575
>>25391576
thank you for clarifying

>>25391431
Just like my American comic books.

>>25391576
>there are exceptions for everything but 99.9% of web novels are way longer than 100k words
Wrong, actually. Even if you exclude discontinued web novels, length and frequency have a fairly inverse relationship. It's just longer novels get discussed more than shorter ones.

>>25391666
are you an autistic retard just wanting to argue or do you really believe this?

>>25391669
Some people's drinking water is just different from others'.

>>25391666
>It's just longer novels get discussed more than shorter ones.
Isn't it implicit that we only care about web novels that people read and talk about?
The masses of unread works cluttering the internet are utterly irrelevant.

>>25391669
>are you an autistic retard just wanting to argue or do you really believe this?
I've been building a backlog of hundreds of novels sorted by length over the past few months. I believe it because it is true. Want me to post the text doc, lmao?

>>25390384
now that he's left a good review, block him

>>25391768
I can sort by followers?
Autist

>>25391785
length, not followers, ESL

>>25391820
retarded autist ignored the response that addresses what every normal person is thinking >>25391698
fuck I hate subhuman insect brains

>>25391822
>retarded autist ignored the response that addresses what every normal person is thinking
What you care about is irrelevant. It's still a dumb fucking claim. It's like acting like most manga is 100s of chapters long because shit like Demon Slayer and One Piece exist.

>>25391835
web novels are spam created in massive numbers by amateurs who get zero readers. it is not the same as manga you dumb fuck

>>25391835
if you sort manga by readers you will find a lot of short mangas
if you sort web novels by readers you will find almost no short web novels

>>25391844
I have no readers and I have long web novel.

>>25391894
what'd you fuck up?

>>25391897
MC is a prick as a part of the plot and he's mean to women right off the bat.

Uh, so I have no idea how VGen works. I'm willing to spend money for an actual cover since I feel like it'd stand out a bit more.
Any anon that have used it before have any advice?

>>25391934
Just make sure you're getting something good. Most comms I've seen here have looked like dogshit

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>>25391934
I've done about a dozen on it now. Just put together a reference image collage of the character you want done, put it in pic related, the rest of the info you can fill out with whatever info is necessary. Then you just submit and wait, and you can talk over any details once they get around to yours.

>>25391770
Submitted reviews can be edited even while blocked, I don't recommend doing that

>>25391219
>Readers like to see the protagonist struggling.
No, they really don't. Any mild setbacks, and they'll call your MC incompetent and stupid. They would've done a lot better if they were in the MC's position. And they are, since their vicariously self-inserting. They'd be smarter. They'd never get hit and they'd never bleed a drop. And struggling is tiresome to follow. Life is already tiresome as it is, they don't want to feel like even reading your story is a chore.

>>25391947
>Just put together a reference image collage of the character you want done
What do you use for references? Just random images on the internet? I know there are some artists that straight up deny a commission because the commissioner sent them an AI photo for them to reference. Or does it not matter?

>>25391844
>if you sort web novels by readers you will find almost no short web novels
On a website where the primary means of discovery are shout outs, recent releases, and popular this week?

Holy shit! That's amazing! Who could possibly see that coming? It's not like literally all of those things require persistent releases or active readers which require persistent releases.

>>25391840
>web novels are spam created in massive numbers by amateurs who get zero readers. it is not the same as manga you dumb fuck
Doujins are a thing, you dumb fuck

what the FUCK is a doujin?

>>25392126
>what the FUCK is a doujin?
The essence of heaven and arse.

>>25392048
For my male MC I used some references from Angel Cop. And the waifubait, an old reference collage I had of one of my VR Chat avatars. Male protags are just super tricky to get a reference because frankly for the longest time I just never did a male commission except for a rare occasion of a Artifical Academy 2 one like 9 years ago. And most of the "good" ones are from like the 80-90s anime OVAs but since they were influenced by hollywood action male stars of that period they're often kinda brown/tanned, and I was so worried people would get the wrong idea if it was a brown dude with a white girl, so use your words accordingly to ask to make his skintone whiter. I didn't, and I deeply regret it, but thankfully I had the psd (I had done commerical rights, so I got it, but it varies artist to artist) and made him white myself.

>>25392126
japanese term for amateur/indie, but almost always used in english to mean unofficial porn comic

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>>25392173
sorry not Angel Xop I'm retarded, meant Bubblegum Crisis. Drink irresponsibly, kids. Eat ass and die fast or something of that nature.

>>25392173
Guts/Dark Schneider/MD Geist/Kenshiro/etc. aren't brown though? Not even the actors they were based on.

>>25392178
Still weird to use either as reference for a *male* MC.

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>>25392179
Not always the case; but sometimes it happens in that era of anime. Pic related being Bubblegum Crisis. Just choose what buff cool male protag you want and make a collage of that guy and tell the artist: "make the dude resemble this" or something of that nature.

>>25392026
When I say struggle, I mean struggle in a protagonisty way. That's why I mentioned John Wick. This is also why actual failure is unacceptable and why, for example, enslavement arcs are widely panned.

The forward momentum must be preserved.

>>25392238
If a winnie MC struggled as fucking hard as John Wick, everyone would give up on the story. The more readers sympathize with the MC, the less tolerant they are of setbacks. I get complaints like "the poor MC just can't catch a break, this is pretty much torture porn" for much milder hardships.

>>25392269
You don't get it.
John Wick doesn't have true setbacks. He has setbacks in the scene and between volumes, but that's not the same thing as true failures. If a single scene resolves on a victory it's fine.

>>25392270
What I do get is that John Wick is not a massively popular franchise, for obvious reasons. Watching the movies began to feel like a painful, repetitive chore at around the third part. This isn't a success formula for WNs.

>>25392290
You are either fantastically dense or pretending to be retarded on purpose.

>spend a few days reading leaving a legacy
>finish, do the same reading sky pride
>finish, immediately reread essence of Cultivation
>find another

I am worse than a heroin addict.

>>25390248
Yes
>>25389777
>>25389781
>>25390185
>>25390443
I'll check them out.

Maybe I should write a xianxia story. Seems like there aren't that many that try to actually meet expectations rather than subvert them.

>>25392370
>immediately reread essence of Cultivation
I swear that this has the best fight scenes I've ever seen in a written story. It's the first time I've cared about the actual mechanics of the fight.

>>25392389
Doesn't hurt that I'm an enormous wizard geek either.

>>25392048
NTA, but I used a mix of regular images plus Heroforge as a basic model reference. So long as you make it clear it's just sort of for basic reference like verifying long hair and the sort of shape language you want, and they have more control over the other details, they'll produce something pretty sick.

>>25392374
>meet expectations rather than subvert them.
What are those expectations anyway?

>>25392440
Focusing on cultivation and character progression rather than harem/drama

>>25392293
Which one of us do you think that applies to? Want to take a 50/50?

>>25392178
>mentioning BGC
Most of this thread is under the age of 25 and will not understand your reference.

>>25392440
MC that becomes powerful and beats the antagonists, slaps their faces, and acquires power, treasures, and beauties.

That's it.

>>25392519
>>25392553
I'm not into fantasy tho
Are there any popular ones which are SF or cyberpunk?

>>25392120
Okay? The statement remains true.

>>25392538
I'm- Shit I'm 27. But I did watch BGC when I was like 20 because I'm a contrarian wrong generation faggt

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>>25392181
Why would it be weird? The alternative is what, scrawny ass Kirito clones, or what else would you even do? That's the thing with having male characters and wanting to commission art of them, it's exceedingly difficult to get even a 3D model of one that's decent to go off anyway.

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>>25389140
I don't care anymore; I'm going to write infodump chapters because I enjoy writing them.

>>25392126
>what the FUCK is a doujin?
A self-published work ranging from web novels to RPGmaker games. Usually refers to doujinshi, self-published printed works, which usually refers to manga either published online or printed in small batches and sold at conventions, and the most common of those to be discussed are hentai and/or fanfiction. This results in some people coming under the mistaken belief that all fanfiction manga are doujins and/or doujins only refers to hentai and/or all hentai are doujins.

>>25392739
So does the original claim about novel length. I never said shorter novels are more discoverable than longer ones. I said they're more common.

>>25392884
being okay with your work not appealing to others is enlightenment

>>25392889
the issue is you're talking about all web novels instead of the subset of web novels that people actually read and talk about, which is retarded because nobody cares about the garbage heap of no reader works.
furthermore, your other argument is stupid too. there are lots of popular short mangas. there are not lots of popular short web novels.
>I didn't say popular
retard that's the point. it's implicitly understood that's what we mean when we talk about "web novels". but you are severely autistic or something

>let something built up a backlog for a couple months
>go through it in a couple days
did it again award. I feel like a dog that eats so fast he chokes on his food and ruins it for himself
any urban fantasy recs?

>>25392890
>being okay with your work not appealing to others is enlightenment
Is there really much of a difference between writing 5 50 chapter works each discovered by 1k people and 1 250 chapter work discovered by 5k people?

You have forgotten opportunity cost is a thing.

>>25392977
for me it is more like
>is there a difference betwen each chapter getting 20 and 5 views

>>25392977
nta but yes there's obviously a big difference.
>opportunity cost
explain how you're applying this because it could go either way

What would Spectral Soul do in this situation?

>>25392981
It's the same number of readers either way. Also shorter works get way less readership drop-off, so you can't really compare views between the situations.

Actually if all you cared about is views, the meta would probably be to just do single chapter stories over and over again. Label each one as Chapter 1. Never continue them. Flood search results with your works. Always be in new series and recent update lists. SEO the shit out of that shit.

>>25393185
>>25392977
The thing is nobody cares about views, really. It's easy to get views. Just serve the market.

Even once you pull the /wg/ out of your ass (not you specifically, the general you), the real important thing is sales and patreonbux. It's money. People should do whatever gets the most money, and that's writing sprawling long stories. They can have endings, InadvisablyCompelled shows that, you just have to write good chapters and monetize them.

>>25392682
>xianxia
>sf or cyberpunk
No there isn't. Cultivation and sf just aren't compatible.

>>25392884
Do it as dialogue or as a lecture where the MC is just present and it goes on in the background while he is doing something else.

Readers can skip it as background noise or pay attention to it if they care for a dive deeper into the lore.

Its the same advice i would give to the anon who wanted to explore the coinage earlier in the thread

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>>25392840
Kirito clones aren't all necessarily bad. The Korean clone was alright (at least until late S2 when they made him go full simp mode)

>>25393214
>the real important thing is sales and patreonbux
foul creature

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>>25393252
Swallowed Star was written by the Coiling Dragon author and got own its tv show. There's also the urban cultivation genre with Daily Life of the Immortal King.

>>25393271
Tbh I've been avoiding Swallowed Star because it's scifi but looking at that pic and those suits it feels like it's mix of scifi and fantasy, not a pure scifi

>>25393214
>People should do whatever gets the most money, and that's writing sprawling long stories
Oh, well that's obvious. I'd never disagree with that. Not saying it's impossible to monetize shorter works, but the one thing that brings in money is commitment. Or more technically the one thing that brings in commitment is money. You aren't about to stop writing something someone is paying you to write unless you've got something else to replace it since otherwise you might try to start again with something that doesn't find an audience.

That's why you'll see a lot of successful web novel authors with multiple ongoing series, generally with a practice of starting one or more as they are wrapping up another so they can get their new works promoted off their old works and be sure they still have an audience to switch to before pulling the plug on their old story.

Same logic as never quitting your job until you have another one lined up.

>>25393304
>>25393214
That said there *is* actually an alternative to that strategy and it's hard scheduling, staggered releases, and interconnected stories. Instead of writing indefinitely until you have a fallback, you build an audience that expects you to end works and knows to check back in for new works frequently, and they stay invested cause most of your works connect to one another in some way.

>>25393307
I've yet to see any examples of that on RR. You might bring up RavensDagger but they write multiple stories at the same time, not switching from one to the other.

>>25393326
>they

>>25393331
sorry, she

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>>25393347
>she

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Are we going to let publishers ruin webnovels?

>>25393352
They're already gone and you speak like we have a choice. Society was originally a frantic race between the inevitable tide of starvation and war and death and horror sweeping toward you. These days we've got a car, but the elites and their sequelae are right behind it. All authentic modern culture is almost purely reactionary, trying to stay ahead of that new tide. Even if unconsciously. Hell, quests are an outgrowth of forum based star trek and sailor moon roleplay posts in the 90s and even those are monetised now.

>>25393352
Web novels are going to ruin publishing actually and that's pretty hilarious

>>25393326
I literally put it in my first post: InadvisablyCompelled, author of Blue Core, Paranoid Mage, and the current Objects in Motion.

>>25393266
It's dishonest to claim "oh boohoo all I want is a reader and a comment" no bitch that's a fucking lie. Everyone wants to be popular and successful and rich.
>b-b-b-but not me
Then I guess you already won, huh.

>>25393383
>Everyone wants to be popular and successful and rich.
yes but I didn't create any way to do the third with my story so only the first two apply.

>>25393352
I wish I had a publisher. I used to be one of those guys who thought it was stupid to give up like half the money for an editor and publisher but holy SHIT I fucking hate self-publishing work. I only like writing.

I would totally abandon my old works and let someone else profit off them if I could get a cut and not waste my time on them.

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>>25393255
That's what I have been doing in the past, but blending into dialogue is still very difficult, and at this point, I just don't care.

>>25391576
>>25391575
When I look for a new stories to read I set my "minimum page count" to a random number between 200-500. That's 55,000-137,500 words.

>>25393352
They can try but they can't control it since they have no power over the means of distribution.
Tech companies and payment processors on the other hand...

>>25393359
Publishers completely missed the gravy train and even worse, they were sometimes hostile to the authors while it was getting started.
The publishers also face cognitive dissonance, or whatever it is called for a business entity, where their customers and projected virtuous ethos isnt compatible with the sword and sorcery nature of webnovels

>>25393433
hahaha imagine a modern publisher looking at the popular webnovels
their reviewers would have mental breakdowns before even getting through the top 10
>libertarian ubermensch
>ayn randian ubermensch
>libertarian ubermensch
>right-wing ubermensch
>libertarian ubermensch
>extremely racist ubermensch
>literally just hitler but he's a wizard
>this one's just taxi driver but he has a flaming sword and kills Netanyahu and it goes on for half a million words

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>>25393477
That's not even an accurate representation.
Even if you include Asian webnovels, it's not.

>>25393480
how profitable is 10,000 followers?

>>25393480
>he doesn't know

>>25392884
>It can't be said when the de-lesbians emerged as a nation...
kek

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>>25393483
It's literally four clicks to find out anon.
Not bad, over $3k/month for that story. That would be enough to cover all of my expenses entirely.

That said "successful" Royal Road / Patreon webnovel authors don't actually make that much money unless they're the top like ten: DCC, BoC, etc. There's a lot of midlisters. The real advantage is that there's very little barrier to entry and no racial or sexual discrimination like in tradpub.

>>25393480
Obviously it's not "literally true" but he's right on principle. Webnovels are full of randyan and right-wing type narratives even in novels written by libtarded troonoids because the fundamental narrative structure and nature of the genre demands it. And a lot of xianxia gets away with truly remarkable concentrations of hitlerium particles.

>>25393488
>It's literally four clicks to find out anon.
sorry, I don't know anything at all about that site

>Not bad, over $3k/month
damn, writing really doesn't pay

>there's very little barrier to entry and no racial or sexual discrimination like in tradpub.
the main draw really

>>25393383
>Everyone wants to be popular and successful and rich.
Until they actually attain popularity. Then it just becomes a burden.

>>25393488
there are around 40 RR authors making 5k+ a month on patreon
That number balloons if you count amazon earnings though

>>25393493
>writing really doesn't pay
It's more about being a dream job

>>25393489
trad pub is full of such societies too. you just can't endorse it or politicize it lol
RR wns are pretty leftist in tone and presentation, idk what you guys are talking about
Chinese WNs are obviously psycho tho

>>25393525
it's not just chinese WNs, it's any WN off RR

>>25393526
the big English WNs not on RR are also leftist in tone
worm, wandering inn, apgte, Scott Alexander, Wales, tgab, etc

I think you just mean translated stuff, which, yes

>>25393526
>it's any WN off RR
It's literally not and it's not even most of them. You can't even name fifteen that are psycho or right wing in any way.
Actually since you sound like a cultivation dicksucker, you probably can't name fifteen RR webnovels of any kind without looking them up.

could you name 100 web novels without googling? I'm honestly not sure I could

>>25393573
Why would i want to do that

>>25393573
100? If I included Japanese WNs off Narou, and didn't have to get the long ass titles perfectly right... maybe.

But that's way more than fifteen, which SHOULD be doable for a /wng/ regular.

>>25393487
Dyslexia is a bitch, huh?

>>25393573
1. Tales of Mu
2. Beware of Chicken
3. Arcane Emperor
4. The Storm King
5. Mother of Learning
6. Change: New World
7. A Dragon Gnawing Its Tail
8. Forgotten Conqueror
9. Everybody Loves Large Chests
10. Mushoku Tensei
11. The Primal Hunter
12. He Who Fights With Monsters
13. Zenith of Sorcery
14. Soaring Heavens Isle
15. Tales of the Reincarnated Lord
16. Black Iron's Glory
17. Release That Witch
18. Magic Industry Empire
19. The Runesmith
20. Sevens
21. My Girlfriend From the Turquoise Pond Requests My Help
22. Ancient Godly Monarch
23. Martial World
24. True Martial World
25. I Shall Seal The Heavens
26. Battle Through The Heavens
27. Chaotic Sword God
28. Death March (some of the best English WN translation)
29. God of Slaughter
30. The New Gate
31. New Life As A Max Level Archmage
32. Throne of Magical Arcana
33. Lord of the Mysteries
34. The Wizard World
35. Warlock of the Magus World
36. Against The Gods
37. Young Master Xian Sure Has Changed
38. Young Master Template Variation v4 (or something like that)
39. Sexy Steampunk Babes
40. Sexy Sect Babes
41. Sexy Space Babes
42. A Hundred Reigns
43. Saving The School Would've Been Easier As A Cafeteria Worker
44. Ave Xia Rem Y
45. Savage Divinity
46. Arifureta
47. Hoard
48. Lazy Loops
I've read the above to some extent. I was going I could get 50, but I just can't remember the names of the novels.

I haven't read:
Skypride
Azarinth Healer
The Wandering Inn
Overgeared
Solo Leveling
Legendary Moonlight Sculptor
Shadow Slave
Coiling Dragon

>>25393694
You haven't read RI or DSE?

>>25393694
that's a lot of translated work
is this thread mostly eastern now?

>>25393731
>now

>>25393729
Don't read RI by Ching Chong, it's pee.

>>25393731
>is this thread mostly eastern now?
South-east asian.

>>25393734
we mostly talked about English stuff when the thread was first made
near exclusively, actually

>>25393736
Okay, I haven't been frequenting these threads for long but now I'm absolutely certain there is a cult-like distaste for RI (probably because of its popularity) given you would warn against it over DSE.

>>25393731
cultivation bullshit was always asian, anon
they originate from 50s magazine serials
this guy is the Tolkien, so to speak, of manhua
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jin_Yong

t. chinese

>>25393760
>cultivation bullshit was always asian, anon
this... isn't relevant to what I said. where was cultivation the main topic?
Get your translation software checked
or your brain

>>25393769
>why does this thread on American detective noir contain mostly translated American novels?
>get your brain checked
>why does this thread on Japanese shonen manga contain mostly translated Japanese manga?
>get your brain checked
>why does this thread on Italian opera contain mostly translated Italian librettos?
>get your brain checked
cultivation bullshit is inherently chinese, seethe and cope

>>25393776
oh god he's just retarded

>>25393779
>no u

>>25393326
>I've yet to see any examples of that on RR
I don't know RR's meta, but I've seen that meta on wattpad, novelpia, and elsewhere.

I'm reading I don't want to be the Hive Queen.
It's 4/5 so far, but I have a strong feeling that this story will become a 1/5 or 2/5 quite soon.

>>25393878
How far along are you?

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>>25393791
>scampia

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Is it worth it to run 2 royal road ads at once?

My current ad is doing pretty well. 500+ clicks, 2 follows, 7 read laters, and the campaign isn't even half way finished yet. But I sort of want to run a new ad.

I just finished reading 20 books of Player Manager / Soccer Supremo. Gonna wait until the next book's complete to finish it, but damn that feeling of emptiness is hitting me.

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Reported a retarded review on my story and the mods didn't bother to even respond. Of course, instead leaving it be, I opened a support ticket to roast them about it. I think the kikes will ban me soon. I hate those cunts so much

>>25394038
>Reported a retarded review on my story
Post it.

>>25394080
Dox myself after calling them kikes? That'd be guaranteed execution then. It was a dumb thing anyway. Guy posts a comment on chapter 1 saying he's not even gonna read the story, and then a 1-star review saying the story goes to shit after chapter 1 without further comment. How could he know when he didn't read it? But this is apparently valid critique.

>>25394105
your story is probably shit though

>>25394118
Could be, but that doesn't justify lying about it, stupid snake

>>25394080
>>25394118
>person who wants anons to expose their fics is a hateful schizoid
yeah

>>25394038
How about you write a better story instead?

>>25394137
Nta, but your writing style here isn't very compelling and I'm already rooting against your protagonist in these posts.

>>25394137
It's the list-keeping stalkerfag. You can recognize him by the intense ick his posts give you. He lurks in these threads 24/7 hunting for vulnerabilities in people just to try and wound them. A hilarious devilspawn

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>>25390265

>>25389376
That sounds boring, I'd rather go Spice & Wolf with it and introduce a dozen different currencies with variable exchange rates.

>>25389733
Protip: metal coins and indeed all currencies have always been fiat in disguise

>>25393729
Yeah I haven't really read RI. I did not enjoy the little I did read. I even forgot about it when making the list.
What's DSE?
>>25393731
English web novels are relatively new compared to translated Japanese, Chinese, and Korean works. Royalroad itself started as a fansite for Legendary Moonlight Sculptor. Tales of Mu is the only one on that list that predates this stuff. (It's a lesbian bdsm WN I read when I was much younger. Before anybody had really even used the term "WN". That's also why I put it at #1 in the list).

>>25394288
>Yeah I haven't really read RI. I did not enjoy the little I did read.
it gets good after chapter 199