Dec 2009 Archive, part c

what do you do if the BadFic you're about to go into isn't finished? Do you tell the author to stop? And then if they don't stop say stop again?

Or do you just do the mission and then return to it if s/he/it continues the BadFic afterwards?

Or if you've killed the 'Sue do you just let it go once you've done the original mission and leave it at that.

just a minor confusion.

~Bryn

But I also post my missions on FFnet which makes it more likely that someone stumbles across a mission than if I posted on LJ or on a private website. My message is:

Hi,

I'm sending you this message to let you know that I've written a spoof of INSERT TITLE. The spoof is not meant as a personal attack on you as the author of this story, but if you have a strong attachment to the character of INSERT NAME OF SUE OC I suggest you don't read chapter CHAPTER NUMBER of INSERT TITLE OF APPROPRIATE PPC SERIAL.

I think that has gotten me three or four author reactions, and the most negative was "Hey, you said your wrote a story about my story, but I don't see it". Because I also usually wait a few days for a reaction before I post the chapter.

In general we don't tell them, because we write the missions for ourselves, not them. Also, more importantly, waving the mission under the writer's nose would probably just result in bad feeling and possibly ignite a flame war, which nobody wants.

On the other hand, if you know the writer would be a good sport about it, there's no reason not to tell them.

~Neshomeh

If I knew this "Blur" character was sonic and shadow's son I would have checked out this fic instead of looking for bad het. Nice find

That last one is painful to look at. I'm going to assume it is a troll for the sake of my sanity.

Did... did he just combine Sonic with Halo? Not to mention the fact that he spelled "Covenant" wrong.
This gives me rage of the powered armor variety!

Just by those basic descriptions I can tell these won't be fun.

I just found out about this fic today.

Now I'm more than halfway through it, and don't intend on leaving my chair 'till I'm all done.

Such a good holiday present for all of us Wicked fans. ^^

Excellent work. As much as I love Wicked, it's nice to see a happy ending for everyone, more or less. I almost wish this was how the story really went, but then, we wouldn't have a good muscial, would we?

Congratulations! ^_^ Have some celebratory cookies!

~Neshomeh

Fangirls who are sugar high
L33tly ‘Sueing o’er the Pit
To our concrit they reply:
“ If u dont liek, dont reed it!!!!”

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

By Tolkien, we charge thee!

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

Veni, vidi, vici!

Suethors, why debauchery?
Why the canons’ angst prolong?
Ruthless is our mockery
So, get Spock out of that thong!

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

Sue’s a peerless fighter?

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

With our logic smite her!

Come to us, the PPC
If Sparrow has One True Love
Bad slash? –Not in our RC!
Commas, pelt her from above!

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

Will’s tears are not crystals!

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

Meet our pair of pistols!

Sue in Frodo’s bed has laid
Her, canons are forced to praise
O Eru, lend us your aid
While we bows and arrows raise!

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

So, think you’re immortal?

Spo-o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o-o-o-orking

Tell that to the Void portal!

Excellent work, you did a great job here. ^^

That was unbelievably cute and fluffy and made me squee loudly at the adorableness. Excellently done, Neshie. =D

Poor Nume having to play Santa. He did a great job, though. XD And Ilraen's sweet as ever.

*applause*

That was total awesomesauce! The poem was cute and funny at the same time with PPC holiday spirit! *tosses around snowflake confetti*

I may try tackling one of the Sues sometime next month if no one claims it first, but don't let that stop anyone from doing it now if possible. Bleh, bleh, bleh.

The third one was discontinued due to circumstances that forced the author to move suddenly and drop the Fic due to lack of time! However the plot that she had planned was terrible. If only all BadFics were dropped like that.

*sigh* These look messy and a real knot to untangle. I think the second one maybe a troll fic, judging by the title and such. Or it's a parody, even without the tag. And the Sue? She must die. Painfully.

For reference, here is my fic. Currently I have the protagonist's basic description shoehorned halfway into the first chapter.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5593724/1/The_Darkest_Ocean

I seem to be the opposite of Neshomeh. If I'm introducing a new character, I'll mention one or two major features just to give everyone (including myself) a visual grounding - usually hair colour, but sometimes clothing or height if it can help build the character's personality. For instance, if I want to introduce a stuffy, arrogant aristocrat, I may write something like:

Walking down the hall was a man in a heavily-embroidered and obviously very expensive waistcoat,

- and then continue with the dialogue or narration that tells the events of the story. If it's not so important to set the character's look from the start, or if it's a character we already know and I want to casually mention what they're wearing, then I'll find a way to slip it in later in the scene, like I did here in a chapter from my Wicked fanfic:

“Oh… fine,” said Glinda, a little startled as she took off her cherry-red overcoat. “It all went fine, really; just took forever.

Of course, it depends on how you write in the first place. I try to weave my narrative and dialogue together with a rather steady pace and flow, so I'll insert dialogue tags in the place of commas, and if the speaker is making a rather extended pause, make that tag longer in order to convey the time in the reader's head - like the above example. If you write very little description otherwise, that method probably won't work.

Of course, that's only if you want to be unobtrusive. If you want to make a point out of it, you can have a sentence or two about their appearance, but never go beyond that - actually, keep it to one sentence, if you can. You can be a very visual writer without drowning us in details.

I suppose it also depends on what character's point of view the story is being written from. I usually write in a fairly distant style, but if your story is told through the eyes of, say, an artist, they'll notice much more detail than a lawyer, and you'll have more leeway to describe it without making your readers feel bored.

So... all you can do is try, I guess. Was that any help?

What I do is focus on a few important details and leave the rest up to the reader's imagination. I almost always give basic eye and hair color with perhaps one adjective each, no more, but a lot of times you can just give the basic complexion, like swarthy or fair, and it's up to the reader to know that swarthy usually means dark eyes and dark hair, and that fair usually means a blue-eyed blond. I may offer the structure of a person's face if it's distinctive--square-jawed, round-faced, etc. I rarely if ever describe clothing unless it's important, as in a situation where the character is dressing for a certain effect or purpose, and then I'll stick to the one or two articles that specifically make the look. (Though if you have a particularly flamboyant character, they tend to break those rules for you.) The trick is to chose your words very carefully, and pick the one that means exactly what you want instead of a whole bunch that dance around the point.

Another thing is that all the details don't have to be given right away if they don't fit in with the moment, for any character. You can string out the description in bits and pieces for as long as it takes to do it gracefully. If you win the readers over with the character's personality, they'll wait for the details.

I hope that helps. I feel like I'm not being very clear, but so much of writing is subjective that it's hard.

~Neshomeh

You've got pages for a whole bunch of people. Are you gonna update them all, or d'you want to make a list...?

Just asking that the task not be left undone, I guess. It would also be nice if any related redlinks got filled in or removed in the process.

That said, bon voyage, good luck, and always know where your towel is.

~Neshomeh

Aww. You were always one of my favorite writers for the PPC. Why'd you decide to leave, if it's not rude of me? I hope you'll do well in wherever life takes you. Additional generic goodbye.

We'll all miss you.

Merry chirtsmas to one and all, and here's to hoping your Christmas wasn't as... hectic... as mine was.

You forgot finding a job (in my case).
Well, I got some wonderful clothes and a peculiar recipe book (recipes are based on recent scientific findings about cuisine).

I got lots of stuff. It's nice.

I opened presents around midnight with the family. I'm going to open presents with the friends later. (I'm a bit sugar-high at the moment...) Merry Christmas, everyone!

I dare everyone in the PPC to start singing one of the songs from the PPC handbook randomly in front of everyone.

Quite classic. Is that in our Legendary Goodfic list? It ought to be.

It's very awesome. I like Sam's poem and Galadriel's journal entry best.

(I mean to read the first two things sometime this holiday, if possible.)

I loved the video! I laughed so hard! Thanks for sharing it. You can't go wrong with John Cleese, that's what I say...

Your merry Christmas is late.

Hehe... *laughs*
It's very funny.
Haven't laughed like that since reading "Don't Panic!". Many thanks for the link.

I love reading the posts and the comments as well. It's just so funny! They have a book published full of these failed cakes. I'm really tempted to buy it, now that I have a gift card to a certain bookstore.

Spent hours reading it sometime last year. Excellent blog!

http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/2008/07/lost-in-translation.html

Your heart is certainly in the right place, and I agree with the basis of what you're saying - so no ethical arguments, no - but actually, I have a few nitpicks about the text itself.

This is a letter you're sending out, right? There's a few places where you seem to fly back and forth across the formality line. On one hand you sound professional, but you also say "Screw you" or use 'lolspeak' like "Plz to be noting", which doesn't really fit the tone. (I admit to having a personal grudge against 'lolspeak', and of course it depends on who, exactly, you're writing to, but consistency is a big part of presentation, and since you want to make a point, you probably shouldn't offer up alternate targets to be fired at by people who disagree.)

One definite error: keep you at arms length should be "arm's".

Also, unless the discussion is already about the PPC, I'd personally prefer if you didn't mention us. We're a small, hard-to-find community and generally seem to prefer to keep it that way. I don't think we cross the borderline you're talking about (we mock and curse the authors themselves, yes, but I don't think we jab at their personal lives, mainly because we don't know a thing about them), but why stir up trouble? Stick to mentioning MSTs, which everyone knows anyway.

But yes, overall, I agree with your point. I wouldn't call it "trolling" so much as "outright rudeness", but that's just terminology. It's also just a matter of politeness and good taste, which are points/words you may want to mention at least in passing, as they'll strengthen your argument.

...And now I'm going to shush and go to sleep, because it's too late at night for me to think straight. Good letter, in any case. Can I ask why you're writing it? (I haven't been to GAFF for about two years, so I'm out of date.)

There are no limits. As long as it's not original fiction or published (so, authorised) work, then you can PPC the badfic. It's sometimes quiite... er... 'fun' to be the only agent working for a particular fandom.

There's no official list of fandoms the PPC covers. The PPC covers anything that needs covering/that they have agents to work in.

The only pseudo-official fandoms are the ones that are so hugely popular that divisions have been created for them in the various departments, like LotR and HP, because they generate so much badfic. Most fandoms don't fall into this category, but that's not because they don't have badfic. It's just not so overwhelmingly common. {= P

Inversely, there are a few fandoms (Twilight, Eragon) that are hugely popular but that no agent will go near, simply because they can't distinguish between the badfic and the canon and can't be trusted not to kill canon characters. That's not to say that the PPC wouldn't cover them if they had people willing to do it, though.

Some fandoms, like Farscape, are lucky enough to have virtually no badfic. Some mediocrefic, but no badfic. I've looked, and I've never once seen any hint of a serious attempt to break up the canon romances, for example. Most of the fic on the Pit is filling-in-the-blanks or AU, with a few "canon adventures" for spice. It's astonishing. That said, if anyone ever does see Farscape badfic, please tell me. I will PPC it with vengeance.

So... yeah. It doesn't matter what fandom the badfic is in. If someone wants to PPC it, that's awesome.

~Neshomeh

I'm not certain, but I believe someone - July, maybe? - was ordered to PPC one of her own old fanfics and ended up recruiting. I'm not sure. I don't think there's anything wrong with the idea - after all, badfic is badfic, and it'd be a good lesson for the agent - but I imagine you'd want to wait until either your agent is sufficiently experienced to handle it or until they've done something for which the Flowers punish them.

But be careful - I don't think any PPC agents ever go into a fic for the sole purpose of saving an OC. Mary Sues and Marty Stus are often unsaveable - it's usually the bit characters we recruit. Your agents would probably have to go in and make the decision to recruit him while on the mission, not beforehand.

Especially if a headcrab jumped mercer.

Totally go for it. Throw in The Many while you're at it. It'd be interesting to see a headcrabbed hybrid. The zombie virus from the urban dead MMORPG might also be interesting, though given the way those zombies can come back from anything and effectively coordinate large-scale actions, it'd probably involve them destroying the other infections pretty fast once it really got going.

I'd especially like to see the humans try to combat all the viruses at once. Whose side would mercer be on?

...dock against the airlock, then come through your airlock, maintaining a hard seal so no air escapes.

I guess you could wear a spacesuit and cut through the interior doors as well, or go through an inner airlock that doesn't seal you out, but there are obvious problems with both approaches.

I've mainly seen the first one, sometimes the second one. Third is rare, but not impossible.

1. Could I add a new page to PPC wikia to describe this new Fandom? Of course you can! Everyone is allowed and encouraged to edit and alter the wiki and add to it if they want.
2. If there are badfics, where do I list them? Right here. Add the category where appropriate if you need to.
3. Could I make up a new type of minis, such as mini-Knightmares? Of course you can, if there's no OFU for the canon in question. If there is, they usually list what the mini is in the first chapter or so. (Oooor you can just ignore that.) Try to not choose anything common or not unique. Like mini-Dragons.
4. Does anybody know a Permission Giver's email? I MIGHT need Permission sometime. I know many PG emails, and would amuse myself by giving some of them to you, but you can also ask for Permission right here in the open on the board. I believe that's the usually preferred way of doing things.

*Disappears!*

There's this funny My Immortal Comic I discovered just yesterday and I wanted to share it with you.

http://www.drunkduck.com/My_Immortal/index.php?p=605205

Isn't it funny? I especially liked the disclaimer.