Nov 2011 Archive, part c

In fact, one of my agents was a character of one of these fanfic. That was some sort of cracky crossover (but after some time it became more serious) between the author's works and several other works, with a lot of OCs too. We wrote it as a roundrobin on the author's forum, and the author herself encouraged us to keep writing.

(It was an Italian fantasy book series, "Nina, the child of the Sixth Moon". It has been published in many countries, but as far as I know it had success only here in Italy)

About the canonicalness (dos this term exist?) of the fanfiction, I doubt it as there were other similar stories there, most of which incompatible with ours. But in a way they were recognized by the author.

If I catch a badfic in that continuum (quite hard, as there isn't much fanfic about it) maybe I can play it out and make Nina recognize Agent!Sergio Turbo... and so the agent has another problem to deal with.

I think that even if the author encourages fanfic, and there is no official canon, the things the author sets down and things that go along with/work off it/etc. are the things that are the standard of what 'canon' would be there.

Meaning: if the author encourages fanfiction of his/her work, that written material... should be a fanfic of THAT WORK. Say writer A sets down Alice and Bob and says 'Go crazy, fanfic all you want," a story that renames Alice 'Charlotte' and contains a Bob with absolutely no resemblance to his canon self... really isn't about the author's work anymore. I'd call that sort of work badfic.

Badfic nearly always does the same thing in every continua: it gums up searching for good fic and it's kind of dumb. I wouldn't think this continua would be that special: just it defines 'canon' a bit differently.

I like to write stories - both fanfictional and otherwise - that play extremely hard and loose with the facts. Although it's yet to reach the level of incorporating elements from other fiction, the idea is rather tantalizing to me. The problem being of course that someone who can quickly produce terrible badfic is in danger of creating a major headache - which might itself be a fascinating mindscrew if viewed through the lens of abstract horror! (Or just a headache.)

For some examples, the Lovecraft Mythos eventually spun off to include many other writers of horror from all across the world - of varying quality, perhaps, but part of the reason it is so broadly known today. Similarly, the Wold Newton concept sought to connect through metafiction various individuals of some fame. I dunno if either'll help with your train of thought, but either way - good luck on your writing, and have fun!

This is actually the largest wave of newbies I have ever seen here on the posting board. Of course, I haven't been here for that long.
Here's a gluten free cupcake simulation. Don't worry. It's not a grenade.

Have some fudge!

...we love it when newbies come in. :D

So welcome! :D

Here, have some Messiaen for the road:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ht5qqE_e1UE

We get, in my memory/experience, weekish-long waves of new people, over about two or three pages' time. Then things quiet down, usually after at least one person has double-posted and been asked not to do so again, and then there's a pile-up, and then people go "Hey stop piling up!" and other people go :| and :
(Hey, maybe we could avoid that bit, this time around!)

I don't know how common it is, being a newbie myself, but it may just be that time of year when alot of people spend time indoors on their computers. Winter can do that to people, or at least to me.

But, it is most definitely not an organized invasion of newbies poised to take over the PPC. There is no need to worry, fret, or prepare a counterstrike, because that would just make you look silly.

I don't know if there's a standardized method for recruiting from World One. Zug was recruited because he managed to defile a nonexistent canon (chess) and came into contact with the PPC as part of their efforts to fix what he'd broken.

I have a World One agent who walked in on a "do you REALLY want to do this?" chat between a gaming friend (and backsliding OFU grad) and said friend's OFU roomie, who had joined the PPC after graduation.

And yes, I know I need to get her agent page up. I've had some RL distractions, like my stepfather's death Monday night.

... who was recruited directly because of her PPC-useful skills (love/respect/knowledge of canon and insanity). The PPC has a well-documented understaffing problem; generally, anyone they can get, they will take, no matter how they wound up in HQ.

I agree that the "falling-into-plothole" explanation is getting a little overused, but there are plenty of other ways for an agent to get into HQ - maybe they have friends who are agents, and on said agents' vacation home they heard about the PPC and decided to tag along and join; maybe they have friends who are agents and said friends invite them in because it's the greatest job ever, you would totally love it, no really it's SO COOL; maybe they saw some suspicious-looking people exorcizing a celebrity on a real-person fic mission, and followed them back to HQ; maybe they're a new agey mystery-lover person who heard about a lot of strange things happening in New Caledonia, went to investigate, and found the entrance to HQ; maybe they saw a really weird ad in the local paper, answered it, and realized they had no idea what they were getting into... pretty much anything goes!

My two were - they kept the PPC's contact info from their OFU days and joined up later.

There have been other methods of recruitment; it's been hinted at that the PPC sometimes puts adverts out in local papers and the like, and some people have met Agents on holiday and been recruited that way.

Hope that helps!

There's no rule for how Agents from any world can be recruited. As long as it makes sense, or at least as much sense as the PPC can manage.

This is so sad. My mother's been reading her books since I was young, and I distinctly remember the first time I picked up Acorna.

Rest in peace, Anne McCaffrey. You died on my birthday. Rain on my parade, why don't you?

Anne McCaffrey was the first sci-fi author I ever read. I have been working on a collection of all of her books for years. I know some of her others are not as well known as Pern, but the Petaybee trilogy is one of my favorite set of books ever. I love the brain ship series, except maybe The City That Fought. I liked the Acorna series, and the Damia series. I never quite got around to reading the Dinosaur Planet and Doona series.

Of course I can't seem to find it now, but I am pretty sure that I looked it up at one time and her list of published works was well over 100 books. What a wonderful contribution to the collective of humanity.

...back at home. All the Weyrs of Pern holds the distinction of being the first book that got me misty-eyed - dammit AIVAS, why did you have to die!? You had so much left to giiiiive! D:.

And I was always quite disappointed that Mellony's parents never DID find out that the daughter they'd abused and all but abandoned had ended up becoming apprentice to the Masterharper of all Pern. Would have been a nice piece of karmic comeuppance.

While I haven't read her novels... yet... I offer my condolences to her family.

(Also, while I'm typing this, I'm listening to "Sticks and Stone" from "How to Train Your Dragon". Would that count as fitting?)

Her books were some of the first fantasy/sci-fi books I ever read.

Wow...

Anne McCaffery was one of my first SF/Fantasy authors that I loved. I loved her Dragon Riders of Pern series, but I also loved her Brainship series. *sigh*

Speaking as someone who was first introduced to SF by her novels... *breaks down and cries*

I was never much of a fan, but my mother loves McCaffrey's stuff. My sympathies go out to her fans.

2011 has definitely not been a good year for authors, as far as staying alive goes. ._.

Repent! Return to the true path of the Great Goddess GreyLadyBa--. Hey, chocolate!

*converts to Julyism*

*eats lots of sweets*

*proffers deep bow, reaches over offering box for a long moment*

Hail!

*leaves, with twice as many lovely shiny chocolate wrappers now covering the box*

*does not speculate on what happens when it is revealed they're all now empty*

...to our new honored Lady of Chaotic Flames!

(Because that is totally what matters here.)

How's a steady supply of truffles, some of them even homemade and interestingly flavored, sound to you? I can provide.

Well this seems pretty odd, its nice to see some more gods. Still I'd like to see how this decision came about.

Truly a new age of peace/chaos is upon us!

(Drops a few Snicker bars and Reese Pieces in the Donation box)

What are domains? I'm so confused.

Although I've only been to the IRC twice, I'm going to agree that it's insane if it produces things like this.

One god of the PPC is not enough. We need a pantheon! More specifically, we need a god to stand against July! I will be that god.

I promote pantslessness every day! Shirts are optional.

Domains: Earth, Chaos, Madness, Trickery, Community, and Evil

Come to the Temple of Phobos. Death for some, fun for all! Donations of booze and salty snacks are always accepted.

No, seriously, dish.

Hi there! Thought I'd introduce myself to a fellow Pokémon author.
I've taken a quick look at your stuff, BTW, and I might just take a look at Mr. Ryu's foray through the Pokémon universe. The others are romance, which aren't my thing. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against romance; it's just not what I prefer to read.
Anyway, hi!
(I said that already, didn't I?)

Welcome to the PPC! Have some cookies.

Welcome to the Board! Here, have some chocolate and enjoy your stay!

Welcome. Have a cookie. It's made of awesome.

Welcome to the PPC! Here's some Bleeprin for your forays into badfic!

Aside from Pokémon, what other fandoms are you into?

Hi, have some fudge!

We love new people!

Here, have some Ravel for the road:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeMhExLaWc8

Glad to have you! Have an introverted, talking force field, and enjoy your stay.

Welcome a-board. Here, have a plate of muffins.

Greetings, new friend! Have a cheat code!

I don't know anything about the author in question, but one possibility of the fics are spaced out in time is that you're seeing her older and newer work next to each other. I know I can't bear to look at some of my original and fan stories from even a year or two ago, let alone some of my very early stuff.
I'd say that regardless of what you think of her 'good' stuff, it's still fine to say that the 'bad' stuff is indeed bad as long as it meets the negative standard for being counted as bad.

Did I just hear "Debt"? I only read one chapter of that and could go no farther.

I've only read one other fic from the author (which was also disturbing in a different way, and also has a TV Tropes page), so I'm not sure about the quality of most of her fics. However, I would not base quality of a fic on the general quality an author has. Some improve over time and write very well at present time but have some downright terrible fics from when they first started. (I suffered from this, for example.)

Tl;dr- Badfics should be looked at on an individual basis, not necessarily looking at an author's entire work (though often badfics's authors will write other badfics). Does that make any sense?

...in general, if the gore is completely out of character for not only the characters but for the world as a whole, and if when you seperate out the gore, the plot itself is bad, or has more plot holes than an art film, then yes, you could legitimately spork the thing (see Cupcakes for a particularly infamous example).

My friends

My family (tends to overlap with the above)

A blessed relief from work

My dogs (DOGS!)

A day late, for me; I spent most of yesterday morning either in transit to my stepmom's house, rushing around frantically, or in transit to my stepmom's sister's house. Thanksgiving is the most stressful holiday. But fun!*

I'm thankful for friends, family, and having a job. For animals that are adorable even when they're annoying, for a house to live in, even when it's loud and packed. I'm thankful for love, and for hope, even with frustrating distances attached.

No matter what there is to complain about, whenever I really think about it, the good outweighs the bad.

*Ah, and of course Fred Clark has already done that:
"Today is a happy day here in America, because it’s Thanksgiving Day — a day to gather with our families to enjoy a meal and spend hours talking with our relatives.

Today is a stressful day here in America, because it’s Thanksgiving Day — a day to gather with our families to enjoy a meal and spend hours talking with our relatives."

Ah, yes, Thanksgiving. We don't celebrate it here in Hong Kong, but I AM thankful for:

- NaNoWriMo, for keeping me on track writing my novel
- Tea
- Frying pans (plus the eggs)
- Family and friends, especially my twin (who can be irritating at times, but still)
- My laptop (and the internet that comes with it)

And that's about it. :)

~Xani B.

Hm...

I am thankful for:
-Popping up again on forums (ahemthisBoardahem) that I should really visit more
-Less homework over the holidays
-College apps almost being completely done
-FOOD. FOOD EVERYWHERE.
-Awesome people (both here and other places)
-Time to write
-Non-angry parents and visiting family

And that is all I can think of right now.

That I get to wait till Christmas before massive intakes of food.

Well... I'm thankful for friends, awesome music, food, a wonderful, supportive environment in school, and everything else.

You know how it is. :D

My family, my friends (gotta get the obvious out of the way)

The Internet

Having a week of break from classes

All my favorite shows

my dog who loves me

Ramen

The fact that people like Mr. Rogers have existed

I could go on.

I'm thankful for having a loving family in stable condition and well, for just being alive, I guess.

Really, I'm more grateful for things than thankful... because other than my parents and the USA government (for being able to live here) there's nobody to really thank.

But 'Gratesgiving' or 'Greatsgiving' aren't nearly as catchy as 'Thanksgiving' so I guess I will pipe down and be thankful after all. ;)

So yeah. Happy holiday, other USA boarders!

I'm thankful that I'm still alive.
I'm thankful that ERROR ERROR DOES NOT COMPUTE

Stupid copy and paste. Wait... I wasn't copying and pasting. Stupid sentient computer HEY!

Moving on...

I'm thankful that I don't have too many school projects. Only a couple.

Thanks to your stupid teachers I have to work overtime! WHY!!!
Shut up, computer.

I'm thankful for *insert random cliche here*
Well, that pretty much sums it up!

I'm thankful for My friends and family,

For waking up again this morning, (without a crippling sore throat, no less)

For being out of school for the next 5 days,

For my dad being an awesome cook.

Everything.

Also that we haven't been eaten by a cosmic abomination yet. Definitely thankful for that.

*starts handing out turkey-flavored cookies*

Pleasure to meet you! Have an expandable top hat. Just don't where it in tunnels.

Welcome to the Board! Have a shoe phone!

Have a fried egg with some weird sauce on top. :) Welcome on Board!

Hi, have some fudge!

Welcome to the board then. Assuming you've already handed in your sanity at the entrance, have this cookie. It's made of awesome.

Hi there! Welcome to the Board, have a cookie, some chocolate, and this weird green blob thing I found behind my couch.

Welcome to the Board! Have some chocolate, won't you?

Hello there, person who is newer than me! Here, have a title. It's still blank, so you can put whatever you want innit, haha.
-desdendelle, Slayer of Topics

Have a pair of socks. They're useful for just about anything, from being worn on one's feet to being used as projectile weapons!

Greetings, new friend! Have some E-tickets!

I had a long concrit written up, but we had a power outage that killed it.

I'll be appending one to this post once I finish rewriting it, but what it comes down to is that while you might have a grasp on the basic elements of grammar and spelling, your writing sample lacks reasoning for the characters, the characters have no characterization whatsoever, there is no real development or change that occurs within the story, and the pacing is shoddy.

I have to say, I like this permission sample better than the first one. It's way less purple and actually tells a short story in a considerable amount of text.

Lurking and then returning is standard policy for a lot of us. Especially people who are actually good at NaNo. *shoots a glare in Artell and Huinesoron's respective directions* (Hey, they're both on the same side of the pond, that's convenient.)

Anyway! In answer to your question, yes! We exchanged NaNo usernames here.

Greetings, new friend! Have a Fire Gem!

Welcome to the Board! Here, have some chocolate, won't you?

Here, have a conical hat and a muffin.

The conical hat is made of tin foil and duct tape, so it'll keep out the conspiracy theorists and bullets*!

The muffin is oatmeal banana strawberry carrot blueberry raspberry chocolate chip apple cinnamon Lucky Charms.

*conical hat will not actually deflect bullets.

Hi, have some fudge!

Good day to you, firemagic! Have a sapient calculator! If it starts rambling about its life story, just hit "clear" a few times.

Have you read The Original Series? If not, head on over to: http://www.misssandman.com/PPC/story.html and read up on it!

Also, what are your fandoms?

Greetings, new friend! Have a Lucky Egg!

Ah, an OFU for Pokémon? I didn't realize there was one! Can I get a link to that, please?

Hi! Have some fudge!

First of all, welcome! Have some Bleeprin for the bad memories; neuralyzers tend to cause brain damage if used repeatedly...

Second of all, a Pokémon fan, yay! What's your favorite type and 'Mon?

Welcome to the Board! Here, have some chocolate, won't you?

And one who doesn't find the LotR books all that interesting!

It's good to know I'm not alone in some things. :)

Anyhow, welcome to the PPC. Here, have some Richard Strauss for the road: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34FFDppvIf8

... from someone who wanders in vaguely every few months. :)

While I disagree with you on the subject of Tolkien (huge fan here - I'm not in any other fandoms) I definitely concede your point: his prose style is not for everyone, so I don't think you need be embarassed about not liking it. Heck, I once tried my hardest to read Les Miserables and just couldn't get anywhere; it gave me a whole new respect for people who found Tolkien too descriptive. This is hardly a Tolkien-exclusive community, either, so I'm pretty sure you're fine. :)

I guess you like Pokemon, huh? Is that your only fandom or are there others?

About the only problem I had was that we don't get a good enough description of the Yatan to explain how feline creatures with paws can use swords and such, but given that such a description may have been forthcoming in another chapter, that may have been an invalid complaint. Otherwise, yeah, it's great.

Today, I met my new partner. She was crying, so I hugged her. She threw me into a wall. I broke four ribs through HUGGING! FML.

Today, I answered the door only to find that the mostly-Sue I recruited yesterday has been made my new trainee. FML.

I just got back with a load of rescued kids from a fic to find that anything under eighteen is my responsibility. This includes my Sue-partner. I now have five kids, all but one under-twelve. I'm 26. FMMFL.

I don't think we need Permission to do this so here goes:

"So I decided to disguise myself as a Dark Templar to follow a Starcraft Sue, hoping that the unit's passive cloaking would shield me. Turns out one of the Sue's speshul powers is being a walking detector. FML."

"Note to self: disguising as a Firebat seems like a smart idea when surrounded by Zerglings but it doesn't give you any flamethrower fuel. FML."

Today I stopped the apocalypse. My dad grounded me for it. FML

Today I got to visit my first fictional world. it was Twilight. FML

"Today I lost almost all my memory. Last thing I remember is my world crumbling around me, everything going fuzzy and me slammed face first into a gray wall. FML."

"Today I got a new partner. Turns out it was the annoying girl I had crashed into before my latest mission. FFMLF."

"Today I met my longtime fictional crush for the first time by bashing him over the head with a hardcover. FML."

"Today we were sent on a mission, and I recognized the fanfic as one I used to star in. FML."

"Today I cooked a turkey for Thanksgiving, only to remember that I'm a vampire, so I can't actually eat it. FML."

"Today my partner cooked a turkey for Thanksgiving, only to remember that he can't eat people food. So he gave it to me. MLIA!"

"Today I went an' made two gift baskets, one for me old boss an' one for a bleedin' Duke of Hell. I switched 'em by accident, an' neither beast noticed the bloody difference. FML."

"My partner built a new machine. It turned my hair blue and her into a giant chicken. It took me five hours to finally chase her to Medical. FML."

"My partner's not-cat keeps teleporting into my room, waking me up, and when I act on reflex and throw her off me, she complains to my partner and gets me in trouble. FML."

I came to the Cafeteria expecting turkey and stuffing. I'm not entirely sure what I got, but it definitely wasn't avian. FML

Aside from them not crediting Miss Cam. That's something that should be mentioned, yes.

But beyond that, OFUs are first come, first serve, or second come, and completed.

We, the PPC, don't have anything to do with the OFUs in and of ourselves. There's nothing wrong with non-PPCers running OFUs.

And yes, of course it's a legitimate OFU. The fact it not ran by a PPCer does not change that fact.

Beyond that, the general thing with minis and OFUs is that the OFU gets the priority in what the minis are called, even if the OFU comes after the mini is already created in the first place. Minis are OFU concepts, not PPC concepts.

And, last I checked, she doesn't care all that much about OFU legitimacy anymore. I don't think it's our place, at all, to take it down. And if they're not making claims about the PPC itself, we can't exactly claim they're treading on our turf.

Honestly, I'd say leave them alone. It's possible (though improbable), that she doesn't know OFUs should be credited, or that she asked and Cam said "Yeah, do whatever you want," or that she doesn't know that they're supposed to follow OFUM. Either way, it's not really our jurisdiction, so to speak.

while OFU writers are not required to be answerable to the PPC, they should definitely credit Miss Cam.

And someone giving the impression the PPC makes OFUs... well, that's really not good. There's generally been a strong affectionate link between them, but they're separate and separately-run entities.

And finally, this person implies that these people are good enough to do the same sort of work as the PPC, but weren't hired. Which kind of goes directly against what we've always taken for granted - that the flood of badfic is so heavy that the Flowers'll hire anyone. I mean, they hired Luxury. :P

Personally, I'd suggest we ask this writer to either fix her mistakes or take it down. :/ Though the latter is something of an extreme measure, I'm aware.

It probably won't happen for a while, and I'm sure you'll do "It's My Life!" long before it, but... I dunno, I'm just curious - what would your idea for a mini be?

I'm certainly not the expert on this, but I would think that would not be a legitimate OFU. They also seem to use a form very similar to those of the OFUs (they even ask if the applicant has heard of OFUs before, but cut out the question about the PPC). It seems that they want the fame of an OFU without dealing with having to be a member of the PPC. (Correct me if I'm wrong/being too judgemental, anyone.)

Oh, and the fic is here, if people were wondering.

Another asian!
Good to meet you.
Here is a (dramatic pause...) slightly used spear. Please do not ask about the bloodstains.

Hi! Have some fudge!

Have a pair of socks! They're useful whether you need to wear a pair or need an improvised weapon.

Hmm, I don't know YGO that well (I'm an APH obsessed fan) but perhaps I'll try reading some of your fics later. ;]

Greetings, new friend! Help yourself to the bag of venomous invertebrates. Don't worry; they don't bite!

First of all, no need to be overly formal as Aster said. Secondly, welcome to the Board! Have an asthmatic vacuum cleaner as a welcoming gift!

P.S: Do I spy a mini-Boarder?

Well, nice to meet you! Really, there's nothing to worry about. Rejecting people really isn't the PPC way. You might as well brace yourself for a series of odd gifts, because the welcome committee is going to be making its rounds soon.

And by 'committee' I mean 'pretty much anybody who decides to reply to this thread.' We're not an incredibly regimented bunch. :)

I'm going to keep an eye on the Firefly crossover. It doesn't seem to bad, and I honestly laughed when I realized that the author had cast Angel (Fluttershy's rabbit) in Jayne's role.

Derpy Hooves is best pony!

...But that'd be kinda dumb ...Wait.

Uh, anyway, I'll have to give the Firefly/My Little Pony fic a look, see if it's up to snuff.

I won't say a thing about the second fic, but I know that even without knowing Firefly all that much, it's probably not that great a fic given that I'm sporking a similar kind of fic for my Floaters RC ATM.

Well, when I'm not writing an MST for something completely different, that is.

And as for the first one... It's not exactly what I'd call terrible, but I don't know, there are a lot of ways that one could go. I say wait and see for the first one.

welcome to the Board, where I myself have been posting for all of three days! Here, have this nice keychain. It was made from a Mary-Sue's ground-up and reformed bones:D

Have some fire! Everyone likes fire!

Good to have you as part of the Great Work. Have some Glistening Oil.

O, hello, Alleydodger. Here, have a plate of Generic muffins.
- desdendelle, Slayer of Topics

Greetings, new friend! Have a heaping helping of street savoir-faire!

Hi, have some fudge!

Welcome to the Board! Here, have some chocolate and enjoy your stay!

Have this cookie. It's made of concentrated awesome.

And yes, using portals is difficult... reminds me of the time I ended up in the shark pool. What do they feed them?

Don't worry, you portalled in at a good time! Welcome to the PPC, Alleydodger! Have a hydrophobic wind-up submarine!

How about telling us about your fandoms?

Hi! Have some fudge! Sorry, I don't have any laced with Bleeprin, but maybe a sugar rush will help?

Welcome to the Board! Here, have some chocolate, and enjoy your stay!

Greetings, new friend! Help yourself to the sack of venomous arthropods. Don't worry; they don't bite!

You've read IT? I don't know what to say, really. Here's some Bleeprin for you, you're going to need it.

Aside from that, welcome to the Board! Here, have a walking desk. It's great for traveling but not so great for working. What other fandoms are you into?

First, have some bleeprin to eliminate your memories of whatever manner of abomination you saw. Second, stay away from Cthulhu, until the smell of badfic wears off, he may try to eat you.

Might I just add that I in no way enjoy, endorse, or any other positive e-words TV Tropes. I do not like this website in any way, I just find it a simpler way to find badfic to make fun of than Google.

And a sympathetic wince on your having read C*l*br**n without any warning.

EX-TER-MIN-ATE THE UR-PLE ONES!

I took that scene as a total example of Owen's just sort of careless skeezieness, which yes, does get explained later on in the series and pretty much completely resolved and redeemed, but I digress.

I can't help but think that that scene was sort of awkwardly played for laughs simply to spark this question, this "What makes people think that this can be treated as funny!?!?" furiosity, because so often the mainstream media does play these things for laughs. But I'm rambling again, and have added my two cents.

So, to recap:
1) Owen=Supercreep, BUT, he Gets Better.
B) Funny To Be Creepy? O.o?

I made one. Here it is: http://starshadowhall.tripod.com/ppc/wikipoll/

~Neshomeh

Like I said on the poll, I'm quite willing to help out.

As for Sue pages--The people who sporked the fic are the best ones to create the Sue page.

Notable Sues include:
--Sues slain in TOS (all of these have pages)
--Sues from Legendary Badfic
--Sues which showed some noteworthy trait or method of canon-bending; for example, possessing Narnia, creating an army of Mini-Sues, or causing Equestria to bend out of shape so far that reality started breaking...

If your mission had a Sue that had an unusual effect on the canon, the other option is to name the effect and write the article on that, linking your mission as a reference, so that the new idea can be used by future writers.

I've never written one, but I've read a bunch, and though I do like them, I think the category as a whole requires some cleaning up.

What would this entail?

I would also like to volunteer to help with sorting out the Sue and Stu pages. I have never written such a page and is too lazy to even contemplate doing so, which should make me qualified. ^^

About the author names ... I have no strong opinion. I think giving credit is important, but I do so in the opening to my missions and I don't really need to do it anywhere else. Having author names on the lists of badfics is something I can live perfectly happy with or without.

Personally, I am shocked that Llama did not win. 0_o

"You need permission to access this item."

Anyone else getting this error message?

I've never written a Sue or Stu page. If some of them need to be evaluated, I have both the time and inclination to... do whatever it is this job is going to entail.

I'd feel that we shouldn't list author names on the wiki. I just think that if we list names in such a way, we'd create some sort of "wall of shame" where people would constantly associate badfic to their (pen) names.

If I saw my name on a list like that for everyone to see, I'd feel downright insulted: it would feel as if not just my work, but my very person is being targeted. I wouldn't like to have people pulling out some old shame out of the depths of the internet and wave it at my face all the time. Authors grow better as they learn and we don't need to keep track of their early attempts at writing which we consider bad.

I say keep it anonymous.

Well met, rookie! Please enjoy this high-powered speedboat as a welcoming gift.

Welcome to the Board! Have a sentient, acrophobic RC airplane!

You live in a swamp, you say? Have this swamp dragon that somehow followed me home! Make sure you're careful around him, though - they have a tendency to explode without warning...

We love new people! Here, come on in!

And have yourself some Bruno Maderna for the road: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tp05zqyECY

I, too, am something of a newcomer. Even so, welcome a-Board!
Here, take this 55-gallon drum of candy! It *totally* at no point contained any Vietnam-era herbicides with unpleasant pasts.

Swamp Wizards ... Are they in any way related to Marsh-wiggles?

I'm fairly new myself, but welcome aboard! Have some chocolate-peanut-butter homemade cookies.

Greetings, new friend! Have . . . uh . . . one of those boats that floats across swampland with the giant fan. That thing. Yeah.

Hi, have some fudge!

I'm new here myself but welcome to this hidden labyrinth of barely controlled insanity mixed with an awe inspiring dedication to duty and a steely eyed determination to rid the world of the plague of badfics that overrun otherwise good sites such as my beloved Fanfiction.net (i.e the Pit)

Have a Discworld swamp dragon model, it'll fit right in! :)

Welcome to the Board! Have some chocolate, won't you?

What are your fandoms, btw?

One of the Discworld books, I think it was Lords and Ladies, involves one of the characters being able to see into other multiverses of her life, and there is literally one for every single different decision she could have ever made. I agree with Calista's idea that it would just create a completely different universe of the combination of the two mirrors, but the fact that a new universe is being created might cause some issues with how aware the characters are in the original universes (and any others that might exist) of the combination.

Theoretically, this merged universe could already exist somewhere along the timeline of the Prime Multiverse and the Mirror Multiverse, and its own timeline could have started just as the combination took place. There's also the issue of the people in THAT universe knowing or not knowing about their being from two merged universes...you'd definitely have to do a lot of explaining on those parts.

I don't think it would work well for an entire IAHF to be replaced by another one, because then you could get into the issue of where the replaced one would go. After all, OFUs don't just disappear. Would it get absorbed? But then you get back to the idea of replacement...maybe it would go into the void, that space between universes like in Doctor Who? There's a lot involved you'd have to think about.

I hope the advice helps. Discworld novels do have a lot to do with different dimensions and universes being traversed or seen into or talked about, so maybe you could read a few of those (but there's a lot, so you'd have to have a lot of time on your hands to read them all). Good luck with the story!

I think it would create a third multiverse which is a combination of the first two.

A story is not just a single storyline; it's also the combination of all the possibilities that could have happened. Therefore, because you are writing a story about sets of storylines, your story is the combination of all the possible ways those storylines could combine. In this case, that means that both the combination and the separate state exist after the merger.

Yeah, this is how you get thirteen dimensions in string theory. :P

Well, as pointed out below, it's recommended that you hang around for a while before you apply for permission. That said, there are a few other issues with your application.

Here at the PPC, our entire mission is to promote goodfic-- one of the most important things that separates goodfic from badfic is the spelling and grammar-- syntax in general, really. So, to put it bluntly, it would really help your chances if you proofread your posts on the Board for spelling and grammar before posting them. I is generally capitalized (unless you have an e. e. cummings style explanation, in which case I really, really look forward to your eventual spinoff, quite seriously) and so on.

Concerning your agents, it's hard to say anything about them, because the profiles, honestly, don't say much about their personality, which is the important bit. (Also, bit of a nitpick-- 'humanish' is generally referred to as 'humanoid,' unless you've an actual species called humanish, in which case I stand corrected.) The thing that makes your spin-off worth reading isn't the age of your agents, or their guns-- it's their character. Their personality-- what makes them tick? How do they view the world, each other, the PPC? Do they regret leaving their home continuum, or look back on it with disdain? All of that-- how they tell their stories, how they live their lives... that's what we're reading for. Think about your agents-- imagine them in scenarios, meeting each other for the first time, reacting to their first Sues, and so on-- that's the important part.

Your writing sample... um. To put it bluntly, you really need a *beta. You've got to work on your dialogue-- for example,

"Yoyo have you even looked at this tag?" Beat questioned "This isn't some try-hard trying to pump himself up. This is quality work and besides only a rudie could reach half the places he's tagged"

should be punctuated:

"Yoyo, have you even looked at this tag?" Beat asked. "This isn't some try-hard trying to pump himself up. This is quality work, and besides, only a rudie could reach half the places he's tagged."

Never end a quote with just a quotation mark-- you want either the full stop or question mark at the end of a sentence, in which case the next words after the quotation mark should be a new sentence. (For example: "They all disappeared." She looked away. rather than "They all disappeared" she looked away.) You can also use a comma, but in that case you need to be careful that you are not starting a new sentence. (For example: "They all disappeared," she said, looking away. instead of "They all disappeared," She said and looked away.)

You've got quite a few comma errors, and you should have some sort of segue between scenes. You've got the first scene, with the two main characters(?) viewing a tag, and the teenager watching-- then you've got the group talking, and then the girl and the villain(?). There's no break between them, so it's a bit confusing to sort out on first read-through.

My recommendation is to go through and read the Original Series, and as many of the spin-offs as you can-- try and get a feel for the style you want, so you know what you're applying for. And be sure to proofread your stuff before it goes up-- a lot of times, you can fix those comma errors just by reading a sentence out loud and feeling where the pauses should be.

This is by no means a permanent deny; you've got plenty of time, and it's absolutely recommended that you hang around and try again when you've got to know the community a little better, and have a feel for what you want to do, more. Hope to see you around!

--VM

*I can't really offer to beta it right now, my life has just taken a turn for the crazy, but if you catch my on the IRC, I'll pm you and discuss things more in-depth-- grammar issues, anyway. I don't know that canon too well.

We usually wait a month to get to know new PPCers before Permission is given. As such, you'll be asked to wait for that long until you're able to repost a Permission request. On that subject, I've found a few problems with the request that probably should be rectified.

1) Inconsistent capitalization, especially when using the word 'I'. It may be that you were just typing rapidly, but hitting either of the 'shift' keys isn't all that hard, even when typing quickly.

2) There's not that much information about your agents here. What roles did they play in their original story? How did Percy get that handgun? What are their personalities like? Why did they have to beg the agent to recruit them? Usually, if an agent comes across willing and able recruits, they shove them through a portal to the Daisy's office ASAP. Also, how did they know the agent was an ally? Just because the agent was in a badfic doesn't mean that they can be trusted.

3) Your writing sample is good, but it seems rushed. Also, there are several instances where you've omitted punctuation marks when closing speech tags.

I hope this helps some!

-Pretzel

As a general rule, you should wait at least one month so we can get to know you better. Quote the Wiki:

Q. When should I ask for permission?

A. Whenever you feel comfortable and confident asking. The sole caveat is that the Permission Givers are not likely to grant permission to someone they just met or don't recognize, so it helps if you've been around long enough to have a visible presence in the community, but there's no magical time period.

You have to be an active member for at least a month before requesting permission.

What is the protocol for sporking trollfics? Or at least, fics that we're pretty sure are trollfics? I know some are funny, and many should be let slide because they weren't meant seriously - but what about the really, really painful ones?

I know that there is a Department of Bad Parody - Troll Division, but I've looked there and there aren't actually any missions in it. Other really really awful fics that were possibly/probably trolls (legolas by laura, My Immortal, Thirty H's, anything by Squirrelking) either have missions written or forthcoming, and in the ones I have read they were treated like honest fics. So... I guess is there standard procedure for these, or in sporking one should I just be extra careful about the charges, or what?

(The fic that I have in mind is http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7324877/1/Homestuck_high, by the way. Yes, it was probably a troll, but I want to KILL IT TO DEATH IN FIRE SO BADLY)

As to the first: It should to be clearly and definitively bad. If it is unintentionally funny, all the better. The difference between something mediocre and something PPCable is, well, the difference between mediocre and bad. If you can read it without wanting to smash your head against the wall, or even enjoy it to an extent, it's probably just mediocre. Badfic, is, well, bad. It's got bad SPaG, OOCness, and stuff that just plain doesn't add up to the point where one or more of the elements involved utterly conquer what might be okay or otherwise excusable.

All agents* have flashpatches. The flashpatch is one of the two consistent items for the PPC uniform; the other is that the uniform is black. The SEP field comes from the flashpatch. The thing with Spies is that, one can reason, while Assassins are there just for the Sue, Spies in comparison spend an extended amount of time in the field given any particular fic, in comparison to other field agents.

There are many different varieties of already existing gadgets in the PPC throughout many different spinoffs- I see no reason why it'd not be okay to have a different version of the same gadget in the PPC. That said, I'd suggest doublechecking with Dann if he doesn't comment on this thread since he's got the main general DoSAT agent who isn't a shared character.

*There is one group that use green armbands instead.

Isn't the fact that they're male characters with a large role in a Touhou story already a canon break?

Okay, okay, that's not entirely fair. Rinnosuke did some stuff, after all. Like that time he did that thing, and that other time he did that other thing. And that time he played soccer.

Portal badfic:

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7405738/1/sarah_in_aperture - Rated M - Portal 2

my portal oc wakes up in aperture and she falls in love...with an AI! rated M because there will be sex ;

Notes: This is hilariously bad. Blatant Sue, author in "denial" but most certainly trolling, SPaG of the worst quality, Wheatley back on Earth and in Aperture, speshul transformation necklaces, etc. I think that this might be an attempt to recreate My Immortal in Portal.

Have a folding car. In becomes a (rather heavy) case whe not in use.

Be very careful with it - it doens't like to stay folded.

I'm a bit late but Happy Birthyesterday! Have a water pistol that shoots chocolate sauce. :)

A spot of French always makes things a bit more classy. Happy birthday to you, sir!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1oqWKAp1N8

Happy birthday to you! :D

Looks like your a few turns ahead of me in the game of life! Happy birthday!

If Belkime were here, I'm sure he'd complain about the lack of chocolate steak. I don't know how chocolate steak would even work or if it would be at all appetizing, but you know how crazy pirate dinosaurs are.

*puts on party hat and joins in the festivities*

Why only chocolate cake? This is a birthday! There must be cakes of ALL kinds!

*Omnomnomnomnomnomnomnom*

Happy birthday!

Happy co-birthday, my friend! *Snags some cake and then dashes off to finish her NaNo*

I raise a wooden chalice of sludge in your honour.

Happy Birthday PC!! Have some smoke bombs!

Have a sack of pebbles, a customised sling to throw them with, and a basket of Bleeprin-berries!

...ooh, cake. *nomnomnom*

Now I feel youngish.

I think I'll mix things up and go dancing in the saloon instead.

Birthdays are good for you; statistics show that people who have the most live the longest!

And congratulations on your new record! But be careful, I'm only three years behind you and who knows when I might catch up to you!

Thanks for the cake, by the way. I brought you this bottle of 1947 champ-...oh, wait, this is carbonated apple juice from 1947. Oh well, I'm sure it'll taste fine!

Have some Portal Cake - wait! don't go! - why does everybody keep running away from me when I say this?

Happy Birthday! Have some yummy homemade brownies in a baking pan that most certainly NEVER contained strange mutant cockroaches from Japan.

Nosiree.

(Blows party horn)

I don't have much of a gift, just a triple chocolate cupcake. But hey, ya can never have enough chocolate, right?

(Steals a piece of cake)

Happy birthday! *eats some cake, hugs the birthday Cynic and gives him a mini-David Bowie she picked up somewhere* Hey, you mentioned dancing in the street...

1) No idea. Sorry.

2) ...no idea. Sorry.

3) Linking is good.

4) This is why I'm sometimes so hesitant to respond to requests. (SOMETIMES. Usually, I either see it and go "Ah, I'll get to that later," not having the time at the moment, and then July or someone Ninjas it out from under me, or I don't see it.) Because I am terribly uncomfortable saying "Yes, absolutely, go ahead!" to someone whose writing I really don't like. Or, as July pointed out, who I don't feel is going to do the PPC any favors. (And here we all owe Nakkel a big hand for being the shameless troll that he is, and providing us with a perfect example subject.)

But the request isn't... doing anything wrong that I can pin-point. (I will say that, unlike what July says below, I wouldn't say yes to someone if I noticed a lot of SpaG errors.) So I just worry and think and go over it in my head repeatedly until someone else comes along and takes the decision out of my hands.

...I'm actually not very good at this job.

It just doesn't sit right with me, stamping "Yes Go Ahead" on someone who I don't think has grasped A) the PPC, in general, B) writing consistently in character, C) syntax skills in English. If I can make good points and it's a clear Yes or a clear No, then fine. But if it's not a clear Yes, I can't just red-stamp it-- and if it's not a clear No, I want someone else's say-so before I go ahead.

So-- what I'm looking for in a writing sample? Good spelling, good grammar, a style that doesn't crunch like a fancy cake being shoved haphazardly into a too-small box. A deft hand with the canons, and someone whose face I recognize from more than just "Hi Newbie!" posts and "Hey, when going for permission..." posts.

That's about it, really. Make sense?

1) Trojie and Pads' missions ca be found on a dreamwidth journal.

2) I am unsure what you mean by that, please elaborate.

3) You're welcome to put them on the wiki.

4) And as to your issue, you just explained it right there with those quoted portions. "We want to see whether you can write well, basically." Flaws in pacing, a lack of depth of character, and no real development within the story indicate a basic inability to write. We- the PGs- are not here just to filter out basic SPaG issues. When your own writing has the same problems that we nail as being elements of badfic, spelling and grammar or not, it means that you shouldn't have permission yet.

I can't speak for the people who got permission who you think are lacking in characterization and pacing, but as Araeph put it in one of desdendelle's earlier shots at getting permission, PPCers shouldn't be just 'entry level' writers. We need to know about writing and how it works. If we don't, we can't identify the unintentional humor that can be caused by use of questionable sentence structure and word choice. We also wouldn't know how to improve our own works.
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Beyond that, there are so many spin offs now, that we should be trying to have better quality for new writers. What incentive is there to read their things if the writing is mediocre, and the only thing they have a handle on is grammar and spelling, and their characters aren't interesting, and the way they write is dull? There are other, better things to read, PPC or not.

The important element in this isn't Spelling and Grammar. If anything, that's just a surface matter. I can't speak for other PGs, but I'm more inclined to give permission to someone whose story and agents for their request are legitimately interesting, and they hit the right spots as far as humor goes, know how to pace their story, or reveal or do something that makes me want to read more, even if their SPaG is off, than someone whose SPaG is technically perfect but has a story and characters that are the written equivalent of cardboard: Flat, without contrast, no change, tastes like cardboard, and soggy when wet.

SPaG can always be fixed, either when they learn it themselves- if they don't have any learning disabilities that get in the way of it- or with the help of a beta.

No one can help with the cardboard stories and characters, short of rewriting everything to the point where the original author's work is all but gone.

Beyond the issue of SPaG, there have also been incidents where previous PGs have also denied Permission on the basis and/or concern that the person who gave the sample would go against the spirit of the PPC on various items, such as lacking participation in the community or not getting along with it and its values (for example, if Nakkel decided to ask for permission, there's a higher chance of HQ being invaded by corgis than him getting permission due to his trolling nature that usually involves him bashing on things and people, which isn't PPC or cool at all) or trying to make the PPC grimdark, depressing, and utterly serious without the odor of humor to it at all.

Getting permission is more than just knowing how to write a sentence.

To answer the first, the problem is that the links on the wiki take you to the missions on Livejournal. I'd though I'd fixed that by redirecting all the links to their Dreamwidth account for their PPC stuff, but I guess I missed a few or something. Their Dreamwidth can be found here, and has all their missions, with the exception of the one Trojie did with July, and maybe one or two others.

I'll take Leglass for the Adoption Centre if nobody else wants him - I'm frankly stunned that there are still new and previously undiscovered Legolas minis around. XD

There's actually an OFU for MLP:FiM now, so those should be left to the writers as far as adoption goes.