User:C3PO the Dragon Slayer/Writing center

 Critic's Forum | Writing tips | FA Projects

Critic's Forum
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The Critic's Forum is a place for users to submit requests for reviews of their articles or works. Users may also voluntarily review someone else's article without a request.

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 * Jedi Master Mary Sue... comments??
 * If you REALLY want to make a good Sith...

Writing tips
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The Writing tips forum is a place were users may submit helpful tutorials, hints, walkthroughs, or essays that may inspire a contributor to write higher quality work. Users may also request tutorials, hints, walkthroughs, or essays pertaining to a certain writing topic here.

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 * Atarumaster88's tutorial
 * I, Jedi and you

FA Projects
View Featured Articles that have been promoted through the Writing Center's FA Projects

In the FA Projects forum, put up an article aimed to become an FA or GA; and everyone will pitch in to help it reach the standard required. Collaborative articles or free-edit articles are preferred.

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 * Let's make a vehicle FA!

F1
Hey guys. I recently made an article Mary Sue. It's about a powerful Jedi Padawan in the Clone Wars who defeated Dooku and was then apprenticed to Darth Maul, but I'm not sure where to take it next. I would like this to become a Featured Article, so if you have any suggestions or feedback I'd appreciate it a lot! Darth anon
 * First off, I'd suggest ditching the name Mary Sue. It carries too many connotations of uber-powerfulness that is highly discouraged by the FA guidelines. Lord Captor
 * The real problem with this article is that it has the gall to suggest a mere Padawan has the ability to defeat someone as powerful as Dooku. I don't know how prejudiced the CoS will be against the name, but the story at the moment needs some originality. Anon, if you have to make your article include a Padawan defeating a Sith Lord, you should tweak the circumstances to make it more believable. Be creative in doing this. If you need any inspiration, you could try looking around Wookieepedia for particularly clever ways that Jedi have been killed, and see if you can come up with a similar tactic. Skykiller
 * Ok, but I really don't want to change the name. What's so bad about Mary Sue? Darth anon
 * "Mary Sue" is a name that refers to unbelievably powerful characters, usually female, emotionally struggling, attractive, and perfect in every way. Naturally, such work is interpreted as an insult to humanity and articles like these are discouraged. Starwalker
 * Do you have to apprentice her to Darth Maul? Isn't he supposed to be dead? Bombad Jedi
 * No, he comes back in several official sources. Darth anon
 * Do we have to acknowledge those as canon? They were bad enough when they were fanon. Since the CoS is more critical than the veto pens that EU comics pass through, you should try to make the story MORE believable than the most ridiculous of the EU. Soresuadept22

F2
This is addressed to Darth Edit:

Your namesake article needs to a bit of help. It's not so much that he's too powerful, or that the story is too linear, it's just that it simply doesn't make sense that your character can get himself into those tough situations and somehow always magically escape or outwit the enemy. I know you're deliberately avoiding a Gary Stu Sith, and hence not relying on his sheer Force power or whatever to emerge victorious, and I applaud your efforts in that regard. But if he doesn't use some kind of Force Maelstrom to get out of that situation on Dathomir, what does he do to escape? I find it hard to believe that all 150 snipers missed as he bounded for cover. There should at least be some distraction to explain how he got away. Queen of Men
 * Wouldn't 150 snipers get in each other's way? I like to think that Darth Edit got away because the everyone was tripping over each other. Darth Edit

F3
The featured article tutorial was an article written on the Star Wars Fanon Wiki in 2009 by Atarumaster88. At the time, the wiki was undergoing a shortage of featured articles to display on the Main Page. In a community discussion, Atarumaster88 sought to provide a possible solution for the article and began work on a subpage of his. His idea was to create an article that serve both as a tutorial for prospective featured article writers, as well as model the appropriate layout and writing style that Star Wars Fanon required of their featured articles. His inspiration came from tutorials that himself and other Inquisitors had produced on Wookieepedia to aid writers on that wiki. The tutorial eventually received the approval of the Star Wars Fanon community, as well as its review board, the Council of Seers and was used to help writers understand the requirements of a featured article.

When writing the tutorial, Atarumaster88 consistently employed proper spelling and grammar. The sentences were written in a consistent past tense and were standardized in American English, so as to avoid reader confusion. He began the article with an introduction of more than two hundred words. All these measures were taken to insure that the tutorial conformed to the requirements laid down by the Star Wars Fanon community. However, preceding the introduction, Atarumaster88 placed an infobox and eras templates in accordance with the Manual of Style. He then proceeded to layout the sections of the tutorial in order to discuss topics and concepts that he felt would be helpful to writers on the Star Wars Fanon Wiki, based on his experience writing featured articles on Wookieepedia and his reviewing of featured articles on Star Wars Fanon.

Eras
In which Atarumaster88 briefly discussed the tiny little templates that occupied the top right corner of the article.

Infoboxes
In this section of the tutorial, Atarumaster88 addressed the uses of infoboxes, where to find them, and how to add them to infoboxes.

Introduction
The introduction was one of the first things that readers examined and the part of the article that appeared on the Main Page. As such, Atarumaster88 devoted a segment to discussing the introduction.

The question of tense
Atarumaster88 used this segment to clarify the usage of past and present tense.

Linking
The topic of how much and where to link, as well as pipelinking was discussed here.

Quotes
An explanation of the Quote template was given here.

From my point of view
Herein, Atarumaster88 warned prospective writers about the dangers of falling into the snares of point-of-view and cautioned them to be sure that their writing adhered to a neutral point of view, also known as NPOV.

Prosetry, or the art of growing prose flowers
The folly of writing in a flowery, poetic style were examined in this section.

Common spelling and grammar errors
Some of the most frequent usage errors and spelling mistakes were addressed by Atarumaster88.

Diction and syntax
Two words that every FA writer should know and cherish, according to Atarumaster88, were clarified and defined in this segment.

Transition and flow
Once the basic principles of sentence structure and wording were discussed, the tutorial transitioned to a commentary on joining ideas and thoughts together.

Sectioning
In this section, Atarumaster88 provided a guide for how to section articles of different types and what to avoid when making segments.

Images
A succinct description of proper image formatting was supplied to users in this section.

Detail
Wherein Atarumaster88 provided a small piece to illustrate the kind of detail expected in featured articles.

Subsidiaries
Having explained sectioning previously, Atarumaster88 then turned his attention to explaining sections such as "Personality and traits", "Powers and abilities", and above all, "Behind the scenes".

Categories
The importance of clearly classifying one's work was given a thorough treatment here.

Mary Sue
The dark path of the overused and unprofessional phenomena known as Mary Sue was pointed out to users as a dubious distinction to avoid.

Surrealism
Wherein Atarumaster88 explained the dangers of stretching reality and how adverse effects could ensue in the FAN process from doing so.

Referencing
This section was used by Atarumaster88 to provide a basic guide to referencing, for those interested in such things.

Good article
Atarumaster88 gave a brief explanation of the Good Article process and its purposes, as well as its workings.

Featured article nomination
The benefits, proceedings, rewards, expected obstacles, and people behind the FA process were revealed in this segment.

Council of Seers
Atarumaster88 created a small piece about the review board of Star Wars Fanon, posting it here.

Acknowledgments
I'd like to thank Wookieepedia for getting me started on article writing. I'd like to thank 4dot for inspiring me to write tutorials. Also, my acknowledgments go out to Solus, who requested that I explore this idea. And to whatever lucky victims let me use their featured articles as fodder for my examples, thank you as well, for being so willing to let me use your work as an example to others.

I suppose a nod of sorts should also be made to the Star Wars Fanon community, for precipitating the events that led to this being created. Now, go write some FAs or something.

F4
This post concerns how I, Jedi, which is acclaimed as the best Star Wars expanded universe novel, can offer important lessons for a writer.

I, Jedi is special in an obvious way &mdash it's written in the first-person. Most Star Wars novels are written in the third person, but I, Jedi tells the story specifically from one character's point of view, and not only that, tells it in a way that that character himself seems to be telling the story. In this book we learn about Corran Horn not only through his experiences and decisions in the novel, but also the way the novel is told. Every word in the book is Corran Horn's, which allows the author, Michael Stackpole, to put in a bit of storytelling bias. This is not inherently a bad thing; it makes the struggles feel more real. Whereas a third-person story can switch back and forth between hero and villain perspectives to create dramatic irony, a first-person story forces the reader to share the uncertainty of the narrator, and experience the story along with him.

This is not to say that first-person heroes are supposed to be like video game protagonists such as Mario or Link or the Jedi Exile; empty shells for a reader to stand in. Quite to the contrary, the differences between a reader and the hero are when a reader learns about both himself and the character. This is an important adventure for a reader, and part of the core entertainment. When the reader identifies a point where he would have reacted differently, a stronger connection with the character is forged than any that could be made with a similarity.

Therefore, it is not necessary that Star Wars Fanon narratives be written in first person, but it is extremely helpful if the writer thinks in first person when deciding what a character should do; only by becoming the character, a separate entity from any person, but a different entity for every person, can characters truly become believable and lovable. --C3PO the Dragon Slayer 6,000,000 forms of communication 15:55, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

F5
Hey, y'all.

I was looking at the FA list and noticed that the most common types of FAs are individuals and battles. Why don't we have much in the way of objects or items? Let's change that and create a Featured vehicle Article. From scratch. Collaboratively. AT-AT tripper

Wanna help?
This project is open to anyone; just sign your name below if you'd like to help create this article.
 * 1) AT-AT tripper
 * 2) Starwalker
 * 3) Skykiller
 * 4) Soresuadept22
 * 5) Darth anon

Choose an era
First off, we need to find a time period to add this vehicle too, and also decide who would use it. Should it be a Rebel tank, an Imperial corvette, a KOTOR-era starfigher, or a Clone Wars-era civilian transport? This is an important stage, since it needs to be something we can all write about. AT-AT tripper
 * I think that we should make a Rebel tank. All the canon sources, especially video games, conflict as to what was standardized for the Rebels. AA1s, T2-Bs, T4-Bs, MPTLs, and all those things in Renegade Squadron. The Rebels obviously didn't have a single tank that was standard, so we should have something that can help explain that. Darth anon
 * As you already said, the Rebels have too many tanks. I say we should fill in the timeline concerning the starfighters the Imperials used before the TIE/ln fighters and after the V-wings. Make a predecessor to the TIE fighter, and that gives us plenty to write about. We could include it in that battle that Juno Eclipse led, what was it again? Skykiller
 * I kinda like the Rebel tank idea, but I think a better idea is a CIS corvette. We don't see any standard corvette-sized ship for the CIS, and I find that really annoying. All we see in the Clone Wars that belongs to the CIS are Munificent frigates and Lukrehulk battleships. Soresuadept22
 * Uh, Techno Union ships? Those are corvette-sized, and Outbound Flight establishes that they can have armament. I say we go with the Imperial starfighter that predates the TIE/ln. Starwalker
 * I'm okay with that idea. Everyone agree? AT-AT tripper
 * Depending on which direction it goes, I'm cool, but I still like the CIS corvette idea. Soresuadept22
 * Well, let's try a few designs first. For the moment, we'll go with it. Darth anon

Choose a type/class
As established, we'll try an Imperial starfighter, the predecessor to the TIE/ln. But we should answer a few questions: What kind of armament did it have? Did it resemble the V-wing, the Eta-2, or the TIE/ln the most? And who built it? Did it fit the role of interceptor, bomber, or fighter? AT-AT tripper
 * I think it should be in the all-purpose fighter class, but fast and good in swarms, like its successor. If you ask me, the Empire should show gradual evolution into swarm-based fighter tactics, so this fighter should be more individualistic than the TIE/ln, but still faster and cheaper than most ships of its class. Darth anon
 * I agree with Anon, but I should add that it should have a secondary weapon like concussion missiles or proton torpedoes. Or a shield generator. Just to show the gradual change from slow and high quality to fast and cheap. Soresuadept22
 * It doesn't sound like the Empire to have an all-purpose fighter with secondaries or shields. Starwalker
 * Meh, I think that's the point. The Empire didn't become the Empire we saw in ANH overnight. It took time for the system to change what we saw in the Republic to the Battle of Endor. The Empire had no real credible threats in this point of time, and so the military would have been specialized for general purpose missions, where swarms were impractical. Darth anon

Make a design
I can make a few designs with Blender if anyone's interested. I'm no good with UV mapping, though, so it'll just be a grayscale image. AT-AT tripper
 * I'm pretty good at drawing ships on paper. I could make schematics. Skykiller
 * Ok, when you finish the schematics I'll try to model it in 3D. Then I'll see if I can color it. AT-AT tripper

Choose a name
For now, since this is a predecessor to the TIE fighter, naming conventions suggest we should keep the TIE name, but have a different title. "T.I.E. starfighter" is a possible name, since that name is hinted at in the New Essential Chronology. Soresuadept22

History
OK, I suggest we just start off by writing a few individuals, battles, etc. that have something to do with this ship by ourselves, then add the combined stories into the history section. Here's just some ideas to start with:
 * 1) Invented in 12 BBY, by Wraith Sienar.
 * 2) Not too many in number (compared to later TIE fighters), served as general-purpose starfighter
 * 3) Used in several pre-Rebellion battles, perhaps salvaged by pirates or fringe groups after discontinued prior to 0 ABY. AT-AT tripper