Forum:FC:Café Fanfic XXXI



Café Fanfic is a discussion topic centered around fan-fiction. Authors are encouraged to contribute to the café's monthly discussion, which are designed to stimulate ideas and encourage engagement between members of the SWF fan-fiction writing community in a criticism-free zone.

Participants in Café Fanfic are also welcome to submit ideas for the next month's topic of discussion.

Previous topics can be found in the archive list at the bottom of the page.

There are three basic premises for Café Fanfic
 * 1) Please restrict this to stuff from your fan-fiction (written or possibly just conceptualized).
 * 2) You can suggest and make observations, but no condemning other people's work
 * 3) "I don't know" is a perfectly acceptable answer.


 * January's topic: What are your goals for the new year in terms of fan-fic writing? Is there a story you want to finish that's been dragging on? Do you just want to write something? Try a new genre of writing such as mystery or comedy?

Atarumaster88
I'm not huge on New Year's resolutions or anything, particularly since goals and schedules often slip depending on my RL and whims. That said, I do have things I'd like to accomplish in 2014. These are the major goals.
 * Finish the FE III rewrite. It's in progress and going pretty well.
 * This'll be my last year to have a SolidWorks license (seriously this time), so I want to get maximum use out of it. I have two more projects I'd like to do.
 * There's 2 more short stories I'd like to work on.
 * Some peripheral stuff needs to be added to as well&mdash;YGS, EGTFE.
 * I have one last major project after the FE III rewrite. We'll see if I can get to it by year's end. Atarumaster88  ( Talk page ) 17:29, January 7, 2014 (UTC)
 * Interesting note about the current, unrevised version of FE3. Ataru once said it was very similar to something I would write. He loathes FE3. Make of that what you will. - Brandon Rhea (talk) 18:09, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * Let me clarify some remarks here. I once said that FE III was inspired by a lot of the themes and elements that you incorporated in earlier drafts (keep in mind, this was in 2008 back when the ASWS was highly prominent). For example, more religious influences and a deeper mythology along with more storytelling elements and themes from the "epic" genre. Those things aren't bad in and of themselves, and I learned to appreciate them from your writing, Brandon.

However, looking back on FE III, a lot of those elements just flat-out didn't work in the book. The mythological/religious tie-ins weighed down the first third of the book with cutesy but ponderous exposition and imagery. Some of the things included from the Hero Cycle were too contrived. The "common man" comic relief characters that were a nod to other similar characters like Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, the two peasants from Kurosawa's one samurai movie, and R2-D2 and C-3PO, were tedious and not written well. The book ended up being mostly about the destiny of these five smuggler types and the antagonists and other characters were filler material. Every single one of the antagonists was a stock character&mdash;the greedy, manipulative mastermind, the angry, dark-warrior beserker type, and the cunning but grouchy military man. There were issues with the pacing&mdash;some scenes were literally contrived to give the non-main characters something to do while the mains were off questing.

For the rewrite, my goal was to centralize the conflict and tone down on the extraneous. The antagonists needed to either have an independent plot arc that could stand on its own, or they needed to be tied to the protagonists to give it a more personal element. The comic side-characters didn't work. The melodramatic heavy-handed "woo, destiny" and forced hero cycle moments needed to be toned back. The protagonist needed to be less of an angsty teenager.

The mythological/epic influences that were in the previous book weren't necessarily a cause of me hating it, but they didn't help. They didn't ultimately tell a story that was worth telling. The narrative structure of the book already makes pacing it an interesting challenge, and including those tie-ins, #1 doesn't fit well with the overall vibe of the series, #2, doesn't match with more recent canon, and #3 made for a less interesting opening act, which is what made the story dreadful. That kind of heavy-handed style just doesn't work for my writing. It was for the best that they be removed. And that's my FE III rant. Atarumaster88 ( Talk page ) 19:12, January 8, 2014 (UTC)


 * Way to ruin my joke with your serious self-reflection, something that all authors here can learn from. Dick. - Brandon Rhea (talk)  19:15, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * I believe an appropriate response at this point is BEEBLE BEEBLE BEEBLE. Atarumaster88  ( Talk page ) 19:21, January 8, 2014 (UTC)

SavageOpress1138
I'll echo Ataru's point on goals slipping due to RL. Many times I simply haven't had the time to write, even when I've wanted to. Considering I only have two works published on here, which aren't exactly amazing quality, no one is really expecting anything from me, which is probably for the best. Would I like to write a good fan-fic this year? Absolutely. Do I have unfinished stories that I could finish? Absolutely. Will either of these things happen? I don't know. Most of my writing time I'm spending on other fiction, so it's not like I have a SW project that's in strong development at the moment. On the other hand, I have (as always) various elements for stories sitting around, especially characters, that I could use if I come up with the right fan-fic idea. At the end of the day, we'll just have to wait and see if anything happens this year or not. Happy 2014!  Savage  1138 22:08, January 7, 2014 (UTC)
 * Don't worry, Savage. I'm the king of "no one expects anything of me." It's not so bad. ;) - Brandon Rhea (talk) 18:10, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the encouragement and inspiration, Brandon. Maybe someday I'll write about the wise Jedi Master who gave all the Padawans advice, named Bran-Don Aehr.  Savage  1138  21:35, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * He should be known as Jedi Master Bac, because reasons. - Brandon Rhea (talk)  21:40, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * Why didn't I think of that? How silly of me.  Savage  1138  22:45, January 8, 2014 (UTC)

Leiamoody of Ysonesse
My goals for this year are pretty simple in black-and-white (or any color font on any color background, they're just harder to read). I want to take up actually *writing* fanfic, and finishing up the character and other profiles I've got half/quarter-finished. I hope that I can return to a state of fanfic that I used to write that was decent and required some actual thought and effort instead of coughing up something from rote that structurally resembles a story but lacks in substance. I've actually forgotten how to write good fanfic...does that make sense? Probably not. But when you spend too much time handing your mental and physical energy over to real life, it's very easy to lose the connection with your creativity.

There are three stories that demand major rewrites. I finished one, got halfway through another, and only made it a quarter way into the other one. There is also a larger fictional universe that I would like to tackle and get some of the outlines turned into actual stories. I've had these ideas written down for so long, and I'm not getting any younger, so it makes sense that I should start now before I put them off for another decade or so and really run out of years to write them. I'm not saying this will actually happen in 2014, but a person can have unrealistic ambitions.

Leiamoody of YsonesseTalk10:00, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * You mentioned a larger fictional universe. Is that a Star Wars fan fic universe (like Ataru's Force Exile, for example), or your own original story? - Brandon Rhea (talk) 18:11, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * I was referring to my own SW fanfic universe. But I do also have an original story that badly needs its own update. Maybe I could try for both this year (wishful thinking!?)-Leiamoody of YsonesseTalk01:40, January 8, 2014 (UTC)

Brandon
I have a couple of goals. Some are obligations, and some are based on whim and time:


 * Obligation: develop the finale for The Star Wars RP. In 2015, we're going to be ending what will then have been one continuous, ten-year long mythology, before rebooting with a new timeline and a fresh start. The end of our current mythology doesn't just end the story of The Star Wars RP; it is designed to be our version of the final Star Wars story ever, and the end of the Jedi and the Sith. No pressure, right?
 * Write Star Wars Legacies: The Jedi Guardian. I, along with my co-writer, am currently working on it. We're in the early stages, and I'm doing things differently than I have at past attempts at finishing things. Instead of diving right into the novel, we're writing a script first. It's not meant to be polished, but it's a good outline of the story, so we know what the scenes/chapters are, and have a general idea of what the dialogue could be. The hard part is breaking the story, and we're done with that. Next is finishing the script, and then novelizing it.
 * Write two short stories set before The Jedi Guardian. One is about the two central heroes, Jhon Cordatus and Sara Umbra, and tentatively titled To Serve in Heaven. The other is about the central villains; though I haven't figured out much of that story yet, I think it would be interesting if it was called To Rule in Hell.

It's entirely possible to do all of this in 2014. Whether I have the motivation to do the novel and short stories remains to be seen, but I'm hopeful! - Brandon Rhea (talk) 18:07, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * I look forward to the next installments of your increasingly large selection of completed works. And, seriously, I like those titles.  Savage  1138  21:35, January 8, 2014 (UTC)

Thimm Nuruodo
My main goal is to succeed in giving life to a new "universe" with the others of Project New Galactic Wars and, so, to write some novella or book that takes place in this new era. The problem is that every time that I'm finishing a work, I think that it's incomplete or has some problem, and at the end I don't finish it. For the new year I hope I will finish a book, and maybe not only one. And this with the members of the Project, because I think that collaboration is a fast way to reach a goal. ADMIRAL MIKE501 Yes, Sir! 19:09, January 8, 2014 (UTC) First of all, I want to give you some encouragement. My favorite word as a SWFanon admin, a wikia editor, and a Wikia Community Manager is "community." That's what wikias are all about, after all, but unfortunately it's something that SWFanon has lacked. There are people around, and they will occasionally talk to each other, but there hasn't been lots of collaboration and interaction like there was years ago. Given that, I am very happy to see Project New Galactic Wars. I haven't even read it, but I love it for the fact that it exists. Keep at it!
 * What are the pros and cons of collaborating on the project for you? Atarumaster88  ( Talk page ) 19:15, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * In my opinion, the pros are that collaboration allows the users to build a friendship and gives the possibility to everyone to create his own story without leaving it alone. The cons are that you can't do exactly what do you want, but you need to consult other project members before creating a new story, character or something else. ADMIRAL MIKE501 Yes, Sir! 21:19, January 11, 2014 (UTC)

With that said, and those who know my writing will appreciate the irony/probable hypocrisy of what I'm about to say, you shouldn't leave a work unfinished just because you think it's incomplete or has some problems. Finish that work, and then use what you've written, problems and all, as a means to help you improve for your next effort. Ultimately, authors are never, ever satisfied with their own work. There's always something they wish they could go back and change, but that doesn't mean you should stop or never finish anything. Hope that helps! - Brandon Rhea (talk) 19:27, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * Do what he says, not what he does.  Atarumaster88  ( Talk page ) 19:33, January 8, 2014 (UTC)
 * What Brandon say is what I think too but I can't put in place, because sometimes I'm very disappointed of what I wrote. And, Atarumaster, we all know that it's easier talking that doing, and the same applies for me. ADMIRAL MIKE501 <font color="#ED9121;">Yes, Sir! 21:19, January 11, 2014 (UTC)

MPK
At some point this year, I hope to begin and make appreciable progress on the next Legends of the Jedi story since, out of all the stories for which I've concocted plans, it is the best-prepared - especially when it comes to the backstories and personalities of the principal characters, which frustrated my first attempts to write it for at least a year. Yet it is not buried in outlines and notes, like so many other projects of mine; I have only the events and sufficient character sketches to go on. -<font color="#990000">MPK, <font color="#990000">Free Man  01:10, January 10, 2014 (UTC)