Thread 24620479

horror edition

Previous >>24615590

>What is Web Novel General?
A general for readers and authors involved or interested in the growing phenomenon of 'web novels', serialized English fiction posted to websites such as: Royalroad, Webnovel, Scribblehub, Wattpad, Archive of Our Own, Spacebattles, HFY, various personal author websites, and more

>Why read web novels?
Not for prose or tight editing or deep themes, frankly. As a whole, web novels are infamous for content sprawl and pacing issues. If you enjoy having millions of words to sink your teeth into to get to know the world and characters, though, you may be interested. Keeping up with other readers on a weekly basis to discuss the story's events unfolding is another perk, in the same way discussing an ongoing TV show might be.

>Why write web novels?
Ease of access & potential for Patreon earnings. Many successful authors gain an audience on their website of choice and funnel their readers into a Patreon. See graphtreon.com/top-patreon-creators/writing for an idea of what some are earning.
Also, once an author has earned a fanbase, transitioning into an Amazon self-publishing career is several orders of magnitude easier than starting 'dry'.

> Advice for Noobs!

##READ THE FOLLOWING BEFORE ASKING FOR HELP##

Running your story like the business it is:
www.royalroad.com/forums/thread/116847

On writing webserials:
alexanderwales.com/how-to-write-a-web-serial/

Sanderson's Writing lectures 2025:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEUh_y1IFZY&list=PLSH_xM-KC3ZvzkfVo_Dls0B5GiE2oMcLY

Recommended web novels
rentry.co/d2yvczro

Anon's guide to success
rentry.co/RRBasicGuide

FAQ
rentry.co/pytefpxn

Reminder

>>24620489
Based

>>24620479 (OP)
I feel like selling out and making isekai.
My humble goal is to get 10 followers before I reach 10,000 words. Is that doable?

>>24620578
Is it doable? Yes.
Is it likely? No.

>>24620579
when would you expect such numbers?

>>24620583
It's rare for stories on RR these days to slowly gain a following. They either succeed or fail from the initial chapters. 98%+ of stories fail.

>>24620578
I got 15 before that but I still think it's bots.

>>24620589
What is considered slow?

>>24620489
I haven't visited that flaccid and impotent crab bucket since the advent of /wng/
for where the real POTENT and VIRILE slopwang action, THIS is the only place to be...!

>>24620589
99% of everything is hot garbage so this means that if you're garbage you've still got 1% chance to make it to the top

>>24620602
Over multiple months. I can't remember the last organic hit, the site has grown too large. Now you need to buy ads, trade reviews, and hope to hit the rising stars to have a chance.

>>24620589
>It's rare for stories on RR these days to slowly gain a following.
Shut up retard, that's every fiction except the top 0.00001% that blow up in the first month

>>24620623
Yes anon, that's exactly my point.

>>24620624
>it's rare for stories to slowly gain a following
>the vast majority of the stories build their following slowly over time
>"exactly my point"
What the fuck are you talking about

>>24620630
esl?

>>24620643
wtf

>>24620589
Fake. My story, FFF-Class, had 20 of average views at the start of my travel. Now, it has 185.

Can anyone provide a rundown on the cultivation trope? What is expected of the genre? Is divergence common, or do stories typically contain the same mechanisms?

>>24620607
It's actually much better now. Seems to me that the segregation has served to civilise both groups.

Rising and trending charts are garbage. I just search the keywords i am interested in.

>>24620650
And how many chapters and views do you have?

>>24612992
You know how people learned what good prose was before chatgpt? THEY READ BOOKS, YOU RETARD.

>>24620666
8k with 40 chapters.

>>24620660
Really makes you think huh

>>24620655
How about you actually read it and be a fan of it before trying to treat it as a get rich quick scheme

>>24620683
At least you're honest. That is an average of below 20 views per chapter, those are almost certainly nearly all bots.

>>24620694
*200

how do I convert my 2k pixiv followers into readers of my slop?

>>24620694
My first volume has about 200 views per chapter, the second has around 130, and the third---still in production---averages about 60. Yet, only 1k of those 8k total views are from the first chapter

>>24620701
draw cool art of your slop characters that makes your followers want to learn more

I've posted multiple stories on RR since 2017, and all of them have followed almost the same, very linear growth rate of followers vs content posted in a given time frame. There's been no visible change in this from when I started compared to now. I've never done any promoting.

>>24620714
kinda doesnt work unless I draw hentai and the story involves more sex but thanks anyway

>>24620703
yeah first chapter inflates things and is not good metric.
They should display the median average instead of the mean.

>>24620680
>THEY READ BOOKS, YOU RETARD.
Books like pic related?

>>24620731
Orlando Furioso.

i wrote things other than my story this week and had to finish the chapter right before the scheduled release time because I'm stupid, but I did it.

Guys, very important question. Is it 'Mana' or 'mana'? Do you capitalize the magical energy source name? Does it depend on the name?

>>24620817
I capitalize all the peculiarities of my setting, aka telling the reader that this isn’t your normal Unicorn or Griffin.

Which one of you cunts dropped me a 0.5 rating? Grow up.

>>24620830
that was me, I did it because I'm homophobic

>>24620116
>>24620502
I found it. It's called The New Gate. MC is a swordsman though, therefore the archmage novel is superior.

>>24620915
Love you, asshole

>>24620694
>Progression
>Litrpg
We've literally had an entire book that had zero progression and basically no interaction with litrpg elements.

>>24620694
Archmage's numbers aren't what surprise me, it's the speed/acceleration. How did it snowball so quickly?

>>24620969
It's probably just being botted. Pay some jeet or russian a hundred bucks and be no.1, it's that easy.

>>24621003
>botted
you literally don't know what the fuck is going on, do you? have you seen the patreon bucks it's bringing in?

>>24621003
it has the highest patreon conversion fucking ever. if anything the views and followers are disturbingly low for the amount of people willing to pay 10$ a month for it. its anti-botted

the patreon numbers are botted too, you drooling retards

Posting this on Royal Road, want to see if its shit or not before its uploaded. Thanks.

https://pastebin.com/dGRyqSr0

Thanks for everyone itt who have read Kaiju. I got a second reviw and comments after Yellow's Typhoon author posted a glowing review.
>>24620969
One theory that's been floated (beyond "it's just goated desu") is that by releasing in Scribblehun first, then transfering to RR, it got a lot of momentum.

>>24621097
Mamma mia, Zucchini.

>>24621098
Send link

>>24621098
>One theory that's been floated (beyond "it's just goated desu") is that by releasing in Scribblehun first, then transfering to RR, it got a lot of momentum.
this makes no sense. all this would explain is getting onto rising stars not 14k followers in 2 months.
50 fics get onto rising stars every month (more). ascribing its success to scribblehub """momentum""" is so braindead

>>24621097
the grammar is no bueno
the writing is cheesy
I think you could polish this further
>before its uploaded
how much research have you done and what are your realistic hopes for this?

>>24621097
the first line caused me psychic damage. literally two outright errors in it, grammar and construction

>>24621098
>that by releasing in Scribblehun first, then transfering to RR
Isn't that also how Princess of the Void did it?

>>24621097
Read the first paragraph aloud to my dog. He listened closely, so maybe you already got a fan?

Not feeling good about Zucchini, you can get away with names like these if you're Japanese (see Golden Wind's entire cast). Cattivo is alright as a name, so, if you like foreign words as names.

>They said it tasted like candy and that its flesh had the texture of fairy floss. So light, that you could break up the meat with your bare hands. Zucchini felt drool form and pool within the mask of his face before it froze on his chin. He huddled within the earth, and soon passed into a fitful sleep, the next morning he shifted within his tomb and felt the ice around his body.
If Cattivo is a one-of-a-kind creature, how do people know the qualities of it's meat? There's a slight comedic tone to the whole paragraph.

Rest is action and regret. It's alright.

I'm not sure about the tone: it's mostly action and grimness but with a touch of cooking comedy?
>>24621116
First, the anon whose I owe a lot and hasn't asked anything from me: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/117925/the-yellow-typhoon-and-the-final-waltz
Here's Kaiju: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/119135/transmigrated-as-a-mech-i-now-fight-kaiju
>>24621127
Then. It's just goated desu. But seriously, knowing how MagicMeter did this is the montly 10k USD question

How many of you would/do listen to audiobook versions of a webnovel, if it were good and non-AI? Would it make you more inclined to try a book?

>>24621142
>But seriously, knowing how MagicMeter did this is the montly 10k USD question
wide appeal via popular tropes, strong technical writing, luck.

>>24621154
Probably, but most people don't like being told to write to the market, to git gud and good luck. It seems obvious and at the same time shitty advice somehow. Even if it's very likely the correct answer.

>>24621142
Hoping your dog returns for future chapters. Btw I'm Italian. So, Cattivo is an important cultural heritage for me.

Tones meant to be action packed, with comedic elements. So I'm glad that got through. Thanks for the read, it means a lot to me btw.

>>24621146
I had this same idea
trying to go after the blind market

>>24621146
lots of rr serial authors make more from their audiobooks than their patreon or kdp earnings
the audiobook audience is massive

>>24621160
>write to the market, to git gud and good luck.
any 2 of these 3 and you'll still have a living-wage hit on your hands. you just won't be an instant behemoth

>>24621092
where do bots get money?

>>24621162
>Btw I'm Italian.
Madonna!

Unfortunately, I don't think the tone is doing you favours. The first chapter is where you set your pieces: the initial conflict, the characters, the setting and tone. The tone conflicts itself a little, the setting and tone is mostly grim so the comedic parts read as whiplash. Not saying that it couldn't work, but it isn't working here.

We don't know much about Zuchinni beyond the fact that he seems to roam the wasteland looking for creatures to cook. Lots of despair for someone who seems to be some kind of gourmand.

People have criticised your prose, but I think the storytelling needs some work desu.

>Thanks for the read, it means a lot to me btw.
I feel the same when someone reads mine. Good luck out there autore!

>>24621154
>>24621160
>>24621183
this really is the formula; this is the triangle
if you aren't writing to market then you need more luck to make up for it
if your LCK stat is low then you need to be more on market
extremely good writing can make up for shortfalls in the other two points but it needs to be damn good

>>24621195
*and you probably still need something else from the triangle even if the writing is good (either luck or being on market)

>>24621186
from their data banks!

>>24621193
>We don't know much about Zuchinni beyond the fact that he seems to roam the wasteland looking for creatures to cook.
By that I mean, what motivates him? The meat of the Cattivo? So it's a cooking story?
>>24621186
From the author's Patreon of course, it's bots all the way down.

Because views seem to be the topic of this thread:
The way I see it, after about a week 40-50 views are just the crawlers.
I have not played the game the way it was supposed to be played. I've taken month-long hiatuses, my chapters often break 5,000 words, and in 10 months I've released only 25 chapters. I do not write anything that could be considered webnovels-adjacent. No isekai, power progression, video game mechanics, etc.
So as it stands, I believe that out of the 80 or so readers I get for new chapters, 50 might be crawlers.
That leaves maybe 30 readers, which lines up since I have only one or two comments for new chapters, and I have 270 followers. So 1/10th of my followers get around to reading the new chapter in the first couple of days
I firmly believe that people who play the game the way it’s supposed to be played (frequent updates, short chapters, eye-catching cover and snypnosis) can easily get double or triple the views I have, and probably not bleed as many readers either lol

>>24621210
Actually maybe a bit less are web crawlers. Says that 46 users with accounts have read up to my newest chapter

i think you guys are seriously overestimating how many bots there are. im sure there are some scrapers but royalroad is so small it doesn't even have a wikipedia page. people are not scraping 10 follower fics in mass lol.
lots of people just randomly click in from 'latest updates' and don't read. or are lurkers/non-commenters.

>>24621210
I've done a lot of the same things - releases are either once a week or once every other week, month-long gaps, no isekai/prog/game stuff/superhero/etc. Chapter length started at 4.5k, then I cut it down to 4k, then 3.5k and it has stayed around that.
Out of 650 followers, my chapter views this year look like this. In two weeks, 20% of the followers have read a chapter, assuming no bots. There are 2-3 people commenting on chapters at this point.

I thought more anons would be writing to market
I've only seen some niche stuff get posted which is cool too

>>24621275
that's why nobody here has any readers

>>24621177
>>24621170
What do you guys think of my reading voice? High enough quality? Good energy?

https://vocaroo.com/1enUHJHdjegF

>>24621275
i think people who care about the market/wider success distance from 4chan as a hand-in-hand consequence

>>24621275
Most are writing for fun I think, at least the one who shared their fictions. But we do a lot of questions about success and monetization, so it's either wannabe RS's or tourists, but there are people writing for the market here.

>>24621275
i started writing before finding out about royal road. I was writing 4 or so months and then found the site and started uploading.
Nobody reading my work saddens me but I want to write what I am passionate about. It is not a career so it doesn't matter that I haven't made it.

akaso anon's publisher got hacked and all his private info is leaked hahahahaha

>>24621310
spoopy...

>>24621275
it's kinda based
/wng/ gets a lot of passerby NEETs and middle age burn outs that see webnovels as easy money. there's often retarded questions of "am I allowed to write X?", "can I write a webnovel if I don't want to write crunchy litrpg?", "I want to follow the money, what's popular?". all questions in the spirit of "how do I get rich and famous this instant?"
but I think only 20% of litwangs are soulless bugmen. these types are embarrassed millionaires and will give the same vapid (and often incorrect) marketing advice thread after thread
40% are baseline human beings with a consciousness. they're writing the story they want to tell and take superficial steps to keep the door open to success like buying an ad, getting nice cover art, following blurb trends, etc
40% are true literary hermits and autistic wizards. they're writing niche stories in dead genres. they usually have ugly cover art, terrible blurbs, deranged story premises, and barely promote their story, even here
it's nice. at first glance /wng/ seems like a garbage general because certain annoying retards are highly vocal and post all day, but it's pretty cozy with a variety of writers

uh oh meltie

that is the opposite of a meltie, you just can't read

>>24621210
I'm also seeing similar results. those 40-50 views over on random chapters have got to be all bots. honestly, I'd be surprised if even one real person is reading all of mine

>>24621330
>give the same vapid (and often incorrect) marketing advice
i give marketing advice a lot here so you might be referencing me, and while that advice might be often 'vapid' (never incorrect at least on my part, i've seen some wild stuff posted here though) the reason it's vapid is because 95% of you are retards and can't get the basics right. so I say "please get the basics right" and then usually there's a meltie about it (are they from you?)

>>24621353
saying to buy an ad and debut with daily release spam is vapid but fine

>>24621353
>How do I market?
>Buy an ad
>Reeeeeeeee
Happened more than once.
Captcha: SWATT

the mad men shitpost tells you everything you need to know about advertising your slop

>>24620180
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/123486/the-class-of-9099
I saw this guy posted his work a couple weeks ago and I really liked the way he wrote his characters and descriptions. It's something I don't do so well, so I was really impressed. The grammar could use a little work and it irked me that they're setting off on a voyage with anything less than full fuel tanks, but society 7000 years from now is just reckless.

I've been meaning to log into my secret burner account and give him a review and some comments but I haven't found the time or energy. Someday I will! In the meantime, y'all wngers should check him out. Especially you space opera fans.

>>24621417
I tried to read it before but it didn't click with me.

>>24620701
>>24620722
Draw 4koma of various scenes. That'll help your writing too because it'll force you to get a punchier style.
After a while you can start having one 4koma reference another.
Character sheets with whimsical details work as well.

>>24621417
>Want to drop story
>see someone say something nice about it
>feel guilty
Sapience bros I don't think we're gonna make it.
But yeah fuggit guess I'm gonna continue. Thanks breh.
>Tanks
Yeaah I feel like having an outline actually fucked me cause I knew had that problem in there and wrote it out on autopilot. IIRC the original sticking point was that they were already at a high fraction of C and the captain felt like gambling.
This is why pantsing is the most holy way inshallah.

>>24621232
Anons are conflating RR with qidian's site, which DOES bot views even for small fics

>>24621207
>make bots that give you money
>give the money you make to bots to give back you
>????
>infinite money!

>>24621097
Poor Zucchini :(
1. Zucchini is a really bad name: it sounds silly AND it's the name of a vegetable. I recommend changing it, because it's strongly incongruent with the overall tone of the story.
2. Your sentences need a lot of work. Many of them are broken grammatically. Remember: Subject, Verb, Object. Be open to just making new sentences when one gets too long or unwieldy.

Much less important:
3. Worms in the meat? The Cattivo was infested with parasites? That's really unusual, in the sense that the worms were in the muscle-flesh and not just stuffed into the digestive tract. I had expected the meat to taste bad due to improper preparation, but not like this. Just be careful: foodie-fiction has taken off and people have high standards for their fantasy-food fantasies now.

The action and tracking scenes were overall fine, and the pacing was good, and starting in the action without too much exposition/lore-dumping was a good choice. If you fix your sentences I could see myself enjoying Z-man's hunt and return to civilization and more story. Keep working on it!

>>24621193
>Lots of despair for someone who seems to be some kind of gourmand.
I thought that was super on brand, having a gourmand friend. He would have been miserable in a pre-modern society, and would absolutely have supported conquering the world to ensure a stable supply of spices and exotic ingredients.

>>24621275
I'm writing to market, in fact my story is a light deconstruction of system and classes in general (a la BTDEM and Azarinth Healer). It bothered me that the MCs in those stories got overpowered classes and just kind of snowballed from there, while all the riffraff got stuck with normal classes and were doomed to being peasants suffering from the monster of the week. I do okay with readers, I have about as many views as followers within ten chapters of my latest release, and about double my follower count as average views. This is after two ad runs, though.

>>24621287
Yep.

>>24621292
>Nobody reading my work saddens me but I want to write what I am passionate about. It is not a career so it doesn't matter that I haven't made it.
Don't take it personally, but keep in mind that the "market" of RR is particular. They have things they like, and everything else is left by the wayside. Other webfiction sites are the same, just with different genres/tropes they like. If you just want more eyeballs on your work, you could buy an ad (cheapest is $55), but don't expect much. Both my ad runs got me about 60 new followers each from people who clicked, according to RR's statistics, and less than 2000 clicks each.

>>24621330
I guess I'm the 0% who wants to get rich doing this, writes what I want to write, not deranged and writing something nobody wants. boohoo :(
Of course I'm also doing this to justify my NEETdom to friends and family, so it's already paying off in that sense.

>>24620655
>Can anyone provide a rundown on the cultivation trope?
Don't write westslop cultivation without reading at least two original chinese cultivation novels

>>24621474
Don't worry too much about the fuel thing, it's just a pet peeve of mine because I worked on a ship at one point and now I'm super anal about certain kinds of things.

If you want to drop the story that's fine, but consider instead condensing the story into something very short. Take it as a writing exercise. You can always come back and expand it later and make use of all the worldbuilding you've put into it. Ender's Game, and the dozen or so sequel books that came after, started as a short story published in a magazine IIRC.

>>24621544
>>24620655

Hot take, you don't have to read a single cultivation novel to write a western one.

In fact you are probably better off that way because all the westoid cultivation novels that are "based on/inspired by" chink cultivation end up being reddit-style "deconstruction" (actually contempt for the genre)

Just learn the general traits of the genre, build your westoid cultivation system, and go write

>>24621553
oh god oh fuck i redditspaced my post on accident i'm gonna go kill myself

>>24621146
I never listen to audiobooks but it seems very common among litrpg / progression fantasy readers. I guess half paying attention to a story while washing the dishes is the final evolution of a lot of these sort of "turn your brain off and numbers go up" kind of plots

>>24621556
Reddit spacing is a meme, but it always gave me the impression that the anon was screaming:
>READ MY POST
I just start a new line and if I'm changing subjects or talking about another point then I give it a spacing.

I've watched an increasing backlash against crawlers and bots. Various websites are adding defenses, proof of work scripts, anti-bot javascript apps, captchas, etc. These measures don't stop the big boy LLMs as they have the resources to automate past all these measures, but it does hammer down the new startups and bit players. At least you can have more confidence the readership numbers reflect real people within 5 to 10 percent.
So, is RR doing any of the like? Or is it just old school wide open or paying Cloudflare for their increasingly useless tech?

>>24621553
Most of the the "ironic deconstructions" are regurgitated tertiary interpretations based on what they've heard of cultivation through reddit memes or other western cultivation novels.
Same for western ironic VNs too desu

>>24621544
Or just binge Chinese Paladin 3 and Return of the Condor Heroes.
Personally I enjoy it well enough but once I'll mainly draw on Stargate and Mystara for my own apotheosis Thing.
Mystara especially is interesting because it's from the ground up designed around (you) becoming The Big Dog™ and the ones that came before are able and willing to help you though that's of limited use since it's a very individual process.
Like one path to ascension requires you to run a country whose citizens don't feel miserable and trying to prevent your descendants from becoming tyrannical retards, kek.

>>24621553
>>24621569
Just don't be a Redditoid, ez.

>>24621553
You don't need to read a whole novel (like 3 million words lmao) but knowing the tropes and the underlying system of cultivation in general is important imo. Like the different realms, how cultivation works, what a dantian and meridians are, etc.

I actually got suckered into reading a cultivation novel accidentally: 1% Lifesteal. I got like halfway through the second volume before realizing. It's good, but man did that sting for a week realizing I got suckered in. Now I'm reading Beware of Chicken and enjoying it greatly. Someday I'll read Reverend Insanity.

>>24621571
Wuxia is its own serious & respected genre with much more history getting published in the real world compared to cultivation which is a newer web phenomenon with plenty of its own incestual genre conventions from cultivation-writers who mainly read cultivation

I want to make an RPGmaker game but have never written a proper story before, would it be good to practice with a webnovel first before diving in?

>>24621581
start with the greeks

>>24621577
Yes, this part is important. It's vital to understand the underlying ideas and the how and why of cultivation, but swallowing ten million words of translated slop will only harm you.

Frankly you would be best-off reading a "quick rundown" like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/MartialMemes/comments/1mfljep/ancient_chinese_mythology_about_the_cultivation/
And then constructing your system on the basis of whatever mythology appeals to you the most. Just take that mythology and go schizomode for a week or so to build the basics of the system.

>>24621577
I was reading 1% lifesteal and the moment he started hitting bushes with a stick I caught a whiff of cultivation stylings and dropped it
I find cultivation 100x more repulsive than litrpg autism. maybe it's just western cultivation that is so soulless, but it always reeks of tacked on market baiting. I've never gone "wow this story is so much more interesting and cool now that I've read 4 paragraphs of breathing techniques that are never going to be narratively relevant again."

>>24621623
>"wow this story is so much more interesting and cool now that I've read 4 paragraphs of breathing techniques that are never going to be narratively relevant again."
yeah for real i would so much rather have 4 paragraphs describing the mc's newest Skill that'll never be narratively relevant again

>>24621623
It's a pretty big part of the story from what I've heard of 1%LS (redditors bitching about the MC and how he keeps "obsessing about working out")

>>24621594
Nta but I also highly recommend reading about Chinese mythology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Symbols
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Sovereigns_and_Five_Emperors
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuxing_(Chinese_philosophy)#Cycles
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_gods_and_immortals#Cosmic_gods

>>24621623
>>24621630
Nah the cultivation stuff is actually really well hidden and not a big part of the story, in my opinion. The story focuses much more on fights, MC suffering and going insane, and everyone around him being a psycho out to get him. I'd say it's worth reading for people who aren't into cultivation, because it's so minor. For people who are into cultivation, I wouldn't recommend it because it's just not a big part of the story.

>>24621594
Yeah. Virtuous Sons was huge just following this approach. I know there's Norse, Aztec, and Arthurian cultivation series out there.

Frankly as long as you've got some sort of power escalating built in and some mythical/philosophical bullshit to wrap around it you'll be fine.

I still don't know how to start my story

>>24621723
>X opened her eyes to the

>>24621723
>See that guy? Yeah... that's me.

>>24621594
I cannot read any Western cultivation stories, no matter if they’re original by sheer virtue of realizing, through my long reading of Chinkslop, that all of recent Chinese fantasy/sci fi is in fact cultivation. They cannot help but insert realms, cultivation, etc., no matter what genre the WN is. I saw this most clearly when I read a Chinese ASOIAF fic, and the first couple of chaoters had the MC go from “apprentice knight” to “knight” level. Chinese wizard novels are simply cultivation novels where the cultivators pursue an illusory truth instead of an ill-defined immortality, that they call themselves wizards instead of immortals, and that they call mortals muggles. Much of the terms and sentences used, although seemingly unique to the genre at a first glance, are in fact reskinned cultivation tropes.

I have been disillusioned by the revelation that LOTM is, in fact, just a western “zhi guai” cultivation novel. I’ve been made a schizo by my unwanted noticing as I’ve read my chinkslop, and can tolerate it no longer.

>>24621723
https://youtu.be/sVn4sBxLokA

>>24621775
>He's beginning to notice
Cease.

>>24621775
...yeah? I thought this was widely known. Almost all chinese webnovels are cultivation in one way or another.

>>24621571
>>24621578
>Return of the Condor Heroes
I love classic wuxia, grew up on it, and am attempting to write it but I don't think it's required reading to understand cultivation tropes — just as I don't think Robert E. Howard/classic sword and sorcery is required reading for people trying to understand that Sanderson-style hard magic/power system-based fantasy or progfan/litrpg more generally.

>>24621723
>in media res
>waking up
>dialogue
>scenery description
the holy quaternity of slop openers

>>24621833
>tfw my opening has all four

>>24620479 (OP)
Here is my idea for isekai.
>all magic comes from energy crystals
>crystals are one-use batteries
>chrystals come from mines with high radiation
>everyone relies on the crystals to protect themself against the monster
>nobody wants to work in crystal mines because radiation mutates people
>therefore, kingdoms and empires rely on slave miners
>MC is isekaid as a slave miner
>he begins a slave revolt
>after liberating many mines, he causes a shortage of energy crystals
>therefore, the monsters are beginning to overrun cities and massacre humans
>in desperation, defend themself against the monsters, the kingdoms invent "black energy crystals"
>more powerful crystals than regular ones, that can be mass-produced in factories without slavery
>however, the mass creation of black energy crystals impacts the environment, causing earthquakes, tornadoes, and heat waves
>MC invests in solar crystals, which are natural energy, but aren't as effective as regular energy
>MC tries to convince the kingdoms to replace production black energy crystals with solar crystals, but they aren't interested
>so, MC teams up with the monster to attack the kingdoms, and arms the monsters with solar crystals, making them strong enough to combat black energy crystals
>as a last resort, the kingdom's resort tries to improve their crystals, which results in a Chernobyl-like disaster

>>24621863
eco commentary makes me want to roll my eyes into the back of my head
could be fun if written well

>>24621833
>>24621843
>Operator?!? Operator come in!!
>Valencia fought against the leaden sleep threatening to pull her back in and woke to a world gone mad
>Through the viewport she could see an endless expanse of sky around and a daunting stretch of ocean below her
>The com bead in her ear squawked relentlessly and she finally loosened her restraints enough to key open a channel

Am I doing it right?

>>24621567
just a few days ago a site popped up that had crawled the entirety of RR and generated ai-voice audiobooks for all the stories so I'm gonna say there's no protection.

>>24621888
wood reed

>>24621901
It's being DMCA'd as we speak. It just takes time.

>>24621901
seeing FFF-Class on there cracked me up

>>24621940
WHAT THE FUCK?!
Who did steal my story?

>>24621955
https://audio-book-ai.com/book/fff-class-unlucky-antagonist-villains-origin-story-litrpg-system-in-a-high-fantasy-world-massive-worldbuilding-RR-119783

>>24621968
They stole my short story too. I wouldn't be upset if they let me hear it, but asking for a login is too much.

>>24621901
>>24621935
The real fun part being once the data's gathered it'll remain out there forever. The data gatherers understand DMCAs nab the front ends, not the system serving the database to the front ends. I'm sure they have dozens lined up as replacements.
Recently, the Internet's largest "library" was "taken down" by the feds. To their credit, the damage was extensive and the library was gone. From that point it took various operators about a week and a half to begin restoring the system. After a little more than another week the "library" has been fully restored and is operating normally.
I doubt RR should do anything now. Guess it's time to have a go at some slop via audio books? Any recommendations?

>>24621974
>Any recommendations?
>>24621968

>>24621968
>old cover.
>just two volumes.
Nothing burger, RR has won.

>>24621974
>>24621975
Also, anyone doing this to AO3? I'll be laughing hysterically to some bootleg audios of my own stuff if so.

I've been in this thread for a week and I've seen half a dozen different retarded nothingburgers and bucket crab moments
Do you actually write or are you just arrested-development larpers

>>24621988
I write, 500-1000 words a day. To be fair I'm mostly just here for the melties and occasional insight.

>>24621988
>Do you actually write or are you just arrested-development larpers
My latest project is walking at glacial pace, I may just as well drop it soon. Not feeling like writing this week.
So I'm an arrested-development larper I guess.
>I've seen half a dozen different retarded nothingburgers and bucket crab moments
The retards are regulars, and the crabs are retards. Are the crabs regulars? Don't know.

>>24621687
Links to an Arthurian one?

>>24621901
Speaking of which, their domain registrar, squarespace, responded to my email:

>Warren F. (Squarespace)
>
>Aug 8, 2025, 10:33AM EDT
>
>Hi there,
>
>Thank you for your message.
>
>Squarespace responds expeditiously to claims of copyright infringement committed on our platform. In accordance with applicable law (including the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA,” 17 U.S.C. §512)), if you believe in good faith that materials appearing on a site or other Squarespace hosted property infringe your copyright, you may request that the material be removed or access to it blocked by submitting a claim of copyright infringement using our Copyright Report Form:
>
>https://support.squarespace.com/hc/requests/new?ticket_form_id=5806104434445
>
>Thank you for your time.
>
>Warren F.
>Trust & Safety

It looks like that link goes directly to a copyright complaint form. I hope the website owners and their entire village starves and is washed away in a monsoon.

>>24621988
I'm Backloggin'©
dunno what expectations you have for this place though. more writing critiques? sharing useful learning resources? /wng/ is more or less exactly what I'd expect it to be

>>24621988
>arrested-development larpers
what did he mean by this

>>24621974
>The real fun part being once the data's gathered it'll remain out there forever
It's not like it would make a huge difference even if they did nuke the hard drive of this one site in particular. RR is still easy to scrape. I use fanficfare to download whole 1000-chapter stories to read on my eink gizmo all the time.

>>24622018
A retard that pretends to be a writer is my guess. Or maybe dressing and acting as the characters from the show "Arrested Development".

>>24622018
the catty and bucketcrabby behavior i see in these threads comes across as people who never developed past high school, that's what i mean by arrested development

>>24622054
there really isn't that much of it anymore especially when compared to wg before the split
this place is comfy as far as generals go

>>24621884
>eco commentary makes me want to roll my eyes into the back of my head
I know, I know, but energy production is really fascinating as well as its impact.

>>24622054
Used to be worse when gonganon's spectre roamed these very halls. If you're talking about the critiques, I kinda agree that some are harsh, I try to be honest and constructive.
Also, most interactions I had with anons on RR was very positive, though I saw one criticism that I thought was harsh and unfair,

>>24622054
>the catty and bucketcrabby behavior
I very rarely see this so I think you're just super sensitive or something

>>24622107
>mfw $65 to copyright my sloppa

>>24622111
what do you mean

>>24622115
the fee to submit a copyright with the u.s. copyright office is $65
you DO own the copyright to your work just by default but i'm schizo paranoid and it's easier to dmca scrapers if i have an official copyright number to point at

>>24622118
Nothing I'll ever make will be worth stealing, so it's fine.
But seriously, it's prudent if you want to take down stuff online, though it's a whack-a-mole.

>>24622118
Oh I see now
seems worth doing for peace of mind and convenience

I DID IT.
The prologue of my next chapter is now complete---4K WORDS.
Meaning that, to actually read my chapter, readers will need to go through all of it.
I’m probably going to lose 20 followers for sure, but for the KINO, it has to be done.

>>24622201
>I’m probably going to lose 20 followers for sure, but for the KINO, it has to be done.
I mean, if they're reading your stuff, they must already like it. So it's a treat for them.

>>24621737
>>24621749
>>24621779
>>24621833
I mean I have a world and characters but no plot to follow

>>24622204
It's 1K words about how I suck at getting my books published and 3K words of worldbuilding about the same island.

Maybe, it's too much even for my readers.

>>24622059
if it's not just thinly veiled moralizing it could be fun. techwank is like its own subgenre of power fantasy so if you can somehow make solar farms cool I could see people engaging with that
your idea is fine. execution is king. time to write

>>24622206
Throw up your notes I'll write you an outline.

>>24622118
How much do you have to have written before filing?

>>24621972
>They stole my short story too. I wouldn't be upset if they let me hear it, but asking for a login is too much.
where the fuck is this shit going down. I wanna hear my story!

>>24622392
Follow the comment chain anon, it's literally above my post.

>>24622206
As yourself what your characters want. Now you've got a plot as they try to get it.

>>24622107
it's worth it if you feel its one of the asian artists who draw crazy, CRAZY good. On that note, mossacannibial seems to be considering uppin his price from 90$ to 120-150$ for the first time in like actual years and may start actually taking comms again. Seems pretty reasonable to me desu

>>24622450
I used to readily pay $200 to this one guy that I commissioned regularly for a good five years straight
Nowadays I pay less of course, but the sentiment stays the same
I spend days hemming and hawing on and off as to whether a $30 model kit of the SNAA Tristan is worth it (worth every cent) but I'll shell out $100-150 no problem for a painted commission of one of my characters

>>24621984
ao3 actually uses cloudflare rate limiting so it would be harder

I wish more characters in stories were like Mark Watney from The Martian or Ryland Grace from Project Hail Mary. I like that those characters solve (some) problems in a systematic way. They make a hypothesis, take measurements, and try to figure out the truth. I love that shit. I wish we had more of that in fantasy.

Any1 wanna play my quest? Will be migrating to fiction.live soon.
Imagine you're in a Stephen King novel, as the writer. And then the guy comes over, from a novel written by Stephen Kind, called "On Writing": For "Webnovel enjoyers, it's your google doc Worm fanfic. Or Omniscient point narrator. Before you can write about a setting seriously, you need to Isekai in there first a few times: As a God, as a peasant, etc.

And then you let the AI write the rest, and like, edit it.

I'm going to have a guy get a small arsenal of sentient weapons who'll be able to assume a more humanoid form that only he can see (At least to start). Should I make the tsundere knightly longsword waifu a blonde or a redhead?

>>24622608
>Traditional longsword
Blonde
>Claymore
Redhead

>>24622617
Works for me. I'll give her handle a gold inlay.

>>24622608
Pretty sure I've read that exact premise more than once.

>>24622647
You definitely have. It's not particularly original the way I wrote it. I just put enough information so that I could get an answer.

>most established cyberpunk western webnovel are about some chick
are the authors trans or something?

>>24622784
yes, trans people love cyberpunk

>>24622510
I did it in a non-standard way. In the end, the MC’s actions might seem pretty straightforward, but there’s a lot of work behind the scene, mostly noticeable after a reread

>>24622784
no people just like actual strong women (not marvel "stronk girlboss" strong)

thekindofgirlthatwouldjustkillme.jpg so on and so forth

MC ends up in a fantasy world with his phone. The phone has a (very slow) local LLM AI on it. The phone has a (very slow) solar charger.

MC uses the LLM to figure out how to survive in a wilderness and find society. He has to navigate said society and find something to do to make a living. What does he do? An adventurer with an LLM?

>>24622863
Thank you for reminding me I don't hate gen Z enough, for this shit to even be dreamt up. Good job incorporating the most annoying form of passivity in the blandest way possible, worse than a lazy demon drip feeding him solutions, worse than an offline copy of wikipedia with local regex search, worse than a worn copy of the boy scouts handbook. I hate this so much. I hate technology so much. The greeks were right. Writing was a mistake. It made men weak.

>>24622874
That Ted fellow might've been on to something.

>>24622874
Unlike all of those other options LLMs can be hilariously wrong. Sometimes they will simply refuse to answer.
LLMs don't have to be bland nor does the MC have to be passive.

You are right in a way though. The LLM can't really contribute in the long-term. Once the MC starts dealing with the actual world the LLM will be useless.

I want mercenary kino.

>>24621988
I do 1500 words a day, but it takes a long time and that makes me surly and bitchy.

>Read book or watch movie
>"Hmm I wanna make this, but worse!"
>Write 20k words
>Watch new movie or read new book
>"Hmm I wanna make this, but worse instead!"

>>24622863
In Another World With My Smartphone wasn't exactly a hit

>>24622946
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but it's been consistently one of the top ranking WN basically since it started. I think I remember seeing it on the top ten of narou like a couple weeks ago when I was checking on honzuki no gekokujou.

The anime didn't do well, and it never became a big hit in the west, and /a/ shat on the anime fiercely (it was objectively bad), but the WN is massively popular.

Well I double checked and my memory is shit. It's all time rank is #124, which is still really fucking good for narou.
https://www.novelupdates.com/series/in-a-different-world-with-a-smartphone/

>>24621988
I wrote and finished a short story back in April, and currently writing its more fleshed-out novel sequel. I've been making good progress on the first draft after finishing most of its outline. I posted a few chapter wips but the 2nd chap was ignored so I haven't been posting any more of it so far

>>24622946
>>24622961
It was awful though. 5 minutes after getting isekai'd some random noble shows up that wants to buy MC's clothes for a big pile of money. All the early problems were instantly solved without even the use of the smartphone or the MC doing anything.

>>24622923
A battalion of soldiers wakes up in a fantasy world. Their CO didn't make it. Circumstances push them into becoming mercenaries with their limited equipment.
They get hired for a contract to finish a siege. They do so successfully and get some of the plunder, but the lord that hired them doesn't pay them. The company sacks his castle for that and they get even more plunder. They have to flee the kingdom though and charter a ship, but during the voyage they get attacked by pirates. Who would've thought that a flamethrower is so effective against a wooden ship?

Wizards are dangerous, but snipers can deal with them before the wizard knows a fight has even started.
Knights are easy to deal with because they are big targets on horseback.

>>24622961
all time number one is tondemo skill, are you trying to tell me this ranking is worth anything?

>>24623037
It's a ranking of popularity, not quality. Which was the point, you gormless idiot.

>>24622935
>Read shitty unfinished ESL webnovel
>"Hmm I wanna write this, but better!"
>Write 20k words
>Realize the ESL mogs me

>>24623165
the esl prose belies a true and earnest SOVL

Do you guys get random reviews even when the story barely hits 500 views?

>>24622863
The obvious thing would be to get an LLM and ask it questions while pretending to be your main character. Retard.

>>24623206
It happened to me, but much later, and it was written in an AI-like style.

Interesting case study. The progression fantasy fiction 'The Crow' relaunched and has nearly twice the followers on Royal Road.

Went from about 619 to 1300 from the relaunch.

Interesting to see such a big difference from relaunching.

>>24623575
wow so youre saying I could double my followers?
imagine the revenue Id make with 4 of them

>>24623575
What's interesting about that? Original followers+first time followers=2x the original followers. Very linear rate. I'm surprised it's not more.

>>24623614
Dunno doubling followers seems like a big deal to me. Interesting to see that the original followers carry over too. I would hate to relaunch and end up with less followers.

>>24623575
If it were me I wouldn't title it something as simple as "the crow." I would add a second animal to the title.

>>24623678
maybe... a rabbit

>>24623649
>Interesting to see that the original followers carry over too.
How does this blow your mind? if the original run gained over 600 followers, clearly people liked it. Why wouldn't they follow again, especially if the author asked them to? But if you sit at 50 followers after a year of posting and try to relaunch, you might not double that.

>>24623717
This is exactly my plan for my RR account. Start with a longish story, work out the kinks in my writing, build up a fanbase, and then the launch of the second fiction, which will be better, will also have a built in number of followers carrying over from the first story.

I'll probably screw it up by switching subgenres but even so I can probably keep growing organically if slowly.

>>24623717
I've got 600 followers but it doesn't feel like I have that amount of real people reading the story. I'm not confident my readers would carry over to the relaunch.

Realistically, how many relaunches can you actually put your story through? Can slop be reincarnated infinitely through the wheel of samsara until you find success?

>>24623918
Don't think anyone did more than once. But RR doesn't seem to care if people are gaming their system, so I guess you could just do it forever. But relauching is not the panacea for a shit story.

>>24623918
I will abide by The Precepts
I will accumulate merits
I will work off my karmic burdens
I will achieve Enlightenment and become the Slop Buddha even if it takes 108,000,000 lifetimes and reincarnations through countless kalpas

>>24623899
This approach just has the risk of backfiring, since not only fans may carry over. Some vocal readers could get pissed at your first story and then go on to shit on your second story too, and you'll have no choice but to nuke your account. Or, people like the first one and your second work is then full of comments like "I wanted more of the first, who asked for this!"

>>24620479 (OP)
LitRPG Con 2025 Playlist
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLweHQvYZIUF7hZsgmg0kT3nigQxWUJ2XU

>>24623958
Just hit 1500 merits. Thinking about buying a martial slop technique from the sect library. Any recs?

>>24622989
Is there really no mercenary kino on RR? Do I have to do it? It seems like a perfect fit for a content farm.

>>24624291
You can probably find a few through the war and military tags. There definitely was a few.

>>24624277
Hmph! A paltry 1500 merits! Scarcely enough to redeem even next year's Farmer's Almanac for divining optimal planting strategies in spirit pill ingredients.

>>24624291
I was writing a mercenaries in another world story, but I was having my Blood Meridian season and after regaining my senses concluded nobody was going to read that rambling.

>>24624291
>It seems like a perfect fit for a content farm.
It does, a dozen hardy men of various backgrounds putting life and limb on the line for paltry pay. Basically Battle Brothers. Endless source of combat and personal drama with worldbuilding.

>>24624431
You get to swap contracts whenever it suits the narrative, giving you endless options.

>>24620828
based Daughter Of Regals enjoyer

>>24623958
WORLD IS A FUCK
BORN TO DIE
Write Em All 1989
I am the slop man
108,000,000 reincarnations

>>24623614
>What's interesting about that?
The interesting thing is that a transparent marketing click managed to bag so many more first-time followers in the first place. If it works that well clearly more anons should be following ""the meta"" and doing it too

>>24624034
I'm expecting it at least somewhat. One of my earliest fans is hyperfocused on a subsubsubgenre, and he'll probably not be interested in anything else I write. Others will be upset I move away from explicit litRPG into normal fantasy. But I'm okay with that. I'm blessed not to have any autistic haters. Most people who don't like it just say what they don't like and, I assume, drop the story.

Through a gap in the curtains, sunlight glared onto Jamie's face, his eyes fluttered open to an unfamiliar sight. His eyes widened in horror. This was not his ceiling. It was not his bed. And he was not in his room.

His mind raced, going over everything he could remember from last night. He HAD showered, he HAD brushed his teeth, and he HAD gone to sleep. In his own bed. The ceiling did not look like that!

Panic set in and Jamie tried to sit up, but his body betrayed him. His arms felt like they were made from lead, muscles weak beyond compare. Simply turning his head was a herculean task and a golden lock fell into view.

Through much difficulty, Jamie managed to grab the golden lock of hair in front of his eyes. It was clearly his blonde hair, but his hair was black. Or at least it was last night.

Suddenly the door swung open, interrupting his thoughts. A gaunt man in a white coat strode in, black clipboard in hand.

"Good morning..." the man greeted in a chipper tone and glanced at the clipboard, "...Nathan. Good morning, Nathan. How are we feeling today?"

"I... Who... Where am-" Jamie started questioning, his voice sounding off.

The other man interrupted, "Oh, before I forget, someone really wanted to see you," the man quickly stepped out of the room and returned pushing a wheelchair.

In the wheelchair sat a black-haired man that looked identical to Jamie. Or at least what Jaime looked like last night. The same face. The same eyes. The same everything.

The man in the wheelchair smiled like Jamie did and said, "Hi! I'm Jamie. Thank you for your donation."

---

Why is writing so difficult?

>>24624846
Why is benching 225 for 3 sets of 5 so difficult?
You just need to spend some time training.

>>24624861
With benching I can easily tell when I get stronger. I can objectively tell whether I've reached my goal or not. With writing it feels so nebulous. I have no idea if I'm improving our whether what I wrote is even readable.

>>24624846
>his eyes fluttered open to an unfamiliar sight. His eyes
'Eyes' reads repetitive here. The other repetitions are stylistic and ok.

>"Hi! I'm Jamie. Thank you for your donation."
Thanks for the gift sub! Sorry, I couldn't hold back.

So, identity theft?

>>24624805
It's too repetitive and too much tell instead of showing. I detest ellipses, as well.

>>24624967
NTA but what's your take on ellipses? I'm not a fan of them either but I can't articulate why

>>24624970
nta - like most things they are fine when used in moderation. they exist for a reason ... to indicate a hesitation or a pause.

>>24624970
It's just a gut reaction from reading a deluge of fanfiction and weeb writing. I overreacted to Anon's paragraph, it's not that offensive.

>>24624887
I just copy the flow and prose of authors I enjoy and want to ape, like Gene Wolfe or Glen Cook.

DID IT.
The second part of my next chapter is complete.
>>24622201
Now the word count is 8.5k. Tomorrow I’m going to complete the third part, which will be around 5–6k, and then, with the fourth part, the chapter’s final word count will be more than 15k---all released at once.

KINO.

>>24624846
>Through a gap in the curtains, sunlight glared onto Jamie's face, his eyes fluttered open to an unfamiliar sight.
comma splice, please go read Strunk and White & understand the basics
>HAD showed, HAD brushed
Please don't capitalize words, this is not acceptable in prose
>ee you," the m
not how punctuation works

yeah anon this is pretty rough. you should probably read a lot more english fiction before writing your own. the flow is stilted and abrupt in places both on the sentence and scene level

genuine question, do you read a lot? this feels like something written by someone who hasn't picked up a natural feel for how writing should flow, which comes with reading shitloads of books

that said keep working at it, everyone is bad when they start out, you can get better. just takes work

.
.
.
Isn't the Nofap movement ultimately just Cultivation sloppa?

I'm more interested in my world than in my MC, what do I do?

>>24625155
>The MC's entire job is exploring the world
I have a reverse issue where I wanna right about an MC traveling around the world, but I hate world building.

>>24625105
yes

>finally figure out the exact riddle/couplet the MC needs to partially hear/read as a clue to slowly figure out how to get to a top secret location
I don't have a word for this type of joy

wng is dead

>>24625692
>didn't have energy to write at work
>came home to crash for 4 hrs
>woke up, ate, and took remaining ashwagandha tablets for today
>stared at word processor
>crashed again for a few hours
>wake up and look at word processor
well, shitting and sharting out words on the next chapter anywho. writing sure does kick my ass desu.

>gaining views, comments, and followers out of nowhere
Holy shit! I’m a rising star in the villainous lead category!

Any non-satirical xianxia sloppa you like?

>>24625771
Congratulation, bro.
Still, I'm over you.

>>24625830
Hopefully this is someone larping as FFF, what a gay thing to say

>>24625835
disliking FFF is a human right

>>24625823
i have no idea what xianxia is aside from being chinese and martial arts related

>>24625771
How does rising stars work anyway?

>>24625771
To celebrate I decided to change the text and add a bit of a gradient. Think it might be a bit more eye catching

>>24625874
I guess fifty fictions from every genre that are gaining viewers just gets put up there?

>>24625881
approved by verified eyeball havers

>>24624964
>So, identity theft?
Yes.
>>24625077
>Please don't capitalize words, this is not acceptable in prose
I would italicize them for emphasis, but that doesn't work on 4chan.
>>24625077
>comma splice, please go read Strunk and White & understand the basics
You're right, but reading grammar isn't going to help me.
>genuine question, do you read a lot? this feels like something written by someone who hasn't picked up a natural feel for how writing should flow, which comes with reading shitloads of books
Unfortunately, I have read a lot and I have not picked up that feel. It feels as though prose didn't exist until I tried writing.

I'm the retard from a few threads ago that couldn't write anything and I've been doing writing exercises since then.
>>24625017
That's a great idea.

>>24625017
>>24625905
Personally, I think too many people mis-prescribe copywork as a magic bullet for improving prose. Simply copying something out once or even multiple times won't change anything. It'd be like doing 100 pushups then not doing them again for a while.
My recommendation (not saying this is the only way but it worked for me) is to get a tiny notebook that's convenient to carry around on your person/in a jacket/in a bag etc. Do your copywork in this tiny notebook and fill it with your favourite excerpts, quotes, turns of phrase, snippets of dialogue, etc and re-read the contents whenever you might otherwise mess around on your phone for a few minutes. Pick an excerpt at random. Over time, the contents will start affecting even the way you think and formulate sentences in your head. Your internal voice changes. Your first drafts will still be shit but you now have a much better feel for rhythm and flow and will be better equipped to assess your own work.
Most people already get some version of this through reading voraciously but you can speed up the process this way.

>>24625905
If you have a hard time getting that feel down, I'd recommend reading aloud to yourself. It helps detect clunkiness. Personally, I also try to make sure I don't use the same choice of words too closely to one another. Your use of golden lock back to back for instance could be changed to stray hair in the second use.

Keep it up and don't sweat the process. We're rooting for you.

>>24625874
>>24625885
It's a mix of various factors. Views in a certain time frame, number and quality of ratings, reviews, frequency of comments. The algorithm is a secret, the admins won't talk about it and say it's regularly adjusted, so people wouldn't try to game the system. They're lying and everyone games the system.

>lost all motivation to write my story after 40k words
>want to write something else now
how the fuck do you stick to a single story

>>24626017
by actually wanting to write my story

>>24626017
30-50k is death valley of writing. You've probably been writing for a few weeks already, yet have only half a novel. Your story is either rushed and in need of heavy editing, or barely started, and the workload ahead seems insurmountable. But after you get out of that pit, it starts to feel easier again and no other such slog will come, no matter how long the story.

>>24626017
a story can be finished at 40k words.

>>24626111
It can be finished at 6 too
What's your point?

>>24626118
the point it that he doesnt need to stretch things out, kind of obvious isnt it

>>24626120
Your heuristic doesn't seem relevant to his problem. I (and others) inferred that he isn't near his intended ending and getting lost in the low motivation soup somewhere along the way.
Nothing in his post indicated that he's just padding out word count. He's just lost steam part way through and wants to abandon the project.

>>24626128
he could wrap things up at 40k

>>24626129
I think anon would learn a lot more if he finishes the story/character arcs he wanted to tell and includes the necessary logical narrative steps that entails even if he needs to write another 20k words and the finished product is still shit. Speedrunning a hastily wrapped up ending in as few words as possible will teach him less.

>>24626129
are there successful webnovels at 40k words? seems far too short. many are just getting started at that point.

>>24625771
HELL YEAH, CONGRATS!
>>24625692
Ironically, Gonganon and FFF spamming really pushed the trafic itt. Though I think we have more posters now, just lest posts.

>>24625955
>Personally, I also try to make sure I don't use the same choice of words too closely to one another. Your use of golden lock back to back for instance could be changed to stray hair in the second use.
I agree. Damn, I added that part after I had pasted the story into 4chan already and didn't catch the repeating of it.
Thank you, so far I've been doing writing exercises every day. It feels a bit easier to write like that now than it did at the start.
>>24625944
I think I need to do it for at least a while to get into the proper mindset.
I do have a few documents on my phone and PC where I collect quotes, ideas, and names (for video games), but I haven't thought of collecting prose. That's a great idea.

Here's a random quote:
>The secret to happiness is low expectations.

what conclusions can be drawn from information

>>24626215
dunno. I'm a statisticslet

>>24626215
Maybe you passed a word count on may, or got out of the double follower shitter. Anyway, I would say that more ratings mean that more people are reading your stuff OR the people who would like your story are finding it and rating it.
>t.doesn't even have access to the statistics of his own shit story

>>24626162
I have no idea my first draft will be, but it could hover over 40-50k, and it doesn't bother me if it does because I'll have told all there is to tell in the story. Rather or not it'll be successful is another thing, since space opera in general don't do well pretty much anywhere

>>24625771
We're all GMI bros

>click on any wanger selfshill link
>rating sub-4.5* every single time
neverevergmi

Got shown cover art sketch and its so amazing bros, I can't wait to show it once its finished

>>24626764
I want to make a special reward for my readers to celebrate the 100 followers.
Would your artists be good enough for an Elf GF(pic)

>>24626935
You mentioned you weren't interested in anime style right?

>>24626162
40k words is enough to get onto rising stars and blow up so technically sure, its possible.

>>24626969
The problem is that artists online are either anime or Tumblr. So, at this point, I have to settle for the best anime style possible

Man, RS main is brutal isn't it? Been following a fiction since early this week—it went from ~100 followers to a cool 643 and still hasn't breached the top of the list.
Not wanting to crab anyone in btw, just a little upset in the stead of the author
>>24626764
Funny, I thought you were FFFanon, so I'm looking forward to see art of elves or mech pilots.

>>24627015
Oh, and I forgot that it could also be a deathcrafter or a mixmatched creature. Artists must be making bank with you guys (in a good way).

>>24627015
>Man, RS main is brutal isn't it?
the traffic that page gets is insane. being in the top 7 (front page) gives like 10x what even the first page of Best Rated will
>it went from ~100 followers to a cool 643 and still hasn't breached the top of the list.
pretty sure one of the criteria is something like "followers gained in the past 30 days", so moving up the list requires being on the list for a while & having reaped more and more followers from it. if it got 500 in 1 week it'll probably end up scooting onto the front page

>>24627015
>I Became The Scoundrel In The Popular Dating Sim
Wow, this is bad. If this is top 1 on RS we're all gonna make it.

>>24627015
not the person waiting on the cover but I will be able to provide very high quality elf art....sometime at the start of next year. I paid a good artist a lot of money to be put on a wait list until december.

>>24627056
>Wow, this is bad. If this is top 1 on RS we're all gonna make it.
If that's your takeaway, you're unfortunately guaranteed to not make it.

>>24627040
>the traffic that page gets is insane. being in the top 7 (front page) gives like 10x what even the first page of Best Rated will
Yep. If one day I ever make to RS I would be a very happy author.
>pretty sure one of the criteria is something like "followers gained in the past 30 days", so moving up the list requires being on the list for a while & having reaped more and more followers from it. if it got 500 in 1 week it'll probably end up scooting onto the front page
RS requiriments are a little nebulous to me, I know it has to do with growth and partially quality (but I saw some really bad shit in there). Knowing that the fiction I'm enjoying has a shot at getting at the top is placating my ire somewhat though, thanks a lot.
>>24627056
Yeah, that's why I'm light when judging people's writing. The worse problem I see here is the lack of a vision rather than writing.
Still beats 'A Dragon Called Bob' and 'The Factory Must Grow'; I almost popped a vein when I read those.
>>24627066
Yay!

>>24627083
>RS requiriments are a little nebulous to me, I know it has to do with growth and partially quality (but I saw some really bad shit in there). Knowing that the fiction I'm enjoying has a shot at getting at the top is placating my ire somewhat though, thanks a lot.
I don't think quality matters. Only engagement of various sorts. I'm nearly certain the RR admins confirmed that ?/5.0 doesn't matter, only the # of ratings and reviews
I've seen like 3.1 rated fictions on rising stars

what if FFF just stalls at 99 followers...


... forever?

>>24626215
>the most recent 5 star rating got changed to a 4 star rating
i'm killing myself RIGHT NOW

>>24627167
My next chapter is an atomic bomb. I’ll drop to 50 followers in a day and then jump to 500 by the next week

>>24627167
Then the world will never know 'Kino'.
But he's sitting at 98 right now, we can at least find two readers willing to follow him, right?
>>24627190
>500 by the next week
Absolutely and completely unhinged.

>>24627194
screenshot this

Just read Zenith of Sorcery after finishing MoL.
Damn, he really fell off huh?

>>24627212
is it bad?
I always thought MOL was overhyped (it's decent though) and carried VERY hard by the timeloop premise, so I didn't have high expectations for his next story. Especially since OPMC stories are character driven and characters were by far his weakest point as a writer.

Would it be an alright idea to make a list of stories made by people in the thread, or should we just leave well enough alone?

>>24627265
yes please, so i can 2 star everyone

>>24627265
I'm on the fence about it; having one was fun for about a day, but the happenings really soured it. I won't be making it again, too depressed lately.
Better wait until Zamba chews FFF, let him derail a thread, then we may do it.

>>24627279
I wish the mofo who 0.5'd me would've been generous enough to give at least 2 stars, and I wouldn't have dropped 60 ranks thanks to him

>>24627265
I wonder how many times this going to be brought up at this point

>>24627265
>xe doesn't know

>>24627265
Already happened and the list used to be in the OP, this person here (FFF) >>24627338 had a meltie while being one of the listed users, begged the thread to attack the tranny who gave him a bad review, and then the tranny emailed the mods the list of people ITT saying that they were a 4chan group of people who helped review swap and harass other people, and almost caused everyone else on the list to get their works nuked.
So, no.

>>24627822
I don't remember otosomething showing the to the mods, but someone here did contact the mods. But I still don't get the jump that some anons made of:
>The mods know everyone on the list
To now:
>Every anon on the list was accused of harassment
The whole episode was wild enough, no need to spin it more.

But it's a very good reason to not have a list though.

>>24627822
I didn't face any or became accused of harassment desu

>>24627853
mean to quote >>24627846—I'm not the FFF guy for what it's worth

>>24627857
Neither did I got any word from the mods, but I'm wholesome and all.

>>24627822
now this is just a case of chinese whispers lmao half these things aren't true

>>24627885
it is dough

F anon literally came to my house and kicked my dog

>>24627822
>and then the tranny emailed the mods the list of people ITT saying that they were a 4chan group of people who helped review swap and harass other people, and almost caused everyone else on the list to get their works nuked.
No, a writer here got ahead of it by reporting FFF himself and disavowing him on behalf of the other writers on the list. Several of them had preemptively removed their own works to avoid association.
Honestly a shockingly professional bit of damage control, it raised my opinion of the average poster in this thread quite a bit.

F anon made it, RR rec’d him to me

>>24627901
I saw FFF anon at a grocery store in Los Angeles yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for a signed copy or anything. He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?” I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying.

The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter.

When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any ranking infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.

After he finally paid and began exiting the store, he stopped next to me and took the mango I'd just bought. He took a bite out of it before sneezing on it. "Unlucky," he said while wiping the fruit on my shirt. He shuffled away like a drunk Michael Jackson, muttering how "This is going in the book. It's so kino."

I unfollowed him later that night.

>>24627929
>shoulder to shoulder with The Perfect Run
I was a fool to ever doubt him

>>24627929
WE adore YOU K-man.

>>24627924
Authors here are quite chill. I hold the opnion that honest posters on fucking 4chan of all places have become less toxic than the internet at large.
>>24627929
Future RS material right ther.

>decide to find something to read
>look in the newest fiction section
>bunch of piss colored ai slop covers
>bunch of ai sloppa synopsis that say nothing
Pic rel made me laugh at how bad it is. It's just ai isms stringed together. I want all of these ai niggers to die, yesterday.

>>24628159
Jesus, nothing says "great fiction" as a generic AI blurb.

Should probably wait till next thread to ask this, but who would ever want to co-author something?
>Overcomplicates things
>Conflicting ideas on where to take things
>Possibility readers pick on the different styles and find yours lacking
>Have to share credit
>Have to wait on co-author's portion of the work to make sure you aren't contradicting prior material
And for what? To get everything written a bit faster? To share the blame if you fail? It just seems like too much trouble to even consider unless you get someone much better than you. And at that point, you're the dead weight weighing someone else down. Just seems lose-lose.

>>24628181
Could be a fun side project to do with a friend? That's all I got.

>>24628181
I can see people doing it for shits, like a small group of authors doing the literally equivalent of mad libbing. Could be fun.
But as serious writing? Nah, you must be crazy. I imagine at some point getting too dependent on your editor as a professional writer does the same. I think co-authoring is moslty used for textbook writing, not actual stories. I only have one book I think that was co-authored, and it was written by two literal who journalists.

I see now. I now understand what you wanted to do. Even though you said you wanted to be a Webnovelist with hundreds of readers… What you really want to be was a genre fiction writer. You compromised and decided to become a webnovelist.

To bring about your career you took the easy route, thinking that a webnovelist’s job was quicker and easier than a writer’s.

A webnovelist’s job is simple, after all. All you have to do is write video game mechanics.

But you can NEVER write true genre fiction.

>>24628306
i'm not writing litrpg or any game mechanics though, my space opera simply isn't marketable desu

>>24628306
I don't even know what a genre fiction writer is.

>>24628306
I don't think about other people
I just write

>>24628306
There's nothing simple or easy about writing, but I don't blame you for thinking that way. It all seems like that to one who lacks passion.

But what of you? Where are your great works, your labors of love? Speak now, oh self proclaimed judge.

That's right, you have none. You place genre fiction on a pedestal, and yet, you can't even bring yourself to add to your world building document.

Burn that blank page to your eyes, because you'll NEVER write.

>randomly got a thousand views in a couple hours
wtf? I'm not on any RS lists, I just checked. I was going to celebrate watching the milestone pass, not just blow through it while fucking around on /v/...

was sampling some free novels on audible, based on anon's recs/discussions. beneath the dragoneye moons and all the skills.

i assume skills for walking and going potty are a dated trend now, and this no longer flies?

they were very similar. and relatively (RELATIVELY) well written, i guess.

>>24628345
bots just scraped your story for chinese sites. sorry anon

>>24628379
BTDEM is decent then falls off hard at the timeskip. How is All the Skills?
As for system skill tropes I dunno, I kinda lean away from 'system' stories because it's gotten so derivative, and I'm even more turned off now that DCC has gone nuts with normalfags.

>>24628381
mfw

>>24628392
still have a couple hours left and/but im certain theres also going to be a timeskip. while similar i can tell it's more of a power fantasy. i think i prefer it over BTDEM.

>>24627056
royalroad readers are mostly blind to prose quality unless it's really bad. youve gotta hit the tropes + marketing meme strats + satisfying plot & worldbuilding

>>24627943
Thanks, bro. HUG

>>24627929
is that a thai webnovel? wtf

I wish harem fantasy was more popular (in web novels). They are really popular in China and Japan, but not in the English market.

>>24627056
Wow. Even my prose isn't as bad.

>>24628521
I wish monogamous romance was more popular. I have no interest in harems unless they're smutslop (in which case i'm only there for the fuckin' and not the characters).

Jannies finally approved my fiction, so its on RR. Just published chapter 2, any good, or shit?

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/128319/labours-of-zucchini-progression-fantasy-sci-fi

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/128319/labours-of-zucchini-progression-fantasy-sci-fi/chapter/2508027/chapter-2-adventure-awaits

>>24627056
>people see this and claim that popularity involves anything but luck

>>24628610
>And yet, for Zucchini, is the edge like a paradise, a bounty with no end.
typo in the blurb, minus 5 points. see me after class

>>24628610
twin...

>>24628610
i'll check it out later, now I have 100 pages left of iliad I'll be able to crunch webnovels for a bit.

>>24628617
Haha, thanks for checking it out!

>>24628628
thanks coombro. i will read beyond the blurb tomorrow

>>24628610
Be sure to post each chapter here and to start a drama whenever you receive a bad review.

This method guarantees 10k views.

>>24628550
Romance stories and movies have turned me off of monogamous romance because the MC only ever gets the girl at the end of the story. I fucking hate that.

>>24628650
>the MC only ever gets the girl at the end of the story
This isn't that common outside of like, manga, IME.
Most romances in novels actually explore the relationship between the two as it develops

FFF plummeted down to 96… not like this

>>24628159
>This story is more than just action, powers, or a broken world.
>It's about the weight of silence.
Imagine reading this and thinking, "yeah this is fire"

>>24628159
you guys are too harsh. I've give it a shot desu. at least its short and brief unlike many who have a doorstopper synopsis

>>24628698
I followed you merely so I could cuck you at a milestone.

>>24628698
It's okay, it happened before, but I gained a favorite, making it a net gain.

>>24628705
nah that blurb is steaming dogshit and you're part of the problem if you'd give that a shot

>>24628646
Lmao, thanks for the suggestion, but I'm just happy anons here are even noticing it

>>24628317
You just proved the point of that post

>>24628844
how so?

alright wangers show me your cover art
you... do have actual cover art, right? you didn't just get chatgpt to shit out some generic slop, right?

Anyone know where to download audiobooks for free? I'm looking for the Dungeon Crawler Carl audiobooks

>>24629051
Audiobookbay, tokybook has streams for some more popular ones.

Give me your guilty pleasure tag/microgenre criminally underrepresented in wordslop world

>>24629072
older woman younger man

>>24628993
was working on something, but I don't really like it anymore

>>24629057
Thanks, will look into these.

>>24629072
MLP femdom prison.

New:
>>24629305
>>24629305
>>24629305

>>24628993
No, I made it myself in paint, like a true artist.
>>24629105
Were you the anon who posted a WIP a while ago? Your drawings are awesome.