Thread 24637098

Physical Copy Edition

Stubbed >>24629305

>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: Royal Road, 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 web serials:
alexanderwales.com/how-to-write-a-web-serial/

Sanderson's Writing Lectures 2025:
https://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

>>24637098 (OP)
Ew.

How much importance is there to volume length? I've been planning on mine being shorter than average since I started writing this story, but last night it hit me that with the release schedule I had in mind I would finish posting the first volume in a month and each subsequent volume would only take two to three months. Seeing it laid out like that kind of shook me, and now I'm second guessing the structure.

>>24637098 (OP)
inb4 this thread gets nuked

>>24637200
I think volume lenght is arbitrary, as long as your chapters are of a good size, no one will care. Except if you plan to stub, then it could be a problem.
>>24637203
We live in fear of the jannie's tyranny.

>>24637200
Releasing a new book every 3 months is ideal for litrpg
the problem is if you go too small, there's a good portion of readers who will avoid your audiobook because of 'value'
it shouldn't affect your kindle sales too hard afaik? though will be a slight negative

>>24637200
Volume length can vary quite a lot: some people put out doorstoppers, some people put out small thin books. It just depends how long it takes you to complete the story.
I only shifted from a single volume to a trilogy when I realized my book was approaching cubic proportions out of a sense of aesthetics.

stop posting eastern slop instead of western slop for the OP, it gets us nuked you tards

>>24637098 (OP)
Nothing ever came close to the experience of reading LotM for the first time, not even COI... Truly a lightning in a bottle

>>24637206
>Except if you plan to stub, then it could be a problem.
I was thinking that if I got to that point I would bundle two or three volumes together for a kindle/Audible release. I know the value of a credit and wouldn't expect any chance there if the books were in the 60k range I'm looking at. I'm just wary about the possibility of a similar bias on RR. I've never seen anything other than chapter and overall fiction length discussed, but I'm already going off meta with my story in general and want to take every move I can to increase odds of success without compromise in telling what I want to tell.

>>24637259
RR still gets chapters on X schedule, there's no reason your imaginary 'volume' cutoffs would affect popularity (unless you're taking long breaks between each volume or something)

>>24637203
>>24637246
why you lames stressin?
it's the official english cover for physical copies
no animu, no mango, no moon runes, no chang script

>>24637253
ive seen so many people say this but the dialogue fucking sucks and the translation is horrible, i literally can't enjoy the ideas because the writing is so bad on a sentence level

>>24637284
>still stuck on form and style
You, sir, need to consume more sloppa. MTL even

do you guys multiplatform launch or just post it up on royal road

>>24637356
SH and Webnovel audiences are vastly different from RR
Unless you're writing unapologetic gooner sloppa, don't bother with SH and Webnovel

>>24637359
bud what does SH mean

>>24637284
? Are you reading it on some knock off website? The official translation is very good. Download the PDF from the Internet Archive.

>>24637362
Scribblehub

>>24637368
ok, well thank you for the tip, i guess it's strictly RR

>>24637366
The official translation is still dogshit. It doesn't read like a human translation into english, more like MTL with a few manual corrections.

>>24637366
i tried both translations

>>24637098 (OP)
Do you guys know any good places to read xianxia/wuxia in chinese?

>>24637445
chinamen have made bare bones one-off websites for every single wuxia/xianxia classic or web sloppa that exists.
just search the name + "线上" (online) and they'll appear to you

>>24637259
>>24637243
pardon my ignorance, but how does the webnovel to audiobook cycle work? Do you have illustrative examples? Is there enough interest and money in it for Audible to fund a polished production with a professional narrator?

>>24637505
great question. i'm curious also, are characterized voices in the audio version important, or do these audiobooks get produced as more of a straight read

>>24637505
>>24637512
Popular web novels often get stubbed (taken down, leaving a few chapters up) and put exclusively on Kindle. With this process, most books also have audiobooks made. It's fairly common for the monetization split to look like 1/3 1/3 1/3, meaning when you see an author's patreon, they're often making 2x that via Amazon (kindle and audible)
Yes, audiobooks are fuckoff ginormous, for some authors it's their biggest income source. Assuming you're popular it's almost always worth it to get an audiobook made. The only question is if you can afford a big-name narrator or a small-name one (150-200$ per finished hour all the way up to >1000+++$)
>characterized voices
Some people like heavy voice acting and some people don't. It probably depends on what your story is. For example in haremlit, it's common to have duet narration with pretty heavy character acting. I think the more 'professional/trad' your book is, the more it trends toward straight reads

>>24636742
>Am I being a stubborn retard by ignoring offers to review swap (all from way smaller authors).
no, reviews barely do anything unless you're a new author and need them to hit the threshold to have your story's rating appear in the first place. review swap autism is pure cargo cult behavior.
now shoutout swaps might actually make a difference, if you can find authors of similar or larger sizes.

>>24637505
I don't know. The RR forums might have a thread about it. I assume people just hire some freelancer or a friend to read it, then self-publish that to Amazon.

Personally I'm thinking of reading my book myself and just uploading it to youtube, for exposure if nothing else.

>>24637246
>, it gets us nuked you tards
literally never once happened except when some anon used a fucking tv anime instead of a novel.

>>24637560
it happened multiple times but the one i remember is apothecary diaries which is a LN too
i think it was a promotional poster for the anime though so fair enough
i can't remember the other instance...wasn't it the legendary moonlight sculptor? or did that one live?

I got some good feedback from /wg/ but I'm betting /wng/ has some slightly more voracious readers.
I wrote a horror-comedy novel about a literary vampire. See picrel for the description. If you're intrigued then email me. I might end up throwing it up on a webnovel platform, who knows what the future holds?
productionblues@proton.me

>>24637574
what the fuck do you want from me

>>24637581
Feedback ideally.

>>24637574
prose needs tightening up especially since this is a blurb, where absolute polish and punchiness is expected
i would cut out the last paragraph, or at least the first two sentences and only keep "A strange, dark, irreverent, and bitingly funny diptych awaits."
I like the idea. Doesn't seem suitable for web fiction however; I would query trad first and post online as a last resort.

>>24637584
then just post your work
who wants to jump through hoops to read your sloppa?

>>24637590
Thanks anon. Feel free to point out specific examples of potential prose-tightening if you have the inclination; here it is copy/pasteable to facilitate that.
>A new kind of vampire is on the prowl.
>Something’s wrong with Kitty, a terminally online, slobbish history buff. One random day, she loses all desire to consume—be it food, drink, or media. Things only get worse when she realizes what she must do to solve her problem: produce. A novel idea comes to her, and she writes a bit of it down, but hates each one of her sentences. How can she possibly carve her name into the history she adores with such poor skills?
>She finds her answer in the darkest corners of the internet. TB. According to real history, the disease imparts literary prowess. But infecting herself with it proves insufficient. It must spread. And not to just anybody; only to adepts of the craft. Kitty’s quest to feed on others’ literary skill takes her on a misadventure through the lives (and deaths) of a series of authors, deep into their own foul methods of obtaining talent.
>And all of that’s just Book One. In a generous two-for-one deal, Book Two is packaged alongside the first. For readers’ consumptive pleasure, a strange, dark, irreverent, and bitingly funny diptych awaits.

>>24637595
It's not ready yet. I'm looking for anons inclined to review unfinished work.

>>24637614
pastebin it or something instead of making us email you.

>>24637574
How long is it? I can give you my impressions but I don't think I'm a good critic, just an average retard.
>>24637590
Agree with cutting the last part, it's unnecessary and detracts from what you've built up; doesn't help with your sale pitch beyond being self-aggrandizing. But I've seen some authors ad their stories as already having volumes written, so if you put it on RR for example, you could make it part of your blurb and maybe even title, could catch some readers—A.K.A it's serialized.

>>24637614
>Thanks anon. Feel free to point out specific examples of potential prose-tightening if you have the inclination; here it is copy/pasteable to facilitate that.
https://rentry.org/mghdw3in

>>24637574
SOUL
>>24637658
SOULLESS

>>24637664
f anon is that you

>>24637574
it reads like a loose ai blurb to me

surely starting my novel with a very fucking cool ALL CAPS CENTER TEXT abridged history of the setting won't drive people away, will it

and by abridged i mean abridged, it's like 130 words of short lines that establishes "this takes place in a civilization that has colonized the milky way and somehow defeated entropy"

pic semirelated, wip of a puppet mc uses

>>24637698
Nah you should start with your character waking up

>>24637704
preferably in the body of a max-level character from a game she used to play

>>24637704
ok so my options are:

- MC opening a door for a traveling group by reciting the aforementioned 130~ word thing as an incantation
- MC in the middle of a puppet performance, presented as an in-medias-res big battle before we pan out to show it is in fact a performance
- MC wakes up hangover style because he huffed too much lacquer fumes and does a comical "hung-over morning routine" sequence showcasing his powers and personality

>>24637715
it's gotta be option c

>get a review for my story with only 2 chapters so far
>offers some critique
>then later on in the review, they say
>"It's too early on in the whether to tell this story will be good or bad, but as it is, I don't care enough to stick around and find out."
What did they mean by this? Why comment if they don't care enough to find out?

>>24637717
as I wrote option C i gradually realized this same thing
it'll be a pain to do it without having it feel reddit but I'm sure I can wrangle the tone

>>24637708
>>24637715
I was joking.
But the third option does sound entertaining. It lacks a little compelling, though. He has to be late for something somewhat important.

>>24637715
3
the others sound gay

>>24637735
>I don't care enough
This is the most important, and perhaps only meaningful thing they posted. Either the premise of the story, or the characters, or both need to be made more interesting and compelling. I recommend describing boobs better or more, and perhaps adding dragons or a puppy trapped in a tree.

>>24637737
the way i have it set up it'd probably be the departure of the people/caravan he's traveling with as of story start

>>24637735
>What did they mean by this?
Probably your hook is lacking, they aren't interested enough to keep reading.
>Why comment if they don't care enough to find out?
Either they had a negative opnion on your work or they are the type of person who thinks their opnion matter. One guy's opnion doesn't matter, but if more say that it could be pointing to problems at your first chapters.

>>24637743
Yep, I like it. Don't forget to describe how hot all the women are in the caravan (and the men too, might as well).

>>24637735
>>24637746
They said they didn't personally like it because of the MC's motivations. Was it bad to reveal them too early?
Also the motivation goes along the line of:
>i can fix her!

>>24637772
Forgot to tag >>24637741

>>24637772
Hard for me to say without reading it directly, but it sounds like they wouldn't like it either way.
Keep writing and don't be oneguyed.

>>24637574
>please read my whole book
bro. would you do this for someone else? are you crazy?

Just updated the character list
200 surpassed, and I haven’t even finished the 3rd volume.

>>24637845
>he keeps a running list of characters instead of just remembering everything and autistically referring back to the manuscript itself

ngmi

>>24637845
I haven't checked in since the end of vol 2 but please tell me you haven't bothered with listing every janitor you ended up naming in passing

>>24637845
What does Jacques look like?

>>24637849
It's for the readers.
>>24637853
Nah, this time it’s 90% important characters

>>24637849
>>he keeps a running list of characters instead of just remembering everything and autistically referring back to the manuscript itself
W-wait, this isn't how everybody does it?

>>24637855
This is how Jacques thinks he looks.

>>24637855
he looks like you

>>24637865
He's a strapping young man!

>>24637438
>>24637418
This is the official translation archive.org/details/lotm-full-english-novel-translations/Clown%20-%20LotM%20Vol.%201/page/n15/mode/2up
How is it bad? Seems really good to me.

>>24637873
I dont know what it is with Korean and Chinese contemporary works but the translations feel so unnatural. I read through journey to the west and most of romance of the three kingdoms just fine but this and that regressor's tale instantly filter me.

>>24637873
I dont understand how you think its good. the writing is so obviously translated. at least amateur English works flow with English thought patterns.
the dialogue is especially bad

>>24637845
Schizo shit

>>24637882
>>24637893
I was a fan translator once and it's a skill issue, made worse by the audience that has some spergs who will complain about re-writing if you don't visibly retain the chinese grammar structure.
Translating is hard.

>>24637899
Yes, I am a writer.

“Mrs. Smyrin, eight pounds of rye bread.”

“Oh. Dear Klein, where’s Benson? Is he not back?” Wendy asked smilingly.

“In a few more days,” answered Zhou Mingrui vaguely.

As Wendy took the rye bread, she sighed. “He sure is a hardworking lad. He will have a good wife.”

Upon saying this, the corners of her lips curled up as she said playfully, “All is good now. You have already graduated. You are a history graduate of our Khoy University~ Oh, you will soon be able to earn money. You should not be staying in the apartment you are currently living in. At the very least, you should have a bathroom you can call your own.”

“Mrs. Smyrin, you seem to be a young and energetic woman today.” All Zhou Mingrui could do was respond with a dry smile.

*
Even by web fiction standards that's really, really bad. It's probably kind of shitty Chinese writing translated into even shitter english writing. Compare that shit even to something like worm, apgte, mother of learning (written by an esl) and it's not even close in prose quality

>>24637904
>Smyrin
>Klein
>Benson
>Wendy
>Zhou Mingrui
One of these is not like the others.
Reminds me of Craddle, 'Wei Shi Lindon' (99% of the time it was just Lindon).

>>24637901
Thats probably it the grammar structure, sentences just sound especially bizarre. Surely theres some way of translating this in a more natural/less arcane way?

>>24637921
Cradle's naming schemes grew on me by the end ok

Like a good translator would restructure this shit into writing/dialogue that sounds normal in english. It's not hard, even I could do it.

“Good morning, Mrs. Smyrin. Eight pounds of rye.”

Wendy smiled. “Dear Klein! Is Benson back yet?”

“In a few more days, I believe,” he responded vaguely.

As Wendy grabbed the rye bread from her shelves, she let out a long sigh. “Sure is a hardworking lad. He'll get himself a good wife, I'm certain of it.” The corners of her lips curled up, and her voice took on a playful tone. “Things are going well for you too, I've heard. Already graduated, and from our very own Khoy University! You'll be living well...at the very least, you'll be moving out and getting your own bathroom!"

Zhou smiled drily. “You seem to be in an energetic mood today, Mrs. Smyrin."

***
Like can't they just get a basic english speaker to do this? And make it readable?

>>24637904
This from the official release? Did a translation team go through this or was this just a fantl that got acquired through someway? This shit is in the national library of china you'd think there'd be some interest in a real localization.

>>24637934
it's pulled from that doc anon posted which he says is the official, "good" one. it's the first extended piece of dialogue in the book (in like chapter 5 lmao)
lotm apparently has amazing ideas but the prose is just vile to me

>>24637904
Klein's slice of life... Sovl...

>>24637937
Yeah looks pretty bad, I wouldn't think a whole lot if it were a fantl but if this is the official release/an attempt at localization its absolutely disgusting.

>>24637922
Also the translator is just a bad writer. Poor word choice and flow. Too much use of passive voice.

>>24637927
A lot of translators are also bad writers. But there's not enough translators so even bad writers get work. It is what it is. And if you put an editor on it, you run the risk of the editor being politically motivated and fucking up the translation to push an agenda, which didn't used to be a problem pre-internet when consumers would slurp up what they could get, but now you'll get nerds posting side by side comparisons that make the company look bad. Look at the controversy with Yen Press and Mushoku Tensei's translation.

>>24637922
lol

>>24637873
> Seems really good to me.
Are you ESL? That translator clearly is and not a very good one.

i think it's fine
anything more would just be insisting upon itself

>>24637953
Wisdom.

>>24637949
>A lot of translators are also bad writers. But there's not enough translators so even bad writers get work. It is what it is. And if you put an editor on it, you run the risk of the editor being politically motivated and fucking up the translation to push an agenda,
which a series as successful as lotm why don't they just get a proper translation now? I understand hiring whoever they could back then, but it's very successful and translating to english would open it up to a lot of english readers willing to pay for it
also i feel like the pushing-an-agenda thing can't possibly be as big of a risk as you're implying lol. if it is, surely the author or someone on his team could monitor for it—lotm makes that sort of money to allow for it

>>24637904
>prose quality
Webnovels readers don't care, simple as. People want to be entertained

>>24637953
i read slop and it doesn't even meet my standards lol. it's not fine. only people used to reading MTL can possibly enjoy that, and if you read MTL you're in the like bottom 1% of readers for prose standards. so you thinking it's fine doesn't mean anything

>>24637904
LotM's translation is infamously rough early on.

>>24637962
web novel readers DO care dude, I've seen this sentiment mirrored by loads of sloppers.

Just because some contingent of people can suffer through it doesn't mean "people don't care".

>>24637960
The numbers almost never make sense for a full retranslation. It's bad enough when LNs face competition from fan translations. But if you re-release you're facing competition from fans and the prior translation, and really only new readers will want to pay money for the better version. Translation is also more expensive than you'd think, especially for good translators.

Anyone else read Unseen Cultivator? Some anon recommended it and I liked it

people just read lotm for the vibes and the power system and plot

>>24637973
Fair enough. LOTM is just one of the most famous web novels of all so I figured that it had to make sense. Because that shit filters a good chunk of readers lol, even in the slop community, much less the wider community who might be interested b/c of the anime coming out

>>24637979
I never got the circlejerking about LotM's power system
It's mushy, plot driven, and really not that developed

>>24637984
I got the same impression as well, it's brought up often enough and has western vibes with victorian presentation and naming schemes so I thought it might atleast be readable.

>>24637962
non-reader babble
good prose is entertaining. I can't imagine where this sentiment that it isn't comes from. it doesn't make any sense to say this
would you rather see a good movie shot by amateurs on a phone camera or the exact same script with skilled actors shot with expert technique? obviously good prose is good

>>24638083
Sure, but you have to understand people read a lot of the (badly) translated webnovels because they can't get those stories they want to read in their native language or with "good prose". So it's either cope with shitty writing, or don't read it at all.

>>24638090
agree. people cope with it for the stories they're interested in
>Webnovels readers don't care
is just wrong though

>>24638090
i gave it a genuine shake and got to like chapter 40 but the shitty dialogue and shitty prose sapped any enjoyment out of it. simply cannot read translated works, I've discovered

>>24638130
to expand, i generally read for character interactions more than plot, and unnatural dialogue makes it impossible to enjoy characters. some people don't really care about that though, i guess?

>>24638136
What are your favorite webnovels?

>>24638150
apgte worm the wandering inn katalepsis dcc cradle (honorary serial kek) mother of learning years of the apocalypse a practical guide to sorcery this used to be about dungeons uh...that's most of them

>>24637574
>disease imparts literary prowess
How do you think you’ll convey this, given you have no idea what good literature is, nor how to write a character that does?

>>24638161
I wrote off some of the stuff on your list at a glance but I really fell in love with Cradle & MoL so I'll be giving most of the stuff there a chance atleast. Thanks for the list

I clicked on the title of something on the recommended web novel page and it downloaded an .exe lmao

>>24638226
Don't bury the lede anon, which link? I want free exes too.

>>24638239
think it was trailer trash

>>24638226
Surely anon isn't giving away free malware with his recs, right?
Most RR and Amazon links seem legit though, but I'm not clicking on everything to double check.

>>24638247
I think it's just you man.

>>24638196
cradle and mol are my iffy picks lol, mol because the characters are kinda boring and cradle because it's too much action spam. so we just don't have similar taste, don't use my list

I have figured out why I don't like superpowers, but do like fantasy magic. It's because superpowers are something part of the character. They learn how to control them better, but there's typically no open-ended growth possible. Magic in fantasy, on the other hand, tends to have that open-ended growth.

>>24638090
One example of this is harem stories. If you pick up a western story with a harem it's almost always a porn book. The focus of the story is about adding girls to the harem, with some B plot sprinkled in.
Eastern stories are different. They focus on the story and character growth (in terms of power) first, the harem is secondary. It's an added bonus and won't take over the story. It doesn't even have to involve explicit scenes.

If what you want is the latter then translated novels are basically all you have. There are a few western novels like that (eg The Storm King), but they're rare.

partway through the second book of All the Skills (anons rec). me likey. can i assume it eats shit (but, no spoiler please)? because i don't ever see it recommended.

is LOTM worth reading? i watched some of the animated series, but the pacing feels schizophrenic with how much they skip inbetween episodes, so i'm wondering if i should just read it.

>>24638427
apparently they skipped a lot of chapters on the anime

>>24638427
i swear to god not a single animated series coming out of china is coherent.

>>24638436
kind of odd that they're skipping so much when they're already planning on making 10 seasons of this.

>>24638442
Korea was the same way until Solo Leveling was actually decent. I think there's a process of the animation industry figuring out how to portray the stories that aren't in the usual format (LN), and that korean/chinese authors don't write in a convenient way for animators. It's a subtle thing but can be huge. Best example I can think of is Jujutsu Kaisen: the manga is basically an anime storyboard more than a proper manga. 100% rule of cool and fight scenes.

>>24638419
yes unfortunately it's one of those series that get worse and worse. i liked the first 2 books too, and fizzled out on book 3. i heard it keeps getting worse lol

>>24638442
tbhx is goated tho

So are we just going to ignore that opening the recommended page and clicking somewhere opens a redirect to a website that instantly downloads an .exe?

>>24638276

Premise: a computer programmer gets whisked to another world and becomes an apprentice wizard. MC travels around the world following his teacher, learning magic. His teacher is a smart, but not very sociable woman. She's being sent to travel around the world to become more worldly. As a result she doesn't know how to handle a male apprentice, her other apprentices are 2 women.

Magic in the other world works a bit like programming (and electrical engineering). MC's math logic skills are what set him up for success. MC is open-minded to the other world's culture and doesn't try to force earthling logic on them.

What kind of trouble would they run into? Angry dragons? Monster hunting? The teacher sending MC to the red light district "because that's what guys do"? Does he hook up with a fellow apprentice? Do they offend nobles because the teacher sucks at socializing? Does the teacher learn to socialize better?

Answers to the questions will remain unknown, because this story will never be written.

>>24638532
>clicking somewhere
clicking where retard. which link redirects
it's possible you have malware that's auto-redirecting you from safe links

>>24637715
>lacquer fumes
from nail polish?

>>24637865
Pass. No appeal to self inserting if the book has an ugly MC.

>>24637873
>This is the official translation
Afaik it's not a new translation, it's merely an editing pass of the webnovel translation. Also they've only released only the first volume out of probably 6 or 7 -- The Clown covers the first arc up to chapter 213 out of about 1400 chapters.

>>24638532
I'm looking at the raw html of the webpage and don't see any link to that. There's some javascript errors in my chromium-based browser, but if you're still running winblows (switch already), you should have noscript installed and set to block all javascript on new websites by default.

Like the other anon said, you might already have some other malware causing issues.

>>24637921
Zhou Mingrui is his Chinese name from before he got isekai'd. Klein Moretti is the outward name of the same character now that he's in fantasy steampunk england.

That said the author really does start scraping the bottom of the barrel and coming up with random shit for English-sounding names later on, with characters like Isengard, Kaslana (named after the MC of a popular chinese gacha game), Ed Sheeran, and I think some more too.

>>24638532
you have some shit in your browser you dummy

>>24638632
Ed Sheeran and Isengard is peak comedy actually

>>24630931
>>Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint
>cmon man, everyone and their mother knows about orv now. mc gets transported in a regression novel that he religiously read, i cant say anymore. Read the novel or the webtoon, hell read both, this shit is GAS
this one apparently got a print release too, I spotted it at Barnes & Noble on a table together with all the Chinese yaoi romance.

>>24638637
Oh i forgot there's also a guy named Ace Snake. And an admiral named Senor (is he supposed to be mexican? no clue)

Does anyone know how wattpad's rankings work? Are they literally just random?

>>24638640
say regression one more time motherfucker i dare you

>>24638519
well... i'm now struggling to suspend disbelief through book 2, even. too many silly plot holes

>>24638992
i think they unironically are, yes

>>24639027
regression
transmigration
reincarnation
isekai
portal fantasy
reborn as a slopmaster

gonna steal all of FFF anon's worldbuilding and write a played-straight level-up grindfest instead of the retarded shit (sorry, I mean visionary plotting) he has now, and watch the patreon bux come in by the truckload

>>24639061
oh yeah? well I’m gonna steal it and turn it into a harem fantasy with explicit scenes and ai generated porn of the babes locked behind a patreon paywall. infinite money glitch

yea, All the Skills is DUMB. the cards are dumb, the protagonist is dumb, the plot holes are dumb.
the writing was otherwise decent though.

It’s over. Born Under a Black Sun is finished.
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/93931/born-under-a-black-sun

>>24639086
congrats anon!

>>24639089
Thank you. It will remain tagged as ongoing. After I beat everdark Libra, I must start on book two: Raised Under Dark Waves

>>24638632
>>24638637
>>24638674
don’t forget the bishop named Jahn Kottman,

at a certain point i’m convinced the author started phonetically coming up with “western” sounding names using chinese (seems to be what all chink authors writing western fantasy do for naming)

>>24639086
So fucking based.
You did it!

>>24639061
>played-straight level-up grindfest
Volume 2 is that and Volume 4 will be that too.

Do you guys prefer the MC getting isekai'd into another person's body, born as a baby, or bringing over their own body?

Being born as a baby has boring baby years and it's awkward with being a baby (breastfeeding, diapers etc).

Taking over an existing person's body can introduce interesting moral conundrums with taking over somebody else's identity (what if the guy was married?).

Bringing over their own body seems the neutral option, but also implies there might be a way back.

Which one do you like the most?

>>24639179
Reborn as a baby is kino if he’s poor and meets his future noblelady wife, then they meet again years later at school, but he can’t reveal he’s poor because poors aren’t allowed to join it.

>>24639179
i like own body, but baby lets you dump info w/o going to jail for it
another body is fine if it's basically baby+

>>24639179
Born as a baby doesn't work well for serialized fiction IMO. It can work if you're writing a whole book and and want to treat the baby/childhood bit as an slow extended prologue type thing, but obviously you can't be getting into the main intrigue or action of the plot just yet which kinda stinks for people waiting a week for the next chapter.
Unless it's a daily life kinda story like ascendance of a bookworm or those many villainess stories where the focus is mostly on characters rather than action.
Take over someone's body if you actually are gonna play with the conundrums involved and not just mention them for a chapter or two then forget about it, otherwise go with the pure vanilla option of bringing their own body.
You can also pull what lotm did (and i think other stories too) and have them reborn into the body of a recently-dead person, which lets you start the work with some pre existing social structure and connections from the host body but dodges the moral issues. Plus you get a nice plot hook for figuring out wtf killed the guy.

but enough about lotm

>>24639179
reborn as a baby but the MC only recalls their past life after a certain age and/or in dreams. It seems like the best way if you need to do isekai

>>24638445
It's because of money. They didn't have the plan to animate all the books until this first season was confirmed to be a big success in china. That's why this season has a smaller budget 13 episodes despite the book being incredibly long, while the next book (which is even slightly longer) is getting 30 episodes.

>>24637735
Lmao, that's fucked. Did they at least give 5 stars? Check their profile. If they're dropping reviews of things they dont care about, they probably have a dozen similar posts

>>24639179
I like reborn as a baby personally, and that is what I did with mine. However, as >>24639206 pointed out, it does kind of lock you into dealing with boring younger years and is where I somewhat shot myself in the foot.

I wanted to get into the meat of the story, but also play with moral issues of having a family the MC can't properly connect with. The early chapters ended up feeling rushed as a result.

>>24639179
Isekai'd into their ideal body. Like, they just come into the world fully formed in their prime and are essentially a fish out of water, much like they would be in their own body, but with the advantages and disadvantages of their new one.

there was that shitpost recently about the 4 holy slop starters but now i realize mine starts with all 4

>>24639179
Maybe start by wondering why the MC needs to go through the isekai procedure at all.

>>24639578
what the fuck are you talking about
OF COURSE there needs to be isekai

>>24639179
I prefer the bringing over of the body. Mostly because I'm writing one where the characters are transplanted into their world to another. I think it's a lot of fun when characters are true foreigners and have to work things out with stakes, or at least opposition which is spoonfed for being born as a baby. Still works fine with another persons body and I always enjoy the 'trying to fit in' stick with it

>>24637735
can you share? ill give you bigboy feedback

>>24639206
>>24639559
If picking "rebirth as a child" please don't rush a story - 7yo killing people en masse, 6yo saving the world, every villain is a 5yo genius wunderkind of all time, elder kings and mighty wizards treating a 4yo child as an equal etc.
In general shonen lightnovel and webnovel authors overdo it.
It is one of the things that bothered me about "Immortality Through Array Formations" where a Qi Refinement Realm 10-13 years old kid kills a world destroying devil alone, he tortures and kills dozens of people

so, now that the dust has settled, are you writing a novel shared on the web or are you writing a Web Novel?

>>24639788
i'm writing a novel shared on the web. Didn't know about webnovel trends when I started writing, just wanted to share what I was working on.

>>24637098 (OP)
>nobody noticed "Stubbed" in the OP
my genius is wasted here

>>24639777
Ah, I didn't mean it in that way. I meant that I didn't spend a lot of time with him being young in the first place. It goes to him being 17 after only 2 chapters of childhood. There is a time skip that is later expanded on, but it's already been pointed out that I should have just begun at the 17 year mark.

So, still a fuck up, just a different kind of fuck up.

>>24639799
You're maybe not as smart as you think you are

>>24639788
I'm writing an early 20th century pulp serial which, short of managing to be reincarnated as a Japanese light novel author, is best done through web fiction.

>>24639799
I noticed. I care. You matter.

>write a story
>schedule 30 chapters for release
>not much attention
>fuck it, stop working on it
>sudden influx of followers, comments and positive reviews after it's over
>oh shit
>scramble to write continution
>schedule another 30 chapters for release
>no real growth going forward
>fuck it, stop working on it
>another sudden wave of praising comments and reviews when it's almost over
FUCK

>>24639828
D1 retard over here

>>24639799
I noticed and was going to carry over if the thread was nuked.

>>24639828
this nibba getting cancellation edged

>>24639904
Cancellation Edge is my MC's ultimate technique

>>24639803
I agree with your take. The time spent as a baby would just lead to awkwardness because the kid can't and shouldn't be able to do the things many readers are there for.

Super Smash Bros. but with /wng/ characters like Ferene, Teren, Jacques, Zucchini, etc

>>24639965
A crossover novel would be kino.

>>24639965
Don't forget Victoria and her Yellow Typhoon, and Ai and Thirteen; but good luck fitting a building-sized mech on screen.
>>24639973
It's a shame the list idea was buried, that would be a fun community project of sorts.

And we all know that Rotwood is too OP, nerf plz.

thoughts on Reverend Insanity?

>>24640023
Amazing

>>24640023
Just a meme, avoid it.

>>24640023
The first story arc is fantastic, but the milking begins in full gear after that and it's really hard to bear.

>>24640023
bretty gud

>>24637845
do readers enjoy character lists and other compilations of the sort?

>>24640058
most readers care very little about the flavor stuff (maps, character bios/art, glossaries, worldbuilding entries, etc). they just want the story
if you choose to do that stuff it's primarily for you as the artist

>>24639991
>Don't forget Victoria and her Yellow Typhoon, and Ai and Thirteen; but good luck fitting a building-sized mech on screen.
it has been done before.

>>24640058
That chapter has a ton of views.
So yes

>>24640058
>>24640066
I've seen some interest in occasional character recaps at the end/start of each new arc or volume especially in litrpg where stats, progression, inventory etc are worth having a running record of

>>24637968
more likely they just don't to be distracted by terrible prose, which is still an incredibly high bar on RR

>>24638393
can you list some titles of the translated harem novels you're referring to in this post

>guy starts commenting on my early chapters 20 mins apart, clearly commenting as he reads. Think he's a new reader
>helpful stuff like corrections for shit I missed in editing at first
>then turns to questioning plot points
>mentions one character is pointless because nothing happens with them in the latest chapters
>realise this guy is rereading from the start and pointing out what he thinks are plot holes as if analysing a complete product
>story isn't even close to finished

I appreciate the engagement, but mate... Shit ain't done yet.

The worst part is I just so happen to be in the middle of writing a chapter that addresses said character in more detail to set up later conflicts. Now it's going to look like I got one guyed. Still gave him +5 rep :-)

>>24640130
if in doubt, hit em with the
>all will be revealed [praying hands emoji] [fire emoji] [smirk emoji]

>>24640130
More common than you think, one of the stories I'm following has a bunch of commenters doing the same; but in that case the MC was gone for 10 chapters. Just don't let them worm into your brain and you'll be fine (I think).
>Now it's going to look like I got one guyed. Still gave him +5 rep :-)
The worse part of discussing chapters is giving rep for the guy with combative comments. Sometimes, it's best to just ignore these people desu. I got tired of getting rep ratio'ed.

>>24640130
>>24640178
what's the cost of never ever replying to commenters?

>>24640180
You could lose the dopamine rush for when they comment followed by the cortisol spike when they keep pointing flaws in your chapter.
Responding to commenters is a way to cultivate engagement and (hopefully) reviews. You don't need to—at some point I think authors just let the commenters do whatever—but at the lower end a comment shows that someone who isn't a bot is actually reading your shit.

>>24640130
Better than pulling a minor character out of ass after 100s of chapters since last appearance without any additional exposition

>>24640180
In my experience, commenters whining that the author won't engage with them.
I haven't yet tried the strategy of writing a commenter into the story and belittling them, like that one guy did with the high school calling them all gay because one kid asked him a dumb question.

>>24640190
>>24640195
in that case what would happen if I just did banal vapid replies like >>24640164

>>24640190
A high quality cortisol spike to be sure.

>>24640199
[peojudging][DrakanNo]
Maybe even a [skull emoji]

>>24640164
If I ever get big enough to not give a fuck about losing followers, I promise you I will do this constantly.

>>24640199
I haven't had the opportunity to try that yet, either, but I've already decided it's /the way/. Commenters asking for spoilers and whining really are just impatient and demanding attention. Giving them attention makes them feel good and maybe they'll stick around, while "all will be revealed" should reassure them that those words that concern them didn't just accidentally get typed in and posted.

>>24640078
no chapter of yours has "a ton of views"

>>24640223
All pass 100...so...good?

>>24640180
>>24640190
I don't respond to any comments, unless the commenter seems genuinely interested and wants to know more about stuff that won't come up later in the story. Explaining or defending your work in comments is just dumb and will make you look like a clueless loser no matter what you say.

>>24640230
Come back when you have views in at least 5 digits per chapter

>>24640238
fuck off esoterictempo

>>24640238
Screenshot this

>>24640124
I wonder if there are any furry or poly harem novels.

>>24640250
You just reminded me of this exchange, you have two days.

>>24640256
I've won

>>24640261
I don't see 600 followers.

>>24640282
100 fw passed.
500 is the second step.

>>24640287
2 days, tick tock, or you're getting another 0.5 rating.

>>24640180
archmage author has 0 public comments which i find pretty based
community engagement is clearly optional

>>24640023
it's pretty decent if you're aware of the usual tropes surrouding xianxia, there are ones I like better but it has a certain edgy charm to it. In my opinion it only got really good later on, some arcs are not good at all

>>24640326
Insect-based magic put me off, I have dropped Reverend Insanity early on. Why can't the author introduce a foxgirl magic or a basic dragon magic? Did he make it deliberately unpleasant to emphasize growth like see what shit cultivators have to do for power or what

>>24640350
Human is the spirit of all living beings, Gu are the essence of Heaven and Earth.

>>24640350
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gu_(poison)

>>24640261
>LitRPG + Anit-Hero meta follower
>Just got 100 followers after two full books
It's over.

>>24639578
isekai is so that the mc can make barely humorous pop culture references as "jokes"

>>24640494
>Meta
I did everything in my power to push readers away, and I still got 100 followers.

>>24640251
>poly harem novels
males don't write these, youve gotta look for the trans author smutslop

>>24640494
I've never read it and by anons' descriptions of it, seems like it's very autistic and not particurlaly interesting. But it got actual fans somehow, gotta give him that.
He has the right spirit; Kinoman is the writer we should aspire to be.

>>24640550
I still cant believe you stuck through with that damn cover K-Man

>>24640588
One day, YouTubers are going to make three-hour essays on its beauty.

>>24640550
That still puts you in the bottom percentile of all RR series. So, congrats I guess.

>>24640626
K-Man what are your personal favorite wns?

>>24640677
Funny: Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
Serious: SSS-Class Suicide Hunter.
That’s why I chose such a shitty name because I truly believe the shittier the name, the kinoer the webnovel.

>>24640688
Your title isn't even that shitty to be honest.

>>24640707
Generic is bad, not shitty. Pic related is shitty (Good).

pick my poison guys - RI or LOTM?

>>24640739
Cradle

>>24640746
Cradle is well-written from a technical standpoint and reads well. No complaints about the character arcs, plot, action, etc but it just feels so soulless. It feels like those manga drawn by white dudes.

>>24640739
Are these your first cultivation novels?

>>24640588
the cover looks cool
it just makes no sense

>>24640754
I don't agree but I can see how someone could think that, cradle appeals to me too much personally tho so that might cloud my judgement. What are your favorites? I've gotten into cultivation recently.

>>24640124
Japanese:
>Mushoku Tensei
>Tsuki ga Michibiku Isekai Douchuu
>Arifureta
>Sevens
Chinese:
Basically all the harem xianxia, here are a few:
>Against The Gods
>Ancient Godly Monarch
>Battle Through The Heavens
>Chaotic Sword God
>Martial World
>The Wizard World
>God and Devil World
>Tales of the Reincarnated Lord
>Black Iron's Glory

If you want something to read then Black Iron's Glory is cool, but be warned that the story was dropped because the author got in trouble with Chinese censors. Tales of the Reincarnated Lord is a bit similar, but you have to skip like the first 50 chapters until he starts moving to his territory. All the flashbacks are useless. The latter story has a bit more harem.

From the Japanese stories it's Sevens and Mushoku Tensei. I can't think of many of the other JP ones because they started nuking fan translations, it's been a while.

what are the best English-original xianxia?
anyone read Ave Xia Rem Y? heard good things

>>24640773
Cradle is the obvious recommendation and the only actually finished one that comes to my mind.I like the by DragonofRochester & have been enjoying Unseen Cultivator lately.

>>24640773
The other work by nobody103 is also interesting but I wouldn't call it straight up Xianxia, also following his release schedule is pure pain.

>>24640757
not my first, i'm pretty familiar with cultivation and all of the systems/references, but i haven't really read many 'big' titles so i feel like i'm missing out on a lot.

>>24640810
What *have* you read?

>>24640823
RTOC

>>24640773
Nameless Sovereign is probably my favourite, the cave arc (first arc) is a bit too long but after that I really enjoyed it
Memories of the Fall is one I would recommend, it has extremely long chapters though, and kind of meandering/boring until the prologue ends
Ave Xia Rem Y is pretty decent, funnily enough the harem/romance aspect is easily the worst part
Reforged from Ruin is entertaining, at least when I last read it at chapter ~100
Reach Heaven Via Feng Shui Engineering, Drug Trade And Tax Evasion is a different kind of take on the genre

>>24640832
Did you like it? The translation hard filtered me.

Monster Evolution, or Cultivation?

>>24640852
transformation/bimbofication fetish

>>24640852
neither. no evolutions and no cultivation
it's just progressionfantasy

>>24640860
Trvke

>>24640843
It gets very autistic at times, but I liked it. I really liked the spooky eldritch elements that it sprinkles into the story, as well as the endless despair of MC losing at every turn.
>The translation hard filtered me.
I don't remember how bad the translation might've been in early chapters, but I remember the translation being good later on.

>>24640869
I'll give it another spin I guess, I wanted to like it but the korean names also throw me off

>>24640852
Love the idea of both, but I always get filtered for some reason.
I hate when monsters get an human form or something.
And I haven't read enough xianxia, but the ones I stuck with, I dropped because I don't care about overarching higher-universe-bullshittery.

I must have some very specific autism as it concerns the "numbers go up" genre.

>>24640879
Not "numbers go up" but "MC gets stronger", the latter is more accurate.

>>24640675
Wut? There's like 50 or 60 thousand fictions on RR. 100 followers definitely clears bottom 1%.

>>24640879
i think the justification for monsters getting a human form in most stories is that the Way of Heaven is genuinely racist and favors Humans for cultivation

>>24640874
>the korean names also throw me of
They filter me too. I struggle to remember characters and end up having to check to wiki to remind myself who they are.
Wiki has many, many spoilers even at the top of the character pages though.

>>24640023
i got uniquely upset during the immortal arc whenever fang yuan would get his whole immortal aperture obliterated every arc or so because the whole pseudo ecology of immortal aperture management really tickles my autistic gears

>>24640885
If you run a search for ongoing series with as many words as FF anon he really might be down there in the dregs. idk how low but he's posted a lot of fucking chapters lol

i went and did it myself. for ongoing, >500 page fictions, he's roughly in the bottom 40% of stories (a bit below average, then)

he also has the litrpg-tag and progressionfantasy tag and i wonder how that would skew results, but i can't be bothered

If I had discovered Reverend Insanity in my early teens/if it existed back then, I would have been the autist to be Gu Yue Fang Yuan at my school's annual fancy dress event

>>24640879
I genuinely drop anything that gives the monster a human/humanoid form early on because they'll almost definitely be like that for the majority of the story. And at that point, what's the point of being a monster?

All this xianxia/wuxia discussion is making me curious; is any anon writing or interested in writing their own? No need to link or anything just speak up.
>>24640917
It's the bane of non-human characters. I've a idea of one that would be completely non-human but I'm shooting it down because it would be a manipulative/genocidal one, which would rub a lot of people wrong.

>>24640933
>All this xianxia/wuxia discussion is making me curious; is any anon writing or interested in writing their own? No need to link or anything just speak up.
i've considered writing a cultivation-lite. meaning stealing a bunch of the basics to the power system and the general vibe of the setting, but not explicitly using terms like dantian, sects, meridians, qi, etc. slightly westernizing it e.g. cradle (or maybe more so)

>>24640933
It's kind of intriguing but for me a lot of the interest comes from the chinese mythology (or in the case of 1% Lifesteal I got tricked and didn't realize it was cultivation until over a hundred chapters in, and the character and brutality keep me sticking around). I don't know nearly enough chinese mythology to make it work even if I stole the underlying structure and made it American.

>>24640933
>>24640917
i’m thinking about writing a nonhuman mc who becomes a grub, expects to metamorphasize but remains a grub and keeps getting bigger, but i’m not sure if that’s exactly to the tastes of the RR audience.

>>24640944
How big are the grub's boobs?
Actually, I'm getting ahead of myself. How sexy is the grub overall?

>>24640933
Getting monster scammed is literally what made me start my story. I wanted to have a dragon avoid getting human'd, then go out of his way to screw with the (in-universe) writer and ruin the plot. It morphed into a much less spiteful story since then. I should really fix up some of the earlier chapters some time.
>>24640944
I'd read it. Sounds like fun.

>>24640949
Dragonfag here, I fucking love dragons. What's your story? I reactivated my burner account so I'll slap a five star on that bad boy and get reading.

>>24640937
Interesting, so the growth by cultivating and maybe pills and such but with another theming? Sounds cool. Considering how many people are reading cultivation stories, I wonder why we aren't seeing things like 'cultivation in the victorian era' (I think I just rewrote LoTM) or 'cultivation in standard fantasy'.
>>24640940
Maybe give it a shot, who knows if it could work?
>>24640944
Definitely they would pick as a satire, but other genres could be difficult to work with. Progression/adventure is a natural one.
>>24640949
Oh, so it's like a meta monster story?

New chapter of FFF-Class 'Unlucky Antagonist' is out.
In this chapter, Jacques explains us why taxes are objective EVIL!

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/119783/fff-class-unlucky-antagonist-villains-origin-story/chapter/2521603/man-part-one

>>24640959
The antichrist doesnt need to convince me very hard on this one

>>24640933
I'm writing wuxia!
Might be wishful thinking on my part since it's my favourite genre but I think there's a growing audience for low(er) fantasy progression and cool, earnest adventuring.

>>24640940
you can just make shit up as long as you rename all the cultivation terms and don't use chinese names

>>24640967
Based

>>24640971
Oh, you're the anon who's backlogging their wuxia, right? Sorry I kinda forgot about you.
I hope people pick your story when you release, and I do think there's space for stories where characters struggle. Needless to say that cool things are cool. People like cool.

>>24640959
>Lost a follower
Tax lovers are such snowflakes.

>>24640957
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/61924/the-dragon-and-the-author
Hope you like it, fellow dragon connoisseur..
>>24640958
Yep. Two primary povs with the dragon being one of them.

>>24640852
these both fucking suck

>>24640958
>Maybe give it a shot, who knows if it could work?
Maybe someday. I've got like 4 or 5 story ideas after my current story wraps up next year (light litrpg native fantasy). Maybe I could make like a novella, but I already have a romantasy novella I think I'm going to try.

>>24640856
that's literally INT is my Dump Stat

>>24640983
It's all good, I appreciate the kind wishes.
Hope your projects are going smoothly too. What are you working on?

>>24641021
A litRPG/SOL thing about a party of people who have been assigned classes that they are unfit for. Made abysmal progress but no other idea is as advanced, it's ~10k words in right now.
I have half a dozen other ideas but they are a chapter or less of length.

>>24641013
no i'm talking about the catepillar book

>>24640852
I like monster evo
wish there were stories that didn't suck

>>24640773
I didn't like Ave Xia Rem. There's an event in the story that basically invalidates the dozens of chapters we read before. The author basically killed all the interest I had in the series with that.

>>24641118
to be fair, that is a very average chinese xianxia thing to do

need idea guys to give me their ideas. i dont have time to fuck around coming up with my own stuff

>>24641322
How will you have time to write, in that case?

>>24641322
Search the archive for the 9000 times we already had this exact conversation, and we've had at least 25 ideas for a story

>>24641331
the expiry date on those is: once archived

>>24641330
too late i'm extracting your ideas through your post. you never should have made contact

>>24641344
Write a story about a person who wakes up as their max level magic-using character in an MMO.

>>24641330
Silly anon. Every writer knows that writing is easy, ideas are the hard part.

if i cared about the idea i wouldn't be willing to delegate. if i thought (most) took any work, i wouldn't expect anything.

but i have succeeded. anon has given me an incredible, never-done-before idea
>>24641351

>>24638226
Not sure if you're trolling but which link? I will remove it.

>>24641441
Nevermind I saw the post where you mentioned it. Anon you should double check you don't have any fishy extensions installed. One of them has a browser hijacker in it most likely. Make sure to clear all of your cookies and cache as well while you're at it.

>>24641441
just checked.
there isn't anything like that, anon is a retard. it's a plain text page w/ hyperlinks
t. webdev

>try a story with a high rating
>it's shit
>try a story with a low rating
>it's decent
Nobody has good taste except for me.

>>24641471
yea... which!?

>>24641240
It's not at all. I've read a lot of xianxia and none of them have killed my interest in the story like Ave Xia Rem did. I would've rated it a 0.5, but I felt sorry for the author, that's how much he fucked up. I'm definitely not reading anything that guy writes anymore.

>>24641518
which what?

>>24641452
NTA but I also got sent to a malware site when clicking somewhere on that page. I was on mobile though. He's not bullshitting.

>>24641636
what are you dishonest thirdworlders getting up to? i assume it's the same anon; but doesn't matter. what's your problem?

>>24640971
Oh shit, someone else is backlogging wuxia, huh? Although mine's more based around the Korean flavor, I guess.

For the past week, I've been held hostage by A Villain's Will to Survive. Why can't westoids write anything this intelligent and compelling?

>>24641677
It's not even the best villain story here.

>>24641685
oh shut up

>>24641677
>>24641689
i'm going to read it w/ the sole purpose of psychoanalyzing someone who would make this claim, as well as give your exact iq score. are you okay with that?

>>24641691
Go right ahead, I don't care. I've read nothing in the past decade that could grip me like this and make me love every character, and we're talking about isekaislop

>>24641677
>reincarnated into a video game as le villain
>I must avoid le death flags
A very boring and standard eastern web novel plot. I haven't read it so I will give it to you the possibility that it could be good. There's plenty of western novels that rehash the same plots, too. All I can say is once you've read your thousandth MTL gookslop reincarnated academy game trope filled harem story where all the cardboard female love interests fall for the mc immediately you will grow tired of it. Slop is slop. It's slop all the way down. There is no high ground to stand on and look down at others when you're all eating from the trough.

>>24641701
right on, ill try it after apgte which is next up on my backlog

>>24641705
>once you've read your thousandth MTL gookslop reincarnated academy game trope filled harem story where all the cardboard female love interests fall for the mc immediately you will grow tired of it
I've read about half a thousand, had grown tired of it, and would've agreed with you before last week. But there's nothing else like this.

>>24641708
Well I'm glad you have something to read you enjoy. I would've been jealous a few days ago but I've finally found my own sloppa to binge recently.

>>24641677
it's just some dude scamming his way through life by gaslighting every woman he meets (sometimes accidentally)

>>24641677
Because you don't read.

>>24641718
Yeah. that's exactly why it's magnificent.

Well, I didn't really come here to promote that story, I just wish western wn authors took some notes from gooks on how to craft engaging web serials on a technical level

>>24641722
any notes or observations on what makes it so engaging to you?

>>24641722
Frog in a well

>>24641722
check out Barbarian Writer in a Murim Dating Sim (available on genesistls but has since been taken down by a novelpia copyright claim) and maybe I'm Not A Regressor (used to be translated by a similar group, now wuxiaworld restarted from chapter 1)

>>24641725

1) The author actually plans ahead. Developments are foreshadowed well in advance. Elements that come up aren't necessarily immediately relevant, but their significance is noted, and their potential blossoms when the conditions are right. The payoff feels organic and deserved.

2) At the same time, the author doesn't overwhelm readers with too much information at once, which is often the cardinal sin of such stories. The narrative doesn't get lost in a jungle of worldbuilding and the complexities of its magic system, but strictly controls what it gives you at once, and doesn't waste time with irrelevant things. This allows the reader to actually notice the foreshadowing and consider its possible significance before moving on.

3) All the characters feel alive. You'd think this was an obvious base requirement for a story, but most just fail this point. In the majority of stories, western and eastern, the cast exists only as tools to either boost the MC, or be an obstacle to be trampled. But the author in this case sees a lot of effort to give every character, no matter how minor, a personal goal, a history that reflects said goal, and they keep pursuing it independently of the MC. It also manages to make them all appealing. So you're not only following the story for the protagonist, but to see "will X achieve what they want, how is Y going to react to this development", etc.

Even villains get some depth and it's not always necessary to kill them, as long as the conflict of objectives is resolved. The story takes a lot from GoT in this. Thankfully, there's not as much head-hopping as in GoT, and the narrative never forgets who is the actual protagonist. Another common issue in western fantasy.

4) The girls. This is continuation to the previous point. Many female characters fall for the dashing MC...but then clash with his stone-cold, villainous personality and are hurt. Coping with disappointment and grief, growing and overcoming, and learning about their crush and each other through time and perseverance is probably the most interesting part of this work. This is one thing I wish even professional authors paid more attention to, personal chemistries, how character traits collide, how every human relationship goes through bumps and conflicts, and either falls apart or is restored stronger. That's the flavor of life.

I could go on and on, but I think if authors studied even just these points, we could all enjoy better writing.

>>24641789
dungeon crawler carl does it better

>>24641789
I do it better

>>24641808
dcc is reddit

dcc is a reminder to chinamen that they can't write for the first world

>>24641946
au contraire, dcc is a CCP plot to introduce westerners to the memetic weapon known as xianxiaslop

>>24642055
cultivationslop is the reverse opium of the 21st century ?

>>24642087
absolutely
they tried it on their own population first with massive success and now they're exporting it

dcc? more like "deceased"

>>24642254
HA! good one, anon!

>>24642254
whoa....... that's so crazy... have you ever, like, thought about writing a book or maybe even a web novel or something?

>>24642055
Wait, do I not know what xianxia is? I thought it was chinese fantasy. DCC is just reddit flavored litrpg.

>>24642460
Inmortal warriors?

>>24642460
It's close. Xianxia is eaten fantasy about becoming an immortal. Xuanhuan throws more fantasy at it. These days the two terms are used kind of interchangeably.

>>24642530
>>24642555
Oh, I was thinking DCC = Dungeon Crawler Carl. I didn't realize there was a xianxia that also had that abbreviation.

>>24642567
I don't like that the thread seems to have a few posters that constantly abbreviate everything
annoying

>>24642570
Some are fine like DCC and APGTE but most times it just forces me to google it. Guess I just need to read more.

>>24642570
ikwym ugh soooo cap fr fr

>>24640739
>>24640810
LOTM isn't cultivation. It's chinese written "western fantasy" in a totally non-Chinese setting.
If you want more exposure to the big cultivation novel "canon" then go with RI.
But if you want more eldritch stuff and people corrupting themselves into writhing masses of flesh from looking too closely at "hidden existences" then go for LOTM.

>>24640856
very based
>>24641013
not fetishy enough, dropped 6 chapters in. i'm going back to scribblehub

>>24642570
im guilty of that but typing out "A Practical Guide To Evil" every time would be annoying, and it's such a major serial that if you're newfaggy enough to not know it, the onus is on you to go google it tbqh
it's retarded to abbreviate small serials though, i can agree there. i don't see that often though. it's typically the super famous ones being abbreviated

>>24642567
ive never heard of a xianxia/xuanhuan with a DCC abbreviation, i think other anon(s) are just retarded

I got a comment for the first time, and was happy to finally get a reader, then I found the user's comments on other works all follow a format and he was just trying to get art commissions. almost fell for it too. kind of soured my mood

>>24642693
Maybe that anon thought this was a chinese web novel general rather than a general web novel general?
>>24642860
Same happened to me, was so happy to have a commenter just to find out it was spam.

>>24642860
Leak your stuff

I've started to become so similar to Gu Yue Fang Yuan it's literally scary

>>24642860
It was the same for me.
Go on, one day, you’re going to find one.

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>>24642980
>>24642980
>>24642980