Thread 24700283

/wng/

Anon Ascends Alone Edition

Stubbed >>24695473

>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 [Embed]

Recommended web novels
rentry.co/d2yvczro

Anon's guide to success
rentry.co/RRBasicGuide

FAQ
rentry.co/pytefpxn

>>24700283 (OP)
First time baking, so I'm sorry if I fucked it up

Friendly reminder that web crawlers make up the first one hundred and twenty-five views on your story. I tested this by posting a story with no cover and only making one chapter with a few pages. Nobody in their right mind would have clicked on it.
A year later it’s at 125 views. All webcrawlers.
If you have fewer than 125 views, no real person has clicked on your story. Sorry

Best series for the mc dies and restarts in the past with all their past knowledge? It's a trope I cannot deny liking too much.

>>24700283 (OP)
I tried reading SSS but bounced off of it HARD
The setting felt hollow

>>24700286
you left the copy pasted [Embed] from the YouTube video kek

>>24698955
>>24699401
Why do you not understand the concept that it's the real world for these inhabitants?
You keep talking about things that are wholly unrelated to the concept of surviving when you're fighting for your life inside a dungeon.
Have you tried looking at military boondoggles instead of these moronic comparisons that show you've never touched the story?

>>24700320
I'm shocked. It's almost as if not everyone will like every popular story.

I exercised the self control to not post FFF class unlucky antagonist in the thread asking if /lit/ ever made anything worth reading.

>>24700473
Real question. Why do you even bother? It's a shit story with shit writing, it'll never be a success. I have a bet with myself for how long it'll take you to quit.

>>24700483
I am not the author. I saw the thread and wanted to shitpost with it, but decided such an act was better left to the author.

>>24700483
Not me, but you are lying---It's pretty good.
At least, you should trying to finish chapter one.

>>24700490
ironic advertising is still advertising
don't do anything for him except leave .5 star reviews

>>24700492
I can't tell if you're series or trolling. I've read a lot of wns, a *lot*. It's one of the worst, even compared to many MTL series I've forced myself to read. It's utter trash, especially for something aimed at RR. It's kind of obvious the author is a schizo.

>>24700483
>Real question. Why do you even bother? It's a shit story with shit writing, it'll never be a success. I have a bet with myself for how long it'll take you to quit.
Interesting. Tina-anon checking in. What's the office pool in your head up to on my imminent success finding a niche somewhere. And don't worry, anon(s). I won't even respond if baited. Just this tidbit and I quit feeding the crabs, I promise.

>>24700499
Are you ChatGPT?
You know...a wall text with 0 arguments...weird.

>>24700506
> What's the office pool in your head
Well, all I'll say is you won't quit this year.

>>24700508
Like I said, a certified schizo.

>>24700514
Like I said...a bot.

man this general thread even exists because too many people were put off by WG and their attitudes. Writing General ain't for writing and talking about it. Its like being in english class and a creative writing professor keeps showing you one of their (well written but) oh so boring essays. Now on that note with what untenable company WG anons really are why come shit up this WNG thread. Answer. Everyone got tired of your shit and made their own sandbox. We get it. We're all "bad writers" and WG is all "good writers". Fine. We got that so you can go hoe. To your containment thread where you can huff farts over dashes and grammar errors and discus how to make the perfect creative writing professor essay on... whatever boring tripe you like,

>>24700519
Disagreeing with someone doesn't make them a bot.

I found a cute web novel but it updates only twice a month

>>24700514
>> What's the office pool in your head
>Well, all I'll say is you won't quit this year.
another fan in the bag. LMAO. lol, even. Thanks anon I take that as a compliment. Cheers and good luck on your own project/read.

>>24700527
Nothing wrong with that. One of my favorite series only updates every 7-10 days. Okay, the chapters are 20-30k in length, but still...

>>24700525
His unwillingness to participate in a fair debate is the main problem here.
You very well may insult me, but don't assume your perceived superiority is enough to win by default.

>>24700286
You did fine! Just forgot the [Embed] in the Youtube link (that one is tricky).
>t.usual baker who refused to get up from his bed

>>24699901
https://audio-book-ai.com

This site made me hyped for a sec but
>No runtime counter for some reason
>No speed control
>No option to download the audio files in case I want to listen offline or in non-phone devices
>Only the voice of a bored old man, even in FeMC series which is just off (I much prefer a female narrator voice in general since they can do both men and women without hurting immersion, men trying to narrate feminine lines sounds faggy)
Almost good, I like the idea but it needs more than that.

>>24700528
Thanks. I had more followers than you after only 2 chapters and I've almost tripled since then. I still feel like a failure but at least I'm not you so there's that comfort.

>>24700542
>Thanks. I had more followers than you after only 2 chapters and I've almost tripled since then. I still feel like a failure but at least I'm not you so there's that comfort.
There's the spirit. WN sites are just the most convenient place to park my catalog while I incubate/work on stuff. I realize I'm like a potato in a carrot patch. Noticed but I'm kind of a WTF item in the bin.

>>24700525
you know this guy is our resident useless loser right?
he WILL chain reply for hours on end. don't waste your time on him

>>24700551
True but some times you can't help but laugh at the village idiot.

>>24700551
>>24700555
>samefagging
utterly pathetic.

How do you guys decide what POV to go with. I call standard "novel by description". And its okay. One time I tried POV and it just worked better. Read better. Working with the same characters across different stories I arrived at a decision once.
The male MC (in the description stories) had essentially a co-MC in the female. When changing projects I tried the FemMC as the POV first person, and it worked better. More personal sometimes intimate. And what you're really reading is the traditional male MC POV. its just as seen and heard by the female MC. She had degrees in psychology so her inner thoughts and observations make for a kind of built-in slight psychological novel feel. I could credibly talk about motivations and personality types without it sounding weird or forced. I draw a hard line at the traditional "wonder woman" MC so often over-used today. But I didn't want her to be a damsel in distress either. She went through character development and by near the end she jumped off a high bridge after him in winter into icy water in a bad storm. She played her part in the adventure at times at least as credibly as a female character can. I couldn't bring myself to have her running around like Amy Schwarzeneggar beating men up right and left. But women are terrified of her. I gave her because of the psychology degrees a sort of Esther Villar attitude. But that simple POV switch (accidentally) brought me things.

>>24700555
>True but some times you can't help but laugh at the village idiot.
look. this is our pool of anons.
Every village sends us its finest idiot. We sort through them but we don't get right of first refusal. I mean its like we work in a small pizza shop and we complain about all the teenagers at work. After enough time you just shake your head and try to keep your sense of humor.

>>24700597
>I call standard "novel by description"
...third person?

>>24700597
and I will admit to a little vicarious thrill from her at times. A female character that's so obnoxious you almost wish someone would come along and deck them. Well she's a woman so she can do it. Kind of satisfying when 5 foot tall mouthy skank gets scarfed up and threatened by a girl that used to be a big ten college athlete. I liked when she followed a mouthy little skank into the bathroom and discretely laid her out.

stop being mean to F anon unless he does something to deserve it (like that review meltie)

>>24700612
>>I call standard "novel by description"
>...third person?
I guess. When I read I get a little movie in my head. When I was young I had to sort out novel styles. I named "regular" novel style "novel by description". Term stuck with me. You get to see the descriptions of everything and get some insight into the characters inner monologue at times. True first person had to grow on me. First reading POV then writing I finally tried it and it worked after not working for a long time.
>
Before the internet really took off I felt like I was in more or less a vacuum trying to write just from reading a lot growing up and into adulthood.

I spent 20 years on this story, and once I started uploading it nobody seemed interested, which was a bummer.

It’s a portal fantasy.

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/98571/august-of-the-elsewild

>>24700637
>stop being mean to F anon unless he does something to deserve it (like that review meltie)
Yes. KinoMan is some kind of mascot to WNG.

>>24700651
>generic premise
>generic blurb
>generic cover art
wonder why
>20 years
>9 chapters
>44 pages
anon...

>>24700651
it might be portal fantasy but everything about it suggests this belongs in tradpub, not web pub. did you try finding an agent?

>>24700652
More like the court jester or the village's idiot

>>24700651
This is the problem with fermenting a "magnum opus" for too long.

Getting your hands dirty and evolving naturally > Fantasizing of making the perfect story for years

>>24700660

I started rewriting it late last year from scratch. I actually like my covers to be more generic. I don’t like the cartoony manga style covers that are so popular.

But, I agree, the premise is kind of generic. I think portal fantasy as a genre always kind of feels the same.

I wrote a LitTPG back in 2016-17, before the book. And that was going alright, but my heart wasn’t in it. That one did a bit better. And then I started working on a historical fiction that was doing really well, so I took it down to see if I could traditionally publish it. So that’s what I’m doing now.

>>24700652
FFF is like an untermenschian example of how not to behave
annoying, stupid, self centered and a shit writer

>>24700671
i do admire how utterly convinced he is that he's writing a masterpiece though

FFF-Chads, rise up and show your support against the /wg/ invaders!

Creativity and love for your story >>> wasting time writing nothing but criticizing others

>>24700685
>/wg/ boogeyman posting out of nowhere
I had a suspicion the recent tard tantrums were you

>>24700651
I read the first chapter of August. Horses - 1.
>
Short even by WN standards but I personally won't complain. The chapter will be as long or as short as it thinks it needs to be.
>
Nothing wrong with the writing. I get a clear movie in my head and if reading isn't sooth it disrupts the movie. I had none of that and I really can't pick apart any grammar issues.
>
The premise you got to it quick. I myself writing tend to dick around up front a little. Let you see your MC in a sort of day to day moment before introducing the premise or the conflict. Based on reading chapter 1, I'd say I liked it and would keep reading for now. A little short but hey it WN rules not paperback rules.
>
Maybe play with covers. Who knows. I like how the image looks like a water marked old paperback cover. Neat effect. Maybe play with font or adding lightning striking in the distance.
>
unless I get turned off by chapter next time I glance at it, maybe the anons here can help you cover/relaunch. The title might be getting you on RR. Its so WN-specific there that all the popular names basically include all the tags in the title. Example, "Help I've been isekai'd into a mouse and my cat is trying to eat me alive!"
>
Maybe a powerful or epic sounding subtitle. That tiny print between the big title lines.

>>24700689
what the fuck is this formatting

>>24700664
what's one more village idiot in this place.

>>24700691
don't reply to TINA or you'll encourage it

>>24700695
ah. forgot there was one who attention whored by formatting in a quirky way
my bad

>>24700693
He's the original village idiot. Everyone else lives in the shadow of his autism

>>24700673
>i do admire how utterly convinced he is that he's writing a masterpiece though
i had to read the first chapter and I was on another WN site not RR. Holy shit this has to be him. I mean I just had to read that first chapter. What struck me was the sheer volume of... *big*. When I was a little kid there used to be a thing about "big" movies. nd anything that said "Dino DeLaurentis" was going to be something big if nothing else. Original Conan with schwarzenegger, original DUNE.
>
When I read the first chapter its like a Dino DeLaurentis production. All its missing is that patented epic soundtrack. I found myself admiring the try-harder effort of all that more than critiquing the writing itself. Its ambitious if nothing else. I gave him 5 stars on the first chapter just on the effort alone. Perspiration gotta count for something.

>>24700685
>FFF-Chads, rise up and show your support against the /wg/ invaders!
>Creativity and love for your story >>> wasting time writing nothing but criticizing others
Tina-anon checking in. if I was doing this for the money or the quick dopeamine I'd be doing something else. trust me here.

>>24700715
>Perspiration gotta count for something.
It doesn't though. All that matters is the result. Readers don't give a fuck if the author spent 100 hours on a chapter or 10 minutes. They only care about how good it is

>>24700695
>don't reply to TINA or you'll encourage it
its cool. I ain't gonna be crab bait today. whatever, anon. I like separating my thoughts because long posts can get to wall of text. But carry on. I am non-plussed.

>>24700732
wait you're a crab?
why do both of the resident retards desire the downfall and unhappiness of their peers
attention seeking is indicative of actual spiritual evil

>>24700542
Tina has a novel? I have never once seen them or anyone else reference what they have written. Now I'm morbidly curious, what's it called?

>>24700722
>>Perspiration gotta count for something.
>It doesn't though. All that matters is the result. Readers don't give a fuck if the author spent 100 hours on a chapter or 10 minutes. They only care about how good it is
>
true. but consider the following. he has a handle on covers. Titling. a sense of big. If one day he has an epiphany about editing or rewriting, I'm trying to imagine that thing, for lack of a better word... fixed. I mean if there was a down and out great editor tht drank too much and is now working at Wal-Mart... pairing the editor with nothing else to do up with kinoman and his masterpiece? Chapter one, two, three might start to be more. Uhm. Dino DeLaurentis. I try to see it for what it could be.
>
There was recently this one writer in this one writing contest here. Anon's text was incredible. A writing coach/editor like *that*? Combined with the big world-building. Hell. Imagine if kinoman woek up one day and decided to take a break. And he grabbed "save the cat" and structured his 80k to 100k novel by that structure. *shrugs* hint, hint.

>>24700746
They have several: https://www.moonquillnovels.com/user/tina-migarlo/books
Only posted this one on RR though: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/125587/merrys-present
>I have never once seen them or anyone else reference what they have written.
They did in the past, here and around /lit/, but it wasn't well accepted, so I suppose they stopped shilling it.

>>24700748
>And he grabbed "save the cat" and structured his 80k to 100k novel by that structure.
/wg/ fag detected
rigid plot structures like STC are extremely gay

>>24700721
my fellow brother

>>24700746
>Tina has a novel? I have never once seen them or anyone else reference what they have written. Now I'm morbidly curious, what's it called?
>
Which one. I have something of a catalog. I'm a work in progress. You would have to keep in mind though that I'm not trying to shoehorn myself (yet) into every WN tradition. Imagine someone trying to write a paperback crime hard-boil/noir as they were before books got pozzed (pre-1990). I made some face-reddening smut. I went for uber-smut because why fuck around. One hard science fiction. I concentrate on the crime noir the most.

>>24700751
Thanks, kindly Anon. I skimmed Chapter 1 and recognise it now from when they were asking for help on the synopsis (considering it looks exactly the same, I'm guessing all advice was ignored).

>struggled with the first 2k words today, thought I would quit there
>accidentally wrote 3k more words after that and now it's the afternoon
Whoa... this is the power... of energy drinks...

>>24700780
you're going down a road I can't follow

>>24700780
proud of you dad

>>24700758
>/wg/ fag detected
>rigid plot structures like STC are extremely gay
I started out not liking and refusing to use outlines. I still don't. Not really. As a writing exercise I jotted down perhaps 15 to 20 sentence fragments. They were just partial sentences and not long. And that was my "outline". My big sprawl went away immediately. Once chapter one and two went fine I just turned the writing exercise into my next project. I aimed for 80k words and didn't come in too far over that. I felt it was my first reader-friendly paperback attempt yet. better pacing. DoIng better with the barely-an-outline approach, it gets me thinking. I wonder what a famous (infamous?) structure would be like. Not like I couldn't do every one of the 15 steps with a sentence fragment. As I look over heroes journey, save the cat, etc. I notice where I *have* some of these elements already. It makes me curious. Structure isn't automatically bad. But you do you.

TINA why do you infest /wng/ and not /wg/? web sloppa readers do not want to read your shitty attempts at revitalizing pulpy paperbacks. yes, i know tradpub and agents won't touch you, but you still belong in /wg/, not here

>>24700835
rude

Its amazing how much my own Cultivation progression system has in common with "He Who Fights With Monsters" more videogame-like system
Even his plot point of High-gods wanting to expanding their influence isn't that different from what i had cooked

The thing is, i completely forgot the story existed before yesterday's thread. Its strange that i was influenced so much by the story when i fucking hate the MC.

>no one answered my question last thread
>>24698053

So is there really no shonen-esque webnovels? Huh, that's genuinely surprising.

>>24700926
read literally any japanese light novel my guy

>>24700929
>read literally any japanese light novel my guy
Which ones though? I'm new to japanese light novels.
Also, I want to know if there's any of them on RoyalRoad.

>>24700926
>shonen-esque
I can kind of get what you're asking, but its hard to recommend any because many novels that start as shonen-esque get bogged down by western (or chinese or korean) sensibilities, so what starts as a genuine effort ends up as a parody or homage or just "Inspired by" instead of the real deal
This guy's advice is as close as you can get >>24700929
And even then, that also gets bogged down by isekai and "videogame culture" sensibilities
Instead of that, i would recommend to read old shonen manga instead if you want inspiration for your own writing, read the popular stuff that you missed out and try to translate those moments, characters and emotions to writing

>>24700963
>read literally any
>Which ones though?
the dumbest man alive

>>24700527
Cute how?

>>24700006
>Actually the real answer is that outside of /lit/ generals no one gives a fuck. Just look at the list of best ongoing series on RR, at least half feature a female MCs or an ensemble cast with prominent female roles. People here are not representative of the average reader.
Because the majority of average readers are women, you retard. It's not that surprising that fewer and fewer men read fiction books when every story is feMC. The only question is whether this hobby will see a similar decline like others when all the men are all driven out.

>>24701079
>Because the majority of average readers are women, you retard.
>The only question is whether this hobby will see a similar decline like others when all the men are all driven out.
Look at Webnovel's power ranking and tell me that shit again, its all #weak-to-strong and #harem power fantasies, the male audience isn't going anywhere

>>24701124
Webnovel is full of -90iq subhuman retards drooling at their mouth

Well I think I learned my lesson posting outside of /wng/

>>24700735
Narcissism is actually just demonic possession

>>24701142
Do you know what thread is this anon? That's your audience you're speaking

>>24701144
What happened, Cap'n?

Turbo newfag here. So, I want to start writing my magnum opus on RoyalRoad. I read in some of the previous thread to immediately upload the first three chapters or so once I publish on there.

My real biggest question is, how many words/chapters should I have ready beforehand?

>>24701162
20k words. Please outline, preferably to the ending. I implore you. Also you want to upload once daily, not 3 at once.

>>24701162
Read the op

>>24701162
The OP has some reading material answering the most common questions

>>24701155
webnovel the site is not synonymous with webnovels as a format, retard

>>24701174
>webnovel the site is not synonymous with webnovels as a format, retard
Yes it is

I've been reading Webnovels at a furious rate, and they have one unifying problem---bad grammar. Just delouse your prose of simple mistakes, and your work will immediately vault to the top .01% of webnovels. The content is secondary to a good thorough edit-job.

>>24701162
study The Precepts

>>24701079
are you...are you implying royalroad is mostly female?

>>24701158
Got called a genre fiction poster :(

>>24701244
There there. Now you know not to venture over to that part of the woods.

So, what's your power system?

need royalroad femc reading gf

>>24701204
Incorrect. Grammar literally doesn't matter. It's all about how popular your premise is and how effectively the author delivers on that premise to the reader. That's why poorly translated LN from Japan and MTL webnovel slop from Asia in general has dominated western readership for the last 20 years. Yes, it is dominating, and yes, it has been dominating for that long. Publishing houses deliberately don't spread around that they're getting their lunch eaten by outsiders. This is mirrored in graphic novels / manga and cartoons / anime. The last holdout seems to be live action film but even then the artsy stuff is starting to lose out.

If I found out my gf was reading webnovels instead of Proust, I'd prolly give her the gate. Slop is my domain; she can read classics and whatever wins the Pulitzer that year.

So what the male webnovel audience wants is:
- powerfantasy
- a system (doesn't need to be LITRPG)
- harem (often)
- interesting/deep worldbuilding

did I get that right?

>>24701290
idk

>>24701290
what in the world makes you think they want harems?

>>24701290
what kind of question is this. can't you just ask yourself what you want to read?
you are male right?

>>24701314
Apparently there's a harem fan-community on r****t and it spills over into amazon sales and KU readership. I don't really get it, all the best harems were already done in anime like 15 years ago anyway.

I almost never see popular harem on RR.

>>24701321
>I almost never see popular harem on RR.
Was what I was getting at, yeah. Harem is a niche, not the default. RR hates harem. It's a little more popular on webnovel but still not standard. If you want to write harem, you go to Amazon.

Related to the FMC & royalroad discussion: I write fmc myself and can say for sure that most of my readers are male. It's not women reading fmc litrpg lol. I would be surprised if RR is any more than a 70-30 male/female split in general

>>24701350
if you read femc you're a female
if you write femc you're a female
sorry, thems the rules

>>24701350
For now. The more people write FMCs the more male audience you lose. Eventually you'll get the same situation as in trad publishing where the majority of books are FMC and male readers AND (new) male authors aren't wanted anymore.

>>24701332
Harem is everywhere on Webnovel. It's a common trope in Japanese, Korean, and Chinese web novels too. It's not the same genre as the Amazon haremfantasy though, because the above stuff isn't romance, but the Amazon ones kind of are.

>>24701361
>makes shit up
surely you wouldn't

>>24701290
You forgot the most important:
- proactive protagonist
That's what turns men away from reading FMCs.

>>24701354
>planned next book has a loli MC
Uh...

>>24701361
women are not going to take over power fantasy litrpg trash, i promise you. it takes a special kind of schizophrenia to even entertain the idea

>>24701377
hey ;))))

>>24701363
Are most of the popular stories on webnovel translated, or english original? Is it viable for an english author to try their hand there?

>>24701124
Yes. Webnovel, the one platform that's made by Asians. Western stuff is becoming more and more female focused, which drives away the male audience. This is even happening in movies now.
Do you think men prefer the novels with bad grammar that Webnovel is full of? Or do you think they prefer reading translations or even MTLs? Or maybe those are the only places that still cater to them?

>>24701383
you can, but they strangle you with the algorithm unless you take one of their shitty scam contracts

plus their numbers seem fake as fuck

>introduced gf to RR
>she's been reading random slop off rising stars
>she's started writing a zombie girl litRPG because the one from the cabal is so lame and poorly written it disappointed her and she said she could do it better
the foid take over is coming
girlbossbros, get ahead of the curve and start taking estrogen

>>24701383
They are English original these days. It's absolutely viable, but Webnovel has an insane amount of churn. People put out an absurd amount of content on there.
I've also heard that Webnovel as a platform can fuck over authors, but I've never published anything there so I don't know.

>>24701387
Based. We need actual good zombie girls.

>>24701379
Suck my hairy taint, cunt

Are these threads really just ffftranny and tinatroon spamming their shit, crabs from /wg/ and their melties?

>>24701385
>Yes. Webnovel, the one platform that's made by Asians. Western stuff is becoming more and more female focused, which drives away the male audience.
You know what? That's fair
Lets look at what's popular in Royal Road then
>Top 10 this week
>9 Male MCs power fantasies
>1 Female MC power fantasy
Oh nononono, bro, you were right! Its over for the male audience
The west has fallen...

>>24701420
No, there's also me.

>>24701420
No. I'm here too: Me, John Anonymous himself.

desu there's just no point in writing female characters
>Write a woman like a woman
>She's intolerable and useless
>Write a woman like a man
>You should have just written a man in the first place

anons which would be more pleasing to read pertaining to the OPMC genre?
>autistic OPMC hyperfocusing on specific topics and accidentally affecting the world around him
>idiotic, careless OPMC bulldozes through the local, historical power structures by sheer ignorance and indifference to the peoples of that world
>nooticer OPMC that constantly gets distracted by various plots and conspiracies and thus derails the overall geopolitical situation of a fantasy world through sheer nooticing
>chinese OPMC who is singlemindedly focused on grinding to get stronger, ends entire bloodlinw (whether ally or enemu) for mildly inconveniencing him, murders beautiful and attractive possible f-leads to “make a point” about his purity for pursuing the dao, etc.

>>24701421
Why make shit up? You didn't even look at the RR RS list.
A new Monster Girl Evo made the list, which is great! Wolf Girl Evolution is good, go check it out. She's a wolf, she's a girl, and she's gonna evolve!

>>24701420
I'm convinced the scary /wg/ boogey man is just fff being a tool
he's announced several epic thread war attempts and thinks its the funniest shit to larp as someone from the opposite thread
so these threads are just two retards baiting all day and actual writers/readers talking inbetween

>>24701433
nah you don't get it. even fmc written like a man is aesthetically more pleasing to read than a male pov
and not all of them are even written like men, it's just women with the annoying bits sanded away. which is peak

>>24701436
>idiotic, careless OPMC bulldozes through the local, historical power structures by sheer ignorance and indifference to the peoples of that world
this one but not
>idiotic
>and indifference

so
>>careless OPMC bulldozes through the local, historical power structures by sheer ignorance to the peoples of that world

that actually has some merit. idiot characters are annoying, and so are sociopathic ones

>>24701440
I cannot fathom being a straight man and wanting more men in my media
how can you be straight and want men. it does not add up

>>24701438
rising stars is not what is popular on RR. Fish Girl isn't even in the top 100 of most-views-in-past-week

>>24701433
I dunno man my MC's waifu is peak waifu.
In fact in my story all the best characters are strong women. It accidentally turned out really feminist in that way. It's 100% a fantasy and unrealistic, of course, but it's at least a pleasant fantasy.

>>24701446
>Not liking cool bros and rivalries
Where is your sense of brotherhood?

>>24701440
>women with the annoying bits sanded away
anon, that's like saying "omelet minus all the egg"

>>24701455
>cool bros and rivalries
nah that's great too. i'm not turbo autistic like you, I read both mmc and fmc. you're missing a lot of great stories bc of your autism

>>24701451
>""""strong women""""
Like I said, you should have just written men instead

>>24701469
strong women =/= strong men

name specific works instead of talking in buzzwords and stock phrases

>>24701474
who are you replying to

>>24701474
who is this even addressed to

>>24701420
Nah, you can/could have good conversations here, it's just that FFF and Tina like their own posts too much. Also, somedays like Fridays and Mondays are slower itt for some reason.
I also haven't been posting much also because I'm busy and some anons actually sap the enjoyment of this general.

I think the ghost replier fag is one of the most consistently obnoxious anons, which is impressive because most of the time i should be on his side

>>24701480
Could be multiple anons, honestly. It's not an unknown baiting/annoying strategy.

>>24701469
Nah, I wrote a positive portrayal of the traditional societal and familial roles of mother, daughter, sister, and wife. Making the characters men doesn't fit the MC's character arc, where he has male mentors, father-in-law, brother-in-law, and male work colleagues to explore the relevant parts of his character.

Keep in mind it's fantasy. There are strong, sane men everywhere. A strong woman who's not insane can ONLY exist in fantasy. Let's enjoy it.

>>24701478
pretty much how I feel
same as /wg/
both threads can be good but 90% of the time it's our star retards hoping to crank their own blood pressure and argue over dumb shit
>>24701480
I do it from time to time but usually directed towards FFF during one of his sperg outs

>put my ideas/stuff down on paper
>its reads like so much shit now that I written it
It sounded so much better in my head... This unironically demoralizes me.
Any other anon felt this way?

I'm writing a woman, and I'm dedicating an entire chapter to describing her tits.

>>24701538
constantly

>>24701539
save it for a side story
should use that chapter to describe her feet instead

>>24701542
Noted.

>>24701538
It doesn't need to be good. It just needs to be good enough. Cultivate that mindset or you will stay a perfectionist who doesn't get anything done. You will improve naturally along the way.

>>24701438
Girl Evolution stuff is an anomaly and RS doesn't actually tell you what is really the most popular on the site. Go and click on Trending or Most Read This Week.

>>24701538
All the time, I have a graveyard of ideas and fictions that didn't advance more than a few thousand words because of that.
Don't delete them though, sometimes you can reuse these ideas in a new context or rewrite them better when the inspiration comes.

>>24701486
>A strong woman who's not insane can ONLY exist in fantasy. Let's enjoy it.
You make a compelling argument, I concede

>>24701469
I can't put a dude in booty shorts and a leotard and have pinups made of him. It also doesn't scratch my ape brain the way hyper murder lady does.

>>24701539
Based.

>>24701538
No, I quite like going back and reading what I wrote. I'm my own biggest fan. This can be a problem because I need to re-write several dozen chapters to condense them and frankly I don't really want to.

Every time I have MC traveling and can't think of what to write I use it as an excuse to insert a scene of a giant fuckoff megazord operated by the setting's Big Church fighting a kaiju from the setting's big bad. Readers love that shit. Like that's just part of the scenery as MC rides by.

There's no difference between this place and /wg/. When you click on their resources it's full of links to RR.

>>24701551
>Read that as BLACKED at first
I may need some therapy.

>>24701559
you're not the first

>>24701558
the difference is that /wg/gers jerk off about muh litfic and pretend to be above le genreslop in the misbegotten delusion that they will be canonized into the new western canon

>>24701559
There's no therapy to stop being brown

>>24701585
Fucking hell, thought this was a table before reading the post.
Cursed image.

>>24701591
>Insight +1

>>24701546
trending is even more nonsense than RS lol. it's the page that deliberately will not allow popular fictions, isn't it?

>>24701624
based
winners win enough

>>24701626
unfortunately, because trending highlights dogshit so much, nobody uses it and being on that page gives you no traffic

>tfw you're a min-wage level writer reading world-class ceo-level literacy and trying desperately to write far above your paygeade.
It's literally not fucking fair. Books for this feel?

>>24701633
The answer is to level up; read some progression fantasy idk.

Readers should be forced to read dogshit so I have a chance

>>24701624
>trending is even more nonsense than RS lol. it's the page that deliberately will not allow popular fictions, isn't it?
uh...
>All stories with 8k to 15k followers
>Literally millions of views
>All updated either today or yesterday
>"will not allow popular fictions"
... are we talking about the same thing? I was looking at the "popular this week" tab

you're not a real slopper if you don't read straight from the latest updates trough

>>24701661
"actually popular" in retardspeak means "flavor of the month"
it's why they made RS, specifically to target those people

>>24700780
Fourth day of going cold turkey to reset my tolerance. It sucks. Feel so damn tired.. Barely getting any writing done. Hopefully it'll be worth it when I can start again on the tenth. See you on the other side, caffeine anon.

>>24701268
Uhhhhh animals

wrote 700 words earlier today. Felt good. Going to write more later.

>>24701633
What book made you spiral like this?

>>24701731
Every FH Dune book and the Iliad. And LotGH.

>>24701734
You can't just read that stuff without some gyroscopic slop to even you out. Peruse RR. You'll feel much more better.

>>24701661
when you said
>Go and click on Trending
I assumed you meant the trending page
https://www.royalroad.com/fictions/trending

>... are we talking about the same thing? I was looking at the "popular this week" tab
then what did this mean:
>Go and click on Trending or Most Read This Week.
>OR

>>24701742
>much more better

>>24701753
I have a confession to make anon: Im not the guy you were replying to and im retarded

>>24701830
The plot is a copy of the movie Limitless

>write what you know
Should I give my MC ADHD? Not the hyperactivity, but the part where he can never finish any project he starts. Maybe add a woman that holds his hand to help him through things later.

>>24701835
DON'T write what you KNOW. DO Write what you love... what you feel.
https://youtu.be/6qxPce1M9lc

>>24701854
I feel the ADHD all the time - less love, more hate. The frustration, the anger, the disappointment that stem from it are very easy for me to tap into.

I just polished the first stage of my cultivation progression system
Im very satisfied with it, its unique but familiar with enough, it has good enough depth to feel complex but not too much where it delved into autism territory, or at least that's what chatgpt said about it

That got me thinking, what is the most autistic power progression system you've seen implemented? for me its this https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/67803/calculating-cultivation
Its not the system itself that's complicated, its the MC that took it too far and the writer that explained in excruciating detail every aspect of his plan and the step by step process of getting the all the resources necessary to get there, its not an exaggeration to say half the story is the MC explaining his cultivation and another 25% dedicated to business
There's barely any characters or fights in the story, just autism, or at least it was when i dropped it

>see a mildly interesting fiction
>wonder why it has so few followers, despite being pretty on meta
>check out the first chapter
>a HUUUUUUGE glaring neon purple amazon ad for the author's other book covers the view
>close the tab in an attosecond
way to shoot your own foot

>>24701319
>>>24701290
>what kind of question is this. can't you just ask yourself what you want to read?
>you are male right?
>
phrased as it all is, it *could* be a writer looking to line up the right WN tropes to hit.

>>24701290
ok but what does the female webnovel audience want? I'm not trying to get a bunch of dudes reading my work. I'm not gay. I want to fill pages that will only be turned by gentle, feminine hands.

>>24701354
are you from /lgbt/? the people over there also told me that I'm a woman.

>>24701833
Lol the guy from Limitless was a failing author.

>>24700835
Tina-anon checking in.
>TINA why do you infest /wng/ and not /wg/? web sloppa readers do not want to read your shitty attempts at revitalizing pulpy paperbacks. yes, i know tradpub and agents won't touch you, but you still belong in /wg/, not here
>
Actually I did wander into and back out of WG. at first. Really wasn't what I was looking for. I get a decent measure of whatever I'm looking for (or need) here. A great deal of the writing advice applies to my paperback thing. I don't think a number of things do and its on me to sort through it while guessing.

>>24701420
I'm just a reader, I came here expecting book discussions and stay here to remind myself why I decided against becoming a writer during college.

>>24700371
In the real world people put much more thought into figuring out the minimum effort way to do their job. of course people who dive dungeons to MAKE MONEY for a living would care about this. If they didn't want they money they would just retire and get some non-adventurer work instead of risking their lives for loot drops!

>>24701290
>- harem (often)
the haremslop audience is relatively small and niche in english. most male royalroad readers will avoid any story that has romance, expecting it to probably be poorly written and cringy. harems are much more common in cn/jp web fiction. maybe other ESL countries too, since thats where a lot of scribblehub readerbase comes from

>>24700542
What fic?

>>24701436
>>autistic OPMC hyperfocusing on specific topics and accidentally affecting the world around him
this one but it's gotta be multi pov so you can have normal brained characters reacting to all the ways he incidentally fucks up the order of the world on his journey to harvest the world's archmage resources to re-invent trains or whatever

>character has a job their life depends on it and looks for ways to do it better
>readers: this guy's so autistic lmao

>>24702188
I'm not that much of a fool to post it here, also I have no idea who this tina is but it's not me.

>>24701436
I want a nooticer story simply because it sounds very interesting. I want to hear about the king being behind the invasion of ninehundred eleven evils. I want to see how lizardmen control the magic gem industry and secretly lobby the warm blooded races. I want to be in awe at how this isekai world isn't an isekai at all and people were instead transported to another section of the world past the ice walls. I'd love it.

I just can't with anons that fail to see data from RR. It's the easiest site to get what the audience wants and still there are dishonest shitheads here that SPAM headcanons after glancing at the front page for 5 seconds.

>>24702218
>I'm not that much of a fool to post it here
A shame. I was actually interested in seeing your fic.
>also I have no idea who this tina is but it's not me.
OK. What are you talking about?

>>24702301
Enlighten us then. What DO they want? Don't just say "LITRPG" or "Cultivation". Be specific.

>>24702306
why? you stupid?

>>24702314
If you want to explain data to illustrate your point, then this is the place. Unless you want to be unhelpful and aggressive?

>>24700597
>Does the main character have a strong, interesting voice?
>If yes, use first person.
>If no, use third person.

I'm so sick of reading things from the perspective of the blandest motherfucker who ever lived, who just so happens to describe things the exact same way a 3rd person narrstor would.
>The skies were grey and tinged with sunset's golden webs.
Yeah. That's third person. Nobody thinks like that in their head. And dont give me any bullshit about how "my character has a high verbal IQ that sounds exactly like an author."
>The sun set and if I didnt get any tacos in me in the next 30 minutes I was gonna put my foot into someone's spleen.
First person.

I'm just having fun writing and posting on the web my dudes.

>>24702316
I'll start with the obivous counters:

No , femMC is not a problem , as evident by the bazilion femmc stories on the top stories
No , sci-fi is not a problem , as evident by the bazilion sci-fi stories on the top stories
Harem is a has been , as evident by the bazlion stories on the top finished but almost none on top ongoing
Light litrpg , heavy litprg , no stats , cultivation , none of it matter much , there are enough fans on everything. Even general gamelit (4x , sports , etc) can find success.

>>24701290
Harems aren't popular in the west. Even the nerds here have had at least one relationship so we know what nightmare it would be to have to have a relationship with 2+ women at the same time.

>>24702329
Thanks, dude. I'm glad you actually bothered, as this is helpful information.

>>24702329
why do you punctuate like you've never seen the written word before

>>24702343
back off , autism boy

>>24702342
all that he said is that top level analysis of trends is worthless because scene is much more dynamic than that
this shouldn't be helpful information. do you read webnovels?

>>24702345
>this shouldn't be helpful information
Anon... it's significantly more helpful than 99% of what is posted in this general.

>>24702345
sure , I didn't mention trends outside RR.
For example , top grossing webnovel , The Wandering Inn , is femMC with soft litrpg.

You are searching where the readership is. The majority of leadership , not loud trends with zero logs. That's where it's at.

>>24702352
**readership

>>24702186
There's people who write harems because they think they deserve multiple women and there's people who write harems because they're afraid of pissing off hypothetical shippers. There's no in between.

>>24702351
fair. people do be larping as market analysts and making shit up to feel smart
my actual opinion is that your story should communicate with what you find fun in some way. are you an autist that plays ASCII roguelikes and agonizes over optimization? write a system dense litRPG. do you get a crush when a service worker smiles at you and fantasize about dating people all the time? write a harem. are you angry and repressed and rage on mic while playing multiplayer games? write edgy murder hobo slop
when writing a literary piece of work, you'll question what your narrative function is. same shit here but with a less pseudy coat of paint. what does your story DO? is it relaxing, is it exciting, is it comforting, does it create a sense of home, does it create a sense of wonder, does it offer catharsis?
there's no space that's as informed by rule of cool as web novels are. embrace that. communicate with what you find cool and write whatever you notice yourself drawn to

>started Mother of Learning the other day
I'm at chapter 14 and enjoying it but how the FUCK does the author manage to stretch this out into THIRTY (30!) hours? Please no spoilers. I know I'm mostly being rhetorical just curious. I get that there would obviously be post-loop content.

>>24702375
>mother of snoring
>THIRTY (30!) hours
>audioslopper
How do these threads collected the most tasteless ultra plebs on the internet? For years we kicked these fags out of /lit/ and now you've invited them in?

>>24702397
babe, you're acting retarded again

>>24702356
how about men who write harems because they fantasize about not being completely invisible to women?

>>24702397
Why are you here? Slow day on /ssf/ ?

>>24702345
Another underrated thing is to actually write what you like. I've seen in this thread since the beginning a lot of people wanting to write slop to make money. That will be really hard if you just look at trends at write things you don't even like.

Write whatever you want instead, webnovels are here to stay and it is in need of different genres.

I think this should come quite naturally as well, I've read hundreds of webnovels over the last few years and written notes about what I like in them and what I don't like. By doing this you get a really good base to work from.

The slopattack on royal road the other week with all the monster girl sloppers is so damn boring and really felt like that moment the normies come and destroy what you like after your hobby gets somewhat popular.

>>24702415
agreed. the whole scene has heart and soul, because it's driven be people creating what inspires them, but as of the last few years grifters and profiteers have been arriving on the scene. I really quite like web novels so it's a shame to see it steadily become another soulless shit heap
reminds me of the Geeks, MOPS, and Sociopaths pattern of subcultures
wonder if there's some way to get ahead of it and preserve the good parts

>>24702421
The best form of preservation is prevention.
Simply by making more good parts, the good parts are more difficult to destroy.

>>24702408
falls into the first category because inevitably you can get a woman, you just think you deserve better women

>>24701538
>Put my idea down
>Write 25,000 words
>Realize it isn't interesting to anyone but me
>Realize the hooks are bad
>I spent three weeks thinking it up and writing it
>Start over and repeat

>>24702481
nah man, I've got a super cute Japanese gamer girlfriend. She's the best. But it would still be nice if random girls smiled at me more often.

>>24702492
Same, except
>Write 80,000 words
>I spent three months thinking it up and writing it

>>24702492
>>24702509
You have to get those first five bad books out of your system somehow.

>>24702492
Fun things I do from my older not good stories is to nick the main characters and make them minor characters in other works. And transfer the good ideas over.

>>24702514
I don't think "uninteresting to anyone but the author" equals bad, there's just a right level of obscurity to hit, smaller for popular works, higher for most stuff posted here!

In general (having written a novel and feeling bitter about it) I find it hypocrytical that the current system pretends to value personal expression while publishing mainly just conventional works and regulating what kinds of expression are broadcasted.

>>24702529
>tradpub
wrong gen
what pisses me off is that web novels allow for anything good to do well but cabals and #girlboss brained retards want to reduce everything to a predictable market to manipulate and exploit

>RS right now is 'Noun EVOLUTION'
Guh.

>>24702545
tradpub or not, there's still such things as discoverability, "finding your audience" and such, appealing to the tastes of others. I guess online it just seems more democratized, which doesn't mean better. I mean look at the most popular shit. All that remains is a faint sense of superiority for liking more obscure starved-artist works

Penis Evolution: Foreskin Restoration With System [circumcised to uncircumcised] [sensitivity rebuilding]

>>24702603
A much better writer than I could turn this into a movement.

crab girl evolution [crab 2 crab] [bucket action] [underwater pipe avoidance]

>>24702397
This may come as a surprise to you but e-readers estimate the amount of time it takes to read any book (it even provides an estimation to complete your current chapter.)

I had to drop Defiance of the Snort after a thousand chapters or so. I just couldn't take another snort.

>>24702672
I still read it. Sunken cost fallacy and all that.

>>24702671
Why would anyone care about that contrived bullshit?

>>24702688
>I don't like so why would any of the other 8 billion humans on this world like ?
Why would you make this nonsensical post shitting up the thread? Think of the wasted kilobytes.

>Getting closer and closer to putting something out on Royal
>Confidence dropping faster and faster
I can't do this, man. I'm gonna fail.

>>24702672
I gave up way earlier, i think in the 200/300 range
It seemed like the kind of story that was more interested in opening plot threads than resolving them, at some point it seemed like the problems were piling on exponentially, i can't be bothered to keep up with all that crap

>>24702693
expect failure. embrace failure
level up fron the experience and try again next timeloop
you are a prog fantasy protagonist
get mental illness. make peace with your demons
YOU ARE FREED

>>24702689
You will die in 28 days and 11 hours. That's my estimate.

>>24702708
>bland vagueposting
Yawn. Go back to /v/.

>>24702708
You will die in 5 minutes!

>>24702693
Try to tell a complete story. Then you can at least say, "I finished something and the proof is out there." That's something to be proud of on its own, and who knows, people might discover your story later, even if it doesn't happen right now. There are readers combing through completed fictions list all the time, someone is guaranteed to give your work a chance eventually.

Don't be like those retards who post 5 chapters, fall into despair when they don't immediately have 20k followers and quit. And all that's left of them is some shit stain on the internet that leads nowhere and never will.

No one writes this stuff for fun. It's a game whereby people write with a view to maximize clicks. Self-respect and artistry simply aren't in it. I'm not being judgmental here; merely objective. Otherwise so many of you wouldn't rise to the demand of each and every meta. You monitor the charts with eagle-eyed avidity, but nothing compels you to turn out a work of originality, substance or polish. Go ahead and write me off as a crabpot or whatever your go-to cope is.

>>24702741
>gives subjective opinion
>I am being objective
is this a coping mechanism to excuse your own behavior or are you the type that gets pleasure from demoralizing others?
insecure or sociopathic?

I write the stuff I want that no one else asked for, but I want it to have a chance at finding an audience and will try to take any chance to make it marketable without losing what appeals to me.

>>24700303
not only web crawlers. I'm downloading every novel and converting them to audio.
>select (select count(*) from novels), (select count(*) from chapters);
>107265, 1840018

>>24702746
the every slopper

>>24702693
I'll let you in on a secret. There's dozens of authors who uploaded their first work, wasn't happy with the response. Their next story they uploaded under another name. So go ahead and upload the first one under the name Cuck Chair Cultivator.

>>24702559
I'm gonna write a story about a noun which is a girl and which tries to evolve into a verb despite also being offered the adjacent "adjective" class and it's gonna hit rising stars also

>>24702757
could be meta kino

>>24702753
Sometimes I worry I'm putting too much pressure on my early works because I know coming up with a second pseudonym is beyond my capabilities.

>>24702186
The audience for translated works is huge though. And many of them do contain harem.

>>24702693
I know what you're thinking: someone, maybe your first commenter, will drop a 0.5 rate bomb telling you that your story is dumb, your prose sucks and you shouldn't even have tried.
But the truth is, that's almost impossible to happen. You'll probably get no responses at all—dozens will read (and then you'll find out that half of them are bots) and you won't get a single comment.
But then, someone, somewhere, will have liked what you've written, and hopefully they will give you a confidence boost.
Don't be afraid of being told that you're bad because most won't give their time of the day for it. You have to weather the feeling that you're writing for no one, and it somehow hurts more.

>>24702772
Just start a document called names. And start making a list everytime you think of something cool, same everytime you see or hear a nice sounding word. I've done this for 15 years or so and I never have a problem with naming books, chapters, songs, aliases and so on.

>>24702785
it actually hurts more when someone likes your work because then you can't give up because you'll let them down

>>24702797
yes, this is the essence at the heart of [it's Serialized]

>>24702654
Crab girl but she has to avoid leveling up so she doesn't evolve into [Old Hag].

>>24702741
Wrong on all counts actually
>I genuinely enjoy some of the things people here call "Slop" and i want to write my (much better) version of it
>I don't "monitor the charts" because i already know my genre of slop is popular
>I firmly believe any artist that expects payment for their work should have an "Entertainer" mindset first and whatever artsy-fartsy aspirations should always come second

realistically will we ever have AI audiobook narration with (the illusion of) feeling and emotion?

>>24702814
definitely.

>>24702797
This is me with my youtube channel. 15 years and every video he goes "great job!" or something like it.

>>24702741
I mean, I was writing before this. I GM games for a tiny audience. I'd still be writing without a website, but I'd love to be able to just roll out of bed, write, and collect 2k a month on Patreon. I won't lie.

>>24700371
The military does exactly what you're arguing against though. The military engages in operations where they can bring so much force to bear at once that they succeed in their objective with minimal casualties by overwhelming the opposition. They would absolutely be doing the "I'm level 100 so I go into the level 70 dungeon instead of the level 100 dungeon" thing.

Militaries will generally only fight offensive battles when they outnumber or outmaneuver the enemy. That's why pitched battles were so rare historically. Armies would usually only commit when they thought they had the upper hand or were forced into the engagement by being caught.

It comes down to the same principle that's behind Lanchester's square law (combat power is the square of the number of units) - a 50 vs 50 is an even fight. Everyone pairs off and they all die, all things being equal. A 100 vs 50 might seem like 50 guys of the first side would die, but in reality it's more like 25, while all 50 of the other side would die. 200 vs 50 would only have 7 guys from the first side die.

This is how things like defeat in detail and encirclements work. That's why maneuver warfare is so important, it's all built on the idea that militaries will try to amass their forces to overwhelm the enemy in offense and rely on fortifications (defensive combat multipliers) in defense, so that they need fewer men to defend and can spare more men on a big offensive.

PS wargaming is one of the most useful things that modern militaries do.

>>24702785
I'm dooming about the reality that no one is gonna read it for certain. I'll cash in for an ad, get a nice cover, and it'll be lipstick on a pig.

>>24702741
like everything its neither extreme
I write what I enjoy within the constraints of what i think will perform well. But if it was purely about cash everyone here would be writing male mc sys apocalypse shit. and I dont think a single person is
grow up and realize adult life is about compromise

>>24702844
that's a lot of text for "big number good"

>>24702851
I'm telling you, someone will read—as long as you stick to it. Too many fictions were dropped 5 chapters in. Be the author that finished it. Don't drop it anon.
Also, buy an ad when you got a bunch of chapters ready, don't advertise your story with 2 chapters posted.

>>24702866
>buy an ad when you got a bunch of chapters ready, don't advertise your story with 2 chapters posted
this
I've clicked on a couple ads and immediately closed out because I saw there wasn't enough there to be worth committing myself to

>>24702866
Thanks man, I'm at 50k words now. I feel a little more confident.

>>24702851
You need to understand that even literal trash gets readers. I'm talking barely readable ubersloppa, its till gets some readers, as long as the author actually uploads with any regularity.

The only works on RR that go completely unread are the ones that are abandoned or completely unreadable, and what you think of as unreadable is several ladder rungs above what is actually unreadable.

>>24702873
No problem. You can do it, as long as you care enough to keep trying.

>>24702329
The only stat page on RR that shows actual popularity well is "popular this week".
>3 out of 20 has a feMC.
>3 out of 20 has sci Fi, but 2 of them are really fantasy with some sci Fi elements
>Harem is indeed less popular
I suspect harem is an oddity and will see a resurgence eventually. Places like Webnovel and HFY have a bunch of popular harem works, but not quite haremfantasy. But harem elements don't really make or break a story.

That being said, you don't want to look at write a trend that's going on right now. You want to predict what the next popular trend will be. That way you can get in there on the ground level.

>>24702899
The RR audience has disliked Harem for as long as I've been frequenting the site (over six years now).

>>24702899
>You want to predict what the next popular trend will be
man I hate these corpo larpers. all of them are stupid as fuck, every single one

>>24702900
western audiences as a whole dislike harem, so that's never going to change.

>>24702902
i personally do not trend chase but idk why people have such an issue with it. there is a very wide variety of stories that i could have fun with writing, and if i had a strong suspicion a subgenre was about to blow up, that might sway me to write something in that niche
writing something you genuinely hate for money is soulless, but idk, maybe im built differently, but i could write romance, sci fi, fantasy, smut, dramas, basically whatever and still have fun with it. likewise I see something interesting in basically all of royalroad's autistic little niches and wouldn't mind writing something in them.

>>24700522
Let me guess, you got roasted alive for being too lazy to slap your shit through a grammar checker.

Web novels have standards too. Keep doing stupid shit like ending your last sentence with a comma, and you’ll end up the next Tina.

>>24702932
I'm almost positive that was Tina...

>>24702921
I'm similar to you in that there's a lot of stories I enjoy and would like to write, and I can imagine a person who is more of a moderate about it, but I find that hard to assume of someone
a serial is a big ass commitment. it's completely misplaced advice to tell someone to preemptively try to game trends when they could be looking down the barrel of years of work. sure, if someone has multiple things they want to write, and they feel like one of those ideas could be The Next Big Thing.tm, might as well favor that. but nobody should start writing monster boy evo for the next 3 years because they thought it'd be easy neetbux
you individually are just built for slopping

>>24702932
>Web novels have standards too.
wrong

>>24702936
I don’t think so. Tina usually crams a bunch of questions? In the middle of sentences? Like this? And the formatting usually looks more spliced, like a tard ripping apart his first draft with a pair of safety scissors.

>>24702946
that's a performative thing for attention
his normal posting voice has other markers of low literacy and mental illness that he can't turn off

>>24702937
>it's completely misplaced advice to tell someone to preemptively try to game trends
agree, i actually recommend writing in established genres over unstable trendy ones.
>serials are a big commitment
Yes, but also no. Especially if you're a newbie author starting out, jumping into a fun premise and writing ~100k words (or the first book) of a serial, then dropping it because you learned a lot and want to do better is totally fine. And if trend-chasing (with genuine interested in that trend) is what inspires an anon to get writing, I say go for it.
Plus if anon has a fetish for playing the lottery, trend-chasing definitely can blow up a mediocre author. If you write in established genres you have to be actually good

>>24702900
It's possible that those readers have moved on or been swamped by new arrivals. It used to be that many of the most popular works were harem. Stories like Change: New World, Arcane Emperor, Savage Divinity, Everybody Loves Large Chests (might not count though), The Storm King. Some newer ones have had success over time too like Sexy Steampunk Babes.

But you might be onto something. RR might have lost a lot of harem readers after they purged stories many years ago. They probably moved on to other places like Scribblehub, Webnovel, and Kindle.
>>24702900
It used to be in a lot of the most popular RR novels. Arcane Emperor and ELLC were on top of the board for years.
Also, you shouldn't try to chase the general audience out of the gate. You want to have some kind of niche that people come back to you for, but harem probably isn't that these days.
Sexy sexy babes and sexy steampunk babes absolutely dominated HFY when they were releasing though.
>>24702902
It's not a corpo thing. The fact of the matter is that you suck. When you try to enter an established niche you have to compete against established works, whereas with a new trend you can be there as the niche starts rising. That's why whenever a new thought to be popular game releases you have a ton of youtubers jump onto it.

>>24702921
I think this was one of the earliest splits we had here: some are writing for the joy of it and hope that it may ganter enough interest to make money from it, while others have money as the explicit end goal.
People who write for money think that no one could actually enjoy writing slop or see writing without an audience in mind as naive; while joy writers dislike money chasers because they turn what was an amateur space into a money scheme.
Hence the dislike for trend chasing: it's souless and floods the space with even more stories that are like you've already seen before.
I don't blame people for writing for money, though I wish more people wrote for passion. It's just that money corrupts absolutely.
>>24702946
I would say that the larger marker for Tina-writing is the "stream of counciousness" both in their posts and prose:
>Now on that note with what untenable company WG anons really are why come shit up this WNG thread. Answer. Everyone got tired of your shit and made their own sandbox.
"Answer", but no regard to proper punctuation.
> We get it. We're all "bad writers" and WG is all "good writers". Fine. We got that so you can go hoe.
"We get it" and "Fine" as if answering questions posed in their own mind.

>>24702961
>some are writing for the joy of it and hope that it may ganter enough interest to make money from it, while others have money as the explicit end goal.
you know, i really doubt many people write purely for the joy of it. even if its subconscious, those anons are picking what story out of their many ideas they will flesh out and post based on how much they think readers will like it.
but maybe that's my own personal mindset leaking into my worldview

>>24702954
I call it corpo larp because the base principle is making money rather than writing stories and it's pretty much vague, vapid bullshit and not thorough analysis
well put >>24702961
the relations between griftniggers and writers is one that's untenable. it's difficult because moderates who want to write and wouldn't mind some money can learn from sociopathic exploiters who will do anything for an easy dollar. buy an ad, write a good blurb, and spam release is all good advice, and none of it subverts the substance of the story, bring down the level of discourse around web novels or writing, or reduces the floor of opportunity. the issue is that the exploiters will do that shit. make cabals, discourage creative diversity, use alt accounts to AI review spam
while the exploitative, profit driven people have lessons to learn from, there has to be a line drawn because if there isn't a conscious awareness of these types and their methods, they inevitably infest and control the scene of whatever community they enter

>>24702967
I agree in a way, actually. I write for enjoyment but I also want to get read (otherwise I wouldn't be posting online), so, even if I got no outright interest in money, I'm also twisting the story into something that got appeal.
In the end, popularity begets money, so—with the exception of someone writing something really out there—joy writers are also beholden to readers' taste, if they want readers, that is.

>>24702981
>the relations between griftniggers and writers is one that's untenable. it's difficult because moderates who want to write and wouldn't mind some money can learn from sociopathic exploiters who will do anything for an easy dollar. buy an ad, write a good blurb, and spam release is all good advice, and none of it subverts the substance of the story, bring down the level of discourse around web novels or writing, or reduces the floor of opportunity. the issue is that the exploiters will do that shit. make cabals, discourage creative diversity, use alt accounts to AI review spam
>while the exploitative, profit driven people have lessons to learn from, there has to be a line drawn because if there isn't a conscious awareness of these types and their methods, they inevitably infest and control the scene of whatever community they enter
I agree with what you're saying, my issue with you is that you seem to be implying that >>24702899 is a grifter. I don't think there are any anons in this thread that are purely after profit and don't care about writing stories. He's just leaning more toward the "how can I find out what's gonna do well?" half of the spectrum than most others. which is fine.
if someone ever says "don't write what you want, write what will profit", or endorses the gay cabal shit and such, go off on him king. but he was just suggesting that finding trendy niches can be a great way to take off, which isn't necessarily wrong (though I do find it a bit misguided as advice).
I suppose you can extrapolate a "write trendy stuff, NOT what you want" from his words, but that feels like you'd be interpreting him in the worst light possible

>>24702899
Disagree , "popular this week" favours daily chapter dumps and does't reflect true tastes

>>24702967
stories are fundamentally communication constructs which looks like author -> story -> reader. everyone has their personal ratios and points on where they draw their lines
some people favor the desires of the author, some favor the desires of the reader, and some favor the needs of the story itself. it's different for everyone and that individual touch of personal values is what helps make stories unique and worth reading
the issue is on defining the terms of integrity. how do you define authorial integrity? how do you define the integrity of your story? even the readers, how do you define their integrity?
a bad faith writer is one with no integrity and who doesn't give a fuck about anything but success. they have no personal values, no stories to tell, and will use every cheap trick to keep readers listening
everything past that I think is a subjective realm where most things are probably fine. I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting readers. I don't think wanting readers makes a person a worse writer, and I don't think disregarding readers makes a better writer

>>24703006
it's the best default page for popularity.
But the actual best way to see what's doing well is to make a search for "more than 7000 followers, sorted by release date" and see what's popping off as of recent

>>24703009
No , "best ongoing" is. The weekly is trend bubble , as evident by mogirl evo circlejerk

>>24703019
Best Ongoing is sorted by rating, anon. It's a terrible page to gauge popularity.
#8 on that page has 3500 followers lol

>>24703019
>The weekly is trend bubble , as evident by mogirl evo circlejerk
wait, what? weekly popular doesn't show any mogirls until page 6. you're confusing rising stars and weekly popular

>>24703034
Lol , ok , go ahead and write monstergirl evolution and ignore ratings. See how well that works out for you.

>>24703046
stop giving condescending advice when you're clueless as fuck anon

>>24703046
I don't understand your insistence on deliberately punctuating incorrectly
just get a trip if you want to signal your presence

>>24703047
Stop talking bullshit just because you don't like women. You are grasping at straws.

Last week it was "Max lvl Archmage readers are all bots". Now it's this.

Oh, it's a troll. I see

This has become into a sperging session, ignore if you'd like, don't bother reading it.
>Inb4 uh melty


>>24702981
It's rather upseting with how commercial and mechanical putting a fiction in the site is. One of the most common problems newcomers have is that they joined the site, put their chapters as they got written and got no readers. Then they go and ask what they did wrong—because they naively thought that it was a space where they could get readers, no strings attached. But they didn't understand the mechanics behind what generates interest and readers. Eye catching covers, good blurbs, on-meta fictions.
It's natural for online spaces to develop a meta, Youtube is probably the most widespread example of that with sub begging and clickbait thumbnails. But the commercial aspect puts extra pressure. Every savvy writer wants to get to RS. Writers want to get Patreon bucks, I've seem on Immersive Ink authors without fictions posted and/or gigantic backlogs chasing the idea of fame (and naturaly) fortune.
I don't blame them. The potential gains are amazing, and even if you don't get there, you can at least escape the minimum wage trap by doing something you like (or at least tolerate).
But it hurts me when I see some prospective writer thrown at the bottom of the ranks because they didn't know the song and dance.

>endorses the gay cabal shit
That is the one that makes me the most upset. I can see where it started: authors that wrote something that got some quality to it helping eachother. Then it turns into a guild of sorts. You get help to make your fiction successful, because to an author making money, a commercial failure threathens their own livelihood. But the road to hell is paved with good intentions. They've become too good at it. Not only they've learned how to game the system, they can do it for their own amusement.

And so, everyone has to find a way to game the system to max their chances.

>>24703058
I will only add one item. I find it difficult to explain or rationalize away. If you talk about the writer's cabals. the canned response. "Oh get better. See? Here's an odd duck. So its possible. Quit whining and write better". Which is fine advice no matter what. Yet if you next wonder aloud "Gee. Why can't we cabal reviews and planed releases too." I'll tell you what you hear. From as little as "I'm never doing *that*!" all the way up to autistic screeching. "I'm emailing the mods! at RR!"
>
Does no one else find it suspicious at all. That "helpful" anons will explain all day long how perfectly legal it is for the writer's cabals to review swap and just happen to time releases. But one *whiff* of anons here doing the same thing? Instant autistic screeching "No!" and "I'm emailing the RR mods! That's illegal!"
>
Now. Formal logic dictates it. There is clearly a "meta" on I suppose best practices for launching and grooming readers. There's *clearly* more than just writing better needed. You need the special tag words in the title. You need the correct style of anime art. These things all help you. But you will *never* convince me of the argument that *those* collected writers review swapping and timing releases and helping each other with art and stuff. That's perfectly legal and a good thing. But its somehow or some way... wrong, immoral, illegal if we here were to attempt to replicate some of the benefits. Its illogical and you know it.

>>24703160
>Instant autistic screeching "No!" and "I'm emailing the RR mods! That's illegal!"
That doesn't happen.

>>24703160
as we've told you a million times TINA, a /wg/ cabal is pointless because nobody has enough pull to organize big shout out swaps, which is the entire fucking point of a cabal and what makes it possible to game your way onto RS
if you mean cabal synonymously with 'discord writer group', just to socialize and critique swap, fuck off, this is 4chan, why are you trying to make a discord

>>24703008
if you cook at home and you really get into cooking. You spend time, money, and frustration to do what you want... which is to make big meals. At some point in the progress you make? You want people to come and eat. I'm not talking getting ready to open up a restaurant. I'm just talking about a good home cook. Of *course* the writer longs for reader(s), of course the cook wants people to come and eat their big meal. There's nothing naughty about it.

becoming the RR equivalent to an incel who insists that I'm never going to make it onto RS while cabalchuds and numberstacies dominate the rankings and obsessing over wordcount retention to drive myself insane

>>24703219
sounds like a good plan
what do you plan to do if you hit RS?

>>24702961
>I would say that the larger marker for Tina-writing is the "stream of counciousness" both in their posts and prose:
>>Now on that note with what untenable company WG anons really are why come shit up this WNG thread. Answer. Everyone got tired of your shit and made their own sandbox.
>"Answer", but no regard to proper punctuation.
>> We get it. We're all "bad writers" and WG is all "good writers". Fine. We got that so you can go hoe.
>"We get it" and "Fine" as if answering questions posed in their own mind.
>
Asking a question, then answering it. That's asking (and answering) a rhetorical question. And since this is actually Tina-anon I would like to thank you for noticing and studying my posting style so carefully. I'm flattered. But the simple fact remains. Asking a question rhetorically then answering it, isn't the giant sin you impugn it to be. There's actually many writing ideas and tricks out there and one of them as you said is "stream of consciousness". When I ran across the same/similar it was called brainstorming. You just... *write* (type?) and don't alter it.But yes, it left a stylistic imprint on my style. The excessive numbers of question marks from my too many rhetorical questions. I've been toning them down and removing more on editing passes.
>
Again, thanks for noticing. I would like to finish with simply this. I love the anons who have the style posting like this: "Aha! I found a grammar mistake! You're argument is wrong! Gotcha!" which I admit I find amusing. Thank you and have a nice day.

>>24703225
idk but in this extended metaphor that's equivalent to doing a school shooting

>>24703228
why dont you just talk like a normal human being though?

>>24702946
The splicing as you call it. That's separating ideas. In case I go long-post I hate reading wall of text.

Nooticing that two well known /wng/ posters have been neck and neck in rising stars in one obscure category for weeks

>>24703034
But best ongoing have way more followers.5 digits for most. Even 3,5k top 3 of RS

>>24703243
Vilanous lead or Satire? idk
>>24703228
I already said that you writing style is better than a trip. Also, I've criticised your writing, so I'm well aware of how you write.
I do find amusing how triggered people get at it.

>>24702949
>that's a performative thing for attention
>his normal posting voice has other markers of low literacy and mental illness that he can't turn off
>
Is that a fact. I actually have natural and easy access to quite a substantial verbiage. I'm my own thesaurus and I've never used Grammarly or similar. I've quickly learned to be amused with how people take things. Now be sure not to tarry along and don't be tardy getting to your next *huge* post. You never know. It might be one I'm waiting on with baited breath, I assure you. (bemused sarcasm is yet another of the services I offer)

>>24702936
>>>24702932
>I'm almost positive that was Tina...
Tina-anon checking in. No that wasn't me.

>>24703269
Damn, my samefag detector failed me.

stop sperging about tina, faggots.

>>24703250
Villainous. Who’s neck and neck in satire?

>>24702876
as an outsider to the whole phenomenon of WN's and how they express on RR. I have noticed this difference. Most of the samples I have read seem to be similar. I call it a comic book approach to writing. Yuo immediately state the premise and in the next 1500 words if that many you go after just that and nothing else. It also leads to curious things. A character mentioned that they were "on their second life". A common enough phrase really. I got yelled at for not saying it was an isekai blurb. Which misunderstanding I found humorous.

>>24703295
Ah, I know who you're talking about now. FFF had reached the near top at Satire some time ago,so I thought someone's else fiction also fit the bill.
And yes, both of them have been chilling in Vlianous lead for some time. Guess it's not a very active tag.

>>24702719
Question: If you make a work as finished. Are you still able to edit/upload edited chapters? Because ongoing editing is a thing.

>>24703317
NTA but I've edited the chapters of my finished fiction and I plan to edit it some more to fix dialogue tags.
You can edit/delete/upload stuff no problem, it's yours. The tags are for the readers' expectations and search purposes afaik.

>>24702520
I hear you. I needed a side character once recently and realized I could just use this one male MC from a long dropped project. I knew all about him, he was a perfect side character. I've also just re-used main characters before. Different name and setting but its them.

>>24703246
popular this week has way more followers on average than best ongoing. best ongoing has tons of tiny stories that just are rated high, it's not what you use to determine popularity.

shit that had 8000 followers last week is still going to have 8000 followers this week, what the fuck is the point of all those pages

>>24703365
griftbros be like

>>24703365
did you seriously just ask what the point of a popular-with-readers page is?

>>24702415
>Write whatever you want instead, webnovels are here to stay and it is in need of different genres.
>
crime hardboil-noir doesn't seem like a viable genre (yet) and it was always a dependable historical performer. The only "detective" story I saw on my small WN site was one with some kind of anime tags. Isekai and something else. Cover looked like six year old black anime boy in a 50's detective cheap suit. I read detective novels and that wasn't the way to get a detective noir fan to read that. What I'm saying is that the new genres you are calling for or waiting on. Well I wouldn't hold my breath. They already exist I'm sure but everything's a deluge of these "tag names titled" thing. My two cents. As someone that grew up with access to and read decades of saved old paperbacks I have to say it. Browsing WN sites is such a completely different experience its practically unreal. The titles, the cover art, the weird blurb style. *all* the WN "genres" are kind of in their own big genre. To people that might have read late 70s early 80s pulp novels its shocking. I stuck around and learned some new words (harem, isekai, rpg, etc) though.

>>24702344
kek.WG crabs getting the shakes because all the action is in WNG instead of WG.

I've developed a fondness for laughing at the retards in the RR forums and how they love to circlejerk one another. My favourite topics are ones that criticise the site culture, and IMMEDIATELY a whole goddamn defense force flies in to +rep each other and discredit whoever dared speak out.

One guy complained about authors pre-emptively banning people so they can't leave negative reviews, (though in this case the guy really is a huge twat, he just blatantly review bombs left and right), yet everybody speaking against him still manages to sound so up their own ass.

How is it a gathering of authors can be so terrible at communication and the discussion of ideas?

>>24703395
writing is a solitary activity
authors spend so much time in their own company that it makes them narcissistic retards

>>24702323
>>The sun set and if I didnt get any tacos in me in the next 30 minutes I was gonna put my foot into someone's spleen.
>First person.
That example reminded me of a sort of Mike Hammer character. I'd classify it as hard-boil. I myself used to associate hard-boil with first person just for that reason. But first person can be more highbrow. if you want it to be.

>>24703371
stop baiting arguments, fag

>>24703357
I just checked. Top ongoing have tens of thousands. RS have 4k at most.

Name ten (10) works from anons ITT

>>24703426
Well, we're anonymous.

>>24703168
>>Instant autistic screeching "No!" and "I'm emailing the RR mods! That's illegal!"
>That doesn't happen.
>
actually, it *did*. Its an inconvenient hisorical fact that me (the dreaded tina) had a few drinks and brought the idea up. And the autistic screeching was big and fast. Me and another author met up on accident at a small WN site (not RR) and we did a first chapter review swap. I reported it here and the screeching was immediate. SOe anon did the usual "I'm emailing th mods at RR!" to which someone responded "good! Its on another site!" which is all funny but still. I now *know* us doing it will never work. Which is sad. I honestly got impressed with a couple writers here that entered and won/placed in contests. They should represent us in the cabal but as I said I agree it can't happen here.

>>24703395
I have a question related to this. We all know artfags can't take critique and cry and shit their pants if they get anything besides wholesome reddit chungus comments. I've started to see similar trends among "authors" on reddit, it's just so damn cringe. Please stop. I never see musicians behave like that.

>>24701972
>or at least that's what chatgpt said about it
Anon I have very bad news. LLMs aren't real. They're an illusion. It's not an entity that read your work, thought about it, and then gave an informed opinion on it. It's a non-sentient probabilistic word generator that's fairly good at producing grammatically correct sentences, but there's no actual meaning behind it.

That's not the bad news. The bad news is that you're letting yourself be tricked by the illusion, and it's going to hurt your writing. You do NOT want to alter your writing to get a certain kind of response from an LLM. You want real readers, and what you're doing by consulting with phantasms is going to harm you in achieving that goal.

And now you've poisoned your perception on the matter, and it's going to be harder to get and integrate real feedback, and if it gets bad enough, you're going to PREFER LLM feedback over real human feedback and get stuck in a rut.

Please stop. Get real people to read your work and give you feedback. Yeah, /wng/ can be caustic sometimes, but it's good for you, I promise.

>>24703328
>You can edit/delete/upload stuff no problem, it's yours. The tags are for the readers' expectations and search purposes afaik.
a thousand thanks, anon.

>>24703421
the discussion is between whether popular this week and best ongoing is better as a mark of total popularity, anon. not rising stars

>>24703421
Nevermind, I was looking at RS , not weekly. Weekly popular does have good picks but I see big overlap with top ongoing. Still tons of femmc stories

>>24703410
I thought you meant why write more pages
my b

>>24703452
>big overlap
>5 of 20 are duplicates
>tons of femmc
>3 of 20 are fmc
why is everything you say nonsense?

I can tell just by the writing in here that some of you produce stinkers regularly. Post your best work and prove me wrong, and I'll try not to faint with envy.

>>24703478
doesn't seem genuine so no

>>24703475
Well , yeah , thats the chapter dump frequency at play

>>24703489
I know this word gets thrown around a lot but I think you might actually be retarded

>>24702492
Bro you can't talk yourself out of shooting your shot. There's almost 10,000,000,000 people in the world, odds are at least a few of them will be super interested in what you wrote.

If you've already done the work, there's no cost to posting it and failing to take off. In fact, you'll get valuable feedback for your next attempt.

Just post it. Use a pen name you don't mind getting rid of if you feel the need to start over. Believe in yourself. Or, if you can't do that, believe in me who believes in you!

>>24703264
Yeah, you're bemused, alright.

>>24703433
>I have a question
>no question asked
Kek

But yes, it really is bizarre seeing creative types becoming so fragile and sensitive to criticism. I blame the internet for providing them a way to easily block and delete negativity instead of facing it.

I saw authors on reddit whining that they should be able to leave a review on commenters' reviewing abilities so they can 0.5 them back.
They have the spirit of FFFanon

most negative RR reviews are completely retarded so it's good to nip it in the bud

>>24703549
Not sure if I'm reading this right, but if you mean we should be able to publicly reply to reviews, I agree on that idea. I've had people with shit reading comprehension just straight up misread and subsequently criticise sections in their reviews, it could at least be quickly addressed by saying "this poster misread the line, here's what it actually says." So other readers don't get misled.

>>24703531
To some extent there is a legitimate reason for this: Massive ratings inflation. So even an objectively ok review still hurts you overall.

>>24703555
so are most 5 star reviews

>>24703433
>le kids today
artists have always been lil sensitive fags and egotistical cunts

>>24703570
they're not harmful so it doesn't matter

>>24703573
being egged on by a bunch of retards is most harmful

one of the most upvoted reviews on "New Life As a Max Level Archmage" is a 2.5 star titled "This Is Not An Underdog Story"
every fiction has retarded shit like that. royalroad readers are something else. an author totally should be able to reply to them, or even other readers (goodreads allows this, so do many review sites)

>>24703578
other readers should be able to but not the author

>>24703582
as long as the retardation can be called out by the rare non subhumans

>>24703578
Comments on reviews is a bad idea. It'd have the unintended but very real effect of turning any review into a flame war between author and commenters. It's fine the way it is.

>>24703577
Story of my life:
>Telling the kids on a discord to not trust people there
>Say something along the lines of: "shame that the new generation not being careful is putting them at risk, so govs want to end anonimity"
>Get egged on by a comment saying that "we've had freedom but it had consequences" and that therefore we should be giving our actual ID's to tech companies
It's always like that. Honestly I'm just tired of dealing with people. I admit that sometimes I'm retarded, but I feel like I get ratio'ed by the dumbest things.

>>24703578
how does someone read a story tagged OPMC and become angry because it isn’t an underdog story when it was never advertised as one?

>>24703443
I think you're being a bit of a drama queen, but i get it
Are there any places where i can get feedback for these kinds of things?
Don't say 4chan

>>24703618
4chan

>>24703019
Popular this week:
1. The Lone Wanderer
2. Path of the Deathless
3. Path to Transcendence
4. Chaotic Craftsman Worships the Cube
5. Skypride
6. Runeblade
7. The Runesmith
8. New Life As A Max Level Archmage
9. Super Supportive
10. The Legend of William Oh

>>24703621
Cheeky. I do try to provide constructive criticism here though. But not right now, I'm too depressed.
>>24703618
NTA, but writer forums/reddit/discords.Pick your poison. The downside is that you have to interact with the sort of people who frequent those places.

>>24703631
>reddit
abyssmal. wouldn't under any circumstance
>discords
hit or miss, huge variance. lots of non-writers. oceans of non-writers. worked for me. met some cool people and have pulled them together into one coherent group
>forums
no comment, haven't tried
twitter is hit or miss as well. I haven't used it for writing but I know some people who have and it seems a good way to find weirdos writing similar stuff to you, if you know how to navigate it and network through it

>>24703621
>>24703631
How common are "Idea thieves"? Should i be worried?

>>24703639
cute
not a concern at all. you shouldn't ever worry about this
ideas are worthless

>>24703639
No clue. But If you're afraid that someone may steal your idea, keep proofs that you've written it first.
Also, regardless of how unique an idea is, the person's writing, authorial voice and so on makes it almost a guaranteed possiblity that it won't be the same. Except if they plagiarized your work directly, having the same idea won't result in the same work.

>>24703639
Nonissue. Ideas are seeds. Execution is everything.

>>24703647
>>24703654
>>24703658
Alright, i guess i'll find a discord

>>24703605
True, but if the author is clearly just whining, it won't help their case, and people will see that in their behaviour. I still think it is beneficial overall. Even one of my reviews has a very valid criticism of the pacing in early chapters that I have since gone back and addressed. It would be good if I could at least note that fact.

>>24703610
royalroad readers would ask for a peanut butter sandwich and then complain that they don't like peanuts. idk they are just literally subhuman

>>24703695
Why do you hold such high expectations for RR readers? It's slop.

>>24703683
Half the reviews on my fiction are complaining about the story being unfinished because I had to take a longer break last year, and they're not even true anymore because the story is active and ongoing, but whatever. I still believe author should stay away from reviews

>>24703718
i don't hold high expectations of them?
I can go hiking and still complain about all the fucking mosquitos. I know it's only to be expected but it's still annoying

>>24703722
I know that analogy sounds good in your head, but you're not hiking for the mosquitoes, are you? The readers give your work meaning, especially on RR where traditional barriers between author and reader are eliminated.

>>24701555
You know how characters travel in medieval texts?
>And he got on a fucking boat and sailed across the fucking ocean and then he was on the other side of the fucking planet.

>>24703744
>The readers give your work meaning
The good readers (90%) do. The 10% who are whiny illiterate bitches can fuck off

>>24703565
I wonder if it would be possible to maliciously post reviews about events in stories that never actually happen to turn away prospective readers?

>>24703160
Anons are skittish about a /wng/ discord because the last big collaboration exploded. Unfortunate truth is that spergs will burn down any big collaborative effort. Though from what I recall someone already made a discord.

>>24703753
Mods would delete it.

>>24703754
eventually tina or FFF will make a discord and they can sit in and be retarded all day with each other rather than shit up the threads

Do ads work better when you have a large amount of content already posted? I'm thinking of buying some when I have my third volume finished and ready to go.

>>24703754
Those were Zucchini anon and his friends. They seemed like good folk. Don't think it went anywhere, but I hope for their success.

>>24703765
yes, though the biggest return on investment is using ads early to get RS
otherwise you can only really expect 100-200 followers on a good ad run, and at 55$ that's kinda expensive

>>24703426
is can you conquer guy one of ours?

I need Pen Names
NOW!

>>24703776
Bic

>>24703778
That's a grea-!
>Its taken
FUCK

>>24703776
Jeffery

>>24703781
How unfortunate.

>>24703766
Was that really Zucchini anon? Should have mentioned as much. Nobody will join the discord of a random when there's the chance it's a schizo who does something really stupid.

>>24703776
just use a generator

>>24703776
Gregory Salamander
Wizzy Gelbeck
Ullbian B. Ganoush
Wilbur Horse
Babbas Gregorin

>>24703776
John Pseudonym

>>24703799
It was. I joined and talked with them. Nice people, recognized them by the review swaps on Zucchni's fiction. Didn't stuck around though. Also told them to be careful and not getting banned because of discord shenanigans.
Having a list of works is one thing, but being in a discord is another whole matter—one sperg can torpedo someone by association.
They seemed open to shoutout and review swaps.

>>24703443
You're an idiot. LLMs don't always give good feedback, but neither do people. LLMs are good enough when it comes to small context sizes. They can analyze things and give decent feedback that's based on more data than any human could possibly consume.

Multiple authors have run tests to see whether people can tell the difference between human and AI written stories and it's not at all a cleae cut win for humans. That alone implies that AI is good enough. You've just got to remember that AI fucks up too and it can't tell that it did.

>>24703818
>Multiple authors have run tests to see whether people can tell the difference between human and AI written stories and it's not at all a cleae cut win for humans
these tests are always short form. it's a bleak indicator nonetheless but AI can't write coherent long-form fiction yet.

>>24703818
with a human you can attach their feedback to their person. when an AI gives you bullshit answers there's no way to tell without being good enough to not need it
human feedback is miles more worthwhile than AI

>>24703160
But one *whiff* of anons here doing the same thing?
And where is here?
4chan. Where we all post anonymously. This space is antithetical to cabal formation. There's nothing wrong with forming a community, but there is an unbridgeable gulf between forming a named community with persistent identities, and that community remaining 4chan. It simply doesn't work.

If you can't understand that I encourage you to lurk more.

>>24703776
Fuzzy Dunlop

>>24703746
that's fine if the journey itself is just to get them from A to B, but that's not always the case
sometimes the journey is also the plot
do you forget that LotR is WALK WALK WALK WALK SPOOKY MOTHERFUCKERS WALK WALK SOME ORKS WALK HIDE AWAY WALK SOME MORE OOH TREES

>>24703618
Here's the tier list for feedback people (sorry I was away but I am now responding)
1. Other successful authors you know personally
2. Non-retards you know personally
3. Successful people (in general)
4. Retards you know personally (4chan/wng)
5. Randos (RR)

All feedback is valuable if you know how to use it, but it's not a common skill.

>>24703836
The point is, get to the good part. If nothing happens between A and B, skip to B. You dont need to waste the reader's time filling up space just because their journey is supposed to take a long time.

>>24703818
Anon, LLMs don't give feedback at all.
>That's not the bad news. The bad news is that you're letting yourself be tricked by the illusion, and it's going to hurt your writing
Nor did you correctly read and understand my point. NOTHING you write will be good until you stop listening to digital hallucinations.

Feedback is completely worthless. I already know what's wrong with my work. No, I'm not fixing it.

>>24703879
That's the usual response people have, they just say that after you read it though.

>>24703822
That doesn't really matter though. When you want feedback you usually want feedback on some specific part. How a specific scene lands or whether the prose is boring or hard to understand. It's much less about feeding it an entire book and then going "so what do you think?"

AI does absolutely suck at writing anything coherent. It can't even write real short stories well, but it can read them and give feedback.
>>24703826
You can just attach the AI feedback to the AI? If you've used it for a while you'll know that the AI is itself biased and what its quirks are. It isn't overly critical for example, especially if you say that you wrote it. You brush off all the glazing it does and prompt it to be more critical.
>human feedback is miles more worthwhile than AI
A lot of human feedback is "I didn't like it".

>>24703879
I felt that way at first, but then my readership growth flatlined for a month and now I'm thinking hmmmm maybe that 40 chapters could be rewritten and condensed to like 12 that actually matter.
Readership and growth slightly picked up once I got past that part in my posting schedule so I'm pretty sure it's just a pacing problem. That and a hefty prologue or author's note chapter explaining some stuff I left too mysterious should help a lot.

>>24703887
you're forming a relationship with an AI...

>>24703887
This nigga seriously failing the turing test in public and bragging about it

>>24703870
...we're writing webnovels, anon. Filler is part of the genre.

>>24703873
>Anon, LLMs don't give feedback at all.
They do. This whole "oh, LLMs are just a next-word-predictor, therefore useless" falls flat on its face when you see LLMs in use.

Frankly, there's little reason for me to argue my point. I don't gain anything by convincing you not to kneecap yourself. If you don't want immediate feedback then that's fine. I do and I find it valuable. Using an LLM is not an arduous process. I don't have to get in contact with someone and to pry secrets out of it. I can take the feedback, use it when I think it makes sense and not use it when I don't.

PS your brain also contains a next word predictor. That's why we're so good at filllng in the blanks and why you don't notice typos.

>>24703921
nta but filler should still be fun. we dont trim the fat like other mediums do but the fat should be tasty
skipping a boring trip is still what you should do, unless you have something to make it interesting

>>24703879
t. Kuso-Man

>>24703903
I wish I could, but that's just possible. Modern AI has this toxic positivity and corporate vibe going on.
>>24703904
Turing test is for the machines, you dummy.
>>24703921
I like slice of life in-between action in my novels, especially after MC gets the girl.

I cannot escape fanatic AI worshippers insisting it can do literally anything and everything and will replace humans in Two More Weeks on any thread, nuke Mumbai already.

>>24703936
>Turing test is for the machines, you dummy.
It used to be. It was a test for computers running chatbot software, but almost immediately it was discovered that the test had far more to do with the person making the judgment rather than the machine spitting out words. Software programs have been "passing" the turing test since the 1970s (ELIZA).

In truth, the turing test has ALWAYS been a test of human intelligence and skepticism, NOT the machine. Machines are by definition not sentient. They do not think, they do not have an inner experience.

There's nothing more dangerous than a person that lets others do their thinking for them; all the more so when it's a machine or bureaucratic procedure they outsource their thinking to.

>>24703927
Goku and Piccolo driving cars should be the prime example of what you can do with filler.

Are there any reading materials for writing cultivation novels?

>>24704068
No, just the novels themselves.

>>24702741
I DM'd forty 6 hour sessions for 4 people. I can handle having 20 followers.

>>24704068
>>24704080
That's a market gap: how is there no wiki or blog about cultivation novels that details the relevant features of the cultivation system and links it back to chinese culture/lore/fairytales?

>>24702741
there were millions of fanfic before this shit was gamed for cash, big dog

>>24703426
I'll just tell you what mine is. I don't mind.

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/93079/keygemin-sky-pirates-gempunk

>>24704217
i should add-- they still jumped on trends, however; it's a community thing.

>>24704068
If you want to go all the way back, Sword Xia of the Shu Mountains, Legend of the Condor Heroes

If you want to get a primer of chink-core, Record of a Mortal's Journey and something of Er Gen's, like Renegade Immortal

Otherwise, for westoidcore... I'm actually not that sure. I don't like almost any of the big westoidcore cultivation novels. Cradle and Virtuous Sons maybe?

>>24704219
i havent seen this one yet, will add and give stars
>>24703426
are they not in the OP? im following at least 10 series from here. im not going to assume they (still) want them shared though

>>24704219
>Female lead
Thanks for saving me a click.

>>24704219
Based self-promoter

>>24704229
Thanks, changed it to "Multiple Lead Characters". I had both "Female Lead" and "Male Lead" clicked. Only Female Lead was shown.

>>24704225
>are they not in the OP?
We used to have it in the OP, but the great FFF sperg of '25 sank the will of anons to attach their work to one another. Shame, it was fun for the one day that it lasted.

>>24704219
>no litrpg
>no progression
>no portal / isekai
what the fuck are you doing?

>>24704213
Most cultivation works incestuously build off of each other.

My suggestion is to start with Journey to the West.

>>24704260
Yeah but I don't want to spend two years reading and cataloging differences and similarities in chinese fiction. I'd rather someone else did that. I'm busy writing my own stories.

There's only so many asian countries I can learn the culture of well enough to understand their current webnovel scene. The number is one, and the country is Japan.

Is there a well-written web novel that's highly pornographic? Not in the mood to navigate a maze of typos and solecisms to get my fantasy nut.

>>24704271
If you don't want to read then you shouldn't be writing.

>>24704219
I didn't comment the first time you posted, sorry.
The characters on the cover look good, good taste. The structure seems kinda confusing, are you writing a bunch of books at the same time?
I suppose that break you took broke your momentum, per the posting time.

>>24704277
>well-written
No such thing. But I can recommend Blue Core, Everybody Loves Large Chests and Princess of the Void. They're not exactly all porn, but the porn parts are good.

>>24704281
>are you writing a bunch of books at the same time?
Yes
>I suppose that break you took broke your momentum, per the posting time.
Also yes, but readership picked back up when I started posting again. I stopped for like 9 months because I had other projects I wanted to work on.
I'm currently working on Barter, I posted a chapter this morning, and should be posting another within the upcoming hours.
I don't do backlogs.

>>24704277
Only one that comes to mind is On Astral Tides - it takes a while to get to the smut since there's an actual plot and progression but then it's fairly regular. There's also Blue Core, but that's more hentai, and the version on RR is nerfed.

>>24704295
>I don't do backlogs.
You got guts. I respect that!
But yeah, it may not help your growth by writing different parts of your story at once, but I don't think I need to tell you that, so disregard.
Carry on you madlad.

>>24704308
>>are you writing a bunch of books at the same time?
Also, I should've checked the blurb (it says excatly that), sorry.

>>24704277
SISSEKAI on AO3. Warning, it's fetishy as fuck. It's actually criminal how good the writing is and how tied up in extremely niche fetishes it is.

If the author put that dedication and skill towards writing normal RR webnovel, they'd be at the top of rising stars pretty much instantly. It easily mogs Top Tier Shaman.

>>24704279
I read too much already. I literally have no time to also read all of China's deep lore fictions.

>>24704321
If you don't even like the genre enough to read it of your own volition then don't fucking write it.

I'm going to write a cultivation story where MC is a decent alchemist and cultivates with pills. His cultivation talent sucks, but he makes up for it with pills. He's traveling around the world to learn more recipes and find exotic alchemy materials.
He's also on the run for 'borrowing' primal yin energies and their fathers did not approve.

>>24704298
Is blue core censored on scribblehub too?

>>24704310
All good.
>You got guts. I respect that!
Thanks <(o.o<) I figure if I get any kind of traction, I'll just publish paperback novels on amazon. Leave the chapters up on RR if anyone wants to support it financially, they can just buy a physical book instead of donating on patreon.
I'm against the idea of stubbing. A reminder that even with RR's userbase, its still only 0.1% of the population of the English speaking world.

>>24704327
You mean like Nine Star Hegemon Body Art?

>>24704342
Maybe. I've never read it.

>>24704336
No. SH tends not to censor anything.

>>24704327
The pill stuff sounds great. Not sure what the point of the yin energy is though unless you're intending to make your MC a tranny?

>>24704337
>I'm against the idea of stubbing
As a reader I find stubs annoying if you're a late comer—you got points with me for that. It's a monetary loss for you as far as I understand it though.

>>24704327
>He's also on the run for 'borrowing' primal yin energies
Yet another trans allegory story

>>24704350
>It's a monetary loss for you as far as I understand it though.
I mean not double dipping on Patreon and Amazon. Can't write for shit today.

>>24704350
Blame Amazon, they don't have a choice. If an author wants to put their book on KU the contract mean you can't have it available for free elsewhere.

>>24704348
Don't you know the "you have a yin body and only my yang body can cure you" trope? MC fucks them and uses that yin energy to add to more cultivation pills obviously. Then he skips town before her dad finds out.
This part could be left out. I'd have to actually write it to see how unlikeable it would make MC.

>>24704364
Do *you* know the dual cultivation trope? If the male MC has yin energy why the hell would he be fucking women?

>>24704323
I don't write cultivation stories. I had an idea for one based on mental illnesses but decided not to BECAUSE I didn't know enough about how the stories worked to write something good.

I'm just saying I wish there was such a resource, and pointing out that there's a market gap there. There are resources on how to write that don't require reading the entire Western Canon. It CAN be done.

>>24704360
Nah, I understand why authors have to do it, I just get annoyed and put them at the bottom of my readlist. Hate the game and all that. Papa Bezos need another divorce.
I do think that Patreon taking a 10% cut by doing almost nothing rather outrageous though. At least Amazon got a whole publishing structure.

>>24704360
>>24704337
I don't plan on KU. You can print and publish paperbacks without exclusivity.

>>24704364
This is what I assumed it meant. That the MC fucked a bunch of chicks and collected their hymen blood and pussy juices in a tub or something and then the girls were deflowered, or draining their yin energy made them sane or something unfeminine.

>>24704327
This is violently generic. Basically every xianxia MC is le alchemist. So it'll probably do well if you write it well.

Write about a talisman master intead.

>>24704353
It's not.
>>24704373
Do I have to spell it out? He fucks virgins and then skips town after getting the girl's "primal yin energy" before her father kills him. Well, doesn't have to be a virgin I guess, could just be sex with a woman.
>>24704386
It just balances them out. MC takes their excess yin and gives his excess yang in return. Cultivation is optimally going to require both yin and yang.
MC just sucks at cultivating so he refines them into pills or ingredients for pills to get more cultivation value out of them.

>>24704389
He sucks at cultivating though, not just at the start. Alchemy is his cultivation path.

Could make him a talisman master and replace the philandering with a woman side kick that is an alchemist that makes the pills for him.

>>24704396
Nah don't pander to that guy, your original idea is good. He even admits it.
Better would be to have him do alchemy and he gets a sidekick who does talismans that get him out of otherwise unwinnable situations.

>>24704393
Every time an autistic virgin tries to write a "cool" playboy character it's the most cringe inducing shit in existence, please spare your imaginary audience from your misguided attempt at writing a philanderer.

>>24704379
Don't blame the authors, they are only trying to earn a living. At least with stubs you know which stories are popular enough to justify the move.

>>24704413
I just said that I don't blame the authors, I just find it annoying...

>>24704389
can someone explain why all the westerners are trying to cater to chinese readers

>>24704423
>all
it's not even most

>>24704219
You got a follow from me

>>24704433
Thanks :P

>>24704419
Seems like a very arbitrary way to ignore plenty of good series.

>>24704455
I don't ignore, I just don't want to go through the extra work of setting up a kindle or searching on AA for the epub. So I just read series that haven't been stubbed yet and read those on a later date.

>>24704461
AA?

>>24704473
Anna's Archive.

>>24703921
Not necessarily true.

Pushing this one past 500, damn.

So is the problem with /wg/ that none of them read? They're missing one of the two staples of every good writer's diet. Because apparently they do write. One of them posted his self-published book which weighs in at just above 700 pages. Too bad he's terminally autistic, and that disqualifies him from writing high literature. It doesn't hamper us though. In fact the web novel might be the perfect medium for the analytic mind to hang free.

>>24704570
no, /wng/ doesn't fucking read
/wg/ reads old classics and writes new classics
fucking summerfags i swear

>>24704579
I've probably read more than all of wg combined
(I've only read wandering inn and nothing else)

>>24704570
Yes. They haven't read anything since high school and think that makes them sophisticated. It also makes them really mad when they encounter someone who reads more than them (which is most people).

>>24704579
did you mean: /wg/ pretends to read old classics and masturbates thinking about how they'll totally write a new classic and get canonized

come on man stop deluding yourself already
I've read more actual historical literature just researching shit for my sloppa than all of /wg/ has this year

>>24704570
>So is the problem with /wg/ that none of them read?
Its a bit more complicated than that. Basically, most of /wg/ who read and write migrated to /wng/.

>>24704570
/wg/'s main issue is that shitposters use it as their personal outhouse

>>24704579
>/wg/ reads old classics and writes new classics
There's a reason why /wg/ hasn't produced a singular classic.

after like 4 months i finally finished reverend insanity...

my ass is definitely still moved by the world.

the hell do i read now?

>>24704745
Regressor's Tale of Cultivation, the direct refutation of Reverend Insanity, obviously.

>>24704766
is it any good? also got recced "Dao of the Bizzare Immortal" but ive heard absolutely nothing about that

bake the next thread you lazy fucks

>>24704787
hmmm... nyo....

>>24704766
>refutation
in what sense?

new bread!
with best featured novel yet!
>>24704859
>>24704859
>>24704859
>>24704859
>>24704859

>>24704584
>i've eaten more hawaiian pizza than all chefs combined