OC Writers Anonymous: Step on a Jawa and break Shmi's Back

Hoorah!
Thanks for pointing that out Lazy.

 

*Blinkblink*

I knew that. I...I was just making sure you guys knew.

That thread needs to be revived...and organized.

 

Ooop! I'm late! I'm always late to these things. Someone aughta poke me every so often, remind me I'm alive.

First of all:

Awesome. Even more awesome because I learned all about that in psychology.

And MY quotent quotables:
This is from On Yodimus and pretty much sums up its theme: over-the-top miscommunication

Yodimus: Yeah, you just keep telling yourself that. Personally, Mr. Freem-
Dr. Freem: Excuse me? What did you say?
Yodimus: Um...personally?
Dr. Freem: After that.
Yodimus: Freem?
Dr. Freem: Before that.
Yodimus: I...said two words...

And Here's a few from my WIP, Planet Hopping.
Yodimus on Sales Reps: I really do despise professional salesmen. (...) These types of salesmen are idiots. Pompous, egocentric, overly optimistic morons who know the price of a every piece of real estate on the mid-layer suburbs of Coruscant but couldn?t tell you his wife?s birthday if it manifested itself into the corporeal and you beat him with it. To death. While yelling it to him.

And this:

Edwin: Hey! "I don?t need this" guy? From the efficiency conference? It?s Edwin! I did the talk about politeness? You threw the ripe cantaloupe at my head?



As for canon, I follow it somewhat. Since my stories tend to go on way in the background, I never have to worry too much about causing a canonical commotion anyways.

And as for RPing, since Thumper09 caught that - it's not so much that I don't play anymore as it is that I ran out of available free time somewhere around '03.

 

Right-O, Fluff-Slayer. Organization is a good thing.
Welcome aboard 1Yodimus_Prime!--fab quote from your WIP. HA!
____________________________________________

Now, to keep things tangy...

We were chattering about good OC vs bad AU canon or just bad canon and it got me thinking about how we advertise OC fics on the boards, which reminded me of a incident from my childhood that I feel compelled to share here, because it's poignant and I broke my toe today. Also I'm in a wonderfully metaphorical mood.

I used to show horses as a kid and for some of the classes you had to get in the arena with all the other horses and riders (up to 50 others) and walk, trot, canter trying to get the judge's attention despite that all the horses and riders kind of looked the same to start off with. It was pretty crazy galloping around with all those other horses and trying not to get killed and at the same time get noticed by the judge and get a ribbon. Alot of the horses were different sizes and some of the riders were veterans and some were at their first show. (If you're thinking that I'm using this horse show story as a metaphor for the fic boards, you're right on).

Continuing with my metaphorical jaunt, I had this one flashy showhorse who was really awesome in the ring by himself, but when he was mixed in with the herd for these big classes, it was a wild ride because he kicked when other horses got up on his haunches. If a judge saw him take a swipe at another horse, I got disqualified. However, in a class that crowded if you constantly had some one cutting you off and such, you weren't going to get noticed. My bright idea at one show was to take a little bit of red ribbon and braid it into his tail--that's the sign to other riders for 'this animal kicks'. I got all the room I needed to show him off in the big classes because everyone was avoiding me. However, when the judge saw it--despite the fact I did a really awesome job she judged him down because of the red ribbon. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.

Attention skim readers my point starts here:
I've begun to realize that when you put "OC" in the title of your story on the boards and you're not referring to an "Anakin AU Orange County X-Over", it's like putting a red ribbon your horse's tail. Therefore, perhaps we shouldn't put a bullseye on our OC fics. Kind of like cutting your nose off to spite your face. Granted don't be misleading/a dirty liar and call your OC driven epic a Yoda fic when the green crusty one only shows up once in a hologram on page 74, but I'm thinking it might be to our advantage as a subculture not to be too blatant.

Here are some examples using one of my fics:
Bad Example:
Thursdays With My Father (OC-a-rama with Mas Amedda's Son and Housekeeper, ANH-ESB)<--This screams page 42.

Better:
Thursdays With My Father (Mas Amedda/OC, ANH-ESB) <--Honest, but who's going to read a Mas Amedda viggie intentionally?

Best:
Thursdays with My Father (ANH-ESB, Vig) <--Yeah, you think it's about Vader. Ca-ching! The reader's already blown through the second paragraph before they figure it out. Hopefully, they're interested enough to ride it out.

A Dirty Lie:
Thursdays with My Father (Palpatine, ANH-ESB, Vig) <--Palpy's just window dressing at the end. The dedicated pro-Palpy mob might be provoked to violence.

So, what do you do with titles???
Feel free to keep talking about Canon/AU/OC as well.

 

Hmm. I really see your point, oqi.
I think I already apply that system to my titling, at least mostly.
My problem,as well as many other's of course, tends to be if I'm writing a purely OC driven fic. That happened with my Storyteller fic. I had a few readers really interested, but after a while I was down to two or three because, well, nobody canon seemed to show up. I don't think it was garbage, my regular readers were quite enthusiastic. It's just a good example of OC prejudice.
I think the question there is really, how do we encourage readers, in general, to open their minds to OCs to begin with? And to throw something else out there, does anyone know how many lurkers may be out there reading our OCs passionately and just not responding?
Before it was too late at night, now it's too early. I don't know if I'm contributing here or just rambling about the redundant with my sleep addled brain!

 

It will always be tougher for OC writers. People know the movie characters, the EU characters. They've invested time in them, and in some cases are emotionally attached to them. It only makes sense that they'll get more attention. When a reader sees a story with unfamiliar characters, they start thinking, "Is it worth investing time in this new character? I don't know a thing about him, but he/she seems pretty frightened/angry/silly/insane. Is it really worth it to find out why? ... I wonder if that new Han/Jabba slash fic is any good..." But when they see a story about an EU/Film character, they go "oh sweet! Him! I love that guy!" So we're at a disadvantage from the get-go.

Star Wars is pretty unique that its fanfic readers even have to consider new-character-worth (why they're also considering Han/Jabba slash is beyond me). In most genres, it seems at least, you'll be lucky if you find two OC stories. Here - especially right here on these boards - they make up an impressive minority of the stories being posted. The only subject matter I can think of off hand where you find a lot of OC stories is Lord of the Rings. And LotR spawned D&D, so it shouldn't even count.

I think it's just a matter of, like Oakie said, getting people in. If the story's good, they'll read it. But nobody's gonna read it if they're not peeking into your thread. But I have a plan. Check it:

Step 1: We create a new thread, calling it "AWESOME THINGS!!!!"
Step 2: We start posting random links to websites in it
Step 3: One of the links will inevitably be to a 'how to start a sucessful rock band' site.
Step 3.14: We use the information and join together, forming a sweet band called 'The r-OC-kers'
Step 4: We go on tour. During the tour, we take bus rides around the different cities prior to the concert. When we hear someone humming on the bus, we steal the tune.
Step 5: We sign to a record label for one of the tunes we stole from a bus rider.
Step 6: Someone is left behind to work on a time machine.
Step seven: We use the money we collected as a one-hit-wonder to commision an extra old, extra smart scientist
Step 8: The scientist comes up with a design for a mind-control helmet, but dies before he can make it.
Step 9: We use the now-completed time machine to get back to when the scientist was young, and kidnap him.
Step 10: We force the scientist to design the helmet, but he doesn't understand the language because he's not from the past: he's from an alternate reality...because we accidently made a transdimentional vortex instead of a time machine.
Step 11: We order pizza
Step 12: Everybody dances.

...

nevermind.

 

Hey, I'll join the r-OC-kers. I'll be your official fiddler.

I'm screwed any way I go, really, since not only do I use OCs, but I write in the Knights of the Old Republic era. Soon as people see the "KOTOR" label, they wander off in another direction. I swear I've only gotten extra random readers to Blue Side because it labeled with the title and nothing else. 'Twas my experiment to see if the KOTOR label really was scaring people away. Not sure if it's been a smashing success, but I seem to have gotten one user into the era, and that's a minor victory in and of itself.

Yeah. Lesson learned, not many people read stuff that happens 4,000 years before any characters they recognise show up. Even fewer are going to spend 36 hours of their life playing a computer game in order to understand KOTOR fanfic. Even if it rocks, which KOTOR does.

 

Compared to some of the "art projects" I've played bass for that's a reasonable plan there, Yodimus.

 

Mmm...military-grade plutonium...yummy.

I can't tell you how many times I've gotten reviews where people say "I really like your OCs" -- as if they're surprised by the fact. Really, every original work of fiction out there is full of OCs, so why should it be a surprise that someone can write engaging characters that don't happen to be canon?

That said, I think it would be a disservice to Mr. Lucas or any of the EU writers whose characters I respect (like Timothy Zahn) to not really research those characters before I started writing them into my own fics. I'm just borrowing them, so I'm going to do my damnedest to make sure they're true to how they were originally portrayed by the people who created them. It was very gratifying to see how many readers told me they really liked my portrayal of Boba Fett in Blood and Ashes, because he's a really hard character to write -- doubly so when you're involving him in any kind of romance.

So, what do you do with titles???

Boy, the topic changes are just flyin' today, aren't they?

If canon characters are involved, I tend to put them first: Blood and Ashes (Boba Fett/OC), Dust of Empire (Han, Leia, Luke, Lando, Imperial OCs). Because, agree with it or not, it's usually the canon characters that catch people's eye. All I can do is try to suck readers in with the canon stuff and then gradually woo them over to the glory that is the OC side.

To wax poetic (pun intended): Writing OCs is like writing free verse. You can do pretty much whatever you want since it's your character. Writing a canon character is like writing a sonnet. You have some freedom in terms of what they say or do, but at bottom you need to stay with the guidelines set forth by the person who created them in the first place.

I don't know whether that made any sense or not...my blood sugar is kind of low right now.

And if you need a singer for the rOCkers, just let me know. I've been told I do a pretty good Pat Benatar impersonation.

 

I like that!

 

I have to be in agreement with Jennifer_Lynn , having a completely OC driven fic is tough, esp. when trying to get readers interested. I have one going (which will eventually contain canon & EU characters), but with no "NAMES".....I just got Maz oqi ... it's tough. I have had cameos in the Part I with Thrawn, and Lord Hethrir (raise your hand if you know who he is) but I'm not about to put the Grand Admiral in the title, or featured characters, because it's not about them. I niave enough to think an OC driven fic would gain Anakin numbers.

How many people out there enjoy Corran Horn, Zekk, Kyp Durron, and Nom Anor? How about Mirax, Mara or Jacen/Jaina?

ALL OCS!!!!!

How many people liked Karen Travis' HARD CONTACT?

ALL OCs!!!!!! (I don't even remember a guest apperance by an EU or canon character)

Rogue Squadron? (except for the big 3, Wedge, Hobbie, and Wes) Asaj Ventress? Quinlan Vos? You get the point.
Is it because they are approved by Lucas Ltd.?

I have to be terribly honest and say, I probably wouldn't have read oqi's own fics if it wasn't for Elan Sleazebaggano in The Ballad Of Mazaricky No-Name. not a major character, but canon none the less, so there is something to be said of incorporating Lucas' and EU characters.....Opps! the secrets out!

 

But what if you have a story that has no canon characters at all?

 

Man, this is going to be a random post of lots of different topics that may not pertain to any particular topic at all. You're warned.

As far as titles, I can't really say too much since my last posted fic here was something like a year and a half ago. But it was purely OC's--not a canon character to be found, not even in a comlink cameo. I didn't try to hide the fact that there was nothing but OC's, but IIRC I did put the type of story first to try to appeal to that particular audience--namely, the "X-wing squadfic" came before the "OC's" in the title. I think. Boy, now I'd be embarrassed if I didn't do it that way, but I think I did. However, even at that time I knew OC's were not as popular as canon characters, so I didn't even start posting the story until I was certain I would be okay with getting no readers whatsoever. With that mindset, the readers I did get (especially the ones who stuck around 'til the bitter end) were a bonus, and I appreciated each and every one that much more because I couldn't take them for granted. Honestly, I know how it feels to look at an OC fic and not be interested in learning the new characters because there are established ones already out there--when I was reading the X-wing books, I had just gotten to the point where I knew the Rogues when suddenly "Wraith Squadron" showed up next sequentially. I looked at the cast of characters, saw only one or two familiar names, and thought, "I don't want to start over again with a completely different squadron! I just got the last one figured out!" I almost didn't read them, but to this day I thank my lucky stars that I did.

For canon stuff, I try my best to stick to "universe" canon, because as was mentioned before, sometimes that's the only thing really keeping my stuff from being a completely original fic: the Rebellion vs. the Empire. For the timeframe I write in, however, it's kind of hard to find canon information (between Yavin and Hoth), so I end up having to...be creative a lot of the times with information about galactic events and whatnot.

On a somewhat-related-but-still-different-topic (I told you this was mixed up ), canon characterization. I use no canon characters in my stories, but the reason for that always confuses me. A main reason I steer clear of them and choose to play with my OC's is that I don't think I could do most of the canon characters' personalities correctly. Yet, instead of trying to write characters who already have a lot of the basic groundwork done on their personalities, I choose to start from scratch and build a character from the ground up. Once I realized that, it just struck me as--backwards and a lot more work. I dunno. Just a random train of thought.

Oh, and going back to a much earlier topic, here's one of my favorite quotes from two of my OC's in my fav posted story, Solid Ground:
(While the two Rebel pilots are stargazing on a planet. Edited slightly.)

"So that's your home system," CC continued in wonder, still looking at the star [Quiver had pointed out as his own]. "That's where your family is. Do they have trouble sleeping at night, knowing that you're out here on the front lines?"

Quiver shook his head. "No, they don't worry about me. In fact?-"

"No," CC interrupted with a mischievous grin, "I meant, do they have trouble sleeping at night knowing that a crazy guy like you is out here on the front lines, and that's their protection? That's not very comforting."

[/shameless plug, but I love that exchange]

-Thumper

EDITS: blasted typos

 

I don't think I could do most of the canon characters' personalities correctly.

I just started writing SW fan fic and my first piece was told from an OC?s POV. It contained a canon character but I realize now that it was because I agree with the above statement. I don?t know if I could accurately or rather believably get into a canon character?s head. Although given that I just took on the Dare Challenge, that will soon have to change.

 

Welcome aboard new folk!

That means you've got an OC-centric fic and if it's taking place in GFFA (as opposed to Middle Earth or the Matrix) you're on the right boards.

With regard to titles maybe focus on timeframe, genre, species (if alien) or location. Perhaps you can come up with a wizard title that will coax in even the most reluctant reader. Your title is your bait.

Here's a little individual activity...
Go over to your era of choice and cruise through the titles on page four. Don't pay any attention to who wrote what, just look at the titles.
What jumps out at you? Why? Which fics do you not want to read based on title alone?
Please don't come back here with a list of good vs. bad titles of actual fics , instead try to make some generalizations about what all the good or bad titles had in common. You can do this in the safety of your own head. Think about your fic.--does it have a good title or a bad one? Why?

 

GrandAdmiralV: Thanks alot for the poetry metaphore. Now I'm having flashbacks to 12th grade english. <shiver>


Y'know, it's funny - the only challenge I ever attempted involved canon characters. I never finished it. I was too busy fiddling with the characterizations to get it done on time, so I left it for dead.

This is interesting because numerous times I have read a fic lead by canon characters and accepted it fine, even though said characters weren't behaving correctly or thinking along the lines we'd imagine. I believe there may be much more wiggle room in our psyches for accomodating canon characters than we realize.


Maybe...just maybe...we're all writing OCs cuz we're just a big bunch of perfectionists

 

ANNOUNCEMENT!
SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL OCs!!!

For those of you who like to "walk the walk" and not just "talk the talk" and really want to throwdown with your exceptionally awesome OCs allow me to subtly encourage you to take your badself and OC buddies over to the following challenges. Yeah, I'm calling you out!

If you're really intrepid and mildly insane there's Fluff-Slayer's Ridiculously Specific Challenges. These are are the kind of challenges that make all others (even the "torturous dares") look as soft as a seven week old guunga fruit. Once you start down Fluff-Slayer's challenge path--forever will it dominate your destiny. If you're too to play, at least drop by and read what authors are doing with these challenges. It's most impressive.

If guunga fruit and fire isn't your thing, there's SabyneAmberle's The OC Dueling Circle. Every week there's a new challenge dictated by the winner of the previous week's challenge. It's a deadline based challenge (for those of you who have to have your deadlines) and the winner is determined by popular vote. This is a really excellent group of writers, super friendly, and a great place to take your OC's out for some exercise.

C'mon, you know you want to...

 

Yes, to oqidaun you listen!

Seriously, both of those challenges are a great deal of fun. You never know what will come out of either, and even if you're not up to attempting one of the Ridiculously Specific challenges, it's always good to support your fellow OC writers by reading them! And the Dueling Circle is fun for everyone.

So go. Now. You won't regret it.

 

Whew! I'm actually working on the Ridiculously Specific challenge for the first time and desperately needed a break. It is a challenge. The stories that have already been posted are a great read though. It's worth a look.

 

What do I do with titles?

I say what era it's set in. For example, one of my 100% OC WIPs, I'm just going to put "Jedi Purge" or "Post RotS era." Since RotS is still so fresh in everyone's mind, for example, people will see that it's a RotS era and be more inclined to read it.

The same goes for any era. People who like reading stories about things that happened in a certain time frame of SW will be more inclinded to read it.

 

Here?s another thought, can you shoot yourself in the foot by using OCs to try to remain consistent with what you know the canon characters have been doing and with their personalities.

Would you get more readers if rather than having OCs you instead ignored the fact that you know from the novels that the canon characters were busy doing something else during the time of your story and distorted (slightly) the canon characters personalities to make them work better for the story?

I think you might, and since people are so polite on these boards (and nobody wants to start a debate on canon) it would be quite unlikely they?d call you on your ?mistakes?

 

Interesting point, however I think that one of the reasons people use OCs is to avoid "distorting" the canon. From what I can tell, a lot of OC folk seem to take canon pretty seriously. Additionally, writers often use OCs because they need a dynamic character the canon can't supply. While the generous souls around here won't harass you on your mistakes, there's a lot of us who simply prefer to us the OC instead of the modified canon character--there's also the issue of "ownership", but I'll bring that up in another post.

As for dragging in more readers? Yes, it's always nice to snag more readers, but this forum isn't solely about snagging readers--heck, I imagine a lot people avoid this thread because of the OC in the title . I sincerely hope that OC writers can build a better sense of comraderie and be more inclined to start reading and encouraging each other's work. Before we can have delusions of converting the masses to our cause, we need a little solidarity.

I've suggested leaving the phrase "Billions and Billions of OCs" out of a title in hopes of getting the wayward and reluctant OC reader to the first paragraph and then it's up to the writer. Hopefully, if it's a well crafted story and the reader isn't just there to read about Anakin's glistening pectorals, the first paragraph will have a bear trap effect. I put a lot of stock in the first paragraph/chapter. If there's not any substance, the reader wanders away--whether or not they like OCs. In the end a good story and nice hook can even garner the "prized" 'I don't usually read stories with OCs, but this is good.' review.

 

Here, here! Good show and all that druff. Couldn't have said it better myself.
I think a well crafted story will attract readers regardless of canon character participation. Gee, guess we all just gotsta write good stuff then.
Go OCs! Go OCs! Go OCs!

 

Here's a question for al of you: I've finally had a major plot bunny bite (so much that I can't work on the songfic I so want to finish because of legwork). Its the kind that you're just sitting there, thinking about a book (notably "The Giver" in my case) and something just hits you, and you have to write it down before you forget the terrific idea. I've been an OC writer for a while, with canon character appearances coming few and far between (we finally had one show up for like the fifth or so time in the latest chapter of my Wicked fic) but they're connected somehow, mainly by relations. Well, of course thats what happened with this one: All OCs, no way I could work in the canon (as they're all dead!). I've already resigned myself to doing tons of work on the personalities of these guys so they don't become Mary Sue/Gary Stu, a small readership (because mine has two killers: OC-centric and far future), and taking it a different pace than what I'm used to. But, how do you develop the personalities of your characters? Is there any ritual? Mine are brand new and only exist in hte pages of my writing notebook, but how do you make sure they're well written? thanks for any help.

EDIT: Forgot to say, DWH but I shy away from basically any fic that isn't KOTOR in Before. So you get me in wiht that!

 

Yeah, I'm moving topics around a little fast as of late, but I thought this was something fun we could do.

Kotorchick wonders how you develop personalities for your OCs and a while back Correllian_Ale suggested we might talk about how we named our OCs.

Drag out 2 or 3 of your OCs and answer the following questions:

1. How did you come up with this OC's name?
2. How did you develop his/her personality? Why?
3. What is the defining personality trait of this OC? Why?