Original character story fan club

TJP: Mine's the same, mixing canon and OC, but I asked earlier and I think I was told it was kay!

Btw, here are two of my favourite OC scenes that I did (for no other reason than I feel like posting them lol!)

. . .

Typical, Alyx thought to herself as she followed Anakin through to the supplies, I manage to make a friend, then I go and kiss him and now we can?t even talk properly. And these spots of insight into the future were getting to be more and more of a pain, giving her half-glimpses of things she didn?t want to know. Maybe it was a gift, but the power always seemed more of a curse.

Anakin knelt down over one of the supply-cases and checked it swiftly, with the experience of a few years. Alyx, on the other hand, took a full thirty seconds to do what took him ten; she had no experience whatsoever, and fumbled with the electronic locks. Bless him, Anakin leaned over and gave her a hand, quickly and wordlessly showing her how to key the codes in to the cases, and Alyx gave him a grin. ?Thanks.?

?Pleasure,? the young Jedi Knight replied, then carried on checking Mara?s. Alyx, for her part, glanced over the cases and knew she wouldn?t have a clue if half the entire kit were missing. The gear looked useful; survival rations, nutrient bars, a handful of blasters ? from what she could see of Mara?s, that contained rather more blasters than the other three. And also?

Alyx grinned. ?Perfect,? she whispered, tugging one of the small tubular devices out of Anakin?s sack and another out of Luke?s. ?Hey, Force Boy,? she called over, ?Catch!?

At first Anakin wondered what she was doing; he got the message when the lightsaber was neatly tossed into his hand. ?Hey, you?re a good throw.?

?I got good coordination.? With that Alyx lit the lightsaber she was holding. ?And I could use some more practice??

?Uh-uh, Alyx, that?s a no way,? Anakin answered, bending over to fiddle with the cases again, ?We?re here to check the cases, not to train.?

?Life is training,? came the quick retort. ?I seem to remember me taking on you and Corran for fifteen minutes on the way to Mon Calamari. Looks to me like you think I might stand half a chance of beating you.?

Anakin glanced upwards and gave her a hard glare. He looked pretty handsome when he scowled. ?Alyx, I was brought up with lightsabers. A saber duel is second nature to me. Besides, we were going easy on you.?

?You were what?!? Stop trying to wriggle out of it, Solo ? a girl matched you, admit it!?

?You did not match me!? A touch of amusement ran through Alyx as she saw he?d forgotten all about the cases now. ?We were testing you out. You?re good, maybe one day you?ll be able to match me, and you?re a natural, but you sure as Sith didn?t match me.?

Alyx snorted in disbelief. ?Bantha fodder! I matched you and Corran, blow for blow!?

With a resigned shrug Anakin lit his own saber. ?Time for you to put feet on your mouth, Alyx. I?m gonna make you eat those words!?

It was obvious Anakin had intended the first blow, a powerful, sweeping cut, to be the last one ? he?d planned it to catch her out. But Alyx saw it coming ? perhaps sometimes her instincts of the future were useful after all ? and she pivoted neatly out of the way, her saber slashing out at Anakin, who was forced to back down. She followed this up by cutting in low, but Anakin jumped up over the knee-high attack, lashing out himself; Alyx had no option but to duck his attack. Both launched sweeping uppercuts, and the two blades slammed into one another with a sound like a thundercrack and a blaze of fierce light. In moments the two Jedi were lost in a complex duel, blades sweeping in and out, seeking the slightest hole in the other?s defence. Anakin was soon resorting to real tactics, not just those he?d use in training ? she was good, he had to give her that. More to the point, she was obviously relaxed, and obviously feeling the Force flow through her.

Anakin couldn?t help a wide grin, and Alyx returned the smile, even laughing as she managed to nick

 

People, I hope it's ok if I ask a question or two?
I'm currently writing a Star Wars New Jedi Order era fanfic story -loosely set after Dark Journey- where the two main characters are characters I thought up, so Original Characters. (Not sure they are that 'original', but you know what I mean.)

The female main character is the granddaughter of a famous PT-era Jedi Knight. (Her name closely resembles that of her grandmother. - Though she adopts the last name of her grandmother only in mid-story as an honorific.)She is a Jedi apprentice and struggles to become a Jedi Knight in the midst of the Yuuzhan Vong invasion.
Would that make the character a 'Mary Sue' or not? (The character is not emulated after myself, since I am male and all.)

The male main character is very mysterious since he is of a previously unknown race. He is regarded as a Sith but the plot arcs reveal that he actually isn't really a Sith. His abilities and the nature, background of his race are plot points that tie in with the Yuuzhan Vong.

Anyways let me know what you think!? Please...

 

Very interesting hints you gave there, Seldes--quite impressive, actually. I'm inspired now to do research on every alien species and their earthern counterparts, just because you made it sound so fascinating.

Thanks for the compliments, Darth_Silenous and everyone else. Sorry about running off at the cursor, though... This is one of the few places I can discuss this sort of thing. No one else in my family is interested, and no one else I know personally writes fanfic.

Just a warning about researching races: I've got a file on my computer entitled "Briefing", which started out as a running dialogue between Graf Zappalo and Queen Amidala concerning Gungan culture. It's now become just a place to write up my thoughts on Gungan society and physiology.... It's four pages long and still growing! World-building can take on a life of its own if you don't watch out.

 

I'll throw in on canon vs. original (though I could punch in a lot of thoughts on "original species")

Mixing canon & OC is fine, but when is it a canon story with OC characters, and when is it an OC story with strong supporting canon roles? I've done 2 of the former and 1 of the latter, and most of the rest are OC with cameos.

Now my personal definition (which everyone is free to disagree with me on) is:

cameo --one to two scenes (Yoda at the Temple commenting on a mission)

supporting --canon characters have less active roles or appear in less than 50% of the story

canon --canon characters have major roles equal in importance to the OCs, and appear in the story pretty much from the get-go.

So we're back to our original question: when is it really an OC story? (VS a canon story with interesting, well-rounded canon characters, which is a good thing, too?)

(As to alien species; I tend to look at the social habits of Earth animals/species & go from there. For example, if you go by snakes, a reptilian species might hatch a child then pretty much abandon it to it's own devices, or to a government training center. So they might not understand why some folks would fuss over giving a child to the Jedi, since in their opinion, the kid isn't their responsibility anyway, they just laid the egg).

 

Just chiming in with my two cents:

I agree with the above definitions. The problem lies when you use your OC to replace a commonly accepted canon or EU character. A perfect example, again, would be an OC I wrote to replace the deceased Anakin Solo. Alot of readers have had a hard time with the story because they don't see anyone but Anakin in the role which I've got an OC in.

Of course, on that same note, many of my readers think that the OC I've written is a fitting replacement for Anakin.

Just as a side note, Anakin is still around in the stories. It's amazing the power of the flashback and Force induced dream, isn't it? I just love them as literary tools. But, that's a whole new thread, I think.

Anyways, point is, you have to be careful when mixing OC with canon. I think it makes for a better story when you do it right, but that's the key, isn't it. I write what I like and go where my inspiration takes me. If I can take some other readers with me on that trip, the more the better.

 

Question? are clones of Cannon Characters considered Oc's or not?

 

That's a tough question. I would say that it would be a hybrid OC/canon. The likeness would definately be canon, but the personality, depending on how you created the character, would be OC. I would say that the character would be more OC than canon, though. A very interesting question you have posed, my friend. I hope my answer helps.

 

@ The Legacy Saga Fanfic series @

If you check out the link you can see that my entire saga is based off of Clones of cannon characters, I 've tried not to break them of a preconcieved idea from thier originals but still given them thier own charactersitics too.

 

I think I need a second opinion on my stories. The series is called 'Eternity'. The second story is in my sig, and the first is in my profile. As it continues, the OC's are beginning to outnumber the Canon. The three main share equal time in the spotlight, though the OC is starting to take over.

 

There's a fine line between an OC story and a regular story with OCs. I think in an OC story all the protagonists are OCs, whereas if a canon character is a protagonist, then the story can no longer be called an OC story.

Any other opinions?

 

I agree with you, Em, but I must say that I would consider any story with an OC main character and OC story. As long as it was made known to potential readers that there are canon characters in the mix.

 

We can also discuss the OCs in a canon story, if we want to...

 

So my stories could be classed as OC then? It's an OT as well.... Original Territory, otherwords, outside the New Republic.

 

JG-- I know, but someone asked what the difference was above, so I was answering, since the question got ignored.


OCs are particularly hard in a story with canon characters, because then you aren't just struggling with a completely unique character, or just a character who is already established. The OC needs to fill some gap that a canon character doesn't exist to fill, and the combination of thought processes required to think on both levels at once can be really hard to deal with.

 

jedi princess-The only thing you have to watch out for with a story you just described is, what is its connection to Star Wars. If you're not visiting the established planets and not using established characters, what is your relation to Star Wars. Is there some off handed comment mentioned about Darth Vader? If you've gone that far as to make completely original characters and original places, why not take that step and just make it an original story as opposed to fanfic? Just a suggestion.

 

I agree...

 

I'll throw in on canon vs. original (though I could punch in a lot of thoughts on "original species")

Mixing canon & OC is fine, but when is it a canon story with OC characters, and when is it an OC story with strong supporting canon roles? I've done 2 of the former and 1 of the latter, and most of the rest are OC with cameos.

Now my personal definition (which everyone is free to disagree with me on) is:

cameo --one to two scenes (Yoda at the Temple commenting on a mission)

supporting --canon characters have less active roles or appear in less than 50% of the story

canon --canon characters have major roles equal in importance to the OCs, and appear in the story pretty much from the get-go.

So we're back to our original question: when is it really an OC story? (VS a canon story with interesting, well-rounded canon characters, which is a good thing, too?)

Which brings me to a massive question...

Where does Darkness Shaped stand? It has a fairly 50/50 split between new characters and old (kinda like the TT I guess)

 

When you find out, Dart, tell me! I am working on a story that was meant to be OC with a Mace Windu cameo. Then he got a supporting role. Now it's a 50-50 billing. My intent was to tell of an incident in the life of the OC, but Mace is turning out to take a far bigger part than I'd intended.

I guess it goes to "intent." I still think of it as an OC, but I may have to add "Special guest appearance" to my personal rating system denote a canon role beyond supporting...

Anyone else?

 

I guess I don't worry about that sort of thing too much. If a story has a really prominent OC, then, while it may not be an "OC Story," I would still consider it fodder for OC fan discussion, at least in the areas in which the OC is active. I have two stories coming to the archive soon, one of which is almost pure OC (Leia, Han, and Lando are glimped in a Bespin corridor by the Alderaanian heroine), and the other with a prominent OC character that I hope to use again soon. There wasn't really much difference in the way I went about doing Ivva's characterization in the Alderaani story and the way I did Daj Orti's "Family Portrait," where he merely plays a major supporting role.

 

Seldes, how right you are about world building. As of yet, I've written more technical and background information than actual fiction. The crown jewel, if you will, of my background info is a 51 page encyclopedia of almost entirely original creations (the only exceptions being entries for a handful of canon species that haven't really been elaborated on).

 

My story is set in the Unknown Regions, which has been formed into a government called "The Domain", which is looked over by my OC's. They still go into the New Republic, fight the Yuzzhan Vong and Dark Jedi, and as I said, it contains Canon characters.

 

up! This thread cannot die!!!

 

I was wondering....

I have a purely OC story that is currently in the works. I have a betta (Thanks Eirtae~! ) but I was wondering if anyone else would like to read it over for me and tell me what they think

*

Why do people here that that many readers tend to stay away from OC fics (or worse purely OC fics)?

 

I have wondered that myself: why do people seem to stay away from OC fics? Anyone? I really don't know...

 

I'm not really sure. I know that some have said that it's not fanfiction if it isn't about the established characters in regards to other things in the past.

I guess they're just in it to read new stuff about characters they already know.