Subject: NaNo is really good at getting the creative juices flowing.
Author:
Posted on: 2015-11-25 19:24:00 UTC
Plus, like you said, it's really easy for writers to beat themselves up over their work; NaNo is an awesome time to lock away that horrid inner editor and just >write.
-Alleb
Seriously, the questions cover so many different topics that I wouldn't be able to put them all in the subject line. But first, that RP that I started last month and still haven't given a conclusion to! *grins awkwardly* I apologize; lots of stuff happened, but I should have gotten back to that by now. I will be posting the closing remarks Sunday (I don't want to do it on Thanksgiving).
Now, so many different questions!
First: I know there is some reason why no one can spork "My Immortal," but is there something we as a community could do about it? Seriously, that thing needs dealing with (she says as she, in improper grammatical form, ends a sentence with a preposition).
Second: Is anyone on here a bow hunter? My AU 10th Walker (that fic I asked for advice on in my very first post; it's coming along nicely!) has taken a dramatic shift, and now participates in the sport. But I hardly know anything about it: I'm already looking into resources. For now, any advice on any aspect of the subject would be appreciated.
Third: Said 10th Walker is also claiming to be a Seer, using her vague-ish memories of the book to pass as one. I actually have three questions with this:
a) Will her "prophecies" be viewed as less trustworthy since she has claimed that they came in a dream? Most of the major prophecies (Malbeth, Glorfindel, even Aragorn's mini-foresight before Moria) are all just spoken. The only dreams I can think of off the top of my head are Boromir and Faramir's shared dream-message about going to Rivendell.
b) How might Glorfindel, who seems a fairly logical interviewer given his one earlier foresight, approach someone who claims foresight? (Keeping in mind that Amy is a weirdo from Bree with no obvious ties to Numenor or Elves, and was also brought to Middle-earth by Sauron for the express purpose of messing stuff up: not that she knows that.)
c) Whilst trolling on the internet for these answers, I found an article on a LotR wiki (A role-playing wiki, actually) that claimed that the Numenoreans had mortal wizards who used alchemy and astrology to divine the future: I don't remember anything like that, but my memory of Numenor is roughly equivalent to the size of a kumquat compared to a BMW.
Fourth (and now for something totally different): How're everyone's Nanovels coming along?
-Alleb
I am very behind, only on 2,203 words, but I realized that the point is not primarily to hit 50,000 words (though that's a good goal) but simply to write. So that's what I'm going to do, and just stop beating myself up and have fun.
Plus, like you said, it's really easy for writers to beat themselves up over their work; NaNo is an awesome time to lock away that horrid inner editor and just >write.
-Alleb
Before anyone goes and declares that they're taking on "My Immortal," I would invite them to stop and think about something: why do you want to spork this story? Can you make something entertaining out of it, or are you doing it for other reasons?
Stories should not be sporked because they need "dealing with." Nor should stories be sporked simply because of how infamous they are. The PPC (as in we the writers, not the fictional organization) should neither be a sort of fanfiction police nor a cadre of badfic big game hunters. I feel like both of those paths have been in vogue recently, and honestly? It's resulted in what I feel are a large number of mediocre missions. There have been standouts, to be sure, but they feel far and few between.
I'm not saying don't claim it. If you think you can make a good mission out of it, by all means do. I'm saying think about your reasons for sporking.
Considering that this was the first fanfiction I ever read and I've spent spent many a sleepover reading it with friends and laughing at it, I've got a rather odd sort of fondness for the story and do think I'd be able to give it the mission it deserves, especially since I've been considering gags for said mission for over a year now. It was just wistful thinking on my part, but now that it looks like the fic's opening up for sporking, maybe not...
My only hesitation is that I've already tackled two other Legendaries already and don't know it would be fair to claim a third. Nobody's piped up about definitively claiming it so far, so I guess I'll put a tentative 'dibs' here unless someone else says something by next week.
Given that you unceremoniously killed the used-to-be-incredibly-infamous My Inner Life.
hS
How I Became Yours deserve the Legendary tag, in my opinion at least.
You get credit for Draco's Christmas Cuppa as well. =]
I think, barring a few cases where I lack sufficient data for an opinion, most people here could if they were giving it all they had. Missions are supposed to be entertaining in a different way to badfic, or at least I sincerely hope they are, and to be frank, I don't find My Immortal funny. Now, I am well aware which of your slightly patronising categories my missions fall into as far as you're concerned, and I'm okay with that. I also think a mission to this badfic won't change that.
I just don't really care.
Not claiming it, though, too much to do right now. =]
While Iximaz and hS stepped in to clarify what I meant (and many thanks to them for doing so), I feel I should say something too. I wasn't saying people shouldn't spork "My Immortal" because it's already funny. For one thing, I also don't find it funny. I was warning people against sporking it just because it is "legendary" or big. Nor should people write a mission just because a badfic "deserves" to be sporked. The primary goal of any PPC writer, in my opinion, should be to create the best possible story they can.
I'm not trying to be patronizing. If that's how I come off, then I apologize.
As a final note, I quite like your missions with Doktor Trollenfisch and Gabrielle. I could have sworn I wrote a review stating as such, but I'll say it properly here. So please don't make assumptions about my opinions.
I'm sorry my own bone-headedness made it necessary. =]
As for your liking Doktor Trollenfisch und Gabrielle's missions, well, I'm very glad that you do, but most of the good stuff in those are down to Ix's input; turns out I work well under adult supervision. The one mission that's entirely my own work (Nesh and Des's beta input notwithstanding) was, er, one you rather savaged. 'S'on my Talk page. =]
I think you owe PC an apology.
I stand by my argument, though. I don't think that because My Immortal is funny bad means we can't get a good mission out of it. However, I shouldn't have been patronising towards PC, and for that I apologise.
... you're also getting PC and Alleb tangled up in your head (I did the same thing, which is why I noticed). PoorCynic basically said 'don't claim it because you want to spork something big, claim it because you've come up with a good way to make it funny/tell a story'. I think that's really good advice; I followed it with Clbr__n (to cap off Dafydd's tale), but I'm not sure I did with legolas by laura; yes, it was a funny mission (I hope?), but I think - eleven years on - I probably wrote it because it was a big story.
Alleb then agreed with that (summing it up with the quite pithy 'it's about making goodfic out of bad, not who can kill the biggest bad'), and added the point about it being funny already. Which is also a fairly accurate point, though not fully drawn-out - there have been missions in the past which consist of little more than pointing at the things everyone reading had already noticed. I don't know whether legolas falls into that, but I wouldn't be terribly surprised - the stupid-funny is so obvious, it'd be hard not to just point and laugh.
However, you're absolutely right that it's perfectly possible to make a good mission out of even a massive shambles like My Immortal. Of course it is! You can make a mission out of anything (though if the badfic literally consists of a full stop, it'll be quite a short mission).
hS
But yeah, you're probably right about that too. I don't personally see the need to have a reason for why you're writing the story other than you want to make people laugh with something, but hey, y'all think differently and it's hardly like I'm the one writing mission guides.
Or, er, missions. Really should get back to that. =]
And I agree. I wasn't in the spirit of the PPC: it's about making goodfic out of bad, first and foremost, not "who can kill the biggest, baddest badfic."
So... who thinks they can make "My Immortal" even more hilarious than its spelling makes it already?
-Alleb
As far as I know, My Immortal is off-limits because someone's claimed it. That's what the wiki page says... but I can't find anything by some quick searching. Eh.
Anyway! On to interesting stuff, and Question the Third:
a) Dreams, dreams, dreams... a claimed dream-warning will be treated with both more reverence and more suspicion. Dreams are the favoured prophetic method of the Valar; Ulmo sent dream-messages to Finrod and Turgon (leading to the founding of Nargothrond and Gondolin), for instance. But... the Valar don't get involved much these days, and Amy has never been anywhere near the Two Trees (which might help make her easier to communicate with for Lorien or whoever). That said, note that Frodo dreamt of Gandalf in Bombadil's house - the dream was late, according to Gandalf, but it's still a dream-vision (and Gandalf never doubted it).
b) Glorfindel is actually a perfect choice - not only is he a de facto Seer in his own right, he's also spent time around at least four others: Malbeth (this is an assumption, but I think a solid one), plus Turgon, Idril, and Tuor, all of whom had visions or other messages involving Gondolin. If there's a pattern in how those messages were presented (and it's very hard to say, since the only two we have details for are Turgon and Tuor), he'd look for that pattern to be repeated. If not... 'feel', probably.
c) Uh... not that I know of? ^_^ I'm pretty sure alchemy isn't mentioned by Tolkien; looking at the stars might be, I honestly don't know. I do know that early descriptions of Numenor imply it reached an Industrial Revolution stage of technology: Our ships go now without the wind, and many are made of metal that sheareth rocks, and they sink not in calm or storm; but they are no longer fair to look upon. But our shields are impenetrable, our swords cannot be withstood, our darts are like thunder and pass over leagues unerring. But I don't know anything about prophecy.
Actually, that's a lie: the Druedain (aka the Wild Men met by the Rohirrim on the way to Minas Tirith) lived on Numenor, and left centuries before the Downfall, since (they claimed) the island felt unstable. So there's that.
hS, rambling.
Hmm... this gives me some stuff to think about. Thanks!
Man, I really need to reread Silm. For now, I'll look over all of the other prophecies and see if I can spot any links or patterns. If I can't, well, at least one of her predictions is proven true before the Felowship leaves, so there's that.
Wait, was that bit about ships and arrows in Silm? If so, I think my kumquat might actually be half a kumquat, because I don't remember that at all.
-Alleb
I think it's in The Lost Road, which would've been the story of Elendil and Isildur's final days in Numenor if - the eternal refrain! - he'd actually finished it. So far as I know, the Silm never implies they had anything more than Third Age Gondor does.
Regarding prophecy, there's an article here, which I haven't (yet!) read, but which looks promising. It notes that True prophecy occurs in a few places, but it is overshadowed by foresight. If we can distinguish between, we must conclude that foresight only intuitively acknowledges that something may or will happen. I think it's a bit dubious that he puts Malbeth down as foresight - dude wrote a poem, that's not an intuitive feel - but maybe the full article explains it better.
hS
I think I might have read this article before, but I'd forgotten about it; it looks like it will be very helpful!
Oh, good; I'm still sitting strong at a whole kumquat. XD If I'd managed to forget something that impressive... yikes. I wouldn't be comfortable calling myself a Tolkienite anymore.
I wish Tolkien had finished that-- it would have been spectacular. Plus, he totally backed out of the bet with Lewis: the guy wrote a trilogy and Tolkien couldn't even finish one book? Come on, man!
-Alleb
I asked about it last year and basically got told it's in a state of perpetual claim by some mysterious person.
-Iximaz, still sad
The history of the Claimed Badfic page has it being claimed by 'SealRat', who has precisely two edits - per the Doctor, 'Guess which ones!'.
Sure enough, my records reveal that 'SealRat' was active on the Board for five months, May-September 2008. They were granted Permission by Nesh a month after joining in May, and... yep, claimed My Immortal here, along with 'The Mad Hattie'.
Do I need to add that they never posted a single mission?
hS
I interpreted SeaTurtle’s answer to Iximaz as "for reasons that are now buried deep in the Board’s archive, at some point in time the community decided that the Prime Badfic should never be missioned, thus it will stay claimed forever", but apparently that’s wrong?
HG
... it happened after a random newbie claimed it and then upped and left. And I don't remember it happening, though I probably wouldn't.
The Board archives are complete from mid-2008 onwards, if anyone wants to go looking.
hS
That it was in a state of perpetual claim because if and when the fic is available for missioning, there'd be a huge argument over who gets the honor of killing it.
Sorry-- I thought that the claim was placed by one of you guys to stop the newbies from clamouring over who gets to kill it. Iunno, it made more sense in my head at the time...
I guess that My Immortal up for grabs-- but at this point why spork perfection? That's my take on it at any rate.
Could have sworn someone had already done MI. Anyway, obviously there's no need to do anything about it, since it's clearly not badfic. It's way too funny to be badfic!
(But seriously, there's a reason we can't do it? News to me.)
The wiki says that "My Immortal" is claimed and a mission was forthcoming, but there's no trace of that in the Claimed Badfic page. A look in the history reveals that it was claimed back in 2008, so I would hazard a guess and say that the claimant either gave up or is long-gone. I see no reason why we cannot mission it.
u van t keel myimtortal becoose eet es teh etiome of good literturee and oot doos ull otters.
While not a bow hunter, I do shoot both recurve and longbow (mostly a recurve, though), so I can at least tell you about how that works. :)
From what I understand, you have to readjust a compound bow for different ranges, so she'll have to learn how to use a longbow or a recurve for battle; you can't exactly pick at what range your Orcs will be. ^_^
-Alleb