Subject: Not a PG, but...
Author:
Posted on: 2012-02-21 19:28:00 UTC
...my apologies, I'm afraid I don't recognize your username. That could be because I'm a ditz and didn't catch where you changed it from something else, but even then, I checked and saw that you haven't been active on the Board. Am I correct in saying that you've been more active on the IRC?
So, I found my fic, borrowed some bleepka and Microsoft Word is up. Here's my two Agents, and then something to prove myself (God help me). By the way, the two Agents come from stories that don't exist, I just came up with them- if there's a problem, I'll head back to the drawing board:
Marikane Cananvi:
From: Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic
How He Found The PPC: He fell through a plot-hole while running around in circles as Taris got blown up at the start of the game.
Backstory: Formerly your typical Gary Stu (Minus the "Everyone loves me!" thing), Marikane thought he was safe from mutiny from his crew, but in truth got thrown off the Ebon Hawk before it got away from Taris. After that, he fell into a plot hole that he made by accident while trying to get through Taris as fast as possible, and wound up in Headquarters.
Personality: Marikane is still a Jerkass who thinks he's (mostly) in the right all the time. Alongside other traits such as Deadpan Snarker and Magnificant Bastard (Mostly the second part of that), he also pokes holes in everyone's plans except his own.
Likes: Video-Games, TV, Books, and blowing a large hole in a Mary Sue.
Dislikes: Mary Sues, Twilight, Justin Beiber and people who repeat themselves.
Weapon(s) of Choice: Lightsaber, some nicked Hidden Blades he stole from a Sue, and a portable Gauss Cannon from the same Sue.
Department: Floaters.
Avento Rikkal:
From: The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim (He's an Imperial).
How He Found The PPC: Davis helped some Agents kill a Sue on top of a mammoth (The Sue using the popular Titanus mod for the PC version of the game), thinking the Agents were strange Companions. After that, he took a few hits (From a giants club- long story involving one misaimed FUS DO RAH), and was eventually asked to join.
Personality: Avento is "the straight man" to Marikane's insanity. Sharing the Deadpan Snarker habit, Avento is more Tranquil Fury, and tries to talk his way out of most of his problems.
Backstory: Avento was a typical "Second Dragonborn" who winded up being little more then a Captain Obvious. After being forgotten about for several chapters, he started walking around Skyrim, before finding his sister on top of a mammoth, flinging meteors at several people screaming "Bloody Murder!". Needless to say, Avento helped the strange people.
Likes: The works of Joss Whedon, classical music, setting fires.
Dislikes: Marikane when drunk, badfic, FOX after they cancel a good show.
Weapon(s) of Choice: The Way Of The Voice, Ebony Blade+Daedric Sword, Destruction Magic.
Department: Floaters.
So, about my "Proof that I'm not a bad writer" thing. Here's an expert from a Glee fanfic I made that parodies a Red vs Blue PSA:
Rachel and Puck trek through some woods outside Lima, and we join in while they're middle of the conversation...
"Puck, for the last time, I will not get possessed by a demon from Jennifer's Body, just because you think I'll eat Jack and Finn!"
"It won't be too bad", Puck stresses, but then Artie rolls over from a small clearing they found, with an ATV (The same one from the Achievements PSA) borrowed off Daniel.
"First", Artie cuts in, "That movie was terrible, and it lied about Megan Fox swimming through a lake, which would have almost made up for her non-existent acting. Second, can we please get this done with, we have a Halo Matchmaking Session tonight, and I wanna get some Doritos".
"Fine, fine", Puck says tiredly, putting his hands up. "Let's just do this".
Artie gestures towards the clearing, and Puck and Rachel get their video faces on: Rachel smiling, Puck looking like Santana is in his pants.
"And rolling!" Arte says, strumming a few depressing chords on a bass guitar before lifting the lens off the camera.
"Hi, I'm Rachel Berry from the Glee Club, New Directions", Rachel begins.
"And I'm that sex shark from the same group", Puck says.
"You know", Rachel takes over, "Many people these days are wondering how they can tighten their belts to weather the hard economic times".
"It turns out some people in some place, did some things that lost a bunch of money, for some people we don't even know!" says Puck with an annoyed tone.
"Yeah, we don't understand the details", Rachel explains. "Apparently people buying houses they can't afford, with money they didn't have, from the bastard banks that weren't paying attention, was a bad thing".
"Who knew?" Puck says amusedly.
"Also, we're having all sorts of peaks now. We've got peak oil, peak water, peak temperature, peak amounts of sarcasm Daniel is limited too (Which is great)..."
"It's just- OWW!" Daniel yells off screen, since he has to wear an electric shock collar to prevent him from being too sarcastic.
"Peak hurricanes", Puck continues, "Peak bees..."
"Peak bees?" Rachel repeats slowly.
"It's true!" Puck replies. "Look it up".
"The point is", Rachel says after an annoyed sigh, "We're all screwed".
"Absolutely", Puck says. "Especially if you happen to be a bee that runs an oil refinery".
"But, in these dark times, it's important that you stay optimistic", Rachel continues.
"Right", Puck says in an assuring tone. "You should be thinking positive thoughts, like: "How can I outlive my neighbours, forward slash arch enemy, so that when they kick the bucket, I steal all their stuff?"
It goes on for a bit after that, but it features an OC I don't own who I was borrowing, so I hope you understand.
Anyway, I hope I did well, if there's anything wrong, just hoot... or something... and I'll correct it and send these OC's to a Fate Worse Than Death- starring in Hannah Montana.
For a few reasons.
For one, you haven't been around very much; we prefer to know who we're giving Permission to- the PPC is community, and not just about sporking fic. Stick around a few more weeks until you think you know people and you've got the hang of things.
For two, with your writing sample at the bottom, while it is amusing, there is one serious issue with it: punctuation goes inside quotation marks for dialogue. Commas, periods, question marks, the whole rigmarole.
For three: One has likes of 'video games' and 'books'? This is amazingly wide! What sort of books? What sort of video games? And by TV do you mean he likes TVs themselves or TV shows? There is a wide swath of difference between, say, Angry Birds, Halo, the Sims, and Skyrim. And with just books? That's the difference between Left Behind, Anathem, 1632- and that's just fiction! Classical music has many differences as well- are we supposed to be thinking 'gosh, he must be classy and swank' for liking classical music? There are many different kinds of music we think of as 'classical' these days.
Elaboration is sometimes a good thing.
Beyond that, three more minor things.
Who's this Davis mentioned in Avento's section?
Additionally, the PPC is not TvTropes, and using tropes as shortcuts to tell us what a character is like is both limiting on your part, and also can be really messy and sloppy shorthand. It doesn't really do much to help you, as a writer. It doesn't help you improve- you're relying on exacting definitions made by other people to get everything across! What about your own words? It can also end up shuttering your skills, because when you start thinking in tropes, it's very difficult to break out of the habit because it's so very easy to categorize everything and everyone, rather than letting your characters grow and develop into being like actual people.
You don't need to be using those to tell us what a character is like- there are better ways. I, personally, would advocate against not doing it at all, but that's a personal opinion.
The very final one is comparatively very minor, and is a personal view: Having a character be from a rather new canon doesn't really work out, to me, for a few reasons.
One is that people are still working and playing through the game, and most still haven't have had the chance to even play it yet- much less afford it! It's a bit rude to those who haven't had the chance because it's still a very new game, and having characters- much less ones supposed to be PCs- from it increases the chance of spoilers for people who still intend to pick it up.
Two is that fanon and fandom takes time to develop, and a few months really isn't enough to tell you what direction- or even if there will be staying power with certain ideas- the fandom will go in.
First off, I agree with July's denial of Permission.
On to the Trope issue. The problem with Tropes is not the Tropes themselves. The problem lies in one of two areas. First, as July said, depending too heavily on Tropes can have detrimental effects on your writing. Second, people use Tropes incorrectly.
The second problem is what I see more of in this permission request. Tropes are a way of categorizing things after the fact. They were not created to be building blocks. You create something and, when you look back at it, say "hey, this looks like that Trope." If you do it the other way around, then you don't have a character/story/whatever. You have a collection of Tropes that you are trying to make look like a character/story/whatever, and it shows.
Remember: Chatacter/Story/Whatever first. Tropes come later.
Also I am not a Troper and, as such, don't know what the majority of Tropes mean. I don't know that any of the PG's are really Tropers. Know your audience. It isn't our job to make your stuff make sense. That's your job. This holds true for any type of jargon. I don't speak in gamer lingo to my father, because he won't understand what I am saying.
...my apologies, I'm afraid I don't recognize your username. That could be because I'm a ditz and didn't catch where you changed it from something else, but even then, I checked and saw that you haven't been active on the Board. Am I correct in saying that you've been more active on the IRC?
I was around for a bit on the IRC channel, but yeah- three pieces over the last month on the Board.