(I'm sure i posted this back over in Authors helping Authors... but I felt I should ask here too. My apologies for any redundancy.)

Have you ever posted a story with a REALLY awesome concept (YMMV), then looked back and see that you may have made a bad first impression, realizing that you've turned off about a hundred or so readers?

Say if you've gone out of your way to go back and get these mistakes fixed by either asking for help, editing the description (long AND short), changing the title, or updating that first chapter until you feel that it's in top condition? Or what if your story starts off slow, only going into high gear after a certain amount of chapters?

It is then that you wonder if people would consider giving your story a second chance.

So I ask you, fellow peeps. Have you ever felt like your story deserved a second chance after a bad first impression?

I know I do.

Because I see it as showing the peeps that you're not a quitter, and you're pressing forward. When I see those fics with the high amount of dislikes, yet they keep posting, I find that admirable. It makes me realize that no matter what happens, you feel a sense of pride to finish your work, no matter how irredeemable it is at that point. It may not necessarily mean you have talent, but it shows passion. And with passion, comes improvement. I think.

In fact, why don't you guys all talk about your stories that you think deserves a second chance? I mean, I think It'll be a good idea to give new stories a second chance to shine!

(apologies for the blatant advertisement. >.> I seldom advertise my fic anyway since I have this feeling that it kinda tests patience regarding the not-so-complex mystery.)

744841
It is admirable that people will just press forwards with their idea even when faced with large amounts of dissent. Something that I love about going through stories that I follow for the ideas, is going through them and literally seeing that writer is improving! With every chapter they fix some mistakes, their style becomes more prominent.

I'll have to find some fics that deserve a second chance later.

Sounds like fun!

Okay... so my very first fic on the site was A Cog in the Machine. Boy, if ever there was a bad first impression it would be the one this story had. First of all, it came out being 14K long. Big turn off right there. Secondly, this was my first fic, so grammar issues were everywhere. One or two errors are fine, but they tend to multiply quite rapidly when there's so much to read And then there's the fact that it was HiE, which is a very common story type that turns people off by default. Lastly, and this is the real kicker, here's a part of my synopsis. "The machine, known as the Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000, was missing just one component to make it all complete. Just one elusive item that no sane pony or pony with values would ever consider using: Fresh dragon's breath."

Sounds fine, right? Well now it does, but for the first three months of this story's life, it read "Fresh dragon's breathe"!! UGH!!!

So frustrating! Beyond that I also have A Rare Scoot which also had a horrible early spelling error (Yet, for some reason, the story only started getting attention AFTER I canceled it ) and And then Twilight Exploded which simply had grammar issues... but I'm mostly just ticked off at the first fic's thing

Yes that's why I'm going through and fixing up my stories to see if its better getting a second chance

744848

Something that I love about going through stories that I follow for the ideas, is going through them and literally seeing that writer is improving!

And that's exactly why I feel that while the first chapter may decide who sticks around or not (Which is quite a shame these days, because I like to give second chances myself), It's great to see the author improve. It's even better when the readers actually give friendly, yet helpful advice to help the writer improve. That's what I like. For me, I pretty much had to ask a friend of mine to read it, and he gave me the critiques I needed to make my story SO much better.

744857

Sounds fine, right? Well now it does, but for the first three months of this story's life, it read "Fresh dragon's breathe"!! UGH!!!

Hey, it's just a one-letter typo. I'm sure the peeps knew what ya meant. I mean, if you got hit by grammar nazis, then yeah. They knew. >_> But uh... HEY.

My fic's a HiE as well, but I'm not complaining. I quite like the concept, because there's just SO MUCH you can do with it by having Humans around. Sounds arrogant and conceited of our species, but that's how I kinda feel. That's why I started with a HiE story. I just didn't realize until a week of me being here on FiM fiction that HiE stories are universally hated. Holy Hell. >_>

744860

Always post a link to the story! At the moment, I don't have much time to read a lot of stories, but I hope to do so when I get the chance!

Sometimes you can't always balme yourself for bad first impressions. As Nyte-Blade basically pointed out, Human in Equestria fics are not neccissarily liked just for the topic though there are whole groups dedicated to these kinds of fics. The other ones that are given a hard time are Dark and Crossover fics. These ones are also sometimes automatically glossed over. I had a fic once that possessed both these tags and several people (On EqD at least) automatically star bombed the story (back when the star system was still in use) and several people even said they would never read it because of what it was crossed over with. But over here on FIMfiction, readers who wanted to read dark fics gave it a surprising amount of praise and it only recieved it's first thumbs down more than a year later (last month.) So it depends on the audience when tags themselves are considered.
Otherwise, I can see what you mean about second chances. Many people are going to base the quality of a fic on the very first chapter, and if they don't enjoy that first one, the rest of the story might not even get a chance. It's unfortunate but true, and even worse not all stories are neccissarily going to be exciting or whatever that particular reader is looking for in the first chapter. I've read bestsellers that critics praised that I thought were boring until a few more chapters in. Trucking on and fixing what mistakes are inevitably going to be made are of course the best thing you can do (as has already been said in this topic) and second chances may come by word of mouth if other folks start enjoying it and it somehow comes back to thosde who dismissed the story before.

744943

I think there are a lot of people out there who down-vote fics without even reading it, or in some cases, without even reading the description! I know this happens because a reader of one of my fics actually admitted that he was about to instantly down-vote a fic of mine (P.A.T.A. Ponies Against Twilight The Alicorn) but thankfully read the description and changed his mind. I've also had a review on fanfiction saying "OH MY GOD STOP WHINING ABOUT TWILICORN BLAH BLAH BLAH! GET A LIFE!" Now, either that person is stupid beyond belief or (most likely) they didn't read my fic. I find it hard to believe that every down-voter actually read it when it has by far the highest praising comments of any of my stories. So I'm guessing people down-voteed it because they assumed some kind of childish Twilicorn hate-fic and didn't even bother to check it out? Eeyup.

Conclusion: People can (and often will) down-vote things for the hell of it. (Why there's an inherent hatred against Dark-fics I will never know) I'm convinced that some people even stoop as low as releasing a fic or an update, and down-voting every fic in sight once theirs hits the home page.

Personally, I stopped caring too much about up/down votes when choosing other fics. I've read stories with negative votes that I thought were golden, and I've also read extremely high-rated featured fics that I thought were shi- *ahem* awful. Hell, one of the people on my friends list had a story of his make the feature box and gain a billion faves etc, but I much prefer his other work, despite their distinct lack of popularity. From now on, I go with my instincts.

Also, I think you make a good point about first impressions. I swear most readers want everything to happen as quickly as possible in the first couple of chapters with no build-up, just so they can see something happen. (This appears to be especially true for romance fics) And yet, novels that do that are either panned or labelled as 'for kids'.

744841 Haters gonna hate. Screw 'em.

But if you really and truly think you had a few errors in your story, do like I do. Review before you post. Simple as that.

I have about 30 pages of story right now and haven't posted a single page yet.

If you honestly think you made a huge mistake and now you've scared away FIMfiction viewers, post the fixed version someplace else like on fanfiction.

744943

Well, whenever something goes wrong, I usually blame myself before I go blaming anything else. Society's Standards and whatnot.

745102

Also, I think you make a good point about first impressions. I swear most readers want everything to happen as quickly as possible in the first couple of chapters with no build-up, just so they can see something happen. (This appears to be especially true for romance fics) And yet, novels that do that are either panned or labelled as 'for kids'.

Haha, yeah. At this point, I'm realizing I can't please everyone. Whatever happens, happens. No sense trying to beg people to give your fic a second chance. However, sometimes, you find yourself dreaming of that day where people see your fic for the gold it is, ya know? I guess that sorta takes time nowadays.

745150

Haha, i DO review before I post. The point I'm going for, is for fic that have already been posted, and made a bad first impression. I mean, you seem like the kind of guy who checks his list twice or three times even before posting. That's understandable, and in the end, gives quality work as a good first impression. But like, you ever made that mistake of posting, and just finding out just how picky the fandom is? >.>

745303

Haha, yeah. At this point, I'm realizing I can't please everyone. Whatever happens, happens. No sense trying to beg people to give your fic a second chance. However, sometimes, you find yourself dreaming of that day where people see your fic for the gold it is, ya know? I guess that sorta takes time nowadays.

I know what you mean when it comes to dreaming about people seeing your fic as gold. I can't wait for the day I get hate-mail about my story when I kill off a particular character. If you can get people's emotions as fired up as that, you know that they're enthralled.

I have this one reader of my 'magnum opus' on fanfiction who does exactly what I wish all my readers would do. He (at least, I assume it's a 'he') pesters me for new chapters, goes nuts over each update and speculates about the future of my characters. He's even claimed to have become 'obsessed' with it. It might not be much, but this one guy keeps me going and keeps me focused. I can only wish that there were more like him...

744841 I've had this issue. When I first posted my stories the descriptions were too long and perhaps confusing, and I had a lot of chapters that, in all honesty, I should've reconsidered or reworked.

I'm working on a revamp now. Once that's posted then I'll ask for second chances.

745303

Yeah, I wasn't saying to just automatically blame everyone else. That would actuaklly be bad and mean that you aren't learning anything. Constructive criticsm is always a good thing. (Hating never is and should just be ignored.)

745689

I have this one reader of my 'magnum opus' on fanfiction who does exactly what I wish all my readers would do. He (at least, I assume it's a 'he') pesters me for new chapters, goes nuts over each update and speculates about the future of my characters. He's even claimed to have become 'obsessed' with it. It might not be much, but this one guy keeps me going and keeps me focused. I can only wish that there were more like him...

Don't we all? I have a friend like that, but he doesn't pester me for new chapters. However, I can't rave about my ideas anymore to him, since he's become so invested in the story. >.> Haha

745946

I've had this issue. When I first posted my stories the descriptions were too long and perhaps confusing, and I had a lot of chapters that, in all honesty, I should've reconsidered or reworked.

I'm working on a revamp now. Once that's posted then I'll ask for second chances.

Good idea. But I thought the rules stated that you can't repost your story as a new one... >_<

746228
Ah, I know, I wasn't accusing ya of such. I'm just sayin'.

747032
I kinda wish more people were like that, but like, people have first impression rules under their belts a little too much, ya know? But yes, to see who you were before, compared to now, it kinda does give a good boost in confidence!

759407 When I post the revamp, I'll delete the old stories. Also a lot of them are gonna be brand-new.

EDIT: Actually, now that you brought it up, I figure I better ask the mods if its okay.

760652
let us know what they say. >.>

761518 Just heard back.

Here's exactly what Mystic said: "I think that should be fine as long as you delete the original. The difference here is the fact that you plan on rewriting all of the content, which is normally something we take into consideration when people want to delete stories. If the change is significant, then it should be okay!"

761577

Significant changes, huh... Well, maybe that should be good.

I don't ever plan on doing that though, but it's great to know.

Also, bumpity bump.

The problem with first impressions is that you only get one.

And personally, I am not inclined to give second chances. I'm always going to remember a story for what it was originally, no matter how many or how good the rewrites and iterations of it are. Such stories that have fallen into my shitlist thusly are a majority of the Ponyfall collab's works, and more TCB stories than I care to count.

If you balls up a story's start with grammar that is only English by merit of not being any other known human language, I wouldn't bother with a re-write. (Unless it's a vanity thing.)

Go ahead, finish it, move on and try again with a fresh story, because "second chances" are few and far between.

807183

The problem with first impressions is that you only get one.

Not necessarily. Plenty of cases in the film industry of people disliking the original film but liking the remake, or seeing the remake first, hating it then discovering the original.

Admittedly there's usually a larger time gap between that and a fanfic rewrite, but I hold that there's plenty of open-minded bronies who will give a new shot a chance.

Of course, if you do it a second time and improve absolutely nothing...