Well I've had better weeks since I've started doing this pony fic thing... · 12:25pm Oct 4th, 2013
Yeah, so I've had an annoying combination of stuff that's left me reeling somewhat. I'll happily admit two of them I probably brought on myself, but that if anything, makes them just that extra bit aggravating. There's probably going to be some venting here, so feel free to skip this one, I genuinely don't mind.
Firstly well over a month ago I figured I'd try my luck and get By Royal Command onto Equestria Daily. It probably doesn't need it having been insanely succesful over my wildest dreams, but I figured the submission is a matter of minutes so what the hell, right? Finally got a response back and it's a no go. Don't get me wrong it is by miles the nicest email they've sent me not relating to back when I used to make PMVs, so that's at least something 
Basic upshot is they'd like to put it up as they do think it's seriously funny, but pacing issues I personally don't think are issues, Trixie being in denial being misread as being due to the idiot ball, it getting serious towards the end which is most definitely intentional, and the usual grammar issues that I'll certainly cop to given they're the bane of my existence equals strike one.
Having rode that horse once already in trying to get Random Elements on there, spending months tweaking, seeking and using various pre-readers, going through the burning hellfires of ponychan twice (don't get me wrong one of them did genuinely help, hurt like fuckery still though), and only getting some pretty rude emails back for all the effort means yeah there's no chance in Tartaurus I'm jumping through those hoops again.
Secondly was foolishly asking one of my mates if he wouldn't mind dropping a plug for All for You on another site. Not asked him since Random Elements, where it had worked gangbusters, so figured I'd see if I could get a boost for the fic while it was still early days. Turned out it just got a whole lot of hostility, a fair chunk of it assumed based on the pairing with not even looking at the actual fic or assuming I was lying with regard to the tone of the story. Not to tar the whole place, some did read first before launching the tirades, and I really do appreciate the people who stuck up for what the story is actually about. Still basic upshot was doubling the number of dislikes which was not the plan and has led to me adding a note on the front page of the story, as apparently the tags and author note in chapter one weren't enough already. Swear to Celestia guys I'm not going for a sucker punch with this. Even less so given that's possibly one of the worst films ever made that I've had the misfortune to sit through. If you don't like the idea of trying to make the pairing work then don't read it. It's as simple as that given I can easily avoid anything regarding to humans in Equestria (okay, alright aside from Lez Ponies), first person shooter crossovers and second person written fics due to my own personal prefferences.
So that demotivation plus the fact that chapter 3 is turning out to be a lot of a bastard to write anyway, means I'm really not going to turn this one round anywhere near as fast as chapter 2. Appologies for that and hopefully I can have it together by the end of next week.
As always thanks for reading my stuff, you're all deeply, deeply awesome.
Yeah, I understand the frustration.
But still, you created several fics that many have had fun reading. It shouldn't be about the numbers, but about sharing something with others. I believe you've accomplished that.
I'll just leave it at that.
1393939 A very fair point, thank you.
Its not even as if the fic is doing remotely badly so I really don't have much too complain about when it gets down to it.
Sorry to hear about all the misfortunes you've had this week. I loved "By Royal Command' and asides from maybe some grammar issues I can't see how they thought there were problems with the story. It is a 'Romance/Comedy', I can't see how they could expect it not to have a few serious moments. The only thing I could 'regret' about the story is that its a one-shot, but I'm greedy like that.
As far as 'All for you' is concerned, its on my 'read later' atm, when chapter three comes out I'll give it a go. Not much else I can say about it asides from it looks to have a unique pairing to it and that has perked my interest in the story.
EqD has very, very high standards. I don't begrudge them that, it's their site and they can make their own rules. At the same time, I don't think getting there is some litmus test for fic quality - there's plenty of fics I've seen there I couldn't get more than a page in before being bored to tears.
I've seen a few writers treating 'getting on EqD' as some qualification of awesomery. Personally, I think it's somewhat overrated. Sure, it gets a bit of publicity, but if you write fanfiction for the public accolades, then you may be doing something wrong. I've recommended it on TVTropes, by the way. Much less stringent qualifications.
Sure, By Royal Command does have its fair share of typos and grammar errors and whatnot, but it doesn't detract from the fact that it's a goofy and funny romantic comedy. Yes, I'm probably biased in favor of Twixie shipping, but even disregarding that I think it's a solid story, with characters having genuine motivations for their actions. It may not be everyone's cup of tea, but everyone's entitled to their own preferences. Incidentally, if you need someone to preread and grammar-check your stories anytime, I'd be happy to assist. At the risk of bragging, I've been told I'm pretty good at it.
I unfortunately haven't read All For You yet (thesis work keeps getting in the way, bah) but once I do I'll see about commenting on it.
1394193 I did notice the link you added to tvtropes which I very much appreciated, thank you. Was deeply amused by the additional note too
Yeah I know about EqD, as I've seen fics far, far better than any of my stuff that I have seen rejected for sometimes crazy reasons (Clavdiv's excellent Cthullu crossover fic for one), so I wasn't expecting much. I didn't even send it over for the popularity, it'd just be nice to have beaten the odds and pulled it off, y'know? Believe me if it had got on there the last thing that would have happened would have been a big obnoxious announcement of the top of the fic stating it to the world.
Back when I was in the feature box another fic had one of those and I admit I was tempted to add NOT featured on EqD! to the story page, but thankfully I'm nowhere near that much of a git
Best thing personally is a TV Tropes page for that kind of thing it really is. Sounds sad I know, but I'm so incredibly proud that people have created and added to the Random Elements page to get it to the state it is. (It's even got a Crowning Moment of Awesome on there *squee!*
)
Thanks for the offer on the pre-reading too, and I'll certainly bare it in mind.
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Wouldn't want to lose potential readers who don't like clop, after all.
Or for that matter, clopfans getting upset by the lack of expicit mare-on-mare action and leaving angry comments and downvotes because of it.
Sadly I don't know how to make entire TVTropes pages, but if one goes up for BRC, I'd add content, definitely.
Well, on the plus side "twice as many down votes" is still less than 10 percent of your up votes.
So, just remember that a small, angry minority, is still a small minority.
Equestria Daily's standards are insane. And I don't mean "insanely high" because many of the stories I've seen on there are worse than ones I know didn't make it, often for bizarre reasons like them just being condescending about the crossover. But they all stick together over there, so once one of them's black listed you for wearing blue on Tuesday or whatever, it's not worth complaining about (Sigh... "oh no, your comedy has a serious moment at the end", Thanks for letting me know that was bad EqD, I'd better go throw Trigun, Slayers, and a number of MLP episodes in the dumpster... actually now that I think of it most comedy movies have serious bits near the end.) I'm not even upset at them so much as amused, anymore, they're kind of ridiculous.
While it's too bad the next chapter won't be as fast as the second was, by the end of next week is still fast.
Huh, so I am not the only one who excludes Lez Ponies from their No-HiE-rule. I was feeling vaguely guilty about being inconsequential.
I can't understand why All For You would draw an unusual amount of hate, though. There are definitely much, much crackier stories out there, and the tone of the story is something the author is free to decide.
What this site probably needs is some feature to hide stories you don't want to see. Some kind of anti-fav. You tag a story, and never have to see it again.
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When in doubt, it's never just you
That'd be a great feature. Personally I'd love more checkboxes other than just the Mature filter. Being able to block all Foalcon with a single tick just as an example would be fantastic I'd also like to see the number of people marking a fic as Read Later, but I'm a terrible statto I admit
Third chapter of All for You is going very well indeed I reckon. Got it past one of my pre-readers in a decidedly well received manner which was lovely. Just waiting on the other one now, so hopefully I'm still on track for getting it up tomorrow.
1409328 Good to hear, looking forward to it