1. Story must have the crossover tag. (Any and all crossovers are welcome.)

2. Story must be understandable and enjoyable to new readers of your crossover. (Kind of like reading a new book with characters you've never seen before)

3. Stories must have at least 50 upvotes before submitting. (So we don't get flooded silly. You can PM any admin about your story if you feel that it's good even without the votes.)

-Have a unique and interesting story
-Be the first crossover with a particular genre
-Crossover with an uncommon genre
-Get a relatively high score in The Equestrian Critics Society and/or any other review group (high = 80% or above)

Note: These are just to help. Having all of the above does not guarantee a pass.
Leave an upvote or a downvote based on how much you like our current rule set. Feel free to leave any comments, feelings, or suggestions down below!

1/17/2014 10:08 PM

Updated rules so it's not a wall of text anymore, lowering rules from 5 to 3.

Changed 100 upvotes to 50.

2585558 May I ask if number of views is valid, or do just the upvotes count? Please specify, it would save me some confusion.

2631550

Upvotes.

2631554 Ok

I liked it at 100. Getting fifty is too easy. This is supposed to be "Only the Best". It should be hard to get on this list. Or at least not easy.

Getting 100 seems like a fairly low bar at times already.

vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

2585558 I would actually recommend putting the bar at 200-300 upvotes. 100 is too easy to reach after a while, and to really narrow down top fics, it should be higher

2635135
2641887
The thing is, Upvotes aren't always equivalent to quality. Sometimes a fairly average story can get a ton of upvotes, while a REALLY GOOD one goes largely unnoticed. Getting 50 upvotes seems like a reasonable level by which to allow stories to be looked at to see if they qualify. That way, this group doesn't just favor the lucky. Even an amazing crossover might not get even 100 upvotes.

2647286 Yah, I know that. But most of the time Up-votes are a good indicator of quality. I am fine with some getting missed to uphold a standard. That is why I come to the good lists. Remember, the tagline is "Only the Best" not "All of the best".

The problem is that fifty votes can be gotten on almost any story. I have seen so many fifty to 100 stories that are just meh or downright bad. Using votes as a rating for quality is inherently flawed; but If you are gonna do it, do it right. Anything with under five-hundred is a coin toss, unless you are good at judging covers, as it is. Just look at the feature box. I see things shoot right into it with around that many and they are rarely worth it in my opinion. Not that I pay much attention to that.

I agree with 2641887. I would bump up the restriction before lowering it.

2635135 Except that people often comment and even fave without upvoting.

Also, crossovers have a harder time getting upvotes than any other type of story on the site.

2693722 Hmm. Do they really have a harder time?

Well, that may change my opinion. If the population that reads crossovers is significantly smaller than the general population, than it might make sense to lower the bar. Can you verify this? Crossover readership seems to vary from fandom to fandom as I can see.

I don't see what people leaving comments have to do with this though. I have commented and/or "favorited" without up-voting at times. This was intentional. Some times I am not ready to say the story was good but I also liked it enough to see if it would go anywhere. And some times I leave a comment on a story that I find more "interesting" than "good." If no thumbs-up was left, I would have to assume that the story did not warrant one in the eyes of the commenter.

2696656

Cross-overs often suffer from having a limited fan base, they only attract fans of "thing x" and MLP. So this curbs initial interest a bit.

They also seem to be targets for users who like to downvote based on not liking a concept over actually checking to see if it was executed well or not.

2696690 Yah, I know that first bit. One of my own rules (flexible) is not to read crossovers with stories I know little to nothing about.

I am not sure why the other bit maters. Down votes might dampen interest a little; but if the story is good that should not stop it. The rules don't select based on down-votes anyway. The good Lists, as I have emphasized (2653514, 2635135,) are, as I see it, to provide a filtered selection of good writhing within a limited conceptual scope. I, personally, don't see it as the job of these lists to foster up-and-coming sorties or writers.

To be callous, I don't care if a good story gets downtrodden and missed because of the standards. I don't think these lists are some magical uplifting force for stories and I don't think that not being on these lists will stop a deserving story from being recognized. I come to these lists with the assurance that the stories will be good -- and in this case, crossovers as well -- and that is all I want. I will stand by whatever method makes that happen; whatever that method is.

Respectfuly,
The Smileyrat

P.S. Is Smiles still listening to this thread anyway?

2696763

Always. Just thinking.

2696763

Smiles is always listening! Even to things that don't necessarily make noises.

2696768 Oh good. I was beginning to feel sillier than I already am.

2696656 Want verification? Just browse my stories, that'll verify it. My crossovers have less heat than anything else I've written.

Less bitterly: You've been around a while. You can't be blind to the trends around here. Shipping and clop get the most attention. Stories that have a fairly novel or batshit insane concept get attention IF the story idea is interesting enough and the writer is talented enough and updates regularly.

Crossovers, by comparison, get VERY little love.

Let's take one of my own stories as an example: Mare Wars.

First published July 2012. 840 first-chapter views. 41 likes. 42 favorites.

Now, let's compare that to one of my NON-crossover stories: Let's Be Evil!

First published April 2013. 4,462 first-chapter views. 608 likes. 746 favorites.

And no, LBE was never featured. So it's a fair comparison.

Now, not ALL of my non-crossover stories perform like Let's Be Evil. But it does sort of prove my point: generally speaking, crossovers have a hard time getting any real attention around here unless they're Fallout: Equestria or some kind of really cracked shipping thing.

So yeah, I think even CONSIDERING a story's upvote counter as a criteria for inclusion here is a bad idea. Seeing as the crossovers submitted are evaluated by admins for inclusion regardless, the story itself, not its performance on the site, should be the ONLY criterion that matters.

2698052 Hmm. Based in the averages votes of your crossovers vs. non-crossovers: It seems you are very right.

My quick and poorly checked math comes out with and average of ~163 "non-cross" votes to 39 "cross" votes on your stories. So it seams your crossovers are about one-fourth as popular as your non-cross stories.

Based on that data I would have to agree that lowering the standard, vs. the other good lists, make sense. Well debated.

2585558 50 upvotes! that's outrageous!... or maybe not.

2585558 If it's a story, that has the same plot as a movie but with ponies, is it considered a crossover by these standards?

2757735

Technically, although it'd lose points for lack of originality.

longest reply time ever!

2585558
How long before submissions open back up?

I accidentally submitted my story before it had 50 upvotes! Sorry about that!

Can someone tell me how to get upvotes i have this idea for a crossover but i have zero upvotes i don't know how to get any do i post it on here and wait for people to like it or do i send it to friends.