As a fan fiction writer, no one is safe from the dreaded thumbs down. No one actually desires to obtain them(unless you're a troll fic writer that believes a thumbs down is a sign of a job well done), but it's almost a guarantee that each story will get at least one. Some people will give you a thumbs down for the tiniest detail that contradicts their headcannon, some will do it for the heck of it, and the very first dislike your story gets could very well be because that person just wanted to be the first disliker. However, some topics are almost certain to get you more than just a couple of thumbs down. Topics that will receive you harsh comments and an ugly red bar at the top of your story. I'm going to help you identify those. This lecture is going to be a bit lengthy, but it could drastically help you in your future stories.

First let's talk about OCs. There is quite possibly nothing on this site that could turn your readers hostile more so than OCs. This is a cartoon we all know and love very well, and by an extension, the same could be said about the characters. So one does not simply toss in a character of their own creation to interact with the world and characters we all know and love. It has to be pulled off just the right way. This is especially true when an OC is the main character, which is most of the time. First things first, you need to know how to make a good first impression on readers for an OC story. You know what not only doesn't do that, but makes a HORRIBLE first impression on readers? A little thing called the pony creator. Now, almost all of us has played around with the thing to make our own OC, which is fine. But using a picture of your OC from the pony creator as your story picture? If you dare to do that, be ready for that red bar to grow, because that very, VERY rarely ends well. Do whatever you can to not use it for the story picture. In my opinion, not using a picture at all is likely to do better for you than using the pony creator. Just avoid that thing like the plague when it comes to picking out your story picture.

Next let's talk about the OCs themselves. There is a lot of things that can make readers flat out despise your character. First off, never, and by the name of Celestia I do mean NEVER, make them an alicorn. If you make your main character an alicorn, be ready for that red bar to grow faster than Mario on shrooms. Just don't do it. Ever. Also never give your OC crazy powers or make them better or equals with main characters at their special talent. For example, if your OC is a pegasus, they better not be able to do a sonic rainboom. That's just as bad as making them an alicorn. No one wants to see an OC with crazy powers that make them overpowered or that are alicorns. Why? Because that makes them a Mary Sue. Trust me, no one wants to read a story about a Mary Sue. I can't stress that enough.

So what else could make readers find your OC to be a Mary Sue? One thing is shipping them with main characters. This makes the story seem like a wish fulfillment story the author is making, letting them(being represented by their OC, or themselves being in Equestria) form a relationship with their favorite character. You'll be further criticized if it is with Rainbow Dash, because it's just done way too often. Heck, just making your character good friends with main characters takes establishment. How they became friends needs to be explained in detail. They can't just magically be besties with everypony. That'll make readers ring the Mary Sue alarm. Now keep in mind, giving your OCs relationships with main characters, romantic or not, CAN be pulled off, but it just needs to be well established. In fact, your OC needs to be established as a whole for people to like them. Refer to Klondike's thread on the topic for more on character development.

A few final notes about OCs. Besides just avoiding making them alicorns, also avoid making them too out of the ordinary. Giving them metal wings, demon horns, or a crazy/obnoxious looking color scheme? That'll just accomplish making people find your OC annoying. I know you'll want to make your OC stand out, but don't make them TOO crazy, or it'll just make readers dislike them. Also be careful in giving your OC a "dark" background, because there are a lot of stories that have done that, making it more of an annoying cliche than something that will make people like your OC.

If you can master OCs, then you've gotten over the most hazardous subject that there is in fan fiction. Congrats! But now it's time for the quick fire round. I'm going to go over each category this site has, and warn you about what to avoid for each.

ROMANCE: I've already warned you of the most dangerous thing in this category, shipping OCs with main characters. But another thing to be cautious about is going against insanely popular fannon ships or cannon ships. For the fannon part, this means going against things like Lyra/Bon Bon or Octavia/Vinyl and shipping them with someone else. It can without a doubt be done, just be aware that it could rustle the jimmies of die hard fans of those ships. Then for cannon ships, be careful of making stories about Mrs Cake or Cadence cheating on their husband, because that's something that can really rub people the wrong way. Finally, just remember that no matter what your ship is, make sure to establish how it came to be, and make your couple believable.

SAD: If you want to mark a story as sad, be sure that it can actually accomplish that, and make readers emotional. Giving characters generic "sad" events to go through without taking the time to develop those events to make them emotional, then there won't be any sadness experienced by the reader.

DARK: Similar to sad, make sure your story actually contains dark themes to call for the tag. As a note for both categories, you may want to add some occasional happy scenes or comedy relief so the story isn't just one big bag of depression(or attempted depression).

COMEDY: As the same with the previous two, make sure your story is actually funny. Comedy kind of speaks for itself, just try to make sure your jokes deliver instead of make people roll their eyes and groan.

RANDOM: Pretty much the same as comedy, but more, well, random.

ADVENTURE: Make sure your adventure is actually an entertaining one, and well paced. Don't make your story so fast that it would make Sonic the Hedgehog blush. An adventure is supposed to be epic and gripping. A story where the characters have traveled from Ponyville to the other side of the world in a matter of two paragraphs is by no means epic. Pace yourselves on adventures.

SLICE OF LIFE: As it says in the FAQ, this is where the situation is like that of an everyday experience. Basically something that could go down in the actual show. Ergo, if there's blood, sex, or cussing in your story, don't mark it with this.

CROSSOVER: First and foremost, don't just make a copy and paste of a story/tv show/movie/video game and replace the characters with ponies. Not only is that lazy, but also against the rules. Next, just be aware that some crossovers are easier to identify than others. Pretty much anyone would recognize a crossover with Family Guy, but a crossover with an obscure anime that only the most hardcore Otaku would recognize? Not so much. Now obviously you can still do this crossover, but if a central plot point would only make sense if people know what your story is a crossover with, that could confuse and turn away many readers.

ALTERNATE UNIVERSE: Kind of self explanatory. It just takes some common sense to identify what alternate universes could rub people the wrong way.

HUMAN: There are so many human in equestria stories that this has become a bit of a cliche. Just make sure your humans are in character if it's from something, and if it is you/an OC person, refer to above about what I said about OCs.

GRIDMARK: There are some people that just plain will despise any stories involving ponies getting hacked to pieces. But those aren't your audience. The gridmark fans that you are appealing to will still want a good story, however. Just having mindless violence and shock elements doesn't make a good horror story. Give your story some psychological thrilling aspects to it to compliment the gore, and you'll be golden.

CLOP: This is tough for me to talk about because I'm by no means a clop fan. In fact, I usually avoid anything that has the sex tag on it. It just doesn't appeal to me. If you want some good advice on writing clop, I'd recommend asking someone like SwiperTheFox, but I'd imagine similar rules apply to it as Gridmark. Don't just make it all about the sex, give it a nice romantic story to go with it.

And that about covers it all. Hopefully at least some of this could help you in the future as you continue to grow as a writer.

A most excellent lecture, professor. Even I took a few notes.

From one professor to another let me applaud your lecture. It covers everything writers need to avoid to start off well.

Especially EVERYTHING TO DO WITH OCs! Students I cant stress this enough. DON'T USE ALLICORNS, MARY-SUES, OBNOXIOUS COLORS AND OR FEATURES, WISH FULFILLMENT SHIPPING, OR ANYTHING ELSE SHED COVERED. These are hated with such a passion that I guarantee you that you will have a pack of bloodthirsty readers spamming your inbox with "I FUCKING HATE YOU", (and no I never wrote a Oc story....YET *insert evil laugh here*...but i know this from pre-reading and me being one of those bloodthirsty spammers.) Also, pony creator images are the worst thing you could possibly do to your fic, it sends a message to every readers "rage" gland and it will cause total rape of the dislike button.

Besides shitty HIEs bad OC fics are probably the worst you can find on this site .

Now for your applause Shed.

*clap* *clap* *clap*

Professor, you have just saved my fan foc from being despised. This was an excellent lecture and will definetly help in my story.

I think OCs can be overpowered as long as someone from the main cast can defeat them, preferably the main character. There are a lot of instances in popular series where this is done to great effect. A protagonist being overpowered, however, is not a good thing. You want to root for the character because he triumphs over adversity, not because he can slice one hundred stallions in half just by batting an eyelash.

Overall a very interesting guide, though most of this stuff is common sense. I would like to add that the best way to construct a great story and characters is not to rush anything. If it takes you three months to hone your comedic relief character into a ponified Rob Schneider while still being 100% original, so be it. If it makes people laugh their socks off, then it will be worth it in the end. Trust me.

DARNIT DARNIT DARNIT DARN IT!
I wish I had read this before posting my story, which contains an OC.
Extra powers was the least of my worries with him though.
Pony creator, big problem. Why not throw in another couple for this one?
And I marked it as a comedy, since I didn't know what "Slice of Life" meant. :
I might have some troubles with the Wish Fulfillment too, but at least not with RD.
Again I REALLY wish I had read this BEFORE posting my OC story.

334519 'S OK, mate! We all make mistakes, amirite? You should read all the threads you haven't read, though.

A very interesting and enlightening read. Thank you for the lecture, I shall take all of this into consideration.

330623 Yeah, that's a valid point.

Very nice and informative post. I agree especially with denying the OCs greater power than canon characters. Many a story I see with a pegasus performing a sonic rainboom- sometimes merely days after they learn to fly! A few have humans holding their own- or winning- against ponies like Big Mac or Applejack in a fight of some sort. From what I can tell, both of those ponies are extremely strong, especially in Mac's case, and Applejack's skill in close combat as shown in the season two finale is nothing to sneeze at. No dazed and confused random guy that may or may not have been turned into a pony would be likely to be able to take either of them down without sustaining heavy injuries, if at all.

My own stories either have pony OCs that interact rarely with canon characters or have a manifestation of myself in a major role. My self-insert character does not perform spectacularly in fights, and his capabilities do not match or exceed any of those of the canon characters. Nobody's rung the Sue bell on me yet, and there might be a reason for that.

335830 Well to be fair, Rainbow Dash performed a Sonic Rainboom when she was just a filly--and as far we know she might have done it just mere days after learning to fly too.

335956 That's her cutie mark talent though, isn't it? Still a valid point, yes, but no other pony can do that. According to what I know of the show's lore, the Rainboom is nigh-mythical.

335974 It's my belief that no one else can preform the Sonic Rainboom simply because they do not have the mane coloring that Rainbow Dash has. I believe that other pegasi can preform Sonic Booms however, the coloring being based off their own mane color.

335985 Huh, that's a neat way to think about it.

335991 Yeah, thought about that because when she preforms it, her mane is what leaves the color contrail behind her. I'm honestly fine with characters preforming a Sonic Boom /if/ they condition enough to do so. I attribute Rainbow's first and second Rainboom to the magic of friendship personally, and not her skill or speed of flight. I could go on and on.. but I'm thirsty so I'm going to the store.

336000 Maybe the second, but definitely not the first. She states herself before she performed it that "the only thing she liked more than to go fast was to win" or something like that.

336017 But wasn't she defending Fluttershy's honor? I remember her saying both, that she liked to go fast and win, but she was defending Fluttershy's honor in the race. *Shrug*

336027 Considering she didn't even realize that she had almost caused Fluttershy to fall to her horrible death, I don't think she was really paying much attention to the yellow Pegasus by the time she was executing her Sonic Rainboom

Well, this is a bit awkward...
What if I already have an OC with a 'dark' background? It's pretty cliché, sure, but I don't think it's that bad.
*checks storyline*
Fuck. I actually thought that one had potential.

I would like to remind people in this thread that there is a concept of Deconstruction: where one takes a common trope or topic, breaks it down into it's components and analyses it, often subverting the trope or showing that it isn't as good or bad as it's meant to be. So, in that case, what about a character that is meant to be a deconstruction of Alicorns or OCs in general? It that just going to be thrown out the window without actually giving it a shot?

I say this for two reasons: A) I'm doing a fic with a Alicorn protagonist, and I'm f**king tired of having this stigma of "It's inherently bad because X" being thrown around all the time (and no matter how many negative comments I get about this idea, I am not changing it.), and B) if things were as "Inherently bad" as people make them out to be, why do we have series' like Namco's Tales of that are incredibly well-written and thought provoking despite using a lot of cliché and stock tropes in their first third?

Anyways, sorry if I came off as a complete d**k just then, I just get really passionate and defensive about this sort of thing.

Thank god i read this. Almost published a fic with a pony creator pic on it.

With the OCs that I made, I seem to be improving. But anyway, what colors can be obnoxious?

Gridmark.

This is good advice.

Should've also went over obnoxious color schemes.

I find that if the color of the mane/coat contrasts too much, it looks stupid.

I find that if the mane/coat is red/black, it looks incredibly stupid. (Especially if it's an alicorn ... and fucking god damn, people are still making this shit even today)

I also find that black coats turn me off. There's something about black coats that really bug me ... even if the mane is something other than red.

Oh, and giving ponies stripes also looks fucking retarded. Giving pony characters weird alternating patterns on their coats is just a serious turn off for me. It's just absurd.

What a bout Harems, from what i seen on the show most of the ponies are females so would it be posssible for them to form for the sake of the race.

3954980 Avoid it unless you can pull it off well. (Or if the story you're writing is just clop without plot). Also, try not to use phrases like "for the sake of the race" in your justifications. Usually people (and ponies) don't do things for the sake of the species as a whole, instead they do things for their own sakes.

I see, thank you for the input in keep this in mind, do you have any idea's that might make it work.

3985706

If Dark/Grimdark/Gore are significant elements in your story, then that is what your story is about, and what it should be tagged as.

As for Slice of Life:

Ergo, if there's blood, sex, or cussing in your story, don't mark it with this.

You should probably just remove that tag. Then pay special attention the appropriate hazards mentioned in this lecture.

323642
You want to know how to make a good OC? Devote time and thought to it. Don't give in to the cries of Mary Sue. Just create a character that you think works. It doesn't matter if they're an alicorn, or if they're shipped with a main character. A well-written character is defined first and foremost by their personality traits, and not by their potential level of power or their relationships with other characters, commenters be damned.

These are some dang good rules, and most people would do well to follow them. Notice that I said most people. The novice follows rules. The mark of a master is knowing when and how to break them. So don't avoid these altogether, go write them for practice and just don't publish it. The day you can pull it off, you will have grown massively as a writer. The big question is how do you know when you've pulled it off if you don't share it? The answer, if you're not sure then you're not there yet. Of course, I'm hardly there either so I could just be spouting nonsense. It sure sounds legit though right?

These are some dang good rules, and most people would do well to follow them. Notice that I said most people. The novice follows rules. The mark of a master is knowing when and how to break them. So don't avoid these altogether, go write them for practice and just don't publish it.

This is very sound advice and really should have been something I added at the end of the lecture way back when I wrote it. It was written early on in the group's history and I kind of over exaggerated some points to match the humorous tone most of the lectures had at the time. It's titled hazardous topics but not forbidden topics for a reason. If you think you have something great the delves into one of the things mentioned, go for it. It's been a while since I wrote this, but I remember it being aimed at the new writers joining the group who would be curious as to what topics would likely attract them more flak or not. Don't let I or anyone else stop you from writing something of yours if you think it's truly great just because the topic might usually be unsuccessful for others.