The Anti-Guide

How do you try to improve your writing?

I try to avoid old, stupid things.	17.5%	[ 2292 ]
I add new things.	14.9%	[ 1951 ]
A combination of both (if one more than the other, pick it).	67.6%	[ 8852 ]
Total Votes:			[ 13095 ]

[hecate-athena]

Marissa Suezette Shadowen Hellfire Blackrose! Mmyes.

[wingnut the improbable]

Fantasy names must end in -ae, -en, or -is. Like... Ravenae. Or Shadowen. Or... p***s xd I can't believe I just wrote that XD

[Jasper Riddle]

wingnut the improbable

Fantasy names must end in -ae, -en, or -is. Like... Ravenae. Or Shadowen. Or... p***s xd I can't believe I just wrote that XD

I would love to see a warrior-barbarian named p***s....

[wingnut the improbable]

Oh yeah- sci-fi characters' names must either be real technilogical or dangerous-sounding words ("Pixel", "Death", "USB Port" wink or be overloaded with x's and unpronouncable ("Exgxhxogoxieghxoexjgrx", "Jdxgxsoxihxgxisuxhgwxiuxh", or "Egxoihxeiguxwsxfha" wink . *thinks about naming a character USB Port and decides against it*

[Evelyn Falcon]

Easy as pie. Just remember, during medieval times, all women went around in next to nothing and were highly respected. They held high positions such as knights and mages, and had all of the freedoms they have today. But if you want to write about them being oppressed (why would you want to do that?) you have to remember that they always dressed in rags and had to act like boys to have the higher positions and boys always had just the biggest cleavage back then.

[Morizawa]

Whenever it is a medieval story with knights, the code of chivalry plays no part in it. Knights just go around willy nilly and just knock the crap out of dragons and dragons alone, they never actually go and help women in distress(example of what not to do would be Lancelot saving a woman from her drunken husband), it is stated in the rules of being a knight to do so buuuut.... noone really cares about anything but "KILL KILL KILL DRAGONS DRAGONS DRAGONS."

[Xerdra]

On cooking:

If, for any reason, a character ends up making a meal for some of the other characters the character cooking will either be good at it or terrible at it. If they're good at it, they could be a professonal chef if they decided to. Also, everyone will rave over how good the food is; no one will think "it's alright but it needed a little more chili powder". If, on the other hand, they're bad at it, you must make them out to be The World's Worst Cook! (yes, in caps with the exclamation mark) and able to ruin a perfectly good peice of produce just by pealing it (or cutting into it, if it's something you wouldn't peal). Moreover, their level of skill must be the same for cooking anything.

[hecate-athena]

Well of course. Everything is about extremes. Gray zones don't exist in anything. That would confuse your readers. Everything must be point-blank, simple, and simple enough so that even the least-educated moron can understand it.

[KiwiOfDestruction]

hecate-athena

Well of course. Everything is about extremes. Gray zones don't exist in anything. That would confuse your readers. Everything must be point-blank, simple, and simple enough so that even the least-educated moron can understand it.

DUH! The good guy has never done anything bad. The bad guy has never done anything good. They are either amazingly beautiful or butt-ugly. They are either the reincarnation of Einstein or their IQ is 45. This is how everyone good does it.

[hecate-athena]

Yep. No such thing as over-inflated confidence either. It's perfectly fine to let your ego balloon get as big as Nebraska. Or Texas. Or if you're really ambitious, you can go for wntire continents.

[Wendy_Chan]

Jasper Riddle

wingnut the improbable

Fantasy names must end in -ae, -en, or -is. Like... Ravenae. Or Shadowen. Or... p***s xd I can't believe I just wrote that XD

I would love to see a warrior-barbarian named p***s....

I LOLed. I feel like an idiot. xd

[KiwiOfDestruction]

Male pregnancy=OMGTEHAWSUMNESS!!ONEONE11!!!1!

Don't bother explaining how it's physically possible for a man to have a baby without ovaries or a uterus, or why, if it's possible for a man to have babies, do women even exist in this society.


That reminds me: don't bother explaining anything. Especially if it makes no sense whatsoever.

[hecate-athena]

I swear, I'm going to name a character in my next story that, or something that sounds like it xd .

And it's magic. Magic can explain everything. Just have them down a potion, and they're all set!

[Teloss]

There is absolutely nothing better to add suspense to your story than by including several "top secret organizations". You'll probably need to explicitly say that they ARE "top secret organizations" so that the reader doesn't get confused.

[JessieWings]

Jessie the Awesome says:
When writing historical fiction, or even historical non-fiction, research is unnecessary. Queen Elizabeth I never married, but in your story, she can have six husbands!

While bad guys are allowed to become good guys, good guys are not allowed to become bad guys unless they're hypnotised or brainwashed. If people became bad guys without being forced, then the bad guys would seem less bad!

Heroes CAN survive on really cold mountains with no protection against the cold better than a cardigan. Duh. Heroes can do anything!

Heroes are, naturally, immune to hypnotism. Your heroine, however, must be particularly prone to hypnotism, to make a nice contrast.

Your heroine must never be more skilled than your hero. She is allowed to be more powerful than your hero, but only if she can't control it/she doesn't know it/it provides an excuse to have the hero be OMGSOKEWL and save her from some bad guy who wants to exploit your powers.

Your hero can never be an average person. He must always come from either a rich family, an abusive family, or an enslaved family.

Robots are incapable of rebelling against humanity, except when they're murderous robots who have no reason to rebel. Remember: most robots love being slaves to humans.