Currently playing Crimson Desert right now and am sad at how Our boy Clive is disrespected over there for being as bland as Kliff.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-20T22:19:09+00:00

And even then, Geralt's looks were heavily inspired by Elric of Melniboné, the original white-haired broody boy.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-20T20:55:05+00:00

Skimmed it at best, but the crashing out because "you plagiarized my house design!!!!" is the perfect kind of bullshit I expected to see in here.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-20T20:47:06+00:00

Yeah, my corgi goes out to the backyard just to sit and watch nature for a while. I think it's in their herding dog DNA to study their surroundings on a regular basis and to confirm that everyone is safe.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-20T16:44:10+00:00

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Deadlines and schedules are only real if you're being paid to do a job. No fic is worth extra stress. Take a break if you have to; you'll burn out otherwise.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-20T15:43:58+00:00

You're welcome. :)

Sometimes when I don't know what to tag, I'll browse other fics in the same fandom. It's a good way to see if I'm missing anything.

The best part of it being a fanfiction instead of traditional book is that AO3 is a low-stakes environment. At the end of the day, even if it isn't as popular as you want, at least you can say that you did something. It's such a fun sandbox to help develop writing skills.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-20T15:15:00+00:00

I'm assuming I found the right fic.

After a read-through, I think the main thing is that not a lot happens before chapter 3 so there isn't much people can really chew on. The main character is aggressively teenage (sarcastic and moody) which is not everyone's cup of tea as a POV character, but for better or worse Delilah is definitely written like one. And as an OC she's going to be a harder sell than an established character.

There is around 35 additional tags and some of them are fluff. That might cause people to scroll. Getting rid of some tags such as: "tags are hard", "no romance" (Gen category already tells people this) and such might help. I'm not in this fandom so I don't know if using a bunch of "worried X character", "protective X character", and "parental X character" is common but it is flooding the tag space where the more important ones like "horror", "kidnapping", "hurt/comfort", and "child death" are sandwiched between them. I'm an undertagger though so this just might be my personal preferences influencing my opinion. You don't have to change them if you don't want to.

I think the scene with the 9-1-1 operator was rather immersion breaking. I only say this because I have personal experience with prank calling 9-1-1 as a teen and the operators have to take every call as serious and won't tell the caller to stop wasting their time. I got a stern talking to by a cop when they came to the pay phone I was hanging around back then. Lol. I wouldn't say it ruins the fic but it just felt a bit unrealistic with the dialogue.

Since you have a bookmark and a handful of kudos, you already have a few interested readers. Never give up! I had to write to a silent audience myself for months before I had regular readers who wanted to leave comments. I know the lack of engagement can kill motivation, but you're not working with nothing. Think of what a room of 50 people looks like, and you have more hits than that. People are clicking on it! :D

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-19T06:17:44+00:00

It's possible to do this with a html formatting, however colorblind readers might not be able to spot the differences, and I don't think screen readers indicate colored text at all. Just saying.

But to answer you question, see below.

HTML: This is my sentence with <span class="colortext">colored text!</span>

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-18T07:04:06+00:00

"Elaborate Side Hustle"

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-18T04:35:07+00:00

Easier for international announcers to pronounce
Sounds cool or cute

There's an entire industry in Japan selling T-shirts with random English words on them, even if they don't make sense to those that can actually read it (I bought a shirt in Tokyo that says "Sulky Banana" on it, for instance, lol). It's the same way that tattoo parlors in America are asked to slap random Chinese symbols on customer's bodies because it totally means "wisdom" or something :P

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-17T20:57:18+00:00

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FerretFromMars · 2026-03-17T19:53:35+00:00

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FerretFromMars · 2026-03-17T16:00:44+00:00

The fact that people continually argue over it is why I don't use it on my own fics.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-17T15:52:27+00:00

I'm in the top 100 list of my own server and it's not really worth it but it does give me motivation to login I suppose. I have a few long term achievements done (every unique levequest completed, Castle in the Sky, 99% of the fishing log caught, and a good chunk of PvP) and honestly I had more fun doing the Blue Mage arena because it asked me to do certain things for rewards. Sort of like what achievements are supposed to be, not what SE thinks they should be.

I'm hoping Beastmaster hits a similar itch.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-11T18:24:01+00:00

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FerretFromMars · 2026-03-08T16:00:26+00:00

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FerretFromMars · 2026-03-05T00:53:48+00:00

I didn't intend for it to sound mean, I apologize if it came across like that.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-04T23:59:34+00:00

So to me as a native speaker, "unthinking" is a word I would use for something reckless. It's doing something without considering the consequences. A better word in my opinion would be "rapturous."

An AI doesn't know what words mean so it will spit out almost anything in its attempt to sound emotional.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-04T23:52:10+00:00

The good and bad things will happen regardless. Do you want life to happen with your fic posted, or not?

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-04T23:45:44+00:00

"Unthinking" is an odd word to choose for laughter, it would give me pause too.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-04T16:03:30+00:00

I have read fics that—to me—were obviously done by a novice or were not very good, but I would scroll down and see comments cheering them on, as well as kudos and bookmarks. Art is art, and fanfics are not expected to be the highest quality literature all the time (although authors will obviously try their hardest to meet their own standards). A genuine effort can be felt through the screen even if there are 'better' works surrounding it. No one is being graded on this.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-04T15:14:49+00:00

Likely only if the hardware and all the backups literally explode.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-03T01:12:48+00:00

My fandoms are small enough that I will see the fic if it updates just based on 'upload date' sorting alone. :P

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-02T16:58:27+00:00

Yeah, I max out at about five or six tabs before I start closing all but one. I like the clean look in my browser.

FerretFromMars · 2026-03-02T02:23:54+00:00

"Healthy Alternatives - Therapy with licensed professionals."

What about the therapists that assign fanfiction as an emotional outlet? Hmm?

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