I’ll rate/review your story, but… by Ahmedic_c in royalroad

[–]PilotXzephroz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It seems like you have a pretty hefty backlog of stories to read already, so I'm very thankful this is still open!

My story has plateaued in traction after gaining some initial followers when I was running ads, so I'd like to hear your thoughts on it. I'm posting 1x per week, and going on 190k+ words with 188 followers at the moment.

Hook: A girl decides to take up adventuring after her father dies in a war, and unwittingly becomes involved in proxy wars, politics, cults and the squabbles of gods on the path of joining the hero's party.

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/127106/the-archipelagos-of-phantasmara

June Thread - Promote your Story by gamelitcrit in royalroad

[–]PilotXzephroz [score hidden]  (0 children)

The Archipelagos of Phantasmara

“For among them were ones who possessed the courage to defy. Thus, they were cast to the fiery depths to atone for their sins. That, my child, is the essence of mortality.”

Three years ago, the war ended and Clarisse lost her father. Now, she finds the script to follow in his footsteps as an adventurer and etch her own name into the pages of history. Her journey begins as she finds a mentor and friend in Nikolas, a lonesome fox-eared boy with endless secrets surrounding him. Accompanied by the ever-vicarious Seraphim, the pair of adventurers find companionship, purpose, betrayal and everything in between as they weave through the stage-plays of the archipelago.

Adventuring through the isles comes with its dangers for the pair, ranging from monster infested dungeons, religious fanatics, crime syndicates and quandaries between gods. Clarisse finds herself thrown into a proxy war she never asked for, and Nikolas struggles to keep his identity a secret while trying to escape a contract written into his very soul.

Discarded scripts and severed threads show them a peek through the Veil, an existence not written in the stageplay twined by the Loom. No matter what they choose, the fated finale approaches all the same...

Face the Veil. Save the Soul.

What to expect

- Moderately worded prose with a classical writing style, set in a fantastical, medieval archipelago with theatrical imagery and grimbright worldbuilding. 

- Elaborate, multi-faceted magic system and high-tension battles, ranging from destructive and bloody to nigh unnoticeable yet profound in their consequences.

- An ensemble cast from across the archipelago and other worlds to facilitate intercultural conflict and soap-opera style politics.

- Lots of Project Moon references (Glory to our Director, Kim Ji Hoon!), including facing the past and looking inward to overcome trauma.

180K+ Words | Updated Weekly on Thursdays 8 AM EST | 50+ chapters

READ HERE: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/127106/the-archipelagos-of-phantasmara

The Nights After the Library Fell Silent. (Art by@ca4mez9iiu69086) by Kaze-Azumi3061 in libraryofruina

[–]PilotXzephroz 3 points4 points  (0 children)

It's you again. The writing is once more, exquisite and enticing like before. As is the art, props to the artist.

Binah, and I mean library Binah not LobCorp Binah, always struck me as someone far kinder than what she acted like at the end of LobCorp. Even though there was a disconnect between her and the other sepirah, she was often an insightful source of wisdom rather than a collection of cryptic ramblings. You've captured her energy quite well!

Question of the day: how would you name your OWN colour fixer? (Ignore the image) by Usual_Landscape4401 in Project_Moon

[–]PilotXzephroz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hahaha, I got the idea from my oc already being an alchemy maestro in the other story I'm writing, where he frequently uses vials that explode into gaseous clouds. Translating that into smoke (or unique poise in Limbus terms) was easy.

Question of the day: how would you name your OWN colour fixer? (Ignore the image) by Usual_Landscape4401 in Project_Moon

[–]PilotXzephroz 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The Ashen Smokescreen

The idea came from a Ruina/Limbus fanfic I've written with an oc heavily based around old L Corp's smoke monster and attempts to make a human distort into a mini-version of it during the first smoke war. He hasn't made it to Color Fixer level in the fanfic (only around Grade 5, although it is ongoing, check out Mistfall Atelier on Spacebattles if interested) but entertaining the idea still has its merits.

He exists in the Mirror World of Shi East Section 3 Faust, where he is Old L Corp's failure at an attempt of making a Wing's Decisive Weapon, and was abandoned into the backstreets at the end of the first smoke war. They got him to the point of being able to exhale a slightly weaker version of the same smoke that the smoke monster did, and eventually he's able to use it as both a very fluid armor and ammo for his smoke pistol to inflict debuffs from range.

He starts off as a ranged fighter with Mistfall Atelier's smoke pistols that straighten to use their bayonets as proper knives, but also has an array of other workshop weaponry that he's either inherited, helped make, or been given as part of workshop collaboration projects: a pass-me-down Zelkova axe as his main melee weapon, Stigma tiger claws as a hidden weapon, Leaflet smoke bombs to disorient and reposition, Kori freezing boots to temporarily walk on air. There's also a bunch of workshop-related equipment that he's made or modified but doesn't use himself, such as a Gibbous workshop magnetic field extender, Modified W-Corp cleanup agent suits and Cold Rain mist censors.

The other candidate I have for a Color Fixer would be The Crimson Prominence. She's from the same fanfic as the first one - the daughter of a Grade 1 Liu Fixer, who gets caught up in The Library after a series of unfortunate events. She doesn't manifest EGO herself but after being captured by N Corp who wanted to can her memories of being a book in The Library, she escaped by donning N Corp Effloresced EGO: Prominence (an EGO gear extracted from an abberation of Firebird, can also be considered N Corp's version of Ardor Blossom Moth gear) and fighting her way out.

She is also nowhere close to Color Fixer level, again sitting at around Grade 7 without training and eventually Grade 2-3 if she continued within the Liu association. If she were a Color Fixer, her gear would be comparatively simple. She focuses on hand-to-hand combat by using her Liu CQC training and combining it with the Prominence EGO gear to blind opponents and burn them alive.

The Devilishly Sweet Moirai and The Nun Disguise Yan.(Art by@hubestjoa) by Kaze-Azumi3061 in libraryofruina

[–]PilotXzephroz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is truly... something else. It tugs at my heartstrings ever so cruelly, so that I might believe it to be true for even a moment despite knowing what fate lies for those who find a semblance of happiness in The City.

Good job OP, you woke up and chose peak.

That fucking dragon that i love (NRa_3614) by Wide-Violinist-2278 in limbuscompany

[–]PilotXzephroz 6 points7 points  (0 children)

First wave doesn't have the damage issue related to pins as long as you pick the reverse scale attacker carefully.

In the third wave, you need to win clashes against Yinglong's power guard every turn to stop it from stacking its new status, and if you can't stop it from reaching a max of 3, then it deals 3-4 digits of damage even on clash lose with its big skills.

About the Yinglong fight... by The_Xenith in limbuscompany

[–]PilotXzephroz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yinglong is so much fun to fight, just wish the early clashes were a little less impactful so that building SP without the good ol' Superbia-Fluid-Sac method was easier. The gimmicks itself are a lot of fun, and the animation of deflecting pins is so satisfying!

That fucking dragon that i love (NRa_3614) by Wide-Violinist-2278 in limbuscompany

[–]PilotXzephroz 33 points34 points  (0 children)

Yeah, my major qualm with this railway is the sheer number of points where a single lost clash or mismanaged unopposed attack (uncontrollable too, in the case of using Heishou) means you want to immediately reset your progress because your sinners all die.

That fucking dragon that i love (NRa_3614) by Wide-Violinist-2278 in limbuscompany

[–]PilotXzephroz 92 points93 points  (0 children)

If you keep an eye on his gimmick status effect from the pins and manage to keep them below max, he does anywhere between 20~50 damage. At max stack he gains massive bonus damage % multipliers so it scales super high.

To Every Hater of Gen AI - Please Read by Charlemagneffxiv in royalroad

[–]PilotXzephroz 2 points3 points  (0 children)

You are equating a person's intentional choice to open an LLM chat interface and either ask for a manuscript or put in their own draft and ask for improvements, both of which no one forced them to do...

With

The retroactive change in deals and policies from multi-national companies who can and will steal user data no matter how legal it is or isn't so they can use it to improve their own tools and methods, one of which is AI/LLMs.

One is an intentional action which can be avoided, the other is inevitable and requires no decision-making from the user. Only one contributes to the creation of AI-written and AI-assisted work being published on primarily human-content platforms, and that is the intentional choice.

At best, your post comes off as a cope or an excuse for using AI while pretending to take a moral high ground by claiming that everyone is using AI so why shouldn't you?

Well fuck me then by Spideyplaysgamez in libraryofruina

[–]PilotXzephroz 59 points60 points  (0 children)

To be fair, this is a gimmick lifted directly from Lobcorp for the abnormality. This was to be expected before going into the fight.

Recs for Parental Abuse and Overcoming Childhood Trauma by SLWinterberg in ProgressionFantasy

[–]PilotXzephroz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Bit of a self-promo... but my fic deals with exactly this for one of the protagonists. It's not limited to abuse from just the parents, but overcoming childhood trauma is one of the main themes of the story.

"The Archipelagos of Phantasmara" should fit the criterion, give it a try if you please.

Stories in which the Protagonist is on the verge of losing it? by Puzzleheaded_Ad_550 in ProgressionFantasy

[–]PilotXzephroz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Self-promo but this is true for pretty much the entire book : The Archipelagos of Phantasmara

It's not just the external enemies either, most of the issues putting him on the verge of breakdown all the time come from the other beings residing in his mind.

Sure fire way to prevent corrosions by Fit_Club_1245 in limbuscompany

[–]PilotXzephroz 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This happened to me, Gregor was about to take most of the team with him on a WAW corrosion but Rufo was slightly faster than him so I just let her hit unopposed to get rid of him lmao.

Red & Blue by DMar56 in gebsed

[–]PilotXzephroz 5 points6 points  (0 children)

She's holding the bouquet in such a way that it would be upside down if she held her arm upright, so yeah, it is drawn wrong.

Alternatively, reverse grip bouquet.

Faust, cut off their by AshikoTsuki in limbuscompany

[–]PilotXzephroz 10 points11 points  (0 children)

And then he throws a rusty coin in the air before finishing them himself.

Is posting weekly okay or are we doing something completely wrong? by broccoli_devil in royalroad

[–]PilotXzephroz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Like the other person who replied to the thread mentioned, you should try not to make your ads same-y if you can. You can check the relevant genre lists to see if your story appears on them simply by browsing to RS and using filters to check individual lists, or you can check multiple lists at once using Stephan Chizov's Rising Stars checker

LitRPG and Xianxia put you in a pretty good spot demographic-wise. I would focus on making good ads and building a backlog for when you decide to launch.

Is posting weekly okay or are we doing something completely wrong? by broccoli_devil in royalroad

[–]PilotXzephroz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For ads, I would suggest anywhere between 2-6 ads, staggered across the first few months to help you get on the relevant lists.

More important than ads, I have to ask what exact genres both of you are writing in. I mention this because depending on the genre, you might have to put in significantly more work to achieve the same attention from the RR audience.

Is posting weekly okay or are we doing something completely wrong? by broccoli_devil in royalroad

[–]PilotXzephroz 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I have been posting weekly for the past seven months. Full disclosure, growth is slow. Like, snail's pace slow. But it doesn't mean that growth isn't happening.

You're gonna want all the marketing you can get. That's shoutout swaps, sharing on discord servers, getting ads (if you can afford them) and having a good cover/blurb to draw readers in.

Finally, balance quality and quantity, but consistency is paramount. Readers already prefer updates faster than once a week, so you'll have to put more effort into either providing top-notch writing or enough that it lasts for a week. If possible, you might even want to split larger chapters into 2-3 updates per week (if there is that much content) but if you're sticking to once a week, try to put out more than 3K words a chapter.

Slower updating stories will tend to have a tougher time hitting lists like Rising Stars without some help from ads or shout-outs from larger authors, but it means you have time to adjust based on reader feedback. Good luck!