Posts by Mephistopheles
Oh, this one's a classic. You have a character with an ego so large, it's on the verge of collapsing into an intellectual black hole. You want to make it into a comic relief but instead, end up wit...
I encountered a certain problem while building my world, one that will affect how the story is written: The protagonists never fight by themselves. There are always at least 15-60 military drones ...
As a certain character from Zootopia would put it: "Fear always works." I soon explain it, but first, as per the universal guideline we found here: Because, unlike, Hitler, we can understand...
I feel I've got a huge obstacle, whenever I'm pretending" to be a character and trying to make out how he/she would react. I feel strongly that the mentality of the creator is reflected in his wor...
[Not a Lawyer, nobody's a lawyer here] Double, triple and quadruple down, make them Creative Commons. I don't think said person have copyrighted them, but if she did, that's already grounds for ex...
This time, I'm not really talking about the legal side (that has already been covered a few times here), but more about what the readers and the critics think. The Inheritance Cycle rips off Star ...
Most political humor I see on the internet is usually directed towards persons, and the jokes are relatively easy. However, it's pretty much useless, and temporary, besides, poking at the personal...
So, due to a smaller miracle, a scrapped concept, a badly timed Eragon review from Nostalgia Critic and the SAO abridged came together and created a good "filler" episode concept and a character i...
So, I was writing a test story to see if my tools can work together in the way intended. Few paragraphs into the first chapter and there is a problem: Character A is a scaredy-cat, and I based the...
I think what you're looking for is Emergence. Emergence seems to be a fundamental part of our universe, and it basically means that dumb things can become smarter together. An individual transis...
I often hear the word thrown around, but I don't have any idea of what it is, or how can it be avoided. So, what does "juvenile tone" mean and how can I prevent it?
So, Character d is dying, he got shot in the side with a Pulse Rifle. This is very bad, as Pulse Rifles are in the laser category and their mode of operation is to focus the most energy on t...
Hold Your Hippogriffs: A (more often than not) cringeworthy version of a saying (though can be invented on the spot), that is prone to cause Fatal Death in most readers. But it sounds fun, who wou...
What do I mean? Well, teleporters: "Every room resets. Remember I told you that? Every room reverts to its original condition. Logically, the teleporter should do the same. Teleporter. Fanc...
The problem with killing off a background character is that their very modus operandi eliminates the most effective advice, because they don't have a long "screentime", and we don't know too much a...
If I have a hard time dissecting showing directly, then I just simply ask about the end result: What showing wishes to create in the readers?
Proposition: Stories are information packets aimed to "entertain" people, and just like every other form of communication, they have: A basic and lasting knowledge for interpreting the informatio...
In hard-SF the writer has to adapt to the world and its limitation. Under normal circumstances, this shouldn't a problem, as you can always make something great, even with the limitations. Howeve...
There is a problem with reference jokes in general, and I just couldn't figure out a solution to them. Here's a demonstration: "Watch your step, there could be even more of these." "Mor...
There is a way to achieve uncertainty: Everyone is a rabbit The prime example is Watership Down, a movie about rabbits that kills characters left and right like there's no tomorrow, but so does n...
"The reason you suck speech" is a trope, that is described as: A character gives a speech on why someone or something is shit. And here's an example: Well done. Here come the test results: You...
Shakespeare did it, he did it quite a lot of times, but there are a few problems with it: He was a screenwriter in an age, where we couldn't afford building enough sets (or cities that don't catc...
Set up your POV: Omnipotent: Knows everything already, and isn't constrained by the limits of time and space. First person: Focuses on one person, it tells everything through their eyes and leav...
I think, it fairly depends on how much you "remember" your original story. For instance, when I do battles in X-Com: Long War with long breaks, it usually results in a gigantic mess-up with destro...
Rants and ranters are numerous and pretty damn popular, so I'd just like to ask about a formula or general tips for writing them, without making my readers rage.
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