Dear Yuletide writer
Oct. 27th, 2012 02:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
liriYuletide!
General preferences: There are always exceptions, but in general, I prefer hopeful endings; that doesn't mean everything needs to be tied up neatly into a bow, just that I'd prefer my fic not to end on a dark note. Angst is fine, despair isn't. Genre-wise, just about anything other than darkfic is fine by me; domestic fluff, plotty whatever-you-want, plotless character study, PWP smut, explicit sex of the "this is more awkward than sexy" variety (the only kind I write!) or whatever else. Any rating is fine!
Note: Updated as of Sunday, Nov. 4th. In the wee hours of the morning, Pacific time.
Holiday fic note: I'm a godless heathen but culturally Christian, and my family always made a big deal out of Christmas. My husband is Jewish and spends a lot of December being grumpy whenever we walk into a store, even though he also adapts Christmas carols into silly songs he sings to our cats year-round. So while I have holiday fic prompts below (mostly for Tiger & Bunny, for reasons fans of the series will understand) I totally understand not wanting to write holiday fic. I welcome it if that's what you want to write, I'm fine with you inventing Yule or Winter Veil or what-have-you-traditions for FF6 or the Suiko-verse if the mood strikes you, but it's not something I'm expecting in any way.
FF6: I'm sorry to be difficult, but I ship Locke and Terra like I ship nothing else. If you write me romance about these two I will love you forever and seriously consider naming my firstborn after you. If you don't feel you can do that, gen focusing on a close friendship is fine. I'd rather have the focus be on their closeness, rather than "gosh, we're such great friends, we wouldn't want to screw this up with romance or anything," and I really don't want any mentions of either of them being romantically involved with anyone else in the present. (I've written other pairings for both, but it was difficult.) I'd rather have something I can take as pre-relationship even if to unbiased eyes it reads as thoroughly non-romantic, if that makes sense?
Unless you too have shipped a really rare pair, you can't understand how starved I am for fic of these two I didn't write myself. That said, you can feel free to throw in any of the nominated or non-nominated characters if the mood strikes you; I really like Terra and Celes as friends, and I love the whole cast. I also love explorations of magic and Espers, particularly given Terra's family ties; Ifrit and Maduin seem to resemble each other, at least to me, and the magic Terra learns on her own has a lot of overlap with the spells taught by Phoenix. If I had to pick just one character for you to focus on, it would be Terra. She's my favorite character out of anything, ever; if I weren't such a wimp I'd probably have her tattooed somewhere on my body by now.
Prompts:
Tiger & Bunny: I selected all the nominated characters because I love everyone in this series. EVERYONE. If you want to bring in characters who weren't nominated, you can do that! If you want to focus on any subset of the nominated characters, you can do that too! In contrast to FF6, I'm a dedicated multishipper for this fandom, and I love gen, too; they could make an entire second season of all the heroes hanging out in the training center talking and I would watch it religiously. Within the nominated characters: I ship Kotetsu and Barnaby, like the bulk of the fandom. I also ship Kotetsu/Barnaby/Karina, not so much like the rest of the fandom, and as a result I'm pretty fond of Kotetsu/Karina (once she's in her mid-twenties or so and the age difference is a bit less jaw-dropping) and Barnaby/Karina. I like Nathan/Kotetsu, too, if it's somewhere in the period between Tomoe's death and Barnaby's debut, as a kind of friends-with-benefits arrangement; I love that they seem so comfortable together. I also really enjoy Nathan and Karina's friendship, and would love gen with the two of them (Pao-lin presence optional, but welcome.)
One caveat: For some reason, I'm okay with pairings that conflict with Kotetsu/Barnaby as long as there's no pining ("I'm in love with him but he's straight") or rejection between the two. I'd prefer not to have the idea of them being together raised just to be ruled out.
Okay, second caveat: I really don't care for the popular fandom notion that Karina and Barnaby are constantly at each other's throats. I know about That Drama CD, but the series itself shows them coexisting peacefully in episode 14, and I just don't find the idea of them catfighting over Kotetsu nearly as entertaining as everyone else seems to. In general, I don't have much patience for the bits of fanon that seem to have accumulated from the drama CDs and manga adaptations, particularly overplaying the "Trollaby" characterization.
Prompts:
Justice League: I shipped John and Shayera SO HARD when I was first watching the series; I was stunned when it went canon, more stunned by "Star-Crossed," and essentially swore off JLU at the time because of Shayera's absence. I've been catching up on it since then, but I'm slow, and will probably continue to be slow unless I'm assigned to write JLU and have to mainline the canon. No need to worry about spoiling me, but there's also no need to worry about being totally up-to-date on canon details for the JLU part of things.
I've never really explored fanfic for it, so I don't what kind of things have been done to death, and I've also never read any of the related comics, so I don't know what's happened in them; you can feel free to disregard them or not as you see fit. I'd really like something shippy, whether set in the window between them getting together and "Starcrossed," or something post-series, after John and Mari go their separate ways. I'll try to come up with a gen-ish prompt or two, since I know insisting on romance is frowned upon, but it's a little difficult when they're this thoroughly canon.
Prompts:
Suikoden III: The Zexen Knights were unquestionably my favorite part of the game. Game canon only, please! The manga's characterization of the knights, Chris in particular, infuriated me. I ship Chris and Salome, but gen with any combination of the nominated characters (and any other knights I couldn't fit into my nomination, if you want) is more than welcome. I'd really prefer that Chris have a significant role, even if you choose to focus primarily on one of the other characters; she's one of my favorite characters of all time. I'm always interested in runic magic, and especially with Chris, given the personal baggage of the True Water Rune, and the fact that Chris both is and isn't an ice queen - I certainly think she projects that persona deliberately at times, but she never seems cold or repressed when dealing with people she knows well, including the other knights.
You should also feel free to make Chris the Flame Champion, if that's how you prefer to write her; it's how I played the game the first time through. Please, nothing romantic with Nash or Hugo; you can have them around if you want (they're both important relationships) but having Chris romantically involved with either one squicks me like you wouldn't believe.
General preferences: There are always exceptions, but in general, I prefer hopeful endings; that doesn't mean everything needs to be tied up neatly into a bow, just that I'd prefer my fic not to end on a dark note. Angst is fine, despair isn't. Genre-wise, just about anything other than darkfic is fine by me; domestic fluff, plotty whatever-you-want, plotless character study, PWP smut, explicit sex of the "this is more awkward than sexy" variety (the only kind I write!) or whatever else. Any rating is fine!
Note: Updated as of Sunday, Nov. 4th. In the wee hours of the morning, Pacific time.
Holiday fic note: I'm a godless heathen but culturally Christian, and my family always made a big deal out of Christmas. My husband is Jewish and spends a lot of December being grumpy whenever we walk into a store, even though he also adapts Christmas carols into silly songs he sings to our cats year-round. So while I have holiday fic prompts below (mostly for Tiger & Bunny, for reasons fans of the series will understand) I totally understand not wanting to write holiday fic. I welcome it if that's what you want to write, I'm fine with you inventing Yule or Winter Veil or what-have-you-traditions for FF6 or the Suiko-verse if the mood strikes you, but it's not something I'm expecting in any way.
FF6: I'm sorry to be difficult, but I ship Locke and Terra like I ship nothing else. If you write me romance about these two I will love you forever and seriously consider naming my firstborn after you. If you don't feel you can do that, gen focusing on a close friendship is fine. I'd rather have the focus be on their closeness, rather than "gosh, we're such great friends, we wouldn't want to screw this up with romance or anything," and I really don't want any mentions of either of them being romantically involved with anyone else in the present. (I've written other pairings for both, but it was difficult.) I'd rather have something I can take as pre-relationship even if to unbiased eyes it reads as thoroughly non-romantic, if that makes sense?
Unless you too have shipped a really rare pair, you can't understand how starved I am for fic of these two I didn't write myself. That said, you can feel free to throw in any of the nominated or non-nominated characters if the mood strikes you; I really like Terra and Celes as friends, and I love the whole cast. I also love explorations of magic and Espers, particularly given Terra's family ties; Ifrit and Maduin seem to resemble each other, at least to me, and the magic Terra learns on her own has a lot of overlap with the spells taught by Phoenix. If I had to pick just one character for you to focus on, it would be Terra. She's my favorite character out of anything, ever; if I weren't such a wimp I'd probably have her tattooed somewhere on my body by now.
Prompts:
- Bonding during their travel together between the sack of Vector and Kefka's assault on Thamasa, whether gen, shippy, or somewhere in between.
- Angst over confronting Kefka and Terra potentially sacrificing herself.
- Shippy fic post-game, with the two of them finally getting together.
- One of them is involved in the other's decision to rejoin the party, whether it's Locke coming to Mobliz to recruit Terra, or Terra talking to Locke in the Phoenix Cave or on the way to Kohlingen afterwards.
- Terra character study, with or without interaction with Locke.
Tiger & Bunny: I selected all the nominated characters because I love everyone in this series. EVERYONE. If you want to bring in characters who weren't nominated, you can do that! If you want to focus on any subset of the nominated characters, you can do that too! In contrast to FF6, I'm a dedicated multishipper for this fandom, and I love gen, too; they could make an entire second season of all the heroes hanging out in the training center talking and I would watch it religiously. Within the nominated characters: I ship Kotetsu and Barnaby, like the bulk of the fandom. I also ship Kotetsu/Barnaby/Karina, not so much like the rest of the fandom, and as a result I'm pretty fond of Kotetsu/Karina (once she's in her mid-twenties or so and the age difference is a bit less jaw-dropping) and Barnaby/Karina. I like Nathan/Kotetsu, too, if it's somewhere in the period between Tomoe's death and Barnaby's debut, as a kind of friends-with-benefits arrangement; I love that they seem so comfortable together. I also really enjoy Nathan and Karina's friendship, and would love gen with the two of them (Pao-lin presence optional, but welcome.)
One caveat: For some reason, I'm okay with pairings that conflict with Kotetsu/Barnaby as long as there's no pining ("I'm in love with him but he's straight") or rejection between the two. I'd prefer not to have the idea of them being together raised just to be ruled out.
Okay, second caveat: I really don't care for the popular fandom notion that Karina and Barnaby are constantly at each other's throats. I know about That Drama CD, but the series itself shows them coexisting peacefully in episode 14, and I just don't find the idea of them catfighting over Kotetsu nearly as entertaining as everyone else seems to. In general, I don't have much patience for the bits of fanon that seem to have accumulated from the drama CDs and manga adaptations, particularly overplaying the "Trollaby" characterization.
Prompts:
- Holiday fic focusing on Barnaby, set just about anytime, including pre-series. Christmas with Maverick? I like the interpretation that Maverick genuinely cared about Barnaby (at one point) and wouldn't mind seeing that as at least part of a fic. The final scenes of the series take place on Christmas Eve, so what was the Christmas that followed like? Or further post-series holidays. Kaede-has-two-daddies fic is so very welcome, as is Kotetsu/Barnaby/Karina OT3 fic (Kaede-has-two-daddies-and-a-stepmom?) or Kotetsu and Barnaby as family while Barnaby's happily involved with someone else.
- Holiday fic involving anyone, really - you can have characters suffering through company Christmas parties or Hero TV holiday specials, you can go all out with Xmas-romance cliches, whatever you want.
- I did say I'm a multi-shipper, so just throwing out a handful of pairings involving non-nominated characters: Karina/Pao-lin, Karina/Keith, Nathan/Antonio, Nathan/Keith, Nathan/whoever-the-hell-he-wants, Ivan/Pao-lin, Barnaby/Muramasa... and I should probably keep it so that at least half the pairing was nominated.
- Nathan! Nathan's my favorite character. I love that he's the most perceptive and cerebral of the heroes, that he owns his own (enormous) company, and that for all the ass-grabbing jokes he has clear depth as a character. Backstory, character study, whatever you want if you feel like writing about him.
- Karina character study would also be fantastic. I feel like she has so much potential as a character, which largely gets drowned out in the second half of the series as the writing focuses on playing her feelings for Kotetsu for laughs.
Justice League: I shipped John and Shayera SO HARD when I was first watching the series; I was stunned when it went canon, more stunned by "Star-Crossed," and essentially swore off JLU at the time because of Shayera's absence. I've been catching up on it since then, but I'm slow, and will probably continue to be slow unless I'm assigned to write JLU and have to mainline the canon. No need to worry about spoiling me, but there's also no need to worry about being totally up-to-date on canon details for the JLU part of things.
I've never really explored fanfic for it, so I don't what kind of things have been done to death, and I've also never read any of the related comics, so I don't know what's happened in them; you can feel free to disregard them or not as you see fit. I'd really like something shippy, whether set in the window between them getting together and "Starcrossed," or something post-series, after John and Mari go their separate ways. I'll try to come up with a gen-ish prompt or two, since I know insisting on romance is frowned upon, but it's a little difficult when they're this thoroughly canon.
Prompts:
- How does sex work with wings? How does sleeping on Earth-beds work with wings? (No need for it to be explicit, though that's fine too)
- Does John ever mention their future kid to Shayera? (...that's an honest question. I don't know if he does in canon.)
- On a more gen-ish front, early-series interaction between the two of them
- What are Shayera's living arrangements like? How did she get started as a superhero on Earth, since at least one other person (maybe Wally?) recognizes Hawkgirl in the premiere?
Suikoden III: The Zexen Knights were unquestionably my favorite part of the game. Game canon only, please! The manga's characterization of the knights, Chris in particular, infuriated me. I ship Chris and Salome, but gen with any combination of the nominated characters (and any other knights I couldn't fit into my nomination, if you want) is more than welcome. I'd really prefer that Chris have a significant role, even if you choose to focus primarily on one of the other characters; she's one of my favorite characters of all time. I'm always interested in runic magic, and especially with Chris, given the personal baggage of the True Water Rune, and the fact that Chris both is and isn't an ice queen - I certainly think she projects that persona deliberately at times, but she never seems cold or repressed when dealing with people she knows well, including the other knights.
You should also feel free to make Chris the Flame Champion, if that's how you prefer to write her; it's how I played the game the first time through. Please, nothing romantic with Nash or Hugo; you can have them around if you want (they're both important relationships) but having Chris romantically involved with either one squicks me like you wouldn't believe.
- Chris/Salome: navigating a relationship given some of the obstacles in their way (the fact he's her second-in-command, her immortality and his lack of it...)
- Percival's return, post-game - why he comes out of retirement, when, how he returns and how they all react.
- Something set earlier, before Chris becomes captain - she's the youngest of the knights, though close in age to Borus and Percival, so what was it like having her as the rookie?
- Squire-era fic about Chris, Borus and Percival.
- Have them tackle the issue of the traitors on the Council, and the general corruption in Zexen government. The RIGHT way, not the integrity-free way the manga did it.