FANFIC RANTING! BAD FANFICS MAKE ANGRY!

[Ellen Kuhfeld]

Ranting due to extreme frustration while fic searching.

I still cannot figure out why the Naruto fanfiction section is so, utterly, utterly, horrible ...

Not a rant - but the highest level FFnet section I've found is the Terry Pratchett stories. You just cannot divorce the writers from the demographic interacting with The Source. I guess to be properly inspired by Pratchett, you need to love words and their uses. That makes for better writers.

What that says about Naruto fans, well, I don't go to the Naruto section. I don't know what the stories are like. You've given me little incentive to investigate.

[mondu_the_fat]

I never browse through the Naruto section at ff.net.

Instead, I go look for recommendation threads, then read the comments on the fics and skip any recommendation that's only a link, or someone else complains about.

The 3 Naruto recommendation threads at Spacebattles is a good place to start.

http://forum.spacebattles.com/showthread.php?t=144783

There's also one at TFF, although after consecutively clicking on three recommended stories that turned out to be yaoi (with no warning) I tend to take things said there with a grain of salt.

[Yrael]

I never browse through the Naruto section at ff.net.

Instead, I go look for recommendation threads, then read the comments on the fics and skip any recommendation that's only a link, or someone else complains about.

The 3 Naruto recommendation threads at Spacebattles is a good place to start.

http://forum.spacebattles.com/showthread.php?t=144783

There's also one at TFF, although after consecutively clicking on three recommended stories that turned out to be yaoi (with no warning) I tend to take things said there with a grain of salt.

Many, many thanks for the link.

[Comartemis]

There's also the Fanfic Recommendation pages on TV Tropes. Lots and lots of fics from dozens of shows and books, and 95% of them are winners. The other 5% are horrendous, but these are clearly marked with warnings like "reading this will give you a new appreciation for bad fanfiction" or something similar.

[Sky]

There's also the Fanfic Recommendation pages on TV Tropes. Lots and lots of fics from dozens of shows and books, and 95% of them are winners. The other 5% are horrendous, but these are clearly marked with warnings like "reading this will give you a new appreciation for bad fanfiction" or something similar.

That's an awesome list, Comartemis!

I also will admit that I don't browse for stories much. PCHeintz72's updates and recommendation threads do very well.

I do wish there was an easier way to filter the wheat from the chaff, especially in Full Metal Alchemist fan fiction, but I seem to do well by setting character, length and word filters.

[Ellen Kuhfeld]

I do wish there was an easier way to filter the wheat from the chaff, especially in Full Metal Alchemist fan fiction, but I seem to do well by setting character, length and word filters.

I don't even bother with stories having illiterate synopses. With what's left over, I look at the first few screens for illiteracy, stupidity, and overused scenes. That filters out the majority of troubles. A read of the first chapter then separates sheep from goats.

[camk4evr]

I still cannot figure out why the Naruto fanfiction section is so, utterly, utterly, horrible when compared to the other sections I frequent on FF.net (Ranma, Love Hina, and a few others). Generally, the majority of the stories posted are at least readable, but the Naruto section....I really wonder sometimes why these authors are posting this drivel and trying to pass it off as Naruto fanfiction.

There's a couple of reasons, off the top of my head, why there's so much crappy Naruto Fanfics on FF.net compared to Live Hina, Ranma and others:

1. It's very popular right now. Naruto, being the latest Big Thing in anime, has 'inspired' a lot of new writers. Unfortunately, most of the new writers suck. Fortunately, some of them will improve with time while some of the others will quit. Eventually.

When Ranma and Sailor Moon were at the height of their popularity they too inspired a lot of new writers, many of whom weren't very good, and many of those who are still writing today have improved.

2. FF.net exists now. It was founded in 1998. Ranma 1/2 had been published and sold by Viz (manga and anime) and it's fans have been writing fanfiction for it for a number of years by this point and so there were more experienced (as opposed to better) writers posting their stories to FF.net. Now, if you want to find some truly horrific older (cause there's some realy bad ones on FF.net too) Ranma fics you might want to try the RAAC archive or the FFML archive.

[lwf58]

At least it's possible to find good Naruto stories, either by recommendation or by working through the Naruto C2 lists.

The situation for Bleach fan fiction is much, much worse. You would have to sort through many times more garbage to find a good Bleach fic than you must for a decent Naruto story.

[Spokavriel]

I find it easier to filter Bleach Fics by going for Authors I already like stories from first. There's just too much trash and the Filler arcs on TV don't help make the situation any better.

After all when 1/3 of aired series is almost as bad as the worst shipping in fannon it's painful.

[Jomasten]

I just usually flit from user to user in FFnet, looking at their faves and whatnot, and just come up with a general consensus. I also look at a story with a lot of reviews. I don't actually read the reviews, but a good, respectable number is what I watch out for. Spelling and grammar, IN THE SUMMARY ITSELF, could also catch my attention, or if the xover/theme of the story is interesting.

I've never actually tried to look at fic recommendations...that is, before I discovered TV Tropes.

[Nadrek]

As with others, I start off with basic filters - Length > 10,000, if there's less than 2k words per chapter I very rarely bother, and mistakes in the synopsis are punishable by death... or my ignoring said fic.

There are a very few stories that I find worth reading that violate these rules; I'm willing to miss most of them.

[Ellen Kuhfeld]

As with others, I start off with basic filters - Length > 10,000, if there's less than 2k words per chapter I very rarely bother, and mistakes in the synopsis are punishable by death... or my ignoring said fic.

There are a very few stories that I find worth reading that violate these rules; I'm willing to miss most of them.

That's how professional editors handle submissions. They get more than they want or need, so they toss ones that probably aren't worth spending attention on. (Manuscripts have a very well-defined format. Violating that format means you don't know the ropes. If you don't know the ropes, the odds are poor of the story being good. Out it goes!)

My cutoff length for chapters is about 1500 words, and I don't make a fuss about overall size. I don't worry about the length of a oneshot at all. Everybody has criteria; the criteria are different for each of us.

[Spokavriel]

Aren't allot of Weebee's chapters under those size limits until after a rewrite where chapters get consolidated?

[Ellen Kuhfeld]

Aren't allot of Weebee's chapters under those size limits until after a rewrite where chapters get consolidated?

On FFnet's author pages, the chapters come in longer than that. In any case, I am familiar with Weebee's writing; I know what I'll be getting into, and that trumps any general rules for deciding. Holds true for all authors: if you're familiar with them, you don't need algorithms to decide to read, or not to read.

That's not a bad rule in itself, after you've been reading for some while: "Do I recognize this person's name? And if so, what for?"

[Nadrek]

As a note on my total length limits, I personally like epics and series, and since I don't really like most oneshots or very short stories, I don't want to see them. Also, that hides from view most of the quickly started and quickly abandoned fics.

As other have said, I ignore my rules for some authors - in particular, there was a Ranma/X-Com crossover by Ar-Kaos that had short chapters, spelling mistakes, some grammar mistakes, but I forgave because I liked the story, I like X-Com, and it came out at a chapter a day or so.

Nonetheless, in the job of separating wheat from chaff, some wheat invariably is lost.