UFO Fanfiction Discussion

[The Veteran]

Nice one BB that's an awesome post and a great summary of chapter 2 Now we just need to find a good reliable 3rd person to be our regular poster no.3! I think you and I could write through a mission a week between us but what with the ideal 2 post minimum and this being a 'cooperative' work... We kinda need someone else!

 

So what's going on out there guys? Come get some!

 

Whatever happened to Full Auto and JFish anyway? They were always really good writers and quite regular at one point... Come on guys help us out

[Alitorious]

There we go - a post.

 

Doh! I forgot to cover Bighorn and Grizzly! I was gonna do that! Oh well, I'm not calling freeze on them. If anyone wants to cover them and get them back to base and make Ramson's jaw drop at the sight of a Hurricane then go ahead!

 

I hope no one minds me starting a new topic. I figured that way you don't have to split chapter 2 apart from chapter 3.

 

An in case people miss it, I just put in there something about the laser guns. The switch does mean something more for the grunts to remember, but with the antiphoton stream turned off the laser's safe to use indoors - even as a cigar lighter if someone wants! But of course the efficiency will go way down - it will use more power and do less damage.

[Bomb Bloke]

I thought I'd hold back on replying until I'd made another fic post of my own, but that seems to be taking longer then I'd expected. And I used to have lots of free time...

 

Anyway, as usual it's an excellent post, Alitorious. I've messed with the threads involved, so the old one is now locked.

 

Good job to you too, Alpha Monkey, but could you add some notes in the character thread? They'd come in handy!

[Alpha_Monkey]

Done and done.

[Alitorious]

Hey, I thought you and Vet were scheming to set up a 3-person fanfiction frenzy! Where'd you guys go?

 

Lol, I just thought of something: We could have a contest for fanfiction posting.

Rules:

First post by an author (all authors are elegible after fanfic starts) is worth +2 points.

Posts with less than 1500 words (Maybe more/less?) are -1 points.

Posts with less than a two post buffer between the previous post of the same owner are worth -1 posts.

Posts with a two post buffer between the previous post are worth +3 points.

Posts with a three post buffer: +2 points

Posts with four post buffer: +1 point

Posts with five or more: 0 points.

If the post is in a good buffer range (2-4 post buffer) but has fewer than 1500 words, the post is still only worth -1. You don't get +2 buffer and -1 wordcount to get +1 points. It's -1.

If more than a month (30 days) passes between posts, the buffer penalty/bonus no longer applies, and the first person to post gets a first-post bonus (+2 points). A person can even double-post (0 post buffer) and get the +2 bonus.

 

 

In case that's a bit confusing, here's an example. Assume all posts have decent lengths (> 1500) with one exception.

 

Trigger Posts

Bomb Bloke Posts - First post: +2 points

Alitorious Posts - First post: +2 points

Trigger Posts - First post: +2 points

Alitorious Posts - 1 post buffer: -1 point

Bomb Bloke Posts - 3 post buffer: +2 points

Trigger Posts - 2 post buffer: +3 points

Alitorious Posts a short post (500 words) - 2 post buffer is overriden: -1 point.

<One month passes>

Trigger Posts - Buffer penalty overriden by month-duration. Trigger gets +2 points

<One month passes>

Bomb Bloke posts - 3 post buffer does not apply; Month-duration first-post bonus: +2 points

Trigger posts - Buffer penalty overriden by month-duration. Trigger gets +2 points.

Alit posts - 3 post buffer: +2 points.

<One month passes>

Alit posts - Buffer penalty overriden by month-duration first-post bonus: +2 points.

Bomb Bloke posts - 3 post buffer: +2 points.

Trigger posts: 3 post buffer: +2 point.

 

At the end of this:

BB: 8 points

Trigger: 11 points

Alit: 4 points

 

 

Scores are tallied and reset at the end of each chapter, winner gets, uh.... bragging rights? A toaster?

 

The way it's set up, if there are exactly 3 people all posting in order, they start racking up the +3s quickly. If you get 4 or more people, there's competition to start churning out those posts faster so you get a +3 instead of a +2.

If posting stagnates, the +2 bonus is applicable to anyone, even double-posters!

 

The buffer also encourages people to wait their turn, unless the fic is slowing down then the MDFPB applies. That means that someone can keep the fic going all by their lonesome, but it takes a while. (Months between posts.)

[JellyfishGreen]

First post bonus!

 

I suppose I should explain my absence a bit. For the fall I was preoccupied with zombies, then for the spring it was dwarves, and I'd better hurry up and do something this summer before the baby jellyfish arrive in November. 'Cos I hear that takes up time too.

 

Anyway.

 

Comments to the authors/editors:

Snikers - love the "Night Stalker" dream sequence Let that be a lesson to the rest of you superheroes.

Ego Terrorist - Smart quotes must die. This didn't look right in Windows, Iso, or Unicode under IE7.

BB - As good as ever, nice closing Ch2.

Welcome, AlphaMonkey.

 

A dangerously big suggestion: I see Skonar has put up "Siege of New York", with my favorite and yours, Chryssies. I was wondering if we couldn't skip ahead in our own timeline a little, postulate a few developments and several new recruits, to where anyone who still wants to use old characters can - the 'vets' - while killing off FNG's at will "Why am I going first?" "Cos you're the FNG"

 

This would put squads into disarray, force us to agree on what technology got developed during the month of floater attacks, but the advantage is Chapter 3 would indeed be placed a month or two later than Chapter 2 and would allow us to engage in something new - snakeman/chryssie combat, maybe crosslink with Skonar - rather than rehashing the floater combat which we've just done.

 

Interested in putting it to a vote? Before I write in a "What happened between Buenos Aires and now" post? Or will we postpone it and fight off a Floater base assault?

[Snikers]

As in, a time skip? I don't know...those always feel rather artificial to me. We could switch focus of the fanfic to technological and character developments for a bit (remember way back when, before Jan 1 1999 fic-time, when we wrote about our characters' interactions instead of blowing up aliens? Nah, me neither) and speed up time, while relegating missions to something that happens mostly off camera.

 

If the aliens lighten up a bit and we're just sent on UFO recovery missions, it's not impossible that we'd be coming home from a few missions without a boatload of deaths. After all, we know what we're going into now, so it's only natural a team of bright, adaptable, highly trained (most of us, anyway) best of the best soldiers would start making mincemeat of the smaller ships. That is, until we get a terror mission reporting horrible snake creatures...

 

Or, in the short form: we don't need to skip time, we can just relegate the missions to background.

[Bomb Bloke]

I don't think skipping a month will work - Yet. We've got a few human captives to interrogate etc and I'm not sure we can realistically do that by skipping a month.

 

Skipping some (if not all) missions, or the occasional day or three, works... That should allow us to quickly get to the next alien race (which could "conveniently" turn up right when the aforementioned matters have been completely dealt with). I can see Terrick's plot line alone eating up about a month, and I doubt that would take a lot of RL time to cover.

 

As for the quotes, they got stuffed up during one of the various forum upgrades. I'd recommend anyone using a MS Word or similar to paste their text into Notepad and then copy that into their forum posts, just in case it happens again.

[Snikers]

So...no time skip then?

 

Should we go ahead and write some new stuff?

[Bomb Bloke]

Looks like it.

[The Veteran]

I can't believe I've been gone so long I'd forgotten about the fics :o Is it even worth me asking though

 

Who's still active and wants to write in these, cos if it looks like we can make a go of it then I'm in again...

[Bomb Bloke]

Oh, I've been planning on writing something any day now.

 

Of course, that's been true for about a year now.

 

Hmm.

[The Veteran]

So is it dead or does it just need a helping hand? We've tried before to make it work with just a few of us and it just doesn't work so we need to know that there are more than 2 people who would contribute if we revive this thing yet again!

[Dumb_Commander]

I'm here, waiting till someone gets back here. Besides I have more time now to surf the internet. Though I doubt I can contribute anything, I'am an amateur unlike the people here, c'mon just look at the fics the people who posted there, I can't even match them in writing an normal post.

[Bomb Bloke]

I had a post half done, then had to bugger off away from home for a month...

 

Still away, but got a chance to pick up my progress during a quick stopover trip this morning.

[Dumb_Commander]

And again this place gathers dust... *starts crying* Why *sob* do I *sob* bother *sob* coming here. *Drowns the room in tears*

[Bomb Bloke]

I'm... I'm working on it! Honest!

 

Well ok, I've been lazy, but I do at least have something half written.

 

That's not to say that YOU couldn't write something...

[Dumb_Commander]

Hey, I'm hopelessly trying. It's just I can't properly introduce my characters and such. Add to the fact that I' am a lousy writer... BTW how is that smiley I asked for going?

[Azrael Strife]

If you're not interested in participating and won't bother writing a post, why whine about others not doing it either?

[Dumb_Commander]

Just... back away. I' am interested greatly it's just... nevermind.

 

And Dumb_Commander the intellectually challenged person as it's obviously noticeable by his name has posted. See you all later when I crack my head open like melon.

[JellyfishGreen]

Woo! Back in style, Bomb Bloke!

 

It's pretty embarrassing to see the post date of Mar 2007 followed by Feb 2008... but I guess we just got distracted by Half-Life 2 or, in my case, Dwarf Fortress that year

[Bomb Bloke]

Yeah, after taking such a break it was tempting to write a post twice the length... Eventually decided against it.

 

I wanted to throw another troop roster in there. Haven't quite accounted for all the new personal yet and the start of a new chapter seems a good place to put it.

[The Veteran]

Hey I'm impressed guys, there's actually been some good progree this year Well done, let's keep the ball rolling though yes? Bomb Bloke, is there an up to date squad roster anywhere and any catchup with open storylines in it? You know like Terrick, the other wierd suits and needing a new interceptor, R&D etc...

 

As soon as I'm up to date I'll be straight back in posting again and that's a promise!

[Bomb Bloke]

Greets again, TJ.

 

For the squad list, check the top of this thread for the list as of the end of chapter two. Chapter three hasn't really taken off yet, so it shouldn't take you too long to find the extras it mentions.

 

The rosters are open to re-ordering, as they haven't been "officially" set out within the fic for quite some time.

 

As for the story lines:

 

We've got Terrick in the cooler/life support. If you're rusty on his back story, he infiltrated X-Com to steal technology on the basis that his parent company is holding his family hostage. Given that he's not only missed his deadlines but gotten himself captured, he may or may not believe they're dead, and he may or may not believe he can get X-Com to help him out in that regard. Either way, I was thinking he'd spill the beans on their location and X-Com would move in and shut the place down.

 

You've got an interest in that area, as Ping is rather pissed at Terrick due to the whole "kidnapping TJ" thing. On the other hand, the last thing Terrick did before starting his runner was take a bullet meant for Rick (which could easily be the reason he didn't end up escaping entirely).

 

Speaking of injuries, Warlord is still mostly deaf.

 

Then we have the problem that some human groups outside X-Com seem to be opening trade negotiations with the aliens. The only real leads X-Com has on that at the moment is a nameless mercenary in the cells from the snow field mission, along with the diplomat Bernard. As yet it's unknown what X-Com intends to do with them.

 

We've got laser pistols and rifles, but nothing heavier in that research branch. The engineers don't yet know how to create plasmas, though all hand held models are at least usable by soldiers and personal armor is about ready to start rolling off the production line (as are the motion scanners). In the field, it's about time the soldiers started trying to capture some alien leaders, as we've got the mind probes to question them with and the stun launchers to secure them with.

 

Don't ask me about how many craft we've got, that's one thing I've never been able to keep track of...

[The Veteran]

Anyone else wantto see some progress in this fic? I know I do so I've been reading through the fanfic summary that BB was so kind to put together for s. It can be found here and makes it really easy to get the hang of what's happened so far! Be prepared to spend some time getting back into the swing of it though as there are currently just over 300 posts in the story!

 

I'm up to the start of Chapter 2 (the entire first chapter occuring prior to the war beginning) so will take me till the morning to completely catch up but I'm totally up for reviving the old girl if there are a few more members with similar feelings.

 

Anyone?