I write
giant posts because they tend to be filled with content for several simultaneous scenes and actions. What bothers me is nobody has
spatial contextual awareness or understands pacing. This implies that a great deal of people have terrible reading comprehension, whether they write ten paragraphs or ten words. I've read several lengthy posts where the author has utterly no comprehension of the passage of time for instance, and will write something absurdly silly. For example, the big bad villain having a giant two paragraph speech about how meaningless life is... Whilst in the middle of combat. Heated combat. Heated, melee combat.
It doesn't matter if you write a giant block of text if you don't understand basic facets of real life concepts. If you can't properly convey the passage of time or appropriately pace out information so information flows at a smooth rate rather than at jerky periods of info dumping, how can you write
anything correctly? People focus on the most stupid things. Star Wars isn't a cultural powerhouse because of its originality (or complete lack there of), but because it's paced incredible and understands how to make emotional connections with the audience in simple, effective ways. Lord of the Rings isn't a cultural powerhouse because of its originality (it literally rips off the folk tales of several European cultures blatantly), but because it takes the time to envelope you in this deep and beautiful world of fantasy and magic that appeases your inner child. It has characters you grow to love which have been aped by hundreds of tales not because they're overly complex, but because they're admirable, relate-able, they're characters you can look up to, who feel human emotions, who have struggles and doubts.
A straightforward knight on a horse trying to rescue the damsel, who is a bastion of human courage and dignity, is a simple concept. However, it is a vastly superior character to any overly complex loner that nobody can associate themselves with because it's the author creating a self-insert fantasy, that he or she wishes to be like, because they don't understand themselves as people yet. Similarly, a plot about acquiring the magical Macguffin sword of a thousand truths to slay the evil overlord who has the princess locked away in a tower, is a vastly superior plot to some convoluted mess of a story with no clear direction or goal for the protagonists. Originality is just an impossible concept, everything you know is something that already is, or a derivative thereof. Inventions are stepping stones building upon what we already know. You don't just magically "poof" a Lord of the Rings into the world, you look at what's come before which people already understand, and try to find a way to put your own unique spin on it.
Note the word choice:
Unique. Not
Original,
unique. Star Wars and Lord of the Rings are unique, there's nothing quite like them. Other stories which are like them are compared and contrasted
to them, because they have great influence in the modern world of storytelling. They are the pillars upon which all others follow. When you mention elves, people don't go "what's an elf?" They think of Legolas. When you mention hyperdrive, they don't go "what's a hyperdrive?" They think of the woosh sci-fi super speed thing in Star Wars.
The more original your story, the less comprehensible it is to other people. Because the more original your story, the more content others see which they have no frame of reference for, which you have to explain. If you have to spend more than five to ten minutes explaining what's going on, you will lose the majority of people, because they will go to other works that don't demand so much of them just to be entertained.
Yet, I still see it. Even more prolific than elitists are people who demand that all works are completely original. That
their works are completely original. They pump out piece of garbage after piece of garbage and never learn from their mistakes, they always blame others for just not understanding them. They never stop to think "oh, maybe that classical knight archetype I disdain is as popular as it is
because it fucking works and I should learn from it." Nope. Everybody is a special snowflake.
It drives me completely batshit as a GM, too. Because I see so many people that could do so much better if they just stopped trying to always be perfectly original and just focused on learning the basics first. They could even enjoy themselves. For instance, a lot of loner archetypes are assassins and rogues. Assassins and rogues also tend to share similarities with fast talkers and ladies men, you can easily expand your character from being the boring as hell Mary Sue super badass loner to this flawed human being that never had a real family. You could easily do this. If you would just try... BUT NOBODY DOES! Nobody tries! Everybody just blames their failures on everyone else! This happens so consistently that nine times out of ten I can instantly tell when I have a new player who will just rage quit the moment I throw a genuine obstacle in his path as a GM. I can call it with near pinpoint accuracy and that's just sad. It's my job as a GM to challenge players, to put their characters through hell, to create adversaries that can and do sometimes win, to make the player characters have to learn and grow and experience all the potential shades of life, from total victory to total failure... But I will still get yelled at for doing that, consistently, every new RP I make I have that shadow fucking lingering over my shoulder, whispering in my ear, reminding me that at least one person who joins will explode in my face the moment I genuinely challenge him to write something better than a fantasy insert.
Yet I keep GMing anyway. Because occasionally I meet good players, really good players. Players like
@Tempest or
@Jorick or
@Kadaeux or
@Elendra who come up with clever schemes and who create incredible scenes, uplifting scenes, dark and deadly scenes. With Tempest I fostered a four year long romance arc between a princess and an ex-pirate lycanthrope. None of those elements individually are particularly original, but put in combination with the fact that they're both women, and you tell me how many fictions you know that contain a
pyromancer princess married to an ex-pirate lycanthrope. Oh, what's that? Basically zero save mine? Well, there you go. How about Jorick, who plays a classic Lothario with a hero complex in one role play, while playing a deranged but charismatic man with a god complex in another role play of mine. How about Kadaeux, who played as a goblin that outwitted a slaver warlord and out-charisma'd an
angel. How many stories do you know of where a goblin escapes slavery, becomes one of the most powerful shamans of the land, convinces an angel to not only stand down but eventually join him, and overthrows a slaver state to become an emperor? Again, not many I'm willing to bet. Elendra? Playing as a little sprite named Draza, who just recently helped to convince two sides of a civil war to stand down and join together by using gardening metaphors, and who easily befriends royalty and nobility from lands all over the continent... By baking them cookies and singing them songs.
No one particular element creates originality. I have a princess who became a queen? Big deal. I have a fire wielding staff chick princess who became a queen? Big deal. I have a fire wielding staff chick princess who became a queen by banishing Gods, marrying an ex-lycanthorpe pirate, and rebuilt her kingdom from scratch, who is now the main quest giver for a new generation of player characters in a new continent-spanning conflict? Oh, look, suddenly "original" by taking entirely unoriginal concepts and combining them together to make something new. How did it work? Because I understood the basic concepts I was using and both played them straight and subverted them where appropriate. I understood pacing and spatial contextual awareness, I spent time building up these character relationships, this world, the players spent time building up their powers and list of achievements by accomplishing short term goals on their way to the long term, in forming friendships and rivalries.
It doesn't fucking matter how long a post is. It only matters what you deliver in that post. If you use length for length's sake, or cut out artistic detail because you're trying to meet a word quota,
you're doing it wrong. You focus on pathos and logos, appeals to emotion and reason. You have to form basic, simple connections with people first before you slowly start to unveil greater complexity, because complexity is a natural result of multiple entities all encountering each other and interaction. Jimmy is a simple country boy, but he's thrust into a world of war where he becomes stronger and smarter, forming relationships with allies and rivalries with enemies. Jimmy through the journey becomes a more complex character, you don't have to heap it on to start with, just understand basic real world things like the passage of time, and literary concepts like pacing, and you will create works of art.
Stop trying to be the best at any one element. Be the best at creativity, and be willing to constantly learn new concepts and archetypes and tropes and stereotypes. The rest will follow with time, including your own writing style, which may be verbose, or short and sweet.
EDIT
Also, if you're going to rant about elitists and want them to give a rat's ass, spell "elitist" correct in the title. Just a tip.
