Requesting advice for first AAR

[Caillagh de Bodemloze]

I'm here in the hope of some advice.

I have been thinking of writing a Skyrim AAR. I'd like to say I was inspired by Hitai de Bodemloze's “By Gods' Jest” – it would be a worthy inspiration – but in fact I started wondering about this a while ago. I hope my AAR wouldn't step on Hitai's (or anyone else's) toes: the idea is that it would be about someone from this world who ends up in Skyrim and has to cope with that.

Anyway, I've never written an AAR before. I've found lots of useful stuff here in the Writers Lounge, and I've been reading through that. Any additional advice would obviously be useful, but what I particularly wanted to ask was what people think should be included in the OP. Links to chapters, or other sections, are clearly a good idea (once I've made it past 25 posts, at least), but is there anything else I should definitely include?

(Well, that's what I want to ask at the moment. When I've started the AAR, I'm sure I'll find I have more questions!)

Thank you in advance.

[Hitai de Bodemloze]

My AAR completely rips off another one anyway, I wouldn't worry! It's just a fun side project of mine as well, not anything serious. Skyrim AARs used to be really popular a few years ago, but I'm not sure how many of the old Skyrim AARtists are still around. Swaeft isn't around any more, Dance is a bit of a rarity these days unfortunately, people like Katsumoto and LuckyLewis who inspired me are long gone. Chirugeon of Nascent Ranger and An Orc In Skyrim fame is still lurking around the Rome II subforum though I think, so if you want some specific Skyrim AAR advice you could give him a shout.

For formatting advice in terms of the OP, a nice snazzy picture or banner often helps. Maybe a bit of a short intro, to hook people in and explain the premise of the story. Chapter lists are pretty essential these days and character lists go a long way to helping folks, especially if people aren't familiar with the setting or your characters have loads of weird names. Maps are really useful, but not essential; an added bonus really.

General advice would be just to dive straight in really. Writing AARs is a huge learning curve, that you can only really appreciate once you're doing it yourself. Like I (and certainly others as well) can tell you that writing an AAR is a massive commitment that eats up a ton of time and energy. It's often a very gruelling process (just wait until you're into 'engineering screenshots' territory). But until you actually do it yourself, you won't really realize just how difficult it can be - I certainly didn't and I bet most other folks here didn't either. So we can tell you all this stuff, but it's honestly better just to ignore us and just go for it. You'll learn and develop as an AARtist as you progress and everyone 'matures' at their own pace and in their own way. That being said, it is of course a ton of fun and we all wouldn't be here if it wasn't. The good definitely outweighs the bad, that's for sure. Just dive in, experiment and find out what you're capable of. I think a week or two ago I used the metaphor of throwing things at a wall until something sticks; pretty much sums up AARtistry, at least to me. Most important though, at least in my eyes, is just getting involved with the community. There is, for better or worse, a correlation between community activity and readership - so the more active and well known you are, the more people will read your stories.To take a less cynical view however, our community is really cool and you should join in! We're all good friends here and the atmosphere is great. Although I write a lot, I come here just as much for the people as I do for the stories. We don't bite and love getting to know other folks who are just as passionate about writing as we are.

A corollary to that is the age old wisdom of 'don't give up' and keep writing. New stories don't get a ton of views usually and it can take a while to build up a readership base. The more you show how invested you are in your own work, and the more established your story becomes, the more people will read it. So a lot of advice you'll find is along the lines of don't be disheartened in the early days and have faith in your own story, since readers will come eventually. Then again, the community is a lot smaller now than it was back in the days when that advice was bandied about. I personally don't have a ton of time to devote to reading, but I know others have been a lot better at this recently.

If you want some inspiration or some specific advice, have a look around other AARs here or dive into the Critic's Quill.

Hope some of that helps! I think I sound really negative, but I don't mean to be! If you want some more specific help on starting stories, or anything, just give us a shout. I'm sure others will chime in with their own views as well in due course.

[Merchant of Venice]

Damn you Hitai you beat me to it!

As my most esteemed colleague has said, an AAR will not eat but devour your time, energy and generally your will to leave. Well maybe not the last one but definitely the first two. Many people (I myself included) aren't aware of the time needed as well as the organisation when they first start writing an AAR. For every hour of pure writing, there is editing to do, screenshots (and borders if you're a snazzy us as Shogun 2 AARtists), advertising on various threads, world-making (if its a historical AAR) and many more. My main tip would be be prepared. At the beginning, know what you are going to do with your AAR. I would also say write a few chapters in advance (at least at the beginning) so you can upload a steady stream of updates and more importantly, so you like the story.

About your OP, it can be varied. There are people who don't have anything in their OP but there are others who have a whole load of different things. You said you were doing a Skyrim AAR? If so, a nice picture with the title would be good (see Hitai's By Gods' Jest), and then a small intro for your AAR. Think of a blurb for a book. It attracts the reader's attention and while you're not necessarily selling your AAR in a conventional sense, you are still marketing your AAR and new readers want to know what they are getting into before committing to reading it. A list of chapters is usually added in the OP (as well as links to the posts they are at) and possibly a character list, though that can depend on how many characters you have and detailed the plot is. A map is always good, especially for a game like Skyrim. Though many people play it, they don't want to open up the game every time you mention a new town just to check on the map. But luckily, you can probably get a map off the internet or just screenshot the one in game. Whatever else you want to add is up to you, just make sure your format it properly (adding spoiler tags may also be a necessity) and ensure it looks good, as I said you are marketing your AAR.

As Hitai said (and this kind of comes under the umbrella of marketing your AAR), comment on other peoples stories. Add a link to your story in your signature and so whenever you make post on the forum, people will see a link to your story and more often than not they might just click that link. The more you are around, the more people know you and therefore the likely hood of more readers increases. And (yet again as Hitai said), and I can't stress this enough, do not give in to the demon of comments and views. Sure, it can be disheartening seeing no one comment but don't let it get you down. Use it as motivation to continue writing and upload more chapters and with more chapters and content, undoubtedly your readership will grow. People are also inclined to comment on AARs they see other people are commenting on so growth is usually exponential in that it will start slowly and then can increase massively. Trust me, once you're better known people will flock to your stories. And say your first AAR doesn't work out, the more people who know who you are and have read your first AAR, the more people will likely comment on your new AAR, usually straight away. It's all about patience, many new writers don't usually get that and give up once they see no one commenting on their story.

But good luck with your writing and I hope to see your Skyrim AAR up and going.

Best wishes,

Merchant of Venice

[McScottish]

I can't really add anything that has not already been said- but you should read my AAR's, because they're amazing!

Seriously though, as has been said, dive right on in and you will begin to get a feel for your own style of writing and of creating in general. We are a nice bunch, and you seem like someone that would fit in well here. So, get to your keyboard, take a seat, pass the peace pipe, and we'll be right here with you.

[Caillagh de Bodemloze]

Well, I wasn't expecting such huge amounts of excellent advice – at least, not that quickly, and not from such eminent personages! Thank you, all of you.

Hitai – I didn't think you sounded negative, just realistic. As far as I'm concerned, that makes your advice far more convincing. If you were telling me it was really easy, and took neither time nor effort, I wouldn't believe that, and it would make it much less likely I'd believe anything else you said. So thank you (all of you) for the realism as well as the rest of the advice.

Merchant of Venice – writing a few chapters in advance sounds wise. If I hate it, we can all pretend I never intended to write anything...

And thank you for the advice about deciding where the AAR is going before I start. That seems especially sensible with such an open-ended game as Skyrim, where you could just carry on for ever.

I'm sure you're all right about comments and so on. It's my first AAR, so nobody has any reason at all to expect anything of it. (Although that takes the pressure off me, too, so it's not all bad.) My plan at the moment is just to keep going for as long as it interests me. If it interests anybody else, that's a bonus.

McScottish – I have to read all your AARs?! That might take a while...


The consensus seems to be that I'll learn best by doing, so I probably ought to get on with the planning/writing/editing/formatting/screenshotting/border-making/map-hunting/character-listing/title-picture-devising/OP-constructing/advertising...


Thank you all again.

[McScottish]

McScottish – I have to read all your AARs?! That might take a while...


The consensus seems to be that I'll learn best by doing, so I probably ought to get on with the planning/writing/editing/formatting/screenshotting/border-making/map-hunting/character-listing/title-picture-devising/OP-constructing/advertising...


Thank you all again.

Nah, most of them are on or two posts long!

Now get writing, 'afore I crack the whip at yer back.

Bon chance, mon ami.

[Shankbot de Bodemloze]

Remember to post a link here when you've started so we can read it.

[Caillagh de Bodemloze]

Thank you! I will do.

[Adds note to the end of Long List of Things To Do. Observes with relief that some one or two of the previous entries have now been crossed off. ]

[Caillagh de Bodemloze]

Well, I've started. There's not much of it yet, but it can be found at the link below...

A Long Way From Home

[Shankbot de Bodemloze]

Looking forward to reading.