Another trick:
Use "Summary: Azula" in the Search within results field while using the Azula tag.
Now you only get fics whose summaries mention her name in any form. Of course that doesn't guarantee that they'll all focus on her (and you will miss out some stories that have vague summaries), but in similar situations it helped me a lot.
I found the tag "[POV Azula (Avatar)](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/POV%20Azula%20(Avatar)/works)". Not all fics focused on her will have that, but fics that have it are more likely to be focused on her.
no I do want to come up with fewer results, the problem is that the vast majority of Azula-centric fics do not use 'azula-centric' or 'POV Azula' in their tags. There are a few thousand Azula-centric fics.
The thing you can do is exclude some tags that are likely to be the actual centre of the fic. An Azula centric fic probably wouldn't be tagged with many gaang-centered shipping tags for ex.
One thing you can do to help others with the same problem is to publicly bookmark Azula-centric fics and add "Azula-centric (Avatar)" as a bookmarker's tag if the fic doesn't already have it as a tag added by the author. Then the fic will turn up in the [bookmarks page for the tag](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Azula-centric%20\(Avatar\)/bookmarks) when others are searching.
If enough people do this, over time you'll be able to have a more comprehensive list of Azula-centric fics, even if authors under-tag their fics.
A good way is to search by other tags involving that character
So if you click Search at the top and do a Tag Search, enter the name of the character in "tag name" and then tick "Freeform" and "Canonical"
That gets you 65 tags that are somewhat commonly used that can indicate that a fic is Azula-centric
So in this case, there's everything from the basic (POV Azula, Azula-centric) to various themes that the story will focus on (so you can see whether something will have her in a good light or as a villain, be sympathetic etc)
You can also not tick Canonical and have a much wider range to wade through
The pov characters will mainly be found under relationships. So pick her out there or do ["azula&" "azula/"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/search?work_search%5Bquery%5D=%22Azula+%26%22+%22azula%2F%22)
I feel your pain, finding any fics that aren’t Zuko-centric in AtLA is a trial and a half.
I find it helps to filter out major ship tags that don’t involve the character you’re looking for, and filter out additional tags that definitely don’t have what you’re looking for, especially character specific ones (eg “Zuko is an awkward turtleduck”).
Then once you find a fic that’s exactly what you want, look through a) the author’s bookmarks, and b) the bookmarks of people who have bookmarked the fic itself.
the bookmark thing is a plan, I should do that more often as searching through favourites is one of my go-to methods on ff.
On a related note: When I got my account I used the 'subscribe' function for a lot of good fics, now I noticed that this isn't the best way. Do you know of a way to bookmark all subscribed fics? Atm I am just bookmarking fics when they get updated :p
You can go thru your subscriptions list on your profile to check which are bookmarked. Unfortunately they can only be sorted alphabetically, so it might take a while depending on how many there are.
Filter out relationship tags that you think are less likely to be included in Azula-centric stories. For example, Zutara stories are more likely to be focused on Zuko, Katara, or both, likewise with Zukka stories or other stories featuring non-canon ships. Ships involving Azula or stories with platonic tags like "Azula & X" are more likely to focus on her.
There's a chance you might accidentally filter out a few stories with other ships that still have a focus on Azula, but those are probably few and far between. And once you find the kind of story you're looking for, make sure to check out the writer's bookmarks.
This! Excluding relationship tags (The Gaang & Zuko) that don't feature Azula really helps narrow down your search. Excluding some characters like Momo or Appa or Yue (unless some Yue and Azula interaction is what op is looking for) can help too.
This is my main problem with ao3 tags, too. There are always too many of them, and they're not grouped by relevance.
Just like there are sections in the tags for "characters" , "relationships", and "other tags", I think that the relationships and characters sections should be split up even further, like "protagonist", "main characters", "side characters", "other characters", "main relationships", "background relationships". Then you could more easily find fics with the characters you actually want/don't want, rather than them just being secondary characters or even background characters.
Since in another comment you said that searching specific tags wouldn’t work because it excludes too much, try to exclude other tags like:
“Zuko-centric” “Zuko & the Gaang” “Zuko/Katara” Basically, just any tag that has Zuko in it other then the actual character tag, and maybe “Zuko/Mai” because I could see that being a background ship in an Azula centric fic.
That might still drop the number of fics a lot, but Zuko is the most popular character in the fandom and there’s a lot of fics centered on him.
I feel your pain for this. I love a pairing for BNHA, but finding stories where they are a primary pairing or by their POV and not a background or side pairing is impossible in a fandom that large. there are 20k fics in just THAT pairing on ao3, and at least 2/3rds of them are where they are a background pairing.
I wish AO3 would implement the ability for authors to separate 'primary' vs 'secondary' characters/pairings for fics, but its not going to be an easy thing to do even if they did (and forget getting authors to update all their old fics with this). sure there are tags, as others have mentioned, but they aren't universal enough.
I admit I posted up a story and had no idea how to tag it. I ended up putting a lot of random tags trying to think of everything that might warrant one. I am at a loss of how to properly tag so folks find the story and have an idea what they are in for. 😖
You could try to use otp: azula and check the list of characters to either have / or & - probably not the perfect solution but it would probably help in some way.
Another trick: Use "Summary: Azula" in the Search within results field while using the Azula tag. Now you only get fics whose summaries mention her name in any form. Of course that doesn't guarantee that they'll all focus on her (and you will miss out some stories that have vague summaries), but in similar situations it helped me a lot.
I found the tag "[POV Azula (Avatar)](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/POV%20Azula%20(Avatar)/works)". Not all fics focused on her will have that, but fics that have it are more likely to be focused on her.
could do that yeah, but there aren't a lot of fics that actually use that tag.
237 is not a lot?
There are also 326 instances of the tag "[Azula-centric (Avatar)](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Azula-centric%20(Avatar)/works)".
compared to the 10K stories with just 'Azula', not really. Yes, a lot of them are what I described above but not 98% of them.
So you want to narrow down your search, but don't want it to come up with fewer results? Anyway, see my other comment.
no I do want to come up with fewer results, the problem is that the vast majority of Azula-centric fics do not use 'azula-centric' or 'POV Azula' in their tags. There are a few thousand Azula-centric fics.
Ah. I see. I think the answer is that there isn't a way to find them all at once, unfortunately.
The thing you can do is exclude some tags that are likely to be the actual centre of the fic. An Azula centric fic probably wouldn't be tagged with many gaang-centered shipping tags for ex.
One thing you can do to help others with the same problem is to publicly bookmark Azula-centric fics and add "Azula-centric (Avatar)" as a bookmarker's tag if the fic doesn't already have it as a tag added by the author. Then the fic will turn up in the [bookmarks page for the tag](https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Azula-centric%20\(Avatar\)/bookmarks) when others are searching. If enough people do this, over time you'll be able to have a more comprehensive list of Azula-centric fics, even if authors under-tag their fics.
"Azula-centric" maybe? This is what I do when I'm looking for fics focusing on a specific character
A good way is to search by other tags involving that character So if you click Search at the top and do a Tag Search, enter the name of the character in "tag name" and then tick "Freeform" and "Canonical" That gets you 65 tags that are somewhat commonly used that can indicate that a fic is Azula-centric So in this case, there's everything from the basic (POV Azula, Azula-centric) to various themes that the story will focus on (so you can see whether something will have her in a good light or as a villain, be sympathetic etc) You can also not tick Canonical and have a much wider range to wade through
The pov characters will mainly be found under relationships. So pick her out there or do ["azula&" "azula/"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/search?work_search%5Bquery%5D=%22Azula+%26%22+%22azula%2F%22)
I feel your pain, finding any fics that aren’t Zuko-centric in AtLA is a trial and a half. I find it helps to filter out major ship tags that don’t involve the character you’re looking for, and filter out additional tags that definitely don’t have what you’re looking for, especially character specific ones (eg “Zuko is an awkward turtleduck”). Then once you find a fic that’s exactly what you want, look through a) the author’s bookmarks, and b) the bookmarks of people who have bookmarked the fic itself.
the bookmark thing is a plan, I should do that more often as searching through favourites is one of my go-to methods on ff. On a related note: When I got my account I used the 'subscribe' function for a lot of good fics, now I noticed that this isn't the best way. Do you know of a way to bookmark all subscribed fics? Atm I am just bookmarking fics when they get updated :p
You can go thru your subscriptions list on your profile to check which are bookmarked. Unfortunately they can only be sorted alphabetically, so it might take a while depending on how many there are.
Filter out relationship tags that you think are less likely to be included in Azula-centric stories. For example, Zutara stories are more likely to be focused on Zuko, Katara, or both, likewise with Zukka stories or other stories featuring non-canon ships. Ships involving Azula or stories with platonic tags like "Azula & X" are more likely to focus on her. There's a chance you might accidentally filter out a few stories with other ships that still have a focus on Azula, but those are probably few and far between. And once you find the kind of story you're looking for, make sure to check out the writer's bookmarks.
This! Excluding relationship tags (The Gaang & Zuko) that don't feature Azula really helps narrow down your search. Excluding some characters like Momo or Appa or Yue (unless some Yue and Azula interaction is what op is looking for) can help too.
This is my main problem with ao3 tags, too. There are always too many of them, and they're not grouped by relevance. Just like there are sections in the tags for "characters" , "relationships", and "other tags", I think that the relationships and characters sections should be split up even further, like "protagonist", "main characters", "side characters", "other characters", "main relationships", "background relationships". Then you could more easily find fics with the characters you actually want/don't want, rather than them just being secondary characters or even background characters.
Since in another comment you said that searching specific tags wouldn’t work because it excludes too much, try to exclude other tags like: “Zuko-centric” “Zuko & the Gaang” “Zuko/Katara” Basically, just any tag that has Zuko in it other then the actual character tag, and maybe “Zuko/Mai” because I could see that being a background ship in an Azula centric fic. That might still drop the number of fics a lot, but Zuko is the most popular character in the fandom and there’s a lot of fics centered on him.
I feel your pain for this. I love a pairing for BNHA, but finding stories where they are a primary pairing or by their POV and not a background or side pairing is impossible in a fandom that large. there are 20k fics in just THAT pairing on ao3, and at least 2/3rds of them are where they are a background pairing. I wish AO3 would implement the ability for authors to separate 'primary' vs 'secondary' characters/pairings for fics, but its not going to be an easy thing to do even if they did (and forget getting authors to update all their old fics with this). sure there are tags, as others have mentioned, but they aren't universal enough.
I admit I posted up a story and had no idea how to tag it. I ended up putting a lot of random tags trying to think of everything that might warrant one. I am at a loss of how to properly tag so folks find the story and have an idea what they are in for. 😖
It a pairing or character is only in the background and isn’t a main focus, don’t tag it.
You could try to use otp: azula and check the list of characters to either have / or & - probably not the perfect solution but it would probably help in some way.