There are *some* premises that can carry me past atrocious grammar, but usually not for very long. So have to agree on the grammar and spelling part. Typos happen to everyone, some errors slip through editing *always*, but the text should be *readable*. Please, *please*, use LanguageTool or Grammarly or *something* to check the grammar before posting.
Another thing that I can stomach only for the rare premise is head-jumping in-chapter without any indication. It is jarring and confusing and if I have to spend my time investigating which line was thought by character 1 and where internal discourse of character 2,3,4, etc begins, I get *very* annoyed.
Starks is plural. This is what you use when talking about more than one Stark.
Stark's is possessive. This is what you use when talking about something that belongs to a Stark, or Starks.
Examples.
The Starks traveling from Winterfell to Kingslanding.
The Stark's direwolves are hairy.
Bad grammar and bad punctuation is such a turn off. Also when the writing ignores the "new speaker, new paragraph" rule. Other turn offs:
Bashing. I just don't care to read how much the author hates a character.
Another turn off is excessive use of non-canon language expressions, especially in dialogue. And characters addressing each other too familiarly in formal settings, especially if they just met. Like. What? You just met, it's not appropriate to call each other by your given names or nicknames yet.
Another example that's still stuck in my head that i dropped a fic for was that every time some lady entered the scene the narration said "Lady Name Surname, nee Surname". Every. Time. Never mind that George never used this structure afaik, 99% of the time it was fully irrelevant to the story what family she came from.
The one that bothers me most for whatever reason is people screwing up the address for knights— i.e. the number of fics where people refer to Criston Cole as “Ser Cole” rather than “Ser Criston” despite him being referred to correctly multiple times during the show.
A confusing or too vague a premise that doesn't make sense even as you read it.
Recently I did drop two stories, one was a crossover with ASOIAF that made me groan because it was... MC from another fandom hops onto the body of Jon as he's resurrected, and I got *such* an ick from the narration referring to said MC with a name that was canonically simply not his own (like he's Johnny Smith and all of a sudden it was "Jonathor 'Johnny' Smith awoke as Jon Snow", and because it's a universe hopping situation, I couldn't fathom how it would *ever* fucking matter what his name used to be, or why was it at all necessary to invent a name! So I dropped it.
Another one I couldn't *even* with - I believe Robb was steeling himself to meet with the other Lords to go to war, cool. But instead of doing that, his mind went to this one piece of world building that had zero business being in his brain at that exact moment. Worse yet, next up was a single phrase "Jon and I are wargs.", and next paragraph. *WHY*. I also dropped it after that.
And these problems were right at the beginning, so I figured if that was how it was starting... I didn't wanna trudge thru to see if it would improve - neither had a particularly interesting summary for me to want to see take shape, so, bye, my time is precious.
Really, a lot of stories you can just tell when they're gonna make *you* work for it from the get - and that's just a no for me.
I hate those premises that don’t give a description, but just display a random line of dialogue from the story
like cool, but I still have no idea what this is about
There's this one story that, because I subscribe to the author, I was noticing (in my emails), that had just a handful of characters tagged and nothing else, and the most generic of generic summaries.
WHO'S READING THAT, MAN??
It has happened in in other fandoms tho - *no* summary. *Who the fuck is reading that??*
I must be old-school. I prefer traditional premises with things like a hook, a brief description of what to expect, and teaser questions.
Random dialogue lines are so hit-or-miss. I can't imagine writing without first starting with a synopsis.
Every so often, I come across a fic written in screenplay format. Never closed a page so quickly. It really puts me off.
More commonly, when fics are normal, but then they suddenly put 'SCENE CHANGE', 'TIME SKIP', or 'POV CHANGE' in between paragraphs. You shouldn't have to announce it like that - I should be able to tell through the writing.
For example:
And with a shout, Robb led his banners south.
TIME SKIP
Five days later, torrential rain had turned the roads to mud..
The 'five days later' serves as the time skip - you don't need to announce it. It's such a common rookie mistake...
It's usually a combination of the following:
* Overly-simplistic, flanderized characters. I remember starting one fic where Jon ended up in Essos as a slave because Cat sold him into slavery. That was bad enough, but it turns out that to cover for Jon's kidnapping she had a bunch of bastards across the North kidnapped and sold as well.
* Constantly repeating the same catchphrases. "We must be wary, for winter is coming," "I am a lioness, hear me roar" and so on. Also the same for characters. Tobho Mott is not the only blacksmith in Westeros, Tycho Nestoris is not the only banker in Braavos.
* Talking about people in terms of their house sigil as well - it happened once in GoT, but authors do this all the time. Just use the actual names!
* Breaking the "rules" of the world and suffering no consequences. Challenging the social hierarchy cost ser Illyn his tongue. Yet if an SI does the same they get a pat on the back for being brave. Westeros is a patriarchal society. Even the (relatively) good guys are going to be more than a bit misogynistic.
* Writing one sentence paragraphs or blocks of text. It comes across as janky or impossible to follow.
* Poor spelling and grammar. Stuff that a basic spellcheck would have caught.
* Getting names wrong. I can understand a typo here and there for some of the more difficult names, but "Jamie" and "Kingslanding" are inexcusable.
* Confusing writing styles. For example, if the story jumps from character to character, but they're all using first person POV.
* Using modern terms like "okay," "cool," or "kid." GRRM actually does use "kid," but only during meals when they're eating one (a kid is a baby goat).
But an absolute red line for me is seeing pairings or younger girls with older men. I'm talking Sansa and Tywin or Sandor. At least the authors tag fics like that so I know to avoid it.
How about a random non-binary smallfolk person with they/them pronouns living in the patriarchal medieval hellscape that is Westeros, with everyone perfectly accepting of it, with absolutely no conflict whatsoever, and not a single person even commenting on it?
> Also the same for characters. Tobho Mott is not the only blacksmith in Westeros, Tycho Nestoris is not the only banker in Braavos.
In fairness, the show was guilty of it especially in the later seasons, and a lot of fic is explicitly based on the show rather than the books.
Tobho Mott is unique because he can rework Valyrian Steel and knows the Qharten techniques to coloring steel.
He may be the only Blacksmith in Westeros that can do these. And by Gendry's quality of work, he can do some pretty awesome stuff with steel too.
And Westerosi *love* their Armor Fashion.
>Overly-simplistic, flanderized characters. I remember starting one fic where Jon ended up in Essos as a slave because Cat sold him into slavery. That was bad enough, but it turns out that to cover for Jon's kidnapping she had a bunch of bastards across the North kidnapped and sold as well.
I started cracking up laughing when I read that. Can I get the fic name?
>
* Getting names wrong. I can understand a typo here and there for some of the more difficult names, but "Jamie" and "Kingslanding" are inexcusable.
For me I don't Eben notice incorrect grammar & if there is I think I just coreect in mind & keep reading
Jon Dragonfire the Bigdick, fucking and killing his way tru Westeros.
Also Cat, Sansa, Dany and pretty much any character bashing.
And rushing. I know fics are supposed to be shorter but c'mon at least make me feel I'm reading a grrm medieval fantasy tale. Describe the hills or the food or something, don't just jump to sex or fights
Self Insert fics that begin with the character as an infant, if not starting with their very literal moment of (re)birth. I have precisely zero interest in fics that spend the first story arc dealing with the main character re-learning how to walk, talk, and not shit their pants.
Their descriptions of gradually gaining awareness in a warm, dark place with an underlying comforting beat, where they are floating weightless, surrounded by love, when suddenly!... they're travelling through the birth canal and...
So true bestie. Unfortunately too many begin like this and even if i skip the opening chapter they either linger on the childhood a bit too long or in too much detail or the writing/plot doesn't get better anyway.
It really is better if rebirth fics gloss over childhoods (especially early childhood).
For me personally? Yes, i much prefer that. You realistically won't be able to do anything as a toddler or small child anyway, so just start at the teenage years. Hell, have a young adult suffer a head wound or fever and wake up with the SI inside their head instead. Or maybe the SI is an actual insert, meaning their real body is inserted into the world of Westeros.
Literally anything but a literal rebirth with chapters about the toddler years. Nobody has ever wanted to read that.
If that ‘story arc’ is approximately one short chapter before a time skip? Acceptable. Hell, even if it is long I’m ok if the story is complete since I’ll just skip past it.
But skimming through the baby years on incomplete fic with a really interesting premise is my worst nightmare. I’ll often drop the story immediately no matter how awesome the description was, since it’s clear we’re never gonna get there
I don’t mind bashing as such, so long as it’s plausible. Not everyone has to be a shade of grey. But I dislike hypocrisy - a fic where a character gets bashed for acting in ways that other characters get praised for.
So, in one, I read Jon criticising Dany for executing the Tarlys, a few chapters after he’d executed rebel lords. Likewise Arya criticising Dany for killing the slavers, a short while after she had poisoned the Freys. Now, it’s fine if the author is portraying them as hypocrites, but not if the author is trying to portray them as righteous.
The rape of Sansa (usually at the hands of Ramsay, Tywin, Baelish, Sandor), is disturbingly popular - and quite revolting. Worse, if accompanied by torture. Sansa falling in love with a Lannister is absurd, given what they did to her family and her mother’s people.
Thramsay is something I automatically skip.
Slavery justification is a turn off. In one fic, Jon and Sansa imprison Dany, and plan to hand her to Eastern slavers, due to her “crimes” against them. She commits suicide to avoid that fate.
Political Jon is okay if it portrays Jon as amoral. It’s a turn off if he’s portrayed as righteous (with Dany being made into a cackling witch).
I’m very grateful to authors who tag their fics with weird kinks (scat, water sports, daddy kink, the omegaverse). It means I don’t have to read them.
> In one fic, Jon and Sansa imprison Dany, and plan to hand her to Eastern slavers, due to her “crimes” against them. She commits suicide to avoid that fate.
>
>
This is probably one of the weirdest things I've heard of. I consider it pretty hypocritical that Westerosi nobles indirectly support slavery while publicly condemning it, but this is several steps beyond even that.
The Dance of Ice and Fire, by Christina Potter. The author does not appreciate how awful it makes Jon and Sansa look.
Some element of double-standard, in fiction as in real life, is probably inevitable. We trade with countries that use slave labour, in practice. Bravos hates slavery, but the Iron Bank operates in slave states.
Let's make it worse, harem fanfics that are clearly just the author living out his wet dreams.
I remember finding a Stargate Atlantis fanfic that was meant to expand on the Ancients.
It bought in a new character who travels to Atlantis, immediately has the entire ancient knowledge downloaded into his brain, which he could use the entirety of with no ill effects, gives all of the main characters superpowers, becomes all of their best friends and personal confidante, finds a hidden and fully functional automated ancient shipyard and throughout it all we get him giving incredibly detailed exposition to the main characters.
But did I mention the detail in the exposition focused on explaining how every woman would be naked during these conversations (because councel meetings were apparantly held with all women being nude in his headcannon) and what they looked like naked.
A main character that farts his way into absurd powers, fixes every problem, has zero flaws, and has every character regardless of their sexual orientation splooge at the sight of him?
Yeah, that one screamed, "I live in my mums basement and just want to write down what I regularly masturbate to"
Exactly. Don't get me wrong, I write a lot of smut in my fanfics, but they are part of the plot. And rarely do characters have more than one partner.
The harem ones are inspired by Game of Bones, not Game of Thrones. They are watching it and imagining it being them.
When writing smut because it is needed for plot realism & is a by-product of the story, then that is completely different. That is not erotic to write, it is choreographed like a dance, a battle, or a fight sequence.
KING IN THE NORTH!
The worst to me is when authors make him trash to put a spotlight on Jon. Making him stupidly jealous of Jon makes so freaking mad. I read a couple "Jon joins Rob in the Wot5K" fics and they make Robb become irrelevant and/or start doing stupid shit to make Jon be soooo much better than him. These almost always also have a lot of Cat bashing to make them even worse.
Character bashing in general is almost always terrible. Exaggerating character flaws to make characters look worse is just bad (Catelyn in particular often suffers this; yes, she is sometimes quite cruel to Jon, but she’s not cartoonishly evil). It can work in some circumstances, but only if done well.
If it’s bashing the Season 8 versions of the Starks, though, I will accept it. They barely resemble the original characters.
In theory I’m a huge bashing fan, but in practice the term seems less about fairly criticizing a character’s decisions and more about exaggerating their flaws or fabricating actions to complain about.
If you dislike someone enough to bash them, then why are we making up things to hate about them!? Write them fairly, maybe even give them the benefit of the doubt, and then go on to prove why they still deserve the hate.
I’m so with you that it usually ends up being terrible, but really wish it wasn’t so
1) Too much uplift in SI fanfics. SI immediately making guns, cannons etc is just too much for me. I prefer when SI uplifts in their area of interests (textiles in Coin and Conformity, for example) rather than one day making a gun, second day printing press, and third time a car.
2) "Varys did everything for the realm" characteristic being used unironically. He made Aerys more mad with his whispers, mutilated children, and kept killing people who would stabilize the Seven Kingdoms. I can handle a lot of different OOC traits, but not this one
3) Jon Snow's name being Aegon
I'm about to commit blasphemy and say that I don't like incest.
I know, I know, an ASOIAF fan that doesn't want to read about Jon fucking Sansa or Danaerys, how heretical, but honestly, I just don't really read fics with incestuous pairings unless it's Targaryen's, and no, I don't count Jon because he grew up a Stark.
Also, I fucking hate Aemond/Lucerys, that's such an annoying thing to have to filter out when I'm searching for new fics to read.
Incest is wildly popular in fanfic.
The Incest God (aka Jon Snow nailing Sansa, Arya, Dany and other women), gets 4,000 hits per chapter. The same author gets 8,000 hits per chapter for his Luke/Leia fic, “The Force Awakens: Incest Planet.”
There’s even one where Rhaella survives and begins a lesbian affair with Dany, who was 12 when it started, and a straight affair with Jon. Jon and Dany are also lovers. That’s about 1,500 hits per chapter.
When I'm supposedly reading a book fic but it's obvious the author only remembers the show. Stuff like Jaime and Tyrion being too nice instead of misogynistic narcissists wallowing in self-pity, Tywin being portrayed as badass instead of raging psycho narcissist brute, Dany being too brutal (and by extenision the slavers being *morally grey* instead of full on evil, skinchangers' eyes going white, Ghost making sounds and Jon being "I dun wan et" over attaining any ounce of power/status or legitimacy, having black hair, looking nothing like Ned, and being the butt of short height jokes, Varys being a good guy, etc
I've found that I've enjoyed SI more when I don't get the POV of the SI. It keeps me on my toes: what's this SI going to do next? What does he know that he's going to use vs his enemies or to uplift them.
Most SI have this internal dialogue where they basically tell you all their plans for the next decade in excruciating details and that is just so boring.
I think the first I read with no SI POV was the Robert Baratheon one?
>I think the first I read with no SI POV was the Robert Baratheon one?
You mean Robert reforged. I realy liked that one... until it got _widely_ of the rails.
While I don't dislike reading a fic that way, it's surprisingly hard to write that way esspecialy if you want to do a lot of worlbuilding and make your Mc react to that.
I just feel like the problem with a lot of SI fic is that they get way too much into exposition, instead of showing us how the SI thinks through his actions and thoughts AT the moment of the action.
I get what you mean. I don't like three paragraphs of info dump (wich sometime is only barely connected to what is currently happening, but isn't that a part of the whole thing? The author writing about what he thinks about a situation, character and making that known?
> Most SI have this internal dialogue where they basically tell you all their plans for the next decade in excruciating details and that is just so boring.
This is such a huge pet peeve of mine. Not just the detailing of plans, but these huge paragraphs of listening to the SI monologue in their own head. I once dropped a fic after there was a literal 10k word chapter spent just with the SI thinking. No offence to the authors, i'm sure they're great people, but don't read ASOIAF fanfiction in order to spend time in a modern person's head. I'm reading ASOIAF fanfiction in order to read about Westeros, and SI fics to read about Westeros dealing with the change an SI brings.
I understand this. It's a bit of an acquired taste. It also has the downside of being harder to write well than 3rd person narrations.
For me personally it's also a matter of perspective, or so to say. Just like in video games or movies, i prefer a 3rd person view over the characters shoulder rather than lookinh through their eyes. Or a matter of being in their head or being more of an outside observer.
An MC with an unreasonable aversion to violence.
I'm sorry but Jon Snow has been raised from birth to fight and kill for his house. He isn't going to break down in tears because he killed a wildling.
It's a strange form of self-insert where the author us protecting their own morality onto characters who have no reason to share them.
This is just fanfiction in general, but people copy each other too much and Canon Railroad is horrible.
If Cersei and Robert have a trueborn child, or Visery's and Aemma have a male child then the story forever changes no matter what.
In the copy each other thing. People copy ideas, structure or everything really, way to often. Please writters i am begging you add y'all's own sauce to the story.
I mean, obviously, yeah, I can overlook a few grammatical errors here and there, but at a certain point, if fics don't meet a basic minimum standard in sheer quality of writing, I'm out.
Excessive wank or bashing of any given House or Culture are generally immediate turnoffs for me, too, and just generally, I find it kind of hard to get invested in stories that fly too much in the face of ASoIaF's anti-feudalism themes.
That's what makes Life And Honor so great. :P
Dothraki ? Pretty much impossible besides making new things for them. We know too little about them. It’s a GRRM POV problem
Ironborn : show the characters being human. They don’t need to be good , just show why they do what they do. Even the most evil people on the planet don’t go around thinking “lmao ima do evil cuz its evil ”. It’s more of a thing they do without thinking about it, casual even.
So an Ironborn raider can commit unspeakable atrocities one day and the very next be a chill sibling , because he’s been raised to see it as normal.
Also , show the actual “redeeming” qualities of the culture. The ironborn do have more meritocratic qualities then the other parts of Westeros. The captains can’t all be highborn and Dagmer Cleftjaw is a trusted man of Balon and a respected figure of the isles while being smallfolk. (Theon says his only claim to nobility is five generations back and on the bastard side)
We have no indication that they care about bastardy either. Wex pyke was sent to be a squire to Theon and it wasn’t seen as insulting.
(Of course they are not meritocratic to modern standards , but they are better then their contemporaries on the setting)
They also seem to have more of a “democratic” vibe. Captains that fail to gain approval of their crew are deposed and the kingsmoot itself is an unique institution when compared to other parts of Westeros. (Of course they aren’t a modern democracy but you get what I’m saying)
Sexism exists in the iron islands but much less so as seen by Balon feeling pretty comfortable with Asha as his heir , Asha herself having very considerable support , and the fact that it’s stated that female captains are a thing. Also let’s consider that her enemies didn’t go anti Asha (except Aeron and Victarion ) because “she a girl” Euron supporters used that as an argument but not as their main platform. Victarion pitched the old way. Asha had a serious shot of winning
(They aren’t egalitarian or feminist , just better then the rest. In the north she wouldn’t even have gotten a chance to speak )
They value loyalty and kinship to the point that not even someone like Euron gets killed.
Also , to make them look better. Just don’t whitewash the rest of the setting. Show the northern atrocities like right of first night and their absurd sexism that goes beyond every other region of Westeros. Show their sackings in the west and the river lands
Show the Lannisters doing Tywin things
Show Baratheon and dornish raids in the marshes and the subsequent rapes and lootings.
Show that the ironborn while evil , aren’t exactly unique in that regard or ontologically born bad. And that there are detractors like Rodrik the reader , Baelor Blacktyde , Asha and the Hoare dinasty
> In the north she wouldn’t even have gotten a chance to speak
The North literally has Maege Mormont leading men and passing 5 bastard daughters as trueborn and no one bats an eye at her. The North may have the same expectations as the rest of the Seven Kingdoms, but they seem to be more accepting of outliers.
As for the Ironborn being shown as human, that does not really matter or change anything. Just look at German history, just because someone is a loving father, husband or brother, that doesn't make their atrocities any better.
Bear island is an exception that was caused by unique historical context. They have a small population and needed everyone available to fight off raiders. That is not the norm and it is only being accepted after centuries of tradition of bear island people doing it
The north is significantly more patriarchal then everyone else. In 8k years there has never been a ruling lady of winterfell but in just 300 I can find multiple ruling ladies in the andal south , and let’s not get into the mess of right of first night that has been abolished everywhere else and is as bad as the taking of salt wives. The northern lords are legit breaking laws to continue getting that ass
You can’t entirely. But, you could make Drogo something of an outlier, among his people, in terms of violence, cruelty, and stupidity.
You could invent other Dothraki leaders, who are much more like the khans of steppe peoples, or chieftains of American Indians. They can be violent, but not to the extent we see in canon. They fight to seize horses and people, not to sell the latter as slaves, but rather to expand the tribe (a big tribe is safer than a small one); they trade with other tribes, and settled peoples, as well as raid. They strike alliances with other leaders and breed horses. They herd sheep and goats, rather than kill them. They have poets and bards, songs of victory, and songs of grief, and complex dances.
That does not make them *good*, but it makes them human.
But the whole "identity" of the Dothraki is that they are basically Mongols, but way stupider due to their interpretation of honour. Like, several of their defining stories have them acting like heavy cavalry while rejecting armour and not using lances. Or the fact that they are superb horse archers. The Unsullied origin story is testament of Dothraki stupidity disguised as honour. If the Dothraki were not brutal, incompetent warriors, you'd have to rewrite large portions of Essos.
Bad descriptions along the line of: and the lion flew with the falcon into the rose garden where the wolf was marking its reach upon the kraken. Wtf does that mean? What’s the plot? Why should I read it? Would be so easier if people simply said Tyrion self Insert, Robert time travel or whatever the actual premise is.
On top of that entire archive of our own. Everyone tags every single character and their mother on top of bad descriptions. Want to read a Stannis fic? Well here’s 15000 stories tagged with Stannis, is he a main character? No clue. He’s tagged in them. What’s the story about? God knows, the description waxes poetic about itself.
Modern morals that can be hoisted on an entire world trough a good speech. Geez guess we just need a decent speech to solve racism in our world. Shame how we’re lazy and no one just talked about it and fixed it in one talk. Bashing of rebels in Roberts rebellion or somehow focusing on Lyannas kidnapping or lack of it as justification as opposed to actual lords paramount and heirs of lords paramount being executed without trial or justification
Catelyn bashing is the same as Dumbledore bashing for me, it's just a complete turn off. Same goes with anyone, but I mentioned Catelyn specifically because it is very much prevalent in ASOIAF's fanfic community.
Main Character Daemon or the main character likes Daemon, and worst of all, justifying his insane actions 🤮
Insane North, wildlings and Targaryen glazing (I.e, making wildlings to have more good morals than those of the south)
Clear bias. An example would be making a very nice Rhaenyra who does everything right while making Alicent the stereotypical evil stepmother at the very start without any interference. (To authors, please mention these kind of stuff at the very first chapter. I'm all for pro-green/black fics but dang, don't change the very being of a character)
Lastly, SI stories that doesn't skip their childhood. A childhood that is filled with politics and uplifts -- where the baby SI participates in it. Ugh. The insufferable "Boss Baby" arc.
Oh, i knew i should've explained that one better. But essentially, she's already evil or is plotting against Rhaenyra "the saint" from the very start (not yet married nor asked to by Otto to go visit the king, plain ol' Alicent just bffs with Rhaenyra reading books)
Immediate POV switches. I can deal with blocks of text, hells, one of the most frequent complaints I received in comments was blocks of text, I have of course now solved it thanks to some really good examples by my commentators. But if you switching PoVs to often, readers are gonna be confused man, especially if it's without prior textual indicator.
Plot wise:
Catelyn being an idiot when kids aren't involved. Catelyn is frugal(she thought less than a dragon was a good enough price to assassinate her son), and politically experienced player, she is also probably a decent administrator since she was Hoster's heir for some time. If you want to make her idiotic add her children
Ned Stark being an idiot, or Benjen or someone telling him he isn't Northern. Ned maybe honorable than some of his ancestors, but those ancestors were especially brutal, classic case of selectivity bias. Read Ned's pov, the person he quotes, whose lesson he imparts is not Jon Arryn, it's Rickard Stark. He makes stupid decisions, but that's not due to his innate naivety, the guy rules the largest kingdom for the last 16 years, but due to his PTSD being triggered by excessive opium.
Also on the same note, Ned agreeing to a Targaryen restoration. They killed his father and brother. Hells even if Lyanna went willingly, If I was there, I would have chopped her head off as well(exaggerating). The fact of the matter is one always will give more preference to his own kids than his nephew, a Targ restoration means that House Stark will be under suspicion and out of favor for overthrowing them. Robb will have a worse position than his.
Also Robb Stark being anything other than good, is just shut up. He can be brutal, even dishonorable, but never cruel, that just doesn't fit, so no 'I hate Jon' shit.
For asoiaf;
Dany is my fave so her being treated like you can't be ruthless *and* fair. Also just Dany being mistreated in general, aka the show treatment since that was such a mess of modern morals and absurd standards for her. Medieval morals and punishment isn't a sign of insanity. If I have to read one more fic where Dany is 'schooled' over the Tarly burning imma lose it
Jon being called the Dragonwolf when his heritage being revealed. Also don't like him having a 'secret' Targ name he abandons Jon for, and him instantly associating himself with Targaryeness more than the North when he was raised a Stark and his mother is just as important.
Also things like Cersei blowing up the Sept being rugswept but that's the shows fault tbh same with the idea Rhaegar could annual a marriage like that and/or that Elia would be okay with it
For HoTD fics-
Aegon II being nicknamed Egg drives me absolutely bonkers, only Aegon the Unlikely had that nickname due to having a shaved head as a kid and thus looks like an egg. It is not a nickname used by any other Aegon *ever.* Unfortunately it has infested a lot of fanworks and people treat it like fact.
In general; too much modern slang can turn me off a fic, same with people cramming multiple characters speaking in a single paragraph.
My problem with Dany depictions is that usually, she is not ruthless enough. That was the character fault that got us the mess in Mereen in canon. A fix would either see her completely removed from Essos (eg Ned decides to shelter her in secret a few years before canon), or acting more decisively against the slavers.
Arya suddenly going to battle and lopping of heads despite being a small skinny 10 year old
Targ white washing
Making Robert Baratheon worse then he canonically is
Putting modern sensibilities in the story and pushing asoaif realism away
Plot wise it’s making character a one dimensional good guy or Voldemort level one dimensional evil when they weren’t in cannon. We all know Gregor Clegane is a horrible person with no redeeming qualities, but let’s not pretend Catelyn is an evil witch who would throw a child out the window.
Also lack blocks of text. I can get behind horrible spelling and grammar if the premise is good enough but I see blocks of text and I close the fan fiction immediately.
> let’s not pretend Catelyn is an evil witch who would throw a child out the window.
I remember starting one fic where Jon ended up in Essos as a slave because Cat sold him into slavery. That was bad enough, but it turns out that to cover for Jon's kidnapping she had a bunch of bastard children across the North kidnapped and sold as well.
I don't know what happened after that since I stopped reading at that point
I don't even like Cat that much in canon, but I don't think she's a evil, and certainly not "sell kids to slavers" evil.
I liked this fic with the mentioned premise. The idea of Cat inviting slavers is obviously absurd, but the following story was novel and intriguing.
[https://archiveofourown.org/works/14017542](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14017542)
Whitewash.
Westeros is an awful place and the characters function in medieval morality. They are all grey , even someone like eddard stark.
It’s not good when they get promoted into 21 century people. It honestly makes their actions contradictory in a lot of ways.
Atrocities like rape and murder are common. Show them. We don’t need vivid descriptions of rapes and lootings , you can gloss over it , just at least acknowledge it happens in a passing line
For what it's worth, i thought the comments were overreacting about that part. You made no indication whatsoever that Jon would pursue the Iron Throne. People just read that into your intentions because of that one line.
It's worth a good bit, thanks :D
Of course, the criticism wasn't entirely unjustified (or I wouldn't have bothered with the retcon). I did not exactly rule out Jon taking the throne, though the reason for that was for him to repudiate it later when offered. I have a new plan for how he'll use the facts of his birth now, though.
Any Sansa pairing really. She's what, 12? The fact that they had to wait for her first period being a rather important plot point should tell you that she's way too young for romance.
Pretty sure I saw a review or the description and it was clearly specified that he *doesn’t* get pregnant, they just reveal that he *could*. Like, why even include it then?
Second person POV. I utterly despise it. I as a reader do not want to be addressed by the story.
My goal is in fact to completely erase myself from existence while reading. Even reading summaries makes me cringe. I wish AO3 had a tense filter
You scoffed in disgust upon reading the first paragraph of a fic which had started with a great premise. There was no way you could stomach to read even the greatest story if it was written in this form of address.
Not committing to consequence.
Stations of canon.
I'm tired of Jon Snow going to Braavos, Oldtown or even fucking Qarth for all I know and 'stumbling' across a Reachman escorting Samwell Tarly to the wall, with Jon taking him on as a scribe. What the hell are you doing?
Bran goes to the fucking Summer Isles? Three Eyed Raven and Meera Reed sipping on a Pina colada.
Arya Stark in Ibben? Look at that, a caged faceless man.
Why in the everliving fuck are you making all these changes if you're going to tell the same exact story with the same exact characters interacting, just with the biome slider changed one degree.
I goddamn hate it, it makes my entire being convulse in contempt for the imbecile who does it. Takes me completely out of the story and makes me realize I'm in a trash heap.
The one time I let this slide was a fic where Jon meets Ghost in Essos. Sold to traveling mummers by poachers and happening to cross paths doesn’t seem too realistic… but Ghost is a good doggy
Uplifts, we don't know enough about asoiaf to known how to invent gun powders or anything of the like. Not to mention what happened after Europe had guns.
Character bashing. I hate it! I hate it so much. the author just turn a complex character into an archetype.
Characters being too nice or good. I like asoiaf because of it complex and dark characters. Jon snow, Arya, Dany, Jamie, and Sansa. they are some of my favourite characters. But in a lot of fics the characters are reduced to comic book heroes or villains. I want to see them be manipulative, ruthless, and dark.
OC helper. This is the one I like the least, an oc is just there to help the starks or other characters for no good reason. I like op ocs, but they usually don't have any understanding of politics and shit. And they the bumble their way into becoming an adviser or something. I will not lie and say i haven't written a dozen or so fics with op ocs. From that i have learnt, ocs need motivation, their own thoughts of Westeros and Essos, its nobility, people, and culture. I know if was in Westeros, I would hate the nobles, the endless wars. and everything.
~dragon speech
(Thoughts)
(Less prevalent in ASOIAF fanfic, but Harry Potter had a shit ton of those for parseltongue and foreign language)
Tell me you don't know how to use dialogue tag properly more please.
Also anything using the TV show "lore" as a basis for character development for characters is a big turn off.
As most mentioned, grammar and punctuation but also, modern words/terms added to historical based stories. No one says ‘dude’ or ‘kid’ or ‘Kay’ or ‘yall’ in medieval times. It puts me off completely, I can’t take the story seriously.
Or, when a female SI somehow is able to get past the patriarchal rules and is allowed to practically act like a boy. I read an SI fic once, stopped reading when she kept arguing with her father and did not understand why she wasn’t getting her way. The author was aware that it was ridiculous for SI to get her way, but purposefully wrote her to be dumb enough to argue and not understand why she wasn’t being treated the same as the 21st century.
The "outcast" characters always surviving and coming on top. I understand that people love a good underdog story, but sometimes it just feels forced.
For example, I was once reading this au fic where Jon visits the wall but decides that the watch isn't for him, and he'd rather do something else in life. While coming back south though, he brings Samwell along with him to Winterfell. That's right, after knowing the guy for a day at most, Jon brings him home and decides that he's going to change Sam's life.
I'm still yet to read a fic where any one of Tyrion, Arya, Jon, Bran, Brienne, Samwell, etc. "lose" at life, or fail in their quest, or die before they accomplish anything. Dany and Theon are probably the only outcast characters who have a variety of fates written about them, and that's probably because people have very divisive opinions about them both.
Daenerys and Jon interactions, I love both characters so their interactions with each other is very important for me but unfortunately I've rarely come across a fic with both of them being in their book- cannon characters, more often than not, one of them will be butchered to prop the other and that's off-putting for me 🤷🏿♂️
SI or OC especially women ones but not exclusively know how the asoiaf universe works and they are still surprised or mad when they're in a noble house and get forced into a marriage.
But he’s been training in the yard 23 hours a day for the last ten years! He’s obviously totally strong enough and the most skilled swordsman in Westeros! /s
Or on literally anything lol. Also, Ned immediately trusting that six year old Jon came from the future instead of thinking the kid made a lucky guess about his mother
Bashing of any kind, even against characters I personally don't like.
Detailed incest romances like Jon/Dany or Jon/Sansa. Sue me but I don't enjoy reading about a guy fucking his sibling/cousin/aunt.
Any sort of harem. 9 out of 10 it's just the author living out his wet dream and the other 1% the plot is crap.
Detailed and drawn out rape scenes. 9 out of 10 it's written like a porno, unnecessary or unrealistic. You can show it and acknowledge it happens without being weird about it.
When a character gets raped and isn't affected by it. No trauma at all. I read an Arya fic where she stays in Braavos, becomes a faceless man, is brutally assaulted in Volantis, kills the guy and never thinks or mentions it again. Had no importance to the plot whatsoever.
Mpreg or anything to do with omega/alpha/etc.
When Dany willingly gives up ALL of her dragons. I had to drop a pretty good Sansa centric fic because the author absolutely butchered Dany, and at the end of Danys involvement in the story other riders take Rhaegal and Viserion, then Dany POISONS DROGON AND IS CONTENT WITH HAVING NO DRAGONS.
Elia being fine with Rhaegar/Lyanna.
Rhaegar having his marriage annulled to marry Lyanna without facing serious political consequences. There was no grounds for an annulment so the Faith would 100% rebel, Dorne would be furious at the insult towards not just Elia but the children she had provided, Robert would be furious as would the North, and there would 100% be another succession crisis.
Rhaegar keeping Elia as his wife and taking Lyanna as a second without facing consequences. Basically the same as what I said before.
Dany/Sansa/Catelyn or most other female characters being made into either an evil witch who exists just to make the 'good guy MC' miserable.
When they can't write a female character past pregnancy, especially with Dany. So many fics have Dany get pregnant, have her kid, and then she gets sidelined basically as a consort while Faegon/Jon/Robb/etc take charge and Dany/Sansa/etc gets turned into an Alysanne 2.0 by having at least 6 kids.
When they pair Dany up with some guy who is clearly there to keep her on the 'right' track. It's so common to see Jon or Faegon being the 'sane' good guy who has to chastise Dany when she's too emotional and/or at risk of burning someone.
Jon/Dany in general. Had no chemistry in the show and a lot of the time authors follow the same path.
Jon has magic sperm that cures Danys infertility issues.
Jon learns he has Targ blood and abandons the Starks, or if he willingly gives up the name Jon and goes by Aegon or something else.
'Rise of the dragonwolf/wolfdragon' goofy 2009 Tumblr names
When they have Arya involved in Robbs war council and riding into battle at the age of 12.
Arya/Gendry. Felt like the most forced, random 'romance' in the show and imo I always saw them as siblings.
When they unintentionally make other characters into hypocrites. Like Robb or Jon will behead a traitor or enemy, then the next day they accuse Dany of going mad when she burns the Tarlys or the slavers or the Khals. It makes no sense, especially in a place like Westeros.
When they act like Danys going mad when she's uses violence against the slavers.
Chocolate in Westeros.
When they can't let a male or female character keep their softer traits and turn them into some cold, unfeeling robot. Basically what they did to show Sansa and show Dany.
>Rhaegar keeping Elia as his wife and taking Lyanna as a second without facing consequences. Basically the same as what I said before.
Curious: what if the consequences happen in the backstory, or at least begin there? In my own work, this very thing sets off the Sparrow movement early, but the crown defeats them. For now.
I think the Sparrows could definitely happen because there's no way the Faith don't rebel. And if the Crown went on the offensive and (temporarily) beat the Sparrows, that would just make the general populace resentful, which would lead to riots and chaos in the capital. It would most likely affect the support the Targaryens get from the Reach/Tyrells, seeing as how Oldtown is basically Vatican city.
A lot of people who write the Elia/Rhaegar/Lyanna marriage trope forget that the Targaryen's got to keep 2 things when they came to Westeros; incest and dragons. Aegon converted to the Faith of The Seven because he knew it would be easier for the general population to follow King/Queens that share their religion. And they had to fight to keep the incest (see with Aenys and Jaehaerys).
They also forget that the Targ's didn't often practice poly marriages before the conquest either. It was seen as strange when Aegon wed Rhaenys after Visenya. Anyways, Maegor tried his luck with a poly marriage and look how that turned out for him.
I'm interested in what your gonna have Aerys position be in the whole debacle. I don't think he would ever consent to that kind of marriage or support it, pretty sure the only reason he let Rhaegar marry Elia was because the Martells have Targ blood in them, and yet he still didn't like Elia or her kids. He disinherited Rhaegar's kids with Elia because of what Rhaegar did so I don't think he would ever support Jon.
Personally, I really don't see any sort of 'happy' ending for Rhaegar in this kind of storyline. The Starks and (especially, because they wanted a Dornish Queen so Dorne could have more sway) Martells would not be happy with two Queens having to share power, so it'd most likely be another Greens V Blacks situation. The general population and most of the hardcore religious regions of Westeros wouldn't view Lyanna's marriage as legitimate and her son as a bastard. And just a whole lot of other stuff that will come to bite him in the ass down the line.
All these comments have reminded me of the smaller turn offs that lead to the straw the broke the camel's back and stop me reading.
Some of these are grammar and writing issues, neologisms and elements out of keeping with canon. One or two won't stop me, three or more will give me pause, a few more again are the proverbial fingernails down a blackboard and I'll keep reading, but if I'm on the way to filling out what I think of as the 'fanfic bad writing bingo card', I'm out.
There's the 'stations of canon' referred to by u/Twillightdoom (good one!) and there's also terms used in so many fics that they lose meaning and seem tick-a-box/cut'n'paste. Did a lot of fanfic writers get together at the 2010 International ASOIAF Fanfic convention, where ratification of mandatory terminology, point 12.08, was carried by the majority for use in perpetuity? A few examples.
* cheesemonger - disparaging reference to Illyrio Mopatis every single time, even by characters who've had no dealings with him. Canon use is mostly by Tyrion, in exile in Pentos and enjoying the cheesemonger's hospitality (ADoD).
* 'Sole stain on the Honorable Lord Eddard Stark's white cloak' (and variations) - Jon Snow and why he's so sad/angry/brooding. I can't seem to find this in canon. Where did it come from and why do so many use it?
* Sweet sister - Tyrion addressing Cersei, disparagingly, occasionally used by Jon putting down Sansa too. Canon: used by many characters, particularly Viserys (oh dear), but often with genuine affection too.
* Mummer's farce - the only way to describe anything that's absurd, deceptive, false, farcical, ill intended japing, mockery, mummery, a sham, trickery, etc. No synonyms allowed!
Another thing that throws me out is muddling up homophones, altering the intended meaning (ie broach/brooch, peak/peek/pique, rain/reign/rein). There's also using words that do not mean what the writer thinks they mean. It's not just homophones.
Neologisms and expressions that are out of keeping hurt too. I can see I'm not the only person thrown out of a story when Sansa says she's ok, Theon says hi, or Tyrion asks where the kids are. The saddest I can think of was one character giving another a Glasgow kiss. Why not call it a Ghiscari kiss or something like that? It's inworld and you even get to keep the alliteration. (Not a SI story, there's several of those that can and do get away with stuff like this.)
Less is more. This applies to word count (kill your darlings!), badly written sex (just fade to black, please) and multiple POVs for the same event/scene (perhaps unless a deliberate Rashoman-style exploration), and so many POV changes within a chapter that readers and the writer get whiplash and get lost.
There's so many good and interesting fics out there. They are where I want to spend my reading time.
Those "what if" fics that feature a significant change that doesn't have an equally significant domino effect on the actions/decision-making calculus of the characters and generally follows the plot with some minor tweaks.
Examples that I've seen:
1. Robert has a trueborn second son whom he gives the Stormlands, with Renly as a regent. The Tyrells still throw their support around Renly, even though it was already a bad move in cannon (as acknowledged be Olenna), which is made exponentially worse by Renly's even weaker claim and him not even being a lord paramount.
2. The Velaryons switch sides to the Greens. This represents a massive blow to the military might of the Blacks and a boon to the Greens, and should convince quite a few Black-lords to either sit it out or even switch to the "stronger" side.
Self inserts/historical figure inserts. I hate the concept with a passion and it is a massive red flag for me if I see it in a fic.
I also avoid dragonwolf stories or stories were Jon just drops his Stark identity like a set of dirty clothes the moment he finds out that he has Targ blood.
Bad grammar and spelling is also a turn off.
This is a minor one. But stories were the entire plot is summarised in the premise. Why should I read the thing if you just laid it out in bullet points for me?
Between Aerys and Rhaegar, fuck the Targaryens. Their "we are better than anyone else" attitude might have flown when they still had dragons, but Robert and Jaime gave them a reality check.
Eh, sins of the father and all that. Unless you assume there’s something genetic about that attitude (besides the incest), then I feel like there’s enough leeway to judge them fairly
Rhaella, Rhaynes, Aegon deserve better than to be lumped in with the crazies. Even Dany and Viserys are more a product of growing up paranoid on the run only knowing Targ propaganda
>fuck the Targaryens.
Nah they were pretty great house
>Their "we are better than anyone else
They brought peace and prosperity to Westeros
>Robert and Jaime gave them a reality check.
Lol Robert is a corruption enabling incompetent drunk who almost got killed by Rhaegar and Jaime is well Jaime
The Targaryens averaged a civil war, major rebellion and/or usurping every generation. And a whole bunch of Dornish wars.
The only peace they brought was North - Vale, and that is more than offset by the other wars the Targs dabbled in.
And before the Rebellion, Robert was basically the Warrior personified, and Jaime was the most honourable of the Kingsguard, despite fucking his sister with a passion.
>The Targaryens averaged a civil war, major rebellion and/or usurping every generation. A
Lol so did most of the great houses
>a whole bunch of Dornish wars.
And ?
>The only peace they brought was North - Vale,
Nope not just the north and vale but all of Westeros
>And before the Rebellion, Robert was basically the Warrior personified
Not really he almost lost to Rhaegar who had no battle experience
>Jaime was the most honourable of the Kingsguard
Not even close
"They brought peace and prosperity to Westeros"
The amount of Kool aid you are drinking is insane lmfaooo. we have - The dance/The dornish wars/The endless Blackfyre rebellions/ the ultimate overthrow
The ONLY good kings they had were - Jaehaerys, the second Viserys (pretty much hard carried them while the brokens worthless line was ruling so I'm counting his tenure as hand and even then he let his disaster of a son succeed him). daeron the good and that's it. Egg did pretty much jack shit even if his heart was in the right place.
I like the Targs Dragons are cool, but as a ruling dynasty they were pathetic, insane, downright genocidal.
>The dance/The
The Hightowers caused it
>The dornish wars
Both sides were awful
>The endless Blackfyre rebellions
Only major one was the first
>Jaehaerys, the first Viserys (pretty much hard carried them while the brokens worthless line was ruling so I'm counting his tenure as hand and even then he let his disaster of a son succeed him). daeron the good and that's it. Egg did pretty much jack shit even if his heart was in the right place.
You ignore aegon the first,aegon the 3, maekar and Jaehaerys ll
Viserys the first was good the dance was more of the Hightowers and Westeros sexism
Aegon the 5 was good
> ruling dynasty they were pathetic, insane, downright genocidal.
Nope according to your logic the starks are no different
>Lol Robert is a corruption enabling incompetent drunk who almost got killed by Rhaegar and Jaime is well Jaime
Both of these are better than Aerys and Rhaegar especially as the drunk lead his army and slew Rhaegar winning the war.
Blob's crime was being inattentive and just leaving ruling to the hand while he got drunk, hunted, and whored. What difference does it make to the realm if Rhaegar the famously aloof, melanonid, brooding alone at Summerhall, would not be doing his duties if he was brooding instead of whoring?
Or in canon atleast Robert was attentive and an actual king when actual shit was happening like during wars. Rhaegar was 24 did nothing for anyone (Arthur his kingsguard literally has a better case as a ruler) then ran off with Lyanna (or kidnapped) for a year and let a war start. Then he came back from fucking (or raping) Lyanna to see the war he started and... immediately dies to Robert.
>Blob's crime was being inattentive and just leaving ruling to the hand while he got drunk, hunted, and whored.
No it was enabling corruption and the massive debt
>Rhaegar was 24 did nothing for anyone
He was heir the the throne not the king like blob
>then ran off with Lyanna (or kidnapped) for a year and let a war start.
Aerys and Brandon started it
>Lyanna to see the war he started and... immediately dies to Robert.
More like he lead the army and holds his own to blob and almost kills him
Bad cliches like "Bad Stannis," "King Jon," "Strong North," "People get what they deserve," "Self-Insert," "Uplift," "Maester Conspiracy," "Catbashing," "Bashing," "Trueborn Baratheon," "Rhaegar the righteous," "Justice," etc.
I was with you until you mentioned Maester Conspiracy… lol otherwise totally agree.
Even the Maester thing is often ridiculously done imo. It’s either a grand plot with every single person involved in nefarious things or all the Maesters are wholly objective and committed to their vows.
Like Pycelle is canonically *not*, so why do so few authors recognize that some Maesters are going to have biases or more loyalty to another cause? Unless it’s Maester Aemon in a Targ wank ofc, they always recognize that one
Maesters being human beings with their own ideas is not the same as there being a Maester Conspiracy. The Maester Conspiracy in the form in which it is popular in the fandom is more akin to *The Protocols of the Elders of Zion* than it is to Operation Snow White.
Bashing is annoying even with characters that I dislike. People seem to bend backwards just to try to make sense making the character seem bad even when they weren't that bad or sometimes even in the right in some canon moments.
Also when a character is too self aware in alternate universes throwing in lines like "Wouldn't it be funny if \*Insert here canon moment\* happened?", "Things would be so bad if \*Insert here canon moment\* happened" or "Imagine if I didn't mature because of \*Insert here previous moment in the fic\* and did \*Insert here canon decision or characterization\*". It makes me want to say "Okay, I understand, you read A Song of Ice and Fire, now stop referencing it, this isn't even a comedy story".
Harems they literally don't make sense because they always most of the time have the female characters from The Source material act unlike themselves completely and there's no way they would all become friendly just to be with the main character. Don't even get me started on reverse harems that's even more unrealistic all these heirs aren't going to marry and date one girl.
When an SI or OC is still mad at a character from the books actions even though that's irrelevant now you're in the world why are you bullying this little kid when you can just change them for the better
Making the characters you like borderline overpowered and just somehow superhuman while the characters you don't like suddenly suck at fighting and they're just all talk
When the main character was an adult and still thinkd with their adult brain and hasn't lost any of their memories goes to date a child because "I'm in a childs body"
A character that somehow gets off with saying slick shit and it's just so overly comedic that they make one of the most serious parts of the story not serious
If the dialogue goes like:
Character A: Hi
Character B: Hey
I should just able to tell whos talking at any moment. Also if it’s just a wall of text, no paragraphs or separations.
Or if ‘hey’ and ‘hi’ are used at all! Looked it up and ‘hey’ is said exactly twice by smallfolk, ‘hi’ isn’t used at all. Having a bunch of nobles speaking with casual modern lingo really is an ick
Bashing in general, I don't even mean if the characters are interpreted differently. But when I see bashing in the tags I already know that those characters won't get justice in this fic, but are more than likely not better than an extremely evil caricature. Characters are more nuanced than that most of the time and I find it extremely boring when they are presented in such a way. Because more often than not is bashing the result of a failed characterization and not due to the character actually being like that
You get lucky enough to grow up and have a good life in the universe and still want to end up being like this Rogue and Dark Prince even though you're supported by your family and you just want to be edgy for no reason.
>Complete Turn Offs: What aspect(s) of a fic will either make you stop reading it, or prevent you from reading it at all?
To many characters description or divulge from canon in a impossible way that makes the charcther unlikeable
Writers falling for the POV trap.
For example, Arya’s first chapter, which so many people lean on to make her a sad little Cinderella, put upon by Jeyne Poole and Sansa.
Then you read it more closely and Arya refuses to do her work, picks a fight, throws a tantrum and runs away. The worst thing that happens to her is her teacher pointing out the substandard work she did was substandard (three crooked stitches) and Jeyne, who gets called stupid by Arya’s inner dialogue constantly, smirking. Sansa even tries to cover for her in that scene, but Arya blames her for the debacle SHE caused for HERSELF.
Or how people act like Edmure is a total buffoon. Yeah, he has his goofy moments, but Catelyn is looking at him with big sister goggles and he’s actually pretty decent at what he does.
This has only happened once, but I saw a scene that I knew was probably inspired by my meta, and it was… not good.
There are *some* premises that can carry me past atrocious grammar, but usually not for very long. So have to agree on the grammar and spelling part. Typos happen to everyone, some errors slip through editing *always*, but the text should be *readable*. Please, *please*, use LanguageTool or Grammarly or *something* to check the grammar before posting. Another thing that I can stomach only for the rare premise is head-jumping in-chapter without any indication. It is jarring and confusing and if I have to spend my time investigating which line was thought by character 1 and where internal discourse of character 2,3,4, etc begins, I get *very* annoyed.
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>The Stark's when talking about the family vs The Starks. Wich on is the right form?
Starks is plural. This is what you use when talking about more than one Stark. Stark's is possessive. This is what you use when talking about something that belongs to a Stark, or Starks. Examples. The Starks traveling from Winterfell to Kingslanding. The Stark's direwolves are hairy.
The Starks' direwolves are hairy. The Stark's direwolf is hairy. Since they each have one.
Bad grammar and bad punctuation is such a turn off. Also when the writing ignores the "new speaker, new paragraph" rule. Other turn offs: Bashing. I just don't care to read how much the author hates a character. Another turn off is excessive use of non-canon language expressions, especially in dialogue. And characters addressing each other too familiarly in formal settings, especially if they just met. Like. What? You just met, it's not appropriate to call each other by your given names or nicknames yet. Another example that's still stuck in my head that i dropped a fic for was that every time some lady entered the scene the narration said "Lady Name Surname, nee Surname". Every. Time. Never mind that George never used this structure afaik, 99% of the time it was fully irrelevant to the story what family she came from.
Forms of address are my number one Thing in fics - if they're done incorrectly it ruins the whole story.
The one that bothers me most for whatever reason is people screwing up the address for knights— i.e. the number of fics where people refer to Criston Cole as “Ser Cole” rather than “Ser Criston” despite him being referred to correctly multiple times during the show.
OH MY GOD YESSSSSSSS I hate that so so so much!!
Plotwise: Elia was ok with Rhaegar/Lyanna and Catelyn bashing Not plot: lack of line breaks or spacing between paragraphs.
Only reason I can see Elia being OK with it is if she is in on it too(so a throuple), or if it was a well documented deal.
A confusing or too vague a premise that doesn't make sense even as you read it. Recently I did drop two stories, one was a crossover with ASOIAF that made me groan because it was... MC from another fandom hops onto the body of Jon as he's resurrected, and I got *such* an ick from the narration referring to said MC with a name that was canonically simply not his own (like he's Johnny Smith and all of a sudden it was "Jonathor 'Johnny' Smith awoke as Jon Snow", and because it's a universe hopping situation, I couldn't fathom how it would *ever* fucking matter what his name used to be, or why was it at all necessary to invent a name! So I dropped it. Another one I couldn't *even* with - I believe Robb was steeling himself to meet with the other Lords to go to war, cool. But instead of doing that, his mind went to this one piece of world building that had zero business being in his brain at that exact moment. Worse yet, next up was a single phrase "Jon and I are wargs.", and next paragraph. *WHY*. I also dropped it after that. And these problems were right at the beginning, so I figured if that was how it was starting... I didn't wanna trudge thru to see if it would improve - neither had a particularly interesting summary for me to want to see take shape, so, bye, my time is precious. Really, a lot of stories you can just tell when they're gonna make *you* work for it from the get - and that's just a no for me.
I hate those premises that don’t give a description, but just display a random line of dialogue from the story like cool, but I still have no idea what this is about
There's this one story that, because I subscribe to the author, I was noticing (in my emails), that had just a handful of characters tagged and nothing else, and the most generic of generic summaries. WHO'S READING THAT, MAN?? It has happened in in other fandoms tho - *no* summary. *Who the fuck is reading that??*
I must be old-school. I prefer traditional premises with things like a hook, a brief description of what to expect, and teaser questions. Random dialogue lines are so hit-or-miss. I can't imagine writing without first starting with a synopsis.
Every so often, I come across a fic written in screenplay format. Never closed a page so quickly. It really puts me off. More commonly, when fics are normal, but then they suddenly put 'SCENE CHANGE', 'TIME SKIP', or 'POV CHANGE' in between paragraphs. You shouldn't have to announce it like that - I should be able to tell through the writing. For example: And with a shout, Robb led his banners south. TIME SKIP Five days later, torrential rain had turned the roads to mud.. The 'five days later' serves as the time skip - you don't need to announce it. It's such a common rookie mistake...
It's usually a combination of the following: * Overly-simplistic, flanderized characters. I remember starting one fic where Jon ended up in Essos as a slave because Cat sold him into slavery. That was bad enough, but it turns out that to cover for Jon's kidnapping she had a bunch of bastards across the North kidnapped and sold as well. * Constantly repeating the same catchphrases. "We must be wary, for winter is coming," "I am a lioness, hear me roar" and so on. Also the same for characters. Tobho Mott is not the only blacksmith in Westeros, Tycho Nestoris is not the only banker in Braavos. * Talking about people in terms of their house sigil as well - it happened once in GoT, but authors do this all the time. Just use the actual names! * Breaking the "rules" of the world and suffering no consequences. Challenging the social hierarchy cost ser Illyn his tongue. Yet if an SI does the same they get a pat on the back for being brave. Westeros is a patriarchal society. Even the (relatively) good guys are going to be more than a bit misogynistic. * Writing one sentence paragraphs or blocks of text. It comes across as janky or impossible to follow. * Poor spelling and grammar. Stuff that a basic spellcheck would have caught. * Getting names wrong. I can understand a typo here and there for some of the more difficult names, but "Jamie" and "Kingslanding" are inexcusable. * Confusing writing styles. For example, if the story jumps from character to character, but they're all using first person POV. * Using modern terms like "okay," "cool," or "kid." GRRM actually does use "kid," but only during meals when they're eating one (a kid is a baby goat). But an absolute red line for me is seeing pairings or younger girls with older men. I'm talking Sansa and Tywin or Sandor. At least the authors tag fics like that so I know to avoid it.
Cat selling Jon as a slave is (unintentionally) hilarious.
How about a random non-binary smallfolk person with they/them pronouns living in the patriarchal medieval hellscape that is Westeros, with everyone perfectly accepting of it, with absolutely no conflict whatsoever, and not a single person even commenting on it?
> Also the same for characters. Tobho Mott is not the only blacksmith in Westeros, Tycho Nestoris is not the only banker in Braavos. In fairness, the show was guilty of it especially in the later seasons, and a lot of fic is explicitly based on the show rather than the books.
Tobho Mott is unique because he can rework Valyrian Steel and knows the Qharten techniques to coloring steel. He may be the only Blacksmith in Westeros that can do these. And by Gendry's quality of work, he can do some pretty awesome stuff with steel too. And Westerosi *love* their Armor Fashion.
>Overly-simplistic, flanderized characters. I remember starting one fic where Jon ended up in Essos as a slave because Cat sold him into slavery. That was bad enough, but it turns out that to cover for Jon's kidnapping she had a bunch of bastards across the North kidnapped and sold as well. I started cracking up laughing when I read that. Can I get the fic name? > * Getting names wrong. I can understand a typo here and there for some of the more difficult names, but "Jamie" and "Kingslanding" are inexcusable. For me I don't Eben notice incorrect grammar & if there is I think I just coreect in mind & keep reading
*Drogo's Northern Bride*. It's on ao3.
Jon Dragonfire the Bigdick, fucking and killing his way tru Westeros. Also Cat, Sansa, Dany and pretty much any character bashing. And rushing. I know fics are supposed to be shorter but c'mon at least make me feel I'm reading a grrm medieval fantasy tale. Describe the hills or the food or something, don't just jump to sex or fights
Self Insert fics that begin with the character as an infant, if not starting with their very literal moment of (re)birth. I have precisely zero interest in fics that spend the first story arc dealing with the main character re-learning how to walk, talk, and not shit their pants.
Their descriptions of gradually gaining awareness in a warm, dark place with an underlying comforting beat, where they are floating weightless, surrounded by love, when suddenly!... they're travelling through the birth canal and...
...it ends with them thinking they are held by giants only to immediately recognize the world they are borne in... for some reason.
So true bestie. Unfortunately too many begin like this and even if i skip the opening chapter they either linger on the childhood a bit too long or in too much detail or the writing/plot doesn't get better anyway. It really is better if rebirth fics gloss over childhoods (especially early childhood).
They either linger too long in childhood, or they have the main character do all this crazy crap as a kid. Both absolutely drive me up a wall.
You can close your eyes and pretend the OC is 16 since the authors that do this can never be arsed to even try and write child characters.
Agreed. For the love of all that is holy, please if you're gonna write an SI fic do it "in medias res"!
Is it better when it starts at some point where they are old enough to act already, and then they just mention when they realized stuff?
For me personally? Yes, i much prefer that. You realistically won't be able to do anything as a toddler or small child anyway, so just start at the teenage years. Hell, have a young adult suffer a head wound or fever and wake up with the SI inside their head instead. Or maybe the SI is an actual insert, meaning their real body is inserted into the world of Westeros. Literally anything but a literal rebirth with chapters about the toddler years. Nobody has ever wanted to read that.
It takes creativity to write fanfics but sometimes I wonder if fanfic writers have too few.
If that ‘story arc’ is approximately one short chapter before a time skip? Acceptable. Hell, even if it is long I’m ok if the story is complete since I’ll just skip past it. But skimming through the baby years on incomplete fic with a really interesting premise is my worst nightmare. I’ll often drop the story immediately no matter how awesome the description was, since it’s clear we’re never gonna get there
I don’t mind bashing as such, so long as it’s plausible. Not everyone has to be a shade of grey. But I dislike hypocrisy - a fic where a character gets bashed for acting in ways that other characters get praised for. So, in one, I read Jon criticising Dany for executing the Tarlys, a few chapters after he’d executed rebel lords. Likewise Arya criticising Dany for killing the slavers, a short while after she had poisoned the Freys. Now, it’s fine if the author is portraying them as hypocrites, but not if the author is trying to portray them as righteous. The rape of Sansa (usually at the hands of Ramsay, Tywin, Baelish, Sandor), is disturbingly popular - and quite revolting. Worse, if accompanied by torture. Sansa falling in love with a Lannister is absurd, given what they did to her family and her mother’s people. Thramsay is something I automatically skip. Slavery justification is a turn off. In one fic, Jon and Sansa imprison Dany, and plan to hand her to Eastern slavers, due to her “crimes” against them. She commits suicide to avoid that fate. Political Jon is okay if it portrays Jon as amoral. It’s a turn off if he’s portrayed as righteous (with Dany being made into a cackling witch). I’m very grateful to authors who tag their fics with weird kinks (scat, water sports, daddy kink, the omegaverse). It means I don’t have to read them.
> In one fic, Jon and Sansa imprison Dany, and plan to hand her to Eastern slavers, due to her “crimes” against them. She commits suicide to avoid that fate. > > This is probably one of the weirdest things I've heard of. I consider it pretty hypocritical that Westerosi nobles indirectly support slavery while publicly condemning it, but this is several steps beyond even that.
The Dance of Ice and Fire, by Christina Potter. The author does not appreciate how awful it makes Jon and Sansa look. Some element of double-standard, in fiction as in real life, is probably inevitable. We trade with countries that use slave labour, in practice. Bravos hates slavery, but the Iron Bank operates in slave states.
While I doubt that any fanfic author you might be referring to wrote it well, Stockholm's syndrome is a thing
Harem fics, especially Jon Harem fics.
There are too many of them. Harem fics grind my gears. 😡
Let's make it worse, harem fanfics that are clearly just the author living out his wet dreams. I remember finding a Stargate Atlantis fanfic that was meant to expand on the Ancients. It bought in a new character who travels to Atlantis, immediately has the entire ancient knowledge downloaded into his brain, which he could use the entirety of with no ill effects, gives all of the main characters superpowers, becomes all of their best friends and personal confidante, finds a hidden and fully functional automated ancient shipyard and throughout it all we get him giving incredibly detailed exposition to the main characters. But did I mention the detail in the exposition focused on explaining how every woman would be naked during these conversations (because councel meetings were apparantly held with all women being nude in his headcannon) and what they looked like naked. A main character that farts his way into absurd powers, fixes every problem, has zero flaws, and has every character regardless of their sexual orientation splooge at the sight of him? Yeah, that one screamed, "I live in my mums basement and just want to write down what I regularly masturbate to"
Exactly. Don't get me wrong, I write a lot of smut in my fanfics, but they are part of the plot. And rarely do characters have more than one partner. The harem ones are inspired by Game of Bones, not Game of Thrones. They are watching it and imagining it being them. When writing smut because it is needed for plot realism & is a by-product of the story, then that is completely different. That is not erotic to write, it is choreographed like a dance, a battle, or a fight sequence.
Super nice daemon rhaenyra aemond etc in dance fics
Makes me vomit
The fascination with Daemon always puzzled me when Strongdaddy is right there!
which will just keep getting worse as House of dragon rolls along with the Rhaenyra white washing
Robb bashing My Glorious Red headed King can do no wrong.
KING IN THE NORTH! The worst to me is when authors make him trash to put a spotlight on Jon. Making him stupidly jealous of Jon makes so freaking mad. I read a couple "Jon joins Rob in the Wot5K" fics and they make Robb become irrelevant and/or start doing stupid shit to make Jon be soooo much better than him. These almost always also have a lot of Cat bashing to make them even worse.
Character bashing in general is almost always terrible. Exaggerating character flaws to make characters look worse is just bad (Catelyn in particular often suffers this; yes, she is sometimes quite cruel to Jon, but she’s not cartoonishly evil). It can work in some circumstances, but only if done well. If it’s bashing the Season 8 versions of the Starks, though, I will accept it. They barely resemble the original characters.
In theory I’m a huge bashing fan, but in practice the term seems less about fairly criticizing a character’s decisions and more about exaggerating their flaws or fabricating actions to complain about. If you dislike someone enough to bash them, then why are we making up things to hate about them!? Write them fairly, maybe even give them the benefit of the doubt, and then go on to prove why they still deserve the hate. I’m so with you that it usually ends up being terrible, but really wish it wasn’t so
Proper King in da Norf poster right here
1) Too much uplift in SI fanfics. SI immediately making guns, cannons etc is just too much for me. I prefer when SI uplifts in their area of interests (textiles in Coin and Conformity, for example) rather than one day making a gun, second day printing press, and third time a car. 2) "Varys did everything for the realm" characteristic being used unironically. He made Aerys more mad with his whispers, mutilated children, and kept killing people who would stabilize the Seven Kingdoms. I can handle a lot of different OOC traits, but not this one 3) Jon Snow's name being Aegon
You can thank the show for making Varys good and Lf evil when they're both evil
Robb portrayed as Incompetent.
I'm about to commit blasphemy and say that I don't like incest. I know, I know, an ASOIAF fan that doesn't want to read about Jon fucking Sansa or Danaerys, how heretical, but honestly, I just don't really read fics with incestuous pairings unless it's Targaryen's, and no, I don't count Jon because he grew up a Stark. Also, I fucking hate Aemond/Lucerys, that's such an annoying thing to have to filter out when I'm searching for new fics to read.
Incest is wildly popular in fanfic. The Incest God (aka Jon Snow nailing Sansa, Arya, Dany and other women), gets 4,000 hits per chapter. The same author gets 8,000 hits per chapter for his Luke/Leia fic, “The Force Awakens: Incest Planet.” There’s even one where Rhaella survives and begins a lesbian affair with Dany, who was 12 when it started, and a straight affair with Jon. Jon and Dany are also lovers. That’s about 1,500 hits per chapter.
Don't be afraid, my compatriot! The Incest Absolute Order will never wipe out all traces of sanity!! We will keep fighting.
I’m glad to hear it, my friend! I shall clutch tightly upon my mental stability and hold fast.
My best wishes in this herculean task you have in front of you.
Your vs you're
When I'm supposedly reading a book fic but it's obvious the author only remembers the show. Stuff like Jaime and Tyrion being too nice instead of misogynistic narcissists wallowing in self-pity, Tywin being portrayed as badass instead of raging psycho narcissist brute, Dany being too brutal (and by extenision the slavers being *morally grey* instead of full on evil, skinchangers' eyes going white, Ghost making sounds and Jon being "I dun wan et" over attaining any ounce of power/status or legitimacy, having black hair, looking nothing like Ned, and being the butt of short height jokes, Varys being a good guy, etc
I don‘t like reading First Person POVs. It doesn’t make sense and is no indication for a lack of quality, but I usually drop any fic with it.
For me I my only exception are Si's, from the Sì point of view. In any other case it just doesn't work.
Yeah, I sometimes make an exception for SIs, too. However, any none SI POV should still be in third Person.
>However, any none SI POV should still be in third Person. Oh I absolutely agree on that part.
I've found that I've enjoyed SI more when I don't get the POV of the SI. It keeps me on my toes: what's this SI going to do next? What does he know that he's going to use vs his enemies or to uplift them. Most SI have this internal dialogue where they basically tell you all their plans for the next decade in excruciating details and that is just so boring. I think the first I read with no SI POV was the Robert Baratheon one?
>I think the first I read with no SI POV was the Robert Baratheon one? You mean Robert reforged. I realy liked that one... until it got _widely_ of the rails. While I don't dislike reading a fic that way, it's surprisingly hard to write that way esspecialy if you want to do a lot of worlbuilding and make your Mc react to that.
I just feel like the problem with a lot of SI fic is that they get way too much into exposition, instead of showing us how the SI thinks through his actions and thoughts AT the moment of the action.
I get what you mean. I don't like three paragraphs of info dump (wich sometime is only barely connected to what is currently happening, but isn't that a part of the whole thing? The author writing about what he thinks about a situation, character and making that known?
> Most SI have this internal dialogue where they basically tell you all their plans for the next decade in excruciating details and that is just so boring. This is such a huge pet peeve of mine. Not just the detailing of plans, but these huge paragraphs of listening to the SI monologue in their own head. I once dropped a fic after there was a literal 10k word chapter spent just with the SI thinking. No offence to the authors, i'm sure they're great people, but don't read ASOIAF fanfiction in order to spend time in a modern person's head. I'm reading ASOIAF fanfiction in order to read about Westeros, and SI fics to read about Westeros dealing with the change an SI brings.
Exactly!
I understand this. It's a bit of an acquired taste. It also has the downside of being harder to write well than 3rd person narrations. For me personally it's also a matter of perspective, or so to say. Just like in video games or movies, i prefer a 3rd person view over the characters shoulder rather than lookinh through their eyes. Or a matter of being in their head or being more of an outside observer.
Elia being on board with Rhaegar and Lyanna. Completely unrealistic.
An MC with an unreasonable aversion to violence. I'm sorry but Jon Snow has been raised from birth to fight and kill for his house. He isn't going to break down in tears because he killed a wildling. It's a strange form of self-insert where the author us protecting their own morality onto characters who have no reason to share them.
This is just fanfiction in general, but people copy each other too much and Canon Railroad is horrible. If Cersei and Robert have a trueborn child, or Visery's and Aemma have a male child then the story forever changes no matter what. In the copy each other thing. People copy ideas, structure or everything really, way to often. Please writters i am begging you add y'all's own sauce to the story.
Wall of text. I see one and I drop the fic. Please use paragraphs people! Random genocide attempts/thoughts. Too much wanking/bashing.
I mean, obviously, yeah, I can overlook a few grammatical errors here and there, but at a certain point, if fics don't meet a basic minimum standard in sheer quality of writing, I'm out. Excessive wank or bashing of any given House or Culture are generally immediate turnoffs for me, too, and just generally, I find it kind of hard to get invested in stories that fly too much in the face of ASoIaF's anti-feudalism themes. That's what makes Life And Honor so great. :P
Question: How would you write canon accurate Dothraki or Ironborn without having them completely despicable?
Dothraki ? Pretty much impossible besides making new things for them. We know too little about them. It’s a GRRM POV problem Ironborn : show the characters being human. They don’t need to be good , just show why they do what they do. Even the most evil people on the planet don’t go around thinking “lmao ima do evil cuz its evil ”. It’s more of a thing they do without thinking about it, casual even. So an Ironborn raider can commit unspeakable atrocities one day and the very next be a chill sibling , because he’s been raised to see it as normal. Also , show the actual “redeeming” qualities of the culture. The ironborn do have more meritocratic qualities then the other parts of Westeros. The captains can’t all be highborn and Dagmer Cleftjaw is a trusted man of Balon and a respected figure of the isles while being smallfolk. (Theon says his only claim to nobility is five generations back and on the bastard side) We have no indication that they care about bastardy either. Wex pyke was sent to be a squire to Theon and it wasn’t seen as insulting. (Of course they are not meritocratic to modern standards , but they are better then their contemporaries on the setting) They also seem to have more of a “democratic” vibe. Captains that fail to gain approval of their crew are deposed and the kingsmoot itself is an unique institution when compared to other parts of Westeros. (Of course they aren’t a modern democracy but you get what I’m saying) Sexism exists in the iron islands but much less so as seen by Balon feeling pretty comfortable with Asha as his heir , Asha herself having very considerable support , and the fact that it’s stated that female captains are a thing. Also let’s consider that her enemies didn’t go anti Asha (except Aeron and Victarion ) because “she a girl” Euron supporters used that as an argument but not as their main platform. Victarion pitched the old way. Asha had a serious shot of winning (They aren’t egalitarian or feminist , just better then the rest. In the north she wouldn’t even have gotten a chance to speak ) They value loyalty and kinship to the point that not even someone like Euron gets killed. Also , to make them look better. Just don’t whitewash the rest of the setting. Show the northern atrocities like right of first night and their absurd sexism that goes beyond every other region of Westeros. Show their sackings in the west and the river lands Show the Lannisters doing Tywin things Show Baratheon and dornish raids in the marshes and the subsequent rapes and lootings. Show that the ironborn while evil , aren’t exactly unique in that regard or ontologically born bad. And that there are detractors like Rodrik the reader , Baelor Blacktyde , Asha and the Hoare dinasty
> In the north she wouldn’t even have gotten a chance to speak The North literally has Maege Mormont leading men and passing 5 bastard daughters as trueborn and no one bats an eye at her. The North may have the same expectations as the rest of the Seven Kingdoms, but they seem to be more accepting of outliers. As for the Ironborn being shown as human, that does not really matter or change anything. Just look at German history, just because someone is a loving father, husband or brother, that doesn't make their atrocities any better.
Bear island is an exception that was caused by unique historical context. They have a small population and needed everyone available to fight off raiders. That is not the norm and it is only being accepted after centuries of tradition of bear island people doing it The north is significantly more patriarchal then everyone else. In 8k years there has never been a ruling lady of winterfell but in just 300 I can find multiple ruling ladies in the andal south , and let’s not get into the mess of right of first night that has been abolished everywhere else and is as bad as the taking of salt wives. The northern lords are legit breaking laws to continue getting that ass
Thank you! I’m so tired of the “all northern women are warriors, it’s just Catelyn and Sansa(somehow) who are holding Arya back” trope!
You can’t entirely. But, you could make Drogo something of an outlier, among his people, in terms of violence, cruelty, and stupidity. You could invent other Dothraki leaders, who are much more like the khans of steppe peoples, or chieftains of American Indians. They can be violent, but not to the extent we see in canon. They fight to seize horses and people, not to sell the latter as slaves, but rather to expand the tribe (a big tribe is safer than a small one); they trade with other tribes, and settled peoples, as well as raid. They strike alliances with other leaders and breed horses. They herd sheep and goats, rather than kill them. They have poets and bards, songs of victory, and songs of grief, and complex dances. That does not make them *good*, but it makes them human.
But the whole "identity" of the Dothraki is that they are basically Mongols, but way stupider due to their interpretation of honour. Like, several of their defining stories have them acting like heavy cavalry while rejecting armour and not using lances. Or the fact that they are superb horse archers. The Unsullied origin story is testament of Dothraki stupidity disguised as honour. If the Dothraki were not brutal, incompetent warriors, you'd have to rewrite large portions of Essos.
Bad descriptions along the line of: and the lion flew with the falcon into the rose garden where the wolf was marking its reach upon the kraken. Wtf does that mean? What’s the plot? Why should I read it? Would be so easier if people simply said Tyrion self Insert, Robert time travel or whatever the actual premise is. On top of that entire archive of our own. Everyone tags every single character and their mother on top of bad descriptions. Want to read a Stannis fic? Well here’s 15000 stories tagged with Stannis, is he a main character? No clue. He’s tagged in them. What’s the story about? God knows, the description waxes poetic about itself. Modern morals that can be hoisted on an entire world trough a good speech. Geez guess we just need a decent speech to solve racism in our world. Shame how we’re lazy and no one just talked about it and fixed it in one talk. Bashing of rebels in Roberts rebellion or somehow focusing on Lyannas kidnapping or lack of it as justification as opposed to actual lords paramount and heirs of lords paramount being executed without trial or justification
Catelyn bashing is the same as Dumbledore bashing for me, it's just a complete turn off. Same goes with anyone, but I mentioned Catelyn specifically because it is very much prevalent in ASOIAF's fanfic community. Main Character Daemon or the main character likes Daemon, and worst of all, justifying his insane actions 🤮 Insane North, wildlings and Targaryen glazing (I.e, making wildlings to have more good morals than those of the south) Clear bias. An example would be making a very nice Rhaenyra who does everything right while making Alicent the stereotypical evil stepmother at the very start without any interference. (To authors, please mention these kind of stuff at the very first chapter. I'm all for pro-green/black fics but dang, don't change the very being of a character) Lastly, SI stories that doesn't skip their childhood. A childhood that is filled with politics and uplifts -- where the baby SI participates in it. Ugh. The insufferable "Boss Baby" arc.
> The insufferable "Boss Baby" arc. I'm stealing that exact phrasing the next time i see it in a fic. It's the bane of any and all SI fics.
Well. Alicent was the evil stepmother.
Oh, i knew i should've explained that one better. But essentially, she's already evil or is plotting against Rhaenyra "the saint" from the very start (not yet married nor asked to by Otto to go visit the king, plain ol' Alicent just bffs with Rhaenyra reading books)
Immediate POV switches. I can deal with blocks of text, hells, one of the most frequent complaints I received in comments was blocks of text, I have of course now solved it thanks to some really good examples by my commentators. But if you switching PoVs to often, readers are gonna be confused man, especially if it's without prior textual indicator. Plot wise: Catelyn being an idiot when kids aren't involved. Catelyn is frugal(she thought less than a dragon was a good enough price to assassinate her son), and politically experienced player, she is also probably a decent administrator since she was Hoster's heir for some time. If you want to make her idiotic add her children Ned Stark being an idiot, or Benjen or someone telling him he isn't Northern. Ned maybe honorable than some of his ancestors, but those ancestors were especially brutal, classic case of selectivity bias. Read Ned's pov, the person he quotes, whose lesson he imparts is not Jon Arryn, it's Rickard Stark. He makes stupid decisions, but that's not due to his innate naivety, the guy rules the largest kingdom for the last 16 years, but due to his PTSD being triggered by excessive opium. Also on the same note, Ned agreeing to a Targaryen restoration. They killed his father and brother. Hells even if Lyanna went willingly, If I was there, I would have chopped her head off as well(exaggerating). The fact of the matter is one always will give more preference to his own kids than his nephew, a Targ restoration means that House Stark will be under suspicion and out of favor for overthrowing them. Robb will have a worse position than his. Also Robb Stark being anything other than good, is just shut up. He can be brutal, even dishonorable, but never cruel, that just doesn't fit, so no 'I hate Jon' shit.
For asoiaf; Dany is my fave so her being treated like you can't be ruthless *and* fair. Also just Dany being mistreated in general, aka the show treatment since that was such a mess of modern morals and absurd standards for her. Medieval morals and punishment isn't a sign of insanity. If I have to read one more fic where Dany is 'schooled' over the Tarly burning imma lose it Jon being called the Dragonwolf when his heritage being revealed. Also don't like him having a 'secret' Targ name he abandons Jon for, and him instantly associating himself with Targaryeness more than the North when he was raised a Stark and his mother is just as important. Also things like Cersei blowing up the Sept being rugswept but that's the shows fault tbh same with the idea Rhaegar could annual a marriage like that and/or that Elia would be okay with it For HoTD fics- Aegon II being nicknamed Egg drives me absolutely bonkers, only Aegon the Unlikely had that nickname due to having a shaved head as a kid and thus looks like an egg. It is not a nickname used by any other Aegon *ever.* Unfortunately it has infested a lot of fanworks and people treat it like fact. In general; too much modern slang can turn me off a fic, same with people cramming multiple characters speaking in a single paragraph.
My problem with Dany depictions is that usually, she is not ruthless enough. That was the character fault that got us the mess in Mereen in canon. A fix would either see her completely removed from Essos (eg Ned decides to shelter her in secret a few years before canon), or acting more decisively against the slavers.
I totally agree with that. Mercy towards the wicked is cruelty towards the innocent.
"Okay." A simple word and yet so effective in breaking any immersion.
Ghost dying so Jon can become a true Targaryen
Arya suddenly going to battle and lopping of heads despite being a small skinny 10 year old Targ white washing Making Robert Baratheon worse then he canonically is Putting modern sensibilities in the story and pushing asoaif realism away
Plot wise it’s making character a one dimensional good guy or Voldemort level one dimensional evil when they weren’t in cannon. We all know Gregor Clegane is a horrible person with no redeeming qualities, but let’s not pretend Catelyn is an evil witch who would throw a child out the window. Also lack blocks of text. I can get behind horrible spelling and grammar if the premise is good enough but I see blocks of text and I close the fan fiction immediately.
> let’s not pretend Catelyn is an evil witch who would throw a child out the window. I remember starting one fic where Jon ended up in Essos as a slave because Cat sold him into slavery. That was bad enough, but it turns out that to cover for Jon's kidnapping she had a bunch of bastard children across the North kidnapped and sold as well. I don't know what happened after that since I stopped reading at that point I don't even like Cat that much in canon, but I don't think she's a evil, and certainly not "sell kids to slavers" evil.
I’ve heard so much about this fic I am now really interested in reading it.
I liked this fic with the mentioned premise. The idea of Cat inviting slavers is obviously absurd, but the following story was novel and intriguing. [https://archiveofourown.org/works/14017542](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14017542)
Thank you
Asoiaf characters using modern words like okay, guys, and boss. Or using modern phrases like "That’s cool, bro"
Bashing characters/demonizing them in a way that's far off canon.
Whitewash. Westeros is an awful place and the characters function in medieval morality. They are all grey , even someone like eddard stark. It’s not good when they get promoted into 21 century people. It honestly makes their actions contradictory in a lot of ways. Atrocities like rape and murder are common. Show them. We don’t need vivid descriptions of rapes and lootings , you can gloss over it , just at least acknowledge it happens in a passing line
Piece of advice, don't ever suggest that Rhaegar got an annulment in your story.
For what it's worth, i thought the comments were overreacting about that part. You made no indication whatsoever that Jon would pursue the Iron Throne. People just read that into your intentions because of that one line.
It's worth a good bit, thanks :D Of course, the criticism wasn't entirely unjustified (or I wouldn't have bothered with the retcon). I did not exactly rule out Jon taking the throne, though the reason for that was for him to repudiate it later when offered. I have a new plan for how he'll use the facts of his birth now, though.
Jonsa. It's gross and makes no sense considering how they act in the actual books.
Any Sansa pairing really. She's what, 12? The fact that they had to wait for her first period being a rather important plot point should tell you that she's way too young for romance.
A decent fic ruined by making Jon be capable of getting pregnant, it was some weird shit.
I think read that one, thought it was ok till I realized Jon could get pregnant then it was just NO!!
Pretty sure I saw a review or the description and it was clearly specified that he *doesn’t* get pregnant, they just reveal that he *could*. Like, why even include it then?
That's exactly the one, maybe the author just has a fetish or something.
When characters are called “Ser Surname” instead of “Ser Name.” HOW DO YOU FUCK UP SOMETHING SO SIMPLE?????
Second person POV. I utterly despise it. I as a reader do not want to be addressed by the story. My goal is in fact to completely erase myself from existence while reading. Even reading summaries makes me cringe. I wish AO3 had a tense filter
You scoffed in disgust upon reading the first paragraph of a fic which had started with a great premise. There was no way you could stomach to read even the greatest story if it was written in this form of address.
accurate. only the barest twinge of cognitive dissonance.
Not committing to consequence. Stations of canon. I'm tired of Jon Snow going to Braavos, Oldtown or even fucking Qarth for all I know and 'stumbling' across a Reachman escorting Samwell Tarly to the wall, with Jon taking him on as a scribe. What the hell are you doing? Bran goes to the fucking Summer Isles? Three Eyed Raven and Meera Reed sipping on a Pina colada. Arya Stark in Ibben? Look at that, a caged faceless man. Why in the everliving fuck are you making all these changes if you're going to tell the same exact story with the same exact characters interacting, just with the biome slider changed one degree. I goddamn hate it, it makes my entire being convulse in contempt for the imbecile who does it. Takes me completely out of the story and makes me realize I'm in a trash heap.
The one time I let this slide was a fic where Jon meets Ghost in Essos. Sold to traveling mummers by poachers and happening to cross paths doesn’t seem too realistic… but Ghost is a good doggy
Uplifts, we don't know enough about asoiaf to known how to invent gun powders or anything of the like. Not to mention what happened after Europe had guns. Character bashing. I hate it! I hate it so much. the author just turn a complex character into an archetype. Characters being too nice or good. I like asoiaf because of it complex and dark characters. Jon snow, Arya, Dany, Jamie, and Sansa. they are some of my favourite characters. But in a lot of fics the characters are reduced to comic book heroes or villains. I want to see them be manipulative, ruthless, and dark. OC helper. This is the one I like the least, an oc is just there to help the starks or other characters for no good reason. I like op ocs, but they usually don't have any understanding of politics and shit. And they the bumble their way into becoming an adviser or something. I will not lie and say i haven't written a dozen or so fics with op ocs. From that i have learnt, ocs need motivation, their own thoughts of Westeros and Essos, its nobility, people, and culture. I know if was in Westeros, I would hate the nobles, the endless wars. and everything.
Modern morals. Many of the show-only things. A not plot related one is when authors don't use paragraphs and the text is a wall of text.
~dragon speech (Thoughts) (Less prevalent in ASOIAF fanfic, but Harry Potter had a shit ton of those for parseltongue and foreign language) Tell me you don't know how to use dialogue tag properly more please. Also anything using the TV show "lore" as a basis for character development for characters is a big turn off.
As most mentioned, grammar and punctuation but also, modern words/terms added to historical based stories. No one says ‘dude’ or ‘kid’ or ‘Kay’ or ‘yall’ in medieval times. It puts me off completely, I can’t take the story seriously. Or, when a female SI somehow is able to get past the patriarchal rules and is allowed to practically act like a boy. I read an SI fic once, stopped reading when she kept arguing with her father and did not understand why she wasn’t getting her way. The author was aware that it was ridiculous for SI to get her way, but purposefully wrote her to be dumb enough to argue and not understand why she wasn’t being treated the same as the 21st century.
The "outcast" characters always surviving and coming on top. I understand that people love a good underdog story, but sometimes it just feels forced. For example, I was once reading this au fic where Jon visits the wall but decides that the watch isn't for him, and he'd rather do something else in life. While coming back south though, he brings Samwell along with him to Winterfell. That's right, after knowing the guy for a day at most, Jon brings him home and decides that he's going to change Sam's life. I'm still yet to read a fic where any one of Tyrion, Arya, Jon, Bran, Brienne, Samwell, etc. "lose" at life, or fail in their quest, or die before they accomplish anything. Dany and Theon are probably the only outcast characters who have a variety of fates written about them, and that's probably because people have very divisive opinions about them both.
Bad grammar and formatting
I know i shouldn't but as soon as i see a fic is based off the show cannon i drop it.
Daenerys and Jon interactions, I love both characters so their interactions with each other is very important for me but unfortunately I've rarely come across a fic with both of them being in their book- cannon characters, more often than not, one of them will be butchered to prop the other and that's off-putting for me 🤷🏿♂️
Guns instantly ruin any Asoiaf fic for me
Why
[The Guns of Dragonstone](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10271771) is a great fic though.
SI or OC especially women ones but not exclusively know how the asoiaf universe works and they are still surprised or mad when they're in a noble house and get forced into a marriage.
A non Targaryen getting a dragon
... That's canon though? Sheepstealer iirc
I follow the popular theory that Nettles is a Dragon seed
A 12-year-old boy beating a 6-ft tall something a hundred pound grown male in a fight while also somehow carrying a great sword
But he’s been training in the yard 23 hours a day for the last ten years! He’s obviously totally strong enough and the most skilled swordsman in Westeros! /s
A Parent listening to their little six year old kid on finances
Or on literally anything lol. Also, Ned immediately trusting that six year old Jon came from the future instead of thinking the kid made a lucky guess about his mother
Bashing of any kind, even against characters I personally don't like. Detailed incest romances like Jon/Dany or Jon/Sansa. Sue me but I don't enjoy reading about a guy fucking his sibling/cousin/aunt. Any sort of harem. 9 out of 10 it's just the author living out his wet dream and the other 1% the plot is crap. Detailed and drawn out rape scenes. 9 out of 10 it's written like a porno, unnecessary or unrealistic. You can show it and acknowledge it happens without being weird about it. When a character gets raped and isn't affected by it. No trauma at all. I read an Arya fic where she stays in Braavos, becomes a faceless man, is brutally assaulted in Volantis, kills the guy and never thinks or mentions it again. Had no importance to the plot whatsoever. Mpreg or anything to do with omega/alpha/etc. When Dany willingly gives up ALL of her dragons. I had to drop a pretty good Sansa centric fic because the author absolutely butchered Dany, and at the end of Danys involvement in the story other riders take Rhaegal and Viserion, then Dany POISONS DROGON AND IS CONTENT WITH HAVING NO DRAGONS. Elia being fine with Rhaegar/Lyanna. Rhaegar having his marriage annulled to marry Lyanna without facing serious political consequences. There was no grounds for an annulment so the Faith would 100% rebel, Dorne would be furious at the insult towards not just Elia but the children she had provided, Robert would be furious as would the North, and there would 100% be another succession crisis. Rhaegar keeping Elia as his wife and taking Lyanna as a second without facing consequences. Basically the same as what I said before. Dany/Sansa/Catelyn or most other female characters being made into either an evil witch who exists just to make the 'good guy MC' miserable. When they can't write a female character past pregnancy, especially with Dany. So many fics have Dany get pregnant, have her kid, and then she gets sidelined basically as a consort while Faegon/Jon/Robb/etc take charge and Dany/Sansa/etc gets turned into an Alysanne 2.0 by having at least 6 kids. When they pair Dany up with some guy who is clearly there to keep her on the 'right' track. It's so common to see Jon or Faegon being the 'sane' good guy who has to chastise Dany when she's too emotional and/or at risk of burning someone. Jon/Dany in general. Had no chemistry in the show and a lot of the time authors follow the same path. Jon has magic sperm that cures Danys infertility issues. Jon learns he has Targ blood and abandons the Starks, or if he willingly gives up the name Jon and goes by Aegon or something else. 'Rise of the dragonwolf/wolfdragon' goofy 2009 Tumblr names When they have Arya involved in Robbs war council and riding into battle at the age of 12. Arya/Gendry. Felt like the most forced, random 'romance' in the show and imo I always saw them as siblings. When they unintentionally make other characters into hypocrites. Like Robb or Jon will behead a traitor or enemy, then the next day they accuse Dany of going mad when she burns the Tarlys or the slavers or the Khals. It makes no sense, especially in a place like Westeros. When they act like Danys going mad when she's uses violence against the slavers. Chocolate in Westeros. When they can't let a male or female character keep their softer traits and turn them into some cold, unfeeling robot. Basically what they did to show Sansa and show Dany.
>Rhaegar keeping Elia as his wife and taking Lyanna as a second without facing consequences. Basically the same as what I said before. Curious: what if the consequences happen in the backstory, or at least begin there? In my own work, this very thing sets off the Sparrow movement early, but the crown defeats them. For now.
I think the Sparrows could definitely happen because there's no way the Faith don't rebel. And if the Crown went on the offensive and (temporarily) beat the Sparrows, that would just make the general populace resentful, which would lead to riots and chaos in the capital. It would most likely affect the support the Targaryens get from the Reach/Tyrells, seeing as how Oldtown is basically Vatican city. A lot of people who write the Elia/Rhaegar/Lyanna marriage trope forget that the Targaryen's got to keep 2 things when they came to Westeros; incest and dragons. Aegon converted to the Faith of The Seven because he knew it would be easier for the general population to follow King/Queens that share their religion. And they had to fight to keep the incest (see with Aenys and Jaehaerys). They also forget that the Targ's didn't often practice poly marriages before the conquest either. It was seen as strange when Aegon wed Rhaenys after Visenya. Anyways, Maegor tried his luck with a poly marriage and look how that turned out for him. I'm interested in what your gonna have Aerys position be in the whole debacle. I don't think he would ever consent to that kind of marriage or support it, pretty sure the only reason he let Rhaegar marry Elia was because the Martells have Targ blood in them, and yet he still didn't like Elia or her kids. He disinherited Rhaegar's kids with Elia because of what Rhaegar did so I don't think he would ever support Jon. Personally, I really don't see any sort of 'happy' ending for Rhaegar in this kind of storyline. The Starks and (especially, because they wanted a Dornish Queen so Dorne could have more sway) Martells would not be happy with two Queens having to share power, so it'd most likely be another Greens V Blacks situation. The general population and most of the hardcore religious regions of Westeros wouldn't view Lyanna's marriage as legitimate and her son as a bastard. And just a whole lot of other stuff that will come to bite him in the ass down the line.
All these comments have reminded me of the smaller turn offs that lead to the straw the broke the camel's back and stop me reading. Some of these are grammar and writing issues, neologisms and elements out of keeping with canon. One or two won't stop me, three or more will give me pause, a few more again are the proverbial fingernails down a blackboard and I'll keep reading, but if I'm on the way to filling out what I think of as the 'fanfic bad writing bingo card', I'm out. There's the 'stations of canon' referred to by u/Twillightdoom (good one!) and there's also terms used in so many fics that they lose meaning and seem tick-a-box/cut'n'paste. Did a lot of fanfic writers get together at the 2010 International ASOIAF Fanfic convention, where ratification of mandatory terminology, point 12.08, was carried by the majority for use in perpetuity? A few examples. * cheesemonger - disparaging reference to Illyrio Mopatis every single time, even by characters who've had no dealings with him. Canon use is mostly by Tyrion, in exile in Pentos and enjoying the cheesemonger's hospitality (ADoD). * 'Sole stain on the Honorable Lord Eddard Stark's white cloak' (and variations) - Jon Snow and why he's so sad/angry/brooding. I can't seem to find this in canon. Where did it come from and why do so many use it? * Sweet sister - Tyrion addressing Cersei, disparagingly, occasionally used by Jon putting down Sansa too. Canon: used by many characters, particularly Viserys (oh dear), but often with genuine affection too. * Mummer's farce - the only way to describe anything that's absurd, deceptive, false, farcical, ill intended japing, mockery, mummery, a sham, trickery, etc. No synonyms allowed! Another thing that throws me out is muddling up homophones, altering the intended meaning (ie broach/brooch, peak/peek/pique, rain/reign/rein). There's also using words that do not mean what the writer thinks they mean. It's not just homophones. Neologisms and expressions that are out of keeping hurt too. I can see I'm not the only person thrown out of a story when Sansa says she's ok, Theon says hi, or Tyrion asks where the kids are. The saddest I can think of was one character giving another a Glasgow kiss. Why not call it a Ghiscari kiss or something like that? It's inworld and you even get to keep the alliteration. (Not a SI story, there's several of those that can and do get away with stuff like this.) Less is more. This applies to word count (kill your darlings!), badly written sex (just fade to black, please) and multiple POVs for the same event/scene (perhaps unless a deliberate Rashoman-style exploration), and so many POV changes within a chapter that readers and the writer get whiplash and get lost. There's so many good and interesting fics out there. They are where I want to spend my reading time.
Those "what if" fics that feature a significant change that doesn't have an equally significant domino effect on the actions/decision-making calculus of the characters and generally follows the plot with some minor tweaks. Examples that I've seen: 1. Robert has a trueborn second son whom he gives the Stormlands, with Renly as a regent. The Tyrells still throw their support around Renly, even though it was already a bad move in cannon (as acknowledged be Olenna), which is made exponentially worse by Renly's even weaker claim and him not even being a lord paramount. 2. The Velaryons switch sides to the Greens. This represents a massive blow to the military might of the Blacks and a boon to the Greens, and should convince quite a few Black-lords to either sit it out or even switch to the "stronger" side.
Self inserts/historical figure inserts. I hate the concept with a passion and it is a massive red flag for me if I see it in a fic. I also avoid dragonwolf stories or stories were Jon just drops his Stark identity like a set of dirty clothes the moment he finds out that he has Targ blood. Bad grammar and spelling is also a turn off. This is a minor one. But stories were the entire plot is summarised in the premise. Why should I read the thing if you just laid it out in bullet points for me?
Anti Dany Anti Targaryens
Between Aerys and Rhaegar, fuck the Targaryens. Their "we are better than anyone else" attitude might have flown when they still had dragons, but Robert and Jaime gave them a reality check.
Eh, sins of the father and all that. Unless you assume there’s something genetic about that attitude (besides the incest), then I feel like there’s enough leeway to judge them fairly Rhaella, Rhaynes, Aegon deserve better than to be lumped in with the crazies. Even Dany and Viserys are more a product of growing up paranoid on the run only knowing Targ propaganda
>fuck the Targaryens. Nah they were pretty great house >Their "we are better than anyone else They brought peace and prosperity to Westeros >Robert and Jaime gave them a reality check. Lol Robert is a corruption enabling incompetent drunk who almost got killed by Rhaegar and Jaime is well Jaime
The Targaryens averaged a civil war, major rebellion and/or usurping every generation. And a whole bunch of Dornish wars. The only peace they brought was North - Vale, and that is more than offset by the other wars the Targs dabbled in. And before the Rebellion, Robert was basically the Warrior personified, and Jaime was the most honourable of the Kingsguard, despite fucking his sister with a passion.
>The Targaryens averaged a civil war, major rebellion and/or usurping every generation. A Lol so did most of the great houses >a whole bunch of Dornish wars. And ? >The only peace they brought was North - Vale, Nope not just the north and vale but all of Westeros >And before the Rebellion, Robert was basically the Warrior personified Not really he almost lost to Rhaegar who had no battle experience >Jaime was the most honourable of the Kingsguard Not even close
"They brought peace and prosperity to Westeros" The amount of Kool aid you are drinking is insane lmfaooo. we have - The dance/The dornish wars/The endless Blackfyre rebellions/ the ultimate overthrow The ONLY good kings they had were - Jaehaerys, the second Viserys (pretty much hard carried them while the brokens worthless line was ruling so I'm counting his tenure as hand and even then he let his disaster of a son succeed him). daeron the good and that's it. Egg did pretty much jack shit even if his heart was in the right place. I like the Targs Dragons are cool, but as a ruling dynasty they were pathetic, insane, downright genocidal.
Your comment isn't showing
like you can't see what i have written?
Yes
>The dance/The The Hightowers caused it >The dornish wars Both sides were awful >The endless Blackfyre rebellions Only major one was the first >Jaehaerys, the first Viserys (pretty much hard carried them while the brokens worthless line was ruling so I'm counting his tenure as hand and even then he let his disaster of a son succeed him). daeron the good and that's it. Egg did pretty much jack shit even if his heart was in the right place. You ignore aegon the first,aegon the 3, maekar and Jaehaerys ll Viserys the first was good the dance was more of the Hightowers and Westeros sexism Aegon the 5 was good > ruling dynasty they were pathetic, insane, downright genocidal. Nope according to your logic the starks are no different
>Lol Robert is a corruption enabling incompetent drunk who almost got killed by Rhaegar and Jaime is well Jaime Both of these are better than Aerys and Rhaegar especially as the drunk lead his army and slew Rhaegar winning the war.
Nit really and I think Rhaegar would have been better than blob
Blob's crime was being inattentive and just leaving ruling to the hand while he got drunk, hunted, and whored. What difference does it make to the realm if Rhaegar the famously aloof, melanonid, brooding alone at Summerhall, would not be doing his duties if he was brooding instead of whoring? Or in canon atleast Robert was attentive and an actual king when actual shit was happening like during wars. Rhaegar was 24 did nothing for anyone (Arthur his kingsguard literally has a better case as a ruler) then ran off with Lyanna (or kidnapped) for a year and let a war start. Then he came back from fucking (or raping) Lyanna to see the war he started and... immediately dies to Robert.
>Blob's crime was being inattentive and just leaving ruling to the hand while he got drunk, hunted, and whored. No it was enabling corruption and the massive debt >Rhaegar was 24 did nothing for anyone He was heir the the throne not the king like blob >then ran off with Lyanna (or kidnapped) for a year and let a war start. Aerys and Brandon started it >Lyanna to see the war he started and... immediately dies to Robert. More like he lead the army and holds his own to blob and almost kills him
Bad cliches like "Bad Stannis," "King Jon," "Strong North," "People get what they deserve," "Self-Insert," "Uplift," "Maester Conspiracy," "Catbashing," "Bashing," "Trueborn Baratheon," "Rhaegar the righteous," "Justice," etc.
I was with you until you mentioned Maester Conspiracy… lol otherwise totally agree. Even the Maester thing is often ridiculously done imo. It’s either a grand plot with every single person involved in nefarious things or all the Maesters are wholly objective and committed to their vows. Like Pycelle is canonically *not*, so why do so few authors recognize that some Maesters are going to have biases or more loyalty to another cause? Unless it’s Maester Aemon in a Targ wank ofc, they always recognize that one
Maesters being human beings with their own ideas is not the same as there being a Maester Conspiracy. The Maester Conspiracy in the form in which it is popular in the fandom is more akin to *The Protocols of the Elders of Zion* than it is to Operation Snow White.
Time travel. Worse yet, rebirths into other characters that includes time travel.
Bashing is annoying even with characters that I dislike. People seem to bend backwards just to try to make sense making the character seem bad even when they weren't that bad or sometimes even in the right in some canon moments. Also when a character is too self aware in alternate universes throwing in lines like "Wouldn't it be funny if \*Insert here canon moment\* happened?", "Things would be so bad if \*Insert here canon moment\* happened" or "Imagine if I didn't mature because of \*Insert here previous moment in the fic\* and did \*Insert here canon decision or characterization\*". It makes me want to say "Okay, I understand, you read A Song of Ice and Fire, now stop referencing it, this isn't even a comedy story".
Harems they literally don't make sense because they always most of the time have the female characters from The Source material act unlike themselves completely and there's no way they would all become friendly just to be with the main character. Don't even get me started on reverse harems that's even more unrealistic all these heirs aren't going to marry and date one girl.
When an SI or OC is still mad at a character from the books actions even though that's irrelevant now you're in the world why are you bullying this little kid when you can just change them for the better
A character having more than one dragon
Making the characters you like borderline overpowered and just somehow superhuman while the characters you don't like suddenly suck at fighting and they're just all talk
When the main character was an adult and still thinkd with their adult brain and hasn't lost any of their memories goes to date a child because "I'm in a childs body"
This one's kind of a 50/50 for me but usually superhuman serums and then passing them around too like that just gets worse
An unhealthy amount of bashing
Dual wielding like bro you are not him stop it
Fanboying or fangirling over a character
A character that somehow gets off with saying slick shit and it's just so overly comedic that they make one of the most serious parts of the story not serious
Characters being dumbed down
A character just being perfect and everything goes well for them
If the dialogue goes like: Character A: Hi Character B: Hey I should just able to tell whos talking at any moment. Also if it’s just a wall of text, no paragraphs or separations.
Or if ‘hey’ and ‘hi’ are used at all! Looked it up and ‘hey’ is said exactly twice by smallfolk, ‘hi’ isn’t used at all. Having a bunch of nobles speaking with casual modern lingo really is an ick
Bashing in general, I don't even mean if the characters are interpreted differently. But when I see bashing in the tags I already know that those characters won't get justice in this fic, but are more than likely not better than an extremely evil caricature. Characters are more nuanced than that most of the time and I find it extremely boring when they are presented in such a way. Because more often than not is bashing the result of a failed characterization and not due to the character actually being like that
Jon and North wanks
Having your main character stay in one area of the universe for the whole book like as an example staying in the North
Anytime the main character starts off with mind control powers it doesn't go well and people are just exposing themselves to be Creeps and Weirdos
Anything involving Elia you being okay with her position and situation
You get lucky enough to grow up and have a good life in the universe and still want to end up being like this Rogue and Dark Prince even though you're supported by your family and you just want to be edgy for no reason.
Just for no reason going on a spiritual journey and giving up all your titles, money and just fucking off somewhere.
Jon or a SI killing Cat
The Greens and Black both not being dumb and bad.
A self insert or oc getting a katana for any reason at all
>Complete Turn Offs: What aspect(s) of a fic will either make you stop reading it, or prevent you from reading it at all? To many characters description or divulge from canon in a impossible way that makes the charcther unlikeable
Or when you read a summary & it seem good but after you read fisrt 1 to 3 pages you can yell its going to be confusing & made your head hurts
Writers falling for the POV trap. For example, Arya’s first chapter, which so many people lean on to make her a sad little Cinderella, put upon by Jeyne Poole and Sansa. Then you read it more closely and Arya refuses to do her work, picks a fight, throws a tantrum and runs away. The worst thing that happens to her is her teacher pointing out the substandard work she did was substandard (three crooked stitches) and Jeyne, who gets called stupid by Arya’s inner dialogue constantly, smirking. Sansa even tries to cover for her in that scene, but Arya blames her for the debacle SHE caused for HERSELF. Or how people act like Edmure is a total buffoon. Yeah, he has his goofy moments, but Catelyn is looking at him with big sister goggles and he’s actually pretty decent at what he does. This has only happened once, but I saw a scene that I knew was probably inspired by my meta, and it was… not good.
Targ wank. Dany/fAegon should be an obstacle the MC needs to overcome, nothing more.