The Fantasy Novellist's Exam

[Stratadrake]

It's a Rinkworks.com production, and a comment on the fantasy genre itself:

http://www.rinkworks.com/fnovel/

Read the descriptions, then rate your own fantasy story against the checklist. How do you score (measured in terms of "no", "yes", "sort of/maybe")?


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[Fayore]

[quote]53. Heaven help you, do you ever use the term "hit points" in your novel?[/quote]
The worst part is, I've seen fiction using that term. :(

I compared the original fiction I'm planning to these questions, and, while I didn't have the patience to read through and answer all of them, I found that my plot wins.

Or at least passes the exam.

Which is really easy because that quiz just takes all its questions from elements from LotR, and my fantasy story doesn't incorporate most of those things. (Gasp! A fantasy fic that doesn't have any elves in it!? )

Also, some of those questions are stupid. Like the one about the weight of a sword. :/ If swords commonly weighed more than 10 lbs., then they wouldn't even exist as weapons because then they wouldn't be manoueverable enough; they'd be too slow and cumbersome and anyone who used a monster like that would get killed, and fast. =_=

Haha, stabbing through plate armor... =_=;

Which isn't to say this exam is poorly designed, I just think it's more directed at inexperienced writers, or, pardon the stereotyping, but the kids over at Fanfiction.net. :/
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[Stratadrake]

A fantasy story I've mused and mulled and drafted over scores as follows:

[i]- Is your main character a young farmhand with mysterious parentage?[/i]
Maybe. He's no farmhand, though he does have a mysterious parentage (with certain ramifications to the plot, of course).

[i]- Is your story about a young character who comes of age, gains great power, and defeats the supreme badguy?[/i]
No, it's a team effort, and the "supreme" badguy doesn't get to be the last villain standing.

[i]- Is your story about a quest for a magical artifact that will save the world?
- How about one that will destroy it?[/i]
Maybe, but it's not the 'real' story. Once discovered, it is soonafter eclipsed by other events.

[i]- Does your story revolve around an ancient prophecy about "The One" who will save the world and everybody and all the forces of good?[/i]
Maybe, there is a prophecy about a chosen one, but there are [i]two[/i] characters matching the description (in fact, the protagonist and antagonist alike), and it plunges the world [i]into[/i] chaos, not out of it.

[i]- Does your novel contain a character whose sole purpose is to show up at random plot points and dispense information?[/i]
Maybe. I could go into hours and hours of exposition, working on that.

[i]- Does your novel contain a character that is really a god in disguise?[/i]
No, but there are the gods themselves (in physical forms) and a few characters who represent them.

[i]- Do you not know when the hay baler was invented?[/i]
Hay?

[i]- Did you draw a map for your novel which includes places named things like "The Blasted Lands" or "The Forest of Fear" or "The Desert of Desolation" or absolutely anything "of Doom"?[/i]
No, however there is a system of caves known as the "Shoshone Caverns", of which the locals refer to its lower depths as the 'Caves of Hell'.

[i]- Is this the first book in a planned trilogy?
- How about a quintet or a decalogue?[/i]
Maybe. Originally planned as five separate volumes.

[i]- Is your novel based on the adventures of your role-playing group?[/i]
No, but I would like to make an RPG [i]from[/i] it. :woot:

[i]- Does your novel contain characters transported from the real world to a fantasy realm?[/i]
No. It does involve two separate worlds, one with magic, one without; they're both fantasy worlds, though.

[i]- Do you have a race prefixed by "half-"?[/i]
No. Half-species (hybrids) don't exist, though there have been magic-related mishaps creating that effect.

[i]- At any point in your novel, do the main characters take a shortcut through ancient dwarven mines?[/i]
No, it's not a mine, nor is it a shortcut. It is in fact the scenic route.

[i]- Do you write your battle scenes by playing them out in your favorite RPG?[/i]
I've yet to find an actual RPG that embodies the mechanics in play (though Kingdom Hearts comes close).

[i]- Have you done up game statistics for all of your main characters in your favorite RPG?[/i]
No. Again, I'd like to make it [i]into[/i] an RPG. Stats would come second.

[i]- Do you think you know how feudalism worked but really don't?[/i]
Fuedalism?

[i]- Do your characters spend an inordinate amount of time journeying from place to place?[/i]
Maybe. I usually fast-forwards the travel sequences in favor of where they arrive.

[i]- Do any of the magic users in your novel cast spells easily identifiable as "fireball" or "lightning bolt"?[/i]
Maybe. But spells are not used very often.

[i]- Do you ever use the term "mana" in your novel?[/i]
No. Magical potential is unquantizable.

[i]- Heaven help you, do you ever use the term "hit points" in your novel?[/i]
No. Unless I were to write a dueling tournament where the "hit points" are actual [i]points[/i], like in sports.

[i]- Do you not realize how much gold actually weighs?[/i]
Their currency is made of alloys, rather than pure metals.

[i]- Do you think horses can gallop all day long without rest?[/i]
Horses?

[i]- Does anybody in your novel stab anybody straight through plate armor?[/i]
No, but one character does impale his sword through an enemy in one chapter (through a gap in the enemy's armor).

[i]- Does your hero fall in love with an unattainable woman, whom he later attains?[/i]
Love?

[i]- Does your story involve a number of different races, each of which has exactly one country, one ruler, and one religion?[/i]
Maybe. There are many races, but they're widely interspersed, and have no official religion(s).

[i]- Is the best organized and most numerous group of people in your world the thieves' guild?[/i]
No, it's the 'Rangers'.

[i]- Does your main villain punish insignificant mistakes with death?[/i]
No. It happened only once, and the mistake was pretty significant.

[i]- Is "common" the official language of your world?[/i]
The official language does not have a name. Nor do the secondary languages, either....

[i]- Is the countryside in your novel littered with tombs and gravesites filled with ancient magical loot that nobody thought to steal centuries before?[/i]
No, they've already been picked over.
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[Fayore]

I think it's interesting how this forum doesn't have an original fiction section, especially since a good deal of the people who visit this forum roleplay, which is just collaborative original fiction writing. :x

Nice, I think I might like to read your story if it gets written. I'll answer the same questions, too.

[i]- Is your main character a young farmhand with mysterious parentage?[/i]
Oh, no, he's definitely not of the farming variety. No mysterious parentage, either. And no, he's not secretly adopted. ;P

[i]- Is your story about a young character who comes of age, gains great power, and defeats the supreme badguy?[/i]
What's a "badguy"? Character foils are uninteresting. :x

[i]- Is your story about a quest for a magical artifact that will save the world?
- How about one that will destroy it?[/i]
No, no mysterious artifacts in this story. Well, there might be (I haven't really planned out the specifics past the beginning yet), but I highly doubt that it could save/destroy a world.

[i]- Does your story revolve around an ancient prophecy about "The One" who will save the world and everybody and all the forces of good?[/i]
Why would the story have such a prophecy when the world is already at peace and not needing any saving?

[i]- Does your novel contain a character whose sole purpose is to show up at random plot points and dispense information?[/i]
...No. o.o;

[i]- Does your novel contain a character that is really a god in disguise?[/i]
No, these gods are content to just watch. Except for one, but he's still being developed. He wouldn't disguise himself, though. XD

[i]- Do you not know when the hay baler was invented?[/i]
...Hay baler? o_o;;;; What? Is this going back to the whole farmhand thing?

[i]- Did you draw a map for your novel which includes places named things like "The Blasted Lands" or "The Forest of Fear" or "The Desert of Desolation" or absolutely anything "of Doom"?[/i]
No, all of the places have proper names.

[i]- Is this the first book in a planned trilogy?
- How about a quintet or a decalogue?[/i]
XD Hardly. I know my limit, and it would 0.5-1 story(-ies). Besides, the story doesn't need to be dragged on longer than need be. NaNoWriMo scares me.

[i]- Is your novel based on the adventures of your role-playing group?[/i]
No. It was originally planned to [i]be[/i] an RP, but then, as I developed it further, I decided that it would probably be mangled as an RP.

[i]- Does your novel contain characters transported from the real world to a fantasy realm?[/i] I dislike transportation stories, they're usually poorly written (can we say, 'plot holes'? o_o; ).

[i]- Do you have a race prefixed by "half-"?[/i]
There are no races created by Tolkien. End of story. We have humans, and we have more humans. We also have other races which were created through a scientific mishap (obviously, humans' fault) but I would hardly call them "half-" of anything. ;)

[i]- At any point in your novel, do the main characters take a shortcut through ancient dwarven mines?[/i]
...We have no dwarves, so there's a 100% no.

[i]- Do you write your battle scenes by playing them out in your favorite RPG?[/i]
What? No. o_o; People actually do that? I wasn't aware till now.

[i]- Have you done up game statistics for all of your main characters in your favorite RPG?[/i]
Game statistics? What? Like assigning numbers to stuff like INT, STR, DEF, etc.? No, I'm creating a character for a story, not an RPG character. Slight differences. XD

[i]- Do you think you know how feudalism worked but really don't?[/i]
We don't have kings or queens. This world is ruled by the unholy combination of religion and science. B)

[i]- Do your characters spend an inordinate amount of time journeying from place to place?[/i]
No, travelling sequences are perfect for Things to Happen. Although if there really isn't anything to be had till the next village/city/town/something I'll probably stick in a little scene of character interaction, then have them get on with it.

[i]- Do any of the magic users in your novel cast spells easily identifiable as "fireball" or "lightning bolt"?[/i]
Nah, the only thing that could really be identifiable as magic would be through clerical spells, most of which are quite the opposite of harmful. Another form of magic is also being developed, but I doubt it'll include anything like fireballs.

[i]- Do you ever use the term "mana" in your novel?[/i]
...Some people play way too much Magic: the Gathering.

[i]- Heaven help you, do you ever use the term "hit points" in your novel?[/i]


[i]- Do you not realize how much gold actually weighs?[/i]
I haven't quite figured out the currency. It's probably going to be a variety of things, kinda like how we have our pennies and nickles and stuff.

[i]- Do you think horses can gallop all day long without rest?[/i]
My people don't have horses. They have to get places the hard way. Besides, who says they have to ride horses? B)

[i]- Does anybody in your novel stab anybody straight through plate armor?[/i]
Plate armor. [i]Plate armor[/i]. No one's going to be stabbing anyone through [i]plate armor[/i]. =_=;

[i]- Does your hero fall in love with an unattainable woman, whom he later attains?[/i]
Just to spite this question, I should make him [i]gay[/i].

[i]- Does your story involve a number of different races, each of which has exactly one country, one ruler, and one religion?[/i]
Of course not. This is not Europe in the feudal era.

[i]- Is the best organized and most numerous group of people in your world the thieves' guild?[/i]
No, crime is actually prevented very well. No one wants to risk it. XD

[i]- Does your main villain punish insignificant mistakes with death?[/i]
Nope, he's actually pretty gentle in his own special way. Which wouldn't quite make him a "villian" anymore, would it?

[i]- Is "common" the official language of your world?[/i]
:/ Who would call a language "common"? At least IRL we have a real name for it, and that's "Esperanto"... besides, my world doesn't have a single official language.

[i]- Is the countryside in your novel littered with tombs and gravesites filled with ancient magical loot that nobody thought to steal centuries before?[/i]
A countryside littered with tombs and gravesites? That's pretty depressing. But no, if my characters want "ancient magical loot", they're gonna have to work for it. :3
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[Stratadrake]

Actually, I just listed the ones in which the answer was something other than a straight "no"....
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[Fayore]

Well, I wanted to say something, and all of them were pretty much "no"...
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[SilentSoul92]

Wow, I answere no to all exept one.

[i]Does a large portion of the humor in your novel consist of puns?[/i]

Uh, sorta. I use puns unknowingly. ._.; I really need to check over what I write more often.

Edit: Oh wait, one more

[i]Does nothing happen in the first fifty pages?[/i]

Good lord, I'm not sure if it's even fifty pgs long. ._.'

[TenthDivine]

Haha, that was an awesome exam thing. xD I'll try to answer some regarding a story of mine that I might one day have completed for....nothing in particular. >.>;


[i]Does nothing happen in the first fifty pages? [/i]
Okay, I'll admit I can be slow to start at times but I'm working on it. I wouldn't say nothing happens in the first fifty pages, though. <<;; At the least, 5 pages o_o;....or 10. oo;;;

[i]Does your novel contain a character that is really a god in disguise? [/i]
I have been guilty of this....in the past... Well, actually, I'd have to say maybe yeah in a way. I've evolved the story many times over that the particular character is not so divine anymore. XP

[i]Would "a fearless warrioress more comfortable with a sword than a frying pan" aptly describe any of your female characters? [/i]
Okay, maybe once....in some other story, though. xD; You can't tell me these kind of female characters aren't fun if you know how to do them right.

[i]Does everybody under four feet tall exist solely for comic relief?[/i]
Yes, lol. I have. ._. NO wait...that's a maybe actually. <<;

[i]Do you think that the only two uses for ships are fishing and piracy? [/i]
I like this question for some reason, lol. Yeah, no, those aren't the only reasons. XD Though fishing and fish are awesome. *thumbs up*

[i]Do you not know when the hay baler was invented?[/i]
The hell??

[i]Does your novel contain a prologue that is impossible to understand until you've read the entire book, if even then? [/i]
I should hope not, lol. Although at the very most, I'm vague. oo;

[i]Is this the first book in a planned trilogy?[/i]
Yes, I have thought about a trilogy. I think my story may be too long on its own to be a single novel.

[i]Do any of your main characters have names longer than three syllables? [/i]
Not main characters, but yes, I have created people with names longer than three syllables.

[i]Do you have a race prefixed by "half-"? [/i]
Hmm. I do have half breeds persay, that is, closely related species mingling and all that jazz. But then I created a word to replace "half" so...technically, they aren't. But still are, lol. xD

[i]Does your main character have a magic axe, hammer, spear, or other weapon that returns to him when he throws it? [/i]
I have created weapons like this but they aren't magical. Technology rox meh sox.


[i]Do you think swords weigh ten pounds or more? [/i]
I think some swords weigh more than 10 pounds but a lot of people know as well as I that that would take a specially trained sort of someone to carry one AND use it effectively. u_U

[i]Does a large portion of the humor in your novel consist of puns? [/i]
I don't even know. I should check. XD

[i]Does your story involve a number of different races, each of which has exactly one country, one ruler, and one religion? [/i]
Yes, my story have different races but no, they don't all have one country, one ruler and one religion. Cultures collide, they mingle, they disperse. xD

[i]Is "common" the official language of your world? [/i]
lol, no, I have cockney in my world. Eh wut, gov'na?



WHo said it, original fiction section? Yes, we should have that...or not, I dunno. >>;

[Stratadrake]

A few more that we could 'add' to the quiz.

- [i]Is your planned illustrator/cover artist best known for drawing well-endowed women?[/i]
- [i]What about men?[/i]

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[Fayore]

Famed for well-endowed men?

Risqu, much?
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[Stratadrake]

Okay, so the second one is more geared towards [i]fan[/i]fiction, but I had to include it as a joke.

More - this one can also be applied to videogame design:

- Are your female characters naked except for their weapons and armor?
- And if so, would they freeze to death if they had to travel through a snowy mountain range?
- Or would they be immune to the change in temperature?
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[TenthDivine]

O.o I can't fathom the naked women in weapons and armor. I'm just thinking, chafing....cold like you said...um...friction. o_o? lol, they'd break out in blisters or something. Wait, I think that could be grouped together with the chafing or I dunno. xD

What characters are there like that? o_o I avoid the 'hardcore' fantasy fiction ( ex., Conan the Barbarian?) so I don't know much. xD;;




One more thing. Well endowed men on the cover of a book? Good lord...



Good...lord.... Goo.... I can't picture that, either. Unless it's like those romance novels I pass in stores. That's unerstandable....somehow.

[SilentSoul92]

lol. rofl. Oh god, I fell out of my chair reading all of the posts after mine. I haven't done that in a while (I hit my head getting up too...ow)

[Papercut_Dragon]

[i]Does your character end up spending an unfathomable amount of time underwater without needing to breathe?[/i]

^Should add that to the list; bothers me when those sorts of things happen. 'It's been 7 minutes, but our hero still hasn't come up for air!'

Anyway, I was reading that list, and for a little more than half the questions I was thinking, "DragonLance! DragonLance! Oh, that's DragonLance . . . oh man, that too! And they must have gotten that question from READING DragonLance!"

I love that series anyway. ^_^
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[Alpha_zero]

that last question 'is your novel basically a rip off lord of the rings' is probably the best in the exam. Its so true, I start some fantasy stuff and sort of realise i'm ripping off lord of the rings.
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[VincentValentine13]

[quote="Fayore (Wilhelm)"] Which isn't to say this exam is poorly designed, I just think it's more directed at inexperienced writers, or, pardon the stereotyping, but the kids over at Fanfiction.net. :/ [/quote]
Hey, I'm from FF.net. <_< We're not all that bad.....well, not all of us FanFiction's just better known for fanwork, so yeah....we get all the bad writers
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