What makes a GOOD warstory?

I've been wondering about this and people's preferences but . . . what really makes a warstory, GREAT?

I mean for a good warstory of course you want good format, ease of reading, and a battle that has content that is both competent and interesting.

Aside from that, I was wondering what people have as their particular interests/pet peeves that really makes or breaks one-- not between the line of good or bad, but between good and great.

?_?

Or maybe people just want to see freak accidents with weak pokes mashing in strong ones! LOL

Reading the war story archives might help you figure that out. There's a reason they were preserved.

Humor is a must. But too much is a no-no.

IMO humor, a good battle(not the 6-0 ones), funny commentary

The Truth. Clarity. and precision.

If I don't know what the person was thinking, a potentially great war story instantly becomes mediocre at best. I need to see reasoning.

Innovatve sherades also work, say, instead of saying gyrados used taunt on blissey, you could say, gyrados called out blissey for a yo mama fight.

CardsOfTheHeart said:

Reading the war story archives might help you figure that out. There's a reason they were preserved.

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I've read the whole archive. :D I know what I like and dislike from them-- kinda into hearing the specific likes/dislikes for others, yeah?

Besides, this is a forum! :D If we never talk and always say: "Go look here, and don't annoy people with questions!" than you lose the whole point of having a forum-- where people with the same interests can interact. :)

- The formal requisites: Well written, clear separation between comments and log, score after each KO.

- The competitive requisites: Reasoning the decisions, interesting battle, good strategies used, brilliant predictions.

- The "crowd pleasing" requisites: Some humour, spectacular turnovers / tight endings, rarely used pokémon, sportmanship among the players.

- The literary requisite: A good story behind (that doesn't outshine the battle itself).


Not all of them are necessary at the same time, and many people don't even like the literary requisite, but this is what I consider a warstory I like should have.

I'm going to go ahead and straight up disagree with Mantyke. Personally, I hate that kind of shit in a warstory. If you're going to try and be funny, you first need to have a sense of humour above a fourth grade level. If it sounds forced and cliche, it probably isnt an entertaining read! There have been many times where I've read a warstory and groaned from some of the "jokes."

Otherwise, Obi is definitely right. Reasoning is the absolute most important part of a warstory. Without competent effort put forth to explain the actions, there's no sense in even trying.

Obi said:

If I don't know what the person was thinking, a potentially great war story instantly becomes mediocre at best. I need to see reasoning.

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TheBM said:

I'm going to go ahead and straight up disagree with Mantyke. Personally, I hate that kind of shit in a warstory. If you're going to try and be funny, you first need to have a sense of humour above a fourth grade level.

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These are the two biggest things for me as a reader.

It's a war story, not a log, and the advantage of that is that the writer can insert some of what they were thinking and why they did what they did. Humor is fine if you can do it well, but I think for the majority of the people potentially writing war stories the humor tends to be more of a detriment than an enhancement... TheMantyke put a great example of what not to include, as TheBM mentioned.



The other really big thing for me is why it is being written. Everyone writes what they write for a reason and I think war stories tend to be something where the purpose can make or break the writing. Obviously there are extreme examples like a terrible log that was posted a while by some idiot who was trying to ecock beating someone more well known here, but even short of that I think there are a lot of war stories that end up being worse than they should be because the writers are trying too hard to make themselves(or even their opponents) look too clever or innovative.

A mention of Chuck Norris is a pretty good chuckle as well. There's some warstories elsewhere that mention him. Like, "Chuck Norris roundhoused kicked Blissey and made it die" or something. I don't know.

I'd definitely lump that in with what TheMantyke said in the 'surefire way not to get into the Warstory Archive even if the rest of the warstory was god's gift to literature' category

TheBM said:

I'm going to go ahead and straight up disagree with Mantyke. Personally, I hate that kind of shit in a warstory. If you're going to try and be funny, you first need to have a sense of humour above a fourth grade level. If it sounds forced and cliche, it probably isnt an entertaining read! There have been many times where I've read a warstory and groaned from some of the "jokes."

Otherwise, Obi is definitely right. Reasoning is the absolute most important part of a warstory. Without competent effort put forth to explain the actions, there's no sense in even trying.

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Let me elaborate more on what I was saying, I meant that warstorys having that once or twice is good, but every fucking paragraph is just annoying. Humor and what you say seporates really a log from an experiance. Also, dramatic story telling mis pretty good also IMO like in bologos stories or the one were jibaku kept saying stuff about aids.

But everyone has a different opinion

Like Obi said, reasoning. I hardly ever read warstories but when I do read them I like to see what the person was thinking when they made the move.

Also, I like seeing my favourite Pokemans

i have written one warstory in my time here, and it received positive feedback(by no means archive worthy).
the thing i kept foremost in my mind was letting people know what I was thinking. the battle itself was pretty good (i lost 0-1) and i chose it to show that the BL metagame is awesome as well.

knowing what the person is thinking is at the top of my list. humor is ok, as long as it isn't forced. a light peppering of humor is cool with me. and telling a story with it can range from good to terrible. it depends on what you decide to make the story about.

Hmm...well IMO, the key thing in making a good warstory is to actually ENJOY writing your warstory, because if you don't enjoy it, the warstory-making process beings to feel like a chore. When something becomes a chore, a lot of people tend to not do it to their fullest potential. That really shows in your writing as there tend to be some warstories that are just a bunch of bolded log that seemed really forced because someone felt they HAD to write a warstory.

Practice makes perfect though. Of course, not everyone is going to like your warstory, there are always ways to improve it, no matter how perfect you think it is.

Remember, even a great battle can look like garbage if the commentary is done poorly, and also, an awful battle can be made awesome by great commentary. Both being good is generally preferred obviously.

It doesn't necessarily require creative writing to be good, I, for one like to do that once in a while, although I try to make some sort of balance. Never will I make a log-story though, ever. Poetry skills and such aren't a requirement for a good warstory, just a willingness to scoop your thoughts out of your head and plop them into your text.

Also, be prepared for criticism, complaining about what other people think does not help. Use it to help you with your next warstory, do not be discouraged if your story doesn't make it into the archive. Just keep practicing, and give the warstory rules a read, they have lots of useful pointers as well.

That's what I've got to say for now.

TheMantyke said:

Let me elaborate more on what I was saying, I meant that warstorys having that once or twice is good, but every fucking paragraph is just annoying. Humor and what you say seporates really a log from an experiance. Also, dramatic story telling mis pretty good also IMO like in bologos stories or the one were jibaku kept saying stuff about aids.

But everyone has a different opinion

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While humor is nice, I have yet to read a warstory that does humor correctly. The best warstories usually kept it serious and to the point. Each step was well reasoned, and the battle was clearly not a joke.

I'm sure it is possible to have a good warstory with a touch of humor, but all warstories I've read with a bit of humor either overdid it, or were simply not funny at all.

Give it the Death Note treatment.

By this, I mean explain your strategy out completely - If I do this, the opponent can do this to counter it...but their most likely action is this...etc. Makes reading a warstory more interesting.

And there's the obvious things, like don't post a 6-0 match or anything.

Hm, the lone story I posted here involved a 1-6 comeback for the win. Do you think that's generally a better battle than one that's close to even for most of the match and one person breaks through at the end? What do you think?

P.S. I know that comeback involved the pink whore, but the comeback still gained some praise. I don't think I'll ever forget what WildAce said about the story, though:

"Every time a Blissey sweeps a team, a kitten gets thrown into the Hudson."

That always makes me lol.

I've never posted a warstory, but I read tons of them. Something I find very annoying is when people don't bother to remove all the noise from the log. Just keep the moves, damage counts, etc. Summarize all the other stuff, notably -- lefties recoveries, sandstream and stealth rock damage, "It's super effective!", etc. Reading through all that crap makes it hard to keep track of the action.

Also another huge pet peeve -- keep all the personal pokemon names out of the bulk of the story. If you really feel it necessary to include them, put them in parentheses when a pokemon is first sent out and never mention them again. Better yet, put them with your team intro and leave them out from then on.

Others have already mentioned the importance on detailed strategic commentary. That's the main reason I read warstories, to get insight into the strategic thinking going on during the battle. A little humor is nice, but often overdone.

For me a good log means:

Less log, more detailed intelligent commentary.
No Lefties Recovery and other annoying stuff like poison damage.
NO NICKNAMES. I absolutely hate people who use nicknames in their warstories.
No humour. I only say this because half the people here suck at making humour. It's always the subtle things that are funny, not stupid shit like "Alakazam sends Gengar running home with his pants down...etc"

The only reason I read a warstory is to see creative and interesting strategies and plays, so elaborating on your decisions is the most important thing to me. Humor isn't important, especially since it is almost always in poor quality and/or taste. For example, there is absolutely nothing funny about Chuck Norris, or throwing innocent animals into a river.

Obviously, the match has to be a good one. The presence of Blissey or Togekiss is always a downer regardless of the situation due to their wash/rinse/repeat nature, so I usually just skip any stories that includes either of these two, or I at least skip over their respective parts. Also, less common pokemon are definitely more interesting to read about.

And leave nicknames out too, please. I read a warstory once where the trainer nicknamed all of his pokemon MAGIKARP and left the nicknames in the log. Boy, was that a great read! Mention them once if you must, but leave the real names in the log, or use parenthesis or something.

Easiest way to put it would be some people wouldn't know humour even if it was dancing naked on their dining table.

Just stick to the basics like good grammar, punctuation and a battle which can actually be commented on.
(I'm of opinion warstories don't always have to be neck and neck scores, you can have genuinely entertaining stories which end with overwhelming victories depending on the situation)

As long as you make it entertaining, make it look good, and show what you're thinking, people will like it. I like some humour, but not every line of "So my fat pink whore stalls the fuck out of Space Duck" then next turn repeating the same thing. However, I'm always laughing when I see a Blissey switch and see "lol % damage". Makes me like it, but not every turn. Once is enough. Also, don't reuse the same joke. Ever.