Is this idea too contrived?

Right, so. As I believe I've already said, I intend to write trainerfic for NaNo. This is an idea I've had for quite some time, and I actually asked a question about it on another forum earlier this year before deciding to just save it for NaNo. I only got two opinions, though, and now that we're getting closer to November 1st I figure I should ask someplace else just to be sure. I already know the idea is marginally stupid, but I'm okay with that; I just want to know whether other people find it amusing-stupid or so-stupid-I-would-never-read-it. If it's the latter, well, I still think I'm gonna write it anyway, but if there are problems I need to address to make it easier to swallow I'd like to get started on them now.

So. C/P from older thread:

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I've been itching to write a trainer fic for quite some time now. I wouldn't call myself an experienced fic writer by any stretch of the imagination (that would require actually writing something more than once every two+ years, lol), and I haven't been doing as much fic-reading lately as I should, but I do know that people are sick and tired of generic badge slogs pulled straight from the games or animé. I like to think that the various OT-fic ideas I've had bouncing around my head are a refreshing break from the norm, but I guess I won't know for sure until I run them by people who actually read/write more fic than I do!

There's one idea in particular that I've been working on recently; I really like it, but I'm wondering whether it's worth sinking any more time into in its current state because I have a nagging feeling that the premise is horribly contrived. I don't want to say too much because I'd sort of like to keep some things a surprise if I ever actually grow enough of a spine/attention span to write it, let alone post it anywhere, so this might be a little vague; if you need more clarification, though, I can probably just get over it and go into more detail. Anything to make this story presentable. ;-;

Here's the gist of it. The "trainer" in question is actually a legendary pokémon. Said legendary makes a few other legendaries unhappy, so they decide to punish it by turning it into a human and leaving it to stew with the other silly humans for a while. (That is slightly more logical than it sounds given the nature of the unhappy-making, but again, trying to maintain some semblance of spoilerlessness so I won't say more.)

The legendary would ordinarily be content to just crawl off someplace and hide until its banishment is lifted, not being terribly social or friendly, but another legendary with a grudge against the first one thinks it would be a lot more entertaining to antagonize it and be generally annoying. The main-character-legendary, fed up with the constant attacks/annoyances from the antagonist and other nasty wild critters, decides to get itself a single pokémon for self-defense--kicking bidoof out of one's way is generally frowned upon, after all, and would result in more run-ins with the police, etc. than the MC would prefer. (Also, "kick things out of the way" will not work very well in the event that it should be accosted by an onix, and without its original legendary form for a proper battle, well. Squish.)

This is where it starts to get a little messy, IMO. The antagonist legendary sees that the MC-legendary now has a pokémon of its own, and it finds this hilarious. It tells the MC that it was originally just going to keep attacking it for the lulz, but now that it's seen the pokémon it has a better idea: have the MC-legendary try the Pokémon League on for size. Get all eight badges and the antagonist will stop the attacks (mostly) and will even see if it can pull some strings with the legendaries who imposed the banishment, maybe try and reduce the sentence a little.

MC-legendary does not trust antagonist-legendary to hold up its end of the bargain, and anyway it finds the idea of being some stupid pansy human pokémon trainer insufferably demeaning. Antagonist-legendary says "well, it's either that or we can go back to me beating you up every other day, and since you aren't a pokémon anymore there's nothing you can do to stop me; besides, if you have a *snicker* strong team of *snicker* champion pokémon then you might almost maybe be able to use them to keep me away". Getting beat up every other day does not sound appealing, MC-legendary honestly has nothing better to do and there's the tiny, if foolhardy, hope that antagonist-legendary will make good on its word and try to reason with the others, so MC-legendary reluctantly agrees. Badges, character development and general silliness ensue, et cetera, et cetera.

There's a lot more to the plot than that, but that's the bit I'm anticipating people having the most trouble swallowing.

The story isn't supposed to take itself too seriously, mind--I wouldn't go so far as to call it comedic or parodical, but it's definitely light-hearted. The legendaries are all a little petty and a bit more "human" (think Greek gods as opposed to, say, the Judeo-Christian God) than I think you usually see in legendary fics, so I don't think most of what I've got is too far-fetched given all that. But the impetus for the MC-legendary becoming a trainer still seems like it's too much, like it's too "convenient", and... ugh. Maybe it's not as weak an excuse a plot as it sounds in my head right now, but somehow I doubt that.

So, is that premise too contrived to be enjoyable or not, and if it is, do you lovely people have any suggestions for patching it up? Thanks in advance.

I'd like it if it was written well, and I think it would be if you wrote it.

I like the idea. Sounds great! Sure, I don't really write fics that much, but RPing counts, right? Also, I read them...

I don't find it contrived, but I have been reading mostly other fics for different series's, so. I'd say go for it!

Well, it sounds mildly contrived, but it works, and it also sounds like it could be a very entertaining idea if done well, plus you say it wouldn't take itself too seriously, so I don't think it really hurts it too much. Go for it.

Hah, see, I knew someone else would think it was contrived. As long as people think it's an entertaining concept then that's all that matters in the end, but knowing that something I'm planning seems forced is still going to eat away at me. Was there anything in particular you thought was more forced than anything else, and do you have any suggestions as to making it a bit more natural? I realize it might be hard to think of something given that I'm being so general, but arrgh it makes me die a tiny bit inside D:

Bah stop worrying so much. >| You are supposed to be big and scary and big scary things don't get scared.

Anyhow. If you play the plot of the legendaries being like Greek gods, and banishing MC-legendary for Greek-god-like reasons (SLUT), it will work and be original (and also funny), two birds with one stone. That's actually something I've never seen before and would very much like to read.

I would totally make it a slut except this particular legendary is about as unslutty as it is possible to be. (agh that is a good idea though and I am actually totally going to do that in another story

maybe

since I never write/finish anything

...Chewy has no self-confidence D:)

I think it sounds pretty awesome, though I am definitely hoping the pokémon have something approaching blue and orange morality. :< [ ... is a sucker for pokémon-centric things where the pokémon are more than a bit Odd. ]

Oh hey I learned a thing today.

I don't know to what extent their morality will be blaring blue and orange, although I was definitely planning on avoiding "I am banishing you because you are evil and you broke the law and now you must be reformed", sure. Well, okay, someone might attempt to justify it that way, but then they are lying. Attaching typical human morality to legendaries has always struck me as kind of boring and at least a little off. So. Yay?

Oh my god this is awesome I want to read it now.

Also, which legendaries are they? Surely that isn't a particularly horrible spoiler?

Well, no, it's not. I keep telling myself that it'd be a good idea not to tell people and that I'm getting some sort of enjoyment out of knowing while no one else does, and that I want the semi-prologue thing to be a big surprise reveal. Then again, it's not like you don't find out who most of them are in the first three or so chapters. That and it's not like it won't all come out when everyone starts posting excerpts in the NaNo thread. Meh.

(Also I tend to deliberately avoid saying too much about most of my projects for fear that people might show interest and then even be disappointed when I inevitably fail to follow through with writing it, but seeing as how this is actually going to happen I decided to ask for input. Everything else I do is, like, vaporfic. :/)

ALL THAT TO SAY that why no I don't have any self-confidence buuut the main one is Giratina, the one Giratina pisses off is Arceus and the antagonist one is Mew (which I am anticipating being a lot of fun to work with, at the very least).

Kratos Aurion said:

Hah, see, I knew someone else would think it was contrived. As long as people think it's an entertaining concept then that's all that matters in the end, but knowing that something I'm planning seems forced is still going to eat away at me. Was there anything in particular you thought was more forced than anything else, and do you have any suggestions as to making it a bit more natural? I realize it might be hard to think of something given that I'm being so general, but arrgh it makes me die a tiny bit inside D:

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Mostly it just has a bit of that "something to justify a legendary-turned-human going on a Pokémon journey" air to it. That may be a matter of the presentation more than anything else, really - a post going "okay, so a legendary-turned-human is on a Pokémon journey, and here's how I've justified it!" will inevitably make it sound a lot more forced than it needs to be when actually written. As long as you set it up carefully so that getting a Pokémon seems like the natural thing for Giratina to do, and so that the in-character thing for Mew to do is mockingly challenge it to collect badges, and so that the sensible thing for Giratina to do is accept the offer, chances are it won't feel that way at all - as I said, it does work in that the reasoning holds logically, so it's mostly just a matter of writing it in a way that makes it feel like a natural chain of events.

Looks like fun to me. It probably wouldn't work too well for a gritty darkfic kind of thing, but as a more upbeat and slightly silly kind of story it fits just great. In that kind of a story you can kind of go with the "Yes, and..." rule of improv. Legendary turned into a human? Yes, and he's going on a pokémon journey, too!

Negrek said:

Looks like fun to me. It probably wouldn't work too well for a gritty darkfic kind of thing, but as a more upbeat and slightly silly kind of story it fits just great. In that kind of a story you can kind of go with the "Yes, and..." rule of improv. Legendary turned into a human? Yes, and he's going on a pokémon journey, too!

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Aww darn, I wish I would've read this thread before writing my fic, where Pokemon turning into people is a main component. Now it just seems like I stole from this thread. I hate it when that happens.

I'm pretty sure that the general pokémon-to-people idea is way older than this, though! I doubt your story is anything like the one I'm planning.

Kratos Aurion said:

I'm pretty sure that the general pokémon-to-people idea is way older than this, though! I doubt your story is anything like the one I'm planning.

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Thinking about this more now, its a lot darker (well it probably is) and the transformation is done with the powers of Science!™ so its quite a bit different than I thought initially.

hrml if it's done by the powers of Science™, make sure you get all applicable science right!

sreservoir said:

hrml if it's done by the powers of Science™, make sure you get all applicable science right!

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Well its the same Science!™ that allows Mew to be both the ancestor of all Pokemon and carry their DNA, the Science!™ that allows matter to increase or decrease during evolution (itself nonsensical), the Science!™ that allows a ten year old to carry more than a year's worth of supplies and run. So in other words, its Science!™ not science, which aims more for consistency than actual facts. (See also: Star Trek)

Eloi said:

Well its the same Science!™ that allows Mew to be both the ancestor of all Pokemon and carry their DNA,

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subject to the same Science™ that allows for IQs of 5000 without unbalancing the scale.

the Science!™ that allows matter to increase or decrease during evolution (itself nonsensical),

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hey, science lets your mass increase while you grow. nothing proves that it's not just doing Physics™.

the Science!™ that allows a ten year old to carry more than a year's worth of supplies and run.

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they also carry pokéballs. hm.

So in other words, its Science!™ not science, which aims more for consistency than actual facts. (See also: Star Trek)

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what I mean is, when science is applicable, don't make up Science™. it makes kittens cry!

what I mean is, when science is applicable, don't make up Science™. it makes kittens cry!

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I actually like hard sci-fi stories. I once wrote a story that humans, after a lot of years of expansion, find a planet (Gliese 581 c) with sentient life and get there with nuclear pulse propulsion (after many failed tries and needed re-establishments of destroyed checkpoints). They find that they communicate and move around using echolocation, and are underground creatures. After many, many, many years, an advanced Artificial Intelligence finally pieced together what the sentient life thought (but there is no way of communicating with them). The sentient life thinks of the universe in an inverted manner i.e. that the center of their world is the farthest away and the surface of the plant was the closest extent of the universe, and since they had no eyesight, they have no idea that there was an outer space whatsoever. They also had no interest in human beings.
Another was about a city in a fictional Middle Eastern city being subject to a nuclear strike, by a hijacked 10 foot tall, five-ton humanoid robot controlled by a complex system that copies the movements of a remote pilot (this is because the locomotion of the machine was too complicated and a computer run locomotion for it was too primitive at the time of deployment) is the only thing that can gain access to the city in terms of weapons of mass destruction due to city being in a mountainous area (which made it difficult for tanks), land-locked (which made it difficult for sea going vessels), and had extremely poor weather conditions of the time and was not near any developed countries air bases in the area (which made air aid/attack difficult), the recent nuclear radiation didn't contribute much to that either. Another robot is developed by the city's allies (which were relatively poor and could only afford to produce one), and sent up to the area to help rebuild the city and look for the survivors as the off-site crew try to track down where the hijacked robot is getting its remote signal.
Finally, I made a story about a very difficult to translate an ancient language of mysterious invaders of Rome during the 3rd Century AD, and some of the obstacles were cleared by knowledge of the culture derived from contemporary sources those being:
1) The people who inhabited the state was described with typically Germanic physical traits. (Which narrowed it down to Indo-European Germanic languages)
2) The people were described as not having gender roles, but not in those terms. The Roman author described them doing the same things for either gender, how they wore the same clothing, and so on. (Which brought up the possibility of them having a different way of classifying objects beyond feminine/masculine.
3)The people had difficulties pronouncing things like v and z as they pronounced them f and s when being taught Latin as slaves. (This means that they lacked voiced consonants in their phonological inventory.)
4)The people traded with Carian merchants, finding Carian pottery in the alleged home of the Germanic tribes. (Which means their writing system was derived from the Carian alphabet.)
Using all of this they decoded the texts they found, and as a result, they got more information about Germanic people from their perspective at the time.

So...yes, I do tend to like science in my stories.