Successful Story Hours - a simple analysis (raised from the thread)

[WizarDru]

Since when was it a competition?

If you try to make a race out of the Story Hours, you'll discourage new authors. And if you had prevented Destan from starting his story hour, I would have had to come to your house and curse all your dice.
Besides which, those numbers aren't terribly accurate, since some story hours get 'pruned' on a regular basis, making your calculation off. PC's story hour has removed more pages than some story hours have. ANd then, of course is the issue that some story hours get fewer posts than views. Speaking for the "Lurker's Choice", I can tell you my page views may jump 500-1000 between posts.

 

[Piratecat]

BTW, PC's numbers in this will be skewed as he prunes excess posts from his thread. It's quite likely over 4,000 posts have been made in that thread.

Exactly. I joke about a "bump-bot" that sits there and hits refresh over and over, but the truth is that I have deleted well over two thousand posts from that thread - and I have a couple hundred waiting to get cut. The numbers aren't valid as a result. In addition, if you combined all of Sepulchrave's stories you'd have higher numbers as well.

People read your stories, they tell their friends, and the number of fans grows. The fact that the story hour forum is doing so well is a point of personal delight for me! It was actually the second forum on Eric's old boards, and he had to actually threaten me to be a moderator for it. See where these things eventually lead?

 

[el-remmen]

Since when was it a competition?

If you try to make a race out of the Story Hours, you'll discourage new authors. And if you had prevented Destan from starting his story hour, I would have had to come to your house and curse all your dice.
Besides which, those numbers aren't terribly accurate, since some story hours get 'pruned' on a regular basis, making your calculation off. PC's story hour has removed more pages than some story hours have. ANd then, of course is the issue that some story hours get fewer posts than views. Speaking for the "Lurker's Choice", I can tell you my page views may jump 500-1000 between posts.

I don't think anyone is making it into a competition, Dru. This is just all just in good fun, I think.

 

[tetsujin28]

And don't think for a second that I inflate my view count by endlessly clicking on the links to my own Story Hours.

Uh huh.

Not me.

No sir.

He doesn't have to -- I do that for him

 

[tetsujin28]

best. footnote. ever.

Why, thanks!

 

[megamania]

Huurmmmm.....

Why do we have this thread?

It erks me because of my efforts into my SH that no one cares about. I tried to develop it with background for that something extra. I have often as many as 5 things going on at once with strange and I thought appealing NPCs. I stay true to the game world.

I have but one person that seems to enjoy it. (I thankyou Suld). Now that I have two full time jobs I have basically dropped out of trying to update regularly for folks whom just don't care.

I have read several sections of the "top" 5 and find a few things that bother me. They are the "popular" people of the site. So is the comments (all possitive of course) legit or kissing up?. I dislike them also because there is little "jumping on" points. Do I need to read back 100's of pages to figure out how these folks got where they are?

My Under a Darksun SH has a special place in my heart. No one cares. So what. The heck with yah.

I know this is coming off negative and perhaps a bit childish but it has hit a nerve with me.

 

[gfunk]

Huurmmmm.....
Why do we have this thread? <rant snipped>

I have to say that I agree with you on some levels, megamania.

There have been quite a few threads started by neophyte authors who wanted tips on creating a successful story hour. Invariably, a more experienced author chimes in and says something to the effect of, "You should only write the story hour for your own enjoyment and those of your players. Don't worry about becoming 'popular.'"

A nice sentiment, but we are human after all.

As a recent thread in the Story Hour forum indicates, writing these things takes a lot of time and effort. You have to keep notes, trim aspects of the game that readers would find boring, and be able to write in a creative and compelling manner. Why would anyone go through the effort if not for the accolades of his fellow gamers?

I have read several sections of the "top" 5 and find a few things that bother me. They are the "popular" people of the site. So is the comments (all possitive of course) legit or kissing up?

Well, I like to think of it that they are popular because their story hours are good.

In truth, even though I wrote my own Story Hour, I seldom find pleasure in reading those of others with two exceptions. One, if the writing is truly exceptional (like Sep's) or if they are running the same module as me (like Lazybones').

I'm sorry that you feel that your story hour is not appreciated, but them's the breaks I guess . . .

 

[megamania]

I'm just in a foul mood and it was related to the SH so the timing of this thread is bad for me.

However, I honestly believe the "best" and most "viewed" are not truely the same.

 

[el-remmen]

Of course, "best" and "most viewed" do not necessarily mean the same thing, or else mine would be the most viewed

But seriously, I really can't say what makes people start reading a story hour. I started mine when there were only about 15 or less story hours (I think really only a dozen) being updated (Heck, (cntxt)'s original TOEE was still going, no one knew who Sepulchrave was and Wulf Ratbane was only 3rd level ), so I really think any original popularity I had was due to lack of options.

And while it may seem like a cop-out, if you don't like writing your story hour or it seems like too much trouble then maybe you should just not write it. I enjoy enjoy writing mine and as time has gone on I have had fewer readers not more. . . but I continue to keep writing until the campaign storyline ends or there is TPK, but at the same time I doubt I would ever undertake such an endavor again, because I don't think I'd want to take so much time again. And because once I did start if I did not keep updating the most disappointed person would be myself.

Ultimately, I hope to print out the several hundred page word doc that this my SH and hand it bound to each of my players as a gift in memory of this game when it is done.

If you are writing for other people and other people don't seem to appreciate it, then stop writing, maybe people will start posting and say, "Hey! where the heck did ya go?" Or maybe they won't - I can't say - But nobody here is trying to rub the popularity of their story in your face and nobody here wants to see anyone else "fail" - Heck, I am proud of how story hour authors tend to try to help each other out and try check out each others stories or are willing to give advice - So, if you have an issue with it, you really need to see that it is your own issue originating from yourself not from the folks that want nothing else but to share their stories and help out others when they can.

 

[Silver Moon]

It erks me because of my efforts into my SH that no one cares about....I have but one person that seems to enjoy it. (I thankyou Suld).

Hold on a minute, I've read your story hours before. They are very well written, and about the only thing that I would suggest as an improvement would be a brief summary of each character at the beginning to better grab the reader.

Don't take the low readership as a criticism, a larger possibility might be that the setting itself doesn't interest most readers. Your campaign is in a Dark Sun setting. Your other story hour threads are in a Ravenloft setting and a science fiction RGP setting (Strikeforce Morituri). That makes you campaign story hours rather unique and out-of-the-ordinary from the traditional D&D world that most people play in. The upside to that is that the stories have a very different flavor to them and are fun to read. The downside is that the vast majority of the readers don't play your game systems and are less familiar and therefore less comfortable with them. They may also feel that there is less likelihood of being able to "borrow" from them to use in their own campaigns (I'd actually disagree with that, feeling that good stuff can be stolen from anywhere).

I know how you feel. My Story Hours have always had low readership, and probably always will. This is because while mine include traditional D&D crunch and flavor they also include a lot of comic moments, jokes and out-of-character/out-of-game comments. I write mine primarily for my players, and they enjoy reading about the parts of the game they found the most fun. But I also have a handful of loyal readers who enjoy them too. The fact that two different readers referenced two different story hours of mine in the recent Pimping thread attests to that. So hang in there, more people will find your stories as time goes on.