Search
On FM Scout you can chat about Football Manager in real time since 2011. Here are 10 reasons to join!

Writing Advice - Story Guidelines

Please read this before starting your manager story, it should help you choose a writing style and perhaps inspire you to start one.
Started on 25 August 2010 by Stam
Latest Reply on 30 August 2012 by benjy00
  • POSTS23
  • VIEWS38967
Pages  
Stam's avatar Administrators Stam
14 yearsEdited
The following text was composed using chunks of posts from the following good people on the official SI forums: Terk, glamdring, Peacemaker7.

--

The styles

There are different styles to work with, such as diary style, newspaper reports, narrator style and even bits of commentary or conversational interludes thrown in. Some people do just their match results and a one-paragraph write-up of them, while at the other end you have people who try to evoke every ounce of emotion a real match endures. Some people do very detailed stories, and oh there happens to be some football in it, while other people do nothing but the football.


Your style

Pick what's going to interest you to keep writing it; don't bite off more than you can chew, by which I mean, don't set yourself an extremely high standard if you're not likely to follow it with equal. For a story to have any life, its got to entertain the author first. So, make sure you write in a style that you are totally comfortable with and enjoy. If you try to get too ambitious with a style you aren't that comfortable with you'll probably lose interest in it yourself too soon.

Beyond that, if its well written, it'll find an audience, and don't worry so much if the audience is different from another writer's; people enjoy reading different styles as long as the story is well written.

One of the best pieces of advice anyone can give, particularly to a newer writer is, do not be afraid to fail. So you start your story, write it a couple of days and then think oh crap, this is not working as I expected. Don't worry, but also if you are battering along with a story and you feel it's really getting tedious to write, don't force it. No-one will think any less of you for walking away from something that isn't working out.


The mechanics

Write in Word, Wordpad, or Notebook, not in the little pop-up "post" window on the website. Then cut-and-paste in when you're ready to post. (That lets you spellcheck, edit, save, etc, and prevents accidental "oops posted before I was ready" mistakes).

Don't "postflood" - if you drop 20 pages worth of posts one after the other, its going to be intimidating and offputting to new readers. Post a bit, leave a cliffhanger or two, and engage your readers that way.

Get ahead - goes hand in hand with that. If you play-and-write a bit ahead of your posting, it gives you a couple advantages. One, you'll have days where you don't feel like writing or playing, and you'll have some material saved to post then. Two, you can "foreshadow" events yet to come. Three, you may observe that something which happened a week or two earlier was more important than you thought it would be at the time.


Rules and a call for improvement

Punctuation and grammar IS important.
Many people have come on here and posted something totally unintelligible, for example "i woz maniging arsenil wot, we wun 2-0 + we wus gud 2".
Whilst that may be accepted in other forums these days, it is not accepted in here. For a start, no-one is going to take the time to read such bull crap anyway.

Always remember to capitalize 'I' this is one of the most annoying thing some lazy writers do, and there is not excuse for it.

Remember paragraphs... and the spacebar. So many new writers come along in their enthusiasm and post a huge long post which could be the greatest piece of writing ever, but it's all one huge chunk of text and is very painful to read.

Listen to people who offer advice and don't go taking the huff. We actually want new writers on here, but stop and think for a moment, why are you writing here?

Writing is primarily for your own enjoyment, but we also write for others to read. If no-one else reads what you write, it is a bit depressing. So if people offer advice, it is because they are trying to help and listening to that advice will go a long way to ensuring that people DO read what you write and post nice comments like, wow this is really good mate, welcome back mate (for the millionth bloody time), we love you mate!

And thats another thing. Take time to actually read other people's stories and take time to offer them praise - and advice - where appropriate. However, do not just post KUTGW in random stories in the hope that people will read yours. Reading other people's stuff is a good way to learn, and can sometimes inspire us to new ideas.
10
Thanks, this is helpful as I was wondering how to go about putting stories on here and this has given me confidence in the way I'm going to go about it. Good guide and very helpful.
Thank's man. Now I see that my story (Comeback of Southampton) was crap :D.
Now I'm going with new one.
I hope it will be good one!


Cheers mate
# Aurelius : Thank's man. Now I see that my story (Comeback of Southampton) was crap :D.
Now I'm going with new one.
I hope it will be good one!


Cheers mate

best be a leeds story :D
Can we put in links to a word document? I've been writing one for the last few days in word and I'd love to put it up, but I've got almost 4000 words done and I don't know what would be the best way to do it :/
You could start your story including (pasting) a part of your document, then add more parts as replies to the same topic as in updates.
Try to split it in 'chapters' of different stuff that you write about. So for example, you could start with an introduction in first post, do the transfer thoughts in the second, etc.

And in case you wish to use screenshots, have a look at our screenshots tutorial.
1
Alright, I feel ready to start a story now. Crash and burn, here I come! :D
Hey Ive been thinking of starting a story for a while now, but am half way through my first season do you feel it would still be good to start one with a brief overview to start of season?
This has really helped me think over my story since I've started it, this is a great help Stam! awesome work
can somebody help me how to add pictures while replying?
i dont really kno
w how to add pictures :/
#40300 FM12HFC : i dont really kno
w how to add pictures :/

Upload it to host site like imageshack. Then when you done uploading the pictures, use the right button of the mouse and then at second button there should say share picture. Click on that. And then just copy the [IMG]url[IMG].[/img][/img]
Hi there,

Dude, how can I delete a story that I started? I lost the file thanks to a monumental cock-up with my PC and I would really like to start again.

Its the story "Return to the Seaside" involving Blackpool.

Peace
Id love to start a report and would appreciate a short guide how to post a link please.

I mean for example a smaller league table that expands to a bigger one when you klick it. Using like paint and then copy it to the report makes the pic a bit blurry.

Using Imageshack for post pics I know how to operate.

Thanx mates !
1
Thanks mate!!!!! This helped me so much as to where to start!

You are reading "Writing Advice - Story Guidelines".

FMS Chat

Stam
hey, just wanted to let you know that we have a fb style chat for our members. login or sign up to start chatting.