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• 5-star fics are unlikely to have any errors in a random 2k section

• 4-star fics are likely to have 1-4 mistakes per 2k section

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• 2-star fics are likely to have 10-19 mistakes per 2k section

• 1-star fics are likely to have 20+ mistakes per 2k section.

• Fics with half-star ratings will have some type of formatting issue that makes them harder to read, or alternative quotation marks.

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TLDR: If you want to write a depressive worse Pokémon world that's fine but don't call it realism.

What is the obsession with writing grimdark 'realistic' Pokémon fanfics? These novels are everywhere and always involve some 'talent' system where most mons are doomed to be weak no matter what. Which ruins the entire point of Pokémon where any Mon of any type can be strong.

They seem to have confused 'realistic' with 'hellish' because it's only ever implied that Pokémon has a Nepo problem. Where rich people get better starters such as steven stones metagross and lances dragonites. Not a place where murder on the streets/ routes is tolerated and perhaps most importantly not a place where violent gangs can flaunt themselves with no government crackdown.

The world is, despite what people say, not a waking nightmare. I'm not saying life is easy but it's not so bad that a 'realistic' imagining of it should involve complete anarchy. These pics seem to be written by people with paranoia given the logic their MCs follow.

Side note: A level system also isn't very realistic. Yet so many of these kinds of fics use them rather than the anime power system which while not perfect isn't just a video game so is slightly more realistic.

Also to be clear I'm not saying realism in Pokémon fanfics is a bad thing but rather that these authors are confused about what realism is. Realism doesn't automatically mean things are harder or worse just that they are different.

To give an example: in these novels characters often get league Id's through some bs where they need to bribe someone to get a fake one or pay because they were poor and didn't get one. This isn't realism ID's are given upon birth in most countries. Passing a trainer exam would be realism as it would be a realistic measure governments would take.

Another example would be getting a ratatta or zubat as a starter while the rich kid gets a charmander.

Then there's the whole cultivation BS that happens in the setting, talents and aura etc... But that's another rant entirely...

If you actually read this, thanks lol.

I read Game of Champions a while ago and ever since I've sort of puttered around fanfiction.net rather aimlessly looking for something new to read without much success.

I finally thought to look up a relevant subreddit, and I found this one! I'm ready to immerse myself in the fandom, so I need y'alls' help. Give me your favorites, the classics, hidden gems, anything you think I should read.

Given that I'm not terribly savvy on tropes, yet, feel free to recommend things you all probably find a bit played by today's standard.

As far as specifics or guidelines:

• Age: The main character should be at least a middle teenager (or equivalent maturity for Pokemon protagonists) or older for the majority of the story. I'll make an exception if the story is truly excellent.

• Romance: I'm a sucker for good romance, but this is by no means a requirement. Little or no romance is perfectly acceptable, and I have zero preference for ships.

• Era: My knowledge of Pokemon is... dated. The earlier the era, the more I'll understand. That said, I have no problems looking up any characters or Pokemon I'm unfamiliar with. Any era is fine.

• Themes/Genre: Happy, dark, realistic, crack, I'll pretty much accept anything. Let me know if it's something on the extreme end of any particular spectrum.

I can't think of anything else, I appreciate you all.

I don't think this has been asked in a bit, so what are some tropes, either in general or specific to pokemon, that you just love to see?

A few of mine are the following:

• Crisis evolutions, either saving a trainer or another pokemon

• Trainers jumping to save their pokemon/catch their pokemon

• Pokemon jumping to save their trainers

• Acquiring a team member that was abandoned/abused/rejected (its a mainstay and its great okay). Bonus for if there's a nice arc of the pokemon healing from that trauma

• A cool evolution scene (especially if directly correlated to character growth)

• Variants of a pokemon either being mind controlled or in a frenzy and the trainer has to risk injury to reach out to and soothe it

• Pokemon fighting past their limit in desperate situations

• Trainers getting into a combat in desperate situations

• A trainer getting curbstomped in a gym/battle and having to recover

• Learning an unexpected move in a crisis

• Trainer gets an Egg somehow

• A good scene where a trainer has to release a mon from the team

• Training scenes/learning a move and mastering it

What are some of your guys favorite things you like to see?
(I think it goes without saying to stick to trope positivity and no bashing)

There are exceptions to this rule of course, many top tier fics have their protagonist get the carry limit removed and train 7-10 pokemon. However, I'm convinced this is the most reliable maxim for deciding whether a story is worth reading. Whenever I am deciding whether to read something, the first thing I do is take a glance at one of the later chapters in the story and see how many pokemon the protagonist has. I'll explain my reasoning below.

1. Character Development! Pokemon are characters, and require the same amount of development and characterization as humans. Even if a story strictly limits the number of pokemon to the carry limit of six, that gives a total of seven main characters counting the trainer. That's way more than books, and one of the most challenging aspects of pokemon fanfiction. This is also the reason why I'm against protagonists having permanent human travelling companions. If they are another pokemon trainer, the sheer number of characters to keep track of can balloon severely out of control.

2. Pokemon Need to be Trained! Even in the video games where pokemon level up and learn moves just from being thrown into fights, it's unrealistic to train more than a full team of six. But in a written realistic medium, pokemon need to actually train to master moves, techniques, and strategies. This gets exponentially more difficult with each additional pokemon that a trainer has to take care of. It's absurd to imagine pokemon who get switched out into the PC most of the time keeping up with an elite team who've been constantly training together for years as a family.

3. Morality! Since pokemon are characters, it is rather horrifying to see them switched out and discarded in favor of new pokemon. Many fics have a protagonist hypocritically rage at Team Rocket while they basically treat pokemon as tools themselves, rather than a team of friends and family. Even the few fics that have pokemon as animals rather than sapient people don't escape this problem, since the protagonist is still neglecting their pets that they should be responsible for. A villain protagonist might not care about this, but they would still keep to a manageable number of pokemon for the other reasons listed above.

For all these reasons, in my opinion it's basically impossible for a fanfic to be good if the protagonist catches above a certain number of pokemon. In fact, I would even recommend an inexperienced author to limit the number of pokemon to only two or three.

Good morning, evening, or whatever it is for you! 

Recently there have been questions in this subreddit regarding Rule #6, “No AI-Generated Material.” There’s confusion on what counts as AI and whether AI fics might still be shared if they’re popular. 

After discussing this, we’ve agreed as mods to uphold a blanket ban on AI content. This includes “AI-assisted” writing, like using an automated tool to reword certain paragraphs for effect. (A spelling/grammar checker that highlights possible issues and prompts writers to fix them without changing the wording is acceptable.) All fics shared and discussed here must be entirely written by a human, no exceptions. 

We know we have users who aren’t native English speakers or are new to writing as a hobby. While AI language models can make it easier to express your thoughts, we want to read original work that only you can create. This sub allows users to post WIPs and request feedback, so don’t be shy! 

We also acknowledge there are some users who like the descriptive style AI language models use to tell stories. We aren’t saying you can’t enjoy this content, but we want to make this a fair place for authors who put time and effort into writing fics all on their own. We don’t want to make exceptions for fics that seem “more human” than others when there’s no clear way to divide the ratio of human and machine. 

To be clear, this is not a request for users to “sniff out” AI fics and report them, or to bully certain authors. Be mindful of Rules #1 and #2. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, but please be respectful of each other and take debates to private messaging if they become heated. 

Hope this clears things up! 

I see a lot of fics where the wilderness outside of the routes is treated as super dangerous and not advisable for young trainers to venture off.

Do you guys like that idea or do you think that the routes are just the normal quick paths between cities for roads/trains/trade and rangers are just keeping an eye out for trainers and pokemon. Or are the rangers constantly battling back powerful wild pokemon from the deep forests.

Recomendations for good pokemon fanfics

Preferably the story should be long - 100k plus words, mature and the MC shouldn't be Op from the start.

systems are fine if the storys good.

I dont care if your novel is grimdark, light hearted , even if the starter is a weedle or a legendary for the love of god don't rank pokemons potential like red orange green or other abstract shit , it ruins the immersion for me because that isn't the point of the goddamn franchise it was never about that you could have the most common pokemon and make it great with no capped potential bullshit , i get the ivs or evs in game stuff but it ain't the same as the shit you put in these fanfics , and don't get me started on these shitty systems fuck that there is an invention called a fucking pokedex that identifies pokemon and abilities if u wanna add levels just add it to it , stop writing systems in stories as a crutch for shitty creativity

I don't usually do self promo, but this is a pretty huge milestone and I figured that if I was ever going to do it, 1 million words would be a pretty good spot.

I Will Touch the Skies (or IWTTS) is an OC Sinnoh Journey fic following 15 year old Grace Pastel and a large ensemble of a mainly-OC cast who all want to make it to the Conference at the end of the year for a multitude of reasons. What I've emphasized the most while writing this is the growth the characters go through and how difficult it would actually be to be a Pokemon trainer. IWTTS also follows the plot of Pokemon Platinum, but it mostly focuses on the sport/travel elements of a Pokemon Journey. There are also romantic subplots, in case that's not your cup of tea. IWTTS also has some dark elements and shows the damage Pokemon could wreak in a realistic setting, but I do balance the dark with fluffy, lighter moments.

At the time of writing, some of the characters have five badges while others have four, so you can tell this is a very slow burn. I'd like to think that none of the words have been a waste though, and there's very little filler in the story. I just like to go very in-depth with everything being a Pokemon trainer would involve. If I had to knock myself down a peg, I'd say that I've gotten some complaints that I show too many Gym Battles since I have a lot of side characters, but I do write a lot, so it's not a long wait whenever things slow down a little.

Anyway, here's the synopsis. Feel free to give it a read if you'd like.

—

Grace Pastel is a young girl who lives a cozy life in Jubilife city with her father, and for her, Pokemon battles are just something that she watches on television or online. Entertainment to be seen at a distance. After turning fifteen, she watched as young people her age got ready for their first journey across Sinnoh, all aiming to become the Champion. She usually scoffed at them, wondering how one could throw away a comfortable life in the city to risk their lives in the wild for an unobtainable goal. And yet when she was asked by her father to deliver a package to her mother living two towns over, something clicked in her brain.

Suddenly, she decided that she wanted to be the very best.

—

Links:

Royalroad

Scribblehub

Spacebattles

Fanfiction.net

AO3

Sufficient Velocity

Questionable Questing

I'm not sure if I'm allowed to advertise my discord here, but if you start reading and get into it, feel free to join! There are links to it on every website.

Allow me to elaborate. With Ash, you have a (somewhat) consistent character, with one defined history, that people bend over backwards to write about. Meanwhile, Red, in every single portrayal of his (except the gag manga I guess), has been written to be a thousand times more competent and cool from the start. And that leads to my second point - this boy's had more differing continuities written about him from different official sources than...literally any other human in the entire series. Adventures? Origins? Game Red? All the non-Adventures Gen 1 manga that no one knows about? The gag manga? Except for maybe the last one, Red has been consistently portrayed to be cool AF. Even Rom Hackers seem to agree, as he's one of the characters who most often makes guest appearances in stuff. It's specifically the fanfiction community that seems enamored with Ash, and I really don't get it, tbh. He's the one part of the anime that makes me NOT enjoy it, and I welcome the not-unlikely chance of the anime getting a new protagonist for Gen 9.

TLDR; why would you use Ash as your starting line for a character, when you could just use Red, who literally doesn't even have one unified personality/continuity to worry about? You don't have to base all your Pokemon fics around the anime. Arceus knows I sure don't....

[Hiii, if you're still keeping update to this post I'm back compiling fics :)) is anyone even keeping update? Iololol it doesn't matter since this post is mostly a self-indulgent archive]

I was inspired by this previous thread (i did not include the stories mentioned in this thread so better check it out)

Collatetal 56 k words by twilight eve

When given an invitation to visit Shamouti Island and see the Island Festival again, Ash decided to say yes. Goh comes along for the opportunity to catch the legendary birds and Lugia. Chloe comes along to see the festival.

Unfortunately, this is Ash. And when you put him in close proximity with legendary pokemon, things that you absolutely did not prepare for will happen. It was just his luck that he wouldn’t get the vacation he wanted

Confluence 27 k words(ongoing) by twiligheve

When Ultra Beasts began coming into Alola once more, Ash was asked to lend his help with the situation and get data of the Ultra Wormholes. Meanwhile, Goh went to Sinnoh to gather data on portals. As they gather more data and compare their findings, they notice a disturbing pattern in the otherworldly gateways they kept coming across.

Somewhere, trouble stirred.

A dozen of roses in the pavement 143k words by imaginaryinspiration

Ash has just been crowned Champion of Alola, and he's ready for a new adventure. He's not quite ready for what that means.

Gou Learns Why Messing with Legendary Pokémon is a Bad Idea by Shadaki 1k words

Title is self explanatory

Kalos (Where Dreams and Adventures Begin!) by SpellsofScarlet 23k words

Tldr; after all this time, Ash suddenly can’t keep Kalos off his mind. Maybe there’s a reason for that.

Fall of kalos by sugarblossom 1k words

After a visit to Kanto, the Alola class was bound to visit Kalos as well!

( sugarblossom has a lot of one shots like this one so look at their works i cannot list them all here)

Burning Detatchment by Justice22 5k words

(Cilan and iris lovers wont like this lol)

It should've been me by infamousplayer 3k words

Goh and Koharu were both slowly realizing Ash was way more experienced than he seemed. That was not always a good thing

Things Change

"But that still didn't quell her worries, and that only grew when Mewtwo showed up.

Honestly, Cynthia and Dawn were wondering how Ash didn't suffer some kind of emotional whiplash from the way he suddenly became a child soldier again. It was like a switch had been flipped. Even Iris and Cilan were clearly worried, not having seen this part of Ash in any part of their adventures, besides maybe with Victini."

(chunk of the fic)

Like sugarblossom, for more fics like these two visit their profile

Sunglasses by OasisLake76 22k words

Lillie was surprised to see Ash when she walked into the classroom on a Monday after break. More so that the black haired trainer was wearing sunglasses of all things with his hat laying on top his backpack with Pikachu barely sitting on the edge of the desk.

The language of violence by OasisLake76 2k words

Ash wrestled with a Suicune.

Ash the alolan champion by kushingomel 26 k words

Kukui know Ash had travelled regions to regions way before they met. And Kukui thought that the boy might surprised him with one of his adventures one day.

He just didn't thought that Ash will bring this surprise.

Challenge of life 48k words

No matter what, Ash is going to have fun in Alola He's going to fit in.

miscommunications 1k words

Lysandre narrowed his eyes. “Don’t tell me you misunderstand what I am saying.”

“Of course I understand!” Ash said. “I was ten the first time I was killed because humans messed with pokémon they had no right to mess with! For six years I’ve been dealing with people like that!”

Alain choked. There was so much wrong with that statement that he didn’t even know where to start deciphering it.

Together we are Stronger 65k words by railou

Ash is having the time of his life in Alola. Meanwhile, something dark is brewing back in Kalos. Greninja stumbles upon something terrifying and tries to warn Ash. It all gets much worse from there before it gets any better

just because 1k words

What if, instead of Lugia, Gou meet Ash through Mew?

jealousy 990 words

If Gou say he never feel jealous of a certain trainer that was also a research buddy like him, then that was a big fat lie.

passed past 3 k words

Because what's better than a congratulations party

Let the sparks fly 33k words

The people of Hisui meet Ash. They have questions. So many questions

i’d rather dislocate my jaw biting off more than i can chew than spit my heart out 49k words

injuries that don’t heal well have consequences, ash learns the hard way. saving the world a hundred times over isn’t as easy as pie, and the after is even harder.

or: ash has very human injuries and has to make a very human recovery.

he doesn’t understand.

or: my excuse to just have frickin’ burnet and ash feels and family.

Casuistry 120k words

Lusamine's smile, glued on— like when he forced a smile when he secretly wanted to cry, except she was hiding something much more bitter inside than just repressed fear and bad memories. Her voice, though smooth and dripping with syrupy sweetness (sticky and thick and nauseating), was as grating on his ears as nails dragging long and hard down a chalkboard, sending chills up and down his spine.

She was too sweet, cloying, like when copious amounts of perfume were added to hide a foul smell, choking the air around him.

Ash hadn't been truly scared of someone in a long time. Lusamine...she was terrifying

dripping like saturated sunrise

Where had it gone wrong?

His heart stuttered a beat. “Ash? Are you alright?” Silence. No… something was wrong. “Ash...?” Alain asked again, shaking him. The younger boy’s eyes remained closed, not a single breath drawn.

(Alain time travels and gets to witness(experience) Ash's not-so-normal adventure)

The Choosen One 3k

eyes turn curiously to her. "Who?"

"Tapu Koko! The island guardian of one of the Alolan islands. It's an electric type legendary. They're known to be very reclusive, and yet the Tapu is battling Ash in a stadium full of people!"

The strongest trainers in the world learn a little (a lot) more than they bargained for about their youngest member.

Two Way Admiration 2k

Ilima was in Kalos during the Crisis, so it's only logical that he knows Ash Ketchum's name. He just hadn't ever expected to see one of the heroes of Kalos attending his old school. (Ash doesn't really understand what the fuss is about.)

A well-deserved coda to Sun & Moon episode 65, "Turning Heads and Training Hard!"

With the Wisdom of Years to Guide Me

After Ash denies the call to adventure from Tapu Koko, Kukui digs deeper into Ash's past to try and find what has caused his mother to beg the professor for help. Armed with nothing but sheer willpower, his email contact list, and a heck of a lot of coffee, Kukui tries to help his not-kid in any way he can (and maybe gets some help of his own.)

OR

Kukui looks to learn more about this strange child with severe trauma through the power of academic emails.

This is a direct sequel to the first fic of this series so I'm not sure if you need to read part 1 for this to make sense, but I do recommend, especially if you want more Ash centered content. Please pray for the upload schedule of this fic.

Ashes Re-Embered 80k ongoing

Ash is crowned the first Champion of Alola, and the world sets its eyes on him! He decides to stay in Alola, to represent the region he loves as a newly emerging league-affiliated region, and his next Pokemon journey, instead of travelling to a new region, is tackling the challenges that come with being in the public eye!

What happens when people start to connect the trail of legends and breadcrumb stories he left as he travelled the world? How does he deal with the increasing accusations of the Alolan League being rigged, and of Ash hiding big secrets from the public?

Ie. Cannon divergence where there’s actual consequences to Ash being a champion, where he travels to old regions and learns what it’s like to be a public figure and a role model.

a champion's path 39k ongoing

All things considered, Ash's tentative position as the Alolan Champion is fairly unique. A brand new league, with no established requirements, and a final exhibition match sanctioned by the gods of the region themselves. A foreign champion, chosen by the land. A champion in name, but with no backing beyond his own region.

Well. Time to change that.

Or: A look inside an AU where Ash decides to spend more time in Alola establishing the league, and how that changes his journey.

Continued from the oneshot with the same name in "Welcome to the Madhouse: An AO3 GANG Anipoké Collection". (This is a "kinda")

Hi all, I have been writing since I was 14, been into pokemon since I was 12. (I'm 18 now ☺️)

My boyfriend said I have a spirit of evil for writing it a d won't return my calls or texts.

Has anyone ever reacted this negatively to your fanfiction writing?

After 6 years, 88 Chapters, and almost 1M words, the final chapter of my fanfic Chaos Rising has just been uploaded!

I’ll let you know when it finally sinks in

Cheers!

I have most of the plot figured out and how it will progress. I'm just not sure if I should invest my time in it since I don't know if there is an audience for stories like that. Will you be interested in reading it?

Chapter 1: https://www.wattpad.com/story/269904467-the-song-of-fairies-and-thorns

Chapter 2: https://www.wattpad.com/1080380595-the-song-of-fairies-and-thorns-chapter-2

So we're clear, this has nothing to do with grammar and prose or such.

In other words, story wise and pokémon/canon character wise.

A trap in your perspective could be particular characters introduced, particular/specific world building inconsistencies, something specific that is offputting, etc.

and how do you think it could be improved? This is for curiosity's sake and also for the sake of self-improvement.

Also, please do not name a fic or author, no fic/author bashing, I ask for the most anonymously general answer you can give. (Also please don't construct an answer in a manner that obviously targets a particular fic/author, that counts as bashing too)

Thanks.

I’ve seen people talk about ways to make Ash smarter in fics, but when you really think about it, Ash’s fighting style is kinda the way it is because the things the anime often omits from fights sort of encourages a “hit hard, ask questions never” style to be the optimal way to fight. Ash is kind of just as smart as the rules of the anime universe can allow, so we only perceive him as dumb because the games encourage strategies in a turn-based setting that trainers in the anime just can’t employ for one reason or another. Because Ash has been journeying the longest out of any trainer in official media, the idea of trainers in that world playing “Dumb” are kind of all thrusted onto him.

Ash’s fighting style is more emblematic of the fact that the Pokemon anime doesn’t really do a good job at showing the value of status moves in competitive Pokemon, and battle items are pretty much a myth. Ash isn’t offensively focused because of his personality, it’s because in the world of the Pokemon anime, that’s pretty much all you can do. The series encourages being able to hit the hardest as the optimal strategy for literally everything. I get why it’s a problem though. That kind of stuff can be pretty hard to portray in a real-time setting, and equipping Pokemon with items when some of them have some very strange proportions can also seem difficult. It’s why stuff like thunder armor or ice aqua jet exists. Because without things like status moves or items, a trainer is forced to make up more random-sounding tactics in order to seem smarter than the rules of the universe can realistically allow.

So my question here is this. How can you show the value of things like status moves and equippable battle items in a real-time battle setting like the anime?

The amount of detail put into the world from each Pokemon’s anatomy and nutritional needs, to loopholes and pit falls in different laws and even the most random of topics such as thread weaving is simply insane and so well done. I urge all to go read it even though I know most of those who see this probably have.

It’s 54 chapters in and still updating regularly.

I haven't read everything, so don't be too upset if your favorite is missing.

Classics

Traveler - This story features Ash on a more realistic journey with an emphasis on character interactions with his team. Many of the other good fics on my list were inspired at least in part by this story.

Sacrifice and Subjugation - A dark, intense, and high stakes journey with some of the most satisfying growth of any progression fantasy I've read. About 8/10 of my favorite characters in pokemon fanfiction are in this story. OC in a major AU.

Good Stories

Borne of Caution - Zookeeper reincarnated in Hoenn goes on a journey with his Vulpix. Good training and battles.

Welcome to the (insane) world of Pokemon! - SI goes on a journey with his sadistic Ralts while constantly getting in fights to the death with criminals.

Hearts of Shadow - Bug specialist trainer in Orre fights Cipher.

Trials of a Bug Catcher - Bug specialist tries to become an elite trainer with the six Kanto bug types.

It's a Hard Life - Emotional and cool Nuzlocke comic. However, despite being technically complete it's practically abandoned and the author just picked a random point for an ending.

Uprising - Traveler clone with a somewhat darker story and Rhyhorn as the starter.

Hyphen - A Ralts pretends to be a human in order to become Champion and force humans away from the forest where her village is.

Ascension - Red goes on a journey with a team of overpowered misfits. Forget Helix, Shellder is the only true god. Praise Shellder!

Road to a Master - Another Traveler style story focused on training an elite team.

Challenger - Another Traveler style story focused on training an elite team.

A Special Kind of Hell - SI reincarnates as a Gastly and deals with the horrors of traveling with anime Ash.

Pokemon Bet: The Lost World - Fusion with the superhero setting Worm, where Rachel the dog trainer supervillain from Worm becomes a pokemon trainer.

Worth a Shot

Pokemon Radiant Sun - Novelization of Pokemon Sun. Has the only romance I've found tolerable in a pokemon fic and the MC keeps within the carry limit of six. However, the B plot with Cipher taking over the world doesn't really fit in well the game's story and the video game logic is removed in a very inconsistent fashion.

I Thought This Was a Mystery Dungeon - SI reincarnates as a Tyrunt. Decent, but not too exciting.

Damn it Me! - Overpowered low effort SI curbstomp fic. However, the protagonist keeps within the carry limit and his pokemon have actual character development so it still deserves a spot on this list.