Story SOTM will be conducted in the month of July

[Aditya]

SOTM - July the 25th​

We're glad to announce that the SOTM is back and like always, the intention is to reward the best story writer for the immensely creative efforts that he puts into his story.

The PlanetCricket team is very keen to motivate new writers to come forward and start their stories. We understand that the starting few steps of starting a story can be complicated and for that, you're always welcome to send me a PM and I'll try to help out with the processes of writing a story, believe me it's very simple.

Don Bradman Cricket 14 is just a few days away from it's release on the PC platform and we believe this is as good a time as any for new story writers to show their interest in this part of the forum and let their creativity flow.

The concept of SOTM is relatively simple - the best stories from June and the starting bit of July will qualify for the competition.

In order to win, the stories will need a clear shot majority among the voters in the poll and the judges - yes, we will have a panel of 3-4 judges that will decide the best story among the nominees, based on a few criteria's. Such as- presentation, story line, creativity, reader's feedback etc.

We look forward to your participation in the stories section. Please feel free to post your doubts (if any).

 

[Dipak]

Can't thank you enough for this.

 

[Champagnepapi]

Sadly I can't update soon for my story.
But great to see this back, will definitely be hoping to see more stories like the ones in the olden days.

 

[Aditya]

Stories that will be nominated for next month's SOTM have to be started before the mid of July, say max by 7th of July, if that's what you're referring to.

 

[lion100lion]

Please feel free to post your doubts (if any).

1) Please can you give a sample story (or a link to it)
2) Also tell the length of the story (how many paragraph etc..)

 

[Aditya]

1) One of my favorite stories - India's Journey To World Cup - by Surendra

2) Stories in this part of the forum are based on cricket matches/tournaments/series'. It depends totally upon the writer as to how long his story has to be. Look around a few stories (there are 3 going right now) and you'll get a better idea.

If you ask me, I'd advice you and other new writers to begin with short stories - one series or tournament, perhaps even 1 match should be good to start off because career diaries and team diaries can be really hard unless you know what you're doing.

 

[qpeedore]

That India story by Suren is one of the best ever posted to this forum. I highly recommend reading it.

I also recommend checking out the Hall of Fame thread. Some excellent stories there.

Some tips for writers:

- Start small. It takes a lot to dedicate yourself to an ongoing story. You'll find that a lot of successful stories on here are focused on a single tournament or series. It's hard to keep an ongoing storyline going with a team.

- Choose your sim/game wisely. Not everyone who writes a Cricket 07 or Ashes Cricket story can write a Cricket Captain story or a Cricket Coach story. But at the end of it all, you can even opt to have no sim at all. Remember that the aim of this is to make your readers enjoy what you have written or posted.

- If you choose to do a "career" story where you are a player or you follow a player, know that this is immensely difficult.

- Be dedicated. Do not give up. Your team seems to be losing? Find a way to make us feel that loss. It makes the wins mean even more. Too many times I have seen stories prematurely ended because writers' teams are losing. So what?

- Just because nobody replies after every post you make doesn't mean people are not reading or following your story. Yes, replies encourage. But by no means are they a sign of your ability as a writer.

- Take criticism. Good or bad. Learn to use it to improve yourself and your story.

- At the end of it all, we want to feel like we are watching your games. Whether you opt to use fancy pictures (extremely effective) or you are text-heavy (just as effective, but harder), you want your readers to really feel like they are right there in the action. If you don't build up a match properly, it's disappointing. Cricket is about passages of play, not necessarily an entire match all at once. Some of the best stories on here have updated a few overs at a time and have been amazing at that.

- Feel free to ask for help. Never once think that you are alone.

- Grammar and spelling matter. Proofread everything.

- The real world happens. If you can't update...we understand.

- Most importantly, stick by your story. If you create five new stories in one month, you had better update all five stories regularly. If you decide to change your mind after one or two matches because "omg i just had a better idea lol"...it takes away from things.

That is all.

 

[Aditya]

We've got our 4 panel members, they are - Surendra, User2010, qpeedore and myself. We look forward to your wonderful stories.

 

[lion100lion]

We're glad to announce that the SOTM is back and like always, the intention is to reward the best story writer for the immensely creative efforts that he puts into his story.

What's the reward ?

 

[Dipak]

We've got our 4 panel members, they are - Surendra, User2010, qpeedore and myself. We look forward to your wonderful stories.

I'm very offended by your decision to exclude me

I didn't understand the process of choosing the winner. The panel and the voters will be given equal powers?

 

[Aditya]

@lion100lion - By reward we mean giving the writers the much needed attention and appreciation for their hard work. The winner will be given vCash as prize and a change of user title i.e. for instance, SOTM Winner - July 2014.
@Dipak - On a serious note, I'm very much considering guest panel members to judge stories. Each SOTM edition will have 1 guest panelist judging the stories (of which the writers will be unaware of) - this panel member will be selected on the basis of his activity and feedback/suggestions that he has given to the various stories running.

Deciding the winner is pretty straight forward. We've had the case of story writers asking for votes via PM/VM, something that we as staff member or panelists would not encourage. Hence to be fair in the judgement of the winner, we have panel members to decide upon the most deserving winner.

Panel members will be rating the stories on 5 criteria's and giving each criteria number out of 10.

We'll then see which story has the clear shot majority and subsequently announce the results accordingly.

 

[Dipak]

I thought something like the PCGMC, wherein both the panelists and the voters have equal weightage.

Suppose the average panel rating is 8/10 and it's got 10 votes out of 20. That means it has 5 votes out of 10. Hence his voters score is 5/10. Then we take the net average of the panel rating and the voters score (You can tweak this to 60-40 or 75-25) if you want

 

[Aditya]

60-40 sounds about fine. The voting system is not finalized yet, I'm just giving out a general idea. I'll go through earlier SOTM's to get a better idea of how we used to go about deciding the winner and then only I'll make it official here. Until then, please do note that this voting system is NOT final.

 

[Dipak]

Yep, all we need to do is to strike the perfect ratio between panel ratings and votes.

 

[swacker]

1) One of my favorite stories - India's Journey To World Cup - by Surendra.

This story is really great. Am thinking of starting one after viewing that.