SSMM Postgame

That’s it for SSMM. There will be a sort of epilogue.

SSMM felt like a mixed bag to me. I liked how some things worked out, but ultimately I didn’t do a good job presenting the relevant evidence in an organic fashion. I’m not saying that the whodunnit can’t be done decently well in this format, but I think it does take a level of skill and effort that I may not have. A smutty whodunnit with a decent plot and reveal is probably within my abilities, but doing it on the fly with votes and choices might be above my pay grade. I also feel like the combination of making the reader work (paying close attention for clues) and smut isn’t necessarily the strongest, but I’m open to feedback on that.

As usual, the pacing wasn’t the tightest and the smut-to-other-stuff ratio never felt exactly right. The solution to this is better story outlining, but the more planned a story is, the less power the readers have to affect its outcome. So figuring that out continues to be an adventure, but SEL is going pretty well in this way. The story is moving along but the readers are exerting a lot of influence on consequential details. We end up in the same place, but the choices matter because they determine who our friends and enemies are when we get there as well as how good our chances of ‘success’ are and stuff like that. So I think these voting stories *can* work pretty well, but what kind of story it is and how well-planned it is seems to have a lot to do with that.

Anyway, I welcome all feedback.

On prizes, there is a grand prize winner and Cheese will get an honorary equivalent prize for their Herculean labors. Those two will get some bespoke smut that you’ll probably eventually get to read as daily chapters. I’ll reach out in DMs on that.

For everyone else who contributed, in the past, the ‘small prize’ has been to design a new character for the next story. I’m not offering that this time around because I’m trying to cut down on character bloat where the VFU has a lot of one-off, forgotten characters that I don’t even remember, and that leads to re-used names (like Jane!) and confusion and stuff. So the ‘small prize’ is that if you want, you can DM me some info that I will try to use in future smut. Here is what I’m looking for:

1. Your first choice of returning character. Alive or dead. If you want them in SSS, pick someone without a penis. But just because they've been forgotten or sidelined or died in some past story doesn't mean that they can't show up in a different one.

2. Tell me what kind of scenes/dynamics you like to see. Here is why I need this: way back when old timey FSC was still going, some reader DMed me asking for autofellatio content in the story. It was a perfectly reasonable request for something that I just wasn’t super familiar with and hadn’t thought to put in there. So it went in, only because this reader told me they wanted it. I’m not exactly on autopilot, but I do default to certain patterns and stuff. So if there’s something else that interests you, there’s no harm in letting me know. Worst case is I just don’t use it. There are whole categories of relationship dynamics that I'm not making the most of just because I don't think to do it, and I want to be better on this.

3. If you have an idea for a new character who is totally distinct from every other VFU character ever, run it by me. The downside to this is that if the character is too specific, they might be difficult to place in the next story and not get used or only have a small role. But if you come up with someone who has no equivalent pre-existing character, I’m ready to listen and do my best to get them in there somehow. But for example, if you want a busty, horny redhead--instead of a new one, let's just use Kayla Jameson or Riona, you know? Or Alison from SSSD. See? We have three of those at least. They do have different personalities, but you probably get the idea. Personalities can be a little bit flexible too; Kayla behaves one way as Riley's carefree sister in her hometown, but she would be different if we put her in a different situation, like if she's a few years older and a... medical examiner.

So if you want, SSMM voters are welcome to hit me with that information in DMs and I’ll try to use it appropriately in future stuff.

And then, of course, as always—do we want more SSS? Do we want to change the format? Do something other than yuri? I just want to know how people feel; SSS chapters don’t really seem to get that many likes, so I’m open to making some kind of change if enough people feel strongly about it. Personally, I’m leaning heavily toward keeping the anthology format and mixing up the genres a little as we go, but I want to write what the people want to read. Of course everyone will get to vote if they like on what we do next, if we decide to do more.

Thanks for reading SSMM and commenting and stuff. My dopamine fiending isn’t going away.