I wrote a story for Camp Veta. It was about 3,500 words because I misread the limit as 5000 words instead of characters. It was nearly 20,000 characters! I'm perpetually internally screaming right now as I try to parse it down...but at least I caught it with a couple days to spare. I've only got it down to like 10,000 characters so far though. Aaaaagh! I don't want to re-write it! Anyone else having difficulty? (Obviously don't give details about your submission. It's supposed to be anonymous.)

[edit] Aaaagh I got it to just under 5k characters. Aaaaagh I did it! It's badly neutered...but the clipped pace still fits what I was going for and mostly it's just a highly abbreviated version of the original story. RIP to the axed character.

, that's why I went against my instincts and didn't submit a writing piece! I always go over the limit and have trouble cutting it down.

As someone who writes research papers for fun, I decided to just throw a simple HA together

I've always been terrible at writing short pieces so I thought it would be a good exercise for me. I was really pleased I was so far below the word limit! /sad laugh

XD haha, probably a nice change of pace for you then, eh?

Yeah. Having a BA in History and looking at grad programs, I'm not sure I know how to write a short story anymore LOL. I am looking forward to reading what everyone has put together. My mind is always blown by everyone's creativity

Aaaagh, looks like I'm not going to get it much smaller than 9,000 characters...I'll just have to rewrite it >.<

I made an ha submission, but I'm wondering if I would have a chance at the art contest. I don't want to put a ton of effort into a piece and then have it worth basically nothing.

I get that. When I complained vaguely on Facebook about the problem, my friends said I should just submit it elsewhere but I mean...I included several Subeta specific names and creatures so I can't really do that. It's this or nothin'. It's nice that there's participation prizes, but if you can just make a HA...

Oh no :( I just made an HA, i know i wont win but i just wanted to submit something to get the submission prizes

but i like what your friend said, could you use it as a pet story or something maybe?

...ehhh maybe. I might just try to pull the Subeta out of the original version and see if I can't submit it to places as a short story, but...I mean writing it specifically for Subeta makes Subeta part of the foundation XD If nothing else, part of why I decided to enter the contest is because I've been slacking off in my writing so it was a good challenge to get me to make something. It's just...[gestures] aaagh when it's not even the right length in the end, you know?

Oh my gosh I'm so sorry, that really sucks. I m super wordy so I feel like I would really struggle with a 5,000 character limit lol.

I'm still working on my drawing entry but I know I could morph it into a story if I end up not having time to finish my drawing since I've been busy. The extended deadline helps though!

I'm glad for the announcement, I didn't really bother to make sure the thing was submitted correctly because I was so tired of looking at it, haha. As it turns out, it DID cut the story short :/ ^_^;

XD But hey, who knows? Maybe I can do something with the longer one if the shorter one is well liked. Idk.

In any case, good luck on your drawing! :D Btw, love your HA/user combo :D