A flop! But why?

[Salirophilia]

Well, I'm a bit baffled over here. When my second most recent story briefly had an average of over 4.5, I thought to myself, "I guess I'm getting the hang of this writing thing." But I posted my latest story a couple days ago and have been dismayed to see its rating to sink to 2.3. To be honest, I wouldn't consider it my best story (then again, I didn't consider any of my 4.4+ stories my best; my personal favorite is at 4.06), but I also wouldn't consider it my worst story either. If its ratings had averaged at even 3.5, I'd probably say "Win some, lose some" and move on with my life, but to be less than 2.5....ooof. There aren't even any comments, so I'm in the dark as to the reason for the poor reviews. Any constructive comments on where I went wrong?

 

[AwkwardMD]

Well, I'm a bit baffled over here. When my second most recent story briefly had an average of over 4.5, I thought to myself, "I guess I'm getting the hang of this writing thing." But I posted my latest story a couple days ago and have been dismayed to see its rating to sink to 2.3. To be honest, I wouldn't consider it my best story (then again, I didn't consider any of my 4.4+ stories my best; my personal favorite is at 4.06), but I also wouldn't consider it my worst story either. If its ratings had averaged at even 3.5, I'd probably say "Win some, lose some" and move on with my life, but to be less than 2.5....ooof. There aren't even any comments, so I'm in the dark as to the reason for the poor reviews. Any constructive comments on where I went wrong?

A quick glance tells me you've written a story more closely aligned with the Loving Wives story category than Group Sex. The readership in Group Sex wants stories that embrace the idea of multiple partners and orgasms for everyone more than they want competitive breeding with humiliating consequences. Readers vote with their orgasm, and if you alienate the audience they will punish you.

At least in Loving Wives, you'd get comments. It might be 30 comments saying "cucks get 1 star", but at least you'd know

 

[Salirophilia]

A quick glance tells me you've written a story more closely aligned with the Loving Wives story category than Group Sex. The readership in Group Sex wants stories that embrace the idea of multiple partners and orgasms for everyone more than they want competitive breeding with humiliating consequences. Readers vote with their orgasm, and if you alienate the audience they will punish you.

At least in Loving Wives, you'd get comments. It might be 30 comments saying "cucks get 1 star", but at least you'd know

Yep, in a perfect world I'd have posted the story to Loving Wives, but I already made that mistake once with a different story, and I thought I could avoid the cuck-haters by avoiding LW. I didn't know the Group Sex crowd had such specific tastes. Something to bear in mind for the future I guess...

 

[AwkwardMD]

Yep, in a perfect world I'd have posted the story to Loving Wives, but I already made that mistake once with a different story, and I thought I could avoid the cuck-haters by avoiding LW. I didn't know the Group Sex crowd had such specific tastes. Something to bear in mind for the future I guess...

There are some story elements that taint other elements, and humiliation is one of them. You could write a great anal story with lots of great butt sex, but if the rest of the story is humiliating your FMC for liking something "dirty and gross", it affects how the into it the reader can get.

Certainly some people like anal because it's a little taboo, but a story that leans into that angle heavily will alienate the average butt stuff fan.

 

[jaF0]

People need to get past the ratings fixation. Write what you like. Don't even look at the ratings. You get nothing from them, not even that warm feeling so many crave.

I kind of wish the site would do away with them.

 

[Salirophilia]

People need to get past the ratings fixation. Write what you like. Don't even look at the ratings. You get nothing from them, not even that warm feeling so many crave.

I kind of wish the site would do away with them.

Good advice, although I did get a warm feeling when one of my stories got above 4.5 . I don't think I would have gotten worked up about the ratings for this story if they had been just kind of low, but 2.3 is so low it put me into a state of introspection that maybe my writing is just really terrible. I guess I'm concerned too that people who might enjoy the story won't even read it now because the rating is so low. For my part, I just skim past anything below a 3, even if the title/summary seems promising. Maybe I don't know what I'm missing.

 

[jaF0]

For my part, I just skim past anything below a 3, even if the title/summary seems promising. Maybe I don't know what I'm missing.

Something happened a few years ago. I lost my ability to focus and concentrate. I can't read and digest more than a few words at a time. Even some forum posts I have to skip over because they just don't make sense if they're more than a couple of paragraphs.

I had all my stories wiped and deleted them off my local drives.

Even with other household tasks, I can only spend a little time on one, before I have tom move to another for a while.

So, I'm probably missing a lot of what people talk about and why it matters to them.

 

[StillStunned]

Good advice, although I did get a warm feeling when one of my stories got above 4.5

Don't be embarrassed. A lot of people will tell you to ignore the scores, but in my experience they've usually been here for a while. Myself, I have 34 published stories, but I've only been doing this since last summer. I still experience highs and lows with every single new vote. There are days when I'm ready to give it all up and have my stories deleted.

The thing is, when you've written something, you've brought something into this world. You've put your creativity, skill and hard work into it. Sometimes your passion. You've opened yourself up to criticism, but only because you believe that you've created something that people will enjoy. When the reception is positive, you feel great. When the reception is poor, well... it hurts. And there's no need to apologise for either feeling.

 

[Thanatos_X13]

Having quickly skimmed through your story, I'm going to echo AwkwardMD's response. I don't think the rating has anything to do with the quality. This is a cuckoldry story through and through, which is not at all what is expected in Group Sex. Your story includes group sex, but it is about cuckoldry. Your ratings are indicative primarily of that disparity in expectations. I'd say, chalk it up to a learning experience and don't worry about it too much.

 

[Rob_Royale]

Having quickly skimmed through your story, I'm going to echo AwkwardMD's response. I don't think the rating has anything to do with the quality. This is a cuckoldry story through and through, which is not at all what is expected in Group Sex. Your story includes group sex, but it is about cuckoldry. Your ratings are indicative primarily of that disparity in expectations. I'd say, chalk it up to a learning experience and don't worry about it too much.

Yep, what he said. I started reading it this morning, but stopped when the gangbang started and the husband was humiliated right off the bat. That's not my thing so I stopped without leaving a rating. I never leave a bad rating though, for content I don't care for. That's unfair.

 

[AwkwardMD]

People need to get past the ratings fixation. Write what you like. Don't even look at the ratings. You get nothing from them, not even that warm feeling so many crave.

I kind of wish the site would do away with them.

Counterpoint: fixations are fine.

 

[TheRedChamber]

I read both the Pregnancy and the Princess Peach story.

A couple of quick points before I get to the meat. Firstly, as others have said, category matters. Secondly, shorter stories tend to get hit harder with downvotes than longer ones - simply because people are more likely to give up and thus not vote on a longer story that they're not enjoying. Finally, your Pregnancy story is only 43 hours old as of now. I had a LW story that was at 1.69 (dude!) 24 hours after publication recently (with 50 votes) and which has now risen to the heady heights of 3.15 (with 300 votes), so there's a chance it may rise.

Your two stories have some common overlap - the humiliation of an incredibly passive male MC with a wife who is, at best, manipulative.

I'd argue that there are a number of linked and fairly fundamental differences that lead to the huge gap in scores.

Your Peach story is unique. I might not remember your username a year from now, but I will remember the Princess Peach Cream Pie* Cum story. (* as in baked good) On the other hand Bull(s) Breeds Wife is, 3 decades into Literotica's existence, as tired a trope as you can find. Which is not to say that it can't be done well, or that some don't enjoy it, but it also draws a lot of ire.

Once the Peach story begins the husband starts to love the humiliation. You move pretty quickly, so the cruelty of the wife in arranging this is kind of glossed over and can kind of excused by the set-up. Once under way you deliver everything that could be expected from a 'public cross-dressing as Princess Peach' humiliation story - the costume isn't just mentioned once, the Mario elements are at the very heart of the story. And to put things simply, it's fun!

On the other hand, the Pregnancy story is depressing even just two or three paragraphs in. I don't want to be one of those LW trolls who say 'the cuck should man up and divorce the bitch' but more than any other cuck story on the site that I've read (and I've read quite a few), I found myself quickly deciding that the cuck should man up and get a divorce. Some men like a hotwife because they claim that extra-marital sex raises her sex drive which in turn makes the intra-marital sex even better. Some just like the sexual thrill of watching or hearing about their wife getting fucked. The introduction makes it pretty clear that the sex is getting worse to non-existent and the man does in no way enjoy his wife having lovers.

Then you get into the gangbang which is disgustingly slimy in its writing. And I don't have an issue with that. However, I think it was probably a deliberate joke that you named the bulls Alvin, Bertrand, and Carl and then the main character Zack - but everyone in the story does feel like an ABC placeholder. The bulls don't really have any personality and are just big cocks.

There's one moment where the MC gets 'the best blowjob of his life' where the reader could almost accept the whole 'he's getting into the cuck lifestyle' aspect but it's still overshadowed by the idea that the wife is only doing it to further lower his chances of being the father.

That brings us to the endings - which are the last thing anyone is going to read before they vote. The Peach ending is that the MC is auctioned off to two hot red-head twins for $10,000 a pop for a further night of humiliating deviancy. And while the wife is fully making those decisions for her own benefit, its also clear that he is going to love it as well. And the story has been crazy enough up to then that as a reader I felt that was an entirely fitting thing to happen in that universe.

On the other hand, the Pregnancy ending is basically full-circle depressing again. The rules of the bet never made much sense anyway - nominally 2 of the 3 bulls were always going to get a humiliating penalty, so even if the cuck agrees to a one-in-four chance of winning, why would they? But in this story, not only does the wife seemingly hate the husband, the universe does as well, so she has triplets and only the cuck gets to endure all three penalties at the same time. Both stories are over-the-top improbable but I'd argue that it can be forgiven in the first one because everyone is having so much fun. In the pregnancy story it's definitely more of a case of the author never given the cuckee an even break. When the story ends with the MC asking if anyone wants to give him a sympathy fuck, the answer feels like 'probably not'. Normally, at the end of this kind of cuck story, it'd end with some kind of acceptance that the cuck does in fact enjoy being a cuck and that is just not present here - the wife reneges on her earlier agreement to close the marriage, they're still not having sex and, of course, he's going to be raising triplets. The ending few paragraphs are very neutrally written and *could* be read as a form of acceptance, but equally, his marriage was described as intolerable before and things have only gotten much worse.

I realize I'm getting pretty close to kink-shaming here, which I want to avoid and I do enjoy the odd humilation story here and there. In short and in summary, with the Pregnancy story it's seems pretty clear that a) the MC hates himself, b) the wife hates the MC and c) the universe hates the MC. Whereas in the Peach story it seems like the universe actually kind of loves the MC and gives him exactly what he wants, however bizarre.

 

[Salirophilia]

Wow! Thank you for the detailed analysis of why one story works and the other doesn't. I really appreciate you going in depth. Thank you!

 

[rdodger]

Good advice, although I did get a warm feeling when one of my stories got above 4.5 . I don't think I would have gotten worked up about the ratings for this story if they had been just kind of low, but 2.3 is so low it put me into a state of introspection that maybe my writing is just really terrible. I guess I'm concerned too that people who might enjoy the story won't even read it now because the rating is so low. For my part, I just skim past anything below a 3, even if the title/summary seems promising. Maybe I don't know what I'm missing.

How do you skip past the low-rated stories? When I look at the new stories list, it doesn't show what the ratings are.

 

[ElectricBlue]

How do you skip past the low-rated stories? When I look at the new stories list, it doesn't show what the ratings are.

Could be it's so new, nobody's voted yet, so there's no score. You need to give the lists a day or two to get votes in.

Keep in mind too, that the Vote to View ratio is actually quite small Depending on category, only about one percent of people who click into a story actually vote on it. It's a very low feedback indicator for us writers.

 

[Gamblnluck]

People need to get past the ratings fixation. Write what you like. Don't even look at the ratings. You get nothing from them, not even that warm feeling so many crave.

I kind of wish the site would do away with them.

No. The ratings allow the author to get some idea if his story resonates or if he is farting the wind. It might not be the best feedback, but in many categories, you don't get enough comments. If I was just going to write something and post it into a void, I wouldn't bother to submit it at all.
And it is not I am a scoring whore either going for 4.5 red H. I just like to see how I am received. If I had my way, I'd like to see a breakdown of those scores on my author page, like reviews for an item on amazon gets. I'd know if I was getting mostly 5;s but with enough 1's to bring it down, or a wide spread of scores.
A few of my friends turned off comments because of the asshole comments, but still use scoring for feedback.

 

[Gamblnluck]

I would have gotten worked up about the ratings for this story if they had been just kind of low, but 2.3 is so low it put me into a state of introspection that maybe my writing is just really terrible. I guess I'm concerned too that people who might enjoy the story won't even read it now because the rating is so low.

I'd skip a story with a low rating unless I knew the author and wondered what he/she did to get that score. My lowest score is one with the most comments. I wrote a sequel to a story that countered how the original was perceived. The original was from the husband's POV and mine from the wife's. I get reads and comments on that story weekly.

 

[Gamblnluck]

How do you skip past the low-rated stories? When I look at the new stories list, it doesn't show what the ratings are.

The easiest way is to look at stories a category at a time. Go to your favorite category and see what stories were posted that day or the day before.

 

[rdodger]

No. The ratings allow the author to get some idea if his story resonates or if he is farting the wind. It might not be the best feedback, but in many categories, you don't get enough comments. If I was just going to write something and post it into a void, I wouldn't bother to submit it at all.
And it is not I am a scoring whore either going for 4.5 red H. I just like to see how I am received. If I had my way, I'd like to see a breakdown of those scores on my author page, like reviews for an item on amazon gets. I'd know if I was getting mostly 5;s but with enough 1's to bring it down, or a wide spread of scores.
A few of my friends turned off comments because of the asshole comments, but still use scoring for feedback.

Score distribution would be informative. I'll try to remember to ask for it in he relevant forum.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Score distribution would be informative. I'll try to remember to ask for it in he relevant forum.

It's been asked for for years, but the site doesn't provide it and right now, if it did, it would be years away.

 

[lovecraft68]

No. The ratings allow the author to get some idea if his story resonates or if he is farting the wind. It might not be the best feedback, but in many categories, you don't get enough comments. If I was just going to write something and post it into a void, I wouldn't bother to submit it at all.
And it is not I am a scoring whore either going for 4.5 red H. I just like to see how I am received. If I had my way, I'd like to see a breakdown of those scores on my author page, like reviews for an item on amazon gets. I'd know if I was getting mostly 5;s but with enough 1's to bring it down, or a wide spread of scores.
A few of my friends turned off comments because of the asshole comments, but still use scoring for feedback.

I've noticed most people who are for dropping ratings, generally have poor ratings, or no skin in the game because they don't publish stories here.

 

[gunhilltrain]

Well, I'm a bit baffled over here. When my second most recent story briefly had an average of over 4.5, I thought to myself, "I guess I'm getting the hang of this writing thing." But I posted my latest story a couple days ago and have been dismayed to see its rating to sink to 2.3. To be honest, I wouldn't consider it my best story (then again, I didn't consider any of my 4.4+ stories my best; my personal favorite is at 4.06), but I also wouldn't consider it my worst story either. If its ratings had averaged at even 3.5, I'd probably say "Win some, lose some" and move on with my life, but to be less than 2.5....ooof. There aren't even any comments, so I'm in the dark as to the reason for the poor reviews. Any constructive comments on where I went wrong?

Congratulations; you're not really a writer here until you get some lousy scores. I think the lowest I got so far is 2.6. I screwed up one story because I made a mistake in the category, and it took several days (pretty fast for Lit) to fix it. It eventually crawled back up to 3.33. But the important question is: do you like the story anyway? If you do, then it was a success.

 

[rdodger]

Congratulations; you're not really a writer here until you get some lousy scores. I think the lowest I got so far is 2.6. I screwed up one story because I made a mistake in the category, and it took several days (pretty fast for Lit) to fix it. It eventually crawled back up to 3.33. But the important question is: do you like the story anyway? If you do, then it was a success.

I've got some stories that I don't think will score well even if I have them under the best category. I'll see what happens when I bring them aboard - they're stories where I like my concept enough to fade any negative comments.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I've got some stories that I don't think will score well even if I have them under the best category. I'll see what happens when I bring them aboard - they're stories where I like my concept enough to fade any negative comments.

The scores can be totally unpredictable. Rather than chase after elusive popularity, write what you wish and see what happens. Sometimes you'll be surprised.

 

[gunhilltrain]

People need to get past the ratings fixation. Write what you like. Don't even look at the ratings. You get nothing from them, not even that warm feeling so many crave.

I kind of wish the site would do away with them.

Yeah, but we all look at them anyway. Some competitive drive is not a bad thing. Merely getting a "participation award" (which would mean getting published at all?) wouldn't satisfy me.