challenge idea cache

[grumpy cat]

have a challenge idea but no time to host it? say no more.

post your idea here and maybe someone else will use it to host the challenge.

---

if you use someone's idea, please credit them when you post the challenge

[grumpy cat]

i'll start:

• challenge creator makes pinterest boards, participants write stories based on those boards (aka a surefire way to descend into the black hole that is pinterest and never to emerge, but we die like heroes....?)
• the obscure language challenge - write a story in which you incorporate a not-commonly-used language in fics (aka no mixing in bits of french/spanish/german, but yes, go wild with greek or icelandic)
• a song of ice and fire scenes reimagined as harry potter (red wedding = bill&fleur's wedding....targaryens = house black .....)

[VaguelyCreativeName]

• the 'neighbours to mild acquaintances to rivals to brothers-in-law' challenge: participants focus on showcasing how the relationship between a set of characters evolves, undergoing at least three distinct stages - this means you can include common tropes like enemies-to-lovers or friends-to-lovers, but you have to show at least one additional state of the relationship, e.g. enemies to lovers to exes
   
• in a similar vein, the 'lovers to friends' challenge: We all love a good friends to lovers fic! In this challenge, participants should take a pairing (this could be of their own choosing or randomly generated, it's up to the host) and focus on how their platonic relationship is strengthened after a romantic/sexual relationship has been formed! For example, this could mean writing about strangers hooking up and then actually becoming friends, but also about an already existing couple going through some experience that ends with them becoming better friends.

[Guest Tanda]

Under the circumstances, I lost the motivation for writing fighting against Corona Virus theme including Nicholas Culpeper.  

As Laura said, writing fanfiction is rewriting and creating new,  forgetting the author herself, so I expect someone who has still passion for Harry Potter, to continue Harry Potter fandom.

My idea for the story challenge is that Fighting Harry Potter to Save the World. 

The protagonist will be any character in Harry Potter, any people from all countries, any gender identities. One shot or multi-chaptered or poetry style, any style is okay. Using other languages okay while translation with it. Any rating, Original or AU will be accepted as well. The other theme you will add, option, romance, angst... any okay as well.

Edited June 14, 2020 by Tanda
Culpeper, not Culppeper...

[RonsGirlFriday]

"A Life for a Life" Challenge (or some similar way of saying that) -- You get to save a character who died in canon... but you gotta kill someone else instead, who did not die in canon. It could involve character 2 actually dying when and where character 1 died in canon (e.g. literally taking their place); or it could occur in a broader sense, that character 1 doesn't die, but at some point in the canon timeline character 2 does.

[CheekyTorah-Lex]

Drarry Challenge (because Drarry is my OTP)

some other ideas:

the kink challenge: get a universal kinks list (minus age play, chan and any other kinks that wouldn’t abide the archive rules) or are triggering to the host) for participants to choose from and have that kink be the theme of the story. Come on y’all our archives limits are broader we neeeeeed to take advantage   (When I’m done mine in October I will host this if no one else does heh)

The Co-Author Challenge: don’t care what you write but you HAVE to write with another HPFT author!

just for JKR challenge. EVERYONE in your story identifies as a person jkr would hate: lgbtq, person of colour, etc. Because maybe I’m a touch bitter.... AND when I mean everyone I mean: EVERYONE

[VaguelyCreativeName]

(I've been obsessing over various DnD podcasts/shows, so...)

The 'Make a Survival Check' Challenge (obviously you could use a different name)

In most TTRPG games like DnD, player are frequently asked to roll for various stats (intelligence, insight, acrobatics, animal handling, etc.) to determine how well they do in performing certain tasks. The idea for this challenge is to incorporate performance checks like these into a story! You would usually add a proficiency bonus or penalty to your roll as well (so if you have a naturally very smart character, you get to add +3 or whatever for each intelligence roll), but I think it'd be easier to just work with straight rolls (i.e. no bonuses) for the challenge!

What I'm imagining is this, although feel free to adapt it however you see fit:

• the challenge host posts a list of possible checks to make (I've linked a page about ability checks here+, if you scroll down a bit they've broken them down into categories, and another explanation about what situations might warrant what sort of checks here+, again you might have to do some scrolling)
• participants get to choose 3-5 of those
• the host rolls for those abilities using a random number generator (1-20)
• (you could potentially re-roll, but ti'd be up to the challenge host if/how often they allow this)
• participants write a story incorporating those elements

For example, if a participant ends up with animal handling: 2, deception: 10; persuasion: 18, you could write a story about a character failing abysmally at controlling a loose blast-ended skrewt, trying to cover up the mess they made but being found out not immediately but pretty soon, but managing to talk their way out of trouble anyway!

Edited July 6, 2020 by VaguelyCreativeName

[Raspberry_cordelia]

Expecto Patronum/No More Angst Challenge: I love me some angst, but I also adore some whole-hearted joy.  Write something about unbridled happiness and bliss with the same amount of intensity that you would write angst - something so wonderful that it could be a patronus memory  

[Raspberry_cordelia]

Hii I'm back:  The Untranslatable Words Challenge

Write something inspired by or with the title of an untranslatable word.  Here's a list: https://global-lingo.com/untranslatable-words-ultimate-list/

[batsam]

bingo challenge!

Participants are given a bingo card similar to below (up to you if you want different versions for different participants, either different themes or the same items in different arrangements) and have to write a fic with 5 in a row either vertical, horizontal, or diagonal

Edited August 24, 2020 by sinnersandsapphics

[batsam]

The Thinly Veiled Fic Challenge

write OF that is shamelessly inspired by a fandom (or several). original fiction with training wheels

[Jo Raskoph]

Inspired by dreamshadow posting "so my trope changed because i literally cannot sink my ship ":

The Break Up your OTP Challenge

[grumpy cat]

'fuck the canon' challenge /take canon and fuck it up in any way you want but meaningful enough that it changes things

[grumpy cat]

the 'gift a story' challenge /write a story (even just a drabble) as a gift for someone

[Jo Raskoph]

Since representation is important but can be tricky to get right and to research: The represent me challenge!

Participants each write a fic aiming to represent a minority identitiy of the participant before them. They should communicate and ask questions. The host writes a story representing the last participant.

So if I hosted the challenge, first participant could pick if they want to represent bisexuality or polyamory in their story, then the second participant writes a representation for the first and so on.

The aim should be main character representation and that would probably require in depth discussion and the information discussed would be part of the challenge and should be posted to the forums as a resource for other writers.

If a participant has absolutely no minority identity one option would be that they piggy-back to the participant before them, meaning they write on the same topic the previous participant chose and take part in the same discussion (group chat) so that nobody has to make an extra effort to accomodate them. The following participant would then write to represent the identity of the person before the person with no minority identity.

[Felpata_Lupin]

Brought to you from a discussion with some of my favourite FFTers @something foxy @Crimson Quill and @Aphoride

"The parents background challenge" or something similar.

Basically the idea is to take a character (OC or not) from one of your stories/universes and write a backstory for their parents. It could be a story about how they met/fell in love, or it could be something different, just expand your character's background through their parents' story.  

[Raspberry_cordelia]

The Modern AU Roulette challenge: write a modern AU, where [thing in fictional world] is [thing in real world].  For example, if this were done with the framwork of places, there would be two lists, one with a bunch of fictional places and one with a bunch of real places.  The participant would then choose two numbers (or ask for their numbers to be randomized), and they'd be given a fictional place that corresponds with a real world place.  E.g.

Fictional places

1 - Hogwarts
2 - Hogsmeade

Real places

1 - sausage factory
2 - preschool

1, 2 -> "Hogwarts is a preschool."

Or if you did it with characters, "Ginny is a drummer for a rock band" or smth like that

Idk if that made any sense 

[grumpy cat]

the fast and furious challenge - challenge host gives a prompt (it can be a prompt, a lyric, a song, a quote, an image...) and the participants have 55 hours to write 500 words-or-fewer story. (probably be best to post it ahead of a weekend/on a friday so it's not too evil )

inspired by +furious fiction

[grumpy cat]

a triptych challenge - challenge host either gives a prompt (e.g. a call in the middle of the night) or allows participants to choose their own prompt/theme and participants have to write three different stories/perspectives ft the prompt/theme. stories can be any length but not multichaps and they should be connected in some way (not necessarily plot-wise, it could be like 3 characters from the same fandom doing the same prompt, the connection can be pretty broad).

Edited January 23, 2022 by grumpy cat

[grumpy cat]

brought to you by ss voyager: 30 day drabble challenge / post 1 drabble per day. they can have the same theme or something, but not mandatory

[Aphoride]

the "write a fandom you know nothing about" challenge 

participants pick a fandom where they've never seen the tv show/movie, read the books, or listened to the podcast/audiobook, and they write a fic for that fandom. #simples 

they gotta do all the research about the characters, the setting, the story, etc. they gotta find something in the canon of the other fandom to take and run away with into whatever story they want to make out of it. 

(this could be made easier (harder?) by saying people gotta pick a fandom already represented on the archives which they know nothing about - so there's actually a finite list of options, plus the results would add to the diversity of fics under fandoms already on the archives)