[retired_w0lfpack1]

We're really not the "FM'07 Records Thread".

This isn't so much about "proving that you're a good FM player" as it is about sharing your story with some friends.

Personally, I don't want a constant reminder that you're playing the game.. I want a description (like in your last post!!) that makes me emotionally involved in your experience.

That can be comedy, tragedy, your emotions, the fans' emotions, anything... but its not a screenshot!

[retired_w0lfpack1]

In creative-writing classes, a common mantra is "Show me, don't tell me."

For example:

TELL: The man who walked into the store was obviously nervous. Sizing up the other customers, he put his hand in his jacket to finger his gun, then realized that looked suspicious, so he took it out again.

SHOW: The man walked into the store, sweating, though it was barely 10 degrees Celsius outside. He glanced shiftily from side to side, and he kept putting his hand in and out of his pocket.

The second shows the reader that something is wrong without telling him what it is. You "see" that he is nervous .. but you don't know what he's got in his pocket, or why he's nervous.

A screen shot, of course, is the ultimate "tell me", the exact opposite of "showing me".

[retired_spark4]

ok, as haven't got FM 2008 yet and i ant FM for 2 years now. I will in the meantime make a structure/notes for my story, like what kind of a manager i am,kind of a profile of the me.

for example i 'd mention in the intro somewhere that deep down i prefer defensive style fo play, but would never think of converting the attacking teams tot his style. I will only hope that the right club come along where i can play a defensive style.

Also that mostly in the past there have been the strikers that do the common thing star strikers do, that is run, run fast, dribble, lost of tricks, flair, good on the eye of viewers etc. But personally like players like Van Nistelrooy, the type that score many vital tap in goals, clever positioning and doesnt run with the ball.

I will post a rough bulletpoint draft here of the intro etc of my story.

[retired_teju]

Punctuation and grammar IS important. (See what I did there huh )

I couldn't agree more with this, in fact, for me it is the single most important thing. Proofreading also shows great respect for your readers. If I go in and see text speak, typos everywhere etc, my immediate thought is "if this bloke can't be bothered taking time over this then why should I?" It's a huge turn off (though everyone makes the odd mistake, that's natural).

When I started out I stuck stubbornly to football only. When I read stories from people like Terk and Axeman full of misfit managers with complicated personal lives, I realised that people have to be entertained as well as hearing about the football. You can also take the PM7 route, and go for more comedy type stuff.

Sticking to football only is a tough ask, if you feel like that, Amaroq does that very well, but it must be exhausting and even he branches out now and then.

[shannon2007]

The story I have in the Hall of Fame was my third one written here. It is about 95% all 'on the park' stuff, introduces a small element of 'off the park'. Most of it is also pretty rubbish by today's standards. I like to think though that what made that story so popular was that at times I was able to convey the raw emotion of what it is like to follow football and that to me is what a lot of new writers lack and some try and tack on 'off the field' activities as is in someway this is going to make their story better.

Football itself is a highly emotive game and it's odds on that the people reading know exactly what it's like to feel the pain of defeat. Which is also why winning everything is not important at all. In that story, my team did have a huge degree of success, but it did not come without a great deal of heartbreak. You cannot of course always 'arrange' for your game to provide you with poignant moments, but when it does, milk it for all it's worth!

[retired_w0lfpack1]

How to start a story

Originally posted by ______ (in e-mail):
I always like to give a big lead up to actually becoming the manager, just to set character, history and make the actual fact of you getting the job to be more realistic as opposed to what is the usual way of doing things it seems, which is:

"I somehow know the Chairman and he offered me the job"
"I'm an ex-player for the club and got offered the job"
"I was a promising professional but got an injury that ended my career early" - most overused opening or backstory in FMS

I fully agree that the "career ending injury" is the most overused opening in FMS, and those others are pretty bad, too.

If you've got to suffer a career ending injury... don't put it in the first post!

I think that's a typical "new writer mistake" - don't start with background. It's "Show me don't tell me" all over again.

Ideally, you want to start with a cliffhanger, to suck them into reading "What comes next". Heinlein was best at this:

"As I left the Kenya Beanstalk capsule he was right on my heels. He followed me through the door leading to Customs, Health, and Immigration. As the door contracted behind him I killed him."

Damned if anybody can read that and not read the second paragraph! (Opening lines of Friday.)

Write your backstory.. its useful for you-the-writer to know .. just don't post it!

Pick the story up in the middle, at a point where the conflict has already reached boiling... and then reveal the backstory in bits and pieces.

If you're "playing in advance of posting", that can let you choose a key moment of the season:
- Ten matches to go, six points back of safety.
- The halftime team talk which turned a game around, and after that, the season.
- The argument with one of your players which threatened to tear the team apart.. and what you did about it.
- The player rising for a header which he just has to win.
- The injury which turned a promising season to mud in a split second.

Alternately, if you're going for a strong out-of-game story, don't start with anything football related at all: start by setting up the out of game conflict. Read flipsix3's opening post of Leaving the past behind: until the last paragraph, you can't even tell that its about football at all... but anybody whose ever had a breakup immediately identifies with Ed, and we get the first glimpses into his character in how he handles it.

More importantly, we've established the conflict, and what he wants, and how what we needs is different from what he wants..

Some other classic "First Posts":
The Bet (Faramir) - a powerful man visibly nervous entering a seedy building? .. of course you have to read on to find out why!!
The Strands of Time (PM7) - a murder? A life that our narrator could have saved? .. of course you have to read on to find out why!!

The True Story of a Footballing Legend (PM7) - Starting with a funeral? Why did so many people care?

The Highly Recommended, Improving Influence of Cold Hard Cash. (attjen) - Why are we here? Qatar? Americans? Shady dealings? What?

They each throw the reader into the deep end; few of them even reveal the team involved.

They're all a lot more "gripping" than "After the shock sacking of Joe Bloggs, the new manager of Somewhere FC was .. ME!"

So, why write the backstory at all?

For yourself.

You want to know more about your character than we-your-readers do. He'll be a lot more "alive" if you have details to let slip, possibly to let slip repeatedly.

Playing career ended via injury? Don't reveal that until its relevant to the character, maybe because his achy knee can sense the storm coming. ;-)

He used to play for Clermont? Have somebody mention that to him in conversation.

If nothing else, having unrevealed backstory and characterization to reveal as you go keeps it from losing your "out of game" stuff and falling into a matches-only story; you still have work to do as a writer!

The flip side of it is, you can do foreshadowing. His favorite side is Newcastle? Mention it early.. and have him follow Newcastle's results even if he's managing several divisions below. Then when he gets offered the Newcastle job, your readers have an emotional investment in Newcastle already, and may already know some of the key players.

Other things you can do - give your character details. A favorite drink ("Shaken, not stirred."). A phobia ("Snakes. Why'd it have to be snakes?"). A car - better yet, one with personality ("Gay, bounce!"). A pet. A friend who has nothing to do with football. A bogey team. A recurring saying. A mannerism. ... they'll all come together to make the character "alive" much more than.

Limit yourself to revealing no more than one per post.. and come back to them. Repetition breeds comfort.. and real people are creatures of habit.

[retired_w0lfpack1]

Of course, if you're HD, feel free to ignore all of that and drop the injury direct into the title.

[retired_teju]

The counterpoint to the old "injury ruined my prospective glittering career" is to have actually had a glittering career, which I did with the character in my stories.

The benefit of this is it adds instant depth to a character and story (as with the character in mine going back to Inter having been one of the club's legendary players). It also makes it more believable that you would get hired to all these huge clubs (i.e. that you had a big reputation in the first place), as opposed to "major footballing shock, Barcelona hire Joe Soap from Middlesbrough who was on the dole at the time".

Oh and I may have mentioned this before but making the character a complete larrikin helps a lot. Via this route, I even managed to get a libel trial into one of my stories, as well as the usual drug taking, boozing, and womanizing stories.

[shannon2007]

OR actually not have a glittering career or an injury, but like most successful football managers just be an ordinary, run if the mill player. And of course, it depends as well which level you are managing. It also depends whether your story is serious or amusing.

The only openings that seriously annoy me are those that offer nothing to the story, or are just plain ridiculous. Joe Soap can go to be manager of Barcelona but there has to be a damned good reason, even if it's just their President got the wrong number, and you then have to be consistent throughout the story.

[shannon2007]

I would also that whilst everything Amaroq says may be correct, it is also totally wrong.