Dark Fantasy, the do's and don'ts?

[ArcanePunkster]

Seeing that I haven't seen any dark fantasy genre or tags, it's a bit hard to find web novels for reference as I'm thinking of writing a dark fantasy on this site. Pretty much what I want to know is there anything that I shouldn't write that is deemed unacceptable for the site's guidelines, the last thing I want to do is to start writing then get reported to the site moderators and go through that hassle. So any help or even links to older posts would greatly be appreciated.

While I'm at it I would like to ask people's opinions on what they like and don't like about dark fantasy novels it would interesting to see some other perspectives on the genre.

 

[ChronicleCrawler]

Though its a dark fantasy. Don't get too dark. No taboos - rape, and excessive swearing (an Mc which mouths is full with f and s-word - every sentence he utters. My personal bias. So meh. ) Always add NSFW warning if you have dangerous contents deemed unfit for children. The question I always like this - how dark is your dark? If your story broke some taboo, it might not be banned but you'll get hate. Well, that's not something new so it will be best to ignore them especially if its not contructive. What I like about dark fantasy - Hmnn, anything that can make me care about the MCs plight. Oh, don't make him a stupid guy please.

 

[Bloodysin28]

Take reference from beserk and the Warhammer franchise

 

[ArcanePunkster]

Though its a dark fantasy. Don't get too dark. No taboos - rape, and excessive swearing (an Mc which mouths is full with f and s-word - every sentence he utters. My personal bias. So meh. ) Always add NSFW warning if you have dangerous contents deemed unfit for children. The question I always like this - how dark is your dark? If your story broke some taboo, it might not be banned but you'll get hate. Well, that's not something new so it will be best to ignore them especially if its not contructive. What I like about dark fantasy - Hmnn, anything that can make me care about the MCs plight. Oh, don't make him a stupid guy please.

Interesting although I can't promise there won't be any rape or excessive swearing what I will say if it appears it'll be for reason not just to make it edgy or darker for the sake of it. And as of planning (around thirty chapter at the moment), I have none of the aforementioned taboos so far.

 

[GDLiZy]

Be realistic. A brutal world where everyone is cynical is great, but when everything is unnecessarily edgy it'll become grimderp real fast. People like dark because they give another side of the world instead of the unrealistic ideal sunshine, so if you dive deep into the unrealistic shithole then it'll come out the same as what the audience didn't want, an unrealistic world.

Ignore all biased advice that forced you to mould your story into a specific shape. Everything is up for the game as long as you know what you're trying to do. Rape is a good mean to plot for conflicts and swear words are healthy for dirty vibe. If anyone hate your story for them, they probably aren't into the dark story.

As for content guideline, as long as you don't encourage it everything is free, except for consensual underage sex.

 

[YuujiEveryleaf]

Write whichever definition of dark you want.
But keep one thing in mind - it would be wise to keep at least one ray of light in the story. One character who tries to make the world better. Or the character that is not as big of a dick as the others. Because if it's all grim, dark, depressing, miserable, hopeless, nihilistic, brutal, shitty experience for all characters who are all assholes/cynics all the time, then it would be quite hard to read for an average reader. Unless you don't care about the average reader and want to write what you want.

 

[ArcanePunkster]

Be realistic. A brutal world where everyone is cynical is great, but when everything is unnecessarily edgy it'll become grimderp real fast. People like dark because they give another side of the world instead of the unrealistic ideal sunshine, so if you dive deep into the unrealistic shithole then it'll come out the same as what the audience didn't want, an unrealistic world.

Ignore all biased advice that forced you to mould your story into a specific shape. Everything is up for the game as long as you know what you're trying to do. Rape is a good mean to plot for conflicts and swear words are healthy for dirty vibe. If anyone hate your story for them, they probably aren't into the dark story.

As for content guideline, as long as you don't encourage it everything is free, except for consensual underage sex.

You have a point about too much unnecessary dark realism it honestly didn't come to mind thanks for bringing that up. As for haters I'm not trying to appease everyone on this site that's impossible I just want to make a story that people can enjoy because its a story in a fantastical world (albeit a dark reality)

As the for the final comment that's a given I'm not into dark fantasy stories that have those forms of dark reailty to get a point accross to the reader.

 

[ConTroll]

Eh, I dunno. I'm writing mine without giving a damn about taboos. It's DARK fantasy, not a slice-of-life trip down a scary hole.

Expletives can be used to great effect when summing-up the character's motives and thoughts into a single word. Hell, you can swear all you want in your story, just don't force it.

Show the reader the cruelty of reality. Explore the facets of psychological stress. Present the duality of human nature. Or don't. You don't have tell a story in a setting that's only filled with depression and nihilism for it to be dark.

 

[Stratothrax]

Idk if it matters but apparently Dark fantasy is like fantasy + horror fiction, grimdark is like fantasy + (dystopian, cynicism, amoral, violence). According to Wikipedia anyway. I looked it up because I wasn't certain myself and peoples suggestions sounded a lot like grimdark.

I assume you mean the horror stuff more than the cynical stuff, in which case I think careful use of the unknown and not giving the reader all the information is incredibly helpful for building tension and a scary atmosphere, not knowing or understanding the monster or antagonist, having them be voiceless is great. That and really unsettling gore that puts you on edge are a great recipe for scariness. Two written moments that stuck with me for the gore one, Eragon where the protag comes a cross a hill of rotted corpses, an entire village, with a dead baby stabbed onto a spear at the top and TWI when there was a monster that could magically suck the skin of a person while still alive and add it to its own body, you could see the victims skinned face on the monsters body. Unsettling but great for the dark fantasy horror vibe imo.

 

[BenJepheneT]

Don't just make it dark for no reason. An over-excessively brutal world is just as bad as one with happy contrivances and coincidences. Make sure your suffering has meaning, else it'll just be torture porn

 

[gaylolis]

i don't know much about dark fantasy, but north korea seems like a good reference

to me dark fantasy can be great to fill in dark jokes, it doesn't necessarily have to be all serious, edgy and realistic. maybe you just want to vent your sadistic desires for some sport. it can be a great outlet.

i guess the most important part is similar to other stories, fun first :D

 

[TotallyHuman]

Seeing that I haven't seen any dark fantasy genre or tags, it's a bit hard to find web novels for reference as I'm thinking of writing a dark fantasy on this site. Pretty much what I want to know is there anything that I shouldn't write that is deemed unacceptable for the site's guidelines, the last thing I want to do is to start writing then get reported to the site moderators and go through that hassle. So any help or even links to older posts would greatly be appreciated.

While I'm at it I would like to ask people's opinions on what they like and don't like about dark fantasy novels it would interesting to see some other perspectives on the genre.

I think most anything goes as long as you don't glorify what you shouldn't... Though I may be wrong. Well I did literally write a chapter where the protagonist burned down a village full of people and kidnapped two children to hold them hostage and my story is still up so there may be a bit of truth to my statement

 

[TotallyHuman]

Don't just make it dark for no reason. An over-excessively brutal world is just as bad as one with happy contrivances and coincidences. Make sure your suffering has meaning, else it'll just be torture porn

And what's wrong with torture porn?... Ergh... For reference's sake?

 

[YuujiEveryleaf]

And what's wrong with torture porn?... Ergh... For reference's sake?

Ask Napoleon :D

 

[BenJepheneT]

And what's wrong with torture porn?... Ergh... For reference's sake?

For reference's sake? Well, to put it bluntly, if the Saw franchise can be equated to Dark Fantasy and just generic torture porn:

Saw 1 - Dark Fantasy
Everything after - Torture Porn

You get me?

 

[ArcanePunkster]

Thanks everyone for the advice and suggestions I'll take them all into consideration when I starting uploading chapters on the site.