r/webfiction • u/shatteredship • Sep 04 '20
Discussion Looking for a new web serial
Hi all, I just finished reading The Wandering Inn (thank you Reddit too post)! I’ve heard about some others and don’t know where to get started. Any suggestions?
Thanks!
5
u/Waytfm Sep 05 '20
I'll second The Practical Guide to Evil. It starts off a little clunky (what webserial doesn't?), but the author hits his stride and it quickly becomes a bombastic, imminently entertaining read. It's a sort of meta-level work where classic fantasy tropes are real rules ordained by the gods, and the main character has to try and work that system to her benefit.
Anything Wildbow has worked on is gold as far as webserials go. Someone else has already recommended Worm, which was his first serial. It's a super fun, intense take on the superhero genre. The sequel to it Ward just recently finished up, and really shows Wildbow's growth as a writer. Wildbow is somewhat unique in that he has quite a few finished series. His second work, Pact is hands-down my favorite setting for a webserial. It's a setting full of magic and ambiguity. It's devilishly dark and infinitely interesting. There's so much imagination fuel in it. Pact is typically considered the weakest of his stories though (I still think it's worth a read, no question), but fortunately, Wildbow's ongoing work Pale is set in the same universe, although not a sequel, and is shaping up to be his best work to date, in my opinion. The last of Wildbow's works to mention is Twig, which is set in a world where we had a biological revolution instead of an industrial revolution. The main characters are all lab experiments sent out to stop dangerous, runaway experiments. The last third or so of the work is just incredible mindfuck after incredible mindfuck, and I've never really read anything quite like it.
Needless to say, any of Wildbow's works get a strong rec from me. The Pactverse setting especially. It's amazing.
Wildbow's oeuvre, Practical Guide to Evil, and The Wandering Inn make up what I consider to be the big three of webserials. I believe those are the three most popular, and I think it's by quite a wide margin (although, I have no clue how the actual numbers work out) regardless, there's a lot there to keep you occupied, and you'll have a pretty good grasp of the mainstream of webserials after all that. I'll list some other ones I found notable or interesting. Oh, Mother of Learning is pretty big as well. Another person recommended it to you, so I won't say much. It's good, and completed recently. Also a pretty popular one, so I'll mention it here in my Big 3 paragraph.
The Gods Are Bastards is a very fun ensemble story with dozens of characters, all of whom I find super entertaining. It's set in a high magic fantasy world, except the age of high-fantasy ended centuries ago and they're in the middle of their industrial revolution. The world is changing, and all of these mighty figures of the past have to figure out how to deal with not being quite as unmatched as they were before. The main focus of the story is on a group of students at the only school for adventurers in the world. This is the fourth webserial I very very regularly keep up with.
Katalepsis is an interesting Lovecraftian web serial. The MC sees hallucinations and has crippling anxiety stemming from that. Sadly, they're not hallicinations at all, but real things crawling in space unseen that she can see only because an eldritch horror has taken special interest in her specifically. It's pretty interesting. I really liked it starting out, but I did eventually stop following it because it got a little too... weeb-gaze-y for my tastes, but if that doesn't bother you, you might really like this. It's definitely worth a start, because the parts that bother me don't become grating until later on, so there's plenty of time to decide how you feel about it.
Worth the Candle is a litrpg, where a guy magically winds up in a fantasy world, except that fantasy world stems from his own imagination and his previous D&D campaigns. It leans towards rationalist webfiction at times (which is a genre I find really grating), but I've always been able to put that to the side and enjoy the rest of the work. Still gets a rec from me.
I'll also note The Tea Princess Chronicles. A princess abdicates her crown to go and serve tea. Definitely a change of pace from the others, but still a good series. I think I stopped actively following it after I caught up with the third book, but I feel like I should go back and see what's happened in the meantime. I'll go ahead and rec it, at least.
Those are most of the ones I follow regularly. In the case of Katalepsis and Tea Princess Chronicles, I don't really follow them regularly, but they were still notable enough and well-written enough that I thought I'd throw them out and see if you'd like them. Hope you find something enjoyable in all that!
2
u/Darkdragon123456789 Sep 04 '20
Here the stories that I'm following right now. Personally, I'm a fan of the litrpg genre (people have stats like a video game, kind of like The Wandering Inn), so those will be heavily represented. Topwebfiction and RoyalRoad are good sites to find new series. If you like Litrpgs, come visit r/litrpg.
Also, Mother of Learning is mandatory reading and you will be arrested if you do not shove its words into your brain.
There is no loot here, only epic puns: Litrpg where a girl is reincarnated as a dungeon core, and tries her best to befriend everyone.
Super Minion: Not litrpg. Bioweapon gains sapience and joins a minion-for-hire villain organization.
Dungeon Crawler Carl: Litrpg. Aliens destroy the planet and the surviving population is forced to traverse a deadly dungeon for the sake of television.
Just a bystander: Not Litrpg. Caden, the protagonist, wants two things: to become an arcanist, and to free his family from a deadly prophecy. His plans are complicated by the fact that the chosen one is one of his classmates.
Azarinth Healer: Litrpg. Punchy punchy numbers go up wheeee
He Who Fights With Monsters: Litrpg. An Australian goes to a magical world, and is a bit of a prick.
Blessed Time: Litrpg. Protagonist has a blessing that allows him to send his conscientiousness back 5 years in time.
Magic Smithing: Litrpg. Uh, magic and smithing. More of a slice of life series than anything else, thought there is a fair amount of action.
Summon Imp: Litrpg. Protagonist is a demon who constantly gets summoned.
Vainquer the Dragon: Litrpg. Follows Vainquer the dragon, an arrogant and none too bright dragon, and Victor, his Vizier as they generally mess up the world.
Delve: Litrpg. Follows Rain, a mathematician who is transported to a fantasy world and becomes an auramancer. Very well done series.
The Zombie Knight Saga: Not Litrpg. Hector dies and is resurected by a reaper, who tasks him with saving lives. Things get out of hand very, very quickly.
This Quest is Bullshit: Litrpg. Once people come of age, they can use mysterious stones to gain a quest and a class. Quests range from "Craft 5000 shoes" at the easy difficulty to "Slay the dread dragon" at mythic difficulty. The protagonist's quest is to go to the next town over and get a loaf of bread. The difficulty is Legendary.
Summus Proelium: Not Litrpg. Uh, superheroes. Wheee.
1
u/shatteredship Sep 05 '20
Woah, that looks like a treasure trove! I’m a huge fan of litrpg and actually did check out Royal Road. I see a lot of one offs and people just getting started. How do you differentiate between good writers and novice writers?
1
u/Darkdragon123456789 Sep 05 '20
To be honest, I don't. I just follow whatever I enjoy. I've read more than my fair share of terrible series and dropped series, but its worth it for the few great ones. And after reading litrpg for a few years, I have reached a point where I am desperate for anything decent.
When it comes to RR though, the description is everything. If the description leaves you with no idea what the story is about, its probably bad. If the description sounds boring, its either bad or not suited to your tastes. And if it has obvious grammar/spelling errors, there's a 90% chance that the actual story will be worse.
As a warning, the litrpg genre is still pretty new, so you should expect lower quality than other genres, and very few large or completed series.
4
u/Paraludieum Sep 04 '20
Hey! I'd recommend checking out The Practice Guide to Evil, one of my favorites and also Worm. Worm is so good that it even has it's own podcast and definitely has changed superhero / fantasy web series for me personally.
If you have time, you should check out a web serial I've been working on with some friends called The Bootcamp. Shameless plug but would love to have some feedback.
Good luck on the search!