How do I make the early parts of my story not cliche?

[JoshRaed]

My story is like a twist on various fantasy conventions. Like the dark lord straight up joins the heroes party on their quest, so they can fight the real villain, the chosen one is basically a stormtrooper, the good king is a tyrant who is genuinely worse than the dark lord is, the prophecy we know is actually propaganda and the magic powering the real prophecy is evil and born of a malicious chaos god, and the chosen one the public knows of is actually a form of war propaganda and the truth is the chosen ones main purpose is to kill half the population, and the only difference between light and dark magic is an aesthetic/mechanical one rather than a moral one, the faceless cannon fodder army is actually a victim of an oppressive system, and the rebellion against the empire is morally messy, side with morally repugnant people to achieve their goals, and is eventually corrupted once they win and become the government.

But the first part of the story is apparently really cliche. At least everyone says so. But I don’t know what parts are cliche and why, or how to change that. What do I do?

The main aspects of part one are:

There’s a fake chosen one and the real chosen one is this worlds equivalent to a stormtrooper, also the good king is actually bad.

[HGohwell]

You either execute them well, or change your entire story.

Here's the thing, originality is overrated. Stories can be as cliche and by the book as you like, if you pull it off well (and sometimes if you don't) but if you're just trying to be original and avoid tropes and cliches you're going to end up with a convoluted original mess no one cares about. Find your story, find your voice, pull it off as best you can and who cares if it's cliche? So what? Everything is. What really makes a work unique these days is rarely the plot itself, but the character world, style, voice and takes on that plot during the execution.

[Lensing]

Don´t change it, finish the story and see how it turns out.
Make the transition from an overthinking questioner to a storyteller

[darthmongoose]

It doesn't sound that cliche, and if a "cliche" is at that big a story level, and especially in the setup of a story I don't think it's that important, personally. The details will make it feel more unique, and the way you resolve it has a chance to be unique, and then on top of that there's the general vibe, the scenes, the personalities... once you put it all together, even the most cliched setup can feel fresh.

Just get on and make your thing.

[feuersichel]

I just started reading a suuuuper cliche story myself. And I enjoy it to no end because the characters make it so interesting.

Don't worry too much about what is cliche and what not. Instead invest your time into your characters

[moontokkym]

I think you may slightly misunderstand the critiques you're getting. I read your comic and remember giving that critique.

It wasn't because the story in itself was bad (there wasn't much of it at the time) it's that your character names and designs and basically all nomenclature is exceedingly non-specific and lead me to believe that you were doing a comedy parody of fantasy tropes, not a serious one. The main issue I had wasn't the skeleton, it was the skin, or lack thereof.

Like your hero is actually called "Heiroe". Your Dark Lord is actually called "Dark Lord". Add to that your character designs being quite simple (not that there's anything wrong with simple in itself, just that serious-tone fantasy is more known for going overboard than being understated) I thought it was going to be something more melodrama/comedy like the opening of One Punch Man or the game Bad End Theatre where the characters are also named "the hero" "the maiden" "the underling" "the overlord" and the tone is generally light throughout until the true ending.

I don't know how much the core of my critique is getting across because it didn't the first time (I'm sorry I wasn't clear enough). I'm trying to say that when you look at the presentation, the story feels generic. Like you've taken fantasy tropes yes, but you haven't made them specific to you yet. There's A hero, there's A dark lord, there's A prophecy, there's A quest and A fight between good and evil, light and dark... But it doesn't feel like they're YOUR hero and YOUR Dark Lord, etc... like you've stripped down Harry Potter and Star Wars to their base concepts and realised "oh, they're really similar if you take away the specifics, I can write a story like that but subverting the tropes" but you haven't rebuilt a seperate identity on top of the skeleton you took, you felt like changing the skeleton was enough... But skeletons can be anybody's at the end of the day, there's very little personal identifiers on skeletons.

[JoshRaed]

The reason he’s known literally as the dark lord is that establishing the cliche directly means it sets an expectation.

Would people make the connection that this character is a dark lord figure if the world is fully urban, with everything just looking like new york?

[pixxiepinks]

I don't think there is anything wrong with using a cliche/trope. I mean they are popular for a reason after all. And using them can help your audience understand your story better and help make it more clear to readers what to expect.

I mean I write isekai stories, and you don't really get any more cliche filled than that, but the cliches are one of the factors people like. So I wouldn't worry too much about it. It might even be the case that it's not the tropes that are the problem but something else, and it's just been mislabeled as cliche. Finish the story first and then in the first big edit, take a good look and see where you can improve and what needs to change. But first, finish the story!

[NickRowler]

I think right now, you should just focus on writing anything and practice the whole process of story creation and uploading your work.

Yes, Chosen One stories are cliche but if that is the project that you really want to create and it helps you build confidence, then just focus on that.

[MelancholicOtaku]

I don’t think having cliches is such a bad thing,it depends on how one execute the cliches that makes the difference.
Right now don’t worry about that just focus on the story you’re trying to tell.

[SleepingPoppy]

The reason he’s known literally as the dark lord is that establishing the cliche directly means it sets an expectation.

Is it possible, or worth while to set him up as a dark lord in a more subtle way? If not, stop worrying about it and move on.

Would people make the connection that this character is a dark lord figure if the world is fully urban, with everything just looking like new york?

I have read a story with a dark lord figure in a fully urban/real world modern setting. So yeah? It’s perfectly possible. (To be fair o think they literally called him the Shadow Lord or similar, but it made sense in the story)

All that really matters is that things make sense internally in your story.

I feel like you get derailed when you ask for advice. Like you are distracted and confused by the feedback, and you argue with people, but don’t actually gain clarity. And you go in circles worrying about what people say but not wanting to change anything. You’re allowed to just make what YOU want and not worry so much about others opinions.

I think opinions on the forums would be more helpful to you when you have a specific problem.

But you do you~

[euphridia]

New writer here, embracing tropes of a demon lord joining the party lead by the "chosen one" to fight the demon king, only to well... serve up an underhanded betrayal to become the new demon king.

So... tropes abound here, right?

First, I'm going for comedy and satire. But really I'm working on the characters. I want them to have personality. Banter, for example. How can you travel in disguise with the hero as a demon lord without at least pretending to bond with the group. Is that bond real? Did you adopt a persona? Was the persona more real than what you thought was the real you?

How did that underhanded betrayal affect everyone? What changed?

These are the questions im trying to answer as I work on my story. I think its embracing the trope and satirizing it a little. Poke fun at it but still give it love. Its the ultimate privilege to be able to write things we secrety love but know could be better, and its fun to try to see if you can get somewhere new by adding some elements to flesh out that trope into something a little more 3D.

I know you can do, and I'm hoping so can I.

[euphridia]

Oh. One more thing I wanted to mention.

I am still learning from this book, but... I love the idea of breaking down the types of feedback you receive into three categories.

Appreciation, Coaching, and Evaluation. They're very different. Sometimes feedback will come with all of them, sometimes not.

It also talks about our brain clashing with the idea between our desire to learn and grow versus the idea of being accepted (as we already are). There's three 3 key triggers the book talks about, too:

Truth Triggers: “The feedback is wrong, unfair or unhelpful”
Relationship Triggers: “Who are you to give this feedback?”
Identity Triggers: “I feel threatened by the feedback.”

It even goes on to tell you how to nicely reject feedback by setting healthy boundaries.

Wonderful thing is, i can link you a video visual summary about it!

I hope this is helpful for you. I have found it helpful to reground me when I get feedback I'm not sure how to take (or even if i should).

[JoshRaed]

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