Name: Lady Salazar, just call me Sal

Location: The USA.

Reading (at the moment): HP crossovers. Other crossovers per interest. I've been super stuck on Tolkein lately. There are not nearly enough plot-centric crossover fanfics. Why oh why do so many people write OC crossplants for 'romance'? So much sadface.

Writing (at the moment): Crossovers, or crossover-inclined. I have HP/Tolkeinverse crossover ideas coming out my ears. Dagorath, Reignite, Walk Through the Valley, The Next Great Adventure, The Long Road Home (provisionally titled), Nephilim, and another unnamed idea...

Shipping: As a straight person, I prefer my protags to be straight. Slash and femslash is fine on the side. But what I really like are fics that have touches of romance, ya know, implicit chemistry, but aren't romance focused. Take a lesson from FMA:Brotherhood, people. Ed/Winry is exactly how its done. Also, aside: HP/Daphne Greengrass is the same as HP/OC. Blank slates are just as easily Mary Sues as original characters, buds. And stop mindlessly bashing Ginny. Seriously. Stop.

Current favorite book: Anything but what I should be reading. To think I was a physics major.

Favorite book series: So many! Harry Potter is obviously foremost, but also Lord of the Rings, Percy Jackson, the Slayers light novels (does that count?)... anyway.

Favorite game: TESIV Oblivion and/or TESV Skyrim modded like nobody's business. Also Shadow of Mordor, when I feel like being an unapologetic mass murderer. Still haven't gotten an uruk captain with Fear of the Gravewalker yet...

Guidelines for Crossover Fanfiction

1. Power levels must mesh. It doesn't matter if you think universe A kicks so much more ass than universe B, crossovers where one side drastically owns the other are auto-fail. For believable conflict, and thus an interesting story, sometimes canon apparent power standards must be modified. Doing this heavy-handedly will make the other universe fans angry. Not doing it at all is worse. Just use a little logic, people. If the lead of one universe is nearing forty, and one’s a teenager, the passage of time alone allows for growth. Just because area-of-effect spells aren't commonly seen in HP doesn't mean there aren't any. Hell, Pettigrew blew up a street and killed a dozen Muggles with one spell. I repeat: Pettigrew.

Example: Naruto ninjas have greater speed? Meet Harry Potter apparation. Why isn't it used in HP combat? Well, think about it. Two wizards using apparation in a battle are going to basically have a high-stakes game of tag, based more on luck than skill. Sensible duelists are going to go for skill, thus minimal apparation. And there’s always the chance that one may be dueling within an anti-apparation ward.

2. Both universes must be present to some extent. In other words, a character crossplant is not a crossover. A boy raised in the ninja world called Harry Potter who’s not involved with Hogwarts, Britain, Voldemort, etc. is called an OC. Just because you call a random LotR elf ‘Harry’ does not mean it’s Harry Potter or a crossover. Call this the ‘if it looks like a duck’ principle. If it looks like a ninja, acts like a ninja, talks like a ninja, was raised like a ninja, and never had contact with magic or the magical world, it’s likely a ninja, not a wizard.

3. Share the pain, share the glory. Anakin Skywalker is the one Chosen to bring balance to the Force. Taking down Voldemort is Harry’s job. Even if it’s a HP/Star Wars crossover, and you think Anakin owns Harry, they are both leads and heros. Respect that, instead of flipping Harry the literary middle finger, and the crossover’s chances of being a success instead of auto-fail drastically improve. It’s one thing to expand a hero’s duty to encompass another universe; gloryhounding in favor of your preferred lead is an entirely different animal.

Corollary: Reincarnation-style crossovers can avoid this issue entirely, but only if done well and carefully. If Harry’s the reincarnation of Namikaze Minato, something of Harry must remain – he must still use magic, still interact with the wizarding world/Harry’s friends, etc. – or you have ventured into the land of lead-replacement, another auto-fail.

4. A crossed universe must be internally consistent. This consistency will usually come at the price of an altered canon, with alterations varying from minimal to great. Wait, Merlin was an Ancient? That’s kinda neat, but not HP-canon relevant. On the other hand, if the crossed universe involves Harry being a son of Sparda, then post-GoF canon is by necessity blown out of the water. One, because devils and demons will be a known if uncommon threat, and two, because the potential consequences of Voldemort's rebirth are positively hellacious. Handwaving this is almost certainly auto-fail.

5. Good and evil are subjective. As easy as it is to draw lines in the sand, the Good Guys of respective universes are not always going to agree on what Good is. Sam and Dean Winchester kill supernatural stuff. Wizards are supernatural. Even more importantly, megalomaniacs out to enslave the world don’t usually team up. Use each other, yes. And even a megalomaniac out to enslave the world may find himself fighting with the forces of Good against a megalomaniac out to destroy it utterly. For a skilled writer, this can be very fertile ground. Very, very difficult to pull off realistically, yes, but to do so would likely transcend the bounds of epic storytelling.

(2/23/15 Old but still relevant. Also, TL;DR STOP NERFING THE KILLING CURSE.)

12/13/2016

It's been over a year and a half since my last upload... geez. Still writing, still writing loads in fact, just having attention-span problems in the wake of what has not been the greatest of years for me (worst summer ever). Still active in fanfic; my apologies to anyone who has reviewed since not long after DUO was posted. I picked up a spambot and FFNet being what it is can no longer block anonymous reviews, so I had to disable review notifications. I'll be keeping an eye on Dagorath, so hopefully I can respond to any new reviews.

(Addendum 12/15/2016: I've finally given in and deleted/reposted DUO, hoping the 'new' story evades the bot. It sucks to lose the reviews/faves/C2s, and I'm really sorry for the redundant chapter alerts for anyone subscribed to me, but I really want to keep my Review Notifications active. Losing the ability to talk with my readers kinda defeats the point in posting in the first place, so let's hope this works!)

Time for tea.

Lady Salazar