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Event ??? Shipping Fic Contest: Theme Suggestions

kintsugi

kintsugi

the beast without a human heart
Eiscue's Exciting Exchange + Winter Roundtable 2025 Nidofam Bulba Bookworm Bulba Book Club Member
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Hiya trainers! We'll be opening up our 2026 Shipping Fic Contest in a few short weeks, but before that, we want to hear from you! What themes would you like to write for this contest? With that in mind, we'll be opening up this thread to gather your suggestions for this year's themes. In about a week or so, we'll be putting up a poll for folks to vote; the most popular themes will be our contest theme!

Some quick guidelines:
  1. You may submit one theme per person. Post your theme in this thread in bold text.
    1. You're perfectly welcome to submit a theme even if: you intend to enter the contest, or you intend to judge the contest. In fact, we would encourage that even moreso!
  2. Themes should loosely be focused around shipping, i.e. the relationships between characters.
    1. Example: "Fighting Rayquaza" or "Riding my bike to catch a Pikachu" will be better suited for some of our other contests.
  3. Themes should be flexible & general, and should not implicitly limit a story to a specific genre or setting.
    1. Example: "Exploring a Mystery Dungeon together" or "Getting a blue headband with yellow spots from my boyfriend GameBoy Red from Pokemon Masters EX" would be seen as overly restrictive/specific.
This thread will be open until March 9, 2026 (8am GMT-8, so roughly this time), at which point we'll post the theme voting thread!

Past themes:
  • Love In Bloom
  • A Dream Vacation
  • New Life
  • Bittersweet Chocolate
  • First Bloom
  • Changing Feelings

(For reference: 2024 Contest Thread | 2025 Contest Thread)
 
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Oooh, neat!

I'll suggest Reminiscing With You - it seems fitting for an anniversary year, and I think it's vague enough that it could make for either really wholesome, loving scenes, or for bittersweet moments, for those who prefer their pairings toxic, hehe.
 
NumberOneSpinelApologist said:
Still waters, tidal waves
Interpreted as a dynamic? As a metaphor of a different kind? Literal? Your choice.
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I will second this!

And make the badge names: Swimming Challenger, Swimming Contestant and Swimming Champion respectively
 
Ness said:
I will second this!

And make the badge names: Swimming Challenger, Swimming Contestant and Swimming Champion respectively
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Appreciate the enthusiasm, but please save endorsementsfor next week--we'll post a dedicated voting thread. This thread is for just submissions, and we will typically use 3 themes per contest, so feel free to think about a theme you'd like to submit yourself! Thanks.
 
kintsugi said:
Appreciate the enthusiasm, but please save endorsementsfor next week--we'll post a dedicated voting thread. This thread is for just submissions, and we will typically use 3 themes per contest, so feel free to think about a theme you'd like to submit yourself! Thanks.
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Oof pardon that i have never partook in a fic contest lmao

Maybe a Touch the Skies! theme? Idk with the announcement of Winds and Waves i feel it makes the most sense to theme the 2026 fic contest after it
 
Mialentia said:
Oooh, neat!

I'll suggest Reminiscing With You - it seems fitting for an anniversary year, and I think it's vague enough that it could make for either really wholesome, loving scenes, or for bittersweet moments, for those who prefer their pairings toxic, hehe.
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I second this! I feel a fic theme that's about reminiscing on times you spent with you and your partner is a very good idea for an anniversary year like this one and there's many ways you can approach it. You can make callbacks to previous fics you've made for a pairing, maybe even call back to a previous year's theme?
 
Ness said:
Oof pardon that i have never partook in a fic contest lmao

Maybe a Touch the Skies! theme? Idk with the announcement of Winds and Waves i feel it makes the most sense to theme the 2026 fic contest after it
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no worries! this is our first time trying out public theme voting so we're also a little new to this. you're not in trouble! I just didn't want you to miss your chance to submit an idea of your own.
RichestAirPirate said:
I second this! I feel a fic theme that's about reminiscing on times you spent with you and your partner is a very good idea for an anniversary year like this one and there's many ways you can approach it. You can make callbacks to previous fics you've made for a pairing, maybe even call back to a previous year's theme?
Click to expand...
Likewise, appreciate the enthusiasm, but please save endorsementsfor next week--we'll post a dedicated voting thread. This thread is for just submissions, and we will typically use 3 themes per contest, so feel free to think about a theme you'd like to submit yourself! Thanks.

Welkamo said:
Remembering might be too similar to Reminiscing With You but I’ll chuck it in because I like themes centered around looking back for a 30th anniversary year. Good thinking @Mialentia
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Do you have any arguments against considering this the same as "Reminiscing With You"? I hadn't considered it when writing the post, but I am concerned that having two similar themes will split the vote (i.e. half the people vote for "Remembering" and half for "Reminiscing with You", and then neither theme wins). You'd be welcome to submit an alternate one if that sounds good to you.
 
kintsugi said:
Do you have any arguments against considering this the same as "Reminiscing With You"? I hadn't considered it when writing the post, but I am concerned that having two similar themes will split the vote (i.e. half the people vote for "Remembering" and half for "Reminiscing with You", and then neither theme wins). You'd be welcome to submit an alternate one if that sounds good to you.
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I think in my head "with you" implied being with the person(s) in question, whereas remembering could be alone. In which case, full 180, Alone But Not Lonely.
 
Ness said:
Oof pardon that i have never partook in a fic contest lmao

Maybe a Touch the Skies! theme? Idk with the announcement of Winds and Waves i feel it makes the most sense to theme the 2026 fic contest after it
Click to expand...
To elaborate this theme:

A story where the shipping couple goes into sky nothing was similar to this so nows the time!
 
also works for friends and family, and may work better as something multi-chaptered rather than a short story, but

"You're Worth Hell"
 
I love some of the themes proposed here and I'll probably write about one of them if they are amongst those that are used for the contest. But since this is a suggestion thread rather than a voting thread, I might as well share my own theme idea too:

Through Thick And Thin

Perhaps the characters' relationship went through a tough spot, before evolving into its current positive status? Or maybe one character supports another as the latter goes through a difficult life situation? Or possibly something else? I hope this theme is vague enough.
 
Ok, here’s my less unserious (but still spring-y) suggestion:

Easter Egg

Maybe it’s about chocolate (what could be more romantic?)

Or new life springs forth?

Or two lovers meet at that truck behind the St Anne you gotta surf to reach? :wynaut:
 
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