moderan

Someone on the Rottenchester nano forum was kind enough to link to this handy little tool:Mary Sue Litmus Test. There are a couple of different versions, one with clickable checkboxes and one without.

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PenPal

I'd never heard of that before, it was interesting. My current main character scored a 13. I always knew he was a weirdo.

Mike C

Actually looks like complete bullshit to me. If you don't have the wit to recognise a 2 dimensional character in your own writing without filling out a questionnaire, you might as well give up now and save everyone else the discomfort of having to read your work.

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SparkyLT

It's fun, though. I have a character who's a 20, and another who's 31 - ouch. That seems kinda high to me.

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Non Serviam

I think it's probably only funny if you've read significant amounts of fanfic. (I thought it was hilarious!)

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The Backward OX

I agree with Mike. I got about half way through Character and clicked it off in disgust. What a crock of shit.

Sunny Rabbiera

Well it does help some uncertainty for some folk.
I know I used it a few times to make sure my "sue" factor was low, as i really dislike that type of character.
But its more of a guide as its very harsh

Mike C

But you can't recognise when you're writing one? Sad.

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valeca

Remember the new and/or young writers, Mike, who have little to no experience. They visit here too.

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Sunny Rabbiera

Well its more of a guide, I do like to play around with my characters and see if I am going too far into the Sue route.
Look I consider myself as a beginner, I just now am starting to realize my potential but there are times I am unsure of myself...
Heck thats why I am here

Dragonsoul

We were all new to the creative writing world at some point. I wrote some truly awful characters when I began writing, and I do not doubt that some of my characters are still inbalanced, etc. It's not the destination to be worried about but rather to enjoy the journey.

I think I've seen this before, but if nothing else, it's kind of interesting.

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Ana Kata

I tested the first person that came to mind, they got a negative one. Oh shit.

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Dragonsoul

*laughs*

That's pretty astonishing. Most of my characters ranked in the teens to the mid twenties. Not great, but better than what I expected. I'll probably try some more. It's good for entertainment and a bit of a learning.

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WriterDude

Most of these questions were completely irrelevant to me, and many can meant different things to different people. Her reptilian eyes were pretty much the one ones she scored on. They do occur in nature, but not on humans, and they are very important to the setting, but not for the plot. She's also a crossbreed between normal humans and reptilian humans, but she doesn't really have any benefits from either other than they chose the best parents possible as donors when they created her and her siblins. She is exceptionally good at martial art (but only as good as any other normal human who literally lives to fight from birth) and was top of her class, but only because she learned from day 1 the weakest half of her class would be killed every five years until only a few were left, and they had to fight until only one survived. But all that happened fifteen years before the story starts and isn't really relevant.

So to summon up, she got about 7 points, give or take a point or two. Either I'm a genius, or the test is crap. Still fun, though.

Edit: At the same time, I can score at least 14 simple points on the "Your character and you" alone, and it doesn't have anything to do about the character in the first place.

Dragonsoul

Another thing I noticed--depending on which character you pick (if you have multiple) then you might get a vastly different score. I mean with my main character, he ranked higher than my secondaries. I mean, it is required for him to have influence on the story, so sometimes those don't really or shouldn't apply.

I think considering the character's importance to the storyline should affect how you react to the score.

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Sophia by The Cruxhadows