These are the rules for the 2017 round of the Dean/Cas Big Bang, which is now closed for registration. The 2018 rules will be available after the new year.
Please make sure you have read and understand the rules before signing up for this event. We have them so this event runs smoothly. If you are unclear on any point, please email deancasbigbandmod@gmail.com and we will be happy to clarify!
Failure to adhere to the challenge rules may result in disqualification from future rounds.
Author Requirements
- Fics must be a minimum of 20,000 words. There is no maximum wordcount.
- One fic per author. You may co-write, but that fulfills your eligibility for the round. You may not submit a second fic as a solo author or as part of a second writing team.
- If you are co-writing a fic, each author must register individually. Do not sign up as a unit. We need each participant to agree to receive emails and declare their age. When you submit your rough draft for claims, you’ll select both of your names for the “Author(s)” field, which will link you together.
- Your work should be brand new for the challenge or a previously unpublished WIP, and no part of it may have been published prior to your posting date. If you are uncertain whether your WIP qualifies, please email the moderators with details.
- To ensure the anonymity of claims, please don’t reveal any details of what you’re working on prior to claims. This includes discussing your fic in private groups that may include people who are not participants in this challenge. If you need group feedback, please take advantage of our discord channel where your fellow author participants are available for discussions. (We want to clarify: It is perfectly fine to discuss privately one-on-one with your alpha or beta reader!)
- The challenge is open to all genres and can be any rating. RPF, fusion, and crossovers are allowed as long as they predominantly feature a relationship between Dean and Castiel (or Jensen and Misha). The relationship does not have to be romantic and/or sexual in nature; it may be portrayed as close friendship.
- Fics that are part of a series or existing universe are permitted. We encourage you to write something that can function as a standalone but no cliffhangers, please.
- All fics must be beta read and represent your best effort at storytelling and grammar. Moderators will assist anyone who needs help finding a beta reader.
- Finished fics should be posted to Archive of Our Own and remain publicly available for at least one year. There will be an official AO3 collection for this round and all fics are expected to be added. If you do not have an AO3 account, the moderators can help you set one up. If you decide to remove your affiliation with the fic at a later point, we would encourage you to consider orphaning the work rather than deleting it.
- You must tag for any of AO3’s major archive warnings, including MCD, non-con, underage (see below for more on this), and graphic violence.
- Authors may not commission art for a fic written for the DCBB due to the team nature of the challenge, since this would be unfair to your artist.
- Your fic must be posted in its entirety on your posting date. Serial posting is prohibited on any website.
- You may register as both an author and artist, but you may not make art for your own fic.
Artist Requirements
- Artists will create at least 2 pieces of art per fic claimed. You are free to create more than the minimum number of required pieces, at your discretion. You’re also welcome to make a promotional banner for your masterpost and separators/icons for your author to use, but they won’t count toward the minimum of 2 pieces.
- Art may be an original illustration or a photomanipulation. Photomanipulations must be more than simple filter application. All materials and styles of art are welcome. Art should be a minimum of 540px wide if it will be posted to tumblr, but final size/orientation are up to the artist.
- Artists are encouraged to work with an art beta. We’ll be asking for art betas during sign-ups and will happily provide you with names and contact information. (This was suggested to us by an artist who consulted on improving the challenge from an artist’s POV.)
- Art can be embedded in the fic (if the author permits it), posted to the artist’s website of choice, or both. Where art is hosted is at the artist’s discretion.
- If you decide to remove your affiliation with the work at a later point, please consider providing your author with the files so they can continue to be displayed.
- You may register as both an author and artist, but you may not make art for your own fic.
Participants under 18
You may participate as a minor, but underage artists may not claim fics containing explicit content, and underage writers must keep their ratings at PG-13 or lower.
Why do we have this rule: Your moderators live in the United States, which considers people under 18 to be minors. We have no interest in policing what you read/write/create on your own time, but you cannot create anything in this challenge which could have legal consequences for another participant (such as your partner) or one of us.
Artist Claims and Eligibility
Rough drafts must be at least 80% complete based on your projected final wordcount, with remaining scenes outlined, in order to be eligible for artist claims. For a walkthrough on how we handle claims, please see the FAQs below.
| Projected final wordcount | Minimum required for claims |
|---|---|
| 20,000 | 16,000 |
| 25,000 | 20,000 |
| 30,000 | 28,000 |
| 35,000 | 28,000 |
| 40,000 | 32,000 |
Due to the size of the DCBB, we cannot accommodate solo author posting for this challenge (definition: this is our term for authors who bypass claims and post without art at the end of the challenge).
Drafts can be submitted for artist claims prior to being read by a beta, but they should represent your best effort at spelling, grammar, and storytelling. The mods reserve the right to reject drafts that do not meet minimum requirements for length and readability.
(A note for people who are nervous about that last part: This has happened exactly once, but please trust us, it was not an appropriate submission.)
Participant Disclaimer
As is the spirit of challenges, you never know who you will be paired with. We ask that you be open and communicative with each other, and work together to make your posting date requests to avoid any conflict.
At no point may you drop your team member and choose a new one on your own. If you are having trouble with your partner, please contact the mod team for a solution.
Teams are required to do an initial check-in with their partner during the first 48 hours of being assigned to each other. There will be several mandatory checkups throughout the challenge. Failure to keep in contact with your partner may result in being disqualified from the challenge and future rounds.
New for 2017
Serial posting is no longer permitted
Serial posting (posing a fic in parts over a period of time in order to increase visibility, rather than posting a complete story on your assigned date) is prohibited beginning with the 2017 round. This includes epilogues and timestamps added during the DCBB posting timeframe.
The DCBB is not a competition but a group creative effort. Since all teams receive equal promotion and visibility on our social media channels, it is the opinion of the moderators that serialized posting on any website is not in the spirit of the DCBB and therefore is not allowed by any participant. Serial posting also places emphasis on fiction over art. Writers and artists function as teams within this challenge, and one should not be placed above the other in terms of importance.
Once all DCBB posting has finished for this round, you’re welcome to add timestamps to your heart’s content, but let your fellow writers and artists have their day in the spotlight.
Advanced Promotion
- For the first time, the DCBB will provide advanced promotion for all fic+art teams on the official challenge blog. Those “Coming soon!” posts you see every year? You all get one on the DCBB tumblr. We’ll ask each author to provide us with a snippet of their story under 250 words for this promo.
- Unlike past years, you may not promote your fic or art on your own social media challenges before your posting date, except to reblog/retweet the official promotion posts. To clarify: You may talk about your story and your art, but you may not create separate teaser promos for your story.
- Teams are welcome to create their own promo banners/covers/photo sets for use on the official blog, but if art is used, it may only come from the artist for your team. No commissions or outside collaborations. If you don’t want to create your own banners, the mods will create one for your team.
Platform change for posting
- On your assigned posting date, one member of your team will submit your masterpost to tumblr. (You can also email it to us.) Once approved, the moderators will crosspost it for you to Livejournal and Twitter.
- All masterposts should be accompanied by a graphic identifying the story, both team member names, and the challenge name (DCBB or Dean/Cas Big Bang). Teams are welcome and encouraged to make their own banners/cover art. Moderators will provide each fic/art collaboration with a banner if it’s not possible for the team to create one. Authors must respect the Artist’s work and not make their own banners from the Artist’s work without their permission.
- Finished fics should be posted to Archive of Our Own and remain publicly available for at least one year. There is official AO3 collection for this round (dcbb2017) and all fics are expected to be added. If you do not have an AO3 account, the moderators can help you set one up.
- Art can be embedded in the fic, posted to the artist’s website of choice, or both. Where art is hosted and embedded is at the artist’s discretion. If you post your art to AO3, please add your art to the official collection for this round (dcbb2017).
Artist and Author Chat
This year we have decided to bring back an old tradition from the early days of the challenge. We will be hosting a DCBB chat channel on discord. All participants are welcome to join the chat room and we will email you a link once you have signed up.
Chat Guidelines