General Exchange Letter

Shadaras @ Ao3

Thank you for creating for me! I’m so excited to see what you choose to make! All the words I’ve written here are for inspiration only; I’m sure I’m going to love whatever you come up with. :)

Treats are also always welcome.

Table of Contents
General Likes
- Trans Likes
NSFW/Kink Likes
Worldbuilding Likes
Art Likes
Vid Likes
Original Works Likes
Other Opt-Ins
DNWs


Likes/DNWs As Given In Exchange Signup

See below for expansion and more details!

GENERAL LIKES
Characters being in communities | Established relationships | Complicated relationships | Compassion and kindness | Hurt/Comfort | Displays of skill | Politics, puzzle-solving, and mysteries | Fight scenes | Teaching/mentorship | Loyalty, fealty, devotion | Trauma and recovery | Bodies (fat/muscles/scars/etc) | Meaningful touch | Queer characters (inc. ace/aro/trans) | Wingfic | The environment/nature/a sense of place | Atypical narrative structures and POV: 1st person, 2nd person, epistolary, poetry, nonlinear, in-world texts, etc.

ART LIKES
Winged characters! | Tarot, dream imagery, and other symbology | Space, the ocean, and other vast environments | Characters being relaxed/happy | Snuggling with partner(s)/friends | Interacting with animals | Action poses | Characters examining artifacts/plants/other neat things | Dramatic lighting! Soft pastels! Vivid color and highlights! B&W/Grayscale pieces! They're all good!

VID LIKES
Parallel scenes fading into each other | Leaning real hard into feelings (try to make me cry/laugh!) | Humor, angst, excitement, and joy are all equally wonderful emotions for a vid/gifset to make me feel! | Narrative songs (any language so long as there are english subs) | Cuts that match to the music’s beats/lyrics | Love for minor characters and women | Color/b&w contrasts | Fight scenes (would love a vid that's just badass moments!) | Poetry quotes | Canon dialogue/quotes used for emotional effect

WORLDBUILDING LIKES
Rituals, religion, and spirituality | Culture clashes | Politics (both within and between groups) | Magic/advanced tech being integrated into everyday life | Architecture and accessibility | Recorded history vs lived experiences | Exploration of educational systems (especially for children) | Dance, art, crafting, music, and other creative acts | Communities and their idiosyncracies | The natural world (flora, fauna, ecosystems, etc.) and people's interactions with it

KINK/SEX LIKES
Non-Sexual Kink | Communication | Marking/Claiming | Control (and d/s) | Sensation play | Mouths and Teeth (biting and oral!) | Clothing Kink/Clothed Sex | Alternate Erogenous Zones | Nonhuman Genitalia | Semi-Public Sex | Rough Sex | Sex Toys | Magic (or the equivalent) | Multiple orgasms | Edging and overstimulation | Foreplay and aftercare

DNWs
Unrequested permanent non-canonical death of requested characters | Stories focused on abusive relationships (of any type) | Sexual/romantic teacher/student relationships | Suicide/self-harm (if canonical: mentions are fine) | Characters not being able to breathe | Mind Control | Noncon/Rape (dubcon is fine) | Unrequested Incest ("like a brother"/shixiongdi is fine) | Teenagers (~under 18) having sex with adults (~over 21) | Underage sex (younger than 16) | Daddy kink, ageplay, etc. | Spanking | Rimming | Vomit, scat, piss (mentions in nonsexual/sfw contexts is fine)


GENERAL LIKES

Communities:
Families, friends, teams, co-workers, mentors/mentees, favorite restaurant, bartender who knows you, etc. The sense that characters have lives outside their work/romantic life/whatever.

Established Relationships:
More than just romantic! People who already have in-jokes and history and are familiar with each other, whether or not they like each other. It's just great to have people who are settled and comfortable with each other, y'know?

Get-togethers are totally fine! I just see established relationships a lot less, and I think they're absolutely fantastic, so I'd love to see them more.

Complicated Relationships:
This starts with stuff like "fuck I don't know if I should tag this & or /" (which is a type of relationship I love), continues through "enemies to lovers," and contains pretty much anything where people relate to each other in more than one way (or have no idea how to explain how they relate to each other).

Click for a bunch of examples!

Queerplatonic relationships. Childhood friends who drifted apart and are reconnecting. Internet friends figuring out how to interact IRL. On-and-off again romantic/sexual relationships. Friends with benefits. "I hate you but you're the only one who understands me." "I care about you and I don't want to, but I need to spend time with you and it just makes me more aware of how vulnerable you are, and I could hurt you so easily, and this sucks."

Non-Sexual and/or Non-Romantic Kink. There Sure Are A Lot Of Feelings Here (and defining them is scary, impossible, or unwanted). We're Partners And That's What Matters (what does 'partners' mean or imply? that's for you to wonder and for us to find irrelevant). Battle Couple (sword and shield, two blades strike as one, mage and bodyguard...). Rivalry is a Very Intimate Bond (who knows you better than the person you've vowed to overcome and/or destroy?). I Am Your Weapon (maybe you want me to be a person but I don't know if I can be). I Hate You (and respect you!) But Neither of Us Can Do This Alone (wait shit maybe I have more complicated feelings about you than I thought...). I've Never Had A Close Friend Before (What Are These Feelings?).

We Used To Date But Then We Broke Up (it didn't make us less tightly bound). We Aren't Dating But Everyone Thinks We Are (idk why, we're just doing Normal Friend Stuff). The Intimate Bond of a Deity and Their Devout Follower. The Devotion of a Knight and Their Liege (fealty goes both ways!). I Have Had My Hands Literally Inside Of You; What's Closer Than That? We Both Love (and Grieve?) the Same Person (let's have feelings about them together, and become closer as a result). You Understand My Struggles; Let's Find Comfort/Relaxation Together (via sex, commiseration, cuddles, making each other eat, etc.)

People taking care of each other: (aka: Hurt/Comfort)
Bandaging wounds, making sure people get enough sleep, taking workload off someone's shoulders, cooking food for each other, hugs/physical affection of any sort, comforting crying characters, brushing/braiding hair, listening to upset character, taking action on behalf of someone who won't, pretty much any other kind of hurt/comfort you can think of... the possibilities are endless!

Radical Compassion:
That thing where a character looks at a foe and goes "No. I'm not going to kill/hurt you. I'm going to be kind to you." (which is much harder, and more terrifying, for everyone involved!) and everyone's baffled and worried but it works and makes everyone's lives better/safer in the end? Yes. That.

Sacrifice and Earned Tragedy:
I love my martyrs. I love characters who realise they can solve problems if they sacrifice themselves. It sucks for everyone around them, and it's so very sad, but it's also really good. When they're canon, I'm always interested in what could happen if they don't need to sacrifice themselves that way; if people find another solution and now they need to keep living even when they didn't expect to.

Competence/Acts of Skill:
Anything that characters are good at, I like seeing them be good at! Whatever that happens to be, if you highlight it I'll be very happy. Be kinky about how skilled they are and I'll be especially delighted.

Casefic/Missionfic/Mysteries:
I love mysteries, I love people solving problems, and I love it no matter how much (or little!) it's focused on. Feel free to go for a background mention as a framework for an emotional story, or focus so hard on the case/mission that the requested relationship is almost incidental.

Loyalty, Fealty, Devotion:
Characters who give themselves to another character are fantastic! Kneeling, swearing oaths to each other, staying by each others' side despite seeming betrayal, sacrifices made for one another... one-sided or mutual, it's all good!

Physicality, Touch, and the Body:
A focus on the body! Especially dance, fighting, or other similar kinds of body-centric beauty. I love motion. I love descriptions of how bodies feel, both internally (what does X action feel like?) and externally (what does X feel like to touch?). Muscles, fat, the way textures change over scars or stubble, the good ache of a stretch or the bad ache of a healing bone... it's all delightful!

If this leads you to write completely gen/sfw things sensual enough that you're like "wow this reads as sexy/kinky", I will enjoy that. Embodiment and people being so grounded and centered in their body and how it relates to the world is one of my loves.

Queer Stuff:
I love queer characters/headcanons! Especially when their queerness isn't the centerpiece of a story and just happens to be a background truth. Trans (inc. nonbinary and fluid identities) (see below), ace, aro, bi/pan, and polyamorous characters are encouraged! Relatedly, I also enjoy the "raised as [gender] instead of [asab] for Reasons" trope and characters having complicated gender/sex feelings about that (and their other possible lives).

Trans/Nonbinary Characters:
I am happy to see basically ANY character I request be trans. If you're concerned that the specific trans thing you're doing might not be wanted, check through the mods, but tbh I'll just be excited to see trans characters in gifts for me. :) Easy version, though: Keep their gender but make them trans that gender! Or declare them nonbinary, with their canon gender being their asab, and use they/them pronouns for them. Then change as much or as little of their presentation makes sense to you! (presentation =/= gender, after all...)

I like characters being casually trans without the story being About Their Transness. (If it's "okay let's talk about how to have good sex and your transness impacts that", or similar things, that's fine, the point is the sex in that case.) I'm not particularly interested in dysphoria being central to a trans character's experience, but I'm fine with it existing so long as your work doesn't linger in it.

On that note: Include as much/little medical transition as you're interested in! (I'm especially here for seeing bottom surgery of any sort! or only one of hormones/surgery.) Use the words for body features (inc. genitalia) that make sense to you for the character(s) you're writing; preference for the words to be gender-affirming or clinically descriptive. When writing nsfw, I am fine with penetrative sex (and want to see it for post-surgery trans characters!), and also all my general nsfw likes apply.

Pronoun-wise, I'm fine with neopronouns in contexts where they make sense (preferences: ey/em/eir, ve/ver, xie/xir and variations). I really love seeing characters use multiple names and pronoun sets, especially when they use different names/pronouns in different contexts/with different people! (I also do not require trans characters to have deadnames. tbh I like it when they don't?)

ART NOTES: Yes all of the above still applies, yes I want to see surgical scars, yes I am here for trans characters having sex, yes I like seeing partial transition, yes I'm here for trans characters whose transness is mostly visible via an author's note saying "btw they're trans"

Aro and Ace Things:
I like aro and ace rep, especially when they're aro/allo or allo/ace. I adore it when an ace character enjoys sex for sensory reasons, or because it's a good bonding experience, or what have you (but if they're sex-repulsed, that's okay too). I think it's great when an aro character finds a way to have a meaningful relationship with an alloromantic person that works for both of them. I think it's super fun to see how people negotiate these relationships, because it means it's so personalised to the people in question, and that's just fantastic.

Polyamory:
I rarely (if ever) feel a need for ships to be exclusively and explicitly monogamous. I also often (if not always) find it interesting to think about ships being polyamorous! Please play with any kind of polyamory you want: stable triads, a complex tangle of FWBs, a primary partner and a couple "when they're in the area" relationships, a romantic partner who's different from a sexual partner, any kind of polycule, something emphasising compersion and fondness in a partner's partner, or whatever else you can think of! Love to have characters with a bunch of different relationships. Or just a bunch of different crushes at once! Or anything else along those lines!

Worldbuilding:
Always good! Some starting points to explore: magic/advanced tech and the implications on daily life; educational systems and academia; dance, music, art, and any other creative acts; ritual, religion, and spirituality; culture clashes, politics, etc.; architecture and accessibility, especially in settings with multiple sentient species with differing body structures. See the worldbuilding section for more!

Assorted Other Things:
Wings and wingfic! Poetic descriptions! A focus on the environment, both built and natural! Kidfic! (meaning: fic where adult characters have children, not ones where adult characters are de-aged.) Atypical narrative structures and POV (1st person, 2nd person, epistolary, poetry, nonlinear storytelling, in-world texts, IF...)


KINK/SEX LIKES

Non-Sexual Kink:
Bondage for the sake of bondage! Caning because it's a release of tension! Submission to stop thinking and trust you'll be taken care of! Things like that. Also many other things, but those are a good starting point.

Communication:
I love boundaries being set and honored. I also like stories where they're brushed up against and someone says 'stop' and then they talk about it and there's aftercare! That's hella rad to read, because I don't see it often and it's so important. But also? Consensual non-consent is good. When people say 'this is my safeword; I will say no and stop but you don't need to listen unless I safeword', that's also really hot.

Marking/Claiming:
Leaving hickeys or other visible marks (scratches, bruises, etc.). Collaring (with literal collars, or necklaces, or watches, or... anything else symbolic in that way). Wearing clothing bought just for you. Rough handling (yes I know this is a little offset but it's in the same category in my head; something about having the right to treat someone that way...?). Calling someone "Mine", calling oneself "Yours".

Control:
This is all about people being into having control and order when they might otherwise not, or being able to let go and not have control when they normally need to keep very careful control; that kind of thing where they relax and release themself into another's hands because they trust them. Or where they're worried about hurting people and are able to let go because the other person likes the pain and it isn't too much. (Dom/sub stuff, pretty much!)

Sensation Play:
This includes painplay (biting, scratching, hair-pulling, crops–but not whips or spanking, please), temperature play (waxplay, ice cubes, probably other things I'm not thinking about), and just generally a focus on sensation (nipple play, extended descriptions of tongues on bodies or the specific way fingers feel, scales or feathers or other interesting textures on the body, etc.). Especially with characters who were touch-starved, the way sensation can be utterly overwhelming is fantastic to focus on.

Mouths and Teeth:
Kissing (anywhere on the body! with any intensity!). Licking (for fun, for sensation, to clean up come, to entice as foreplay). Sucking (on collarbones, earlobes, fingers, etc.). Feeling someone's breath because you're so close. I just really like mouths! I am intensely into biting! I think it's hot in general, and especially as a form of marking/claiming! I adore oral sex! It's really lovely and I always want more of it!

Clothing Kink/Clothed Sex:
Clothed (or partially-clothed) sex is awesome and hot (especially in the context of 'just snuck away and need to not be seen by anyone'). Give me scenes about someone wearing a dress/skirt getting oral from someone kneeling in front of them half-hidden by the skirt/dress, for instance. In a similar vein, uniform kink is something I am super into, because of the focus on clothing and sex all at once. Touching through clothing, riling someone up and seeing the evidence through clothing—all that is really good too!

Masturbation:
I like both fast/desperate masturbation and long/planned out/luxurious sessions. Waking up horny. Nipple play. Masturbating for comfort/good brain chemicals rather than sexual relief (see: wanking as a sleep aid, wanking as a way to relieve menstrual cramps, wanking as a distraction). Being so turned on/horny that you gotta get off right now even if it’s a questionable idea. Exploring the body/learning what feels good. Grinding/humping. Solo Kink. Masturbation while still wearing clothing, especially through clothing. I like masturbation on public transit (inc. airplanes). Love the idea of someone subtly wanking while concealing their actions under a blanket/coat (or just Really Hoping People Don’t Look). Masturbating while someone watches.

Alternate Erogenous Zones/Nonhuman Genitalia:
Genitalia are very nice, but there are so many other erogenous zones! Boobs. Throats. Hands. Ears. Bits humans don't have but aliens or fantasy people might! (Tentacles, horns, tails, etc.) In the context of non-humans, I'm into size differences (though, like, keep it reasonable for a human-normative body if there's penetration) and navigating them. I'm also just... really into wings. Give me wing-kink if you can, please, even if that involves adding wings to people who don't normally have them.

Semi-Public Sex:
Outdoor sex is excellent! Sex pressed against windows is great! I'm into characters being aware they could get caught and that being arousing on its own (due to needing to stay quiet, being so much more aware of what's going on around them, pretending they aren't having sex; things like that). Similarly, having hidden sex toys (vaginal or anal plugs, for instance) or kink things (like rope harness/shibari) under clothing while in public spaces is delightful.

Assorted Other Things:
Rough sex. Non-penetrative sex. Bondage. Begging. Crying. Laughing. Sex toys. Magic (or similar) being used during sex. Telepathic sex (sensation feedback loops, emotional feedback loops, etc.). Multiple orgasms. Edging. Overstimulation. Two people having sex about a third (mutually desired) person they can't have. Foreplay. Aftercare.


WORLDBUILDING LIKES

I love worldbuilding. When I fall in love with a canon, it's often as much for the world as for the characters. Pretty much anything you do to explore and expand upon the world as a whole is going to be something I enjoy!

My specific fondness for educational systems and academia is because those tell you so much about the world and what it values. How are children treated? What about adult learners? Who teaches? What size group? What is considered important and foundational to the culture? What must everyone know, and what's specalized and/or protected knowledge?

Magic and advanced technology often has plot-relevant aspects that are highly explored but also knock-on effects that canon doesn't focus on as much. How is magic/tech used in daily life? How much access do people have to it? How do specalists interact with everyday people? How do people think about it? Where are people looking to push further and learn more about what's possible with this magic/tech?

Religion, ritual, and spirituality are often either very important or completely ignored by sf/f canons. I love digging into these elements and thinking about how they influence people and their worlds. What superstitions exist? How prominent is religion? How do people (especially in stories where gods are real) interact with religion and divinities? What power and presence do religious and spiritual leaders have in society? Where does society draw the line between religion and spirituality? What everyday rituals do people have? Birthday parties and coming-of-age rituals, for instance, are fascinating! What other life stages or personal events does society mark, and how?

Culture and society shape characters. Unfortunately, a lot of sf/f stories tend to flatten them with broad strokes and stereotypes, and I want to know more about the details and differences within a group! Get into the nitty-gritty of daily life and how those broad strokes gain nuance when there are more representatives of a given group.

This ties into my desire to see politics, culture clashes, and investigations into the differences between objective historical truth and subjective or incomplete historical documentation. What stories do people tell about themselves and each other? How is a one event/interaction framed by the different people involved in it? Whose story gets highlighted and accepted as truth? How are social/cultural institutions used to influence opinions? Anything along those lines fascinates me!

I'm fascinated by embodiment and bodies in general. How do winged characters think about cities and space? How do shapeshifters think about clothing? How are structures built when they must accomodate both cat-sized and elephant-sized people? What design sensibilities do people with four arms have? How do people adapted to low-g or zero-g think about gravity? What's it like for people whose primary sense is scent to interact with people whose primary sense is hearing? And how does all of this shift and change when disability gets involved? Are disabled people supported? What is considered a disability by society? What kinds of assistive devices are available, and how easily accessible are they?

Creative acts (dance, crafts, music, arts in general) are just super fun! I love reading about creative people doing creative things. Where do they find inspiration? How much support do they have for their craft? What does their creative act feel like in their body (and/or heart)? Who are they doing this for? What meaning does their art have for them and the people around them?

Nature and people's interactions with it should be interpreted broadly! Deep space could be nature just as much as the deep sea. Nature can be found in sidewalk cracks as much as untouched old growth forests. Deserts and tundras are alive. Think broadly! A bunch of questions to spark inspiration: How (and where) do people build their homes? How do people find (hunt, gather, farm, etc.) their food? What elements of the natural world do they consider normal? Which do they consider unusual? What natural elements are accepted into their lives (houseplants, pets, wildlife in the city, weather events, migrations...) and which are rejected/avoided? How much knowledge of the natural world do people tend to have? How do they relate to wilderness? What does 'wilderness' even mean to them?


ART LIKES

I really love seeing fanart of my favorite characters, especially for my rarer ships. I honestly can’t think of a style of fanart I don’t think is cool. I love both realistic and cartoony styles, I think that chibis are cute, I have a lot of delight for reinterpretations of visual canons (some of my favorite pieces of fanart are setting AUs). That said, some things I especially like in art:

If you want to draw NSFW stuff, go ahead! My only preference is that if you're drawing characters who normally have body hair, I want to see the body hair! Especially pubic hair. That's basically my only preference as far as genitals go. xD I like seeing realistic body types (I especially like seeing chubby/fat characters!). I am interested in art of disabled characters and accessibility devices. I like seeing trans characters (see the details in General Likes for more info there!), I'm down for intersex characters, and I enjoy anthros and xeno and things like that too.


VID LIKES

I don't request vids that much, but I do think they're super cool! I hope that these are helpful notes for you!

Music Preferences:

I like most styles of music! I have yet to find a genre of music that I categorically dislike. For vids, I think that narrative songs can be super cool for pulling out parallels/storylines between scenes that weren't obvious in the canon itself, but I'm open to whatever you want to use!

That said, I know people wanna choose stuff that their recip will like! So, some more specific details: when left to my own devices I tend to go for the following: pop punk, operatic rock, trance/electronica, and anything with really good harmony (a capella is incredible). If you're inspired to use a completely instrumental track, that is also great; I like classical music and folk music and dance music and video game soundtracks.

A scattering of musical artists I like (to provide inspiration/give you a better sense of the breadth of my musical tastes; feel free to pick a song I don't know and introduce me to new music!): E Nomine, Hua Chenyu, Leonard Cohen, Zhou Shen, The Decemberists, Accusefive, Frank Ocean, Janelle Monae, Tokio Hotel, Apocalyptica, Within Temptation, ERA, G.E.M.

If you choose a song with lyrics, I would appreciate having accessible song lyrics (whether embedded as subtitles or posted in the vid description) so that I can read the lyrics as well as listen to them. If you choose a non-English song, it'd be nice to have an English translation, but don't worry about it too much if that's not possible; so long as you give me the gist of why you picked X song and the emotions come through, that works for me. :)

Vid-Specific DNW: No strobe effects/flickering lights, please! I tend to be okay with quick cuts so long as they don't have quick brightness changes, though.


ORIGINAL WORKS LIKES

Feel free to use any gender(s) for characters in prompts without built-in genders! I love f/f, m/f, m/m, and anything with nonbinary characters. I'm extremely fond of seeing trans characters (especially trans men!) and he/him butch lesbians. I'm down for neopronouns if they fit the setting. I love seeing platonic relationships and queerplatonic relationships between any/all people.

I like science fiction and fantasy settings a lot! Historical settings are great too, but I tend to like having some spec-fic element in there. The biggest exception to my "put spec-fic stuff in!" preference is spies, detectives, and mystery prompts, where I'm absolutely fine with the general spy/detective tropes being the spec-fic element.

I also love space fantasy, fantastical science fiction, and anything else that blurs the edges between genres. Horror is great for this too! I'm particularly fond of things like “Here is a world with gods, but hey we’re in space; put science fiction trappings on this fantasy-typical conceit” and “Hello I am a robot in a fantasy world, deal with it”, as well as "This fantasy-looking setting is actually sci-fi! Dragons are aliens! :D".

My fondness for superheroes, similarly to my fondness for spies/detectives, comes from seeing people take common tropes and play with them. Lean into those tropes! Twist them! Subvert them! They're good tropes for a reason!

I like minor magics/subtle things at least as much as giant world-changing magics. Honestly, I just like seeing magic as technology or technology as magic—show me how these different ways of interacting with the world are integrated into everyday lives (or how they aren't but could be and ordinary people get annoyed about it) and I'll be very happy.

I love weird god shit. I'm equally cool with vast unknowable deities and with really mundane "we're people but with a ton of power" kinds of gods. I love gods of very specific domains, and I love people yelling at gods for not being good enough.

My love of loyalty kink and hierarchy and competence porn comes out in my love for both noble+bodyguard kinds of things and military specfic. I really like seeing women rescue themselves and each other, too.

Please feel free to use anywhere you want as your setting or the inspiration for your setting! The Middle East and the Amazon and Oceania and the Arctic Circle and Thailand and the Serengeti are all just as cool (and honestly more interesting due to rarity than) European-based settings. I have a fondness for natural settings, but I also love reading about solarpunk cities and sci-fi space stations and fantasy castles.

A lot of prompts are read as assuming baseline humans unless stated otherwise. That's fine. However, I'm also happy to see you take these prompts and write about non-human characters!


Opt-Ins: Things I'm Open To (Which Are Often DNW'd)

If you've got an idea that involves any of these topics, you're welcome to go for it! I rarely seek out this stuff (but I might if I'm in a particular mood), but I'm not against any of it so long as it suits the story.

Do Not Wants