Trick or Treat 2024 schedule & info post

[pumpkinkingmod]

This is the general schedule & informational post.

General Links

2024 Collection
2024 Tagset

2024 Schedule

Sept 1 – Nominations Open
Sept 8 – Nominations Close
Sept 11 – Sign-Ups Open
Sept 18 – Sign-Ups Close
October 24 – Assignments Due
October 31 – Gift Reveals (16:59 UTC)
November 7 – Creator Reveals (16:59 UTC)

All times are 23:59 UTC unless otherwise specified.

The Basics

Trick or Treat is an exchange in the style of exchanges like Yuletide or Chocolate Box. It is inspired by a real world holiday, but you do not need to celebrate Halloween to participate in this exchange.

Each participant will receive at least one gift. The gift will be a trick or a treat, and gift minimums are 300 words for fic or a nice sketch for art. A trick should be more horror, occult, supernatural, or scary. A treat should be more sweet, sexy, or fluffy. These are a bit vague to give the writer/artist room for how they interpret trick or treat.

Participants must be 18 years or older.



Nominations

The first phase of Trick or Treat is nominations, where you submit the fandoms and characters/relationships that you are interested in receiving in this exchange to the tag set. Each person can nominate eight fandoms with eight character or relationship tags from each fandom. The tag set is what AO3’s assignment generating algorithm uses to match requests and offers later in the process.

What fandoms are eligible?

Traditional fandoms, RPF, and some fanworks are all eligible. You can also request Original Work and crossovers.

There are three extra rules for RPF:

1) Non-famous friends and family are not eligible.
2) The person in question can be removed from the tagset at the request of the individual.
3) For contemporary RPF the individuals must be over the age of 18.

While rarely invoked, PumpkinKing can choose not to accept a nomination that is in bad taste. Examples of this would be Nazi RPF, modern serial killer RPF, or COVID-19 related nominations. These sorts of nominations will be rejected.

Nominations format

You can nominate characters and/or relationships under each fandom you nominate. For AO3 matching algorithm reasons, both characters and relationships are nominated under the “Characters” slot in the tag set, and relationships should be specified by including “Ship:” in front of the pairing.

All fandoms in the tag set need to be nominated with at least one character or relationship tag under that fandom.

For all tags:
Please nominate original works under the fandom Original Work.

Please avoid using pipes where possible and do not use diacritics/tone marks where unnecessary.

All character and ship nominations must be disambiguated. (See below for an explanation!)

Please use the name order as in the canon ("Given Name Family Name" for most western canons, "Family Name Given Name" for most Asian canons).

For relationship tags:
You may nominate / or & relationships. "A/B" is a romantic or sexual relationship; "A & B" is a platonic relationship.

Please alphabetize ships by family name.

Please nominate crossovers under the fandom Crossover Fandom, with ships in the format:
Ship: Yuri Plisetsky (YOI) & Rajah (Aladdin).

What is disambiguation?

This means adding the fandom in brackets after your nomination. Some examples:

Sakurayashiki Kaoru (SK8)
Leia Organa (SWOT)
Luke Skywalker (SWST)
Ship: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (BBC Sherlock)
Ship: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson (Sherlock Holmes - ACD)
Ship: Mia Fey/Phoenix Wright (Ace Attorney)
Ship: Enoshima Junko/Tsumiki Mikan (DR Hope's Peak)
Ship: James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers (Marvel 616)

You cannot nominate both / and & in a single tag. This means any nominations like "Ship: Aerith/Tifa & Cloud (FFVII)" will be rejected.

Before nominating, please check if your fandom is already in the tagset, and what disambiguations were used. Your nominations get approved faster if they are already in the correct format.

Signups

Requests

You must make 3-10 requests. Each request has one fandom, 1-20 characters/relationships, and 1-4 medium/preference tags.

Requests for individual characters can be gen or shippy. You may request a single character and mention in your optional details what scenarios or ships you would enjoy them in; however, a ship is not guaranteed.

If you absolutely want to see the character interacting with a specific other character, make sure to request ship tags — Ship: A/B for romantic or sexual interactions, Ship: A & B for neither romantic nor sexual ones.

Medium and trick/treat preferences:

Fanart - Trick
Fanart - Treat
Fanfic - Trick
Fanfic - Treat

A trick should be more horror, occult, supernatural, or scary. A treat should be more sweet, sexy, or fluffy. These are a bit vague to give the writer/artist room for how they interpret trick or treat.

There are also four optional freeform tags where you can:

1) opt out of receiving extra gifts (you may still receive multiple gifts if more than one person is assigned to you)
2) allow creators to ignore your medium preference for extra gifts
3) allow creators to ignore your trick/treat preference for extra gifts
4) ask that your medium and trick/treat preferences be respected for extra gifts

Gifts that ignore your preference cannot become main gifts if your giver defaults. These tags are not used for matching and their use is completely optional. If you don’t use these tags, “Medium and trick/treat preferences must be respected for extra gifts” is the assumed default.

You also have the option to add optional details or a link to a letter. These can be very useful to give your writer/artist ideas for possible tricks and treats. It can also be invaluable for telling them what you do not want at all.

If you have anything you Do Not Want (DNW), it must be in the AO3 sign-up form directly to be enforceable. Authors/artists should respect the do not want list; however, the requester should not abuse it to try and force the author/artist into a corner. Do Not Wants that appear only in an external letter will not be enforced.

Offers

You must make 4-10 offers. Each offer has one fandom, 1-20 characters/relationships, and 1-4 medium/preference tags.

For offers, "Any" can be selected for characters/relationships and mediums. "Any" means any nominated character or relationship from that fandom, not any character/ship in the fandom in general.

How does matching work?

Trick or Treat uses the AO3 exchange matching algorithm, using “OR” matching. That means in order for a creator to match to a potential recipient, only ONE combination of their fandoms/characters (or ships)/trick or treat choices needs to match. The exception to this are the additional tags regarding extra treat preferences--these are not matched on.

Medium preferences are baked into the Trick and Treat tags, so they’re also matched on.

What is the mod stance on socks (multiple accounts)?

You may sign-up with two accounts. If one account is banned then all of your accounts are banned.

What if no one offers what I request?

Then you will go to the pinch hit list and someone will claim you.

What if nobody is requesting what I'm offering?

You will be contacted after sign-ups end to add offers based on what is being requested. If you don't wish to add offers, your sign-up will be deleted.

It's recommended to keep an eye on the requests summary and adjust your offers based on what is being requested.

Assignments

Minimum Requirements

Assignments need to include one of your recipient’s requested fandoms and one of the characters/relationships requested in that fandom. They also need to be one of the media requested, and themed trick or treat according to their request.

NOTE: an A/B request is for a romantic or sexual relationship; A & B is for a platonic relationship. Both requested characters must be included to fulfill an A/B or A & B request.

Fanfic minimums: 300 words
Fanart minimums: a nice sketch, not on lined paper

Works need to be complete, newly published for this exchange, and created by you. AI-generated content does not fulfill requests. Edited graphics/photo manipulations do not fulfill fanart requests unless the recipient specifically says they want graphics in their signup.

Posting

In order to post, go to your AO3 assignments page and click the "fulfill" button on your assignment. That will take you to a new-works form with the assignment and recipient already tickied.

As long as you post it like that, it'll end up in the ToT collection and will be anonymous until creator reveals.

Deadline

The deadline is October 24, 23:59 UTC. No extensions will be granted, so please plan ahead accordingly.

If you can’t complete your assignment by the deadline, you can default. The sooner you do, the sooner a pinch hitter can take over your assignment and make a gift. If you default, you will no longer be guaranteed a gift, and you won’t go to the pinch hit list if your own writer/artist defaults.

Anonymity

Works are anonymous until creator reveals, one week after work reveals.

Extra Treats

Extra Treats are works created without being officially assigned. Anybody may create extra treats, whether they are signed up or not.

The same rules apply for extra treats as main assignments: they must include a requested fandom and requested character/ship, and respect DNWs. They must also respect the recipient’s trick/treat and fic/art preferences unless the recipient has opted into additional gift types for treats.

To post a treat, go to the collection profile and click the "Post to Collection" button. That will take you to a new-work submission page with the collection info already added.

You'll need to add the recipient's username in the "Gift this work to" field (in the "Associations" section).

There is no deadline for extra treats, and they can be posted at any time.

Extra Treats do not have to be “treats” in the Trick or Treat sense; they can be tricks. The “extra treat” terminology originated separately from Trick or Treat’s tricks vs. treats terminology.

Community Challenge

Every year a challenge is given to the community. The specifics change from year to year. Last year it was a challenge to treat everyone signed up to the exchange, and previous events have included bingo and battle of the bands. To check out previous community challenges click the tag. Community challenges are revealed before sign-ups start.

Ground Rules

- The aim of this exchange is to create gifts that the recipients will enjoy. If you break the rules above or are found to be participating in bad faith (e.g. signing up with multiple accounts in bad faith; acting spitefully towards other participants), you may be banned from participation.
- Participants must be 18 years or older.

Other questions?

Comment on this post or email halloweenmod@gmx.com.

Please note the time-change on reveals!

Comments

[pumpkinkingmod]

Thanks! Unfortunately I'm not going to update tags at this point.