User blog comment:UltimateTORINOR/Featured Story: How New is Too New?/@comment-1874924-20100516170237

To expand on what others have said, Ult, take a look at who is opposing your 3-chapter story. If they're not the same people who are supporting 4-chapter stories, there's your explanation. If they are the same people, then maybe their just doing a favor for a writer whom they know better than they know you. As long as an Oppose voter doesn't pronounce it a bad story, publicity is publicity.

For my part, I never vote to Oppose unless I truly think a story is so poorly written as to be inherently unworthy of FS status. Even then, I will normally Oppose only once. (That's why I'm not opposing Travelization this month. It doesn't have a serious chance to win, and I made my editorial point last month.) Conversely, I can't in good conscience Support a story I haven't read, although I know that doesn't stop some people.

A competition story is most likely to win when it is nearly finished or recently finished. That said, a quixotic early nomination is a perfectly legitimate way to get the word out on a good new story--especially if the author is also new to the wiki. The TDNC nomination was, after all, how you came to my attention; and my first nomination of Legacy, only 3 weeks after I joined the wiki, helped put me on the map.

Another noteworthy point is that long stories tend to get more consideration than shorter stories, probably because people tend to regard them (not unreasonably) as requiring more creative energy. If Legacy, clocking in at "only" 10k words, wins this month (and it's currently in the lead--a round of thanks to everyone here who's supporting it) it would be the shortest FS winner to date. (Total Drama Isle, currently the shortest winner, runs ~15k words.) The story length issue obviously won't be a problem for TDNC, and I fully expect it to be Featured in the fullness of time.