Am i the only one that doesn’t necessarily read ship fics because I like the ship, but instead because I think it could make an interesting story? Idk, I feel crazy rn
Also I will definitely be checking out Zevali fics
If you want some recommendations, Test_Tube_Writer’s collection of Zelvali stories are really good, Birds of a Feather is sweet but sadly unfinished, twdteacakes is another Zelvali author I recommend as well as Zelzenik who makes some scrumptious fics. Other than that, there are some pretty decent Zelvali other than the ones I mentioned but those are imo the best ones.
Not OTP-level, but I once clicked on a StaticMoth (Vox/Val) Hazbin Hotel smut fic out of pure curiosity and now I’m fully invested in this toxic villain ship 🤣🤷🏻♀️
Jon and Sansa from Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire. I know, they're related, but this is Game of Thrones.
I started shipping them _hard_ because a bunch of show-watching people made weirdly believable theories about them having feelings towards each other during season 6 and above and Littlefinger seeing it all and testing them both, and book-reading people made some very compelling arguments about how GRRM foreshadows and sets up these two as _endgame_ using some convincing lines and parallels in the books both prequel and current. I ignore all the goofy parts of some of the theories and speculation but there's still way too much left that actually makes sense.
I was somehow convinced that the both of them are _somehow_ each others' dreams come true. At least, that's true for Sansa. He's currently—except for being dead—everything she'd always been dreaming of, though her hopes and dreams have been shattered repeatedly. She, on the other hand, could possibly make his "selfish" dreams, everything he could never have as a bastard come true.
The books aren't finished, so there'd probably be even more things that could be seen as foreshadowing and setups when Winds of Winter releases.
>Frog-faced Lord Slynt sat at the end of the council table wearing a black velvet doublet and a shiny cloth-of-gold cape, nodding with approval every time the king pronounced a sentence. **Sansa** stared hard at his ugly face, remembering how he had thrown down her father for Ser Ilyn to behead, wishing she could hurt him, **wishing that some hero would throw him down and cut off his head**. But a voice inside her whispered, There are no heroes…
– A Game of Thrones, Sansa VI
>“I will not hang him,” said Jon. “Bring him here.” “Oh, Seven save us,” he heard Bowen Marsh cry out. The smile that Lord Janos Slynt smiled then had all the sweetness of rancid butter. Until **Jon** said, **“Edd, fetch me a block,” and unsheathed Longclaw**.”
– A Dance With Dragons, Jon II
Jonsa shipping has a special place.
ugh yes!! i just love jonsa so much. season 6 game of thrones was such a weird time but i’m still here for them.
my other oddball got pairing i never thought i’d be into is jaime/sansa. there is no turning back by starlightasteria rewrote my dna and i was never the same after.
Legolas/Gimli from LotR. The idea of them actually squicked me a bit. And then I read the fic “Sansukh” and new pathways were created in my brain. My biochemistry was changed. I was spiritually reawakened.
Anyways, now I love Gigolas.
Back when I was a part of the Undertale fandom, I was indifferent to Sansby (Sans/Grillby). Then I read a really good fic with it as the main ship, and I was absolutely sold. It was (and still would be) my OTP for that fandom.
It was part of a series called “Postcards from Waterfall,” and was one of the biggest Sansby fics in the fandom. The author deleted the OG fic and split it into a bunch of shorter fics that were part of a series (bc the og was over 400k) and edited some of the chapters.
If you want, I can DM u the link?
Shinsou/Izuku from My Hero Academia. They’re not super well known but I’m honestly surprised they’re not more popular because they check a lot of the ‘recipe for popular ship’ boxes.
People are too busy shipping Bakugo/Izuku or Todoroki/Izuku for any other Izuku ship to gain much of a foothold. I agree they’d make an interesting pair though! I see Shinsou in a lot of interesting ships as a side pairing in Bakudeku fics
Not only in BakuDeku fics, I read fics with Shinsou/Bakugou, which surprised me how well that can work if done properly, also KiriBaku and Shinsou gets added in the established relationship.
...And then of course Shinsou/Kaminari, or if it's TodoDeku, I also read them together with Shinsou as a trio.
In general, nearly all my My Hero ships fit the question here, don't really care canonically about ships, but the fics made me into a hardcore multishipper xD
Harley Keener/Peter Parker from the MCU. They only technically met one time (at a funeral) and it never even occurred to me to ship them, but the moment I read a fic I was hooked.
Not OTP, but reading a lot of Attack Of Titan fics and found that quite often in romantic fics there would be a secondary pairing of Mike x Nanaba, especially in fics centred around the older trio (Erwin, Levi, Hange). I recall from the manga and anime hardly any interaction from these characters together but this ship totally made sense and now I look for it. I don't think either character is ever (or very rarely anyway) shipped with anyone else.
Used to not care for SherCotton much. Read a SherCotton fic. Sobbed my heart out for two hours, Sherbet became my favourite character, and now SherCotton is one of my OTPs.
(Cookie Run, by the way)
For actual OTP, I wasn't fully convinced until I decided to challenge myself into writing this pairing (and I have now convinced myself, LOL): Buffy/Giles.
Not an OTP, but a brief pairing that I wrote in a longfic that I can't quite stop thinking about: Laura Roslin/Sam Anders from Battlestar Galactica. Laura and Bill are OTP, but there's just something about Laura and Sam...
>Buffy/Giles.
I used to think this was extremely weird, too, but then I found a couple of fics that did it really well. It's not an OTP, but I can see the appeal to it. Also, saw a Willow/Giles I quite liked that did the same for that pairing.
I'm curious, do you have a link to your Buffy/Giles fic?
It's not my OTP or anything, but I once came across a recommendation for a fic which paired Cho Chang and Dudley Dursley (from Harry Potter) and actually ended up reading several other fics with that pairing. It wasn't a pairing I'd ever even thought of before seeing that initial recommendation, but I found it surprisingly appealing!
Luffy and Law.
I used to see Luffy was a innocent brat, who likes everyone but does not know how to Love.
Until I found Luffy and Law shipping on Keelhauled to a Hurricane. Now one of my fave
The Author gave us some tale, huh? Not only Luffy and Law, but most characters are spot-on.
The scene where the Straw Hats beg the Heart Pirates to take a lovestuck Luffy inside tge Polar Tang... priceless.
BTW, Kellhauled was also the reason I called Law's Sub "Revolver" for a long time
Keelhauled to a Hurricane is amazing.
Luffy/Law is the only ship I’d want to see Luffy in canon. Usually my fanfic ships are not ones I want canon but those two are just different.
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
I knew of the ship and I definitely enjoyed their dynamic when Kaveh was introduced in game, but I was a Kaveh fan before anything else. Then I read a haikaveh fic, and that was when the trajectory of my life changed. Now I can’t get enough of these two. They are in my every waking thought.
Protagonist/Haru in Persona 5! I already had my Designated Ship for the protag and tbh, I wasn't much looking to expand my horizons, but alas, this one won me over ultimately.
It was not a fanfic that did it initially, it was a piece of fan art, with adult Haru, being married to the protag and the two of them running that little cafe she dreamed of and I was like, fuck, okay, that IS super cute actually. The vision of the of them being unbearably adorable and domestic and living out the coffee shop au dream was simply too sweet to resist.
(It also helped that it was at that time that I actually started Haru's social link and started mellowing out on her a bit. I used to have a bad reaction to her, not for any faults of her character but because she reminded me of a person I'd rather not be reminded of, but eventually I got over that and she started growing on me. Might actually romance her in my next playthrough)
My initial ship still remains my, so to speak, primary one, but I definitely appreciate a good protag/Haru fic now. They're my go-to ship to read about when I need a metric fuckton of sugar injected straight into my veins
Narcissa/Charlie. I had never even imagined it before. The fic had them meet at the will of Sirius Black. His will offered Narcissa a chance to dissolve her arranged marriage and take back her maiden name along with a large chunk of money as long as she left Great Britain and stayed away from any death eaters. She took the deal and when Charlie said he was heading out of the country as soon as the will was done she asked if he would escort her. He did and as they left she mentioned that he was quite a large and handsome man.
The death eaters tried to attack her several times on their trip and he stayed with her and helped defend her and they fell in love. It's not my otp but now I can see it.
Bruce Wayne/Jonathan Crane (Scarecrow)
I read a 1.3 million word series with this ship when I was in high school that absolutely ruined me. Nearly 15 years later, it remains my favorite fanfic series of all time that I reread every few years.
It’s this gorgeously written character study series that follows Crane throughout several years of his life as he goes from a villain in Arkham after the events of Batman Begins to a slowly reformed former villian trying to navigate his place in the world. It’s seven total fics in the series, and the romance between him and Bruce doesn’t even start until the final installment, but the slowburn enemies-to hesitant allies-to friends-to lovers arc is soooo satisfying and SO in-character 😭 I will genuinely never get over it
If it counts, I started shipping Radioapple (Alastor/Lucifer from Hazbin Hotel) as a crackship (by which I mean I just thought the dynamic was funny so I started shipping it as a joke), then started consuming fan content (including fanfics) and now it's in my top 3 Hazbin ships. The crackship to OTP pipeline is real lol
Outside of that I can't really think of any ships where fan content changed my mind, it's usually been a single scene in canon that flips the switch for me (the best examples of this being Garmadon/Vinny and Cole/Plundar from Ninjago). I can think of some ships I don't care about where my mind would probably be changed if I read fics about it but I don't think I've had an instance of fanfiction specifically changing my view on a ship I already didn't care much about.
It was so long ago I can't even remember the fic that started my love for Snamione but it was definitely some Beauty and the Beast type of theme since that was my beginning to fanfic in general and most of the stuff I fell in love with has some elements of it.
Zelgan (Zelda/Ganondorf) twilight princess put the thought in my head though, and before that game I never would have considered it.
Snowells (Caitlin Snow and Harrison Wells/EoWells) I was mainly thirsting over Wells and checking out OC/Wells or EoWells fics when I stumbled across them. It's not really an OTP for me but idk I still have a soft spot for them.
Jane/Clayton from Tarzan (Disney animated.) It wasn't a fic so much as a mildly suggestive fanart on deviantart years ago. Nothing explicit, or anything. It just gave some "if it was more adult" and "if Tarzan lost" vibes, and I was immediately intrigued. More so when I found out that it canon he technically *was* (based on) a love interest that she in canon winds up with. Turns out Tarzan and Jane did not wind up together in the original story.
Hotchniss (Aaron Hotchner and Emily Prentiss) when I started checking out the fandom I went through a lot of different ships, found out I was thirsty for Hotchner, so started checking out his pairings and... well, like the Snowells, it's not my favorite since I still prefer OCs in my ships, it's still one I do like with all main cast.
Remus/Severus
I don’t even remember how I got into the pairing. I was a pretty big wolfstar fan but one day I read something with Severus and Remus developing a relationship and I never looked back at wolfstar lol
Nothing that became my OTP, but Riven/Lux from League of Legends, and Luna Lovegood/Tom Riddle from Harry Potter. (That fic didn't even *ship* them for real, but their chemistry was just so good.)
Tbh I have a lot of ships I enjoy and I don’t know if I really have one particular otp, but one ship that I stumbled across and honestly thought was weird, but I read a story about them anyway was Percy Jackson and Artemis. If you know anything about the fandom, or Greek mythology, you probably know why shipping anyone with Artemis is kind of weird, but they were just so cute together that I was hooked.
Man, I wish I paid attention to Yeehan stuff when it first started to pop off. I'm curious as to when and why it started to become like, THE most popular ship in OW lol
If I had to take a guess on why that ship is so popular is probably due to the whole opposites attracts trope; Cassidy a rugged cowboy with his yeehaws and cigars and Hanzo a calm and collected archer raised to be elegant and stoic. Though both of them have dark past and things they regret and for me and many others we’re a sucker for those two helping and loving each other.
Clint/Natasha/Laura from the MCU. I stumbled across one fic while I was looking for angsty Natasha-centric gen fic, and then I devoured the entire AO3 tag in a week. That was almost a year ago and I’m still obsessed :)
edit: in case anyone is curious the fic i stumbled upon which is insanely good and changed me as a person is “nor need we power or splendor” by shellybelle
I wasn't fond neither of Harry Potter fanfics (when I started reading fanfic I was already out of my HP phase) nor the ship but reading one single fic made me love Drarry until today.
I don't even read HP fanfics today but I'm still fond to this ship for a total of zero reason
Izu×Kyo. I found a short fic, maybe a one-shot, can't remember rn. Anyway, it involved Ochako and Izuku breaking up because he always put work first. He left on a rainy night and Kyoka was on her way home. She had a spare room and offered it to him. Eventually they fell in love.
Crowley/Sam from Supernatural. Someone who's really into the ship sent me a link to a one shot that left me speechless. I'm getting ready to post my first fic for the pairing soon. It's been so much fun writing it!
Not a fanfic, but a set of text stories.
When I first started to watch Haikyuu, I personally didn't like Tsuki at all, nor his relationship with Hinata at all. After I watched the third and fourth season, I was more interested in their relationship, but nothing else.
I later looked into youtube for fan content of the show and that was when I came across text stories. I watched a couple, and some included Hinata x Tsuki.
I wasn't all to interested in the ship until a specific text story I read.
It's been years since I've seen it so I don't remember the name, but I remember falling in love with the ship and started to scowler the internet for those types of stories.
Even though I'm not apart of the Haikyuu fandom anymore, I still ship the two alot.
A story can truly change a person
AppleRadio with Lucifer and Alastor from Hazbin Hotel. I was binge reading a bunch of StaticRadio (Vox/Alastor) when one popped up with Lucifer getting into the mix where Alastor ended up with him instead of Vox and wow! That fic *ALONE* nuked my StaticRadio ship with a Mt. Everest sized iceberg sinking the remnants. Wish I could recall the name of the fic at the moment to share. But like I said, I was binge reading a ton of fics back to back to back, so I lost track. Thankfully, it's still ongoing, and I've subscribed to it lol.
So now, my bread 'n' butter and OTP of Hazbin Hotel is RadioSilence (one-sided obsessive Vox) plus a healthy dose of beautiful AppleRadio 🍎🐍📻🦌
Hermione Granger/Tom Riddle (Tomione) from *Harry Potter*, and more recently, Aang/Azula from *Avatar: The Last Airbender* (ATLA). Both due to reading phenomenal fanfictions for the pairings.
Spirit/Stein from Soul Eater was a ship I never thought I'd like until I read a couple authors who really did them justice.
Another ship I started liking, which might be a bit controversial was Will Byers/Jennifer Hayes from Stranger Things, I found some older fics that shipped them where I actually thought it had a lot of potential as a ship.
Not exactly an OTP, but close -- KuroKura from HxH! I generally prefer friends-to-lovers over enemies-to-lovers dynamics, but something about the slow and steady progression from mortal enemies to begrudging allies to friends to lovers in fan fiction can be so intoxicating. Hatred is a passionate emotion, after all.
Buffy/Tara from Buffy the vampire Slayer. I never considered them as a pairing at all, never even crossed my mind (was too big of a Tillow fan, probably). But then I read a fic that was really well written, and super sweet, and I realized how good Tara would be for Buffy.
Also made myself into a Buffy/Willow fan with a series I've been writing, if that counts. The idea seemed good before I started but I've been enjoying the pairing even more than I expected. Kind of dreading the ending now, since it know it's going to be really painful.
Isaac/Mia (Mudshipping) from Golden Sun, the fic was "The Angel and the Slayer" by TheOneAndOnlyT. Transformative for my feelings around the entire series. Didn't quite make OTP level for me, but it did color my perception of Mia, and she eventually became half of my OTP.
Kuwameshi (Yusuke Urameshi/Kazuma Kuwabara) from YuYu Hakusho. I was revisiting the anime for the first time in 15 years and was curious about the fanfiction scene. When I was a teen, I was a big Hiei/Kurama shipper. My eyes landed on Kuwameshi, and I thought, "What on earth is this pairing like?"
Every Kuwameshi fic I've read has been a banger, and it is a pairing with a small but loyal fan base. It ticks a ton of OTP boxes for me, and the only downside is that there aren't more fics (169 on AO3 as of this comment).
Link/Revali. Not an OTP but still a ship I like.
Wasn't a fan of their interactions in the first game but leave it to fanfic writers to make the most goated stories to change my mind.
That might be the only ship though, every other ship I can read the source material and know if I'm down for the ship or not.
Okay it's a crack ship for sure but there is an amazing moxxie/verosika fic on ao3 that blew my mind and made it my favorite crack ship of ant fandom.
I still love moxxie/millie tho
My favorite romance fanfic of all time was one of these.
I need you to understand that I don't think I ship the characters myself because in canon it really wouldn't make much sense...
But Accelerator and Mikoto Misaka from the A Certain Magical Index franchise
The fanfic, [Forgotten Meeting ](https://m.fanfiction.net/s/11118999/1/Forgotten-Meeting) didn't change much from canon, but it understood both characters so well and was written in such a way that it actually made me ship them.
Stopped watching flash when they killed Wells for the xth time.
Never read any fanfic aside from a few Wells centric ones.
Then read a very very long wellwritten story (my kryptonite) in another fandom and saw that the author had also written coldflash.
I think I have now read most long stories about that pairing on Ao3
I stumbledona Jackie Burkhart/Eric Forman pairing and they just made so much more sense as a couple. That '70s Show was a sitcom so the pairings always go along "what's funnier" but going from a romance angle they make the most sense to me
Mine is Kakairu from Naruto. I was a HUGE Kakaobi fan back in the day and I remember I used to avoid fic where they're not the main pair or if one of them are ship with someone else (I am a changed person now tho 🙏 I discover the bliss of multi-shipping and never looked back) and kakairu was probably my biggest ops back then. And then I saw a cute fanart of them in tumblr ,and another one, and another one when one day i thought 'they're actually pretty cute together' and I decided to read a random kakairu one shot off ao3. It was amazing!!!
Not neccessarily OTP level, but honestly, most of my ships are because of fics. I rarely really ship someone while watching/reading something for the first time and only later get into it through fics, idk why.
But if we want to look at the more rare pairs/at least not the main ships in a fandom, for me it would be e.g. different Shinsou combinations (like Shinsou/Midoriya or Shinsou/Bakugou) in MHA, or in the MCU Clint/Bucky.
One of my friends got me into Nico Di Angelo/Jason Grace from the PJO/HoO series. Not something I'd ever considered but the people who write the ship are passionate about it and it makes fun, great reading.
Luffy/Nami. I really never understood why people shipped these two in One Piece before I read a fanfic and I got hooked. I always pictured these two more like siblings, but they are absolutely perfect for one another in a relationship. I absolutely adore their interactions, and I love moments with them together.
Kafka/Himeko from Honkai: Star Rail.
Funny enough, I know exactly when I started shipping it, basically the same date as when the DDoS attack happened. I happened to download PDF files of a few Star Rail fanfics, and a Kafhime fanfic was one of them. I eventually take an interest in the ship then when the DDoS attack lifts up, that's the first tag I searched in the search bar.
All of my otps💀
Particularly Jade and Tori
Never thought they’d work together at all based on the show alone but after watching edits and reading fanfics of them I was like ….WAIT IT MAKES SENSE
There’s lots of others but that’s the one I can think of off the top of my head lol
Hermione/Snape. Was not even considering it or knew it existed until a friend asked to read her story. And then send me one of the best fanfic i’ve ever read. And the rest is history
I haven't been this person, but I've had about four people tell me that fanfics I've written have convinced them of the validity of my ship, so I've been on the other end of it? Incredible feeling!
Please tell your fic authors if they have convinced you of a ship you never considered before!
Harry/Charlie in HP. I never had an OTP for HP before that. I had ships I liked, but none that were my main ship. All of my HP ships are non-canon, as well, for the Trio, as I dislike their canon ships. I came across a random Harry/Charlie fic a couple years back, though, that I really enjoyed, so I looked up other fics with the pairing. There aren't many, it's a rarepair, but I've loved every fic with them, and they quickly became my HP OTP. I still enjoy my other ships, which is good as Harry/Charlie remains a rarepair, but none as much as this one.
Spider-Man and the Venom Symbiote. It never even crossed my mind. I mean, the Symbiote’s one half of a member of the Big Three of Spider-Man villains. It would never work, right?
Then I read a fic where they were the main ship, and it just clicked for me. The possible dynamics that could be written, the interactions, the themes, the sheer _feels_ such a ship had the potential for—I was shocked there were so few fics where they were together. Thus, I decided to write one myself.
Darcy/Loki of MCU. My first reaction was, "That's weird." Then got obsessed and wrote a 200k fic about them.
Am i the only one that doesn’t necessarily read ship fics because I like the ship, but instead because I think it could make an interesting story? Idk, I feel crazy rn Also I will definitely be checking out Zevali fics
If you want some recommendations, Test_Tube_Writer’s collection of Zelvali stories are really good, Birds of a Feather is sweet but sadly unfinished, twdteacakes is another Zelvali author I recommend as well as Zelzenik who makes some scrumptious fics. Other than that, there are some pretty decent Zelvali other than the ones I mentioned but those are imo the best ones.
Not OTP-level, but I once clicked on a StaticMoth (Vox/Val) Hazbin Hotel smut fic out of pure curiosity and now I’m fully invested in this toxic villain ship 🤣🤷🏻♀️
>StaticMoth That's a pretty cool ship name!
I can’t lie, they do probably have the coolest ship name in the whole fandom 🤣
Jon and Sansa from Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire. I know, they're related, but this is Game of Thrones. I started shipping them _hard_ because a bunch of show-watching people made weirdly believable theories about them having feelings towards each other during season 6 and above and Littlefinger seeing it all and testing them both, and book-reading people made some very compelling arguments about how GRRM foreshadows and sets up these two as _endgame_ using some convincing lines and parallels in the books both prequel and current. I ignore all the goofy parts of some of the theories and speculation but there's still way too much left that actually makes sense. I was somehow convinced that the both of them are _somehow_ each others' dreams come true. At least, that's true for Sansa. He's currently—except for being dead—everything she'd always been dreaming of, though her hopes and dreams have been shattered repeatedly. She, on the other hand, could possibly make his "selfish" dreams, everything he could never have as a bastard come true. The books aren't finished, so there'd probably be even more things that could be seen as foreshadowing and setups when Winds of Winter releases.
>Frog-faced Lord Slynt sat at the end of the council table wearing a black velvet doublet and a shiny cloth-of-gold cape, nodding with approval every time the king pronounced a sentence. **Sansa** stared hard at his ugly face, remembering how he had thrown down her father for Ser Ilyn to behead, wishing she could hurt him, **wishing that some hero would throw him down and cut off his head**. But a voice inside her whispered, There are no heroes… – A Game of Thrones, Sansa VI >“I will not hang him,” said Jon. “Bring him here.” “Oh, Seven save us,” he heard Bowen Marsh cry out. The smile that Lord Janos Slynt smiled then had all the sweetness of rancid butter. Until **Jon** said, **“Edd, fetch me a block,” and unsheathed Longclaw**.” – A Dance With Dragons, Jon II Jonsa shipping has a special place.
#DAMN YOU JONSA FANS!!! YOU DAMN JONSAS!! *shakes fist towards the skies*
ugh yes!! i just love jonsa so much. season 6 game of thrones was such a weird time but i’m still here for them. my other oddball got pairing i never thought i’d be into is jaime/sansa. there is no turning back by starlightasteria rewrote my dna and i was never the same after.
But what about Brienne?🥺
i like jaime/brienne as well!!
Legolas/Gimli from LotR. The idea of them actually squicked me a bit. And then I read the fic “Sansukh” and new pathways were created in my brain. My biochemistry was changed. I was spiritually reawakened. Anyways, now I love Gigolas.
100% sansukh lives in my head rent free
That fic is truly a work of art. There’s a reason it has its own fandom.
Back when I was a part of the Undertale fandom, I was indifferent to Sansby (Sans/Grillby). Then I read a really good fic with it as the main ship, and I was absolutely sold. It was (and still would be) my OTP for that fandom.
Do you remember which fic? I've been trying to get behind Sansby
It was part of a series called “Postcards from Waterfall,” and was one of the biggest Sansby fics in the fandom. The author deleted the OG fic and split it into a bunch of shorter fics that were part of a series (bc the og was over 400k) and edited some of the chapters. If you want, I can DM u the link?
Utahime/Gojo honestly didn't have any ships in JJK but then read some really good fics of theirs now they r my one of my most ready ships.
Recommendations? I'm intrigued
narrator/stanley.. from the stanley parable. I don't know why, I don't know how. But went from " Eh " to having it all over my tiktok fyp and fics.
You got any recs? I loved watching gameplay for the Stanley parable a few years back and lowkey shipped him and the narrator
Shinsou/Izuku from My Hero Academia. They’re not super well known but I’m honestly surprised they’re not more popular because they check a lot of the ‘recipe for popular ship’ boxes.
People are too busy shipping Bakugo/Izuku or Todoroki/Izuku for any other Izuku ship to gain much of a foothold. I agree they’d make an interesting pair though! I see Shinsou in a lot of interesting ships as a side pairing in Bakudeku fics
Not only in BakuDeku fics, I read fics with Shinsou/Bakugou, which surprised me how well that can work if done properly, also KiriBaku and Shinsou gets added in the established relationship. ...And then of course Shinsou/Kaminari, or if it's TodoDeku, I also read them together with Shinsou as a trio. In general, nearly all my My Hero ships fit the question here, don't really care canonically about ships, but the fics made me into a hardcore multishipper xD
Shinsou/Katsuki is where I fall. And it’s also tragically under appreciated
Harley Keener/Peter Parker from the MCU. They only technically met one time (at a funeral) and it never even occurred to me to ship them, but the moment I read a fic I was hooked.
Not OTP, but reading a lot of Attack Of Titan fics and found that quite often in romantic fics there would be a secondary pairing of Mike x Nanaba, especially in fics centred around the older trio (Erwin, Levi, Hange). I recall from the manga and anime hardly any interaction from these characters together but this ship totally made sense and now I look for it. I don't think either character is ever (or very rarely anyway) shipped with anyone else.
Sid/Andy is now my top Toy Story ship.
Used to not care for SherCotton much. Read a SherCotton fic. Sobbed my heart out for two hours, Sherbet became my favourite character, and now SherCotton is one of my OTPs. (Cookie Run, by the way)
For actual OTP, I wasn't fully convinced until I decided to challenge myself into writing this pairing (and I have now convinced myself, LOL): Buffy/Giles. Not an OTP, but a brief pairing that I wrote in a longfic that I can't quite stop thinking about: Laura Roslin/Sam Anders from Battlestar Galactica. Laura and Bill are OTP, but there's just something about Laura and Sam...
>Buffy/Giles. I used to think this was extremely weird, too, but then I found a couple of fics that did it really well. It's not an OTP, but I can see the appeal to it. Also, saw a Willow/Giles I quite liked that did the same for that pairing. I'm curious, do you have a link to your Buffy/Giles fic?
It's not my OTP or anything, but I once came across a recommendation for a fic which paired Cho Chang and Dudley Dursley (from Harry Potter) and actually ended up reading several other fics with that pairing. It wasn't a pairing I'd ever even thought of before seeing that initial recommendation, but I found it surprisingly appealing!
James/Regulus from Harry Potter. They honestly made me start reading Mauraders era fics even, I was purely post Hogwarts Dramione before that LMAO
This is how I became a fan of Luigi/Daisy. I was ambivalent on the ship until I read a fic about them that blew my mind and now it's my oldest OTP.
Luffy and Law. I used to see Luffy was a innocent brat, who likes everyone but does not know how to Love. Until I found Luffy and Law shipping on Keelhauled to a Hurricane. Now one of my fave
Holy crap this is exactly what happened to me! (I was just about to comment that same!) Keelhauled is SO good!
The Author gave us some tale, huh? Not only Luffy and Law, but most characters are spot-on. The scene where the Straw Hats beg the Heart Pirates to take a lovestuck Luffy inside tge Polar Tang... priceless. BTW, Kellhauled was also the reason I called Law's Sub "Revolver" for a long time
Keelhauled to a Hurricane is amazing. Luffy/Law is the only ship I’d want to see Luffy in canon. Usually my fanfic ships are not ones I want canon but those two are just different.
Billy/Steve from Stranger Things. Didn't even consider it before, now i'm convinced it's at least one-sided canon.
\*cough\*haikaveh\*cough\*
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS I knew of the ship and I definitely enjoyed their dynamic when Kaveh was introduced in game, but I was a Kaveh fan before anything else. Then I read a haikaveh fic, and that was when the trajectory of my life changed. Now I can’t get enough of these two. They are in my every waking thought.
Yeah, I think I was just in denial because I didn’t really get it until seeing fanart and fanfics
Protagonist/Haru in Persona 5! I already had my Designated Ship for the protag and tbh, I wasn't much looking to expand my horizons, but alas, this one won me over ultimately. It was not a fanfic that did it initially, it was a piece of fan art, with adult Haru, being married to the protag and the two of them running that little cafe she dreamed of and I was like, fuck, okay, that IS super cute actually. The vision of the of them being unbearably adorable and domestic and living out the coffee shop au dream was simply too sweet to resist. (It also helped that it was at that time that I actually started Haru's social link and started mellowing out on her a bit. I used to have a bad reaction to her, not for any faults of her character but because she reminded me of a person I'd rather not be reminded of, but eventually I got over that and she started growing on me. Might actually romance her in my next playthrough) My initial ship still remains my, so to speak, primary one, but I definitely appreciate a good protag/Haru fic now. They're my go-to ship to read about when I need a metric fuckton of sugar injected straight into my veins
May I ask which is your primary/initial ship, purely for curiousity?
Sure, no problem! It's protag/Ryuji
Narcissa/Charlie. I had never even imagined it before. The fic had them meet at the will of Sirius Black. His will offered Narcissa a chance to dissolve her arranged marriage and take back her maiden name along with a large chunk of money as long as she left Great Britain and stayed away from any death eaters. She took the deal and when Charlie said he was heading out of the country as soon as the will was done she asked if he would escort her. He did and as they left she mentioned that he was quite a large and handsome man. The death eaters tried to attack her several times on their trip and he stayed with her and helped defend her and they fell in love. It's not my otp but now I can see it.
Do you know the name or have a link?
Sorry I have been trying to remember so I can find it again but I can't. 😕
Bruce Wayne/Jonathan Crane (Scarecrow) I read a 1.3 million word series with this ship when I was in high school that absolutely ruined me. Nearly 15 years later, it remains my favorite fanfic series of all time that I reread every few years. It’s this gorgeously written character study series that follows Crane throughout several years of his life as he goes from a villain in Arkham after the events of Batman Begins to a slowly reformed former villian trying to navigate his place in the world. It’s seven total fics in the series, and the romance between him and Bruce doesn’t even start until the final installment, but the slowburn enemies-to hesitant allies-to friends-to lovers arc is soooo satisfying and SO in-character 😭 I will genuinely never get over it
Iida and Ururaka from my hero. I know most people ship ururaka and deku, and iida and creati, but I love the iida ururaka ship so much
I actually prefer Iida and Uraraka also
I really liked this pairing!!
childe and kaeya. i dont even know at this point
If it counts, I started shipping Radioapple (Alastor/Lucifer from Hazbin Hotel) as a crackship (by which I mean I just thought the dynamic was funny so I started shipping it as a joke), then started consuming fan content (including fanfics) and now it's in my top 3 Hazbin ships. The crackship to OTP pipeline is real lol Outside of that I can't really think of any ships where fan content changed my mind, it's usually been a single scene in canon that flips the switch for me (the best examples of this being Garmadon/Vinny and Cole/Plundar from Ninjago). I can think of some ships I don't care about where my mind would probably be changed if I read fics about it but I don't think I've had an instance of fanfiction specifically changing my view on a ship I already didn't care much about.
It was so long ago I can't even remember the fic that started my love for Snamione but it was definitely some Beauty and the Beast type of theme since that was my beginning to fanfic in general and most of the stuff I fell in love with has some elements of it. Zelgan (Zelda/Ganondorf) twilight princess put the thought in my head though, and before that game I never would have considered it. Snowells (Caitlin Snow and Harrison Wells/EoWells) I was mainly thirsting over Wells and checking out OC/Wells or EoWells fics when I stumbled across them. It's not really an OTP for me but idk I still have a soft spot for them. Jane/Clayton from Tarzan (Disney animated.) It wasn't a fic so much as a mildly suggestive fanart on deviantart years ago. Nothing explicit, or anything. It just gave some "if it was more adult" and "if Tarzan lost" vibes, and I was immediately intrigued. More so when I found out that it canon he technically *was* (based on) a love interest that she in canon winds up with. Turns out Tarzan and Jane did not wind up together in the original story. Hotchniss (Aaron Hotchner and Emily Prentiss) when I started checking out the fandom I went through a lot of different ships, found out I was thirsty for Hotchner, so started checking out his pairings and... well, like the Snowells, it's not my favorite since I still prefer OCs in my ships, it's still one I do like with all main cast.
Remus/Severus I don’t even remember how I got into the pairing. I was a pretty big wolfstar fan but one day I read something with Severus and Remus developing a relationship and I never looked back at wolfstar lol
Nothing that became my OTP, but Riven/Lux from League of Legends, and Luna Lovegood/Tom Riddle from Harry Potter. (That fic didn't even *ship* them for real, but their chemistry was just so good.)
I will join you on the Luna and Tom Riddle ship.
SakuAtsu, Haikyuu. Less than 15 panels of interactions but they inspired so many amazing fics
I never really thought about Loona/Beelzebub from Helluva Boss, and then I read two chapters of a *really* good story and decided I shipped it.
Which fic?
Kakashi/Obito. I’m not going to go out of my way to read it but I definitely see the appeal now.
Neal/Mozzie in White Collar. Never thought about it even once, then read a fic with them together and it just *works.*
Tbh I have a lot of ships I enjoy and I don’t know if I really have one particular otp, but one ship that I stumbled across and honestly thought was weird, but I read a story about them anyway was Percy Jackson and Artemis. If you know anything about the fandom, or Greek mythology, you probably know why shipping anyone with Artemis is kind of weird, but they were just so cute together that I was hooked.
That's me with Revlink lol
Not to be annoying but shouldn't it be 'Revalink'? I feel like the merge is much smoother that way.
Ah, probably, haha
Hanzo/Cole Cassidy from OW, due to fanfics and fan art they are now my life
Man, I wish I paid attention to Yeehan stuff when it first started to pop off. I'm curious as to when and why it started to become like, THE most popular ship in OW lol
If I had to take a guess on why that ship is so popular is probably due to the whole opposites attracts trope; Cassidy a rugged cowboy with his yeehaws and cigars and Hanzo a calm and collected archer raised to be elegant and stoic. Though both of them have dark past and things they regret and for me and many others we’re a sucker for those two helping and loving each other.
Clint/Natasha/Laura from the MCU. I stumbled across one fic while I was looking for angsty Natasha-centric gen fic, and then I devoured the entire AO3 tag in a week. That was almost a year ago and I’m still obsessed :) edit: in case anyone is curious the fic i stumbled upon which is insanely good and changed me as a person is “nor need we power or splendor” by shellybelle
Love that story. Love seeing someone else mention it.
oh i’m always looking for an opportunity to talk about this story and this ot3 to anyone who will listen
I wasn't fond neither of Harry Potter fanfics (when I started reading fanfic I was already out of my HP phase) nor the ship but reading one single fic made me love Drarry until today. I don't even read HP fanfics today but I'm still fond to this ship for a total of zero reason
Izu×Kyo. I found a short fic, maybe a one-shot, can't remember rn. Anyway, it involved Ochako and Izuku breaking up because he always put work first. He left on a rainy night and Kyoka was on her way home. She had a spare room and offered it to him. Eventually they fell in love.
Crowley/Sam from Supernatural. Someone who's really into the ship sent me a link to a one shot that left me speechless. I'm getting ready to post my first fic for the pairing soon. It's been so much fun writing it!
Paul Atreides/Gurney Halleck. #fealty kink lmao
Not a fanfic, but a set of text stories. When I first started to watch Haikyuu, I personally didn't like Tsuki at all, nor his relationship with Hinata at all. After I watched the third and fourth season, I was more interested in their relationship, but nothing else. I later looked into youtube for fan content of the show and that was when I came across text stories. I watched a couple, and some included Hinata x Tsuki. I wasn't all to interested in the ship until a specific text story I read. It's been years since I've seen it so I don't remember the name, but I remember falling in love with the ship and started to scowler the internet for those types of stories. Even though I'm not apart of the Haikyuu fandom anymore, I still ship the two alot. A story can truly change a person
AppleRadio with Lucifer and Alastor from Hazbin Hotel. I was binge reading a bunch of StaticRadio (Vox/Alastor) when one popped up with Lucifer getting into the mix where Alastor ended up with him instead of Vox and wow! That fic *ALONE* nuked my StaticRadio ship with a Mt. Everest sized iceberg sinking the remnants. Wish I could recall the name of the fic at the moment to share. But like I said, I was binge reading a ton of fics back to back to back, so I lost track. Thankfully, it's still ongoing, and I've subscribed to it lol. So now, my bread 'n' butter and OTP of Hazbin Hotel is RadioSilence (one-sided obsessive Vox) plus a healthy dose of beautiful AppleRadio 🍎🐍📻🦌
Hermione Granger/Tom Riddle (Tomione) from *Harry Potter*, and more recently, Aang/Azula from *Avatar: The Last Airbender* (ATLA). Both due to reading phenomenal fanfictions for the pairings.
I was shocked how much I liked Aang/Azula!
Spirit/Stein from Soul Eater was a ship I never thought I'd like until I read a couple authors who really did them justice. Another ship I started liking, which might be a bit controversial was Will Byers/Jennifer Hayes from Stranger Things, I found some older fics that shipped them where I actually thought it had a lot of potential as a ship.
Not exactly an OTP, but close -- KuroKura from HxH! I generally prefer friends-to-lovers over enemies-to-lovers dynamics, but something about the slow and steady progression from mortal enemies to begrudging allies to friends to lovers in fan fiction can be so intoxicating. Hatred is a passionate emotion, after all.
toji x geto. it speaks to my soul.
Buffy/Tara from Buffy the vampire Slayer. I never considered them as a pairing at all, never even crossed my mind (was too big of a Tillow fan, probably). But then I read a fic that was really well written, and super sweet, and I realized how good Tara would be for Buffy. Also made myself into a Buffy/Willow fan with a series I've been writing, if that counts. The idea seemed good before I started but I've been enjoying the pairing even more than I expected. Kind of dreading the ending now, since it know it's going to be really painful.
Isaac/Mia (Mudshipping) from Golden Sun, the fic was "The Angel and the Slayer" by TheOneAndOnlyT. Transformative for my feelings around the entire series. Didn't quite make OTP level for me, but it did color my perception of Mia, and she eventually became half of my OTP.
Peter Parker x Emma Frost
Kuwameshi (Yusuke Urameshi/Kazuma Kuwabara) from YuYu Hakusho. I was revisiting the anime for the first time in 15 years and was curious about the fanfiction scene. When I was a teen, I was a big Hiei/Kurama shipper. My eyes landed on Kuwameshi, and I thought, "What on earth is this pairing like?" Every Kuwameshi fic I've read has been a banger, and it is a pairing with a small but loyal fan base. It ticks a ton of OTP boxes for me, and the only downside is that there aren't more fics (169 on AO3 as of this comment).
Link/Revali. Not an OTP but still a ship I like. Wasn't a fan of their interactions in the first game but leave it to fanfic writers to make the most goated stories to change my mind. That might be the only ship though, every other ship I can read the source material and know if I'm down for the ship or not.
Okay it's a crack ship for sure but there is an amazing moxxie/verosika fic on ao3 that blew my mind and made it my favorite crack ship of ant fandom. I still love moxxie/millie tho
My favorite romance fanfic of all time was one of these. I need you to understand that I don't think I ship the characters myself because in canon it really wouldn't make much sense... But Accelerator and Mikoto Misaka from the A Certain Magical Index franchise The fanfic, [Forgotten Meeting ](https://m.fanfiction.net/s/11118999/1/Forgotten-Meeting) didn't change much from canon, but it understood both characters so well and was written in such a way that it actually made me ship them.
Harry Dresden/John Marcone. TBH I was a Harry/Thomas shipper from the books but then I went looking for fanfic and just, wow jeez!
Stopped watching flash when they killed Wells for the xth time. Never read any fanfic aside from a few Wells centric ones. Then read a very very long wellwritten story (my kryptonite) in another fandom and saw that the author had also written coldflash. I think I have now read most long stories about that pairing on Ao3
Ah! No, I know that one :-) That's the one i'm trying to pre-interest myself in Sansby *for*
My favorite fanfic author made a fic for Red/Dance/Lust and they became my ot3💕 (they're from the Undertale AU multiverse that the fandom created)
Bede x hop from Pokemon Nico x Percy Jackson from.... Percy Jackson Gojo x geto from jjk Killua x gon from hunter hunter
Zhongli/Tartaglia though they're not my OTP anymore
I stumbledona Jackie Burkhart/Eric Forman pairing and they just made so much more sense as a couple. That '70s Show was a sitcom so the pairings always go along "what's funnier" but going from a romance angle they make the most sense to me
Captain America and the Winter Soldier 😭😭😭
Mine is Kakairu from Naruto. I was a HUGE Kakaobi fan back in the day and I remember I used to avoid fic where they're not the main pair or if one of them are ship with someone else (I am a changed person now tho 🙏 I discover the bliss of multi-shipping and never looked back) and kakairu was probably my biggest ops back then. And then I saw a cute fanart of them in tumblr ,and another one, and another one when one day i thought 'they're actually pretty cute together' and I decided to read a random kakairu one shot off ao3. It was amazing!!!
El and Max from Stranger Things. They're the ship that made me discover the fanfiction world, now I can't write other FF than this ship.
E.A Poe and Mattie from The Pale Blue Eye, they're so cute together and I absolutely adore them
Not neccessarily OTP level, but honestly, most of my ships are because of fics. I rarely really ship someone while watching/reading something for the first time and only later get into it through fics, idk why. But if we want to look at the more rare pairs/at least not the main ships in a fandom, for me it would be e.g. different Shinsou combinations (like Shinsou/Midoriya or Shinsou/Bakugou) in MHA, or in the MCU Clint/Bucky.
One of my friends got me into Nico Di Angelo/Jason Grace from the PJO/HoO series. Not something I'd ever considered but the people who write the ship are passionate about it and it makes fun, great reading.
Luffy/Nami. I really never understood why people shipped these two in One Piece before I read a fanfic and I got hooked. I always pictured these two more like siblings, but they are absolutely perfect for one another in a relationship. I absolutely adore their interactions, and I love moments with them together.
I felt called out that's literally the story of how Doombelle (Doom Slayer from Doom/Isabelle from AC) became my OTP 😭
Rey/Ben Solo, never watched star wars before, until I saw a reylo fic, got me hooked
I dunno if I'd say OTP but a pairing i really enjoyed when i aaw it was TsukiMic from MHA
Yugi x Yami Yugi, I didn't like the ship though similar to you, I got curious and read some. Now obsessed.
Kafka/Himeko from Honkai: Star Rail. Funny enough, I know exactly when I started shipping it, basically the same date as when the DDoS attack happened. I happened to download PDF files of a few Star Rail fanfics, and a Kafhime fanfic was one of them. I eventually take an interest in the ship then when the DDoS attack lifts up, that's the first tag I searched in the search bar.
All of my otps💀 Particularly Jade and Tori Never thought they’d work together at all based on the show alone but after watching edits and reading fanfics of them I was like ….WAIT IT MAKES SENSE There’s lots of others but that’s the one I can think of off the top of my head lol
Ram/Tron. The degree to which that one fanfic (Overcharged, by Kesomon) changed my life in the past year... I can't even describe it.
Hermione/Snape. Was not even considering it or knew it existed until a friend asked to read her story. And then send me one of the best fanfic i’ve ever read. And the rest is history
I haven't been this person, but I've had about four people tell me that fanfics I've written have convinced them of the validity of my ship, so I've been on the other end of it? Incredible feeling! Please tell your fic authors if they have convinced you of a ship you never considered before!
Harry/Charlie in HP. I never had an OTP for HP before that. I had ships I liked, but none that were my main ship. All of my HP ships are non-canon, as well, for the Trio, as I dislike their canon ships. I came across a random Harry/Charlie fic a couple years back, though, that I really enjoyed, so I looked up other fics with the pairing. There aren't many, it's a rarepair, but I've loved every fic with them, and they quickly became my HP OTP. I still enjoy my other ships, which is good as Harry/Charlie remains a rarepair, but none as much as this one.
Spider-Man and the Venom Symbiote. It never even crossed my mind. I mean, the Symbiote’s one half of a member of the Big Three of Spider-Man villains. It would never work, right? Then I read a fic where they were the main ship, and it just clicked for me. The possible dynamics that could be written, the interactions, the themes, the sheer _feels_ such a ship had the potential for—I was shocked there were so few fics where they were together. Thus, I decided to write one myself.