Thank you! Interesting. Still do not see the reason for it but good to know!!
NP 
It makes it fair for all authors 
Like when the contest deadline passes and you miss it, you can’t enter but if you publish early, you get a headstart which isn’t fair so there needs to be a balance.
I am just thinking if even with this rule it is better to not publish and promote early… I mean if the story is not good no strategy will help anyway. And if it is good I gues it will not loose readers gains in several weeks… Or will it? 
Well according to this article: Episode Explained: Creator's Contests
“We typically give 6-8 weeks for entry and Episode readers play a significant role in helping to determine the winners. Most contests get 150-200 entries with somewhere between 6-15 stories making it to the winners’ shelf.”
Episode gives a fair time frame for everyone equally that enters to promote their story and get reads so it’s fair (there are links above that explain in more detail about how the contests run in the first post)
Remember it’s not just about the number of reads (yes, you need a certain number to qualify) however, reader retention plays a very important part-does your reader only read 1 chapter (which can hurt you rank) or all of them (which can help your rank)
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Thats not what I meant😉… I mean if the story is good it will still have gains of readers after the deadline even published early if it is bad it will not get enough readers no matter when published… The recomandation to publish late looks like if most readers per week one gets just after the publishing… If you know what I mean.
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Have you already published it? If so, it won’t count. If not, good luck.
I believe they published it for the contest as they put their story on this thread and I’ve mentioned their story on another Clue thread and they didn’t seem to mind 
Ah okay. I just saw you telling them to lock their story? Which would mean it’s already published.
Obviously, if it were published within the duration of the contest, then that’s completely fine.
So in regards to this:
Of course if a story is good (depending on how you define it), it will continue getting reads after the deadline (with those reads being counted only for the contest)
In regards to this:
I wouldn’t exactly call a story bad. If you’re an author who works hard on your story, before you publish, you are confident that it is good. Since this contest requires writers to write in the mystery genre, it will appeal to people who like the mystery genre. Perhaps they won’t read a story if it contains certain elements they don’t like but there are tons of other stories they can check out. Even stories that don’t make the winner’s shelf are good and sometimes make other shelves.
Honestly, a story being good or bad just depends on what the readers enjoy. If the writer enjoys their story, that’s really important.
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Yeah I think so too, it needs to be published when the contest is announced and before the deadline (mainly near it would be the best) 
@karthika11 this contest was announced on April 8. You did publish your story for the contest and read what the rules of the thread are (listed in the first post) right? 
I told them to lock it as reads won’t count until June 3rd but I do believe they published it for the contest as they put their story on the thread and are not denying it otherwise but I’ll double check 
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I think some stories can be in deed called bad.:)) If somebody lacks talent and writing abilities the stories are flat boring or make no sence and such story I believe one can call bad. 
Of cause I hope our story is not one of such, but it is not easy to be objective to onself regarding the writing skills. 
Therefore I believe that confidence to publish has absolutly no corelation with good quality story.
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If you. I am talking about the author finding it good in this part.
No, don’t make people feel bad on this thread, they’re all pumped up and excited to publish their contest entries, don’t crush their hopes 
Good luck to everyone, am sure your stories will be amazing and not bad 
Also I don’t think this is the thread to talk about whether a story is good or bad quality as it can end up off topic, but I do believe a discussion on whether a story is good or bad can be talked about on another thread 
And sure, stories can be naturally bad and butchered and not in good quality but if you try your best, it most likely won’t happen unless you absolutely put no creativity in there or plot lines that don’t make sense. During a contest, people want to aim to try their best and have fun.
If you are unsure, get some beta readers, or if you do see a fellow author that needs help, help out, we’re a community and if we work together, we can do it and even tell ourselves “well, there’s almost no room for a bad story” 
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lol I am not trying to put others down there fore I was writing in aim on my owns story.
Oh OK lol (lots of love), GL 
You seem to be experienced in the rules - can you tell me how is it with publishin more chapters after the deadline?
We got 3 published and i have read that you cant make big changes in the evaluation time including adding chapters but it also says thay evalueate it based on reads of first 3 chapters.
We now have almost finished 4 chapter and till deadline we probably will have finished also the 5 chapter.
so my question is…is it problem if we before the deadline publish also chapter 4 and 5?
And is it problem if we publish 4 and 5 after the deadline during the evaluation time?
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You can publish episodes 4, onwards, as it makes no difference to reader retention.
Editing episodes 4, onwards, should be perfectly fine. However, if you are in doubt, ask support.
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I asked few days ago…thay say they will send it to Liz to answer it… but I didnt got after that any reply even I 2 times asked them about if I will get the answer 
…guess Liz is the only one who knows and she is not there or something like this…bcause I tryie to contact her also here via private message ans also with no sucess. 
Assuming all questions about the contest go to Liz, she is probably bombarded with questions. Mine took 10 days to be answered.
If you would rather not risk it, then don’t update during the reviewing period, unless she replies to you.
However since she only said the first 3 chapters, you should be fine.
Do you underedstand the ranking?
Does it mean that even we got only 13 reads we are on 140 place in Mystery gendre and 2897 in total???
Trending User Story Rank: 2897 ( #140 in Mystery ) | Total Chapters Read: 13
Yup, I’d assume so.
Do you want reviews for your episode?