Carol: you've phrased my 'fears' perfectly! But I'd prefer to believe that people are saying what they mean here. Makes me feel better!
Well, you can rest assured on my account for one, Chris - if I say I enjoy aplots that's precisely what I mean and nothing but.
I do think, however, that there is a tendency more towards b than aplots in FoLCdom generally. That makes a lot of logical sense to me as most FoLCs were attracted to the show because of the relationship between Clark and Lois, not the villain of the week. Naturally, that carries over into fanfic.
Your thoughts on writing echo mine precisely and I've said so in the past. I've always found writing for FoLCdom quite a unique experience in all kinds of ways, not to mention a little difficult at times. In the past I've always written for shows with large ensemble casts and with characters whose backgrounds, histories, etc were somewhat hazy. A lot of the pleasure came from filling in the blanks. What had happened to X as a child to make him become the man he was in the show? And so on. These generally aren't an option with LNC and I do find that a little more restrictive at times than I've been used to.
It took me an awful long time, for example, to get used to the fact that I was dealing with the same two characters scene after scene after scene, rather than being able to structure a story around moving between the threads of three or four characters' actions to build up suspense.
Prior to writing for FoLCdom, much of my stories were structured to be as much like an episode of the show as possible - with a and b plots - which is why my first real venture into LNC was Caped Fear. But I did realise soon afterwards that this kind of story wasn't what FoLCs were really looking for and that the aplot was largely irrelevant for many of them.
Did that change my writing habits for this fandom? I guess so - although it certainly wasn't a conscious decision. I've never sat down and planned what I'll write next and probably never will. Just not the way my Muse is wired. But there is a natural tendency, I think, to tailor what you write to the market you're writing for. That just makes sense.
Having said that, I wouldn't say that an author shouldn't write aplots. If a story idea presented itself to me tomorrow that had a huge aplot I'd write it and post it without a second thought - and I'd certainly encourage any author to do the same. When all's said and done, I believe what FoLCs enjoy most are stories that are well written - you give them that, they'll be more than happy to read and comment.
LabRat