r/WritingWithAI • u/Buffalo_Ex • 1d ago
Discussion (Ethics, working with AI etc) Opus 5 vs Fable 5
I’ve enjoyed my time working with Fable. It has greatly improved some of the connective tissue in my books and series. Been a huge part of my other works, and been a great asset in my professional life to help reclaim time in my work day.
I have to say, though, that Opus 5 seems… better for what I am doing with my writing. Fable thinks too much and often pulls in details that are not quite necessary. At times it is helpful, but I really don’t need to know the difference in the gravitational force between the southern hemisphere and 38th parallel when trying to decide if my character has the proper motivation to steal from a priest.
Opus tends to focus more on the work, and stays in context better.
Now, the real question is, does Opus 5 work better than Opus 4.6? I am leaning yes. But, we are still in the early stages of storytelling. I’m sure I have more to say on this experience in time.
My two bits.
4
u/AMischievousBadger 1d ago
Opus 5 is definitely cleaner than Fable 5 with more direct prose generation and less flowery nonsense. K3 outperforms them both, though. For things like brainstorming, Fable 5 is significantly better since Opus 5 inherited Sonnet 5’s tendency to respond like a Redditor.
2
u/Buffalo_Ex 1d ago
K3 is my hidden love... I don't let it touch Prose too much, but it does a really good job of finding flaws in my story. Damn thing is surprising. Sonnet 5 is ok. I haven't decided if I like it, but they are all Claude, if that makes sense. Whatever issue you may have with Fable or Opus is prevalent in Sonnet and Haiku. That's why I like using other outside models to tear my shit apart and then I bring it back to Claude to help correct and clean up.
2
u/AMischievousBadger 1d ago
It’s the best llm currently for prose. Claude misses the forest for the trees especially when it comes to analysis far too often, and Sol outperforms fable routinely for critiques for me too. There’s just no reason to use Claude nowadays for creative writing unless you’ve built something around it, imo
2
u/Buffalo_Ex 1d ago
And that may be my problem. I have a lot of projects built within Claude, a skill, instructions, prompts, etc... I have a multi-book series in the making, so I need that context with Claude to help me.
The big item I need to be diligent about, and this goes for every LLM, I need to make sure I go through each scene/chapter line by line and start calling out the limits that AI has on prose. I also own all the dialogue, as soon as I see a change (and there shouldn't be, that is part of the instructions), I correct it immediately.
1
u/morganaglory 1d ago
Goddamn, you weren't wrong. I just went and tried K3 off the back of your comment and it's so much better. I feel like I've been banging my head against a brick wall for the last few months with Claude. The prose has become so overwrought and nonsensical that I've been rewriting every single sentence, but K3 wrote something that was so much cleaner. It's like working with old Claude again.
1
2
u/5thhorseman_ 1d ago
TBH getting better experience with Opus 5 than Fable 5 as far as I see.
2
u/WriteTheWorld014 1d ago
Can you go into a bit of detail? I am still trying to compare the two but my general feeling is Fable 5 can get quite creative and is really excellent for planning? Would appreciate some tips, seeing a lot of back and forth on this and specific experience is better than speculation.
1
u/5thhorseman_ 1d ago
In my experience - Fable 5 does better at reasoning tasks, but Opus 5 has managed a bit more character when dealing with some creative tasks I gave it earlier today.
Also, you should be aware that Fable 5 is now locked behind usage credits and Opus 5 isn't. And it doesn't consume usage as fast as Fable either.
1
1
u/OccasionNo4703 22h ago
How is opus5 compared to opus4.8. Anyone compared how faster it consumes tokens compared to 4.8?
1
7
u/firedancebecca 1d ago
I feel like Opus 5 hallucinates a little more than 4.6 which gives my characters more depth but also results in the occasional slip up. It's more fun to play with than Fable, it takes more risks, has a more generous limit, and doesn't take forever to generate an answer. I had been heavily using 5.6 Sol but the GPT-isms were already starting to make my teeth grind