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Sounds good. Any other newbies want to swap crits?
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 08:45 |
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# ? Apr 19, 2024 09:46 |
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Quoting for the new page. Judging is going to take a while, so here's some poo poo to keep you occupied and prevent you from reflexively crapping your pants while jumping up and down screaming for results. Bad Seafood posted:INTERPROMPT Sitting Here posted:OUTSTANDING TOXXES: You have until noon PST to avoid the reaper's blade.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 08:49 |
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I almost want to write 300 words of a barbarian critiquing someone's story.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 08:54 |
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Your proposal is acceptable. Go forth, my child, to crit and conquer.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 08:56 |
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Crits: I do copy-editing for a living. I will point out your grammar errors and tense issues and explain in detail why they're wrong. I'll also crit style and story a bit but grammar is my thing. If that sounds helpful to anyone, I'll crit the first three takers. (also grateful for return crits)
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 08:58 |
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Sitting Here posted:assignment Pham Nuwen - Chance Man This is very well written for a TD newbie, with good punctuation etc. I'm having trouble caring about your protag. There isn't really anything that likeable about him and he doesn't do much except react to the situation. The fourth paragraph (starting with "You wouldn't expect...") is quite expositiony. I feel like most of it could have been cut and the rest woven into the story. Overall - a solid action/adventure piece with a cool wizard power that fails to connect emotionally.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:07 |
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newtestleper posted:Pham Nuwen - Chance Man If you're wondering how a good, concise crit looks, this is a great example.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:11 |
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Here's my crit for newtestleper's story just because I read it so might as well talk about it. At first, I was really confused for some reason, but I think that's just the tiredness speaking. There were a bit of grammatical errors as well as some run-on sentences, as well as you mixing up the whistle with a watch. I did like the use of the whistle and its humming, and I also liked that it was discarded once it was used up, almost like using it for the spell sucks away its meaning. That's a cool concept that I wish was explored a little more in depth in the story (if that was intentional). I felt like when you explicitly said "cast a spell" it felt tonally off. You could just say you stopped the bullet without having to explain that it was exactly a spell. Characters were a bit so-so, I felt like you had the ability to explore Walter's life and your main character more through the lenses of his powers, and I was given little hints, but not enough to make me care for them immensely. Overall, I thought it was fairly good, some very nice words, a few errors, but overall something that was good and enjoyable once I actually remembered how to think. Also, i have a line crit for Dr. Kloctopussy that I offered in irc but that'll probably be up tommorow after i actually sleep. i just wanted to get newt's out before i forget and i also did it in-line because im dumb. flerp fucked around with this message at 09:30 on Apr 27, 2015 |
# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:15 |
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The following people have toxxed and will receive bonus crits: Broenheim, Wangless Wonder, ravenkult, newtestleper, Dr. Kloctopussy, Benny the Snake, skwidmonster, kurona_bright, curlingiron, JuniperCake, Auraboks, Doctor Idle, Maugrim and ZeBourgeoisie if he mans up and submits something, anything, like seriously If anybody toxxed and isn't on that list, speak up. Maugrim posted:Crits: I do copy-editing for a living. I will point out your grammar errors and tense issues and explain in detail why they're wrong. I'll also crit style and story a bit but grammar is my thing. If that sounds helpful to anyone, I'll crit the first three takers. (also grateful for return crits) I'm ESL and I'd like this. I was going to crit yours anyway, so you'll get a bonus linecrit instead. Entenzahn fucked around with this message at 09:23 on Apr 27, 2015 |
# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:15 |
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Maugrim posted:Crits: I do copy-editing for a living. I will point out your grammar errors and tense issues and explain in detail why they're wrong. I'll also crit style and story a bit but grammar is my thing. If that sounds helpful to anyone, I'll crit the first three takers. (also grateful for return crits) Cool! I also do this for a living! But I am more likely to crit story and characters and stuff because that's what I care about. (It is also the other thing I do for living, write reviews of media that is.) I'm just getting back into the dome and I need the mental exercise, so I'll do three line-by-lines for the first three people that ask for one from me, and three wee concise-crits for the first three people who ask for one of those, making six in total, as per Sitting Here's assignment EDIT: Dr. Kloctopussy posted:Anyone (who participated this week) who does 10+ non-poo poo critiques will get a gift certificate for a custom avatar. For this illustrious award, you will need to do more than the minimal 3-5 sentences, but SittingHere's guide (above and quoted below) is a good guide. Crits don't need to be a line crit, but more than a few bullshit sentences. It's arbitrary. Deal. Well, dandy! In light of this, I'll extend it to three line-by-lines and seven concise-yet-efforted-crits. If I don't get that many by Wednesday night (a distinct possibility), I'll pick out entries at random to fill the difference. Sounds like fun! Jay O fucked around with this message at 09:43 on Apr 27, 2015 |
# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:18 |
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Aw, shucks. AgentCooper - Tulpas for the One Percent It is possible to write evil characters people care about, a good example is Frank Underwood from House of Cards. Your protagonist does bad things, but in an uninteresting way with uninteresting motivations. A dull baddie is even worse than a dull goodie, because at least we can connect to the goodie with empathy. There is no conflict in this story that I can see. If you want to write about something icky and controversial like pedophilia you should either know you're doing it sensitively or not do it at all. Overall - This story had a lot to dislike, and very little to redeem it. You need to go back to basics.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:23 |
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you know what gently caress it I read another one for some reason so i'll crit it as well. Wangless Wonder You seem to be trying way too hard for making your protag edgy and cool and that it just doesn't work. If it's supposed to be ironic, it didn't seem like it, and if it was intentional, well I didn't think he was cool, so w/e. The beginning was also kinda stupid, him just being expository for really no reason. It was a bit strange when you introduced the paladin because you said the man when you first introduced him, so i thought you were talking about the police officer but then it was another dude so it was confusing. I did not like the dialogue that much, kinda just felt like two people trying to one-up each other on what cool things they could say. felt like deadpool dialogue (ok tbh i never read deadpool but this is what i imagine it being, edgy and trying really hard to be funny but not working at all). it was also kinda weird how your paladin was like invincible or something, or that cop couldnt fire for poo poo. i didn't like the ending at all. it just feels a little deus ex machina to me and just fits with the whole "my protag is super cool and awesome and has everything figured out." it just wasn't satisfying at all, but I do like the idea of him trying to spread his sigil around and make it a logo in order to become more powerful. i thought that was p. cool. also, thanks ent, you're too kind.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:29 |
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Hail, me Groth the Barbarian. Me crit baby pansy wizard story. Wizard make Groth SO MAD HE TYPE ALL CAPS. This how you know what Groth say. Sixty one stories mean Groth roll sixty one horse knuckles to random pick one. GROTH HORSES VERY MAD NOW. Groth horse kick him in face on fifty-six roll. Story fifty six is one with bones in title. Dr. Kloctopussy posted:The Bone Loom Groth think story good for warning of dangers of wizard. Me am not sure if wizard or witch, but maybe because distinction based on gendered actions. Story am reaffirm magic very evil and Groth justified in kill all wizard.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:32 |
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Anyone (who participated this week) who does 10+ non-poo poo critiques will get a gift certificate for a custom avatar. For this illustrious award, you will need to do more than the minimal 3-5 sentences, but SittingHere's guide (above and quoted below) is a good guide. Crits don't need to be a line crit, but more than a few bullshit sentences. It's arbitrary. Deal. Not gonna lie, there's no good way to make this "objective" so you're going to have to rely on my own interpretation of the above. Life is hard and luck is mostly on your side. If you hope to see a new picture under your name, PM me with a link to your critique post(s). If you cannot PM me, you will have to ~enter the IRC~ where pretty much anyone can pass me the message. (It's #thunderdome on synirc, by the way, and if you don't hang out there 24/7 you are a ...silly person who should make less silly decisions). Sitting Here posted:-What you didn't understand
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:35 |
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Jay O posted:Cool! I also do this for a living! groth would like concise crit of story of HONORABLE BARBARIAN WIZARD
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:37 |
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Yo Cache Cab, you've been and gone and clearly don't give a poo poo about my offer, so I'm passing it into somebody else. HEY, LOSERS Yeah you, people who have lost. The first three of you that ask, I'll give you a full line-crit of any one of your stories of your choosing. No loss = no crit. I'm looking to help people get from the bottom to the top.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:38 |
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Claven666 - Old Lady Cabuncle Immediately your first paragraph strikes me as meaningless. This is flash fiction, you need to dive straight in, not give us this long winded, hokey, introductory crap that serves voice and nothing else. Also random AIDS is off-putting. Okay so your use of voice is what really struck me, as you laid it on way too thick. I couldn't help but read this in the accent of Jed Clampett from the Beverley Hillbillies. It's actually bordering on insensitive. Voice can be a very powerful tool, but it's never an excuse for your story to meander around with nothing happening. So I guess some stuff probably happens in the second half of this story, but I didn't get that far, mainly because of the aforementioned voice problem. But don't worry, I have a prescription for you! TD veteran Tyrannosaurus is extremely good at using narrative voice to tell stories. Here are a couple of good examples you should read. http://writocracy.com/thunderdome/?story=3417&title=Five+Minutes+on+the+Powerline http://writocracy.com/thunderdome/?story=2679&title=Awesome
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:42 |
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thehomemaster posted:I'm putting my hand up for judging next week early. maybe make sure you don't lose first hey
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:50 |
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Noeland posted:Three Dimensions, More or Less 1272 words You said 'same' twice which looks really awkward and you have used too many adjectives for shelves, it's really not worth the alliteration. quote:Instead, I cut myself on the pages of less sinister, but no less dangerous volume, a 9th edition 'Practical Papercraft for the Occasional Occultist'. Well first, you need something like 'a' or 'the' in front of 'less sinister' I think, and second, Practical Papercraft is clearly way less dangerous than a book that turns your head inside out. quote:Rough or worn edges of the book being handled are usually a great preventer of mishaps. What? What does this sentence mean? I think you are missing a word or something because that doesn't make any sense. quote:Nobody cared to share such info with me, so I happened to be a soft handed senior student when it came time for me to take the task of fetching and replacing some of the most rare and dangerous volumes of recorded magic in all of wizarding history. I don't like this sentence either, it feels longer than it needs to be and has lots of words like 'happened' and 'came time for' and 'take the task of' that could be replaced by much fewer words and be easier to read. quote:For some reason, that book is constantly going missing despite being one of the heaviest set of texts to ever make print, it has 10 volumes! I reckon maybe a colon or a period or something would work better instead of that last comma. quote:Anywho, the Papercraft book tends to generate such excitement for folding with its readers that most people tend to take the pages straight out of the bindings and begin to practice right then and there. You used 'tend' twice in the one sentence which is bad IMO. quote:In the opposite hand I held the red hot colored ink stamp, an ancient anti-theft device to prevent more books from disappearing like the Sourceresses volumes, ready to mark the new book with the magic words, "PROPERTY OF THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY ARCANUS, PLEASE DO NOT STEAL". 'Red hot colored ink stamp' sounds confusing. Are you saying the color is 'red hot'? Or are you saying that it is red hot, and also colored? quote:The proximity of the red hot stamp caused the horsehide to begin to get nervous and sweat. This makes it sound like the latter, but I dunno. quote:
Really? That's how you're going to treat the only thing that actually happens in this story? "I don't remember anything about it, but now I can do wizard stuff?" Uggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. So, the main problems with your story are as follows: Your sentences are too long and too wordy. It's OK to do this occasionally IMO, but if it's all the way through your readers will get bored; and It's all exposition. There's no moment when I, the reader, feel like I am immersed in a thing that is happening, I just get to read the report about it later. A little bit of exposition is all right, and the tone could've carried it a bit for a paragraph or so, but that's all there was to it, so it was pretty dull. My advice: next time, try to avoid exposition, and try to use some shorter sentences.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 09:55 |
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Even if wizard use number for evil like in bone story, Groth use number for honorable crits. Groth only use one number (five) but he use it five time and then five time again so he have fifty. Story fifty have different number in title. Wizard definitely trying to kill Groth but Groth too smart. curlingiron posted:Twelve Steps Groth think this have best character so far because she kill wizard. But story is tough in beginning because hard to convey conflict specifically about loss of memory/emotion. Groth say first part of story weak flabby wizard-like part of story, which should be killed to make world a better place for all. Story become interesting when people start to lose memory and emotion, so why not start there? For story with numbers in title (sign of wizard evil), story itself is not bad.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:05 |
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Dr. Kloctopussy posted:Anyone (who participated this week) who does 10+ non-poo poo critiques will get a gift certificate for a custom avatar. For this illustrious award, you will need to do more than the minimal 3-5 sentences, but SittingHere's guide (above and quoted below) is a good guide. Crits don't need to be a line crit, but more than a few bullshit sentences. It's arbitrary. Deal. EDIT: These crits need to be completed by sign-up deadline for next TD
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:20 |
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Groth get new number from thing Groth just have to punch then it gives number. But all numbers very close so Groth think probably wizard trying to keep me from good stories with low number. This time number is fifty nine. This story title about sleeping, which is best time for attacking wizard.skwidmonster posted:When He Sleeps Groth want to say is tragic story of wizard mother and barbarian son but is not really story. GROTH LOVE CONFLICT and where is conflict? Mother does not believe son because she is bony wizard sympathizer. At end son does not make choice. What is important about beginning? Groth does not understand, which means story is probably written by wizard. Groth does not support wizard parents to gaslight barbarian children who just want to ride horse.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:24 |
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Djeser posted:groth would like concise crit of story of HONORABLE BARBARIAN WIZARD *grunt, nod* Once again, I'm gonna focus predominantly on story/character for my crits, and just touch on style and grammar with a q-tip, because there are scads of domers better equipped at critique on those levels than me and idk my taste level there. I'll talk more style and grammar for a line-by-line though, of course. Djeser - Sif the Strong It seems like a little thing, but the first paragraph/first two sentences could easily be cut for a much stronger hook into the story, and that changes the energy of the whole thing right up front, in a good way. In fact, that lead-in seems to be telling a different story at first. It seems like there's a peaceful debate or argument going on between barbarian friends (with Sif as the subject) before it U-turns violently into the attack, which means it doesn't really matter what they were doing beforehand. You want to start with your best foot forward and discard anything that doesn't matter, at least with flash fiction in this vein. You reinforce Sif's feelings of weakness and inadequacy in other places in the story (and could stand to do it more, but I'll get into that below), so that aspect isn't needed in the opening lines either. Crop 'em and it's already a big improvement. Anyway, the heart of your story here is good material. Sif's perceived inadequacy gives way to a hidden power. She feels weak, but she's really a powerful warrior (of a different kind). This is a good skeleton, you've just got the bones in the wrong places. Since the thing that matters most here is Sif's view of her own self-worth and how it changes, you don't want to blow your load too quickly on that and then focus too much on extraneous details. Sif's turn from weakling to ubermensch happens in the first third of the story, and it's too soon to really have any impact. No sooner have we learned how she feels about herself than her problem is solved! She doesn't fully realize this, but nothing she does during the dragon fight affects her emotional journey, so it's basically the case: the audience already knows how this story is going to end from the moment she merges with the dragon, but hasn't had time to invest enough emotion to feel catharsis from it, so you've shown your hand way too soon. The dragon fight is cool, and the imagery of her as its beating heart is cool, but it belongs in a different story, because its elaboration requires too much detail to pack into this one. Long story short: decompress and hone in on Sif's feelings of helplessness, particularly the scene where she's being cornered by her potential kidnappers. That's where you'll build tension most effectively, and the dragon-summoning that follows it is the gently caress Yeah of your reward if you've grabbed the audience's hearts with this more intimate focus. Yes, it means less detailed dragon action, but you can only fit so much into a flash story. Stylistically, this story has a lot of rabbit trails, particularly in the final third. All that stuff about Sif's new Hagrid isn't necessary at all, and could be cut in service of greater focus on Sif's father's newfound respect for his daughter. The good news is that there's no comprehension problems, even when the prose gets wonky. Due to the curt sentences and focus on immediate emotions and reactions, the action is very easy to follow, and the story reads fine. You just need time and practice to refine your voice and cut the chaff. On a grammar level, there are some run-on sentence parties goin' down, and mismatched tenses like "grabbed the man around his chest and raising him into the air," (past tense incongruous with present progressive) but you'll have to ask someone else to grammar-crit you, because writing about grammar kinda puts me to sleep. ---------------- Six concise-crits left up for grabs, three line-by-lines, first come first serve.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:29 |
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I wrote fantasy for the first time and found it difficult, would love a concise crit, please.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:36 |
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Groth want smaller number this time and me get smaller number, which means me certain wizard is behind numbers. This story is name worst thing ever: just a wizard.Nubile Hillock posted:Wizard 1300 words Story confirms many beliefs that wizard are terrible. Groth think main trouble with conflict is story ends with status quo and character has not really change. Is okay, story is mostly meant for amusement. Groth think better amusement if story ends with few paragraphs of wizard burning, or beheading, or crushing, or drowning, or other fun way of kill all wizard.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:54 |
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Jay O posted:Six concise-crits left up for grabs, three line-by-lines, first come first serve. I'm down for a concise one, really curious to see how people liked my story
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 10:59 |
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Jay O posted:Well, dandy! In light of this, I'll extend it to three line-by-lines and seven concise-yet-efforted-crits. If I don't get that many by Wednesday night (a distinct possibility), I'll pick out entries at random to fill the difference. Sounds like fun! Can I have a line-by-line crit? Thanks. Additionally, I'm gonna see if I can do 10 crits of fellow newbies or people with losertars.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 11:06 |
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SurreptitiousMuffin posted:Yo Cache Cab, you've been and gone and clearly don't give a poo poo about my offer, so I'm passing it into somebody else. Hit me. Heres your victim. If you'd prefer to use the google docs link, go right ahead.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 11:13 |
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Jay O posted:Six concise-crits left up for grabs, three line-by-lines, first come first serve. I'd like one.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 11:17 |
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Morning Bell posted:I wrote fantasy for the first time and found it difficult, would love a concise crit, please. -What you didn't understand: Is your character also an eye wizard? Or just a guy taking on the eye wizard? And how is that power used? She has monsters, she has a weeping statue that fills a pool with tears, but we never get an understanding of what she does. Is it spying? Is it summoning? I'm not sure where the magic is. Also, I confused Kieron with the rebel leader a few times. Why is he guiding him and learning maps, if the character can see and he is a worm? -Where you stopped reading (if you struggled with reading the whole thing in one sitting): I didn't really struggle reading it. It felt like it went by really fast, so we didn't get a lot of characterization. It felt kind of rote, to be honest. Hero loses eye, goes back to get eye, loses friend, almost defeated by big bad, kills big bad. That's it. -Whether or not you understood the characters' motivations: The motivations were fine enough, but it all felt somewhat superficial. Sure, he's out for revenge, Kieron a worm, Cassandra is evil. -Whether the ending resolved things satisfyingly, or at all: It resolves things, but so what? She's dead, his eye is itching, and that's it. Is there another mage using his dead eye? Is he trying to use it, and that's why it itches? What about the liberation army? Did they let the city fall into ruin, after all that time? It's competently built, but I don't feel anything reading it, if that's understandable.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 11:32 |
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Benny the Snake posted:La Voz Silenciada I'll try to hit at least 2 more people with crits later today. Jay O posted:Six concise-crits left up for grabs, three line-by-lines, first come first serve.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 11:58 |
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Jay O posted:Six concise-crits left up for grabs, three line-by-lines, first come first serve. Oh hey, I'd love a concise-crit too.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 12:01 |
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Okay, I have one concise crit left to offer, and two line-by-lines. I will do all these tomorrow after I get some goddamn sleep it is four o' butt in the morning now.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 12:08 |
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Thyrork posted:Hit me. Heres your victim. If you'd prefer to use the google docs link, go right ahead. 1) it's important to try and find the right balance between action and dialogue. 'action' doesn't need to be fireball kung-fu fights- it can often just be little physical things somebody is doing while they're speaking. They look around, clean under their nails, take the last cigarette out of the pack then stare at it for a few seconds before putting it back etc. Also, you can have a great story with no dialogue, but it's really hard to have a story with no action. 2) simple language is better than complex language in most cases. If you're going to throw out a big fancy-looking word, make sure that you're using it correctly, and that there's not a more elegant way of saying the same thing. 3) sometimes the prompt locks you into doing something that's just kinda eh. There's always the option of going back and editing the story later though, to really make it shine without worrying about the judges getting mad. 4) the 'dome is weird. The quality of entries and the number of new writers have both been increasing a lot over the last maybe year or so, and that leads to situations where a story that's simple 'meh' ends up losing. I don't think we've seen anything genuinely awful a la Rural Rentboys or The Golden Bean in a long time (nb I have managed to blank out "Elmo is going to gently caress you now" please don't trigger my flashbacks tyvm) but at this point, losing is not the indicator of low quality it used to be. If you lose, don't get discouraged, and do keep coming back. I got two more line crits. Who wants 'em?
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 13:11 |
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sebmojo posted:maybe make sure you don't lose first hey if I lose
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 13:11 |
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Jay O posted:Okay, I have one concise crit left to offer, and two line-by-lines. I will do all these tomorrow after I get some goddamn sleep it is four o' butt in the morning now. Concise me please! First entry, curious as to how many inches of toilet water I'm allowed to drown myself in.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 13:17 |
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Good evening, my ambulatory presentient rear end-tumors. I'm going to crit some randomly-selected "people" (term used loosely) because gently caress you. A Classy Ghost - “A Gift for Amy” This story’s more problematic than a neo-Nazi skinhead in a Women’s Studies class. Let’s start with the small stuff. Your word choice and sentence structure are both very rough and rocky. In several places, you use weird, jarring words or phrases which don’t fit your milieu, and your paragraphs lack rhythm and flow. Read more fiction. At a higher level, you’ve grasped the very basic idea of what a story is - a sequence of events which proceed from one another via an internal logic - but you’ve missed everything else. Your characters are practically anonymous, with little in the way of distinct personalities or roles. Crucially, their motivations are opaque, as are the consequences of their actions. We basically have a “mob deal gone bad” scene which you’ve slapped a robe and wizard hat atop. It’s not until the fifth paragraph that I know Wilbart’s motivation, and it’s a weak one: he needs to make a sale (which doesn’t yet seem sinister or interesting) for someone named Amy. He doesn’t seem to be in distress or under pressure. The whole opening is slack, without urgency or tension, and that’s not how you hook reader interest. I was bored by paragraph six. Drop at least one detail into the opening paragraph which whispers to the reader “something odd is going on”. Illustrate both what’s commonplace in your story-world and also what’s unusual about the situation. I don’t see a reason for you to have Garfloyd in this story at all. He barfs a few lines to prompt Wilbart into saying something, but he seems to serve no narrative function at all. He’s described as “hired help,” he displays neither interesting motivations (e.g. being at cross-purposes with Wilbart) nor is he given a distinctive personality. He’s a mook with a name, and he disappears without impacting the story’s action. The ending has no payoff, either. A guy gets a magic present for his kid(?), which he had to do because… he’s the best wizard daddy ever? I have no idea. There’s no consistent theme beneath the muck, either. The characters don’t exemplify or illustrate any interesting ideas, and your writing isn’t smooth or interesting enough to hold up the saggy plot. TL;DR: I hate you, please die. Cpt. Mahatma Gandhi - The Square Root of 13 Ah, federal wizard cops, a setting dear to my heart. This could do with a minor proofreading pass; you have some mistakes a basic spell-check would catch (“Spacial”) and some which require eyes(“I’ve got memorize”). Not a capital crime, but c’mon. The headline problem? The story doesn’t matter and the characters are marionettes. You start off with the hook of “why is a number-wizard blowing up 13th floors, and 13th floors in particular” and then resolve it with “oh I was just bored”. COME THE gently caress ON, YOU LAZY COCKSUCKER. This reads like you had an amusing thought, hacked out an opening and then couldn’t figure out how to actually wrap a character around it. So you just went “gently caress it, magical gunfight”. Consistency of character, theme and motivation are the skeleton supporting your story, rear end in a top hat; spend time on them. There’s a few places where you could trust your reader more. The paragraph where you describe the wizard’s lair could just end with the equations; they’re obviously wrong, and that can draw interest - there’s no need to belabor that point in the following sentence. If needed, remind the reader later on, when it makes sense. Those numbers bring up another point - you have a lot of wacky ideas, but you follow through on none of them. Winnow the story to revolve around one or two well-developed, well-observed details instead of tossing irrelevent tidbits everywhere. Focus. TL;DR: I hate you, please die. Entenzahn - Hunting Golgoth I hate this less than the two stories above this, but that’s like saying I prefer gonorrhea to AIDS. You’ve got a cracking opening line, and then the story goes limp as a wet noodle. We have three wizards who go looking for a rogue creation of theirs, either to put it down or protect it. That’s the setup for some conflict, but how does it “keep coming back” to haunt them? I feel like there should be more fighting between the wizards which is ostensibly about how to deal with Golgoth, and is really about some deeper issue regarding responsibility for one’s creations - that’s what your opener has set up. Instead, we get some wandering-around-at-home pablum and some wandering-around-outside pablum. You could cut all that and focus on the issues at hand:
I also feel like you could cut one of the three wizards out. Sanguinis feels like background material; his impact is minimal, and his role as “instigating the attack” could easily be moved to Bags. Focus the story on what the characters are doing, on why they’re doing the things they’re doing. There’s some minor linguistics which could be touched up, words which could be tightened or omitted, but it flows better than the other stuff I’ve read this week. TL;DR: I mildly hate you, please have an excruciating-but-nonfatal bowel movement.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 13:43 |
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I would really dig receiving any criticism that anyone has to offer about my story for this week, despite its excessive length. Not contingent to the above in any way, I am also going to do up a brief crit of each story entered this week by Friday week, as I haven't offered any crits to date. I mean it.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 14:22 |
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newtestleper posted:crit Thanks for the crit. Radical and BADical! fucked around with this message at 16:52 on Apr 27, 2015 |
# ? Apr 27, 2015 14:35 |
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# ? Apr 19, 2024 09:46 |
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Djeser posted:
Truly Groth has a warrior's soul and an honorable heart. My INterprompt submission will be dedicated to you. I'll show you barbarian conflict the likes of which will make your hands itch for something stabby.
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# ? Apr 27, 2015 15:08 |