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Jagermonster posted:In. Hit me with a flash rule please. Your protagonist is almost certainly going to win this bet, but they don't want to win. hubris.height posted:You know what, gently caress it, I'm in. Please give me a flash rule. A hero with a tragic flaw, fated to lose this wager, but fighting to overcome that fate.
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Jun 3, 2015 20:05
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Entering WEEK 147 JUDGEMODE* beep boop beep *that means I can’t see who wrote what you fucktards Seriously, I read all these stories blind and had no idea who wrote what until I was writing out my judgepost. I have not bothered to go back and include your name in my notes. Deal with it. Do not post in this thread saying something asinine like "Thanks for the crit!" I don't care. If you actually got something out of my critique, write one for someone else! Be proactive in your betterment as a writer! Critting is not only an extremely useful way of seeing what works and what doesn't work but it's also helpful to the community at large. From Rose to Thorn - Forbidden love tempts and destroys a young couple. This story was objectively terrible. Subjectively as well but I’ll get to that in a second. First, you use way too many words to describe things that are stupid and meaningless. I don’t need to know that Ryan kicked the door shut “with his closest foot.” Just say he kicked the door shut. Why did you include the phrasing of Mikkel’s Southern voice twanging “across the cell towers?” That gives me a totally different mental picture than what you were aiming for as well as being completely 100% irrelevant. You already let me know they were talking on the phone. “Ryan’s voice fell silent. His cheeks went tight and stung. His mouth watered sourly before being immediately dried by his thirsty tongue and cheeks. His stomach twisted and knotted as he stared at the words. His eyes were stuck on one spot in the letter and his jaw had gone slack.” You could cut literally every word after silent. Why? Because you’re just jerking off on the page furiously repeating yourself in an attempt to sound smarter and more poetic than you really are. Your reader’s time is precious. Precious as gently caress. It is your lifeblood as a writer and if you waste it with a bunch of bullshit you’re going to lose them. Which, for me, you did. Completely absent of everything else, your inclusion of such tremendous piles of bullshit made me hate this. Now let’s focus on the plot. Did you succeed in writing a story that could be summed up by your prompt? Yes. Yes, you did. Good job. Did you include in your story a twist that was completely out of left field with precisely zero foreshadowing along with several characters mentioned for the first time in the middle of your story who were somehow inexplicably vital to the growth and development of your main characters as well as a violent ending where one character commits suicide because goddamnit this story needs to be impactful and emotional and death is always super emotional? Yes. Yes, you did. Do you see why this is a problem? Characters: I didn’t give a poo poo about any of them. I should care about, or at the very least emphasize, with at least one character. But all you gave me were a couple talking heads (on of which ends up catching a bullet). I mean, jesus, where the gently caress did the gun come from? You have to foreshadow these things! Don’t just pull poo poo out of your rear end in a top hat! You know what you pull out of your rear end? poo poo. God I hated this story. I guess the best thing you did here was submit early so I had plenty of time between reading it and reading something else. Also, on a completely objective level, I hated this story because… I mean, what point were you trying to make? I hope it wasn’t “Only thing worse than gay is gay incest, amirite hyuck hycuk hycuk” but it kind of feels like it could be. I’m going to assume that you were just trying to write something subversive and deep and take these character types “no one” writes about and show their torment or some other high school level bullshit. I don’t know. Focus on writing a good, solid story first. Then you can start trying to get cute. The Monster of Adelphia - Two sets of twins turn the town upside down. At first I was wondering why there was only one set of twins in this story but then the dragons showed up and I thought, “Well. At least s/he fulfilled the prompt.” Sort of. Maybe. I don’t know. This thing was a mess, though. You had major, major grammatical errors throughout the whole piece. “This is wrong!”, Example character yelled. “This is correct!” Example character 2 yelled back. See the difference with the comma? Drove me nuts. Also, your tense shifts were painful and almost equally omnipresent as your grammar issues. Clean that poo poo up! I’s a problem that is, like, insultingly easy to fix! loving read your story out loud goddamnit! You submitted hella early, too, so it’s not like you didn’t have time to scope this sucker out once or twice. gently caress you. You set up the plot pretty decently, so that’s good. You introduced an issue early and you resolved the issue by the end. That’s good, too. Keep doing that. Now, the dragon poo poo was weird and I didn’t like it. First, you clearly set this bitch in Greece. I don’t normally associate dragons with ancient Greece. Why didn’t you pick a monster more thematically appropriate? Or at least one that would be less jarring. A minotaur or… I don’t know. While this isn’t a major issue in of itself, it is the sort of thing you should consider. Extreme example: if you’re writing a slave story in the antebellum American south and the plantation owner is a Chinese dude then you better have a good reason for that because it’s going to be jarring and unexpected. The dragons were like that. Not outright wrong for you to include but you needed a better reason to have used them than “just cuz.” Also, I didn’t like that the nameless dragon saved the day out of nowhere. Yeah, I get he got a stick pulled out of his eyeball but saving a town from his (I’m assuming here) dragon twin brother just because of that isn’t a super convincing motivation. And was this the dragon’s story or the Greek guys’ story? Did P save the day by observing the monster like he suggested be done or did he just kind of do some poo poo and some poo poo happened and yay I’m a king now even though the town previously just had a mayor also that’s a bit of a plot hole, huh? I don’t know. The Willow and the Ribbon - A romp in the forest where everyone falls in love. Welp. In no way shape or form was this a “romp in the forest where everyone falls in love.” Jesus loving christ what the hell I’m at a loss for words. Did you think that this story fulfilled your prompt or did you just not care? What bizarro world do you live in where having sex with a crying girl = falling in love? You know what, if you couldn’t bother to fulfill my prompt I really shouldn’t bother wasting my time critiquing you. Seriously. gently caress you. This was a terrible story. It didn’t make any sense. Why does Jane want to gently caress Johnny so bad? Why is she leaving and never coming back? Why should I give a poo poo about any of this? gently caress you. When you can read the world - A man lives, loves, loses, and regains his family while touring the Mediterranean Sea. This made me laugh a couple of times and it amused me pretty much all throughout. You have a very nice conversational tone to your writing and I dig it. You also fulfilled your prompt which is never a given it seems so good job there, too. I actually really liked how your character’s motivation (finding his kids) was simultaneously unimportant and super important. His self-acknowledged lovely parenting came across as oddly charming. Like maybe he’s not such a bad dad. Maybe he’s just hard on himself. He certainly came across as a good guy. I liked that. It was a whimsical and neat little tale. The bits where you list off the things he talked to her about was a little too… something for me. I don’t know the word. You hit it too hard. It broke up the flow. It was… clumsy! Yes. Clumsy. Rough. I could tell you couldn’t come up with a more elegant way of saying what you wanted to say. However, I did enjoy how to was called back to there at the end. Your use of the callback was subtle and well-done. The only thing I didn’t particularly care for: first, the relationship between the girl and John was a little too obtuse for me. I needed more connection to the rest of the story. I’m assuming “ Loud and tan, like their mother. Big brown eyes and dark hair.” means that the he ends up with the girl which is cool. I like that. But I’m having to assume it. A good place to tie it all together would have been your ending. Instead, I got something very vague. Man I wanted a strong ending here! That is for sure what kept you out of the high pile of stories this week. “She looked pissed. “You rear end in a top hat, John.” I offered her another drink. She left a half hour later with a red-faced tourist in a baseball T-shirt.” Yeah. No clue. I do not understand why you decided that this was your conclusion. Any Way the Wind Blows - A young prince plans revenge against his murdering uncle. Welp. I loved this. Part of me wanted to blast you for just writing about Hamlet and not coming up with someone more original. But the other part of me loves Tom Stoppard so… gently caress it. Great job. For real. I think this is pretty close to publishable. You need to extend it a little bit (I could tell there were places you were constricted by the word count) and I disliked the title and I disliked the opening line but other than that I loved it. Great use of humor. Great self-awareness. Just really great. Kissing a boy - A boy loves a girl but she is in love with another boy except this second boy is secretly a girl who is in love with the first boy. This was a tough prompt but you worked it like a pro. For real, your use of the prompt was quite nice. It was quite good. Plus, you created a story where characters had clear motivations and were active in the pursuit of their goals rather than being reactive to situations that occurred. You had a nice tone. This was easy to read. I didn’t get bored. Awesome! With that being said, there was a lot here that could have been snipped. This was way way too wordy. I mean, you spent more time dithering about describing things than you did actually talking about the story at hand. Also, all the throw outs to Shakespeare and whatnot seemed overly self-aware. Also also, I had a difficult time placing the age of the main character. You filled her life with an awesome backstory but it seemed too “full” for her to still be a kid. I wasn’t really sure about any of their ages. And the setting was too vague for me as well. I could tell something had happened and, normally, I like leaving stuff to the imagination. But in this case it was just too much. I had too many questions as to how to world got to where it was from, seemingly, complete and total normalcy. The absence of answers felt more like plot holes than intelligent teasers. Diplomacy - France is invaded. This was cute. Probably would have been in the running for an HM if you hadn’t edited your post. But you did. So you’re disqualified. Danny’s betrayal was too out of nowhere. You could have easily foreshadowed it and been in a good place. Lot of good one liners. “The French can be forgiven a little risqué clothing.” I originally wrote that there are places where you go too “little kid” but overall I think you did a nice job with the voice. I still think you did a nice job with the voice but I forgot that your main character was supposed to be a high school senior. You missed that mark. So… bad job with the voice actually. You swung too far. The Final Lap - A man kills everyone in his way to get his way only to lose everything including his life. Good use of the prompt. A couple minor errors (race car's thanks instead of tanks for example) but nothing overly egregious. The ending was haunting. Probably the best ending I’ve read so far (though I’m only eight stories in so take that for what its worth). What I think this story is missing, ironically, is more action. You paint a nice picture. You use your words really well. But this is really more of a summary of the history of this dude’s life rather than a story. It’s a cool summary but that’s all it is. Where’s the conflict? The motivation? The change from the beginning to the end? Honourable Men - Friends murder one of their own when they fear he's on the verge of seizing power. “Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honourable man.” One of my favorite monologues so you got a smile out of me there. And I love cowboy poo poo. Love it. So good job on that, too. You fulfilled your prompt. Aight. Throwout to ‘honorable men.’ Tight. Too much exposition in the beginning and it felt repetitive on top of that. I don’t want to read a quarter of your story before I start learning what your story is about. This is flash fiction. Get to the point. GET TO THE POINT. I need to know what’s going on… uh… pretty much loving immediately. Did you really need to describe bringing in Joe Cottonhead? No. Why? Because it didn’t do anything to advance the plot. Everything you write needs to be advancing something. A goal, character development, something. I think you also wasted too much time focusing on the mayor. The mayor wasn’t important. They mayor’s offer was. You did that a lot. Focus in on weird poo poo I mean. Like the bottle. When you give a lot of attention to small details you make you reader think that those details are in some way significant. Dialogue was pretty good. Descriptions were too wordy. From Above - A man uses magic to recover his land and find a husband for his daughter. Opening paragraph made me laugh. Good start. I think this is chairchucker but I don’t remember him signing up. So I dunno who this is. I haven’t really been able to pick out anybody. So I guess yay judgemode? Good use of prompt. Good use of humor. Clear conflict. You use “anyway” too much in the dialogue but other than that the dialogue is good. The tone works. Its the mix of super conversational and classic storytelling but it works. I’d let this sit for a while and then run it through the ol’ editing machine one more time. Nothing terrible but there’s some places that could be cleaned up. I don’t think this is good enough to win but, damnit, I liked it. Good job. Jelly - A man gets so jealous that he makes his wife fall in love with someone else (there's also some magic involved). This was pretty bizarre but you also had a strange prompt. I was entertained the whole time. Well, most of the time. It had little moments of excellent humour. This was a pretty funny week. The TV bit at the end was confusing. The dialogue was good. You had a bunch of comma splices. I hate comma splices. Hate ‘em. Don’t include a comma just because that’s where you’d pause if you were reading outloud. Appearances - A man "tames" his wife but, really, it's the wife who gets what she wants. This was a cool take on the prompt. Not what I was expecting at all. I had to read it twice to make sure I picked up on everything. Lots of cool little details. You didn’t overly feed me he setting and I appreciate that. Here’s the thing. It just didn’t “sit” with me right and I can’t put my finger on why. I just didn’t care for it. Maybe it’s because the “hero” was just a talking head? Sorry I can’t be more specific whoever you are. Things that are just okay are the hardest to critique. Would that we Could - A man and a woman vow undying love, which dies all too quickly. This was tight. It felt like fairy dusy. Like there was something bewitching going on but it was totally believable. Everything about this story was believable despite the fact that it was all very Shakespearean in that I-know-we-just-met-but-I’m-def-in-love-oh-dope-you-love-me-back-let’s-do-something-crazy sort of way. Your ending did a wonderful job of tying everything back to “reality.” You crafted a lot of characterization through your dialogue. I liked that. I’m big into dialogue. And you were comfortable enough in your writing to just let the dialogue work on its own and not feel the need to fill in a bunch of ‘she said, chewing nervously on her fingernails’ and ‘he said, stomping his foot angrily’ type poo poo. Good. God that beginning though. Despite everything else being so good, you started off on a bad foot. You actually suffer here from a fairly common problem. You, the writer, know what you want to write but not necessarily where to start (and that’s okay!). So you grope around in the dark for a foothold and then you take off and weeeeeee everything’s good. But you left that stumbling opening in there. Always always always go back and look at your opener. There’s a good chance that it a) is unnecessary, b) no longer fits the style of style/tone of your story, or c) is just too drat wordy. They Call Him Girl - Witches give a prophecy and a throne is seized. This isn’t really surrealism (well, maybe, I dunno) but I think the advice still fits-- you need something to ground your story in realism. If everything is goddamn bonkers then the reader doesn’t have anything to connect to. They feel unsteady and unsure and all your work comes across as stupid rather than interesting. It’s kinda like that thing about dreams. Everybody wants to talk about the dream they had but nobody wants to listen to one. This was just too heady. Too dreamy. Too… insubstantial. What was the story buried underneath the fancy dressing? ‘Till Death - A man runs away to avoid his new wife but she follows him and tricks him into being a faithful husband. This started off boring and then got REALLY interesting and then ended boring again. Shame. Small matter of taste but I would have prefered for you to have hyphenated Pinkerton Smith. As is, it seemed like Pinkerton was her first name. Was it her first name? Strange choice either way. The bargain or deal or whatever was really, really, really poorly worded. Like, to the point of not making sense. Contextually I understood what was going on but you were definitely shoving a square peg into a round hole. The bit between the lady and the receptionist was nice. The time thing didn’t work. The interaction between husband and wife didn’t work either. It was too rushed and poo poo got unclear in a hurry. My New Church - A man starts up a new church so he can get remarried. My notes here are probably going to be a contradictory and that’s because this was a story being pulled in couple different directions. This too took long to get going. And I feel like there was a major tone shift that occurred and it was jarring as gently caress. All the Yo Mama jokes that were repurposed got me ready for one kind of story but then you went in a different way and I think that could work but it just didn’t here. This story was so weird because it was waaaay too jokey but, at the same time, desperately needed humor to keep it from getting preachy. I just don’t think the humor used here worked. It still came across as too preachy. I guess it’s difficult to write about a conflict when the whole conflict is whether or not the character should do something. Its an issue that seems to come up a lot nowadays with super hero films. “Oh jeez I have all this power but I don’t know if I wanna whine whine” who the gently caress cares The Gryphon Spell - Two houses head off a civil war. I really liked dragons and gryphons and poo poo when I was a little kid. I did not like your story about dragons and gryphons and poo poo and I think I would have probably hated it when I was a kid, too. You need to look “smaller” for flash fiction. This was clearly envisioned as an epic, sweeping tale. But you only had 1500 words! That’s just not enough to do what you wanted to do. Take any of the parts of your story, focus in, and spend your 1500 words on just that. Gimme a slice not the whole pie. You don’t have enough time for the whole pie. Dispatches from the Capital City - The king wonders why is son can't be more like that nice boy until that nice boy starts a rebellion. I think I needed to know what was going on sooner. Especially with the letters. Telling me they were being burned but not giving me any more information as to why for a while did this story a disservice. Especially since the ending was so strong. Great ending. Nice way of tying the whole story together. I wanted to know more about the outside conflict. Again, I needed more of a why here. Why are the nobles being locked up? Why are they being starved? Why is this significant? I thought it was all very interesting but I didn’t have enough to connect to to really, truly appreciate what was going on here. The Monaco Shuffle - Despite help from France, the crown is lost. Very cute. Very nice use of the prompt. Very much appreciated. Humor is a fickle mistress and I know first hand that if your reader doesn’t like it then they won’t like the story no matter how good the rest of it is. I liked the humor. I liked that the French was this bumbling, irritating (to Beatrix) fool was also super good at his job. And I liked that you didn’t feel the need to explain why he chose the nickname. You didn’t need to. It’s unfortunately very common for writers to include too much detail. You gave me a very nice balance. Ultimately, I was just so charmed by your writing. By your style. By your characters. By everything. It was not the best thing I read this week but I enjoyed it all the same. Nice job! Grizzled Patriarch or Entenzahn maybe? Eyes Only For You - A man tries to study in seclusion but succumbs to the temptations of love. Did you spend a lot of time thinking about this before you wrote it? It feels like you did. Like you had this cool world, this cool poo poo all planned out in your head, and then you ran out of time. For real, this was a super dope idea and an enjoyable read. Unfortunately, it was marred from an HM by it’s simplicity. Or, uh, lack of complexity maybe is a better way to describe this. You had 700 words left to play around with and this story desperately needed some expanding. The visuals you created? Beautiful. I loved the ending. I just didn’t get enough characterization, growth, and development to appreciate this to the degree I think it would deserve if it was a little longer. My very simple shorthanded note for this was: “Enjoyable. High/mid.” Take that as you will. Immortal in a Time of War - Rome’s best general feels slighted, so he switches sides. Okay opening. Pretty good ending. Episodic middle that didn’t do you any favors. Honestly, this just feels super rushed. Much like the story before. Which leads me to believe I’m getting close to the end. I’ll ask you the same questions: Did you spend a lot of time thinking about this before you actually sat down and wrote it? If so, I think you could be pretty disappointed in yourself. You had a solid idea and you’ve written out a decent frame but your story is just so… thin. You need more meat. More… something for your reader to be able to sink their teeth into. This was just so barebones I don’t have much more to say about it. You used half the available words.
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Jun 3, 2015 20:10
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Tyrannosaurus posted:If you actually got something out of my critique, write one for someone else! Be proactive in your betterment as a writer! Critting is not only an extremely useful way of seeing what works and what doesn't work but it's also helpful to the community at large. Giving other people crits has helped me significantly in understanding what I as a reader want out of a story and how to deliver that in my own stories. You don't even have to be good at writing to give a good crit. Which is lucky, because otherwise no one in Thunderdome would be able to give good crits.
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Jun 3, 2015 20:21
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crabrock posted:This is a pretty boring story that reads more like a teenager's fantasy than an attempt at an adult story. Some girl is sad, she meets her friend, he keeps badgering her and in order to shut him up she fucks him. then she disappears and nobody has grown or changed and nothing has been resolved other than a weird creep took advantage of somebody who needed a friend in order to get himself some of that sweet poon that he was entitled to after he had the courage to let her stick up for him in class. How can we improve it? We read that poo poo is how: Woot woot.
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Jun 3, 2015 20:22
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Tyrannosaurus posted:From Rose to Thorn - Forbidden love tempts and destroys a young couple. Hot poo poo! Well thanks man, that really does help quite a drat lot.
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Jun 3, 2015 20:28
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StealthArcher posted:How can we improve it? We read that poo poo is how: 
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Jun 3, 2015 20:30
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StealthArcher posted:How can we improve it? We read that poo poo is how: You guys are more than welcome to do more of this sort of thing 
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Jun 3, 2015 20:31
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StealthArcher posted:How can we improve it? We read that poo poo is how: This should be a podcast
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Jun 3, 2015 21:26
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Benny the Snake posted:You know what, T-Rex? Keep it to yourself. Benny the Snake posted:I'd be lying if I said this wasn't personal, but you know what T-Rex, how would I know if your decision to make me a dishonorable mention wasn't personal? How do I know that there isn't still any antagonism on your end towards me? Even after that brawl we settled? I read your story blind, Benny. I could not see whose name was attached to what story. You received a dishonorable mention because what you wrote was bad. Benny the Snake posted:I do know is that I poured a lot of heart and soul into a story which was incredibly unpleasant to write and did not need to be posted. But it did not deserve the DM. Benny. You don’t deserve anything here. Who cares that you poured your heart and soul into this? That doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t matter how hard you worked. It never does. In anything. The only thing that matters is the final product and your final product was a big, stinky turd. If you waddled out of your bedroom, plopped down on the toilet, grabbed your ankles, took a massive dump, and wiped your rear end really, really, really hard but still failed to completely clean yourself off… Do you think your mom shouldn’t be mad when she pulls your streaky, poo poo stained underwear out of the laundry basket? Do you think it is then appropriate to go crying to dad saying Mom is a big ol’ meany who doesn’t understand how hard you tried? The answer, you idiot, is no. And if you’re confused by the metaphor because you are a moron I’ll go ahead and explain that you represent you, I represent your mother, humbolt squid is your dad, and your disgusting partially brown whitey-tighties is the story entitled “The Willow and the Ribbon” which you submitted for Week 147 The Tragedy of Shakespeare Descending in the 2015 Thunderdome thread on the Something Awful forums. Now, with all that being said-- the most absolute amazing thing to me, what is truly incredible, what is the most fascinating cherry on top of this obnoxious, unwelcomed sundae is the fact you still failed to follow the prompt. Oh my god! The irony! The sweet, delicious irony! In spite of all your protesting my judgement you completely ignored the fact that you also were disqualified because you failed to follow the prompt. All that bitching about rules. Oh my my my. I am so incredibly tempted to also put you on ignore. Much more intelligent and sensible people than I have already done so. But I won’t. If. IF you will answer the following question: Benny the Snake-- knowing that your prompt was to write a story which could be summarized by ”A romp in the forest where everyone falls in love,” did you think that your submission (where a boy fucks a girl who is upset and crying and then leaves him without explaining why) honestly fulfilled your prompt or did you purposely submit a story which you already knew did not adhere to rules of the week’s challenge? If you do not answer, you will be ignored. If you are too cowardly to respond in thread, you may PM me and I will continue to read and critique your stories same as I do for everyone else. I honestly do not expect an answer but I would love to receive one.
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Jun 3, 2015 21:35
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Tyrannosaurus posted:Nah fam. I gotchu. Should I drama read this?
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Jun 3, 2015 21:37
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wait gently caress was replying to some rly old post e: oh just wanted to say blind judging is sweet because of my incredibly advanced autism posting e2: oh i realized i havent even gone in yet, so in take the moon fucked around with this message at 21:57 on Jun 3, 2015 |
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Jun 3, 2015 21:44
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StealthArcher posted:How can we improve it? We read that poo poo is how: loving lol this is so goddamn good
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Jun 3, 2015 21:47
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in and flash me please
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Jun 3, 2015 21:52
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docbeard posted:Speaking of brawls, this one comes due in less than twenty-four hours. Tick tock.
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Jun 3, 2015 22:32
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Also, hit me. (By which half-hearted blackjack reference I mean I'm in, and would like a flash rule.)
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Jun 3, 2015 22:34
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StealthArcher posted:How can we improve it? We read that poo poo is how: I don't know what's broken in your brain that you subject yourself to needless readings of Benny's stories, but the end of your reading summed up my thoughts perfectly. 
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Jun 3, 2015 22:38
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docbeard posted:Speaking of brawls, this one comes due in less than twenty-four hours. Is an extension possible? I just haven't been well this past week for various reasons and guts appears to have disappeared into the abyss.
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Jun 3, 2015 23:11
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Tyrannosaurus posted:Do not post in this thread saying something asinine like "Thanks for the crit!" Hey T Hey T Thanks for the crit <3
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Jun 3, 2015 23:18
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docbeard posted:Also, hit me.  EGG RULE A feud between egg farmers is settled by a bet. the brotherly phl posted:in and flash me please A gentleman wizards' wager.
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Jun 3, 2015 23:20
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Blue Wher posted:Is an extension possible? I just haven't been well this past week for various reasons and guts appears to have disappeared into the abyss. it's up to the judge, but the expectation is brawls don't get bumped, that's why they're normally toxxed
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Jun 3, 2015 23:45
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Tyrannosaurus posted:Entering WEEK 147 JUDGEMODE* beep boop beep Thanks! I will try to be better at computers next time so I don't DQ myself....
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Jun 3, 2015 23:51
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Blue Wher posted:Is an extension possible? I just haven't been well this past week for various reasons and guts appears to have disappeared into the abyss. Because I am a merciful soft touch or something, I will allow for an extension of 24 hours. Best make it worth my while.
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Jun 3, 2015 23:56
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LOU BEGAS MUSTACHE posted:new rule i just made up: if 10 people emptyquote this, benny the snake, the legendary rulebreaker, is banned from entering the thunderdome ever again
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Jun 4, 2015 02:43
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StealthArcher posted:Should I drama read this? I loved the first one Tyrannosaurus fucked around with this message at 02:48 on Jun 4, 2015 |
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Jun 4, 2015 02:44
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bye
anime was right fucked around with this message at 06:56 on Oct 27, 2015 |
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Jun 4, 2015 02:46
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No thanks!
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Jun 4, 2015 02:59
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He's not important enough to ignore.
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Jun 4, 2015 03:13
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It seems to me that he doesn't want to participate. He writes entries, they're judged, and then he gets upset about the the judgment, and when he loses his avatar over his story -- which was honestly bad -- he appeals to a mod. The losertar isn't something to be ashamed of. It's a sign you wrote a bad story, yeah, but it shows that you're taking your lumps in trying to get better, and it also works as a sort of viral advertising for the Thunderdome. Benny, I want you to get better at writing, but I'd rather you did it somewhere else.
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Jun 4, 2015 03:20
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Hey guys I have a novel (heh) idea, what if this thread was about writing instead of one ne'er-do-well goon? What if every post after this one....was about writing? What if I don't capriciously close the thread cause no one would shut up about stuff that doesn't matter? makes u think
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Jun 4, 2015 03:35
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 FLASH TABOO Shut up about dumb derails This applies even if you aren't in this week. -500 from the next thing you submit.
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Jun 4, 2015 03:46
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Djeser posted:
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Jun 4, 2015 03:51
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Jun 4, 2015 03:55
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hey guys I'm back from my four month vacation in Venezuela. *drops blood-caked luggage on this week's prompt* (I'll take a flash rule too.) Phobia fucked around with this message at 05:11 on Jun 4, 2015 |
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Jun 4, 2015 04:40
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Jun 4, 2015 05:11
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LOU BEGAS MUSTACHE posted:oh, we hit that. act as you see fit and face the consequences
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Jun 4, 2015 05:23
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Phobia posted:(I'll take a flash rule too.) We bet on what's inside the egg, and it keeps making that weird ticking, but it just won't hatch no matter what.
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Jun 4, 2015 05:27
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High Stakes Prompt: Gambling Words: 1500 I think I got a gambling problem. I looked down at the corpse, glassy eyes glaring with the sort of hate only dead men feel. Blood stained the gaping hole where his throat used to be, his formerly white shirt was coated in the stuff. His stiffening fingers held onto a still-smoking gun. I wanted to wretch at the mixed stink of copper and gunsmoke. Oh yeah. *** It all started a few months ago at a lovely little bar in the county's rear end in a top hat. Me and the guys were smoking and sweating like pigs and playing poker in the backroom. Good old boys from around town, not too bright, but generous with drinks and bad at cards. I wasn't very good myself, you see, but I was better than them. There was one man I didn't know. He looked older than me, hair frizzy from the humidity and smoke, and I could have sworn one of his eyes looked at everything but what he meant to look at. The only thing about him stick out was that he claimed to be the devil. "Just call me Scratch," he'd laughed, then coughed as he choked on a peanut. He washed it down with someone else's beer. I did good at first. Real good. I should have stopped then, but I was riding high, the same kind of high some folks got from the stuff Lorraine sold before her trailer exploded. My heart was thumping like one of those voodoo drums like black folks used to use in the jungles of Africa, and Scratch seemed to be the only one who could hear the beat. "You don't believe me, right? 'Bout me being the devil?" Scratch had grinned and lit a cigar with a match. The smoke curled up, and on recollection I realized it seemed to form horns around that fuzzy off-gray mop. "Then how about we make a little wager." He pulled out a beaten wallet and dumped its contents onto the table. Ben Franklin and his nine identical brothers winked up at me from the stained, scratched wood. "Whoever wins the next hand, takes it all," Scratch said, leaning back and crossing his arms over his gut, which poked out from beneath his ill-fitting shirt. "If I win, I get your souls. How about it, gentlemen?" None of us were rich. All of us had debts. A thousand bucks would go pretty far; I had a little girl who needed some new shoes, and the tranny was going out on the car, and I was short on the rent, and... "You're on," I said, pushing my pile of chips forward. The other men looked around at one another, and one by one they excused themselves until it was nothing but me and Scratch. "Looks like you're the only one with some guts," Scratch grinned. "Well, let's see your cards. Show me what you got." I looked down at my cards, keeping my face impassive with both effort and alcohol. With trembling fingers I lowered them. "gently caress me," Scratch spat, crestfallen, shoulders slumped. "That's a straight flush." "Yes," I said with a swallow. Scratch stared at his own cards, then spread them, fingers scratching through his greasy hair. "...I got the king, the queen, the letter 'A,' the clown, and ten, and they're all red diamonds. Is that good? We don't play poker much in hell. Cards catch fire too easy." *** After that night, my life had turned into a living hell. The sun burned me, food made me vomit, and I couldn't sleep. And then there was the thirst. I tried animals, but they made me throw up worse than when I tried to eat regular food; at least regular food didn't taste like my daughter's corgi. My first victims were easy; there was the landlord who kept making eyes at my daughter, my boss, some of the other bastards that made my life hell. But I got greedy, sloppy -- and the hunters came to town. Vampire hunters. They don't care where we come from, they don't care why we are what we are, only about putting us down. If I weren't afflicted I'd be all for them, but I am, so that's that. That's who the corpse was, by the way. Some nasty bastard with a big gun loaded with blessed bullets. He managed to pop off a couple shots, but he was surprised and I was too fast, and he met his end at my teeth. I'd have felt worse about it, but in a way, we were both out for blood. I stashed the corpse somewhere out of the way, and hurried on to where I was going: the bar where it all started. *** "I was wonderin' when you'd get here," Scratch said as he poured himself a glass of scotch. He was sitting at the battered card table in the back room of the bar, unopened deck of cards before him, a friendly grin on his chapped lips. "Up for a game of blackjack?" "On one condition," I said, trying to keep my voice level. "I get back what you stole." "Stole? You bet and lost. All fair and square, buddy." Scratch took a drink and coughed loudly, wincing. "Besides, you don't have anything else I want. But your daughter does." Claws of ice squeezed my lungs. "My daughter? What does she-" "I knew you was coming tonight," he said with a shrug. "She heard you talking to me over the phone. Said everything finally 'clicked.' She's a good girl, helpin' her deadbeat daddy out like this. I tried to tell her to keep to her own business, but..." "I can't let her do this," I said, but my protest sounded hollow to my own ears. If I didn't get my soul back, if I didn't stop being a monster, then it wouldn't be long before I tossed away what remained of myself and drained my little girl dry. I couldn't do that to her. "You sure? You're free to walk out whenever you like, you know. But if you do..." He shrugged and took another sip, shuddering and smacking his lips at the taste. "Well, we don't need to go there, do we?" I sat down, my eyes fixed on the unopened deck of cards. "Let's play, then." The words dropped from my lips like vomit. "Two out of three." We shuffled the cards, each of us cutting the deck to keep things fair. Scratch tried to make small-talk as we played, and for the life of me I couldn't figure out if he was trying to distract me or if he was legitimately trying to have a conversation. It didn't matter either way -- my focus was like a splinter of frozen steel. He'd won the first game, I'd won the second. "Lessee," he said, laying down the cards for me to see. "I got a king and a queen. What's that mean, again?" My throat closed up. "C'mon, that good or not? I don't want to hang around here all night." Scratch nibbled at one ragged fingernail. "I got better things to do. I'm the devil, you know." "I know," I said, clearing my throat. The words were a wheeze. "You have a twenty." Scratch opened his eyes wide. "Really? That's good, right?" I nodded, then looked down at my hand. My breath stopped. "Yeah," I said softly, setting my cards down. "Real good." He looked at them, then back up at me. "An eleven? You should have asked me to hit you, pal." "Not quite," I said, pointing at the ace alongside the king. "The ace can either mean eleven, or one." Scratch screwed up his expression and looked up at me, both eyes meeting my own for the first time since we'd met. "You're sure?" "Yes," I said, my body shivering with fear and exhilaration as hope thrummed behind my eyes, hot and sharp as a migraine. "I've won." Scratch sat back, looked cross for a moment, then let out a short laugh. "I'll be damned. Good for you! I felt a sudden heat invade my body, my limbs burning as blood flowed through my veins once again. The cold fog that had invaded my vision cleared, and all the old, familiar aches and pains returned. I was a man again, and not some soulless, bloodthirsty ghoul! "Shame about your daughter, though. Real shame." Scratch shook his head and lit a cigarette. My heart had just started beating again, now it stopped dead in my chest. "What do you mean?" "Happened during our chat, see," he said slowly, remorsefully. "The hunters caught up with her -- burnt her alive. I heard most of it before the line cut. Took a while." I heard laughs and whoops and hollers outside, and I smelled acrid smoke as the bar began to burn down. Scratch's grin was too wide. "And they followed you here."
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Jun 4, 2015 05:47
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Sitting Here posted:What if I don't capriciously close the thread cause no one would shut up about stuff that doesn't matter? You won't.
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Jun 4, 2015 13:41
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I'm in! I'll always remember my first time.
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Jun 4, 2015 13:52
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| # ? Apr 23, 2024 17:37 |
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In. 
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Jun 4, 2015 18:03
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