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Ironic Twist
Aug 3, 2008

I'm bokeh, you're bokeh
~subs closed~

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sebmojo
Oct 23, 2010


Legit Cyberpunk









interprompt: what i did on my holidays

The Saddest Rhino
Apr 29, 2009

Put it all together.
Solve the world.
One conversation at a time.



i ate an ice cream

sebmojo
Oct 23, 2010


Legit Cyberpunk









I sacrificed an elk and bathed in its hot blood it was ok

Uranium Phoenix
Jun 20, 2007

Boom.

Week #257 - Judge failures week, or Wizard Week 2: Cast Freedom of Movement or Die Hard (CRITS Part 2 of 4)
seriously, though, judges, do you even crit? do you even crit, bro??? speaking of bros...

***
Wizardbro Subculture by Jitzu the Monk
Plot: A teenage bloodmage is confined to a hospital for cutting an a psych ward for word magic. His attempts to get laid are ultimately thwarted.
Thoughts: Well, nice job establishing the protagonist as a jerk real quick. Obviously, you’ve got a strong character voice. You also create some strong visuals (ugh). The story starts with the character concerned both about his interrupted spell and getting laid. It ends with that thwarted, which is sort of like the comeuppance an audience might want for this flavor of rear end in a top hat, but not particularly satisfying. The main character is unchanged in the end, but that seems intentional. I don’t have a ton to say about the story; it seems to accomplish the light humor and ridiculousness that it set out to portray; there’s not a ton of depth beyond that or egregious problems to discuss.


***
A Call to the Restoration Crew by a new study bible!
Plot: Two art-mages are called into to cover up a murder, and solve it in order to complete the cover.
Thoughts: This is primarily a functional story. It resolves, though not entirely satisfactorily. We’re given an implied justification for the boy’s murder, and the murder is solved, but the story ends too abruptly. The other aspect of the ending is a recall of the story’s primary theme. The theme--what art is and is not—is the entire point of the introduction. Art gives objects personality—literally, in this story—and at the end, Eardrum comments on the murder as art. The weakness is that the discussion on art isn’t particularly profound, but that and the art magic is all that make this piece particular distinct from any other story like it. The story needed more of them arguing about art, with perhaps a college student interjecting their opinion, and the comment about the murder as art should wrap up the discussion in some way. The voice established in the first line also needs to continue throughout to give the piece the necessary impertinent tone that will allow it to bridge the seriousness of murder with the frivolousness of art discussion and animated M&M tattoos during a cover-up. As it is, the tone seems to shift after the introduction, especially at the end.


***
The Satanists by Benny Profane
Plot: A band plays for a bar, killing dozens, then leaves.
Thoughts: Going into it blind, this story is going to blindside people with a bunch of dead bodies and demon magic 6/7ths of the way through with almost no warning. Until then, it’s just the classic, rather boring tale of the band-that-isn’t-quite-making-it. One might infer the vagrant was satan or a demon, but what point or purpose that serves is unclear. In fact, having read it twice, I still don’t know what it’s about. I had to read the flash rule to figure out what the power was, and I think the story spent too much time fulfilling the prompt to actually tell much of a story. A lot of description gives us a clear picture of this rather cliché place, but so little actually happens, and all the parts of the story that would differentiate it are glossed over quickly at the end.


***
The Wizard’s Hoard by Hawklad
Plot: Sandlot, abridged, but with wizards, and it’s about the wizard’s problem, not the kid’s.
Thoughts: The baseball in the creepy backyard is a well worn trope, but it’s used well enough here to build tension. However, that trope is usually used because the child character needs to find their courage, where here, it’s just a long elaborate justification to get the girl to know the wizard, and probably superfluous. The story is actually about how memory is linked to objects and moving on from loss. Only the last third of the story actually focuses on that, though. It’s also almost entirely about the wizard, and the child is basically just tacked on as an excuse for him to show and talk to the reader about things. I think the kid needs her own problem—not just about wanting cheap toys—so that the story is more about her. As it is, the story is bifurcated into two separate stories, one about losing a baseball that is solved by literal magic, the second about loss that is not resolved, really. The significance of the song the wizard plays might only make sense if you’ve read the flash rule, because the story itself doesn’t address what it could mean. Presumably, he’s following the girl’s advice, but why hide that moment of catharsis from the reader, and why pair it with such an asinine thought? Yes, ten-year old kids are short sighted and very much enamored with ‘things,’ but they do have other thoughts and problems that would make for a much better story. I also don’t know that ‘let go of all the stuff you made to remember this person you loved’ is really the best solution to the wizard’s problem.


***
Earthmover by Fuschia tude
Plot: A fortune-teller comes back from the dead to kill his murderer, and does.
Thoughts: Immediately, I feel a clash between the voice of the narrator and the apparent time setting. Lines like “Me, a mere itinerant fortune-teller with a flair for the dramatic” and “I still wore my fortune-teller getup” need reworking. The tone of the story is rather flippant, and I don’t think that really serves the story all that well here. Once the narrator comes back from the dead, he’s basically the terminator so there’s no tension. There’s no tension in the start of the story either, because we know he’s going to die from the first line. “I’m dead at the start of the story” serves as a hook, but then repetition and introductions slow down the story and make that hook less effective. The prose also needs to be cleaned; for example: “I said, through my makeshift bandanna mask” and “the dying embers in the fireplace threw weird shadows across the room.” There’s also something of a plot hole: Big Bill has no knowledge that a dead man has come back for him, yet all-out flees anyways instead of perhaps going for his gun first like he did early in the story. There’s not much depth to the story; the two characters serve singular, plot-driven purposes. More could be done with the voice of nature. Rather than this mysterious force talk a bunch (“Big Bill, it explained, was buying tracts of land to cut down all their trees and sell the lumber”) it seems more apt to have it be feelings and images, rather than additional exposition. That said, it’s a fairly functional vengeance story that could benefit from tightened prose, rearrangement of the introduction, and making the protagonist in a bit more danger at the climax.

Deltasquid
Apr 10, 2013

awww...
you guys made me ink!


THUNDERDOME

Deltasquid posted:

Flavor: Bastani Sonnati

Amon-Zeus (1224 words)

Not going to edit this but I'm an idiot. It's 1024 words, not 1224.

Mercedes
Mar 7, 2006

"So you Jesus?"

"And you black?"

"Nigga prove it!"

And so Black Jesus turned water into a bucket of chicken. And He saw that it was good.




sebmojo posted:

interprompt: what i did on my holidays

I did things Merc wouldn't even do. It was glorious with a dash of shame.

sebmojo
Oct 23, 2010


Legit Cyberpunk









Mercedes posted:

I did things Merc wouldn't even do. It was glorious with a dash of shame.

:dukedoge::dukedoge::dukedoge:

Fuschia tude
Dec 26, 2004

THUNDERDOME LOSER 2019

Uranium Phoenix posted:

Week #257 - Judge failures week, or Wizard Week 2: Cast Freedom of Movement or Die Hard (CRITS Part 2 of 4)
seriously, though, judges, do you even crit?

Thank you!

Yoruichi
Sep 21, 2017


Horse Facts

True and Interesting Facts about Horse


判断に
いつも待っている
悪かったか

Uranium Phoenix
Jun 20, 2007

Boom.

sebmojo posted:

interprompt: what i did on my holidays

seaside hotel review

the hotel has a nice view of the ocean and the coffee at the complementary breakfast buffet is pretty good. there were a lot of weird tourist groups though and the walls were thin so i kept hearing them chanting and scratching all night. when the earth split open and claws of lava consumed the lobby, including the coffee and donuts, we were given breakfast vouchers, but then as the maw of the beast consumed the building my room lost wifi and i was unable to finish watching the pay-per-view mma fight that i had already paid for. i've tried calling the management for a refund and all i heard was static and distant screams. 2/7 stars would not recommend. has valet parking though.

QuoProQuid
Jan 12, 2012

Tr*ckin' and F*ckin' all the way to tha
T O P

Crit for The Night’s Post by Third Emperor

What do I Think This Story Is About? A recently deceased man tries to convince his beloved to swallow poison to join him in the afterlife, which turns out to be slightly less cool than it initially seems.

What Works? This piece is a very well-written riff on early 19th century pulp fiction. If you had asked me whether these were excerpts from The King in Yellow or a Lovecraft contemporary, I would probably have believed it. Period appropriate writing is extremely hard to pull off, but you do so well here. Epistolary writing even more so. Your use of poetic phrases (“They tell me stories of faraway palaces and oceans of warm pink waters that fill the lungs as agreeably as air”) and evocative imagery, (“Go to the window and at full arm’s reach splay your right hand, set your thumb over the dog star”) is pretty masterful. The prose might be purple, but it’s a hella nice shade.

That you can capture a very specific style of writing is integral to the story you are trying to tell. I don’t think this story would work, for example, in my usual barebones, ho-hum style. The excessive description juxtaposes nicely with the narrator’s dark intentions and underscores his growing desperation as the story moves forward. By the second letter, the reader knows that something is terribly, terribly wrong in this place, but the loquaciousness and dreamy descriptions almost make the whole thing seem tempting.

It's a dark concept handled well.

What Doesn’t Work? I don’t have many complaints with this story that aren’t inherent in the style or venue itself. It is easy to get lost in the story if you skip even a small word or phrase. I initially had some confusion regarding the “priests in paper clothes” before realizing I had missed a sentence. I also tripped up on one or two of your descriptions, but I think that is more of a reading comprehension issue than a writing issue.

My second complaint is mainly about length. You are very much constrained by the word count this week, which prevents the reader from really dwelling on the mounting horror of the piece. I would have really enjoyed one or two additional letters to better allow the narrator’s façade to collapse. Perhaps some begging or bargaining before the outright dejection of the final letter. I don’t think it is necessary, but it might have also been good to get some small hints about the implied, in-universe reader of this piece. As written, I can imagine the writer exploiting that relationship to get his way.

Takeaway: As I said in IRC, I was very surprised that this didn't place. I would seriously recommend expanding this piece a little further and sending it off for publication. It's a very good piece of Lovecraftian horror.

QuoProQuid fucked around with this message at 02:39 on Nov 7, 2017

Yoruichi
Sep 21, 2017


Horse Facts

True and Interesting Facts about Horse


桜散る
判断に待つ
いつもそう

sebmojo
Oct 23, 2010


Legit Cyberpunk









some crits from funhouse week

Simbyotic: victor steele

This is a perfectly ok premise, you’ve got a dude with a motivation running into something weird that bears on that motivation and a bunch of cool and weird stuff to describe. Unfortunately you gently caress that premise up like a toddler in charge of a paint factory, but faceplanting at the halfway mark is a proud tdome tradition so don’t feel bad duder.

The issues with your story are various, starting with the soggy cardboard words, endless array of errors and drearily underimagined joys of the titular park , but the fundamental problem is your protagonist doesn’t dooooo anything. It’s a pity because there’s a nice catch 22 nastiness to the second to last para. Keep trying.

Chairchucker: lawn guy

A guy mowed a rude word into a bunch of artificial turf. Normally it’s super cheap to do that kind of reductive summary, but it’s not this time b/c that’s literally all there is. Even the ferris wheel is only there to allow the delivery of the extremely bad joke which (and this is key) you don’t even bring home, because what is the ‘unflattering message’ about the meany boss, Chucker? Does he wear too-large pants, run over pigeons, fart in church? We will never know and are all the poorer for it though tbf not much poorer. Lucky to avoid the DM, on sober reflection.

Derp: circus freak

I liked this on my first reading and still sort of do, but it wimps out at the end – you convey a powerful nausea with solid words and a pleasingly deranged intensity, but then the final spasm of action just leads to the protagonist changing his mind, boo. When I get to the end of a story and it falls flat I like to go back to the title and see if that reads differently now I know the end, but your piece fails that test too – it’s generic circus chat. A pity, I think this had promise if you’d found out what was underneath the surface of your repellent freak guy.

One thing to consider is to look at your own life and find the point of frustration the character’s coming from and use that to springboard into a resolution. I’m not saying you’re an enraged circus freak on a chain (tho you may be I guess and that’s cool if so) but there’s some well expressed emotion – where does that come from in you? Is there a juxtaposition you could chuck in there?

Exmond: goddammit why do I keep getting dms, cliché cop edition

The first two paras actually land really sweetly, apart from the final line – do you see how ‘I focused on the situation at hand’ is a clunky irrelevance to the solid noir pulp vibe you have going on? Of course you do. Unfortunately you didn’t back then otherwise you wouldn’t have kept clumsily grafting awkward introspective musing to awkward action. Ultimately this is too many ideas struggling for air in pursuit of a goal that’s probably not worth reaching. What happens? Guy shoots a guy, gets shot, while musing. Again, reduction is unfair but there’s not enough juice to make me feel bad about it. DM: justified.

Devorum: horsemania, spooky carousel edition

There was a fair bit of dissension in the judge ranks this week and on reflection I’d probably say chucker deserved a DM more than this one – Exmond, for e.g., could learn from the way it keeps its head in the game and tells a good pacy adventure story with well-chosen and cleanly conveyed details. I think it falls over at the end in a ‘ran out of time/ideas’ kind of way, because there’s no real motivation around the horsification of the bullied protag – perhaps if he’d made more of a devils bargain it would land better, rather than just being turned into a demon carousel horse guy by authorial magic fiat? But, really, not too bad.

T-rex – rollercoaster dragon relationship metaphor thing

It’s is only ever short for it is fyi, perhaps you should ‘try-annosaurus’ to get your grammar right in future? Haha just a little joke there. Which is nice because this story is free of jokes, emotion, or interest really. Dull couple have dull ride on dull rollercoaster whilst awaiting end of world (also dull). ‘it doesn’t really matter one way or the other’ hmm good point protagonist. Words adequate but not very interesting, which is also in-theme I guess.

Sercypher: weirdly placid robot death

That’s a great opening line, which the rest of your story fails to really capitalise on – you had the idea and possibly chortled while rubbing your hands together but then you didn’t really deliver. I confess to a stomach churn at the description of the daughter being brave, but that’s cheap and easy because parents like me have their brains altered to make that happen. The big problem in this isn’t the premise, which is solid horror, but more that it’s lacking in recognisable humanity. Why are some people placid and some enraged? Why does the protag go from amiable flesh robot to end-of-Bodysnatchers-level freakout? Is there anymore to the end than the machines, idk, slurping up all the human protoplasm for some dumb experiment? The whole thing is superficially creepy but so poorly imagined that the horror doesn’t survive the lightest application of thought.

Twist – Alycia

Yeah so this is a glitteringly perfect assemblage of words and it’s a delight to read but it’s so inward focused that I just bounce off it. I get a whiff of absent father turning up to the birthday party, perhaps? Through that lens I can get taste of what you were aiming at, and don’t get me wrong this is probably entirely publishable in an Arty Magazine of some description, but ime as an occasional purveyor of such it can be salutary to get a touch of the quirt every now and then. Bring your readers along, don’t showboat by gesturing at significance and wiggling your eyebrows.

Schneider heim – test of courage

This is a combination of ploddy social realism and high concept magic realist dreamscape that annoyed me a lot on first reading, but I guess this just about makes it over the line. I think it would have worked better without the magical falling through compartment roofs and what not, but even without that it’s a bit ‘bad thing could have happened but didn’t, yay’.

Mag7, Darlene mysterious full stop

I liked this a lot but you’re lucky I did because that’s what it took for me to over look that terrible first line. look at that line, ‘I suppose I’ll always be drawn to the carny life like a cat to a basket weaver’. It’s so bad – repeats the ‘I’ which is clumsy, has a superfluous ‘suppose’ has a bland passive verb in ‘be drawn’, has a puzzling tense in ‘always’ – and omg that simile, it’s baffling what cats have to do with basket weavers. However the rest of the story is great, I like the vividly evoked carny life, I like the sly double ghost story flickflack, and the ending is just weird and sweet. If you’ve got a particular angle or turn of phrase, make sure there’s a good on ramp for it = something specific and relateable, not clumsy and abstract..

Apophenium, vacation

The words in this are good enough, I guess (if needlessly overwrought at times), but as far as I can tell it’s completely pointless – a guy hits somethings, sees a ghost, the end.

Qpq, tricky dick story

Yeah this is solid nixoning if a little bland –it’s the sort of story you’d hear in your head if you thought of Nixon. It also doesn’t do much more than provide a sour interior monologue to ten minutes in the life of america’s favourite president villain. It’s well-delivered, has good words, but you could have used that to do something stronger and stranger, I think.

Exmond
May 31, 2007

Writing is fun!

sebmojo posted:

some crits from funhouse week

Exmond: goddammit why do I keep getting dms, cliché cop edition

The first two paras actually land really sweetly, apart from the final line – do you see how ‘I focused on the situation at hand’ is a clunky irrelevance to the solid noir pulp vibe you have going on? Of course you do. Unfortunately you didn’t back then otherwise you wouldn’t have kept clumsily grafting awkward introspective musing to awkward action. Ultimately this is too many ideas struggling for air in pursuit of a goal that’s probably not worth reaching. What happens? Guy shoots a guy, gets shot, while musing. Again, reduction is unfair but there’s not enough juice to make me feel bad about it. DM: justified.


Thank you!

Ironic Twist
Aug 3, 2008

I'm bokeh, you're bokeh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFggLJxv9zA

WEEK 274 RESULTS

Let's get to the point: despite the jaunty tune above, this week was...it wasn't bad, exactly, just kinda sorta dull, especially towards the bottom. Nothing was the sort of fun and blatant Loss that we were secretly hoping for, just a bunch of stories that were mostly technically competent but fell short in one way or another.

The Loss pick this week, with acknowledgement that it still had potential, belongs to Fumblemouse. Sorry, man. You're a good writer, but some of us were just straight-up confused or ultimately thought the whole thing fell flat. It was a neat concept that wasn't executed very well, and in a week without a standout worst story, this is how it went down.

HMs this week go to flerp, crabrock and Hawklad, for solid and mostly competent stories.

The HMs weren't unanimous, nor was our Winner this week, but we ultimately decided that the winning story was that one that, in my opinion, nailed its execution and imagery very well.

Thranguy, last Sundae Night belongs to you.

Djeser
Mar 22, 2013


it's crow time again

judging this week was very much like being invited to a dinner party where you're sure someone is going to piss their pants, and all throughout the evening you're just waiting for the piss, and then the evening's over and everyone's trousers are still dry, and you're glad that no one pissed their pants, but now also slightly mad that no one pissed their pants

Ironic Twist
Aug 3, 2008

I'm bokeh, you're bokeh

Djeser posted:

judging this week was very much like being invited to a dinner party where you're sure someone is going to piss their pants, and all throughout the evening you're just waiting for the piss, and then the evening's over and everyone's trousers are still dry, and you're glad that no one pissed their pants, but now also slightly mad that no one pissed their pants

tfw

Thranguy
Apr 21, 2010


Deceitful and black-hearted, perhaps we are. But we would never go against the Code. Well, perhaps for good reasons. But mostly never.
Thunderdome Week CCLXXV: Bring on the Lovers, Liars and Clowns

Keeping it simple this week: your assignment is to write me some comedy. I’m pretty sure we’ve had close to a dozen horror weeks and not a single humor one. This is supposedly a comedy website, so let’s give it a go. Usual advice for comedy applies: try to write some actual characters rather than punchline delivery systems, I’d prefer a story to a long joke, probably don’t ‘punch down’, whatever that means. Even more so than other weeks, though, if you make the judges laugh, you can probably ignore all this.

Oh, avoid inside jokes. I’m going to try to get at least one relative newbie to cojudge to to make sure they’re completely lost on at least one judge.

No fanfic, erotica, screeds, etc.

Flash rules are available. They’ll come in the form of songs from the late eighties and early nineties. The usual advice for song flash rules applies: don’t be too literal, don’t retell the narrative of the song, don’t use more elements from the song than will fit in your story.

1000 Words

Wordcount gimmicks
Anyone who toxxes gets 500 bonus words.
Anyone who submits on Saturday gets 500 bonus words. (Note: Thursday and Friday are not Saturday. Nor are Tuesday and Wednesday, for that matter.)
If you toxx to submit on Saturday, that’s an extra 500 bonus bonus words, for a total of +1500.
(If you do the above and don’t submit Saturday, your account’s execution won’t happen until after the deadline Sunday night. The words will be gone forever, but if you submit something under 1000 words Sunday you at least won’t fail the week.)

Signups close Friday 11:59 PM Pacific time.

Saturday ends 11:59 PM Pacific time

Submissions close Sunday 11:59 PM Pacfic time

Judges:
Thranguy
apophenium
Antivehicular

Comedians:
Sham Bam Bamina (toxxed)
Djeser
crabrock (toxxed)
The Saddest Rhino (Shadow of a Doubt)
antivehicular (Under the Milky Way)
babyRyoga (Sally Cinnamon)
Chairchucker (International Pop Overthrow)
Quo Pro Quid (The Queen Is Dead)
Jay F Fricks (toxxed)
Exomund (toxxed)
J.A.B.C
Fumblemouse
Sebmojo
Mercedes
Sparksbloom
flerp (Blood Makes Noise)
Deltasquid
Tyrannosaurus (toxxed)
Magius

Thranguy fucked around with this message at 04:00 on Nov 11, 2017

Sham bam bamina!
Nov 6, 2012

ƨtupid cat
In!

I thought for sure that I was cruising for a DM this week at best. I still hate that I wasn't able to do more, but I'm glad that what little I did apparently worked.

Djeser
Mar 22, 2013


it's crow time again

in :newlol:

Uranium Phoenix
Jun 20, 2007

Boom.

Week #257 - Judge failures week, or Wizard Week 2: Wizard Harder (CRITS Part 3 of 4)
magic missive!

***
Minding the gap by Fumblemouse
Plot: A wizard teleports a subway to another world, then back for no discernable reason. Then the lights go off and he does stuff involving a safety film. He finds a place where passengers have been falling into, then uses hole magic to vomit them all out to safety, then stays in the pit to save anyone else who falls in.
Thoughts: This was not an especially clear story, and it took a second read to understand what was actually happening. Having reread it, the annoying repetition of ‘mind the gap’ doesn’t need to be repeated so often. I’m still not entirely sure why the train went dark and why there was a film playing, or how behind the film was this piles of bodies stuck between the gap between train and station, nor how so many people fell in, nor how they were all still alive. In several places, it would be easy to clean up the prose, such as: “Tim grunted in extreme annoyance and stamped his foot.” The conflict seems to be a man versus the (un)natural, and There-Are-Some-Who-Call-Me-Tim (Holy Grail reference) changes from a joyrider to a responsible guy who’s entire life now involves lying in a void-abyss mouth vomiting people to safety, so, there’s a character arc I guess. His noble sacrifice doesn’t feel all that meaningful because apparently he just has nothing better to do. Also, without the context of wizard week, this story would no doubt be even more confusing.

***
Diamonds are a Wizard's Biggest Headache by Capnfalcon
Plot: A wizard steals a diamond and becomes friends with it.
Thoughts: You get hard-mode because minerals are a hobby of mine and I wanted this prompt. For example, rubies and sapphires are varieties of the same mineral corundum, so immediately you’ve destroyed the verisimilitude of all the pedantic geologists reading your story. The good news is as long as your protagonist does more than give a girl a dog at the end, your ending will probably be better than the previous incarnation of this prompt. [UP goes and reads your story]. Oh for gently caress’s sake. The guy gets a rock-friend at the end? Uggh. Okay, you set yourself up for the protagonist making a big change by talking about how big diamonds make for big wishes, and the conclusion is not particularly satisfying because the ending is not what was ‘promised.’ It’s also not set up that the protagonist is lonely, so the ending being acceptable to him/her is not foreshadowed. The heist is rather anticlimactic. It’s what the story up to that point has been building to, but it goes off without a hitch and just… ends. Then it’s about convincing the diamond to do stuff. The line about naming his gems being nuts seems to contradict the rest of the story where the protag constantly banters with his/her rocks. The rock magic is also very mundane; the most magic we see is a cloaking spell with the opal. Everything else could be done with a bit of liquid nitrogen, a blowtorch, and a living friend. Oh well. I guess the real treasure here was the friends we made along the way.


***
The Dream Taker by super sweet best pal
Plot: An apprentice learns magic from a bitter wizard after copious exposition, who subsequently retires.
Thoughts: Ugh, error in your first sentence is not a good way to start. This introduction is weak, and the integration of the prompt’s power seems forced. Your protagonist, Mary, is almost entirely a non-entity. She just shows up for the plot and does what she’s told to do; with no personality, dreams, interests, description, or autonomy, Mary is about as bland as a character can be. She obtains apprenticeship with no struggle, and a huge chunk of the intro could be cut because it serves little purpose. Then you’ve also a bunch of dry exposition, and all of this is before I can even find a conflict in the story. The conflict, and core of the story, arrives late in. It’s that they can only get magic power from stealing wishes. This is all blatantly spelled out for the reader. That premise is interesting. The execution is flawed. Once the premise is spelled out, and a story is ready to take place and Mary is, perhaps, ready to actually make a choice affecting the story, the story ends. Basically, you’ve explained your prompt to the reader and not a lot else.


***
Hedgewizard by ThirdEmperor
Plot: A wizard’s friends pick up some illegal wizard drugs. After they leave, the wizard police come calling, and the wizard kills one then goes off to rescue his friends.
Thoughts: Starts with some vivid prose and quick characterization. The wizardry also has it’s own mysterious character, and is acceptably arcane. Your particular style is present again, where some clarity is sacrificed for voice, pacing, and prose. I like Richter’s title, but the name the wizard-police call him confuses; I see that it’s a reference to his older self though. I like the magic in this story. It has personality and one can infer a mysterious and ancient flavor to it. There’s a complete character arc: Richter goes from someone letting the world pass him by to someone acting. The story has one of several possible conclusions. I think more could be done to show Richter’s connection to nature. With the line “drat human thing to do,” it’s clear he associates himself more with different parts of nature, and I think that could be built up more earlier. He thinks he’s removed from it all, even though he’s clearly not. You’ve also got a strong setting that I can really visualize, and characters developed well in the short space. If you wanted to extend this story, it would be seeing how Richter gets involved again in human affairs.


***
Bambina Loca by sebmojo
Plot: A lovely wizard rides his magic car into the past to replay the events that led him needing to stop his crush from marrying an evil wizard, then instead of knifing the dude and getting sent to wizard jail, instead gets his magic car and talking hat to pick the nemesis up, which causes his wizard-nemesis and the car to both disappear.
Thoughts: Nice snappy intro with a tone-setting visual and that immediately makes the conflict clear. After that… wow. So, it’s a story that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and doesn’t take things like linear time too seriously either. It feels like Zamboni probably learned something, if only it’s ‘use weird magic spells you don’t understand, rather than shanking the guy you hate.’ It feels like the conclusion needs a bit more. Something with Zamboni and Susie, or something more than Bevan just disappearing inexplicitly, which may not actually resolve the conflict. The core of this story is it’s over-the-top ridiculous action, so, I mean, obviously keep that part. And maybe things like the talking hat and the goat don’t really need explanations, but maybe we need a bit more on Zamboni’s past and the mistakes he made so that when he fixes them the impact is a bit more meaningful.

crabrock
Aug 2, 2002

I

AM

MAGNIFICENT






in

The Saddest Rhino
Apr 29, 2009

Put it all together.
Solve the world.
One conversation at a time.



prompt me 💕thranguy💕

Antivehicular
Dec 30, 2011


I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

I'm in and would like a flash rule, please!

Thranguy
Apr 21, 2010


Deceitful and black-hearted, perhaps we are. But we would never go against the Code. Well, perhaps for good reasons. But mostly never.

The Saddest Rhino posted:

prompt me 💕thranguy💕

Sonic Youth, Shadow of a Doubt

Antivehicular posted:

I'm in and would like a flash rule, please!

The Church, Under the Milky Way

Sitting Here
Dec 31, 2007
oops

Yoruichi
Sep 21, 2017


Horse Facts

True and Interesting Facts about Horse


Sham bam bamina! posted:

In!

I thought for sure that I was cruising for a DM this week at best. I still hate that I wasn't able to do more, but I'm glad that what little I did apparently worked.

You are insufferably smug Sham Bam Bamina. Brawl me.

Oh also thanks for the PM, "My story was poo poo, but I'm surprised that you weren't able to follow its basics." After reading your kind explanation of your shitful story I have revised my assessment of it downwards to: brawl me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_2D8Eo15wE

Yoruichi fucked around with this message at 08:36 on Nov 7, 2017

BabyRyoga
May 21, 2001

THUNDERDOME LOSER 2021
This sounds rough for a greenhorn such as myself, but why the hell not,

In, and flash rule please!

Chairchucker
Nov 14, 2006

to ride eternal, shiny and chrome

THUNDERDOME LOSER 2022




flash me bb

Thranguy
Apr 21, 2010


Deceitful and black-hearted, perhaps we are. But we would never go against the Code. Well, perhaps for good reasons. But mostly never.

BabyRyoga posted:

This sounds rough for a greenhorn such as myself, but why the hell not,

In, and flash rule please!

The Stone Roses, Sally Cinnamon


Material Issue, International Pop Overthrow

Sham bam bamina!
Nov 6, 2012

ƨtupid cat

Yoruichi posted:

You are insufferably smug Sham Bam Bamina. Brawl me.

Oh also thanks for the PM, "My story was poo poo, but I'm surprised that you weren't able to follow its basics." After reading your kind explanation of your shitful story I have revised my assessment of it downwards to: brawl me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_2D8Eo15wE
I don't see why you had to drag your feet for two weeks on this, but I guess I'll accept.

crabrock
Aug 2, 2002

I

AM

MAGNIFICENT






Oh and :toxx: cause apparently it helps me right now

Djeser
Mar 22, 2013


it's crow time again



Prompt: Fleeting Relationship
Your story will feature two characters who meet for the first time, experience something brief and important together, then leave, likely never to see each other again.

Word count:
1200 max

Deadline:
Tuesday, November 21, 11 PM Pacific

Toxx up so I know I'm not wasting my time.

Chili
Jan 23, 2004

college kids ain't shit


Fun Shoe

Djeser posted:

Prompt: Fleeting Relationship
Your story will feature two characters who meet for the first time, experience something brief and important together, then leave, likely never to see each other again.

Word count:
1200 max

Deadline:
Tuesday, November 21, 11 PM Pacific

Toxx up so I know I'm not wasting my time.

gently caress you, you loving dickshitting promptstealing flearidden wordpuker

come and get me, bitch

Djeser
Mar 22, 2013


it's crow time again

Chili posted:

gently caress you, you loving dickshitting promptstealing flearidden wordpuker

come and get me, bitch

don't sign your posts

and sure

Chili
Jan 23, 2004

college kids ain't shit


Fun Shoe

Djeser posted:

don't sign your posts

and sure

Pre :toxx: for whatever our judge comes up with. Cos I got stones.

Dr. Kloctopussy
Apr 22, 2003

"It's time....to DIE!"
just do that same prompt duh

Djeser
Mar 22, 2013


it's crow time again

Chili posted:

Pre :toxx: for whatever our judge comes up with. Cos I got stones.

sorry to hear that, don't drink so much soda

:toxx:

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Yoruichi
Sep 21, 2017


Horse Facts

True and Interesting Facts about Horse


Djeser posted:

Toxx up so I know I'm not wasting my time.

okily dokily :toxx:

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