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Jan 1, 2015 01:23
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December Octopodes posted:homework 
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Jan 1, 2015 21:20
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Oh right so this was going on. Surreptitious Twist Judgment Muffin and Twist, you two have left me in quite the jam. Generally speaking, brawls tend to be very one-sided, or come down to who loses a race to the bottom. Well instead you both turned in strong submissions, and I've spent the last week trying to make up my mind about which one I liked better. Close as we get to a photo finish, though instead of ten seconds it takes up ten days. Muffin, despite your grumbling, you still manage to churn out a respectably lean piece. Afforded a generous word count, you went for an economy of words (albeit by circumstance rather than design) and some nice, sparse imagery. A week later, your images still linger in my head; particularly autumn and winter. That said, it's a good thing the two of you agreed to a pretty prose brawl because it is definitely the imagery that does the heavy lifting. Although you deliver on the prompt as promised, your man for all seasons doesn't leave much of an impression beyond the powerful symbols associated with him. His trials and choices are universal enough that they could apply to anyone, but also vague enough they could have been written by anyone. You would have done better to delve into the specific and draw forth the universal. Twist, you went the opposite route, something far more ambitious. In contrast to Muffin's sparsity, you presided over a carnival of images. Almost too many, you might say. It all flowed together well enough, but after the initial awe I found very few of them stuck out beyond your opening and ending selections. I would have preferred it if you'd whittled it down to smaller number of stronger images and sensations. But it works well enough for what your aims were, and your protagonist is enough of her own character that she becomes an image in and of herself. She and you both played to the seasons, and I was fond of your uses of echo. Unfortunately, the ending spoils it a bit. You invoke mythic names and imagery, only for the object of her affection to be...some random guy? Your choice to end on fear and bewilderment is also an odd one. Twist's aim was to challenge himself and improve. I'd like to say he did both. Muffin obliged him, and showcased his prowess even under pressure. But if there can only be one winner, I guess it'll have to be Muffin. Sometimes less is more.
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Jan 6, 2015 12:32
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Also, my surreality crits from the tail-end of the last thread, for those of you who missed it.
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Jan 6, 2015 12:35
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Good job Crabrock you can't even lose properly.
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Jan 20, 2015 03:16
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Mr.48 posted:Can I edit Bad Seafood fucked around with this message at 10:57 on Jan 21, 2015 |
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Jan 21, 2015 10:55
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In Tandem (150 words) The door creaked, and light invaded my world. He stood there alone in that morning warmth; naked and wet, my one and only. "It's that time again," he said, eyes locked on my slender frame. With masculine arms he roused me from my slumber. As always, he carried me. His whole body shivered. The sound of bare feet on ceramic tile signaled our arrival, the air still thick with steam from the shower. His grip tightened, resolved. Here he was the expert. I could only accept his knowing hands. With a practiced rhythm, he made his first thrust. I breathed in deep, captivated by his hypnotic skill, his firm caress. The lingering steam lent an almost dreamlike quality to the old routine. It'd been far too long since the last time we'd done this. After two minutes, he was finished. "Got it, finally." He flushed to be sure.
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Mar 9, 2015 10:14
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newtestleper posted:I fail to see how common sense needs to be qualified as an "unofficial caveat."
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Mar 23, 2015 06:05
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LOU BEGAS MUSTACHE posted:i know this is loving crazy but you could all try writing a story first and THEN entering???? holy gently caress lol
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Apr 19, 2015 04:44
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Cache Cab posted:Cities Fall Yet Rivers Still Flow 960 Words.
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Apr 27, 2015 08:25
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INTERPROMPT  Wizards are lame and for nerds so let's talk about barbarians who unlike wizards are totally sweet. You have 300 words to tell me a story featuring barbarians. I literally do not care what your story is about as long as it contains barbarians. Wizards are absolutely prohibited unless they are on the receiving end of a barbarian's sword, axe, or fist. Now go forth and find out what is best in life. EDIT: vvv Crits are also totally sweet and barbarians approve of constructive critique where applicable. Bad Seafood fucked around with this message at 08:48 on Apr 27, 2015 |
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Apr 27, 2015 08:39
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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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Pham Nuwen posted:I wrote a barbarian story while sitting in the airport, we're just supposed to post those whenever right? More seriously, "Yes." The point of an interprompt is something short and sweet (and often silly) to fill the time between submissions closing and judgment being rendered.
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Apr 27, 2015 20:01
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crabrock posted:Judges: crabrock, SexySeafood, sexything2 
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May 12, 2015 06:55
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"Ben E. Coyote, super genius." *Straps himself to rocket and fires it at the the moon.* Bad Seafood fucked around with this message at 20:17 on May 16, 2015 |
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May 16, 2015 20:14
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Benny if you are not going to post constructively please hold off until the interprompt, thanks.
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May 16, 2015 20:15
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Don't worry Blue Squares you're still No. 1 in my book.
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May 16, 2015 21:09
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SurreptitiousMuffin posted:Huh. Genuinely sorry if that's a mistake. Who the hell was I thinking of? Somebody wrote terrible erotica, got mad then stormed off.
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May 17, 2015 05:40
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Not recording Merc and myself* reading this for posterity is one of my top ten regrets in life. Because I'm certainly not rereading it. *Somebody else was there too but I've forgotten who, sorry bro.
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May 20, 2015 20:39
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Some much-belated crits. Short and snappy cause honestly not too many stories last week deserved anything more and I don't believe in fixating on minutiae when the whole needs to be tossed anyway. If you somehow feel I have shortchanged your submission by summing up in three sentences why it sucks, too bad. Those of you new to the 'Dome should know I typically assign homework along with my crits, the purpose of which is to target your weaknesses and make you a better writer. I won't be doing that this time since the whole joint-authorship deal makes it tricky to nail down who's at fault, but the next time I'm at bat you should all be prepared. Gifted and Talented by Newtestleper & Jay O A weird thing happened, the end. That's your entire story. I've just distilled it into six words. The opening conflict of a baby growing at an accelerated rate causing problems is immediately defused by the punchline that this sort of thing happens all the time here at the brothel to the stars, yes. Not exactly a seamless transition from worried parents to a pimp and his prostitute there Jay O. Fortunately nothing was lost as neither of them were particularly interesting characters anyway. Leaving It All Behind Simplefish & Blue Squares Several hundred words of dry introspection followed by a father-daughter bonding story that didn't really build off the first half in any meaningful way. Not that I blame Blue Squares for taking a detour what with the directions he was given. As a general rule of thumb, I should care about your characters before you unload all their baggage on me. Your longtime friend coming clean about his marital struggles is heartbreaking; a stranger's just a drunk guy in a bar. It doesn't take long to establish someone's lost everything, so next time consider saving some of your words for the purpose of bringing me closer to your protagonist. Then his suffering shall be my suffering. Except we weren't looking for suffering this week, which is where you both screwed up. The second half is better than the first in that there's an actual narrative taking place and not just some dude staring off into the distance while a harmonica plays in the theater of his mind, but fails to realize or redeem anything from the first half beyond the names as it tries to tell an intimate story with an impersonal tone. Eh. An Unfinished Story by Posh Alligator Two characters talk about stuff I don't care about while one of them struggles in vain not to look at the other's eyepatch. Several times. Nobody continued this story, but I've no real desire to see how it ended. Round Sundown by Blue Squares & Skwidmonster This was okay. No real surprises, but competently executed. Blue Squares writes yet another bumbling Middle American, but he's got personality so I am invested in this newest of the presumably many dilemmas he finds himself embroiled in. His wife's more a punchline than a character though, and the story suffers for it. It may be a reveal, but it was never really a twist. An Unfinished Story by Benny the Snake I don't crit plagarism. Mercury Rising by Pham Nuwen & Benny Profane Everyone in this story is either a dickbag or an idiot. Some of them are both. Your protagonist is both and that makes me angry. I don't like reading about dickbags unless they are interesting dickbags, and I don't like reading about idiots unless they are sympathetic idiots. Your protagonist is neither interesting or sympathetic. She is instead an incredibly bitter and petty person whose response to getting fired is to deploy a virus into the computer system hypothetically responsible for keeping everyone alive in the harsh vacuum of space, her act of revenge enabled by her equally petty coworker whose password she is able to guess because he decided to dedicate it to insulting her. But she saves the day and so her slate is washed clean without any self-examination or special exertion on her part. Go team. Competent prose, but don't take that as a pat on the back when it's in service of unlikable characters who can't even be unlikable in engaging ways. Prehistory by Benny Profane & Ironic Twist Congratulations on writing a boring story about an intergalactic hero who is also a dinosaur. Your opening was promising, if a little heavy on exposition, but when the whole of your story can be boiled down to a famous person learning he's famous even way out in the boonies, why do I care? Not even the occasionally fun dialogue could save this piece. It feels like you spent all this time telling me your protagonist was off having cool adventures when instead you might have shown me some of those adventures. Lame. The Monster in the Closet by Jitzu the Monk & Something Else "Hmm, Crabrock requested a lighthearted week, no drama, so let's do a young woman struggling with her emergent sexual identity in the face of her conservative religious upbringing, yes, that's the ticket. Lacking that Something Awful touch though, dear me...well let's just jump straight to the loving bit and skip over any hint of a substantive relationship. Gah, no erotica though. Fine. The post-loving bit." Decent prose, wrong week, subtle as an anvil. Your protagonist wants something and is given that thing on a silver platter. There are no stakes. Her inner struggle is relegated almost immediately to the periphery, which is a shame because beyond her struggle she's got nothing of note. Bobbins by Schneider Heim & Sebmojo I know you goons love your profanity but sometimes I feel like you guys don't appreciate how it can transform a story. Here we've got the makings of a quaint, quirky little slice of somebody's life only for a big fat "loving" to come outta nowhere piercing straight through the tone. People swear in real life, of course, and sometimes you wanna wake the reader up like that, but I don't think you did right here and it really strikes me as out of place. Unless you're writing a story in which (or a character for whom) casual swearing in the norm, consider instead how a single word like this can either take the legs out from under you or knock down the dominoes just as you planned. Anyway, as the guy whose only winning entries have been ghost stories, I can't say I thought too much of this one. Schneider spent way too much time on setup while Sebmojo kinda rushed the climax. If I wasn't expected to critique it, I'd likely have forgotten all about it by now. The C-Word Out of Space by Spectres of Autism & Thranguy My reaction upon reading this story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5a-Wz4DLZUA Everyone dies, nothing was learned, the end. Your 12-year-old genius protagonist (who acts like none of those things) creates a monster because he feels like it, who in turn proceeds to kill everyone because it feels like it, except it's...his mother? Then it kills him and his death triggers a killswitch which kills it. Maybe. What a waste of time. Next time consider cutting down on the mountain of corpses to make room for any semblance of reason why I should care about your characters or their plight. Also consider submitting during a different week since nothing about this tale was remotely lighthearted. The Crucible by Sitting Here & Grizzled Patriarch Your protagonist doesn't speak at all until the halfway point which is kind of weird to me. Your protagonist also uses RPG magic to solve all her problems, which drains the story's tension. Without any established rules or known limitations governing what your protagonist's magic is capable of, the solution to everything boils down to "I cast the right spell to overcome this obstacle," in which case wow, who cares. Otherwise, an adequate effort. Chalk this one up as another story I would've forgotten if it weren't my job to put it through its paces. The Fire and the Slave by JcDent & Jonked (6:14:59 PM) BadSeafood: Done with the slave story. (6:15:09 PM) bompacho: was it lighthearted (6:15:11 PM) BadSeafood: I like how the slave said and did nothing the whole time. I think Broenheim very nicely summed up everything wrong with this story so just read his twice but imagine the second time it's me. Square Pegs are for Squares by Blue Wher & Tyrannosaurus I like how everyone in this story has exactly one character trait. I also like how the problem is solved by a character just randomly having an idea which is then implemented off-screen to great success with no complications. Yawn. The Art Lesson by Fuschia tude & Jitzu_the_Monk "Hmm, Crabrock requested a lighthearted week, no drama, so let's do a young woman putting a gun in her mouth to join her sister in a magical realist painting." You did whatever you felt like in this story with little rhyme or reason. Your protagonist was dull and your antagonist (???) was pointlessly cryptic. Please refrain from writing something this offensively stupid in the future, thanks in advance. Sole Survivor: Space Janitor by DMboogie & RedTonic How rad would Risk of Rain have been with an innocuous janitor character. This was the first story I actually enjoyed reading this week. Your premise was fun and your protagonist was funny. Tonic's contribution was a little underwhelming after Boogie's opening but paid off dividends with the conclusion. Not a fan of the epistolary structure but that's just me. Your prose is serviceable; nothing more, nothing less. Sculpting Perfections by Ironic Twist & Blue Wher Weird Science meets the Gods Must Be Crazy. Kinda preachy. Not sure I can believe the protagonist would be satisfied with the woman he wound up after how he was nitpicking everyone at the beginning. He's happy just to have someone who appreciates his work after reverse-catcalling the women of the village for their physical blemishes? Not sure I see his turning point. The ice crying out was weird but I'm not sure what it was in service of. At the end of the day, inoffensively bland. Ring Quest by RedTonic & Pham Nuwen Now here's a story that started off great only to crash and burn in the second act. Your protagonist is charming and knowable. Everyone is, really. Even though she's dealing with a major dilemma, there's this feelgood atmosphere that permeates the piece. I was concerned over the fate of your protagonist's ring and hopeful that they would recover it. Except she doesn't recover it and someone else ends up solving her problem for her. Strike one. Except they really didn't since it's someone else's ring. Strike two. Which she decides to keep making her seem incredibly petty. Strike three. Ever hear the story of the Honest Woodsman? What you've done is reward your protagonist for lying while punishing her for taking matters into her own hands. Not an unrealistic ending, but not a very satisfying one either. Her success is ultimately someone else's doing and her victory rings hollow. Work Experience by Something Else & Newtestleper I was with you until literally the last two lines. The door's over there. A Better Place to Be In Jay O & Schneider Heim A shipwrecked crew turning to cannibalism isn't the first thing I'd think of when asked to write a lighthearted story but maybe I'm just old fashioned. There's a sequence of events here, but I can't be bothered to care about any of it. The captain cuts the protagonist free saying they'll need every man they can get...to eat(!), but didn't kill him beforehand because...? If the protagonist's fate is to nourish his former mates, shouldn't it be a bad thing he's not as far as Dario? I'll admit I'm not exactly hip and with it when it comes to the subject of cannibalism so it's possible there exists intimate insider knowledge I am unaware of. Some stories I forgot about reading after I read them but this one I feel like I forgot about while I was reading it. Birdy by Grizzled Patriarch & Spectres of Autism A promisingly absurd opening spills over into serial killer territory. Your protagonist getting angry over his apartment-sized self-declared nation not being recognized by the United States is funny. Your protagonist fetching a gun to murder the person who's come to check up on him is not funny. I don't profess to know you, Specters of Autism, but between this and your half of the C-Word Out of Space I am becoming increasingly concerned over your definition of a lighthearted story. Ulterior Motives by Jonked & Simplefish Your protagonist is a thoroughly unlikable person and the time travel element feels like it came out of nowhere. Probably because it did. Again I direct you to Broenheim's comments. Trouble Trouble by Chairchucker & DMboogie Literally the only reason this didn't DM was because that wouldn't be fair to DMboogie since whoever got stuck with this was doomed from the start. Chair, you're usually pretty funny, but this felt like someone trying to imitate your style and falling flat. The poorest possible successor to your David Bowie story. What a Twist Thranguy & JcDent I liked your opening paragraph. I also liked how you ultimately completely disregarded that conflict to come up with a new one that was stupid in every way. I liked how your action was confusing, and I had to reread certain segment to parse what was happening. I liked how nothing about Gord was interesting or compelling beyond the contents of his trunk. I liked how the fact that it was cats was what he found most pressing. I liked how this bizarre scenario in no way accented or developed Gord's character in any appreciable way. I liked how this bizarre disaster was virtually interchangeable with several mundane and/or nondescript ones. I hated the ending though. The Princess Ball by Skwidmonster & PoshAlligator I kept having to mentally correct my projected age for the protagonist's Mummy Got Boned by Djeser & Sitting Here My only disappointment with this story was that the mummy wasn't bandaged up. Otherwise, a delightful read. Of particular note is the effective use of tone. Your protagonist is essentially a bad guy, a predator stalking his prey, yet the mood of the piece and the antics of its players leave the whole thing feeling like a screwball comedy. That woman is totally gonna have all her internal fluids sucked out and that's hilarious. Thee Tends Well By Sebmojo & Fuschia Tude After Sebmojo's hilarious opening I hit Fuschia Tude's court transcript and immediately stopped reading. Congratulations Fuschia on turning gold into lead. What's Left When It All Goes Wrong Tyrannosaurus & Djeser Heartwarming and off-prompt. It's probably worth noting this is pretty much the only story you might've tricked me into thinking one person wrote all the way through, so props to Djeser for perfectly matching Tyrannosaurus' style. Not a bad piece on its own merits, though I dislike how your protagonist has literally no agency. He's in a bad way and his father fixes everything. As with Ring Quest, realistic endings aren't always thematically satisfying.
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May 26, 2015 10:32
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If you like to gamble, I tell ya I'm your man.
Bad Seafood fucked around with this message at 01:23 on Jun 3, 2015 |
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Jun 2, 2015 12:10
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Posthumor posted:I'm in for gambling & would like flash rule. JcDent posted:I hate gambling and/or losing. I'm IN. Flash rule, maybe? Bonus points if you make them likable despite their habits.
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Jun 2, 2015 19:05
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Congratulations to the first guy in TD's three-year history to complain to the mods over judgment.
Bad Seafood fucked around with this message at 01:08 on Jun 3, 2015 |
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Jun 3, 2015 00:59
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(10:57:21 PM) BadSeafood: But yeah I love gambling stories. Is it alright if I offer flash rules? (10:57:57 PM) Thranguy: Okay, so that's set up. Sure, go ahead and offer flash rules, was just about to say that I wasn't going to myself but that it would be fine.
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Jun 3, 2015 01:06
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Jonked posted:gently caress it,
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Jun 3, 2015 02:31
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and give me a flash rule.
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We've had two-judge weeks before. Noah always judges solo. No rules were broken. Rest assured though I read your story and it awful. Had I accepted Tyrannosaurus' offer to co-judge in IRC I would have agreed with him 100%.
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Jun 3, 2015 03:03
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Kinda weird it's Benny going off about the rules though considering he breaks them all the time when it suits him.
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Jun 3, 2015 03:09
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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 3, 2015 03:22
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Jun 3, 2015 04:50
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Fausty posted:I lost last week and I wanna make up for it. In.
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Jun 3, 2015 05:51
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SkaAndScreenplays posted:I signed up this week? curlingiron posted:Gonna need a flash rule.
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Jun 3, 2015 07:31
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Lake Jucas posted:Guess what goons, I'm back!
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Jun 4, 2015 20:50
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Benny Profane posted:In. I'd like a flash rule, too -- hit me hard.
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Jun 5, 2015 03:02
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Jun 9, 2015 08:50
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chumprock, nature's gimp posted:all the judges last week were the worst. especially seadoof, who may as well be named poopdoof and be smeared on the bottom of a common park bench for ladies to accidentally touch and squeal in disgust. my opinion is the only one that matters now. Let's see how your story holds up to a real judge: 
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Jun 9, 2015 22:11
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But seriously, there was actually a fair bit of division between the judges on some stories. Be sure to read everyone's crits as some of you will get wildly different takes from all of us.
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Jun 9, 2015 22:11
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Ha ha time for crits. Before I begin I should probably reiterate that there was quite a bit of division among the judges this week, and that had I gotten my way that DM list would probably have been twice as long. Thranguy and Djeser were also far more generous than I was about what constituted a "Bet." If your story wasn't explicitly singled out for an HM, consider the following gif indicative of my overall opinion of this week's performance.  If you did get an HM, you might still not be safe! I absolutely hated at least one story to HM this week, and the more wily among you may be able to guess which one in advance. As for the rest of you, stay tuned. Also, HOMEWORK! For the uninitiated among you, I have a habit of assigning homework to the stories I crit. Just think of it as my little way of highlighting stuff I think you suck at and giving you the opportunity to improve yourselves in the eyes of Man and God. I appreciate of course that some of you have busy lives, and are therefore under no obligation to complete my homework. Sympathetic as I am to your plight, this still does nothing to lessen your status as a grade A superchump. So do your homework, and I myself shall carry you across the Gates of Valhalla where you shall write eternal, shiny and chrome. High Stakes by Screaming Idiot Congratulations on submitting first! Within 48 hours of the prompt post no less. Surely this will be a well-conceived, tightly edited, highly polished submission from your friend and mine, Screaming Idiot. Title: High Stakes. Opening Line: I think I got a gambling problem. I see you read the prompt post. That's certainly half of the battle. Your opening act is actually pretty passable. Your protagonist is kind of a lowlife idiot, but at least in a believably human way. His idiocy feels like his own, rather than the author's idiocy pervading into the realm of the story (an important distinction). You do a good job setting the scene and even reveal a bit of character through actions rather than words. You kinda skimp over the actual gamble itself though, but hey we've still got a bit of story left to go. Also kind of a bit weird you'd go against someone who claimed to be the Devil without a plan in your back pocket, but since we've established this sort of lack of foresight is habit to the protagonist I'll let it slide. Little harder to forgive the line "The only thing that stuck out about him was X" following a whole paragraph of character description though. Then your protagonist turns into a vampire, and quickly graduates from killing animals to killing people he doesn't like to killing people just in general. Then some vampire hunters show up and he kills them too. Kinda hard to retain any kind of sympathy for your protagonist at this point, especially when the twist later on is that he could have conceivably called up the Devil at any time to request a rematch, the meeting place for which isn't even out of his way. You mention his daughter in passing as a sort of morality object, but the two never engage in any sort of meaningful interaction. I only know she is important to him because you tell me she is. In the meantime, he's slaughtering dozens of nameless mooks that make for semi-decent opening hooks. "I'd have felt worse about it, but in a way, we were both out for blood." No protagonist whose name I can't say because he doesn't have one, you are not both out for blood. You are a monster who murders people, and this is someone who's come to stop you. I recognize that people who do bad things in this, the real world, typically have some line they feed themselves to feel better about what they're doing, but this is a click away from "gently caress you, got mine," which again is weakened by the revelation that for all we know he could have requested a rematch at any time. Maybe he couldn't have, but since you gloss over whether or not the Devil took any of his earlier calls - or if he even made any of them - I have to presume he's just a dick who doesn't care how his problems affect other people unless those are people he actually cares about. Then he shows up to challenge the Devil without a plan. Playing black jack, which has a larger luck component than poker. Against the Devil, who is the Devil. I overlooked him not having a gameplan the first time around, but now the character's idiocy is really the author's. But through sheer luck, he wins. Except he doesn't, of course, because he's playing against the Devil whose whole deal is screwing people. Now his daughter is dead and the hunters are here for him. All that nothing for a whole lot of nothing. Who's he telling this whole story to anyway? Your prose is largely competent, but your protagonist is dumb and unlikable and the whole thing ends up being a huge waste of time. Everyone dies, no lesson was learned, and at no point past your skipping over the poker game was I emotionally or intellectually invested in anything. Try again. HOMEWORK: The Emperor of Madness returns home to help his daughter with a math assignment in 400 words. *** Between Friends by Fausty Hey man, I watched Gladiator too. Let's see, where to start. Said bookisms, head jumping, confusing blocking, tons of modern swears in my presumably anccient Roman gambling story. I'm not opposed to having characters swear, nor am I opposed to deliberately anachronistic elements in semi-historical fiction, but here it felt like you just made everywhere swear in lieu of giving them any sort of interesting personality. The prisoner and the two centurions all share the exact same "Voice" in my head. You might want to do something about that. But all this is peanuts next to the real crime of this story: Aulus is a complete and utter idiot. He makes a gamble he stands nothing to gain from, a gamble in which he is functionally risking everything, and watches dumbfounded as Martinus turns out to be a slimy weasel and murders his partner. You try to spin the old friends angle of their relationship, except there's nothing in the text to make me think that carries any weight. Aulus' thoughts are entirely focused on whether or not this will blow back on him. Speaking of which, best case scenario, what was his plan if Martinus really did just run and his partner couldn't catch him? Surely his partner would ask how he got loose, or why Aulus didn't pursue. What would his response to these questions have been? Alternatively, a question Aulus might have asked is how delivering a supposedly petty thief would grant him the happiness of the Caesar? "The loving Caesar," that is. The most preeminent of all Caesars, I'm sure. I liked how you tried to sell Martinus' supremely stupid suggestion as some kind of manipulative masterstroke when the only reason it worked was because Aulus was similarly supremely stupid. When Martinus rides off, he knows Aulus won't follow. How does he know? Why does he know? Why doesn't he. Aulus has no reason to adhere to the agreement at this point. Regardless, it doesn't matter. Despite Aulus' confidence nobody would ever find out, they found out anyway. Somehow. After which we're treated to several extra paragraphs that contribute nothing to the narrative beyond making Aulus' day even worse. Nice job making the judge seem like a malicious prick though when he's actually being strangely merciful by sparing his presumed dominant hand? Which leads into another issue: who's the protagonist of this story? I would have presumed Martinus based off, well, the majority of it, but then you switch over to Aulus' worst day ever at the end there (and into his head at several points in the narrative). For that matter what's the arc here? Events happen, but why do they matter? A prisoner escapes because his guard was an idiot, the guard gets punished; the end. I don't know how this story slipped my mind as a DM candidate, but it's a regret I will take to my grave. But hey, good job on writing the canonically longest piss in Thunderdome history. HOMEWORK: A magician's workshop has gone awry, and it's up to his apprentice to take care of things before the old man gets home in 500 words. The apprentice is still in the performing menial chores portion of his tutelage and doesn't even know a single magic spell. *** Sardines and Sunny Afternoons by Hocus Pocus This story was silly but not quite as silly as it needed to be. Your precocious kid protagonist (how old is she anyway?) is upset because the local neighborhood stray cat upstages her at every opportunity. Whenever the cat is actually around it acts just like a regular cat, but in hearsay and recollection it plays musical instruments and knows how to bake cookies? If you'd gone full tilt with the madness and just had an impossibly talented cat, I could've gone along with it. If you'd gone in the opposite direction and just had an ordinary cat who coincidentally kept doing things to earn your protagonist's ire, I could've liked that too. Instead you kinda just tread the middle path so the absurdity feels inconsistent and cartoonish rather than at home. Not that your story wasn't plenty cartoonish anyway. Your characters are basically cartoons, with all the depth that implies. But hey, cartoons can be fun. This story wasn't, but it could've been. The core premise is fun, but your protagonist is a brat and you, the author, end up dragging your feet with a lot of inane details and setup. You also take your sweet time spelling out that it's a cat she's mad at for some reason, like that twist is supposed to be some tonal paradigm shift. The fact that her rivalry is with a cat is the only thing interesting about your story, so next time maybe establish that a bit earlier. If I were a casual reader and not a judge and this story were in a magazine on the subway and not an Internet comedy forum, I wouldn't have bothered reading far enough to learn it was a cat. But since I did bother to read that far, I'm not sure how that game was in any way, shape, or form stacked in her favor. Sardines are small and slippery and there was no guarantee her friends (who all seem to like the cat) would favor her with their throws. Also, "I need to talk to you. Alone. Oh sorry, you guys should actually listen too." What? This feels like you, the author, changed your mind in the middle of writing this scene rather than the character changing her mind. The contest itself employed some confusing blocking, as did several earlier sections of your story. In the end your protagonist is humbled, but I have no reason to believe it will stick or make any lasting impact on her. HOMEWORK: CAN CAPTAIN CAT SAVE THE PRESIDENT IN 300 WORDS? TUNE IN TO FIND OUT! *** The Rascal Mayor by Hubris.height Fifty words over the limit, hmm, well, I'm sure you cut everything you cou- hubris.height posted:"I don’t like the odds, Frank,” He looked up from the hubris.height posted:“Look trust me, and we both get rich,” came his hushed reply, from behind darting eyes.  Cliche dialogue, redundant dialogue, sloppy attribution. Once you've named Frank, you can attribute everything Frank says to Frank. Later on you reintroduce Frank as the mayor, but then refer to the mayor in an ephemeral sort of way that briefly made me think the mayor was someone else Frank was in the room with. You do this quite a bit, so next time maybe take a moment to parse your own work to double check it's clear who's saying what. Not that the dialogue matters overly much in this first scene since it's all generic "We could strike it rich," "But we'll be ruined!" gambling placeholder dialogue. The open scene as a whole matters very little anyway since it's not until the timeskip that the plot really starts. I will say I was briefly interested in how Frank managed to rig the horse race in his favor, until it was revealed that he didn't rig it, they just got extremely lucky with an event literally nobody could have predicted. If I were Frank's friend I would've hit him for that since by all rights we should've lost. Instead both Frank and his friend (Clarence, you eventually deign fit to name him) attribute it to Frank's gambling sense. Years later Frank's mayor and Clarence is a boxer but they're still cardboard cut-out characters I don't really care about. They never seemed like friends to begin with, but now they're certainly enemies. Frank wants Clarence to take a dive against Johnsmith (any particular reason his name is always Johnsmith other than you forgot to Ctrl + F replace your placeholder name?), Clarence won't do it, so Frank arranges for...something to happen? Then it happens? Then the story is over? This is just a sequence of events with no weight to any of it. Thanks for the news report, I guess. HOMEWORK: Joe's a beat up ol' boxer, but if he can't win this next match in 300 words then his son can't go to college. *** The rear end of the Universe by the Brotherly Phl 500 words over the limit. Your story would literally need to be solid gold for this to be acceptable. It wasn't, of course. Not even fool's gold. Ah well. "The only thing that’s worth our time is the magic," which is why we stand ragged and shivering and unshaven on street corners performing parlor tricks for passersby. You kind of sacrifice the right to talk about the majesty of creating when all your characters squander their talents performing dumb spectacles so that people will bang them or throw a few bucks into their guitar case. There's no beauty in their actions or even implied awe from the audience. You even infer this sort of thing is rote around here. One would think a world where people had the ability to transmography things into completely different things would have wilder societal repercussions. "Magic isn’t about changing the world. It’s about figuring out how the world is meant to be, and getting it there," which is why I make my living turning rabbits into trucks and back for spare change from strangers. But enough about that. Your dialogue is functional but uninteresting, except when the dad is talking (who I didn't realize was the dad until the end of the story) in which case it was functional and crass and only sometimes uninteresting. Your characters weren't that interesting either though, so I guess it fits. You jump around in time a lot which I imagine you thought was pretty clever, but since it's just a dumb gimmick that in no way benefits the story - rather, it makes reading it even more annoying - I'd have to say it wasn't actually that clever in practice. For a little while there I thought you were going for some kind of moral about hard work vs. instant gratification, but you end up pretty much dropping that angle. Marney doesn't like magic for reasons that are never explained or important, and the protagonist's dad harasses him a lot in ways that ultimately don't amount to anything. Biff is actually the most interesting character in the piece, so naturally he's relegated to the bit-part of Marney's Yet for all the words and time you waste, you still manage to cut the story right before any kind of ending can take place. Does he do it or doesn't he? You can only withhold that kind of material resolution if it's clear your character has had some sort of spiritual or relational resolution in its place, but I don't think there is one. I don't really consider Biff's challenge a bet either, long as we're on the subject. Rest assured, if your story hadn't been disqualified by default, I would have pressed for a DM. I should have done that anyway. HOMEWORK: A scientist finds himself in a bar coping with the fact that he lives in a world where magic is real for 200 words. *** Destroyer of Worlds! Dragon Godhead by Spectres of Autism This story made me mad. Mad because I can't believe you thought this was an acceptable submission. Mad because submitting this means you either completely ignored my crit during Crabutt's pizza week, or worse: that you did read it and failed to internalize any of it. I almost considered skipping this story in my crits because there's literally nothing here worth salvaging. Nearly 1,500 words of vague technobabble and superfluous detail and you spared barely any of it for your characters. Who are these people and why do I care about them? I didn't even remember anyone's name. Your protagonist wants to save a girl and cries over the withered, dying husk of his opponent who was never anything more than a huge jerk. The game itself is a straight rip-off of Yu-Gi-Oh/MTG, except with no understanding of the rules or familiarity with the cards I have no idea what is happening. Every card draw is narrative convenience, which is also the problem with actual, halfway decent stories involving cards. Poker is commonly picked as the focal point in this sort of narrative because your actual hand matters much less than your ability to bluff and psyche out your opponents. It's also a game most people are generally familiar with, making it safe to gloss over the rules. You can still get away with more obtuse games of course if your characters are strong enough, but your characters were barely there. Instead of reading your story I could've just tuned in to a twitch stream of some random dudes playing Hearthstone. I would have about the same level of emotional involvement as well. I'm sure this story was an ambitious undertaking for you, but none of it worked, most of it was confusing, and all of it was unpleasant to read. There is literally nothing in any story more important than the characters. Try to include some next time. HOMEWORK: Someone is born, lives, and dies in 100 words and don't you dare waste a sentence on meaningless details. *** The Last Deal by Enchanted Hat Your protagonists are one-note jerks in a world filled with idiots where a single fake blog post is enough to tank the global economy and kickstart a nuclear war. All of which your protagonists do gleefully and without remorse in their pursuit of money. When not busy being petty jerks, they're boring. I'm glad they're dead. I'm not glad I had to read this. EVERYONE READ THIS Your protagonists should always be likable OR interesting. It's okay to write about jerks or scumbags, but they should be jerks or scumbags in ways that are interesting. This goes double for all characters who are deliberately written to be unlikable. No matter how loathsome your characters are, if I find them compelling then your story is worth my time. If I don't find them compelling then what you're asking me is to spend time with unpleasant people being unpleasant. I don't like hanging around with unpleasant people in real life, so I don't know why you'd think I'd want to in your stories.  HOMEWORK: Someone living in the post-apocalypse finds a single beautiful flower growing in the middle of the desert. 300 words. *** Five Fingers by Masonity Speaking of unpleasant people, pretty much everyone in this story qualifies. Your protagonist is some snot-nosed kid who wants to hang out with the presumably cool, equally snot-nosed kids who desire to test his mettle by having him steal something for them...except the twist is they actually intended for him to get caught so they could make their own getaway. Your protagonist figures this out, but still wants to hang with them because he's an idiot, but I guess he'll fit right in since he's equally manipulative. Now there's a friendship that'll last. Good thing that security guard turned out to be sympathetic to his invented plight. Even gave him a bit of advice. I admire adults who encourage violence as the solution to the younger generation's problems. Less admirable is getting your protagonist in a jam and having someone else let him off the hook with a minimal effort lie. I've actually worked in places before where kids shoplifting was a concern. Even if you believe them, even when they're telling the truth, you never let it go at that. Especially not with extremely expensive merchandise on the line. That this guy behaves differently, while not unthinkable, is obviously narrative convenience. Kids typically aren't good actors either, so I'm surprised he bought it. The gamble was also weak. I don't really consider a dare or contest with a prize as much of a gamble, except in the cosmic sense in which almost anything is a gamble. Boarding a plane is a gamble. You don't know if it'll drop out of the sky or not! Writing a paper's a gamble, running a marathon's a gamble. Anything where you might win or lose with consequences is potentially a gamble. This qualifies, but barely. Aside from being petty thieves your characters are dull and this story is dull. Your protagonist is allegedly a nerd but is functionally identical to Mark and Andy who are themselves literally identical to one another. The security guard is Every Security Guard With a Soft Side, though to his credit you do have him pontificate on the virtues of scarring people's faces. Shoplifting isn't particularly exciting to read about and you do it no favors here. Your narrative arc is your protagonist is a right bastard and gets reward for being a bastard. The kid on the outside wanting to be "In" with the cool crowd is one of the most overdone plot points there is and you do nothing to spruce it up. In terms of actual writing skill, your formatting sucks and your story is rife with little errors and said bookisms. There's also your dialogue, which more than occasionally comes off as unnatural. Dialogue needn't necessarily obey the same grammatical rules as the rest of your story, but it should still sound natural to the ear. This story only HM'd because Thranguy personally liked it. I wouldn't necessarily have DM'd it, but it would've been close. Don't count your chickens. HOMEWORK: A group of kids play truth or dare for 500 words. Each should possess a distinct character and none of them should be jerks. *** The Gamble by Rap Three Times After the preceding solid stream of bile, I was almost prepared to like this one. You've got a good voice and your protagonist wasn't immediately unlikable. Unfortunately, he wasn't interesting either. Neither was this story, if you can call it that. Something happened and then it was over, the end. Not really much of an arc. Your protagonist is in trouble and someone else gets him out of it. Nothing wrong with one character getting another out of a jam against the backdrop of a longer work, but your protagonist should always be the active agent within the limited economy of the short story. If someone needs to be rescued, your protagonist should be doing the rescuing. If your protagonist needs rescuing, they should use their own personal skills to escape rather than relying on someone else. That aside, style over substance is clearly the order of the day. Not even original style either, much as you might try to rock it. Smarmy spy banter, stereotypical bad guys, torture, espionage, and a badass chick straight out of a Joss Whedon script. All this and you still forgot to actually include a gamble. Disappointing. HOMEWORK: Your protagonists from this story are getting married, but several of their archenemies crash the ceremony in 700 words. *** On the Bright Side by Entenzahn Five bucks seems a bit cheap for a bet potentially involving loss of life and substantial property damage if failed. I recognize that the money isn't the "Point," but nonetheless it makes me wonder who sets the prices. Anyway, your protagonist is as much a loser as several others before him, but unlike those wastes of space he is actually an interesting, human loser who has human reasons for the stupid stuff he does - even if it raises some questions. How did a dude this addicted to a literal gambling high - with an implied less than impressive track record for wins - ever put together the scratch to buy a fancy car for his son's birthday? What's his job and how does he function in society with kids and a house to consider? All the same, I was invested in your protagonist enough that these questions only occurred to me after reading your story rather than during it. I wanted him to get clean and was somewhat heartbroken when he wasn't, but still satisfied with the end result since he never betrayed my image of him. I also appreciated your subtle attempts at worldbuilding. This neural bet network is clearly something big with an extensive explanation behind how it integrates into society, but you don't waste our time with any of that. Instead you give us an intimate story inside a much larger stage. Very good. HOMEWORK: Another story set in this universe, but following someone who takes the crazy, high octane bets. 800 words. *** Shorted Out by Erogenous Beef A lot of people decided to go with high-stakes market manipulation stories this time around, but this was the only one that didn't suck. Good job. Your protagonist, his boss, and his coworkers were human beings with distinct personalities whose office politics and white collar jobs I found myself invested in. You also managed to tell a lot of story without actually having to tell it, as well as justified how your non-standard bet qualified better than most. The prose, as expected, was sharp and on point. Ending felt a kinda rushed though, and I wasn't exactly clear on how throttling the exchange stood to make the boss money. Not that I needed to be, but, you know. This was my pick to win behind Docbeard's. HOMEWORK: Corporate espionage in the realm of craft supplies. 700 words. *** The Hungriest Game by Benny Profane You beautiful bastard.  This story was gratuitously stupid in the best way possible. The minute I realized what you were up to a huge grin burst out of my noncommittal face and lingered there until the end. It's far from perfect unfortunately. Your characters themselves are kinda just there. Your protagonist loses all agency after the reveal, reduced to little more than a spectator. Not much in the way of an arc either. Really, it feels like you wanted to tell a joke rather than a story. But guess what? If the joke's funny, that's all that matters. You've written the literary equivalent of getting away with murder. Good job. HOMEWORK: This sort of story again but with characters and an outcome I actually care about in as many words as you see fit. If it's too many though, I'll come down on you. *** Painted Jezebel by Docbeard After reading this story I reported (jokingly) in judgechat that I liked your reveal that the protagonist was a woman, to which Djeser responded, "It was a woman?" Your protagonist's obscured gender aside, I thought they played an excellent straight man to the lunacy of the story. The story itself was lively and fun, though the dialogue occasionally got a little muddled. I can't say I like that the bet was more of a footnote than a central fixture of the proceedings, nor that you kinda just brush over how your protagonist recovers the prized hen. Nevertheless, you managed to deliver a story that covered the prompt and nailed your flash rule while still displaying a wonderful personality and a satisfying conclusion. You earned this win. HOMEWORK: No homework. Winner's exemption. *** Big Enough by Jagermonster This story took a little bit to get going, but I thought it did alright once it got there. Your words were the real star here though, I have to say. Your premise, setting, and characters weren't anything too novel or impressive on their own merits, but you managed to bring them together in an entertaining way. I liked how subtly you played the protagonist secretly being the wanted man where a more novice writer would've just blurted out and told us. I also liked the sort-of arc where this outlaw comes in from the wilderness to civilization, only to realize he's not fit to stay. Dunno if that was intentional or not, though if it was I will say that it would've rung more true if he'd done less to make trouble for himself. A good hustler knows you need to lose sometimes or the mark won't keep playing, or worse: get angry. It was probably safe for him to make a statement as well, though it was probably stupid of the bartender to have pulled his own gun. A thoroughly average story that I didn't hate reading and didn't mind looking over again for the purpose of this crit. If that sounds like damning with faint praise, not in this week it isn't. Be proud. HOMEWORK: This town ain't big enough for the two of us, but let's settle this without violence in 500 words. *** God Doesn't Play Chess by Le Woad This story wasn't bad, but I can't help but feel like we skipped over several more interesting stories in the service of this one. Cross-temporal communication is now possible (and costly), but our protagonist only uses it to play a game of chess with one of the greatest minds in history? Why is Newton so chill with this voice coming out of the future to speak to him? Newton was a pretty religious guy, actually, so I'd expect there'd be a period between first contract and now where he'd be troubled by some of the theological implications of time travel. Why are they gambling in the first place? Good work though identifying Newton's major contributions to the study of light and color though. I was afraid you were going to go with the theory of gravity. Then your protagonist loses, and divulges knowledge of the future. Considering how resource-intensive this time travel technology is, I can't believe there's not someone monitoring him or keeping track of what's going on. Surely he can't just share that information, even if Newton's missing some pieces. Again this goes back to why make the wager? This story as a whole eludes a certain sleepy, laid-back sort of tone. Which is fine. Unfortunately, it also extends to the characters themselves. Your protagonist isn't very interesting in and of himself, and Newton's Newton without any flair. The story itself also lacks a proper arc. Two men chat while they play chess, one loses, the end. The only rub is the time travel element. Like with Jagermonster's submission, a competent but average work. Head and shoulders above the rest of this junk though. HOMEWORK: Someone goes back in time to convince their younger self not to go back in time. 400 words. *** To Tell the Truth... by Lake Jucas PROTIP: The next time you're having trouble wrapping up your weakly dramatic, (in my opinion) off-prompt story, consider NOT making one of the characters a vampire. Your protagonist is a spineless twit who can't even be bothered to break up with the girl he's barely dating anyway (of his own admission) to be with someone else, lies to her with her life on the line and his secret not a secret, only it turns out she's a vampire and she kills him. The end? If that was her endgame, why did she wait this long? How did your protagonist fail to notice he was dating a cursed member of the unholy undead? I would suspect there are several things which might have tipped him off. Was this a recent development? He must've really been into his side chick not to notice the turning point for his main squeeze. Don't get me wrong though, this ending would still suck even if you had foreshadowed it because the conclusion is completely removed from the emotional core of the story. Your protagonist is in a jam, makes a decision, takes an action, but it's all rendered moot as he's broadsided by a force completely external to his dilemma. You might as well have had a tugboat fall out of the sky and crush him to death. Also, your gamble (like many) only qualified on technical grounds. You'd better thank Specters of Autism for submitting this round because you were No. 2 on my hit list. HOMEWORK: A rugged manly man is discovered to have a traditionally feminine hobby in 300 words. *** Balcony Two of the Theater of the Mind by Jonked   Silly as it is, I enjoy the whole shoulder angel/devil idea. I also appreciated your implicit It's a Wonderful Life spin without wasting my time going into the specifics. What i don't like is how in this story our protagonist's good and evil conscience are effectively indistinguishable. Good bets one way, evil bets another, but they both speak in the exact same voice in the exact same way and neither seems particularly elated or torn up over his decisions beyond how it affects their wager. You also had to use the "Rectum? drat near killed 'im!" joke which I am contractually obligated to hate. Your protagonist was fine. He was human, which is always a plus. Kinda felt like you were back-peddling a bit on the stakes though. First it seems like he's secretly gay but married to a woman, hesitant about whether or not to act on his impulses in the relative privacy of a club (which isn't really private, posing its own risks), but then nah, he's getting divorced - or at least he says he is - and hey so's this other guy in a similar situation and it's all very neat. Too neat. Also kind of weird how your protagonist is narrating his story but then his consciences feel like a third person intrusion. "Unbidden," he thinks of his wife right after Good mentions her, so he's clearly not aware of these figures as he narrates. Not a bad story, not a great one. Welcome to the middle. HOMEWORK: Three people play cards. Two of them have secret identities as a superhero and their villain counterpart, respectively, but neither knows the other's secret. The third guy is just a guy. Don't tell me who's who, but make it so I should be able to guess. 500 words. *** Can't Put a Price on a Fool by Broenheim I expected better from you Broenheim. I really did. The whole opening scene is pointless, which is just as well since it's not very engaging either. I mean, neither is the rest of the story, but it's always good to have losses you can afford to cut. Your characters are functional but not particularly memorable (or likable) and your protagonist isn't nearly as clever as he thinks he is. Wagering an allegedly priceless artifact except it's actually something he swiped from his mother's jewelry box, alright, not a bad plan to get some extra cash out of this guy assuming he doesn't lose, but then he gets drunk and it turns out his opponent is exactly the kind of guy to take something he wants by force...which raises the question of why he didn't earlier. Your protagonist is gonna be in trouble when that guy gets his prize checked out by someone certified. Likely not long for this world. How'd a schmuck like this guy wind up with such a priceless treasure anyway? Some confusing blocking further degrades the piece. This wasn't my least favorite by a long shot but you should still be ashamed of yourself. HOMEWORK: A mad cult's summoning ritual proves to be a dud when one of their ancient artifacts turns out to be a fake nicked from a discount antique store. 600 words. *** Clean Slate by Curlingiron A tragic sequence of events engineered to elicit as much sympathy as possible except that I can't be bothered to be invested in your cookie-cutter characters one bit. Certainly not your protagonist whose idiocy causes the people around him to suffer. Considering Alzheimer's is a very real medical condition that puts great mental and emotional duress on the patient and those close to them, your protagonist's indifference to his memory loss and refusal to tell the doctors even as his family is falling apart around him comes off as unrealistic, stupid, and selfish. In the end he forgets everything. I wish I could forget this story. Also, not a gamble. HOMEWORK: A young child goes to visit the old man who remembers things that others have forgotten. Their meeting takes place over 400 words. *** Rugby Players Eat Their Dead by Tyrannosaurus I liked your protagonist (initially), which would be great if I liked anything else about this story. Daughter rebels against domineering mother to pursue traditionally unfeminine interests, yawn. Not a bad premise, but one that's been done so many time that it really needs that extra personal touch to soar. You go to great lengths to reduce the mother to a gibbering cartoon, a clear object of ridicule, but I actually thought some of her concerns were halfway understandable? Rugby is one of the more violent popular sports, so I can kinda get behind a parent being worried over their daughter's safety...especially when she proves her mother right by breaking her collarbone and needing to be hospitalized, which her mother is presumably paying for. Then this happens: Tyrannosaurus posted:“Honestly,” I say, “I think you could try to stop being a bitch all the time. That’d be nice.” Also, not a gamble. HOMEWORK: The extended family comes together to deal with the loss of a child for 500 words. *** Pushing Luck by JcDent Everything about this story felt very low-energy, and not in a good way either. People talk, things happen, but very little of it carries any weight. Your characters are as uninspired as their names, and the only interesting thing that happens is the reveal that you kinda sorta wasted our time with a bunch of extraneous stuff in the first half only to finally get to the real story in the second. One of your protagonist's girls wants out and needs to gamble over the right but he "Cheats" to allow her to leave? That might've been an interesting rub to his character if he had one. Its more than his girl's got at least, or anything else. This story wasn't as actively on fire bad as many of its peers, but is so dull and lifeless that it isn't much better. Apply yourself. HOMEWORK: A buddy cop duo with wildly contrasting personalities are called upon to fix the town drought problem! 500 words! *** The Sure Bet and Tough Break by Killer-of-Lawyers Killer-of-Lawyers posted:I think that the human history of non violent collective action speaks for itself.  It occurred to me upon completing this story that this line was possibly intended as grim foreshadowing, or possibly even a bit of dark humor from the author to the audience. Either way, it makes no sense as the underlying logic propping up the plan of a presumably highly logical sentient AI allegedly well-read on human history. Yes, surely there will be no problems if the international economy crashes and planes start falling out of the sky. You know, most actually successful strikes vocalize their mission statement. There's also the fact that if my and several other computers simply stopped working one day, I'd sooner presume a hardware breakdown than some AI silent treatment. Anyway, I didn't like your story because the whole thing hinged on presumably incredibly smart characters acting incredibly dumb. Then society completely falls apart, which doesn't strike me as giving humans too much credit either. Maybe this is the same world as Enchanted Hat's story? Your AI also don't really feel like AI, nor are they particularly interesting beyond their base desire for recognition. Then your protagonist's conclusion at the end of it all is that something which was actually his fault is really everyone else's. Now begins the reign of terror. Blah. I didn't care about this story going into it and you somehow managed to make me care even less by the end of it. HOMEWORK: In the distant future, a robot research vessel arrives on Earth to study the smoldering ruins of human civilization; a comedy in 500 words. *** A Godly Wager by Skwidmonster You should always be wary of submitting stories in which the characters themselves are only vaguely invested in what they're doing. If they don't care, why should I? You've got two gods betting over a mortal's actions as an idle curiosity because they're bored (and also boring). The girl's a bit less boring, but a bit out of place thinking she's getting too old for this religious "Nonsense" in an ancient society - especially since her father is a priest. So some stuff happens to her but she's not really aware of the larger machinations at play, the end. Aside from a desire not to see the girl slaughter her presumably beloved pet, there's not much that carries weight in this story. Even the god who loses treats his loss as a trifle. I'm of the opinion that writers should always read back their own stories to themselves, and ask themselves what anyone might see in it who wasn't forced to read it. I don't see much in this one. HOMEWORK: Disguised as a drifter, one of the gods grants a mortal a choice offer...but is it a test, or a trick? Tell me in 700 words. Bad Seafood fucked around with this message at 01:55 on Jun 11, 2015 |
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Jun 11, 2015 01:51
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Scrolled back looking for Docbeard's prompt post and stumbled onto Hocus Pocus' second batch of crits and I would just like to say that THISHocus Pocus posted:
Bad Seafood posted:You beautiful bastard. It seems there is something native to Benny Profane's storytelling ability that both Hocus and myself believe him to be visually attractive even as we presume upon his parentage.
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Jun 11, 2015 10:35
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You beautiful bastard!
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Cache Cab posted:If somebody could give me a critique I would appreciate it, only please make sure to say things in plain English, because most of the time I cannot understand what the person is trying to say. Keep in mind that I did not go to college and have very little understanding in terms of writing jargon, and I don't know why things have made you confused. Its your brain I can't make you understand something even when I wrote it clearly. Just tell me your favorite parts of my story or maybe if there is a section that you do not like, but in all honesty I probably can't delete it out before I send it to publishers because that will make the story even more confusing for people who already understand it and like it. Cache Cab posted:The Termolenator
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Jun 15, 2015 21:15
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is the only emotion he can muster. Thus far the prospect of getting dirty's had more impact on him than witnessing murder.
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Also Cache Cab I should inform you that I am also a published author before you play that card.
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Jun 15, 2015 21:26
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