11-06-2015, 06:53 PM
Reading thoughts:
[spoiler]Magus Post 1
What a lovely start, with the quotes. Well-played, Sir, you speak to my love of Shakespeare and Henry V.
It’s been a loooong time since I read Magus. I enjoy how blatant he is. ‘You’ll die if you fight me.’ Cojones on this guy.
Shadow people? Does that tie into a previous storyline?
Black Mage Post 1
This is my first exposure to your character, but that first paragraph gave much such an amazingly clear picture of your character (or at least I hope it did).
“Backed against the wall the Black Mage attempted to dart to the side and evade the blow, but his opponent's quickness was equal to his own, and the Black Mage suffered a blow to right forearm.” – A lot of sentence. Little too much for my tastes.
I think it’s a really cool touch that he uses incantations, even if (IC) Magus isn’t a fan, although make sure you double-check after you write: “He grunted as he pulled his palms together, fingered outstretched as the epicenter of a small vortex, throwing his opponent backwards” – I believe that’s supposed to be ‘fingers’?
“The Warrior of Light threw one bubble at his shins with his left, then one with his right aimed in a straight shot at his chest, hoping to hit one way or another. His foe's reaction was quick enough to evade the first strike, but acid tore through cloth on the next, corroding into his body a few seconds later.” – I think that clever use of paragraph breaks could have added some extra tension to this scene. It might be something to play with in the future.
Magus Post 2
“Magus rolled his eyes. Another incantation? Really?” Magus IS a dick, haha.
““Poison, you goddamn, backwards, mouth-breathing, incantation-spewing, fucking Philistine,” he growled, struggling pathetically to try and get up off the floor. His hand wrapped around the guardrail and he pulled himself up, but what he saw caused him to topple back down.” – Philistine is an amusing slur.
TIE FIGHTERRRRR
Black Mage Post 2
Wait, did his arm just get blown the heck off?! Brutal.
“To say his body cringed was an understatement,” – I think you might have picked the wrong verb?
Magus Post 3
“The lightning that the Scarecrow commanded was powerful stuff, indeed. His leather chest plate had melted and fused to his flesh where the arcane energy had struck him, and his limbs twitched and spasmed uncontrollably.” – Brutal. Loved this paragraph.
Black Mage Post 3
Some good stuff. Lots of emotion. I’d toy with paragraph length.
I enjoyed the references to the previous fight and the fact that Magus kills kids (fuck that guy).
Both of you:
It was a nice fight. You’re both good writers, but there was a part of me that felt like not a whole lot happened? I dunno. I felt like I breezed through the reading part of this with having to pause much to digest the action.
I’d also avoid recapping – you both do it, and it’s rarely necessary in situations like this. Just take the hand you were dealt and roll with it.[/spoiler]
Magus Score Card
Description and Clarity
3.5 – I feel like this was certainly your strong point. You do an amazing job setting a scene and describing the action that ensues. You paint a beautiful tapestry with all your words, and at no point did I find myself rolling my eyes at any blatant use of thesauruses (it happens to me every now and again as I read stuff). It’s all very organic for the reader, and that’s something I think you’ve always been great at. Glad to see the years have been kind to you.
Voice
4 – I often tell people to work on things like changing up the structure of sentences and paragraphs, but I see you doing a lot of that in your posts. Your posts flowed, very well. You incorporated a lot of thoughts and ‘extra’ stuff (like questions that weren’t necessarily thoughts) that didn’t drag down the narrative. Everything flowed nicely from start to finish.
Character
3 – Ahhh, Magus is such a terrible person. Has he always been this way? I read the end of your last fight where he nonchalantly murders a child as part of an experiment, and here he is, insulting someone he just met for using chants. What a dick. I wanted Black Mage to beat this guy’s face in by the time I was halfway through the thread. The downside, however, is (and this is reflected below as well), I didn’t feel like Magus was really threatened or challenged until after the crash. There were some run-ins with shadow people and Black Mage’s offensive, but it seemed like it took the crash and the poison to really crack open Magus’ mind. He became a whole lot ‘realer’ after that moment in the fight, and I wish I could have had that connection with him from the get-go.
Story
1.5 – This isn’t an indictment on your writing talent, because I’m going to say the same thing for Black Mage, but for some reason, this fight didn’t click with me. The writing was solid, but the actual actions that occurred were very dry. Exchanging spells, stepping into shadows, exchanging spells… the diversion with the TIE Fighter was a nice concept, but as a whole, I was pretty underwhelmed with the content of the fight. It was like the character involved were just going through the motions.
Grammar and Spelling
4 – I didn’t catch any major screw ups here.
Total Score - 18
Black Mage Score Card
Description and Clarity
3 – Very solid. There were places where I feel like you could have incorporated some more details (especially since you had wiggle room in terms of words remaining). You do a good job describing what is occurring in your posts, though. You can fine-tune some of it, but I like how your spell-casting works. A nice, old-school touch.
Voice
2 – Standard. Like many writers, you stick to a very standard set up of large paragraphs that often begin with speech and go on until more talking occurs. I’m not saying that’s atrocious, but it does get repetitive for a reader. Try to mix it up. You don’t really need an excuse to make a new paragraph (not that you should do so willy-nilly, of course, but try to experiment with how your posts look visually. It might seem like a strange thing, but it does help the flow and can even create tension for the reader.
Character:
2 – I feel like, after the first post, I stopped being able to keep a bead on Black Mage. If I may ask here… does he speak outside of spell-casting? Your writing referred to Magus as a child-killer but I felt like there was so much more you could have done with that to really made it fuel Black Mage’s efforts to defeat Magus.
Story:
1 – The same thing I told Magus is true for you. Your writing was on par with the rest of the Omniverse, but the actual fight itself felt like it was lacking something. Maybe that’s simply a result of the two characters not lending themselves to overly dramatic action set-pieces? I’m not sure. I liked the writing from the perspective of another writer, but as a reader, I wasn’t moved. There weren’t any passages that made me stop and stare with wide eyes (almost with that arm thing, but I felt like that was breezed over?!) or let out a hearty ‘boh boh boh.’
Grammar and Spelling
2 - About on-par with everyone else here. I’d keep an eye on grammar and make certain to always read over everything a second time. You didn’t have any blatant spelling mistakes, but there were a few missed marks and incorrect words that you may have caught with a second glance-through.
Total Score = 10
WINNER: Magus
You can chose to either execute, banish or spare you opponent in a final post of any length. If no post is made by the time your next fight begins, it will be assumed that they were spared.
[spoiler]Magus Post 1
What a lovely start, with the quotes. Well-played, Sir, you speak to my love of Shakespeare and Henry V.
It’s been a loooong time since I read Magus. I enjoy how blatant he is. ‘You’ll die if you fight me.’ Cojones on this guy.
Shadow people? Does that tie into a previous storyline?
Black Mage Post 1
This is my first exposure to your character, but that first paragraph gave much such an amazingly clear picture of your character (or at least I hope it did).
“Backed against the wall the Black Mage attempted to dart to the side and evade the blow, but his opponent's quickness was equal to his own, and the Black Mage suffered a blow to right forearm.” – A lot of sentence. Little too much for my tastes.
I think it’s a really cool touch that he uses incantations, even if (IC) Magus isn’t a fan, although make sure you double-check after you write: “He grunted as he pulled his palms together, fingered outstretched as the epicenter of a small vortex, throwing his opponent backwards” – I believe that’s supposed to be ‘fingers’?
“The Warrior of Light threw one bubble at his shins with his left, then one with his right aimed in a straight shot at his chest, hoping to hit one way or another. His foe's reaction was quick enough to evade the first strike, but acid tore through cloth on the next, corroding into his body a few seconds later.” – I think that clever use of paragraph breaks could have added some extra tension to this scene. It might be something to play with in the future.
Magus Post 2
“Magus rolled his eyes. Another incantation? Really?” Magus IS a dick, haha.
““Poison, you goddamn, backwards, mouth-breathing, incantation-spewing, fucking Philistine,” he growled, struggling pathetically to try and get up off the floor. His hand wrapped around the guardrail and he pulled himself up, but what he saw caused him to topple back down.” – Philistine is an amusing slur.
TIE FIGHTERRRRR
Black Mage Post 2
Wait, did his arm just get blown the heck off?! Brutal.
“To say his body cringed was an understatement,” – I think you might have picked the wrong verb?
Magus Post 3
“The lightning that the Scarecrow commanded was powerful stuff, indeed. His leather chest plate had melted and fused to his flesh where the arcane energy had struck him, and his limbs twitched and spasmed uncontrollably.” – Brutal. Loved this paragraph.
Black Mage Post 3
Some good stuff. Lots of emotion. I’d toy with paragraph length.
I enjoyed the references to the previous fight and the fact that Magus kills kids (fuck that guy).
Both of you:
It was a nice fight. You’re both good writers, but there was a part of me that felt like not a whole lot happened? I dunno. I felt like I breezed through the reading part of this with having to pause much to digest the action.
I’d also avoid recapping – you both do it, and it’s rarely necessary in situations like this. Just take the hand you were dealt and roll with it.[/spoiler]
Magus Score Card
Description and Clarity
3.5 – I feel like this was certainly your strong point. You do an amazing job setting a scene and describing the action that ensues. You paint a beautiful tapestry with all your words, and at no point did I find myself rolling my eyes at any blatant use of thesauruses (it happens to me every now and again as I read stuff). It’s all very organic for the reader, and that’s something I think you’ve always been great at. Glad to see the years have been kind to you.
Voice
4 – I often tell people to work on things like changing up the structure of sentences and paragraphs, but I see you doing a lot of that in your posts. Your posts flowed, very well. You incorporated a lot of thoughts and ‘extra’ stuff (like questions that weren’t necessarily thoughts) that didn’t drag down the narrative. Everything flowed nicely from start to finish.
Character
3 – Ahhh, Magus is such a terrible person. Has he always been this way? I read the end of your last fight where he nonchalantly murders a child as part of an experiment, and here he is, insulting someone he just met for using chants. What a dick. I wanted Black Mage to beat this guy’s face in by the time I was halfway through the thread. The downside, however, is (and this is reflected below as well), I didn’t feel like Magus was really threatened or challenged until after the crash. There were some run-ins with shadow people and Black Mage’s offensive, but it seemed like it took the crash and the poison to really crack open Magus’ mind. He became a whole lot ‘realer’ after that moment in the fight, and I wish I could have had that connection with him from the get-go.
Story
1.5 – This isn’t an indictment on your writing talent, because I’m going to say the same thing for Black Mage, but for some reason, this fight didn’t click with me. The writing was solid, but the actual actions that occurred were very dry. Exchanging spells, stepping into shadows, exchanging spells… the diversion with the TIE Fighter was a nice concept, but as a whole, I was pretty underwhelmed with the content of the fight. It was like the character involved were just going through the motions.
Grammar and Spelling
4 – I didn’t catch any major screw ups here.
Total Score - 18
Black Mage Score Card
Description and Clarity
3 – Very solid. There were places where I feel like you could have incorporated some more details (especially since you had wiggle room in terms of words remaining). You do a good job describing what is occurring in your posts, though. You can fine-tune some of it, but I like how your spell-casting works. A nice, old-school touch.
Voice
2 – Standard. Like many writers, you stick to a very standard set up of large paragraphs that often begin with speech and go on until more talking occurs. I’m not saying that’s atrocious, but it does get repetitive for a reader. Try to mix it up. You don’t really need an excuse to make a new paragraph (not that you should do so willy-nilly, of course, but try to experiment with how your posts look visually. It might seem like a strange thing, but it does help the flow and can even create tension for the reader.
Character:
2 – I feel like, after the first post, I stopped being able to keep a bead on Black Mage. If I may ask here… does he speak outside of spell-casting? Your writing referred to Magus as a child-killer but I felt like there was so much more you could have done with that to really made it fuel Black Mage’s efforts to defeat Magus.
Story:
1 – The same thing I told Magus is true for you. Your writing was on par with the rest of the Omniverse, but the actual fight itself felt like it was lacking something. Maybe that’s simply a result of the two characters not lending themselves to overly dramatic action set-pieces? I’m not sure. I liked the writing from the perspective of another writer, but as a reader, I wasn’t moved. There weren’t any passages that made me stop and stare with wide eyes (almost with that arm thing, but I felt like that was breezed over?!) or let out a hearty ‘boh boh boh.’
Grammar and Spelling
2 - About on-par with everyone else here. I’d keep an eye on grammar and make certain to always read over everything a second time. You didn’t have any blatant spelling mistakes, but there were a few missed marks and incorrect words that you may have caught with a second glance-through.
Total Score = 10
WINNER: Magus
You can chose to either execute, banish or spare you opponent in a final post of any length. If no post is made by the time your next fight begins, it will be assumed that they were spared.