MOCK BATTLE: We need a Judge. [OOC]

[Ash]

xD

I'm sorry.

Anything else you don't like?

[Ian Sylvester]

....what's stopping me from making my blade go *poof* when you try to use it to swing up?



fuck it, I activate phasing (which requires a lot of concentration, so all my cubes and blades disappear)

[Ash]

Edit: Didn't see your comment.

I guess nothing. Except it wouldn't be as cool, and Ash still has the Claw which was already loaded. It would have just sent us into another chase, and that's not as fun to write.


I guess that's all she wrote.

We did the thing, Ammy. Sadly I was not able to put Breakdance in my post. =[

(We're done)

[Ian Sylvester]

yeah....I rolled dice to see if I would pass out or not


I rolled a 1

[Amaterasu]

Alrighty, you guys are ready for me to get on with judging then, yes?

[Ian Sylvester]

yep, we are

[Ash]

Yes.

Be Gentle

[Amaterasu]

Gentle? That word doesn't exist in my judging dictionary :v:

I'll start reading now and hopefully have the results back with you within the next couple of hours!

[Amaterasu]

*dramatic drumroll*

Judgement!

First things first:

– Youtube. Unfortunately I couldn’t listen to the music you guys used, though it’s a nice touch.

-Advice to both: Do not use the Site counter to count your words. It’s not reliable. Use wordcounter.net or MS Word (or an equivalent) instead. Generally using Word/OpenOffice Writer or a similar software is recommended because you can’t save drafts on the site anymore, and one accident could lose you your entire post.

-Spelling, capitalization and overall grammar and orthography is important... very important at least to me, to preserve the reading flow and immerse the reader. This is somewhat more the case for Ian than Ash: I see way too many cases where you don’t capitalize words. I recommend always running the post through MS Word or another spellchecking software to weed out the biggest errors.
Keep in mind that most Omniverse judges are harsh on this one! Thaal’s grading standards for instance have the following (quoted) “Generally every major grammatical Error per 500 words moves this section down one grade.“ Plus, a judge will subconsciously be biased against you even if what you wrote is good but they have difficulty reading it due to grammar.
I could list up every error that I see either of you made, but I want to focus on what you wrote rather than technicalities for the judging – this is not meant to shame you in public for your errors. If you want a list though, let me know and I’ll PM you one.

-Environment! You guys had such an awesome place built up; you didn’t use it nearly as much as you could have. To your credit, you didn’t fight in a vacuum, but breakable platforms, statues, water and long drops? There was a good bit of unused potential here, sadly.


-Ian: I’m all about writing as much as you like without forcing yourself into an excess amount of literacy to blow up your word count, but your posts’ word counts were 217, 121 and 43, which is very little. There is no “punishment” for going under any threshold, but in the best case, you’ll have a lot less writing to keep the judge’s attention with. In the worst case, they’ll misunderstand it as you being lazy (which I don’t think that you are!) and be biased against you. It’s not fair, but it’s the truth. My personal recommendation is trying for at least half the maximum word requirement (so in this fight, 400 words)


-Ash: Lots of –ing and stretched sentences. See if you can split one sentence into two instead of using a comma.

-You’re using adjectives a little too much. Sometimes less is more.

-Avoid paraphrasing the post as you did in your final post – the main message should be conveyed in the IC part. The combat logs are meant to be just that – a brief overview for the reader to compare to your Roster, to search for pictures or descriptions of moves for instance.

General Fight Notes

Ash 1-
“Ash heard the muffled noise of music approaching the door, suddenly it snapped open only for one of the hippest guys in her life to waltz in casually.” This is one of the examples where you could divide a sentence into two pieces.

“[...]a fierce opponent, as the image of a Bearcat, popped up on her commlink” Too, many, commas :frog:

“Ash has never been about traditional anything.” I think “had” would be correct here since you’re in the past tense.

“To him, she must just look like a demoness here to ruin his day.” Sudden shift from past tense to present here... try keeping it consistent.

“Besides those without a sense of individuality, and her snobby 'co-workers' she had actually loved that job.” You don’t put a comma before an and unless in some very rare cases where it’s permitted.

Vanishing and appearing is... a little fast even for someone using Burst Movement, if you’re SPD 3. But this isn’t so much a big thing.

A nicely written post, portraying the interaction very nicely and dipping a lot into Ash’s mindset!


Ian 1-
“And then I spun the circle as fast as I could, and I'm twisting and turning with it.” A shift from past to present tense? :frog: Keep it consistent please.

“cutting her with each pass”, it would have been nice to indicate where she’s getting cut, how deep, what her reactions are and such.

“after a few passes I end up behind her, I ditch 2 blades and make a cobalt blue cube (again, it looks like a neon sign) and shove her over it (if she is still there, it takes me about a second to make something while I already have the move going).”
Does Ian just drop the blades or what? I’m confuzzled by this wording :psy: And he “shoves her over it”? Does he put the cube on the ground and push her onto it? Then there’s two “and”s which, while not grammatically wrong, are just... egh. It may have been more fitting to divide the sentence or use commas. Finally, those brackets. If you absolutely need to put some OOC remark in, put it into a quote at the end of the post. Dropping them in the middle of the post breaks the reading flow immensely. You could also have tried to incorporate a description into your fight post.

On another note, avoid putting hyperlinks into the IC post – leave it in the quoted part. Sometimes the site code that calculates OM can get confused by things like that, it’s better to be safe than sorry. (note that the quoted part of a post does not give OM)

It’s an okay post but needs a little work. I do see potential for improvement though!


Ash 2-
“Literally and physically.“ :frog: Silly Ash, stop being redundant. I think you may have meant to say “figuratively” instead of “literally”? As in that Ash is quick at thinking, and fast at moving around.

You seem to be ignoring the cuts that Ian inflicted on you in his post. While they don’t have to be deep enough to cause trouble yet, I would at least have liked to see a reaction – a pained grimace, a little blood or something else.

“He'd notice her foot work was also her most common attack on him, and each time she'd swing her foot high to kick him the head he'd duck under it, sliding under it like it was always a part of their choreography before going back to his own moves.” :psy: Okay, this... this is a lot. First of, the usage of “he/she would do X”... it’s not wrong per say, but irks me personally. Why WOULD they do it? Why don’t they just DO it? The comma followed by and makes a return here also. And it’s another huge sentence that could’ve been divided.

“she took the awesome opportunity“ Awesome is... out of place here. “Perfect” opportunity would’ve been more fitting, IMHO.

“They were quickly back to back again, as the music came to its final words she expected him to answer her about the kiss.” :frog: Silly Ash, you don’t stick a comma there.

“she felt him push her butt bump her towards a solid brightly colored block.” :frog:

“Which she flipped over expertly using the momentum he'd give her, even doing a little spin on top of it and pushing off of into a few back flips.” wat: Starting a sentence with “which”? Just no, please... (I think some really good writers – as in Tolkien levels of good – can pull this off but it’s a difficult thing, and it doesn’t fit well in this case) This is also an example where adjectives are a little too plentiful: expertly and little. Maybe leave one and take out the other, or even both.

“bird god statue, leaving boot prints over its gorgeously sculpted face” Do birds even have faces? And “gorgeously” is another of those adjectives that I’m not sure if they’re fitting. Might just be me though.

“Really quickly she escaped his range while showing off her limber body and its moves.” “Really quickly”, “limber body”. Another instance with too many objectives.

“There was no warning, no sound, no way to predict it, but the sound of metal impacting old stone was loud enough to be heard over his music and he would see her body swinging via the rope.” :frog: There was no sound but then there is sound? And where does that rope come from?

“She twisted in the air to land on the wall she hung from, only to run in a big circle on this very tall wall” I think you should’ve seen this one while proofreading... “wall” twice in the same sentence, it could’ve been avoided. (“Wall” is also brought up in the next sentence, so... egh :xd: )

“With only a simple grasp of his abilities, it would seem he could manipulate them expertly, but that they had range.” “Them”? I know what you mean, but you could’ve elaborated a bit here.

“That range was twice as big as her's” :wat: “Twice as big as her is”, is what you’re saying here. This is a personal thing that irks me a lot, the distinction between its and it’s, and the like.

I especially love those last two sentences though. Sounds very Ash-y :frogbon:

Overall, the post could’ve been better but there were no glaring issues.


Ian 2-
“I ditch a couple more blades” Again, “ditch” isn’t the best word to use here. Let them disappear, pull them into your sleeves, hide them behind your ears, whatever must be done, but paint the picture for your reader. You could also point out how many blades and cubes Ian has at this point.

“I stagger them to make a set of steps” :frog: Wut? You stagger them? That may be me not being the most proficient english speaker but I understand that staggering is something different. Did you mean “stack” maybe? Also, using the cubes to walk through the air like that would require Super Jumping (and a move) or Flight. Just something to keep in mind.

“I ditch the cube I currently am” Another “ditch” instance. Refer to the above.

“I move the other 2 neon signs of chip damage to position” :frog: Neon signs of chip damage? Unless Ian is creatively describing his blades in his head, this comes over as kind of awkward.

“the punk of a teens wet dream.” :frogbon: Poor Ash.


Ash 3-
I understand that you changed some details and why you did it, but keep in mind that especially in events, fights are pretty strict. Post-posting edits usually cause the person in charge some annoyance, as we saw this DA with Alex. Of course, this is a mock battle so I’m not going to hold it against you. I just want to point it out.

“Looking like ninja stars that spun in the air the lanky man pockets his hands in his dancing pants.” I had to read this sentence twice to understand what you mean. The structure is somewhat off. Also, you were using past tense, now suddenly present tense, and past tense later again? Keep it consistent, folks!

“Good, he didn't like this chasing game he lowered his chin as he mentally commanded the weaker blades to attack.” All you needed was one period and one capital H :wat: This sentence is begging to be divided into two.

The acrobatics after that are pretty cool! Well-written post bit.

“Apparently she was paying attention to the song as well.” An odd shift of perspective from Ash to Ian there :frog: But okay.

“Both parties, however, weren't exactly done fighting, while Ian distracted her” I think that shifting “however” to the end of the sentence and ending said sentence with “fighting.” would have been better here. Again, sticking together two sentences where they really should have been split. There’s no shame in small sentences, Ash :frog:

“most of them hit, the first one making her drop Shocking Grasp.” Most? How many is that? Also, “drop” Shocking Grasp... there would have been much more potential here. Let it fizzle away without effect, or use other fancy words :yay:

“Ever the master of falling though she managed to land” For once, you left out a comma where it could have helped. (that’s between “though” and “she”)


Ian 3-
I’ll point this out again for emphasis... 43 words. That’s just slightly over a twentieth of the maximum word count. No matter how concise of a writer you are, this is just too little.

Two of the three sentences don’t have periods at the end, and two aren’t started with capital letters. This feels very “whipped up” in five minutes... and that is no bueno :poop:

“I use phasing to dodge the claw” :psy: Okay, I get what you mean, but this is just too short. Phasing isn’t instantaneous especially at 3 SPD... benefit of the doubt here, he could have seen the attack coming. Also, there’s a ton of unused potential here: letting Ian see the blade fly through his immaterial body, maybe, or something with phasing activating at the last moment.

“As the cube disappears” :frog: Why does it disappear? Because Ian can’t maintain it?

“exhausted from using 2 exhausting maneuvers” Exhausted used twice in the sentence... egh. And 2 written as a number? For numbers consisting of short words like that, please type it out, it keeps a better reading flow. (“Two”, “a million”, “fifteen” for instance. Obviously don’t word out “2.578.612” if it’s not necessary – this is something learned by trial and error, IMHO).



Penalties: Both of you respected Word Counts and Time Calls without missing any posts (to the best of my knowledge anyway), so no penalties.

Scores:

Ash:
Quality – 6. Good description of the characters, their thinking etc. but unfortunately you fell a bit short with the environment. Also, while you were greatly descriptive sometimes the usage of adjectives threw it off.

Technical – 6. I’ve pointed out where the issues are, but you wrote well overall.

Realism – 7. Mainly deducting points here for having ignored the injuries that Ian inflicted, and overall not showing signs of Ash getting tired or hurt, as well as “disappearing” in a teleport-y way when 3 SPD with Burst Movement wouldn’t allow for that. But, you kept a very detailed and realistic account of things otherwise.

Scale – N/A. Not grading this one since it happened in a vacuum world without any connection to an outside world or NPCs by which that scale could be measured. There may be other ways to measure the scale but I’m not certain how.

Skill – 3. This may come off as a low score, but I recommend checking Blarghman’s notes in his judging template for this one. There was no “game plan” or any big, overarching goal that Ash was pursuing during the battle. Also, no short-term traps and tricks that Ash has set. You went with the flow instead. Pity, because the environment offered a LOT of opportunity here. You used it to some extent though, hence the score of 3.

Bonuses/Penalties – 0. No SP was used and no penalties were issued.

Total Score: 22/40


Ian:
Quality – 3. While you show a lot of potential with good writing and understanding the site’s concepts and rules, enough that I’d place you on the lower end of average, you could do with some improvement. A mock battle is a great way to do so though, so good on you for taking the first step!

Techical – 4. There’s not a lot of errors, but the ratio of errors per word, so to speak, is pretty high. I pointed out where the issues are in my general notes.

Realism – 4. The cube staircase and phasing without any real time indication were pretty bothersome to me, but Ian also showed no reaction to injuries nor to exhaustion until the last sentence of your third post. You used your Illusionary Electro Swing’s offensive very well though, keeping to the limitations, so you do get a decent score here.

Scale – N/A. Not grading this one since it happened in a vacuum world without any connection to an outside world or NPCs by which that scale could be measured. There may be other ways to measure the scale but I’m not certain how.

Skill – 2. For the most part Ian didn’t formulate any short-term or game plans, but the management of his Illusionary Electro Swing cubes and blades as well as using the cubes as platforms to keep them on “his” territory are worth noting.

Total Score: 13/40.


Keep in mind, this is a Mock fight, there are no winners. Except Ash :derp:

Ian, hope you don’t take this too harshly. Like I said you show a lot of promise! I’ve seen worse writers on the Omniverse who became great after staying for a while and learning, and I’m confident that you can get there too, so I hope that the low scores don’t discourage you.

Ash, good performance! You can see where there is room for improvement, though while I may have pointed out many errors you did pretty well in conclusion. Hope that you'll find my notes useful.

As noted, let me know if you need closer advice, since I don't want to share things that are just not meant for the public eye. I'm happy to provide you with any help you need if you want to improve!

[Ian Sylvester]

about what I expected

'specially the skill part, good at managing, bad at long term.

I think I have an old writing text book somewhere, I might read a couple chapters.

[Amaterasu]

You're going to improve if you keep playing with others and reading (both the Omniverse and in general). We have a whole bunch of great writers here in the Omniverse that are happy to point you in the right direction, and outside of that you're going to learn it by doing :yay: