[BT1] Alexander Trafford v Shou Resolved

[Jonathan Meer]

http://cdbzrpg.com/forum/showthread.php?t=28423

Will be closed in three days.

[Sigfried Hunin]

Alexander Trafford:
I really liked the high level of writing you brought to the table. You character didn't seem forced, you didn't have to put much real effort into reading it, and it didn't seem like you had to work too hard at writing it either. It just seemed very fluid and natural, and I really appreciate that kind of character immersion. I do feel like there was a bit of a lack of action in the fight, for it being a fight and all. Things did happen, but it didn't seem to be a riveting fight between the two, rather exposition about the two characters fighting decorated with sprinkles of things actually going on. I think that can be a good thing, but I'd like to see you find a little more a balance there.

Shou:
I had a little bit of a hard time following exactly what you were trying to do with your character in certain scenes. It seems like certain things need some more description or discussion for me to really understand what's happening. Like the scene with the armani suit and it getting on the grass was pretty confusing to me. I assume he did the thing where he portalled his arms through or used psychokinesis or something, but flowering up the text with a bit of explanation would have been really helpful as a reader. that said, I liked the action that you put up in your posts, attempting to keep the pace up and put the pauses in the flow in the right places, and that's very very good in these kinds of circumstances. You got through a bit of your character with his attempts at humor and etc, and I'd really love to see you really expand into that role in the future!

Overall, I have to hand it to Alexander Trafford. He just carried the role and made it a very fun and easy read to go through.

[Victoria]

I'm not going to read Sig's C&C so that I can try and give my own feel for the fight without basing off other people's thoughts.

Alex:

Honestly, I can't find much to complain about. I've written with you in Kill Town and it was a pleasure. You have a good handle on narrative writing (such as when you began your second post). You also do well in description, although, your fight scenes are a bit simple. It's lacking a little depth, but fighting can be like that. All I could say is that I found you used too many...what's the term...titles? Instead of using names you would say "the ninja-like warrior" or "The veteran psychokinetic". That's fine, but, you do it so much, it just felt sort of over-done. That might just be personal preference. I also noticed you do a lot of "show don't tell". Most people do, even I do at times. For example, reading "Alex lifted his white shirt’s sleeve in order to wipe away the brick-colored fluid" just didn't sit well. Perhaps a change in vocab would help, use more invoking words to describe things. Otherwise it's a tad dry.

Shou:

Well...your writing is interesting. It feels a bit abstract, but, for some reason I just couldn't follow what was going on. You had a few mistakes in grammar. At times I wasn't sure what was going on. You have a good grasp on describing certain things, just, it was sort of all over the place. It was vague in some places. I wasn't even sure who was who sometimes in your post.

Anyway, my vote goes to Alexander Trafford. He posted twice, and he really has a good handle on his writing style. Plus...I understood what was going on in his posts.

P.S. Victoria says you can buy her a drink any day ;D.

[Jarka]

Alexander Trafford:
I absolutely loved the beginning of your second post. Loved, loved, loved it. Sometimes it's interesting to get a fight from outside the perspective of ACTION ACTION PUNCH TIME, and I felt like you pulled it off. I really enjoy your voice when writing as Alexander, it meshes very well with how I interpret your character. When it comes to action action punch time, you are a bit rusty, but that's what C&C is for. Unfortunately, I'm not very good at action action punch time myself, so that'll have to come from another source


Shou:
Some of your imagery is really really good, but some of it gets lost - namely that Armani jacket scene. I think I know what was going on, but I'm not 100% positive. It kind of felt like you were super high-energy writing it, and it showed in your action and dialogue. Mostly that's a good thing, but it kind of felt too hyper at points. I was sad you didn't post a second time, I looked forward to reading more.

I vote Trafford

[Aero]

Alex
You're one of my favorite writers. You prove why every time you post. Like most of your writing, your posts in R1 were very fluent and easy to read. Your vocabulary is very refreshing, and easy to grasp even for people with lower reading-levels. Great narrating. Sometimes I feel like you lack a little in the dialog department, but I'm not sure if that's your character or simply your style. Very little grammatic and punctuation errors.

Shou
Honestly, I liked your posts. Very entertaining. You had me laughing most of the way through. However, you should take the same time you use to come up with witty remarks to indulge more into narrative description. Sometimes it felt choppy, moving from action to action without really painting the picture of how Shou got there. Some grammar and punctuations issues, but I'm not the type to knock people because of that.

Overall, this was an entertaining fight. Nice to see a serious style clash against something more casual. I have to go with Alexander Trafford in the end. It really came down to flow to me; Trafford trumped in that category.

Shou, I'd love for you to keep improving as a writer. I think you have a lot of potential with character development. I'd just like to see a little more improvement in descriptions.

[Edward Reynolds]

Alexander Trafford: Whether you’re a bitter prince of darkness or a well-dressed street entertainer, I'm always a fan of your writing. It just seems very natural (I guess in literature terms I would say that I'm a fan of your voice? hell if I know). In terms of what happened, I found the discourse between the two interesting, but after a while, it just seemed to lose me as a reader.

Shou: You only posted once, so that doesn't help much in the overall picture. As people have stated before, your style seems very…out there ('abstract', I suppose). While I think that would be wonderful in a private story, it seems out of place on this stage. I had trouble following some parts, which always makes me a sad panda. You seemed to gloss over a lot of actual events, and that also didn't come off well for me as a reader (the best example was when he disarmed Alex of his guns. I had to re-read that to make sure I knew what happened because it seemed to be over and done so fast).

I think you both did a great job, and I would have loved to see a second post from Shou. My vote goes to Alexander Trafford. On top of writing two great posts, I give him the edge in writing a more engaging (and less confusing) bout.

[Belle Hibiki]

Alex:

In my review, you mentioned that you were a bit rusty. If that's true, then I honestly hope you get knocked out of the tournament before I have to go up against you, because if this writing is you rusty ... Well, let's just say you're a top contender.

The best example I can think of is the first sentence. Ironic, funny, cleanly cut; I smiled when I first read it. Alex's 'don't give a shit', sarcastic attitude comes through in the writing, and the attention to the little details, like the way he deliberately readies himself for battle in the loosening of his tie and buttons, suggests his concern with his appearance/image/class; it's not just a knot, it's a windsor knot.

As for things you could improve, there are one or two typos, but fairly minor. You have a tendency to overstate or to leave in unnecessary language. For example:

Alexander chuckled and responded, “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before.” He exhaled a bluish grey plume of smoke, and then inhaled again.

You should trim out the "and responded." The previous dialogue has already established that there's a back-and-forth; it doesn't need to be stated that Alex says something, we already know that he is. You could also cut out the last 'and,' as it serves no purpose, or even the part about him inhaling another breath entirely.

Alexander chuckled. “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before.” He exhaled a bluish grey plume of smoke, then inhaled again.

It just flows better, to me. These are small things, though.

Shou:

Let's start with the positive. There are few spelling errors, you use commas, and let me make it clear, there's some good shit in here and some pretty fun, creative descriptions.

Okay, now that that's done with... Your writing is inconsistent. Often confusing. While there are few spelling errors, your style is all over the place. It's hard to get a handle on the character; am I supposed to think he's comedic? Serious? Deadly? Childish? A ninja? A clown? Because they're all here.

A lot of your sentences are unrefined and don't flow. In the future, try reading a sentence out loud to yourself. If something SOUNDS wrong, chances are it's going to READ wrong, too. We read like we listen, and even if a sentence might make literal sense on the page, that doesn't mean it's good.

ex.

Shou managed, clearly and belligerently through his facial garment. It contorted when he spoke as though it were one with him, because it clearly was.

Is it clear? Because it hasn't been made clear to me. And this is from Shou's POV, right? Why the 'as though'? There shouldn't be uncertainty here at all.

Replace 'facial garment' with 'mask' and cut out the final sentence completely; it confuses more than it illuminates, and is needless to the action besides.

There is a lot of this.

“Don't bring that Kool-Aid to a man's party!” he proclaimed with authority.

When someone makes a proclamation, it's more or less assumed that it's done with authority. When was the last time anyone "proclaimed reservedly"?

Cut it.

Shou caught the all-too-familiar sensation of his knees giving way and his testicles crying bloody murder -

GOOD.

- in the dead of the night

HUH?

Why is crying bloody murder in the dead of night any different from just crying bloody murder? This just totally yanked me out of the writing.

Cut it. Ruthlessly go through your work and ask yourself when you see things like that if it really needs to be there and why. If it's part of your 'style' and you cannot bear to part with it, refine it so that it does not confuse.

Verdict: Alexander Trafford. Shou still has a ways to go before he can compete against the kind of quality Trafford was putting out.

[Orion]

Alex: It's been a while since I've read your material, but you did seem a little rusty to me. There are definitely things you do well, but I'd like to point out the stuff that bothered me before I get to the good stuff.

Every now and then, check what you've written. There were a few mispellings, word exclusions and some awkward placements of commas. Sometimes it helps to actually read it aloud and see how it flows, otherwise it can get a bit sticky in parts. There are parts where sentences should be shortened or the wording made more concise, eg:

"Clouds dotted the sky, but not the dark, menacing types, just the whimsical, thin wisps that were more likely remnants of former clouds than clouds in themselves."

That's far too many words to describe wispy clouds.

"Some waved flags, others flashed signs, and many simply cheered, ignoring their personal bereavement, if just for a day, in order to stand together in a moment of celebration."

I found the flow jarred a bit with so many commas in this sentence. If you took out "if just for a day," it would've been a lot better.

I also thought "The gong's deep, reverberating twang sounded" is weird. A twang to me is a discordant note like the random strum of a guitar or a coin ricocheting off something metal. I don't thing "twang" fits with a deep, resonating sound.

You also do something that I'm a major felon of as well, which is this:

"Parting the air as they careened through it, the large-caliber shells began to glow brilliantly as they carved their path towards their target"

You describe an event twice in the same sentence (the bullet flying through the air), albeit mentioning another characteristic of it. I do it so much and it really annoys me, because it doesn't read well and makes it look like previous material is being rehashed within the same sentence. I don't know how to fix it, otherwise I would've by now. :S

Now your good stuff. Trafford is an enjoyable character to read, and while he's not what I would call particularly unique (in his cocky, tough guy attitude anyway), I appreciate the way that you describe the quirks that he has, which makes him stand out. The part where you mentioned he felt naked and unprofessional without his Armani suit was rather endearing, and this sentence:

"Trafford recovered quickly and stepped back in. He launched several jabs with his left hand, which his agile opponent expertly dodged while appearing to waste little to no effort. That too frustrated Alex; the man’s movements appeared so lazy and effortless"

points to Alex's ability to read a fight, but also how he perceives it (appearing to waste little effort) and that he was irritated by the lack of effort he saw.

tl:dr; A very stable, consistent writer but the wrinkles need to be ironed out.

Shou:

Admittedly this is the first time I've read you, but I think further practice would do you some good. You have a style that is emerging, but it's hampered by some odd choices of descriptions and flow breaking, hard to decipher paragraphs. For example:

"Fabric stretched as Shou extended his leg to meet Alex's face, where he expected it to be. It whipped through air and something strange happened. Shou caught the all-too-familiar sensation of his knees giving way and his testicles crying bloody murder in the dead of the night. He also bounced across the arena with solid disregards as to his bearing but, never one to admit his fallacies, jumped to his feet and bounced on the balls of his feet (“Balls of steel!” he cried out in spite of the tears that burned his eyes). The brown-haired kid who'd introduced himself a long time ago on a planet far, far away had torn the arena upwards trying to avoid Shou's onslaught and had already prepped his gunheavy assault."

Everything after "Shou caught the all-too-familiar..." is a really hazy and imprecise description of the events that follow. I had to read this paragraph a few times before I loosely understood what happened. To me it seems like you're trying a little too hard to be creative but the choice of words really dampens the understanding. Like Belle, I also don't understand the inclusion of "in the dead of the night."

"in an explosive splash of 'Retry' menu"

Again, I can see where you're trying to achieve here, but it's not executed well. Unless you're versed in video games, that doesn't actually make much sense.

However, there are moments when your creative and logical faculties come together. "His heart skipped a beat to a discord(ant) lullaby of gunfire and shrewd determination" really leapt out at me. I also thought you had a penchant for dialogue; the exchanges between Alex and Shou were pretty entertaining and characterised Shou rather well.

tl:dr; Good writing, but somewhat dragged down by (what I perceive to be) inexperience and a little lack of refinement.

My vote goes to Trafford.

[Mal Nova]

Alex: You do what you do. Some parts are easy to read, while others aren't. I think you've been able to make the harder parts more understandable these days. And more intersting.I really dont know where to say that you did anything bad at or anything so yeah...



Shou: I felt that you were trying to hard and used to much of an extensive vocabulry to explain tihngs in the erlier parts of your posts. Some things got me lost for a few moments because of it and a few parts were n't easy enolugh for me to follow. All and all though it was a great post and theres part of me that hopes that one day I can use such a vocabulary at a whim like you do

I Vote Alex

[Jonathan Meer]

Final Tabulation: 6 votes Alexander Trafford

Alexander Trafford wins Round 1.