MortalPlague
Adventurer
So I did some trial and error with Wordcounter.net. It counts hyphenated words as a single word, and it counts contractions as a single word. I believe those two factors account for the discrepancy.
2018 IRON DM Tournament
- Thread starter Rune
- Start date
So I did some trial and error with Wordcounter.net. It counts hyphenated words as a single word, and it counts contractions as a single word. I believe those two factors account for the discrepancy.
Gradine
The Elephant in the Room (she/they)
This is the site I use to check my own word counts. I used to also use a Google Doc plug-in that would give me different numbers too.
Rune
Once A Fool
For those playing the home-game version of “Guess the Word-count,” CleverNickName’s entry has given me the widest varience yet: 1494 in WordCounter.net and 1516 in my app (which is Ulysses, by the way – with no formatting, just text).
As stated previously, I’ll be sticking with the WordCounter.net count.
Edit= And no, those double-hyphens aren’t adding to the word-count; I checked!
As stated previously, I’ll be sticking with the WordCounter.net count.
Edit= And no, those double-hyphens aren’t adding to the word-count; I checked!
CleverNickName
Limit Break Dancing
Eeep! That's quite a difference, especially for a contest with a hard requirement. MS Word gave me a count of 1496. 0.o
I too will be using WordCounter.net, if I advance. And I've learned my lesson; I'll try not to push the envelope as much and give myself a little more breathing room. That was a little too close for comfort.
Rune
Once A Fool
Don’t sweat it too much, [MENTION=50987]CleverNickName[/MENTION]. It’s pretty clear that my apps are the problematic ones, so I know not to trust them for the count. And I wouldn’t let a suspicious count go by without checking into it, anyway. I don’t want the contestants to feel as if their effective word-limit is less than what is stated. That wouldn’t be fair.
I was just providing data in case there were still people trying to figure out the puzzle.
I was just providing data in case there were still people trying to figure out the puzzle.
Iron Sky
Procedurally Generated
Round 2, Match 2
Round 2, Match 2:
Here's how I judge:
My first pass will be literary: how well does it read? Are there typos? Is it coherent? Is the phrasing awkward, awesome, or ambivalent? Did the writing help or hurt the entry? Does the adventure tell a good story?
Second pass will be as a GM: would I want to run it? Is there a good hook? Does it flow? Do I have all the information I need? Is it mostly backstory or mostly adventure? If I bought this adventure to save prep, how much prep does it require? Is the conclusion satisfying?
Third pass will be as a player: would I want to play it? Are there any interesting choices? Do my actions matter? Does it have interesting things to do for different types of players? How about characters? Is the conclusion satisfying?
Fourth pass will be ingredients: how well were they used? Could any be removed or altered without changing the adventure in major way? Are they tied together tightly? Any particularly clever uses?
I'll finish with a conclusion that sums it all up and throws in anything else that doesn't fit into one of these categories such as logical breaks, major inconsistencies, or other elements that "break" the adventure as posted.
A final note before jumping in: I try to be entirely constructive and honest with my feedback since that's been the main benefit for me doing the half-dozen Iron DMs I've competed in and my ability to write has been drastically honed by them for all types of writing, not just adventures. Empty praise or skirting problems to be "nice" is pleasant and useless. If I like it, you'll know and if I think it could use work... you'll know. Feel free to discard it if you don't agree, my main goals are to be fair, honest, and critical.
Literary Pass, The Cake of Kings:
This entry has something that few others have had: strong voice and tone. The narrator is excited and by the end of the paragraph its clear that this is going to be a fast, light-hearted adventure. Great!
Of course, there's hiccups: "...the thieves slashed the top of the carriage, helped themselves to the cake, and carried off the rest..." Helping themselves makes it sounds like they ate it all, but then they made off with "the rest". I had to reread again to figure out if there were multiple cakes or some other food aside from the cake.
The second was "...a chat with the thief in the jailhouse..." I immediately went back through the story to see what had been stolen only to realize it was the guy who tried to be a thief. I guess if you catch someone in the attempt, you'd still call them the thief, but reading it much later I assumed it was someone who had actually stolen something.
A quick grammar note: if you say '"Because attempted theft carries a lighter sentence than attempted murder, he shrugs.' you're saying that the shrug is how he says that. I think you meant 'he said, shrugging' instead of assuming that he communicated all of that with a shrug.
There were a few extra commas here and there.
All said, usually the less I say here the better and these are pretty small critiques. This read fast and I even smiled a few times – writing that evokes emotion is excellent (as long as its the intended emotion anyway).
Maybe the best adventure of the tournament so far, at least as far as the writing is concerned.
Literary Pass, The Twisted Court:
In the first sentence, there's an extra comma and, in the many things I have read on writing, one of my biggest takeaways has been "when in doubt, don't put a comma" since they tend to either break up sentences that don't need to be broken, or they allow you to chain sentences together that really should be separate, such as this one which could probably be four, maybe five, sentences already, but is now super, super long and tiring to read, largely due to me gluing it together with way too many commas, and now you're taking the brunt of my criticism after a single sentence, mostly because there have been so many entries, especially in this round, that have done the same thing, to their detriment, which is sad, since they can weaken otherwise strong entries, for real, yo.
I would also put that first two-sentence paragraph at the end of the hooks paragraph so we can jump in with cool story stuff. I.e. "here's the situation and a bunch of cool NPCs! (Two will be used later)".
I also started to hit made-up-word fatigue in the second paragraph, then hit it even harder in the third, and bottomed out a bit in the fourth. Here's proper nouns I'm expected to remember: Byeshk Mountains, Eldeen Reaches, Silver Lake, Sylbaran, the Reaches, Droaam, Fernii d’Vadalis, House Vadalis, Test of Siberys, Mark of Handling, Tel'daar Duukuun, Dhakaani [K]ingdom, Graywall, Dhuggaan or Dhogec, Dhogec Ghuukac (Mount Fury), Daelkyr.
I know this is Eberron and so these 15 people/places/things probably already exist in the setting, but for someone reading this adventure only knowing vaguely what Eberron is it's overwhelming. I've ready the beginnings of many people's first novels and it reads a lot like this: here's a bunch of obscure, non-evocative names built of made-up words full of arbitrary a'postraphes to make it sound mystical and foreign that I shall vomit forth in a massive heap of exposition.
It was so dense I read and reread the first four paragraphs several times just trying to be sure I had everything. These four paragraphs took longer to read than the entire previous adventure took.
[sblock=What it looks like to me]Tales of strange, horrific creatures coming out of the southern Rubikarbik Range have travelled throughout the Abidiri Extent and across Lake Lockmoor. They all originate from one town: Thasti'kir, on the coast of Lake Lockmoor, just across the border between the Extent and Vlothee, the realm of monsters. The Rubikarbik Range form the natural border between the two.
One woman has followed these rumors seeking answers. Chulthaa r'Nomoro, an Abidiri Ranger and scion of Dynasty Nomoro (Dynasty Crest: Hippogriff) has recently failed her Challenge of Bronre, and wants to know why she hasn’t yet manifested the Glyph of Touch. Her mother married into the Dynasty, her father died before her birth, and her uncle, her only other close familial link to the family, was excoriated from the Dynasty for his experiments when she was still young. She has begun to suspect that her biological father has no ties to the Dynasty, but her mother denies that she has lied about her parentage. Chulthaa is attempting to seek out her lost uncle for answers, and the rumored creatures bear the hallmark of her uncle’s work.
Hin'sool Restiaa is a cunning hobgoblin warlord and claims to be the heir of an ancient Vhaccal kingdom situated around the southern Rubikarbik Range. He could very well be an heir for all he knows; all that matters to him is that he’s been able to attract a small following and none of the forces within Vlothee have attempted to challenge him yet. He cares little of rebuilding the glory of the Vhaccal empire or carving out a kingdom for himself; his merely seeks the financial gain to set himself up for life in the Vlothee city of Brickguard. He has been seeking Iillthara an Sivvce, a Vhaccal fortress situated underneath the volcanic Sivvce Yallne (Peak Rage). The fortress, home to a forge of rubikarbik weapons, was said to have been converted into a mint after the Rhoboloth and their aberrant armies were defeated. There is said to be a whole treasury full of byeshk-minted coins. Hin'sool has found the entrance; he might have hired the adventurers to brave the depths with him, or a rival or Abidiri official might hire them to put a stop to his plans. If he has not hired the PCs, he will have an entourage of followers with him.[/sblock]
To pile the fatigue on further, each paragraph gets longer and longer with no white space for a break to process the amount of data thrown down. On top of all that, it's a huge pile of exposition which may never be learned, used, or relevant (especially since it says the hooks are optional). When you say "hooks" I was expecting "here's how you get your PCs into the adventure" not "here's everything happening in a one kingdom radius."
I stopped taking notes at this point, trying to read through and get what was going on here and I think I was simply overloaded. Add to the noun list: Daelkyr War, Bragi, Iacthatkarlosh, Daelkyr Yahathl'thess, and Hephaestus. For about 20 characters, locations, houses, empires, and races all introduced in about 2 pages. Every time I came to one of these words, I had to read back up to figure out what it was again. Dhuugaan or Dhogec especially got me as the or kept making me thing it was two things and I had to remind myself it wasn't that kind of "or".
After reading through it twice, I don't think I still know who is who or what the PCs are supposed to be doing. Hopefully it becomes more clear in future passes.
Literary Pass, Comparison:
The Cake of Kings since I know what happens.
GM Pass, The Cake of Kings:
Breaking it into scenes:
Hook (make one up?) → Crime Scene → Catacomb Culture → Royal Mint + Rain → Poisoned Hippogriff → Xaxfas → Reward
Fairly linear, though that isn't always the bad thing past me always made it out to be. As a GM, I get to lay on the campiness, run a light investigation, a battle with an ooze, watch them steal mint from a dragon in the caustic rain (they also have to collect), then run a fight with an illithid.
The biggest weakness thus far is how much of it seems to be given to the PCs for free. The investigation is a red herring, the "interrogation" of the thief is automatic and both the ingredients list and antidote recipes are given. There's really only three or four meaningful scenes: the ooze, the dragon / rain, and the illithid fight.
Containing an ooze will be fun, the dragon fight and rain collection sounds like horrible fun, and the illithid battle is just a boss fight – unless the capture it anyway, but why would they? Unless they know there's a reward for doing so, 99% of PC are just going to murder the thing.
Luckily, the adventure's tone lets us know it's supposed to be light fun so everything doesn't have to be difficult.
GM Pass, The Twisted Court:
Scenes:
Hook (Tel'daar hires them or an official hires them to oppose him or ?) → ruins?
Is Fernii seeking answers a hook? If so, why doesn't it mention that she might hire the PCs? There's no indication that she knows where Bragi is so how would she even know to look in the ruins?
Honestly, I'm not sure what the PCs are doing here or why. They might be hired by Tel'daar or not, so knowing his motivations doesn't help us. Why do they want to end the curse and/or destroy the mint? There are some NPCs here that seem to be doing things, but that doesn't help since I can't figure out why the PCs would care.
When it says to make your own hook, I'm not sure enough of what is supposed to happen that I know what I'd hook on to.
There are monsters, NPCs, a curse, but they are like meat without a skeleton to hang it on and walk us somewhere meaningful through the data and into an adventure.
Admittedly, I'm doing this in little 20-40 minute chunks whenever I have some time throughout the week, but if it's this obscure to me it probably would be to at least some of the theoretical audience using it.
GM Pass, Comparison:
The Cake of Kings since I know what happens.
Player Pass, The Cake of Kings:
The PCs have some light (meaningless) investigation, try to capture part of an ooze, fight a dragon in volcanic wasteland for some mint, try to catch acid rain, then fight an illithid. The climax isn't the coolest part, but that's in part since the previous ones are so interesting.
Seems like a challenge and a blast.
Player Pass, The Twisted Court:
I think they PCs are supposed to go to the ruins for some reason (escorting Tel'daar or trying to kill him or maybe following Fernii if she goes for some reason) and once there they fight some monsters, maybe fight an illithid(?), kill a hippogriffish thing, kill corrupt Bragi, maybe destroys the ruin and also maybe saves a town. It sounds cool, but I'm not sure how to run them through it or even how to start.
Player Pass, Comparison:
There seems to be cool stuff in The Twisted Court and its starting to make a bit more sense to me what happens, but I can't visualize the session in my head in part because I don't know where to start.
Ingredients Pass, The Cake of Kings:
♦ Mindful Mind Flayer: Xaxfas, mindful as he is wary of intruders. The big bad who poisoned the cake. His illithidness is incidental, most importantly he's an alchemist.
♦ Con Artist: The Knack, caught for (not) stealing the cake and poising the hippogriff. Spilling his beans, the link to Xaxfas. His con is that he was stealing not trying to poison.
♦ Ancient Culture: My favorite – the ooze who is the key culture for the sourdough needed for the cake. Awesome.
♦ Royal Mint: Mint for the frosting. It's royal since it's in the cake of royalty, but would have been stronger maybe if it was in the royal preserve or hunting grounds.
♦ Incremental Malison: Xaxfas' curse to slowly turn the nobility to illithids. It does turn the hippogriff into one. Saving him is the primary meat of the adventure.
♦ Hungry Hippogriff: Bucky who ate the cake and so is dying. He really could have been any type of creature, however.
♦ Burning Rain: Caustic rain to help soften the sourdough.
A sentence:
A Con Artist poisons the royal cake with an Incremental Malison on orders of a Mindful Mind Flayer and to save the Hungry Hippgriff that ate it, the PCs must collect some Ancient Culture, Royal Mint, and Burning Rain.
Tight. A few items might be tweaked a bit and still fit, lets see:
A Con Artist poisons the royal cake with an Incremental Malison on orders of a Alchemist Poisoner and to save the Hungry Wolfhound that ate it, the PCs must collect some Ancient Culture, Dragon Mint, and Burning Rain.
Still pretty good.
Ingredients Pass, The Twisted Court:
♦ Mindful Mind Flayer: Iacthatkarlosh who researches in the mint.
♦ Con Artist: I'm not sure if this is Tel'daar claiming to be royalty (that he might be weakens it) or the illithid pretending to be helpful. Maybe both.
♦ Ancient Culture: The Dhakaani empire that is long gone, whose fortress the adventure takes place in.
♦ Royal Mint: The old Dhakaani mint where Tel'daar wants to make coins. Seems somewhat incidental as the curse is on the forge not the mint (which is why they were able to make coins but not weapons?)
♦ Incremental Malison: The curse on the forge.
♦ Hungry Hippogriff: A monster bred by bragi. Its hippogriffness is not really important – and it's not even half-and-half as it claims since it's part manticore, displacer beast, byeshk, and has a whip tongue (which gives it a swallow attack to stand in for hungry).
♦ Burning Rain: I reread the whole thing to find this and I think it must by the volcanic eruption that would happen should the PCs trigger the explosion.
I don't know if I'm just being dense or am stuck or what, but I'm still not sure how the PCs fit into all of this so don't even how to make a sentence involving them. Hopefully other judges won't have the same block I do and will get it. It really may be just some personal foible of mine that is making me not get it.
Ingredients Pass, Comparison:
While The Cake of Kings' ingredients aren't perfect, they all are all essential to the adventure: the PCs interact with, fight, or collect them – or all three!
In The Twisted Court the ingredients seem looser and most are optional. Since I'm too dense too understand the key path to the adventure, I just can't tell what the essential parts are. This has got to be a frustrating judgment for you Gradine since I know you put a ton of work into it and I just can't seem to figure it out.
Conclusion
I won't belabor the point any further as it's pretty obvious where I fall here. Maybe I just developed a personal bias against The Twisted Court in those first paragraphs or maybe never having more than 45 minutes to scrape together at a time to work on it is just creating a block.
The Cake of Kings is great; solid writing, clear tone, and some truly challenging and fun encounters. The final boss is a bit of a let down after the excellence before it and it seems a touch light on content, but all in all well done.
[MENTION=57112]Gradine[/MENTION], sorry; read fail.
[MENTION=50987]CleverNickName[/MENTION] has my vote for finalist.
Final Note: I had word counter still open and this judgment is a shade over 3000 words...
Round 2, Match 2:
Here's how I judge:
My first pass will be literary: how well does it read? Are there typos? Is it coherent? Is the phrasing awkward, awesome, or ambivalent? Did the writing help or hurt the entry? Does the adventure tell a good story?
Second pass will be as a GM: would I want to run it? Is there a good hook? Does it flow? Do I have all the information I need? Is it mostly backstory or mostly adventure? If I bought this adventure to save prep, how much prep does it require? Is the conclusion satisfying?
Third pass will be as a player: would I want to play it? Are there any interesting choices? Do my actions matter? Does it have interesting things to do for different types of players? How about characters? Is the conclusion satisfying?
Fourth pass will be ingredients: how well were they used? Could any be removed or altered without changing the adventure in major way? Are they tied together tightly? Any particularly clever uses?
I'll finish with a conclusion that sums it all up and throws in anything else that doesn't fit into one of these categories such as logical breaks, major inconsistencies, or other elements that "break" the adventure as posted.
A final note before jumping in: I try to be entirely constructive and honest with my feedback since that's been the main benefit for me doing the half-dozen Iron DMs I've competed in and my ability to write has been drastically honed by them for all types of writing, not just adventures. Empty praise or skirting problems to be "nice" is pleasant and useless. If I like it, you'll know and if I think it could use work... you'll know. Feel free to discard it if you don't agree, my main goals are to be fair, honest, and critical.
Literary Pass, The Cake of Kings:
This entry has something that few others have had: strong voice and tone. The narrator is excited and by the end of the paragraph its clear that this is going to be a fast, light-hearted adventure. Great!
Of course, there's hiccups: "...the thieves slashed the top of the carriage, helped themselves to the cake, and carried off the rest..." Helping themselves makes it sounds like they ate it all, but then they made off with "the rest". I had to reread again to figure out if there were multiple cakes or some other food aside from the cake.
The second was "...a chat with the thief in the jailhouse..." I immediately went back through the story to see what had been stolen only to realize it was the guy who tried to be a thief. I guess if you catch someone in the attempt, you'd still call them the thief, but reading it much later I assumed it was someone who had actually stolen something.
A quick grammar note: if you say '"Because attempted theft carries a lighter sentence than attempted murder, he shrugs.' you're saying that the shrug is how he says that. I think you meant 'he said, shrugging' instead of assuming that he communicated all of that with a shrug.
There were a few extra commas here and there.
All said, usually the less I say here the better and these are pretty small critiques. This read fast and I even smiled a few times – writing that evokes emotion is excellent (as long as its the intended emotion anyway).
Maybe the best adventure of the tournament so far, at least as far as the writing is concerned.
Literary Pass, The Twisted Court:
In the first sentence, there's an extra comma and, in the many things I have read on writing, one of my biggest takeaways has been "when in doubt, don't put a comma" since they tend to either break up sentences that don't need to be broken, or they allow you to chain sentences together that really should be separate, such as this one which could probably be four, maybe five, sentences already, but is now super, super long and tiring to read, largely due to me gluing it together with way too many commas, and now you're taking the brunt of my criticism after a single sentence, mostly because there have been so many entries, especially in this round, that have done the same thing, to their detriment, which is sad, since they can weaken otherwise strong entries, for real, yo.
I would also put that first two-sentence paragraph at the end of the hooks paragraph so we can jump in with cool story stuff. I.e. "here's the situation and a bunch of cool NPCs! (Two will be used later)".
I also started to hit made-up-word fatigue in the second paragraph, then hit it even harder in the third, and bottomed out a bit in the fourth. Here's proper nouns I'm expected to remember: Byeshk Mountains, Eldeen Reaches, Silver Lake, Sylbaran, the Reaches, Droaam, Fernii d’Vadalis, House Vadalis, Test of Siberys, Mark of Handling, Tel'daar Duukuun, Dhakaani [K]ingdom, Graywall, Dhuggaan or Dhogec, Dhogec Ghuukac (Mount Fury), Daelkyr.
I know this is Eberron and so these 15 people/places/things probably already exist in the setting, but for someone reading this adventure only knowing vaguely what Eberron is it's overwhelming. I've ready the beginnings of many people's first novels and it reads a lot like this: here's a bunch of obscure, non-evocative names built of made-up words full of arbitrary a'postraphes to make it sound mystical and foreign that I shall vomit forth in a massive heap of exposition.
It was so dense I read and reread the first four paragraphs several times just trying to be sure I had everything. These four paragraphs took longer to read than the entire previous adventure took.
[sblock=What it looks like to me]Tales of strange, horrific creatures coming out of the southern Rubikarbik Range have travelled throughout the Abidiri Extent and across Lake Lockmoor. They all originate from one town: Thasti'kir, on the coast of Lake Lockmoor, just across the border between the Extent and Vlothee, the realm of monsters. The Rubikarbik Range form the natural border between the two.
One woman has followed these rumors seeking answers. Chulthaa r'Nomoro, an Abidiri Ranger and scion of Dynasty Nomoro (Dynasty Crest: Hippogriff) has recently failed her Challenge of Bronre, and wants to know why she hasn’t yet manifested the Glyph of Touch. Her mother married into the Dynasty, her father died before her birth, and her uncle, her only other close familial link to the family, was excoriated from the Dynasty for his experiments when she was still young. She has begun to suspect that her biological father has no ties to the Dynasty, but her mother denies that she has lied about her parentage. Chulthaa is attempting to seek out her lost uncle for answers, and the rumored creatures bear the hallmark of her uncle’s work.
Hin'sool Restiaa is a cunning hobgoblin warlord and claims to be the heir of an ancient Vhaccal kingdom situated around the southern Rubikarbik Range. He could very well be an heir for all he knows; all that matters to him is that he’s been able to attract a small following and none of the forces within Vlothee have attempted to challenge him yet. He cares little of rebuilding the glory of the Vhaccal empire or carving out a kingdom for himself; his merely seeks the financial gain to set himself up for life in the Vlothee city of Brickguard. He has been seeking Iillthara an Sivvce, a Vhaccal fortress situated underneath the volcanic Sivvce Yallne (Peak Rage). The fortress, home to a forge of rubikarbik weapons, was said to have been converted into a mint after the Rhoboloth and their aberrant armies were defeated. There is said to be a whole treasury full of byeshk-minted coins. Hin'sool has found the entrance; he might have hired the adventurers to brave the depths with him, or a rival or Abidiri official might hire them to put a stop to his plans. If he has not hired the PCs, he will have an entourage of followers with him.[/sblock]
To pile the fatigue on further, each paragraph gets longer and longer with no white space for a break to process the amount of data thrown down. On top of all that, it's a huge pile of exposition which may never be learned, used, or relevant (especially since it says the hooks are optional). When you say "hooks" I was expecting "here's how you get your PCs into the adventure" not "here's everything happening in a one kingdom radius."
I stopped taking notes at this point, trying to read through and get what was going on here and I think I was simply overloaded. Add to the noun list: Daelkyr War, Bragi, Iacthatkarlosh, Daelkyr Yahathl'thess, and Hephaestus. For about 20 characters, locations, houses, empires, and races all introduced in about 2 pages. Every time I came to one of these words, I had to read back up to figure out what it was again. Dhuugaan or Dhogec especially got me as the or kept making me thing it was two things and I had to remind myself it wasn't that kind of "or".
After reading through it twice, I don't think I still know who is who or what the PCs are supposed to be doing. Hopefully it becomes more clear in future passes.
Literary Pass, Comparison:
The Cake of Kings since I know what happens.
GM Pass, The Cake of Kings:
Breaking it into scenes:
Hook (make one up?) → Crime Scene → Catacomb Culture → Royal Mint + Rain → Poisoned Hippogriff → Xaxfas → Reward
Fairly linear, though that isn't always the bad thing past me always made it out to be. As a GM, I get to lay on the campiness, run a light investigation, a battle with an ooze, watch them steal mint from a dragon in the caustic rain (they also have to collect), then run a fight with an illithid.
The biggest weakness thus far is how much of it seems to be given to the PCs for free. The investigation is a red herring, the "interrogation" of the thief is automatic and both the ingredients list and antidote recipes are given. There's really only three or four meaningful scenes: the ooze, the dragon / rain, and the illithid fight.
Containing an ooze will be fun, the dragon fight and rain collection sounds like horrible fun, and the illithid battle is just a boss fight – unless the capture it anyway, but why would they? Unless they know there's a reward for doing so, 99% of PC are just going to murder the thing.
Luckily, the adventure's tone lets us know it's supposed to be light fun so everything doesn't have to be difficult.
GM Pass, The Twisted Court:
Scenes:
Hook (Tel'daar hires them or an official hires them to oppose him or ?) → ruins?
Is Fernii seeking answers a hook? If so, why doesn't it mention that she might hire the PCs? There's no indication that she knows where Bragi is so how would she even know to look in the ruins?
Honestly, I'm not sure what the PCs are doing here or why. They might be hired by Tel'daar or not, so knowing his motivations doesn't help us. Why do they want to end the curse and/or destroy the mint? There are some NPCs here that seem to be doing things, but that doesn't help since I can't figure out why the PCs would care.
When it says to make your own hook, I'm not sure enough of what is supposed to happen that I know what I'd hook on to.
There are monsters, NPCs, a curse, but they are like meat without a skeleton to hang it on and walk us somewhere meaningful through the data and into an adventure.
Admittedly, I'm doing this in little 20-40 minute chunks whenever I have some time throughout the week, but if it's this obscure to me it probably would be to at least some of the theoretical audience using it.
GM Pass, Comparison:
The Cake of Kings since I know what happens.
Player Pass, The Cake of Kings:
The PCs have some light (meaningless) investigation, try to capture part of an ooze, fight a dragon in volcanic wasteland for some mint, try to catch acid rain, then fight an illithid. The climax isn't the coolest part, but that's in part since the previous ones are so interesting.
Seems like a challenge and a blast.
Player Pass, The Twisted Court:
I think they PCs are supposed to go to the ruins for some reason (escorting Tel'daar or trying to kill him or maybe following Fernii if she goes for some reason) and once there they fight some monsters, maybe fight an illithid(?), kill a hippogriffish thing, kill corrupt Bragi, maybe destroys the ruin and also maybe saves a town. It sounds cool, but I'm not sure how to run them through it or even how to start.
Player Pass, Comparison:
There seems to be cool stuff in The Twisted Court and its starting to make a bit more sense to me what happens, but I can't visualize the session in my head in part because I don't know where to start.
Ingredients Pass, The Cake of Kings:
♦ Mindful Mind Flayer: Xaxfas, mindful as he is wary of intruders. The big bad who poisoned the cake. His illithidness is incidental, most importantly he's an alchemist.
♦ Con Artist: The Knack, caught for (not) stealing the cake and poising the hippogriff. Spilling his beans, the link to Xaxfas. His con is that he was stealing not trying to poison.
♦ Ancient Culture: My favorite – the ooze who is the key culture for the sourdough needed for the cake. Awesome.
♦ Royal Mint: Mint for the frosting. It's royal since it's in the cake of royalty, but would have been stronger maybe if it was in the royal preserve or hunting grounds.
♦ Incremental Malison: Xaxfas' curse to slowly turn the nobility to illithids. It does turn the hippogriff into one. Saving him is the primary meat of the adventure.
♦ Hungry Hippogriff: Bucky who ate the cake and so is dying. He really could have been any type of creature, however.
♦ Burning Rain: Caustic rain to help soften the sourdough.
A sentence:
A Con Artist poisons the royal cake with an Incremental Malison on orders of a Mindful Mind Flayer and to save the Hungry Hippgriff that ate it, the PCs must collect some Ancient Culture, Royal Mint, and Burning Rain.
Tight. A few items might be tweaked a bit and still fit, lets see:
A Con Artist poisons the royal cake with an Incremental Malison on orders of a Alchemist Poisoner and to save the Hungry Wolfhound that ate it, the PCs must collect some Ancient Culture, Dragon Mint, and Burning Rain.
Still pretty good.
Ingredients Pass, The Twisted Court:
♦ Mindful Mind Flayer: Iacthatkarlosh who researches in the mint.
♦ Con Artist: I'm not sure if this is Tel'daar claiming to be royalty (that he might be weakens it) or the illithid pretending to be helpful. Maybe both.
♦ Ancient Culture: The Dhakaani empire that is long gone, whose fortress the adventure takes place in.
♦ Royal Mint: The old Dhakaani mint where Tel'daar wants to make coins. Seems somewhat incidental as the curse is on the forge not the mint (which is why they were able to make coins but not weapons?)
♦ Incremental Malison: The curse on the forge.
♦ Hungry Hippogriff: A monster bred by bragi. Its hippogriffness is not really important – and it's not even half-and-half as it claims since it's part manticore, displacer beast, byeshk, and has a whip tongue (which gives it a swallow attack to stand in for hungry).
♦ Burning Rain: I reread the whole thing to find this and I think it must by the volcanic eruption that would happen should the PCs trigger the explosion.
I don't know if I'm just being dense or am stuck or what, but I'm still not sure how the PCs fit into all of this so don't even how to make a sentence involving them. Hopefully other judges won't have the same block I do and will get it. It really may be just some personal foible of mine that is making me not get it.
Ingredients Pass, Comparison:
While The Cake of Kings' ingredients aren't perfect, they all are all essential to the adventure: the PCs interact with, fight, or collect them – or all three!
In The Twisted Court the ingredients seem looser and most are optional. Since I'm too dense too understand the key path to the adventure, I just can't tell what the essential parts are. This has got to be a frustrating judgment for you Gradine since I know you put a ton of work into it and I just can't seem to figure it out.
Conclusion
I won't belabor the point any further as it's pretty obvious where I fall here. Maybe I just developed a personal bias against The Twisted Court in those first paragraphs or maybe never having more than 45 minutes to scrape together at a time to work on it is just creating a block.
The Cake of Kings is great; solid writing, clear tone, and some truly challenging and fun encounters. The final boss is a bit of a let down after the excellence before it and it seems a touch light on content, but all in all well done.
[MENTION=57112]Gradine[/MENTION], sorry; read fail.
[MENTION=50987]CleverNickName[/MENTION] has my vote for finalist.
Final Note: I had word counter still open and this judgment is a shade over 3000 words...
Deuce Traveler
Adventurer
Round 2, Match 2: CleverNickName’s “The Cake of Kings” vs Gradine’s “The Twisted Court”
Most likely due to the hippogriff and mind flayer ingredients, these were both fantasy entries. I will use the same scoring system that I used for Round 2, Match 1. I will admit that I chose my parts of the ingredients in order to be a bastard and make this as difficult as possible. For instance, I chose Hungry Hippogriff as an ingredient, mainly for how hard it would be to make the ingredient integral in any story dark enough to include malison, mindflayers, and burning rain. So with that, I’ll read the entries and pass my judgment. I apologize ahead of time if I make grammar errors of my own, but I must admit to physical exhaustion and no rest coming in the next few days, so better I finish judging this now then later.
Accordance to Rules
Both entries were easily on time; fantastic job to both writers. “The Cake of Kings” came in at 1494 words, while I have “The Twisted Court” at 1498 words. It looks like both writers made it a point to be as economical as possible. Two points to each.
Score:
CleverNickName 2, Gradine 2
Grammar and Readability
My spell checker found an error in “The Cake of Kings”. “Their extra effort will be rewarded with a special commendation from the local Order of Paladins, for having the decency to bring even this uworthy criminal back to face the justice of the court.” The word ‘uworthy’ is probably meant to be ‘unworthy’. Otherwise the entry flows well and is easily understood despite its wide-range of characters, events, and locales.
“The Twisted Court” has a problem with its flow right from the beginning, where it focuses one instance on “one town” then mentions some mountains that “form the natural border between the two”. Two what? You just had me focused on one town. After a couple of rereads, I figured it out, but that didn’t start off as a good sign. Another part had this error: “While it is still half-eagle, half-lion, its lion tail has been replaced two tails…” This should have been typed as “While it is still half-eagle, half-lion, its lion tail has been replaced by two tails...”
The rest of the entry was hard to follow, with a list of numerous characters all following their own agenda which might clash with the party’s plans. While I had ‘The Cake of Kings’ figured out after the first reading, I had to reread portions of “The Twisted Court” multiple times before I understood everything that was happening.
Two points to CleverNickName and one point to Gradine.
Score:
CleverNickName 4, Gradine 3
First Ingredient: Mindful Mindflayer
Both entries used this ingredient in the same exact way. Both mindflayers were mindful by putting their goals first and having a willingness to use dialogue, deception, and a magical curse to do their work for them instead of starting with direct confrontation or being influenced by petty emotions. But in neither entry did I feel that the monsters had to be mindflayers; any intelligent and powerful creature or evil spellcaster with the ability to influence minds would have worked. This is unfortunate, since mindflayers have so many unique traits that could have been incorporated. One point for each writer.
Score:
CleverNickName 5, Gradine 4
Second Ingredient: Con Artist
In CleverNickName’s story, there is a criminal named Tarn who spiked the cake with a dangerous poison. But I didn’t really see him as a con artist. A liar at best and an attempted assassin at worst. He isn’t running a con in the entry, and certainly isn’t any sort of artist considering how easy he is caught. I am not awarding any points for his inclusion.
In Grandine’s entry, I was trying to figure out if the con artist was Bragi for lying about paternity, the mindflayer for trying to delay the adventurers until they fall under the curse, or the hobgoblin warlord for pretending to be an heir. Ultimately I decided it must be the hobgoblin, but I also felt he was more of a liar than a con artist since there is little indication of him going out of his way to establish the con. So I’ll give a point for the con, but zero for the artistry.
Score:
CleverNickName 4, Gradine 4
Third Ingredient: Ancient Culture
CleverNickName gets some clever (pun intended) use out of this pair of words, where an ingredient that the adventurers have to track down is a living mold and vital ingredient for a cake that is to be made. This was pretty meta, too. An ingredient for the entry ended up being and ingredient for the cake. I’m awarding two points for this one.
Grandine’s entry used the ingredient in a much more standard way, where the ancient culture was reflected in the ancient ruins of a lost empire. The ancient history seemed vital to the entry, but I never got a feel about the culture. The little tidbits that were mentioned about the hobgoblins didn’t seem vital. I am awarding one point.
Score:
CleverNickName 6, Gradine 5
Fourth Ingredient: Royal Mint
This ingredient is integral to “The Twisted Court”, with different actors all trying to get control of it. Because there are royal lineages involved, the first part of the ingredient is as important as the mint itself. This is a solid use of the ingredient and changing the first and second parts of it cannot be done without changing important pieces of the entry. Great work and two points.
“The Cake of Kings” really stretches the ingredient here. The mint part works, even though the monster guarding it is really straining the ingredient’s use. However, the royal part of the ingredient face plants. I award only a point.
Score:
CleverNickName 7, Gradine 7
Fifth Ingredient: Incremental Malison
Both entries had an incremental malison being employed by a mindflayer, with the curse being a creation of the mindflayer in “The Cake of Kings” and being something the mindflayer of “The Twisted Court” would use to his advantage. They are also both used as a timer; in the first, take too long and the pet hippogriff dies, and in the second, take too long and the characters themselves fall to insanity.
The problem I have with the use of the ingredient in “The Cake of Kings” is that there are more pressing reasons to deal with the mindflayer besides a dying hippogriff. For one, he has abducted other humans. Second, he is an evil mindflayer bent on destroying the kingdom. A sick hippogriff seems minor in comparison.
In “The Twisted Court”, the incremental malison has effected an important NPC and the PCs themselves. Further, there is concern that is is stretching its evil influence to other places and drawing people to the mint. There is a stronger sense of terror and urgency here. I award one point to “The Cake of Kings” and two points to “The Twisted Court”.
Score:
CleverNickName 8, Gradine 9
Sixth Ingredient: Hungry Hippogriff
I was surprised by how well the Hungry Hippogriff was used in “The Cake of Kings”. It was important that it was hungry, due to its devouring of the cake which sets off many of the events of the adventure. Also it was important due to the hippogriff being a royal pet and the symbol of royalty, since the royalty task the adventurers into helping when their pet gets sick. Nicely done and two points awarded. I can’t see getting the same effect out of switching the Hungry Hippogriff with Hungry Hippo, Hungry Lion, Angry Hippogriff, etc.
On the other hand, “The Twisted Court” didn’t seem to have a use for the ‘hungry’ portion of the Hippogriff. Surely it is hungry and therefore a threat to the characters, especially with its ability to swallow an opponent whole. But that seems to have little importance to the entry as I could have said Firebreathing Hippogriff and made it equally deadly without changing much else. However, the hippogriff did seem to be integral to the royalty in the same manner as the one in “The Cake of Kings” and I will award one point.
Score:
CleverNickName 10, Gradine 10
Seventh Ingredient: Burning Rain
I feel like both entries phoned this one in. In “The Twisted Court”, a final decision by the party can result in the destruction of the Royal Mint by exploiting some poorly designed engineering. This would end the curse, but the same sort of destruction could have been through Rushing Water if the site was built on a dam or Creeping Lava if it used molten magma flow. I did like how the ingredient tied to the Royal Mint, however. I would have elevated that to give preference to the ingredient if it was used properly.
On the other hand, “The Cake of Kings” just tacks on some acid rain as part of a scavenger hunt in a dangerous part of the kingdom. The ingredient only gets a short two or three sentences and never has relevance again. Zero points for both entries.
Score:
CleverNickName 10, Gradine 10
Potential for Dungeon Master
This is where “The Cake of Kings” really suffers. I applaud the entry for being well-written, and I love the whimsical feeling for the majority of it. However, I can’t see myself running it in its current form. Players matter little in this railroad of an adventure. They are brought in to investigate a missing cake, but as they are making progress Character A shows up and sets them upon Path A. Then when that is complete, Character B shows up and sets them upon Path B. The characters are going through a story, but aren’t affecting the world around them and there is little room to cut their own path. Also, the first half is almost perfect in tone, but the introduction of a mindflayer abducting townsfolk derails it. What starts off as a fun romp in a magical kingdom where the largest concerns are royal relationships, exotic animals, and missing cake, turns into a horror story about people that have been abducted over the years. Why the hell is the court so concerned about minor issues like cake when there is an evil overlord nearby enthralling their people? Man, that is messed up. Also, why would a mindflayer pay off a known criminal instead of enthralling a trusted chef? I award one point for the first half of the adventure, where a DM could run it as a fun one-off.
“The Twisted Court” is more of a sandbox, where the character can become involved in a multitude of ways and their actions have ripple effects on several involved NPCs. Further, at the end of the adventure there are several hooks that can lead to follow-on missions. An evil party would also be as at home in this adventure as a good-aligned one, and the events could easily be part of a larger campaign. I award Grandine two points here.
Score:
CleverNickName 11, Gradine 12
Judgment
This was a strange one to judge. Both writers showed that they are very talented when coming up with adventuring ideas. However, ingredients were just shoe-horned in with both entries. I am giving Gradine the edge, but do not believe this to have been his best work.
Most likely due to the hippogriff and mind flayer ingredients, these were both fantasy entries. I will use the same scoring system that I used for Round 2, Match 1. I will admit that I chose my parts of the ingredients in order to be a bastard and make this as difficult as possible. For instance, I chose Hungry Hippogriff as an ingredient, mainly for how hard it would be to make the ingredient integral in any story dark enough to include malison, mindflayers, and burning rain. So with that, I’ll read the entries and pass my judgment. I apologize ahead of time if I make grammar errors of my own, but I must admit to physical exhaustion and no rest coming in the next few days, so better I finish judging this now then later.
Accordance to Rules
Both entries were easily on time; fantastic job to both writers. “The Cake of Kings” came in at 1494 words, while I have “The Twisted Court” at 1498 words. It looks like both writers made it a point to be as economical as possible. Two points to each.
Score:
CleverNickName 2, Gradine 2
Grammar and Readability
My spell checker found an error in “The Cake of Kings”. “Their extra effort will be rewarded with a special commendation from the local Order of Paladins, for having the decency to bring even this uworthy criminal back to face the justice of the court.” The word ‘uworthy’ is probably meant to be ‘unworthy’. Otherwise the entry flows well and is easily understood despite its wide-range of characters, events, and locales.
“The Twisted Court” has a problem with its flow right from the beginning, where it focuses one instance on “one town” then mentions some mountains that “form the natural border between the two”. Two what? You just had me focused on one town. After a couple of rereads, I figured it out, but that didn’t start off as a good sign. Another part had this error: “While it is still half-eagle, half-lion, its lion tail has been replaced two tails…” This should have been typed as “While it is still half-eagle, half-lion, its lion tail has been replaced by two tails...”
The rest of the entry was hard to follow, with a list of numerous characters all following their own agenda which might clash with the party’s plans. While I had ‘The Cake of Kings’ figured out after the first reading, I had to reread portions of “The Twisted Court” multiple times before I understood everything that was happening.
Two points to CleverNickName and one point to Gradine.
Score:
CleverNickName 4, Gradine 3
First Ingredient: Mindful Mindflayer
Both entries used this ingredient in the same exact way. Both mindflayers were mindful by putting their goals first and having a willingness to use dialogue, deception, and a magical curse to do their work for them instead of starting with direct confrontation or being influenced by petty emotions. But in neither entry did I feel that the monsters had to be mindflayers; any intelligent and powerful creature or evil spellcaster with the ability to influence minds would have worked. This is unfortunate, since mindflayers have so many unique traits that could have been incorporated. One point for each writer.
Score:
CleverNickName 5, Gradine 4
Second Ingredient: Con Artist
In CleverNickName’s story, there is a criminal named Tarn who spiked the cake with a dangerous poison. But I didn’t really see him as a con artist. A liar at best and an attempted assassin at worst. He isn’t running a con in the entry, and certainly isn’t any sort of artist considering how easy he is caught. I am not awarding any points for his inclusion.
In Grandine’s entry, I was trying to figure out if the con artist was Bragi for lying about paternity, the mindflayer for trying to delay the adventurers until they fall under the curse, or the hobgoblin warlord for pretending to be an heir. Ultimately I decided it must be the hobgoblin, but I also felt he was more of a liar than a con artist since there is little indication of him going out of his way to establish the con. So I’ll give a point for the con, but zero for the artistry.
Score:
CleverNickName 4, Gradine 4
Third Ingredient: Ancient Culture
CleverNickName gets some clever (pun intended) use out of this pair of words, where an ingredient that the adventurers have to track down is a living mold and vital ingredient for a cake that is to be made. This was pretty meta, too. An ingredient for the entry ended up being and ingredient for the cake. I’m awarding two points for this one.
Grandine’s entry used the ingredient in a much more standard way, where the ancient culture was reflected in the ancient ruins of a lost empire. The ancient history seemed vital to the entry, but I never got a feel about the culture. The little tidbits that were mentioned about the hobgoblins didn’t seem vital. I am awarding one point.
Score:
CleverNickName 6, Gradine 5
Fourth Ingredient: Royal Mint
This ingredient is integral to “The Twisted Court”, with different actors all trying to get control of it. Because there are royal lineages involved, the first part of the ingredient is as important as the mint itself. This is a solid use of the ingredient and changing the first and second parts of it cannot be done without changing important pieces of the entry. Great work and two points.
“The Cake of Kings” really stretches the ingredient here. The mint part works, even though the monster guarding it is really straining the ingredient’s use. However, the royal part of the ingredient face plants. I award only a point.
Score:
CleverNickName 7, Gradine 7
Fifth Ingredient: Incremental Malison
Both entries had an incremental malison being employed by a mindflayer, with the curse being a creation of the mindflayer in “The Cake of Kings” and being something the mindflayer of “The Twisted Court” would use to his advantage. They are also both used as a timer; in the first, take too long and the pet hippogriff dies, and in the second, take too long and the characters themselves fall to insanity.
The problem I have with the use of the ingredient in “The Cake of Kings” is that there are more pressing reasons to deal with the mindflayer besides a dying hippogriff. For one, he has abducted other humans. Second, he is an evil mindflayer bent on destroying the kingdom. A sick hippogriff seems minor in comparison.
In “The Twisted Court”, the incremental malison has effected an important NPC and the PCs themselves. Further, there is concern that is is stretching its evil influence to other places and drawing people to the mint. There is a stronger sense of terror and urgency here. I award one point to “The Cake of Kings” and two points to “The Twisted Court”.
Score:
CleverNickName 8, Gradine 9
Sixth Ingredient: Hungry Hippogriff
I was surprised by how well the Hungry Hippogriff was used in “The Cake of Kings”. It was important that it was hungry, due to its devouring of the cake which sets off many of the events of the adventure. Also it was important due to the hippogriff being a royal pet and the symbol of royalty, since the royalty task the adventurers into helping when their pet gets sick. Nicely done and two points awarded. I can’t see getting the same effect out of switching the Hungry Hippogriff with Hungry Hippo, Hungry Lion, Angry Hippogriff, etc.
On the other hand, “The Twisted Court” didn’t seem to have a use for the ‘hungry’ portion of the Hippogriff. Surely it is hungry and therefore a threat to the characters, especially with its ability to swallow an opponent whole. But that seems to have little importance to the entry as I could have said Firebreathing Hippogriff and made it equally deadly without changing much else. However, the hippogriff did seem to be integral to the royalty in the same manner as the one in “The Cake of Kings” and I will award one point.
Score:
CleverNickName 10, Gradine 10
Seventh Ingredient: Burning Rain
I feel like both entries phoned this one in. In “The Twisted Court”, a final decision by the party can result in the destruction of the Royal Mint by exploiting some poorly designed engineering. This would end the curse, but the same sort of destruction could have been through Rushing Water if the site was built on a dam or Creeping Lava if it used molten magma flow. I did like how the ingredient tied to the Royal Mint, however. I would have elevated that to give preference to the ingredient if it was used properly.
On the other hand, “The Cake of Kings” just tacks on some acid rain as part of a scavenger hunt in a dangerous part of the kingdom. The ingredient only gets a short two or three sentences and never has relevance again. Zero points for both entries.
Score:
CleverNickName 10, Gradine 10
Potential for Dungeon Master
This is where “The Cake of Kings” really suffers. I applaud the entry for being well-written, and I love the whimsical feeling for the majority of it. However, I can’t see myself running it in its current form. Players matter little in this railroad of an adventure. They are brought in to investigate a missing cake, but as they are making progress Character A shows up and sets them upon Path A. Then when that is complete, Character B shows up and sets them upon Path B. The characters are going through a story, but aren’t affecting the world around them and there is little room to cut their own path. Also, the first half is almost perfect in tone, but the introduction of a mindflayer abducting townsfolk derails it. What starts off as a fun romp in a magical kingdom where the largest concerns are royal relationships, exotic animals, and missing cake, turns into a horror story about people that have been abducted over the years. Why the hell is the court so concerned about minor issues like cake when there is an evil overlord nearby enthralling their people? Man, that is messed up. Also, why would a mindflayer pay off a known criminal instead of enthralling a trusted chef? I award one point for the first half of the adventure, where a DM could run it as a fun one-off.
“The Twisted Court” is more of a sandbox, where the character can become involved in a multitude of ways and their actions have ripple effects on several involved NPCs. Further, at the end of the adventure there are several hooks that can lead to follow-on missions. An evil party would also be as at home in this adventure as a good-aligned one, and the events could easily be part of a larger campaign. I award Grandine two points here.
Score:
CleverNickName 11, Gradine 12
Judgment
This was a strange one to judge. Both writers showed that they are very talented when coming up with adventuring ideas. However, ingredients were just shoe-horned in with both entries. I am giving Gradine the edge, but do not believe this to have been his best work.
CleverNickName
Limit Break Dancing
[MENTION=60965]Iron Sky[/MENTION], [MENTION=34958]Deuce Traveler[/MENTION], and now [MENTION=67]Rune[/MENTION]: Thank you for the feedback (and judgment) on my entry! I can't speak for all of the competitors, but feedback and commentary like this are why I compete in the Iron DM contest in the first place. Most of my work as a DM is done in a vacuum, with little encouragement or feedback. Except from my players, and they usually only give me feedback when they are mad at me. I guess that's helpful too.
My response to Iron Sky's Judgment
Thank you for the kind words! I'm an engineer, and--well, let's just say that we aren't known for our writing ability. I truly appreciate the encouragement and feedback.
I am my own worst critic, though. After I posted my entry, I re-read it dozens of times and found all sorts of things that I should have changed to tighten the entry up. First, I would have made it clear that this adventure is intended to be played by children. The light-hearted tone and silly names hinted at it, but I probably could (should?) have specified.
And I agree, the start of the adventure is really bumpy. I don't do a very good job of setting up the scene, and I put in too many unnecessary distractions that pull focus (Bucky's pen being "suspiciously unlocked," for example), and I needed to sprinkle in more clues--or at the very least, add a few more hints that might implicate the Con Artist. I needed two or three more revision passes here.
Spelling errors, comma splices, repetitive word use...I had to physically restrain myself from editing the entry after I had posted it. Seriously. I had to slap the laptop shut and walk away more than once. *sigh* I'll do better next year, I promise.
My response to Deuce Traveler's Judgment
Drat, missed it by one point! *head desk*
Like I said above, I should have made it clear in the beginning that this adventure is intended to be played by children. Maybe that would have clarified things a bit as far as tone, pacing, and blocking. It's clear now that Deuce Traveler was looking for a specific kind of adventure (a darker, non-linear story) and I delivered something entirely different.
The Sandbox vs. Railroad debate is probably still raging in one of these forums, and I won't take any sides except to say this: if I'm running a game for kids (my favorite way to babysit, btw), a linear game is the only way to go. Kids are too easily distracted by spell effects and fantastical beasts (and fart jokes) to focus on long-term plans, and multiple options will usually do more harm than good to the gaming session. And seriously: the next time you babysit your nieces and nephews, play D&D!
I really struggled with that illithid.
I've never been able to take mind flayers seriously. They are ridiculous. Purple people from outer space with squids on their faces and ~mind~ powers? O-okay...
I couldn't think of a way to use mind flayers that would fit the story and not change every other ingredient. I couldn't find a clever interpretation of "mind" "flayer" that worked either, like I did for "ancient culture" and "royal mint." Since it was the only patently evil ingredient on the list, I shoved it into the role of Main Villain and walked away. Lazy, I know...I totally deserve the harsh criticism. It was the best I could do.
Fun fact: his name was originally "Calimari", but I felt that was too slapstick.
My response to Rune's Judgment
Mind-full. Full of minds. Eaten too many brains...how the heck did I miss that?! I must have poured over every possible iteration of "flayer" but that one, and it seems so obvious now!
It surprises me that nobody made the connection between the Cake of Kings and Royal Mint. The word "royal" is why I gave the cake its name, and why the story revolves around a royal wedding. (shrug) Ah well. It seemed clear to me, but I obviously didn't illustrate it effectively if I'm the only one who saw it. I should have spelled that out a little more, and maybe dropped the word "royal" from its proper name.
Excellent review, Rune. Thank you for the feedback as well. It's a bummer that I didn't win, but I can't really complain. I put forth the best effort I could, and if that wasn't good enough, well...that's what next year is for. You guys haven't seen the last of me, I promise.
My response to Iron Sky's Judgment
Thank you for the kind words! I'm an engineer, and--well, let's just say that we aren't known for our writing ability. I truly appreciate the encouragement and feedback.
I am my own worst critic, though. After I posted my entry, I re-read it dozens of times and found all sorts of things that I should have changed to tighten the entry up. First, I would have made it clear that this adventure is intended to be played by children. The light-hearted tone and silly names hinted at it, but I probably could (should?) have specified.
And I agree, the start of the adventure is really bumpy. I don't do a very good job of setting up the scene, and I put in too many unnecessary distractions that pull focus (Bucky's pen being "suspiciously unlocked," for example), and I needed to sprinkle in more clues--or at the very least, add a few more hints that might implicate the Con Artist. I needed two or three more revision passes here.
Spelling errors, comma splices, repetitive word use...I had to physically restrain myself from editing the entry after I had posted it. Seriously. I had to slap the laptop shut and walk away more than once. *sigh* I'll do better next year, I promise.
My response to Deuce Traveler's Judgment
Drat, missed it by one point! *head desk*
Like I said above, I should have made it clear in the beginning that this adventure is intended to be played by children. Maybe that would have clarified things a bit as far as tone, pacing, and blocking. It's clear now that Deuce Traveler was looking for a specific kind of adventure (a darker, non-linear story) and I delivered something entirely different.
The Sandbox vs. Railroad debate is probably still raging in one of these forums, and I won't take any sides except to say this: if I'm running a game for kids (my favorite way to babysit, btw), a linear game is the only way to go. Kids are too easily distracted by spell effects and fantastical beasts (and fart jokes) to focus on long-term plans, and multiple options will usually do more harm than good to the gaming session. And seriously: the next time you babysit your nieces and nephews, play D&D!
I really struggled with that illithid.
Oh I agree completely. I would have loved to replace the mind flayer with literally anything else.Deuce Traveler said:
I've never been able to take mind flayers seriously. They are ridiculous. Purple people from outer space with squids on their faces and ~mind~ powers? O-okay...
I couldn't think of a way to use mind flayers that would fit the story and not change every other ingredient. I couldn't find a clever interpretation of "mind" "flayer" that worked either, like I did for "ancient culture" and "royal mint." Since it was the only patently evil ingredient on the list, I shoved it into the role of Main Villain and walked away. Lazy, I know...I totally deserve the harsh criticism. It was the best I could do.
Fun fact: his name was originally "Calimari", but I felt that was too slapstick.
My response to Rune's Judgment
Mind-full. Full of minds. Eaten too many brains...how the heck did I miss that?! I must have poured over every possible iteration of "flayer" but that one, and it seems so obvious now!
It surprises me that nobody made the connection between the Cake of Kings and Royal Mint. The word "royal" is why I gave the cake its name, and why the story revolves around a royal wedding. (shrug) Ah well. It seemed clear to me, but I obviously didn't illustrate it effectively if I'm the only one who saw it. I should have spelled that out a little more, and maybe dropped the word "royal" from its proper name.
Excellent review, Rune. Thank you for the feedback as well. It's a bummer that I didn't win, but I can't really complain. I put forth the best effort I could, and if that wasn't good enough, well...that's what next year is for. You guys haven't seen the last of me, I promise.
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Rune
Once A Fool
Judgement for Round 2, Match 2: Gradine vs. CleverNickName
The two adventures in this match are vastly different in tone, style, and presentation. One is tightly constructed, fairly polished, and slyly humorous. The other is...not. But it has other strengths: namely, an underlying complexity that results in a rich scenario and detailed NPCs with developed motivations. It also appears to have used more ingredients well-integrated, but a deeper analysis may yet reveal otherwise. We’ll get to that.
Gradine’s “The Twisted Court” (“Twisted”) is dense.
It is peppered with little errors that would likely have been removed with one more editing/proofreading pass. These are things like consistently using “excoriated” instead of “exiled” or “excommunicated,” (which would make more sense in context) or labeling something a hippogriff and then describing the features of a griffon (we will definitely get back to that one).
These errors exasperate the lack of focus that is the risk inherent in using a sand-boxy presentation of NPCs, motivations, locations, and associated dangers instead of a more explicitly presented adventure. The adventure elements are present, but get buried among what is otherwise indistinguishable from background information.
And the names! I know this is the setting (a setting I like, by the way), but there are an awful lot of D-names and apostrophes, which, given the previously mentioned issues, just make reading the piece harder. Incorporating some bullet-points would probably have done wonders for the presentation of this adventure.
Meanwhile, CleverNickName’s “The Cake of Kings” (“Cake”) is fun to read.
The piece doesn’t take itself too seriously. Tonally, it reminded me very much of an episode of Adventure Time (at some points, a particularly dark episode, but still...). This might make insertion into an ongoing campaign a little difficult, since the silliness is baked into the very names, but ultimately seems easily adjustable without destroying the spirit or structure of the adventure.
...The structure of which is very tight, well-paced, and entertaining. What I’m not sure about is whether or not it is actually better than the adventure we get in “Twisted.” In “Cake,” what we have is a pretty noticeably linear structure that doesn’t care so much what methods the PCs use (this is especially evident in the very well-done “Resolution” section), but does care very much about where they go next. So much so that, at key points, NPCs show up to lead them there. I find it difficult to believe that most groups will fail to notice that.
Does it mar the adventure? Well, yes, potentially. If the players then feel the limitation. On the other hand, the linearity also is a major contributor to the tight pacing of the piece. The twist involving Bucky’s poisoning/curse (brilliantly set up at the very outset of the adventure) is a prime example of this.
I am left with the following questions: First, would the adventure be fun? And second, can I think of a better way to provide the adventure experience?
I do think the adventure would be fun, both to play through and to run. And, frankly, I’m not sure I can think of a better way to do it.
So, what does “Twisted” offer?
Mostly it offers NPCs with motivations designed to run into each other. In some cases, this might cause the role of the NPC in the adventure to shift (for example, either Fernii or Tel’daar might start out as an ally or employer and end up as an antagonist or rival).
Added to this, solving the original problem potentially leads to a much worse problem (for the town). This ratchets up the tension and stakes nicely, all while ensuring the interwoven conflicting motivations of the NPCs collide. This is, fundamentally, a richly rewarding structure.
So, would the adventure be fun?
To run? Absolutely, if the DM has enough time to absorb the details and understand the implications of all the pieces. To play through? Yes, if the DM can handle it. In both cases, the answer depends on an outside factor: the DM’s skill and preparedness. This could be a problem.
Can I think of a better way to provide the adventure experience?
Structurally, no; it’s great. But the presentation really gets in the way, here. Briefer, bullet-pointed NPC descriptions and some more explicitly illustrated results of colliding agendas would do a lot to improve the readability and shoulder some of the burden that now rests on the DM.
Also, providing a much more explicit and direct hook for the players would be a significant asset. As things are presented, the players are sort of required to make their own hook out the pieces provided, which muddles the beginning unnecessarily.
Ingredients, then.
The Mindful Mind Flayer fulfills a similar role in both adventures. I must confess, I was a little disappointed not to see a mind flayer that had eaten too many brains and was, therefore, full. Never mind that, though.
Both entries go for the awareness angle. “Cake” falls short, here. Xaxfas is described as vigilant, but doesn’t actually do anything when confronted that a mind flayer couldn’t be reasonably expected to do. For that matter, why does it matter that Xaxfas is a mind flayer? The adventure runs just as well if it is a human wizard, for instance.
Iacthatkarlosh, in “Twisted,” is more than just vigilant; it is hyper-aware, both of its own motives and its environment. And this is important, because it allows both for the manipulation of NPCs and the curse itself. These things become tools. But, does it need to be a mind flayer? Maybe not, but it needs to be something like a mind flayer in order to avoid the mind-affecting effects of the curse. This also factors into the mind flayer’s connection to (one of) the ancient culture(s), since it was the Daelkyr who crafted the curses in the first place (presumably in such a way as to not affect themselves). Clearly, “Twisted” earns this one.
The Con Artist presents us with an unusual situation. “Twisted” gives us an NPC who actually attempts to gain and exploit the confidence of others in Tel’daar, but the importance of that con to the adventure is pretty minimal. He really doesn’t need the pretext to carry on exactly as he is.
In “Cake,” Tarn is described as a having a con artist background, but is an assassin in the context of the adventure. Except, the lie he tells upon being captured does play upon what the chef wants to belief (just like a good con) and impacts the course of the adventure in a direct and fundamental way. This one has to go to “Cake.”
Ancient Culture is very cleverly used in “Cake” in a relevant way that makes a lot of sense. It also is given strength by its relationship to another ingredient; I’ll mention that again in due course. It is, however, only one little piece of the larger puzzle.
In “Twisted,” the two Ancient Cultures are much less directly relevant. One in particular, though, looms over the entire adventure as its legacies (the products of the curse, the ongoing effects of the curse, and the mind flayer) are present throughout. This one tilts toward “Twisted.”
“Twisted” gives us a Royal Mint that is that is part location and part Macguffin. It’s connections to both the Burning Rain and Ancient Cultures ingredients help it out, but it is fundamentally replaceable. It would provide just as much motivation for Tel’daar if it was a foundry, wouldn’t it?
“Cake” has a much more ingredient-focused use for the ingredient. The mint part works, but in what way is it royal? And why does it matter? Answer: it isn’t and it doesn’t. I do like the green dragon with the minty-fresh breath, though. Not that that’s relevant.
I think I’m going to call this one a draw.
I very much like the role that the Incremental Malison plays in “Cake.” It is more than relevant; it is crucial. But, while it is time-released (and that’s very important), it isn’t really incremental (at least, not in the way it manifests in the adventure).
In contrast, “Twisted” does have a malison that is incremental and the incremental nature of it does matter to the adventure. Furthermore, the ingredient serves both as the lynchpin for the mechanism of the adventure and the core of the ingredient-weave that supports it. Excellent.
Not so much, the Hungry Hippogriff. The hunger is only evidenced by the ability of Hephaestus to swallow a PC whole. The fact that the author mixes up the hippogriff with a griffon when describing the beast’s original form illustrates exactly how little it needs to be a hippogriff in the first place. Worst of all, the entire scene can be excised from the adventure without changing a thing. Even the manifestation of Fernii’s mark won’t have a meaningful or lasting effect!
Speaking of Fernii, she is another manifestation of the ingredient. The hunger works much better for her, but making her house the crest of a hippogriff is as weak as it gets. Two weak implementations of an ingredient are even worse than one.
In contrast, “Cake” has a hippogriff that needs to be some sort of domesticated beast of burden to place it at the scene of the crime. It needs a degree of intelligence and a means of infiltration to get into the carriage. And it needs to be hungry (or, at least, gluttonous) to set everything in motion. This is about as perfect an ingredient-usage as you will find in IRON DM.
Burning Rain can’t measure up to that, but it’s still pretty good in “Cake.” The fact that it is the necessary complement to the Ancient Culture ingredient strengthens both. It seemed at first odd to me that the rain was made the chemical base and the sourdough starter acidic, but it all makes sense when I consider that the gray ooze that its stats are based on deals acid damage (in D&D, anyway). Also, the scenario in which the rain must be collected, as with so many scenarios in this adventure, looks like a lot of fun to play through.
“Twisted” doesn’t even mention the Burning Rain explicitly (or, if it does, it is buried in the dense text). It is pretty easy to infer that it is the means by which the explosion of Dhogec Ghuukac will cause the destruction of Sylbaran. As such, it is a pretty significant portion of the adventure’s climax. This is a natural consequence of the destruction of the mint’s location by the means described, so it is pretty much necessary in this form. This puts it ahead of the version in “Cake,” despite that entry’s solid usage.
Reckoning:
So, that’s 4 to 2 in favor of “Twisted,” with one draw.
Is that level of dominance in ingredients-usage enough to counterbalance the issues that hinder the actual adventure? Put another way, does “Cake” provide an adventure that is better than twice as good as the one in “Twisted?” That’s what it would take to overcome the ingredients-deficit.
Am I more than twice as likely to want to run “Cake” than “Twisted?”
I don’t think so.
Am I more than twice as likely to enjoy it as a player?
Possibly. That goes back to the DM’s skill and level of preparation. “Cake” requires a lot less of the latter, but I think a DM who lacks the skill to run “Twisted” smoothly and to full effect is also going to get a little hung up on the limitations that are byproducts of “Cake’s” linearity.
Ultimately, I think [MENTION=57112]Gradine[/MENTION]’s “The Twisted Court” ekes this one out by virtue of its pretty strong set of mostly well-interwoven ingredients.
Frankly, that decision surprises me. By the time I had begun wrapping up this last section, I still didn’t think it would swing that way. But the numbers really clarified the comparison I had to make. If [MENTION=50987]CleverNickName[/MENTION]’s “The Cake of Kings” had done slightly better with the ingredients – even one more (or fewer) draw – I think that would have been enough to make the difference.
CleverNickName, you’ve definitely got the chops! For future tournaments, a little more work on integrating those ingredients across the scope of the entire adventure might see you become a dominant presence. Further, if you can find a way to make as tight an adventure without leaning so heavily on the linearity, I’m pretty sure there’s a championship in your future. Had you done so this time, I think you’d be advancing.
However, by a decision of 2 to 1, the current IRON DM, Gradine, advances to defend the championship against former IRON DM, MortalPlague!
The two adventures in this match are vastly different in tone, style, and presentation. One is tightly constructed, fairly polished, and slyly humorous. The other is...not. But it has other strengths: namely, an underlying complexity that results in a rich scenario and detailed NPCs with developed motivations. It also appears to have used more ingredients well-integrated, but a deeper analysis may yet reveal otherwise. We’ll get to that.
Gradine’s “The Twisted Court” (“Twisted”) is dense.
It is peppered with little errors that would likely have been removed with one more editing/proofreading pass. These are things like consistently using “excoriated” instead of “exiled” or “excommunicated,” (which would make more sense in context) or labeling something a hippogriff and then describing the features of a griffon (we will definitely get back to that one).
These errors exasperate the lack of focus that is the risk inherent in using a sand-boxy presentation of NPCs, motivations, locations, and associated dangers instead of a more explicitly presented adventure. The adventure elements are present, but get buried among what is otherwise indistinguishable from background information.
And the names! I know this is the setting (a setting I like, by the way), but there are an awful lot of D-names and apostrophes, which, given the previously mentioned issues, just make reading the piece harder. Incorporating some bullet-points would probably have done wonders for the presentation of this adventure.
Meanwhile, CleverNickName’s “The Cake of Kings” (“Cake”) is fun to read.
The piece doesn’t take itself too seriously. Tonally, it reminded me very much of an episode of Adventure Time (at some points, a particularly dark episode, but still...). This might make insertion into an ongoing campaign a little difficult, since the silliness is baked into the very names, but ultimately seems easily adjustable without destroying the spirit or structure of the adventure.
...The structure of which is very tight, well-paced, and entertaining. What I’m not sure about is whether or not it is actually better than the adventure we get in “Twisted.” In “Cake,” what we have is a pretty noticeably linear structure that doesn’t care so much what methods the PCs use (this is especially evident in the very well-done “Resolution” section), but does care very much about where they go next. So much so that, at key points, NPCs show up to lead them there. I find it difficult to believe that most groups will fail to notice that.
Does it mar the adventure? Well, yes, potentially. If the players then feel the limitation. On the other hand, the linearity also is a major contributor to the tight pacing of the piece. The twist involving Bucky’s poisoning/curse (brilliantly set up at the very outset of the adventure) is a prime example of this.
I am left with the following questions: First, would the adventure be fun? And second, can I think of a better way to provide the adventure experience?
I do think the adventure would be fun, both to play through and to run. And, frankly, I’m not sure I can think of a better way to do it.
So, what does “Twisted” offer?
Mostly it offers NPCs with motivations designed to run into each other. In some cases, this might cause the role of the NPC in the adventure to shift (for example, either Fernii or Tel’daar might start out as an ally or employer and end up as an antagonist or rival).
Added to this, solving the original problem potentially leads to a much worse problem (for the town). This ratchets up the tension and stakes nicely, all while ensuring the interwoven conflicting motivations of the NPCs collide. This is, fundamentally, a richly rewarding structure.
So, would the adventure be fun?
To run? Absolutely, if the DM has enough time to absorb the details and understand the implications of all the pieces. To play through? Yes, if the DM can handle it. In both cases, the answer depends on an outside factor: the DM’s skill and preparedness. This could be a problem.
Can I think of a better way to provide the adventure experience?
Structurally, no; it’s great. But the presentation really gets in the way, here. Briefer, bullet-pointed NPC descriptions and some more explicitly illustrated results of colliding agendas would do a lot to improve the readability and shoulder some of the burden that now rests on the DM.
Also, providing a much more explicit and direct hook for the players would be a significant asset. As things are presented, the players are sort of required to make their own hook out the pieces provided, which muddles the beginning unnecessarily.
Ingredients, then.
The Mindful Mind Flayer fulfills a similar role in both adventures. I must confess, I was a little disappointed not to see a mind flayer that had eaten too many brains and was, therefore, full. Never mind that, though.
Both entries go for the awareness angle. “Cake” falls short, here. Xaxfas is described as vigilant, but doesn’t actually do anything when confronted that a mind flayer couldn’t be reasonably expected to do. For that matter, why does it matter that Xaxfas is a mind flayer? The adventure runs just as well if it is a human wizard, for instance.
Iacthatkarlosh, in “Twisted,” is more than just vigilant; it is hyper-aware, both of its own motives and its environment. And this is important, because it allows both for the manipulation of NPCs and the curse itself. These things become tools. But, does it need to be a mind flayer? Maybe not, but it needs to be something like a mind flayer in order to avoid the mind-affecting effects of the curse. This also factors into the mind flayer’s connection to (one of) the ancient culture(s), since it was the Daelkyr who crafted the curses in the first place (presumably in such a way as to not affect themselves). Clearly, “Twisted” earns this one.
The Con Artist presents us with an unusual situation. “Twisted” gives us an NPC who actually attempts to gain and exploit the confidence of others in Tel’daar, but the importance of that con to the adventure is pretty minimal. He really doesn’t need the pretext to carry on exactly as he is.
In “Cake,” Tarn is described as a having a con artist background, but is an assassin in the context of the adventure. Except, the lie he tells upon being captured does play upon what the chef wants to belief (just like a good con) and impacts the course of the adventure in a direct and fundamental way. This one has to go to “Cake.”
Ancient Culture is very cleverly used in “Cake” in a relevant way that makes a lot of sense. It also is given strength by its relationship to another ingredient; I’ll mention that again in due course. It is, however, only one little piece of the larger puzzle.
In “Twisted,” the two Ancient Cultures are much less directly relevant. One in particular, though, looms over the entire adventure as its legacies (the products of the curse, the ongoing effects of the curse, and the mind flayer) are present throughout. This one tilts toward “Twisted.”
“Twisted” gives us a Royal Mint that is that is part location and part Macguffin. It’s connections to both the Burning Rain and Ancient Cultures ingredients help it out, but it is fundamentally replaceable. It would provide just as much motivation for Tel’daar if it was a foundry, wouldn’t it?
“Cake” has a much more ingredient-focused use for the ingredient. The mint part works, but in what way is it royal? And why does it matter? Answer: it isn’t and it doesn’t. I do like the green dragon with the minty-fresh breath, though. Not that that’s relevant.
I think I’m going to call this one a draw.
I very much like the role that the Incremental Malison plays in “Cake.” It is more than relevant; it is crucial. But, while it is time-released (and that’s very important), it isn’t really incremental (at least, not in the way it manifests in the adventure).
In contrast, “Twisted” does have a malison that is incremental and the incremental nature of it does matter to the adventure. Furthermore, the ingredient serves both as the lynchpin for the mechanism of the adventure and the core of the ingredient-weave that supports it. Excellent.
Not so much, the Hungry Hippogriff. The hunger is only evidenced by the ability of Hephaestus to swallow a PC whole. The fact that the author mixes up the hippogriff with a griffon when describing the beast’s original form illustrates exactly how little it needs to be a hippogriff in the first place. Worst of all, the entire scene can be excised from the adventure without changing a thing. Even the manifestation of Fernii’s mark won’t have a meaningful or lasting effect!
Speaking of Fernii, she is another manifestation of the ingredient. The hunger works much better for her, but making her house the crest of a hippogriff is as weak as it gets. Two weak implementations of an ingredient are even worse than one.
In contrast, “Cake” has a hippogriff that needs to be some sort of domesticated beast of burden to place it at the scene of the crime. It needs a degree of intelligence and a means of infiltration to get into the carriage. And it needs to be hungry (or, at least, gluttonous) to set everything in motion. This is about as perfect an ingredient-usage as you will find in IRON DM.
Burning Rain can’t measure up to that, but it’s still pretty good in “Cake.” The fact that it is the necessary complement to the Ancient Culture ingredient strengthens both. It seemed at first odd to me that the rain was made the chemical base and the sourdough starter acidic, but it all makes sense when I consider that the gray ooze that its stats are based on deals acid damage (in D&D, anyway). Also, the scenario in which the rain must be collected, as with so many scenarios in this adventure, looks like a lot of fun to play through.
“Twisted” doesn’t even mention the Burning Rain explicitly (or, if it does, it is buried in the dense text). It is pretty easy to infer that it is the means by which the explosion of Dhogec Ghuukac will cause the destruction of Sylbaran. As such, it is a pretty significant portion of the adventure’s climax. This is a natural consequence of the destruction of the mint’s location by the means described, so it is pretty much necessary in this form. This puts it ahead of the version in “Cake,” despite that entry’s solid usage.
Reckoning:
So, that’s 4 to 2 in favor of “Twisted,” with one draw.
Is that level of dominance in ingredients-usage enough to counterbalance the issues that hinder the actual adventure? Put another way, does “Cake” provide an adventure that is better than twice as good as the one in “Twisted?” That’s what it would take to overcome the ingredients-deficit.
Am I more than twice as likely to want to run “Cake” than “Twisted?”
I don’t think so.
Am I more than twice as likely to enjoy it as a player?
Possibly. That goes back to the DM’s skill and level of preparation. “Cake” requires a lot less of the latter, but I think a DM who lacks the skill to run “Twisted” smoothly and to full effect is also going to get a little hung up on the limitations that are byproducts of “Cake’s” linearity.
Ultimately, I think [MENTION=57112]Gradine[/MENTION]’s “The Twisted Court” ekes this one out by virtue of its pretty strong set of mostly well-interwoven ingredients.
Frankly, that decision surprises me. By the time I had begun wrapping up this last section, I still didn’t think it would swing that way. But the numbers really clarified the comparison I had to make. If [MENTION=50987]CleverNickName[/MENTION]’s “The Cake of Kings” had done slightly better with the ingredients – even one more (or fewer) draw – I think that would have been enough to make the difference.
CleverNickName, you’ve definitely got the chops! For future tournaments, a little more work on integrating those ingredients across the scope of the entire adventure might see you become a dominant presence. Further, if you can find a way to make as tight an adventure without leaning so heavily on the linearity, I’m pretty sure there’s a championship in your future. Had you done so this time, I think you’d be advancing.
However, by a decision of 2 to 1, the current IRON DM, Gradine, advances to defend the championship against former IRON DM, MortalPlague!
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