Cooperative Dungeon #1 is Done. (I mean it this Time)

[DiFier]

I went and checked it, and it doesn't look to bad to me. Those 4 dark squares can be easilly lightened though.

If you guys want it changed, e-mail me the map (maybe Mark has the original), and I will lighten those squares. Even someone with windows paint can fix those.

I'm talking about the map on page 33

 

[tarchon]

If anyone can list other erratta, I could use it.

Well, there's nothing overwhelmingly important, I guess, but here are a few more noticeable things in CD1:

p. 24
Room 14 is very definitely locked, DC 30 lock, or whatever the default lock characteristics ended up being.

p. 25, in Ghusk-Haleg's stats
Spd. should be changed back to 40 - he's a barbarian.
Everything that was added about prepared spells should go out since bards don't prepare spells.
Under SQ "resistance (+4)" should be "turn resistance +4"

p. 40
Room 26... I personally think the bluebkg. text to be read to the players as it is now gives the wrong information to the players in the wrong way. I have no idea why it was changed, but to fix it you'd have to rewrite the whole thing, and it's not worth the bother. Honestly, so much of 26 has been changed in ways that I strongly disagree with that it would be more correct just to take my name off of it. Fixing grammar and spelling is one thing, but, you know, on a "cooperative" project, this kind of heavy handedness with the content strikes me as uncool.
I feel much the same way about R. 27 and R. 28, but from a purely objective POV, on p. 42 "straitjacket" is the original and correct spelling which is now rendered "straightjacket." Straitjackets are strait jackets; they aren't straight jackets, and it's obvious that very little about them is straight if you've ever seen (or been in) one .
p. 42 "The vrocks are here to play but attacks intruders with gusto" obviously should have "attack" instead.
And just incidentally, on p. 42 Room 29, para. 3 (blue text) should have "altar" for "alter" and "lies" instead of "lays."
Also, it's neither right nor necessary to put commas after every adjective in a list of adjectives like "southern, iron doors." Someone doing the editing painstakingly added those superfluous commas throughout the text. Most style recommendations, especially older ones, require adjective list commas but _only_ with highly coordinate adjectives.

Important tests: Would you say "southern and iron doors" or "iron, southern doors" - no? I wouldn't either - so no comma. See http://www.wvup.edu/jcc/pam/commas.htm for example. Superfluous, commas, are, just, evil, and, the, idea, that, people, are, wasting, their, time, and, my, writing, putting, them, in, bothers, me. Clearly many things bother me, but you asked for errata.

 

[trentonjoe]

Commas

I checked your link but I think it is missing some conditions.

A southern iron door may be interpreted as southern being a type of iron. You need the commas to designate that southern is being used to describe the door, not iron.

Anywho, I think the best way to write it would be, " an iron door on the southern wall." If possible...

 

[MerakSpielman]

(from dictionary.com)
straight·jack·et n. & v. Variant of straitjacket.

It's probably still incorrect, but has been (mis)used so often that it is now considered a variant spelling.

I hear southern iron is not as good as northern iron. -2 hardness for all doors made of southern iron.

Re: room 26 changes: The only changes I made were minor. I clarifyed the paragraph for the required listen checks, and tweaked a couple sentences in the description. The vast majority of the text is as it was when I recieved it.

By the way, I know from experience that having things that you've written get edited requires a thick skin. Things that make perfect sense to the writer sometimes get changed (or even outright deleted) in editing, because the editor deemed it to be "unclear" (or "unnecessary"). Everybody involved is doing their best to increase the quality of the product, and people early in the production process are just going to have to accept the (sometimes questionable) judgement calls of the people later in the process.

I showed off the finished product to a fellow editor here in my office, and she opened it to the first page (the intro, the letters) and within 2 seconds said "I found an error." Nothing is error-free, but it's significantly better than it was without any editing at all.

 

[Leopold]

I noticed an error on the room with the horrid wilting trap (room 3 or 4??).

It does not implicitly SAY that the horrid wilting trap is on the door and what happens when/if it goes off, but rather you must infer it from from the description and then assume that that's the trap they are talking about on the door.


I was most baffled until I read and reread it over and over again.

 

[der_kluge]

I must say this turned out awesome, and I am seriously considering using this in my campaign. Though, I will be changing blasphemy into a vampire. There may be a few other changes as well, but most of it may remain intact.

 

[tarchon]

(from dictionary.com)
straight·jack·et n. & v. Variant of straitjacket.

It's probably still incorrect, but has been (mis)used so often that it is now considered a variant spelling.

My point is that I did it 100% right, and it was changed to what I already knew was a less preferred and less historically correct alternative spelling. There's just a little - I dunno exactly how to describe it without sounding too combative - thing about the underlying attitude there that bothers me, like "I just assume I know better than you, and my idiosyncratic personal preferences are far more important than yours." I'm sorry - you don't and they aren't. If it was just that one spelling, no big whoop - who cares? - but like I say, it just was done time after time, and extremely deeply on the content of room 26. It was, IMO, extremely excessive for what this project is supposed to be, and it served no good purpose.
I'm sorry to sound like a whiny wanna-be <I>artiste</i> or something - oh, alas, my artistic integrity! [fan, fan] - but I'm just by nature very driven to try to do things as well as I can, and it disturbs me a little to have my name on something that isn't really mine and significantly, almost diametrically differs from what I wanted it to be.

 

[MerakSpielman]

My point is that I did it 100% right, and it was changed to what I already knew was a less preferred and less historically correct alternative spelling.

Interesting. The version I recieved for editing had it written as "straight jacket" with a space. What I did was type it into dictionary.com and it suggested the spelling "straightjacket." When I saw "straightjacket" was a word, I assumed it was the correct one.

I'm not sure what happened to room 26. What did you originally post? Honestly, this was one of the rooms for which I had the fewest number of edits.

I'm sorry to sound like a whiny wanna-be <I>artiste</i> or something - oh, alas, my artistic integrity! [fan, fan]

I suspect there was a round of editing before the version I got. I try rather hard not to mess with the artiste's vision. Sometimes something will be poorly explained over the course of several sentences, and I'll find a way to make it shorter and more clear at the same time, but I try hard not to actually change the fundamental nature of what was written.

So I firmly absolve myself from suspicion of being the one who ruined this artiste's artistic integrity!

 

[MerakSpielman]

Though, I will be changing blasphemy into a vampire.

Adding the vampire template to Blasphemy? That's just cruel...

edit: I'm not sure I like these new smilies. That's just not the evil grin it used to be. More like an exagerated embaressed smile.

 

[Creamsteak]

I think the rest of us that worked on the editing should try and avoid any blaming. I know which additions mistakes must have happened before I recieved the thing, but I should have caught them. I didn't think of "why does this bard have a spell list?" or about going back and checking the characters speeds, but I probably could have caught all three had I thought about it.

Overall, I think we did an excellent job.

And as far as complaining that your work didn't make it through to the final stage completely in tact, that's just the way things are going to go.