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<blockquote data-quote="mythago" data-source="post: 1315491" data-attributes="member: 3019"><p><strong>Round Four judgment: Cedric vs. Kesh</strong></p><p></p><p><span style="color: yellow">Maldur</span></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px">Cedric with a story on loyalty, undead guidedigs and a variantion of the medusa ( lets call it a moondusa <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite8" alt=":D" title="Big grin :D" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":D" />)</span></span> </p><p></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px">Kesh with a very short story on regret and undead.</span></span> </p><p></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px">I have to go with Cedric on this one, even though the statues idea was done before, it s a nice story. But going completely the opposite of salia's technique and writing a VERY short story made Kesh's story to short for my taste( But the idea is fine, it just needs more … everything)</span></span></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><strong>Judgment: Cedric</strong></span></span></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"></span></span></p><p></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"><span style="color: yellow">arwink</span></span></span></p><p> <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="font-size: 10px"></span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="font-size: 12px">Cedric – The Garden of the Moon</span></p><p> Like many stories in Ceramic DM, I can’t help but escape the feeling that</p><p>Cedric’s story has been disadvantaged by the time limit on its construction. </p><p>There are a lot of great ideas in there – the garden of the moon itself and Pitr</p><p>the dead dog, but they way they are connected doesn’t quite present them as well</p><p>as it could be. </p><p></p><p>My two biggest problems with Cedric’s story largely come down to the lack of</p><p>tension, and the dialogue. The lack of tension is the hardest for me to</p><p>overcome, but after reading this story two or three times I realized that I</p><p>still had no real idea of what was at stake for the characters. The king is</p><p>missing and Edmund must find him, but I don’t ever really understand *why* it</p><p>must be Edmund and what he stands to loose if the King stays lost. The conflict</p><p>that’s driving the story is hazy, which leaves me wondering why I should</p><p>empathize with Edmund’s journey. On the surface, the story is about the search</p><p>for the king, but it needs something deeper than that to carry it. Edmund, as a</p><p>hero, seems largely to be following instructions – nothing that is resolved in</p><p>the story is really done by him. Pitr does the tracking, the Queens rose breaks</p><p>the kings enchantment, etc. Pitr comes off seeming more like a messenger than a</p><p>hero – he needs something to do that makes us realize why he, and no one else,</p><p>should be on this mission. The one place where he does seem to be necessary –</p><p>the months long trail he follows with Pitr – is glossed over so quickly that it</p><p>seems insignificant to the story.</p><p></p><p>The dialogue I may not have noticed if the tension of the story was stronger,</p><p>but combined with the lack of strong plot elements it comes off sounding flat</p><p>and lifeless. Characters here don’t talk to each other, they annunciate and</p><p>state. There is no sense of personal connection between them, no sense of</p><p>familiarity. While this appears to be done to create a sense of grandeur and</p><p>style that’s appropriate to Cedric’s setting, but it saps the life out of the</p><p>characters to hear them speaking so formally.</p><p></p><p>My favorite part of Cedric’s story is easily Pitr, the undead dog being raised</p><p>to track his former master. When I first saw this clue being put up, my gut</p><p>clenched with the thought of undead guardians, so it was nice to see the</p><p>necromantic option being used to aid the hero, albeit with a slight sense of</p><p>discomfort. I would have preferred to see this unease played up a little more,</p><p>coming through more effectively in the skeleton creatures interaction with</p><p>Edmund and the mystics that create it. </p><p></p><p>Similarly, the Garden of the Moon is handled with a nice sense of style once we</p><p>arrive there – its more fleshed out than the earlier parts of the story, and</p><p>carries a greater sense of weight than the introductory paragraphs.</p><p></p><p>Kesh – Chilled to the Bone</p><p></p><p>Kesh’s story opens with a nice sense of style, the first paragraph filled with a</p><p>sense of ambiguous menace that carries through the rest of the story nicely. He</p><p>builds the sense of dread nicely as his barbarian protagonist arrives at the</p><p>village, carefully crafting a place where something obviously bad has happened</p><p>without giving away what exactly has happened. The crossing of the snow-covered</p><p>lawn, with it’s field of bones and skulls, works particularly well for all it’s</p><p>a somewhat cliché approach to setting up danger and foreboding.</p><p></p><p>If this story has a weakness, it’s in the way it shifts gears to quickly once</p><p>the protagonist finds his statue. The idea behind it is a good one – the</p><p>ominous set-up leading into an introspective moment of guilt rather than a fight</p><p>against lingering evil – but the pay-off isn’t handled as smoothly as it could</p><p>be. The reader is told, rather than shown, how the King feels about his failure</p><p>and why he left. I’d suggest giving a greater sense of familiarity to his</p><p>knowledge of the ruined village in the earlier parts of the story (his knowledge</p><p>of the gazebo and its use is a good place where the future revelation could be</p><p>set-up, but is currently to easily dismissed as common knowledge for someone who</p><p>is even remotely familiar with the setting’s social structure). This is a minor</p><p>complaint about the story, however, and certainly only a minor detraction from</p><p>my enjoyment of it.</p><p></p><p>Kesh has crafted a brief but effective tale, one full of mood and unspoken</p><p>internal conflicts that are only just beginning to be resolved. This story</p><p>could easily be played out a little longer should Kesh choose to, giving us some</p><p>more detail on exactly why the King has returned and what he seeks to find from</p><p>his ancestral home, but can also work quite well as a suggestive first-act only</p><p>kind of story.</p><p></p><p>Judgment</p><p></p><p>Neither story has used the pictures in any way that gives them a truly</p><p>significant edge over the other to my mind, so I’m inclined to look at this</p><p>purely on the quality of the work. As a result, I have to give this round to</p><p>Kesh whose story is more focused and atmospheric than his opponents. There are</p><p>a lot of great elements to Cedric’s story, but it doesn’t hold my interest quite</p><p>as well as Kesh’s tale. <span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><strong>Judgment: Kesh</strong></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"></span></p><p><span style="font-family: 'Arial'"><span style="color: yellow">mythago</span></span></p><p style="text-align: left">Interesting that both authors chose similar themes--failure of duty, loss, the fall of a lord. Unfortunately both show the effects of time pressure and didn't, in my opinion, use the pictures as well as they might have.</p> <p style="text-align: left"></p> <p style="text-align: left">In <em>The Garden of the Moon</em>, there's a lot of intriguing tension between the missing lord, his lady, and the servant. The bone dog is used well, and the cursed moonlight was a nice twist. However...there was a lot that fell into the category of "awfully convenient". The river is full of beasties, yet the villagers boat on it? The hero is a sworn guard to his lord, yet he failed his duty because his charge insisted on running off alone? (Surely the foolhardiness of young nobles is the whole point of having the oath-bond.) Why does the mystic utter a cryptic warning instead of just saying "Oh, almost forgot--if the moonlight touches you it will turn you to stone"? </p> <p style="text-align: left"></p> <p style="text-align: left"><em>Chilled to the Bone</em> was well-written in that not much actually happens--the lord comes home and surveys his dead village--yet it still tells a story, and a believable one. Unfortunately the story didn't use the boats as much more than window-dressing. The dog was creepily used to good effect, but why was it wandering around? And, unfortunately, there were clichéd phrasings that really took away from my enjoyment of the story: the barbarian in leathers with a scar on his brow, uttering a muffled curse, having a broadsword strapped to his hip, and so on. </p> <p style="text-align: left"></p> <p style="text-align: left">I did quite like the ambiguous ending.</p> <p style="text-align: left"></p> <p style="text-align: left">It was really reaaally close, but my judgment here goes to <strong>Cedric</strong></p> <p style="text-align: left"></p> <p style="text-align: left">Good job, guys! You bore up well considering the bizarreness of your pic set <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /> Cedric, we'll see you up against Sialla in the semifinals.</p> <p style="text-align: left"></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="mythago, post: 1315491, member: 3019"] [b]Round Four judgment: Cedric vs. Kesh[/b] [color=yellow]Maldur[/color] [font=Arial][size=2]Cedric with a story on loyalty, undead guidedigs and a variantion of the medusa ( lets call it a moondusa :D)[/size][/font] [font=Arial][size=2]Kesh with a very short story on regret and undead.[/size][/font] [font=Arial][size=2]I have to go with Cedric on this one, even though the statues idea was done before, it s a nice story. But going completely the opposite of salia's technique and writing a VERY short story made Kesh's story to short for my taste( But the idea is fine, it just needs more … everything) [b]Judgment: Cedric[/b] [/size][/font] [font=Arial][size=2][color=yellow]arwink[/color] [/size][/font] [size=3]Cedric – The Garden of the Moon[/size] Like many stories in Ceramic DM, I can’t help but escape the feeling that Cedric’s story has been disadvantaged by the time limit on its construction. There are a lot of great ideas in there – the garden of the moon itself and Pitr the dead dog, but they way they are connected doesn’t quite present them as well as it could be. My two biggest problems with Cedric’s story largely come down to the lack of tension, and the dialogue. The lack of tension is the hardest for me to overcome, but after reading this story two or three times I realized that I still had no real idea of what was at stake for the characters. The king is missing and Edmund must find him, but I don’t ever really understand *why* it must be Edmund and what he stands to loose if the King stays lost. The conflict that’s driving the story is hazy, which leaves me wondering why I should empathize with Edmund’s journey. On the surface, the story is about the search for the king, but it needs something deeper than that to carry it. Edmund, as a hero, seems largely to be following instructions – nothing that is resolved in the story is really done by him. Pitr does the tracking, the Queens rose breaks the kings enchantment, etc. Pitr comes off seeming more like a messenger than a hero – he needs something to do that makes us realize why he, and no one else, should be on this mission. The one place where he does seem to be necessary – the months long trail he follows with Pitr – is glossed over so quickly that it seems insignificant to the story. The dialogue I may not have noticed if the tension of the story was stronger, but combined with the lack of strong plot elements it comes off sounding flat and lifeless. Characters here don’t talk to each other, they annunciate and state. There is no sense of personal connection between them, no sense of familiarity. While this appears to be done to create a sense of grandeur and style that’s appropriate to Cedric’s setting, but it saps the life out of the characters to hear them speaking so formally. My favorite part of Cedric’s story is easily Pitr, the undead dog being raised to track his former master. When I first saw this clue being put up, my gut clenched with the thought of undead guardians, so it was nice to see the necromantic option being used to aid the hero, albeit with a slight sense of discomfort. I would have preferred to see this unease played up a little more, coming through more effectively in the skeleton creatures interaction with Edmund and the mystics that create it. Similarly, the Garden of the Moon is handled with a nice sense of style once we arrive there – its more fleshed out than the earlier parts of the story, and carries a greater sense of weight than the introductory paragraphs. Kesh – Chilled to the Bone Kesh’s story opens with a nice sense of style, the first paragraph filled with a sense of ambiguous menace that carries through the rest of the story nicely. He builds the sense of dread nicely as his barbarian protagonist arrives at the village, carefully crafting a place where something obviously bad has happened without giving away what exactly has happened. The crossing of the snow-covered lawn, with it’s field of bones and skulls, works particularly well for all it’s a somewhat cliché approach to setting up danger and foreboding. If this story has a weakness, it’s in the way it shifts gears to quickly once the protagonist finds his statue. The idea behind it is a good one – the ominous set-up leading into an introspective moment of guilt rather than a fight against lingering evil – but the pay-off isn’t handled as smoothly as it could be. The reader is told, rather than shown, how the King feels about his failure and why he left. I’d suggest giving a greater sense of familiarity to his knowledge of the ruined village in the earlier parts of the story (his knowledge of the gazebo and its use is a good place where the future revelation could be set-up, but is currently to easily dismissed as common knowledge for someone who is even remotely familiar with the setting’s social structure). This is a minor complaint about the story, however, and certainly only a minor detraction from my enjoyment of it. Kesh has crafted a brief but effective tale, one full of mood and unspoken internal conflicts that are only just beginning to be resolved. This story could easily be played out a little longer should Kesh choose to, giving us some more detail on exactly why the King has returned and what he seeks to find from his ancestral home, but can also work quite well as a suggestive first-act only kind of story. Judgment Neither story has used the pictures in any way that gives them a truly significant edge over the other to my mind, so I’m inclined to look at this purely on the quality of the work. As a result, I have to give this round to Kesh whose story is more focused and atmospheric than his opponents. There are a lot of great elements to Cedric’s story, but it doesn’t hold my interest quite as well as Kesh’s tale. [font=Arial] [b]Judgment: Kesh[/b] [color=yellow]mythago[/color][/font] [left]Interesting that both authors chose similar themes--failure of duty, loss, the fall of a lord. Unfortunately both show the effects of time pressure and didn't, in my opinion, use the pictures as well as they might have. In [i]The Garden of the Moon[/i], there's a lot of intriguing tension between the missing lord, his lady, and the servant. The bone dog is used well, and the cursed moonlight was a nice twist. However...there was a lot that fell into the category of "awfully convenient". The river is full of beasties, yet the villagers boat on it? The hero is a sworn guard to his lord, yet he failed his duty because his charge insisted on running off alone? (Surely the foolhardiness of young nobles is the whole point of having the oath-bond.) Why does the mystic utter a cryptic warning instead of just saying "Oh, almost forgot--if the moonlight touches you it will turn you to stone"? [i]Chilled to the Bone[/i] was well-written in that not much actually happens--the lord comes home and surveys his dead village--yet it still tells a story, and a believable one. Unfortunately the story didn't use the boats as much more than window-dressing. The dog was creepily used to good effect, but why was it wandering around? And, unfortunately, there were clichéd phrasings that really took away from my enjoyment of the story: the barbarian in leathers with a scar on his brow, uttering a muffled curse, having a broadsword strapped to his hip, and so on. I did quite like the ambiguous ending. It was really reaaally close, but my judgment here goes to [b]Cedric[/b] Good job, guys! You bore up well considering the bizarreness of your pic set :) Cedric, we'll see you up against Sialla in the semifinals. [/left] [/QUOTE]
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