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Ho ho ho!

'Tis the season. The season for writing, that is. Post your Christmas-themed stuff, or just whatever you happen to be working on.

>>97092070
>>97103745
>>97124704
I haven't forgotten about these, I just literally have not had a spare moment this weekend. I'll try to get to them in the next day or two.

>>97124689
Thanks, anon, that's really helpful.

>>97122678
>>97123924
>>97123932
Bumpin my query from the end of last thread, hoping to discuss some more ideas and thoughts if anyone's got any.

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Not Christmas themed at all, some aura farming for a Martian colonisation themed setting:

The fronterize corporative (frontier worker) has a home, a fixed contract, disciplined habits, respect for authority, on whose side xhe will always be, even against xer better feelings.

But the caseríe net (out-and-out frontier folk) is the typical wandering lowland miner, here today, there tomorrow; gambler, quarreller, enemy of discipline; who flees civil service or employment and takes refuge among the Nomads if xhe knifes someone. Xhe never conceives of any attachment either to the soil or to a master: however well they may pay, and however kindly they may treat xer, xhe leaves them at any moment when xhe takes it into xer head, most frequently without even bidding them adieu, or at most saying, "I am going, because I have been with you long enough".

The first has the instincts of civilisation; xhe imitates the Uplanders in xer dress, and customs. The second loves tradition; xhe hates foreigners; xer luxury is xer rover, xer patched-up surface suit, xer canvas sash and xer fación. The first takes off xer surface-suits to go into a colony’s habs, the second goes there flaunting xer frontier trappings. The first is a strip mine employee, a dump-truck driver, a licensed shop-keep, a steelworker, a peon. The second hires xerself out for seasonal mining. The first has been a soldier several times, first for the people’s government, then for the free state. The second was once part of a reconnaissance squadron and deserted as soon as xhe saw xer chance.

1/2

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>>97134859
The first is always autonomiste, the second is no longer anything. The first still believes in something; the second believes in nothing. The caseríe has suffered more than any hab-dweller, and so has been disillusioned quicker. The corporative votes, because the company tells xer to, and with that, universal suffrage is achieved. In a word, the first is a useful colonist for industry and work — the second is a dangerous inhabitant anywhere. The former makes up the ever-increasing Lowland social mass; the second is all but marked for extinction.

>Dr. Dyah "Supraman" Londojo, Report on an Excursion into the North (2249)

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>The gang comes across a white man essentially doing native-face (pic semi related)
>This is a fantasy setting so nobody has any idea he's being offensive, they just think he's an eccentric tribesman
How do I make it clear that this is a white man badly disguised as a native american and not just me being very fucking terrible at writing a native american character?

What do you use to write stuff when you're not home and have access to a computer?
Any useful tool I may get as a xmas gift?

>>97134859
>>97134896
Idk what aura farming is and after I looked it up, I don't think this is the place for it. This is a place to post, read, and critique the work of others.

That's a lot of description, but it doesn't really show anything if you catch my drift. It appears one group is a bunch of toadies and the other is a bunch of assholes.

Each sentence runs on quite a bit. It took a couple readings to actually separate that you were talking about two groups. Advice an anon gave in that last thread holds true: If a sentence can end, you should end it.

There are some evocative bits in there, though. Basic components of a scene. So good job on that.

I have to ask, with the fear of derailment: What's with the pronouns? Transhumanism? It really throws off the flow of the sentences.
Are you trolling?

>>97133821
>>97092070
>https://pastebin.com/FZCB5Aj9
This is definitely a significant improvement on what you started off with. The style is better, you've fleshed out the protagonist as a person more and sprinkled in just the right amount of backstory, and while there isn't much dialogue in the section you've provided what you do have does feel a little more natural. The errors I'm seeing now are just minor things that would be ironed out in editing rather than systemic flaws that make it unreadable.

The only real note I have is that I liked your original opening line more. That punchy, staccato style was hell to read for paragraph after paragraph, but an opening line should stand out.
>The lands below are broken. Karsts jut from the ashen ground. Only the black smoke of battle shrouds the pitted expanse.

>>97133912
Just now found the thread again as I'm heading to bed. I'll get back to you tomorrow.
>>97136174
Has the gang encountered Natives before?

>>97140245
Thanks man! Does is pass the 'picked up from library and read first pages' test?

Slight correction on your assumptions as well. It's less about finding individuality and more about the idea that morality cannot exist without identity, it becomes clearer later. When they get to the city. One can do the right thing by following orders, but you can't do so of your own volition without a sense of self and belonging.

I also have a poem meant to start off the next campaign for my group:

Upon a little king was a little crown
On his face a vicious frown

His lands are all drained away
His people aren't on this final day

Past and present warped by this lord
But he would not turn the sword

Despite what the maw would insist
The king alone would persist

He throws the blade into the sea
If nothing else, he would be

But no force could ever cease
His will alone he can bequeath

And begin his reign anew
From his palm, he also flew

A final act as lights go out
In the steel a last redoubt

The sins of one brought to another
Inflicted on a distant brother


For each brings with him he takes
From the flight, the world now shakes

The final king will have his power
What he brings with him will devour

A simple snack and tiny bite
And thus descends the endless night

Do not fear and do not tremble
Ring the bells and do assemble

The one you love and your good friend
Walk with us into the end

>>97141301
>>97133912
Are you opposed to protag changing X to good instead? Or M using an underhanded option like bluffing as the bigger threat forcing protag to pull away from X? Hard to know what to do really without knowing history as well.

>>97143659
>Are you opposed to protag changing X to good instead?
X and M are both part of a group of primordial demons from the birth of creation. X's physical vessel was created at the dawn of life itself and has endured ever since, while M's has changed over time. (When a vessel dies, the Primordial Demon still remains and returns in time. M has "died" several times but X hasn't)
The core of the book is actually about the two of them and the fundamental conflict they bring. Because M's latest "incarnation" as it were, is very much not a villainous person. She considers life to be sacred above all else, and that directly goes against X because she's basically all about the cycle of rebirth and decay and considers death itself to be sacred. This goes into the broader state of the world mentioned where nothing can die. So its the question that the protag has to struggle with "Does she join the 'good guy' that wants the world to be stuck in an endless limbo of undeath, or does she join the 'bad guy' that wants people to die naturally again?"

Which with that context, is a roundabout way of saying X turning "good" isnt really an option. Her motivations are technically "aligned" with what the Protagonist is already trying to achieve. And even if she wasnt aligned, and could be persuaded, she is fundamentally an evil being.

>Or M using an underhanded option like bluffing as the bigger threat forcing protag to pull away from X?
X already sees M as the bigger threat, but because they're part of the same "group" they cant directly oppose each other. Hence both trying to get the protag to join them as the third party.

cont

>>97143659
Ultimately, the story that I've planned and I feel is most interesting and that I want to write goes like this:
>M meets with Protag and convinces them that she is the better option, despite their motivations being morally opposed.
>Protag agrees and decides to make [[some sort of insurance plan]] with M
>Protag then goes to X and alongside all the plots, she joins X and becomes a psychopomp.
>This is done through some sort of contract, a pact, something that cant simply be walked away from, on top of the physical/mental/ability-related modifications.
>The idea is for this change to be permanent for a good chunk of the story, until, that [[insurance plan]] mentioned comes into effect.

Whatever that [[plan]] is, it needs to break something in that contract, some sort of breach or clause that allows the Protag to be saved. To give a stupid example, the contract has the clause "I wont eat gluten" and X accidentally serves her pasta, you get what Im saying? That's my main issue right now, coming up with a satisfying solution to this situation I've created.

>>97144482
>>97144494
Sounds like M could throw in a "untill death" clause, and Deadman trigger a resurrection if protag uses their power on themselves. Or am I misremembering something?

>>97145082
If the protagonist kills themselves though, how would they get ressurected? Sure, M is a necromancer but I dont believe the protagonist wishes to live the rest of her life as a zombie technically.

And also, I dont see a way where that works. X wouldn't allow the protagonist to commit suicide once they're under their control. Wait but maybe someone else could kill them instead?
This might have potential actually.

>>97145082
>>97145336
Okay here's some additional context cause you just sparked a cool idea, and I wanna hear what you think.

Remember I mentioned in last thread's context that Protagonist went through a horrible tragedy that left them traumatized and slowly descending into a bad place mentally? Well that tragedy was that the love of their life died at the hands of two other of those "primordial demons" like X and M.

Now its been 7 years since, and unbeknownst to the Protagonist, their lover has "technically" returned recently. Its a bit complicated exactly how and why (They stole one of those demon's eyes, their soul was corrupted before death, M helped, etc) but their lover is alive and working with M from the shadows.
I think it'd work really well if the "clause" that X gives as part of their pact is that her servitude will only be released by "Death only by true love" sort of like a play on true love's kiss. X would think "well since her true love is dead, no worries" and it wouldnt be a foolish assumption on their part (dont want to make them seem stupid)
I think it'd be really cool if this was all part of M's plan, having the foresight and planning that the protagonist would join X eventually, and bringing their lover back to life to eventually save them.
whatdya think?

>>97145465
You could hit a few birds with one stone here actually if it's a route you want to go.
Make the Deadman trigger "a sacrifice to save their one true love." X and protag both know their one true love is dead so protag gets to legitimately join bad side. Then later find out their love is "technically" alive, and through mumbo jumbo whatever the protag can perform the sacrifice to turn them actually alive and break contract at same time. The sacrifice can then be whatever makes sense plot wise from losing the newly conquered kingdom to kicking a puppy. Or hell, go ham with a love triangle and they have to kill a new lover they'd taken after true loves death.

>>97147360
Nah, I dont want the protagonist to be the one doing the sacrificing because Ive done that plenty already, it will get repetitive at some point (and the act of her joining X is in itself a sacrifice already). I think its more thematically impactful for this character that decided to take the painful solitary path to be saved by someone else for a change.

Also there's already a love triangle going on, its a whole thing.

>>97147546
Already have a love triangle, go SUPER ham. Keep the trigger "a sacrifice to save their one true love" but have that 3rd person have the protag as their one-sided one true love. So when that character sacrifices themself to save protag it breaks the contract.

>>97147749
The love triangle unfortunately is over the person who died.
>Protag loves Guy
>Evil other character loves/wants to kill Guy
>Protag and Other Villain hate each other

Like I said, its complicated. But the reality is I cant use it in this scenario, especially because that other villain isnt involved in this plotline.

I've only done once a Christmas story in my campaigns.
One was set in WWI in a trench of Weird War, the night of christmas one day in the german trenches, the PCs prussian soldiers, while patroling the trench they find a ghostly spirit that seems to hunt down and brutalize other soldiers and officers, it seems like Krampus.
So yeah that's the plot IG, Krampus comes to punish the PCs and had to survive all my "points" like
>Point 1 if the PCs discover the first body it trigger point 3
>Point 3 the office in the mess will die for boiling water poured on him. Go to point 4
>Point 4 the PCs discover the body if they're scared Krampus will try to attack but at any action he will run away
Something like that, in the end my friends didn't do anything stupid and survived the christmas night and Krampus is no more.
anyway I was thinking for this year to make a Cyberpunk2020 Xmas Campaing, I had in mind
>PCs get together to party for xmas at the local pub/bar
>Plot point NPC appear and ask the PCs(They look like street samurai) to start a legit bodyguard contract with duration of 24 hours immediatly from signing and no take back.
>The contract say to stay near the guy for 24 hours straigh and i'll give back 20000€$ to divide between the guys but he doesn't give an explaination why he need to sign now (the NPC can be convinced to put 20000 more in case asked)
>The NPC is called "The crazy gambler" like the name imply he won big at the last mob Game (100000€$) he cashed out all the gangsters. Now he need protection just 24 hours so he can settle all his stuff
>The game will be oneshot or bishot and the PCs need to protect the gambler from other Street samurais, thugs, booster gangs and many more
>The game I have in mind he have to run between his wife to give money back he stole. Then go to his daughter who works as a waige and give her a lot of money.
So this is what I had in mind.

Sorry if is the wrong place. I've been trying to find a greentext for the longest time so I've given up and stopped lurking to ask directly.

It was about a group in a world with no paladins, or at least nothing named paladins. Every other class existed fine. The only guys called paladins were implied to be christans crusaders either from another world or newly formed. There were some passages about them that they worshipped only one God and were interested in destrying all other religions, that they had swords of fire and when people tried to use Speak With The Dead to talk to those they killed the only thing they heard was screaming of a person being burned alive (hell, obviously).
The main reason they went around hunting other gods is because the paladins stole power from them and the main campaign was trying to stop them from doing that.

To be clear, the paladins were the enemies, and the PCs were trying to stop them. The main focus of the campaign (from what I remember) was stopping them from destroying the idol of an old and forgotten god to steal it's power.

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>>97133821
>>97124704
I really like this story. It manages to be quite moving in a fairly short amount of space.

Also, I too have wondered what it would be like to selectively breed animals for super-intelligence.

>>97103745
Sorry, anon, the link expired before I could look at it.

>>97154820
>Thanks man! Does is pass the 'picked up from library and read first pages' test?
Yes it does. I won't say that it's at the level of 'too engrossed to put down' yet, but I would definitely keep reading.

And the premise you've outlined sounds interesting.

>Upon a little king was a little crown
The poem isn't terrible but - unless this is some kind of stylistic choice I'm missing - I think you've made the key mistake a lot of would-be poets make, and focused on the rhymes over the rhythm. A poem can survive a weak rhyme but unless you're deliberately doing some kind of freestyle, abstract thing (and if you were doing that you wouldn't have such a regular rhyme scheme) if you want a poem to sound good you've got to get the meter right.

Poems are meant to be read aloud. Or at least they were originally. Homer didn't go around passing out scrolls with the Iliad and the Odyssey written on them for people to take home and read on their own, he was (probably, allowing for the fact we don't have many concrete details about his life) hired to attend rich people's parties and sit there with a lyre reciting them. Even down to the 19th century, into the early 20th, poets would write in the expectation that even with modern methods of mass media they would still at some point be standing in front of a room full of fans reading them out.

It's not even enough to focus on making sure you have the same number of syllables in each line (another rookie mistake I myself have been guilty of), you have to make sure the stress lands in the right place too. It's got to be

>Ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum
>Ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum
not
>Ba-dum, ba-dum-dum-dum
>Dum ba-dum dum ba-dum

tl:dr meter > rhyme

>>97154820
>the link expired before I could look at it.
Here you go. Set it to 2 weeks. paragraph 53 is the new stuff now, though i think its just cause how the formatting swapped over.
https://pastebin.com/VECwXg1u

>>97154820
>>97154880
Righteous. Gonna keep plugging away at that book then. Glad you liked the little raven story! Same world as the book, actually.

>>97154880
And thanks again for sacrificing the time to read a stranger's work. You're very appreciated

>>97155224
My thoughts are more or less the same as they were last time: a few bits of awkward phrasing, some points where you get the tense wrong, but other than that it's okay. You're fairly good at creating a distinctive voice for your characters and writing natural-sounding dialogue.

The thing that concerns me at this point is that I'm not getting much sense of the actual plot. Digressing into old war stories would be fine for a later chapter, but right now I have absolutely no idea where any of this is going; you really need to set up what's actually happening before you give any more background information about characters.

>>97154880
oops, that was obviously a response to >>97141920

>>97161796
>tense
Yeah, as I mentioned previously, my by far biggest weakness.

I may need to sign post it a bit more then, but the whole plot IS the stories. Like, 90% of the book will be him talking to the captive audience. He's there to ostensibly to break up the day for the wounded soldiers and give them something to take their minds off of the pain and such. He's a good man that takes the little bit he has left to give to help the only people left who matter to him.
First story is about hate and rage and combat. Second story is about how bad winter down time was next to the silk road and watching his unit descend into drugs, gambling, etc. Third is about his childhood, local villagers and what happened to each of them as he grew, the local mayor and the scandals he fomented amongst the populace, and how he met his wife who he didn't know was pregnant when he killed the mayor which leads into story 1. And the final story of how he lost his leg, the broken supply lines, the hopelessness of being cutoff behind enemy lines and desperately hoping to make it home to his wife and then 3 kids.

All ending in Nurgle offering him a way out. He would make sure he survived and would live out a long healthy life with his wife and kids, but when she died he would become his plaguebearer and spend the rest of his usefulness converting more willing cultists, which he does to the 3 soldiers. It's why he's supernaturally durable.

Turns out the 4 gods had been trying to convert him his whole life. Khorne in story 1, Slaanesh, and Tzeentch in the other two. It's hard to keep the surprise though if you go in knowing it's a Warhammer Fantasy book.

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I wrote kind of an essay on my user page in the 1d6chan wiki. It tries to establish a critical perspective on the current state of pen&paper rpgs. It's not fictional writing, rather an attempt at writing in the style of ethnographies or similar treatise on cultural matters. Anyone care to read it?

>>97162556
I'd like to.

>>97162628
>>97162556

Though I'll only tall style and concise news rather than the points brought up so there's no derailment.

>>97162628
>>97162635
https://1d6chan.miraheze.org/wiki/User:Tanon

>>97162725
I actually think the two rant sections could be combined into a cohesive whole. The point about ritualization is a bit arcane considering the more 'mundane' pieces you bring in later on. Basically, starting from an 'occult' style of description and moving into a more piece by piece analysis is a bit off putting.

You're going hard against the nu rpg crowd (which I do agree with) but don't spend any time explaining why it's bad or listing the many examples that could back up your thesis.

Speaking of which, I'd really appreciate a thesis statement of some kind to lay out the texture of what you're going for. More concise points to drive home the idea would also really buoy the writing. All you'd need to do is back up those points.

It doesn't feel that structured if I had to sum it up.

Also, I'm not a weeb of any kind but the other stuff you listed tells me you have good taste.

>>97162725
You have a couple points I would directly counter against that have a lot to do with semantics, population expectations, arbitration, etc. But critiqued from a reading perspective it comes off both too clinical and too emotional. If you're going to screed, screed. Don't stop halfway to start lecturing. Either is perfectly good on its own, it's the dichotomy that wrecks it.
I'll also agree with the poster above me saying a thesis would be nice.

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>>97163056
>>97163467
thanks for reading and for your constructive feedback! I copied your replies to the discussion section, so I can use them as a guideline when I write on. I really appreciate the effort you put into your analyses and I'll try to put them to good use.

Just to give some context:
I'm not a learned writer by any means. I dropped out of university many years ago and never really wrote a proper paper. I'm just imitating the style of the kind of books I like to read (besides rpg stuff) and try to examine topics from the hobby in that fashion. I wrote the text because these things are going trough my mind and it's fun to write them down, further developing my thoughts in doing so. There's no clear aim or perspective behind the writing. I could just have hacked it into my plaintext editor, stored the file somewhere on my harddrive and forget about it, but I like the idea that it can be found in a remote corner of our sweet old wiki.

>>97164841
You bet! Glad it's useful, man.

I'm the first anon and would suggest you take a look at persuasive writing if you want to hone the idea a bit more. Keeping it opinion based rather than having to 'prove' your viewpoint can also make it a lot more fun.

Having to organize thoughts on paper is pretty tough sometimes.