A Winter Long Ago...

[Rayse Valentino]

Shortly after the death of Victoria Loryn...

There were only a dozen people gathered in the church of The Sway. Her brother was noticeably absent, but her parents were here to pay their respects. She looked peaceful in her open casket, like all the worries of the world had been washed away. It was Trent's turn to take his son and walk up to her, and he very formally wished her off and stepped away. His two-year old son remained, climbing on top of the stone slab her casket was on and peering down inside. She didn't look dead to him, but he heard the 'mommy is going away for a while' story before. The infant couldn't find it within himself to be sad, because he honestly believed his mother would return someday. He saw the shiny necklace that used to be around her neck. It was what was always hanging down in front of him when his mother leaned down. When he saw that necklace, he knew his mother was coming. It wasn't around her neck this time, but rather on top of her bosom, so he easily reached down and took it. He thought he could hold onto it for her. If his mommy was going away for a while, the necklace would be there as incentive for her to come back. Sticking it around his neck and down his shirt so no one would notice, he stepped off the slab and joined his father. He was just going to borrow it, to take some part of his mother so she would always be with him.

[Call me J]

Well, before I get anywhere, I want to say I really like this thread because it demonstrates two points I have made for a long time on Althanas, A) that solos can be interactive and B) that sometimes, vaguer profile histories are better because you can fill in the blanks later with RP. I really like this thread for other reasons actually relating to the writing as well, but I’ll get to those in the rubric. Here, I just wanted to talk about how this thread should be the kind of thing that everyone sees, just to realize that these two points are true. Also, please note that the comments and scores are weighted proportionately to participation, so Bloodrose makes a larger part of the scores and the comments received.

Total Score- 80

• STORY ~ 19/25

Continuity (4/5) ~ I really loved this introduction, but it wasn’t because of its continuity. This thread was really hard to score in terms of continuity, because the whole thread, in and of itself, was basically a prologue for another thread. As such, I’m going to skew the rubric to deemphasize this characteristic, and put the points in Wild Card, because I don’t really see where else to put them.

Setting (8) ~ I really liked the job you did here creating ambiance. It wasn’t that you always had a lot of detail, but you always had ambiance.

Pacing (7) ~ This thread started off really well, but it tapered off a bit. The foreshadowing, though well done, was insufficient to get a super high quality score.

• CHARACTER ~ 21/30

Dialogue (6) ~ Bloodrose: At times, the dialogue came off a bit clichéd, and at other times, it was very strong. I’m pretty sure if you skim through you’ll know (if you don’t already) where the strong lines and weak ones are, but if you don’t, I’ll be happy to talk this over with you.

Action (7) ~ When you have your character expressing himself nonverbally, consider also how that will look to the reader. For instance, the image of Teric clenching and unclenching his fists came across more as comedic or seizure induced than the grief that I’m sure you wanted to convey.

Persona (8) ~ Rayse’s single post was practically oozing with persona, especially considering its brevity. I don’t really have that much to say to him, but I wanted to get that little respect knuckle in. Bloodrose, I really liked the way that you played two

• WRITING STYLE ~ 26/30

Mechanics (10) ~ No issues here

Technique (8) ~ Great work here, technique and dialogue made many of the things Teric said to be quite pithy.

Clarity (8) ~ There were a couple parts that were hard to follow.

• Wild Card (14/15) ~ For all the reasons I listed above.


EXP and GP
Bloodrose receives 2490 EXP and 240 GP
Rayse Valentino receives 867 EXP and 24 GP

Spoils
Rayse Valentino gets the necklace, if he doesn’t have it already.

[Karuka]

Exp/Gp added! Movement pending