STORY
Continuity - 6/10 - I was a bit concerned that at the introduction of this thread, you didn't really give me enough bread crumbs to figure out why Lillian was where she was or even how she got there. What I've surmised though was that she was in Raiaera during Xem'Zund's rise to power and the initial invasion of his undead hordes, maybe at Istien University? I'm unsure. Even without this information, you took Lillian and ran with her through this thread and even if I was lost at first I quickly found myself unable to look up from reading this thread after being immersed in it.
My advice in the future is to always remember that everything has a beginning, even if you start at the end of something. While it isn't imperative that you dedicate an entire post to the history of the events that came before this, it does help significantly when you give enough details that readers can begin to connect the dots. I've never read anything from the Raiaera side of the FQ outside of the OOC posts, so my knowledge for example is very limited outside of that information. Giving me and others a quick game of catch-up, at least with the information that is pertinent to Lillian, would have been a huge help with reading this quest. Work on it.
Setting - 9/10 - Your work with setting in this thread was absolutely immaculate. I found myself right alongside Lillian and Orophin with the forest, the cave, the cart and eventually the biouvac. Everything was written in exceptional detail and I found myself wondering why you've never chosen to get anything published, because I think you could swing it. The only problems with setting that I saw was that it was often marred by the overabundance of detail that you chose to incorporate.
Yes, sometimes too much detail can hurt you. As I was reading this, I found myself wondering if you were unsure of whether or not people understood what you were trying to put forth. As I've had the same problem in the past, I want to assure you that it was never the case. There is no need to underline every point that you make with additional sentences of analysis, because after awhile it becomes tiresome to read.
But, overall, the setting in this thread was vibrant and came to life, helping your characters out significantly as you often used the setting to your own ends and sometimes even let the setting use you. Great job.
Pacing - 6/10 - Your pacing in this thread was my biggest peeve. Having known you for awhile now and while I haven't read much of your writing, I'm accustomed with your style enough to understand that you take your time when trying to set the pace of your writing while establishing what you need in the mean time. While this certainly has strengths of it's own, I feel that this style keeps you from moving as fast as you could have when starting this thread.
However, even if you started off slow in this thread, by about post 8 I found myself unable to put this thread down until I could hardly keep my eyes open from sleep. Hard as it is to believe after talking to me yesterday, Jean, I did enjoy this thread. While it wasn't as concise or fast-paced as I would have liked, I feel that lies more in my own personal tastes then what should be regarded in the rubric. I'd still like to warn you about the pacing so that in the future you can work on picking it up, because I'd very much like to see what you'd be capable of having as much fast-paced action as you did after your climax for the majority of your thread. Experiment and see if you like it.
CHARACTER
Dialogue - 7/10 - The dialogue here was very well written, if a bit long-winded. Orophin was a windbag. He might have been a 2,000 year old High Bard elf-thing from Raiaera, but throughout this thread he was a windbag. I often found myself cursing during his many speeches during this thread because it really killed most of the momentum you had going.
However, this was not a huge knock to your score. Overall the majority of your dialogue was fitting and made sense, even if it was a bit wordy for fantasy-set characters. But, I'll leave that to the suspicion it was a contribution of your sterling intellect. Just remember that when in character, you are that character. Not everyone has the answers to everything or speaks like Einstein if he LARPed, which a lot of this seemed like shadows of your own personality rather then individuals in your story. But, considering how hard that particular cord of ownership of a character is to break, I empathize.
Action - 6/10 - The action of this thread was really far and in between, but when it happened you were at your finest. A lot of the strategy and critical thinking Lillian and Orophin used on the battlefield was impressive, even if it was sometimes a bit far-fetched. I think after your climax, the bulk of your action helped carry this thread home. What I found to be your biggest weakness with it, however, was that it was still long-winded in your explanations of what was going on.
Whether you were aware of it or not, your establishment of a Setting and what made it so vibrant wasn't the abundance of details but rather the lack of them. You capitalized on certain parts of the setting, but left the majority of it to my imagination which helped me considerably when trying to immerse myself in this thread.
The same could be said for the use of action. Not everything needs to be absolutely spelled out to a T to keep your reader on deck with you. Don't be afraid to let your readers do some of the footwork for you when trying to connect the dots. Because not only will it keep them hooked on your every word, but you're doing them a service by not insinuating that they are children that need to be led around by the nose with every detail. Surprisingly, people do take offense to that sort of thing. Just try to be less wordy and give your writing a bit more space to grow in the reader's mind and you should be fine.
Persona - 9/10 - Your biggest asset in the rubric is by far this area of the score. While many of these characters possessed shadows of your own personality, I'd suspect many reading this wouldn't be aware of it unless they knew you very well. Despite this, all of your characters had minds and lives of their own even if they had a traits in common.
Lillian was ingenius from how she made use of her cave, to the surveillance system, to much of her ingenuity and forethought in combat. While I know you have a lot of skills with her that apply to quick and critical thinking, I saw much of it utilized here. Outside of that, you really took your time in analyzing her character and allowing the flaws and weaknesses to come out for everyone to see. While it isn't something everyone appreciates, it's the sort of thing I absolutely love to see. After all, what would people be without their faults?
For such a prominent and legendary figure in Raiaera, Orophin had a lot of flaws especially for being so old. I loved it. Being an elf or even 2,000 years old doesn't exempt you from the reality that nobody is ever perfect, and as somebody who has a deep, black hatred for elves I found myself liking Orophin and his compadre throughout this thread.
However, even with your own characters taking on a life of their own, what I most enjoyed was your own spin that you put on the undead when you used them. You have no idea how unique and satisfying it was to read some of the little odds and ends you incorporated with their physiology and into their character. Collapsed lungs, dry skin, The Black, etc. What is often mistaken is that iconic figures in literature like the undead can speak for themselves with little work needed with them. This is a fatal pitfall that many writers fall into today and is the source of much of my resentment towards races like Elves because of their overuse and how under utilized they are.
Though, I digress. What you managed to do with your undead NPCs during this thread really opened my eyes and if there was a hook in this thread to keep me reading, this was it. Don't underestimate your power to create and breathe life into characters, because if you ever had a source of strength, this was it.
WRITING STYLE
Mechanics - 7/10 - There were a few minor and petty errors here and there that I managed to spot over the majority of thread. Most of them were really hard to find, but I could tell you definitely proofread outside of the obvious answer of you asking me to give you time to edit before I read this thread. I honestly think though that you're big weakness is an overuse of weird word choices. While I understand you're somebody of high intellect, you need to compensate for those that aren't. The majority of your posts were around a thousand words or less, but they felt like 3,000. I don't really boast to have a huge vocabulary myself, but I had a lot of trouble understanding where you were coming from and spent the majority of my time trying to concentrate on dissecting words I can't even remember using in a sentence in my entire life.
Technique - 8/10 - A lot of this thread was done in a master stroke, and while I would classify this thread as a narrative rather then a story, it was done impeccably well. Aside from the purposeful use of terrible puns at every end, I found most of the strategy and use of techniques in your writing to be done very well. You've definitely found your voice as a writer, you just need to find the right octave for it.
Oh yes, you aren't the only one who can think up dumb puns on the fly, Jean. =P
Clarity - 7/10 - The majority of this thread was a tough read and requires a lot of attention to get through, and while you know my favorite literary word by now, it struck me very much in the style of lovecraft. He spent a lot of time in opening up his stories slowly and slowly building up with it until he hit the climax. While this is a decent trait to have, it was very much too slow for my own personal tastes. The sheer volume of your work hurt your clarity score as it's hard to maintain a clear, concise picture with this thread when you have 5-6+ more paragraphs to go through in a single post. Cut down on your word count, and do so properly, and you should see many areas of your score get boosted because of it.
Wild Card - 5/10 - As this is your second solo you've ever completed, and did so under your personal record of 500 days, I'm throwing you 5 points in the Wild Card. Congrats.
TOTAL: 70/100
You've gained 6028 EXP, 300 GP and leveled to 7! Congratulations!
Your flute, flute-blade, and melody are all approved. I'll leave it up to the RoG to hammer out the details with you later.
As for the return of Orophin, I'd support it after what he went through in this thread, but the power of that lies completely in Flames' court. But, knowing him, it won't be much of a fight to get Orophin mentioned in a couple areas of the FQ. Make sure to talk to him about it.
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