Mood: Chilly
Music: Anti-Venom by Ubiquitous Synergy Seeker
If you'd like me to get more specific/elaborate on the foundation of my comments here, feel free to contact me via AIM or PM.
Story ~ 6/10
You're a good story teller, but you were obviously focused on other things than building a compelling storyline in this quest. It would have helped a lot to have a better introduction of Tagaz/Stephanie/the IK, to set the stage a little bit, and you need to be aware of the line between building tension and just confusing the reader. At times your posts made me wonder what would happen next, while at other times they seemed needlessly opaque and would have dissuaded me from continuing.
Continuity ~ 4/10
Aside from the Dahlios history lesson in the latter half of the quest, little in this thread connected it to the rest of Althanas. Overall it failed to situate the reader, and looking at this as a standalone story (which we always do) the references to IK and Jensen Ambrose were meaningless. If you had included some early interaction between Tagaz and Steph which helped to establish what/who the IK/Jensen is, it would have added a lot of depth to the references you made throughout the story.
Setting ~ 5/10
I never forgot where I was, but the setting never seemed original or came to life either. When writing in generic locations (a gym, a pub, an inn, a forest) it helps to focus on the details which make that particular location different. In this case the initial description could have been much more interesting with regards to exactly what the fighters were doing, what their training equipment was made from, etc. I may mention this again, but you often fell into the trap of telling rather than showing. It is very basic to provide a list of items in a room; it is much more interesting when each of those items is used for something by someone. Even if you feel you have done a sufficient job of a describing a location, you can always reinforce it by personifying it.
Creativity ~ 7/10
You had some nice literary devices, but they petered out in the latter half of the quest, and frankly many of them felt somewhat forced. The unfortunate thing is that you regularly miss excellent opportunities to bring the setting to life, and you have the skills to do so. Often when you use words like "was", you could reorganize the sentence to add imagery such as personification. Finding the natural places in your writing to add metaphors will not only make it flow better, but add more than a forced simile.
Character ~ 6/10
Considering how comfortable you were writing all of these characters, I found it surprising how little I learned about each of them (not including Seth, obviously.) My notes on interaction will help this, but I feel the style of the story also influenced it. The characters didn't come off like real people acting in their own best interest - most of the time I was very aware I was reading a story with clear intentions that influenced their behavior.
Interaction ~ 5/10
First is a simple note against the past participles "was" and "were". These words have their place, but you overuse them. A fine example is Seth's entrance - the hat was tossed, the jacket was flung. This reads much better as "he tossed the hat, he flung the jacket" - especially considering you can add more this way. The main difference though is that "he tossed the hat" gives a clear mental image of someone tossing a hat, whereas "the hat was tossed" is purely an informational statement (telling rather than showing).
The other major issue here, which also brought down your character score, is that the characters became talking heads during dialogue. I got really sick of seeing "he replied" or "he said firmly" at the end of sentences. When real people talk, they do things. So rather than telling me that someone spoke firmly, show me what he does with his body and voice, so I'll know he spoke firmly. In this way you can also keep setting alive and present throughout interactions.
Strategy ~ 6.5/10
I enjoyed the first post in which Seth fought Tagaz, but after that the action became difficult to follow as often as not. Keeping the majority of your action in active voice (avoiding "was, were, had") will help this, as will using less thickening words (began, continued, very) and weak adjectives. Active verbs describe action best, so focus on having as many of them as possible and fewer adjectives. I feel that you are an excellent writer whose style needs some tweaking, and with your permission I may use posts from this thread as content for lessons in the WW, let me know if that's cool. The main thing you can do to increase the flow of your action sequences is to edit them diligently.
Clarity ~ 6/10
While I could usually understand what was happening, my mental image was never crystal clear, and there were times where I got confused as to exactly what was going on, or why. Basically you need to edit better, and this score will come up.
Mechanics ~ 7.5/10
There were a handful of varied mistakes scattered throughout your posts, but nothing that you don't know how to fix if you proofread properly. I find the difference between great writing and decent writing is often the editing process, and in order to improve your skills you will need to analyze your own work rather than just spellchecking and going through the motions.
Wildcard ~ 6/10
Parts I enjoyed, parts I wished had more in them, and parts that bored me. Overall a good read and a decent history lesson on Seth Dahlios.
Total: 59/100
Dissinger receives 1500 EXP and 100 GP
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