Forum Brawl #6 - Round 4 - Voting

[JonathanCrazyJ]

none really impressed me here. In fact, I pretty much disliked them. I went into tl;dr mode on TTG's submission, and wordcounttools.com count it at 1209 words.

It's a combo task. Crusader and Royalty, so word limit is 2000

And on the wizard task my wordcounter tool has 995, confused

[Espithel]

Not sure why TTG feels entitled to make this enchanter task a scribe task.

The more complex the story, the harder it is for a card to explain it. A card can represent it very well, but it can't explain it.

Sieges? Some big dumb creature? Simple to explain on a single card. This is not necessarily a bad thing.
A charismatic faith healer that's making a pun on a historical villain? Not easy to explain on a single card. This is also not necessarily a bad thing.

Grasputin's Aura represents what he is doing very well, but representing it is not explaining it.

[ARTHANASIOS]

FROGS: I dislike having to download stuff. I might do it later, if I am convinced to.

Well, it will take just a few seconds to download, it will occupy just a few megabytes from your hard disk's free space and it will need just a crappy PC to run.

[CleanOnion]

Here are my voints and stuff for Round 4.

Spoiler for Royalty + Crusader:

Spoiler for Crusader:

PC: The People deck seems to be padded with half-useless Entropy Pendulums, which implies uselessness but isn't reciprocated by that the cards are upgraded. The description for the Gov deck references a King and Queen, which aren't present.

FROGS: I'd expect a deck labelled as controlling to be full of CC and PC. Description for how the Gov deck operates in-game is great, but not in-lore. Similar issue for the People deck, but to be honest the cards tell their own story for this one.

S7: While a little dull perhaps, the Gov deck is thematically very good. The People deck seems at first glance to be composed of mostly random cards, although without an in-game strategy I can't tell if this is the case.

TTG: Lore was excellent, and while the coloured text seemed patronising at first, it did make it easier to look to the deck to see exactly what was being referenced. The decks were also good thematically. This one had to win for me.

Spoiler for Royalty:

PC: The description seemed a little vague and didn't really tell me anything. That the people worked together could have been backed up by some justification of sorts.

FROGS: The story definitely needed a proofread - spelling mistakes and tautologies are prominent. I would have liked to see the decks referenced more, but the standalone story is good enough.

S7: A good government is an extension of the people and would logically abdicate if unpopular, but this doesn't make for a very interesting story. There was no justification for why the People deck would win despite being unupgraded.

TTG: Story is rife with lore regarding the government (albeit mostly repeated) and very little regarding the people. However, I appreciate the effort that went into writing it.

I voted equally for TTG and FROGS for the effort that went into writing their respective stories.

Spoiler for Bard:

FROGS: The whole map is artistically very consistent, however it is a little dull and lacking in detail. The good thing about an empty map is that there's little to criticise.

TTG: A lot of effort went into this, I can see. However, it's overdone. The concentration of locations makes it look like a theme park map rather than something I'd use to navigate. Additionally, the cartoony style doesn't do you any justice for this task. While the perspective is a nice touch in theory, in practice it looks like it was added as an afterthought - for example, Classified Area looks like it's floating two miles above Darkfin Village.

PC: Style across the map is inconsistent and very little detail is present anywhere, even in the Zyarhelm emblem. Looks very rushed to me.

S7: Style is perfect, although I know this is because a tool was used. However, I tried to use the tool and found it rather difficult to use, so I won't let this account for my votes. The map itself could have done with a little less empty space although the style makes up for it.

I offered equal voints to FROGS and S7.

Spoiler for Enchanter:

TTG: I had to read the TL;DR to understand what the threat actually was, and even then I'm not sure I get it. Is it that Grasputin is thinning the empire's troops, or is it just his influence? For the card itself, does it reduce damage from creatures by 1, or permanently reduce ATK á la an inverse Fire Shield? If the latter, this is seriously OP.

S7: The card needs no explanation and works all by itself. I'm unsure if the description refers to the S7 team or the people of Ombrella, but I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt. This was the winner of the task for me.

PC: Even in a monowater deck this card pretty much ensures that you'll always have enough air quanta to max it out. I feel that therefore the effect of this card is very little, however, it does actually seem pretty balanced in my opinion. The card text could be written better, as it took me a few moments to work out the precise mechanics.

FROGS: A siege is certainly a threat, but this submission doesn't state who is being sieged by whom, why it costs gravity, or why it would cause you not to be able to use abilities. A little context would be nice for such a generic card.

Spoiler for Scribe:

FROGS: This isn't a scam. I'd buy this. However, I can't let this win owing to the fact that the appeal is in the product itself rather than the pitch.

TTG: The product being tentacle ink made it a little hard to relate, and I'm sure a tentacle would be able to distinguish between mud and ink - presumably being exposed to both on a regular basis. Having said that, the persuasion is very well written, particularly the initial responses of the recipient.

PC: The words "mum" and "vapor" being used within a few lines of each other threw me off. That and the grammatical errors. Always proofread! Despite this, the speaker was clearly skilled in emotional manipulation. This should have been checked for mistakes, but even so, it scraped a win for me.

S7: Much like FROG's submission this doesn't feel so much a scam as a regular sales pitch - with the possible exception of that it's implied that these wands are pretty much found on the floor. They do seem to be specific products, though - how would the salesman know that a wand will teleport you somewhere safe, for example? If the wands actually do nothing, this should be more heavily implied.

Spoiler for Wizard:

PC: The task wants an explanation of culture and/or history, and this submission describes a part of the culture that explains the history. Two birds, one stone. One criticism that I would make is that the event tells us about a lot of aspects of the culture without going into detail of any of them.

S7: This one does a very good job of explaining the formation of the country. It seems a little odd that the place is composed of people who consider themselves miserable and hated, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

TTG: Why can't he read?????? The story itself is good, however details relating to culture and history are somewhat lacking. The main bunch of historical information, the play, is glossed over completely. The submission excelled at explaining the emperor's sheltered life, however.

FROGS: I liked how the information was neatly condensed with interspersed humour, and not too much context to distract from the submission. My only criticism was that the only details of the FROGS themselves were their names, which doesn't tell the Supreme "Councelor" anything. This was the winner for me.

Spoiler for Bonus:

FROGS: As I'm unable to run EXE files on my Chromebook, I had to judge based on the little content available to me, which didn't explain any details. As such I wasn't able to offer a voint.

S7: The description was fairly basic, though it covered the court in a positive light rather well. It felt like the kind of response that might be given in a lighthearted interview. I listened to the music while reading, and that was a nice touch.

TTG: A bit overboard on the formatting here. I wasn't a fan of having to scroll side to side to read the submission. This opinion changed when I was instructed to read clockwise. Detail for each character was very good and NAAWWW THEY USE A TURTLE AS A TABLE. This was the winner for me.

PC: I've always disliked explanation through dialogue. A good rule for storywriting is "show, don't tell" and dialogue is great way to ensure you tell but never show. However, I liked how the twist was that this is the Scribe's fantasy world, and the end may even imply that the last paragraph is still being written by the scribe. Nonetheless, details were slim, and some were taken straight from the prompt.

Spoiler for Challenge 1:

FROGS presents Arsenic, PC presents a multicoloured sword. I wasn't very much a fan of either. It does seem that marginally more effort was put into Pyrocloaks' submission so that one was the winner.

Before voting, we updated the poll for the challenge - the rules regarding voints previously forced you to give 5 voints to each submission, which is useless. This has been updated to a binary vote.

[Aves]

TTG: Why can't he read?????? The story itself is good, however details relating to culture and history are somewhat lacking. The main bunch of historical information, the play, is glossed over completely. The submission excelled at explaining the emperor's sheltered life, however.

History wasn't a main focus, yeah. It's all about the culture! It is possible to infer things about the society using the relatively obvious details you have seen, to look deeper rather than have it all spelled out for you. Some hints:

Spoiler for Make Inferences! Some spoilers if you haven't read the task:

1. A military commander with many titles is both in command of the nation and illiterate. What does this say about the Empire? This is a society that highly values marital skill and engages in frequent warfare and conflict! However, infrastructure is  clearly not geared towards such luxuries as "writing" for the common citizen. 

2. The regent is worried about differentiating an intelligent sea-slug from a delicious one, and a priestess from a whore. This is a very diverse society, with many different walks of life, in both social status and race. It is also difficult for an outsider to discern who belongs to which layer.

3. The regent is told to distrust parliament, while being the one who is supposed to being the one presiding over them AND being mostly ignorant of the laws and customs. What does this imply?

There's more, but I'll let you make your own inferences.

It would've been easy (and boring) to write something like "The Frostkracken Empire is a warlike society, conducting raids almost daily and covering a vast expanse of territory and life. The government is a puppet one with true power in the hands of the Emperor." But that kind of exposition that only tells-- it does not demonstrate.

[worldwideweb3]

To fellow voters: Voting this time will take some time, so i advise doing it early. Especially playing FROGS game in bonus task.

[Calambar]

@CleanOnion

"The concentration of locations makes it look like a theme park map rather than something I'd use to navigate."

Serioulsy?

"Bard: I'm looking for style over anything else. If you're doing a more modern map, detail is a must. Medieval map, and you'd get away with a lot less precise. Of course, there are many other kinds of maps, and not all are used for navigation."

I wanted to be original for YOUUUU, my dear! Boohoo, you broke my heart   

[Jenkar]

@Aves : Wow, a culture based on >marital< skill. That must be a fun culture indeed

[andretimpa]

@Aves : Wow, a culture based on >marital< skill. That must be a fun culture indeed

Tentacle culture ...

[Aves]

@Aves : Wow, a culture based on >marital< skill. That must be a fun culture indeed

Damn typos Love and war are one and the same! 

[worldwideweb3]

ROYALTY & CRUSADER


SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS: I do like the goverment deck very much, and the people's deck to an extent, shame that it's a rainbow. Also, i don't really see much work from royalty side here.

TTG: Both decks are good, though in the people's deck, i don't really like the idea of one copy cards. The story was good too, but it is potraying the goverment as the villain, which i don't think is the right way to go here. Also, not much from people side here.

FROGS: People's deck makes me wonder why is there a leaf dragon with no light quanta.... Apart from that, good decks for the theme, but perhaps not very original. I do like the story ending very much though, poor farmers XD

Pyro: There's lots of wasted entro quanta there in people's deck. But apart from that, while the deck suits the theme, is it really that original in game? For gov. deck, i guess nymphs are queens, and phoenix the king? if so, why are there multiples? Though i do like the deck this time. The story is too vague though. You say people will win, but crown can win if they set aside the differences, but what differences? How is it reflected in deck? Also, not sure about ending it with "whatnot" XD

BARD

None of the maps had the distance measure-y thing scale so i dont know how far things are from each other.

SSSSSSSSSSSSS: I like the map, though perhaps a small explanation of each place would be nice.

FROGS: "City of the tailor" is a town? Artistically, it's good, but it is a bit vague and looks empty.

TTG: I won't be taking the song into account this time, as i don't think it would be fair, considering task only says to make a map. The map i feel is too cartoony (i kinda like it but a part of me doesn't). Also, seeing as it's underwater, i'm not sure about some of the places of maps being underwater....perhaps some other stuff could be thought of like "reef village" or something

Pyro: Lacking in detail a lot.


ENCHANTER

One idea for teams is to have a sample deck with your cards too. Just a brief idea is sufficient too. Shows that you have put thought into how card can work with other cards in the game.

Pyro: Seems pretty balanced, perhaps a bit UP. The upped will probably be overshadowed by crawler.

FROGS: Nice card. Seems balanced. Only thing to add is what's in bold.

SSSSSSSSSS: I like the card, and fits the task perfectly. BUT there will be a problem in calculating distance. "This includes the ones adjacent at the top/bottom." You will notice that when you have more than one row, cards arent exactly beneath each other. So, how do you decide what's the distance? Is it 1.5? XD

TTG: I don't understand the active ability, someone needs to explain it. (shield can have active ability? o.O)

Scribe

SSSSSSSSS: I really do like this. Fits in with all the dragon stuff and the lot. Can i have one now?

TTG: I do like dialogues so i did like it. Though not too sure about the idea of selling muddy water as the ink...Would have been better had it just been selling ink, imo.

Pyro: Proof reading would help as there were a few errors (i should probably be proofreading this post but oh well). Story was pretty funny though, given all grammatical errors and the lot were sorted.

FROGS: ooh, really interesting product! A bit too overpriced for my taste, but that's not the main point i guess.

Wizard DONT READ FROM HERE ON, IT NEEDS UPDATING.


SSSSSSSSSS: The BE was misunderstood i think, despite the story being interesting.

Frogs: BE was again misunderstood.

TTG: Nearly there but not quite. BE is like a small change leading to many small changes resulting in a difference. But the story was good, and did gain some voints.

Pyro: Yes, BE was clearly shown here. The first paragraph actually made me think of dragon ball super....does the writer watch it too?

[JonathanCrazyJ]

The song is not a new one. It is the lyrics from my previous song about landscape highlighting the places i referenced in that song which are now represented on the map.

Also, we are not villains, we are a dictatorship masquerading as a democracy. I don't see the problem with not being clean cut heroes.