... You're right, that doesn't work.

Subject: ... You're right, that doesn't work.
Author: Neshomeh
Posted on: 2014-05-09 16:43:00 UTC

You can't swap in any two names—definitely not if they belong to established and well-known characters. That was unfair of me. I'm sorry.

What I was trying to say was that, if I didn't know who Lou and Natro were, I'm not sure I'd be able to pick them out of a crowd based on that particular example of them interacting. Since the writing samples are supposed to show us who these people are, that could be a problem for me in a real sample.

That said, you are also right that the bio should do at least some of the work on that front; the writing sample should corroborate what's been laid out in the bio. If it does (did? would? Damn hypothetical tenses...), then I suppose I'd be okay with it in the absence of any other problems.

What I'm looking for... lemme ramble for a few paragraphs and see if I can figure it out.

"Complete stories" isn't right, because as you say, we don't want to set the bar to ridiculous. I'm not looking for "beginning, rising action, climax, denouement, end" or any other traditional structure you care to name.

"Complete" is, though. For instance, I kinda want to know what experiment Narto was doing that caused the stain—then I could identify him as "that guy who does X kinds of experiments in his RC." In Dark Brother's second sample, I want to see the actual planning for the actual party—as it is, it's just "Hey, can I plan a party? Yes? Good!" The End. It starts something, but doesn't finish it.

The requirement for Permission isn't merely "Can you spell?" It's more like "Can you write interesting characters, in a setting recognizable as the PPC, in an entertaining style that is free from (serious, preferably any) mechanical/structural and logistic errors?"

The thing about short stories/vignettes/snapshots is that every word must have a reason to be there, so in a sense they're harder to write well than longer pieces. I think this is where I'm coming from. If I only have a few hundred words to look at, I'm inclined to analyze every single one for all the information I can possibly glean. If those few words don't amount to something whole and wholly pleasing, it's hard to cut them much slack.

So, there it is: asking a short piece or two to prove the writer's ability to construct a full story is placing a lot of weight on narrow shoulders. Whatever we ask for a writing sample needs to be big and strong enough to bear it. A short work needs to be completely solid through and through, and it needs to accomplish something, else what hope is there that they can pull off a longer, more complex work?

The length isn't really that important. It's what the author can do with whatever space they have to work with. I wouldn't want to force anyone to pad an idea to achieve a word count, but on the other hand, I don't want to put people in an impossible box with a too-small sample.

Maybe different suggested counts for the different prompts would help. Other opinions would be good, though.

~Neshomeh, rambling on.

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Permission Request by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 04:47:00 UTC Reply

PG's, may I have your attention please?

I believe that I have worked out everything I need, so here are my agents' profiles. I expect this to be rather long, so I will divide this up into two posts- one for the profiles, another for the control prompt and the random prompt. The second post will be in the very first response to this one.

So without further ado, here are the works I have for you.

Agent #1)

Name: Spencer Ellis

Species: Human

Age: 32

Appearance:
- Eye color: Sky blue
- Hair: Light brown, short and combed
- Height: Average
Additional Features:
- He is rather fat, but not morbidly obese

Department: Department of Mary Sues, Freelance Division

Personality: He is highly focused on academics, has greater need for dominance, leadership and attention than is usual, and he prefers initiating activity. He is very detail oriented, and can therefore catch things about someone's personality that others wouldn't based on small bits of evidence. He can learn very quickly, and he feels uncomfortable without a detailed plan laid out. He therefore is strongly agitated whenever someone doesn't follow the plan. Likewise, he becomes irritated whenever someone does something without telling him first. He holds the emotional needs of others in very low consequence, and is therefore not generally liked among the other, rather mentally unstable Agents. However, he hates losing someone during a mission and will obssess over their overall safety. Lastly, he holds views of Mary Sues that border on racism, constantly blaming Agent Bessie for the team's shortcomings and misfortunes and calling her a Mary Sue.

Abilities: Though he is a fairly skilled sharpshooter, Ellis' skills lie not in his combat prowess, but in his ability to analyze a situation, create complex battle plans, improvise when those plans fail, and work cohesively with whatever group he is in. He also has the makings of a fine leader.

Backstory: Spencer Ellis and Melvin Moore were both lawyers in Maycomb County, Alabama, alongside their peer, Atticus Finch, in a To Kill a Mockingbird fanfic. One particular case, the Case of Marietta Crocker, drew the attention of a pair of assassins from the PPC, who proceeded to kill the Mary Sue, Marietta Crocker, in the county jail.

Fascinated by their methods, Ellis and Moore decided to join the PPC. While Moore decided to apply for a job in the Department of Internal Affairs, Ellis tried out for a position in The Legal Department, but was turned down because he "wasn't what they were looking for".

Dissatisfied with this, Ellis joined various Departments- the Department of Plagiarism, the Department of Technical Errors, and eventually the Department of Finance- but was fired for various reasons, such as the inability to play well with others and attempting to get directly involved in missions he was not given. He eventually got a desk job in the Department of Finance, but deeply hated that he was not "doing his Duty".

Agent #2)

Name: A. W. "Bessie" Besserdchenney

Species: Human

Age: 21

Appearance:
- Eye color: Unremarkable Brown
- Hair color: Brown, shoulder length
- Height: A little short for her age

Department: Department of Mary Sues, Freelance Division

Personality: She has a playful wit that she uses to either pull elaborate pranks on people or make fun of them. She is cunning, intelligent, deceitful, and can think outside the box. This last trait can give her the urge to make some foolhardy or implausible strategies during missions. She tries to stick to a strict code of honor; she will not fight an unarmed opponent, unless they show that they are capable of fighting her unarmed; she will not kill innocent civilians; she will not kick someone while they are down or running away; she will not abandon people she is close to or feel need her. However, this code of honor does not always apply, such as when she is hunting Mary Sues. She is unaware that she was a Mary Sue in a previous life, and takes offense whenever someone calls her one.

Abilities: A powerhouse duelist, she has an almost perfect balance of agility and strength, which she employs with brutal ferocity in battle. Her Kampilon sword is sharp, her armor is hard, and she can learn from her mistakes and successes quickly.

Backstory: The character that would come to be known as Bessie originated in an unnamed Shakespeare Suefic. She was captured by PPC agents Plank and Wells, and her story was destroyed because of its mechanics and horrible geography and flora and fauna.

The experiments that Plank performed on her worked, if only in part, and Plank insisted that she be inducted as an Agent, despite various protests from all over the PPC that Bessie, as she was now called, was not fully de-Sued.

However, Bessie did become an Agent, and her first job was with the Disturbing Acts of Violence Department, Action Division. She participated in several classified assignments, the purpose of which was to damage her brain even more and suppress her memories of being a Mary Sue further.

However, she was removed from the Department due to her overly violent outbursts resulting from massive consumption of Flaming Balrog after missions. She was sent to the Medical Department, where she had a six week recovery period, and which sent her to the Character Protective Services upon orders from the Flowers.

It was during this time that Bessie became infatuated by various Harry Potter and Twilight characters.

After a distinguished mission in which Bessie saved Sirius Black from a Mary Sue Death Eater, she was transfered to the Department of Mary Sues as an assassin.

Agent #3)

Name: Vivian Elsa Wells

Species: Human

Age: 29

Appearance:
- Eye color: Brown
- Hair: Dirty blonde, blown back so that it sticks up
- Height: Average

Department : Department of Mary Sues, Freelance Division

Abilities: Aside from her extensive knowledge of animals, plants, land masses and time paradoxes, Wells possesses a strange ability to run at superhuman speeds, which may or may not be connected with the candy she eats.

Personality: Vivian Wells is a woman with a manic and unruly personality. She really enjoys physical activities that involve her use of her insane bursts of speed, such as racing people. She also loves candy, often going entire days with a strictly sugar diet. However, she also adores the color pink, unicorns, and throwing parties. She goes into long talks about strictly feminine activities, such as cooking, fashion misshaps, the attractiveness of other female Agents, etc. She also likes to go shopping whenever she can, but at the same time she is wise with her money, usually only buying things that she thinks will be useful in some way. She likes to make fun of people when she knows it won't hurt their feelings, and therefore places a lot of emphasis on the emotions and mental wellbeing of others. She likes playing pranks. She has mastered the puppy face, notably being able to use it to sway the stubborn and resilient Ellis on several occasions, and can sometimes whine and complain when she doesn't get her way. Concerning her extensive knowledge, she has trouble recalling what she knows due in large part to her perpetual sugar high.

Backstory: When she joined the PPC, Agent Vivian Wells was initially placed in the Department of Floaters. However, she quickly gained a vast career, joining various Departments, such as Geographical Abberations, Misplaced Flora and Fauna, Bad Slash and Temporal Offenses.

Unfortunately, it was during her tenure in the Department of Temporal Offenses that she became clinically depressed and began her sugar addiction.

After this time, she joined Agent Plank, eventually capturing Bessie.

Wells then faced a troubling time in her life. Because of his exposure to a particularly powerful Mary Sue, Bessie, Plank began to contract Suemonia. However, instead of the usual effects, it began to drive him insane with grief and self loathing.

I believe that is the end of the profiles section. They are a little long, but I did my very best to keep each profile as close to four hundred words as possible. Agent Plank is not on here because he is more of a supporting character. However, if you would like to see his profile, let me know and I will happily show it to you. But for now, this is the end of part one of my permission request. Part Two will be up momentarily.

Regrading the depression bit... by Iximaz on 2014-05-10 02:22:00 UTC Reply

I haven't seen much of anything in the thread about Vivian's clinical depression and feel like I should add my two cents.

Now, obviously, I can't speak for everyone who suffers or suffered from depression, but I'm pretty sure sugar doesn't work like that. Sometimes I would feel so upset and disillusioned about the world that I would go on a sugar binge- I mean, actual granulated sugar, straight from the container- and I would feel better for about as long as the sugar was in my mouth. Then the sugar would be gone and I would be the same as ever, except I'd feel worse because I just ate like two cups of pure sugar and had nothing to look forward to in life.

I can get why Vivian would hide her depression under a hyper facade, but you need to realize that depressed=/=unhappy all the time. Maybe she is genuinely a hyper person who suffers from depression.

Is it major depression or minor depression, or somewhere in between? My therapists classed me as minorly depressed until my failed suicide attempt. If I'd been showing symptoms like losing interest in things that interested me, generally withdrawing from family and friends, or giving away possessions, they would have labelled me majorly depressed, but apparently trying to kill myself wasn't enough to merit the reclassification.

Sorry if I'm being too blunt, but this is a really touchy subject for me for obvious reasons. So why am I putting it out here for everyone to see? Because people need to know this stuff. There've been improvements in the general understanding of depression, but unless you've directly experienced it (or one of those psychotic so-called experts, I guess), you can't really capture what it's like.

Most days I used to wake up dreading having to go through a new day. I would go to school and see my friends and for a while, everything would seem fine, even wonderful. Then I would get the latest update on my grades in a particular class and my world would fall apart inside, but I wouldn't let anyone see how I felt because I didn't want them to worry or brush me off or call me crazy or send me to a mental hospital.

You can seem completely normal to everyone else, but there is a lot you keep bottled up because you don't want anyone to know what you're going through.

What really bugs me about Vivian's description is that it seems like you gave her depression just for the heck of it. How do I make a three dimmentional character? I know! Let's make her depressed!

I'm really sorry if this comes off as harsh, I really am. I just want to let you know that you'll need to handle it carefully so you don't really insult someone.

Oh. :( by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-10 02:46:00 UTC Reply

I'm sorry to hear that. I know that you probably heard these things before, and there isn't a whole lot I can do about it, but you have my sincere sympathies. I totally understand why it would be a touchy subject.

But since you have some experience, may I ask a question, if it isn't being insensitive to do so?

The question: If the person were to be in total denial about their condition and found some escapist fantasy (such as indulging in homicidal tendencies on a sugar high and with a disproportionately odd personality to begin with), would that work?

I mean, I have a friend who is only nine years old who is an unashamed Bronie who told me that, uh, Pinkie Pie, I think her name was, was in some sort of state of denial about something that was apparently a psychological problem. A strange example, I know (and I had to figure out what he meant after a full five minute discussion, which was hard on me, since I'm no Bronie), but does that happen in psychology?

Well... by Iximaz on 2014-05-10 16:39:00 UTC Reply

I have been declared 'recovered' for about six months, though I'm still on meds. I'm definitely not depressed any more, but it does bother me when I hear people discussing it and they have all sorts of wrong ideas and I just want to scream at them that it's not funny but I don't because it's usually not people I like very much and I don't want to get into the personal stuff with them.

Sigh.

I suppose everyone's coping methods are different. For me, it was mostly reading. A lot. I must've read Harry Potter more times in that last year than I have in the rest of my life put together. But it wasn't a cure, just a... Hmm... Okay, think of it like this. Someone collapses in the middle of the street, you give them CPR and then they're fine. You still want to take them to the hospital, because emergency first aid isn't always enough and you want to make sure there aren't any other complications.

That's kind of what coping methods are- first aid. They're enough to keep us going for a while, but we can't rely on our coping methods alone.

And there is a lot of debate among Bronies about whether or not Pinkie Pie is crazy (and I don't like to use that term, but the closest example I can think of is some bizarre Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde). Basically, when she thought a bunch if her friends were ignoring her, her mane went completely flat and she held a party where the guests were a bucket of turnips, a stack of rocks, and (I think, it's been a while since I watched that episode) a potato. And she was convinced they were talking to her. Then Rainbow Dash came along and dragged Pinkie to a surprise birthday party and Pinkie's mane poofed back up and she was back to her bubbly self.

That's not depression; it's more like disassociative personality disorder or something along those lines. I wouldn't use a nine year-old Brony as information about depression, especially if his information came from MLP.

The Jekyll and Hyde thing seems really obvious when you say 'homicidal tendencies'... you might want to rethink that or rephrase it.

Glad to hear it by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 04:17:00 UTC Reply

That's good to hear. I'm happy for you.

Well, I'm sorry if I offended you. Being a naturally happy person, I won't even pretend to know what that's like.

I see...

Really? I don't know a whole lot about MLP, just what the nine year old told me. And I don't even know all the four primary characters' names. Let me see, there's Pinkie Pie. There is the yellow one, Fluttershy? She is "the wimpy one", as the nine year old calls her. Then there is Rainbow- something, who I think looks like a hippie, but I guess is kind of the opposite of Fluttershy. I don't even know the name of the purple one. But there is supposed to be some evil dragon thing, I guess.

Or at least, that's what the nine year old told me, and I have learned the hard way not to take his word for stuff I don't know about... (sheepish grin)

Oh, I see. I know a little bit about that.

Yes, yes, I should rephrase that. Let's see... Department of Mary Sues assassinations? Doing the job? Something along those lines?

Outhra and sjostern already covered the basics... by Iximaz on 2014-05-11 14:03:00 UTC Reply

So I'll fill in a bit more.

Don't underestimate Fluttershy. She might be extremely timid around most everypony, but she actually ended up shouting at a dragon and making it cry when it hurt her friends. She also stared down a framing cockatrice, managed to befriends Discord (the embodiment of chaos, pretty much), and there was one episode in particular where she took assertiveness lessons from a Minotaur and ended up terrorizing Ponyville when she took things too far.

There's also a dragon as part of the major minor characters (does that make sense? Eh...) named Spike. He's always referred to as a baby dragon, though considering he acts as Twilight's assistant and has a crush on Rarity, I'd say he's more the equivalent of a ten or twelve year-old human kid. He's usually a pretty cheery character, though he always feels like he needs to prove his worth by doing- or trying to do- stuff way outside of his abilities.

Then you have the Cutie Mark Crusaders. They're a trio of young fillies who want to earn their Cutie Marks (the symbol on a pony's flank representing their special talent) so they aren't the targets of bullies at school. The thing is, though, you can't force a Cutie Mark, you have to discover it, but no matter how many times older ponies say so, the CMC don't listen.

The first member is Apple Bloom, who is Applejack's little sister and the founder (if you can pick one specifically) of the CMC. There have been a few indications in the show that her special talent has something to do with building, but she's not really noticed that herself yet. Like her sister, Apple Bloom is stubborn and doesn't like to listen to other ponies, and she usually feels like she has to prove her worth as the kid sibling of Big Macintosh and Applejack.

Sweetie Belle is Rarity's little sister and sees a Rarity as her role model, wanting to get a Cutie Mark in fashion or design or something similar, even though it's pretty obvious her talent is more of a musical nature. Sweetie Belle can be a bit naive, but she usually is the first of the CMC to realize when they've gone too far in a particular stunt and acts as the mediator between Apple Bloom and Scootaloo when they butt heads.

Scootaloo is the last member of the Crusaders and is definitely a tomboy. She sees Rainbow Dash as the coolest pony ever and thinks of her like a big sister, even though they're not related. Scootaloo's favorite thing to do is zip around Ponyville on her scooter, using her wings to get up to great speeds. Her wings are a bit smaller than other ponies her age and she can barely fly, something that's a huge sore spot for her. Still, she's very kind, if a bit blunt.

If you want a good episode to get started watching, I'd suggest 'A Canterlot Wedding' because OMG PLOT BAD GUYS EPIC SONGS ACTION!

*ahem*

But I really do recommend it as a starting episode. It's fantastic.

I think I get it by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 15:16:00 UTC Reply

So, I think it's making sense. I may want to do some research into this, since I Claimed Pattycakes.

Really? Dude, that's hardcore.

Discord? Maybe that is the dragon that the nine year old told me about.

Spike... I'll remember him. He sounds familiar.

Okay, so, I think I kind of like Apple Bloom. Building stuff is awesome.

As for Sweetie Bell, I think I like her more than her big sister. Obviously, I haven't seen any episodes, but her personality, from what you gave me, sounds very realistic of little siblings. Makes me wonder if I'm a pain for my little brothers sometimes... Oh well, we try our best.

I have heard the name Scootaloo somewhere. Where have I heard it?... Oh, yeah, there was a Fanfiction.net user that I collaborated with at one point named Pikascootaloo. Now I understand the name.

"The Canterlot Wedding"? Okay. I may watch it, if only for "academic" reasons. (begins laughing) I just can't imagine the looks on my brothers' faces if they catch me watching it!

"What are you watching, bro?"

"My Little Pony."

"Why are you watching My Little Pony?"

"I'm researching for the PPC."

It'll be hilarious!

Don't rely on shows. by zdimensia on 2014-05-11 12:42:00 UTC Reply

My Little Pony can't even keep its characterization straight between episodes. Pinky Pie is thoughtful and caring in an overbearing way when the episode is her focus, but she is a full-on bonkers child when she's just there for comic relief.

For other shows that can keep characterization straight, their writers are not experts, and are serving the story more than they are serving realism.

Mm-hm by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 13:41:00 UTC Reply

Okay, I won't. Unless the shows in question happen to be the canon, in which case I will have to make a choice if the show does do the things you say.

I'll try to keep your advice, though.

I meant for mental disease by zdimensia on 2014-05-11 15:52:00 UTC Reply

Of course you would have to rely on the show to determine if something is canon to it.

Since you are doing pattycakes... http://mlp.wikia.com/wiki/Episodes I recommend "Putting your hoof down," "Keep calm and Flutter on," "Flight to the Finish," "Stare Master," and "Read it and Weep."

Okay then by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 17:06:00 UTC Reply

Thank you very much.

(jetpacks in to give pony crash course) by Outhra on 2014-05-11 08:34:00 UTC Reply

There are six main characters, actually, seven if you count the Dragon you mentioned.

The purple pony is Twilight Sparkle(yes, everyone has already made all of the vampire jokes), the studious and magically powerful unicorn and current prodigy student of the country's ruler. The dragon isn't evil; his name's Spike, and he works as her personal assistant.

Rainbow Dash isn't a hippie. She's actually the sort of pony who would get bored very quickly with the hippie ideology. She spends most of her time breaking speed records and convincing others that she's awesome. She's managed to sway a large portion of the fan community, who have largely elevated her to mostly-uncontested "best pony" status ever since Twilight's... let's call it a "promotion", at he end of Season Three.

Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie you already know, just not in detail.

Rarity is the first of the main characters you missed. She's a unicorn with aspirations of high status, and usually gets involved in the story when there are fancy clothes that need to be made or important ponies that need to be fraternized with. She tends to be overdramatic and a bit full of herself at times, but she's very supportive of her friends and family, especially her sister Sweetie Belle, who is part of a side-character organization referred to as the Cutie Mark Crusaders.

Applejack is the other, an apple-harvesting farm girl who serves as Rarity's occasional dramatic foil. Blunt, honest, and accepting of no nonsense, Applejack is the most straightforward and grounded of the main characters, but she's also the most uncompromising and stubborn. Her sister, Apple Bloom, is moderately less apple-obsessed than her sister, and spends most of her screen time as another member of the Cutie Mark Crusaders.

Sorry, World-Jumper; Marvin and Printworthy's hover-booth wasn't available. I had to deal with this one myself. Sorry if I accidentally misrepresented any details. (jetpacks away)

Dang it guys! by World-Jumper on 2014-05-12 19:38:00 UTC Reply

I'm away at work, and what happens? Somebody on the Board asks for a crash course in MLP. And I missed it! Come on guys. That's like, my thing.

Anyway, the others covered just about everything. I would give you a list of episodes to watch, but honestly, the others have that covered too. So, here I am, the guy with the agents in the MLP department, and I cant even cover it for you. *sigh*

Well, if you do have any questions on the fandom, and any popular fanon, let me know. I've been reading up on the fandom's most famous fanfics (the good ones, I'll have you know). It's been interesting, reading the old famous fanfics, and seeing how they have affected the fandom as a whole. For example, there is a popular fanon idea that Deer are the equilavelt of Elves in Equestria. That idea was started by It's a Dangerous Business, Going Out Your Door, by Jetfire. Not canon by any streach of the immagination, but something you may come across. But anyway, just ask, and I will happily tell you anything you want to know.

Also, Outhra, Marvin and Printowrthy's hover-booth is always available. Just keep in mind that it runs off of a Fallout: Equestria Spark Battery, which may or may not explode if not treated properly. But don't worry too much about it. They're sure absolutly nothing bad could possably happen.

Sorry! (nm) (nm) by zdimensia on 2014-05-12 20:24:00 UTC Reply

Oh, okay. by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 13:39:00 UTC Reply

Really? Six? Okay, that's cool.

Twilight, huh? (forces down an evil grin as he tries not to think of the possible jokes)

Okay, so that's Rainbow Dash. Promotion into what? Actually, don't tell me. I'll research it.

Yeah, I never really bothered because I never considered that kind of thing to be, well, my kind of thing.

Rarity... Based on that description, I don't think I like her very much... Oh, well. Gotta have at least one that I don't like. It's actually a good thing, because it represents a diversity in personality.

Applejack seems okay, though. Sounds like me, at another time.

Misrepresented? I am not aware of that. I wouldn't be, but still...

Thanks for the descriptions.

Misrepresentation because I've not seen it for a while. by Outhra on 2014-05-11 14:55:00 UTC Reply

There might have been important establishing moments or character development I haven't taken into account, such as whatever Iximaz saw that redeemed Rarity for her. Also, I might be biased toward or against specific characters and not recognize it.

I hadn't said what the "promotion" was because I hadn't wanted to give you spoilers for an event that happened three seasons in. Not that the information wouldn't have been easy to find, since the change coincides with an obvious alteration in her character design, but spoilers are not the sort of thing that should be dropped in freely.

I personally recommend the Return of Harmony two-parter for your first episode. Canterlot Wedding is great, but it's not quite in tune with the rest of the show and might give you the wrong impression if you start out with it, like what the Friendship is Magic series premiere does. Honestly, it's tonal whiplash between the premiere, the not-very-good episode 3, and the rest of Season One. Return of Harmony shows the main six at their worst and best, pits them against an interesting and unpredictable opponent, and features the awesome John de Lancie. Everything is better with John de Lancie.

Oh, and as for the episode... by Iximaz on 2014-05-11 21:13:00 UTC Reply

I believe it was episode 19 of season one, when Rarity gets kidnapped by the Diamond Dogs.
Heh, okay, fair point. (nm) by Iximaz on 2014-05-11 21:07:00 UTC Reply
Oh, the choices! by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 15:36:00 UTC Reply

It's okay. We all have our preferences and biases.

A change in character design. Hmm... Okay, I'll look into it.

Return of Harmony. Okay, I'll look it up as well. While I'm at it, I'll watch the first, ohhh, two seasons in their entirety. From there, I will probably move on to season three, or whatever numbers there are. I think there are at least four, maybe five, according to the nine year old. This time, if I get it wrong, it's my fault, because I was not paying that close attention to him when he said how many there were.

Twilight's name by Iximaz on 2014-05-11 14:07:00 UTC Reply

is actually Twilight Sparkle. And just about every joke you can think of has probably been made already. ;)

Rarity still gets on my nerves, but after a particular episode, she's moved into my 'she's cool and I like her, but my God she annoys me sometimes' books. The cool thing about the different personalities is that it gives a little something for everyone.

Awesome by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 15:22:00 UTC Reply

Twilight Sparkle. Okay, gotcha.

I'll keep that in mind. Which episode, by the way?

About That Evil Dragon by sjosten on 2014-05-11 09:34:00 UTC Reply

I believe the dragon that was being referred to was actually Discord, who is a mish-mash of various creatures (ironically, so is a dragon) known in the show as a draconeques. Discord served as the big villain of the season two premiere before being reformed into a trickster style character in the third season. He is the embodiment of chaos, as well as the mini for this incarnation of My Little Pony. I imagine that means Tirek (who is a dragon [man this show likes dragons]) is the mini for the older generations?

Medical factoid! by SeaTurtle on 2014-05-10 20:27:00 UTC Reply

>"Someone collapses in the middle of the street, you give them CPR and then they're fine."

Not even close: CPR is administered when a victim is unconscious and no longer breathing. It involves compressing the chest at a specific point (from the bottom of the sternum, two fingers' width up, then one hand span above those fingers) five centimetres down (roughly two inches) for a 30 compressions to 2 breath cycle (breaths can be omitted if you don't know how to do them or if the mouth area is FUBAR) to the beat of the Bee Gees' Stayin' Alive.

CPR done right will dislocate/break the sternum and fracture ribs. Your victim will be in a world of Pain if they wake up. I say "if" because survival rates for cardiac arrests outside hospitals are very, very low: 8% according to this website. The main purpose of CPR is to artificially circulate oxygenated blood around the victim's body to delay tissue death and to give the paramedics something to work with.

Herp derp by Iximaz on 2014-05-10 22:21:00 UTC Reply

It's been a while since my training. I really need to take a first aid class again.

Your entire research on depression... by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-10 11:39:00 UTC Reply

...was talking to a nine-year old Bronie!?!

No wonder you don't have any idea about it. Seriously. That grotesque, nightmarishly-cheerful cartoon is literally not in the same universe as anything like true clinical depression.

Anyway, going back to what Iximaz said...

For a start, adults just plain can't get the same kind of intense hyper sugar highs that children do. That's called the "cube rule" but it's nothing to do with sugar cubes, just simple maths. If an adult is twice the size of a child all round (i.e. twice as tall, twice as wide widthways, twice as wide front-to-back) then it will need eight times the amount of sugar to produce the same result (because 8 is 2x2x2, the first 2 for twice the height, the second 2 for twice widthways, the final 2 for twice front-to-back.) This is why adults use alcohol or stronger drugs to get their buzz more efficiently!

And that's before you start taking into account the effects of depression in actively cancelling out the high. Despite what the ponies may have told your friend, true depression isn't merely an absence of happiness; it's something that actively seeks out and destroys happiness and turns it into misery.

You would know this if you'd done real research into the subject instead of asking a random kid about cute cartoon creatures! Even Wikipedia is better than that!

Okay, okay! by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-10 14:21:00 UTC Reply

You're not mad, I hope.

But from what I can tell, there are a few rare things from the show that are slightly grounded in reality. You never know.

Never heard of that rule, but it does kind of sound like common sense stuff. But maybe if it wasn't sugar... Now there's an idea.

Okay, maybe there was a lapse of judgement on my part, but don't make too much fun of me for it. He's a friend of my little brother, and I had to pretend that I was interested, so I tried to think of something in what he was saying that was at my level. You know?

Don't worry by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-10 16:39:00 UTC Reply

I like you. You mind me of a younger me but with less self awareness.

(Yeah, yeah, I know, objectively, that's probably not a very useful thing for you to be, but I like it anyway!)

We both have an overactive imagination that's always coming up with wonderful story ideas that won't go away, but we don't know how to do anything with our ideas to make them work or turn them into really good stories.

The difference is that you haven't given up trying. You still have that enthusiasm. It hasn't been drained out of you yet. Don't let us take that away from you!

(Now I'm picturing you dressed up as Fred Astaire, singing "They can't take that away from me...")

Anyway, let's get back to business.

What do you want to achieve, in story terms, with Vivian's history of mental illness? Is it just an excuse for her sugar/cocaine/Bleepcaine/whatever addiction? Or are you also going somewhere else with it?

If the depression's not important, then just drop it, and go with something else. (e.g. My earlier suggestion that she's a former badfic writer who, after joining the PPC, found herself transformed by an author's note she'd written as a kid, and now has superspeed and this implausible addiction to sugar as a result.)

OTOH how important is it, in story terms, that she comes from the real world? Are you going to do anything important with that?

If neither of these are important, then maybe you could just drop them both and say she comes from a universe where people's bodies react differently to sugar and so superspeed and sugar addiction are normal. Problem solved.

But if there's no other choice and she absolutely has to come from the real world with a real mental illness, you'd better do it realistically.

I've had a few mental health problems in the past, and I'm using that as part of the back story for one of my characters. But I'm trying to keep it realistic, and also making it an important part of his motivation for joining the PPC in the first place.

Anyway, keep on finding ideas. You're good at that. But also try and take time to let them breathe and grow naturally. And feed them with plenty of research. They'll thank you for it. Ideas love research the same way that Minis love bacon!

Thanks, I guess by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 04:05:00 UTC Reply

Thank you for that.

What do I intend to achieve with it... Well, I certainly wasn't using it only as an excuse to give her the sugar high (which is, even now, evolving into something more technologically advanced). I intended to bring it back every once in a while to force her to face the source of the depression, which mostly resulted from her long time in the field and watching someone she grew close to suffer. Forcing her to face those things, at the time, seemed like a good way to develope her character. Now that I am reevaluating my agents, I may choose something different, but that was the general idea.

I remember that suggestion. It's in my pool of possibilities still, along with a few others. If she were to be a former badfic writer, it would be interesting to bring in her former stories for missions... Oh, the possibilities!

I had a sense of irony in mind, actually. Ellis comes from a fanfiction story based in the early twentieth century, and therefore he would be behind the times, despite his ability to learn rather quickly. (Not Mary Sue quickly, but still...) Bessie, on the other hand, is a Mary Sue, and her grasp of logic, physics and reality in general are shaky. Wells was supposed to be the one out of the three who anchored them in reality the most. And there in lies the irony, because Wells is obviously the hyper one with the short attention span and stuff. I thought the idea was amusing.

I will, and thanks for the help. (air five)

Research by Miah on 2014-05-10 07:43:00 UTC Reply

To me that sounds like you are edging out of depressed territory and into Dissociative territory. That sounds like a near complete break with reality. I don't have any experience personally or research-wise with this, but I suppose you could be falling into something close to mania. (which can be very bad for your health, especially untreated, so no saying she is bipolar and in a manic phase just to explain away why she was depressed and is now super hyper and eating candy is not a good idea).

But I think the basic point to the entire Permission thread, and to these last two posts, are that you need to do some basic research on your own. It kind of seems like you operate like this: Idea! Post question about idea! Oh, someone says idea doesn't fit very well. Think thirty seconds, alter idea, post alteration!

I know that's probably a little overly blunt and a bit of an exaggeration on the time spent, but go read articles on clinical depression. If you aren't comprehending the first ones, read more. Check out the further information and related articles links. Google words you don't know.

Bad Medicine and Bad Psychology are two of my biggest pet peeves in fanfics. I know this information can be found on the Internet, because I've gone and done the research myself. I spent probably three weeks researching how EMTs respond to various emergencies. I watched real training videos, went to real product sites, and read real standard operating procedure manuals from several different companies/counties/hospitals that currently operate ambulance services. I had to look up a lot of medical jargon, and I also read blogs by EMTs that covered training scenarios and explained common slang. I did refrain from speaking to an actual EMT, which for accuracy's sake I really should have, but I don't do well in RL social situations. All of that research was to be able to fairly accurately write a single scene in a fanfic, and honestly the medical stuff was the background that allowed the plot stuff to happen--it wasn't even the centerpiece of the scene. If it had been the main point of the scene, or if the story was going to be about the EMT's, then I would have gotten out of my comfort zone and talked to people who actually do the work. The point being is that if you are going to write something that you don't already know about then you've really got to put in the effort for it.

Re: Research by Iximaz on 2014-05-10 22:25:00 UTC Reply

When I decided I wanted Rina to be allergic to Bleep products, I did some digging on allergic reactions and the different kinds and time before symptoms show up and such. When I realized there was a lot more to it than I originally thought, my 'bit of digging' turne into several hours' worth of poking around on medical websites and the like, gathering information.

I doubt any of the information will be used after one scene I have planned, but it's pretty important. Too much research? No such thing. You never know, that random bit of trivia you retained could be useful.
I agree with research by zdimensia on 2014-05-10 19:17:00 UTC Reply

Honestly, all it takes is time an effort to check whether something is "common knowledge" or just something that time-pressed television writers got wrong. Often that's why some shows hire a consultant if it's worth the budget.

Have her suffer from non-specific soap opera disease if it's so important. Or have the sugar addiction be a self-induced belief.
I see what you are trying to say, but... by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-10 14:14:00 UTC Reply

I have done some research into psychology, but it has been limited to psychopathy.

Also, I don't usually roll like that. Just saying. It is something that I usually do not do, and all that. In this case, I did some research, but it was clearly not enough to get by.

Attitude by Miah on 2014-05-11 06:53:00 UTC Reply

Okay, well, I am truly sorry you feel that way. Hopefully some day you will grow up and learn to help yourself and to take advice. Maybe one day after that has happened you will even get Permission with the PP...il something in your attitude has changed though, I don't believe I will be offering you any more help.

Good luck with your writing journey.

Wait, hold on by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 13:26:00 UTC Reply

I'm sorry, have I said something wrong? It's not that I'm not taking your advice, it's just that everyone else is also offering me advice and it's a little overwhelming.

If I said something that made you mad, I am sorry.

At a guess... by Neshomeh on 2014-05-11 18:40:00 UTC Reply

You said you "don't usually roll that way" about doing in-depth research, which is the number one thing people are shouting that you need to do, especially about a sensitive subject like depression. Being recalcitrant about putting in the effort on your own does tend to turn people off from trying to help. Some sooner than others.

If you meant something else, the context makes that very difficult to discern.

~Neshomeh

That was not what I meant by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-11 22:38:00 UTC Reply

I'm sorry, I'm sorry. That is not what I meant to say. I usually do research things, a lot. What I meant was that I don't usually jump into the writing and stuff before learning whatever I can about it. That is not how I roll. My mistake, I should have clarified.

I never meant to be mean or insensitive. Honestly, I didn't. Maybe I ought to post a formal apology thread to get this all sorted out. After that, I think I ought to take a day off from the Board. Just to get my stuff straight, as it were. (While I am away, I will do the research into clinical depression that everyone is telling me to do.)
Recalcitrant? by sjosten on 2014-05-11 19:56:00 UTC Reply

Working through a word of the day calendar?

Nope, just a good serviceable word. (nm) by Neshomeh on 2014-05-11 20:48:00 UTC Reply

Let's see, then. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-08 09:46:00 UTC Reply

As far as Spencer and Vivian go, I see no fundamental problems with them. You have the basic setup of thinky versus hyper, which should (could) work out well. I will point out that the Department of Finance isn't an Action Department - while I've got a 'mission' in the works for them, all their jobs are fundamentally desk jobs. And on Vivian, I'll also note that giving a character clinical depression - and then covering it up with a permanent sugar high - is something that certainly should lead to problems (for her) down the line. If you're not planning on that, either remove the depression, or start planning it.

Bessie... worries me. Perhaps appropriately for a Mary-Sue, her bio is riddled with plotholes. I'll just paste in the notes I took so you can see what I mean:

>Fairly contradictory. Intelligent but prone to implausible strategies? Strict code of honour she discards at will?
>Cunning/deceit doesn't usually combine with brute strength.
>Why was Plank on the mission /and/ performing missions.
>How did Plank persuade the Flowers to make her an agent? The Flowers are in charge.
>Why the torture of her?
>Why the idea that DMS is a 'promotion' from DCPS?
>How does Ellis know Bessie was a MS? Or, inversely, how does she /not/ know when everyone else seems to?

If I have seven issues with her and her backstory from just the bio, there's a fairly serious problem there.

Moving on to the samples:

Sample 1 I have only a couple of problems with, but given Sample 2, they may be significant. You say 'PPC compound', which suggests you may not understand what PPC HQ is like. You have an exclamation point in your narration, which is generally frowned on in third person; you also have a random capital letter on Brown hair and, worryingly, your 'Shakespearean' dialogue contains an error: t'is should be 'tis. If you're going to write in that style, you have to do it well - misusing Shakespearean English is a fairly common charge in missions. Still, overall, yes: you give a decent look at your agents.

But Sample 2... oh dear. I only wrote two notes, but they're big ones:

>Flowers do not speak in quotes! It's one of their primary characteristics
>The SO is wildly out of character in most of his lines. The only one that feels in is 'I cannot eat those. I am [a Sunflower].', and that one has a typo.

You seem to have a good grasp of your characters, though I'm still dubious about Bessie. Moreover, you seem to be able to write your characters, which is even more important than being able to craft bios.

But you are also displaying serious holes in your understanding of the PPC. 'Flowers speak in italics' isn't a subtle thing you can miss - it's a feature of every single one of their appearances. And your SO... doesn't feel like the SO.

Permission Checklist

-Active in the community - YES.
-Characters not Suvian - YES.
-Acceptable writing ability - YES.
-Understanding of the PPC - NO.

I'm going to turn down Permission at this time, based on that last concern. To put it another way, it feels like you've learned all the names of things without learning what they are. That's the same issue people raised in your big thread, and you don't appear to have solved it yet.

My advice is this: for each PPC concept that will appear in your writing - in this case, the SO and PPC HQ - read two or three missions or stories that contain them, from different authors where possible. So if you wanted to write something about DAVD, you could read this, this, this, and this. The Wiki will be your friend here - most pages have some form of 'Appearances' section, or failing that, there's the References. It might be more difficult with the SO, but he's in so much that you shouldn't have much trouble.

Once you've read about the character or concept - as presented in multiple contexts, and by multiple authors - be sure to base your version on what you've read.

With that in mind, unless other concerns are raised I'll be happy to consider this again in this same thread, if you'll provide:

-A rewritten version of Sample 2, with the SO in character. The suggestion above should help you do that.
-A 200-or-so word very short story with one or more of your agents going... oh... from their RC to the Cafeteria. No portals allowed.

Addressing some of my concerns about Bessie too wouldn't go amiss.

hS

My Revisions by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-09 15:50:00 UTC Reply

Here are the revisions you asked me to make.

First, Here is my revised bio of Bessie.
Agent #2)

Name: A. W. "Bessie" Besserdchenney

Species: Human

Age: 21

Appearance:
- Eye color: Unremarkable Brown
- Hair color: Brown, shoulder length
- Height: A little short for her age

Department: Department of Mary Sues, Freelance Division

Personality: She has a playful wit that she uses to either pull elaborate pranks on people or make fun of them. However, this does not make her intelligent, and she is prone to foolhardy moves in combat. She tries to stick to a strict code of honor; she will not fight an unarmed opponent, unless they show that they are capable of fighting her unarmed; she will not kill innocent civilians, unless they are non sentient; she will not kick someone while they are down or running away, unless they are a Mary Sue; she will not abandon people she is close to or feel need her. She is unaware that she was a Mary Sue in a previous life, and takes offense whenever someone calls her one.

Abilities: A powerhouse duelist, she has an almost perfect balance of agility and strength, which she employs with brutal ferocity in battle. Her Kampilon sword is sharp, her armor is hard, and she can learn from her mistakes and successes quickly.

Backstory: The character that would come to be known as Bessie originated in an unnamed Shakespeare Suefic. She was captured by PPC agents Plank and Wells, and her story was destroyed because of its mechanics and horrible geography and flora and fauna.

The experiments that Plank performed on her worked, if only in part, and Plank insisted that she be inducted as an Agent, despite various protests from all over the PPC that Bessie, as she was now called, was not fully de-Sued.

However, Bessie did become an Agent, and her first job was with the Disturbing Acts of Violence Department, Action Division. She participated in several classified assignments, the purpose of which was to damage her brain even more and suppress her memories of being a Mary Sue further.

However, she was removed from the Department due to her overly violent outbursts resulting from massive consumption of Flaming Balrog after missions. She was sent to the Medical Department, where she had a six week recovery period, and which sent her to the Character Protective Services upon orders from the Flowers.

It was during this time that Bessie became infatuated by various Harry Potter and Twilight characters.

After a distinguished mission in which Bessie saved Sirius Black from a Mary Sue Death Eater, she was transfered to the Department of Mary Sues as an assassin.

Next, I decided to add something else. Quite a few things are left unanswered by my not elaborating on Agent Plank, so I decided to include the bio for him as well. Please keep in mind that he is meant to be more of a supporting character.

Here it is.
Agent #4)

Name: Alfred Plank

Species: Human

Age: 59

Appearance:
- Eye color: Grey
- Hair: White and messy
- Height: Slightly above average

Department: Department of Mary Sue Experimentation and Research

Abilities: Aside from being a crack shot with a Phaser and an ambitious inventer, Plank is a veteran agent with a highly developed understanding of Mary Sues and Sue Wraiths.

Personality: He has a scientific curiosity in all things to do with Mary Sues, going beyond normal boundaries and even coming across as obsessive and pushy. He takes risks that most other scientists wouldn't take, partly because he is going senile. He has a passionate hatred of Mary Sues, and after contracting Suemonia and starting to become Sued, he began to loath himself.

Backstory: Little is known about his early life, except that he probably came from a Star Trek fanfic. What is known is that he joined the PPC around twenty-five years ago. During his time in the Department of Floaters, he began showing an aptitude for using chemical components as weapons. Because of this, he was made an assassin in the Department of Mary Sues.

He went through several partners, all of whom have apparently been killed in action, from year one to year twenty. It was then that he met a clinically depressed Agent Vivian Wells, who he helped recover by giving her candy laced with hyper adrenaline chemicals that gave her an almost perpetual sugar high and granted her superior speed.

This began a successful partnership between the two, until nearly five years later, when the PPC discovered a badfic that has since been wiped out. The target Mary Sue was captured instead of killed so that Plank could study Mary Sue psychology and learn new ways to alter their minds.

After one particularly difficult mission involving the capture of Bessie, Plank contracted Suemonia, which began turning him into the very thing he hated most. He started taking Bleepium, a serum of his own design meant to block out entire aspects of one's personality.

To this day, he strives to find a true cure for Mary Sues.

And finally, here is the new writing prompt that you gave me, "The agents walk from their Response Center to the cafeteria."

"Slow down, Wells!" Ellis begged. "We can't all go as fast as you can."

But the hyperactive Wells giggled and told her friends, "You should have packed light, like I did."

Ellis turned red. "Will ya stop callin' me fat?"

"Thy antics art bothering me too, Wells." Bessie was panting and sweating from the weight of her armor. "Wouldst thou please sloweth down?"

Wells stopped zigzagging down the halls and turned to face them. "Okay, okay, fine. But let's please hurry."

Relief dawned on Bessie ' s face as she told her friend, "I do not knoweth wherefore thou art so excited to get thyself to the cafeteria, mine friend. Most times, the food is abhorrent."

"I agree with her, though, Bessie." Ellis told her. "I'm so hungry, I'd eat about anything."

The trio meandered through the halls, becoming less and less sure of their current location. Wells became less and less patient, and this began to make Ellis angry.

"If you want to there so bad, then help us find it!" he finally snapped.

"Just follow me, then." Wells almost took off at high speeds, but stopped herself at the last second and led them along at an almost leisurely pace.

"A truly excellent show of restraint, mine friend." Bessie congratulated Wells. "I am proud of thee."

"Yes, thank you." Something about the way that Wells answered bothered Ellis. He could not put his finger on it. But there was clearly some unspoken tension between his partners, for whatever reason.

How was that? Better?

Permission denied at this time. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-09 16:19:00 UTC Reply

Leaving aside absolutely everything else that's come up in this thread, your Sample 3 at the end demonstrates that you did not do the research on what makes navigating HQ difficult. Since the prompt was given with the explicit intent that:

for each PPC concept that will appear in your writing - in this case, the SO and PPC HQ - read two or three missions or stories that contain them, from different authors where possible. [...]

Once you've read about the character or concept - as presented in multiple contexts, and by multiple authors - be sure to base your version on what you've read.

You also continue to show problems with the Shakespearean English that you want to use - to take a single example, 'I do not knoweth' is wildly wrong - and for some reason have only responded to the first comment I made about Bessie. You've kept the torture, and added abuse of prescription drugs to Plank's repertoire. I'm pretty sure adrenaline is not a cure for depression. And you now have Plank both hating Mary-Sues and trying to find a cure for them, which is a massive contradiction.

You haven't offered any explanation for Plank switching randomly between DMS and DMSE&R, for the fact that the Flowers have apparently allowed an agent to join despite their disapproval - for the fact that they disapprove at all - for the reason Bessie was given to the assassin Plank for rehabilitation rather than to FicPsych - for your insistence that DMS is a 'promotion' from DCPS.

You also haven't rewritten Sample 2, which I specifically requested. As a consequence of all these things, I have to say Permission Denied at this time. That doesn't mean you should try to make frantic changes and repost as soon as possible - it means you should sit back, read a few missions (maybe even review them as Neshomeh suggested), get a better feel for what the PPC is like, and rework your characters. Pippa has uploaded her prospective agents onto her blog on the Wiki, and I think that's a brilliant way to get concrit on them without constantly making new threads. But however you do it, do not go away right now and start crossing things out. That's the best way to end up with a wrecked and useless character. Characters should be cohesive wholes, not a bundle of edits made in response to specific comments.

I really wanted to be able to grant Permission here, Dark Brother 16. You can spell-and-punctuate, you have ideas I think are interesting, and the combination of grumpy control freak, ditzy sugar-high, and Shakespearean duelist looked really interesting. But every time you've added more information it's revealed bigger and bigger holes in the logic of the characters - and in your understanding of the PPC. I'm sorry. But if you take all the suggestions people have made to heart, work on making logically-sound agents who fit into the framework of the PPC rather than trying to bend that framework around them, and ask again in a month or two, we will definitely consider it again.

hS

Right, then. by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-09 16:26:00 UTC Reply

How disappointing. However, this is a good learning experience for me. I'll try harder to develope my agents, and I will do more research (which I have done, by the way, but obviously not very well).

I will be back for permission, eventually. Until then, I have some reading to do. Thank you for your help.

To clarify about research & HQ. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-09 16:39:00 UTC Reply

The defining characteristic of HQ - and the thing I was looking for in Sample 3 - was stated by Jay Thorntree way back when: "It's a bit of a maze, unless you haven't noticed." You do not get anywhere in Headquarters by trying to find it - instead, you distract yourself with music or rambling conversation, try looking for a different room, or in many cases, bang your head into a wall until you're dizzy. There's as many ways to do it as there are writers - but you didn't use any of them. You took my prompt as 'write some people walking', which was exactly what I wanted not to see.

That's the sort of research-and-reading I'm talking about.

hS

Mm-hm by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-09 17:09:00 UTC Reply

I did read that about HQ. Looks like I failed to recreate it very well. I will practice these things after I read them.

I disagree on one point. by Phobos on 2014-05-08 16:54:00 UTC Reply

While I agree that Dark Brother has been active in the community, and that his writing is technically acceptable, I feel that the characters presented are all a bit speshul and/or contradictory. I won't bother mentioning Bessie, since you've done an excellent job of cataloging those problems. Here are some instances in the other agents:

Ellis "work[s] cohesively with whatever group he is in" and has the makings of a fine leader. However, he doesn't really care about the emotional needs of others and he isn't well liked (which makes sense, since Dark Brother mentioned elsewhere that he is supposed to be unlikable). Those things don't seem to add up.

Plank gets Suemonia from contact with a powerful Mary Sue but it doesn't affect him at all like it does other people. Also, is he in an action department or in DMSE&R? If the former, why was he experimenting on a captured Sue? If the latter, why was he on a Mary Sue mission with someone who was, as far as I can tell, in the DTO?

Wells is a World-One human who gets super speed from a combination of clinical depression and sugar-high. Enough said, on that one.

So, all of this means I, personally, can't give a pass on the characters.

-Phobos

Ellis. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-08 17:08:00 UTC Reply

My notes described Ellis simply as 'Control freak'. The impression I got is that he will work with whatever tools (y'know, other people) he's got, but not treat them as people. He doesn't care about their feelings, but basically wants to keep them intact because they're useful. The phrase 'has greater need for dominance, leadership and attention than is usual' fits into this - it's not actually talking about I'll-lead-and-you-follow type of leadership, but more, well...

... actually, more like how I imagine the Strategist, ironically enough. I don't like him, but I can see him as an interesting character.

Plank is only talked about in Bessie's bio, so I covered him in there, but I do agree with your comments.

Wells... well, I think she's basically a hyperactive fangirl. I have no problem with her sugar high giving her super speed (or even 'runs everywhere and so looks like she has super speed') because Pippa's not-so-silly suggestion makes perfect sense to me. At least the parts about sugar highs. Maybe she got first-person'd into an author's note of the kind Pippa describes, and can't shake it off? That would be funny, I think.

hS

Re: Ellis. by Phobos on 2014-05-08 18:53:00 UTC Reply

I didn't see Pippa's comments. They seem to have been posted about the same time as my comment, which always seems to happen, doesn't it? I do agree with her and you that with an appropriate explanation, it could work. And a number of people have offered a lot of possible explanations for the problems that have come up.

My problem comes down to this: When does it become Dark Brother's responsibility to explain his own characters?

You give him the benefit of the doubt and point to many explanations that could work, but none of it is in evidence in the permission request.

For me, there is just too much doubt. Too many things need explanation. We should not need to make so many assumptions and speculations about the characters' basic information.

-Phobos

Again, I partially agree. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-08 21:37:00 UTC Reply

Specifically, I agree about Wells. I think I did bring up her depression/hyper dichotomy, though I don't believe I mentioned the speed thing. So yeah, I think that needs explaining.

But Ellis... I don't feel like I'm coming up with an explanation. 'Control freak' is what I read right there on the page. I mean, look at his 'personality' bio again:

He is highly focused on academics, has greater need for dominance, leadership and attention than is usual, and he prefers initiating activity. He is very detail oriented, and can therefore catch things about someone's personality that others wouldn't based on small bits of evidence. He can learn very quickly, and he feels uncomfortable without a detailed plan laid out. He therefore is strongly agitated whenever someone doesn't follow the plan. Likewise, he becomes irritated whenever someone does something without telling him first. He holds the emotional needs of others in very low consequence, and is therefore not generally liked among the other, rather mentally unstable Agents. However, he hates losing someone during a mission and will obssess over their overall safety.

The only thing I've snipped is the 'racism' part at the end. Every other sentence in the bio supports the idea that he is very clever, very good at forming plans, has a burning need to be in charge and have everyone follow his plans - and doesn't care about them as people in any way, but as elements of the plan.

The only place that breaks down is in 'abilities', and I admit I didn't see that on my first read. Let's take a look:

...his ability to analyze a situation, create complex battle plans, improvise when those plans fail, and work cohesively with whatever group he is in. He also has the makings of a fine leader.

Analyse a situation. Create plans. Those fit perfectly with what we've already been told. The last three clauses are a bit more debatable, but the fact that he is good at improvising, doesn't invalidate the fact that he dislikes doing so. I'm not actually sure what the phrase 'work cohesively with' means ;), but Ellis - as described - could certainly work-with-as-in-use any group. Y'know, provided he was allowed to issue orders.

As to 'the makings of a fine leader'... only if he learns to get his ego under control! And that, yes, is jarringly different from what we've been told. But one line doesn't break a character.

Anyway. Hopefully, Dark Brother 16 will be reading everything that's being said about his characters, in an attempt to learn what problems there are and what to do about them. Hopefully, he'll take this hint I'm dropping - this one, right here - and rework his bios so that every portion of the personality and abilities is justified by the history (which is something I'm going to put into the doc right now). If he doesn't read the entirety of his own Permission thread... then that says something else entirely, doesn't it?

hS

Additional concern. by Neshomeh on 2014-05-08 14:53:00 UTC Reply

Just want to put this out there: I get the impression that Dark Brother isn't actually interested in writing about the PPC for its own sake, but rather for an extra dimension he can tack on to his original story. Kinda like how he doesn't seem interested in editing the wiki to make it better, but simply to collect badges. This is borne out in a lot of the question threads he's started since joining, but perhaps most worryingly in this thread, which is less than two weeks old.

Until I see signs of that changing—such as him reading and possibly reviewing missions, demonstrating a regard for PPC concepts, and giving up (not just backpedaling and tweaking, giving up) the kinds of overlarge, high conflict spinoff ideas that I and others have objected to—I'm not personally going to be in favor of giving him Permission. That's not gonna change in just a few days.

~Neshomeh

Further to what hS said... by wobblestheclown on 2014-05-08 16:52:00 UTC Reply

Remind me again how grand and sweeping done well is, y'know, bad? I get you having reservations about particular people doing it, but in and of itself, "overlarge" is a meaningless descriptor to dole out as a negative. Hell, you could chuck it at George R. R. Martin from the moment he introduced the rest of Essos, and at Iain M. Banks for, well, pretty much every book involving the Culture.

I'm also not particularly fond of how you're talking about him asking questions. How else is he supposed to learn about the intricacies of the PPC, osmosis? I mean, I did a lot of research before coming in, but that's because my life's about as empty as it's possible for a human life to be. Asking people questions is [i]how human beings learn[/i]. You may consider it pointless, you might consider the questions witless, but you've been here for a lot longer than he has and you have sufficient knowledge of the PPC to be a permission giver. Not everyone has that knowledge base, particularly someone who hasn't been around very long.

Oh, while I'm here, so what if he wants to write something as a spinoff? We're fanfiction authors, for goodness's sake. We don't write anything [i]except[/i] spinoffs. Hell, my most Internet-famous piece of writing is the bastard offspring of a medieval folk ballad and My Little frigging Pony. It's a spinoff of two different, totally disparate themes, and it seems to make people laugh.

tl;dr: I understand where you're coming from in regards to PPC knowledge base; I just think you're overegging that particular pudding a bit.

Allow me to clarify. by Neshomeh on 2014-05-08 18:07:00 UTC Reply

I think some of what you said is addressed in my reply to hS, but a few things in particular:

- Grand and sweeping done well is great... in a universe that was built to accommodate it. The PPC wasn't; the PPC was built for short and silly lampoons of bad fanfic. If you've been around long enough to build up the trust and experience to pull it off, maybe you can try something grander here, but no newbie in the history of ever has had those qualifiers. Overlarge with the implied for this context is a valid complaint, I think.

- I was not complaining about Dark Brother asking questions. I was pointing to his question threads as places to discover the intent I'm concerned about. (That said, it does say right up in the Board's header that doing research before asking a question is a good idea. It perfectly reasonable for me to have that expectation.)

- All PPC spinoffs are indeed spinoffs... of Jay and Acacia's Original Series. Or at least they should be. If you're trying to make it into something else with a PPC decal slapped on for show, that's a problem in my book, just as writing a so-called Lord of the Rings fic that relates to the original in name only is a problem in my book.

I think you may have been expecting the worst of me here. I hope this gives a more accurate sense of my meaning.

~Neshomeh

I was. I have a tendency to do so of people. by wobblestheclown on 2014-05-10 01:25:00 UTC Reply

For that, I apologise. I may not agree with you, particularly on the subject of scale in comically-oriented universes (read Sluggy Freelance all the way through for my rebuttal), but it was wrong of me to put my reservations in such a diffident way. Reading through your response to hS, which did not exist while I was writing the original comment, I can see what you were driving at. I shouldn't have snapped at you and I'm sorry for it.

You misconstrue my point about spinoffs, though. Not only are PPC fics spinoffs of TOS, they're also fanfiction for the universe we're entering (specifically a weirdly meta breed of Fix Fic), and fanfiction by its very nature is transformative. I've read tender character-driven stories based on grotesquely violent anime series and Cornwell-style war stories based on a Western show about talking animals in various delightful pastel shades. Good is good, regardless of the original intent of the setting. I don't hold with diving headlong into a game of Obscure Trivia Bingo at the expense of telling a good story, much like I can forgive slightly iffy grammar and spelling if the ideas are praiseworthy.

Iunno, I guess I'm just more lenient than a Boarder should be.

I dunno, but... I dunno. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-08 15:50:00 UTC Reply

I agree that the wiki editing was bad, but I don't think he's done it in the last few days; granted that might indicate he was busy, but I'm willing to hope he's actually paid attention to the things we've said.

On the subject of isn't actually interested in writing about the PPC for its own sake, but rather for an extra dimension he can tack on to his original story... well, how much of a 'bad thing' is that? Always provided the PPC writing is done well, I don't know that I'd feel comfortable objecting that people weren't paying their fanfic enough attention, but were writing their own things instead. ;) To put it another way - after The Ispace Wars ends I plan on opening it up as a free-to-write-for shared universe, but won't be offended if people only use it as an add-on to the PPC.

Your other comments, however, I don't have much objection to. Reading missions was one I mentioned in my response - my 'recommendation' was more of an instruction ;) - though the idea of reviewing them didn't occur to me (though it should have). 'Demonstrating a regard for PPC concepts' is essentially what I failed the request on. As for giving up on 'overlarge, high conflict spinoff ideas'... well, perhaps I have a higher tolerance for those that most. Given my history (and my History) I'd look a bit hypocritical saying 'No overarching plotlines! No big stories! No drama!'.

hS

The difference... by Neshomeh on 2014-05-08 17:01:00 UTC Reply

... is that you didn't start out by saying you were going to co-opt the PPC universe and cause trouble in it (say, by resurrecting killed Legendary Badfics) for your own side-purposes. I think we absolutely can and should object to people coming in with that mentality. In fact, we do often tell people to start small and not immediately go gunning for Legendaries, novel-length AUs, or bottom-of-the-barrel squick. I feel that's appropriate, and I think we can quite reasonably extend that response to this situation.

Also, the heart of my concern is that I think writing for a world and concepts you aren't invested for their own sake basically guarantees they're not going to be well-written, just as they weren't well-written here, and we'll keep seeing more of the same until that changes. It's not that I think no one should ever write other stuff and the PPC at the same time, or even that no one should ever involve the PPC with outside stuff. It's that, at this time and for the near future, I don't trust that the stuff I have some guardianship over will be handled well. That could totally change, but only over time.

So, tl;dr, I don't want to see your "no" reversed too soon, is all.

~Neshomeh

Okay. by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 13:53:00 UTC Reply

Alright, thanks. I'll have these redone and typed out again in a few days.

Permission Request, Part 2 by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 04:57:00 UTC Reply

To every Boarder who hates Mary Sues, this is my permission request, part two!

Okay, I chose both of the prompts at random, and here they stand.

Control: The agents first meet

Random: The agents meet a robot in HQ wearing a mask of a canon character, OR, one Agent plans a surprise party for the others.

As I have said before, I will likely separate the prompts. One will be located here, and the other will be located in the response to this response.

Without further ado, here is what I have for you.

Response Center 525, one of only a few triplexes in the entire PPC compound. This was Ellis' new home. He knew better than to hope for a partner who was anything like he was.

Sure enough, as he opened the door, utter chaos struck him hard in the face!

Or rather, a Boston Crème Pie hit him hard in the face. Ellis began swearing profusely, dropped his luggage and began wiping the crème out of his face.

"Oh, no!" cried a high, scratchy, yet distinctly feminine voice. "Oh, I'm sorry. I fell into that broken table again. Here, let me help you."

Ellis felt a cloth begin wiping off his face. "No, 't'sall right, I got it. Jus- hey- stop." he added when she didn't stop.

Whoever she was, she gave him his space as he finally managed to open his eyes. His new partner was slightly shorter than he was, and had Brown eyes and dirty blonde hair that stood up, as if they had been blown back while she had been traveling at high speeds.

She began shaking his hand furiously. "Hi! I'm Vivian Wells, your new partner."

Ellis drew back, regained his balance, then told her, "Nice t'meet ya." Though he didn't entirely sound like it was nice to meet her at all. "I'm Spencer Ellis."

"Want some?" Wells offered him some sweets. "You look like you might enjoy these."

Spluttering in indignation, Ellis demanded, "Is that a fat joke?"

Wells giggled mischievously as she burst away toward her side of the RC, 525-B, with inhuman speed.

"Do not, Mr Ellis, take offense to her joking personality," came a bored, imperious voice from 525-C. "She means only to test you and find your limits."

This voice belonged to a slightly short young woman with brown eyes and brown, shoulder length hair. She could not have been more different from Wells, as, instead of wearing a tank top with a daisy on it and sweats, she wore a set of steel plate armor.

But Ellis knew who this was. "You! You're-"

"Bessie. Aye, t'is so. Like many others, you know me, then?"

"I..." Ellis struggled to find a new subject. "I... I gotta unpack."

"Very well." Bessie replied, turning to return to 525-C. "Consider fixing the table Wells broke."

And that is the control prompt, everyone! I am experiencing difficulties with posting both of the prompts, there fore the next one, the random one, will be up momentarily in the reply to this reply. Stand by!

Permission Request, Part 3 by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 05:03:00 UTC Reply

Coming up next: the random prompt. "One Agent plans a surprise party for the others."

The Sunflower Official nodded its head- or whatever it was really called- as it replied, "Yes, I think that something like this would be exactly what Agents Ellis and Bessie need."

Thus encouraged, Wells pressed the advantage. "Yeah, Ellis is feeling stressed out and stuff. He feels unappreciated."

"As for Bessie, "the Sunflower Official added, "I will not pretend that I do not have my reservations about her, but the fact is that she is an official member of the PPC. We take care of our own, as much as is possible."

Wells smiled uncertainty. "She really isn't all that bad. I think that, by now, it won't matter what she was. We are her friends, and, like, she really feels that that means we are family. Candy?" she asked politely as she offered him some sweets.

But the Sunflower Official held up its leafy arm. "I cannot eat those. I am sunflower."

"Oh, right." Wells giggled. She popped the candy into her mouth and felt the rush of energy fill her veins and heard the hum of the world around her slowing. "I'd better go and get started with the preparations, then."

"Alright. Have a nice day." The response was very strange, coming to Wells in slow motion.

Wells rushed off at the top speed that she could maintain for however long she needed. She had work to do, and she needed Plank ' s help.

And that is all, ladies and gentlemen! Please tell me what you think. If I have permission, the link to the badfic I have claimed is in the response to this response, because it is giving me issues again. If I don't have permission, ease tell me how I may improve, because I, like everyone else here doubtlessly does, like to improve myself.

Not a PG, but My Opinion by sjosten on 2014-05-08 05:31:00 UTC Reply

The writing samples seem rather short. Plus, since the second one only has Wells, I think you'll be asked to redo them. They're supposed to let us see how you write your characters, and all we really got from Bessie was her saying hi. However, you did write quite a bit for your character intros, so I feel like we have a little to go on from those. Bessie seems like she'll be an interesting character, but you seem to forget that there are many former 'Sues working in the PPC. As such, the prejudices against her would most likely come from few besides her partner. Speaking of Ellis, he seems rather unlikable. Very sure of himself, very spiteful, and very abrasive. For Wells, there is one thing in particular that catches my eye. You say she was clinically depressed at one point, then Bessie inadvertently killed her partner. This tortured past doesn't seem to fit with her energetic character, no matter how much candy she's gnawing on. Also, would she really want to be near Bessie after Plank caught Suemonia from her? I mean, the Flowers might like their buddy cop mismatches, but that seems a bit much. Lastly, where does Wells come from? You never mentioned it in her bio, and I'm curious as to why you didn't simply say "Oh, she comes from the DC Universe" or some such to explain her super speed.

Oh, I see by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 06:40:00 UTC Reply

Mm-hm. Good advice, thanks. However, I have a fee things I want to point out, which I probably should have mentioned in the bios and excerpts.

1. The writing samples, I think, we're only supposed to be 200-400 words long, so I didn't have a lot of room there.

2. There are other Agents that used to be Mary Sues, I am aware of thst. The controversy is that there are those who believe that she didn't go through enough "reengineering", if you will. I had hoped to make that plain in the bio, but maybe I should touch up on that.

3. Yes, Ellis is supposed to be unlikable at first. That is the point of his character development. Also, I had hoped to have a lot of the comedy happen to him for a while.

4. That is a good point, the relationship between Wells and Bessie ought to show some kind of strain. It's only human for that to happen. Maybe... Naw, that won't work. I'll think of something.

5. She was meant to come from the real world. You're right, I forgot to include that in the bio. My bad.

Silly question and a sillier suggestion by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-08 16:53:00 UTC Reply

Now I'm very confused. This is probably a very silly question, but...

If Vivian Wells is from the real world, why does she have superspeed? Maybe you haven't noticed this, but real people don't have that kind of superpower. (At least, I don't think they do, do they?)

You hint that it might be connected with all the sweets she eats, but that's more likely to just make her fat, unless there's something very weird about the way her body's biochemistry reacts to sugar. Although, since sugar can also apparently cure her clinical depression, maybe that is the case.

(If it really was that easy to cure depression, all the antidepressant manufacturers would've gone bankrupt long ago! I know from sad, personal experience that eating lots of sugar when you're clinically depressed just gives you the energy to convert your depression into random anger and aggression.)

Hmmmm...

There might be one specific type of people in the PPC's version of the real world who respond to sugar the way Vivian does. Badfic writers often leave author's notes saying thing like, "AN: Soz this chapters so craaaazy but id just had sum sugar wren i rote it and i wz rly rly hyper!!!" What if those excuses are true in the PPCverse? And Badfic writers really do react strangely to sugar?

So... Vivian could be a former badfic writer who joined the PPC to make amends for all the bad stories she wrote when she was younger.

This would also the relationship between Vivian and Bessie. Bessie is from a fic that Vivian wrote, so Vivian feels a sort of motherly affection towards Bessie. That's why she's forgiven her for infecting Agent Plank. And, of course, you'll have the humour of someone with the personality of a hyperactive 12-year-old wanting to act like a protective mother to someone who is emotionally more mature than her. (Especially if Bessie doesn't know why she's doing it!)

However, that's only a suggestion and it probably doesn't fit in with any of your other ideas, so just ignore it and go with something better instead.

I will hopefully explain it all in the next attempt by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 22:54:00 UTC Reply

I will try and address these concerns of yours in my next attempt at getting permission. Since I have to fix a few things, I may as well look into all of these. They are good points, after all.

Re: Oh, I see by sjosten on 2014-05-08 07:45:00 UTC Reply

Ah, now I see why they're so short. I believe the 200-400 words limit was intended to be for the character descriptions, and not the writing samples. Also, perhaps I simply haven't noticed it, but I don't remember any of the 'Sue agents being "re-engineered" before. Honestly, it almost comes off as creepy. The way you've described it, it sounds like we're brainwashing the poor thing, then traumatizing her so she'll accept the brainwashing. I mean, we traumatize everyone here, but the brainwashing thing is a bit off. Hopefully, I just misunderstand what you're trying to convey.

RE: by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 13:49:00 UTC Reply

Oh, I didn't know that. The word counts are only for the bios? Okay.

Not all Mary Sue agents get the treatment that mine will get. It's a bit experimental, and obviously highly controversial. It is also a parody of Mary Sues having Dark backstories.
RE: by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 13:48:00 UTC Reply

Oh, I didn't know that. The word counts are only for the bios? Okay.

Not all Mary Sue agents get the treatment that mine will get. It's a bit experimental, and obviously highly controversial.
Word limit applies to samples too. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-08 09:03:00 UTC Reply

For two reasons:

1/ We don't want you to think you have to write 10,000 words about a random prompt you're not interested in. ;)

2/ Long stories take longer to read.

3/ It arguably takes more skill to present a character in 300 words than 3000.

Three reasons. Our three reasons are-- look, I'll come in again.

No one expects the hS

That seems like a harsh limit to me by the Irish Samurai on 2014-05-08 13:13:00 UTC Reply

At least, if you're going to enforce the 'max. 400' bit. I think that's fine for a character bio, which is just supposed to be a summary anyway, but seems like it'd be quite restrictive for the actual writing sample. Not that I think it's a bad idea to have word limits on the samples, but I think the bios and the sample should have different limits (at least in terms of the maximum allowed).

For reference, my own Permission piece was just over 2500 words. While it was an extended scene that I could've shorter, I'm not sure that I'd have been able to show off my characters and that I understood the PPC universe sufficiently well if I'd been limited to 400 words.

Which are the sort of reasons... by Huinesoron on 2014-05-08 13:55:00 UTC Reply

... the whole process is still in 'open beta'. ;)

I understand what you're saying, and it's true that the numbers in that section are essentially random - but I also think that a shorter story is better. Remember, you've already given us a bio, so we know who your characters are - we're trying to see that you can write them, too.

I think there's a balance to be struck, too, between 'what's useful' and 'what won't turn people off'. If we say (for instance) 'You must write two 1000-word stories to be considered for Permission', we're heading back into Pippa's 'exam' territory - that's more than a day of NaNo, for Aule's sake!

That said, the stories of mine which I think of as analogous to the samples are up around 800 words... hrm. What about a 'guideline' of 400-800, with a note that you can go higher or lower if you feel like it - but watch out for on the one hand, not giving enough to work on, and on the other, waffling?

Okay, blind test time. I've rolled myself up a prompt, 5-6:

The agents discuss their career plans (current or past).

OR

One agent tries to impersonate a Flower.

And this is what I think would constitute a decent writing sample:

-----

"Department of Operations, Building Maintenance Division. Whaddaya want?"

I glanced at Lou, still leaning against the wall, and she nodded cheerfully. Taking a deep breath, I bent over the microphone.

"This is the Really Big Monkey Puzzle Tree," I said, putting on my best breathy 'Flower' voice, and trying to give off a feel of being large, spikey, and wooden. "I require your assistance in-"

"Quit joking around," the voice from Building Maintenance said. "Do you need anything or not?"

"Er, no," I managed, dropping back into my normal voice. "Sorry. It... sorry." I hit the switch to cut the circuit, then turned and glared at my partner.

"You knew that was going to happen."

"Oh, Narto," Lou said, grinning, "of course I did. I always know." She flicked her head slightly in the direction of the ceiling.

I looked up at the Generic Surface, and at the massive yellow-black stain that covered half of it. "Fine," I grumbled, "be like that. But have you got a better idea for getting it cleaned?"

"Always." Lou pushed off the wall and vanished into the bathroom, returning a moment later with a black towel. "There you go, get to work."

"... this is my towel."

"And it was your experiment," Lou said. "Come on, Narto, keep up."

-----

That's 215 words (possible a little less, depending on how Word dealt with the HTML), but it shows a) that I can write properly, b) how my agents interact, c) that I can make something of the prompt other than a literal 'Ho ho, see my impersonation', and d) that I can make use of PPC concepts. (That was Colt in BM, by the way, since he was given to me. A bit cheeky, I know)

We're not trying to conduct an evaluation of every aspect of your skill at writing. Those four things are what we're looking for - and you don't need thousands of words to do it.

Still, I'm (thankfully!) not Permission Dictator General. If we can generate a discussion, I'll update the document with the consensus version.

Aside from all of that: I don't think we'd 'enforce' the word limit, no. Part of the PPC's Thing is taking ideas and running with them - we could hardly say no to a 'I started writing this and it kept taking me really interesting places!', could we?

hS

Hmm, that does feel too short to me. by Neshomeh on 2014-05-08 15:37:00 UTC Reply

Definitely at least 400, maybe 500 words each. Any less than that may come off as a bit of a shallow effort. 800 is probably a good upper signpost (unless you're turning it into a full interlude, in which case, cool).

For a counter-example, this writing sample, which could be a response to "the agents receive a mission" and which I enjoy quite a bit (not sure if in spite of or because of fourth-wall-pushing meta), is 775 words according to the Word Count Tool add-on I have for Firefox. It could be a little shorter, perhaps, but it's not long by any means, and it feels more like a complete, solid narrative, with multiple exchanges between the characters. They feel more whole and grounded to me than Narto and Lou in your example, possibly because they were given more space to breathe. They don't feel like vehicles for a punchline, whereas Narto and Lou in this instance do. In the absence of any description or particularly defining mannerisms, you could probably swap in any two names, and it would still work as well. (Also you inserted a paragraph break between two of Narto's lines and it was confusing because I was expecting a change of speaker. >.> )

So yeah, I'd rather see longer writing samples.

~Neshomeh

Well (again). by Huinesoron on 2014-05-09 14:39:00 UTC Reply

First up, a 2:1 consensus is still a consensus, so I've changed the doc. And actually, since it's Friday already, I'll be rolling it out onto the Wiki tonight. People are already using it, so that's not going to change anything - and I'll leave the table open for comments at the same address!

As to my 'sample'... well, for one, I object (StReNuOuSlY1!1) to the idea that you could swap in any two names. In fact, let's do it and see!

-----

"Department of Operations, Building Maintenance Division. Whaddaya want?"

Selene glanced at Dafydd, still leaning against the wall, and he nodded cheerfully. Taking a deep breath, Selene bent over the microphone.

"This is the Really Big Monkey Puzzle Tree," the vampire said, putting on her best breathy 'Flower' voice, and trying to give off a feel of being large, spikey, and wooden. "I require your assistance in-"

"Quit joking around," the voice from Building Maintenance said. "Do you need anything or not?"

"Er, no," Selene managed, dropping back into her normal voice. "Sorry. It... sorry." She hit the switch to cut the circuit, then turned and glared at her partner. "You knew that was going to happen."

"Oh, Selene," Dafydd said, grinning, "of course I did. I always know." He flicked his head slightly in the direction of the ceiling.

Selene looked up at the Generic Surface, and at the massive yellow-black stain that covered half of it. "Fine," she grumbled, "be like that. But have you got a better idea for getting it cleaned?"

"Always." Dafydd pushed off the wall and vanished into the bathroom, returning a moment later with a black towel. "There you go, get to work."

"... this is my towel."

"And it was your experiment," Dafydd said. "Come on, Selene, keep up."

-----

That would be wildly out of character for Selene (even though she fits into the same Junior Partner slot), and for Dafydd, too. Not just the situation as a whole - the words. You know, without even having to ask, how Selene would react to someone telling her to use her towel to clean the RC, and it ain't pretty. Narto, though, is submissive enough to potentially do it (though honestly, I suspect Lou will stop him before he actually ruins his towel).

More to the point, you say 'in the absence of any description'. I'm sure you're not suggesting that every writing sample - which are given in concert with a bio which contains a physical description - must state the colour of every character's hair and eyes, their general body shape, etc etc. But since there was a fair amount of movement in the story, can you clarify what you are suggesting? I'm a little lost.

But apart from all that... from what you're saying, I get the feeling you're wanting the writing samples to be complete stories - ie, you could come into them cold, with no supporting material, and 'get' them in their entirety. (Actually, that's not interpretation, is it? You said 'feels more like a complete, solid narrative') But... why? That means our requirement to get permission to write PPC stories is no longer 'you must be able to spell', but 'you must have written two complete stories set in the PPC universe which pass muster with your Permission Giver'. That's a very high bar to set for a universe we want people to write in - and to learn to improve their writing while writing in.

That was a lot of words (again!) so I'll close with a suggestion. How about we give the Control Prompt a high wordcount (500-1000), and an explicitly stated expectation that it be a complete story - ie, what people were doing anyway. But then we give the random prompt a low count (300-500), and state that it's expected to be a snapshot - ie, not a complete story. It's something that could be a scene in a mission or interlude, not a comprehensive story in itself.

That would mean our control prompts gave something like this - Dafydd's introduction (which clocks in at around 600 words) - while the random prompts would be something more like one partner apologises to the other:

-----

Dafydd wandered back to the response centre, meandering through the grey corridors, idly dreaming his dreams. Of course, as he was in no hurry to arrive at his destination, he was there within seconds. Opening the door, he stepped through and was greeted by the sight of someone he hadn’t seen in a long time.

Selene was slumped in the corner of the room, looking more tired than Dafydd had ever seen her before. Still, she was still glaring at him, and he did have a crossbow aimed at his head so she was obviously still mostly herself. Dafydd’s well-honed preservation instincts kicked in.

“I’msorryI’msorryI’msorrywhateverIdidIdidn’tmeantodoitpleasedon’tkillme!”

Selene raised an eyebrow at this performance and then put her crossbow down next to her, checking that the safety catch was on. Dafydd took this as a good sign and inched further into the room, Thanduril flapping forward to meet him. The two agents stared at each other before Selene broke the silence and said, “I’m sorry I shot at you. Thank you for the crossbow, anyway; it was a thoughtful gift.”

Dafydd relaxed a bit more. Remembering Vemi’s reaction to what he said he had done, he felt as if he should apologise again.
“I’m sorry for whatever I did wrong, I didn’t mean to do anything worthy of being shot at.”

Selene closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, trying to regain her composure. The skills of self-control she had honed over centuries had been severely atrophied over the past month, and she did not want to lose those skills completely. She replied, “As a note for the future, if I come back from having a mutant plant lecture me on restraint and camaraderie, threaten me with even more probation, send me for counselling and group therapy, and then reveal that my food has been drugged for at least six weeks, it’s not a good idea to say, ‘Oh, you got off lightly.’”

Dafydd winced, and was about to apologise again when he was cut off by the sound of a plot device masquerading as the console.

[BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]

-----

Taken from the opening of Echoes of the Narbeleth, and clocking at around 350 words.

Thoughts? It would present two distinctly different challenges while not ramping up the word counts into 'well I'm not spending hours on that' levels.

hS

... You're right, that doesn't work. by Neshomeh on 2014-05-09 16:43:00 UTC Reply

You can't swap in any two names—definitely not if they belong to established and well-known characters. That was unfair of me. I'm sorry.

What I was trying to say was that, if I didn't know who Lou and Natro were, I'm not sure I'd be able to pick them out of a crowd based on that particular example of them interacting. Since the writing samples are supposed to show us who these people are, that could be a problem for me in a real sample.

That said, you are also right that the bio should do at least some of the work on that front; the writing sample should corroborate what's been laid out in the bio. If it does (did? would? Damn hypothetical tenses...), then I suppose I'd be okay with it in the absence of any other problems.

What I'm looking for... lemme ramble for a few paragraphs and see if I can figure it out.

"Complete stories" isn't right, because as you say, we don't want to set the bar to ridiculous. I'm not looking for "beginning, rising action, climax, denouement, end" or any other traditional structure you care to name.

"Complete" is, though. For instance, I kinda want to know what experiment Narto was doing that caused the stain—then I could identify him as "that guy who does X kinds of experiments in his RC." In Dark Brother's second sample, I want to see the actual planning for the actual party—as it is, it's just "Hey, can I plan a party? Yes? Good!" The End. It starts something, but doesn't finish it.

The requirement for Permission isn't merely "Can you spell?" It's more like "Can you write interesting characters, in a setting recognizable as the PPC, in an entertaining style that is free from (serious, preferably any) mechanical/structural and logistic errors?"

The thing about short stories/vignettes/snapshots is that every word must have a reason to be there, so in a sense they're harder to write well than longer pieces. I think this is where I'm coming from. If I only have a few hundred words to look at, I'm inclined to analyze every single one for all the information I can possibly glean. If those few words don't amount to something whole and wholly pleasing, it's hard to cut them much slack.

So, there it is: asking a short piece or two to prove the writer's ability to construct a full story is placing a lot of weight on narrow shoulders. Whatever we ask for a writing sample needs to be big and strong enough to bear it. A short work needs to be completely solid through and through, and it needs to accomplish something, else what hope is there that they can pull off a longer, more complex work?

The length isn't really that important. It's what the author can do with whatever space they have to work with. I wouldn't want to force anyone to pad an idea to achieve a word count, but on the other hand, I don't want to put people in an impossible box with a too-small sample.

Maybe different suggested counts for the different prompts would help. Other opinions would be good, though.

~Neshomeh, rambling on.

I like that phrasing. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-09 16:57:00 UTC Reply

Can you write interesting characters, in a setting recognizable as the PPC, in an entertaining style that is free from (serious, preferably any) mechanical/structural and logistic errors?

That seems like the sort of quote that should appear in the Wiki article or the doc: an actual description of what we're looking for. And I agree with it in every respect. (That said, we also need to make it clear that 'interesting character' doesn't mean 'quirks'; Narto is/can be interesting despite being Just Some Guy)

I also agree - I guess - about 'complete'. You're not talking about complete as a story, but as an idea. I think it's very hard to quantify - basically everything falls into scope if you pull the viewpoint back far enough - but the notion that, for instance, you shouldn't end on a 'here's what we'll do' cliffhanger in a sample - because we'll never actually hear what it is. It's great for some types of story, but here we want to know the idea - it informs the character.

The 'experiment', by the way, was a chemical one - that was an implicit assumption on my part, because that's how I think of the word, not an intentional omission. It's actually one we did at school, and wrecked the ceiling - I believe it may have been the reaction of iodine with aluminium. It produces a huge cloud of purple smoke, and leaves a horrible yellow stain. I'm guessing Nar remembered it like I did, and couldn't resist trying it when he found out (by accident) what the chemicals were. ;)

As usual - and as expected - I feel you're being too strict about how much a sample should accomplish, but I do at least think we're in the same chapter, if not the same page. I'll settle for that ~~until my mind-control song is finished~~.

hS

PS: Yes, everyone, please suggestions about word counts - either identical or different - for the prompts. I'm leaving it at 400-800 for both until some ideas get thrown around, but I think a change would be a good thing. ~hS

Re: I like that phrasing. by the Irish Samurai on 2014-05-09 21:42:00 UTC Reply

Going back to your 'impersonation' prompt, while your point about not being able to just swap any old names in is certainly true, I think Nesh is right in that some names could be swapped in. The piece is just so short that that we get bare snippets of characterisation, which makes them more interchangeable with A. N. Other.

My own agents could probably swap in without going too far out of character. Skeet would replace Narto (committing some random act of vandalism in his RC and then trying to get out cleaning it up is 100% in character for him), leaving Amy to take Lou's place. That's trickier for her, but if we assume this is an Amy that's been with the PPC for a bit, and gotten used to her partner, then it more or less fits.

The two bits that would stand out would be her 'nodding cheerfully' at the beginning, because I think that makes it look like the impersonation was her idea and she was encouraging Skeet to do it - the idea is silly enough that it'd be one of Skeet's, and he really doesn't need the encouragement. However, some context (which the sample is currently missing, and possibly links in with the intention that the sample should be a complete idea, even though it's not supposed to be a complete story) could provide an explanation - maybe just before he picked up the phone Skeet bet a week's worth of chores that he could get the mess cleaned up without any effort. In which case Amy would quite happily encourage him to do something she was sure wouldn't work.

The other bit that's a little off (for my character) is the line '"Oh, Skeet," Amy said, grinning, "of course I did. I always know."', mostly because of the implied omniscience, which isn't really Amy's thing. However, changing the wording to 'of course I did. Anyone would've known that!' preserves most of the same character interaction, and keeps her in character.

There was one bit that stuck out to me while reading that piece:

"Oh, Narto," Lou said, grinning, "of course I did. I always know." She flicked her head slightly in the direction of the ceiling.

I looked up at the Generic Surface, and at the massive yellow-black stain that covered half of it.

I honestly can't tell if Lou looking up here is meant to be a hint of the power mentioned in her bio, or just that the stain happens to be on the ceiling. And if I can't tell the difference between an explicitly stated character trait and a coincidence... well, then, you've kind of failed at presenting the character to me. I just think the scene is too short and light on detail. Going into more depth would better showcase your talent.

In contrast, your 'apology' piece just seems better. Is it just coincidence that I think the longer piece is better? Well, maybe, but I don't think so.

With regards to your earlier comment concerning the necessity of character descriptions when they're presented along with a bio, I'd like to see at least a little bit of description in the sample, unless there's a particular reason not to. It depends a little on which style of character bio is used - the list style that Lou's currently using on the GDoc is fine for a bio, but would be really jarring if it was just dropped into the narrative like that. Giving good written descriptions is a skill, I think, so it'd be a useful thing to see in a sample. I've also read enough badfic where the author has assumed that everyone is familiar with how the characters look (more common for fic of TV/films) and hasn't bothered to give any, that I tend to think of a lack of such descriptions as a sign of poor writing.

My thought on the word limit was to keep the minimum at 200 (if someone thinks they can do a good enough job with a piece that short, I don't see why they shouldn't try. I just know that I'd need to write something longer to feel like I'd done it properly) and raise the maximum to 1000, just because you tend to stick to round numbers for this sort of thing, and a thousand feels like a 'rounder' number than eight hundred to me.

As for your comment about not enforcing the word limit, well, this is just my opinion, but if you're not going to enforce it, why bother even mentioning it? If you want to give some advice on length without being restrictive then I'd call it a guideline rather than a word limit (pedantic I know, but to me 'max. word limit X' means that someone who writes X+1 should be getting marked down).

I'm also wondering if we should encourage people to use Betas for Permission samples a little more. I don't recall seeing Dark Brother 16 ask for one, and no Beta credit was given, so I'm assuming he didn't use one. But it strikes me that a lot of the reasons you gave for denying Permission (particularly on the second attempt) could've been spotted by someone else before taking it to the Official Request stage.

Specifically on the head-flick. by Huinesoron on 2014-05-10 08:07:00 UTC Reply

That was deliberately ambiguous. Lou is making use of one gesture to do two things - indicate the problem, and reference why she always knows. So if you can't tell which it is - good! That was the point. ;)

hS, will reply longer when he has more time

OK, I get that. by the Irish Samurai on 2014-05-11 13:54:00 UTC Reply

And in a normal Interlude I probably wouldn't have given it a second thought. But for a Permission piece, surely the story is meant to back up the details given in the character bio (I mean, you can write anything in a character bio - I could say that Skeet can speak fluent German, but I wouldn't be able to back it up in-story), so making ambiguous/obscure references to characters traits probably isn't the best idea in this specific case (in my opinion).

Obviously this is all just academic because, a) I'm not a Permission Giver and b) you already have Permission. But while looking over the piece it occurred to me that if I was expected to make a decision on it, I'd have probably had to see some more writing, either an extension to that scene or another prompt entirely, before I could make up my mind.

Going back to thinking about the word count of the samples again, I know you've done various graphs from the Board data, so I'm assuming you have a copy of all the posts or something? Would it be possible to look up past Permission requests and see what the max., min., and average lengths of the successful ones are? It might be a better way of coming up with the numbers rather than just plucking them out of thin air (or it might even confirm that the current numbers are about right).

Also, I've thought of a couple of questions that it might be worth adding to the Permission FAQ (once we've worked out suitable answers):

Q) What if I want to tweak the prompts slightly? How about instead of one of my agents getting stuck up a tree (roll of 1 - 6) one of them falls down a well instead? It'd be sort of the same scene.
A)???

Q) Can I combine the two prompts into one story? And if I do, how does that change recommended length?
A)???
OK, I get that. by the Irish Samurai on 2014-05-11 13:54:00 UTC Reply

And in a normal Interlude I probably wouldn't have given it a second thought. But for a Permission piece, surely the story is meant to back up the details given in the character bio (I mean, you can write anything in a character bio - I could say that Skeet can speak fluent German, but I wouldn't be able to back it up in-story), so making ambiguous/obscure references to characters traits probably isn't the best idea in this specific case (in my opinion).

Obviously this is all just academic because, a) I'm not a Permission Giver and b) you already have Permission. But while looking over the piece it occurred to me that if I was expected to make a decision on it, I'd have probably had to see some more writing, either an extension to that scene or another prompt entirely, before I could make up my mind.

Going back to thinking about the word count of the samples again, I know you've done various graphs from the Board data, so I'm assuming you have a copy of all the posts or something? Would it be possible to look up past Permission requests and see what the max., min., and average lengths of the successful ones are? It might be a better way of coming up with the numbers rather than just plucking them out of thin air (or it might even confirm that the current numbers are about right).

Also, I've thought of a couple of questions that it might be worth adding to the Permission FAQ (once we've worked out suitable answers):

Q) What if I want to tweak the prompts slightly? How about instead of one of my agents getting stuck up a tree (roll of 1 - 6) one of them falls down a well instead? It'd be sort of the same scene.
A)???

Q) Can I combine the two prompts into one story? And if I do, how does that change recommended length?
A)???

Accio Numbers! by Huinesoron on 2014-05-12 11:18:00 UTC Reply

I don't actually have the posts saved - but I do have a handtyped record of when people asked for Permission. I've compiled the data back to last January online, and it's... not all that informative.

I've also copied across two graphs from Excel. Basically, they reveal that:

-Asking for Permission before you've been here a month doesn't work. 26 days is the shortest 'yes' on the list.
-Any length of sample can get Permission or not.
-Though if you don't post a sample, you're not getting Permission.
-Phobos and I are more likely to say yes; Nesh is more likely to say no. ;)

If someone can come up with a good way to plot PG, sample length, and yes/no in a single chart, I'd be interested in seeing it.

As with my usual statistics stuff, I'll probably add to the data over time. But right now I'm worn out with it. ;)

hS

Wait, really? by Neshomeh on 2014-05-12 14:41:00 UTC Reply

Huh. I know I've gotten more strict over time, but we were sure Phobos was the strictest of the three of us. Though, it looks like three of my five Nos were to people who'd been here less than 20 days, so perhaps it's not as bad as it sounds. {= )

~Neshomeh

The thing is... by Huinesoron on 2014-05-12 15:02:00 UTC Reply

... well, two things. One is that there's only a very small sample size - 20-odd Permission requests in the last sixteen months. But more than that, it's the circumstances under which we'll each respond.

For instance, I'm the only one of the lot of us who'll really reply with a 'don't know; someone else check'. When that happens, you're likely to be the second responder - and you'll probably say no to something I wasn't sure about. ;) So that bumps your 'no's up.

And, as you said, you do a lot of the 'duh no' responding (although I have a relatively recent 'I'd like Permission, can I have it?' one I replied to). So again, that bumps your average up.

And, well, Phobos only has three responses in the timeframe. It's not exactly a statistically significant sample. One more might mean he's perfectly balanced - or that he has a 3:1 ratio of yes to no. It's all in the maths.

I wonder what it'll look like when I get back to Jan '12...

hS

As Far As Past Permission Request Word Lengths Go... by sjosten on 2014-05-12 05:01:00 UTC Reply

I can only speak for myself, but both of my samples were 600-700 words.

Re: As Far As Past Permission Request Word Lengths Go... by Miah on 2014-05-12 09:01:00 UTC Reply

Older Permission requests might not be the best source, especially before the practice of writing a story within the PPC world became the standard practice. At one point that was kind of frowned on before getting Permission. I like the shift, as this method gives a better view of how someone writes in the rather unusual PPC setting.

It really was a different time, wasn't it? by Phobos on 2014-05-12 21:29:00 UTC Reply

For instance, my own permission writing sample was 4626 words long. That is a bit length for this sort of thing.

-Phobos

Damn, that was supposed to be titled 'My (rambly) thoughts' (nm) by the Irish Samurai on 2014-05-09 21:46:00 UTC Reply

Everyone? by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-09 19:09:00 UTC Reply

You probably won't want my suggestions, since I'm coming at the PPC from a literary criticism background, rather than a creative writing one, but I'd feel a lot happier with the shorter limits.

I'd been struggling for days on my first prompt (the random one, because I don't like the look of any of the control ones so I'm leaving them to last) and I'd finally managed to get something that looked good and complete at 381 words, and then the limit was increased. So now I'm really struggling to think of more stuff to add to it.

Out of curiosity, roughly how many days should it take to write for each prompt? Maybe if I had some sort of deadline, it would be easier.

If You're Having Trouble Writing... by sjosten on 2014-05-10 06:45:00 UTC Reply

You might want to try doing some timed writing with your agents, just to get their characterizations onto paper more. Prractice makes perfect, so the more you write, the more you'll know the characters and how to put in more text.

How will timing my writing help? by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-10 10:41:00 UTC Reply

I mean, yes, I could time how long it took me and then say "I've finally reached the 400 word limit me six days, 11 hours, 37 minutes, and 2 seconds after I first started thinking about what to write."

But unless I know how many days a writer should take to write 400 words, that information is useless. It doesn't tell me anything.

You Misunderstand my Intent by sjosten on 2014-05-11 02:06:00 UTC Reply

What I meant was, do a bunch of little five or ten minute scenes with your agents. When you've familiarized yourself with them more, the writing should come more naturally.

OK, Thanks (nm) by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-11 10:13:00 UTC Reply

Ask 100 people and you'll get 100 different answers. by Storme Hawk on 2014-05-10 18:44:00 UTC Reply

It completely depends on the person, and can even depend on what they're writing.
for example, currently I'm writing up a short story for my original piece of fiction. I've reached 400 words in just shy of 20 minutes, but when it comes to report writing it will normally take me a bit longer, perhaps about 30-35 minutes.

But then again I'm currently working with a character who I know like the back of my hands, mainly because I've been writing/RPing with one form of him or another for a little over 3 years now.

Hope that helps in some way.

Storme Hawk

20 Minutes??? by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-10 23:54:00 UTC Reply

That's fine for something you want to write. But for an assignment like these prompts, that you've got to write even though you just plain don't want to and you aren't interested in the subject? How do you force yourself to do that?

Well, by the Irish Samurai on 2014-05-09 21:55:00 UTC Reply

hS has already indicated that he doesn't think the word limit should be strictly enforced. To slightly misquote a certain pirate, 'They're more like guidelines than actual rules'* so you're probably OK with what you've got. I'm sure the PGs will be looking more at the content than the number of words.

*sorry, hS, but in my head you now talk like a pirate :)

Unfortunately hS isn't the only one by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-10 12:28:00 UTC Reply

I get the impression that Nesohmeh seems to take minimum limits very seriously.

It doesn't really matter now anyway. I've managed to insert an ugly bit of padding into it to make it over 500 words now. My inner critic is screaming that the padding sticks out like a sore thumb and needs more work, but I'm sick of this piece by now and don't want to do anything more on it for a while. I'll come back to it after I've started on my other prompt.

But meanwhile, if anyone wants to help me beta it, you can find it here.

Y'know... by Neshomeh on 2014-05-10 23:17:00 UTC Reply

I did say toward the end of this post that I don't want to force anyone to pad an idea just for a word count. Didja miss that?

In the future, please don't inflict any psychological trauma on yourself for my sake. I'd rather not be responsible for that. O.o

~Neshomeh

Oops... Sorry. I must've missed that. (nm) by Pippa's Ghost on 2014-05-10 23:56:00 UTC Reply

We do have rehabilitation. Perhaps he mean't that? (nm) by 99Hedgehog on 2014-05-08 08:05:00 UTC Reply

Link to the Badfic by Dark Brother 16 on 2014-05-08 05:08:00 UTC Reply

Call me ambitious, but I have decided to claim Pattycakes, part 1 and 2. Here are the links.

(Pattycakes, part 1)

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tYd5iFkwn1nscOqC4e9BYIyWqLK1QhHxQMYHmGMDYXY/mobilebasic?pli=1&hl=enUS

(Pattycakes, part 2)

<a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yudxzSYojD2XYI32KPlfoMIxPwIIuERyEx-W2ZGAw/mobilebasic?pli=1&hl=enUS">https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yudxzSYojD2XYI32KPlfoMIxPwIIuERyEx-W2ZGAw/mobilebasic?pli=1&hl=en_US

Is this too much for a first mission? Should I have it particularly scarring? Obviously, I should, but still... I think I will have it keep coming up in conversations and stuff...