Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
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Posts: 743
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Post by Lockhart on Mar 11, 2019 20:27:04 GMT -5
Name: Kennedy Matthews What I Read: Royal Revelations What I Liked: Description, Premise of Shoot, Character Conflict. What I Want To See: Less Exposition, Deeper Character Interaction. Suggestions: “Show, don’t tell” and keep developing your characters through dialogue.
You had a lot of strong points in this RP that made it an enjoyable read. I love how you gave context to the scene in which your shoot was taking place, and your description was up there with some of the higher-level stuff I’ve seen in the federation. You clearly know how to set a scene, and I think you should keep playing to that strength. The writing quality here was good.
However, some of it felt bogged down by the amount of exposition you put into your RP. Trust your readers, let them figure out some things for themselves. For instance, people who read the show would know that Bobby Rage had done an after match attack on your partner. IF you want to bring that up, do it with your dialogue. Mention at the beginning of your shoot something like: “I out-performed a monster like Bobby Rage effortlessly. He realized he couldn’t compare to me, and that’s why he felt the need to take out my partner. He was upset that I was just too good for him.” (Just an example, mould it into your character’s voice.) Not only does this show the readers and the judges that you’re paying attention, but linking your RPs to the shows and other stuff going on throughout the federation is a big boost to RP quality in my eyes. The idea was there for sure through your exposition, but I feel like it could be executed better.
Next up, shoot. This was solid. Definitely not bad, but not as good as it could have been. You had the idea, but I feel like you could’ve cut a bit deeper with it. The idea that Kidsgrove and Dandy can’t work well together is a fine one, but show WHY that will benefit Kennedy. For instance, bring up the Royal Family and point out that Kennedy knows how to function as part of a team. Do your homework on the characters at hand, say something like Kidsgrove is obsessed with stardom and has cast a shadow over others, which he might try to do to Dandy in this situation which could lead to be mistakes in teamwork, giving you ample opportunity to pick up the win.
Also, stating that Kennedy is “above” the US Title is good, and keeps in-character with the whole “Royalty” thing. BUT, it can’t be unfounded. You need to give a reason as to why she’s looking down upon this belt now. Maybe something like “I’m not interested in participating for a belt that’s being hot-potatoed around by two idiots not even fit to shine my shoes on their best day.” Bring up something, anything, that discredits the belt and Dandy winning it, or else it’s just kind of empty words without any reasoning behind it.
To wrap it up, the end of your RP was also good, I enjoyed it and got a real sense of the conflict going on. You did an excellent job there, and I know this is harder to do with the whole 2k word limit for the Battlebowl BUT I feel like it ended abruptly. Why did Edwina admit to snitching, only to not defend herself or her actions in the slightest after getting insulted by Kennedy? In fact, why would she admit to it at all, when she had just previously said “you don’t think she knows, do you?”.
This isn’t a plot hole or anything. You can easily expand on this next week and give us a better understanding of why Edwina gave in and told the truth, and why she didn’t feel the need to defend herself. Or maybe in your next few RPs you have her trying to get the favour of The Royal Family back? The opportunities are open and you can take it in a few directions. I just think that you need to go a bit deeper with it, and sometimes take your interactions between characters a little further. For instance, Jaice seems a little dismissive of Kennedy. Maybe that’s just how the relationship is, or how Jaice’s character is, but it comes across as a bit odd to me. That’s all.
I see the foundation of a super strong RPer. Your writing has quality to it. Your dialogue is solid, although it could use improvement. You clearly have an idea and intention behind your shoot, and this week you were close to hitting it perfectly. I’d say the ceiling for Kennedy as a character and you as a writer is high, it’s just a matter of how much work you want to put into improve!
Hope this helped.
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Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
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Mar 13, 2019 5:09:28 GMT -5
Post by Lockhart on Mar 13, 2019 5:09:28 GMT -5
Name: Beau Blaze
What I Read: The Mind Of A Marlboro Man, Gotta Get On His Level Part 3 & The Finale.
What I Liked: Characterization, Voice.
What I’m Not Sure About: Shoot
What I Want To See: More direction with character development/story.
Suggestions: Give Beau a direct focus/goal.
You’re a well-rounded RPer, Beau. Your prose is solid, you can set a scene and the writing is mostly clean. There’s some little things that could use some work like wording and grammar, but it’s nothing serious and doesn’t really detract from the quality of the work.
Your work seems as its best when it utilizes an even amount of both dialogue and description. I find the lengthy exchanges of dialogue to sometimes be too much and could benefit from being broken up with some description that adds more weight to the interactions that Beau is involved in, which is pretty much all of them.
I enjoy the differentiation between all of your characters, and you do a good job of giving them a different voice. Your portrayal of ZMAC for instance is good, and I enjoy seeing the clear differences in attitude between Beau, his family, and Hattie. It definitely makes your story seem more natural and something that would actually happen in real life, which can be a difficult skill to develop and incorporate into your writing, so great stuff with that.
I’m… not certain about your shoot. There’s some good parts in there, but there’s also some parts that need work. Beau definitely has a voice that is made to be a hard shooter, someone that can rip into a guy and drop some good insults – but that’s where it seems to end. This isn’t a knock on you, but a lot of Beau’s shoot seems to fall into the “yeah I’m tougher than you, I’mma beat you up, suck my dick” kinda thing. Obviously that’s not what you ACTUALLY write, but it gives off that idea.
The way to stop this would be to dig into your opponent’s history a bit more and figure out some talking points instead of targeting the obvious. This will give you added depth to your shoot and theoretically make it score better with the judges. You’re talented and smart enough to figure out weak points within a character and target those, so do it. At this point, your shoot is solid – but it could be GREAT. So that’s what I’m getting at with that.
As for your story, I noticed something within the three RPs I read. The one that had a clear focus and drive behind it (Gotta Get On His Level 3) was a lot better to read than The Mind Of A Marlboro Man. This isn’t to say the latter was a piece of shit and doesn’t deserve to be read – it was still good. However, I much preferred the former, where you clearly had an idea and progressed the Beau character and gave him more conflict to deal with. That’s why my suggestion to you is to figure out exactly where you want to take the Beau character, give him a BIG conflict that he’s gonna have to deal with if he wants to better himself or better the quality of his life, and then run with that. I guarantee that you’ll improve both as a writer, a story-teller, and as a RPer if you can somehow do that.
I know it’s vague in a sense, but I can’t be the one to tell you the direction your character should take. That’s why I’m just suggesting you go to the drawing board, think of a story or arc that’ll challenge Beau as a man and help him develop as a character.
Sorry if this wasn’t much of a help, but after reading your work I do think you could make the jump to being one of the top guys here with a bit of work. Just stay focused, keep writing consistently, find out where YOU want to take the character, and work on that shoot a little. Keep it up!
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Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
Playtime is over.
Posts: 743
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Post by Lockhart on Mar 13, 2019 5:51:12 GMT -5
Name: Claire Hawkins What I Read: Witch Hunt XIV, XV, XVI and XVII What I Liked: Story, Dialogue. What I Want To See: More shoot. Suggestions: Figure out a way to utilize Claire’s intellect/wit into lengthier, harder hitting shoot. This might seem like a cop out, but I don’t have much advice for you in the story/character development part, Claire. What I read from you had excellent dialogue and description, this is clearly your biggest strength. If there was something I have to point out, I want to see more of the dynamic between Claire, Mary and Annette. It’s interesting, but you’re not giving us a lot to work with. In some ways, this is good. You keep the reader waiting as you reveal plot point bit by bit, but I feel like it could be beneficial for you to pull the trigger on this and give us a more thorough explanation of what’s going on with that. Keep in mind, I’ve only read these last four RPs so I may be missing A LOT of information. If that’s the case and you have already given plenty of backstory to this, then my apologies and completely disregard this statement. All I’m saying is maybe think of running with this as a larger part in your RPs! What I have more advice for you on is the shoot. With the way you type with Claire on the internet boards, I was expecting some KILLER shoot. She’s smart, has a lot of wit, and seems to have a heap of apathy. Play up these characteristics more in your shoot. I see it a little here and there, especially in these RPs that discuss the UCI Title, Karlie Nash and the Battlebowl… but give me more of it. Have her level that apathy at her opponents more often – that’s when your shoot was at its strongest. Your shoots on Karlie stand out the most in this regard. I’m not sure if this is time constraints, or you just don’t enjoy writing shoot that much when compared to telling a story, but I was expecting a little more from your shoot against Casey. She’s the champion, take it to her. Claire should have plenty to rip Casey on. You laid out the foundation for this by talking about her not being willing to be truly represent the belt and company as a champion, but it didn’t go deep enough. The shoot felt short and didn’t really leave the feeling of “damn Claire just bodied this fool” like it should’ve. In that same RP, you painted a beautiful scene with Claire to give context to the scene and the shoot. It was great to read, and shows your capabilities as a writer. Now imagine if you put that same effort and talent into dropping some pure ether in the shoot? I would assume that if you added that into your game and became a beast both in the character development side of the game and the shoot side… you’d be up at the top of the card in no time. Right now though? It seems more like a work in progress. I will say that your most recent RP showed signs of that development. Maybe it’s because you decided to make it a full shoot RP with just a bit of scene description here and there, but man I saw some good shit in there that I hope you continue to work on as you spend time here. Keep in mind I am looking at this from an E-FEDDING PERSPECTIVE. So what I’m basically pushing you towards is an approach that gives you more a “competitive advantage”. If you’re here for fun and don’t give much of a fuck about results, then don’t feel like you have to start dropping like 2000 words of shoot every week and busting your ass to write something that you don’t enjoy. If story and description is your thing, then stick to that and give us a story that we’ll love to read. If you do want to become more well-rounded, then work on the shoot a little, but keep doing what you do best. At the end of the day this is just a hobby and we should enjoy it, so you do you! But what I do know is that you’re a talented writer who likely could make quite the ascent up the card. It just depends on what you want to do, and what you enjoy doing the most. Thanks for reading.
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Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
Playtime is over.
Posts: 743
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Post by Lockhart on Mar 13, 2019 5:54:02 GMT -5
Hey guys. After I've given my thoughts on L Verez, I'm going to hold off on taking anymore requests, just for the time being! Probably 1 to 2 weeks. I'm working 20+ hours this week and next and along with that have a couple university assignments I have to get through. Add RPing on top of that, and hopefully you'll see where I'm coming from. If you are looking to get feedback though don't stress, I'll make another post in here saying I'm ready to get back into it when my schedule has cleared up, and you can make you requests here! Thanks everybody.
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Ask Me!
Mar 13, 2019 6:23:17 GMT -5
Post by Guillotine (QDT) on Mar 13, 2019 6:23:17 GMT -5
This is an incredible thread. Thanks for your generosity with us all. If anyone else wants to follow suit from a different perspective (I know Wade said he might), that would also be awesome.
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Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
Playtime is over.
Posts: 743
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Ask Me!
Mar 13, 2019 6:31:05 GMT -5
Post by Lockhart on Mar 13, 2019 6:31:05 GMT -5
This is an incredible thread. Thanks for your generosity with us all. If anyone else wants to follow suit from a different perspective (I know Wade said he might), that would also be awesome. This! As I said before, I am by no means the best at giving advice, and I'm certainly not the best writer. Everyone has a different view of people's work, so let's all help each other out to improve. One person's thoughts are not final and don't give the complete picture of what someone does well, and what else they can work on.
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Post by Beau Del Sol on Mar 13, 2019 11:46:42 GMT -5
Name: Beau Blaze What I Read: The Mind Of A Marlboro Man, Gotta Get On His Level Part 3 & The Finale. What I Liked: Characterization, Voice. What I’m Not Sure About: Shoot What I Want To See: More direction with character development/story. Suggestions: Give Beau a direct focus/goal. You’re a well-rounded RPer, Beau. Your prose is solid, you can set a scene and the writing is mostly clean. There’s some little things that could use some work like wording and grammar, but it’s nothing serious and doesn’t really detract from the quality of the work. Your work seems as its best when it utilizes an even amount of both dialogue and description. I find the lengthy exchanges of dialogue to sometimes be too much and could benefit from being broken up with some description that adds more weight to the interactions that Beau is involved in, which is pretty much all of them. I enjoy the differentiation between all of your characters, and you do a good job of giving them a different voice. Your portrayal of ZMAC for instance is good, and I enjoy seeing the clear differences in attitude between Beau, his family, and Hattie. It definitely makes your story seem more natural and something that would actually happen in real life, which can be a difficult skill to develop and incorporate into your writing, so great stuff with that. I’m… not certain about your shoot. There’s some good parts in there, but there’s also some parts that need work. Beau definitely has a voice that is made to be a hard shooter, someone that can rip into a guy and drop some good insults – but that’s where it seems to end. This isn’t a knock on you, but a lot of Beau’s shoot seems to fall into the “yeah I’m tougher than you, I’mma beat you up, suck my dick” kinda thing. Obviously that’s not what you ACTUALLY write, but it gives off that idea. The way to stop this would be to dig into your opponent’s history a bit more and figure out some talking points instead of targeting the obvious. This will give you added depth to your shoot and theoretically make it score better with the judges. You’re talented and smart enough to figure out weak points within a character and target those, so do it. At this point, your shoot is solid – but it could be GREAT. So that’s what I’m getting at with that. As for your story, I noticed something within the three RPs I read. The one that had a clear focus and drive behind it (Gotta Get On His Level 3) was a lot better to read than The Mind Of A Marlboro Man. This isn’t to say the latter was a piece of shit and doesn’t deserve to be read – it was still good. However, I much preferred the former, where you clearly had an idea and progressed the Beau character and gave him more conflict to deal with. That’s why my suggestion to you is to figure out exactly where you want to take the Beau character, give him a BIG conflict that he’s gonna have to deal with if he wants to better himself or better the quality of his life, and then run with that. I guarantee that you’ll improve both as a writer, a story-teller, and as a RPer if you can somehow do that. I know it’s vague in a sense, but I can’t be the one to tell you the direction your character should take. That’s why I’m just suggesting you go to the drawing board, think of a story or arc that’ll challenge Beau as a man and help him develop as a character. Sorry if this wasn’t much of a help, but after reading your work I do think you could make the jump to being one of the top guys here with a bit of work. Just stay focused, keep writing consistently, find out where YOU want to take the character, and work on that shoot a little. Keep it up! Greatly appreciated this is exactly what I’ve been looking for and always welcome the advice on my shoot. I know it’s not up to par. I’m going to try and execute this. Thanks bruh!
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Post by Hazel Overton on Mar 13, 2019 14:31:02 GMT -5
When you find the time, I'd love to get your feedback on Hazel Overton's rps
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Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
Playtime is over.
Posts: 743
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Ask Me!
Mar 19, 2019 6:40:32 GMT -5
Post by Lockhart on Mar 19, 2019 6:40:32 GMT -5
Name: L Verez What I Read: Universal Champion, Ransacked, Rebound, Adapt or Parish. What I Liked: First Person Perspective, Dialogue, Character Voice, Shoot (For The Most Part). What I Want To See: More of everything! Literally. Suggestions: Once you’ve wrapped up your TV Title reign and you’re satisfied… move up the damn card and don’t look back. You are too talented to be restricted to 1K a week.
So I read three of your recent TV Title RPs to get a sense of how you handle shoot, since that’s mostly what goes on with that belt, and I was impressed. Even though you faced the same opponent three weeks in a row, you were able to come in with different angles each time and that showed off your creativity. Your execution with the shoot was also solid, and you do a great job of really pushing forward Ls character values and personality. I read about someone who was a strong competitor, someone who valued the title, and someone who thoroughly detested the recent acts and behaviors of not just Andre, your opponent, but other heels in the federation. As I mentioned in an earlier feedback post (I think) linking the other events of the fed into your RPs is always great, so props for that.
I love the way you use the first-person perspective, and I want to see more of it in your RPs (although I know it is currently difficult due to the cap you’re being held under). In this perspective, you do a great job of conveying all of Ls thoughts and more importantly – her doubts. Anxiety. Stress. It’s fantastic to read. We see the responsibility that is bearing down on L and how she’s dealing with trying to be successful on her own… while also leading a group of strong-willed individuals and trying to prevent the entire group from combusting. It’s legitimately good to read, and since your dialogue generally comes thick and fast without much separation with scene description and whatnot in between, it’s easy to understand and you get your points across really well. As I mentioned in the what I liked section, you also do a good job with character voice, which I don’t feel needs much more explaining.
The other RP I read was one from before you were involved with the TV Title, as I wanted to gather a better sense of how you merged both character development and shoot into one cohesive RP. You did well at this, and I think the fact that you continually utilize The Guardians as a part of your plot benefits you big time, as no matter what narrative or character arc is happening, you’re still able to keep things at least somewhat relevant to Action Wrestling, which is good (although always feel free to let your creativity loose and do something unrelated, readers love diversity and I think you excel at that).
I’m not sure if this was just in that specific RP, but your shoot against Casey in that particular RP (Adapt or Parish) was weaker than I expected. I feel like L could’ve had a lot more to say about Casey, and while I liked the angle you came from to attack her, I felt as though something was missing from it which MAY have been why you didn’t win that particular match. I don’t know. The RP as a whole was definitely upper-card standard, but the shoot let you down a little in my opinion. Again, this might have just been an isolated case where you weren’t flowing well with the shoot that particular week, as I thought you did an excellent job against Andre in the three TV Title RPs I read against him (don’t be put down by the couple of losses, Andre at his best is arguably top 4-6 in my opinion). So yeah, I think maybe shoot consistency is something you should strive for, and always try and hit hard with it.
Honestly? You’re a main-event caliber writer, no question about it. I know after Uprising especially you were starting to trend in that direction and you were becoming a forced to be reckoned with. I think the TV Title reign is good for the character for now… but I also feel like you could be doing so much more. The United States and World Titles shouldn’t be out of Ls reach, you can hang with the best of them. L is a unique character, your shoot is mostly good, you have a great writer’s voice and your narrative is interesting. Don’t limit yourself and always know that you are one of the top writers around here, and that’s including anyone. My only major suggestion to you would be to go deeper with everything. Deeper, more heavier hitting shoot. More description of L in the first-person, let us know about all the insecurities, let us see what the current situation with The Guardians is really doing to her and how she plans on solving it. I know right now you can’t really do that with the 1k cap… but as soon as you’re free from that? It’s time for you to go ham. Show AW what you got. 😊
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Mar 19, 2019 9:17:33 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by Estrella Luiz ✨ on Mar 19, 2019 9:17:33 GMT -5
I don’t know if you’re doing this again, but imma ask. Is there any way you could read my rp from last week for that battle royal? I tried my very hardest and would like to know how I can improve for my title match this week. Thank you very much. (If you’re too busy I completely understand rl comes first)
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Lockhart
Professional Wrestler
Playtime is over.
Posts: 743
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Post by Lockhart on Mar 19, 2019 9:19:57 GMT -5
I don’t know if you’re doing this again, but imma ask. Is there any way you could read my rp from last week for that battle royal? I tried my very hardest and would like to know how I can improve for my title match this week. Thank you very much. (If you’re too busy I completely understand rl comes first) I'm going to continue doing them, but I'm holding off on requests until I've completed my first set of university assignments. I just did L Verez since she requested before I made the post saying I was taking a break. Since Hazel and you asked though, it's no issue at all. When I start up again, you guys will be the first to get feedback.
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Deleted
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Mar 19, 2019 11:43:10 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by Deleted on Mar 19, 2019 11:43:10 GMT -5
Much appreciated, Ryan! I was definitely struggling with shooting against Casey. That won't be a problem next time though.
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