Scalpel, Sniper, Stegosaurus [Submission]

[Blaka]

Plot Title/Link:  Scalpel, Sniper, Stegosaurus [Shining Pirates Medical Group]
Marine Mission Rank/Number: N/A
Mission Number: N/A
Total Number of Posts: 43
Plot Summary: Earlier that day (in the previous thread) the Shining Pirates were ambushed by the Holy Remunum Empire's army. As a result of this encounter, warships were coming to Nuovo Romanum to obtain the Ancient Devil Fruit Ability currently in use by the Shining Pirates' First Mate Kusatta. While their Captain went to distract the army from coming after his crew, the rest of them had to get medicine, food, a disguise and a ship. This proved difficult at first due to the different moralities the different crewmembers had as well as Kusatta's severe trust issues. After a disputing wether to kill the apothecary they stole medicine from or not, they were ambushed by a couple of soldiers in a food shop. Defeating the soldiers woke up the mysteriously powerfull drunken old pirate chef Poele Ohdora, who had been sleeping there. With his help, the crew managed to get to a clothing shop without drawing any more attention. There, they bought new clothes, disguises, for themselves so they could walk past the soldiers unseen and steal a ship from the docks. With it, the three human members got into a ship battle with one of the warships while Brandon was flying off. Just as it looked like they would lose the fight, the soldiers on the enemy's ship let them go due to the Shining Pirates' captain Leonard, who Brandon found near the docks, completely battered from his fight.

Pirate Crew: Shining Pirates
Pirate Name/Link: Kusatta "Starving" Kotei
Current Bounty: 0
Number of Posts: 12
EXP: 224/500
What percentage of bonus exp do you want as Poinz?: 50%

Pirate Crew: Shining Pirates
Pirate Name/Link: Brandon the Penguin
Current Bounty: 0
Number of Posts: 8
EXP: 96 / 100
What percentage of bonus exp do you want as Poinz?: 100%

Pirate Crew: Shining Pirates
Pirate Name/Link: Hikaru Shin
Current Bounty: 0
Number of Posts: 12
EXP: 69/100
What percentage of bonus exp do you want as Poinz?: 0%

Pirate Crew: Shining Pirates
Pirate Name/Link: Hiroto "Black Archer" Shiaru
Current Bounty: 0
Number of Posts: 11
EXP: 36/100
What percentage of bonus exp do you want as Poinz?: 0%

[Mr. Moshypocrite McSlowbro]

-------->Individual Ratings!

Kusatta (Blab) -- 4/5

SPOILER: Click to show

The Good:

[/b]: I like that you have Kusa going through what he needs to get done, why he needs it, and the steps he is going to take to try and achieve these goals. Keeping the reader up to date on his thoughts and feelings help endear Mr. Stegosaurus to the readers, help explain his actions and motivations. Always a good thing.

Good Leadership!: Honestly I think I'm the only grader who comments on this. Being the leader in a thread is a lot of work as compared to being a follower. Others get to react, you have to actually do stuff. And you do a good job of it! Even when Kusa is being angry or bloodthirsty, he's still got this aura of 'I'm the boss dammit, do what I say'. Vaguely Zoro-esque. 

Character development!: Literally, one of my favorite things ever to see in a thread. I like that you took the time to take this character who has known little but suffering and hate for the majority of his life, and expose him to genuine friendship from his crew-mates. Which stuns him. And hopefully leads him to becoming a better and less angry person, at some point in the future. Either way, nice job.

Overall, your vast improvement is why you are getting a 4! Plus, your stuff on the third page is pretty awesome.[/ul]

The Bad:

[/b]: This is an issue I've mentioned to you before, and remains one now. But you have definitely improved a lot from the last time I saw your work, heck you improved a lot just from the start of the thread. Watch out for run-on sentences.

Lack of Description: This improved a lot by the end of the thread as well, but I would still like to see you work on it. But at the start, you really didn't describe anything. Not your character, your crewmates, the world around you, the town you were in, what had happened, anything. Honestly, I'm not even positive anyone mentioned what time of day it was. Day? Night? Was it pouring rain, humid and buggy?

Show not tell: Something I've been saying a lot tonight. The idea is to show the reader your character's reaction, not just tell them. You want them to know Kusa is angry, alright. How about instead of just writing 'He said angrily', you put 'Kusa growled, his teeth bared.' Things like that. I'd like to go in more detail, but it's late. Ask me or PM me later.[/ul]

The Awesome:

[/b]"[/i][/ul][/spoiler]
Brandon (Vio) -- 4/5

SPOILER: Click to show

The Good:

[/b]: Which, just like your character Augustus, is more important for you than it is for most! Not just the thoughts mind you, but Brandon's observations and word choices are done in a way to reflect his penguin-y nature. Even with all his birdy wisdom and experience, he still draws incorrect conclusions about the strange world of humans, which is honestly just funny as heck to read.

Excellent Description: Of your crew-mates, of events, and of the world around you.

Wordplay and Vocabulary: Wow! You must have been putting a lot of work into this sort of thing, because it shows. Excellent writing.[/ul]

The Bad:

[/b] Okay, I'm not really sure how to handle this. Every character in a thread is supposed to contribute something to the overall story. Help advance the plot, or something. And while Brandon is funny and enjoyable to read, the posts are almost entirely you commenting on things that have already happened. I realize, as a penguin, it might be more difficult to contribute in the same way a human would? But I don't know. Just... from what I can see, you could remove him from the thread and nothing would exactly change up until the very end. And that's usually not a good thing, y'know?
[/ul]

The Awesome:

[/b][/font][/i][/ul][/spoiler]
Shin (Shin) -- 3/5

SPOILER: Click to show

The Good:

[/b]: A lot of your post is devoted to giving the reader a solid reflection of Shin's thoughts and observations, which make for a very interesting read! People sometimes just post the actions their character takes, but you actually explain why he is doing things. Good job. ...Also, like 50% of that dude's thoughts revolve around cigarettes.

Good combat writing: It's pretty clear that you have fun in fight scenes! You do a good job of writing them, and your enthusiasm shines through.
[/ul]

The Bad:

[/b]: Okay, don't take this the wrong way, I am only asking because you are in a thread with Blab (Who I know is German). Are you a native English speaker? You have a lot of basic grammar and spelling mistakes, you sometimes use words in completely the wrong way, and you just have a constant stream of run-on sentences. One of which was 140 words long. That is not a good thing. You are a good writer, I can see that, but you seem to be having a hard time putting your words down into text.

Normally I would copy/paste some example sentences here so you could see what I was talking about, but in your case it's... pretty much everywhere. I suggest going back through and maybe reading your posts out loud before submitting them? Or if you have questions about grammar and such, you can always message me or another staff member. We are always happy to help.

There are other mistakes in your posts I could point out, but this is really the biggest deal here. I'd rather you work on this first before trying to improve on other areas.

You also use the word 'cold' to describe Shin at least once a post, sometimes more. Just... pointing that out.
[/ul]

The Awesome:

[/b][/font][/i][/ul][/spoiler]
Hiro (Ambs) -- 4/5

SPOILER: Click to show

The Good:

[/b]Great internal dialogue: This pro I give to a lot of people, but I really like how you handled this. In particular, the points where you had Hiro reflecting on her loving childhood in comparison to Shin and Kusa, who had a much rougher life. As we as her disgust at the army attacking their own citizens just to get at the devil fruit. It's a nice character development moment that goes over well. 

Great EXTERNAL dialogue: For some reason or another, a lot of people (Including some of your crewmates) have issues writing character speech. It just comes out awkward or robotic. But you do a great job of sounding more natural, like how a normal person would talk! It helps me picture Hiro, can almost hear her voice and inflection as she does stuff like yell at Kusa.

Great character overall!: Hiroto is cute.[/ul]

The Bad:

[/b]This is actually not a writing issue, not exactly. It's more about what you choose to write. That is to say, the majority of your posts seem to be a recap and reaction of what the posters before you said. Which is fine of course, you are in a crew you are supposed to be interacting with one another. Just, that isn't supposed to dominate the post. And I realize in this situation, the thread is sort of being controlled by other people and you are sort of limited in what actions you can take. But each person is supposed to help advance the plot in their own way, give their crew mates something to react to as well. If only one person is towing the line, posting begins to feel like pulling teeth. In this situation it was fine, but it would not go over that well in other types of threads.

More description: You do a good job of this in certain areas, things like Hiro's new outfit and such, but not quite as much as I would like. In particular, I'd like to see some more environmental detail out of you. It seems like you are spending so much time in your character's head that you are skimping on the world around her.

All in all, I think this is a perfect case of 'telling not showing'. You say 'She did this because of this', which while accurate, comes off as rather dry. Mix things up a bit, get some more emotional content in there. I honestly had a hard time even coming up with these cons because your writing is solid, and doesn't have any glaring flaws I can pick it. It was just... Well, like I said. Dry. Y'know?

Some awkward grammar: Though not as bad as Shin, you still had a few moments of your own. In particular, you seem to change tense mid-sentence on occasion. Something to watch out for. Here's an example:

"She looked over, seeing Hikaru went into action, taking his scope out, seeing what had actually happened."
[/ul]
The Awesome:

[/b][/i][/ul][/spoiler][/font]
Errors in Template:

N/A

Totals and Endzone!

    ---->Kusatta: 308/500 (New Total EXP for Kusatta) and 24 Poinz;
    Details:

SPOILER: Click to show

EXP at Time of Submission: 224/500 (Kusatta EXP at Time of Submission)
Base EXP Earned: 12 (Number of Posts) * 5 (For doing a Story Thread) = 60 (Base EXP Earned)
Bonus EXP Earned: 12 (Number of Posts) * 4 (Quality Bonus) = 24 (Bonus EXP Earned) + 24 Poinz
New EXP Total: 224 (EXP at Submission) + 60 (Base EXP) + 24 (Bonus EXP) = 308/500 (New Total EXP for Kusatta) + 24 Poinz

    ---->Brandon: 136/500 (New Total EXP for Brandon) and 32 Poinz;
    Details:

SPOILER: Click to show

EXP at Time of Submission: 96/100 (Brandon EXP at Time of Submission)
Base EXP Earned: 8 (Number of Posts) * 5 (For doing a Story Thread) = 40 (Base EXP Earned)
Bonus EXP Earned: 8 (Number of Posts) * 4 (Quality Bonus) = 32 (Bonus Poinz Earned)
New EXP Total: 96 (EXP at Submission) + 40 (Base EXP)  = 136/500 (New Total EXP for Brandon) + 32 Poinz

    ---->Shin: 165/500 (New Total EXP for Shin);
    Details:

SPOILER: Click to show

EXP at Time of Submission: 69/100 (Shin EXP at Time of Submission)
Base EXP Earned: 12 (Number of Posts) * 5 (For doing a Story Thread) = 60 (Base EXP Earned)Bonus EXP Earned: 12 (Number of Posts) * 3 (Quality Bonus) = 36 (Bonus EXP Earned)
New EXP Total: 69 (EXP at Submission) + 60 (Base EXP) + 36 (Bonus EXP) = 165/500 (New Total EXP for Shin)

    ---->Hiro: 135/500 (New Total EXP for Hiro);
    Details:

SPOILER: Click to show

EXP at Time of Submission: 36/100 (Hiro EXP at Time of Submission)
Base EXP Earned: 11 (Number of Posts) * 5 (For doing a Story Thread) = 55 (Base EXP Earned)
Bonus EXP Earned: 11 (Number of Posts) * 4 (Quality Bonus) = 44 (Bonus EXP Earned)
New EXP Total: 36 (EXP at Submission) + 55 (Base EXP) + 44 (Bonus EXP) = 135/500 (New Total EXP for Hiro)

Please update your profiles!

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