[JUDGED] !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Printable Version +- HELOVIA || The Way to the Sun (http://helovia.com) +-- Forum: Out of Character (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=1) +--- Forum: Archives (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=11) +---- Forum: Battle Archives (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=64) +---- Thread: [JUDGED] !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] (/showthread.php?tid=5820) |
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!! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Seele - 02-20-2013
RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Mauja - 02-26-2013 Sorry that it took me so long to get to this, my muse and mind kind of crashed. x[ Also, too bad I don't play my old-old character Adalwulf anymore, or they could've shouted German at each other. <3 Dusk: and darkness fell as the light failed. Shadows snapped at his hocks as they drew tighter around him in a mocking embrace of his argent glow, and only when the trees shrouded the sky completely did Mauja stop being a beacon of light. It was the curse of having an alabaster hide, yet he would not trade his color for anything in the world — upon the snows where he lived, it was he who remained unseen, nothing but a smear of white against a backdrop of the same color. A small smile curled his lips in the dark, black-rimmed ears twitching and swirling; he was in this foreign forest, tracking the call of someone who asked for blood. Did they expect him to come, trussed and obedient, like a lamb to the slaughter? Hopefully they had more sense than that, and as he finally rounded a thick oak trunk and stepped across its bulging roots, it was with a wolf's hungry grin upon his face. Boughs stretched on overhead, blocking out the dark sky, and in the murky light it was hard to tell what color she was, but that hardly mattered to him. Night-silvered eyes swept across her lithe frame, lingering for a moment on the tip of her glass horn, before falling back to the groove in her neck. She had asked for blood, but he'd not use his own in the bargaining, oh no. A thrill of excitement ran through his body, shuddered through his soul as Irma's hoarse cry split the silence from somewhere above — for a moment, he could feel what it was like, to sink sharp talons into warm flesh, and watch the life bleed out as the body grew cold... Tonight, they were both predators, he and the owl, and slowly Mauja drew out from the shadows. He spoke no greeting, said not a word as he stepped across the debris littering her arena of choice. Nearly a year he had lived in a forest, and his body remembered how to move, when to raise a hoof higher as to not stumble. It was time to begin this, the narrow confines pushing him closer to her faster than he wished, even at a slow, skulking walk. Adrenaline fluttered in his chest, anticipation sent his every nerve tingling, and with a deep, sickening lust to break something, he pushed off into a powerful canter, a white wraith coming to drink her blood. One step. Two steps. Unless she turned away from him, he came head on, but every moment he was ready to alter his path to chase her down — just looking at her slim shape made him convinced she was faster than he. Not if I break her legs, the thought, smiling to himself. Aiming slightly to his own right, Mauja swung his large head, first out to the right, and then in towards the left, feinting the icy tip of his horn towards her left eye to keep her glass weapon away. He had no desire to speared so early on in their scuffle, and once his cheek was past hers — if she did not do take off or otherwise mess up his plans — he bunched up his hind legs underneath him to the sickening crunch of a breaking branch, and pushed off with his front knees like battering rams going for her chest and throat. He had no mercy that night, nothing but cold ire in his blood as he sought to push her over with his heavier body, grinning like a mad wolf. Let's see how pretty she was once she'd rolled in the dust, where she belonged. [ 1/3 ] [ 609 ] So, here we go! Mauja has been feeling evil today, and as this is OOC, I took the liberty to go all-out crazy and bloodthirsty. ;D As I don't really have much to say yet, I'll just give a few tips and pointers for your next post. ^^ Prose This section can easily become your biggest enemy, if you don't proofread. Always spell-check your fight posts, to make sure they've got a good flow, and use explanations which are fairly straightforward. Try to work emotion into it - I myself suck at this in my fight sequences xP - because often it becomes a bit "dry" when you're rattling off positions. They're important, but sometimes they're the bane of my existence. Attacking/Defending One thing which can really make things awkward, is if you move on too far in your post. In my opening attack, I just try to barrel into you, which is more or less 1 attack even if it had a feint too. If I had then proceeded to write that I ran past and kicked out, it kind of would've limited the plausible ways of reacting. So I suggest that we stick to the pattern of attack, defend, attack, defend. A defense can also be a counter-attack, say, you can rear up and strike towards Mauja as he comes, describe the effects of my attack, and launch a new attack if there's plausible room for it, but the important thing would be to not move on too far. It is always better to end a post with your attack, and not append something like (in my case) "and once past her he ran off a few paces", because who knows, maybe you will make Seele fall over and Mauja will kind of fall on top of her? Then the end of my previous post would've made no sense. :) In fights, less is often more. Sometimes it's a lot easier to understand simply worded straightforward attacks, than too intricate things. When you attack/defend, try to include things like: which body part am I attacking with/taking injury to? Left or right (this is can usually be left out in defense, as long as you take the attack where your opponent aimed it, and they declared which side they were attacking)? Does it hurt, and will it affect me for the rest of the fight (only applies to defense)? Even if you completely avoid an attack, you must mention it somehow, like "I ran away, thus avoiding his buck". Surroundings & Breed These are kind of tricky. You've set us a fairly cluttered place, which means we have to remember things like sticks breaking, maybe tripping on a particularly large/bothersome one, are the rocks in patches large enough to slip on? etc. As for breed, we'll have to keep in mind things like Mauja is probably stronger, and while friesians (and appys) are fairly agile for their size, Seele is so much smaller she'll probably be faster in close combat. There's also the height difference to consider. Just to try to keep these two things in mind when you write your post, and scan it making sure you're not suddenly playing as if there's no things underfoot, etc! ^^ RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Seele - 05-23-2013
RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Mauja - 05-27-2013 I wonder what sound she will make as she breaks. Perhaps the sound would be like the dry crack of the branches under his frosted hooves? Or would it carry a certain wetness to it, a bloody thud as her flesh groaned and hit the unyielding floor? Darkness clouded his mind, the feral thirst for blood his only guide; of course, dreams are always larger — better — than the mundane reality. She wasn't about to fall now. His question would remain unanswered a little longer. That his horn touched nothing was not even a disappointment; he had expected her to avoid it, would've thought less of her if she hadn't. That she moved away.. well, in all honesty, he hadn't expected her to be a sitting target, but some part of him still seethed in frustration that he wasn't able to bowl her over and trample her at the first try. Still, his knee knocked against her bony shoulder, but with her already moving away, it was a useless thing. There was no satisfaction in the ache spreading in his kneecap, no fulfillment in the impact; his knees straightened out, hooves back on the cluttered ground. All he'd got from their first clash was a dull throb, and seeing her stumble backwards was a hollow pleasure when he had wanted to achieve so much more. The soft earth cushioned his steps, but he spared no sliver of soul on gratefulness. Instead, he leaned right, the rhythmic three-beat thuds of his gait carrying him away while she still recovered. In the pallid light of moon he felt very much like the big bad wolf, and she the spindly girl in the red hood; she seemed eager to entertain him, but how would their story end? I know what end I would like. Frigid and graceful Mauja slowed after a moment, wariness etched along the darkened planes of his face; she had recovered from the impact of their bodies, her smaller frame powering heedlessly across the ground as his own nearly slowed to a stop, frosted hooves dancing lightly upon the debris. She was so eager to dance with him, coming back to him as if she longed for his embrace after moments of cold separation... A smirk spread across his face, the thunder of his heart a song in his ears; he wanted her to come closer, too.. kiss her neck and leave stains of red, dance with her until he'd drawn every vestige of energy from her and leave her nothing but an empty, broken husk. She was a graceful creature, he would not deny that, but grace was no reason for him to let himself be slaughtered. His brief wait for the right moment, when her glass horn would be close enough, was over before it had barely begun. Some invisible cue, an instinct honed by a life of fighting, triggered his movement; his hips curled right while his left shoulder jutted out, pivoting on his forehand to bring them parallel again. Sacrifice, for the victory — the sharp tip of her horn went into the white skin, running along the flat plane of his shoulder and leaving a stinging trail of red in its wake as it slid off the point of his curved body. At the same time, Mauja lowered his head to the left, aiming his sturdier horn towards her moving body; his right hind hoof skidded in under his belly, and mustering what power he could against the awkward surface of a root he pushed forward, wanting to spear her between the ribs, or just behind them. [ 2/3 :: 600 words. ]
Aaaand action! (I'm going in-depth here! xD)
I am very much enjoying Seele's voices - they add a kind of narrative, and I think they can become a very powerful tool for setting the mood. But, as with all prose, just make sure it doesn't "take over" or break up the flow of the fight (it isn't in this post! but it can happen if you don't watch it). The first "situation": "Aiming slightly to his own right, Mauja swung his large head, first out to the right, and then in towards the left, feinting the icy tip of his horn towards her left eye to keep her glass weapon away. He had no desire to speared so early on in their scuffle, and once his cheek was past hers — if she did not do take off or otherwise mess up his plans — he bunched up his hind legs underneath him to the sickening crunch of a breaking branch, and pushed off with his front knees like battering rams going for her chest and throat. " "So close to my eyes I had a slight panicked moment. Dropping my head so the horn didn't snag any of the important features placed upon it. And then, I began to stagger out of the way, feet tripping a little over the roots underfoot. Keep moving! To the right! Go to the right! Tenor chords vibrated in my head as I forced my eyes open and continued to stumble to the right. I caught sight of his body moving toward my chest and I collected my position, his right knee slamming into my left shoulder as I stumbled back a few steps with a low growl." On the whole, there's two "things" with this. The most obvious is the hit, right knee + left shoulder. Staggering sideways is a great response to avoid Mauja's attack, and would definitely make him hit only with one knee - however, it ought to have been his left. Since they are parallel and facing opposite directions, their left sides would be against one another. Because of this, the logical thing would have been for his left knee to hit her shoulder. The other thing that caught my attention is minor, but has to do with the pacing/time frame of fights. At the point of Mauja's feint he would logically be only a short stride away, as it requires their heads being more or less beside each other. "And then, I began to stagger out of the way, feet tripping a little over the roots underfoot. Keep moving! To the right! Go to the right! Tenor chords vibrated in my head as I forced my eyes open and continued to stumble to the right. I caught sight of his body moving toward my chest.." seems to stretch this short moment on for too long. A better way to organize the paragraph would've been something like: - Starting to stagger right - Ducking head - Getting hit This would keep all steps of your paragraph, without stretching the moment out. It's really just reorganizing it! But, trying to sidestep is definitely a great way to deal with the attack, and I probably would've done the same! Your attack: ".. his right knee slamming into my left shoulder as I stumbled back a few steps with a low growl. One step to stabilize myself. One step to start to move forward. Then, catapulting forward, in one swift movement I aimed my horn toward the muscle in this stag's shoulder, perfect level for my height at the moment. (..) He was so proud that I had managed to get out just enough to not be tackled, yet close enough I could easily come back at him." Mauja came in at a canter, and a canter stride is approx. 9-12 feet in length (according to google x[). Stumbling back a few steps is a slower business for a horse with four legs than a human with two, and then two steps are further mentioned before the attack commences. By this time, as nothing tripped Mauja up, it seems realistic he is somewhere around two strides away, and I admit, I was mean and ran off to the right to foil your attack. D: So, I do not think Mauja and Seele would still be that close. Even if Mauja had continued straight ahead, the length of his stride versus Seele's stumble would probably have them lined up at the hip, or Mauja past her. It almost seems like Mauja stopped moving in your head, remaining in the position of his strike. Unless you strike back instantly, like sticking out a hind leg to catch Mauja's and hit him/trip him, you can't really assume they're anywhere, doing anything. So each time you let distance happen between them, you kinda have to "reset" all you knew of their position/gait, and just hurdle out into the unknown - almost like making the "first attack" all over. Prose-wise, there's nothing I reacted to as being bad/wrong. :3 Maybe you could've broken apart the last, big paragraph into two, to make it a bit easier to grasp as a whole, but there is certainly noting wrong with it as it is! ^^ The voices carry it along nicely. So far, you are doing good! You had a very sound reaction to my attack, but the dynamic/pacing of the fight threw your own a little off-kilter. So try to keep the movement in mind! It's a hard balance to find, as you can't really assume I do anything, but neither can you assume I don't; you learn how to phrase things after a while to make it make sense while not sounding declarative of your opponent's positioning/actions. :) And always double-check your left's and right's! They're easy to mess up, and I sometimes mess them up hardcore myself x_x; (fortunately mostly when I do verdicts.. and as you only see the final one, you never see my confusion. ;D) I'm looking forward to what you'll throw at me the next round! If you have any questions about what I ramble about, just let me know. xP RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Seele - 05-29-2013
RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Mauja - 06-01-2013
[ I am not entirely sure how her hooves would be on impact, so.. o_o; treated them much like normal hooves. ] Just maybe, I am crazy. What was the point of anything? What was the point of hunting her? She clearly did not want it (who in their right mind wanted to be hurt, anyway?), as she was drawing away from his horn, yet the darkness slithering through his veins demanded he follow — commanded him to, even as the realization that this was pointless washed over him. Nothing spurred him to harm her. She was a stranger; there was no grudge, no desire for vengeance or glory, only the strange need to hurt her. Nothing was his motivator, and yet that very same nothing was consuming his blackened heart. She drew away, and he knew by the slight forward jerk of his head that his horn was no longer tearing through her flesh. Disappointing. Easily he caught his balance, but that was all he had the time to do before her hooves came flying up. With a snarl Mauja tossed his head up and rocked back; one dainty glass hoof crashed against the point of his left shoulder, the other clipped the front of his chest. The sharp sting of impact faded to something dull, blood vessels broken beneath the skin, but he could barely feel it — his senses felt muted, his nerves only telling him that he was hot, and not the vital things like your shoulder is bleeding or your left knee is aching. She was so small, so dainty, and just in front of him.. almost within reach... Not caring that her hind legs could come flying out again, or rather, not stopping to consider it, Mauja pushed off the hard ground and threw himself forward. Most sane thoughts had been obliterated by the nothing, the hot flare in his gut, the numbness in his veins; he needed something... He needed a release. Like those of a lunging wolf his jaws opened wide, his aim her dock, but it was more of a distraction, just as much for her sake as his own; on a good day he could stand still and kill someone, but on a bad day, he needed to entertain his body, too. The fire in his blood was consumed in an instant, doused with cold and dark, like a sudden plunge through rotten ice. It offered no clarity, only muddled his senses further, but somewhere at the edges of his mind the world became chillier, beautifuler, more dangerous; he grasped for it, felt the thrum of magic through his blood, the power as the earth groaned and obeyed. Beneath where she stood a faint tremble rippled out through the ground, before it broke open; two spikes rose quickly towards the sky, one towards her abdomen, the other slightly in front, preferably in front of her chest, to trap her and strike towards her throat. They rose in silent salute towards the moon, simultaneous with his mad lunge, and for a split second, it felt like everything made sense. [ 3/3 :: 494 words. ]
Apologies in advance. I ramble a lot about fights. xD
I guess it becomes a matter of personal interpretation; for me, the mention of "two steps" seemed to indicate a larger distance between them than the close quaters at first.. however, if the distance is lesser than I perceived it as, it also becomes a matter of, would you have hit Mauja's ass as he ran away then? Would Mauja's longer, albeit a tad slower strides, be able to put the distance between him and the smaller Seele that I played on? etc. Fights are so dynamic. xD But we'll just leave this to the judge to, well, judge. :D While your previous post was good, this one was a lot better! The shorter paragraphs made it easier to follow, and the narrative was smoother, more linear, and the action was more constant. The thing you always strive for in a fight post is to maintain some kind of emotional presence without sectioning it off into "emotion - action - emotion - action", but rather intertwining them throughout, and this post did this a lot better! However, at the end of the post you wrote: "Forcefully shaking my head I closed my eyes for two seconds before continuing to yell at my mother in my mind." Something that is very underestimated in fights is the speed of a fight (while "30 seconds" in battle restrictions is understood to mean roughly 1 post, I'd say 30 seconds could be the entire time span of one fight xD). A horse's kick takes less than a second. Close your eyes and count to two, and you realize that it is quite a while; essentially you're a sitting duck right in front of Mauja, immobilizing yourself. Some other, "faster" ways to indicate time would be: for a moment, a heartbeat, etc. It's a much more liquid concept, and it carries the same "brief pause" meaning without immobilizing you. You see when these two get going, it's all very fast-paced, and two seconds seems very long, at least to me. :3 As for the action itself - again, trying to move away is a good response (it is a good response to most things!), but if you consider their positions: Mauja is almost stationary, with Seele coming with speed. In order to harm one another with their horns, they'd have to be lined up nearly head-to-shoulder with one another. You have Seele spinning on your forehand, which, given the close quarters, would probably have her hips smashing into his chest and preventing her from moving further at that point - it would've made more sense to spin on the hindquarters. Ultimately, it would've put more space between them, and freed her up for the kick, whereas I think spinning on the forehand would put them much too close for the scenario you described. :3 And harum harum, of course I had to subject you to some magic. :D Might as well deal with most aspects of a fight while we're at it, haha. And, in regards to the way I wrote it - since my magic is sort of not reliant upon Mauja's position in relation to Seele's, I can say that I start it beneath her. However, that is just the starting point; the spikes are stationary, and once they've started in one place they're not about to follow her around. c: Magic, as long as it is a kind of "third party source" (Smoke can make a smoke veil, Mauja can make ice spikes) or something you place in another's body (Azzaron can set your insides on fire, Mauja can put ice in your blood, Paladin can boil your blood) can be written as starting to happen at the victim's current position, wherever it is (aka assuming, something you otherwise get smacked on the fingers for xD) - as opposed to eg. Deimos death magic, which requires his victim to be within reach of his aura, or Archibald's stomp, which is centered around him. ^ not sure if this made any sense... Basically, I can write "I make ice spikes beneath you c:" because I aim based on your current position (Mauja's position in relation to Seele doesn't matter) - I don't have to write "I made ice spikes beneath you where you were last time", as you have to do with physical attacks (where relative position does matter). lmao. random giant ramble of wording justification. XD But, in short: this post felt a lot more well-written, it was clearer and easier to follow. You're not pulling anything outlandish or confusing me at any point, and it seems to me that you have a good grasp of, well, moving your horse! Just try to keep in mind where all body parts go if you do something, especially when considering turning on the forehand or hind end. :3 RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Seele - 06-03-2013
RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Mauja - 06-04-2013 The world faded to gray again. There was no flesh between his teeth, nothing to hold on to as the chaotic world spun around him; he was free-falling through a shrieking darkness, urged on by the chill erupting in his veins, and barely felt the black hair ripping through his teeth. The moments until his frosted hooves touched the solid ground seemed endless, and once they were down it felt like his spirit plunged five feet deeper before ricocheting back where it belonged. He blinked in the darkness, gaze snapping to his monuments of ice; the tip of one was lined in something dark, and his heart beat triumphantly. With jagged steps Mauja drew himself forward, dwarfed by his own creations — she, the kind donor of blood, stood upon the other side, apparently disinterested in coming around to continue their little dance. What a pity; she had been a good partner, and the wolf inside wanted to taste more of her flesh, to find the answer to the question of how bodies broke, but it seemed that he would be left in the dark for a little longer. She could probably outrun him in the forest. Stopping beside his spikes, Mauja raised his elegant head towards the sky, his dark muzzle smudged with red as he brushed it against the cold, blooded tip. It was sharp with frost against his sensitive skin, and with a sigh he released the magic. Shattering, the spikes fell to the floor, bursting into a million pieces before sinking back into the earth; the veil between them was torn, and Mauja peered oddly at her through the darkness, but made no move towards her. [ closing defense, 279 words. ] Actually, you could've attacked again, as the first to attack (in this case, mee! :3) always get a closing defense, to react to the attacks made in the last round of actual fighting. :) But yes, once the closing defense of a spar/challenge has been posted, you're supposed to change the prefix to "JUDGE". And, as for editing posts, you only get penalized if you edit after your opponent have replied to them. I think editing to change the prefix in the first post is exempt from this rule, though. :) As far as her glass hooves go, the line "Perhaps I would get a nice shot, even if the sharp edges couldn't quite cut anything upon his frame." from your previous post had me thinking that you were saying they wouldn't, but I admit I wasn't all sure of it. xD I recommend adding it to her profile, in the appearance section, because I checked to see if it said something of their design. It won't hurt to elaborate on it, or discuss things like, is the glass super hard and rarely breaks? Or does it break sometime, but grow out again? etc. When things aren't "normal" it's best to have it described in the profile, as it's the place I'd look for information on how to handle it. :3 And yeah, I'm thinking that continuity may be the reason the post was better, as this one was too! Cleaner writing, better flow and all that jazz. :) As for spinning away, I assume she did it on the forehand, but it wouldn't have hurt to write if you went left or right - nor did it really hurt not to in this case, but if it had been the middle of the fight and I had maybe wanted to follow my attack up with stabbing towards your thigh, I would've appreciated to know which direction you went. :3 Sound reaction, however, and there's nothing at all wrong with how you handled the spikes! I'm not sure they would've blocked your way back entirely, but ah well, was the end of the fight anyway! ^^ Good job! I think you write good posts, as these last two showed your true caliber, and overall you made sense, I think you just need to "learn the fight lingo" and I'm sure with another spar or two, you'll have "fight writing" down! :3 I hope this spar/teaching made sense and helped you understand them more. ^-^ If you have any further questions, just aaask. :D RE: !! LadyKiller [OOC || Mauja] - Official - 06-15-2013
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