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~^~~^~ Black Winds ~^~~^~

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Parakarry267

Parakarry267

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Azigarath said :
I will read the entire story and offer feedback starting within a few days from now.

This old thing was written back when I was just starting high school (I'm 21 now), and was finished within my freshman year. As such... I wouldn't expect it to be superbly written. There's a lot of criticism I could level at it, but I'll let you form your own opinion first.

08-Jan-2014 21:09:28

Azigarath

Azigarath

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Oh, an 80,000-word story will not scare me away. I remember the title of this years ago and cannot help myself but to read the story. So, as I read, I will comment on this and that, but I will keep everything minimal.

“people running around like mice from cats under a >>> waterfall of water <<< ”
I think “of water” is a little redundant here XD

“crimson sword with a look as if fire itself had smithed the blade.”
Fire is indeed what smiths a blade.

The fighting was badly done, and the story lacks much originality in this case. But this was a long time ago, when we were all young. Note that in a real medieval fight, takings turns parrying was sparring, which means playing. If you parry an attack, within the instance you can kill your opponent, especially with a sword.

Here’s two titles that you can put in YouTube to search and then look at, if you want to look at something different and exciting.
Fencing with the long sword 2012
Longsword techniques: Zwerchhau, absetzen, nachreissen

Well, the story is childish, but I know I could not do any better back then. But at least the spelling and mechanics are good.

They argue about pizza.

“The mob of tourists started to walk down the square to the clothes store, and they accidentally ran over Romeo while he was gazing at the sky, thinking of Juliet.”
lol, that was awesome, the best thing I read so far.

Needle is thrown, Earth Strikes destroys furniture, Thessie and Sonia fight, a tornado appears and Sonia goes away.

You have a tendency use a formula of “this happened, and it was like this” quite often. A tad bit too much similes.

“tight plateleg armor”
Cuisses and greaves of plate can be tight, but that’s why they have straps and buckles.

“and the one thing that they all had in common was their worn Rogue armor.”
What’s Rogue armour?

09-Jan-2014 23:58:28 - Last edited on 10-Jan-2014 00:02:15 by Azigarath

Azigarath

Azigarath

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“clean from its shoulders, blood exploding from the cut.”
Well, that’s a nice way of describing it. When beheaded, blood will spurt out the severed neck and head with the pressure of a fire hose; too bad the human body doesn’t have any more blood than it does.

“There was a longsword stuck through her stomach.”
Very slow way to die. It’d be better if she fell on her sword with the tip angled beneath the chin, upward towards the centre of the head, or blade sideways poking the ribs at her heart.

Dialogue is silly; adults behave like cartoon characters, but then again, and again, I couldn’t do any better back then either.

Third bliss bookmark before chapter 6, but I don’t see the reason for those bookmarks. The chapters were good enough for me.

So, does Savlon do any butchery? Or does he just eat things raw? Human jaws are not strong enough to do much stuff like that.

“Suddenly Levantris felt a diamond shoot through his heart, and he woke up in his room, coated in sweat.”
What’s so scary about that? I read such phrase many times, the formula is “(put something random here), and he awoke in sweat.”

“O'Hinal whipped out two knives and they skewered two guards' necks, their screams muffled by the gurgling blood in their throats as they fell in front of Marent and Patrick, who then tripped two more guards as they turned around to see who had killed their brothers.”

Another common death. When you throw a knife, it has, on average, a 50% chance for the blade to hit, and when it does, it wouldn’t instantly kill you, even if you got it in the throat. When the British went to Afghanistan in the nineteenth century (The Anglo-Afghan Wars), a British officer wrote in his journal, that he saw an Afghan’s head split in half vertically by a sword, and lived long enough to shout his last prayers to Allah (probably lasted a few seconds).

09-Jan-2014 23:58:40

Azigarath

Azigarath

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There are accounts of soldiers being shot up to a few times, yet still manage to bayonet several foes and dying long after the battle. There may be similar cases with arrows/bolts, but I have not yet come across any. But, during the Siege of Jerusalem, there are accounts of European knights, covered with arrows front and back, who still managed to take the city while killing many. Their armour must have saved them.

There are also rare accounts when men’s entire bodies are pierced with swords, straight though the torso, yet still manage to live long enough to kill up to several enemies before expiring.

Anyways, back to the story. The guards ask if the bandits want to live? Why not just kill them?

The guard’s armour does not help them, and they are unable to kill thieves and even drunks. These guards are bad at their job.

“He lifted the man in midair for a second, and then with a barbaric yell that was a mix between a man's and a demon's, hurled him down on the pile of bodies with a thundering crash.”
Like what you see in anime?

“”Hey, Levantris! You going to finish that?” Patrick asked, eyeing Levantris's piece of pizza hungrily.”
Haha, that’s a good one.

“speaking of repetitive, do you notice that these are placed about every 13-19 posts?”
No, I did*’t.

“although now it was searing hot, almost like lava,”
When you used words like volcano, lava, exploded, the exaggerations are a bit too extreme.

Ah, a past-focused part. Ten years ago, that is.

“Levantris looked both ways before darting across the street, his slim figure only a shadow as it flew through the back alleys of Varrock.”
That’s a nice way to word it.

Sonia kisses and falls to the floor.

“Remember these Bookmarks exist just for you to rest and mark your progress!”
Well, isn’t that what chapters are for?

09-Jan-2014 23:59:07

Azigarath

Azigarath

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“My parents were killed by this very gang! And I only ended up here because of a *tornado!*”
Thinking about that, what a thought to think about.

“I need an aspirin or something”
Aspirin was used as medicine for a long time, but as a pill?

Santa Clause, when Sonia was seven.

From page 8, the story is quite boring; talking and behaviour is all that’s portrayed. It feels like filler.

“whipped out a knife, and sliced a passing dragonfly in half, causing its guts to fly behind him and splatter on the grass.”
Relevant?

A mage appears, who can hurl a lack of brightness at people, which transforms into purple mist midair.

“I screamed at the guy in anger, and then kicked the door in fury.”
Reminds me of a time in grade 9. This student became very angry and left the workshop, kicking the double doors open. Except he kicked the door on the right, which was locked, and he hurt his leg and then walked out the door on the left which was unlocked. I chuckled.

“But, I guess I'm just an idiot today.”
No, Sevan, you’re always an idiot. :P

“The water and wind got to their worst, as everything seemed to turn to a bazooka of neverending white mist and white water bullets flying sideways across the plain.”
Bazooka? That word feels misplaced and anachronistic.

“Ralph turned them over and removed the masks from their faces, and then placing the masks in the water next to those who had died,”
Hunh?

“You showed a pathetic sign of weakness! You refused to kill the innocent! You're lucky Levantris didn't just feed you to Savlon!”
Throughout history, even criminal organisations had some kind of honor and discipline; if their criminals misbehaved, or acted wrongly against members of itself, the person was often punished. I know your story is fantasy, but they are ridiculously void of reason to such an extent they are weaker than caricatures.

09-Jan-2014 23:59:30

Azigarath

Azigarath

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“The other thieves jumped from the top sequentially, and then the thief with the candle presented it to Sonia and Levantris, like a peasant presenting a jewel to a king and queen.”
Artistically, this is the best line I read so far.

The thieves have an odd way of stealing, it’s more like ransacking. Their first adventure, when they were almost killed by guards, was quite careless. Thieves are supposed to do everything they can to not look like suspicious figures.

“Sevan took out a throwing knife made out of Runite and aimed for Beraw's leg, which caught square into the armor and made a huge dent in it,”
There is no way a knife would dent armour. But, Beraw is said to not take any damage.

As for combat, I really shouldn’t complain about it, but your characters seem to be dancing rather than fighting, taking turns doing acrobatic feats that are rightfully depicted not doing anything.

Levantris and Nali fight.

“He held a small dagger hilt, with no blade on it.”
A hilt consists of a tang sandwiched by wood and leather; the tang is part of the blade. If there is no blade, there is no tang. Do you mean that the blade broke off from the tang? If so, the crossgaurd would fly off too.

“The key rings shot out nine colors of spikes: black, white, red, blue, brown, green, pink, orange, and purple, that phased into Nali's head and left holes in it that glowed in correspondence to the color of the spike.”
So he looks like a Christmas tree now.

“he thrust the acid-tipped knife into Nali's heart, creating a loud steaming noise.
The acid was melting Nali's heart, and before long,”
A knife into a heart will kill you quickly. And why is it that the acid can melt bodies but not the knife it’s on? Why not just chuck a little acid at someone and kill him or her like that?

09-Jan-2014 23:59:44

Azigarath

Azigarath

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Armoured combat portrayed is completely wrong. I am unsure if the story is supposed to be within the game mechanics of RuneScape or not. Well, the fighting continues, and people take turns throwing things, casting magical things, and shooting things through blowguns and such, and jumping away from them.

“The man stopped moving as blood squirted out from the neck wound,”
If you pierce someone’s throat, very little blood goes out. Only cutting makes blood go out there.

What kind of gun is featured, anyways? I don’t recall or can’t remember. The idea of bazookas and shotguns just doesn’t fit for me, regardless of the reasons behind it. But this is your story, not like it matters what I feel.

“Feel this, you little urchin!!”
Ouch!

After a long, hard skirmish involving hand to hand combat, magical projectiles and magical powering of weapons, transformations, and enough blood to float a boat, Sonia meets her end, glad that it was all over. She seems to wake up in a dream, an afterlife of some sort.

Now, onto the hidden scenes.

The PoV in the hidden scenes was written much better than most of the main story. It reveals Sonia as a phoenix siren, whatever that is. I suppose it is the reason why she continues life in the next world. Hunh, I started reading it at 11 AM, It’s almost 4 PM PM now, did I really spend almost five hours on this? That went quickly.

Thus I read the story, but my feedback turned out to be more on commentary than anything else; I was too exhausted due to a lack of sleep to do any better. But, at least it is adequate proof that I read your story. What did I learn? What is the moral? What do I think about? What is there to feel? I don’t know.

I did not feel much for the story, and simply did not care about what was going on. This is not your fault, for if I am unable to grasp and care about the story, it’s my flaw.

09-Jan-2014 23:59:59

Azigarath

Azigarath

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The story features Levantris and Sonia especially. Levantris’ tale, from his youth to his final thoughts, was a core element in the story. He is an embittered character who finalises with nothing to lose but his life, but has no life to lose, and the innocent Sonia falls. There was good artistic development here, but I was often distracted by the immaturity of characters’ behaviour. Another thing you did well was the morbidity, especially in the first third of the story. The violence was mostly unrealistic, definitely not according to human anatomy, and the combat felt cartoony.

But could I have had done any better back then? No, I couldn’t, and I seem to have done even worse, because no-one read anything I typed prior to 2009. Indeed, we all have to go through the worst phases in our early days, I know and remember my own work from when I was young was absolutely ridiculous, unrealistic, absurd, pointless, contradictory and just plain dumb. I am glad that everything I made in the past is long gone now, and for what is still alive, I force myself to reread the work and tidy it up.

But Black Winds is an achievement with results, and I noticed a gradual increase in all aspects of storytelling the farther I read, which I also recall when I read Serene End’s work and Anne’s story. Better yet, you received the praises of many back then, by those who appreciated your work (And by very few who figured it’d be best to end up with hidden posts, I guess people like that never change).

Well, my feedback is coming to a close. Feel free to disagree or disregard anything in whole or in part, and if you have any specific questions, comments, corrections or anything else, I’ll be open to reply to any of them.

This is all for now, until next time, and thank-you for making Black Winds.

10-Jan-2014 00:00:07

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