IWT 9 - Character Grab-Bag

[Locke]

Hey, Usoki, maintain a list of who sent which characters, would you? Some are easy to guess, but I think it'll still be amusing after the results come out.

[Usoki]

Hmmm... yeah, that's not a bad idea. I'll probably also track who has used their own character(s), and how many of them that they used, which I will present after contest end but before voting end. That should probably also be factored into the rating... Someone making a story out of their own characters isn't nearly as impressive as one made without any of their own characters.

[Locke]

Someone making a story out of their own characters isn't nearly as impressive as one made without any of their own characters.

I'm not going to penalize anyone for that. I understand what goes into creating a character: you put part of yourself in there. Your contest has already done good work by forcing us to visualize these characters. As I see it, it's the author's right to use them.

I hope - and have faith - that participants will develop more than just their own concepts. If you want to make it a rule that everyone has to use at least one character someone else came up with, that's fine by me, but almost certainly unnecessary.

If someone is self-sacrificing enough to develop a character, give it to the contest on faith, and then not use it themselves, I count that as a virtue, and I have respect for that person. But I won't factor it into my rating.

[Vesnic]

Uh...I'd really prefer if you left the characters anonymous and didn't list each one by who submitted it.

I see where Locke is coming from about each author investing in the characters he/she creates, but the whole point of creating a character who is NOT oneself is to, essentially, GET OVER oneself. Once I've created a character, and contributed it for common use, I don't think it should matter that I was the one who gave birth to it. I might have squeezed it out, but now it's up to the village to raise my child.

Also, I can't help but think that there will be some bias if people know whose is whose. I like the clean-slate democracy of this herd of strangers all penned up together on a little ship, sailing to IS-istan for the first time, leaving their pasts behind them. Yes, one or two may bear the obvious racial markings of the tribe of East-Asian homunculi from which Usoki is descended, but this really should be left in the past as they tread new waters and build new lives on the fertile, if somewhat cannibalistic grounds, of their new country.

[Locke]

I'd find it really interesting to know (after the vote, so as to avoid bias. Although I'm not sure how much of that there would be). But if you feel that strongly about it, sure, keep it anonymous.

[Crunchyfrog]

Snuggles McSquishbottom, eh?

*ponders*

[Playa988]

I've been considering it and what the hell, maybe officially joining the contest will encourage me to get off my lazy ass and actually start pumping out a story.

So yeah, I'm in.

[Locke]

So yeah, I'm in.

You do realize that not following through condemns you to SHAME now?
Please don't be like me, Playa. Enter something, even if it's Mudkip.

Oh, ye gods, the SHAME. Not to mention the PMs from Endmaster, hinting at my imminent demise, and the open mockery of Chubby (there's the seething hatred of the silent majority, too, but that's just a given).

I'd say you stand a good chance of knocking out filipinofreddy, but I don't want to sound racist. Does anyone know anything about him? The site says he's Canadian, but that's all I've got.

A casual Google search turns up only this, an ad page.

[donteatpoop]

I'm worried that I'll be shamed this year. I have a few writing projects that are consuming the shit out of my time; including an ineractive one. Might not get to enter this year. I'll make sure I rate at the very least.

[End Master]

I sort of wonder if anyone is actually going to submit a story this year. Everyone that has volunteered so far has been pretty quiet and you really need at least 3 for a proper contest.

Then again most don't get started until the last minute around here anyway.

[Usoki]

I've actually managed to figure out what I'm submitting for the contest. Granted, I've only got 2 rooms so far, and I don't have the current plotlines mapped out to cross the critical 20 room barrier... but I've figured out how to use four characters- and three of them aren't even mine! I figure that's really good progress for being only mid July.

And if things look bad in November or so, we can always pull out the "Fuck it" theme as a backup. I mean, it worked the year that no one was ambitious enough to write an allegory...

[Cat2000]

It took me a while (and a new laptop), but I'm finally on track to have... well, something. Maybe. Hopefully.

[BatCountry]

So the forums have been pretty dead as of late it seems. Just want to make sure there will still be a contest following the parameters that Usoki set. I still plan on contributing, and from the looks of it so do Usoki and Cat.

I think this is such a great idea for a story contest and it would be a shame if we are the only 3 in this. MOAR PEEPOLE!!! MOAR PEEPOLE!! These forums need to be revived! Place is like a ghost town.

[mizal]

I just don't have a lot of time and I'm not overly interested in writing about characters that aren't my own in the first place. Though I guess I could always submit something completely unrelated with the intention of losing if another entry was needed that badly. Though I've kind of sworn off posting incomplete stories.

[Usoki]

Any thoughts of what we should do about the contest? Are we still going forward as planned? I'm not going to have motivation to work on my contest piece until December-ish, what with NaNoWriMo coming up. I do, however, have it planned out so that I can get all of the characters and special conditions that I need. But I don't want to win by default.

Do we need to chicken out a bit? Maybe include three characters, but only one out of three special conditions needs to be met?