Constructive Feedback - Improving writing

[Kaelara Mentahn]

When I first came here to Tazlure, I hoped to shake free of some poor 'rping' habits from free-form chat posting - while I know my writing has matured at least a little, I'm still a bit pensive about my 'wall of text' when I hit a button to submit a post. While I've always been a bit verbose, without feedback from a reader, I'm not sure if I'm going over-board or not.

I'll add the poll, if folks want some anonymity. I do enjoy writing, and would like to improve on where I am now... which means I'll need to know what works and doesn't. I guess I'm looking for perspective, and the best perspective is sometimes more than can be communicated from a poll here.

If you haven't read my threads, and would like to do so before commenting, please see the 'Journal' link to your left. I would suggest the later Chyril posts, as they are the most recent snatches of my writing style.

There's always room for improvement, and I promise I can take feedback!

[Craghley]

Sorry, made a mis. Please ignore (I hit option 4).

[Finley Ward]

Hey hon! :)

I hope you don't mind my feedback. I moderated you for a little while, so I (like to) think I know your writing reasonably well. However, this was a while ago, perhaps a year, so please disregard anything that's no longer relevant...!

Honestly, you were one of my favourite players. You always were a challenge! Lengthy, thought-out replies with masses of character in them, making me feel as though I was reading a good story, rather than merely doing my rounds as a moderator. I usually left writing your reply last, for that reason - I got the most out of it, by a long way, and I felt any scene with you in was bound to be a powerful, well-written one.

My one piece of advice was, I sometimes found you would give me eight things to respond to in one post, moving on before you gave me time to respond. This could sometimes make writing my reply tricky - I found myself replying in kind. Which meant the thread moved along relatively fast, but sometimes there were things said and done which had to be sort-of ignored and glossed over... because we had other things to be concentrating on! It's not so much that you give the other player (or the mod!) nothing to respond to - more that you give them so much that it's sometimes hard to know where to begin! (Which is great for a mod, trust me - nothing worse than a player who won't do anything!) I would suggest perhaps cutting your replies down a little, and making them shorter - not so much because of the text-wall syndrome, because your writing is very very lovely, and always a pleasure to read! But rather because sometimes you get ahead of yourself a little. Try to limit yourself to maybe two things per post, and this will make the scene flow a little easier with your writing partner.

Anyway. I hope that helps! :)

Much love,

Finners

[Maeve]

Oh, I can so relate. The best tip one of my fellow mods ever gave me ten years ago was "Take your reply.. and cut it into three parts. There is too much there and thus you are skimming over the good stuff."

[Finley Ward]

As Grant puts it, leaning over my shoulder, "...there should be only one active predicate in a post..."
Anything more makes it confusing to reply to. Of course, this doesn't mean you can't include as many passive predicates as you like... (things that don't really need replying to, that can be assumed, such as... your character stands up.)

[Kaelara Mentahn]

Thankyou, that's exactly what I neede to hear! Although I knew something with the length of my posts was a bit... off... I was struggling to put my finger on what it was. In the end, it's very good, very true advice - I try to serve the whole meal at once instead of letting it come course by course, afraid I'm going to miss something, or let something slide.

Thanks for the feedback, and good to see you manuevering a bit around here Finn.

Now to put that into practice...

[Maeve]

Are you in the current Moddin Seminar yet? We have changed the seminar and now we allow for Review threads both from potential mods and current senior players.

[Kaelara Mentahn]

I've gotten involved in the discussions on my 'Special Branch' handle... but because I tend to flake out on people after a few weeks of modding, I'm best suited to minor helps here and there.

So at the moment, there are no threads that bear a 'moddish' stamp. If anyone needs help in a spot, temporarily, I can maybe help - but no more long-term modding for me until RL calms down, I think...