The Avali Nexus

Man I hate causing drama...

 

Hey, guess what? You can be quoted and not respond to it. That is totally a thing you can do. It's a miracle, the world is saved!

 

I'm gonna talk about your story with a completely on-topic critique. Pay attention or don't, this is just what I thought when I read it.

When it comes to disturbing stories, I've always been a big fan of psychological horror, subscribing to the "nothingness is scarier" line of thought. It's too easy to turn gore into narm, which seems to be the problem a lot of your audience had. Rather than be disgusted or horrified by this poor Avali's superhuman devotion, a lot of us seemed to just go, "Ew... Heh, yeah right, like that's actually possible." I don't really care about how bloody a headshot was, nor does it really make sense to me (or do I care) that an Avali could run a couple hundred meters before jumping two stories with half of his brain missing.

So what if instead of giving us the descriptions of the gore and injury from an external perspective, you presented the internal viewpoint of your dying character? Show us his anguish! What is he feeling as his friend dies before him? What if that friend was the last pack member he had left? Don't make him just effortlessly run all that way, make it be a long, hard slog as he keeps getting shot and simply refusing to die. Just having him keep running with half his guts outside his body makes it sound too simple; it's be really hard to actually stay conscious through that, what with the pain and the blood-loss and the weight of the impact. Have there be other characters that try to stop him from committing suicidal revenge. You're trying to describe a character who has hit the despair event horizon, and the gore actually distracts from this character's fascinating emotional state.

Don't try to disgust, just try to get the readers to root for him to reach the snipers nest. If you do so well, you'll horrify us along the way simply as a side effect.

Just my two cents.

 

Did I mention that you really should adjust that sarcastic attitude? I wasn't joking, we don't need that here.

 

Man, you're a prick. Just stop replying...

 

*Comes back in thread to see what's going on*
Drama. Nope.
*Walks out and resumes reading Homestuck*

 

I almost wanna take a crack at it with some of my characters and races

 

/ban Shadowhunter12 is that a thing?

 

Had I not have written it on the spot it would have been more refined. Thank you very much for your constructive criticism.

 

Maybe you should adjust the melodramatic "woe is me" attitude while we're at it.

In other news, wrestled about 450 words of this backstory-thing together thus far, so that's going well! Still need ideas for Avalon delicacies, though... Hmmm. The mention of piru noodles being the favoured food of avali students makes me think they aren't really considered high-class, but then again....

Oh well. Once I get over this speedbump, maybe I can kick this part out onto the thread and get to work on the actual first conflict, instead of the stage-setting.

 

I am just going to...
*gets a pair of binoculars*
...watch from a flying blimp.

 

and while you can't say no, I'm going to assume your silence means I have permission to destroy every hive in the known galaxy

 

Reply to him, and he feels compelled to reply back. So for his sake, and to keep things from getting out of hand

Just drop it.

 

This satisfies condition B for me. A was slowly working my way loose from being a pillar of the community, but screwing stuff up and failing at my attempts to be social and normal to the point that I get chased out works.

I guess I need to further develop my social skills for next time.
(Don't you dare make a fiasco about this, you people are too good at baiting me back here and I just want out)

Edit: and on this note, cancelling backstory among many other things.

 

That's why it's funny.

 

*muffled talking*

 

I'm speechless right now.

 

I'll take that as an "I approve" *begins burning hives with a flamethrower*

 

*throws binoculars at your face*