Post by joshuachrisstoff on Jan 17, 2012 10:20:19 GMT -5
I am familiar with the game from years ago. Is that where you got the troll and the spells? Are you an experienced Fantasy writer?
It had been a bitter fight, one she would not soon forget. Oh sure it started fine, but than the troll decided to make a late change in the game going from defense to offense.
-then
Later you confirm that trolls are dumb, big, mean, nasty and not very bright at all. I had that picture in my mind from the minute I saw troll.
I am a little bothered that you have 'written off' the first half of the fight and didn't tell me what happened? I feel you owe me half a fight here.
Trolls being dumb I suggest they will only ever ATTACK. Alternately, maybe 1 in 10 is smart enuff to know it is dying or about to die and will turn tail and run away. I suspect you of being convenient and not giving your monster a fair go at living thru this or making a fair show of its end of it.
threw some dust all over her causing her to shrink down to the size of a peanut
Really? You thort I was gonna let you away with this one, eh? A troll in a clearing, having close to zero IQ reaches down randomly and clutches magic dust that is shrinking powder? I can't go with this.
=Maybe he reaches into a cloth sack he is wearing over his shoulder and tosses the only thing he has in there, shrinking powder.
Or words to that effect.
BUT then, NEXT, why is he staying there and fighting something he can't see? At the first sign of pain inflicted when he can't see its origin, isn't he gonna run away very fast?
Clambering up the beast she called for a bow and arrow which appeared at once. Taking her time she crawled along the side of the beast.
Good use of the hair previously defined.
Summon the bow and arrow maybe, but there is a flaw here, I will explain. Summon the bow later.
She is crawling along the hairs of the troll which is dancing about madly trying to stomp or even find her. Needs both hands to crawl unless she is a monkey type and has four hand type appendages. You can't crawl up a raging beast with one hand, two feet and one bow and arrow, let alone a quiver for additional arrows if she fires more than one.
beast’s shoulder she wrapped the fur around her using it as a makeshift harness
Excellent
She took aim and shot the arrow watching as it soared through the air and landed directly in the brute’s eye.
No good!
She is standing on the beasts shoulder. Look at your shoulder? Can you see a peanut there with your eyeball in a conventional position? Nope!
She shoots him in the ear. If this is a +1 or magical arrow, it may penetrate and kill the big dumb thing, you can't shoot his eye from the shoulder! Verboten!
Leaping to the ground she shot another arrow at the giant’s foot
I have trouble here with leaping to the ground. As a peanut, it will be a helluva fall from 8 feet. If she is a magical creature or a Magic User from AD&D, leap and cast "feather fall", then floats to the ground as a feather may do.
Now that can be from the dead troll as they topple, you wouldn't want it to fall on you.
Again, if you kill the troll with an ear shot, no more shots are needed but if it isn't dead, isn't an arrow to the toe only likely to cause it to chase you?
Light kills trolls.
Not straight out of AD&D but never mind. There, light is light, blinding but not harmful as such except to undead, never mind. Lightening is a different spell, higher level as such and certainly does damage. For you, I prefer you to cast, call, summon lightening rather than light. Of course, that is if you didn't kill it with the arrow in the ear. Maybe the arrow in the ear stunned him or disrupted his balance.
Is your character going to rob the corpse, all good characters do that all the time, it is how they get famous and powerful.
I have already led you into that when he pulls the shrinking powder from the sack over his shoulder. He is bound to have some copper, silver, and gold coins in there, plus maybe some other magical treasure he doesn't know how to work. Maybe he has another sachet or two of shrinking powder or dust of disappearance or anything in the world you might like.
Instantly the troll turned to stone
Lightening versus flesh and bone plus a great, hairy hide. I think it would singe the hair, smoke rising from the head and torso, maybe even splitting the head in two. I just don't think you would likely get stone from lightening. AD&D doesn't. I don't mean to harp on that at all, your work is prolly unique and deserves to be judged as so, but you need to consider your audience. I don't know if AD&D is still read widely but when it had a lot of readers, people tended to use it as a bible of the Fantasy World. Maybe not so much today.
Watchers sat is silence
=IN
My understanding of magic spells is unless specified, they ran out. Some hi level spells are permanent but they are very rare. Her shrinking powder should go away within a few minutes, perhaps ten at the most or certainly after a dip in the local stream with your clothes on would resolve it.
I can't write fantasy but I surely did love playing that game of AD&D and really do wish I was still playing it with the all the people in the big groups. Hell that was fun!
I hope you think I am hard on you. The truth is, you want to make it the best possible, eh? Also, if you attract AD&D players, they usually have high IQs and are the smarter bears in the cave, you will want it the best you can if they are to read it.
Good job!
This is another one that I wouldn't normally read but I liked it and would love to see the end result. I hope my ideas on magic in the crit are not too far off the current norm! <GRIN>
It had been a bitter fight, one she would not soon forget. Oh sure it started fine, but than the troll decided to make a late change in the game going from defense to offense.
-then
Later you confirm that trolls are dumb, big, mean, nasty and not very bright at all. I had that picture in my mind from the minute I saw troll.
I am a little bothered that you have 'written off' the first half of the fight and didn't tell me what happened? I feel you owe me half a fight here.
Trolls being dumb I suggest they will only ever ATTACK. Alternately, maybe 1 in 10 is smart enuff to know it is dying or about to die and will turn tail and run away. I suspect you of being convenient and not giving your monster a fair go at living thru this or making a fair show of its end of it.
threw some dust all over her causing her to shrink down to the size of a peanut
Really? You thort I was gonna let you away with this one, eh? A troll in a clearing, having close to zero IQ reaches down randomly and clutches magic dust that is shrinking powder? I can't go with this.
=Maybe he reaches into a cloth sack he is wearing over his shoulder and tosses the only thing he has in there, shrinking powder.
Or words to that effect.
BUT then, NEXT, why is he staying there and fighting something he can't see? At the first sign of pain inflicted when he can't see its origin, isn't he gonna run away very fast?
Clambering up the beast she called for a bow and arrow which appeared at once. Taking her time she crawled along the side of the beast.
Good use of the hair previously defined.
Summon the bow and arrow maybe, but there is a flaw here, I will explain. Summon the bow later.
She is crawling along the hairs of the troll which is dancing about madly trying to stomp or even find her. Needs both hands to crawl unless she is a monkey type and has four hand type appendages. You can't crawl up a raging beast with one hand, two feet and one bow and arrow, let alone a quiver for additional arrows if she fires more than one.
beast’s shoulder she wrapped the fur around her using it as a makeshift harness
Excellent
She took aim and shot the arrow watching as it soared through the air and landed directly in the brute’s eye.
No good!
She is standing on the beasts shoulder. Look at your shoulder? Can you see a peanut there with your eyeball in a conventional position? Nope!
She shoots him in the ear. If this is a +1 or magical arrow, it may penetrate and kill the big dumb thing, you can't shoot his eye from the shoulder! Verboten!
Leaping to the ground she shot another arrow at the giant’s foot
I have trouble here with leaping to the ground. As a peanut, it will be a helluva fall from 8 feet. If she is a magical creature or a Magic User from AD&D, leap and cast "feather fall", then floats to the ground as a feather may do.
Now that can be from the dead troll as they topple, you wouldn't want it to fall on you.
Again, if you kill the troll with an ear shot, no more shots are needed but if it isn't dead, isn't an arrow to the toe only likely to cause it to chase you?
Light kills trolls.
Not straight out of AD&D but never mind. There, light is light, blinding but not harmful as such except to undead, never mind. Lightening is a different spell, higher level as such and certainly does damage. For you, I prefer you to cast, call, summon lightening rather than light. Of course, that is if you didn't kill it with the arrow in the ear. Maybe the arrow in the ear stunned him or disrupted his balance.
Is your character going to rob the corpse, all good characters do that all the time, it is how they get famous and powerful.
I have already led you into that when he pulls the shrinking powder from the sack over his shoulder. He is bound to have some copper, silver, and gold coins in there, plus maybe some other magical treasure he doesn't know how to work. Maybe he has another sachet or two of shrinking powder or dust of disappearance or anything in the world you might like.
Instantly the troll turned to stone
Lightening versus flesh and bone plus a great, hairy hide. I think it would singe the hair, smoke rising from the head and torso, maybe even splitting the head in two. I just don't think you would likely get stone from lightening. AD&D doesn't. I don't mean to harp on that at all, your work is prolly unique and deserves to be judged as so, but you need to consider your audience. I don't know if AD&D is still read widely but when it had a lot of readers, people tended to use it as a bible of the Fantasy World. Maybe not so much today.
Watchers sat is silence
=IN
My understanding of magic spells is unless specified, they ran out. Some hi level spells are permanent but they are very rare. Her shrinking powder should go away within a few minutes, perhaps ten at the most or certainly after a dip in the local stream with your clothes on would resolve it.
I can't write fantasy but I surely did love playing that game of AD&D and really do wish I was still playing it with the all the people in the big groups. Hell that was fun!
I hope you think I am hard on you. The truth is, you want to make it the best possible, eh? Also, if you attract AD&D players, they usually have high IQs and are the smarter bears in the cave, you will want it the best you can if they are to read it.
Good job!
This is another one that I wouldn't normally read but I liked it and would love to see the end result. I hope my ideas on magic in the crit are not too far off the current norm! <GRIN>
