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A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I'm writing this in the perspective of the dragon. I've plotted out branching and started one of the paths. This is the first page so far:

You're soaring over the Buurdhol Wood. It's a bright summer's day, but you're not worried about being spotted. You're soaring right over the thick of the wood, where no human would ever dare to go.

Or, at least, you thought no human would ever dare to go there. You're quite surprised to see a young woman (a girl, really) standing alone in a clearing. Doesn't she know that's essentially screaming, "Monsters! Come and kill me!"  You fly over to get a closer look, and the girl notices you. Instead of running away (which is quite useless, because you could easily catch up to her) she calls out. "Dragon!" This girl is either really brave, really stupid, or a combination of both.

By the way her sack is swinging, you can tell it has something heavy in it, quite possibly gold. It might be worth seeing what this girl is calling out to you for. On the other hand, this might be a trap. It seems a little too obvious.

I'm wondering about the section where it says, "You...see a young woman (a girl, really)..." The punctuation seems a bit off there, but I don't know what else to do.

For my first contest, I feel I'm progressing well!

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago
It’s fine how you have it. I caution on going overboard with parentheses though. You could reword it a bit and just set the clarification off in one set of commas. Or you could use dashes/hyphens.

You see a young woman, little more than a girl, standing ...

You see a young woman - a girl really - standing ...

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

Thanks! Once you pointed that out, I realized I do use parentheses quite a bit in my writing. I'll try to look at alternatives, though I probably won't stop using them entirely.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I would argue that the items in parentheses might be unnesscary... for example stating that running from a flying dragon is useless because it can catch her is pretty implicit. You might want change that to describe how the dragon feels about it or make it add humor. Something like "She doesn't run away--people always seem to think they can run from you on their short stubby legs--but this one is either brave or stupid."

you also can just call her a girl...

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago
Maybe. But I think there's an argument that it can be used like that as part of a writing or narrative style. The nice thing about writing is that all the "rules" can be broken if you have a good reason.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

True, half the fun of writing and reading is enjoying the different personal styles of each author.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago
>By the way her sack is swinging, you can tell it has something heavy in it


Oh my.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago
No activity in a week. You shamed her off.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

Sorry about that. I'll try to keep my updates more consistent from now on.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago
So long as she didn't send you running off blushing.

How's your word count?

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I'm almost done my path with the epilogue (though I wouldn't necessarily consider it a "true" ending, given that the whole point of CYOAs are to choose) If and when I make a sequel, that will be the path the sequel leads from.

My word count is...embarassing.

I don't describe much on each page, though, so that might be part of it.

I have until January 3rd, however...

I only have until January 3rd. Oh no. Better keep writing... 

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I've made some decent progress in my story. I'm almost finished the first path.

One grammar issue:

"Well, I guess the charade is up, isn't it?" she says softly, with a sigh.

The "with a sigh" part seems a bit awkward in the sentence. Maybe I could say something like, "Well, I guess the charade is up, isn't it?" she says softly, then sighs.

Any suggestions?

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

"Well, I guess the charade is up, isn't it?" she says, softly sighing.
And you also get an awesome alliteration! 

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I like "softly, with a sigh," just fine.  It doesn't sound awkward to me at all.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

My story has magic in it, and I'm wondering about a few things.

I know it's important in stories with magic in them to properly nail down the rules of magic. One of those rules I'm playing with is what can prevent magic. In many fairy tales, iron hurts fairies or prevents them from performing magic. But I have also heard that leather can contain magic or prevent it.

I am trying to create a suit of magical armor, and I want there to be a mention of the material restrictions. 

Therefore, my question is: Iron, leather, or both?

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I'm a little confused by the question.  Do you mean, "what should a suit of magical armor be made of, if it is designed to resist magic, assuming that leather and iron resists magic?"  Or is there some angle to this question that I'm missing?

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

What I mean by the question is simply, "Which material would be the best fit to resist magic?"

The suit would be magical, so if it was made out of the choice material, the magic wouldn't work. I'm trying to find a material for this suit that is commonplace (for medieval standards) but that also doesn't block magic My two thoughts were iron and leather, but I realized both of them could potentially block magic.

Pretty much any animal skin wouldn't work, as the whole leather-blocking-magic thing is based on the idea of the spirit of the dead animal interfering with the spirit of the magic.

So, to rephrase my question better, I am asking for a commonplace material to make a suit of armor from that does not resist magic. Since I couldn't think of anything other than iron and leather, I am wondering if I should make a decision between them, or if I should search for a third, magical material.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

Anything... people made armor out of wood, various metals (including iron, steel, and bronze), and leather. Leather is common, but it sounds like you don't want to use it.
 

When you make up the story you also make up the rules. The leather armor could be made from a protective animal that even protects the wearer in death. In that case it would conform with your rules even tough it is leather armor. You could also have like a cotton/wool shirt that is enchanted to be protective. 

Trying to avoid any material made from a living thing would be hard... basically that limits you to just metal. Synthetic materials like carbon-fiber would probably not be a thing in your world. You could have a metal imbued with gems, which are often given magical properties in stories. The possibilities are endless as along as you can explain why it makes sense with your story. No one is going to say "but in XYZ leather can't be magic!" As long as your story is consistent with yourself pick anything that makes sense to you!

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago


What's the tech level of the world?

Often in stories where iron is the culprit, there is an over-arching theme of magic/paganism vs. industrialization. Iron, in a way, can represent humans trying to restrain and control the natural world or co-opt it to their own purposes.

There's no reason you can't make up your own restrictions, though.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

Interesting thought. But in my view, iron serves as protection, as the knight dons iron armor to protect the princess, not to control anything. It also serves as protection against magic, as magic is a powerful force. But I like the idea that iron is also a restraint, both physically, with it being unwieldy and heavy, magically, because it restrains the use of magic, and philosophically, because the knight's helmet hides who they really are.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I mean you can do that, as long as iron consistently resists magic. Also keep in mind that iron is very heavy. Full armor would be like 50 pounds of weight someone was carrying around.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

Tempered steel full-plate would be around 50lbs - I think full iron-plate would run closer to 100. So I guess that could be like magically resistant armor vs. armor impervious to magic.

But, if iron just is immune to magic no matter how thick, one could perhaps use iron foil or iron powder to "coat" regular armor and shields and swords. But going this route would have it's own disadvantage, as that protection could be easily scratched, leaving vulnerabilities to magic.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

True steel can be lighter and stronger, giving people a reason to want to use it over iron. I like the idea of choosing better physical armor at the cost of magical resistance... In real life whoever made the better steel just sort of had an advantage because magical resistance was not factored in, haha. I don't know if the ratio is that extreme though. Depending on the type of steel, it can be nearly the same weight as iron.

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I think I'm going to decide on iron resisting magic and it being the only material that resists magic on its own. If people can turn into animals, and necromancers can control the spirits, it doesn't make sense for leather to have much effect on magic.

So, leather would be a material more commonly used by magicians, because you could enchant it.

Thank you all for your help!

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago

I've completed the main story path and am on to the other (shorter) paths. Well, that took forever.

I know exactly where I'm going to be headed with the other paths, though I might need to simplify them slightly.

On a side note, completely unrelated to Mizal's comment in any way, I have decided to change "sack" to "rucksack".

A knight, a princess, and a dragon. (Contest)

4 years ago
Glad I could help.