Criteria Conference Transcript

Criteria Conference Transcript

<ProjectMinotaurOCT>Welcome to the Criteria Conference. The goal of this event is to clarify the interpretation and application of the judging criteria from the perspective of each judge.  We will start by introducing all the judges, and then cover each of the three criteria and how each judge views that item. Judges will state one at a time, briefly, their opinion on that criteria until each judge has spoken.  There will be a chance for final comments from everyone, and then we'll move on to the next item. This will repeat until all three have been covered.   Only judges will be able to post to the chat during this time. Once each criterion has been addressed, the chat will be opened to all comments for a question and answer session.  So, without further ado, let's start the introductions.
<RobinRone>I'm RobinRone, the Host. I'm primarily a webcomic creator. My work can be viewed here: shadesofgrey.rydia.net/

<Khan13>I'm Khan.... I'll be judging.
<SyprusFenix>I'm Syprus, co-judging with RekKa. Feel my wrath!
<rekka>*waves* I'm RekKa. I've been webcomicking for about 7, almost 8 years now with several projects... the main one being this: www.skyfallmanga.com/ 
…;
<Star-Seal>I'm Seal. I'm not nearly as scary or crazy as I often come off around here. I am a judge and I do most of the chat maintenance.
<RobinRone>Cheeko-001 may have stepped out for a moment.  She'll join us later in the chat.  She's the creator of several webcomics as well.  onequestioncomic.com/ and www.drunkduck.com/Daisy_and_Mo…, that's everybody. Now on to our first item!

Characterization
<RobinRone>Characters are a big focus for me. They need to be complex, well developed, round, and realistic characters.  People have reasons for how they behave, even if it isn't obvious when you first meet them. They are contradictory, flawed, and paradoxical.  Their strengths make them fun, but their flaws make them INTERESTING. Make sure to characterize your character enough to at least hint at what makes him/her/it tick.  Those are my main thoughts.
<Khan13>Characterization is of paramount importance.  One thing to keep in mind is consistency.  Both with your characters and your opponents.  Please research your opponent so you may do them proper justice in your entries.  This will be as important as your own character
<SyprusFenix>One of the most important things about characters are their flaws. A character without flaws is boring. If he wins to easily no one cares to watch the fight.  And I agree with Khan, make sure you do your opponent justice, and if you get a chance, try to make them look better than you, so when you finally pull out the win, you look that much more cool.  Quirks (not necessarily flaws) are also highly important as far as characterization goes. Everyone has quirks, and they make who that character is.
<rekka>For me, I don't care quite as much about having a far-out crazy creative character as having a believable one. Someone with powers can be cool and fun to write, but I'd rather read about their human side. Dealing with the human (or... not quite human) condition is something that doesn't get boring as easily.  So yeah. Balance between the two I think is important in creating a character.
<Star-Seal>Alright. Well, first and foremost, my favorite topic of all time: Mary Sues.  If you don't know what a Mary Sue is, God preserve us, here's wikipedia.  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue… you do, I urge you all to run over to www.springhole.net/quizzes/mar… and run your character through, but be sure you read the rules.
<Cheeko-001>Ughhh... Mary Sues. I could go on for hours on those.
<SyprusFenix>I'll give the short version and just say "Don't give us Mary Sue characters"  As a side note: If you give us a Mary Sue but they show decent growth throughout the competition, then it's more acceptable.
<Star-Seal>Now, it's only fair for me to point out that we judges won't be impressed by Mary Sues. Many of us have been in OCTs before. Mary Sues are boring to read, they are immature, and they give us a poor opinion of the writer. Worse, they're no fun at all to go up against.  Now, symptoms don't make a disease. You can have a charming, charismatic nice vampire/superhero/zombie who's a great, rounded character. Buuuuuut you should be very confident in your abilities before you try.  Just let me say, a helpful thing for characters are pasts and contradictions. Don't say your character was abused by her dad. Thoroughly explain what he did to her. This will naturally flesh out specific traits for your character. Don't pick something you know nothing about. If you've never been seriously depressed or done tons of research, don't make your character a cutter. We'll think he's just angsty. As for contradictions, this is what makes a character rich and believable. People are complex.  Someone who loves to be in control but doesn't want to be mindlessly obeyed. Someone who wants closeness but fears it. Someone who wants to help people but gets fed up by them.  I can say, in perfect honesty, that I am content, depressed, wrathful, compassionate, bitter, mature, immature, young, old, weak willed, and strong minded.  Saints are fun to imagine but not fun to read about; nor are the Saturday Morning mustache-twiddler villains.  All characters are, if well made, many many shades of gray.
<Cheeko-001>The most important thing for a creator to know is the difference between a Mary Sue and a good character.  The only real difference between a Mary Sue and a good character is one word: PERSONALITY.  The main reason why Mary Sues are so detestable is because they practically invite themselves to be hated.  Instead of creating a cluster of super powers and forming a character around those, YOU MUST CREATE THE PERSONALITY OF THE CHARACTER FIRST, and then give those powers to them.  This is usually how most Mary Sues are born.  A creator will become enamored with a specific idea and try to create a character around it (ex: ninja student in Naruto universe, Hogwarts student for Harry Potter...).  The person gets lost in the situation.
<Star-Seal>without doing any more research on the actual topics of ninjary or whatever
<Cheeko-001>Haha! Exactly.  Be sure you keep the focus on your character's growth and personality rather than the POWERS that make them so different.  Because ultimately, the only things that distinguish us from each other in a world without the fantastic elements of our characters' realms are the way we think and act.  Pretty simple, but that's really all I look for in a character. I doesn't matter how much or little they can do, it's just what they do with it.
<Khan13>Remember, make us want to choose your character to win. Your character should deserve to win. A character does not deserve to win because he has the most powers. He deserves to win because he wants it more.  Win on personality before powers.  The powers are fun, but they are more fun with an actual character
<RobinRone>One rule of thumb for me on characters is that if what you have for your powers is longer than your character description, you have a problem
<Cheeko-001>Physique, Intelligence, Social Skills. Pick two. If you've got all three, be very cautious in how you handle the character.
<Star-Seal>If your character IS well rounded and just happens to have all three, introduce them slowly, so we don't run screaming thinking it's a Sue.  Well, as a judge, I am insanely critical. I'll go ahead and throw that out there. i take 'storycraft' very, very seriously, and characters are very important to that. A good character makes things happen, not just things happen to some random character. I might seem hard to impress, but I'm actually very easy to if you can show me something I haven't seen much before. Novelty and unique things will get you points from me. You have to pull it off, of course, but a unique, creative character will get my attention. Don't go overboard and certainly don't get ridiculous, but I suggest you all strive to set yourself apart from other character refs as best you can. We have a lot of things to go through; make yours stand out.

Creativity

<RobinRone>Creativity doesn't mean powerful, wild, and crazy to me. Creativity means taking simple concepts and applying or combining them in complicated ways.  It's easy to take a whole bunch of magical abilities and just throw them together in a long list. It's much harder to take a few basic ideas and think up ways to combine them together into something new.  If you want to get even more advanced, think up reasons for WHY and HOW those particular combinations even exist. This gives more depth to your ideas and usually leads to even more ways to creatively apply them!
<SyprusFenix>And a big thing to add to that with powers/mutation: Don't just make your mutation a beefed up version of your starting powers. It's lame, and it really makes me want to not pick your entry.  Like Rone said, make things that seem simple but can be used in a lot of ways.  Because when you come up with a cool new use, it's just that much better, and also it gives your opponent more things to play with.  Like if you've made your character a meat tank, and that's about the extent of your powers/abilities... that really doesn't give your opponents much to work with.  So try to be open with what you're doing.  Ummm, also a cautionary on creativity: I like a big happy universe that's all fun and wacky or trippy, or whatever, but if you give it to me without enough stuff to back it up, all I get is crazy and wacky and no story... This is in the end a storytelling competition.  
<Khan13>Creativity can come in many forms. Obviously, you want a creative character, and a creative plot. Remember that you can be creative with your media as well. A written entry doesn't need to only be written, but can be mixed with pictures or sound bites. Make you entry a joy to read, and your plot will look all the better for it.  Just be open to creativity outside as well as inside your plot structure.
<rekka>I'm pretty easily impressed on the creativity part of this. I think people (artists and writers alike) are good at making things that are new and inventive. I like seeing twists on things that've been done before, I like seeing things that I've never seen. That being said, I tend to favor believable execution over a super-original idea. Make me believe and accept it.  And doing that can take a lot of work and creativity as well.
<Star-Seal>Having a ^&*(ton of flaws and shortcoming forces your character to WORK for his or her win. And it is my firm belief that people who work deserve to get paid. Everyone loves an underdog. Not a scrawny little orphan who can blast planets to bitz with his glorious suddenly manifested LAZOR-HEAD YEEEEHAW, but one who in all honesty sort of sucks at all this.  Then the plot will come out from necessity. I'm sure you'll all get sick of hearing this story, but when I ran into an OC mine didn't have a chance against, I let him beat her to literal pieces, and fed him to some inbred self-righteous unicorns. I was very worried about the judges condemning this ludicrous turn of events, but I didn't take it seriously, milked it for its unsuspected effect, and they lapped it up. If you firmly believe your idea is a good one, don't worry too much what we'll think. I don't want anyone selling out to impress us. If you really do like it, just try it. Chances are we'll be delighted.  Know when to take your stuff seriously and when to be tongue in cheek when being so bizarre, though.
<Cheeko-001>I don't usually look for really huge, radically different concepts to define something as creative.  Creativity today usually doesn't come from an ENTIRELY new concept. If you take something mundane and make it incredible, you have a winning concept.  If you have trouble thinking of something, take mental notes as you go about your day, specifically paying attention to small problems you have throughout, and then come up with fantastical solutions to those problems.  Little things like that, though it is surprising to think so, will catch a person's attention.  A superhero who can, I don't know, change or concentrate the acidity of a liquid into a dangerous solution is so much more interesting than a beefed up superhero that can bench press the earth. The solutions that each will come up with to solve problems/resolve a conflict will be drastically different, but which will be more interesting to read?  If you're going to experiment with your storytelling, though, PLEASE, for the LOVE OF GOD, have someone else proofread it first!  I would suggest everyone find themselves a kind, supportive and HONEST person to look over their work.
<Khan13>But do make sure your creativity is understood.  Making up words is fine as long as you define them
<RobinRone>Editing in general is a basic thing for this -- No, we're not judging based on technical skill, but that isn't an excuse to be lazy
<Cheeko-001>It would SUCK if you create what you think is a RADICALLY different way of telling a story, only to find that the judges don't have ANY idea what you're talking about.
<Khan13>Remember, if an idiot can't read it, a judge won't.
<SyprusFenix>If it's too much of a pain to read we won't bother.
<Star-Seal>Don't let that scare you, just keep it in mind.  We were all beginners once.
<RobinRone>On the idea of having powers that lead to TWBII versions of those same powers, there is a difference from just adding a multiplier and having a theme.  THEMES are much more developed ideas and usually flow with the character concept.  Also, try to consider more than just the physical when considering abilities and TWBII.  Crazy random things are a happenin' to your character. Most won't just shrug that off and be fine with it
<Star-Seal>Gods have powers. People have personalities.  Humans tend to root for people.

Storytelling

<RobinRone>Storytelling For me, storytelling is the most difficult item of the three criteria to define. Basically, when I'm looking at an entry I ask myself a few key questions.  Do I want to see more of this character? Are they interesting and/or likable? (Note that they do NOT have to be both.)  Is the story engaging and compelling? Am I emotionally and/or intellectually invested?  Is the creator doing justice to ALL characters, not just their own? Are they making their characters earn their victory?  For me, these are the most important elements to Storytelling.
<Star-Seal>Well, for me, there are two types of stories- ones that are great, and ones that are told well.  A great story, for example, would be Disney's Black Cauldron. The characters, elements, and area were unique, they were all taken from an incredible series of books. Novel things happened, characters matured.  But it was told very poorly.  For those of you who don't know, Taran basically saves the world from an evil army.  In doing so, he gets no injuries. He makes no sacrifices. He loses no friends.  With a mite of effort the world is safe without one casualty.  It's like getting a new car for Christmas. Charming, but you didn't earn it. People despise you for it.  On the other hand, we have mild or even bad stories told incredibly well. These are simple, predictable, even cliched plots, but they are executed in an engaging, marvelous way.  I personally prefer these to badly told stories.  Remember, meaning is important. Those who work deserve to be paid. It's biblical.  If you're going to get something, your character should suffer accordingly, be it in mind, body, or heart.  Then there are stories that are all around good, and those are the ones that win Project Minotaur.  And, an example has been requested. I don't have a lot on the top of my head, but one I can mention is, in all Honesty, what I've seen of Princess Tutu. I really, really enjoy watching it, despite the episodes being fairly similar and predictable.  Simple elements, but good characters and actions.  Another note is manipulating the audience. For those familiar with *Unknown-person, Karl is, let's be frank, a bastard.  But, by the end, many of us are watching him shiver and grin grimly and willing him not to run out of energy before he gets what he wants so dearly.  If your character doesn't have a chance, you should make us feel that. Make us feel the blood and tears. Make us know what it's like to be such an underdog.  If you can get your readers to punch the air and cry OH HELL YEAH! at an incredibly satisfying well developed pay off, or bawl OH, GOD NO during a brutal scene of failure, you're doing something right.  Writers tug heartstrings like the chords on a marionette.
<rekka>Okay. I don't know how much I can really add to that. I'm a lazy lazy ass reader. Entertain me. Engage me. Compel me to read more than just the beginning and ending of your story (which is what have I do to scientific papers... unless they're really really good).  I don't know how to be more descriptive. You stoled all my words.
<Cheeko-001>Blast you, SS>
<RobinRone>Word thief
* Star-Sealtwiddles mustache
<SyprusFenix>A story with a good progression is always appreciated. The story needs a rise and fall. Build to a climax, have fantastic things happen if you want to, but make sure the whole thing doesn't feel like a climax or the readers will get burned out before the end. Also, when the floor drops out on the character(s), let them sweat it out a bit and suffer, but don't keep them there too long or we'll get depressed reading the angst.  And yeah, like RekKa said, make it engaging. We all have things to do, so if your story doesn't pull me in until page 15 or 30, I probably won't bother to get that far.  As judges we reserve the right to say "This isn't worth my time. Next!"
<Khan13>Many plots are character driven. Things do not happen for no reason. More often, things happen because someone wants them to, or someone wanted something else, and was surprised. Actions are driven by people, and people are driven by motives. Make sure you know yours and your opponent's.  If you have questions about an opponent's character, you should ask their creator. A good opponent will oblige you, not to make your job easier, but because it's fair. You should do the same if you are asked. You don't need to show them where to stick the knife, but you should be honest.  When making an entry, remember to play to your strengths. Do you write scenery well? Are you good at drawing eyes? These are what will set you apart from your opponent,.
<Cheeko-001>I will mention the importance of perspective.  Though it isn't the most important aspect of a story, it has one of the biggest influences of how effective or powerful that story will be for a reader.  Twilight could have been a halfway decent series if it wasn't told from the point of view of the most BORING character in Meyer's universe.  Not to say that you can't tell your story directly from your character's perspective, but how certain points and situations are interpreted will make something seem much more serious than from the point of view of... shall we say, the god of the universe.  Make sure the readers know exactly what your character is going for, what they're thinking, even how they think.  If what your character does seems the most logical thing to do based on their mentality and their experiences (to the point you would make the same decision if you were in their exact situation), you've done your job.  Example: who knows about Showtime's Dexter?  Basically, it's a show about a serial killer who kills murderers.  The show is very dark, obviously because of the character it focuses upon.  Dexter, our star killer, is the narrator of the story. He tells everything from his POV. Everything that appears mundane becomes twisted and dark when he makes his remarks upon them.  If you want an idea of what I"m talking about, go look up the opening sequence they play at the beginning of each episode.  But the real genius in the show is not how twisted and disgusting everything becomes when seen from Dexter's eyes, but the fact that the viewers start ROOTING for him when he's got his victim strapped to the table, despite his dark, twisted mentality.  In conclusion, though, it's not the most important aspect of storytelling, but its definitely one that a really good writer will be able to use to play with readers, making the tale that much more engrossing.
<Star-Seal>Also, show, don't tell. "Don't mind the head wound... Robin was grumpy." Is more fun than "I am wearing this bandage because I talked too much and our wonderful Host Robin hit me with a pipe bomb." And it saves words. Words are precious. Don't go wasting them.

Question and Answer Session
<ProjectMinotaurOCT>That concludes the initial comments of the judges. We will now open the chat so that people can ask questions. Any (and sometimes all) judges can answer questions.

Q:  Can we take creative liberties with the world outside the Labyrinth?
A:  Yes
Q:  How much background information should be provide?
A:  Generally, more is better, provided it can remain engaging.  Try to express it in the form of your story. The setting can be a character too.  On the more is better note, though, we don't want it all. You should give us just enough that we know what we're looking at, and start to like it, and then end right there. If you make us want more, you've pretty much won your case.  You don't need to tell us everything. Just enough to get us interested and to make sure we can keep up with you.
Q:  Is it okay to leave loose ends?
A:  If anything, I encourage it. It shows us you have something in mind and plan to answer whatever questions you've inspired via your entry.
Q:  Our character doesn't have to start out as some sort of action hero do they? Could the character begin as a regular person pulled into an extraordinary world?
Very, very, yes. That sounds like an excellent starting point to me.  Dadrick, I'd prefer a normal person.  Those are my favorite kinds of characters.  That was kinda the idea for this tournament.  Normal people, strange situation.  Hence the emphasis on CHARACTERS over powers
Q: I'm going to be writing in turns with my partner in a far different fashion than most. We'll be telling the story not from ONE perspective but from two different character's perspective. I focus a lot on imagery and emotion so things should be interesting. I'm just wondering if it might get a bit confusing
A:  Have somebody edit it.  If they say it's confusing, it probably is.  If not, then you're probably fine.   I'd highly recommend getting at least two people to proofread and edit your work before submitting it.
Q:  Stance on killing your opponent?
A:  It isn't against the rules to do it, but we want your opponent's permission, not because we want to baby you, but because to kill someone in the space of a single round is extremely hard to do respectfully. Killing your opponent, even if it's in-character to do so, is to say I Don't Value This Person. We're OCTers ourselves. We know what it's like to be disrespected. It'll lose you points. However, if you can kill someone and, at the same time, make them look AMAZING even in death, then you're probably fine.