[ WIP Crit ] The Star Mage's Sanctuary

[kovyx]

You heard a story once or twice about a cave of dragons, lead not by a dragon queen or some victor of a battle for supremacy, but by an arcane mage. The story was very esoteric, not many could decipher the layers of symbolism and code. Maybe you actually did, or maybe you didn't and just so happen to wander in this direction, when you saw a flash of light on a cliffside. Three quick bright flares, as if it were a signal... and for whatever reason, you decided to follow it.

After a trek through the forest and a hike up the rocky roadless path to your destination, you eventually clamber up to the entrance of a seemingly small cave. It doesn't look like much, but something in your subconscious urges you on. As you make your way in and gaze into the darkness ahead, a soft and oddly warm breeze comes from within, carrying with it the faintest scent of incense and herbs... You proceed, until a soft voice speaks in your mind.

"Hello friend, i see you've made it here safely." Though the voice is unfamiliar to you, its gentle tone feels welcoming. Seems that would be the rumored dragon mage, and before you could begin to speak your response, the mage continued. "Come on in, it's not as unpleasant as it looks. Meet my friend, she'll help you through the cave."

Lo and behold as this was said, a bright orange magi dragon peered at you from the shadows, a soft glow emanating from her body. Her head tilted as she stepped closer and sniffed at you with a flare of her nostrils, the dim light that reached in from the entrance casting an iridescent glimmer upon her smooth scales. Your gaze is drawn to her eyes, initially dark glassy orbs now glowing white. You blink, and suddenly, you're no longer in the cave...

Now you stand in a grassy cove, surrounded by a small crowd of dragons going about their business. You see a couple giant floating limbless dragons, xenowyrms, appearing to be in telepathic conversation. There's a regal pink wyvern perched comfortably atop the rocks at the height of the cove, a strange apparition of star-like sparkles amidst the translucent form of a dragon, which disappears from sight almost as soon as you recognize it.. Oh, and there's the magi dragon, now sitting beside a white dragon among the trees at the farther end of the cove.

"You stand in the presence of nigh gods, my friend." Speaks the voice from the cave, now aloud just behind you, prompting you to whip around to face them... and you see what appears to be human, wrapped up in clearly hand-made clothes, but there was something somehow.. not quite human about them. Their voice had a strange echo in your mind, and you had a hard time keeping track of their movements as they walked around you. "I'm glad you found us, your spirit is strong. Few are able to see my signals, and even fewer would have gone so far to follow it.. You felt the pull, didn't you?" Their smile warm and friendly, the knowing gaze in their eyes as they scanned your face, you felt you could be at ease around this person. You nodded, and they gave a lighthearted chuckle, gesturing for you to follow as they began to walk.

Given how difficult it was for you to look at this odd individual, seeing the expressions they made and clothes they wore, but unable to figure out what they actually looked like despite them being right there..... you decided to just look around more instead. As you walked and the scenery shifted, you saw more and more dragons of wildly varying sizes and shapes. You knew people who raised and befriended dragons for years, you had done so yourself a bit, but this seemed different somehow.

"As you've noticed, this place is not quite the same as the dragon caves you're familiar with. I don't collect dragons, or raise them. I'm here simply as friend, and agent for those like you in this world, known where i come from as amina nek - spirit kin. My purpose here is to guide ones like yourself on their path, whether though advice or introducing them to their companion, or simply giving supplies."

Even as this was said, you feel something pulling at your attention. The same pull as earlier when you spotted the flare and wandered into the cave, but stronger now that you were closer to its origin. Without much further thought, you followed the feeling, until you spotted... an egg.

Edited September 3, 2020 by kovyx

[kovyx]

[[ structure wip ]]

 

submit an app and i'll assign you a dragon which i will personally breed for you. so long as you write at least one longer interaction and three other good posts within three days of your egg being bred, and another longer post upon hatching, i will send you the baby.

 

you can fill this out either as yourself or a rp character. read rules before filling this out.

 

Name:
Zodiac Sign:
Dnd Alignment:
Personality:
Hobbies:
Fav music genre(s):
Fav food(s):
Fav color(s):
Fav word:
Likes:
Dislikes:
Strongest virtue:
Strongest vice:
Most noteworthy trait:
And finally, tell me a little about yourself, anything you feel worth adding to influence which egg you get.

Edited September 3, 2020 by kovyx

[kovyx]

Rules;

- All the basic rules and etiquettes apply. Mind your behavior, don't get a mod warning in here.

- That said, please also understand that i'm a busy person and can be a slow writer. Have patience, and please don't message me about replying. I promise i see your responses and will get to them as soon as i can.

- Try to have decent writing in your replies, i wont accept any script style roleplaying. Looking for semi-literate to literate, 4-12 sentences per post.

- Also in the roleplay aspect on here, i won't tolerate 'evil' characters who come in looking to cause trouble. The premise of this rp is you adopting a dragon companion, please behave as someone who would care for your companion, i will give your egg away to someone else.

- You may have multiple dragons only for yourself. If you want an egg for an OC that you might use in another rp, you can only have one dragon per OC.

- No negative actions or trading/re-gifting the eggs you get here. This is your dragon from my sanctuary, please take care of them. Also would prefer you name the dragon you get.

- For the time being, you may only pick up one egg from here per month, because i am only one person with so much egg space. Might open applications for others to help run the sanctuary and give away eggs as well.

- Although i can't/won't force you to take an egg you don't want, please don't argue or be negative about the dragon you get. I pick them based upon your application as well as what dragons you already have. You're going into this with a chance of anything from any dragon on my scroll, please don't take it personally if it's not what you were wanting.

- Please read these rules before submitting an application. While you can maybe argue with me about some of them, i give exceptions to them on a case by case basis. Include what egg you want and why in your app to let me know you read all this. DM me if you have a question regarding these rules.

 

 

 

[[  ooc threads (TBA)  ]]

Edited September 3, 2020 by kovyx

[kovyx]

log of adopted dragons

 

[[ none yet ]]

Edited September 3, 2020 by kovyx

[kovyx]

reserved

[kovyx]

to-do list for self, also to let others know what i'm up to on here.

 

further explain rp structure

Edited September 3, 2020 by kovyx

[kovyx]

okay, since there's no rp going on yet, i'm not going to have an ooc page until i think it'll be needed. for now, here's a concept i been working on. still very wip, but i hope there's enough to critique on or give suggestions for. feel free to post now!

[ValidEmotions]

Hello  

Just coming in to say that I see this and I will be helping you get this prepped for approval when I have better time tomorrow morning. 

[kovyx]

awesome, alright! i'll be here. i'm also working on the structure bit now, so there will be more when you get back.

[ValidEmotions]

You have a pretty good base here.  Most of your writing is clean and easy enough to follow. You do nicely at creating the setting for the characters and you hint, very slightly, at a historical legend. I recommend expanding on that legend and/or adding some more to the history of the setting so that members know what sort of backgrounds to make for their characters that'll fit within the world. You do need a plot, though. What's happening once everyone gets an egg? If no evil characters are permitted, what kind of RP are you intending to run? What will people be RPing?

 

The most consistent things I noticed:

1. Your past and present tense verbs switch back and forth frequently, often times in the same sentence/paragraph. Read through and focus on one or the other. 

2. You need to capitalize 'i' whenever you are using it for singler first-person. (I, I'll, I'm, etc.)

3. The information you state outside of the OP also needs to follow basic capitalization standards as well.

4. There are a few run-on sentences that could benefit from being reworded and/or split apart. I know some are stylistic choice, but too many run-on sentences can easily make readers feel breathless and/or lost/confused. 

5. All ellipses (...) have three dots. When they are occuring at the end of a sentence, there is a fourth mark for proper punctuation (a period, comma, question mark, etc.). However, ellipses are most effective when used sparsely. 

6. Punctuation, when used in dialogue, should be a comma (or question mark or exclamation mark) if the dialogue is not the end of a sentence.

E.g.: "I don't care," she said.

E.g.: She said, "I don't care."

E.g.: She frowned. "I don't care." Then she left.

 

Regarding the requirements for posting frequency:

I noticed that you want people to have 1 long interaction post. What does this mean and how long is "long"? "Interaction" isn't the same as "introduction" and interaction can only come when there is already someone else to interact with. 

Similarly, you require 3+ "good" posts after this long interaction. Is this related to the minimum of 4-12 sentences or is the "good" qualifier based upon a different standard you'll be using? What if there's only one person? Who are they supposed to respond to in the 3 days you allow them? After all, you said it yourself: you're a busy person and thus slow to make posts. 

 

You're allowed to create rules specific to your thread. But they have to be reasonable rules. I know you're working within the time constraints of DC's eggs and hatchlings before they grow into adults and become untradeable. I would recommend that you either ditch the heavy posting requirements (because first and foremost, it is unfair to put everyone on a 3 days' notice when you, yourself, are too busy to meet that requirement) and/or ditch the concept that you will be providing each member with an egg that you have bred specifically for them.

Side note: what happens to that 3 Days timeframe if the dragons you tried breeding don't produce an egg? Does the member get an extension until an egg is produced?

Edited September 5, 2020 by ValidEmotions

[SomeRandomCorviknight]

just posting here cause this looks cool as BLEEP and i don't want to forget about it

hope it gets approved soon!

Edited February 20, 2021 by SomeRandomCorviknight
forgot to change the font

[kovyx]

On 9/5/2020 at 7:30 AM, ValidEmotions said:

You have a pretty good base here.  Most of your writing is clean and easy enough to follow. You do nicely at creating the setting for the characters and you hint, very slightly, at a historical legend. I recommend expanding on that legend and/or adding some more to the history of the setting so that members know what sort of backgrounds to make for their characters that'll fit within the world. You do need a plot, though. What's happening once everyone gets an egg? If no evil characters are permitted, what kind of RP are you intending to run? What will people be RPing?

 

first off, hello!! thank you for getting back to me! 💕 and i apologize for taking so long to get back to this..

secondly, in response to this, i haven't added much lore or story because this really wasn't originally intended to be a full on complex roleplay. i was simply working with the basic ideas of the site lore to create something believable for my little concept here. after reading though it again, i decided to simplify the concept and make it basically just an egg giveaway thread, albeit with a roleplay element to receive your egg and the opportunity to keep rping in the little world i have going here as long as they wish. therefore there will be lots of people coming and going from the rp, rather than a set of accepted people who stay and play out a story. people who choose to stay can spend time raising and going on adventures with their dragon, their dragon teaching them things via this little plot, interacting with others who come there, plus my character will always be around to offer support and facilitate these adventures. this also means i would be the primary person to rp with, so likely this would (still) be a slow thread.

 

 

Quote

The most consistent things I noticed:

1. Your past and present tense verbs switch back and forth frequently, often times in the same sentence/paragraph. Read through and focus on one or the other. 

2. You need to capitalize 'i' whenever you are using it for singler first-person. (I, I'll, I'm, etc.)

3. The information you state outside of the OP also needs to follow basic capitalization standards as well.

4. There are a few run-on sentences that could benefit from being reworded and/or split apart. I know some are stylistic choice, but too many run-on sentences can easily make readers feel breathless and/or lost/confused. 

5. All ellipses (...) have three dots. When they are occuring at the end of a sentence, there is a fourth mark for proper punctuation (a period, comma, question mark, etc.). However, ellipses are most effective when used sparsely. 

6. Punctuation, when used in dialogue, should be a comma (or question mark or exclamation mark) if the dialogue is not the end of a sentence.

E.g.: "I don't care," she said.

E.g.: She said, "I don't care."

E.g.: She frowned. "I don't care." Then she left.

 

gotcha, will fix as soon as i can.

 

 

Quote

Regarding the requirements for posting frequency:

I noticed that you want people to have 1 long interaction post. What does this mean and how long is "long"? "Interaction" isn't the same as "introduction" and interaction can only come when there is already someone else to interact with. 

Similarly, you require 3+ "good" posts after this long interaction. Is this related to the minimum of 4-12 sentences or is the "good" qualifier based upon a different standard you'll be using? What if there's only one person? Who are they supposed to respond to in the 3 days you allow them? After all, you said it yourself: you're a busy person and thus slow to make posts. 

 

You're allowed to create rules specific to your thread. But they have to be reasonable rules. I know you're working within the time constraints of DC's eggs and hatchlings before they grow into adults and become untradeable. I would recommend that you either ditch the heavy posting requirements (because first and foremost, it is unfair to put everyone on a 3 days' notice when you, yourself, are too busy to meet that requirement) and/or ditch the concept that you will be providing each member with an egg that you have bred specifically for them.

Side note: what happens to that 3 Days timeframe if the dragons you tried breeding don't produce an egg? Does the member get an extension until an egg is produced?

 

yeah this is the main thing i'm deciding to simplify, i think really what i'm gonna have people do is apply to join in and get an egg on another thread, and that application will sit there until i find and/or breed an egg for them. then i will send them a trade link in the rp thread along with a starter to show them the opportunity to grab the egg (and perhaps a description of the kind of personality and adventure this dragon has for them should they choose to stay and rp longer). their reply to accept the egg is their character taking the egg, although i won't force anyone to reply before i actually give them their egg. this will likely lead to some people never getting back to the rp, but that doesn't matter too much to me.

 

 

On 2/19/2021 at 10:59 PM, SomeRandomCorviknight said:

just posting here cause this looks cool as BLEEP and i don't want to forget about it

hope it gets approved soon!

 

aahh yaayy thank you!! so glad you like it, hope i can get it up soon, and keep up with it haha 😄

[ValidEmotions]

Welcome back! And thanks for replying  

 

52 minutes ago, kovyx said:

i haven't added much lore or story because this really wasn't originally intended to be a full on complex roleplay. i was simply working with the basic ideas of the site lore to create something believable for my little concept here. after reading though it again, i decided to simplify the concept and make it basically just an egg giveaway thread, albeit with a roleplay element to receive your egg and the opportunity to keep rping in the little world i have going here as long as they wish. therefore there will be lots of people coming and going from the rp, rather than a set of accepted people who stay and play out a story.

 

So, based on this, I do recommend perhaps moving your thread into the Freeform section of the Roleplay forums. Here's why:
The Unapproved section is intended for threads going into the Other and DC Roleplay sections with expectations of a slightly higher standard/caliber of literacy than the Freeforms section. This includes having an actual plot for members to participate in/with. Knowing more of the world, too, is beneficial (generally as a whole, regardless of the section the RP is going into) so that members will know if their super-tech character or the lack of cellphones reasonably fits within the context of the world.

We have a thread dedicated to Rules/Guidelines and the Approval process to help fulfill basic expectations/understandings. I'm more than happy to continue working with you through the process if you wish to proceed in the Approval Process, but it would result in changing up a lot of the concept you were initially aiming for.

 

If you wish to keep the free-flow, loose sandbox, nature of this RP concept, that's perfectly okay, too!  You would just need to PM a moderator so they can move this thread into the Freeform Section and you can get started right away once moved. (I unfortunately don't have the ability to move it; I can only move approved threads into the DC or Other sections.)

Edited March 18, 2021 by ValidEmotions