Descriptions

[Xonovik]

Aside from the Imms and probably cabal leaders... does anyone read other players descriptions?(By reading, I mean the whole desc, not just one line of it or parts of it..)

I only ask mainly because with anyone I look at, I go straight to the equipment. Normally, if I was bored, I'd probably take a peek at the desc.

I'm not suggesting anything with this poll, I just want to know who's like me? Honestly, I don't remember what my description says most of the time.

[Quiet Wanderer]

I usually do. 'Course nowadays no one bothers to make any good ones, so I've slipped off. But all and all I normally read the descs of people. If they're worth knowing in game, their desc is normally good quality. Thats my opinion though.

[Mental Patient-101]

I used to alot, but now I just skim a few if i want a vague ideal of what they look like...

[Avendin]

I always read through, and if they're someone I encounter often (like IC friends or cabal-mates) it usually sticks with me. I enjoy reading a well-written description, especially if it helps me with RP interaction (though I despise seeing character history in descs unless worked in seamlessly and even then it irks me some).

[marsd]

I used to stop around and scrollback to the buffer to read some descriptions. But after quite many badly written descriptions that are obviously 1min-done-job at lvl 14, just 100tnl to 15 kinda, i just gave up on reading them.

[Seryie]

i'll read any of over 35, but still some of disgusting quality..,. people usually have a shitty quick one they write at 14, and change it later.

[Spalino]

I only read level 50's. When I got to 50 I totally revised my desc to make it better. People need better descs imms should be harder on em I think

[Shroud]

I personally read all desc that I have time to, mainly groupmates while sleeping, or people who rp real well. I like reading herald descriptions mostly! Though there is one desc that sticks in my mind the most, some two years ago when I first started ar, a ninja starting with SWOOSH something passes before you eyes, or something like that.

[Unknown Criminal]

Ill read anyone desc who is in my group, if im just standing around reading descriptions ill get killed, no point in making it easy for people;)

[Vertas]

Let me know if this is any good... Let me know if there are any errors, or something that should be changed. (the hardest thing in the world to roleplay is an opposite gender, everyone keeps hitting on me and I don't know how to respond because you know the whole straight thing keeps me from doing it back, only I'm not entirely sure that's what my char would do...)

Before you stands a young human woman, she seems to have seen no more than seventeen winters. Her eyes are large black and seductive seeming to promise eternity itself. They look vainly around as if to say is any of this good enough for me? Her hair is long and black, and tied back to keep her bangs out of her eyes. She looks fair enough with her pale complexion, but an aura of pure evil hangs around her and a maniacal laugh seems to ring about the air around her. She gazes around with hatred and malcontent written all over her face. Her voice is dark and musical, and full of lust. Unseen strange symbols are tattooed onto her back and forearms strange runes from a distant past, or a more distant future. She looks as if she weighs about 120 pounds and stands at a pathetic five hands. She wears a long hooded cloak with the hood down so that all can see her face. She has an odd array of weapons hidden all over her body including one in her boot, in her sleeves and a mysterious tattoo shaped like a dagger on one of her calves. When she walks it is like waves breaking across the beach and she seems to get many sneaked looks as she glides past. She looks like she makes a great effort into putting her appearance right, though what this would be for is unknown. Her leather jerkin is spotless except for a small spot of blood just above her collar. She smells like jasmine and honey suckle and beneath that there is a stink out of corruption underneath it all.

[Avendin]

Grammar Nazi Mode ON

[Stephen2]

I'm a picky bastard, and my descs suck but, you asked for it?

"Before you stands" <-- Showing action. Will she always be standing?

"young human woman" <-- Human with a capital.

"Her eyes are large black and seductive seeming to promise eternity itself." <-- comma before 'large', fullstop or ';' before 'seeming'. How do one's eyes promise eternity itself? Poetic, but doesn't mean anything.

"They look vainly around" <-- 'vainly' as in, she's vain? Or her eyes are looking around without finding what they're after?

"as if to say is any of this good enough for me?" <-- Don't convey meaning, leave it up to other characters to decide what it means when you're looking around vainly. Again, it's an action. Her eyes aren't ALWAYS looking around vainly.

"Her hair is long and black, and tied back to keep her bangs out of her eyes." <-- replace 'long and black,' with 'long, black'. IE Remove comma replace 'and' with comma.

"an aura of pure evil hangs around her and a maniacal laugh seems to ring about the air around her." <-- Jeez, she's evil. I'd tone this down a bit (read: a lot). It just sounds cheesy.

"She gazes around with hatred and malcontent written all over her face." <-- More action?? And this time she's not gazing vainly, she's gazing with hatred. This girl's pissed off.

"Her voice is dark and musical, and full of lust." <-- I like this line, but can you hear her voice by looking at her?? Replace the 'and' in 'dark and musical' with a comma. Remove the 'and' after the comma. 'Her voice is dark, musical and full of lust.'

"Unseen strange symbols are tattooed onto her back and forearms" <-- They're unseen, but you can see them? Bizzzare. I would venture you couldn't see them, when she's fully armoured up, what do you think?

"... and forearms strange runes from a distant past, or a more distant future." <-- First, a fullstop between 'forearms' and 'strange' would be nice. Plus, it's poetic again, past and future, but they're just tattoos.. She probly got 'em yesterday at the local parlour.

"She looks as if she weighs about 120 pounds and stands at a pathetic five hands." <-- Nice weight, pity that "1 hands = 0.333333333 feet". So she's 1.6 feet tall.. Now she's sounding like a fat midget. Maybe five feet tall?

"She has an odd array of weapons hidden all over her body" <-- If they're hidden, how can we see 'em? This isn't that bad, but maybe they shouldn't be 'hidden' all over her body, 'placed', 'located' whatever..

"and a mysterious tattoo shaped like a dagger on one of her calves." <-- That should maybe be in the mysterious tattoo section, not in the weapon section. Unless it's a REAL dagger pretending to be a tattoo...

"When she walks it is like waves breaking across the beach and she seems to get many sneaked looks as she glides past." <-- Haha, she's a SEXY fat 1.6 foot midget, again there's lots of actions going on here. Usually a no no.

"She looks like she makes a great effort into putting her appearance right" <-- She sounds good looking for a midget, but that maniacal laughter puts me right off...

"Her leather jerkin is spotless except for a small spot of blood just above her collar." <-- Lots of AR's imms say not to describe your clothes, because REALLY you're wearing red dragon or worn or whatever, but I like describing clothes. This is a good line:)

"She smells like jasmine and honey suckle and beneath that there is a stink out of corruption underneath it all." <-- The words 'beneath' and 'underneath' mean the same thing, pick one and remove the other. 'out of corruption'. Remove the word 'out'. Maybe remove the word 'that', to make it flow a bit more.. 'She smells like jasmine and honey suckle, yet beneath is the stink of corruption.'


QED.

[Avendin]

Stephen.. did you just repeat everything I said or were there any differences? I didn't bother to check...

[Sebryn]

I'm curious about the "seen no more than seventeen winters" bit. Obviously you're trying to show your character's age, but unless she has some phylactery or other means to hide or alter her age she won't always look so hot.

I am by no means saying that I'm the master of descriptions; hell, I'll fully admit that Sebryn's description pretty well sucks and needs some major reconstruction. That said however, I personally don't think it's a good idea to reference age characteristics in your description.

Unless you're playing "hardcore"... then you'll probably look exactly the way your description says you do, for all of a few days anyway.

[sweet_canadian_mullet]

A char of mine back in the day had a cut on his arm for every year he had been alive. And those cuts never healed. I thought that was kew. But to my real oppinion. vertas...lay off the chicks. Make a dude and stick with that. Holy gad. Males playin females never work. It is very obvious who the males are and who the females are. Actualy the two chics I know real life both play males cuz they are tired of all the dudes tryin to hook up. Halarious.

[Davairus]

Kind of hard to read desc when it gets scrolled off by a set of red dragon, opals, etc. I have considered adding a 'glance' command that just looks at a players desc. There was some good reason why I didn't do that though. Probably because then if anyone looked at you, you'd know its just to see your eq. (As opposed to just being 90% sure it was that.)

25% of forum-reading players not looking at descs at all is pretty disgusting I might add.

[marsd]

yea so it's time to make it a point for players at lvl 20 to make a proper good desc, fuk desc scribbling at 15 and make a real original one at 20. Hell, I just make one real good one for every different race/class I play, then when I replay the same race/class i use it back, edit a bit, and it still looks good.

[Seryie]

people reuse lots of descriptions, and i'll admit i do it too.. i think it should stop really haha.... but

[marsd]

but sane people reuse a good properly done description. But i hate those scribbled ones, written directly to desc editor. LIke: Here stands a 5' 6" blah blah. (new line) He is very strong. (new line) He carries a huge backpack that is fulled to the brim. (blah blah blah), and some lots of mistakes in punctuation etc and sentence forming.

I mean, wtf? Why reuse it! I've actually seen someone's lvl 15 or so minotaur's desription that was done that way, used on another lowbie mino! wtf?

[Seryie]

nysquits was reused into sosolitos, i remember ranking with nysquit, i think he got denied for afk scripting? dunno really.. but then i see sosolito with the same, page long desc