Descriptions Wanted 1.0

Adet

"This image has been resized to fit in the page.  Click to enlarge."

For the largest picture of a pin in the world!

I agree with @Jonners regarding parenthetical commas, in this case - though I'm not sure there's anything wrong with dashes generally, they just seem a little out of place in this particular context.

Jonners

The dashes are technically correct, they just pull the eye like using digits (5'8") does for height.

Taraus

would be straight pin, for tailor thing.

Synbios

@Antidas has already picked one of the descriptions(the karambit one), so yay! Thanks for the critique though guys. 

Synbios

an asymmetrical longbow/an asymmetrical bow/a towering asymmetrical bow/an asymmetrical siege bow

An oddly-shaped bow of blackened wood has been left here, waiting for an archer's grasp.

This strange bow is expertly fashioned from blackened cherry wood and bamboo laminate. At an imposing seven and a half feet in length when strung, this weapon easily surpasses a regular human's height, yet the material renders it almost as light as a regular bow while retaining its ability to lend impressive draw weight to nocked arrows. Catching the eye almost immediately however, is its irregular curvature. With the grip of the bow positioned at two-thirds of the distance from the upper tip, the resulting shape is that of a bow with a longer upper limb than the lower, allowing for ease of kneeling and horseback archery forms. A string of ramie fibre joins the two ends of the bow, reverse-twisted to provide extra strength and durability for protracted use. Curling through the length of the bow, vine-like tendrils of silver leaf adorn the dark wood, gouging through the material with wild, savage patterns. 

I am doing a customisation job for @Sena. I'd like some critique and suggestions for improvement. What she wants is essentially a Yumi made of cherry wood surrounded by bamboo, with ramie fibre serving as the bowstring. 

Also, concerns have been made if 'longbow' would be accepted as part of a custom item name, since the base item type is 'bow'. Alternative names suggested by @Sena include "an asymmetrical bow", which she considers too plain and "a towering asymmetrical bow", while I thought of something like "an asymmetrical siege bow"(which I incidentally thought up halfway through typing this post, because the large bow reminds me of a siege ballista). 

Would also like some suggestions for the silver leaf design. What we essentially want is something of a tribal pattern.

Phraag

He is a frog-like grook. Standing just under 4'11" he has a stout body with slender arms, and legs. 

His skin is a light tint of green with gold speckled eyes. There are accents of gold lines around 

his cheeks and along his torso.

I kept it simple and I think I pretty much covered everything that a person could use to get a mental picture of my character.

Synbios

After some discussion with @Sena, here's the updated customisation design for her bow:

a blackened asymmetrical bow

An oddly-shaped bow of blackened wood has been left here, waiting for an archer's grasp.

This oddly-shaped bow is expertly fashioned from blackened cherry wood and bamboo laminate. At an imposing seven and a half feet in length when strung, this weapon easily surpasses a regular human's height, yet the material renders it almost as light as a regular bow. Drawing the eye immediately is its irregular curvature. With the grip of the bow positioned at two-thirds of the distance from the upper tip, the resulting shape is that of a bow with a longer upper limb than the lower, allowing for ease of horseback and kneeling forms of archery. A string of ramie fibre joins the two ends of the bow, reverse-twisted to provide extra strength and durability for protracted use. Throughout the length of the bow, mottled patches of silver leaf are scattered about its surface, mimicking the predatory markings of a snake. 

Shirszae

Phraag said:

He is a frog-like grook. Standing just under 4'11" he has a stout body with slender arms, and legs. 

His skin is a light tint of green with gold speckled eyes. There are accents of gold lines around 

his cheeks and along his torso.

I kept it simple and I think I pretty much covered everything that a person could use to get a mental picture of my character.

A very simple mental picture. I think you could afford to add a little bit more of detail while still keeping it simple. Also, I am a fan of not writing the precise heights of characters in their description. I think descriptive words work best, and actually add something from which you can elaborate further.

Antonius

Phraag said:

He is a frog-like grook. Standing just under 4'11" he has a stout body with slender arms, and legs. 

His skin is a light tint of green with gold speckled eyes. There are accents of gold lines around 

his cheeks and along his torso.

I kept it simple and I think I pretty much covered everything that a person could use to get a mental picture of my character.

Wording is a bit awkward.

The comma between arms and legs makes it unclear whether his legs are slender like his arms or if you're just telling the reader that yes, he does indeed have legs.

The next sentence also suggests that his skin is a light green and covered with gold speckled eyes, rather than that he has light green skin and also eyes that are gold speckled.

Phraag

Shirszae said:

Phraag said:

He is a frog-like grook. Standing just under 4'11" he has a stout body with slender arms, and legs. 

His skin is a light tint of green with gold speckled eyes. There are accents of gold lines around 

his cheeks and along his torso.

I kept it simple and I think I pretty much covered everything that a person could use to get a mental picture of my character.

A very simple mental picture. I think you could afford to add a little bit more of detail while still keeping it simple. Also, I am a fan of not writing the precise heights of characters in their description. I think descriptive words work best, and actually add something from which you can elaborate further.

Hmm... yes I understand your problem with listed heights, I was actually without one until I had read someones character discription that listed one and I thought perhaps it would be fine to use. I am going to reword this and drop the height while adding a bit more embellishing.

Antonius said:

Phraag said:

He is a frog-like grook. Standing just under 4'11" he has a stout body with slender arms, and legs. 

His skin is a light tint of green with gold speckled eyes. There are accents of gold lines around 

his cheeks and along his torso.

I kept it simple and I think I pretty much covered everything that a person could use to get a mental picture of my character.

Wording is a bit awkward.

The comma between arms and legs makes it unclear whether his legs are slender like his arms or if you're just telling the reader that yes, he does indeed have legs.

The next sentence also suggests that his skin is a light green and covered with gold speckled eyes, rather than that he has light green skin and also eyes that are gold speckled.

Noted!

Iocun

The main reason I'm not overly fond of numerical height descriptions is that I'm used to the metric system and have to think for a while before figuring out how tall 4'11'' is. And since I'm lazy and don't like thinking, I usually skip that step and thus end up with no mental image of this character's height at all!

The same problem exists with descriptions that use lots of peculiar/difficult words. As much as I admire people with a great vocabulary, if I have to open a dictionary five times to understand a sentence in someone's description, I'm probably going to just imagine him to look as faceless as Synbios.

Strata

When I customized my dirk, I thought about adding something like "its extremely sleak and light-weight design affords the wielder speeds faster than Iocun can only wish for." but ...

Phraag

Standing just head and shoulders above a barrel of brew with eyes like gold dust. His body is rather stout with slender arms and legs. His features are quite bright accented by gold stripes that mark the sides of his cheeks and along his torso. His skin is like a thick stock of a sunflower with a colour equally as green.

reworded a bit let me know what you think  

Synbios

Strata said:

When I customized my dirk, I thought about adding something like "its extremely sleak and light-weight design affords the wielder speeds faster than Iocun can only wish for." but ...

...but 'sleak' is actually 'sleek'. Other than that, looks fine.

Jonners

Iocun said:

The main reason I'm not overly fond of numerical height descriptions is that I'm used to the metric system and have to think for a while before figuring out how tall 4'11'' is. And since I'm lazy and don't like thinking, I usually skip that step and thus end up with no mental image of this character's height at all!

The same problem exists with descriptions that use lots of peculiar/difficult words. As much as I admire people with a great vocabulary, if I have to open a dictionary five times to understand a sentence in someone's description, I'm probably going to just imagine him to look as faceless as Synbios.

I hate it personally because numbers draw the eye and ruin the flow of a description. I would much rather see a descriptive sentence about your height. Much cleaner and I think it's easier to understand 'approaching five feet in height' over ~4'11"~ 

Ooqio

Phraag said:

Standing just head and shoulders above a barrel of brew with eyes like gold dust. His body is rather stout with slender arms and legs. His features are quite bright accented by gold stripes that mark the sides of his cheeks and along his torso. His skin is like a thick stock of a sunflower with a colour equally as green.

reworded a bit let me know what you think  

I think you're on the right track. Right now, all of the sentence structures are the same, which makes the description very monotonous. Try to break it up some. However, I do like your imagery. Here is my description, if it helps give you any ideas (and if anyone else wants to chime in on it):

He is a frog-like grook that possesses an animalistic disposition. He is squat, even for his kind, and possesses a dense, bulbous body. Wet copper skin provides a marshy sheen to his figure, large black dots covering his body like droplets of ichor. Protruding from his wide head are two amber orbs that serve as his eyes, flitting from different points of interest around him -- often not looking at the same thing. His limbs are long and knobby: incredibly skinny in comparison to his spherical torso. They end in flat, clumsy pads with veiny webbings. The vocal sac of this grook is almost always distended, billowing and bleating with the discordant calls of his existence. Whenever he is silent, however, the sac shrinks and retracts up into his rounded, moist neck. His frog-like tongue often licks and teases his curved, lipless mouth like a racial habit.

Chapel

Ooqio said:

Phraag said:

Standing just head and shoulders above a barrel of brew with eyes like gold dust. His body is rather stout with slender arms and legs. His features are quite bright accented by gold stripes that mark the sides of his cheeks and along his torso. His skin is like a thick stock of a sunflower with a colour equally as green.

reworded a bit let me know what you think  

I think you're on the right track. Right now, all of the sentence structures are the same, which makes the description very monotonous. Try to break it up some. However, I do like your imagery. Here is my description, if it helps give you any ideas (and if anyone else wants to chime in on it):

He is a frog-like grook that possesses an animalistic disposition. He is squat, even for his kind, and possesses a dense, bulbous body. Wet copper skin provides a marshy sheen to his figure, large black dots covering his body like droplets of ichor. Protruding from his wide head are two amber orbs that serve as his eyes, flitting from different points of interest around him -- often not looking at the same thing. His limbs are long and knobby: incredibly skinny in comparison to his spherical torso. They end in flat, clumsy pads with veiny webbings. The vocal sac of this grook is almost always distended, billowing and bleating with the discordant calls of his existence. Whenever he is silent, however, the sac shrinks and retracts up into his rounded, moist neck. His frog-like tongue often licks and teases his curved, lipless mouth like a racial habit.

 Ooqio is trying to hard, let me show you mine

 He is a Lizard Like Xoran. He has scales, a tail, and a crocodile mouth. Is not diseased.

  

 Some people write sonnets and force strange words on you, ichor. Excuse me while I dont google that.

    I write descriptions for credits, just let me know bro. I got you

Ooqio

@Chapel: To be fair, yes, I wrote out a lot, but it was a venue of imagery I couldn't pass up. I have no regrets, but I don't really think I'm trying too hard. Also, in a setting like Achaea, the word ichor is hardly a "strange word."

Chapel

atleast not as strange as your quoting method!

Jonners

Or your name. Cool description though, overall.

Phraag

Ooqio said:

Phraag said:

Standing just head and shoulders above a barrel of brew with eyes like gold dust. His body is rather stout with slender arms and legs. His features are quite bright accented by gold stripes that mark the sides of his cheeks and along his torso. His skin is like a thick stock of a sunflower with a colour equally as green.

reworded a bit let me know what you think  

I think you're on the right track. Right now, all of the sentence structures are the same, which makes the description very monotonous. Try to break it up some. However, I do like your imagery. Here is my description, if it helps give you any ideas (and if anyone else wants to chime in on it):

He is a frog-like grook that possesses an animalistic disposition. He is squat, even for his kind, and possesses a dense, bulbous body. Wet copper skin provides a marshy sheen to his figure, large black dots covering his body like droplets of ichor. Protruding from his wide head are two amber orbs that serve as his eyes, flitting from different points of interest around him -- often not looking at the same thing. His limbs are long and knobby: incredibly skinny in comparison to his spherical torso. They end in flat, clumsy pads with veiny webbings. The vocal sac of this grook is almost always distended, billowing and bleating with the discordant calls of his existence. Whenever he is silent, however, the sac shrinks and retracts up into his rounded, moist neck. His frog-like tongue often licks and teases his curved, lipless mouth like a racial habit.

I like your description it's very detailed and is the sort of attention I pay to actions, or describing scenery more than what I would put into my Achaea character.

Lousk

Here mine, and yes I know it needs work.

A olive green skinned creature with stringy white and black hair, Lousk's eyes are yellow and bloodshot. While of average height for a Troll he towers over the smaller races. His lanky stature conceals the strength native to his race. Two large cracked and yellowed tusks protrude from his bottom jaw.

I would gladly take any advise anyone has as well.

Exelethril

Lousk said:

Here mine, and yes I know it needs work.

A olive green skinned creature with stringy white and black hair, Lousk's eyes are yellow and bloodshot. While of average height for a Troll he towers over the smaller races. His lanky stature conceals the strength native to his race. Two large cracked and yellowed tusks protrude from his bottom jaw.

I would gladly take any advise anyone has as well.

Trolls don't have tusks RP-wise, by the way - they're just bigger humanoids with greyish skin. You could try reading HELP TROLL for a rough idea on what they're supposed to look like.

Antonius

Exelethril said:

Lousk said:

Here mine, and yes I know it needs work.

A olive green skinned creature with stringy white and black hair, Lousk's eyes are yellow and bloodshot. While of average height for a Troll he towers over the smaller races. His lanky stature conceals the strength native to his race. Two large cracked and yellowed tusks protrude from his bottom jaw.

I would gladly take any advise anyone has as well.

Trolls don't have tusks RP-wise, by the way - they're just bigger humanoids with greyish skin. You could try reading HELP TROLL for a rough idea on what they're supposed to look like.

The commissioned artwork for the Troll Blademaster has large, protruding bottom teeth. I'm not sure if I'd refer to them as tusks, but I think that's the intent here and it seems like a valid Troll description.

Exelethril

Antonius said:

Exelethril said:

Lousk said:

Here mine, and yes I know it needs work.

A olive green skinned creature with stringy white and black hair, Lousk's eyes are yellow and bloodshot. While of average height for a Troll he towers over the smaller races. His lanky stature conceals the strength native to his race. Two large cracked and yellowed tusks protrude from his bottom jaw.

I would gladly take any advise anyone has as well.

Trolls don't have tusks RP-wise, by the way - they're just bigger humanoids with greyish skin. You could try reading HELP TROLL for a rough idea on what they're supposed to look like.

The commissioned artwork for the Troll Blademaster has large, protruding bottom teeth. I'm not sure if I'd refer to them as tusks, but I think that's the intent here and it seems like a valid Troll description.

Pretty sure that artist drew his inspiration from WoW as opposed to following the IG description.

Antonius

I can't see @Sarapis presumably commissioning and paying for, and then posting up a picture of a Troll that doesn't look how Trolls in Achaea are supposed to look. If HELP TROLL disagrees with the artwork, it needs to be updated or the artwork needs to be taken down. You can't say "Hey, take a look at this cool Achaean artwork." then add "(by the way, Trolls don't look anything like this)".

Anaidiana

one word solution:

 

EVOLUTION.

 

 

you're welcome.

Kyrra

Some people are born with buck teeth. Maybe that troll lucked out in the gene pool.

Lousk

I did change the description abit, And actually it works out better for how I am rping him.

Enyx

Anyone wanna help me make a description for Enyx? I suck at making descriptions. All I know is he is a short fur/no mane Rajamala who is Albino that stands six foot with a sleek and wired frame. He has old and new scars and has a tail.