Feb 2017 Archive, part c

Cowriting with someone who has Permission is OK; it's assumed that the person with Permission can keep the other one in check, if needed. Of course, if your girlfriend would want to write on her own, she'd need to ask for Permission for herself.

Okay, first of all, welcome back! Returnbies are always nice. ^^
Anyway, as for your question, I'm not a PG (and don't even have Permission myself) so this is purely in my own opinion, but I think she'd also need Permission. It's granted mostly based on your own writing skills, after all, and that doesn't mean anything about what your girlfriend's writing is like. If she's a good writer, I guess it would be easy for her to get Permission, at least! Though coming up with your own Agents if you don't necessarily plan on using them much might be a problem, I guess.

When I started writing PPC missions, I cowrote with a friend who didn't have Permission, but was allowed to as long as I was writing with her. There was a stipulation that she would have to get Permission as well at some point in the future, but she left before that could happen. I know we've had other, similar arrangements in the past, too.

So I'd assume the same would hold true for your girlfriend. Good luck! :)

Steven instantly dropped the half-built crib, and it shattered as it hit the floor. Ignoring the shattered would he dived towards the console but was still beaten to it by a furry blur.

Would = wood

That was a short mission, but yegah was that Sue bad.

I literally facepalmed at the mention of wings. Like, come on! How obvious of a Sue did the author want her to be?

A few errors I spotted:
1) I’ve got Lindsey’s third birthday party to plan next month, and now we’ve got a new baby on the way as well we’ve got to reorganise the second bedroom, not to mention the fact that I’m trying to petition the Flowers to give us a bigger Response Center, can I not trust you to stop Lindsey from trying to play at being an agent for five minutes?

I can tell that the effect is supposed to be that it all came out as one sentence. However, there would still be natural breaks in the speech. Consider adding a word (which would help with the natural rhythm of the sentence) and repunctuating, thus: "I’ve got Lindsey’s third birthday party to plan next month, and now that we’ve got a new baby on the way as well, we’ve got to reorganise the second bedroom—not to mention the fact that I’m trying to petition the Flowers to give us a bigger Response Center; can I not trust you to stop Lindsey from trying to play at being an agent for five minutes?"

2) Steven instantly dropped the half-built crib, and it shattered as he hit the floor, but was still beaten to the console by a furry blur.
As written, the crib was beaten to the console. One pronoun can make a world of difference: "Steven instantly dropped the half-built crib, and it shattered as he hit the floor, but he was still beaten to the console by a furry blur."

3) Before Sasha even had time to formulate a response her husband and the Ewok had stepped through a portal and into the word world beyond.
Missing comma: "Before Sasha even had time to formulate a response, her husband and the Ewok had stepped through a portal and into the word world beyond."
Also, "Word World" is capitalized.

4) With an exasperated sigh she reached down, picked up the broken crib and began to head into the bedroom.
Two missing commas: "With an exasperated sigh, she reached down, picked up the broken crib, and began to head into the bedroom."

5) Silently Wallis pointed up at the words, shaking his head.
When referring to the text of the fic, the word "Words" is capitalized. (You've missed this throughout the mission.) Also, you missed a comma after "silently".

6) Gods this is going to be a bad one isn’t it.
Two missing commas: one after "Gods", and another before "isn't it".

7) Wallis nodded, grabbing Steven’s arm and pulling him down behind a rock as Lion-O and Lena seemed to materialise out of nowhere.
Lena isn't a canon, and this is her first mention in-fic. Mark her as the Sue. Consider this fix: "Wallis nodded, grabbing Steven’s arm and pulling him down behind a rock as Lion-O and the Sue, called Lena, seemed to materialise out of nowhere."

8) And first charge, giving her own suspension capsule the exact same failing as Lion-O’s.
That comma should be a colon.

9) “Okay, yes, if they knew she was a Sue then they would be only too happy to see her go, but still…” his voice trailed off as he watched the words.
Capitalize the "H" in "his"; this is an altogether new sentence.

10) At least the lack of description means we could still be anyway,
"anywhere"?

11) She felt some satisfaction as
My brother will
I'm guessing that those underscores were meant to be em dashes?

Also, I think you could use a beta-reader. There are multiple cases of Ing Disease and missing commas, plus it's hard to read without an extra blank line between paragraphs. I've made my username clickable; feel free to send it to me for a going-over if you'd like.

Yay, Ewok agent! Love those little guys. *offers Wallis a Jolly Rancher*

I know it's Shipfest and all, but really, offering me sweet things, even under the pretense that you're offering it to everyone for a holiday? You're playing to the judge.

...now, this does not mean that I do not accept your sweet things. Because I do. I still have the biggest sweet tooth ever. The pączki are mine now. Nom.

In return, have the most completely Southern candy I could think of: Goo-Goo Clusters. Ahem:
"The Goo Goo Cluster is a southern treat made of caramel, marshmallow and peanuts, all covered with chocolate. They had their 100th birthday in 2012, and are available all over the state of Tennessee."
These are flipping delicious.

...what goes into those, exactly? As in, the filling? Because I'd swear those are sufganiot (jelly donuts in the English, don't ask *me*). We eat them around Chanukah, and they're absolutely the most delicious things around.

...mainly, though, I'm just really glad you have them, because *everyone* should get to try a good sufgania-or-something-similar-to-one.

(I'd hazard a guess as to whether pączki and berliner donuts are the same thing or not, but that Wikipedia sentence is...kind of ambiguous if you don't already know what it's talking about, and I'm not sure. Either way, I can confirm that sufganiot don't tend to be filled with rose marmalade: they're more likely to have jam of varying types and qualities, chocolate, caramel...all sorts of things. If you're ever in Israel around Chanukah, check out the bakeries--they have SO MANY TYPES. And that link is just from one bakery, too.)

Anyway. The sufgania as a cross-cultural thing? I am SO ON BOARD WITH THIS.

~Zing

I remember a few weeks ago Zingenmir was playing music in the group chat, but I couldn't join because I was technically supposed to have been at school. I wold be so happy to have another chance to be musical with you all.

Maybe we can decide on a tune (or five) for that drinking song!

--Key: can't sing, does anyway

Glad you're feeling better now :)

Pleas have this bit of music as a welcome-back gift.

That's new. How can I join it?

Sorry. Although it's actually not very far east, I can't make it.

HG

I can't find my itinerary, but I think it's March 27th and April 8th? I won't be able to go places on my own, since I'll be with a school group, but we'll go somewhere to eat and do a teeny bit of sightseeing, so if anyone wants to come hang out in a diner and stare at monuments while being glared at by suspicious high-school teachers, that would be so awesome.

And, of course, I'll be in Cape Town, South Africa between those two dates. Freedom of movement restricted again, but if anyone's in the vicinity I bet we could find a way to have a nice mini-Gathering.

I also might be going to Los Angeles/southern California a bit after that? Details are still being worked out.

--Key would love to hang out with any of you in Real Life

I live in the east-northeast of France, this backwater we call Champagne-Ardennes, and do have family near the north, but I'm, and will be, in the middle of a four monthes stage, meaning I cannot take the time of coming.

IIRC QuintusFabiusPictor is a Flemish Belgian? But I haven't seen him around for ages.

1) As far as I'm aware, we don't spork MSTs, and I think that sporking something that's been taken down is bad taste.
2) You don't have to report every single badfic you find to the Board. You can just chuck 'em in the Unclaimed List.

The scene change where they land in the back of the limo was a bit confusing, but I don't know how to fix it. Also, the igor is standing?

I was very confused because I have no idea what Persona 4 is.

Other than that, it's not a bad story. I liked the part where they were suffering because of purple prose.

You brought me a book. This book involves something possibly originating from one of my favourite groups of people of all time.

You are my friend forever.

I bring you a comparatively paltry Newbie Gift: a full set of Roleplayer's Dice. It's fairly standard - d4, d6, d8, 2d10, d12, and the ever-important d20. Please, accept my humble offering!

--Calliope

Have a purple glitter gel pen. Your agents aren't allowed to use it to fill out mission reports.

Welcome to the PPC! We're all a little crazy, so... stay! We don't mind people that dig in deep as long as they're not bad folks!

As a welcome gift, have this: https://youtu.be/AZra3ydYytU

Well, I've never heard of it!

So it probably is old news. Older than three months or so, at least, which is about as far as my memory extends before everything gets all cloudy and wobbly and half-existent.

And I'm pretty sure it's not a faux pas, but maybe I've forgotten that, too. I dunno. If we have torches and pitchforks and we're throwing them at you and screaming 'And stay away from our daughters!' then it was probably a faux pas.
But that won't happen, because, not only is everybody here incredibly nice and accepting, but everybody here is too poor to throw expensive pitchforks and torches at people!

Looks an interesting book! I'll keep an eye on it, and probably not get to buying it until a decade or so, given my massive reading list!

Also, welcome!

I remember I was bone-shatteringly nervous when I made my first post (a year ago). I revised it about ten times before hitting the "post" button.

Bribery to encourage you to stay and talk to us My gift to you, in congratulations on your first post:



The book looks super cool. I haven't been around long enough to know if the author's a PPCer, but I'm sure they've heard of us, if they've done thorough research into those who fight against "the Mary-Sue Disease." After all, we're a well-known group. Practically famous. Aren't we? We're probably not. Still.

--Key, and a Tubecat

'Cuz they sound pretty cool to me. Check out the summary of that book, it seems like our cup of tea.

Thanks for dropping this by, RPB. Do come again. {= )

~Neshomeh

eg here

Which raises an important question:



What do the Tengwar say?

(What, you thought there was any question more important?)

The text on the anvil is fairly predictable - it's the Ring inscription. The lower-right segment is readable as 'ashnazggimbatul', which... yeah.

The ring itself, though... (oh, btw, that's a New Ring of Power - where does that come on the charge lists? ^^ But if there's one person allowed to make one...) well, it's not part of the Ring text, and it's not even written in the same mode. Note the lack of vowel-signs over any of the letters.

Instead, it looks like the Mode of Beleriand - the mode used for the inscription on the Doors of Moria, so points there. It says:

... mmof cwch hw(?) (?)occh...

... which you may note is gibberish.

Okay, so maybe it's upside-down? Except it can't be, because there's a very clear hwesta sindarinwa in there - it's the one that looks like a lowercase d with a tail.

It's not a portion of the inscription on the Doors of Durin, clever though that would be. So let's try the next theory: that it's actually English text typed using a Tengwar font. This is an unfortunately common problem: Tengwar fonts are laid out differently (so the series 1 't-p-c-q' runs along the first column of the keyboard, '1-q-a-z'), so it's worth a stab:

...em the and of Shad...

Dingdingding! There it is. It's pretty clear that last word is 'Shadow' (capital included - it's the weird both-up-and-down letter on the last word visible). Hilariously, this means the word front-and-centre is actually 'and' - nice symbolism there, guys!

Looking through the trailer again, there's another shot that shows a little of the word at the start - I see '... deem', and while it's not legible in its own right, the word 'redeem' would fit the letter-forms. (Suddenly I know how Christopher Tolkien feels trying to interpret his father's writing!) I think that 'and' is supposed to be 'Land' - capital-L gives a dot on the font I'm using, so they could've cut it out.

Going back a bit earlier in the trailer, we can get a decent read during the next-to-last strike of the hammer - it actually shows the same side of the ring, and confirms the 'Shadow' reading. There might be an extra letter on the end, but it's definitely not 's'; I'm guessing it's just a flourish. It also shows us the inside of the ring, which sadly seems to be mirrored.

So! The New Ring is inscribed to 'redeem the land of Shadow', by someone who doesn't read very well. So now we know. ^^

hS

PS: Oh, yeah, was the first game any good?

SECRET MESSAGE 13

Hope you feel better soon!

Many happy returns, generic well-wishes, etc!

Nice to meet you, Codie. (Is it okay if I call you that? I'm a bit of a Nicknamer.) Welcome to the PPC! What kind of games do you like? I'd be interested in possibly doing some multiplayer with you, or helping you with potential game missions in the future.

For your Newbie Gift: A copy of every video-game console ever made! I usually don't give these out - they're precious things and only for serious gamers - but I believe in you. Play all the games! ALL OF THEM!

--Calliope

Hope you have a good time here! I don't really have much in the way of newbie gifts, but here's a gel pen! It's got glitter, and not the Sueish kind!

Welcome to the PPC! Have two cents, so you can put them in to a discussion at some point.

And because no one seems to have linked it to you yet, here's an invite to our Discord server if you're interested.

Welcome to the PPC! We're a bunch of crazies over here, so don't mind us!

Anyway, you know the drill. Leave your sanity at the door, do all sorts of other things...

Oh, and have some welcome music! https://youtu.be/5nrnW-F0DzE

Here, have the master pen, the ink of evil's bane.

Have a 75-pack of perfectly average metal paperclips. Keep your eyes on them whenever possible, however. Whenever they aren't being looked at, they acquire sentience and the overriding goal of making all vegetables into Julienne fries. How paperclips are supposed to do that, I don't know.

Yeah, other than that, they hold paper together.

Have one of my own shed feathers and a complimentary kit of Spikes!

Hi

I call myself Sir McKillen O' Railey-MacAllford van Pritchardson the Fiftieth. But everyone keeps calling me things like 'Larfen' and 'Larf' and 'Lard' and 'Larfen J. Stocke, esq.' and 'Larfen, go away, your presence is like concentrated poison!' It's very odd.

But, yes, welcome! My gift upon you is: a tiny unicorn that has horns all over its body and is brown. The natives of this land call it a 'porcupine.' It's very odd.

Welcoooooome!

Here's a pack of sticky notes shaped like pawprints! :)

Please have a pot of black-hole coffee, and welcome.

Now, what are your fandoms? You mentionned video games, but without other precisions. Or mention about other points of interest in other media.

Have this bit of music and this best hamster as gifts.

Have a purple glitter gel pen. Your agents aren't allowed to use it to fill out reports.

Hello, and welcome aBoard! For your newbie gift, take this plate of freshly-made SPaGhetti!

If you haven't yet read them, may I point you towards the Original Series and the Constitution? They're pretty much the only required reading around these parts. Gald to hear you're already on the Wiki; if you have any questions, just look there before asking. We like it when newbies do the research. ;)

As for potential other spin-offs for you to read, have a list of my favorites!

Hope you like it here! :D

Never heard of people needing to re-apply for Permission after hiatuses.
Unless you want to, then who am I to stop you from doing it?