Retainer Ad-Venture Contest (EU) - Discussion Thread

Please feel free to use this thread to discuss the Retainer Ad-Venture Contest and practice submitting your entries.
Please remember, you cannot edit your entries in the entry thread once you have posted. Your entry must not exceed five hundred (500) words.

The full contest details and rules can be found here.

When you are ready to make your entry, please do so by posting in the entry thread.

Here's an issue that might be a bit on the side, but one that's gonna become not-so-subtle especially with this contest: the forum still has a character limit of 1000 per post. I know it can be circumvented, I know it's even very easy to do so (which, to be honest, only makes it even more of an annoyance, like, what is its point then?)...

Yet now once again, we see a very long and detailed post of the rules (over 10k characters, apparently!), and we are asked to post entries that will potentially consist of double or triple the amount of characters the current limit allows. I can't be the only one to feel that this is a little backhanded. I'm aware of past events that made the restriction necessary back then. How long ago was that? We even left 2.x behind since; could we please, for the love of Menphina, have the character limit abolished as well? Especially with such contests being held? Have a captcha check or some such for long posts, for example. Or at the very least, increase that limit to 3000. Anything. Please. Just get out of this ancient restriction. I mean, even Twitter is considering to move beyond 140 character now.

I seem to have made a grave error in posting. And cannot delete it due to the no editing. I failed to realize the exact locations specified were not all inclusive, and submitted something I was not qualified to submit.

I somehow gained a * in the middle of my entry and can't edit it to remove it. I just wanted to post here to apologise for the weird *. Sorry. IT was a copy/paste error in my excitement at actually being able to enter a competition.

Incidentally, the character limit doesn't seem to apply in that thread and I'm really anxious about my word count which is, I believe, 499 >_>;

Jeeze, I really failed at reading comprehension, as excited as I was to enter. Not only am I not a valid participant, but it's WORDS, not Characters... I was pounding my head against a wall, trying to figure out how to write a Retainer story in 500 characters.

That sucks, Isala, it must be really disappointing to work on it then realise you can't enter. I liked your (unofficial) entry though!

It would be really hard to write a story in so few characters. I usually struggle to write a post on the forums with fewer than 500 characters...

I feel really bad for clogging up the thread with two posts because I made a copypaste mistake in my first attempt, and can neither edit nor delete that post. I hope the mods can clean it up.
I have also seen several others before me having to double post because of errors they found in their first attempt. I understand why we cannot edit our posts to prevent possible cheating, but it would be great if we could at least delete our own entries, to keep the thread clean and avoid any confusion.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by TheTen

I feel really bad for clogging up the thread with two posts because I made a copypaste mistake in my first attempt, and can neither edit nor delete that post. I hope the mods can clean it up.
I have also seen several others before me having to double post because of errors they found in their first attempt. I understand why we cannot edit our posts to prevent possible cheating, but it would be great if we could at least delete our own entries, to keep the thread clean and avoid any confusion.

---

I have made a few huge grammar mistakes but I believe moderators don't look at that.
IMO quality of the story will be number 1 thing when deciding who wins or not. :)
If you made somehow good and funny story, I wouldn't really worry with a few errors if I was you.

I might be inspired to type something up just for the heck of it, even though I'm not able to enter anything (not being in the EU, of course!). Whether I actually do is another story...

ive made a story 499 words but just checking does the word limit include details?
such as name server

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaylie

ive made a story 499 words but just checking does the word limit include details?
such as name server

---

The server and character info and chosen prize are not part of the story so I don't see why it would be counted in the 500 words. Some people are however entering stories of far more than 500 words. I think I've seen 2 at over 1,000 words so far. If in doubt, use a word processor with word count functionality, folks! It'll save your entries!

On a side note, Hemingway is credited with a 6 word story:
"For sale: Baby shoes, never worn."

I also made a rather large error. I did not see the 500 word limit when I was posting, cos when I was redirected I was brought to the end of the 1st page (something weird to do with this laptops settings on chrome, don't know how to fix the thing). So I'm wondering, for the people that made to mistake and made big posts, are they allowed to re-edit or repost their entries or is the one post enough and we're automatically out?

Gah, I can't believe I forgot to add my details at the bottom of my story! >< Was too busy trying to make sure my story was good for the forum post.

I hope adding the details in the post underneath is okay :(. Can we get a forum mod to tell us this? T-T

I'm sad this contest isn't all Region I would love a contest like this on the North American side.

I had an entry written and everything... But alas, the USA isn't a PAL Territory country.

Entry in! I've never written a story before... :)

For those itching to get a prize in the NA region, remember that yas currently have another competition already going ;P

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by mbncd

For those itching to get a prize in the NA region, remember that yas currently have another competition already going ;P

---

While this is true, I'm fairly certain that US players who prefer writing would rather be here, just like EU players who enjoy maps more would rather be doing that instead. Just a slight kick in the junk to both regions, to have completely different, yet interesting in their own way, events, instead of giving both to both regions.

I would imagine not, but try going through your work to remove 2 words just to be sure.

Wow 500 words is SHORT. I'm really struggling editing mine down from around 1,000.

This is a great competition, and I understand that you can't very well read a ton of long short stories, but if (hopefully when!) you run a competition of this kind again, could you please consider upping your word allowance to 1,000? :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mjollnir

Wow 500 words is SHORT. I'm really struggling editing mine down from around 1,000.

This is a great competition, and I understand that you can't very well read a ton of long short stories, but if (hopefully when!) you run a competition of this kind again, could you please consider upping your word allowance to 1,000? :)

---

Would YOU like to read a hundred entries of a 1000 words?

If you're having a hard time getting the word count down, throw your story away and plan it again from scratch. Plan the important parts and revolve around that, do we NEED to read about your retainers interaction with your character? Does your retainer NEED to talk about your character?
Questions that I've brought up from the very long entries(the ones that also disqualified themselves :p), the story is about the retainers' adventure. Do we need to read about the parts we see in game? What is the most interesting part of the story? Is the most interesting part what you have written down?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chiramu

Gah, I can't believe I forgot to add my details at the bottom of my story! >< Was too busy trying to make sure my story was good for the forum post.

I hope adding the details in the post underneath is okay :(. Can we get a forum mod to tell us this? T-T

---

Guilty as charged. Though, to be honest, I don't see myself using the Scarf (last item I don't have yet) at all...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chiramu

If you're having a hard time getting the word count down, throw your story away and plan it again from scratch. Plan the important parts and revolve around that, do we NEED to read about your retainers interaction with your character? Does your retainer NEED to talk about your character?

---

Had already cut mine down to 500, but it took a lot of the storytelling and emotion out of it which was a shame. I wanted to write about my retainer's interaction with my character, so aside from the required mention of what was brought back and how it was gotten hold of, I though it would be interesting to reflect on the current state of the game from my perspective. We have plenty of roof-stealers and minion-hunters in the thread so far, but in-game my eight retainers are past that phase and only head out to get the specific materials I require for the crafts that day.

On reflection, I stand by the 1,000 word request for future shirt story competitions. 500 words only takes about a minute and a half to read. Would I like to read a hundred entries of 1,000 words? Sure! Not all at once, but there's no reason to do so. Spending an hour to read twenty a day for a week seems fine, especially if it was part of my job to do so!

Added my story ^_^

Maybe not the best had to get back into writing again.
I also hope it's not really a problem that I mainly play on an American server, at the moment. But I am a Dutch/German (yes both) young woman living in the Netherlands so I do fall under the Europe cathegory for contests right?
(Maybe I'll transfer to a mainly European server in the future - but now I'm at home in Malboro).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mjollnir

Wow 500 words is SHORT. I'm really struggling editing mine down from around 1,000.

This is a great competition, and I understand that you can't very well read a ton of long short stories, but if (hopefully when!) you run a competition of this kind again, could you please consider upping your word allowance to 1,000? :)

---

Hehe, I know what you mean. Within half an hour of writing mine, I was already three times over the limit. I had to spend the next hour and a half painstakingly trying to decide which parts to remove. No matter, my entry's in now. ^-^

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Elita-Draconia

Hehe, I know what you mean. Within half an hour of writing mine, I was already three times over the limit. I had to spend the next hour and a half painstakingly trying to decide which parts to remove. No matter, my entry's in now. ^-^

---

You should plan before you write.

You should, but that doesn't mean it always happens. I'm a literature major and I never plan before I write, ehehehe......

I threw mine together and ended up at 492 words. Would've liked to have written more but gotta keep it short and sweet!

(And yeah, I play on an American server but that's just to play with my friends - I'm in Australia).

So, Community Team, my entry is actually 500 words on the dot (post #162 in the entry thread), but I just pasted the whole thing into a word processor and it counted 502. It's added 2 words because I split paragraphs with "---" in two places. Obviously those aren't actual words, so the entry is still 500 words.

Is that going to be an issue? :S

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Bizant

So, Community Team, my entry is actually 500 words on the dot (post #162 in the entry thread), but I just pasted the whole thing into a word processor and it counted 502. It's added 2 words because I split paragraphs with "---" in two places. Obviously those aren't actual words, so the entry is still 500 words.

Is that going to be an issue? :S

---

I don't think that should be an issue. You don't read the paragraph breaker :p.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chiramu

I don't think that should be an issue. You don't read the paragraph breaker :p.

---

Well, you could try ;)

But yeah, exactly. The paragraph breakers obviously aren't words. I'm just concerned they'll paste it into a word counting tool, see the number 502, and instantly disqualify it without realising those 2 extra "words" are just formatting to make it easier to read.

So... the Announcement Date was supposed to be, what, four days ago now? Any word on that?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Niet

So... the Announcement Date was supposed to be, what, four days ago now? Any word on that?

---

21st and after it read. Just be patient :) I'm super anxious for the results too, I hope I win!

Oh man, I was not expecting that! I'm thrilled to bits that my story was well received! :D

Congrats to all the winners and to everyone who entered, too - lots of really funny and clever stories were penned!

After I cringed so hard when I saw that through copy-paste shenanigans my formatting got totally gutted, I didn't even expect much from this contenst. Specially when reading other peoples' entries that made me go 'Oh maaaan... these stories are WAY better than mine. And look properly formatted too.'

I practically fell out of my desk chair when I read the result this morning. I still want to say that I enjoyed reading all the other entries a lot. Thanks for some fun reading in a few quiet moments at work.

Can't even contain how happy it made me seeing my entry win! :D

(And looking at the other winners, and entries in the thread, I had some solid competition against me for a winning place)

Completely forgot it would be announced based on forum account name and not the character we want the prize for, skimmed the list of winners for the wrong name and felt all my hopes drop before remembering my forum alias. That was a bit of a surreal moment for me.

"Oh I didn't wi- ...wait a minute... is that? What!? OH. OH ****!"

Followed by a lot of fairly incoherent internal screaming with joy, and then yelling in every possible linkshell.

I hope they do more contests like this, I had a lot of fun working on my entry for it. It's always nice when my writing can get me a little something for the time and effort, and I've coveted that scarf for a long while.

Congratulations to everyone else that won! I love how everyone took a different approach with all their stories, not one winning entry feels too similar to another, and everyone's retainers have their own unique personalities. It's great to see how creative the community for this game really is.

I checked the winners to see whether my friend's story won after nagging her to enter it for so long, and was so excited I didn't even notice that mine also won a prize until some time later. Thank you to the community team for choosing my story even though I've been so grumpy and hostile on the forums recently ;_;

I also had a lot of fun reading the other entries, both the winners and those who weren't picked this time. Hopefully they'll consider running more writing contests in future.

Congratulations to everyone who won!

These creative contests are excellent fun, bravo.

Thank you so much for selecting my entry as one of the winners. I am truly honoured by this. As an aspiring writer this was a huge confidence boost for me moving forward. I am really loving this scarf.
http://pepeangogoan.tumblr.com/image/132175023766