The RPG Duelling League
Social Forums => General Chat => Topic started by: AndrewRogue on September 23, 2014, 03:45:55 AM
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Yep. Everyone does some writing, everyone workshops, maybe we do some skyping and stuff. All that sort of stuff. Just excuses to write and get your writing read.
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Hmm, I have been trying to get back into writing. Something like this would be good for me.
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Registering interest.
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I figure the general idea would be set a weekly meeting, exchange X words worth of writing, do the general perusal/commentary on it, then discuss it at the meetings. Not fully sure how well that'd work, so I'll look at some general suggestions on what more casual writing groups do!
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Possibly set up a dropbox where we can keep the writing, and then set aside some time each week in order to discuss the writings of the group?
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Prolly. I favor GDocs over Dropbox, but that prolly works too.
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I too am interested in this. I think GDocs works better, too, but hey I have both so.
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I'd be willing to give it a try at least. Though ask anyone I've tried to do a weekly game with how good I am at being reliable for any given thing every week. (Hint: the answer is not at all).
I have dropbox and could learn Gdocs I guess.
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GDocs is pretty tailor made for this (on the spot real-time editing, ability to leave comments and create subversions with edits, etc.)
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So it looks like this is about it for interest.
1. Andrew
2. Alex
3. Excal
4. Zenny
5. Gate
6. Ash?
So we should prolly talk a bit about form. I was thinking long form (novel, in other words) and trying to work with something like a submission (~1 chapter or so, 3000-5000 words?) every two weeks. Ideally it might be best if we had actual meetings every week to split up how much we need to discuss every meeting. I think Skype would be an ideal format as it is much easier and more efficient to speak.
Thoughts?
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I actually like the skype idea. Though, I may be limited if I can't find my headset.
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Kinda meh on skype, I assume we'll have IRC in addition though because why wouldn't we. Also my sleep schedule is crazy (crazy AWESOME). But yeah sure.
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So do we have a day in mind for this? IIRC, everyone sucks at being around at the same time on the same days...
For the record, I can't do Mondays and, shortly, Thursdays. And it would almost always have to be after 7pm PDT during the week because work. I might be able to swing a work lunch time if it's necessary.
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Collaborate for NaNo, it'd be hilarious.
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I can't honestly commit to any particular time weekly, especially for skype, and recommend people not worry about me that much when it comes to scheduling. I can say reliably that I will NOT be available Wednesday nights, and enough Sunday nights to make that less than ideal, if it matters.
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I can't honestly commit to any particular time weekly, especially for skype, and recommend people not worry about me that much when it comes to scheduling.
For my part I intend to read people's stories then type up constructive criticism and mail it to everyone involved. Being on the other side of the world it is simply not practical for me to expect to get into any of the skype convos. I have a hard enough time getting one person on the same schedule as me to skype unless they're night owls to begin with.
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OK. It has come to my attention that with as difficult as it is to have us all even be AWAKE at the same time much less have all of us be off of work, with no other social obligations, and have us all be at home with internet connectivity, no computer problems, no pets demanding affection, and no other distractions to devote the *2+ hours necessary to devote to a real-time discussion... that the idea as it stands is from a logistics perspective wholly unreasonable and just a little bit dumb.
*Alex, Andrew, Ashley, Excal, Gatewalker, me, (Fudo??, Laggy??)... 6 (8??)... twenty minutes a workshop (minimum, if we want to have any constructive criticism and ideas arise from any of this)... yeah, 2 hours a session easily, unless we rotated stories workshopped. I don't know about you, but a large part of my interest in this is to kick me in the pants to write something, ANYTHING, and give me frequent deadlines, so that doesn't really work.
So, to put it short, we got problems.
My instinctual solution to this problem was, as I mentioned in my previous post, to write up my own critique of each individual story and mail it out to everybody. We could all do that, but that would be very dumb for very different reasons. For one, a lot of the e-mails could be pretty repetitive if they held the same criticisms. But, more importantly, they lack the reason why in-person workshops are much more effective: discussion. From discussion between the story's audience can arise new ideas that no one person who read the story could have come up with on their own, and these new ideas are often much more fruitful for the author than any individual's opinion could ever be without having them bounce off of each other.
But, guys. GUYS. GUYS!! There is a solution. What medium combines the ability to have people with disparate schedules submit their opinions AND the ability for audience members to have a discussion and bounce ideas off of each other?
Hint:
You're posting on it.
I propose that for the writer's group, we create a new subforum on the RPGDL. Basically, a new writer's forum. We all have a deadline to submit a work of writing to everybody else in the writer's circle. We all have some time to read one another's writing, and then discuss it on the new forum. This combines the advantages of real time discussion with the flexibility of the e-mail into something we can actually use to facilitate this program.
There is more that I would like to address, in particular setting some ground rules for how we discuss each other's stories, especially with the forum format I just proposed. That said, for now I think we should just address the way we handle this, and see if anyone else has a better idea than what I have just suggested.
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Hmm. While I do like the Skype idea, voice to voice is very effective, it is impractical. As such, I like the idea of the forum as primary method with perhaps an informal Skype session set up every now and then which, if you can make it, great. But if you can't, then no loss because the forums are still there.
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There is more that I would like to address, in particular setting some ground rules for how we discuss each other's stories, especially with the forum format I just proposed. That said, for now I think we should just address the way we handle this, and see if anyone else has a better idea than what I have just suggested.
Now that I am slightly more sane: you're right, Japan has infiltrated your bloodstream.
But yeah forum format sounds good, presumably some IRC action as well and Skype sessions for people who want them and can make it. Seems like a no brainer honestly and I'm curious what else you have in mind.
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There is more that I would like to address, in particular setting some ground rules for how we discuss each other's stories, especially with the forum format I just proposed. That said, for now I think we should just address the way we handle this, and see if anyone else has a better idea than what I have just suggested.
Now that I am slightly more sane: you're right, Japan has infiltrated your bloodstream.
Japan and being an abrasive cunt making me err on the side of overly democratic rather than being demanding.
Nothing I am going to say about rules is going to be particularly shocking for anyone who has done workshops before, blah blah blah talk about the story not about who wrote it, don't be dismissive of genre, talk about what can be done to help the story reach its goals and not necessarily how the story can better fit a different mould than the one it is trying to fill, blur blur. The one thing I do want people to nom on is that I think with each submission deadline, you *have* to comment on *every story submitted* or get kicked out or face some more reasonable penalty, just so that everyone who submits is ensured to get some feedback. I'll do a more thorough post when it is not 2AM about creating an actual list of ground rules later but really that's the only idea that I think is only half-formed and not blatantly obvious.
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Sorry, been a little bit lax.
Generally agree with Zenny. Voice chat just isn't going to work, and forums allow for a decent sense of permanence and response in your own time, both of which are quite handy. Plus some people here are just more comfortable with text communication. Only downside is we may not be able to use this forum (it has some secrets apparently) but I'm looking into a solution for that one.
Zenny's pretty dead-on with the workshop rules as well. The only one I would generally add would be the standard "No defending yourself" clause. You can ask questions and ask for clarifications, but you need to steer away from commenting on your commentary.
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I think we can adopt fairly standard writing workshop ground rules, as Zenny suggests:
- Do not be prescriptive.
- Be courteous.
- Critique the story, not the writer, not the subject matter, not the genre.
- Don’t try to rewrite the story.
- Avoid line editing.
- Be specific. Avoid “This works.” Say what works.
I agree with deadlines and group requirements. These things only work if everyone participates, and everyone participates regularly. You don't get to submit a story for workshopping and then fail to workshop anyone else's story. It is fine not to have a lot to say but you will never have nothing to say.
Suggested format:
- Everyone will submit something of X* words every Y weeks.
- Workshops will last up to 1 week, with 2-3 stories at a time, to give everyone sufficient time to compile constructive feedback and authors don't have to wait forever to get their story workshopped.
- A new topic will be created for every submission, not every author. (It'll help keep commentary clean and easy to find.)
- An author will not comment on a topic until the end of the week in which his story is being workshopped.
- Provide marked-up copies of the workshopped story with your feedback.^
- A single story or chapter can only go through the workshop 4 times maximum.
* How long do we want each piece we have to read to be? How frequently should we be able to give feedback? For people writing longer works, long delays between feedback can stall progress, which would be counterproductive.
^ I recommend a Google doc since it's a format readable from any browser. That said, I'd recommend workshoppers provide an individual copy of a Google doc rather than one with common edits. The author will keep the same main doc, however, for all subsequent submissions.
Questions
- Do we want everyone to be working in the same format? E.g., everyone is workshopping pieces of a longer work? Or should we allow people to write in any format (short story, essay, novel, etc.)?
- What can we do to prevent someone from skipping out on participation? I dislike the idea of removing them from the group entirely as sort of a zero tolerance rule, but maybe we could have a strikes system that erases over time. For example, someone who missed submitting their story gets 1 strike. 3 strikes and you're ejected. However, for every time you successfully participate in a workshop or submission, you erase half or one-third of a strike.
- How many people do we want participating at a time? Do we want to invite people to join every cycle (e.g., after everyone participating has gotten a critique in a round) if there's interest? I recommend asking people who want to leave to wait until a full round is completed.
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Getting a board shouldn't be too hard. I remember having to make a board for something else I was involved in about a year and a half ago and aside from making the place look fancy, it was super easy. And I'm guessing that for what we want, just the default skin should be enough.
General thoughts, what Lady Door and Zenny said sound pretty good. I like the idea of a three strikes system where you can erase them at a third of a strike per round. And as a novice, I don't have strong opinions on length of pieces to be workshopped. Though, perhaps we can start with a trial length, and after one round of workshopping, see if we want to revisit that length.
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just skimming, more thorough stuff later
I don't think necessarily a minimum word count is necessary. Some stories work fine as 3 page flash fiction, others don't. Less nobly and more honestly a minimum word count would stress me out and make me disinclined to write due to worrying about it more than I already should.
I don't think forcing everyone to have the same format is necessary either. If someone really wants to submit poetry (don't think any of us write that?) or creative nonfiction that should be allowed.
I do think we should set the maximum word count at about 3000-5000 words or so, perhaps allowing flexibility in that arena if someone has submitted something
Agreed with author not commenting until the end of the week, though I think some commentary during submission about whether it is a first draft, revised draft, etc, plus whether it is meant to be fantasy/fairy tale/mystery/realist/nonfiction and *NOTHING ELSE PAST THAT* is fine.
I think everyone should participate in the commentating (of course being allowed to opt out if real life is too busy... not every time, though, and if you opt out you're not allowed to submit for a couple rounds?) while 2-3 of us have our stories workshopped in cycles.
All ideas are just off the top of my head right now. Will mull it over more.
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I don't see the point in a minimum, either. What you submit is up to you, and if you're behind and don't have enough words, well, that means you get less read and given feedback on.
I'm fine with multiple formats, too, just want to be explicit about it. To your point about introducing the work, I agree; mention what kind of thing it is, how many times you've written/rewritten it (especially as we keep going and multiple drafts cycle through the rounds), bring on the workshop.
<5k is what I said before I changed it to "X" so I'm plenty good with that limit.
What do you mean about 2-3 of us having things workshopped in cycles? 2-3 for every week and then a second round after we've gone through everyone?
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Nothing I am going to say about rules is going to be particularly shocking for anyone who has done workshops before
So, ah... I haven't done (creative writing) workshops before, which is why I was hoping for some more clarification. My organized wordsmithing experiences have all been on the lit crit, article and essayist sides of things, which seem to operate under very different rulesets compared to what I'm seeing here. So I am a little culture shocked, and kind of scared by the casual penalties for violations.
Don't mind me, though?!
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The stuff I outlined in my post is pretty much what workshops look like.
The "penalties" are more to encourage people to participate in all aspects. There's a tendency -- perfectly natural! -- to want to submit for workshopping but not participate in workshopping others' stuff. Penalties are just to help everyone get the most out of this thing.
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Yeah Alex don't fret too much, the guidelines basically boil down to three things: 1) Be constructive in your criticism 2) Don't be a duck 3) Don't derail the discussion.
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Could everyone who is still interested just do a quick reconfirm for me just so I know who all is still in?
Then I guess the big question is: how long do people actually want between submissions? Is two weeks a good number? Do people think that's enough time to do their own writing AND comment on people's stuff?
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I'm still in.
My previous workshops have been 1 week for turnarounds on feedback, but that was when I was in school. 2 weeks sounds fair. If you're talking about a round, though, that'll take longer; 2-3 people per 2 week period ...
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Hi. No real opinion on time controls.
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Sure, still in
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For what my input is worth (ie not much since I don't write for shit and am not taking part), I would envision rolling roster of who is submitting is still done weekly, you just are staggering who is submitting each week on and off.
Or can have rolling roster split between two groups with an on and off week alternating along with the rotation...
Just generally try to set it up to smooth out the input/output cycle while still leaving plenty of room to work. Just need to have people okay with being late in the cycle for your first week.
#designingsustainableworkflows #synergizingyourworkerstoempowerthemtowork #justcorporatethings
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Yeah, that was sort of what I was thinking.
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#designingsustainableworkflows #synergizingyourworkerstoempowerthemtowork #justcorporatethings
Monetiiiiiizeeeee our aaaaasseeettssss
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Still in, just been alternating between too busy and too exhausted to think about anything that requires thought.
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I'll give it a try. Again, Gate and Reliability do not mix well, but I'll see what I can do. If I miss one of my own submit cycles because I just can't manage to get anything out, I'll still try to comment on others' work so I'm not being completely non-productive.
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That's pretty much what the plan was AFAIK, Grefter, just the 2-week window for commenting because everyone keeps crying busy (which I totally get).
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Okay, so talked to Tal and he wasn't super sure on how to do things on this forum. So, for sake of ease, as well as better control, I have created a new forum! Supposedly we'll get ads in two weeks so I guess we'll see if that explodes the universe or anything.
http://dlwritersgroup.freeforums.net/
Go here and reg please.
First point of concern is how to arrange the forums. Ashley has suggested we do one board for the workshopping rounds and then have individual archived boards for each person to move the relevant threads to on-completion, allowing them to access commentary later while keeping the core board clean. Whatcha'll think?
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Sounds good to me.
If I may request, I have a pretty big-deal demonstration class coming up on November 2nd. I would like to request at least two weeks after that (or if others would like to have their works shopped sooner, later is fine but not too much later. I do actually need to kick myself into gear for writing) for it to be my turn to have work shopped. 2 weeks should be enough time for me to get a rough draft going.
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Don't see a problem with that. To be honest, I'd rather give us all 2 weeks from now to pull together something to submit. From today, that would put us squarely on a November 1 start date.
Since I still think we should do 2-3 per cycle, and give ourselves 2 weeks to comment, we should be fine to give you the time you need. We have 6 people signed up. If we start easy and do 2 people per 2 week cycle, you can easily go to the final one (though I should mention holidays are going to wreak havoc with schedules -- all the more reason to have 2 week windows).
Green?
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Like a fuckin' forest. But not one where Nazis planted trees so that the foliage made a swastika in autumn, like a fuckin' forest filled with pines high on a mountain
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Sorry. Been lazy.
Considering everything seems in order, does anyone else have any particular scheduling concerns at the moment, or are we in a good position to start doling out due dates?
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Okay. Looks like no objections, so would everyone be okay with having the first round of submissions due on... hmmm... November 8th?
That said, do we want 2-3 entries per round of submissions, and who wants to be in first, second, and maybe third groups?
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No objections. Previous preferences for second or third group still stand.
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I vote for 2 per cycle until we get through the holiday season.
I'd prefer not to be 1st pair because I will need to write something from scratch at the moment. I'll do it if necessary, but I think Andrew was fine being first so we'd just need one more there.
Haven't heard from anyone other than Zenny in a while, though...
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I'd need to do a bit more writing, but I do already have something. Don't think it's very good. But, I suppose that's part of the point, isn't it.
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Okiedokie, executive decision to give people some time to get things done. Don't stress too much about this. This is a casual workshopping group and we're all here to help each other, not tear each other down. :) Plus this is the first round and there are bound to be some hiccups.
Stories Due November 8
Stories & Previous Group Notes Due November 22
Stories & Previous Group Notes Due December 6
Previous Group Notes Due December 20
BREAK: December 21 - January 9
Round 2 begins January 10. We'll figure out the revisions to the process before we set that (number of weeks between submissions, order, etc).
Please do the following:
- Get yourself acquainted with http://dlwritersgroup.freeforums.net/. If you haven't registered yet (I don't remember who has), please do so soon! It's moderated so we don't end up with a lot of spam folks.
- When your story is due, please go to Workshopping - Round 1 and begin your own thread.
- When notes are due, please post them to the thread created for that story. This will remain true for all future submissions, even if the stories are continuations or revisions of the previous. After a round is finished, please move your post to your personal archive folder. We'll rename the master folder at each round.
Let me know if something sounds wrong or if there are any questions. :)
Let's get started!
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REMINDER
Andrew, Excal, your submissions are due on Saturday!
When you're ready to post, create a new thread (title can be whatever you'd like) here (http://dlwritersgroup.freeforums.net/board/8/workshop-round-1).
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Please remember, Gate and Ashley! Your submissions are due on Saturday!
Everyone else, please remember, commentary on our first two submissions is due on Saturday as well!
We also have an IRC channel now if you want to chat. #DLWritingGroup.
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Commentary on Excal's story up. Commentary on Andy's expected to be up after work tonight. C'mon people get discussing.
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Yosh. We are past deadline folks.
Given this is the first week and I know some people were busy I'm willing to extend a bit of credit and push everything back one more week, but we really need people in and doing stuff if this is going to work!
That, or we need to cull people early.
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All my creative energy has been caught up in GM prep lately(huuuuuuuge complicated arc coming up in the game I run for Jenna), between that and sick I kinda forgot this was a thing. @_@ Will be happy to give feedback on this cycle of stuff, but I'm going to miss this round for submission.
On the plus side, I do have like 8 custom monsters and two new prestige classes done! Buuuuut those aren't exactly things I can submit to this(unless people want to see them anyway or something).
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I frankly see nothing wrong with submitting that sort of stuff? It's still writing, our focus on giving feedback is just gonna be a bit different than submitting a story.
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Really not happy with anything I've written lately. It's all flat.
Ended up unexpectedly without computer internets which made it impossible to submit feedback. Just posted the feedback I'd written previously. Stupid vacations.
May or may not post a story and I'm willing to relieve myself of participating in the story submission part because fail. I'll still participate in the reviews!
(Also, gate, your membership is approved so you can post now.)
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Hokay. So, been a little slow on this, but here is the deal. Due to a few failures (and anticipated failures) for the remainder of round 1, I'm just going to call a mulligan on this whole thing and we'll launch again in the new year.
That said, gloves do have to come off after the mulligan. Writing groups need consistent participation to function. I know stuff'll happen sometimes and, if you can just let us know a bit in advance, that's cool. But we really can't have due dates arrive and see absolutely nothing to show. Both parts of a writing group (putting your work out there and commenting) are super critical. So, we'll offer some leeway if you can provide advanced notice and just shift your individual dates a bit, but implement an unquestioning 3-strikes for a straight failure to deliver.
Does that work for everyone? And if it does, how is January for people? Did 2 per two weeks work? More better? Less better?
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wordswordswords
January works, maybe, probably, hopefully? But there is a lot of stick there and not much carrot and that saps my motivation from "ok, let's try and have something for this" to "maaaybe I should just quietly drop out now and not even try, there's no way I can keep up with these expectations..."
For me, the long spacings and times actually hurt, I want the involvement and activity to keep up. The first attempt had - by my mental standards - a really long delay from startup to action. Topic went up late September, interest came in pretty fast, but then it was mid-October before things were finalized, and then the first dates were set at the end of October into November. That's several weeks from people posting interest to actually doing anything, and in the intervening time life stuff came up, depressive phases started and entered full swing, etc. It's easy for people to lose interest in that amount of time, and kind of harsh to go from cooling heels for multiple weeks on setup to a sudden schedule of activity expected every week with penalties for missing.
In my case in particular, I was talking with Andrew about scheduling one night, and we made a rough schedule that had me in the first group with about a week to write something. That got me excited and planning... until the next day, when I woke up and saw that Ashley had posted a schedule here that had me in the last group to submit, and I talked to Andy again and we decided to go with that one since it was posted here. So my brain went "oh, now I don't actually have to get writing for another month, huh..." annnnnd other stuff came up as per above. Now, that was just miscommunication, it happens, no big deal by itself. But it highlighted the large amounts of startup downtime, especially for people in later groups.
So my long rambling point here is that we're doing it again, it's December 10 and we're already talking about doing nothing for the rest of this entire month, but then reemphasizing the need for activity in January!!! - except for whoever's in the last group and doesn't have to write anything until probably February...
So I guess for me, more activity would be better? (Or maybe I'm just being a huge jerk and should sit out? That is also possible)
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I'm on vacation until January 9th. After that is fine.
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I'm fine with shortening the sub/review period to weekly. I believe in Parkinson's law -- that a task will swell to fill the time allotted to it, no matter the task -- so it makes sense to keep it fast paced.
I put you at the end, Alex, because Andy mentioned you might need time to work through some things.
If everybody's up to the pressure of quick deadlines, let's go for it. We can start whenever. I wanted to be accommodating to everyone's individual situations but obviously that leads to inaction.
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So we all just gave up on this right?
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Sorry, been preoccupied and not actually checking the forums. But yes, at the moment, it is dead in the water.
I'd still like to give it a shot if people are still interested.