Feedback for Flaming Steel

[Cain Magnus]

Have at it. =)

Please refrain from posting in the story topic, please.

[eclipse]

1. Put a link to this topic before the story begins.

2. Just how low was that dude to the ground for him to be hit by the sword hilt?

3. One day, there will be a realistic fight scene in a movie involving a young woman. Until then, remember that pressure = force / area, and that wrists are not exempt from that.

[Cain Magnus]

1. Put a link to this topic before the story begins.

Whoops. I was going to edit it in, but I forgot.

2. Just how low was that dude to the ground for him to be hit by the sword hilt?

Aiden was still standing when he hit the thug. And he wasn't really hit with the hilt. He was hit by the bottom of the saya (The sheath). By natural reaction, I meant he literally used the sword while it was still sheathed. But I suppose I could have described that situation better. My bad.

3. One day, there will be a realistic fight scene in a movie involving a young woman. Until then, remember that pressure = force / area, and that wrists are not exempt from that.

I'm not exactly following. What do you mean and which part of the fight are you referring to?

Edited May 26, 2012 by Magnus Blade

[eclipse]

2. Fair enough, I guess.

3. Here's a couple of quotes, both which seem to be relatively close together, story-wise.

The person moved fast and delivered a serious punch to the armed thug's face, knocking him out cold on his back.

Mere minutes later, the girl managed to hit one of the thugs so hard in the face, the sound of his skull felt like it smashed.

Punching someone out is gonna hurt. Punching someone in the face hard enough to kill them not long after is asking for wrist problems (never mind the state of her fists). If you want a comparison, punch a cantaloupe open in one hit, and keep in mind that it's softer than your head.

[Cain Magnus]

Oh, I see now. All right, I'll remember that from now on.

I would say that because this story is meant to be pictured like an anime (Yeah...I kinda suck at making that clear) that it wouldn't matter much, but with a modernized setting like this one, realism still plays a huge part here...well, it technically is in general with anime, but most of them out there says screw logic. XD

I'm not sure if you pictured it any other way or not though, so I thought I'd just say something to be on the safe side.

[eclipse]

I'll accept that.

[Cain Magnus]

Updated. Chapter 2 is now up.

Also: If you see "Ian" anywhere, that's supposed to be Aiden...it's just that they both coincidentally sound similar when you pronounce them and I kept saying Ian in the back of my head when typing Aiden. >_> I triple and quadruple checked in my proofreading to correct them, but stuff like that still tends to slip my eye. Let me know if you see it.

[Anouleth]

This Terra lady seems pretty evil. She sees a group of men chasing a boy. For all she knows, the boy could be a thief. And her response? She kills the three men in cold blood. Quite aside from seeming to be some kind of superhuman.

[Shuuda]

Feels like there's a lot of needless descriptions. For example:

Aiden, who was extremely silent

As opposed to regular silent? It seems almost oxymoronic to me. EXTREME!

The parents had to literally end up glued to their children when they want to play outside.

Do the parent's use superglue, or a prit stick or something? That's what the sentense implies when you use the word "literally".

There's also a bit of head-hopping, where you jump between point of view. It's not an inherently bad thing, but most writers can't pull it off. Most of the time I suspect you're better off choosing one PoV and sticking to it.

I should also point that pretty much nothing happened in the first scene of the second chapter. Every scene in a story should serve to advance the story in some way, but this scene was just a meaningless conversation between characters with no conflict, or anything interesting. The story would be a the same if you cut out the scene entirely.

[Cain Magnus]

This Terra lady seems pretty evil. She sees a group of men chasing a boy. For all she knows, the boy could be a thief. And her response? She kills the three men in cold blood. Quite aside from seeming to be some kind of superhuman.

Ah...yeah. I kinda could have worked with that a little more, couldn't I? XD

As far as her strength goes, I'm tying my best to not spoil it too soon in the story.

@Shuuda:

All right. I've taken note of it all and will edit in what I can on the second chapter. Thanks.

Also, thank you all for reading so far. =)

[Cain Magnus]

I might be able to do the editing tonight, depending on if my day doesn't leave me exhausted and in a crappy mood. But even so, I have a small question (Which chances are, I may end up answering my own question, but just being sure here).

Since I'm sticking to one PoV now (Which is Aiden), how would I go about in describing the mystery caller's warning in Chapter 2? Since Aiden's the only one being looked over, would I have to do a quick one sentence PoV change or blank out the warning entirely in the text and describe it with Aiden's observations instead?

EDIT: Never mind. I got my answer.

Edited June 1, 2012 by Magnus Blade

[Cain Magnus]

Update: Chapter 2 has been revised appropriately. A few major changes thanks to the critique.

[Cain Magnus]

I haven't forgotten about this story, just to let you all know. I haven't been able to get on Serenes too much like I used to, but some spare time will be headed my way in the next week and a half, so expect Chapter 3 to roll around near one of those days. :)

[Cain Magnus]

Update: Chapter 3 is up!