Monster Writing Guide: Page 6
Victory do's and dont's
Victories can fall into similar traps that descriptions can. Actually, the first rule to avoid mistakes there is one we already heard before:
Always consider that a player might have mixed up mutations!
This does not particularly matter for the victory the critter imposes on
the player, -however- as soon as the victory is on the player's hand (or
crotch, as the case may be), you need to be careful. Victory messages, first
and third person, done by the player, should either:
1. Not be specific about the player's mutations aside of the groin, or
2. Use code to check the individual mutation parts of the player and adjust accordingly.
To be honest, there are -a lot- of victories that violate this rule, and are
on the grid. It's not hard to find them, either. A lamia player wrapping around
the victim despite having legs, a tarragon player vomiting acid on the prey
despite only the groin being tarragon. Many of these victories actually come
from a time where checking for the other bodyparts was not possible. Maybe
they will get fixed one day, maybe not. But now that we have the ability to do
such checks, past mistakes should not get repeated.
Likewise, victories, player and critter alike, should do checks for organ
sizes. The victory 'stretching the defeated to bursting' becomes rather silly
if the defeated person is a giant, and you are fairy sized. The same goes for
the body size. While this aspect of victories is not as important as the check
for bodyparts, as it does not quite as much break the illusion, it still can
have a highly positive effect on the creativity of the victory message, and
makes it more immersive and believable.
Also:
As soon as genitals matter, write a victory message for each victor and prey gender combination that matters for that victory
Male vs. male, male vs. female, female vs. female, herm vs male, herm vs
female, herm vs. herm, Male vs. Neuter, Female vs. Neuter, Herm vs. Neuter,
Neuter vs. neuter.
Quite a lot of combinations there, eh? Not all need to be used. There might be
no diference between a male or a herm abusing a female, or a herm or female
getting their hands on a male, which removes the amount of necessary combi-
nations. Likewise, with the victor being neuter, the gender or the defeated
might not matter...but it could.
It all depends on the theme of the victory message and critter in question.
Note down all necessary combiations that apply to your case before writing the
victories.
Page 1 - General description guideline
Page 3 - The Hills Have Eyes; Your Arms Don't.
Page 5 - Keeping Things Interesting
Page 6 - Victory do's and dont's
