ROUND 1 MAG FT: MMLP & SRAL
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKCNXhrvIqU

@symetrik
@Witty
@Genocide
@timeless
@Ullr
@Ness
@Destroyer
@Mr. J
@Diablo
@YDK
@Bags
@sound @dead man @trapazoidal

Enjoy.

just a white rectangle with a black border, can't see/hear anything

Lol this shit hilarious

Mmlp plays the face to lars heel to perfection

says movie not loaded, haven't seen how this normally works so idk what to do about troubleshooting, definitely interested in peeping though

Yea worked fine for me idk hommie

got it lol for some reason embedding youtube on here doesn't work on my chrome, I switched to firefox and it worked for whatever reason

watching now :P

Wait, when was I a dick to either of you? If I was I really apologize, I have no idea what I did lol, if it was my bailing on this site a while back that wasn't anything on the site itself nor either of you, that was 100% because I was upset I had an opponent who preferred denying an extension rather than actually battling me, I have no ill will or ill feelings toward either of you and respect you both. Btw Baron best of luck in the SS! We both took risks haha, I don't think either of us ended up in the loser's bracket because we got outclassed, I thought you wrote a very solid verse for what it was it just wound up taking a hit because any emotion was traded for a pun which was clever and well written but your opponent was able to milk that and that's why he took the win imho, I don't think you got outwritten at all lol

Waaaait, when did I ever deny an extension? I literally don't think I have ever done that in my entire career battling lol, I need some links or whatever here because I literally have no clue haha

dope work gentlemen! Quite entertaining, I don't know most of the backstory behind these battlers so it's really cool getting a glimpse into NC culture through the lens of two dudes just chilling over some brews

Second round be fire yo

LMAOOOOOOO

in retrospect I don't think it actually was you.. I think it was like Shoguncrosse or something hahahahahhahaa

you've just become guilty by RR association in the drunken stupor of it all

Needed this in the first round!! Awesome shit boys. Thank you

Subtitles are well off at times haha!

Hahaha I feel that but I don't even remember being on a tag team with Shoguncrosse lol and I don't see how would get that name mixed up with mine it seems pretty different Shogun Baron I mean you're called Baron too so it seems like something you would remember hahaha as far as I know the only people I have tag teamed with r z stone who lives in Albany near me who I actually convinced to join the site just to do the GSL tag team topical and we wound up winning the season I have tag teamed with walking keys and he and I won the GSL season as well actually via no show in the finals vs Vlad and nemean but I don't recall ever being with Shogun for him to deny you an extension I would have had words about that because I would always rather Grant an extension than to take a free win via denial of an extension lol

It's all good either way man haha thanks for doing this mag btw @sraL and @MMLP btw expect errors in this post I was using voice recognition on my phone lol

lol'd.
yeah, consistency is always my weak point, I was gonna ask @Ullr (or whoever) what makes a line flow in text? I'm audio, so I try to avoid 4/4 but can't always succeed.
it hurts me that @sraL thinks I'm an alias

This would be welcomed lol

Lmao ive beaten mmlp but he beat me most recently, i jus asked if hes up for a rematch i never said he turned it down

Alcohol.

lmao forever instigating

I know right lmao gonna have mmlp thinkin i been talkin shit over battles that never happened

Lol I think you beat me in the poetry league and I got two wins in topicals if memory serves me correct. I could wrong. I don't care who I battle really. I just find moments throughout the year when I feel like writing. I'll probably get fed up of this in 2-3 weeks time. It's hyped now, probably should rematch

That sounds about right to me lol im down for whatever man i havent really been motivated to write a topical in a year or two tbh but its still fun to throw somethin together occasionally

Hahaba so dope.
U2r fucki. Hilarious

You fagots should stick around for the AOWL REVIVAL !!

I was going to PM but I'll post just in this thread so others can read and comment

At least by my view on it flow is just how effortlessly the verse is read, how consistent the schemes are and how little the reader gets tripped up by things changing unexpectedly and just creating a bad time for the reader

For example

This line flows 'cause as time goes it's not hard to read, but a bar for me is in my arteries, it's art for me to rip apart the schemes - I shred the excess, so anything that X says is sex affects your senses intentions of dense trends of text flows bend and flex -- etc etc

I keystyled that trying to use the line itself to explain a bit, basically, for a line to flow optimally it must have the following things:

Strong prevailing rhyme scheme

line flows/time goes A A
hard to read(b)/bar for me(b)/in my arteries(B)/ art for me(b)/ rip apart the schemes(B)

the next bit is a little harder to break down because it is doing what I refer to as "cresting" because the schemes and internals interact and affect one another and the result is a more rhyme dense but more difficult to define scheme of the line, you'd have to analyze that element looking at the actual sounds I introduced for the internals but the prevailing multi here was

X says is sex/dense trends of text/(flows) bend and flex

the (flows) was added because it allows me to hop to the next scheme without needing to change the entire thing, you can preserve a multi chain in this manner, and the flows was different enough that it punctuates it as something different

so like, it might continue

I shred the excess, so anything that X says is sex affects your senses, intentions of dense trends of text flows bend and flex those tend to stress ---

hereafter you could change the scheme entirely or lock into the multi and have a section where it is just the multis with literally no filler words

flows bend and flex those tend to stress November depths coal embers drenched prose rendered wrenched --

since the way the line is written prior it locks you into that very punctuating scheme repetition you as the writer can choose to utilize that to create even more density, but be careful you're not just throwing fluff because people will not like it if you're like cat hat mat pat fat rat!!! #barz but in the line prior there is still meaning intact despite the disjointing nature of the scheme I chose, so it results in a more rapid but more punctuated section of the verse

so as an aside, this is also helping your verse in that it creates different flows for sections rather than just adhering to that one flat flow that is pretty much synonymous with basic topicals




okay so this was a longer post than expected but yeah, this is at least an intro into what flow is on a text piece at least by my crazy definition, hope this helps and if you have questions feel free, I am actually thinking of doing a video series on this stuff because fuck man we spend so much of our lives perfecting it someone should learn from it tbh, I could invite guests and stuff and we can introduce the world at large to topicals as we each see them and our special brand of methodical madness lol

hurry up
@Ullr cool thanks, helps a bit I think

The biggest thing is just be ruthless and remove excess words, clean it up, read it over 10x and make it read smooth like butter

lmao that example was horrid though

it makes zero sense as a complete sentence

I find that to be a huge problem with RR members, a lot of you are so caught up in the mechanics your content suffers and makes the verses unreadable/unejoyable and I think this is in part due to you guys using "category" based voting rather than simply saying who's you enjoyed more and why. I've literally seen people lose battles at RR because of grammar and punctuation LOL

I was just keystyling for the sake of the example, I wasn't trying to make it meaningful, it was basically braggadocio because the actual words and content were not the focal point nor should they be regarded as such, I'd have done it in just vowel sounds like ah eh oh ooh ih ee ah ooh ah if that didn't look ridiculous, the whole purpose was just showing how you can modulate flow using phrasing and multi spacing

Grammar and punctuation is important though haha, if we're trying to make our writing more than just battles and leagues and really be able to call a topical its own form and stand as essentially the pioneers of a new form on the same level as a sonnet or a haiku the attention to detail is going to be what does it ultimately, we need to be able to do both dope lines and make it presentable to an arbitrarily large audience, we all want our work to be seen on the largest stage we can manage, you can't do that if half the people are turned off by the very first line with typos and shit




Okay so I just had lunch allow me to elaborate on some of the things I was thinking about

first, yes you're 100% right my example wasn't meaningful and that makes it a bad example of what a topical is, I focused entirely on mechanics as you pointed out and that is something I will work to address and improve in myself because we as writers must do more than put words together in a beautiful flowing manner but must also make those words compelling and gripping and really invest the reader in them deeply and emotionally, if not they are hollow parlor tricks and cheap, I 100% agree with you on that and I am going to dig deep to improve upon that.

That said, pertaining to my last post about being ruthless removing unnecessary words:


A quote from the 1858 "Methodist Quarterly Review" on the subject:

"It is the sculptor’s power, so often alluded to, of finding the perfect form and features of a goddess, in the shapeless block of marble; and his ability to chip off all extraneous matter, and let the divine excellence stand forth for itself."

We, as writers, are much like Michaelangelo's David as it was carved, we must carve away all the excess marble that is not "David" - the only difference is, we invest ourselves in our writing, so really, we are the marble and we must carve pieces out of ourselves to craft something greater. That means painful reworks, lines we love for our own reasons being sacrificed for the piece's sake. We only have a limited amount of words in each topical, if not every one of those words directly adds to the overall idea and intent of the piece it must be removed to make room for ones that do.

Also, in my original post I was offering up to anyone else to make examples/explanations of the idea of flow because I was just going to spitball some haha, I know a brilliant writer such as yourself would certainly be able :)

someone touched on my grammar, maybe it was ullr. I know there's no ONE way for text to be "correct", but I'd love additional input on the question of what makes a piece come across through text, etc.

Also 100% agree about category voting, I think it is robbing us all and have voiced my opposition to it on numerous occasions on the board. That said, the reason for the categories is to ensure that the average feed is going to be more detailed. That is a criticism I would lodge about some votes here, it really feels like

"Nah bruh this was nice but I'mma vote for this guy yo" no explanation why, just "I liked this verse better", nothing to learn from, nothing to allow the writer to elevate. I think while categories force us to focus on the wrong things at times they are useful in at least that respect because they give guidelines for us all to focus on, maybe they're the wrong things to focus on but the end result is at least something to work on instead of just blindly tooling about and hoping our changes are good.

Also, that is not to say all feed is like that, just some - there are some really great writers here and some really great feedback given but certainly not all, though the same can be said about ANY site just saying we've all got our own issues haha

sym I'm going to do some videos on the subject coming up, you had a really fucking dope verse man, just some little things to tweak to improve

think of how you say your verse, add punctuation to make the verse read exactly like you say it, read it out loud try different ways and experiment, that makes a difference.

I like to think the only battles here with inadequate feedback like that mentioned only happens in battles where there's a very clear winner and loser, usually in battles where it's obvious one party failed it in with no effort

The actual battles where both tried never get votes like that, and those cast in that way are discounted.

for sure. is there a resource that details what punctuation "formally" gives which length of pause?

Just a space is obviously least and renders effectively no Paws aside from the normal spacing between words based on your Cadence

Hey, is the next shortest it provides a momentary pause slightly greater than that of no punctuation

Next I would say is probably the semicolon or colon depending on your usage semicolon is used for a half new sentence half, Bridge statement and a colon denotes a separate but included list

The next is probably preference in terms of how much of a space it is but I like to use hyphens dashes for longer pauses I will sometimes use more than one dash to really emphasize a hard pause that is not yet a new piece or idea

Finally we have the period hich is obviously the hardest punctuation because it completely disconnects one idea from another meaning that it is entirely distinct and separate only related in terms of its order with relation to other sentences or chunks of your piece.

You can also consider line-breaks and things of that nature to be punctuation as well and you could also consider italics and bold to be another form of punctuation but those are a little different and those are preference and in a touch of irony given that I am talking about punctuation for a verse please excuse the fact that this post will have no such punctuation because I am dictating it via voice recognition haha

this page gave me cancer.

Shame that you are a slave to it I guess, you might consider sorting that out friend

lmao we never bold, underline, and rarely italicise anything here at NC. We don't colour coordinate our multies either. Do you find it helps readers at RR if you colour code your multis so they pick up on them? Do you not think the reader has the skill to pick up on this without the need for an aid to walk them through it by the hand? I'm fairly certain the majority here have done this long enough to pick up on what's happening without a further unnecessary show and tell of what's being done.

feel free to post these in the Discussion forum here so they get maximum views/replies

We don't do that on RR in Topicals either, very rarely at least but it is definitely done in text battling for example, they go balls deep using bold, italics, colors, hyperlinks even pictures and shit. The most topicals get is color sometimes, like what I personally do sometimes is I will make my verse orange by default, and if there is a section which is distinctly different and brings more resolution to the piece I will color code it as royal blue. I also have color-coded dialogue in the past to make it easier to keep track of who is saying what.

I know 100% that people are intelligent enough to pick up on stuff, but aesthetics help, if your verse looks good it will be better received than one that doesn't, that's not even a conscious decision, we as humans just prefer things to look and feel pretty, just the same reason we like to vote for attractive politicians with deep voices, it is a game of aesthetics (shout outs to Zyzz RIP)

I know here almost no formatting etc is used and that's why I don't really do any here either because it's the style on NC but on RR the default is centered, one color for the verse and nothing else, some will push the boundaries and try things to make their verse more appealing etc. The writing always comes first but in a form so competitive we must do everything we can to improve our verse once the words and lines are as perfect as we can manage in order to take the W, that means making purely stylistic choices that are definitely not necessary but have been consistently proven to help.

I will do so! I'm in the planning stages, I will definitely invite others to guest star in recordings once I have established the channel at least a bit, I really want to be able to share the form and introduce it to people who might get involved or at least find it fascinating and want to read/see more and perhaps become voters/readers etc. I'm going to also record voice readings of certain verses of mine and invite others to do the same if they have verses they particularly enjoy. That's the future, I think. A hybrid style where we must both make it look/read nice in text but also read it in a recording to accompany the verse. The way I see it we can really push the form because what we have isn't some "different" form, it's a hybrid, it's combining the best out like seven or eight different writing disciplines ranging from poetry to freeverse to lyrics and short shories, it isn't any particular one of them, it's all of them, and that means we can adapt it really easily to other venues. I would actually be really interested to have an Audio/Text league someday, we're in talks to do that already, I'd also love to do a primarily text topical league where you are given an instrumental and you must write a text topical first and foremost that must also transfer flawlessly to audio as lyrics. I think that would be really dope, it would reward those that naturally have great flow in their verses and influence everyone involved to become better as lyricists, that will 100% improve how others see our form if they see all the ways our chameleon style can adapt.

Anyway, be back later - I'll try to at least record the first video! Hey, if you wouldn't mind, how would you define a topical in your own words? What makes a topical a topical? I will probably make a thread when I get back to get opinions/input to improve my definitions in the videos since I don't want it to just be me talking, I want it to be representative of the form itself and that means sharing the advice/views of the titans of the form haha

I'm sure @Richard Corey already tried and failed to make text a relevant form of poetry/writing with his "Scrypt" shindig and this sounds like you're trying to do the same thing

I'd be interested to hear @BROKE LESNAR's thoughts on your grammar and punctuation are so important in text ideas for sure

So are you saying if my verses were rainbow coloured they would have been better received at RR than me just straight up posting them?