SRS THREAD ABOUT TOPICALS. ARE "PICK YOUR OWN TOPIC" WEEKS LAZY AS FUCK ON THE MODS PART?

[sral]

this came up in the AOWL today:

http://www.netcees.org/showthread.ph...wpost&t=120194

personally i think it is.

it might not be, and i'm not knocking the mods because they put in a shitload of time here i dont

BUT 'pick your own topic' to me just feels like a cop-out

it has an aura of "The mods couldnt be bothered to find any topics, so go find one for yourself"

the whole idea is to be given a set topic so you force yourself to be creative with it

finding your own topic completely nullifies that

in my opinion.


anyway, i could be wrong, maybe you guys feel different on this?

thats why i brought it here.

discuss?

[Hush]

Agree
It would be like write ur own mag week

[Amen.]

yes, lazy

and yes, you right bout being giving a topic and forcing the writers to be creative

rather then letting them select something that they know they are used to or accustomed too

yes, lazy

[sral]

Originally Posted by Hush

Agree
It would be like write ur own mag week

or "pick your opponent to write a battle verse against this week" and just use a bunch of pre-prepared ether you've been stacking up for

i dunno man

open a "topic suggestions" thread or something and have people drop ideas in if you're really that short on time/effort

nah mean?

i'm not even having a pop at the mods, i respect their shit, i just call it how i see it.

[Split Eight]

I agree with this sentiment, but believe that the idea was to maybe make people a little less reluctant to write by allowing more creative freedom

Not to mention- for as much as we collectively demand quality, challenging topics-- I think that "how well did each competitor write to the topic" is VERY often overlooked in favor of "which competitor wrote better and did they also mention the topic in passing"

Like, if you clearly repurpose an old verse everyone jumps all over it. But it's completely binary, like as soon as you *scrape* the surface of the topic the main voting criteria suddenly becomes heavily weighted towards everything BUT connection to the topic

It's like people want us to enforce the idea that writing to the topic is important because it eliminates voter bias/ skill mismatches, but then outwriting your opponent is all about showmanship and we as voters allow that to happen

It works both ways. People rarely write strictly to the topics because creative leeway gives them a competitive edge

This is why I think picture topics are superior. There are many ways to interpret them, you can incorporate them as the entirety of your story or a brief scene, and it's glaringly obvious if you grabbed something from the archives

[Hush]

How bout pick ur opponents topics ? @Vulgar @dr. Dog @sraL

[Witty]

I always write to the topic.

Give me any topic, I'll write THE FUCK out of it.

[Split Eight]

Originally Posted by Hush

How bout pick ur opponents topics ? @Vulgar @dr. Dog @sraL

That's a cool idea, the only problem is that we need to enforce a check-in deadline for that week

We will look into trying this.

I was thinking of trying some other shit as well, like:

-given a quote, one writer has to support it and the other has to discredit it
-giving two or three easier/ open-ended topics to each battle that all have to be used
-given a well-regarded Open Mic verse, write the better collab/ complementary verse than your opponent

we'll see

[Mr. J]

I remember when I champed for a few rounds I had the option out of three topics and the one that wasn't picked was given to other writers

we also had like a topic suggestion thread where topics were placed and you just chose what you wanted

either way I dont recall picking your own topics from your own ***he of stuff...
it has its positives & negatives

[Diode]

god forbid you be creative in a creative writing league

[sral]

Originally Posted by Hush

How bout pick ur opponents topics ? @Vulgar @dr. Dog @sraL

I mean this is cool to an extent, Certain used to do it and let his opponent pick for them.

Personally I wouldn't be a fan of this in my battles. I much prefer a topic list with 8-9 pictures chosen by the mods, maybe some phrase topics, maybe even a few story prompt topics "You just found out you have AIDS, what do you do?" etc

Diff topics inspire diff formats of writing for diff writers. Sure, ideally you should be able to come up with something to anything if you're that good a writer... but if someone is inspired by a certain picture/topic, it usually leads to a better verse by them rather than then half-assing to a topic their opponents chosen for them that doesnt hit them creatively.

[sral]

Originally Posted by Diode

god forbid you be creative in a creative writing league

It's lazy as fuck on the mods behalf to do it. If you can pick and choose your own topic to write to, why even bother being in the league?

You can throw that in Open Mic and be done with it.

That's my point. It's nothing to do with being 'creative'.

[Diode]

Originally Posted by sraL

It's lazy as fuck on the mods behalf to do it. If you can pick and choose your own topic to write to, why even bother being in the league?

You can throw that in Open Mic and be done with it.

That's my point. It's nothing to do with being 'creative'.

because the end result is "who wrote a better story"

this is the way topical leagues ran for YEARS before the mod-assigned format became popular

[sral]

lmao i'm pretty sure i've been around and participated long before you and yeah

that never happened

thanks

[Diode]

Originally Posted by sraL

lmao i'm pretty sure i've been around and participated long before you and yeah

that never happened

thanks

you're completely wrong, especially since i ran both topical leagues on bboys and pr.

IT'S OKAY TO BE WRONG, LARS.

[sral]

so then they had a mod assigned... you, by your own admission just there.

i dont argue for the sake of things.

these things have almost always had assigned topics going back to 2003 at least.

even if they didnt, who cares?

my original point still stands: its lazy of the mods

[Geno]

Ya.. write week is kind of fucked lately. Mainly on my end. Soon as i geg a chance i will check in on allbthat shit and either name a new win er for the last one (iv it wasng done) or i will host another one. Perhaps even host a write night later on. Basically write nights are like fight nghts. You get 15 minutes from check in to write a pimit of 8 li es on a pre decided topic for each battle. Everythig else runs accordi g to fight night rules and regs.

I will be running a write night or a write week later today when im done with my car shit. Keep aj eye out.
Let me know what yall would prefer.!!!

[Geno]

Just realized that i came in here misunderstanding the thread topic. But my prior response sands. Lemme know what yall are bout and ill host one of the two later this afternoon.

[Diode]

Originally Posted by Genocide

Just realized that i came in here misunderstanding the thread topic. But my prior response sands. Lemme know what yall are bout and ill host one of the two later this afternoon.

classic geno.

[uh-oh]

If i knew you guys did this i would actually participate. Assigned topics are garbage. Giving me an assigned topic is like giving michaelangelo a stick and telling him to draw something cool in the dirt. OH YOU DONT WANNA DRAW AN OUTLINE OF AOMETHING IN THE DIRT TO PROVE YOUR BETTER THEN SOMEONE ELSE DRAWING IN THE DIRT. ITS CUz u suck

Diodes referrong to topic threads btw. Each writer picks a topic out of the thread instead of being assigned one. Kinda baffled baron is acting like those never existed