The Skellingcorner

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See, that’s what the app is perfect for.

Sounds perfect Wahhhh, I don’t wanna
writingwithcolor

WWC - General Topics

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A collection of WWC posts that deal with more general writing advice, character creation and diversity topics applicable to most marginalized people, particularly People of Color and some more specific ethnic and religious groups.

Tools

Writing Characters of Color: The Generals

Description 

Diversity & Representation

Characters - Creation & Culture

Characters - Cultural Disconnect & Erasure

Fantasy & Coding

Race Allegories / Symbolic Racism

Racism, Micro-Aggressions & Slurs

Racial Slurs & Offensive Terms

Stereotypes & Tropes

Useful Non-WWC Posts

Villains / Anti-heroes 

Worldbuilding

White Saviors, White  - POC Interactions

Writing About Your Own Culture (Ownvoices)

Writing Sensitive & Controversial Topics

–WWC

compilation general writing advice articles racism culture people of color diversity race characters compilations general topics guides
its-a-writer-thing

Quick Tip: Making Characters Info Dump Without Seeming Like They’re Info-Dumping

The Tip: REFERENCE information with their OPINION being the focus. Never “tell” information, while not showing an opinion.

  • Why and How it Works:

Show of hands; how much do you hate when characters tell other characters things they already know, just because the reader doesn’t know (and needs to know)? Sometimes there’s information that needs to be shared with the reader and there’s no other way to do it but by SAYING it.

Here’s how to dodge the problem.

Imagine you and your friend are characters. You and your friend just watched a movie together. When talking about it, you wouldn’t “tell” them what happened – you’d reference it.

Example:

“It was an awesome movie. That scene where Harlock swishes his cape and pulls out a huge sword that’s actually a gun, kills three soldiers, and then moves down the hall to take down the others; that was so cool!”

Vs.

“In Harlock Space Pirates, there’s this scene where he swishes his cape and pulls out a huge sword that’s actually a gun, kills three soldiers, and then moves down the hall to take down the others.”

The reader now knows what happened in the movie, but the characters didn’t need to explain it to each other like its new information.

In real dialogue, people REFERENCE shared knowledge. They never “tell” it. If they “tell” it, it’s insulting and the person they’re talking to will be insulted, because you’re essentially saying they’re dumb.

Here’s the Kicker That Makes it Work - Opinions:

What your friend already has is the information. What your friend doesn’t have yet is your view on things. What you’re really giving your friend is an opinion – but what you’re giving the reader is information. Have your characters assess the information and give their thoughts, opinions, feelings, etc. on it in the same breath – rather than just saying it. As a bonus, this is fantastic for showing your character’s personality. 

Pro Tip:

The opinion doesn’t need to be long. It can be as simple as “that was cool!” or “it was evil but it was damn smart.” The end. That’s the opinion. You got all that info to the reader and your character doesn’t look dumb or mean.

info dumping dialogue writing advice writing tips character development characters speaking to each other characters info dumping iawt
its-a-writer-thing howtofightwrite

Anonymous asked:

How well does hitting someone in the throat work and how long will they be affected by it?

howtofightwrite answered:

Like everything, the answer is it depends. There are many different ways to attack the throat, depending on what your goal is. There are a lot of different ways it can go, and the effect can last anywhere from a few disorienting, terrifying seconds of panic to choking and, eventually, death.

Think about the throat, the front of your neck.  What primary bodily function resides there that is absolutely necessary to your survival?

Your ability to breathe.

The throat acts as a conduit for air from your lungs and your mouth. If you can’t breathe, you can’t fight. If you can’t breathe, you can’t scream. If you don’t breathe, you don’t live. A crushed windpipe is neither a fun nor quick injury to die from.

There are certain parts of your body that you have a biological imperative to defend (these usually only kick in after you’ve received damage). This is your natural instincts respond with a panicked, “OH GOD! NO! I NEED THIS!” and, for most people, that’s how they’ll respond.

You hit them in the throat and their hands will immediately rise there, they’ll stumble back coughing, and their number one priority their brain has focused on is protecting their throat.

So, much like a sucker punch, striking the throat will result in giving you open access to their whole body as it is now defenseless. You, the attacker, moves on to other, better strikes while they’re caught up trying to breathe.

When someone punches someone else in the throat (as opposed to another kind of strike), this is the hoped for response. They want to open up their opponent. “Open up” is one of the terms for “lowering defenses”, because when your opponent’s defenses are up you cannot reach the nice soft spots on their body where you’ll do the most damage.

The throat is one of those nice soft spots difficult to hit if your opponent is mentally prepared to fight. You’ve got to be within arm’s reach, and within the grappling sphere, to land the hit. So, if you’re not close enough to reach out and grab hold of their neck, you’re not close enough to land the strike. If the hit doesn’t come as a surprise attack, then you’ll have to fight for it.

Learning to measure distance between fighters in a fictional context when you’ve no experience judging it with real people is a difficult one. Most people never realize there are different spheres of distance around the body which define what attacks you can make before moving inward. For them, two people fighting is often a one hit exercise and not a strategic contemplation involving multiple attacks, breaking past defenses, and taking advantage of your opponent’s mental faculties/body’s instincts/physiology to hit your goal. Then, consider that most fights are finished in under 30 seconds.

These are not “safe” combat techniques by any stretch of the imagination and some are far more dangerous than others. Some will also break your fingers if you try them without having a fucking clue what you’re doing.

So, how can you attack the throat?

I’ll give you three of the common attacks on the trachea, there are more.

1) You can punch them in the throat.

This is more of a stunner, and not as likely to crush the windpipe or the larynx. The reason is that the fist actually spreads the delivered force over a wider area. So, you punch them and it’s likely to hurt and scare the hell out of them, Punches, while effective, are a great deal safer than a knife hand or a palm strike to the opponent because of that dispersal of force.

The more pointed the force, the deeper it penetrates.

2) The spear hand to the throat.

You take your fingers, brace them together, and drive them forward, palm down. (You can also strike palm up, which is done if you’re striking on an upward diagonal from the hip. This can also be a referred to as a palm strike, knife hand, etc.) This is windpipe crushing territory. The force is confined to the first two fingertips, a much narrower vector, and will penetrate into the neck. Doubly more likely if you grab their head/throat first with your other hand so they can’t run/stumble back at the moment of impact.

A good general rule in martial arts is the smaller the tool, the more dangerous the strike, and the deeper into your body it goes.

This may break your fingers if you’ve never been taught to perform it properly or how to lock your fingers/wrist/arm together. So, don’t expect an untrained fighter to pull it off. Or even know it exists unless they’ve been watching a lot of Japanese/Chinese language films.

3) Half-Palm to the throat.

Instead of your fingers, you use your knuckles. Bend your fingers, so your fingertips touch the top of your palm. Brace. Then strike the same way as you would with #2.

This will, more than likely, break your fingers if you’re not careful.

This, of course, assumes that a denial of breath is your end goal. You can always knife hand (blade of the hand, opposite the thumb) the side of their neck, which has the added bonus of potentially closing off the arterial blood flow between your head and the rest of your body. Most likely not, though.

None of these are “guaranteed kills” (not that you’re guaranteed anything), the possibility of death is there and they are dangerous. They are very effective if they can be landed. However, your character should not be doing these unless their life is in danger, their willing to accept the consequences of killing their opponent, and the situation calls for it.

Fiction often struggles with this, but proper application of force to the circumstances is one of the hallmarks of a responsible martial combatant. Being able to adjust according to the situation (and knowing what techniques are warranted) is one of the signs we use to judge in real life whether or not the person in question knows what they’re doing. A person who doesn’t self-moderate is a danger to themselves and others.

You can, in fact, blend Rule of Cool with the knowledgeable, responsible combatant that sells themselves as awesome and skilled without coming off as a reckless fuckhead.

If your character is using these just in general, then they just don’t care. They’re also a reckless fuckhead. Have others treat them accordingly.

-Michi

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thehistorymonks sirblackaxe
[There] are people who will follow any dragon, worship any god, ignore any iniquity. All out of a kind of humdrum, everyday badness. Not the really high, creative loathesomeness of the great sinners, but a sort of mass-produced darkness of the soul. Sin, you might say, without a trace of originality. They accept evil not because they say yes, but because they don’t say no.
Lord Vetinari, (Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!)
quote discworld guards! guards!
its-a-writer-thing fixyourwritinghabits

types of writers

insomniac-arrest

The Lore-ist 

  • has detailed if not meticulous notes on the universe they’ve created, down to the food eaten and language quirks, they use mythos and setting to bring it all together
  • most of the character’s backstories are already loving laid out, though may not be all connected yet. 
  • Has yet to write a full chapter. (But they’re getting there!)

The Bae

  • Story is centered around a complex and engaging OC that they’ve spent years developing
  • said OC has been through A Lot, the love is real, so is the pain
  • OC may sort of be a loser? ie the story is a character-driven piece where the plot is moved ahead by said character’s bad decisions and questionable habits

The Researcher

  • akin to the lore-ist but spends more of their time on wikipedia articles jotting down notes and things like how much a watermelon weighs 
  • Everything from knowing Too Much about child-care to how a body decomposes or flapper chest-binding is on the table, their breadth is large and Should Be Feared
  • takes a long time to start but make the most of their words, from spot-on sci-fi to history to murder, readers will learn something on the way

The Lemon Flavored Factory

  • alright take it back now y’all, this writer has written enough smut to make a tom cat blush, they can write other things too, and often well, but there will inevitably be bed-rattling at some point (or car or shower)
  • either unusually creative or just sticks to classics like Aliens Made Them Do It, neither is necessarily bad but there is oddly little in between
  • their author’s notes tend to be hilarious or at least very self-aware

The Word Vomit Canoe

  • action oriented writer who spews out the words before they know what is happening, no plans, no outlines, 10k of the first thing that comes to mind, sometimes things like ‘maybe dragons?’ & they go with it
  • their strengths are productivity, weaknesses are not knowing what the hell is going on
  • style is marked by fast-paced tone and downright impressive word count

The Muse

  • their inspiration doesn’t come as often, but they are always listening for her & redy 2 go
  • update schedule is…sporadic at best, but makes up for it with long chapters and clean editing
  • Will write 30 pages in a day and then take a few months off, enjoys one-shots but can do longer works
  • doesn’t have the best sense of time and when they are in The Zone may forget to eat or shower
Source: insomniac-arrest
i'm the bae and the word vomit canoe writer quirks writer problems
sweetlittlevampire trucy-fey
spacemuffinz

why are ball jointed dolls so pretty i don’t even like dolls i want to punch myself in the eyes this isn’t fair stop being prettier than me you are made of plastic and the repurposed souls of dead poetry 

thedarklordemma

oh boy wait til you hear about the dragon ones

image
image
image

They’re about the size of cats. and you can get them here 

spacemuffinz

*cries for eternity*

thranduildweebleaf

I NEED ONE OH MY GOD I WOULD LOVE FOREVER ANYONE WHO GOT ME A BALL JOINT DRAGON HOLY SHIT

Source: spacemuffinz
I WANT ONE!