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#1http://strolen.com/viewing/The_First_of_Cities
Morningstar portion removed: [8113#94866|text]
Not nearly as enthused as other folks, sorry to say. This isn't a usable city: it's the foreword to the writeup of one. Two-thirds of it is a history lesson, and most players don't give a damn about which long-vanished ancient realms fought over a city or that many centuries ago it used to have wooden walls before finances improved enough for stonework.
Strolen:
I think one of the main points to understand is that this submission was probably not written for you. Perhaps it is a world being fleshed out still and the backstory is important to other interconnected ideas that never made it. Or perhaps it was just an idea that was sitting in the brain and must be got out. We don't expect everything to be the pinnacle of world building.
The purpose of the site is not to provide game ready ideas and scenarios, it is "is a place of creative freedom for role players and game masters with awesome ideas. Over time, the Citadel has turned into a bottomless resource of creativity and inspiration for thousands." Obviously you have a ton of issues with it, but nothing in the writing that sparked an idea or anything else to add or share?
So, I get bothered by inflammatory comments like your opening volley. "This isn't a usable city" and "players don't give a damn." Seriously? Apparently other commenters accepted it for what it was, a shared creative idea. If the author asked for an editor to review the material, some of your other comments would be more welcome but I think you expect too much sometimes for a site that wants to be a creative outlet. This is simply somebody's idea that they were willing to share, not the next LotR, so shouldn't be condemned for sharing.
Maybe you didn't mean it as critically as you wrote. But read it from the author's perspective and some empathy and maybe you will better see how it comes across.
axlerose
I think you are being unfair strolen and I think you need to own what the site has become strolen. Scras recently wrote this about submission quality and he was paraphrasing another one of your luminaries Moonhunter.
"This is not a bad submission, but it isn't a good one either. An ideal to strive for is the Hollywood standard, as in presenting the item as if it were to be used in a movie, comic, or other entertainment venue. What does it look like? Who created it, and why did they do so? It is obviously a powerful weapon, and there are many powerful weapons (YAKAS - yet another kick ass sword), so what makes this one different?"
I am not trying to defend Morningstar's behavior or his "logic". Nor do I want codemn him. But it is wrong to suggest that this is a free-form open forum for sharing ideas. As you have said it is not "newbie" friendly. Furthermore, to tell Morningstar that this was "written not for him" is also absurd. We can only critique what is on the page. We can say how we would use it or we can guess at other uses, but that sword cuts both ways
Finally, I think the responsibility for the "usability" critique lies on you or whoever wrote the voting prompts. Saying something is useful is a coarse critique, sometimes applicable, but largely irrelevant for an idea guild. We should judge whether the idea is well developed, novel, well written, well presented and does it achieve the literal goals set forth on the page. After that, we can get into stuff like entertaining, useful or offensive.
You are right Morningstar is unkind. I have been dismissed by guys like him. (I always hope I am not one, but if I write one that looks like his just leave the comment Morningstar and I will change it. Though to be fair I didn't think his write up of this post was all that off base.) Yet I have also but also been pushed around by you, strolen, for being too "intellectual", "obtuse" or "critical". So my sympathy cuts both ways. . You, strolen, have put forth a system for judging ideas. There is a community built around that. You have achieved something here. I am not knocking that, but I don't think you are entirely comfortable with it. If one just wants to share ideas one could stick it in the forums. But if you want it to be judged you stick it out here. And you are the one that gave the judges the scoring card that read "useable".