[Discussion] A Critique of "A Critique of Control Slave

[Demonic Attorney]

JPMeyer, you can relax.  This won’t be another formal criticism.  I won’t even be writing it.  Everyone else will.  I’m sure a good number of you have heard about my criticisms of Smmenen’s article on CS.  If you didn’t bother to sift through it, but you’re now interested, click here:  http://www.themanadrain.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=22165

While I’m told the reaction the reaction to at least the initial piece was generally positive, I did notice some people weren’t exactly thrilled with it, or the direction in which the thread proceeded after Smmenen joined the battle.  I’d just like to restate the reasons behind doing what I did, and ask everyone here for feedback.

I’ve noticed many Vintage writers have produced meandering, confusing, verbose articles and presented them through SCG to the Magic community as work worthy of publication and widespread notice.  I’m something of a writer myself and for a long time, this really bothered me.  First of all, the big name writers represent the Vintage community to Magic players in general, and I think more effort could go into making Type I players look better by crafting better writing.  Second, I think the way in which the articles were presented did a disservice to the ideas that they conveyed, since their organizational structure and diction were not always easy to follow.  Finally, I was shocked that the reaction from the TMD posters was almost uniformly positive, when English teachers I had in high school would have given writing like this back to me with a suggestion to “See me after class” if I had ever turned it in.  So, I decided to depart from what seemed to be the typical response and point out the shortcomings in “A Closer Look at Control Slaver” in the hopes of doing two things.

One, I hoped to set an example to the Basic User community at large that they did not need to smile and nod at every article published on SCG just because it was put there by a Vintage Adept.  I believe I’ve accomplished this goal since Basic Users are already taking a more critical approach to evaluating articles.  Second, I hoped to compel other aspiring writers to think about this sort of potential reaction before turning in their next article, and check it over just one more time to make sure it is truly their best work.  Some prominent figures have already indicated to me that they will do just that, so I’d like to think I succeeded in that respect, as well.

But what about the job I did?  I am certainly no more above criticism than Smmenen.  Did I pursue worthy goals in writing my critique, or did I just come off as nitpicking a big-name writer for no good reason?  Do you think the always-positive reaction to SCG publications needs to be more critical?  Do you think it will have a lasting impression?  Was there anything you would have done differently?  Please share your thoughts; I'm particularly interested in whether or not other posters agree that a more critical evaluation of Vintage writers' work is needed.

[nataz]

Did I pursue worthy goals in writing my critique, or did I just come off as nitpicking a big-name writer for no good reason?

You both came off as "nitpicking" to me. It was tens of pages of pretty worthless stuff that completely took away from the discussion, made me stop reading the thread, and failed to answer almost anything of relevance.

I am by no means an amazing writer, but I am sure that I, and you for that matter, could have made your point in under a page if you cared to do so.    

Do you think the always-positive reaction to SCG publications needs to be more critical?

 
 
If someone has written an article that really jumps out at me, and got me thinking, I'll say so. If someone wrote an article that I don't care about, I don't make a comment. I am not their editor, style and flow should be in the realm of Ted.

The one exception to this has been the training wheels article. I did post negative feedback there, but only because I expected a lot more from a talented man like shay. His knowledge of control slaver is obviously amazingly deep, and in contrast his article came off as fairly shallow. I was looking forward to two in-depth articles written by the primary proponents of Control and Goth slaver, instead I got "training wheels", and 60 pages of arguments about flow.  

My comments, like yours, were said only because I am sure the writer is capable of better things; notice however, that I did keep it under a page. We are all big boys; we don't need every detail pointed out to us.

[The Atog Lord]

his article came off as fairly shallow

We are all big boys; we don't need every detail pointed out to us

[Demonic Attorney]

It was tens of pages of pretty worthless stuff that...made me stop reading the thread

However, despite your unwillingness to read them, you still somehow discovered that my posts

failed to answer almost anything of relevance.

[Zherbus]

I am of mixed thoughts. First, I found it extremely entertaining that someone could match Smmenen on his typical level of discussion. I felt a taste of his own medicine was not only ironic, but potential for something entertaining. However, I was wrong in that the conversation quickly (or slowly, depending on how you look at it) into two wordy law-students opening doors for each other in a contest of pages, that really could just just taken a few paragraphs.

I will take some examples from the thread and post them below to illustrate my point. The colors show the same thing said, just in a slightly different way. I'm not claiming to be the best Vintage writer, but I do know that the danger of boring a reader is an interest-killer.

First, I’d like to address the introduction to A Closer Look at Control Slaver. For the first five paragraphs, Smmenen provides his readers with a meandering discussion of the history of Drain decks in Vintage. After concluding this trip down memory lane, Smmenen then introduces his thesis, “In this article, I'm going to take a look at the most successful Mana Drain deck and attempt to resolve some of the more interesting debates and controversies surrounding it.”  (Steve Menendian, A Closer Look at Control Slaver p.1) After reading his thesis, I was left wondering exactly why the previous five paragraphs of text were included. They were not ultimately relevant to the points Smmenen’s article addressed and served only to delay the introduction of the points on which his article actually focused.

A more glaring shortcoming emerges immediately after this point. Smmenen identifies the core of the Slaver deck as Mana Drain, Force of Will, Brainstorm, Ancestral Recall, and Time Walk. Conspicuously absent from this set of core cards are Goblin Welder, Thirst for Knowledge, and Mindslaver—the cards which had always seemed to me to be the fundamental engine of every Slaver deck since the German prototype. If Brainstorm, Mana Drain, Ancestral, and Time Walk were all banned tomorrow, I firmly believe Slaver would still be a viable, if weaker, deck. If Force of Will joined them on the banned list, the basic Slaver engine would continue to function, even if Slaver as a deck concept became more susceptible to an early blitz from combo. Thus, I have trouble understanding why Smmenen identified those cards as the “core” of Slaver. He expands the cards he identifies as “essentials” a bit with a second list of key cards, but this too excludes Mindslaver. I’m at a loss as to how a Slaver deck could function as a Slaver deck without Mindslaver. It seems fairly essential to me.

...and this one, where the bolded sentances could have gotten the point across just fine.

Shortly afterwards, Smmenen begins a truly well-written discussion of role of Yawgmoth’s Will in Goth Slaver as the lone consideration in favor of including black. His remark that “the question [of whether to run black] basically becomes a proxy for whether to run Yawgmoth's Will or not [in Goth Slaver]” was particularly well put. Ibid. My only criticism of his first introductory paragraphs addresses his conclusion that “I think the answer is that the deck should run Yawgmoth's Will, but that upon the clearest showing and the highest burden, you can overcome that presumption.” Ibid. I won’t argue with this idea, though I don’t necessarily agree, but I merely want to point out that Smmenen’s choice of diction here is obtuse and awkward. His conclusion would have been better-phrased if he had said something like “In the presence of compelling circumstances, you can justify the exclusion of Yawgmoth’s Will from Goth Slaver despite the initial presumption to the contrary” instead.

I should also add that "Ibid" and "(Menendian, 8)" notation really meant nothing to most people, I'm sure. The former I had to google, while the latter was easy to figure out. Even still, that notation wasn't necessary because these articles are only a few pages in length and easy to navigate, unlike 900 page tomes.

I'm not going to keep picking apart paragraphs, because I think I can illustrate my point with just a few. Redundancy and just being long-winded can really turn people off.

That said, I think that critique is wonderful. I think critique, in general, should exist solely to help improve the work being critiqued and to offer up to other people what they are missing (for lack of better phrasing, think movie reviews). In this case, you should be:

1) Helping Stephen write a better issues article.
2) Show the public what they are missing from the SCG: Premium piece.
3) Both.

I don't mind being told my article sucks balls, as long as there is a comprehensive reason behind it. Case in point, people were starting to get bored with my monthly 30-50 person tournament data articles. While they were much more commentary driven and less data driven than Dr. Sylvans work, it eventually came to pass that I was saying the same things each month. I couldn't really help that since the reasons why the same decks were dominating never changed, so I just stopped doing the articles until an interest resurfaced.

While you pointed out what you didn't like about the article, it was written in more legal terms than either something helpful to an author or a would-be reader. I really felt that the good points you had were buried in a much-too-wordy critique.

Had you done the same thing to me, I don't think I would have honestly been able to benefit from your review at all. Maybe I'm just an individual, but I like people to get to the meat of the arguement, point, or critique. Repetition and notation just really aren't nessecary.

[Hi-Val]

Criticising verbal masturbation with verbal masturbation makes me a sad panda. If you want to get a point across, read Hemingway as a primer.

[nataz]

Rich, you took that out of context, or maybe I wasn't being specific enough.

Either way,

I felt that you did not add enough detail to a fairly complex issue, and Demonic added far too much detail on the relatively unimportant issue of flow. Demonic wrote tens of pages on merely the flow of Steve's article, only barely touching on the issue of content, while you wrote less then four in your entire article.

I meant for my criticism of your article to be constructive. I don't read SCG very much, but I can honestly say that I would make sure to read anything that you wrote for them, premium or otherwise. I respect you that much. I do think you are capable of more, and I would like to see you write again.

Demonic,

One of the first things that I learned, years ago in pre-law, was that the best briefs, were just that, brief. Detailed, yes, specific, also, but in the end, we were taught to use as few words as possible. This was even more important when we did our mocks in front of live juries.

The most powerful phases, and memorable lessons are those that are both well thought out, and simple in their communication.

As for your response;

The simple answer is I went back and read the entire thread after you posted this topic in an honest attempt to answer the question to which you asked of us.

Next time perhaps I'll write a novella, or maybe even a detailed manuscript explaining how that could be possible; but suffice it to say, that at least for now, you get the point that I was trying to make.

*edit

@ hi-val
<3 hemmingway

[Demonic Attorney]

Okay, I was going to leave this until tomorrow because I thought Zherbus' comments in particular warranted close attention in their own right and I didn't want anything I said to take away from that.  But since so many people are bringing it up...

My entire post was a caricature of the writing style I was criticizing.  Verbose, aggrandized, inaccessible, intentionally intellectually intimidating.  These are the sorts of conventions in Vintage writing I was taking a shot at by making my critique an exaggerated manifestation of all those flaws.  Ibidem citation isn't even used outside of graduate school papers, to my knowledge.  I included it as another extreme example of the problems that accompany trying to sound like as one poster put it, Hemingway, or as I put it, Derrida or Foucalt.  It invariably puts unnecessary distance between your message and the reader.  This was essentially Zherbus' point in his post, as I understood it.
 
So, to everyone saying my essay was unnecessarily verbose and tediously over-detailed, I agree.  That was part of the point.

[Hi-Val]

You, but like, did you realize how annoying it would be to read? And that people making an attempt at it would write you off as another sophist? The end result was a complete failure at a rebuttal because it was not succinct. Mocking someone for their writing style by mimicking it for the purpose of satire is hot-dogging, not contributing awesome criticisms.

[jpmeyer]

Okay, I was going to leave this until tomorrow because I thought Zherbus' comments in particular warranted close attention in their own right and I didn't want anything I said to take away from that.  But since so many people are bringing it up...

My entire post was a caricature of the writing style I was criticizing.  Verbose, aggrandized, inaccessible, intentionally intellectually intimidating.  These are the sorts of conventions in Vintage writing I was taking a shot at by making my critique an exaggerated manifestation of all those flaws.  Ibidem citation isn't even used outside of graduate school papers, to my knowledge.  I included it as another extreme example of the problems that accompany trying to sound like as one poster put it, Hemingway, or as I put it, Derrida or Foucalt.  It invariably puts unnecessary distance between your message and the reader.  This was essentially Zherbus' point in his post, as I understood it.
 
So, to everyone saying my essay was unnecessarily verbose and tediously over-detailed, I agree.  That was part of the point.

This isn't like totally directed at you, but I personally have been unable to figure out exactly what are the necessary "hooks" that you need to include in a Magic essay in order to switch your audience's mode of readership/viewership out of "Magic article" into something else.  Usually, it's pretty easy.

You see
some writing
formatted like this
and think
"This is a poem"

and read it appropriately, paying attention to imagery, cadence, rhythm, devices, metre, etc.  Or you see a lot of explosions and think "action movie, so I'm going to think about how awesome the action is because that's what's important, not the character development."

So while the point of the article might be "Why can most Vintage writers get away with this?", little things like the short segments where you discussed the deck made it hard for the reader to get into the mode of thinking that you needed them to get into in order for your essay to accomplish what you wanted it to.

[Saucemaster]

I included it as another extreme example of the problems that accompany trying to sound like as one poster put it, Hemingway, or as I put it, Derrida or Foucalt.

I'm going to step entirely outside of the actual content of the thread here and just respond to this sentence with: "WTF?"  Sounding like Derrida or Foucault (though the two of them have very different styles): check.  Got that.  But no one here has yet tried to sound like Hemingway.  Doug brought up Hemingway as the antithesis of a verbose style.  Can it be that our own Demonic Attorney has never read Hemingway?  For shame!

Me, I'm going to go utilize some more of this Scotch.

[Demonic Attorney]

First off, re-read that sentence carefully, Saucy.  I'll even bold the critical part for you.

I included it as another extreme example of the problems that accompany trying to sound like as one poster put it, Hemingway, or as I put it, Derrida or Foucalt.

I hope that clears up the confusion that seemed to serve as the inspiration for that post.

Second, my undergrad institution wouldn't have let me out the door without some Hemingway, since we have a whole building bearing the namesake.  Personally I found The Sun Also Rises to be a little verbose, especially during the beat-you-over-the-head-with-phallic-imagery scenes, but eh.  To each their own.

As for everyone else who basically said, "Yeah, we see what you were trying to do but it was, like, really annoying and tedious!"  Well.  Yes.  It was.  I made it that way on purpose.  However, we've now gone a step further and I've been accused of the having the same flaw in my critique as verbose Vintage writers have in their articles.  I suppose that's true; if I made my critique an extreme example of flawed writing, that same flaw is bound to be there, so I can't exactly deny it.  But what I will say is this.

While my critique was not intended solely for a certain "target audience", I did have a select few people in mind when writing it, who I suspected would sift through the thing, tedious as it was.  I wanted people like Smmenen and the other site writers to read through my post, because the details were really only meant for them.  I figured they would read through my post, tedious as it was, and it seems I was right.

I guess the next logical question is, "Well, why not just PM your critique to those people?"  Well, I had a second purpose in mind, too.  While the details themselves were only really intended for the writers, I also wanted "everyone else" to see that the critique was made.  This is a much more general purpose.  It's not important to me that Basic User X know that Smmenen tautologically converted 2 nonidentical statements.  All I wanted the "general audience" to see is that someone out there took a critical view of the article, and that they could too, if they chose.  And it seems I succeeded there, because someone else took the initiative to follow my example soon after my thread appeared.

Did I exclude some of the general audience by making my piece intellectually inaccessible?  I sure did.  But I only really wanted the general audience to see that it was there.  The people I really wanted to sift through the details did so, and a number of them apparently thought to themselves, "Wow, this guy is a pretentious hack!  It's so difficult to sift through this unnecessarily long post!  This could half as verbose and one-third as long!"  And they were right, too.  I hope the next time those people write articles, they think to themselves about not wanting their stuff to turn out like my intellectually inaccessible critique.  That was the reason I made it they way I did.  If they do, then form will have counted for something after all.

[kirdape3]

It's annoying enough to listen to Smmenen speak on Magic theory/read Smmenen's writing.  It's downright painful to watch someone else waste my time and theirs satirizing it - and to have such an altruistic goal of raising the bar of the basic users?  Niger, please.

Next time, make yourself better at ANYTHING before you waste that much time and effort trying to make someone else better.  You still obviously have a long way to go.

[Saucemaster]

First off, re-read that sentence carefully, Saucy.  I'll even bold the critical part for you.

I included it as another extreme example of the problems that accompany trying to sound like as one poster put it, Hemingway, or as I put it, Derrida or Foucalt.

I hope that clears up the confusion that seemed to serve as the inspiration for that post.

Second, my undergrad institution wouldn't have let me out the door without some Hemingway, since we have a whole building bearing the namesake.  Personally I found The Sun Also Rises to be a little verbose, especially during the beat-you-over-the-head-with-phallic-imagery scenes, but eh.  To each their own.

Well maybe I'm just a little slow here, so enlighten me.  You seem to believe that at least one poster equated the writing style of Hemingway with that of someone like Derrida or Foucault.  The only poster who I noticed mentioning Hemingway was Doug, and he fairly obviously intended Hemingway to be an example of the OPPOSITE of the verbosity you were critiquing.  So did I miss something else here, or did you completely and utterly misunderstand Doug's post in its (short) entirety?

And if you found Hemingway to be verbose, I'm not sure what I can do to help you.  He's famous for short, simple, declarative sentences.  Precisely the opposite of what you seem to have felt when reading him.  Maybe you want to crack those books again?  But hey, maybe you can bold a few other things and further clear it up for me.

[Rico Suave]

It's annoying enough to listen to Smmenen speak on Magic theory/read Smmenen's writing.  It's downright painful to watch someone else waste my time and theirs satirizing it - and to have such an altruistic goal of raising the bar of the basic users?  Niger, please.

Next time, make yourself better at ANYTHING before you waste that much time and effort trying to make someone else better.  You still obviously have a long way to go.

Smmenen's writing is annoying to read.  I am pained reading it just as much as you are.  Just as I know I'd like to see him write better articles, then I'm also sure you wouldn't mind if it was less painful to read Smmenen's articles in the future, no?

Any critique that could possibly change it into something less irritating would be a benefit for even you.  I don't understand why you seem so irritated.

[kirdape3]

Assuming that Smmenen would EVER change, I'd agree with you.  He will not.  Hence the folly of the action.

[Smmenen]

It's annoying enough to listen to Smmenen speak on Magic theory/read Smmenen's writing.  It's downright painful to watch someone else waste my time and theirs satirizing it - and to have such an altruistic goal of raising the bar of the basic users?  Niger, please.

Next time, make yourself better at ANYTHING before you waste that much time and effort trying to make someone else better.  You still obviously have a long way to go.

Smmenen's writing is annoying to read.  I am pained reading it just as much as you are.  Just as I know I'd like to see him write better articles, then I'm also sure you wouldn't mind if it was less painful to read Smmenen's articles in the future, no?

Any critique that could possibly change it into something less irritating would be a benefit for even you.  I don't understand why you seem so irritated.

What bothers me is that if you felt this way - why didn't you speak up earlier in my, Oh, say nearly three years of writing?  Why wait until this particular article if it is so irritating?  Of course it just seems to obvious to me that the reason you waited until this particular article, when you could have chosen one of the nearly 60 that I have written up until now, is that it argues in a particular way that you disagree with.  Which then makes the whole critique less effective.

Had you chosen a neutral article, it would be more effective.

Also, I know what it is that Demonic Attorney doesn't like: Clarity.  I'm not clear the scope of your criticism - whether it applies to mana drain posts or my articles and specifically in what regards you find them annoying.  Becuase I state disagreement with you, becuase of clarity, verbosity, becuase you don't like that I try to draw hard distinctions, a combination of all these factors, or what?

[Demonic Attorney]

It's downright painful to watch someone else waste my time and theirs satirizing it - and to have such an altruistic goal of raising the bar of the basic users? Niger, please.

I'd satirize that sentence, but its author did a fine job of that for me.  Kirdape, if you need some extra money to invest in a grammar-checking program to check your syntax while telling others that their writing needs improvement, let me know.  I might be able to spare some.  

Seriously though, I've been hearing this a lot lately, so I want to take this opportunity to distinguish between satire and caricature.  The two are not the same, though they can be.  I wasn't satirizing Smmenen's article; I thought its redeeming points gave it too much value to just make fun of.  Rather, I exaggerated the main flaw I saw in it in my own work, to draw people's attention to it.  Very few people who read my post seem amused by it, so calling it satire seems a little off.

Saucy, I'll get right on cracking those books right after I spend one second caring that my opinions don't coincide with your own.  Also, to clarify what I was saying-- Vintage writers try, to varying degrees, to aggrandize their writing and have it come across like the work of great writers.  Verbose like Derrida or otherwise, trying to take on a different style to lend to the gravity of your work almost invariably ends up making it harder to read because you're speaking in a voice that isn't your own.

To get back to the discussion, I'd like to expound upon Smmenen's point.  Precisely the reason I picked this juncture to "step up" and say something was because it was pretty clear to me no one else was going to.  Perhaps Rico was hesitant to voice his concerns because he foresaw a discussion on the topic degenerating into oh, I don't know, say-- 92 pages' worth of debate that ends up getting moved to the Basic User forum.  Or maybe he is too busy with other obligations to put together a  case for why Smmenen should change his style and investing the time to defend it.  Whatever the reason, I decided to write my critique in a rare moment of extra free time to initiate this sort of dialogue.  A lot of people have said I didn't pick the best way to do that.  So, I'd like to ask a question.

Would this much have come of my post if I had said only "Smmenen's writing is verbose, at times unclear, and occasionally awkward?"  It would have been brief and admittedly less annoying, but would it have done its job?

[Vegeta2711]

Would this much have come of my post if I had said only "Smmenen's writing is verbose, at times unclear, and occasionally awkward?" It would have been brief and admittedly less annoying, but would it have done its job?

Yeah, that would've come across fine. A brief post on why his writing style was in error and an example of what he should aspire to, probably would've been more helpful and not resulted in a 90,000 word snore fest.

[Jacob Orlove]

Would this much have come of my post if I had said only "Smmenen's writing is verbose, at times unclear, and occasionally awkward?" It would have been brief and admittedly less annoying, but would it have done its job?

While there is certainly some value in minimizing post length, you have to compare the value gained with the loss of meaningful content. Your best approach, in my view, would have been a short piece that adequately summarized and defended your arguments--one that argued the merits of good writing by example, not by counter-example.

[Saucemaster]

Also, to clarify what I was saying-- Vintage writers try, to varying degrees, to aggrandize their writing and have it come across like the work of great writers.  Verbose like Derrida or otherwise, trying to take on a different style to lend to the gravity of your work almost invariably ends up making it harder to read because you're speaking in a voice that isn't your own.

Except that Smmenen wasn't attempting to sound like anyone.  Stephen WAS writing in his own voice, which is what you were criticizing him for.  Far from attempting to prevent him from adopting a different style, you're actually asking him to do so.  And there's nothing wrong with that, but you can't have it both ways.

[Rico Suave]

What bothers me is that if you felt this way - why didn't you speak up earlier in my, Oh, say nearly three years of writing?  Why wait until this particular article if it is so irritating?  Of course it just seems to obvious to me that the reason you waited until this particular article, when you could have chosen one of the nearly 60 that I have written up until now, is that it argues in a particular way that you disagree with.  Which then makes the whole critique less effective.

Had you chosen a neutral article, it would be more effective.

Also, I know what it is that Demonic Attorney doesn't like: Clarity.  I'm not clear the scope of your criticism - whether it applies to mana drain posts or my articles and specifically in what regards you find them annoying.  Becuase I state disagreement with you, becuase of clarity, verbosity, becuase you don't like that I try to draw hard distinctions, a combination of all these factors, or what?

I didn't speak up because of what kirdape said:

"Assuming that Smmenen would EVER change, I'd agree with you. He will not. Hence the folly of the action."

On this particular article, I feel you are wrong in the content.  If you want to post about, say, Oath or Doomsday, go right ahead.  I just felt that wording tried to take away from the content here, and I didn't want anybody confusing content with wording.

[jpmeyer]

Someone should try to write an article using ecriture feminine.

[Smmenen]

To get back to the discussion, I'd like to expound upon Smmenen's point.  Precisely the reason I picked this juncture to "step up" and say something was because it was pretty clear to me no one else was going to.  

But I don't think that answers my primary criticism:

What bothers me is that if you felt this way - why didn't you speak up earlier in my, Oh, say nearly three years of writing? Why wait until this particular article if it is so irritating? Of course it just seems to obvious to me that the reason you waited until this particular article, when you could have chosen one of the nearly 60 that I have written up until now, is that it argues in a particular way that you disagree with. Which then makes the whole critique less effective.

Had you chosen a neutral article, it would be more effective.

I don't think you sufficiently answered this point.

I have written nearly 60 Vintage articles and you waited until this particular one to make those points.  Wouldn't it have been more effective to make a critique as you did, say, two years ago?

Would this much have come of my post if I had said only "Smmenen's writing is verbose, at times unclear, and occasionally awkward?"  It would have been brief and admittedly less annoying, but would it have done its job?

I have to agree that if you had just said that I would have been like: admittedly it's true but it would not have been a lasting impression.  Your points have really been taken to heart.  But I think the net effect is that I'm just going to be more careful about what I put out.  This might just decrease my quantity at the trade off slightly enhancing my quality.  

But the thing that I don't think is all that fair is this: my articles have varying degrees of this.  Some of my articles that go through multiple edits are pretty damn clear and not very awkward.  This article was probably an example of the my worst in that regard.

[Meddling Mike]

I have written nearly 60 Vintage articles and you waited until this particular one to make those points. Wouldn't it have been more effective to make a critique as you did, say, two years ago?

I don't think Demonic Attorney has really had cause to read many of your articles prior to this occasion Steve. Although an extremely capable vintage player he has only been part of the TMD community for a short time. I know I personally only read articles that are brought to my attention or which I consider to be particularly relevant to my particular situation. In the case of the article in question I read it because it partially responded to Training Wheels as well as discussing various builds of control slaver, which up to this point has typically been my deck of choice in Vintage. Had this not been the case I probably would have neglected to read the article. Although I cannot speak for Demonic Attorney, I'd assume he read that particular article for similar reasons.

[Demonic Attorney]

Steve,

Since the quoted material in your original post was someone else's, I wasn't aware you were addressing me, and hence didn't answer your question.  

Rereading your latest post, I'll point to the segment in our previous exchange that answers it:

My motives as far as selecting this particular piece are quite simply this. I lead a very busy life and don't often have time to read Magic articles and engage in protracted debates about them on the internet. This week is my week off from school and with zero money and all the time in the world, I thought I would try my hand in this arena. I selected your article merely by chance; it happened to come out at a point in time when I was free to read and respond to it.

[Smmenen]

Steve,

Since the quoted material in your original post was someone else's, I wasn't aware you were addressing me, and hence didn't answer your question.  

Rereading your latest post, I'll point to the segment in our previous exchange that answers it:

My motives as far as selecting this particular piece are quite simply this. I lead a very busy life and don't often have time to read Magic articles and engage in protracted debates about them on the internet. This week is my week off from school and with zero money and all the time in the world, I thought I would try my hand in this arena. I selected your article merely by chance; it happened to come out at a point in time when I was free to read and respond to it.

Well, you've said that you've read other articles that featured these problems.  Why not speak up before?  You didn't have to do a full length writers edit pointing out the flaws in the grammar, etc.  You could have just posted that the article could have been clearer, etc.  Most of the time, there are opportunities for people to respond to articles with follow up threads.

[Smmenen]

This is probably one of the oldest substantive thread revivals on these boards.    Here goes...

I am drafting my 250th article for Starcitygames, and as part of that project I have been re-reading articles from my archive and the community response.    The purposes are manifold and evolving, but I have learned alot.

Just so people know what this tread was about:

My Article: A Closer Look at Slaver in Vintage.

Your satirical critique.

Your basic point, that as a writer I could have spent a little bit more time on organization, clarity and review is dead on.     As I re-read the article, I cannot help but agree with much of your criticisms.    For example, the five paragraph opening is out of place.  It's the sort of thing that would be cut in a good edit or moved somewhere else.    This article was sloppy, poorly organized, and hastily composed.   It's definitely one of the articles I'm least proud of, not just from the first fifty, but out of all 250 (in fact, this article was my fiftieth article).

I think the bigger issue was not the writing deficiencies, but the fact that I was wrong.    The point that Control Slaver should play Yawg Will is too obvious for serious debate.   The real purpose behind the article was to argue that Goth Slaver was a better Slaver option.   Yet, very clearly, I was proven wrong.     The reasons why I failed to grasp the power of Slaver remain somewhat elusive to this day, but it has to do with the fact that Control Slaver was a blindspot for me.   The way that I positioned myself in the metagame at the time made it difficult for me to understand how a deck that a) drew less cards b) seemed less powerful, c) had a less powerful Yawg Will could be better than one that drew more cards, seemed more powerful, and had a better yawg will.  

What I misunderstood: to oversimplify,  that Control Slaver wasn't amazing at any one thing, but it did 3 things very well.    (In Truth, Control Slaver had the best Tinker).    Control Slaver couldn't over power Grim Long or outdraw Tog or out-counter Meandeck Gifts, but what it did do was win anyway.    It's not about how well a deck does any one thing, but a combination of factors that matter.   Thirst-based Slaver was more resilient, less linear, more 'agile', to borrow Rich Shay's phrase.   Against Gifts, you might not have the ability to combo out as fast, but you can use simple tools like Tormod's Crypt to put them in a bad spot or Boseiju to punch through a counter wall.   And so on.   The efficiency of thirst - and flexibliity that affords -- allows more options and greater resilience.    

I kept saying that Goth Slaver was more 'powerful,' but what I meant was that it 'seemed more powerful' because I drew a bunch of cards, played a ridiculous Yawg Will and won the game.  But that didn't make Goth Slaver a better deck.    

In retrospect, and I will write about this in my 250th article, this was a blindspot for me.   Blind spots are a function not simply of one's perspective, but one's position.    The way in which I was positioning myself in the metagame at the time, playing Grim Long, for example, made it very difficult for me to see the advantages of Thirst-based Slaver.    Just as my choices of Mono Blue in Worlds 2004, then Oath at SCG II, two decks designed to attack the Trinisphere/Workshop metagame, made it very difficult for me to understand just how distorting the dynamic of Workhsop/Trinisphere/Crucible truly was.   These are lessons that I learned the hard way.

If I had been right, I doubt you would have even responded in the first place.    

I think, given the flaws in the article, I should have tried one of two things:

1) Not pretend to even have a focus and just submit the article as a free form essay.  

2) Tried to write and edit a stronger article.  

And only (2) makes much sense.  

But, as I re-read the replies to this thread, a few things ring true:

Also, to clarify what I was saying-- Vintage writers try, to varying degrees, to aggrandize their writing and have it come across like the work of great writers.  Verbose like Derrida or otherwise, trying to take on a different style to lend to the gravity of your work almost invariably ends up making it harder to read because you're speaking in a voice that isn't your own.

Except that Smmenen wasn't attempting to sound like anyone.  Stephen WAS writing in his own voice, which is what you were criticizing him for.  Far from attempting to prevent him from adopting a different style, you're actually asking him to do so.  And there's nothing wrong with that, but you can't have it both ways.

Of course, Justin was right.   I took DA's comments as a personal attack -- even though it was phrased in terms of 'Vintage writers generally.'    Yet, it wasn't that I was trying to sound that way, that was my actual writing voice.    

I think my 'voice', however we characterize it, was much less problematic than the far more glaring presentation issues, such as clear writing and strong organization.   Had I addressed those things with a nice solid edit, I think the concern over 'style' would have been a non-issue.

Assuming that Smmenen would EVER change, I'd agree with you.  He will not.  Hence the folly of the action.

If by "ever" Rian meant the near future, he was sadly correct.    

I can't say, at this historical remove, how you could have helped me write better.    Some things one has to learn on one's own.    I don't think that your critique -- for the reasons that were stated by Zherbus and others -- could have produced that outcome, for the simple reason than it was, predictably (in spite of your protestations otherwise) perceived as a personal attack.   Not just that, but I viewed your comments through the lens of the fact that you disagreed with me rather than simply an honest, good faith attempt to help me write more effectively.

I think Steve O'Connell's response struck just the right notes.  On the one hand, he saw the need for me to improve my writing and the value of critique, but he was unsure that the way you did it was likely to achieve your objectives.   I wish there had been a way -- back at that time -- to get me to see the need to write more clearly and effectively.    Unfortunately, I doubt that there was anything you could have done.   It's not that I was incapable of writing more effectively.   My GroAtog primer does not suffer from these problems.  

Lessons for life and Magic...

[vassago]

Even though this an issue dating a few years back and I am not really involved, I would have to say I have gained a little bit of respect for you Steve. 

[Smmenen]

Thanks man.  I hope you weren't starting from zero