Writing Process: Part 2 - Sharing

My current job is to tutor people in writing at the college undergraduate level. What I've found is that the act of sharing one's work is often ignored. Within the college environment this is partly due to procrastination but more importantly is how one's writing is very personal. In general people don't like to share their writing because, "it's bad, I'm not very good, writing is hard, just edit it for me, I'm scared I'll be made fun of, why bother," et cetera. Look, writing is a process. Think hard on this idea, was there ever a skill you picked up and able to do professionally? Consider it seriously.

When you have a group project at work, in class, at home, or generally anywhere else, how well does running in without thinking work? Better analogy, how well does running face first into an unknown dungeon work? Is it more effective to casually stroll in or have the stealthier characters scout and check for traps? Is it best to create an area to rest or to only search once everyone is out of spell slots? Where you amazing at the game from the start or did it take practice to get better?

As a player creating a backstory or a Game Master (G.M.) creating a sessions it is important to sit down and consider how and with who you can share your work. The purpose of sharing what you have done whether it is a late draft or ideas in a brainstorming session is to gain a second opinion. New perspectives can be crucial in catching or incorporating things into your work.

In regards to G.M.s making a session, find an online forum or chat room where other Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) players congregate to trade information. Better yet, such as with a session zero, discuss with your players what they would generally want or ideas you have that you are playing around with in your head. Player's working on a backstory simply need to do the same with the G.M., so it can better be incorporated into the campaign.

As an example of the second stage of the Writing Process [Sharing] I sent my post on free writing to my university's Online Writing Lab (O.W.L.). The person who reviewed it had no knowledge of D&D, yet their comments are still very useful.

The main thing to understand about these comments is how they give direction for the piece. The first major comment made is about grammar/ sentence structure. Considering how the blog post is meant to be shown in the written word, grammar errors should be fixed.

Notice how the second comment is talking about translations not transitions as the sentence stated. Not all comments need to be taken into consideration, and sometimes a comment is wrong. The third comment queried about table-top-games. This question may or may not be considered. I could state more specifically D&D or any other list of like games, or add "most, general, all" in front of table-top-games to indicate I don't mean any specific ones. The comments are a means of bouncing ideas off another person, where those ideas land depends on you.

My favorite comment was of course the final one where the commenter honestly mentioned they were confused from not knowing what those pronouns I was tossing out were. I think their comments about being confused are even more important because of the confusion. My blog was initially set for G.M.s; however, it should be readable to people not accustomed to D&D. Not every nuance should be explained in great detail for every post, yet there should be some elaboration for people new to this sea of fantasy to anchor themselves.