Tricks of a trade.

[The Politoed Hunter]

I finally decided to get back into URPG, but I decided I should start somewhere simple, litterally. I now Present you!

TRICKS OF A TRADE!

Albert had successfully caught a new Pokemon, Hoppip. Hoppip were Pokemon with pink bodies and green cotton leaves. Albert loved Hoppip, and planned to turn it into a Jumpluff.

Albert had travelled upwards a mountain. The mountain had a ravenous path that swirled into clouds. At the top was a dark moonlit sky. He had finally decided it was time to rest, so he laid out his sleeping bag, drifting away to sleep…

Darkness swirled near a bright light. The original one, resting peacefully underneath this light, was protecting it. It had white fur, beautiful green eyes and four yellow arm-like things sticking out from its body. The site of this creature was mystifying. Its beauty was something that Albert never even dreamt of seeing. All was peaceful; until a dark creature conjured of spirits started firing masses of dark spheres conjured of shadows at the original one. The dark creature seemed very pleased with itself, as the original one struggled to fight back, but was soon sucked into a black hole. The dark creature laughed menacingly, red eyes glaring. It disappeared, chasing after the hole.

Albert awoke with a shower of sweat dripping from his armpits. The dream was horrifying, watching the white Pokemon getting dragged away to its doom. It was near morning, so Albert packed up his stuff and continued on his way.

Albert let the dream bother him all day. He had so many questions. Who is the white Pokemon? Who is the black Pokemon? What were they doing? Why were they doing it? Albert wanted answers, even though it was only a dream. A very life-like dream.

Albert soon came to a little hut on the edge of the woods. Its door was made out of pine; the bricks seemed to be made of mud. The roof was made of slate and the windows weren’t mad of anything. It was actually a hole. Albert paid no attention towards the old man that was staring outside the hole at him. Soon however, the old man stepped outside. He was walking towards Albert, obviously wanting to chat. The man was wearing mud stained rags, as if he hadn’t change clothes for at least a hundred years old.

“He must be a mountain man. Like a bat down a cave.” Albert thought to himself, whilst chuckling. The man approached him.

“Hello, I am one hundred years old.”

“No surprise there then.” Albert said whilst thinking aloud. The man looked very insulted, but kept on a straight and serious face.

“I wouldn’t go ahead if I was you.” Sneered the man. “Well, not if you don’t want any trouble. The man was looking very smug in his tattered clothing. Suddenly, he collapsed, like his body seemed very exhausted. Albert bent over to investigate. The man was twitching, sweating heavily, giving off a lot of heat…. and a lot of odour. Suddenly, however, a very sinister black cloud swirled from out of the old man’s body, shrouding Albert completely. Albert fell unconscious. He was now sweating, stinking and any other vile thing a person could do.

Albert thought he was awake. Dead wrong. Ahead of him was a swirling void of nothingness, much like the place in his latest dream. Albert Picked himself up, clearing the dust off of him. He coughed, the dust particles invading his breathing tube. He decided he should walk ahead the dusty path in front of him. Albert looked up. Instead of a normal blue sky, this void had a Black hole swirling above. It appeared to be getting larger. Albert decided he should definitely try to get out of here. Many Pokemon stared at Albert. One Albert noticed was Misdreveaus. Misdreveaus were ghost type Pokemon, with a red necklace dangling from below the head. These Pokemon loved playing tricks. Albert strayed away from these Pokemon. He didn’t want to afford seeing horrid hallucinations.

Soon Albert came to a dead end. The black hole seemed incredibly large, Albert knew he was running out of time. Albert didn’t really notice that he had crossed a shadow. With next to no light and nothing where the shadow came from, how could there be a shadow. A dark figure arose from where the shadow was. It’s body was cloaked in darkness. It appeared to have a black body and a gaping red mouth. It’s crystal green eyes seemed innocent, but it’s words spoke otherwise.

“Welcome human, to my dark lair of nothingness!” It boomed, seeming fully confident.

“Who the heck are you?” Albert asked.

“As of now I am your master.”

“Not without a fight!”

Albert tossed a PokeBall into the air, releasing his tadpole Pokemon, Poliwag. Poliwag shifted his body to an attacking stance, but the creature seemed calm.

“Poliwag, Bubble! Now!” Albert commanded. Poliwag released a jet of bubble spray towards the mysterious creature. This is when things went mental.

“Mortal fools!” It screeched. It conjured a ball of darkness in its two hands, firing it at Poliwag. Albert saw that this was an extremely powerful attack, so he held out Poliwag’s PokeBall and recalled it. The Shadow Ball hit the spot where Poliwag once was. It exploded on contact with the floor and created a gaping hole in the ground.

“What do you want with me? Albert asked. “Who are you?”

“I am Darkrai and I want your soul!” It shouted. Darkrai jetted towards Albert. Upon collision with Albert, it vanished into him. Albert collapsed onto the floor, as the massive Black hole shook open the ground and devoured everything.

Albert felt like he was falling for an age. He was surprised that the black hole didn’t rip him to shreds. He finally fell onto something. It was…. soil. Albert stood up.

“I’M ALIVE!!!” He screamed.

“Yes, but not in control.” A deep voice boomed, swallowing Albert in a dark aura.

“What is your bidding, master?”

“I want to make the most powerful dark army in the universe! You are going to help me conquer this. First, return to the old man’s house where you first met me. I want to pay him a little visit. Also, while in this from, only you can hear me. So no one is going to notice anything. No one is going to save you from the shadows. It is over, for you at least.”

Albert was under the control of Darkrai. He could control nothing. Nothing at all. He may as well of died in the Black hole. No, that is pathetic really. There will be a way out of this.

Albert (Well not really Albert, more Darkrai.) started to walk towards the old man’s house, where he fist met him. Albert peeked through the window. The old man was resting on a chair, his wife comforting him. Albert burst through their wooden pine doors. The woman squealed in shock, fainting on the old man’s lap.

“How dare you! You can’t just barge in here and expect to get away with it! What have you got to say for yourself!?” He yelled.

“I say…. Poliwag, go!” Albert yelled, completely under the influence of Darkrai. Albert tossed Poliwag’s PokeBall on to the floor, releasing his favourite tadpole.

“Hypnosis.”

Poliwag fired multicoloured rays at the old man, who instantly fell asleep.

Albert walked over to the old man’s desk. A letter materialized in his hand, which he slipped through the drawers. A key then materialized, which locked the door.

“Good.” Darkrai said in a deep tone. “Now to start our army. Proceed outside, where there will be a Poochyena. Poochyena are sly canines with a dark attribute, covered in grey fur. You will notice it. Catch it. I will now no longer control you. However, you must continue catching dark types, or I will kill you! Now go!”

Darkrai appeared in front of Albert and disappeared.

Albert proceeded outside. Funnily enough, there was a Poochyena. Albert decided the element of surprise was best, so he threw Weedle’s and Poliwag’s PokeBalls. They both materialized onto the ground, ina fighting stance, as if they knew what to do. Poochyena was instantly alerted to thier prescence. Ut ran towards Poliwag and leapt onto it, tearing it's flesh apart. Poliwag screamed in pain and used it's tail to batter the Poochyena off of it.

“Poliwag, we must do this to save our lives! Poliwag, hypnosis on that mutt, Weedle, use Poison Sting afterwards!” Albert commanded. Poliwag fired multicoloured circular rays at the pooch, while Weedle shot sharp, purple, poisonous barbs at Poochyena. The rays and the barbs contacted with it, the poor dog didn’t even get a chance.

“Yena…” It said as it snoozed off.

“Weedle, let’s wrap this up with a String Shot!” (Yes, pun intended.) Weedle shot silvery webs towards the hyena. It was literally rapped up. However, Poochyena woke up and used its teeth to tear out of the combining webs. It tackled Weedle to the ground, who was knocked out. Albert recalled Weedle, commanding Poliwag to use a Hydro Pump. Poliwag forcefully sprayed water at the opposing Poochyena. The water pushed it towards a tree, which collided with the Poochyena's body. It seemed very weakened now/ Albert tossed an empty PokeBall very stylishly. The Poochyena was sucked into the red and white orb, which fell to the floor and started to shake.

One…

Two…

Three…

[The Politoed Hunter]

Pokemon writing for: Poochyena
Length needed: 5K - 10K
Number of characters: 8176

You can now rate my story ^^

[Starkipraggy]

MINE! BWAHAHAHAHA! >:3

Introduction:

Saying that Albert has just caught a Hoppip and is really happy about it is a pretty nice and subtle way of saying that he's not a very experienced trainer. And I has lieks for subtlety, unless you hide it under like 10 hidden layers of meaning. Okay, so I know what Albert is doing, what he has been doing, what he is going to do, but I don't know what he looks like, which is... sort of odd. While it's passable, do remember to describe your main character next time.

That's a pass here.

Plot:

Okay, Albert is a newb trainer, heads up a mountain, gets pwned by Darkrai and catches a mon under Darkrai's influence.

On the whole it was okay, but you did leave a lot of things for me to extrapolate. I'll just pull one example out because it's the one that sticks out the most due to being at the end.

Albert tossed an empty PokeBall. It started to wobble.

One...

Two...

I had to backpedal for a moment there. You didn't even mention that the Poochyena was sucked in. Granted, it's not a particularly important thing, but it does disrupt the flow of the story because the reader has to stop and join the dots for him/herself. This happened a couple of times more further up. Do watch out for these.

Something I have to nitpick here is that why do you call the white creature Darkrai pwned "the original one"? Doesn't make sense to me.

The plot isn't holey, and I get the feeling a sequel is coming to fill gaps anyway, so you get a pass.

Grammar:

I find it hilarious that 8 paragraphs out of 42 (<-- ZOMG 42) start with the word 'Albert'. Moving on.

You only have a few errors, but I'll only list out a few. Most of your non-recurring errors could have been fixed by proofreading, so do so next time. The ones listed are the ones that I think that you wouldn't know to fix without guidance.

A very life like dream.

Life-like should be hyphenated.

Recurring errors:

There's no need to capitalise the B in black hole. Treat it like a standard non-living thing.

Things like hadn't and couldn't should not be used in stories outside of character speech. Write it out fully to 'had not' and 'could not' and other whatnot. Here's some training for formal writing. l3

You misused it's when describing Darkrai. They should have been its.

its = The version of 'his'/'her' for 'it'. i.e. Starki ate its ruler. lolwhut.
it's = 'it is' i.e. IT'S NINE 'O CLOCK ZOMFG

You seem pretty confused with speech. Even if the speech ends with anything other than a period (in which case it'll be replaced with a comma) the part after the speech has to be decapitalised unless it doesn't relate to the speech or the word after the speech is a name. Confused? Ponder these:

Originally Posted by Random speeches

"Kristy, I really like you," he said.

"Pikachu, Thunderbolt him!" Ash cried.

"Listen to what I have to say," Gallium said angrily.

"CHOU GINGA! GURREN! LAGANN!!!" he yelled.

"Beam Rifle!" He drew his beam rifle as the lock on it released, got a lock, and fired.

You have commas after ellipses, which is wrong. They don't need to be there, so just remove them in your next story.

You screwed up here and there with commas in speeches. Again, these are fixed with proofreading, since they don't occur every other time in the story.

You get extra points for using a SEMI-COLON. Those things are simply awesome to use and use correctly.

Well, fine, but proofread next time. Pass desu.

And your word choice is a tad odd. I can't put my finger on it without ripping your story apart, which I'm loath to do at the moment. PM me if you really want to know.

Length:

8k is fine, but slightly on the short side. Meh.

Detail:

I find it funny how you described Hoppip and Misdreavus but didn't bother to describe Poliwag even though it's the Pokemon with the second largest number of appearances in this story (the other being Darkrai).

'Sweat dripping from his armpits' is the most eww description of sweating like crazy that I have ever seen. Given that you were trying to create an atmosphere of dirtyness for the cave scene, you get a star here for helping to up the grossness factor at the cave scene. @_@

You did describe everything except the old woman with the old man, Albert, and Poliwag. At least, these three glare out at me. It's not a major problem, but remember to describe everything next time, ESPECIALLY the main character, especially in a third-person story. Pass.

Battle:

I have to mark you down dramatically for this. Poochyena should have had at least an attack, really. Pokemon are released with a bit of noise, enough for any Pokemon with sensitive ears like Poochyena to pick it up and be on guard. This was waaay too short and extremely one-sided. TBH even Magikarp battles are more epic than this. Only three attacks that should do little to no damage from one side and Poochyena is already that weakened? Doesn't really happen, in my book.

I'll have to fail you here...

Overall:

Everything was passable, except the battle... And the passes aren't enough to save your fail in that area, unfortunately.

Result

Poochyena NOT CAPTURED

Get a-fixing and PM/IM/VM me for a regrade. I'll be waiting. :P

[The Politoed Hunter]

AACK! Fixed. (word word)

Edit: Oh yeah, I called the white creature 'the original one' as it kinda hints that the white creature is Arceus.

[Starkipraggy]

i c wut u did thar

Wellll... The battle is slightly more realistic now, so the mark increase is enough to warrant a Poochyena Captured. There is still room for improvement, but you can work on it slowly since this is your first story from your return to URPG. A good way to make a battle is to start from the opposing Pokemon's side, and then think of what it might do, then switch sides and think of how best to counter what the wild Pokemon does. I'll use this battle for example, and list it in point form.

1. Albert opens the door and releases the Pokemon.

2. Poochyena picks up the noise, and is on guard. Starts to look around.

3. Poliwag and Weedle attack. Poochyena dodges one attack. I'll let it be Hypnosis. Poison Sting hits Poochyena but it shrugs it off.

4. Poochyena rams Weedle, leaving it nearly unconscious.

5. Poliwag takes the chance for a point blank Hydro Pump.

6. Poochyena hits a tree, stunned.

7. Weedle, clinging on to the edges of consciousness, fires a String Shot.

8. As Poochyena struggles to free itself of the webbing, Pliwag musters another Hydro Pump.

9. Poochyena jumps aside and while doing so, rips the webbing apart.

10. Poochyena charges. Poliwag fires Water Guns, but Poochyena dodges them, jumps, and clamps down on Poliwag's head. They struggle.

11. Albert is all 'noes!' and kicks Poochyena out of desperation.

12. Poochyena lets go in surprise. Poliwag is injured. (I would have blood, but it's up to you.)

13. Poliwag quickly blasts Poochyena away with Hydro Pump.

14. Poochyena is nearly gone. It tries to get up.

15. Pogeyballz, goooo!!!

Well, there. There's enough room to go a lot of different ways just in this battle, so make a better effort to construct a battle next time.

[The Politoed Hunter]

Thanks Starki. I will keep those points in mind when I write my next story, which is right now! >=D