JJBA OCT #8 R1M10 Jojolity Deliberations

Judge CleverRuse -

WIS:

I do think Timbur and Baquil could have enjoyed the beach far more than presented. The focus throughout is very much on the end goal without giving much time for taking in the surf and having a good time. There are mentions here and there of the two enjoying what they are doing (mostly with regards to Baquil fulfilling his own 1 skill, which I would be remiss to count toward this with much weight), but this comes off as very much circumstantial; they would be performing these acts anyway to facilitate them winning the match, and having fun doing so just comes with the character. Very little deliberate action is taken to make the most of their time in the sand, and most tech that incorporates aspects of beach fun don’t really do anything with the concept to elevate it beyond ‘we do this to win’. Five.

LIB:

The narrative sets up these women being here to have fun and I think they follow through on that pretty well! Every act they do has an undercurrent of a day of normal beach activities; BBQ, drinking heavily, playing in the water, and digging in the sand. It's all present, though I think the payoff for each could have been a bit stronger. For example, as the grass was being setup to be slick with water I was expecting some big Slip-N-Slide type attack to come from it to really drive home Coco’s need for fun, but it's kind of left on the table. What's written isn't bad, but could have very easily been pushed to the next level with a bit of creativity on the attack. Seven.

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Judge DSOddish -

Starting off with Written in Salt, I’m going to be blunt and say I’m going to give you guys a **5**. I’ll preface this by saying I understand where you were going with the JoJolity on this one. You were given the prompt of have fun at the beach, and it is certainly in character for Baqil’s idea of fun to be fucking up Mets haters and Timbur’s idea of fun to be stealing from people. I’ll even give you some credit for a bit of creativity on display on how you achieve the former, with the human shield or turning people into human cannonballs with Ween. However, I think that this is a poor way to approach this JoJolity. Yes, it’s funny and in character, but none of this changes how Baqil or Timbur would ordinarily function in a normal match. Baqil *has* to fuck with Mets haters because his 1 skill forces him to. Timbur *has* to steal valuable things from people because that’s what his 1 skill forces him to do *and* it's how his Stand scales. The question I asked myself was “if you drop Baqil and Timbur into a different match entirely with a wholly different JoJolity, would they play this any different?” and my response to that is I don’t think they would, which is why I really can’t justify anything higher than a 5. An honest attempt was made, but I don’t think it really interacts with the JoJolity in any way that’s unique to the circumstances of the match.

Moving onto La Isla Bonita, I’ll give you guys a **6**. I think you had some pretty good JoJolity integration on Sarah’s part. Several of the actions she took throughout the strat were both believably in character as something Sarah would find fun while also serving a mechanical purpose within the strat as opposed to just feeling extraneous (e.g., trashing the rich person’s stuff also destroying the paintings and denying WIS resources for Ween’s scaling, drinking a ton of booze at the bar allowing her to store up calories for spawning barracudas). Where I think your attempts falter is with Coco, however, who I think feels a little underfocused on in this strategy. There’s some good ideas here, like using the Granule Form slip and slide tactic to boost the girls’ speed while fighting Baqil in the combat section, but beyond that, there wasn’t really much that stood out to me as an attempt to let Coco have fun in any meaningful way. With that in mind (as well as the fact that even while Sarah’s end is better, it still feels like more could have been done), I think a final score of 6 is justified. My advice going forward would be to just do more. The few plays you have on display here are fun and clever, and do a good job of making the JoJolity plays have mechanical purpose. If you just had a few more ideas of the same or similar caliber on display here, I could easily see this going up to a 7 or maybe even an 8.

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Judge AtomicPeace -


Written in Salt -

I found execution on the jojolity here a bit lacking to be frank. I do think there were some fun moments in the narrative, you played up the aspects of your characters enjoying what they’re doing here, but it didn’t ultimately feel like much attention was dedicated to executing on a particular vision for this jojolity in this particular arena. It didn’t feel like they were doing much that they wouldn’t already do, and none if it felt very particular to the beach locale. 5/10

La Isla Bonita -

I thought you wove a pretty fun narrative throughout your strat, with good moments that felt like they highlighted both characters quite well, and standard day at the beach fare! Classic activities such as eating sand, drinking a ton, and having fun in the sun! Overall I don’t have a ton to say here, I thought it hit its notes well and was present narratively, but could’ve used more presence mechanically to really make everything feel cohesive, even though it still got across the fun beach day vibes. 6/10