First workshop

[Farskit]

Did you know? The use of commas before "and" in certain cases (specifically in lists) is called the "Oxford comma" because that's where it came from. So the whole "british english" thing is kind of a moot point from there on

http://oxforddictionaries.com/page/oxfordcomma

While we're on the subject, you'll notice the very website of the Oxford Dictionary uses commas before "but":
http://oxforddictionaries.com/page/g...ntencesclauses

I agree that it's a touchy subject and that when it can be worked around, it often should. I'm often guitly of going completely rogue with them! However it's just as incorrect to maintain that it's wrong in every single case, which it isn't.

That being said, thanks for the correction of my piece! I disagreed with a few of the comments but others were spot on, such as the tendency to make sentences being with interjections. My bad. I rewrote it (but haven't edited it on Astro yet).

[Nomad]

FA has it pretty much wrapped up. I prefer to see no sentence started with any conjunction and believe if you have to put a comma before a conjunction, you have compounded the sentence really badly and should look at sentence atructure. There is no arguing that the example from Game of Thrones is wrong, whichever way you look at things. Those commas just are not required.

[Ossai]

Thanks for all the feedback so far, I shall move to implement it because, like Ging, I shall be using that section in my story :D

Speaking of Ging:

(Ring-a-ding-ding, 470 words. I understand it's very narrative and ends rather aburptly, but sue me. I was trying to write proper and I intend to write more of this scene. I was simply submitting for the 500-word cap.

Cherriana smiled a soft smile as she stepped through the ankle-deep snows of Kannard Vale. She walked up a small mound of snow near the silver-iron fences surrounding her regal estate. She looked over the lands - her lands, she reminded herself - with eyes as green as grass and a smile as white as the snow at her feet. Absent-mindedly, she ran a nail through her long blood-red hair.

She simply stared at the trio of rising moons in silence for a moment, the moonlight reflecting off her pale skin. She smirked. "I am glad I took this from you, Mother."

The harsh winter winds tore at the black leather and silver chainmail she wore. The wind seemed to be displeased at her attempts at modesty and seemed to want to present her bare before the moon. The Goddess of the Moons - Nyr - wanted her presented with nothing to conceal her. "How romantic," Cherianna said aloud, sarcastically as she smiled faintly at the thought.

Her joints began to cramp from the cold and thus, she began to move away from her home and towards Kannard Vale proper. As she moved, the winds increased in bitterness and strength. To try and counter it, she pulled the black furs around her shoulders closer.

Cherianna was a Vampiress and was hardly concerned by mortal concerns such as the cold or heat. However, she had an appearance to keep up. To the people of Kannard Vale, she was mortal. To them, these petty matters of nature and God's whim were a concern and to keep them appeased, to her they must appear. They must appear to all her family: The K.

She shook her head in disguist invisible to the plebs who hailed her as she walked. 'Honestly,' she thought to herself, 'For nearly three hundred years our dark family has ruled and yet no has noticed we are more than human?' Sometimes, she truly hated the plebs.

She stopped beside the arena, its white marble walls glistening in the moonlight. She thought of the gladitorial games that had occured over the last three days to celebrate her rise to the throne. And her Mother's death, on a less significant note.

Brave men saluted, fought, bled and died under her eye. The thought of the blood , crimson and hot, splashing on body, armour, sword and floor caused her mouth to water and a tounge to run across her fangs. She decided to go in, her black fur-covered boots impacting on the black granite floor with a wet thud. She stepped through the arena's entryways and followed along to the battleground itself. She stopped for a moment, however, when she noticed a figure dueling the very air around him. A Gladiator.
"Pray tell," she called out, "And who are you?"

This, I have to admit, is really good. I don't know why but I wasn't expecting Cherianna herself, nice to see how you handled her description though. Aside from the couple of things already pointed out (The uses of plebs twice in the same paragraph and the bit Nomad pointed out) it is really good. Perhaps you could call the plebs peasants, or nithings or something just as insulting?

All in all, I want more

[Farskit]

I swore I'd do this, so...

Jelcine Enandra was an attractive woman who would’ve been utterly stunning if her face wasn’t covered in such copious amounts of make up. She was well into her two hundreds but thanks to extensive and extremely expensive juvenant treatments (to the point that some would say to a narcissistic degree), looked like a healthy woman in her mid thirties. Her brown skin was almost luminescent and her thick, long, curly hair was bleached bright blond.

She wore a long coat of elaborate design, with ornate, polished sliver buttons that had slight “I’s” emblazoned on each of them (everyone is for people). Her coat was open, showing she wore a high quality vest of mesh armour underneath and on her head sat a tall tipped, wide brimmed hat. A hat that accentuated her already respectable height even more, a hat worn by the Witch Hunters, the Inquisitors of the Ordo Hereticus. Yet she wore it tilted and with distinct disdain, as though she held little respect for what it represented.

Slowly, she started to walk across the deck, her high heeled boots clanging loudly on the metal floor with every step.

She moved with a confident swagger that made Karmen Kons look like a timid scholar girl in comparison and her long, lithe legs slipped in and out of her coat.

A slight, contemptuous smile curled her thick lips then from the sheath at her hip she drew a beautifully ornate power sword and with that; an equally ornate bolt pistol.

Jelcine shrugged, stopped, raised her bolt pistol and said in a voice as soft as silk; “Well, I guess (commaremoved) it’s the end of the road for you.”

Then pulled the trigger. Don't begin a sentence with a preposition! You tend to do this alot, watch out.

You had a small problem early on in the description when it was altogether too static. You were just listing stuff as if you kind of wanted to be done with it already. It gets better later on, when a bit of narration forces its way inside, so it seems you got conscious of that.

From the part when she begins to walk it gets a lot better.

I have one additional minor annoyance that probably is very specific to me: I knew what she'd be like after the first two sentences, because that archetype of the cold-blooded beautiful young vamp-like feminine character has been done to death, not so much in 40k but pretty much everywhere else. You also seem to be conscious of that because you obviously tried to break the mold when you added the makeup part, but that's just a tiny crack. Bring the hammer on, I say, and get free!

[Flailing-Axes]

It's been about a year since I even tried to write anything from a Games Workhop world, so apologies if it seems shabby. I often feel like I need to change my writing style to compensate, and it may seem a bit forced. Not exactly description, but I hope it gives an impression of the characters anyway. I'll try and get some crits done aswell when I get time.

***

He awoke into a confused state of tenderness and dull pain. Thick down blankets stretched across his wiry frame but a throbbing ache seemed to loom just behind his temples, like the dull tap of a hammer or a building pressure working its way slowly outwards and upwards through his skull.

He moaned and tried to throw his hands to the sides of his head, but found them plied away again. The pain gradually subsided enough for him to recognise the feeling of soft flesh against his own, and he opened his eyes cautiously to see the vague shape of a woman hovering by his bedside.

“Try not to move so quickly mi’lord, you need to lay still.”

He succumbed to her demands and let his eyes drift shut again. Her voice felt like a balm between his ears, spreading across his forehead to leave an enticing numbness that beckoned sleep. The voice of a carer, he realised, perhaps one who had devoted her life to the discipline. But upon opening his eyes again, he realised she was too young for that to be true. Her cheeks were too red for that, her blue eyes too deep and complexion too clear. Life had yet to leave a mark on her beyond a shy smile at the quiet hopes and wonder of things.

“Where am I?” he asked

“You’re in Bankhurst mi’lord. A few o’ the men found you wandering through the woods with a fever; I’ve been nursing you back to ‘ealth.”

“How long for?”

“Only about four sun-ups mi’lord. You’ve a strength about you.”

He laughed dryly, then rocked hard as the laugh became a choking cough that shook him as he lay. In a flash the maiden was by his side, gently forcing a pitcher of water between his lips. The water dulled the burning in his throat, and as he drew the pitcher away he allowed his fingers to linger ever-so-slightly over hers. Then he wiped his mouth with a sleeve. “Thank you.”

She smiled in a way that made him feel naked, a mere crease of a smile that showed no teeth but flooded her cheeks with colour. She got back to her feet. “I’d best be getting off now mi’lord, I’ve affairs to be dealing with abouts the house. You need only call if you be needing me.”

She made to leave, but he called after her. “Wait! I must know your name.”

She faltered and turned her head by a fraction. “Elaine, mi’lord.”

He nodded his thanks. “Then thank you Elaine. I am Peter.”

“Aye, mi’lord Peter.”

“Oh-“ he began, but found the words caught in his throat. She waited patiently, he swallowed. “I think, just Peter will be fine.”

She smiled that same naked smile and looked down, then scurried away through the bedroom door.

[Gaius Julius]

The opening is very deliberate, borrowed from another would be author. Anybody care to provide who that might be?

That'd be Edward Bulwer-Lytton; there's a contest named after him to come up with the worst opening to a novel. Nice reference :D I'll have a shot at this when I get the time-nice idea, these workshops...Writing in little bite-sized chunks is something I can manage :D

cheers

GJ

[Nomad]

Nice GJ. No suprise you got there.

[Adrassil]

Wow... I actually quite suck at describing characters (after re reading over Secret War can see now that I'd made the exact same mistakes there that I did here) will work on fixing that, but had no idea until this.

Thanks again!

[Anne Marie]

Whoo, the first workshop seems to be doing well thus far! Excellent work guinea pigs... erm, I mean, writers!