In praise of Charles Evans

[Sean McGowan]

Hi, Charles. Pardon me for embarrassing you by singling you out, but, well, you deserve it, so too bad. I would have done it sooner, but didn't want to be accused of sucking up to a voter. (Even though you are on record as having a non-voting policy this year, the point still stands.)

I'm not sure exactly why you chose to abandon your former critiquing style from years past; I know you took some flak for it, but personally I always appreciated the unvarnished honesty. That said, there are other blunt and/or brutal reviewers out there, so it's not like we lost anything irreplaceable there, and instead we gained your delightful alter ego.

Even in the most nervewracking weeks of this contest, when my nails were bitten down to the bone and I was in danger of becoming addicted to nicotine by virtue of the many 'no, it's just for the stress!' cigarettes I found myself purchasing, I always looked forward to the point in the voting when a certain succubus would get around to doing her reviews, with her rather... different way of evaluating things. I'm sure I'm not the only one who felt that; I know other competitors felt the same, and I'm sure a good chunk of voters did as well. So I just wanted to make sure you knew that it was appreciated.

Put simply: you made this contest more fun. Thanks for that.

[John Bennett]

Everything is more fun with succubi ;).

[Jerall Toi]

This thread deserves a +1.

Throughout the contest, whenever I even thought about something Lawful Evil, I couldn't help but wander what would RPG Succubus say.

[Artus Nemati]

The contest would have been more boring without a succubus commenting on each round. Thanks you for all the effort you put into making this more fun.

[Turin the Mad]

\o/ There ya go Sir Charles, appreciation for your alter ego! From the contestants themselves no less!

evil grin

Now go find a game and kill something :)

[Charles Evans 25]

Ummmm...
<embarrassed silence>
More later possibly, after I've had time to recompose myself.

[Ethan Day-Jones]

Sean McGowan wrote:

Even in the most nervewracking weeks of this contest, when my nails were bitten down to the bone and I was in danger of becoming addicted to nicotine by virtue of the many 'no, it's just for the stress!' cigarettes I found myself purchasing, I always looked forward to the point in the voting when a certain succubus would get around to doing her reviews, with her rather... different way of evaluating things. I'm sure I'm not the only one who felt that; I know other competitors felt the same, and I'm sure a good chunk of voters did as well. So I just wanted to make sure you knew that it was appreciated.

Pretty much exactly my thoughts. Reading the comments on your entry during the 'keep your mouth shut' periods of the competition could be surprisingly stressful. Even the inability to respond to positive comments could get a bit trying at times, so it was always nice when you hopped on to check on your submission to see that the succubus had stopped by. Just that one funny review could do a lot to remind you that at the end of the day the competition is, above all, a heck of a fun ride.

Plus once I knew you had hit mine up, I just had to make the rounds and check on everyone else's succubus review to see how I stacked up. Unfavorably overall I think :P

[Charles Evans 25]

Okay, to give some response to Sean's comments:
The former style of reviews went because questions I was asking myself over how much use they were to anyone got too big to comfortably ignore. By the point in December when the first RPGSupersuccubus post showed up, I was having a hard time in real life, which probably added to those gnawing doubts over the worth of the posts I had until then been making, and then when January rolled around there was a thread posted by Jim Groves about 'audience participation' that helped make the decision to ditch the former style of review much easier. I'm not a diary keeper, and I'm not sure if the idea of a lighter style of review came first and inspired the alias, or the alias came first for other purposes, but suggested the humorous review.
It's a great relief to me to know that I've been successful in entertaining and providing an even temporary relief from stress to some of the contestants. In my position of doubting that I had anything both significant and useful to add on a technical side, the last thing I wanted was to make things much harder.

[Ask A RPGSupersuccubus]

Hmmmph. Well in my opinion, anyway who promotes devil worship should have their lives made much harder. Unless that somehow supports their crazy beliefs, in which case their lives should be made as luxurious and as pampered as conceivably possible...

[DM Wellard]

All I can say is they made me smile a lot..nicely done Charles and I trust we will see the lady make comment elsewhere on the boards.

[Eric Hindley]

Ha, I'll pop in here. I'm sure I'm not alone, but even the "negative" neutral succubus reviews made you feel like you were winning. You put a smile on my face more than once Charles, so take that how you will...

And my mistress Succubus, may you further all my demonic plans!

*Shadow Falconer Gloves for all!*

[John Bennett]

I have to admit the first round, I was kind of confused. I didn't know RPG Succubus was an alter-ego. I had only been on the boards maybe a month at that time and I'd some some of "her" posts. I was like, "Is that some other RPG company?" Then, the first round rating, I got a "Fissh" which threw me. Did I do good/bad? But then I figured it out and was totally cool with it.

[Marie Small]

I always checked to see if the Succubus had posted yet, even when I was out of the running. Charles, this vein of critique was greatly appreciated. Thank you.