Anyone who writes a lot knows the scourge of the writer's tic. Some things just sound really awesome to you, so you employ them over and over in your writing without due consideration.
As I've played through many Pathfinder products now, I'm beginning to notice certain tics that come up repeatedly, especially in box text (where all the coolest words live).
There's nothing wrong with these words. In most cases they are great words. But players do tend to roll their eyes if they appear in box text one too many times.
I'm starting this thread as a service, I hope. Post here any words that you think should be put on hiatus in Pathfinder products.
I'll start.
eldritch
Primeval
Great thread topic.
Reminds me of an old DM of mine who described every single corpse we ever encountered (animate or otherwise) as "desiccated." It got so routine that our characters jokingly began to speculate about a worldwide conspiracy of moisture-stealing necromancers.
Yeah, I want to reiterate that this isn't a mean-spirited thread. More of a writer's workshop, "happens to the best of us" kind of thing. I worry that it might be misinterpreted (as many of my posts seem to be lately).
That's what happens when you wear your alignment on your sleeve.
True enough.
Twice on page 11 of the Serpent's Skull PG, in reference to two different NPCs. This caused much eyerolling in session 1 of S.S.
Overall, not worth banning from future writing, although the person who wrote those NPCs blurbs ought to make a note of a possible tic.
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Yeah, I want to reiterate that this isn't a mean-spirited thread. More of a writer's workshop, "happens to the best of us" kind of thing. I worry that it might be misinterpreted (as many of my posts seem to be lately).That's what happens when you wear your alignment on your sleeve.
Or on your nametag, as the case may be.
I apologize in advance or after the fact for having used some rather, umm, archaic and/or obscure words in some of the stuff I've written for PF.
Moreover, I know that there are enough different writers that we might be dealing with "tics" in the publication that aren't the product of standard writer's tics, but rather contributing authors who don't know a word has been overused recently.
We want to help, not reprimand!