# Heresy-Online's Expeditious Stories 12-11: Innocence Voting Thread



## Boc (Mar 19, 2010)

This concludes Heresy-Online's Expeditious Stories Challenge 12-11! With the Annual Fiction Competition going on this month, thanks to those of you that found the time to still participate!

Congratulations to all of you who participated in this month's competition and making it a success! Thank you all as well, for helping to add colour to the already exceptional fanfic forum here on Heresy. Hopefully in the following months, we can continue to build up interest and maybe bring some more fresh blood to HO's fanfic forums.

Voting works as such:
Each reader (not just writers) can cast three votes, ranking them 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. Feel free to share your thoughts, comments, or brief reviews on the stories as well, since each of the writers worked hard to get their entries up.

Scoring works like this:
1st place: 3 pts
2nd place: 2 pts
3rd place: 1 pt

*When you vote, ensure that you vote in the following format:*
1st Place: Author, Name of Story, 3 pts
and so on.

Unfortunately, to prevent any possible dramas, you cannot vote for your own story. If you cast any votes, you have to cast all three, no picking a single story and nothing more.

Additionally, if you wrote a story, you must vote! As the competition grows, I think it is necessary to point this out. If you enter but do not vote, any votes for your story(ies) will not be counted.

By the end of the voting period, all votes will be tallied and a winner declared.

Once this winner is declared, the winning story will be placed into the Winning HOES thread which has been stickied in this forum.

Just to emphasize again, _you do not need to have written a story to cast your votes!_ The more people that cast their votes, the better!

The deadline for voting will be midnight US Eastern Standard Time *Tuesday, 01 January 2013* (adjusted one day due to voting thread going up late). At that time this thread will be completed, the winner declared, and the new HOES topic for Competition 13-01 will be posted.

Due to the change in the reputation system, the rewards for entering/winning have also changed:
Participation - 1 reputation point
3rd Place - 2 reputation points
2nd Place - 3 reputation points
1st Place - 4 reputation points

Here are the entries from HOES 12-11:

*Table of Contents*

Mossy Toes - A Memory, Sundered

gothik - Innocence Lost

The Son of Horus - The Enemy Within

Romero's Own - False Innocence

Keen4e - Killing the Sick

ckcrawford - The Presumption of Innocence

Dave T Hobbit - Washed Clean

anygorn - A Courtly Summons

Liliedhe - On Innocence​


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## Mossy Toes (Jun 8, 2009)

Gah, had a lot of difficulty sorting out what order to put my 3 votes are in—the stories I regard as the top 3 are all so close to each other in awesomeness. Any of 'em could have taken any of the places.

1st - The Son of Horus - "The Enemy Within" (3 points)
2nd - Dave T Hobbit - "Washed Clean" (2 points)
3rd - Liliedhe - "On Innocence" (1 point)


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## Liliedhe (Apr 29, 2012)

1) Washed Clean - Dave T. Hobbit (3 points)
2) A Memory, Sundered - Mossy Toes (2 points)
3) A Courtly Summons - andygorn (1 point)


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## Richter_DL (Aug 30, 2012)

1) Liliedhe - "On Innocence" (3 points)
2) Mossy Toes - "A Memory, Sundered" (2 points)
3) Dave T Hobbit - "Washed Clean" (1 point)


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## Bloody Mary (Nov 6, 2009)

1. Liliedhe - "On Innocence" (3 points)
2. Dave T Hobbit - "Washed Clean" (2 points)
3. Mossy Toes - "A Memory, Sundered" (1 point)


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## Dave T Hobbit (Dec 3, 2009)

Like Mossy I had great trouble ranking my choices, and indeed making my shortlist. However, I finally chose:

1st place: Romero's Own, Innocence, 3 pts
2nd place: The Son of Horus, The Enemy Within, 2 pts
3rd place: gothik, Innocence Lost, 1 pt

My brief thoughts on each entry are: 

*andygorn*, A Courtly Summons: I found some areas discussed events instead of showing them; for example " It is almost as though the guards think the peasants should be eternally grateful that they are being told anything at all" 

*ckcrawford*, The Presumption of Innocence: The ending was very good; however it felt a little like a narrative instead of a story.

*gothik*, Innocence Lost: an excellent twist. The language seemed too variable; I feel it would work better if it were either formal or slang.

*Keen4e*, Killing the sick: telling a story within a story is ambitious in only 1000 words; in this case the changes in point of view seemed off.

*Liledhe*, On Innocence: an interesting premise; however the action felt a little unemotional for a supposedly disturbed protagonist.

*Mossy Toes*, A Memory, Sundered: The language felt awkward; it is probably how Eldar would be translated but the awkwardness kept interfering with my immersion

*Romero's Own*, Innocence: As he is only one soldier among many he seemed overly preachy. The Children were an excellent enemy and well described.

*The Son of Horus*, The Enemy Within: This had a good feel for Astartes; however it did not quite grip me.


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## gothik (May 29, 2010)

1st place Romeros own False Innocence 3pts

2nd place Mossy toes a memory sundered 2pts

3rd place the son of horus the enemy within 1pt


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## ckcrawford (Feb 4, 2009)

1st-mossytoes, A Memory, Sundered
2nd- lillhede, On Innocence 
3rd- Dave T. Hobbit, Washed Clean


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## The Son of Horus (Dec 30, 2006)

A very tough call-- I think really these could go in any order. Can't wait to see what we've got for next month!

1st- Mossy Toes - A Memory Sundered (3)
2nd- Liledhe- On Innocence (2)
3rd- Dave T Hobbit - Washed Clean (1)


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## Romero's Own (Apr 10, 2012)

1st: gothik- Innocence Lost
2nd: Mossy Toes- Memory Sundered
3rd: ckcrawford- The Presumption of Innocence

It was a tough call this month as there were some great stories.

I have to thank Dave T Hobbit for the feedback he gave as it helps everyone and will improve the calibre of stories we get next year


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## VulkansNodosaurus (Dec 3, 2010)

3rd place: gothik, Innocence Lost, 1 pt.
2nd place: Liliedhe, On Innocence, 2 pts.
1st place: Mossy Toes, A Memory, Sundered, 3 pts.


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## andygorn (Apr 1, 2011)

Hi all, great stories once more!

*Mossy Toes ("A Memory, Sundered")*
Evocative and full of tragedy, but I don't think it got the "innocence" angle across very well. 

*Gothik ("Innocence Lost")*
Nice twist at the end, but I didn't really get a feel for the "innocence". 

*The Son of Horus ("The Enemy Within")*
Quite a good sense of innocence. To me, it seemed that the Libararian and Chaplain understood it better than the battle brother themself, which I thought was an interesting slant on things.

*Romero's Own ("False Innocence")*
For me, his loss of innocence was a bit sudden. Could maybe have set the scene deeper if (e.g.) the children reminded him of his own children, or those of neighbours/friends/etc.

*Keen4e ("Killing the sick")*
Good descriptions, but definitely needed breaking up so it was more readable. However, a really good start to your writing here.

*ckcrawford ("The presumption of innocence")*
I enjoyed this story, but felt it needed breaking up into more manageable chunks to take it all in.

*Dave T Hobbit ("Washed Clean")*
A well-written story, with a good twist to it.

*Liliedhe ("On Innocence")*
Intriguing concept, but I didn't really get a strong sense of the apothecary's innocence to stop the Captain.
I thought this could have done with a few more sentences about the captains rages. E.G. He could have turned on his allies after the battle, but the apothecary is the only one he cannot raise a hand against (he turns away at thre last second and crushes the side of a wrecked vehicle or something). Then, when he comes around later, he still tries to fight, but the apothecary is the only one who can remind him about how he was earlier able to control himself.

It's a bit of a shame to have to put these characterful tales in precedence, but:
1st Place = 3 points = The Son of Horus ("The Enemy Within")
2nd Place = 2 points = Dave T Hobbit ("Washed Clean")
3rd Place = 1 point = ckcrawford ("The presumption of innocence")

IMHO, 2012 has definitely ended with a great series of tales. With you guys writing, 2013 is looking really strong for fanfiction/stories, too.

I think Romero's Own is definitely correct about feedback....we all need to get reactions about what we post.
With this in mind, please could you let me know (privately if you want) about whether there was anything you did or didn't enjoy with my posting (+ any suggestions such as "keep x, remove y, change z", or whatever)?

I really want to improve my transcribing so that you have better quality things to read, but the only way that I can really improve is to hear people's thoughts & see if there's any negative habits or patterns running through my posts which I haven't yet got rid of, etc. I'm not frightened by feedback & I think that all criticism is positive.

Thanks for reading (and in advance if anyone wants to let me know), AndyG.


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## Boc (Mar 19, 2010)

And the voting window has closed, results are in, and the winners are:

*Third Place* - 12 Points - Dave T Hobbit's _Washed Clean_

*Second Place* - 13 Points - Liliedhe's _On Innocence_

And the winner is...

*First Place* - 21 Points - Mossy Toes' _A Memory, Sundered_

Congrats to Mossy for a rather powerful return to HOES, thanks to all of you who entered, and I'll have the post up for 13-01 shortly. Thanks everyone for participating!


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## gothik (May 29, 2010)

well done mossy and everyone else


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## Liliedhe (Apr 29, 2012)

Congratulations, Mossy.


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## VulkansNodosaurus (Dec 3, 2010)

Congatulations on a record-breaking FIFTH (if I counted correctly) HOES win, Mossy Toes!


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## Mossy Toes (Jun 8, 2009)

5th it is, so I manage to eke out a slight lead over Lil again—not that counting wins really matters.

Wow, the margin of this win really surprises me. I'd seen a lot of people voting for other stories, so I'd surrendered my expectation of winning and just let the voting run. A surprise, certainly—but a pleasant and flattering one! It makes the taste of not finishing my annual competition entry in time slightly less bitter...

Thanks, all!


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## andygorn (Apr 1, 2011)

Well done to Mossy, Liliedhe, Dave T Hobbit and everyone else who entered. Really strong stories here. I know that having good writers around me spurs me on to try to improve my game.


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## Dave T Hobbit (Dec 3, 2009)

Well done everyone


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## ckcrawford (Feb 4, 2009)

Congrats, you winning hoes!


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