Name: Mortimer Schaub
Gender: Male
Age: 18
Grade: 12th
School: Red Rock High School
Hobbies and Interests: Reading and collecting books, video games, horror media, internet culture
Appearance: The most notable thing about Mortimer Schaub is his height, a tall 6’4. Despite this, he has no athleticism and is visibly out of shape. He is of an average weight of 185 lbs. As a result of his lack of fitness, there are large, residual fat deposits around his stomach and chest region. The hair on Mortimer’s legs exists in inconsistent patches. The patchiness is a result of a habit he’s developed over time where he would twist bunches of leg hair into tiny knots before yanking them out. He is German-American with pale skin.
He has a full head of short dark brown hair that he keeps parted on his right. His ears are large and stick out from his head. Facially, he has brushy eyebrows, a set of turquoise blue eyes, along with a straight nose. He has a set of slightly pointy canines in his teeth after two baby teeth had to be pulled, combined with a natural overbite. Due to a poor sleep schedule, he has visible dark circles under his eyes. He remarkably lacks acne on his face, however his arms are rife with skin tags and bumps. Some acne has appeared beneath his elbows, and some mistreatment has given them the resemblance of needle marks.
Mortimer preferred to wear shorts and T-shirts, though he sometimes wore jeans. Typically, Mortimer dressed without much care. He usually grabbed the first clean shirt from the top of his clothes drawer and often wore the same pair of shorts every day of the week. Even on cold days, Mortimer wore shorts, though he wore a black sweatshirt when subjected to low temperatures. On the day of the trip however, Mortimer wore a black cheap leather jacket, a slightly-too-tight Hotline Miami shirt—bright pink and depicting the character Richard—a pair of beige shorts with a brown belt, white socks, and some black Nike shoes.
Biography: Mortimer Schaub was born on February 12th, 2007 to his parents Sharon and Bruce Schaub. He is the youngest of two children, being 2 years younger than his sister Catherine Schaub. His mother works as an x-ray technician at hospitals around the city, while his father worked at an office as a sales representative. Bruce made a large amount of money, having the family sustain a middle-class income level. Nowadays, Mortimer believed that his father does random part-time business jobs simply to stay afloat. Mortimer and his family were originally from Redondo Beach, California but in 2013 relocated to Las Vegas. This relocation was motivated in part by his father beginning to work in an office in the city. Mortimer spent the rest of his life in the suburbs of Las Vegas. The family still visited California regularly both to see Mortimer’s grandparents and participate in general tourism.
Mortimer was diagnosed as being neurodivergent when he was around a toddler. Mortimer himself wouldn't fully learn this information and the extent of his disorder until he was finishing up 7th grade in middle school. Mortimer's disability resulted in speech problems—specifically, it would cause him to frequently stutter. This included having trouble speaking words properly or coming across as mumbling. As a result, throughout elementary and middle school, he would be called out of class briefly to be with a speech counselor to improve his speech. This was done with simple vocal exercises and reading out loud. Since then, his speech had improved, and as of high school, he had been able to stutter less and control how he spoke. Mortimer tried his best to articulate himself properly but was still prone to stuttering.
In elementary school, he was given exposure to socialize with his classmates in his homerooms. Mortimer would feel like he was in a close-knit community within his homeroom, which would give him optimism. At a young age, he was more recognized and able to know his other classmates. Mortimer originally suffered academically with his grades, struggling with questions related to math and close reading. For his first 3 years in elementary school, he originally had no issues. However, his teachers in his later years of 4th and 5th grade became critical of his negative academic performance. This carved towards his academic expectations for fear of punishment. As a result, Mortimer attempted to focus hard on his studies, wanting no issues with his teachers and parents. This has helped him from being singled out by teachers and made sure to have him avoid being given a negative reputation by the school itself.
His parents were listeners of old-school music, such as the Beach Boys and the Grateful Dead. They would introduce a young Mortimer to the music of the Beatles since the band was popular during their childhoods. Mortimer enjoyed the classical tunes of the Beatles, even having childhood nostalgia towards a rented copy of the animated movie Yellow Submarine. Mortimer accepted a love of music, appreciating the vibes of each song that he listened to. By doing so, it gave him a sense of the culture around the music that he was allowed to explore. His music range expanded to unprecedented levels when he grew up throughout the years, tackling everything from indie music to progressive music to synthwave to avant-garde. Mortimer lacked experience or interest in musical instruments since he was more fascinated with the creativity that each band he listened to had. Keeping up with him being in high school, he listened to emo and pop punk music, suiting his new mature tastes. Being friends with a classmate known as Mercedes “Mercy” Myers-Prescott, he shared his enjoyment of the music that she played.
The only way that Mortimer was almost in shape was due to the physical education done during school, even though he performed negatively and struggled to do so. He had little to no cardio in terms of sprinting or running and had no control of his stamina. He wasn't able to achieve a single push-up without assistance, due to being unable to bend his arms while doing so and his body structure. While he has improved as he grew older, he still found physical activity to be tiresome. When allowed to exercise, he preferred to work out in a gym or an area where he could easily have breaks and air conditioning.
His other hobby began when he was introduced to reading while at school. He first became interested in the books that were at his family house. This ranged from cookbooks, books on nature and animals, and even copies of standard history books for miscellaneous topics. His school library had old copies of Goosebumps books, which would be one of his first favorite books to read. In particular, Mortimer loved books that explored the weird and wonderful. For someone who viewed himself as outside of the ordinary, Mortimer saw himself in them. Soon, he became an avid reader and collector of books. His favorites are the horror genre—typified by the Goosebumps Horrorland series—and catalogs of the abnormal and extraordinary, such as annuals like Guinness World Records and Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Mortimer grew up with video games at a young age, starting with his first video game console Nintendo Wii U for Christmas in 2014. Mortimer's first games were exclusively made by Nintendo, such as Super Mario 3D World and other games that were licensed by Nintendo. Later, he got the opportunity to play on different consoles that he was gifted, playing games such as Marvel's Spider-Man and Cuphead. As he grew older, he ended up drifting away from console gaming and secluding himself into PC-only gaming. He became a fan of gory and/or violent video games, his usual genre of games to play expanding to mature experiences, such as Hotline Miami 2 and Postal 2. After elementary school and being taught in school how to use computers, Mortimer got his laptop, where he began using the internet. He watched videos that were catered to tweens, and he enjoyed watching Let's Plays from YouTubers that he subscribed to. Later, he got involved with Twitch, becoming a regular chat member for several gaming streams.
His start into middle school was unfortunately different from how Mortimer imagined. Having multiple classes a day rather than one teacher for all subjects was something that overwhelmed Mortimer. Socially this was also a struggle because rather than getting to know his classmates throughout the day, his classmates changed on the hour due to the school’s period system. Some of these classes had him working alongside 8th graders, some who looked down upon him when he started middle school. It was enough to make him frustrated with the older kids at school since they ridiculed him for his lack of athletic talent in physical education. Mortimer felt that his middle school was full of other students, who were prone to engage in harassment and bullying. This led him to keep a low profile since he saw himself as a target for their shenanigans. His need for isolation to avoid being picked on and his view of the older kids looking down on him in his school led to him developing an introverted status.
In 2020, Mortimer was forced to be moved to online teaching for his 8th year of middle school, due to the pandemic. Mortimer didn't see it as a difficult transition, since he already struggled with gaining friends in middle school. Mortimer grew comfortable working inside his residence, specifically inside his bedroom, where he would always be on his computer. Because of the pandemic, Mortimer was mostly forced to stay indoors at his home, though his parents had to follow COVID mandates when they were loosening.
However, during that same year in the summer of 2020, his parents divorced. His parents' marriage was already strained when he began to start middle school, mostly from personal conflicts with one another. When Mortimer was 14, however, it reached its tipping point with a heavy verbal argument heard by both Mortimer and Catherine. The divorce made him feel more isolated and disillusioned with his sense of innocence being gone since his idea of his family staying together in harmony was proven wrong. Mortimer’s mother was more involved in her children’s education and thus received primary custody. Since his father remained in Las Vegas close by, Mortimer visited him usually every weekend for lunch or on the 4th of July. Overall, Mortimer still respected his father. He also respected his mother, since she helped him throughout his life. Despite this, the divorce has given him some emotional strain and discomfort.
During the 8th grade, Mortimer ended up discovering episodes of Eric André and found the humor to suit his taste for its random surreal nature and dark comedy. The nihilistic comedy from the show inspired Mortimer to delve into mature material. From that point, he began seeing the world with a "fuck-it-all" mentality from the various bleakness that he saw to be caused by others. This type of bleakness he viewed was from how he saw the current social climate at the time of unrest in 2020, along with a growing disdain for politics, in general. He also ended up watching episodes of Xavier: Renegade Angel, which also added a surreal and random tone to Mortimer's sense of humor, mostly from being nonsensical. To further hammer in and strengthen his shock comedy interests, Mortimer would look up to celebrity Brandon Rogers, known for making explicit comedic videos. Mortimer idolized and admired the comedian's delivery of jokes and skits, becoming a fan.
Mortimer attended his high school physically after the pandemic, though during his freshmen year, he still wore a mask of concerns about COVID-19. It was when he began to look for actual friends, seeing how he was fresh in a new school in Red Rock. The batch of friends that he ended up with was part of a group of youths his age that was video-game interested, composed of edgelords and gamer geeks. They were seen as misfits, due to some of their actions commonly being frowned upon by local school staff for misbehavior and other trouble. Despite this, Mortimer saw appeal in them, mostly for their heavy specific gaming interests and his shared style of edgy humor.
Since it was high school, he was exposed more to mature content from online and his peers. While he enjoyed horror literature, he also delved into other forms of horror media. To suit his developing interests, he became interested in slasher flicks and true crime documentaries, finding them engaging with their emphasis on realism and brutality. He was fascinated at the idea of slasher killers, seeing how they were made to be frightening as actual serial killers. Despite some films not made to be grounded in reality, Mortimer thought the horror from slasher movies came from the menacing presence from the slasher villain and how they killed on screen. He would voice his observations in explaining why he believed some of his favorite horror movies, both Scream and Terrifier, were successful at being cult classics.
Mortimer does have the habit from time to time to dabble in different fandoms and other popular media that become of interest to him. He used the website of Nationstates to engage in roleplaying, including using characters from existing franchises as placeholders for his own stories on the site. Not wanting to admit it directly, he had an interest and liking for the Five Nights at Freddy's franchise. Due to the reputation of mascot horror during the time in which FNAF was labeled, he didn't want to be associated publicly in school for his guilty pleasure in the game. This was also due to nostalgia towards the franchise following dislike for other mascot horror games that Mortimer had issues with. This interest began after the introduction of FNAF: Security Breach, based solely on what Mortimer deemed to be wasted potential in the game, in which he would write alternative scenarios privately online. Currently, due to the involvement of his idol Brandon Rogers, he watched episodes of Helluva Boss, admiring the humor and the animation. He even received a Christmas gift from his sister, who provided him with an autograph from the celebrity that Mortimer put in a frame.
Mortimer is seen as irritable and abrasive for preferring to go a route that he chooses over others. He is also easily annoyed when things do not go his way. However, he still cares for his friends and family. He is viewed as indifferent towards others and their plights, due to acting unsupportive from supposed emotional context. He does wish to be meaningful in wanting to help others and their problems that he believes he can solve or give advice to. He tends to view himself as a victim of circumstance in situations where he's unable to explain himself properly. He has a decent amount of friends who share the same interests and can tolerate his sense of humor and bleak views. He does struggle in making new friends, since he is socially awkward, taking a longer period to socialize with those unfamiliar to him. He is seen to be polarizing by the majority of the student body for his personality and antics, giving him a checkered reputation.
The relationship with his family has still been positive since he's mostly trying to stay on his parents and sister's good terms. Due to his mother being his main parental authority, he attempts to behave whenever she's around. He keeps her happy with his good educational GPA, where he even shares some current day trivia that he believed she might find interesting. He still hangs out with his father, despite seeing some flaws with him, but their relationship is still moderate. He tends to lightly bicker a bit with his sister Catherine, but usually on trivial things. His grandparents, who are on his mother's side of the family, are visited by Mortimer, Catherine, and their mother usually a couple of times a year to stay over in their house for holidays.
Mortimer tries to distance himself from any political talk or discussion and is against cancel culture whenever possible. He is given the perception that the political system is hypocritical and corrupt, due to heavy disillusion towards the overly-politicization of his favorite types of media. He also views that politicians exploit their power and wealth to cater to the elite and not everyday people like him. Realistically, he saw himself as a slightly left-wing to centrist, despite a lack of commitment to politics. There are supposed claims that Mortimer supported radical political figures, but he believed that this stems from his private political views that have been blown out of proportion. Said radical views are due to his voting support for a gubernatorial candidate, who advocated for free healthcare and valued the working class. He will still get mad in some rare cases, if someone accuses him of supporting far-left or far-right views.
Mortimer is planned to attend a community college, which is where his mother and sister have gotten their degrees from. He is expected to attend, where arrangements are to be made after he graduates. Despite this, he struggles to think of what his main major is for college. He had been debating on picking a major relating to his hobbies, either for Engineering or for English. Both majors are meant to be based on his hobbies and enjoyment of videogames and literature respectively. He is beginning to see the appeal of getting himself an English major since he found he has more passion for online writing, so he can get himself a presentable degree for being either a librarian or a technical writer.
He does want a job where he can get a good salary, however, he is harassed with suggestions for jobs that he felt don't match his interests and conveniences. These suggestions were fueled by his mother and later his father when his ex-wife had him try to get Mortimer to look into alternatives. This immediately became a pet peeve of Mortimer when it was repeatedly mentioned and forced onto him since he doesn't want to be stuck in a job in which he will be mistreated and put through poor conditions.
To reward Mortimer for his future graduation from high school, he is intended to go on vacation to Japan with his mother and sister. However, due to a health scare from his grandparents, his mother considered canceling the trip briefly. His mother decided to have the trip scheduled after Mortimer's first quarter in community college. As a result, she had caved into the idea of Mortimer taking the school trip instead. This is mostly due to Mortimer wanting one more splurge with his friends before they graduated.
Advantages: Mortimer is willing to defend himself with what he is given, being crafty with improvisation. With his reputation and his overall size, he may be viewed as more trouble than worth, warding off potential threats and offering up a defense.
Disadvantages: Mortimer is generally seen as a polarizing figure, due to his abrasive attitude when things do not go his way and his overly passive mood. His physical stats are also lackluster, due to being out of shape and not prepared for exertion.
Mortimer Schaub
The dreaded self-insert...
Hey there Deblod! We're excited to see you entering V9 of SOTF. Before we can give you a full critique though, your profile for Mortimer needs to fully adhere to the template. Currently, you have an extra line break between the School and the Hobbies and Interests section, as well as between the Advantages and Disadvantages section. Fix both of these, and someone will be able to get to Mortimer to give him a proper critique shortly!
Line breaks have been removed!
Hey Deblod! My name is Buko/Chad and I will be the one critiquing Mortimer for pre-game! I do like to begin all my profile critiques with a little schpeal: the profile process is just that, a process. Anything said here is said with the goal of making Mortimer better and getting you ready to participate in the game proper. Because I am human, I may miss things in this first go-round that I mention later in subsequent go-rounds. The goal here is not to move the goalposts or provide hoops for you to jump through, I just might’ve missed it or have come to a different consideration through our conversations and critique. Tonally I prefer my critiques to be fairly conversational and written with a degree of informal spirit, there is no ill intention and my only goal is to achieve personal honesty and contribute to Mortimer's construction in the best way I can!
With that said, let us get to it!
Hobbies & Interests
A lot of these seem redundant and don't have much specific impact on Mortimer aside from being sort of checkmarks in his life presented to justify their presence in this section. I'd reduce this to like 3 or 4 major things. I think you can put a bunch of them under the umbrella of 'internet culture' and just have a paragraph talking about how Mort spends too much time online. But, that's just me. This is a section that in my opinion is best built with some intentionality, an unwritten rule is if it's worth mentioning here, it's worth getting a paragraph in your biography. Think about how much of this stuff is worth a paragraph narratively. Who doesn't like music?
Appearance
Okay, so we do have some grammatical, tonal and structural issues with this appearance.
Right off the bat we have a bit of a soft GMing.
This is a bit of a philosophical thing that you can take onto other aspects of the profile and into other profiles you work on as well. Everything in the profile should operate with the character as the metaphorical sun. You do not need comparison to provide credibility, it will only invite scrutiny. You can just say that Mortimer is tall and then give us his height. We can do the contextualization that he is one of the taller members of the cast when we actually have a cast to contextualize.
To continue with the appearance…
I might do a version like this:
“The hair on Mortimer’s legs exist in inconsistent patches. The patchiness is a result of a habit he’s developed over time where he would twist bunches of leg hair into tiny knots before he violently yanked them out.”
Feel free to steal this, feel freer to use this as an idea of how the end product should look and read. A cheat code I use for writing, of all kinds, is to read the work aloud. It divorces your reading from your mind editing things to your intention—it gives a clearer vision to how someone outside your head would consume the work. It’s the simplest way I’ve found to get a sense on how things flow and sound.
In this, the last sentence: ‘Mortimer is of Caucasian skin tone.’, the sentence reads abrupt and sudden. You spend a significant time in the following paragraph talking about Mortimer’s skin, I would integrate his race into that section or more plainly state his ethnic make-up at the beginning of the appearance if you’d want to integrate it that way. The way you have it now it reads very jarring, sudden and sort of tonally out of left field.
This section carries a bit of the issues from the last one in terms of flow and readability. A quick piece of advice I would give is to stick with simple, short sentences. In part to regulate your tone, in part to keep you honest from making grammatical mistakes and getting lost in your own sauce. Once again, read everything aloud and try to stick to every subject matter getting its own individual sentence.
This’ll prevent things like this:
This sentence reads in a way that makes it seem that his eyes are coming out of his ears. The sentence itself is also not grammatically correct and could stand some restructuring. ‘His ears are large and stick out from his head’ might be something that reads smoother and closer to your intent. You’re trying to do too much and also doing too little in these sentences. Give each feature its own sentence and spotlight and try to speak as simply and plainly as possible. Simple sentences and periods are your friend.
Add a slightly before that pointy to prevent him from going full vampire.
Also, high water should be high-water. High water is what is left in my bong after a Saturday night.
Simplify, simplify, simplify. You can remove the ‘he can’ before jeans and just go ‘wears’. You get kind of lost in the sweater narrative. If he’s not wearing the sweater on the day of the trip you can just not mention the sweater when describing his trip outfit. A lot of this is same notes as above, reread, simplify, and keep your sentences focused when it comes to subject matter.
Biography
I am not going to go through this paragraph by paragraph and sentence by sentence like I did the appearance because I think that doesn’t err on the side of productivity. Keep in mind, the same type of mistakes you made in the appearance—you made in the biography. You need to re-read and re-write a lot of this to fit better within the parameters of grammar and flow. There are a lot of obvious and silly typos that a word processor might miss but that you should pick up on pretty clearly just by reading the work aloud.
In this, I will focus more of content and logistics and point out grammatical inconsistencies as we come across them. I’d say that the biggest offender grammatically is using either too much words or misusing or missing a word—all of these are solved head-on by reading aloud and making the sentence structure simpler.
You need to redo this whole section for flow as said before, but things like “he is the younger child of two children in their nuclear family” make it read like his parents are actually children having children. Simplify, simplify, simplify. In that spirit and more in the realm of content, I don’t really understand what we’re doing with Bruce’s job. Just state directly how he is making money during this period rather than focusing on what Mortimer believes. I presume since he manages to be the reason the family relocated to Vegas that him being an office worker would line up with this goal.
Content wise the following three paragraphs are fine, but you do need to rework them from a grammar and sentence structure standpoint. Simplify the sentences, re-read and re-write.
What is the Pacer Test? Is it something within the The Presidential Youth Fitness Program? I’m not familiar with this. Can what you’re seeking to accomplish be done by just saying he performed poorly in sports and got bad grades in PE? The devil isn't in these details.
This whole paragraph is redundant and needless, we don’t need to go through an entire lineage of every console that they’ve owned. Mention the first game and then mention Mortimer’s favorite genres and two to three current games they play. We can get the idea without getting into the minutiae.
We’re going to need both narrative and actual clarity here. The story makes it seem like he’s in class with eighth graders consistently from sixth grade and that doesn’t really line up with how middle school often is. Furthermore, the bullying and harassment seems to be handled very casually and endemic of the school itself, but also at the same time is framed personally. This creates a situation that feels systemic but functions purely to make Mortimer awkward and isolated which is something his disability and neurodivergence accomplish narratively already. We’re kind of lost in the sauce here again. Simplify this and get to the core of what you’re trying to get out of it narratively. Simplify it and say what you intend to say plainly when it comes to sentence structure. Complexity is a cancer to clarity here.
This is a bit of a weird structural thing. The previous paragraph being only two sentences and Mortimer’s parents getting divorced during the pandemic makes me think that we could structure this differently. Perhaps give a paragraph to the pandemic and the home situation then another paragraph taking in the result of the divorce and Mortimer’s living situation. Remember, remember, simple sentences and singularly focused subject matter.
The paragraph discussing Eric Andre, Xavier and Brendan Rogers can be structured differently and reads a bit of a listing. I do not know what you gain from specificity given on a timeline like this. Give us why Mortimer enjoys this type of comedy and then give examples, we do not need each example introduced and explained as if they were characters in the biography themselves.
I also do think that narratively, structurally and character wise we have a bit of an issue where a character’s parents’ divorce is given essentially the same amount of time and attention and affect as their Wii U. That’s not wrong per se, but it is something you might want to consider for what it implies about Mortimer. We have a throwaway line about Mortimer considering his father ‘manipulative’, maybe dig into the vein for some specificity and I think there is some narrative and RP gas there.
I also don’t know what we want or are saying narratively here in terms of the friend group and response from the school. You need to rewrite this for more clarity and plainly state the intended goal and consequence here. I don’t think that a school would let someone to continue getting in trouble with staff just because it was the first time they felt accepted. What about the staff? You need to find out what you want to say here and say it better because as is it’s left me with more confusion than certainty. The story you've presented doesn't pass the plausibility sense even in the most kind interpretation.
What type of content do we mean here? What methods does he go for his parents or the school itself to not find out about this interest and activity? How does he explain it? You might want to cut this out if it gets too far beyond enjoying true crime documentaries.
This isn’t even really mentioned in the Hobbies & Interests but we end up with a whole paragraph for it which doesn’t make sense structurally or narratively. I think you can either cut this or at the very least if it’s worth this paragraph make it worth noting in the Hobbies & Interests.
Needless information that sort of provides confusion and divorces from clarity due to over-detail. We can really make these two paragraphs about Five Nights and NationSates into two sentences. This does not aid in characterizing Mortimer aside from functioning as a list. Keep this in mind for yourself and your own narrative aesthetics, it does not need this much detail in a profile.
Don’t forget: simplify, simplify, simplify. Simple sentence structure, linear narrative, plain-spoken prose. Those should be your guiding lights and main missions in editing this profile.
TMI.
We don’t get anything narratively from this run-down of Mortimer’s sexual proclivities and history and in fact it creates a bit of a level of discomfort in the reading. I would cut this paragraph in its current state. If Mortimer’s relationship with his virginity and pornography is such that it merits mentioning in the profile and given narrative weight, you need to be a bit more clinical and respectful in that you’re discussing a high schooler. Is the juice worth the squeeze here? It reads tonally inconsistent with the rest of his character and completely out of left field. To go down this specific route would require almost a complete reorienting and different presentation of Mortimer thus far. I don't think that's your goal here.
Whole section needs to be cut or revised. Think about more what you’re trying to say with this than saying this specifically.
Long sentences, complex ideas, a reader that is ultimately left a little confused. You need to simplify this and speak with a plainer vocabulary. This is three sentences and probably needs to be six. It’s a lot of context without a lot of content. This should be cut or changed completely.
This runs in counter to him considering his father manipulative, you might want to separate his feelings on his family and friends as two separate paragraphs and give more context to his paternal relationship. Focus on a singular subject for each sentence and a singular connected idea for each paragraph. Simplicity is the road to clarity here, you will ultimately say more as you figure out how to say it with less. The content in here is for the most part fine, it just can be structured to focus on clarity more primarily and tonally to be made much simpler.
A lot of this is fine, but it needs to be rewritten to be better in terms of flow and grammar. We get into a hyper specific political example with a specific politician but don’t get the politician's name. We dance a bit between too much information and too little detail. If this is about Mortimer’s political views, make it about Mortimer’s political views. Where did the social anarchism come from? If he was so moved by a campaign so as to take on it as a political identity, give it mention and name. If this ends up requiring splitting things up in two paragraphs? Well, hey, that’s still free! The important thing here is clarity. And clarity can be found in concision.
I’d split up the collegiate ambitions and plans with the working stuff and I’d cut out the Jeff Bezos opinions. It reads as tonally dissonant and inconsistent and is sort of the type of thing that’d be better suited to bring up as a character beat in the RP than in the profile itself. Otherwise just the regular prognosis of simplify and restructure with clarity as a north star.
I like this character beat, but the paragraph can be made a bit smoother. Simple sentences and periods. At this point, I hope you get the picture.
Advantages & Disadvantages
For the advantages, you don’t really give us any and instead simply tell us about how Mortimer views himself (which we know may not be rooted in reality or with humbleness as a virtue). Give us the strength of Mortimer’s character and his skills, not as he sees them, but how he’s achieved them. Simplicity is your friend here as it is throughout. Disconnect yourself from the character's shoes and look at him with a bird's eye view.
For disadvantages you need to instead of going into how things might go wrong, state Mortimer’s weaknesses plainly and clearly. If his strength is his cunning, his weakness might be his overconfidence etc. If his strength is in his mind, his weakness might be in his physicality. This yin-yang and balance should be your guide here. Focus on plainly stating the character’s pluses and minuses in simple sentences.
And that’s all for this round! I know that this is a lot and can seem overwhelming, but your issues lie more in structure and form than in content. That means that these are relatively easy fixes even if they are fixes that have to be repeated throughout. If you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to reach me via smoke signal, messenger pigeon or Discord DM. You’ll have the most success with the last one.
Thank you for your patience and happy editing! When you're done with the edits post in here and I'll give Mortimer another look!
With that said, let us get to it!
Hobbies & Interests
A lot of these seem redundant and don't have much specific impact on Mortimer aside from being sort of checkmarks in his life presented to justify their presence in this section. I'd reduce this to like 3 or 4 major things. I think you can put a bunch of them under the umbrella of 'internet culture' and just have a paragraph talking about how Mort spends too much time online. But, that's just me. This is a section that in my opinion is best built with some intentionality, an unwritten rule is if it's worth mentioning here, it's worth getting a paragraph in your biography. Think about how much of this stuff is worth a paragraph narratively. Who doesn't like music?
Appearance
Okay, so we do have some grammatical, tonal and structural issues with this appearance.
Right off the bat we have a bit of a soft GMing.
6’4” is objectively tall. It makes Mortimer in the 98th percentile for height in the United States. You can just say that, there is no need to contextualize this with the other students. For one, we don’t know the composition of the class we have as of yet. For two, this profile is not about the other students at the school—it’s about Mortimer. Let's only talk about and comment on Mortimer.The most notable thing about Mortimer Schaub is his height: at 6'4", he is one of the tallest students in the school, even compared to some of the other athletic students in school.
This is a bit of a philosophical thing that you can take onto other aspects of the profile and into other profiles you work on as well. Everything in the profile should operate with the character as the metaphorical sun. You do not need comparison to provide credibility, it will only invite scrutiny. You can just say that Mortimer is tall and then give us his height. We can do the contextualization that he is one of the taller members of the cast when we actually have a cast to contextualize.
To continue with the appearance…
This section reads choppy and grammatically inconsistent. You’re going to want to reword a lot of these sentences and reread this to make sure it flows correctly. I’m talking things like changing the ‘is’ before 185lbs to of. The sentence involving the patches of hair on his legs needs to be written to flow better and be consistent in terms of tense. Something I might suggest is splitting the hairy legs and the habit into two different sentences.Despite this, he has no athleticism to speak of. He is of an average weight is 185lbs, though he is visibly out of shape. As a result of his lack of fitness, there are large, residual fat deposits around his stomach and chest region. Mortimer has patches on his hairy legs, due to a habit that Mortimer would do by twisting and fidgeting his hair into ball-like knots, before tearing the knots off. He is of Caucasian skin tone.
I might do a version like this:
“The hair on Mortimer’s legs exist in inconsistent patches. The patchiness is a result of a habit he’s developed over time where he would twist bunches of leg hair into tiny knots before he violently yanked them out.”
Feel free to steal this, feel freer to use this as an idea of how the end product should look and read. A cheat code I use for writing, of all kinds, is to read the work aloud. It divorces your reading from your mind editing things to your intention—it gives a clearer vision to how someone outside your head would consume the work. It’s the simplest way I’ve found to get a sense on how things flow and sound.
In this, the last sentence: ‘Mortimer is of Caucasian skin tone.’, the sentence reads abrupt and sudden. You spend a significant time in the following paragraph talking about Mortimer’s skin, I would integrate his race into that section or more plainly state his ethnic make-up at the beginning of the appearance if you’d want to integrate it that way. The way you have it now it reads very jarring, sudden and sort of tonally out of left field.
He has a full head of short dark brown hair that he keeps parted on his right, where his eyebrows are bushy. His ears are large that stick outwards, where he also has a set of turquoise blue eyes, along with a straight nose. He has a set of pointy canines in his teeth after two baby teeth had to be pulled, combined with a natural overbite. Due to a poor sleep schedule, he has visible dark circles under his eyes. Due to a high water intake, he remarkably lacks any acne on his face, however his arms are rife with skin tags and bumps. Some acne has appeared beneath his elbows, which some mistreatment has given them the resemblance of needle marks.
This section carries a bit of the issues from the last one in terms of flow and readability. A quick piece of advice I would give is to stick with simple, short sentences. In part to regulate your tone, in part to keep you honest from making grammatical mistakes and getting lost in your own sauce. Once again, read everything aloud and try to stick to every subject matter getting its own individual sentence.
This’ll prevent things like this:
His ears are large that stick outwards, where he also has a set of turquoise blue eyes, along with a straight nose.
This sentence reads in a way that makes it seem that his eyes are coming out of his ears. The sentence itself is also not grammatically correct and could stand some restructuring. ‘His ears are large and stick out from his head’ might be something that reads smoother and closer to your intent. You’re trying to do too much and also doing too little in these sentences. Give each feature its own sentence and spotlight and try to speak as simply and plainly as possible. Simple sentences and periods are your friend.
He has a set of pointy canines in his teeth after two baby teeth had to be pulled, combined with a natural overbite.
Add a slightly before that pointy to prevent him from going full vampire.
I don’t really understand why we don’t have acne on his face but have acne on his skin. Is there a medical condition unrelated to his diet that causes this? I’d remove the diagnosing and just stick to description here; you muddy the waters when the reason can be mostly coincidence in terms of where he gets acne. The point is that the kid has some skin issues but a clear face. This is a spot where research is your friend.Due to a high water intake, he remarkably lacks any acne on his face, however his arms are rife with skin tags and bumps. Some acne has appeared beneath his elbows, which some mistreatment has given them the resemblance of needle marks.
Also, high water should be high-water. High water is what is left in my bong after a Saturday night.
Mortimer prefers to wear shorts and t-shirts, though sometimes he can wear jeans. Typically, Mortimer dresses without much care. He usually grabs the first clean shirt from the top of his clothes drawer and often wears the same pair of shorts every day of the week. Even on days with cold weather, Mortimer wears shorts, though he wears a black sweatshirt on him when he is subjected to low temperatures. On the day of the trip however, he lost his sweatshirt. Overall, Mortimer wore a black cheap leather jacket, a slightly-too-tight Hotline Miami shirt—bright pink and depicting the character Richard—a pair of beige shorts with a brown belt, white socks, and some black Nike shoes.
Simplify, simplify, simplify. You can remove the ‘he can’ before jeans and just go ‘wears’. You get kind of lost in the sweater narrative. If he’s not wearing the sweater on the day of the trip you can just not mention the sweater when describing his trip outfit. A lot of this is same notes as above, reread, simplify, and keep your sentences focused when it comes to subject matter.
Biography
I am not going to go through this paragraph by paragraph and sentence by sentence like I did the appearance because I think that doesn’t err on the side of productivity. Keep in mind, the same type of mistakes you made in the appearance—you made in the biography. You need to re-read and re-write a lot of this to fit better within the parameters of grammar and flow. There are a lot of obvious and silly typos that a word processor might miss but that you should pick up on pretty clearly just by reading the work aloud.
In this, I will focus more of content and logistics and point out grammatical inconsistencies as we come across them. I’d say that the biggest offender grammatically is using either too much words or misusing or missing a word—all of these are solved head-on by reading aloud and making the sentence structure simpler.
Mortimer Schaub was born on February 12th, 2007 to his parents Sharon and Bruce Schaub. He is the younger child of two children in their nuclear family, being 2 years younger than his sister Catherine Schaub. His mother works as a x-ray technician at hospitals around the city, while although Mortimer doesn't officially know his father's true job, he believes that his father stays afloat doing odd jobs with friends and connections, putting the family being able to sustain a middle-class income level. Mortimer was diagnosed as being neurodivergent when he was around a toddler, though Mortimer himself wouldn't fully learn this information and the extent of his disorder until he was finishing up the 7th grade in middle school.
Mortimer and his family were originally born in the state of California at the coastal town of Redondo Beach, but in 2013 at the age of 6, his family officially moved to Las Vegas, due to a job opening from his father at an office building. Mortimer would end up living the rest of his life in the suburbs of Las Vegas, but would come to California again for visiting the grandparents and going to Disneyland or some other tourist attraction.
You need to redo this whole section for flow as said before, but things like “he is the younger child of two children in their nuclear family” make it read like his parents are actually children having children. Simplify, simplify, simplify. In that spirit and more in the realm of content, I don’t really understand what we’re doing with Bruce’s job. Just state directly how he is making money during this period rather than focusing on what Mortimer believes. I presume since he manages to be the reason the family relocated to Vegas that him being an office worker would line up with this goal.
Content wise the following three paragraphs are fine, but you do need to rework them from a grammar and sentence structure standpoint. Simplify the sentences, re-read and re-write.
The only way that Mortimer was usually nearly in-shape was due to the physical education that he was involved in during school, even though he would perform negatively towards the Pacer Test.
What is the Pacer Test? Is it something within the The Presidential Youth Fitness Program? I’m not familiar with this. Can what you’re seeking to accomplish be done by just saying he performed poorly in sports and got bad grades in PE? The devil isn't in these details.
Mortimer would grow up with video games at a young age, starting with a Nintendo Wii U for Christmas in 2014, until he would gain a Playstation 4 a few years later and eventually a X-Box One S when he was in middle school. The latter was brought later on, since Mortimer would hear negative word of mouth from his peers of how criticized the original XBox One was, due to the usage of Kinect. Mortimer's first games were exclusively made by Nintendo, such as Splatoon, Super Mario 3D World, and Smash for the Wii U. Later, he would get the opportunity to play on the other consoles that he was gifted, playing games such as Marvel's Spider-Man and Cuphead. As he grew older, he ended up drifting away from console gaming and secluding himself into PC only gaming. He would become a a fan of gory and/or violent video games, such as Hotline Miami 2, Postal 2, Left 4 Dead, and Hitman.
This whole paragraph is redundant and needless, we don’t need to go through an entire lineage of every console that they’ve owned. Mention the first game and then mention Mortimer’s favorite genres and two to three current games they play. We can get the idea without getting into the minutiae.
His start into middle school was unfortunately different from how Mortimer would imagine. Rather than a tight-knitted community where he was able to know his classmates, he was subjected to a multi-class system, being forced to stay productive. He was looked down upon by 8th graders, when he had began to start middle school in the 6th grade. It was enough to make him frustrated towards the older kids at school, especially since they ridiculed him for his lack of athletic talent in physical education. Not helping matters was due to the environment being full of other students, who were prone to engage in harassment and bullying, Mortimer kept a low profile, since he saw himself as a target for their shenanigans. His need for isolation to avoid being picked on and his view of the older kids looking down on him in his school led to him developing an introvert status.
We’re going to need both narrative and actual clarity here. The story makes it seem like he’s in class with eighth graders consistently from sixth grade and that doesn’t really line up with how middle school often is. Furthermore, the bullying and harassment seems to be handled very casually and endemic of the school itself, but also at the same time is framed personally. This creates a situation that feels systemic but functions purely to make Mortimer awkward and isolated which is something his disability and neurodivergence accomplish narratively already. We’re kind of lost in the sauce here again. Simplify this and get to the core of what you’re trying to get out of it narratively. Simplify it and say what you intend to say plainly when it comes to sentence structure. Complexity is a cancer to clarity here.
In 2020, Mortimer was forced to be moved to online teaching for his 8th year of middle school, due to the pandemic. Mortimer didn't see it as a difficult transition, since he already struggled with gaining friends in middle school.
However, during that same year in summer of 2020, his parents divorced. His parents' marriage was already straining when he began to start middle school, mostly from personal conflicts with one another, but it reached it's tipping point 2 years later with a heavy verbal argument heard by both Mortimer and Catherine. The divorce made him feel more isolated and even disillusioned with his sense of innocence being gone, since his idea that his family would stay together in harmony was proved wrong. Due to arrangements with his mother being more supportive and in charge of his education, him and Catherine would live in a different apartment, while he would usually visit his father every weekend for lunch or for 4th of July. He did see his father being somewhat manipulative, however he still respected him, along with respecting his mother, since she helped him throughout his life.
This is a bit of a weird structural thing. The previous paragraph being only two sentences and Mortimer’s parents getting divorced during the pandemic makes me think that we could structure this differently. Perhaps give a paragraph to the pandemic and the home situation then another paragraph taking in the result of the divorce and Mortimer’s living situation. Remember, remember, simple sentences and singularly focused subject matter.
The paragraph discussing Eric Andre, Xavier and Brendan Rogers can be structured differently and reads a bit of a listing. I do not know what you gain from specificity given on a timeline like this. Give us why Mortimer enjoys this type of comedy and then give examples, we do not need each example introduced and explained as if they were characters in the biography themselves.
I also do think that narratively, structurally and character wise we have a bit of an issue where a character’s parents’ divorce is given essentially the same amount of time and attention and affect as their Wii U. That’s not wrong per se, but it is something you might want to consider for what it implies about Mortimer. We have a throwaway line about Mortimer considering his father ‘manipulative’, maybe dig into the vein for some specificity and I think there is some narrative and RP gas there.
Mortimer would attend his high school physically after the pandemic, though during his freshmen years, he still wore a mask in concerns of COVID. It was when he began to try to look for actual friends, while trying to take advantage with what social opportunities that high school now posed to him. The batch of friends that he ended up with were part of a group of youths his age that were video-game interested. They were on the lines of misfits, since they were given a bad rap from others, mostly for their heavy specific gaming interests and commonly being in trouble with the local school staff. For Mortimer, he finally had a place at a table.
Mortimer's interactions with the group had gotten wind by his teachers and parents, who knew of the group's reputation, causing them to question Mortimer's judgment and how it could affect his relationship with other kids. Wanting to set the record straight and being sick at how he was being misunderstood, Mortimer declared it was the first time that he actually felt comfortable, noting that he felt happy for once. His parents and teachers didn't fight back, though Mortimer still wanted to get on their good side by continuing to do his academic work the best he could. His relationship with his parents was unchanged, though his teachers were still cautious. His new group of friends were more or less indifferent to Mortimer's situation and simply allowed him in.
I also don’t know what we want or are saying narratively here in terms of the friend group and response from the school. You need to rewrite this for more clarity and plainly state the intended goal and consequence here. I don’t think that a school would let someone to continue getting in trouble with staff just because it was the first time they felt accepted. What about the staff? You need to find out what you want to say here and say it better because as is it’s left me with more confusion than certainty. The story you've presented doesn't pass the plausibility sense even in the most kind interpretation.
Since it was high school, he was exposed more to mature content from online and his fellow peers. He started browsing websites and videos that suited his interests in horror and horror literature, though he would later be encouraged by himself to look up more uncomfortable mentions, such as controversial movies and Wikipedia articles covering graphic topics out of curiosity and boredom.
What type of content do we mean here? What methods does he go for his parents or the school itself to not find out about this interest and activity? How does he explain it? You might want to cut this out if it gets too far beyond enjoying true crime documentaries.
Around his sophomore years, a website would gain his interest that would allow him to world build and be involved in roleplaying with other people called NationStates. While the site was made to be primarily to be in-character for the nation that one would make, the site also introduced a "Portal to the Multiverse" option, where Mortimer was able to play and sign up for non-nation related roleplaying, which is where he would gain his first experiences in being involved in roleplaying with others online. He would go on to make his own nation with a story, which he sums up as being an "anime version of the SCP foundation", however he kept this nation to himself and not to his friends. He would also have two other puppet nations he would create for the plans of two other self-writing projects, so he can world build with two other primary stories.
This isn’t even really mentioned in the Hobbies & Interests but we end up with a whole paragraph for it which doesn’t make sense structurally or narratively. I think you can either cut this or at the very least if it’s worth this paragraph make it worth noting in the Hobbies & Interests.
Mortimer does have the habit from time to time to dabble in different fandoms and other popular media that become of interest in him. He would be interested in the game series of Danganronpa, favoring the third game and even using some of the characters as placeholders for characters back in his first NationStates world. He played Dead by Daylight, mostly as a killer main, unfortunately he would become annoyed, due to the perceived notion that the game was being unfair to those playing in the "killer" role, based to recent patches that negatively affect playable characters. Not wanting to admit it directly and avoiding the topic, he does have an interest in the Five Nights at Freddy's franchise, after the introduction of FNAF: Security Breach, based solely on what Mortimer deemed to be wasted potential in the game, which he would write alternative scenarios privately online. Currently, due to the involvement of his idol Brandon Rogers, he watches episodes of Helluva Boss, where he even had received a Christmas gift from his sister, who provided him an autograph from the celebrity that Mortimer put in a frame. While Mortimer is also interested in Hazbin Hotel and is awaiting more content from it, he also has been watching other web animation, such as Murder Drones and The Amazing Digital Circus.
Needless information that sort of provides confusion and divorces from clarity due to over-detail. We can really make these two paragraphs about Five Nights and NationSates into two sentences. This does not aid in characterizing Mortimer aside from functioning as a list. Keep this in mind for yourself and your own narrative aesthetics, it does not need this much detail in a profile.
Don’t forget: simplify, simplify, simplify. Simple sentence structure, linear narrative, plain-spoken prose. Those should be your guiding lights and main missions in editing this profile.
One of the things that Mortimer tends to think less about himself is his sexuality, however he considers himself heterosexual, feeling comfortable towards women. Currently, Mortimer lacks a proper girlfriend and is considered a virgin, though he keeps believing that he is able to still gain one through other means outside of school. He has became aware that he is sexually interested in viewing or writing up queer romances, even if he's straight. Mortimer would keep his vices in terms of drawn sexual pornography private and to himself, having some maturity.
TMI.
We don’t get anything narratively from this run-down of Mortimer’s sexual proclivities and history and in fact it creates a bit of a level of discomfort in the reading. I would cut this paragraph in its current state. If Mortimer’s relationship with his virginity and pornography is such that it merits mentioning in the profile and given narrative weight, you need to be a bit more clinical and respectful in that you’re discussing a high schooler. Is the juice worth the squeeze here? It reads tonally inconsistent with the rest of his character and completely out of left field. To go down this specific route would require almost a complete reorienting and different presentation of Mortimer thus far. I don't think that's your goal here.
Whole section needs to be cut or revised. Think about more what you’re trying to say with this than saying this specifically.
While he can be seen as irritable and abrasive for preferring to go a route that he chooses over others, along with being easily annoyed when things do not go his way, he still does care for his friends and family. He is viewed as indifferent towards others and their plights, due to acting unsupportive from supposed emotional context, despite actually being meaningful in wanting to help others and their problems that he believes he can solve or give advice to. He tends to view himself as a victim of circumstance in situations where he's unable to explain himself properly, usually when issues arise that he forgets or come out of nowhere, even ones where he finds himself being the one in blame, usually when he sees himself as not being purposely in the wrong.
Long sentences, complex ideas, a reader that is ultimately left a little confused. You need to simplify this and speak with a plainer vocabulary. This is three sentences and probably needs to be six. It’s a lot of context without a lot of content. This should be cut or changed completely.
The relationship with his family has still been positive, since he's mostly trying to stay on his parents and sister's good terms. His grandparents, who are on his mother's side of the family, are visited by Mortimer, Catherine, and their mother usually a couple times of the year to stay over in their house for holidays. He has a decent amount of friends who share his same interests and can tolerate his sense of humor and bleak views. He does struggle in making new friends, since he is socially awkward, taking a larger period of time to socialize with those unfamiliar to him. He is seen to be polarizing from the majority of the student body for his personality and antics, giving him a checkered reputation.
This runs in counter to him considering his father manipulative, you might want to separate his feelings on his family and friends as two separate paragraphs and give more context to his paternal relationship. Focus on a singular subject for each sentence and a singular connected idea for each paragraph. Simplicity is the road to clarity here, you will ultimately say more as you figure out how to say it with less. The content in here is for the most part fine, it just can be structured to focus on clarity more primarily and tonally to be made much simpler.
Mortimer tries to distance himself from any political talk or discussion and against cancel culture whenever possible. He is given the perception that the political system is hypocritical and corrupt, due to heavy disillusion towards the overly-politicization on his favorite types of media, along with Mortimer viewing that politicians exploit their power and wealth to cater towards the elite and not everyday people like him. Despite this, some others in his friend group, even his own mother after a small argument, can consider him a socialistic anarchist. Realistically from Mortimer's standpoint and view, he sees himself as a slightly left wing to centrist, despite a lack of commitment to politics. The claims of his so-called socialist anarchism was due to him voicing support for a governor candidate who advocated for free healthcare, which Mortimer felt was blown up to proportion. He will still get mad in some rare cases, though mostly hypothetically, if someone calls him a tankie or an alt-right goon.
A lot of this is fine, but it needs to be rewritten to be better in terms of flow and grammar. We get into a hyper specific political example with a specific politician but don’t get the politician's name. We dance a bit between too much information and too little detail. If this is about Mortimer’s political views, make it about Mortimer’s political views. Where did the social anarchism come from? If he was so moved by a campaign so as to take on it as a political identity, give it mention and name. If this ends up requiring splitting things up in two paragraphs? Well, hey, that’s still free! The important thing here is clarity. And clarity can be found in concision.
Currently, since college is on the horizon, he is left to debate on his major, since he wants to get a degree in computer engineering to make his own video games. However, the problem is that he lacks the passion for doing so and that he had never expressed and committed to any actual programming skills during his youth. The original major was simply due to his favorite hobby of video games, but overall he lacked any official skill in computer programming. His mother already planned on him going to a community college, which had became a bit of a family tradition, since it was where his mother and sister went to get their degrees. He does want a job that he can join a good salary, however he is harassed with the recommendation of joining Amazon from his own mother and later his father, when his ex-wife had him try to get Mortimer to look into the alternative, which immediately became a pet peeve of Mortimer when it was repeatedly mentioned and forced onto him. Not helping matters for Mortimer was that he had an extremely negative view of Jeff Bezos, being aware of worker's mistreatment and bad conditions occurring in the company. He is beginning to see the appeal of getting himself an English major, since he found he has more passion in online writing, so he can get himself a presentable degree for either a librarian or technical writer job.
I’d split up the collegiate ambitions and plans with the working stuff and I’d cut out the Jeff Bezos opinions. It reads as tonally dissonant and inconsistent and is sort of the type of thing that’d be better suited to bring up as a character beat in the RP than in the profile itself. Otherwise just the regular prognosis of simplify and restructure with clarity as a north star.
To reward Mortimer for his future graduation from high school, he is intended to go on vacation to Japan with his mother and sister. However, due to a health scare from his grandparents, his mother considered cancelling the trip briefly, so that it can be scheduled after Mortimer's first quarter in community college. As a result, she had caved in onto the idea of Mortimer taking the school trip instead, mostly due to Mortimer wanting one more splurge with his friends before they graduate, despite being incredibly aware of the danger involved from SOTF.
I like this character beat, but the paragraph can be made a bit smoother. Simple sentences and periods. At this point, I hope you get the picture.
Advantages & Disadvantages
For the advantages, you don’t really give us any and instead simply tell us about how Mortimer views himself (which we know may not be rooted in reality or with humbleness as a virtue). Give us the strength of Mortimer’s character and his skills, not as he sees them, but how he’s achieved them. Simplicity is your friend here as it is throughout. Disconnect yourself from the character's shoes and look at him with a bird's eye view.
For disadvantages you need to instead of going into how things might go wrong, state Mortimer’s weaknesses plainly and clearly. If his strength is his cunning, his weakness might be his overconfidence etc. If his strength is in his mind, his weakness might be in his physicality. This yin-yang and balance should be your guide here. Focus on plainly stating the character’s pluses and minuses in simple sentences.
And that’s all for this round! I know that this is a lot and can seem overwhelming, but your issues lie more in structure and form than in content. That means that these are relatively easy fixes even if they are fixes that have to be repeated throughout. If you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to reach me via smoke signal, messenger pigeon or Discord DM. You’ll have the most success with the last one.
Thank you for your patience and happy editing! When you're done with the edits post in here and I'll give Mortimer another look!
I have edited once again. I think I'm going into the right path here.
Hey DeBlod! Mortimer is looking and reading much better and so thank you for your hard work.
I will say, before I begin, that there are still a lot of little grammar mistakes and somethings that I asked for in the previous round that are still present. Breathe. Take your time. Do your edits, eat a snack and take a break—and then edit your edits. It’s not a race and the more we knock out at this stage, the quicker you can get approved when it comes to island time.
Patience is both power and a virtue in the profile stage, trust me.
With that said, let’s get to cracking on Mortimer Round 2.
Hobbies & Interests
This is good and seems fine. Nice job.
Appearance
A tiny thing, but we’re going to want to write his weight as ‘185 lbs.’ with a space and period.
Aside from these things, the appearance looks much improved and went down much easier. We’re starting to see some sizzle in my steak metaphor.
Biography
We still have more questions than answers with Bruce’s jobs. What kind of odd jobs? Why are they so well-paid? It’s making it seem like he’s doing drug-runs or working for the mafia a little bit and I’d imagine you’d’ve given me more detail if that’s the intention. Let’s scrap the odd-jobs phrasing and say that he was doing freelance work largely in stuff like maintenance, sales and hospitality. I think that’s more the vibe you’re going for, but if I’m wrong, we can continue to hash it out. I think getting so hung up in the specifics of Bruce’s employment is a trap and a pitfall, pick at the very least an industry for him to be doing odd jobs in and let’s put a label on his work. How would it be captioned if he went on a reality TV show?
I get what you’re trying to say here, but we get kind of lost in the specific dates and critiques going year by year. How did Mortimer improve his grades here? We talk about him being “forced to improve” but don’t get into how he improved or why teachers critiquing him would make him want to be a teacher’s pet. We’re putting details in the wrong space here, let’s view and write his elementary education from a macro-perspective and get into either the teacher that invested time in him or the stuff his parents did to help foster (or force) this academic improvement. This is a piece of steak where you can do a bit of trimming.
It's cool that we get this, but this is functioning more as a listing of genres and artists than actual character development. The important thing here is not that Mortimer likes these artists—it’s what music means to him and how it serves as a vehicle to connect with his family and then with himself. Focus less on the music itself and more on what it means for Mortimer. He is the sun and, in this profile, we want to see his planets—these notes on emo and pop-punk barely qualify as asteroids. Cut this or change what you’re trying to say with it.
This is a fun-fact but we don’t get anything narratively out of this and it inspires no lifestyle or character change in Mortimer. Save this for something to mention in passing in a post when it becomes obvious Mort is gonna die at 18—it don’t need to be here in the profile. This sentence is also grammatically all over the place and changes tense a bunch. I’d just cut it completely.
Similar note as above, this is fun-fact stuff, but it doesn’t contribute anything to the character or profile in this space. We know about his acne from the appearance, we don’t need this here. Cut it.
This sentence works, but this is a place where we need to get into why. Why does Mortimer struggle and dislike physical activity? Build this paragraph and thought process out as I think this is a keyway in which you view and have characterized Mort. His lack of physicality and disdain from physical activity runs against expectations and is a bit of a personal identifier—let’s talk about that here. Remember, simple and clean sentences!
You can combine these paragraphs, it’s all about Mort reading and specifically reading horror. This was a good way to integrate genre and specific works. Notice how there’s only one or two of each example and it’s not said so much in a list format? That’s the way you should be doing it in other places within the biography. It’s about what it means for Mort—a way of feeling at home within his own home, a way of confronting and embracing his own weird and wonderfulness. Think about what you get by introducing specifics and be utilitarian with it and with your narrative in mind.
Similar to the music section, this reads too much like a list and is too many games. Focus on what games mean to Mort and why he likes the games that he likes, save the individual games to be mentioned and referenced in the narrative outside of the profile. I would probably cut this paragraph in half and use it as a lead-in and transition to the next paragraph talking about Actual Plays. It’s obvious that the intention is that video games are Mort’s connection to the internet as he gets into internet culture by watching Actual Plays and gaming streams.
This paragraph is fine content wise, but it requires still a bit of fat trimming. There’s a lot of using two words when one word would suffice and that inflates the sentence structure and makes things needlessly confusing. Stuff like changing ‘would imagine’ to ‘imagined’, ‘some of which would begin to look down upon him’ to ‘some who looked down upon him’. Simplify, simplify, simplify!
Similar note here. Simplify the sentences and make sure you stick to your tenses. Stuff like changing ‘proved wrong’ to ‘proven wrong’, ‘was already straining’ to ‘was already strained’. Read the work aloud and slow your mental editor down so as to gain a sense of how the profile truly reads.
Freshman year is just one year if you do it right (and from what we got, Mortimer did it right).
I still don’t really understand what is going on with this friend group. Are they edgelords and gamer geeks or are they delinquents? I don’t know what we get from this character beat because we ultimately end up at the same spot where we began. Why don’t we just say that his parents were uncomfortable by his friend group’s humor but were cautiously okay with it because of Mortimer’s happiness. I don’t think we’re communicating or getting what we need narratively from this in making it more complicated or high stakes than that. I don’t think you need Mortimer setting the record straight as a narrative beat or dramatic moment, just discuss his friend group and how his parents/teachers view his role within it.
We can’t really just get away with ‘graphic topics’—what kind of topics is Mortimer looking up? What kind of movies? Why aren’t the teachers telling his parents if they know?
This is good in terms of combining the interests and word economy, but I think we’re still getting more into listing things as opposed to saying why Mortimer enjoys the things. It makes it read a bit more like a quilt rather than a tapestry of Mort. Focus less on listing specific media and more talking about why Mort enjoys the kind of media he enjoys, then providing examples.
This is a very long paragraph, but I think there’s a lot of fat you can trim here and words/sentences you can reorient. Focus on it reading succinct and smooth. Describe Mort’s personality from a macro-umbrella perspective rather than getting specifically into how he reacts to a specific condition. This paragraph is about 142 words and I think you should try to say what you want to say in around 100 here. Get to the core of Mort’s core and why. As you’ve laid out the profile currently, this paragraph is an opportunity for personality thesis and that’ll be a good thing for you to go-back to as you write and develop Mortimer.
On that note, in my effort to refine and condense this paragraph, I’d prolly look to combine it with this paragraph…
I think that’ll read structurally better and also make your point and illustration of Mortimer clearer.
These two paragraphs can similarly be reduced, refined, and then combined. You’re saying the same thing and addressing the same stuff here, you don’t really need to say it all twice.
Reads a bit choppy and long. I’d probably bring that sentence about his mother wanting him to go to college down here and combine it with this paragraph. As it reads, we go from “Will Mort go to college?” to “Mort is debating his major”. I think there’s gas here and more characterization to be explored in Mortimer’s desire and passion vs his execution and effort. That’s what I think is the most interesting part of this Engineering saga and what I think your writing time would be best invested in.
Paragraph needs to be cleaned up a bit for grammar and tense, stuff like ‘mother decides’ to ‘mother decided’. I would keep the beat of Mortimer wanting to spend time with his friends before they graduate but cut out the specific mention of SOTF. We know what website we’re on and as it stands the ending readys sort of clunky and too on the nose.
Advantages and Disadvantages
We’re still not really writing this as we should or saying what we need.
This should be a summation of the character we’ve gotten thus far, a bird’s eye view of the character profile. I’ll give you an example I wrote and then an idea for how I see Mortimer’s advantages/disadvantages.
‘Mortimer is a crafty individual capable of improvising with his back against the wall. His general size and off-putting demeanor could serve as a potential defense as he may be viewed by some as more trouble than he’s worth.’
Similarly here is a Disadvantages that I wrote…
Address these concerns and I’ll give Mortimer another look.
Best of luck and happy editing!
I will say, before I begin, that there are still a lot of little grammar mistakes and somethings that I asked for in the previous round that are still present. Breathe. Take your time. Do your edits, eat a snack and take a break—and then edit your edits. It’s not a race and the more we knock out at this stage, the quicker you can get approved when it comes to island time.
Patience is both power and a virtue in the profile stage, trust me.
With that said, let’s get to cracking on Mortimer Round 2.
Hobbies & Interests
This is good and seems fine. Nice job.
Appearance
This is still soft-GMing. This is Mortimer’s profile—stick to describing Mortimer. Something like this: “The most notable thing about Mortimer Schaub is his height, a tall 6’4”.” If you notice, we say everything you said in 13 words versus 22 AND we no longer are saying anything about anybody else. Think of editing this like trimming fat off a steak, we want the most effortless and enjoyable reading experience as we can get. I imagine if you were to go sentence by sentence in this profile, you could refine and trim off a little fat off every other one. You don’t have to do that much, but it’s something to consider when you’re going through Mortimer again.The most notable thing about Mortimer Schaub is his height: at 6'4", he is one of the tallest students in the school.
A tiny thing, but we’re going to want to write his weight as ‘185 lbs.’ with a space and period.
Aside from these things, the appearance looks much improved and went down much easier. We’re starting to see some sizzle in my steak metaphor.
Biography
We still have more questions than answers with Bruce’s jobs. What kind of odd jobs? Why are they so well-paid? It’s making it seem like he’s doing drug-runs or working for the mafia a little bit and I’d imagine you’d’ve given me more detail if that’s the intention. Let’s scrap the odd-jobs phrasing and say that he was doing freelance work largely in stuff like maintenance, sales and hospitality. I think that’s more the vibe you’re going for, but if I’m wrong, we can continue to hash it out. I think getting so hung up in the specifics of Bruce’s employment is a trap and a pitfall, pick at the very least an industry for him to be doing odd jobs in and let’s put a label on his work. How would it be captioned if he went on a reality TV show?
Mortimer did suffer academically at first with his grades, since he struggled in certain types of questions relating to math and close reading, though he would be forced to improve. For his first 3 years in elementary school, he originally had no issue, however, his teachers in his later years of 4th and 5th grade would be critical of his negative academic performance. The expectations from others, including his teachers and parents would be what would enforce a teacher's pet mentality since he would carve in towards his academic expectations.
I get what you’re trying to say here, but we get kind of lost in the specific dates and critiques going year by year. How did Mortimer improve his grades here? We talk about him being “forced to improve” but don’t get into how he improved or why teachers critiquing him would make him want to be a teacher’s pet. We’re putting details in the wrong space here, let’s view and write his elementary education from a macro-perspective and get into either the teacher that invested time in him or the stuff his parents did to help foster (or force) this academic improvement. This is a piece of steak where you can do a bit of trimming.
When he was young, his parents, who were listeners of old-school music, such as the Beach Boys and the Grateful Dead, introduced him to the music of the Beatles, since the band was popular during their childhoods. Mortimer would enjoy the classical tunes of the Beatles, even having childhood nostalgia towards a rented copy of the animated movie Yellow Submarine. His music range expanded to unprecedented levels when he grew up throughout the years, tackling everything from indie music to progressive music to synthwave to even avant-garde. Keeping up with him being in high school, he does listen to emo and pop punk music, suiting his new mature tastes.
It's cool that we get this, but this is functioning more as a listing of genres and artists than actual character development. The important thing here is not that Mortimer likes these artists—it’s what music means to him and how it serves as a vehicle to connect with his family and then with himself. Focus less on the music itself and more on what it means for Mortimer. He is the sun and, in this profile, we want to see his planets—these notes on emo and pop-punk barely qualify as asteroids. Cut this or change what you’re trying to say with it.
At the age of 6, his parents were concerned that he could be at risk of becoming a diabetic at the age of 21. Mortimer was usually a picky eater, along with the fact that he was consuming more fast and junk food, along with carbohydrates. However, these were simply health concerns, since Mortimer's health would remain relatively the same.
This is a fun-fact but we don’t get anything narratively out of this and it inspires no lifestyle or character change in Mortimer. Save this for something to mention in passing in a post when it becomes obvious Mort is gonna die at 18—it don’t need to be here in the profile. This sentence is also grammatically all over the place and changes tense a bunch. I’d just cut it completely.
Mortimer has been drinking more water than a normal human being, which managed to lend him help break out from acne facially, though he was still prone to traditional acne on his arms as he approached puberty.
Similar note as above, this is fun-fact stuff, but it doesn’t contribute anything to the character or profile in this space. We know about his acne from the appearance, we don’t need this here. Cut it.
The only way that Mortimer was usually nearly in shape was due to the physical education that he was involved in during school, even though he would perform negatively and struggle during PE.
This sentence works, but this is a place where we need to get into why. Why does Mortimer struggle and dislike physical activity? Build this paragraph and thought process out as I think this is a keyway in which you view and have characterized Mort. His lack of physicality and disdain from physical activity runs against expectations and is a bit of a personal identifier—let’s talk about that here. Remember, simple and clean sentences!
His other hobby began when he was introduced to reading while at school. While he only attended his elementary school library for book fairs, he became interested in the books that were at his family house, which ranged from cookbooks, books on nature and animals, and even copies of standard history books for miscellaneous topics. His school library had old copies of Goosebumps books, which would be one of his first favorite books to read.
In particular, Mortimer loved books that explored the weird and wonderful; as someone who viewed himself as outside of the ordinary, he saw himself in them. Soon, he became an avid reader and collector of books. His favorites are the horror genre—typified by the Goosebumps Horrorland series—and catalogs of the abnormal and extraordinary, such as annuals like Guinness World Records and Ripley's Believe It or Not!
You can combine these paragraphs, it’s all about Mort reading and specifically reading horror. This was a good way to integrate genre and specific works. Notice how there’s only one or two of each example and it’s not said so much in a list format? That’s the way you should be doing it in other places within the biography. It’s about what it means for Mort—a way of feeling at home within his own home, a way of confronting and embracing his own weird and wonderfulness. Think about what you get by introducing specifics and be utilitarian with it and with your narrative in mind.
Mortimer grew up with video games at a young age, starting with his first video game console Nintendo Wii U for Christmas in 2014. Mortimer's first games were exclusively made by Nintendo, such as Super Mario 3D World and other games that were licensed by Nintendo. Later, he would get the opportunity to play on different consoles that he was gifted, playing games such as Marvel's Spider-Man and Cuphead. As he grew older, he ended up drifting away from console gaming and secluding himself into PC-only gaming. He would become a fan of gory and/or violent video games, his usual genre of games to play expanding to mature experiences, such as Hotline Miami 2 and Postal 2.
Similar to the music section, this reads too much like a list and is too many games. Focus on what games mean to Mort and why he likes the games that he likes, save the individual games to be mentioned and referenced in the narrative outside of the profile. I would probably cut this paragraph in half and use it as a lead-in and transition to the next paragraph talking about Actual Plays. It’s obvious that the intention is that video games are Mort’s connection to the internet as he gets into internet culture by watching Actual Plays and gaming streams.
His start into middle school was unfortunately different from how Mortimer would imagine. Rather than a tight-knit community where he was able to know his classmates and be taught in one single classroom, he was subjected to a multi-class system, being forced to stay productive. Some of these classes would have him working alongside 8th graders, some of which would begin to look down upon him when he started middle school. It was enough to make him frustrated with the older kids at school, especially since they ridiculed him for his lack of athletic talent in physical education. Mortimer felt that his middle school was full of other students, who were prone to engage in harassment and bullying, leading to him keeping a low profile since he saw himself as a target for their shenanigans. His need for isolation to avoid being picked on and his view of the older kids looking down on him in his school led to him developing an introverted status.
This paragraph is fine content wise, but it requires still a bit of fat trimming. There’s a lot of using two words when one word would suffice and that inflates the sentence structure and makes things needlessly confusing. Stuff like changing ‘would imagine’ to ‘imagined’, ‘some of which would begin to look down upon him’ to ‘some who looked down upon him’. Simplify, simplify, simplify!
However, during that same year in the summer of 2020, his parents divorced. His parents' marriage was already straining when he began to start middle school, mostly from personal conflicts with one another, but it reached its tipping point 2 years later with a heavy verbal argument heard by both Mortimer and Catherine. The divorce made him feel more isolated and even disillusioned with his sense of innocence being gone since his idea that his family would stay together in harmony was proved wrong. Due to arrangements with his mother being more supportive and in charge of his education, he and Catherine would live in a different apartment, while he would usually visit his father every weekend for lunch or for the 4th of July. He did see his father being somewhat manipulative, however, he still respected him, along with respecting his mother, since she helped him throughout his life. Despite this, the divorce has given him some emotional strain and discomfort.
Similar note here. Simplify the sentences and make sure you stick to your tenses. Stuff like changing ‘proved wrong’ to ‘proven wrong’, ‘was already straining’ to ‘was already strained’. Read the work aloud and slow your mental editor down so as to gain a sense of how the profile truly reads.
Mortimer would attend his high school physically after the pandemic, though during his freshmen years, he still wore a mask in concerns of COVID.
Freshman year is just one year if you do it right (and from what we got, Mortimer did it right).
Mortimer's interactions with the group had gotten winded by his teachers and parents, who knew of the group's reputation, causing them to question Mortimer's judgment and how it could affect his relationship with other kids. Wanting to set the record straight and being sick at how he was being misunderstood, Mortimer declared it was the first time that he felt comfortable, noting that he felt happy for once. His parents and teachers were cautious since they wanted Mortimer to not end up becoming a delinquent, though he still wanted to get on their good side by continuing to do his academic work the best he could. His relationship with his parents was unchanged, though his teachers were still hesitant. His new group of friends were more or less indifferent to Mortimer's situation and simply allowed him in.
I still don’t really understand what is going on with this friend group. Are they edgelords and gamer geeks or are they delinquents? I don’t know what we get from this character beat because we ultimately end up at the same spot where we began. Why don’t we just say that his parents were uncomfortable by his friend group’s humor but were cautiously okay with it because of Mortimer’s happiness. I don’t think we’re communicating or getting what we need narratively from this in making it more complicated or high stakes than that. I don’t think you need Mortimer setting the record straight as a narrative beat or dramatic moment, just discuss his friend group and how his parents/teachers view his role within it.
Since it was high school, he was exposed more to mature content from online and his peers. He started browsing websites and videos that suited his interests in horror and horror literature, though he would later be encouraged by himself to look up more uncomfortable mentions, such as controversial movies and Wikipedia articles covering graphic topics out of curiosity and boredom. His parents generally don't check his internet history to know what kind of information he would look up. His teachers are semi-aware of his knowledge of graphic topics, however Mortimer would make excuses that this was related to his interests in horror and his style of preferred comedy.
We can’t really just get away with ‘graphic topics’—what kind of topics is Mortimer looking up? What kind of movies? Why aren’t the teachers telling his parents if they know?
Mortimer does have the habit from time to time to dabble in different fandoms and other popular media that become of interest to him. He would use the website of Nationstates to engage in roleplaying, including using characters from existing franchises as placeholders for his own stories on the shite. Not wanting to admit it directly and avoiding the topic, he does have an interest in the Five Nights at Freddy's franchise, after the introduction of FNAF: Security Breach, based solely on what Mortimer deemed to be wasted potential in the game, which he would write alternative scenarios privately online. Currently, due to the involvement of his idol Brandon Rogers, he watches episodes of Helluva Boss, where he even received a Christmas gift from his sister, who provided him an autograph from the celebrity that Mortimer put in a frame. While Mortimer is also interested in Hazbin Hotel and is awaiting more content from it, he also has been watching other web animations, such as Murder Drones and The Amazing Digital Circus.
This is good in terms of combining the interests and word economy, but I think we’re still getting more into listing things as opposed to saying why Mortimer enjoys the things. It makes it read a bit more like a quilt rather than a tapestry of Mort. Focus less on listing specific media and more talking about why Mort enjoys the kind of media he enjoys, then providing examples.
He can be seen as irritable and abrasive for preferring to go a route that he chooses over others, along with being easily annoyed when things do not go his way. However, he still does care for his friends and family. He is viewed as indifferent towards others and their plights, due to acting unsupportive from supposed emotional context. From his perspective, he wishes to be meaningful in wanting to help others and their problems that he believes he can solve or give advice to. He tends to view himself as a victim of circumstance in situations where he's unable to explain himself properly. This happens usually when issues arise that he forgets or come out of nowhere, even ones where he finds himself being the one to blame. Whenever this occurs, he sees himself as not being purposely in the wrong.
This is a very long paragraph, but I think there’s a lot of fat you can trim here and words/sentences you can reorient. Focus on it reading succinct and smooth. Describe Mort’s personality from a macro-umbrella perspective rather than getting specifically into how he reacts to a specific condition. This paragraph is about 142 words and I think you should try to say what you want to say in around 100 here. Get to the core of Mort’s core and why. As you’ve laid out the profile currently, this paragraph is an opportunity for personality thesis and that’ll be a good thing for you to go-back to as you write and develop Mortimer.
On that note, in my effort to refine and condense this paragraph, I’d prolly look to combine it with this paragraph…
He has a decent amount of friends who share the same interests and can tolerate his sense of humor and bleak views. He does struggle in making new friends, since he is socially awkward, taking a longer period to socialize with those unfamiliar to him. He is seen to be polarizing by the majority of the student body for his personality and antics, giving him a checkered reputation.
I think that’ll read structurally better and also make your point and illustration of Mortimer clearer.
Mortimer tries to distance himself from any political talk or discussion and is against cancel culture whenever possible. He is given the perception that the political system is hypocritical and corrupt, due to heavy disillusion towards the overly-politicization of his favorite types of media. This is also added that Mortimer views that politicians exploit their power and wealth to cater towards the elite and not everyday people like him. Despite this, some others in his friend group, even his mother after a small argument, can consider him a socialistic anarchist. This claim was due to him attending a voting session and voting for a gubernatorial candidate. The candidate in question was someone who advocated for free healthcare and valued the working class.
Realistically from Mortimer's standpoint and view, he sees himself as a slightly left-wing to centrist, despite a lack of commitment to politics. There are supposed claims that Mortimer supports radical political figures, but he believes that this all stems from his private political views that have been blown out of proportion. He will still get mad in some rare cases, though mostly hypothetically if someone accuses him of supporting far-left or far-right views and figures.
These two paragraphs can similarly be reduced, refined, and then combined. You’re saying the same thing and addressing the same stuff here, you don’t really need to say it all twice.
Currently, since college is on the horizon, he is left to debate on his major, since he wants to get a degree in computer engineering to make his video games. However, the problem is that he lacks the passion for doing so and that he had never expressed and committed to any actual programming skills during his youth. The original major was simply due to his favorite hobby of video games, but overall he lacked any official skill in computer programming. His mother already planned on him going to a community college, which had become a bit of a family tradition, since it was where his mother and sister went to get their degrees.
Reads a bit choppy and long. I’d probably bring that sentence about his mother wanting him to go to college down here and combine it with this paragraph. As it reads, we go from “Will Mort go to college?” to “Mort is debating his major”. I think there’s gas here and more characterization to be explored in Mortimer’s desire and passion vs his execution and effort. That’s what I think is the most interesting part of this Engineering saga and what I think your writing time would be best invested in.
To reward Mortimer for his future graduation from high school, he intends to go on vacation to Japan with his mother and sister. However, due to a health scare from his grandparents, his mother considered canceling the trip briefly. His mother decides to have the trip scheduled after Mortimer's first quarter in community college. As a result, she had caved into the idea of Mortimer taking the school trip instead. This is mostly due to Mortimer wanting one more splurge with his friends before they graduate, despite being incredibly aware of the danger involved from SOTF.
Paragraph needs to be cleaned up a bit for grammar and tense, stuff like ‘mother decides’ to ‘mother decided’. I would keep the beat of Mortimer wanting to spend time with his friends before they graduate but cut out the specific mention of SOTF. We know what website we’re on and as it stands the ending readys sort of clunky and too on the nose.
Advantages and Disadvantages
We’re still not really writing this as we should or saying what we need.
This should be a summation of the character we’ve gotten thus far, a bird’s eye view of the character profile. I’ll give you an example I wrote and then an idea for how I see Mortimer’s advantages/disadvantages.
An example you might use is like this…Richard is someone with a surprising amount of athleticism and with a deceptive amount of speed for his weight and a surprising amount of muscle for his height. His mental make-up and propensity towards tenacity along with his competitive drive could also give him an edge against more frail or unsure classmates.
‘Mortimer is a crafty individual capable of improvising with his back against the wall. His general size and off-putting demeanor could serve as a potential defense as he may be viewed by some as more trouble than he’s worth.’
Similarly here is a Disadvantages that I wrote…
And for Mortimer, I’d also focus on his lack of physicality and the previously introduced personality defects. It shouldn’t be written bullet-point or list style, but it should sort of be easily digested and capable of functioning as almost a ‘tale of the tape’ or character preview coming at the end of the profile.His weight makes endurance an issue and although capable of quick bursts of speed and strength, he is also someone who is quick to lose his breath and have very, very heavy steps. Richard is emotionally dependent on food and struggles with hunger and overeating even in his day to day and so he will definitely feel the initial loss of food more than his fellow students. That same tenacity also leads itself to a strong stubborn streak and just like with his basketball career, Richard sees no problem in attaching himself to a sinking ship if he feels that it carries with it a challenge or if it aligns with his moral sense and personal integrity.
Address these concerns and I’ll give Mortimer another look.
Best of luck and happy editing!
Here comes another wave of edits!
Hey Deblod! Firstly, thank you for the patience, some real-life things have kept me from Mortimer’s critique, but now I’ve gotten some time! Unfortunately, Mortimer is not looking up to snuff as of yet and in my opinion the improvements in the last round were much less dramatic than those in the first. Part of that is the scope of the edits, yes, but part of it is also in my opinion a lack of care in the editing—you’re dying a death of a thousand cuts.
Take your time.
Edit your edits.
You don't want me to click on this thing and just post "reread and rewrite again". A lot of these problems are endemic and throughout the profile. Slow down. Focus on clarity and concision. If there exists a word to cut and way to make A to B shorter—cut it and make it shorter! Focus on clear communication, not flourishes or trying to convey things intelligently. Explain everything to everybody like they're 5.
So, after my schpeal, let’s get it!
Appearance
Biography
“Mortimer and his family were originally from Redondo Beach, California but in 2013 relocated to Las Vegas. This relocation was motivated in part by his father beginning to work in an office in the city. Mortimer would spend the rest of his life in the suburbs of Las Vegas. The family still visits California regularly both to see Mortimer’s grandparents and participate in general tourism.”
Shorten and simplify your sentence structure, at this stage, I would accept some choppiness for simplicity and clarity. That should be your priority here in the edits.
My advice is to cut this whole thing, it’s the quicker way to approval.
And that’s pretty much all I can see in terms of specificity. I do think that the whole profile should be reread through and tightened up at a few places. Please do not take the re-reading and re-editing lightly. It makes the whole critique process take longer and needlessly frustrates your critiquer. If you finish this on Thanksgiving Day, pause, enjoy some food and then check it out again on Black Friday. Give yourself time and distance so you can fully divorce yourself from your own perspective and approach this with an editorial eye and vision.
Advantages & Disadvantages
And that’s it for this round! Happy holidays and happy edits!
Take your time.
Edit your edits.
You don't want me to click on this thing and just post "reread and rewrite again". A lot of these problems are endemic and throughout the profile. Slow down. Focus on clarity and concision. If there exists a word to cut and way to make A to B shorter—cut it and make it shorter! Focus on clear communication, not flourishes or trying to convey things intelligently. Explain everything to everybody like they're 5.
So, after my schpeal, let’s get it!
Appearance
This sentence still reads weird, especially in the current placement. Caucasian is more ethnicity than tone or color. Put this sentence at the beginning of the appearance and describe the color of his skin. If he’s German-American with pale skin—say that and just that! This is too many words and too weird of a phrasing for what is essentially just a white dude.He is ethnically a German-American, and he has a Caucasian skin tone.
I didn’t notice this the second-time around but this needs to be switched to be more consistently past tense. “usually grabs”, “dresses”, stuff like this. Rephrase and restructure this paragraph to make it more consistently past tense.Mortimer prefers to wear shorts and T-shirts, though he sometimes wears jeans. Typically, Mortimer dresses without much care. He usually grabs the first clean shirt from the top of his clothes drawer and often wears the same pair of shorts every day of the week. Even on cold weather days, Mortimer wears shorts, though he wears a black sweatshirt when he is subjected to low temperatures. On the day of the trip however, Mortimer wore a black cheap leather jacket, a slightly-too-tight Hotline Miami shirt—bright pink and depicting the character Richard—a pair of beige shorts with a brown belt, white socks, and some black Nike shoes.
Biography
Just say that he is the youngest of two children, the nuclear family phrasing sort of invites interpretation and doesn’t make the fact that it’s only two children readily apparent.He is the younger child in the nuclear family, being 2 years younger than his sister Catherine Schaub.
This is still very unclear and needlessly complicated. What do we gain from Mortimer not knowing his father’s true job? Atop this, the sentence structure is too complicated for what you’re trying to do. Pick a single subject and stick to it. Simplify or cut this stuff with his dad. If he’s an office worker, just say that in similar fashion as you say his mother’s job.His mother works as an x-ray technician at hospitals around the city, while Mortimer doesn't officially know his father's true job was before the divorce with Mortimer's guesses that his father worked at an office. Bruce was making a large amount of money, having the family be able to sustain a middle-class income level. Nowadays, Mortimer believes that his father does random part-time business jobs to simply stay afloat.
This lacks clarity and flow. Simplify. You’re going to want to stick to one idea in each sentence.Mortimer and his family were originally born in the state of California at the coastal town of Redondo Beach, but in 2013 at the age of 6, his family officially moved to Las Vegas, due to a job opening from his father at an office building. Mortimer would end up living the rest of his life in the suburbs of Las Vegas but would come to California again to visit the grandparents going to Disneyland or some other tourist attraction.
“Mortimer and his family were originally from Redondo Beach, California but in 2013 relocated to Las Vegas. This relocation was motivated in part by his father beginning to work in an office in the city. Mortimer would spend the rest of his life in the suburbs of Las Vegas. The family still visits California regularly both to see Mortimer’s grandparents and participate in general tourism.”
Shorten and simplify your sentence structure, at this stage, I would accept some choppiness for simplicity and clarity. That should be your priority here in the edits.
This em-dash is too much of a flourish and doesn’t quite work. Just split up these ideas with a period.Mortimer's disability resulted in speech problems—specifically, it would cause him to frequently stutter, including having trouble speaking words properly or coming across as mumbling.
Don’t we all? This idea is a bit like a fragment. Finish the thought or cut the sentence. I think what you want to say here is “Mortimer tries his best to articulate himself properly but can still be prone to stuttering even today.”He tries his best to articulate himself properly.
Weird and long sentence with a strange tense switch. Simplify. In terms of keeping it past tense it’s “related” to math and close reading and “Mortimer suffered academically”.Mortimer did suffer academically at first with his grades since he struggled with certain types of questions relating to math and close reading.
Split up this sentence, the teacher’s pet mentality stuff is still not coming through. You’re going to want to elaborate on what a teacher’s pet mentality is as one sentence and then talk about how he did this to avoid punishment in another.The expectations from his teachers and parents would be what would enforce a teacher's pet mentality since he would carve in towards his academic expectations for fear of punishment.
Tighten this sentence and stick to past tense.As a result, Mortimer would attempt to focus hard on his studies, wanting to have no issues with his teachers and parents.
Another tense issue. Keep it past tense. Simplify the second sentence, maybe even split it up.Keeping up with him being in high school, he does listen to emo and pop punk music, suiting his new mature tastes. Being friends with a classmate known as Mercedes “Mercy” Myers-Prescott, he was able to share his enjoyment of the music that she played.
Same thing here, stick to past tense, simplify the sentence. If you get to the point where you’ve added more than one comma, think and ask: should a period serve instead?The only way that Mortimer was usually nearly in shape was due to the physical education that he was involved in during school, even though he would perform negatively and struggle during PE. He would have little to no cardio in terms of sprinting or running, having no control of his stamina. He isn't able to achieve a single push-up without assistance, due to being unable to bend his arms while doing so and his body structure. While he has improved as he grew older, he still finds physical activity to be tiresome, preferring to work out in a gym or an area where he can easily have breaks.
Simplify and split up this sentence. Explain what you’re trying to say like I’m eight. I don’t know what you mean by “reserved for the digital world of the internet”. Just say he began using the internet if that’s what you meant.After elementary school and being taught in school how to use computers, Mortimer got his laptop, making himself reserved for the digital world of the internet.
Split up this sentence. Give us an actual date instead of 2 years later, something as simple as “When Mortimer was 14” would work.However, during that same year in the summer of 2020, his parents divorced. His parents' marriage was already strained when he began to start middle school, mostly from personal conflicts with one another, but it reached its tipping point 2 years later with a heavy verbal argument heard by both Mortimer and Catherine.
Simplify. “Mortimer’s mother was more involved in her children’s education and thusly received primary custody.”Due to arrangements with his mother being more supportive and in charge of his education, he and Catherine lived in a different apartment.
Split up and simplify the sentences. Elaborate on “manipulative”, why? What did his father do to make him feel that way?He did see his father being somewhat manipulative, however, he still respected him, along with respecting his mother, since she helped him throughout his life.
Redundant and implied elsewhere in the previous and subsequent sentence. We don’t need this. Cut it.The sheer randomness of the show from its public pranks and interviews with celebrities would have Mortimer find the show funny.
I think you meant inspiring. Simplify and split up these sentences. Stick to past tense.The nihilistic comedy from the show ended up aspiring Mortimer to delve into more mature material, especially since he was now seeing the world with a "fuck-it-all" mentality from the various bleakness that he saw to be caused by others.
Sentence is too long and not a complete idea at that. Simplify it and complete the thought.It was when he began to try to look for actual friends while trying to take advantage of what social opportunities that high school now posed to him.
Phrase this better, though narratively I don’t think you get anything from this and the way this paragraph ends in a round-about way lends me to thinking it can be cut.Mortimer's interactions with the group had gotten winded by his teachers and parents, who knew of the group's reputation.
I don’t think we get anything from this. Just have him be interested in horror movies and true-crime documentaries. We don’t need it to get to looking up graphic stuff on websites. You have this characterized as something inconsequential that his parents don’t care about. It’s not. Cut it or make it match the way you’re treating it.Since it was high school, he was exposed more to mature content from online and his peers. He started browsing websites and videos that suited his interests in horror and horror literature, though he would later be encouraged by himself to look up more uncomfortable mentions, such as controversial movies known for their gore and subject matter, including grisly horror movies. He also looked up Wikipedia articles covering graphic topics out of curiosity and boredom, from articles on serial killers to major disasters. His parents generally don't check his internet history to know what kind of information he would look up. His teachers are semi-aware of his knowledge of graphic topics, however Mortimer would make excuses that this was related to his interests in horror and his style of preferred comedy. Some teachers did make off-hand comments towards Mortimer's parents about his graphic knowledge, but they assumed that he knew of this from learning of these topics from one of his movies or books.
My advice is to cut this whole thing, it’s the quicker way to approval.
Shite? This is a typo, obviously, but it shows what I mean in terms of lack of care or time with the edits. Take your time. Read things out loud. Then read them out loud again.He would use the website of Nationstates to engage in roleplaying, including using characters from existing franchises as placeholders for his own stories on the shite
A good example of extraneous information that doesn’t really flow in a way that makes sense. Why would the AT care? Stop focusing so much on the what and instead focus on the why. It isn’t important the specific reason Mortimer got interested in FNAF, what matters is the shame he associates with it and why he’s into it. Give me that more so than the origins and his takes on a specific game.This interest began after the introduction of FNAF: Security Breach, based solely on what Mortimer deemed to be wasted potential in the game, in which he would write alternative scenarios privately online.
Save this for a thread or post, we don’t really get anything from this specificity. Cut it.While Mortimer is also interested in Hazbin Hotel and is awaiting more content from it, he also has been watching other web animations, such as Murder Drones and The Amazing Digital Circus, enjoying the plots and animation from both.
Very choppy and filled with tense switches. Simplify and make sure you stick to past tense consistently.Currently, since college is on the horizon his mother still wants him to be ready, even considering a possible job for his future. He is left to debate his major since he wants to get a degree in computer engineering to make his video games. However, the problem is that he lacks the passion for doing so and that he had never expressed and committed to any actual programming skills during his youth. The original major was simply due to his favorite hobby of video games, but overall he lacked any official skill in computer programming. His mother already planned on him going to a community college, which had become a bit of a family tradition, since it was where his mother and sister went to get their degrees.
And that’s pretty much all I can see in terms of specificity. I do think that the whole profile should be reread through and tightened up at a few places. Please do not take the re-reading and re-editing lightly. It makes the whole critique process take longer and needlessly frustrates your critiquer. If you finish this on Thanksgiving Day, pause, enjoy some food and then check it out again on Black Friday. Give yourself time and distance so you can fully divorce yourself from your own perspective and approach this with an editorial eye and vision.
Advantages & Disadvantages
This isn’t a disadvantage; most people will try and seek refuge with friends over strangers. You can cut this.He will be more seeking friends and those in his group circle, rather than attempting to befriend strangers as allies.
And that’s it for this round! Happy holidays and happy edits!
I used a scalpel in place of a steak knife for edits.
I cut away what I believed is enough gristle and made sure everything was in past tense.
I cut away what I believed is enough gristle and made sure everything was in past tense.
Hey Deblod! You already know the schpeal, but I do just want to say that I appreciate the patience and perseverance in this profile. We’re still stuck on some things, but you’re closer than you’ve ever been to getting into pre-game. Probably an edit away from being an edit away…
Which means, hint-hint, when you feel it’s ready to post—it’s prolly a sign to give it another read through and edit. You know the deal--there is no reading, only rereading. There is no writing, only rewriting. Reduce, repurpose, and refine!
But that’s for the future, this is for now…
Let’s get to it with round 4!
Appearance
This looks serviceable, good job as I read it on this run.
Biography
We’re still stuck on his father’s employment and being too vague. You need to plainly state his profession and justify him being the primary breadwinner in this family capable of maintaining a middle-class income. It doesn’t need to be detailed, but it can’t be vague. Give this man a job doing sales or something similar in an office that facilitates an easy transfer to Vegas. You're doing too much to get too little here.
On another note, with this paragraph, I think it’d flow better to move his neurodivergent diagnosis to when we actually talk about how his neurodivergence manifests in his speech. I think you move this sentence to that paragraph and combine this first paragraph with the one facilitating the move to Vegas for better flow and cohesion.
I would combine these paragraphs. I’d also just cut out the teacher’s pet mentality line at this point. You get what you want in terms of characterization of Mortimer as a student in the subsequent sentences. The way you have it laid out sort of invites interpretation and question in a way that’s a bit counterproductive to your mission and intent.
Does he only go to the library for book fairs or does he find Goosebumps in his school library? I would just cut this book fair line and go right into Mortimer being into books at home and then books at school. Say what you want in as little as possible here.
Just combine these paragraphs, think we’re talking about the same sort of stuff here and this subsequent paragraph looks very weird being so scarce. This idea is mostly a continuation of the PC gaming concept as it is an extension of Mortimer getting involved with computers.
This sentence is still a bit clunky and too long. I’d simplify this to something like: “Having multiple classes a day rather than one teacher for all subjects was something that overwhelmed Mortimer. Socially this was also a struggle because rather than getting to know his classmates throughout the day, his classmates changed on the hour due to the school’s period system.”
Focus on a single idea for each sentence. This sentence explains why Mortimer struggled with class. The next one explains why he struggled socially. Simplify, simplify, simplify.
This doesn’t really make sense and isn’t doing what you want, I think. I’d give us a reason for the manipulation. Perhaps make it so that Mortimer doesn’t believe his father’s efforts are genuine and that the fact that he didn’t fight for custody to be a silent admission of Mortimer not being worth the effort of parenting. That’s the sort of vibe and inference I get from how you’ve laid out the story thus far and I think would be more in line with what you want to say.
Ultimately, you could just cut this view of his father being manipulative for the biography and expand on this thought through your writing and reflecting on Mortimer in pre-game. I think you have a decent amount on the divorce, the fall out and why things would be awkward with his father as is. If you do feel this is important, expanding on it in a way similar to how I stated would work for me.
Winded isn’t the word you want to use here, and I remain that this subplot with the parents, teachers and friends is kind of pointless and round-about. I’d just cut this whole paragraph if I’m being honest. Save the awkwardness with his parents and his friend group for actual RP with PCs or in memory.
Expand here. Why does brutality and realism interest Mortimer? Why is he drawn to this violent content and what does the people surrounding him think about it? I personally think you should just cut this paragraph. I think you get more of what you want with the wonderful and weird exposition you had earlier talking about his love for horror literature. But this is your choice at this point. If you want to keep this paragraph here, give me a sentence or three of expansion.
Need a little expansion here. Maybe talk about his mother? You kind of don’t have anything on Mortimer’s relationship with her here. Remember to be detailed without being dense or diluting your prose.
We’re stuck in this minutia of major here and I think attempting to stick too close to your personal life rather than Mortimer’s as a character. Cut all that. Just say Mortimer is planning on going to community college and doesn’t know what he’s going to major in.
You can keep this but put it at the end of a paragraph discussing his plans for school. But once more, he’s not in college, we don’t need all this right debate over major right now. Focus more on describing the imminent graduation and signing up for community college. Maybe hint at the engineering vs English struggle here, but don't go into detail so much that you cloud up and confuse your point and the paragraph.
Advantages & Disadvantages
We’re good here.
And this is it for round four! I’ll try and get to the next round a bit quicker, but I appreciate the effort and patience so far. Remember—slow down! Read out loud! Edit your edits—then edit them again!
Best of luck and happy editing!
Which means, hint-hint, when you feel it’s ready to post—it’s prolly a sign to give it another read through and edit. You know the deal--there is no reading, only rereading. There is no writing, only rewriting. Reduce, repurpose, and refine!
But that’s for the future, this is for now…
Let’s get to it with round 4!
Appearance
This looks serviceable, good job as I read it on this run.
Biography
His mother works as an x-ray technician at hospitals around the city, while his father worked at an office. Bruce made a large amount of money, having the family sustain a middle-class income level. Nowadays, Mortimer believed that his father does random part-time business jobs simply to stay afloat.
We’re still stuck on his father’s employment and being too vague. You need to plainly state his profession and justify him being the primary breadwinner in this family capable of maintaining a middle-class income. It doesn’t need to be detailed, but it can’t be vague. Give this man a job doing sales or something similar in an office that facilitates an easy transfer to Vegas. You're doing too much to get too little here.
On another note, with this paragraph, I think it’d flow better to move his neurodivergent diagnosis to when we actually talk about how his neurodivergence manifests in his speech. I think you move this sentence to that paragraph and combine this first paragraph with the one facilitating the move to Vegas for better flow and cohesion.
In elementary school, he was given exposure to socialize with his classmates in his homerooms. Mortimer would feel like he was in a close-knit community within his homeroom, which would give him optimism. At a young age, he was more recognized and able to know his other classmates.
Mortimer originally suffered academically with his grades, struggling with questions related to math and close reading. For his first 3 years in elementary school, he originally had no issues. However, his teachers in his later years of 4th and 5th grade became critical of his negative academic performance. The expectations from his teachers and parents enforced a teacher's pet mentality onto him, in which he would appeal to his teachers. This carved towards his academic expectations for fear of punishment. As a result, Mortimer attempted to focus hard on his studies, wanting no issues with his teachers and parents. This has helped him from being singled out by teachers and made sure to have him avoid being given a negative reputation by the school itself.
I would combine these paragraphs. I’d also just cut out the teacher’s pet mentality line at this point. You get what you want in terms of characterization of Mortimer as a student in the subsequent sentences. The way you have it laid out sort of invites interpretation and question in a way that’s a bit counterproductive to your mission and intent.
His other hobby began when he was introduced to reading while at school. While he only attended his elementary school library for book fairs, he became interested in the books that were at his family house. This ranged from cookbooks, books on nature and animals, and even copies of standard history books for miscellaneous topics. His school library had old copies of Goosebumps books, which would be one of his first favorite books to read.
Does he only go to the library for book fairs or does he find Goosebumps in his school library? I would just cut this book fair line and go right into Mortimer being into books at home and then books at school. Say what you want in as little as possible here.
Mortimer grew up with video games at a young age, starting with his first video game console Nintendo Wii U for Christmas in 2014. Mortimer's first games were exclusively made by Nintendo, such as Super Mario 3D World and other games that were licensed by Nintendo. Later, he got the opportunity to play on different consoles that he was gifted, playing games such as Marvel's Spider-Man and Cuphead. As he grew older, he ended up drifting away from console gaming and secluding himself into PC-only gaming. He became a fan of gory and/or violent video games, his usual genre of games to play expanding to mature experiences, such as Hotline Miami 2 and Postal 2.
After elementary school and being taught in school how to use computers, Mortimer got his laptop, where he began using the internet. He watched videos that were catered to tweens, and he enjoyed watching Let's Plays from YouTubers that he subscribed to. Later, he got involved with Twitch, becoming a regular chat member for several gaming streams.
Just combine these paragraphs, think we’re talking about the same sort of stuff here and this subsequent paragraph looks very weird being so scarce. This idea is mostly a continuation of the PC gaming concept as it is an extension of Mortimer getting involved with computers.
Rather than a tight-knit community where he was able to know his classmates and be taught in one single classroom, he was subjected to a multi-class system, being forced to stay productive.
This sentence is still a bit clunky and too long. I’d simplify this to something like: “Having multiple classes a day rather than one teacher for all subjects was something that overwhelmed Mortimer. Socially this was also a struggle because rather than getting to know his classmates throughout the day, his classmates changed on the hour due to the school’s period system.”
Focus on a single idea for each sentence. This sentence explains why Mortimer struggled with class. The next one explains why he struggled socially. Simplify, simplify, simplify.
He did see his father being manipulative by having him be a favored parent towards him by providing him free food and gifts, along with trying to have him be manly
This doesn’t really make sense and isn’t doing what you want, I think. I’d give us a reason for the manipulation. Perhaps make it so that Mortimer doesn’t believe his father’s efforts are genuine and that the fact that he didn’t fight for custody to be a silent admission of Mortimer not being worth the effort of parenting. That’s the sort of vibe and inference I get from how you’ve laid out the story thus far and I think would be more in line with what you want to say.
Ultimately, you could just cut this view of his father being manipulative for the biography and expand on this thought through your writing and reflecting on Mortimer in pre-game. I think you have a decent amount on the divorce, the fall out and why things would be awkward with his father as is. If you do feel this is important, expanding on it in a way similar to how I stated would work for me.
Mortimer's interactions with the group had gotten winded by his teachers and parents, who knew of the group's reputation.
Winded isn’t the word you want to use here, and I remain that this subplot with the parents, teachers and friends is kind of pointless and round-about. I’d just cut this whole paragraph if I’m being honest. Save the awkwardness with his parents and his friend group for actual RP with PCs or in memory.
Since it was high school, he was exposed more to mature content from online and his peers. While he enjoyed horror literature, he also delved into other forms of horror media. To suit his developing interests, he became interested in slasher flicks and horror video games. He also became invested in grisly horror movies and true crime documentaries, finding them engaging with their emphasis on realism and brutality.
Expand here. Why does brutality and realism interest Mortimer? Why is he drawn to this violent content and what does the people surrounding him think about it? I personally think you should just cut this paragraph. I think you get more of what you want with the wonderful and weird exposition you had earlier talking about his love for horror literature. But this is your choice at this point. If you want to keep this paragraph here, give me a sentence or three of expansion.
The relationship with his family has still been positive since he's mostly trying to stay on his parents and sister's good terms. He still hangs out with his father, despite seeing some flaws with him, but their relationship is still moderate. He tends to lightly bicker a bit with his sister Catherine, but usually on trivial things. His grandparents, who are on his mother's side of the family, are visited by Mortimer, Catherine, and their mother usually a couple of times a year to stay over in their house for holidays.
Need a little expansion here. Maybe talk about his mother? You kind of don’t have anything on Mortimer’s relationship with her here. Remember to be detailed without being dense or diluting your prose.
Currently, since college is on the horizon his mother still wanted him to be ready, even considering a possible job for his future. He is left to debate his major since he wanted to get a degree in computer engineering to make video games. However, the problem is that he lacked the passion for doing so and that he had never expressed and committed to any actual programming skills during his youth. The original major was simply due to his favorite hobby of video games, but overall he lacked any official skill in computer programming. His mother already planned on him going to a community college, which had become a bit of a family tradition, since it was where his mother and sister went to get their degrees.
We’re stuck in this minutia of major here and I think attempting to stick too close to your personal life rather than Mortimer’s as a character. Cut all that. Just say Mortimer is planning on going to community college and doesn’t know what he’s going to major in.
He is beginning to see the appeal of getting himself an English major since he found he has more passion for online writing, so he can get himself a presentable degree for being either a librarian or a technical writer.
You can keep this but put it at the end of a paragraph discussing his plans for school. But once more, he’s not in college, we don’t need all this right debate over major right now. Focus more on describing the imminent graduation and signing up for community college. Maybe hint at the engineering vs English struggle here, but don't go into detail so much that you cloud up and confuse your point and the paragraph.
Advantages & Disadvantages
We’re good here.
And this is it for round four! I’ll try and get to the next round a bit quicker, but I appreciate the effort and patience so far. Remember—slow down! Read out loud! Edit your edits—then edit them again!
Best of luck and happy editing!
I think I know what's I'm doing.
EDITED!!!
EDITED!!!