V8 BKA/BDA Voting: Holiday 2022/January 2023

[Buko]

Welcome to the Holiday/January Best Kill and Best Death Awards. Before we begin, the rules:

1. In this thread, you may post as an anonymous guest to select one student to receive the day's Best Kill Award, and one handler to receive the Best Death Award. Prizes will be given out in-character for BKA, consisting of a weapon and food, and out-of-character for BDA, consisting of a quote from their character to be displayed on the board index until the next BDA is awarded.
2. You may only vote while logged out. You can identify yourself in your vote if you want, but you may not claim to be another handler.
3. You may only vote once, and you may not vote for yourself in either category. Staff can see IP addresses, and we will check them if we have reason to suspect shenanigans.
4. You must provide reasoning with your vote for why you think your choices deserve the award. Votes with no reasoning will not be counted.
5. Don't be a jerk. You can explain why some scenes are your favorites without tearing others down.
6. Make sure that your answers are clear; please don't use any formatting that might cause votes to be miscounted or left out.
7. Please be sure to read every kill and death before voting, please vote for your genuine favorites rather than just voting for your friends, and please don't campaign for awards in the chat or otherwise try to influence the vote.

And your Best Kill and Best Death contestants:

BEST KILL AWARD:
Jezzie Stark for killing Bill Taylor
Katelyn Graves for killing Mitch McDuffy
Daenarys Todd for killing Roberta Chen
Joshua James for killing Zora Morrison
Russel Fitzroy for killing Tull Talbott
Alex Avanesian for killing Cedar Dalisay

BEST DEATH AWARD:
Ohm for the death of Bill Taylor
Fiori for the death of Mitch McDuffy
ViolentMedic for the death of Roberta Chen
Buko for the death of Zora Morrison
Melusine for the death of Marian Dick
ItzToxie for the death of Tull Talbott
almostinhuman for the death of Ingrid Wilde
Cicada for the death of Cedar Dalisay

Voting will run for five days. Votes will remain hidden until time is up, and the winners will be declared in the following announcement.

[rtz]

BKA: man, it's a little hard to decide, but I gotta give it up for Alex! The desperation and efficiency kinda hit together right ngl.

BDA: Zora. Realistic in its depiction of how fast things go wrong.

[Late Krampus]

Best Kill: Josh James for killing Zora Morrison. I loved the way Josh snapped here. It's hard to set up a character arc from pregame with subtlety and have it come to fruition so well on-island, and I think Rugga really pulled it off. The reveling in violence and power that he has never gotten to have before alongside the clear understanding that what he's doing is wrong and the shame is fantastic. The prose from both sides was really evocative, but I particularly enjoyed the physical description of Josh's transformation from sleeping and angelic to awake and murderous and then back to just a regular person who has done something horrible and now has to grapple with that.

Best Death: Buko for the death of Zora Morrison. The other half of an excellent thread. Zora has less of a background than Josh, but her short arc also followed a really good progression of setting up who she is, why she's that way, and then her downfall because of it. I always appreciate when handlers don't shy away from the brutality of their characters' deaths, and I feel like the beating was a very good way for this scene to go as opposed to a quick shot from struggling over the gun. It really underlines the ugliness of the situation and Zora's inherent need to keep being defiant in some way, if only internally, to the bitter end.

Honorable mentions to Kitty Graves vs Mitch McDuffy and Daenerys Todd vs Roberta Chen for another pair of threads I liked quite a lot.

[Medic]

Brad—(cough) Josh James for BKA
Josh is such a goddamn creepy character, and him like insisting to himself that he gave her a chance, gave her a chance, even as he’s just being like so unnecessarily violent and how clearly that excuse doesn’t hold water anymore (maybe initially, but not as the fight continues), especially with the words he’s actually saying. (Plus saying ‘you’re nothing’ especially, given Josh’s continual thing of not really being anything to anyone else. Absolute obvious power trip. It’s horrible, I love it.) And him reverting to trying to do right for his oown vibes rather than any actual care is like oof, like he’s framing it with his words like he’s doing something right but then he’s also thinking of it almost like disposing the evidence (and becoming nothing again).

Mitch McDuffy for BDA
Like the little slips of the tongue of him almost yelling out Oakley’s name instead, and also how he’s just like a little frustrated because ‘hold on you’re meant to FIGHT BACK.’ And how that hesitation regarding her initial reaction of begging is what basically kills him, alongside him still being stubborn enough to want to neutralize the threat without killing her, while if he’d been a less decent dude he probably would have survived (which is always my jam). Also the mental fantasy of him being dramatic as fuck and bringing her down too only for her to just like vaguely flop is good good.

(Shout-out to Kitty and Zora for being great killers/victims and making both the above so good also, it was hard to pick who was gonna be which.)

[Juan Perón]

I'm going to give the Best Kill Award to Joshua James.

The scene was excellently written. The background character, the mere extra in everyone's life but his own, finally gets the spotlight. Come next morning, everyone will know his name. It feels like a great turning point for his character, where he's finally done with being a nameless extra to nearly everyone he 'knows,' and instead lets his emotions take matters into their own hands. I like how after he's done, he feels both a sense of catharsis and horror, going from ruthlessly strangling Zora and feeling a sense of control to remorsefully giving her body a burial at sea. It's a good dichotomy of emotion, and it'll give Josh ample room to keep growing naturally as a character.

I'm going to give the Best Death Award to Tull Talbott.

In his first thread, Tully had the protector persona. I enjoyed seeing, in his death thread, that protector persona being pushed to its absolute limit. The way he absolutely loses it after Alex shoots Tenshi puts Tully firmly on the border between 'overzealous protector' and 'frothing beast' in a way that's very enjoyable. His death post was also very poignant, and I love his realization that had he gone further into the game, his frothing beast side probably would've become dominant. It's a bittersweet end to a great character i would've loved to keep reading.

[Ruggahissy]

A little over two days left for voting!

[AWOOOwerewolfofSalem]

BEST KILL AWARD: Joshua James for killing Zora Morrison

What I really like in this kill is how the cruelty is eased into, with tension being built throughout the thread. Josh waits until he has control physically to unleash his developing sadism, which I think is an interesting choice since with him being attacked he could have just acted like it was all Zora’s fault and he was defending himself.

BEST DEATH AWARD: Buko for the death of Zora Morrison

Buko does a great job of communicating Zora’s personality through actions instead of having to explain why she does what she does. Actions are also mixed with physical description/scene dressing well, post #9 of Pecola does this particularly well, with its descriptions of losing teeth.

[anonymouse]

Best Kill: Joshua James

This one felt like an inevitability, and was about as disturbing as expected. Joshua's been a pretty stellar antagonist thus far, able to channel a genuine creepiness that few other characters manage without devolving into farce, whilst retaining enough humanity to feel scarily real. These traits were all emphasised to great effect with his killing of Zora, making his mark as a figure seemingly destined to become one V8's more iconic heels.

Best Death: Tully Talbott

This was just a really fun slug fest, plain and simple. A great moment of defiance and a hint of how things could have gone had luck been on his side, going out with a bang after what's probably been one of my favourite fights so far. Don't have much more than that to add, a solid end for a solid guy.

[camM9q5rDDtGaXHBrW4g]

BEST KILL AWARD:

KILLER: S002: ALEX AVANESIAN [Applesintime], VICTIM: S055: CEDAR DALISAY [Cicada]

---

This review probably will not be as thorough as my first—I apologize to anyone interested in reading another essay. I am tired and lack the energy to pour my thoughts onto paper. Despite that, I think I've got a good deal to say about this thread, : after story.

This story is the culmination of several threads of buildup on both ends. Alex's game has set him up as a killer since his first thread, and Cedar's group has been on track for disaster since they formed. In this death, both plotlines tie and burn, the fuses long lit.

This scene is notable because two deaths—with different killers and victims—occur during it. I'll state my reason for picking the one I did here because both are very good: I think Alex Avanesian deserves a lot of credit as an antagonist—my personal favorite of the version thus far.

This thread, in my opinion, is where he shines as a dangerous individual. It is clear that the character has learned from his previous failures, and here, he's much savvier—both in terms of his social game and tactical knowledge. At times, he oozes menace. He pulls one of my favorite tricks thus far in the scene.

Either way, Alex was currently outnumbered, outgunned and would probably die if he started shit. But that gun was too much of a prize to just give up without a fight. Alex knew that he wasn't exactly a good shot, but people wouldn't be expecting a sniper. In all his time watching SOTF, from the old 2005 footage to the 2018 lot, he couldn't recall a sniper either. All you had to do was wait for someone to take a break, stay still, and pull the trigger.

"Hey, uh, Fitz. There's uh, there should be like, uhm, little numbers and stuff on the side of the rifle. For identification. Can, uh, can you hold it, uh, up to the camera? Just, uh, if someone can see the identification stuff they can maybe figure out where the rifle came from and get one step closer to tracking down the ATs." By the time anyone saw it everyone on this island would be dead. But it could help. And personally, he was curious about where it had come from. 176 models made ever. What collection had this come from, or did the ATs have a whole gunsmith making reproductions of rare weapons for them?

"It's, uh, a rare sniper. They uh, they only made like a hundred and seventy-five of them, some-something like that. So, like, if people can see the serial number, they can maybe figure out where it came from." Alex only refrained from correcting Fitz on his stupid pronounciation of the Walther's name because it didn't matter if he was going to end up dead in five minutes.

He'd talked a lot about planning. Not acting on impulse. But. Fitz never seemed like the kind of guy who used a gun, would know that popping the magazine out didn't automatically take every bullet out of the gun. And even just one kill could snowball you to a BKA and from there to victory.

Shoving the spear haphazardly into the duffel bag on his back, blade down, Alex lunged for the gun, ripping it away from its rightful owner and flipping it around. "You pulled the magazine out. One in the chamber, give me the mags or I will make you a closed casket." Alex quietly instructed Fitz, hoping he was smart enough to be quiet and not risk his life. There were three rounds the WA 2000 could be chambered in. Neither of them would leave a pretty body. His eyes flickered around, waiting for the inevitable outcry. Someone running at him. Something that'd get his name out there.

Fitz hadn't been quiet. Or maybe the act of pointing a sniper rifle at one of your fellow students in a crowded room was bound to get you some attention. Alex reveled in it for a moment, being in the spotlight.

...

And then, he shifted the rifle towards Tully, perhaps a little too quickly, and pulled the trigger.

Bang.

Thanks, Fitz.

This reversal of fortunes—easily contrasted with his first thread, where he does something far less subtle—is a great shown of danger. Alex's writing can convincingly show Alex's two-faced nature as he straddles the line between ineffectual and fatal as a villain.

Of course, this plan fails: Tull catches on too quickly, and the gig is up. As a result, Alex ends up on the wrong foot and almost dies for it. I find stuff like this commendable on the part of their writers—people don't always want to take a lot of damage, especially so early, so it's cool to see.

Anyway, Alex, on the back foot, wriggles free from the jaws of death as a result of the (also very well-written) accidental execution of Tull at the hands of Fitz. Alex's writer, again, plays this keenly, as the next post after making a break for it is almost horroresque, evoking old slasher movies with their sudden cuts.

A spear tore into Cedar’s stomach, twisted, and ripped upwards and out.

Some would mistake this for a low-effort post, but I'd disagree. As someone who, as I said in my last review, tends towards overt verbosity, I would argue that short posts can be just as evocative as long ones. One-liners are not always bad. This post is an example of that.

Of course, I have spent most of my time talking about Alex, but Cedar's writer does not pull their punches either. Everyone in the scene is going for the gold, pulling out their A-game. I will include some for your consideration.

The smoke continued to hang, thick like curtains over everything. Like a room not intended for human use, every bit of furniture sealed away, covered. A room for the dead and the dying. The occasional shadow jutted out at her, and she'd startle, but it'd be too boxy or square to be human.

The first shadow that was definitely a person, she immediately ran at.

She was used to pain, of course. But not like this.

The only reason she didn't scream was because her ribs locked like a vise. Her body trying instinctively to hold onto the blood. It failed, and the scent of iron and bile painted the floor under her.

Cedar fell to a knee. She only didn't want her last words to be nothing at all. The way the smoke billowed around her, erasing all shapes but her own rapidly deflating one, even that simple request would probably be asking too much.

It'd always been her. Her first friend in America, her first confidante when Cedar had said goodbye to her heritage, traded blood for chosen family. The first words, day in, day out, that Cedar would broadcast to the world. Tenshi's evening rants: something stupid, something fun, something for some fucking nerdy ass weebs. It was as immutable a law as those of nature- as every reaction, so too its equal and opposite. Tenshi couldn't be left with the last word. Cedar owed her her own last words- her last words ever.

That message, however, would go unanswered.

S055, Cedar Dalisay: Deceased
114 students remaining

BEST DEATH AWARD:

TULL TALBOTT [ItzToxie]

---

This was a really tough pick. I tend towards indecision, and when faced with a cluster of great pieces of writing, it was hard to choose my favorite. Ultimately, I hate to double-dip, but once more, credit to : after story. In particular, my choice is Tull Talbott.

His writer, Toxie, has an established penchant for stealing the spotlight like a movie star—and I mean this in a good way. Every scene becomes a blockbuster, an action movie on release day. There is a certain bravado in every line, a confidence in the ability to evoke the same adrenaline as old cinema.

In addition, his handler shows a great understanding of how to write an intense, evocative, visceral fight scene. They exhibit a real sense of momentum and motion—it makes every fight seem like the high point of a slaughterhouse film.

Emotions are not in short supply, either—the scene is able to evoke a sort of primal rage and then effortlessly pivots to a denoument; it really sells the feeling of coming down from an overwhelming rush of adrenaline. Overall, it's a really great time.

It can be hard to express in words what I like so much about this death; it escapes description. Really, I think the best demonstration is to show you the writing itself. It stands on its own—a testament to the writer's ability to always go above and beyond.

Are we really doing this?

Already?

Looks like it.


“Well shiet; today’s the day!”

There was a click. Grasped inside Tully’s hand was a metal cylinder shaped object, it’s lever squeezed to his palm. In his other hand, twirling around his finger was the ring. He glanced at Dawn, she knew the trick by now and he’d hoped she wouldn’t give it away.

“Hey Alex! Check this out;”

Tully twirled the ring along his free finger. He wanted to look blasé, careless, like Brad Pitt in fight club or a Tarantino flick. In a way he was, he knew he wasn’t long for this world the moment he woke up, but he wanted Alex to see. He wanted him focused on Tully so Fitz could get behind him.

“It was nice while it lasted I guess, but if we’re starting this shit I’m just gonna let you know right now I’ll take this whole fuckin’ room with me before I let you walk outta here with that. We’re all gonna fuckin’ die anyways, sure, but you got me fucked up if you think your bitch ass is gonna be the one.”

He shrugged, pin dancing from finger to finger. Tully hoped this worked.

“Figure if you’re gonna shoot us all anyways I might as well skip the bullshit and take that pleasure from you too.”

Tully dropped the smoke grenade, it harmlessly rolling for about a second before the whoosh of purple haze poured out. His eyes turned to Alex. Smiling, smug little Alex. He thinks he's the one.

You enjoyed that? You like hurting people like that? Think it's fun? Think you're hard? Makes you feel big? Think you're gonna go home, and all you gotta do is kill the people you knew your whole life? Think it's easy?


I hope so. I really, really do.


Tully stepped forward, his face a serene smile. Even though the room was steadily becoming purple, all he could see was red.

Tully smiled. Alex smiled.






Tully smiled wider.



He watched the little geek walk towards him, twirling his gun around like a bat, like he was going to hit him! Alex really believed it didn't he? He was the one? Alex swung for the fences, and Tully had taken the brunt with his wrist, before wrapping his arm around the butt of the gun, pinning it to his ribs. He yanked back, and the gun clattered to the ground behind him. Tully had seen Alex's face change then, he weren't smiling no more.



Tully was. He smiled even bigger. He reeled his fist back and caught Alex in the jaw. His head hadn't even felt the full whiplash of jerking back before his left arm shot forward and caught him right in the nose, sending him stumbling back into the desk behind him. By the time Alex tried to reorient himself, Tully grabbed him by the throat, and chokeslammed him backwards into the desk, sending his fist into his nose again. He'd let go of Alex's neck and swung into him, then swung into him again. This was different. Weren't like no boxing ring, or even a fight at school. This was fighting for your life, for the lives of the people around you.

Left, right, left, right, left, right-

Alex bled. Not as much as Tenshi though, he had a long way to go before he reached that.

Left, right, left, right, left-

No it wasn't- who was he kidding? This wasn't fighting for his life. This was a slaughter-

Right, left, right-

There was a high pitched shrieking noise- it was coming from Tully.

Left, right-

He weren't no better than Alex. This killing shit felt pretty good- Tully started cackling;

"ARE WE HAVIN' FUN YET?!"

Tully gripped Alex by the bloodstained collar of his shirt and yanked him up, throwing him across the room into one of the cabinets on the wall. He wondered what Alex was feeling right now? Before he thought he was alpha, right? Some sort of predator feeding on the prey around him. Something about a wolf dressed like a sheep? How'd he feel dealing with a real wolf?

... Whatever Alex was feeling before, Tully didn't want him feeling it now. He wanted him to realize just what he really was, he wanted him to know just how weak he really was, just how fucked he really was; just how much he fucked up.

Tully was grinning ear to ear as he battered Alex around. ... He wanted the last thing Alex to see was his face; to see what a real monster looked like. ...

...He'd fully lost his own ability to speak and became nothing more than a raving, howling, lunatic with one goal in mind.

Send Alex to hell screaming and crying.

When Tully heard what he'd had to say, he'd done a double take. "You..."

It was an accident.

"You dumb sumbitch..."

He spit more blood to the side. He was going blind again, so he fell on his back. Laughed despite the pain, if you could call it that because it didn't hurt all that much, least not as much as Tully expected getting his ribs blown out should.

"Shoulda..."


"Shoulda aimed a lil' bit to the right."

Tully thought about his friends again. This game would change them if they stick around. It would have changed him if he stuck around. That was the scary part, discovering something about yourself you wished you never see. He didn't want to think about the ways he'd end up hurting other people, even if some of them like Alex would've deserved it. He knew some of them wouldn't have; and in the end none of it would've been worth it.

At least going like this, he could pretend he was a good person in the end.


Tully Talbott- Eliminated

[ThePlantainSupernova]

BKA

Muh Queen! I am going with Daenarys Todd for killing Roberta Chen. I enjoyed this kill a lot right off the bat due to the conceit and concept of the set up, the mid-announcement brawl and kill was a North Star I chose to follow this go-round myself and so it was very cool to see another group of writers hit the same opening concept organically but also come up with something clearly different. I think the stakes of the fight are realistic, the conflict itself well-enough paced and the swerve at the end exhibiting a good sense of tone, characterization and just general cold attitude. This thread was straight-forward in that it was easy to parse through and understand and it was interesting because it sort of exposed a cruelty rooted not in conscience but in calculated efficiency. It was both messy at times and poised at others but it never felt out of control or lacking in focus. That's not a bad vibe or ambience for a Day 2 kill to hit!

BDA

I struggled a lot with this vote and ultimately decided to reward what I felt was the bravest and most assured performance in my opinion: almostinhuman for Ingrid Wilde. I think that there is both a pressure at this stage to write a crazy impactful and experimental fight or something that is emotional and tugs fully at heart strings both IC and OOC--but that can be an almost impossible ask this early in the game. Ingrid's death is solid and personal and it shows a clear idea of righteous defiance I think is unique. I think the bravery that should be rewarded is the idea of letting your writing and your character stand on their own in their final moments. There was something stripped down to this death not unlike watching a singer armed only with a spotlight and a mic. I don't think Ingrid or almostinhuman shrink from that spotlight and I think the grab a hold of the mic and what we get is a character who uses suicide not as an act of desperation or depression--but defiance and rebellion. Along with a writer unafraid to leave a reader thinking and wanting more. That's pretty deep for a oneshot. Kudos!

[Guest]

Best Kill:

Kitty Graves

Kitty's an interesting killer. In this scene it's hard to tell how much of her victim mentality is justified and how much seems to be her mentally trying to justify what she's done and is continuing to do. It's a really nice bit of character growth and her ability to contrast and compare this kill with her previous ones and see how she's changing and evolving is creepy but still vastly entertaining.

Best Death:

Roberta Chen

I liked the poetic nature of the entire thread, playing out during the announcements and riffing off that in a really creative way. But what really stood out for me was Roberta being immobilized and being afraid of dying slowly, and trying to provoke D into killing her, recognizing that she absolutely did not deserve that mercy from her. It was a really well-done scene, and beautifully executed.

[roger ebert]

BKA - It was a pretty close toss-up for me between Joshua James and Daenarys Todd but I think I have to give it to Daenarys. I liked the usage of the announcements as a pacing device along with the narrative callback between her and Roberta's previous scene together in the guard shack. Pretty good stuff all around.

BDA - Giving it to Zora Morrison this time, though I really liked Roberta's role in her scene along with Ingrid's last oneshot as well. I think Buko did a great job of selling the violence laid into Zora from Josh and the use of some very visceral imagery and that's why I am ultimately voting for him.

[chuggachuggachuggach]

henlo

I am voting one scene for BKA/BDA.

BDA: Chad for the death of Zora Morrison
BKA: Joshua James for killing Zora Morrison

This scene is short but intense and very, very grim. On Chad's end there's this intense depiction of powerlessness, and wanting but failing to climb out of it, and then suffering all the consequences for said failure. It's not the most gory thread in this set (shout out Mitch/Kitty! good work in that scene too), but Chad does a lot of work to sell the pain and brutalization and desperation and fear of this scene.

And Rugga does a lot of good work bringing about said fear. Josh's end is a chilling depiction of the factors that lead to men doing horrible things sometimes, and how you can get drunk off the power that comes with bringing about fear and violence.

'You ate everything' is also a very powerful quote in context.

[M E !]

I’m not late!

BKA: Alex Avanesian for killing Cedar Delisay.
I could probably spend ages labouring the point of how much I dig Apples’ writing for the whole scene, but the sudden brevity of the killing strike on Cedar is very effective. Alex is a delight to read throughout, and the dumb tryhard even has the award in mind as he’s doing it. The AT gotta love a guy who worries about how well he plays to the camera, not to mention the guts to stick around after the beatdown Tully put on him and knowing Fitz now has a loaded gun. The kid deserves it.

BDA: almostinhuman for the death of Ingrid Wilde.
This is harder to explain. I guess it’s all subjective at the end of the day but I digress. There’s something oddly affecting about her mindset here. Going out on her own terms in a fairly unique fashion, and similarly to the above, the starkly contrasting brevity right at the end. I really liked it a lot.

[The InfoWar Devil]

Hello folks.


BKA: Daenarys Todd

I really liked the scene in Dare. I liked that it was a nice continuation for both characters from their previous encounter with Roberta having left Daenarys in the jail cell, and the conclusion Daenarys come to following that to take her stuff makes total sense. Beyond the set up, this is a clean fight to read, straight to the point, but descriptive in the brutality when it needs to be. The use of the announcements as drowning out the fight and washing over them was really clever as a framing device. I really love that Daenarys stops and hesitates on the killing blow, then rationalizes that this is how she gets her one kill, and it'll never be this easy again. Then the girls have a moment before she brings the blade down. Roberta is given the room to be spiteful, and it's an interesting internal back and for Daenarys.

I also like the scene's coda when Daenarys takes stock of what she's won (all now wet due to slicing through a water bottle) and has to reckon with the fact that this was the loot she got for a human life.

Honorable mentions: An honorable mention for Kitty's scale of violence in hacking Mitch to death.

BDA: Ingrid Wilde

This was very tough and I went back and forth between Ingrid and Roberta. The premise behind Ingrid's death is a simple one, but a good one. It is suicide as a form of escape. It's even more poignant because she is a swimmer, and so this is how she chooses to go out. She uses something inherent to her to make her stand. The descriptions of hitting the water and swimming are lovely and I think I'm a sucker for someone using physical expression to escape in spirit.

Honorable mentions: I mentioned it already but I thought Roberta did a good job of someone who held up their end of the fight and was defiant even as her guts were spilling out. An honorable mention to Zora who I thought did a great job also of describing suffering, helplessness, and attempting to escape in the mind when the body cannot.