These are Starlight Aurate's nominations and comments for the 2018 awards. See all nominations here.
Written for Monthly Mod Madness, Farfetch'd takes advantage of the mods being kidnapped and violates as many forum rules as he can with this little piece. He does a brilliant job of breaking the rules but knows where to stop, and ends the little one-shot before the joke gets old.
Kotone acts in a fairly typical manner when confronted with a talking Nintendo DS: she antagonizes it, provokes it, and starts screaming hysterically when thrown into the game she had abandoned years ago. Arkadelphiak does a great job of captivating the audience and making us laugh along the way.
Virgil134 does a great job in fleshing out characters to make the audience really feel for them. Cabot's longing for adventure really shines through, as does his conflict with his parents when it comes time to leave home. The story is concise, engaging, and brings the characters to life.
Oh, poor Nate. This guy easily provides some of the most entertainment in all of Salvage. Started out as a Team Rocket member, he goes through an endless amount of physical abuse. He's clearly shown to care deeply for his Pokemon, though, even when fighting with them, is always one of the characters I look forward to most when reading this story.
Classic Mewtwo is one of the most powerful Pokemon in canon, and the most powerful Pokemon to appear in this fic (thus far). This version, however, is riddled with emotional distress and has the one goal of desperately searching for his mother. He manages to be terrifying and yet hysterical, if primarily due to his interactions with the great Nathaniel Morgan and the reactions he brings out of the unnamed protagonist.
“You’re the first trainer I’ve seen deploy Pokemon with such mastery. But I should warn you—my son is stronger than you.(1) He even challenged the Pokemon League, I’ll have you know!(2)”(1) No, his son is not stronger than you. In fact, he’s not stronger than a lot of people—I’ve lost so many battles the moment I stepped into Victory Road, and every loss only further proved my father wrong. Whoever you are, there’s a pretty solid chance that you’re stronger than me.(2) He hasn’t challenged the Pokemon League, I’ll have you know. He just told his family that he did, when the truth is that I haven’t seen the other end of Victory Road after weeks of training here. And how could I when all these trainers I battle are so much better than me?
Del manages to get an impressive amount of writing done. She not only finished multiple fics, but also completed 2018 NaNoWriMo. She posts consistently and frequently and is clearly devoted to her writing.
Sike Saner consistently comes back to the fics she started reviewing, and always leaves at least some comment on every chapter that's been posted.