SOTG: FEB 2016

[futurologists]

state of the game Hello everyone! Now that we’re officially done with Chantes and moving forward into Nalawi, we thought it’d be a good time to go back and do a review. Futurology’s gone through a number of adjustments already, but we’d love more feedback as we finish designing the next mission: What went wrong in Chantes? What went right? What are you hoping to see more or less of as we move forward? In an effort to facilitate discussion, we wanted to provide some context behind our decisions so far, as well as issues we’re aware of and working to fix. Topics we’re addressing: PACING: In hindsight, we feel as though the earlier months of Chantes had too many low-key events placed together, and the end of it had too many active ones. The recent rush was partly to finish Chantes and move on, while December’s slice of life focus was for the holidays; neither of these cases will be the norm. Moving forward, we’d like to return to fewer events, but with more impact on the PCs and active tasks in each of them. PLOT CLARITY: Futurology was originally created by one mod anticipating about 30 characters -- and it’s become far more than that! Exciting as this growth has been, there’ve been a few issues along the way. The more mystery-oriented parts of the plot were unwieldy and didn’t have enough leads for characters to follow, and with the size of the game it was difficult to permeate information to everyone ICly. We also failed to communicate how deeply the plot progress was affected by character decisions and player plots. The arrest and subsequent jailbreak, sungazing log, peacekeeping, etc were all directly formed by player inquiry and suggestions, and much of the overall direction of the game was developed in response to IC decisions. Our hope was to have characters directly influence the success and flow of the mission, much like a D&D campaign, but we also feel that this left a number of weeks where things felt aimless, or that characters were meandering to fixed plot points. There were also a number of plot possibilities raised but not followed through, and overall progression was choppy. In the future, we plan to provide more mod structure and direction, while hopefully avoiding a plot that’s too inflexible. Events will also stay away from mystery and will instead be oriented towards exploration and discovery in addition to the usual action. As brought up in the above point, we’ll also avoid having too many lowkey or extremely active logs scheduled in excess. NPC THREADS: Going forward, we’ve increased the number of mods handling NPC threads and will aim to lead them to satisfying conclusions. However, as much as we would love to thread out everything with everyone, it’s not a sustainable workload. For more passive thread topics like item discovery and politicking, we will continue to err towards handwaving and OOC discussion. PLAYER PLOTS: First off, thanks to everyone who submitted plots in Chantes! We’d like to take a second to explain how the process has been going so far and what we’re looking for. When players ask questions that we think could lead to an event, or when suggestions are submitted, we’ll usually PM and discuss how to integrate ideas into the plot and game schedule. We do try our best to make player plots relevant, but it’s much more likely to get integrated if the playerbase as a whole can participate. For example, if the mission goal is to build a bridge across a river, we encourage players to submit plots for everyone to go chopping wood together rather than one character finding the solution on their own. After a plot has been submitted, we can help with write-ups and how to adjust details so everything works in the setting. Please don’t be afraid to submit plots or ideas! Many of our favorite game developments were thanks to player involvement, and we’re looking forward to what everyone has for our next mission as well. If you have any suggestions, our page is open here. We’d prefer comments to this page rather than PMs. WHAT ABOUT. . .? Uniforms will be announced on the upcoming event log. We’re currently working on a more relevant set of Test Drive Meme prompts that will be stickied and updated on the meme community. A Chantes Epilogue will be available at the beginning of Nalawi, similar to how Anwick results were shared at the beginning of Chantes. Also similar to the Oska Burning event, we will be trying out a flexible time ratio during events to give everyone enough time to thread things out. Activity check and hiatuses: As we grow as a game, we would like to take the time to clarify our activity standards. AC will continue to be two proofs per monthly cycle. A single proof counts as 5 action comments or 10 network/inbox comments. If a thread on a network post switches to action, it may count as an action thread. AC begins on the first of the month and lasts until the fifth. Threads with NPCs (including ALASTAIR NPCs, plot NPCs, etc) will not count toward AC but may be used for Bonus AC. Bonus AC is outlined in this post. It was recently updated, so if you haven’t had a chance to look yet, please do. Bonus AC is processed concurrently with AC, so please only submit your bonus threads during the AC submission window. Players may choose to hiatus at any time. However, using a hiatus as an exemption from AC is not allowed during consecutive months. In other words, you may use a hiatus to be exempt from AC in January, but not in February as well. Strikes function as hiatuses; you may not take a strike in January and also use a hiatus for AC exemption in February. Of course, life happens! The mods are willing to work with players on an individual, case-by-case basis. If you know you will have difficulty meeting AC and cannot take a strike/hiatus, please let us know as soon as possible and we will see what we can do. See the comments section if you have any questions, but otherwise please feel free to use this post to discuss with us and each other about the state of the game, how you feel about how things are going, concerns, etc. We also have a comment over at the HMD for general mod critique! Let us know over there how we’re doing as a team and if you have any feedback about mod behavior.