A week has come and gone, and I'm opening up staff positions, have a new fiction topic to once again plug, and am close to releasing the final venue for Fading Light: ACC. We'll wrap up with some ACC discussion and another instalment of The Voice's Question!
I'm opening up applications for one Magistrate and one Praetor. The same application can be used for both positions, but the duties for each position are different and so make sure to tailor your application to which position you are clearly interested in. Time commitments vary by project and responsibilities of particular positions, but staff members are expected to be putting hours weekly into their projects and responsibilities.
As Magistrate to the Voice, you would be responsible for a series or projects related to the fictional or character development of the Brotherhood. The Voice Office has a ton of projects awaiting willing hands, but is always accepting new ideas, as well. Magistrates will be responsible for regular project updates directed to the Voice.
Praetor to the Voice is a little different. While my Praetor will be involved in projects as well, he or she will also help make sure there are regular fiction/character developmental activities for the Brotherhood to engage in, take on grading responsibilities, and assist with the ACC when needed.
If you are interested in either of these positions, please email me an application by October 4th. No minimum rank. Applicants should explain any relevant experience in leadership positions in the Brotherhood (especially useful for the Praetor position, but not a requirement), any useful media skills they have such as graphics or wiki knowledge, and explain why they'd be a good choice for whichever position they are applying for. Furthermore, any project ideas you'd like to work on are more than welcome, though we have enough projects that even those without a particular idea at the moment can apply.
The latest Voice Fiction topic allows you to delve into Begeren and explore the planet from outside of the confines of the ACC Tournament. Begeren is an inhospitable desert wasteland for much of its surface, but it's also something more, with Brotherhod and One Sith interests clashing to devastating results. As Begeren Turns offers up first level crescents for placements, a chance to make your mark on the fictional outcome of Begeren, and Clusters of Ice for every 500 words of fiction!
Fading Light: ACC nears completion, with Aidan Kincaid and Timeros Entar emerging victorious from the shattered ruins of a storm-ravaged bridge! Both now find themselves in a palace full of One Sith at the center of an unnatural storm. What awaits our heroes? The finals will begin Soon (hopefully tonight!) and more of what is really going down on Begeren will be revealed. I've also decided, as I'll discuss below, that we really should have been counting these matches in Elo. See what that means in the ACC section just below this.
There's a ton of potential for competitions utilizing the new ACC format, and look for some from this office soon. In addition, I wanted to highlight three unique takes on Venues that offer some differences from traditional ACC combat:
I've also heard some interest in a dogfighting sort of venue, and I'm open to that if our pilots want to get in on the writing. We'd love to see new Venues. In order to help promote the creation of venues, I am offering, for a limited time and subject to approval of the venue, Dark Side Scrolls for venue creation. If interested, check out the current venues, and think about what venue you think is missing. You can include various Markdown stuff and have fun with it, but in order to earn a DSS, your venue must meet my approval. Minimum standards include a unique feel to the venue, has a second person introduction that makes clear some amount of where the combatants are and what's going on, and is written clearly enough and with enough interesting details to allow for a variety of encounters to take place in the Venue itself. When you feel you have something ready for use in the ACC, email me it, but only email me one venue at a time, so that we can work through one at a time.
On to another ACC topic. As mentioned above, we are heavily considering an Elo "reset" of sorts that will incorporate the Fading Light matches played. I feel it was a mistake for me to exclude the first major DB competition utilizing the new ACC from the Elo system. The net result would be an adjustment of existing Elo ratings as if all the battles happened essentially at once, tossing in the Fading Light matches to the pot in addition to all the current matches that have modified Elo. This may cause those who lost in the first rounds of Fading Light to drop some points, while it'll cause people that won to go up in points. Overall, I think this is a good change, but if you object to it, feel free to email me or comment (along with answering my question at the end!!).
Last week, I asked about what members thought about roleplaying. It seems many people want to use their DB character, but would like some freedom to make NPCs. It also seems most people aren't terribly interested in forum roleplaying, and prefer something over IRC. We've tried this before, though, and ran into some trouble. I know Gryffon has looked into ways to handle freeform roleplaying on IRC in a way that can benefit members. My ears are open here, as I love the idea of finding ways to let people roleplay their characters more outside of the traditional means. I think that the responses to my report showed there is interest there, but we've tried to tap it before and not been successful, so we'll need some fresh ideas. If you've got ideas on that front, feel free to email me them!
This question is a bit of a different turn. We all know the Brotherhood has two distinct paths: Light and Dark. But within those paths, there's a great deal of gradation. My character, for instance, really isn't all that dark. I know many of our characters, even those of us that are Sith, are really not anything like Palpatine and may resemble Sith cultists more than Sith Lords. Some of us take certain parts of the Jedi or Sith code to heart more than other parts. So where does your character fall? On a spectrum of one to five, with one being Palpatine darkity dark, and five being... uh, a paragon of goodness (maybe Yoda?), where would you find yourself? How darkity dark or goody goody is your character? If you don't like a number scale, toss out some adjectives.
Until next week!
TL;DR
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Do we email you with Venue proposals? Or will there be a competition involved? I'd love to write some dogfighting venues.
Nikola,
Good questions, I'll clarify in my report. Email me with the venue, one venue at a time, so if there are issues with it we can work on them one at a time..
Tough question about alignment. I see Lexiconus as a laid back guy and always on the picket fence, like Tom Bombardil. But he only gets involved in a fight when the balance is upset or forced to one scale. In his morality he feels he is doing the right thing, and I guess that makes him a Grey Jedi.
Mav, perhaps you could elaborate a bit on how/why previous RP attempts failed. That might give the rest of us an idea about where we're starting (and prevent us from suggesting things which have demonstrably already failed). I'm guessing that logistics (getting everybody online at the same time) are a big issue for IRC roleplaying, what were some of the others?
Hi Viv,
For the most recent attempts, Arden would have to answer that in more detail, and perhaps we could pull that into a group elsewhere. I think logistics of getting everyone together was an issue to keep things going for any length of time, but he could provide other/more specifics I think. When I tried it years ago (back around the Exodus) we could never get a crowd of consistent people together often enough to keep things happening. That's why I was intrigued by the idea of forum RP (in a way that was a bit different from Run-Ons, given the GM involvement).
Re: DB Sith vs canon Sith - The DB Sith Order is not based on the ideology of what we'd consider the main Sith (Rule of Two, blah blah, etc), but is instead based on that whole triumvirate, three-order, Ferran, crazy-lady and Okemi thing. So trying to judge members of the DB Sith Order against EU Sith doesn't make a lot of sense as it currently stands.
Not sure why this way was chosen, but I'll blame Trev anyways :P
We've actually done quite a bit of roleplaying over IRC in House Odan-Urr in the past. Around three of our sessions were House-wide, and very successful. However, I have never had much success in organizing role-play sessions over an external program or website (Roll20.net). Run-Ons are also great fun, as a form of forum role-play. My best guess is that most people would be more comfortable if these were held over a familiar format (IRC, forums). Perhaps if we had James code in a FATE dice roll command into Dbb0t? Just a thought.
Unleashed Venues, in which participants find themselves with access to the Force as if they were a Master. Power overwhelming! <- You must construct additional pylons
#ForceAgnost #ObbieLife
Agnostic, even.
A venue where you must only use Parkour!
PARKOUR!
I would say on a scale I would see my character as a two. I like the idea of the 'scale' system that you mentioned in your last paragraph. Not sure how we could implement this into the DB though.
Didn't notice the actual question before...
On a scale of 1-5? Kincaid would probably be a 2, whereas Shadow (old persona) would have been a 4.
I've always seen Aabs as more of a pragmatist. He's looking for power, answers, and sees the allure of the dark side in that regard. But he isn't wedded to the theology of any of it. More of a political alignment.
My attempt at tabletop RP suffered from, above all else, the inability to get a quorum (generally 4 people) together at any one time. I'm not opposed to making another attempt in the future, though it would likely be with a different system, If folks want to give it a go, y'all know how to reach me.
My character, despite not having a real history laid out in text (yet_, could be considered a 4 on this scale of yours, Mavles. When competing with other Dark Jedi, Shaz'air always seems to crank it to 11 to be the "baddest". That's the big difference I see from 3 to 4. Someone that ranks themselves on the scale as a 3 are neither prone to be very evil, nor very good, either. I think the difference between a 2 on this scale and 4, would be that like my character, someone beyond the middle of the scale - whether by instinct or intentionally - tends to be badder than those surrounding him. Whereas someone who would rate themselves as a 2 on the scale would find themselves tending to be more good.
And really... while we're on the topic of how people view their characters characters on this non-existent scale: Perhaps a format be created for the Brotherhood to use on their character sheet, explaining this very concept? It's all well and good to know the various aspects and such of a member of the DB, but knowing exactly where they stand as far as morals go can make for a very different story. My point being, we know that someone who has We Must Protect This House! as an aspect will do anything for his house, even give his/her own life... but would he first save those around him/her that are in danger, or would you take them down with him/her?
My thinking is, much like the way we have aspects that describe the character, there could something small that gives a brief description saying: this person is a gray Jedi, and tends to stand on a neutral front; neither revering their enemy, nor hating them. On a scale of White Shores, Vibrant Flame, Fading Luminescence, Darkest Night and Black Hole. All of this being said for conversational value to paint a nice pretty picture of what I am thinking. Sorry for the rant. But if enough peoples respond to this threat with their stance on how baddy or goody their character is. And all of what I just said might be sheit. But yeah, let's roll with a 4 on this round. =P
Thanks for the report Mav.
Probably a 2. Pretty dark, but has honor.
My character is pretty dark. He started out as a psychopath, but has begun to build relationships with members of his House and Clan filling the void left by his family. He's a brute who would love to dominate opponents and fill them with terror.
Kordath is a 3, leaning towards a 2 as time goes on, he'd probably be a Lightie if he didn't hold certain vices in such high regard. Arcona is slowly chipping away at some of the moral core, so maybe a 2 1/2, heh.
Turel is probably a 4 leaning 3, classic chaotic good.