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 Posted: Fri Jun 08, 2012 7:34 am
Thanks! I'm glad you like it. And that's a good point. We could do unestablished past characters. Or even make up characters that died in the past.
What do you think, Chris?
Oh, and when I was talking earlier about making Spektral like it was when I first came in and it was really popular, I meant my first time here ever. It wasn't as Amy. I was a different character who was rooming with Erin's character. And I think one of the first people besides her that I RPed with in the story was your brother, Chris. lol! That was years ago. But that was the time I was referring to, not when I first came in as Amy. And you might have been thinking of that time, too. Just wanted to specify what time I meant.
And I love Supernatural! I've loved it for years, but it only seems like recently I've seen a lot of gifs pop up with the brothers in them.
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Posted: Fri Jun 08, 2012 9:37 pm
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 12:56 pm
You really need to come in here and respond. Even if you don't have much to say, there's no way we can proceed with rebooting Spektral unless we have some sort of input from you.
Are our ideas good? Bad? Is there something else you'd rather use for a plot? What kind of characters do you think we'll need? Where would you like the school to be set?
Setting-wise, ninety-nine percent of school roleplays are "in a forest, next to a lake". It's... standard. Cliche, actually. Harry Potter set the mold, and I think we should break it. I think Spektral would work well with an island setting - like a forest, it's insulated and secluded. An island setting is also very lovely, especially a tropical one. Volcanoes and earthquakes are always a nice touch.
Characters - well, this is a school roleplay, so we need teachers and students, yes? How many people do you want in this roleplay altogether? Do you want a group of 5 to 8 people? 9 to 12? Or more than 12 people? Do you even care? What if there's a lot of people? Are you going to cap the number of characters each person can play? What sort of ratio do you want? It's bad form to have more teachers than students. Do you want more girls or boys? There's almost always more girl characters in a roleplay than boy characters, so it's going to take some extra work to keep a relative balance if that concerns you.
As far as the number of characters, do you realize that you'll have to adjust the plot accordingly? School roleplays tend to attract a number of people, therefore any sort of plot that focuses on a core group is out the window. I mentioned this to you the other night. There can NEVER, in any roleplay, be a group of "main" characters. There can be YOUR main character, as in the character that you play the most often and favor over your others, but story-wise, there is NEVER a "lead" or "main" character. It's a despicable practice. By placing extra emphasis on certain characters, you are saying "the other characters don't matter, they aren't important". Even if you insist it's not true and that you don't mean it, that is what happens. That's why it's absolutely imperative that you pick a plot that doesn't favor a certain group of characters. Subplots that involve only certain characters are alright, but the entire premise of a roleplay should not EVER rest on the shoulders of only a few.
Setting up the roleplay - we're making this a thread in the forums, yes? Yes, I think we ought to. That's where the most people are. Do you plan to use the guild is well? If that's the case, then all the old threads need to be deleted or archived - everything needs to look as neat and clean as the new thread.
What will the profiles be like? There should be a form that everyone had to fill out. Everything should be organized, and every profile should contain the same information, including at least two defining flaws. The more that's left out, the more chances people have to godmod and powerplay, and that ruins roleplays by upsetting the playing field. So how are you going to curtail that? Are you going to come up with some basic scale based on impact or trust people not to make their characters unfairly powerful? How do you want magic to work? Can it affect time and space? Can you heal with magic? Can you bring people back to life or visit them in the afterlife? Is there an afterlife at all? If magic can do all of these things, where is the line drawn? What are the stakes in this story? Could a student or teacher at Spektral believably perform these sort of spells?
An example - in Ozzy's world, there is no afterlife. The people of that world are more or less soulless. Their "soul" and strength of their powers come from containing the essence, a tiny piece of the goddess Almatha. Their bodies are actually elements of nature turned into flesh. When Ozzy dies, her body will turn into sand and her "soul" with return to Almatha at which point it merges with the goddess. That's why necromancy is both very difficult and a forbidden art, in her culture it's the highest form of blasphemy.
A second example - in an in-progress plot called Royal Witches, there are strict limits on magic. It's something only women are born with, and even then I've designed the world so that there's only certain types of magic, and all spells must have an incantation.There's also no such thing as healing magic. Any injuries the characters sustain cannot be magicked away. If you are hurt, you are hurt. It raises the stakes of battle that much more.
I know you speak often of Spektal being a wonderful place where imagination flows free, but....
I'm actually not sorry for this.
If you want this roleplay to work, you need to buckle down and start deciding things now. Get your head out the clouds, and stop talking pseudo-inspirational bull. At this point in the process, it's nothing but carbon dioxide that suffocating everyone else. It's fine in the very very very VERY beginning when you're trying to figure out what kind of roleplay you want, but we're past that now. You already decided - a reboot of Spektral, which is either a magical or a superpowered school roleplay (there's a lot of overlap, but the stuff that's not the same is all the difference). That's done. Now we need to sit down and figure this stuff out. Only after everything is organized and up and the roleplay is ready to open will you be allowed to put your head back in the clouds.
If you delegate, everything will go that much faster. You're not online often, but Cuwen and I are. I don't know about her, but I'm confident that if you can clearly and succinctly articulate your vision for Spektral (again, no vague crap about what you want it to feel like, we need facts and specifics to work on), a fresh and functional (though unpolished) version of Spektral could go up in Barton Town in a week's time.
It all depends you, Chris. This is YOUR roleplay. Give us the most information possible or else nothing will happen and Spektral will fail again.
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:25 pm
Ooooh! I love the idea of Spektral being on an island. Great idea, Liz! I hadn't even thought about how cliche a school being surrounding by a forest with a lake is, but you're right. And we need to have something that sets apart our story from the other school RP's. Not a lot b/c if it's too different, people won't join. But we need something. I think that's a great idea. I can start looking for good island/beach pictures and post them on here. We can all vote on the one we like the best or use multiple ones.
Chris did say that we are going to the forums in a PM. So, I think we should plan for that. If we do use the guild, I think we should archive the past threads. I never like deleting story threads b/c there might be something you need to go back and look at, especially if you're using a character from the previous chapters. Maybe make a subforum just for the archive chapters. Make the subforum accessible to everyone, but lock all the threads. That's my opinion, anyway.
And yes, kind of like I was mentioning at the beginning, the story can NOT focus on one or just a few characters. Liz is right. Stories go downhill fast that way.
And I think a good, successful school RP needs a lot of characters, like 12. I usually like RPing with a much smaller group, but school RPs are different. You need teachers, students, staff... you need a lot of characters and a lot of RPers to portray those characters.
Also, besides Amy and a teacher, I think I'd also like to try my hand at a male student! I've only been a male character once, and that was for a very short time in the 3rd chapter of Dragons. It was kind of fun. And Liz is right. There are usually a lot more female characters in a school RP than male characters. If we have quite a few male characters in the beginning, that would be another thing that separates us from the other school RPs and might entice more people to join.
So, we'd have some teacher characters already, a couple male characters, we'd be on an island, we're already setting up to be different from the other school RPs in little ways that might attract people. I think we're on a good path.
As for delegating, that's a good idea, but the only thing I ask not to be in charge of is profiles. I suck at them and I hate even making my own. I miss things and just generally suck at it. I really like the idea Liz has about listing flaws. That's a very good idea. It'll keep the characters from being perfect and annoying. I like.
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:26 pm
Oh! And I looked back and finally found my first character. First, what was I thinking with the spelling??? Cassey? Ugh. It should have been Cassie. I was probably trying to be clever. rolleyes
But I give us permission to use her as one of the ghosts if we want. Anyone can have her show up as a ghost if they want and do some tormenting. If we decide to go with the ghost route for awhile, that is.
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:39 pm
I only skimmed that last few posts. But I wanna point out some things.
You can run multiple plots at on time, each focusing on a single group, thus making them the main characters of that plot. It actually works well if you plan it out thoroughly. (It takes a lot of planning, mind you.)
I think it would be cool to have it be a floating island. Very magical and whimsical. Waterfalls toppling over the edge. Lush forests of tropical trees and animals. Danger around every turn if you venture beyond the schools outer limits. The school could have a very roman design to it, very open and free. Magic becomes a large idea. It feels like something legends are trained in. An active volcano in the back drop, Hot springs, a large pristine lake of water bluer then the Caribbean. Colorful fish, birds, insect. Dorms are carved from stone, yet furnished with very fine items. The cool northern winds and hot sun keep it a decent temperature. The island itself is massive, with much to explore including cave, dungeons, ruins and what have you. There can even be parts of the island still unexplored in depth. Ohh, and a huge waterfall into the lack earlier described.
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:49 pm
Caves wouldn't be able to go so deep in a floating island though. As awesome as that is, how would utilities work? The school would need its own small power plant and sewage plant.
EDIT: It would be interesting to see a small farm or large garden, if the school has a grown-your-own-food policy similar to prisons.
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:49 pm
Oh my gosh! Kuxri!! You're back! Great to see you! biggrin
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:50 pm
Oooh. I really, really do like the idea of a floating island. It'd have to be pretty big so we have area to explore. And could portals to caves on land be built into the area?
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:04 pm
Wow, an actual discussion. I'm impressed that Cuwen and I aren't the only living beings in this guilds.
Anywhoozle, along with setting we need to discuss race. Is Spektral strictly humans-only?
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:07 pm
Well, the way I am imagining it is you have one main island that is huge, I mean massive, where the school it. I am kinda thinking the size of a small country. or state. And around it are other smaller islands. That should give enough room for explorations and for the school to be, in a sense, it's own self sustaining city.
I could be over exaggerating the size a bit, but you know. Go big or go home.
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:08 pm
How about this?
Here's another.
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:10 pm
You'll notice I vastly prefer scenery illustrations to photos - unless we're using photos of models for characters.
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:11 pm
I can't see the pictures.... Link instead?
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Posted: Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:17 pm
Yay!! A discussion is going on! biggrin Woot! And I can't see the pictures, either.
And I don't think Spektral is simply humans. We had dark beings, demons I think, angels, mermaids...
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