Welcome to Gaia! ::

Alright - once we get our players assembled, I'll be discussing the "workshop" or creation elements of the game. It's in this forum where we can have an Out Of Character Chat...about our characters (and more). You may ask questions, pose ideas, pretty much anything here. But be warned: this privilege ends once the game begins. Use your time wisely.

That's a great question, something you'll have to tackle in-game. As far as you can remember, you definitely CAN'T do anything like that. But you'll find that the strange world you're placed in has no need for rules like that.



In other words, it will take some time, but you will find that the more you understand your situation, the more clear it will become to you why and how you can develop certain abilities.

I don't want to reveal the big plot twist, but I'll just tell you that power of the mind seems to have a ridiculous amount of control when you stay within the boundaries of your own imagination, personality, strengths and weaknesses. The more of yourself you show to your environment, the more restricted...and centered you become. That can be either very good or very bad.

Like, if you have a very pushy, Type-A attitude, you might find that people listen to you more than others, or that you find yourself at times forgetting your own strength.

Does that help? It's hard to explain without giving away the whole plot.

You will, of course, but like...I can't give certain things away. You guys will help write the start of your storylines - the beginnings of the game. I'll take it from there.


Okay, time to explain a second thing. The Sanctum's Entrance will accomodate the rest of the players tonight. Take note of what goes on in there and beyond - your alter-egos there are up to you to create, and will play a big part in the process here. I'm talking about a fourth and hidden game. When you're stuck in one, try the other. They will HELP each other. It should be tricky, but think of it as reading a book that writes itself as you go, a story you can alter and change as you grow and learn.

My goal is for a certain connection between you and your textual, in-game personailities to grow strong...on more than one front. That's why the main forum is called Within the Bindings - it's the unseen spine that holds this book together.

Yes. Those I will post last tonight.

Erm... I'm not really getting much out of the player's manual thread.

Certainly.

The player's manual thread has NOTHING right now but a table of contents. I will create it once I know what you guys want in there.

It's really a lot less work that you're making it out to be. All I need is someone to say, for example,

"In uh...in the "Story" section, we're going to need to know an overview of the plot."



...but I mean, if you guys want me to just go ahead and make it, I guess that's okay, but bear in mind I will use less detail.


But it seems we do have a suggestion from selphie!


Getting Started

The first thing any player will experience is a small "cutscene" describing some lone, past memory of theirs before they are suddenly jolted, as if from a deep sleep, into reality.

Reality is a blank world, a never-ending white cube that seems to have no floor, no ceiling and no walls. It will be tought getting anything done.

As the sterile holding pen of what appears to be deep space begins to morph and change, so must you. Here are the first actions and commands that will get you by:

Basic Controls

Speech
Earmark your external dialogue with quotation marks unless you think there will be no confusion. Thoughts work best in italics.

Body
Speaking in the third person makes for better-looking and easier controlled posts, generally.

OOC
OOC speech can be done in double parenthetical earmarks.

Moving and taking an action
The Darkness Chronicles represents the "Cause-Effect" type of play. You may also be familiar with it as "Call-Response". In any case, moving and doing is very important, even at the smallest scale. To do so, all you have to do is state you desired action, say like "Ellisent put his ear up to the steel door and listened intently." This will spark either a response of what happens next or a prompt to roll dice.

Rolling
There will be several types and occasions for rolling dice. The way I do it is based on a "success" system.



...and that's what we have so far. It's still really lacking some key things. So throw stuff out there!


Here's how I'll be building the actual manual. First, I'm going to compile all "pages" like this (in non-graphic format) in the manual thread. After a couple touches of my own, they're going to a HTML-formatted digital page (much like Kunai's, idea, Liro)

As for character sheets, your "character" will already be created in some part, but the character sheets are what I call "build testers", where you can plug in and test the differences in your skills when you plug in certain numbers for certain stats. Eventually, you guys will be able to test-battle a couple of enemies, as well. That part is the least of my worries and not that hard, as I've done it before.

In addition, the character sheets will be an easy way of documenting and changing each of your statuses.

And how we obtain them?

Okay, first thing's first - Job Classes.

Remember, if at any time you think you have enough info on a certain topic or sub-topic, let me know. That section will be LOCKED and ready to go in the actual online handbook.

Job Classes

Job Classes are skill sets and building guides that a player can choose from once they have found their first Rift. Applied automatically, Job Classes can help players become either one-man wrecking machines or truly irreplaceable team players. Remember: Once you pick a class, it sticks! Note as well that the choices made available to you will be based upon your previous behavior. For whatever reason, the environment you work in is very intelligent, and will not wish to place you in a class you don't belong in. Why this is...remains yet to be said.

There are also "Second" Job Classes, or advancements made from your previous class. These are obtained once the player reaches a certain level of power and aptitude within their class.

1st Job Classes
White Mage - Works with healing and assist spells
Black Mage- Wreaks havoc with damaging spells
Knight - Uses physical strength to win battles
Monk - A quick, acrobatic class with balanced strength and magic
Spy - Uses stealth and high attack power to cut down foes
Archer - Wields long-range weapons for safe attacking
Mimic - Resourceful; Steals skills from allies and enemies