We Float: Plot

Opening ceremonies for the Olympics are set to be this Friday. If I were really really REALLY productive, I'd come up with a proper schedule for the games, or at least when the major events would be, but um... I don't have that kind of time, unfortunately (even if I feel like I OUGHT to be doing it because it would help).

Maxxie is road-tripping to Edmonton and has managed to get passes to some events. She's using her folks' money for this rather than Anhalt funds. She's taking Tom with her -- he doesn't get a choice. She's renting a car and says SHE is driving because if someone ELSE drives all that way she might go completely and utterly INSANE. :)

Is anyone else from the existing group going to join them? I haven't posted something IC, but I think most folks can assume she has mentioned it and if they would like to come along, they are welcome to. How many people decide to go will define how large a car she rents.

Jason has proposed a one-shot character plotline, which brings up the question of International politics and what would happen to a wild card on Canadian soil, plus what nationality is the newly turned card and can they go home safely?

For those who would note, Maxxie does not refer to her ex-teammates as friends. There's probably only one girl left on the team who competed in 2092 with her as 20 is pushing it for a woman's gymnastic's career. There are probably boys on the team from 2092, though, as they compete far longer than the women do.

She will get tickets to other events than gymnastics (it's like y'know, touching that sore tooth for her, that she still HAS to go watch the women's all-around) if people want to attend those. She DEFINITELY wants to see a basketball game or three.

There are two weeks of Olympics, so plenty of time to have threads around it. I'm up for anything.

Since there are a lot of plots flying around, I thought I'd throw this up with links to the plot posts that I'm aware of and ask people to comment with any general chatter about plot, questions they have, characters that need plot, help needed with a plot, kudos, whatever.

(This'll also help with synopsis writing from our end.)

In no particular order:

Plot name: Olympics (title?)
Original Plot Post: http://asylums.insanejournal.com/wf_plot/2486.html
Description: The 2096 Olympic Games will be in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada, during the last two weeks in July. This means the opening ceremonies will be on Friday, July 16, and the closing ceremonies will be on um... Sunday, August 1st.

Plot name: Skip Divided
Original Plot Post: http://asylums.insanejournal.com/wf_plot/2181.html
Description: Ongoing. This is the plot to investigate virtual clubs for anti-Wild Card extremists and root them out in the virtual worlds.

Plot name: Wild Card Underground/Radio
Original Plot Post: http://blackhole-son.insanejournal.com/750.html
Description: Del and Tom are putting together a radio station to broadcast to wild cards. (Under the impression that this may eventually turn into a Wild Card underground railroad-style project but this mod could be wrong.)

Plot name: Hunt the Hare
Original Plot Post: http://asylums.insanejournal.com/wf_plot/1923.html
Description: This plot's almost wrapped. As far as I know, the last point is bringing Andrey in onstage as a villain.

Plot name: Sympathy for the Devil
Original Plot Post: http://asylums.insanejournal.com/wf_plot/1923.html
Description: The group's Senate sponsorship is blown when Katherine publicly exposes herself as a Wild Card. The details on the plot post are currently very loose as the government players are still working through this. (Ideas, suggestions are as ever always welcomed.)

Plot name: It’s What You’ve Got Inside That Counts
Original Plot Post: http://asylums.insanejournal.com/wf_plot/1923.html
Description: There really are threats out there, and there really are people capable of killing over genes. We want to bring them on screen to provide something for the group to react to. Follow-up to Sympathy for the Devil.


I think that's a lot of them. Anything I'm forgetting? Please feel free to comment with other interesting things that are happening- this will be a resource for new and prospective players as well, to see what we're up to. Thanks.

Not a plot so much as a... notice? Device? Background noise? Reason for Maxxie to be even more cranky?

It's 2096, and the summer games will be happening, and I've decided that they ought to happen in about a month, for the two weeks at the end of July. Given what happened with Maxxie four years ago, and the current climate towards Wild Cards, much of the current publicity leading up to the games is filled with speculation about the influence of Wild Cards on the future of the game. Instead of steroid use, or the influence of technology on sport, people are talking about hidden Wild Cards changing the games and Maxxie is being held up as an example of someone who competed using her power for years before she was caught.

I was thinking this might be a time that detection devices could be introduced in the public eye in part because they'll want to screen Olympians for Wild Cards (known and unknown) and there may be various minor uproars about people who didn't even know they had flipped a card (Deuces or invisible Aces like Maxxie was) or people who were hiding deformities that helped them (extra joints, etc. etc.) being pulled from the games. Just to add a little extra furor.

Er. No idea where the games are taking place this year. Any preferences?

Oh, and a thought -- do we have ideas on what the international view on Wild Cards is, and would this be a good time to bring those on screen, so the gang has an idea whether non-US boltholes would be good? One of the things Maxxie was thinking of was an underground railroad to rescue endangered WCs, so shuffling them out of country (if they could make contact in other countries) might be one way of doing that.

I have now reached the point of just burbling ideas in the hopes that someone latches on to them for brainstorming and making sense.

EDIT: The 2096 Olympic Games will be in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada, during the last two weeks in July. This means the opening ceremonies will be on Friday, July 16, and the closing ceremonies will be on um... Sunday, August 1st.

I'm posting this as a player rather than a moderator because it's not actually a global plot or anything. (Really, this is me nosing for people to play it with, at least the first part.)

Ganesh and Alec had a conversation (okay, a couple) in Ganesh's journal. One of the outcomes of the talk was that they developed a plan in which, under the guise of false avatars, Ganesh and Character (or characters) X would start going into the virtual world and trying to determine where wild card hate groups were located. As this team locates the groups, Alec would assist in destroying bases/avatars/whatever after information had been gained.

Now, Ganesh is going to present this openly in character so it's official. I wanted to put it here, however, to point out a couple things.

I'm seeing these places as being like the V-clubs (Virtual clubs) in Caprica. Since probably not everyone's familiar with those, have a link:

http://www.capricatimes.com/the-v-club (has a video, only 1:45)

Basically, it's your standard SF spot like Second Life, only bigger. You make your Avatar and do variably horrible things because it's not real. The V-clubs are illegal but everyone's kind of aware of them on a low level. They exist as an offshoot of regular online activity.

Also, while Ganesh will be investigating these with whoever he can get to help him, it's also okay for other people to steal this idea and run with it, imho. It's just kind of an ongoing project for him and an easy way for nats to go after crime with a playing field that got much more equal.

So this is what I'm thinking. It's very loose- feel free to jump in with comments, steal it, adapt it, whatever.

In step order!

Hunt The Hare

1. We need to find Barton
2. We need to find Thu Hien and let him lead where he will
3. We need to get Andrey into peoples’ minds and on screen.

Notes I (Cass) have an email from BriAnne about this that I have received but honestly hsve not read. I will reply to it within 24 hours.

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Sympathy For The Devil

Objective: To remove Katherine from the current game equation. On a meta level, we feel that she has too much influence and power, that she does not deserve.

1. Katherine reflects on her life with Bart.
4. Tereska catches Bart violating privacy and kills him.
5. Tereska finds out that she didn’t entirely prevent the violation of privacy and informs Alistair and Katherine that Katherine’s cover is blown.
6. Katherine disappears (either into hiding or dead).
7. The group is effectively leaderless.
8. This segues into...

Notes This really is going to remove Katherine from the game. We're very serious about that. Jillian, we'd like to know what you'd like to have happen to Alistair, who we'd like not to lose.

---

It’s What You’ve Got Inside That Counts

Objective: There really are threats out there, and there really are people capable of killing over genes. We want to bring them on screen to provide something for the group to react to.

1. Genetic readers (G-readers for short) - machines capable of reading a person's genetic structure even from a distance of about twenty feet - are released to the public by Vile Corporation X.
2. Gangs of patriots begin assaulting/killing Wild Cards.
3. Tereska and Alistair have some kind of resolution (not necessarily the same one) that they are no longer employed; this needs to be decided with Jillian.
4. Matt and Gabe realise that a) they have an ideological objection to what’s happening, and b) they want it to not be happening, so c) they need to behave openly as heroes in an attempt to change public opinion. This sets up a decision loop.
5a. The group decides to fracture over Matt and Gabe's actions. (Not desirable, but our last idea is to force people to keep doing things they wouldn't want to.)
5b. We can soften this some by having public opinion be supportive of Wild Cards as a result of the killings that have shocked the nation if we need to give the characters space. However, if the characters go into hiding...
5c. The characters can operate incognito to promote the greater good.
Notes: Obviously a lot of character discretion in the latter half of this plot.

---

We do not have firm timeframes for any of these, but we do expect that we'll have more time starting next week to get some of these actions happening. As ever, we welcome discussions and/or questions.

Puzzle-solving: not as good over the internet as in real life.

Purpose: Twofold. Maybe two-and-a-half-fold. We want to introduce a new, antagonist faction, or at least antagonist character who controls hordes of faceless NPCs until he can start controlling hordes of PCs. This character, whom absolutely no one should be surprised to realise is not yet fully written up, is Andrey St. Laurent; journal is at morningofthewar. Gwen and I both feel that games cannot survive without conflict of some kind, and we like ours moral.

The second purpose of this plot was to get players to, as time allowed, start to develop their worlds. We've all sketched in some rough outlines, but honestly, there's a LOT left to figure out, and that's not in the game setting but in terms of how your characters fit into the world. Off the top of my head, I would say that all the characters are socially well-grounded - seriously, find me someone in this game who knows NO ONE - so who are the people the characters interact with? Where do they go first? Is that the place they feel most comfortable? What do they think of first when presented with a relatively unreasonable situation? We want this plot to be about the characters, not about the situation.

Additionally to that, how do the characters work together? We wanted to start that interaction small, with something relatively harmless; as Matt and Maxxie have just found out, for example, not having a coordinated plan of attack is a bad idea when you're confronting a set of villains with a gun and a teleporter who knows TKD. Matt will have nightmares for some time to come about almost shooting her when she blinked into his line of fire. What are the natural lines of authority in the group? Whose power complements whose? How good is the exchange of information?

Time Constraints: Player generated, honestly. I can keep throwing bits of solution at everyone in sight for as long as I need to, and when Gwen returns she can pick up right where I left off. If people want to take this as a long event (for either IC or OOC reasons) we can run longer with it. If people are tired of it, we can chop it off sooner than we expected. Since it's mostly a plot for player exploration of characters and world, it's really up to you guys how long it runs.

Ultimate Upshot: Well, Barton's gonna die. Katherine may be disappointed by this, or she may not be; it kind of depends on what the team decides to do and how they choose to handle the situation. However, she doesn't know about St. Laurent in specifics, and she isn't aware that this is a fishing expedition of his own, so that part of it Katherine doesn't control. So from a mod viewpoint, the ultimate upshot would be to bring in St. Laurent, figure out how the group works together, and go humbly tell Katherine that they might've, kind of, possibly, fucked up. (I recomment Maxxie's meek and mild demeanour for THAT mission.)

Questions? Comments? Leave them here, or direct them to the mod box. (For reference, the mod box forwards to me, because I am very lazy and hate Gmail; Gwen, when she's got internet access, checks the mod box every day.)

We are getting contacted about next steps for this plot - we wanted people to have time to get organised, which, yay for happening! - and now we're curious to know who is talking to whom for information about Richard Barton.

If you're using a personal contact, let us know who they are and where they're at and we'll let you know if they know anything useful. If you're looking in a general area for information - the two groups at this point seem to be heading for Jokertown and for the last known address - who is your character likely to talk to? What are they likely to do if, for example, they get access to Barton's former place? If you're hacking, what sites are you visiting?

In other words, tell us what you're doing and we'll tell you what you're finding out from it. Feel free to make things like locations and websites up - just tell us a bit about them, because if you're looking on allwildcardsmustdie.com, you're going to get different information than if you're on undergroundrailwayreturns.com, and, as ever, we like player-generated world data even more than we like cookies and puppies.

Also! As your search evolves - you talk to the nurse who tells you to talk to the bar owner who points out that the fish-throwers might know something, who say no, but they saw that guy talking to the balloon dancer - feel free to keep asking for more information. We will continue to happily generate it, and give it to you as quickly as we can.

Alright... so now that everyone's had a chance to settle in, I figure it's time to talk plot and generate some ideas on how to get things moving. (And also to offer up Katherine as needed, to give characters a reason to do things.)

This post will be a little scattered and for that, I apologize, but I'm generally a little scattered myself.

By now, most of the characters are moved into the Anhalt, although there are a few exceptions. So it should be expected that they can start acting as Team Something.

This being a plot device mainly, I wanted to say that people should feel free to start talking about ideas for how these characters could act as a supers team. This post here's a good place to do it. We've all likely read a comic or two in our time. I think those scenarios can be used as jumping off points; likewise, I don't think it would be a bad idea to develop villains that could also be used against the protagonists. (And yes, NPCs can be used for this.)

Within reason, it's fine to "borrow" Katherine or use a black envelope to have characters sent on missions. (A tweet to the game twitter might be nice for a FYI that the post needs to be read. They are all read by a mod but it's sometimes hard to keep up on threads.) Clearly, Kat's not going to send anyone out for pop tarts but it's okay to use her for your basic superhero type stuff. This could be anything from stopping a hate crime in progress to chasing down a much larger threat.

I'm keeping this short because I'll be at work in a few hours but I wanted to get the ball rolling and see what people's thoughts in general were.

Thought I would shoot this out into the ether, see if anyone thought this was A) a bad idea or B) a good idea and wanted to be apart of it:

Del wants to start a radio station of sorts [not sure what the technological equivalent is, but live rather than podcasts] that would at least start as a radio call in show where affected aces/jokers/people could call and share their experiences, both in the aftermath of the bill being passed and talk about the problems they've had in general. As a way of giving people a chance to vent and generating a sense of community now that the Underground is scattering. Maybe it might grow into interviews or something more journalistic, but that's future scope I think.

At any rate - shoot it down, offer suggestions, squee excited: just let me know your thoughts :)

Jillian

So, this is what may be a rather pathetic attempt to explain how the global plot event will work this weekend. This is also the place to ask questions, if you have them.

What will happen - OOC:
On May 8th, a series of thread starts will be posted. These threads will all be open and characters can move from one thread to the next.

Threads will go from that Saturday to the following Friday. In real time and game time, this event will proceed to Friday. We're all going to agree to suspend disbelief and alter time, however - characters can jump around and RP at different points in the time frame, etc.

What will happen - IG:
Each character is receiving a "black envelope." This envelope will tell the character to arrive at a certain place and here, they will meet up with the other characters. In actuality, this is being done as a way to bring this group of people together and to keep them away from Jokertown where the real shit is going down.

We suggest and encourage creativity in how your character receives their black envelope! Dancing monkeys are a definite possibility here.

That's all good, but... what's the final effect?
A series of events will happen during this timeframe. Your character(s) may be involved, or not, as you wish. However, we do ask that they follow the directions in the envelope and show at the original meeting so that we have an excuse for all having met.

( Timeline )


Another helpful hint when navigating is to clearly mark subject lines as your character moves with the character name. Unless a comment line says "[CLOSED]", it is assumed that all comments are open.

We are officially open. Fire at will!