Oh Marvelous Mod (ohmarvelousmod) wrote in oh_marvelousooc, @ 2016-01-02 01:25:00 |
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Entry tags: | !modpost, reboot |
Reeeeboot.
Allright, folks, let's talk about a reboot. Here are the things that'll likely happen with it and changes I'll be making:
Game mechanics
-Character limit: I'm thinking we're going to have a six character limit to start. It's plenty of characters to work with in the game, and a manageable number for each player to focus on and give attention to. If anyone wants more than that later, it can be discussed with me later, on a case to case basis.
-Canon: A mix of 616 and MCU, starting with "origins" in mind (<--ignore that), that most heroes haven't been doing this too long and the whole open super power thing is newer in the world. It's up to you to work out what aspects of your character's history you want to use, and what the "Game history" is. Like what, if any, teams exist yet, etc. As we're still a GPSL we can build up our own canon, just not with quite so many universes to choose from as we had before, and a more definite place to work from by starting with the post-origins perspective. If you want to take up a character that requires more "extended canon" in order to exist, we can always find ways to work them within the framework we create.
-Character Page: In lieu of a full app from any of you, I'd like everyone to post a page where they write out whatever character history they create. On this page as well, players should keep track of plots they're working on (so that we don't just talk about it in ooc plot posts then forget about them), and every few months I'll remind everyone to make some notes about "big" things that happen to their characters in game. Things that you would think "this is what someone new/another player might need to know about my character". This can be as little as a couple sentences, really just making notes. Not only will it be a handy reference, updating your plots and ongoing character "histories" will serve as a way to regularly reassess what you have going on, if character development is going the way you want, and if you're accomplishing what you hope to accomplish. I'll come up with a template for it, because it's something I'd want new players/characters to do, too.
-Time: Time in the game will now be at a 3:1 ratio, 3 real time days for 1 day in game. I'll be keeping track of this by posting every three days to tell you the date (as well as include other information in a news format, like the weather, where monsters are popping up in various parts of the city, and anything relevant for minor events). Hopefully this will make tagging and plotting somewhat more manageable without worrying about how much time has passed between character interactions we see "on screen", and plots dependent on other threads finishing up.
-Net: The .net will now be combined with the main game. With the time ratio changing, it's simply easier to have everything in-game appearing on it's "day". It's also nice to see a lot of stuff going on in the game, even if it's net-type stuff, and maybe having more happening will encourage activity.
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Premise: A strange energy dome has encapsulated NYC! Everything from weather to animals can pass through it out of the city, but not people. Others can come in, but no person can leave. There is a constant underlying motivation of "fuck this fucking dome", whether that be from a character grumbling about it, or Science!characters Sciencing about it. So basically, the dome can always a useful plot fall back.
As if that fuckass dome wasn't enough, there are these asshole wormholes opening up all over the city. Some are small, some are large, all are annoying but, fear not, you don't have to deal with them constantly if you don't want to. There are three ways in which the wormholes affect your characters.
1) Monsters- Wormholes are always pouring out weird monsters from other dimensions and it's up to you if you want to use these in threads. Although the "news reports" will mention monster saturation in various areas of the city, they're not mod controlled and you can pretty much do as you please with the monsters so long as they're smaller more manageable run-of-mill-get-their-ass-kicked monsters (as opposed to like super fucking up the city monsters).
2) Minor Events- Minor events are small "events" that effect sections of the city. This would be like a giant godzillaesque monster knocking down buildings in Brooklyn and I'd likely control the monster for threading purposes. Or, say, a weird device fell out of a wormhole in Queens and now everyone in these few blocks are cats for a day or two. These are events that you have the choice of involving your character in, but they do remember them if they get involved. These can also be used to further personal character plots. The minor events are going to be less in-depth than, say, the alternate universe of what_if because it gets way too complicated for our characters to suddenly have whole other histories they're supposed to remember. More often, minor events are just weird little cracky things that are fun to play but don't last long, and when they're over our characters are like "wtf that was totally strange" without any real disruption to their lives/personal plots (unless you're using them for your own means). These will usually be done as a mod-made post, with multi-threads. I'll take suggestions for these all the time in the dropbox.
3) AUs- So, the last type of wormhole is one in which a few characters actually go in to explore wormholes for various reasons. Chances are SHIELD will start up ARMOR and send heroes in to explore wormholes giving off extra high energy signatures that match the dome's energy, searching for artifacts or anything that might solve the dome/wormhole problems (some kind of infinity stone-esque macguffins, really). Or random people can get sucked in and need rescuing. Or random heroes can just go in to see what's there. The point is these are like the opportunity to do what_ifs in game. A few characters from the OM-Earth will go into what amount to AUs, where we can play that universe's version of our characters (these are not the OM-verse characters, they're copies, you can still do whatever you want with all your OM characters while others are exploring AUs). Basically, think Wizard of Oz. For example, OMverse Kitty goes into like a Dystopian world ruled by Ultron where she meets that AU's Tony and Steve who help her on her goal of finding the Important Thing, and she manages to kill Ultron along the way and then she goes home. We'll plan these ahead of time like we do with any what_if, and they can open us up to more what_ifs in the future in the actual what_if comm. Doing this is a way to introduce to more in-depth what_if sandboxy scenarios into the game itself, without worrying about totally disrupting our character's lives and plots. Have your cake, friends, and eat it, too.
Okay, last thing, to be honest, the wormholes could be a thing of their own without the necessity of the Dome, although the Dome adds more drama. It's up to everyone to figure out if we want both or not.
This was a lot, I am sorry. Questions! Comments! Concerns! And let's start deciding what characters we want, and figuring out the "Game History" based on who we're keeping. Don't feel obligated to keep any character for anybody else, this is a new start, clean slate. Do what feels best for you and makes you want to play.
Edit: Okay so thinking about the "origin" thing, I feel two things should be clarified.
First, although we're doing the 3:1 day thing, and time passes so we can do you know seasons and holidays, as far as character ages the actual aging thing doesn't need to happen unless it's relevant for your plot. Be "mid 20s" or "late 30s" or whatever forever.
Second, so when I say origins I mean more like adapting the origin story, but letting us all have a clean slate. Basically that your origin story has happened but other canon "stuff" you'd have to slog through in 616 to build a character history hasn't. If your origin requires that your character be particularly young, but you don't want them to be, we can easily develop work-arounds for that. You're totally allowed to retool and build your history by pulling from canon.
Edit 2: Basically ignore the origins thing, I realize it doesn't necessarily work for everybody well (which isn't to say you can't use it, but you don't have to). As long as we can work it in and write it down, it's fine. Open super-heroing as a concept can be newer in the world (newer as in five years to a decade versus like 50+ years of forever like in comics), which isn't to say that super-powered individuals haven't been around for awhile, doing their stuff quietly.