Ambrosia Software Web Board: A TS Idea! - Ambrosia Software Web Board

Greetings heroes and heroines of Cythera!
As of late I have been pondering an idea for the next TS (of course we will have to wait untill the old one is finished)
What my idea was is to basically start again with new characters, With the following guidelines.

They must be very Cythera based, So no people from other worlds, no elementals, no half hybrid things, This time they
must be very HUMAN!

The other part of my idea was to revert to a very simple style of story, So in the end we would need a party.

A warrior leader, who is intelligent but still is learning, He is the person who brings the group together for a sound reason (this is to worked out later)

A mage or two, One who is good at healing and aid, whilst the other is an attacking mage, (we can not have too many mages, as they would be more rare
than swordsmen.

Perhaps a simple historian to find out some of the little information he has discovered

A simple forge man, who can help with some of the gear problems...

Hand to Hand man! Just a suggestion but this could add a different style to the story.

A bard or musician to help cheer up everyone at night! or play inspiring songs during a battle

Extra people who are drawn to the cause... Or maybe the leader will recruit them?

Anyway you should all get the idea...
Other ideas for this would that all the characters would be starting out very fresh!
So no fancy items to begin with, very little skills and all very plain. And then as the story progresses or in multiple stories, our characters gain skill.
They may chance upon a fancy magical item?
Perhaps we should all have to buy our equipment?

Some ideas for the story could be...

Travel to the wise man and seek a quest?

Defeat a savage monster attacking a village..

Simple! SIMPLE! story lines to begin with...

And maybe we shall enforce some rules like...
4 posts per campsite made before day breaks...
max 5 posts for small battles
Max 9 for large.
You must post 1 message a week to keep the story moving.


Anyway all suggestions please let me know what you think! I belive that this could work well and would be very enjoyable!

I SUCK AT POLLS! it was my first time owell just post the result and ignore the poll

This post has been edited by Avatara: 16 December 2007 - 04:16 PM

Pippin 3, on Dec 16 2007, 04:30 AM, said:

I would fill out the parts above.

I have also been thinking of a new TS but my idea was semi-complex and was very other worldly, though it started as yours did.

How about we do this TS before the Land King fell ill and a heroine came to Cythera. This way I wouldn't have to create a new character I would only have to reduce the age and experience of Yomu. (Yes I know, I'm cheap.)

So yeah, I'm in.


For no reason the basic idea I had was:
There was a bill posted on the wall in the Tavern on it was a picture of a chest overflowing with gold, underneath this picture was a ver strange style of writing which stated, "Once In your lifetime opertune! Hello adventurer, greetings! I need a part, you find it! If you retreive it you take the money posted on bill! Please come to the following adress...."
As the patrons of the tavern stared at this bill they reached into their pockets and felt dust and the occasional dust mite. "Hmm, Ya'know I think I need some fresh air." one an said sneakily making his way to the door, "Uh, yah I need to um... Find my house! Yah that's it!" another person said as they too made their way to the door, "Hell yeah! I'm gonna be rich!" a thrid aventurer said as they rushed out the door and down the road.

Once they got the part they'd take it back to the crazy old man who was building a weird portal to other worlds. This would lead to something to make them go through the portal, starting something.. Well this Pippin's Idea sounds better now.

Pippin 3, on Dec 16 2007, 05:30 AM, said:

Fixed

Pippin 3, on Dec 16 2007, 05:30 AM, said:

I think this might work best if it was a very character-driven story. Perhaps even make it so that the "party" was thrown together against their will and they're each trying to do things their own way, with the "leader" being the guy who attempts to be the voice of reason and keep everyone together. That'd require a strong writer playing the "leader" character though.

(Another one of my rambling, perhaps somewhat off-topic posts.)

Some of these ideas (not necessarily Pippin's though) sound as if they'd be somewhat outside of the current TS continuity (which I think is fine with me although I think that quite a few people wanted a continuity). A simple TS is probably a good idea (at least poll results here suggest that's the case). (The Tree of Life was actually chosen as a plot because it was Cythera-related, I think.)

I suggest caution on rules about character-types and posting though, although I can understand wanting everyone to be ordinary human Cytherans. The one attempt at an STS (which had the requirement that people post at least once in two days) did not go very well (although one must keep in mind that I probably chose a bad storyline).

I think that an Alternate Universe TS (one that is outside the "official" canon) could be interesting as well. (Once Again is an example of such a TS.) Such a story could be based on the hero doing something differently in the game (e.g. freeing Ur-Sylph who then seizes the Crolna, kills Alaric, and begins a war against the other elements). In such stories, one could even use their ordinary characters who would differ from what they are now because of the changed world. (One could even make it a TS where the characters have to go back and fix whatever went wrong or something similar.)

In my opinion, however, what a TS perhaps needs most is for people to post: to move the story along (or add to it in some way) and to not be afraid of working with the main plot.


I myself had considered doing an mirror universe TS for next TS (the group comes back to find Cademia under attack by strange enemies), but I doubt there are enough people around to do it at the moment.

Selax, on Dec 16 2007, 02:56 PM, said:

Well, I'm not sure a restriction on character-types would be a bad thing (though you probably would have to sit down beforehand and determine who is playing what if you really wanted the balance given). I mean, one of the issues with the current TS is all these outlandish powerful creatures are so experienced and built up so much now that the normal villains don't pose enough of a threat, so you have this spiraling cycle of powering up a bad guy to compete with the good guys and then having the good guys power up when they finally defeat them, and so on. Part of this was my fault, I think I was one of the first that ignored the original restrictions set by the game long ago.

If continuity is an issue, perhaps set it in a different time a bit? Supposedly the earliest of the TSes here (and the tavern) begin a dozen years after the game (and all of the original characters we've encountered have grown a bit). You could simply create a new arc to fill in that gap, or maybe even a time in the years just before the game or whenever (maybe Alaric forced the "party" to gather and go on the mission before he fell ill).

I think the biggest risk with preset roles is actually one of participation. What do you do if the "leader" stops posting mid-story? There are some possibilities, like having another member step up to fill the gap temporarily/permanently, but those are potential sticky situations.

Firsts things first, thanks for fixing the poll.
This is just a basic idea it needs a lot more refinement.

Selax, the posting rules could prove a problem, although i think a week is plenty for people to write even a small camp-site post
perhaps another poll to the masses on whether or not we should have post restrictions or not.

Avatara, I love the idea of the Ts being set before the game began....
And also the powering up the bad guys is a good point aswell. If our characters find smaller bad guys tough to fight, I personally feel that
it will create more excitement to come up with ways to work with the group and to be able to defeat enemies.

People will not be limited to pre-set roles, but it does help to have a wide range of people in the group.
( we do not want a group of 1 swordsman and 10 mages...)

Pippin 3, on Dec 16 2007, 10:40 PM, said:

Playing the swordsman in that group could be great fun, especially if you assume there is prejudice between magi and non-magi.

To-Shay!

Yes!! I already have a character that will fit with this!

Sounds great. I'd have to create another character, though. And on the way, we might get to find out the origin of the Third Spell!

EDIT: Actually, I think I'd like to take one of the 'Mage' slots.

This post has been edited by SoItBegins: 18 December 2007 - 01:57 PM

I really like this idea of the characters being limited to only actual Cythera type people

humans and mages and such, so we don't get carried away with powers

These TSes are after all based on Cythera, so it would make more sense to me to go with pippin's idea

I also think it's more fun to play humans with human weaknesses and the like

and I suppose there could also be Seldane perhaps?
or whatever the hell Omen is supposed to be

so long as it remains within Cythera's boundaries


but ya...ramble over

I personally like this idea, and I think I would like to be the bard character unless someone else had their on eye that first

(Note: I'm somewhat annoyed because the post that I had written here and posted was lost because the Web board failed to load, so this is my rewrite. Thus, I hope this is not poorly written.)

Setting the TSs in a different time period is an interesting idea (one which hadn't occurred to me). I was under the impression that there had been a great deal of desire (at one point) for there to be a unified Cythera continuity, so my various ideas of restarting the continuity, using time travel, or doing Alternate Universe TSs didn't seem very likely.

As for restricting character-types, I'd prefer it if people were allowed more freedom in this area, although the character should still be a more simple, Cythera-related one. Since one of the main premises of the idea is going back to more simple, Cythera-related character, people joining would presumably wish to do so. (Changing the character-types and going back to simpler plots are both very good ideas, by the way.)

I don't really like the idea of posting restrictions: what is needed is for people to participate in the main plot more. If they don't, posting restrictions will only result in a lot of posts that don't accomplish much. I think that many of my early posts and even some of the ones that I have done recently fall into this category, and, other than perhaps keeping the story alive (although these days I usually try to push the story along instead as I suggest others do), I honestly don't think that a lot of such posts are really good for the story. It will also make TSs less fun, as one feels pressure to participate.

Overall, I think it's a good idea, but I think that a lot of restrictions could take out a lot of the fun and creativity that are present in TSs, as well as making things harder on new members.


(We should have some big event in TSs that kills off most of the characters in the Info thread—many would be assumed rather than specific so an absent member would have no problem returning with an old character—then, have the simple people of Cythera trying to do tasks that heroes once did for them.

Yes, I'm mostly kidding. )

I'm probably overstepping some line somewhere because I'm posting so many comments without being very active in the stories myself of late.

Selax, on Dec 18 2007, 11:31 PM, said:

Could you clarify on this? I think restricting the party to only having X of 'mages' and Y of 'swordsmen' and stuff is a bit much, but restricting character types to the original classes (plus perhaps an additional commoner class type) doesn't seem so bad. Just like in the game, a swordsman can still learn magic (so you still have some flexibility), their class only indicates their main focus - I'd figure its akin to people lumping/grouping/stereotyping people into "classes" based on what they see them do.

Quote

I agree that post quotas don't accomplish much. A story that goes two months without posts is still a good story as long as each post that is made is of sufficient quality (though there is always the risk of losing people, but that seems to happen regardless) and in many cases more enjoyable to read than a story that was posted in daily, but is full of a bunch of "filler" posts.

On a random sidenote, I don't think a bunch of "campside posts" is necessarily a bad thing, as long as they're used to develop character interactions. Its entirely possible to tell a compelling story through the journey to reach the destination, rather than just showing up at the goal and bashing stuff in, but that depends a bit on the authors' personalities.

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I think you were funnier when you didn't have a sense of humor...

Avatara, on Dec 19 2007, 02:43 AM, said:

I was mainly referring to the X of "mages" and Y of "swordsmen" part, although I think it might be good if people were allowed to create characters (or perhaps character-classes) that could reasonably exist in Cythera (~vIsitor~'s Shanadar character for example). This could still fall into been grouped into a class though.


I agree with you on "campfire posts," but it seems to me that, recently, few people use them and as a result the story is slowed. For example, in Missing Sorceress, a time was allowed for the group to camp and to have character development. If memory serves, a few people did use the time productively, but someone was ultimately forced to shove the group on its way again because the story began to stagnate.

Avatara, on Dec 19 2007, 02:43 AM, said:

If I have developed one, then it's probably all your fault .

Well once we get plot development underway (probally after this TS right?), I'll start on a new character.

(Random Appearance! (probably do to the lack of homework) heads up, I might unintentionally rant)

One of the reasons you lose people with TSes is that it moves really slow. Don't get me wrong, the TSes are filled with great details that you'd find in a novel, but its just that after a while you start thinking about new things and you want to rush the TS or you just lose interest because you've been working on it for a month or more.

As far as making new characters goes... Don't. 9 times out of 10, with your first character, you'll notice some flaws you made and decide its easier to make a new character than try to salvage your first into what will fit great. Try to develop your character into the way you want him/her to fit into the world. Through that you'll get a whole lot better with your character and really add some depth to him/her. If you continue to make a new character to replace the flaws of the one before it, it'll get to the point where you have like 20 or more characters, all full of flaws that rely on each other to be perfect, and they will never seem perfect because of that.

I mean look at Avatara, his character has been through countless TSes, witnessed the destruction of many Taverns, maybe even popped up in some chronicles. The depth of Avatara is vast, by reading all that, you can pretty much plan out how Av's char will react to a situation, without having to read Av's post. (Unless of course he just wants to keep you guessing )

Now, there are benefits... I made 3 chars before Talryn came along, then I decided to stick with him. I made Tej for the purpose of being able to help with the TS when Talryn and his (ex) master were not apart of the plot. And he continued to serve his purpose till Talryn betrayed his (ex) master and rejoined with the group and now lives (on life support) in the chronicles.

I think what I'm trying to say is, use the character you've made for a while, test run him/her in the tavern and through a couple of TSes before you decided if you want to move on or not.

(ASW update: I still haven't decided whether I'm staying with Cythera or not (it depends on how Talryn's story unfolds))

-Tom

Dark Jet, on Dec 19 2007, 09:20 PM, said:

I don't mean to digress, but I'm not actually sure you've read any of my posts.

Sometimes a new character allows you to play a totally new personality, for a change of pace. You can't always model your old character to fit what you want to do now, or you lose believability.

Dark Jet, on Dec 19 2007, 08:20 PM, said:

Well I don't want to make a new character yet since I only just introduced Yomu, but if the next TS calls for it... I do want to participate. But if it's set in the past I can use Yomu since he is a human. (Isn't particular adept with any weapon class but knows how to fight well enough, and he only knows low level healing magic.)

Quotas are not a bad thing, so long as they are small and positive. Restricting the number of mages or swordsmen is a bad thing; indicating that at least one person each must be a mêlée or magic support character is good and fine.

I agree with Pallas. Also would this TS start in the tavern again?

And on a side note please fix the spelling error in the title of this topic. Sorry, it bugs me.

You would deny Ann her proper credit in developing this idea?

I should clarify that I meant that role quotas are fine. Post quotas are bad. Also, I feel that asking everyone to be a human character somewhat within the confines of gandreas's Cythera is reasonable; that should be accompanied by a break from TS continuity, which definitely does not take place in gandreas's version.

I don't mind the characters all having to be human or even role quotas that specify minimum numbers of classes (such as, requiring at least two swordsmen, one healer, etc.). I would just prefer that characters (or character-classes) that could reasonably exist in Cythera be allowed. (Maybe, they are and I'm just misreading this?)

Okay, I'm going to briefly explain my view on this. I have reserved my vote for the moment, as I can not definitively say one way or the other.

It is a good idea, generally speaking. My largest problem with it is that I'm worried you're talking about restarting the whole TS continuity. While that idea has been suggested before, I am just now feeling that my character (Wizard) is a good character. He's fun to write, and he's also beginning to get well developed. I don't want to feel compelled to start a new character and forget about the one I have that I enjoy so much. So, I would say that I disagree with this idea if it is supposed to take over all of our current TSes.

On the other hand, I would be very agreeable to using this idea as a single TS. It would be fun to set a story in the past, before any others took place. We could make new characters or, possibly, use our current characters to give them some backstory. But I don't want to forget about our current characters. After we pursue this idea and see what it's like and how it works out, then I think it would be nice to set another story in the regular timeline.

To sum up: I was at first very reluctant to accept this idea (nothing personal, Pippin ). I just didn't want to make a new character and give up on the one that I've worked so hard to develop and actually like to use. As long as we do go back eventually to our other stories, or maybe try to run them parallel or something different, then I am open to trying this idea.

The idea was never to completely give up our old characters... but to run a few Ts's (2 or 3) in the past with new characters.
Or maybe just even 1. I have just been feeling of late that nothing can really stop the Ts group. we are a little to powerful. with skills that cover everything.
But no we would not be completely errasing the current timeline just more or less going backwards(A lot) To have a weaker group with little skills and has to really work together to get a goal complete.