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

Avatara, on Jan 24 2008, 04:02 PM, said:

Amazingly, enough, he actually did it .

I'm not sure. I think we could come up with an idea, but I don't know if we could come up with the people for two. As I recall, multiple TSs used to run at once, but there were more people and higher participation. (Continuity might also have been an issue because it's easier to tell stories one at time: this really wouldn't be as much of an problem if the stories took place in different time zones.) If enough people are willing to try it again, it might be doable though.

yes, I seem to recall meeting a plethora of simulacrums when I read through the Best of Cythera ^_^

I think it would be a good idea for me to sit out the next TS, because I can never think of anything creative to write and end up dropping out. On the other hand, if I actually came on more than once a week at best, I might have a chance to write about something.

Right now it doesn't look like there's going to be another TS unless we get more direction on what we want it to be about.

Ummm yes... My apologies for not posting for a while. Have been rather busy with getting back to school. (I have been concentrating on media a lot)

Well, We need ideas and finalisation on how we want this T.S to be run. My opinion is that we should set this aside from normal T.S continuity for the moment. (although this will most likely be a one off T.S and we shall return to normal as soon as this one is finished. My suggestion would be even though this T.S is running is to post in the tavern and keep up with your other characters)

So we need

: An Idea (Remember that the idea's that I think should be be looking for are simple and very classic style hero and adventure. eg. Holy grail, Find a lost lady, Go and protect a town, figure out how to save a village, Get the magical sword so you can go and fight the evil!... Ok so most of those ideas were pretty bad, and i am sure you T.S ideas men and woman can make some brilliant suggestions.

: People to post what character they will be playing and have the people judge whether or not it is Cythera related enough or is it a character that could never end up in the Cythera world.
: And last off We need some guides on how powerful characters can become and how easy it will be to kill an enemy

I suggest doing something simple, such as saving a village from some monster (as I believe someone suggested earlier).

I don't know about guides for characters and such. As I stated earlier, I think people should make their own choices (after all, the whole goal is to choose simpler, more Cythera-related characters), as long as they don't get too carried away and a majority of people become upset with their choice. The standard character-classes could always be used as a judge of strength.


As for two TSs, I am still not sure. It seems to me that, at the moment, there might be hardly enough people for one (i.e. where did everyone vanish to this time?).

I'm afraid that I have to agree with Selax. We only have enough people right now to run one. I'm willing to try Pippin's idea for our next TS; I just have to decide what character to use.

There is another Ts running at the moment?

Not really, no. I didn't intend to give that impression. I meant that if we start another TS following your suggestion, then I doubt we will have enough people to do another normal TS at the same time. There is no TS at the moment (at least, not officially), so I'm willing to go ahead with your idea for the upcoming one just as soon as we can think of a good story.

The Wizard, on Feb 16 2008, 10:51 PM, said:

I think we're missing people because nothing is happening.

Besides, the active posters in one story are the same posters that would carry the second story. The only exception would be the one or two (mostly one?) people that fight for hours to figure out what they want to write, in which case, it'd probably be overwhelming for them.

Avatara, on Feb 18 2008, 03:35 AM, said:

I agree.

I don't know. I fear that, given the low rates or participation by some people when there is only one TS, two might overwhelm quite a few people; however, I haven't actually been around at a time when two TSs were being run simultaneously, so I lack experience in that area.

Well then, if everyone else is up to it, I'm willing to try running two at once.

I think the better question is "what do you have to lose?"

Avatara, on Feb 25 2008, 04:24 AM, said:

My insanity! ^_~

I'm still here


just waiting for something to happen I suppose

but don't be fooled

I haven't gone anywhere

>.>


<.<

You should try the non-RP TS ^_~

So, does anyone have an idea for the TS to be set in the usual continuity? (Of course, such an idea might be better discussed in another topic, I suppose.)

Obviously, this lack of TS ideas is all Avatara's fault; therefore, he needs to come up with one .

How about:

A village's failing economy is forceing the resedent to have to leave.

This would in turn force (or provoke) some new adventurers to band together to either find away to save the village (meh) or quest outward to make their fortune.

It's quite simple and would lead up to odd jobs, and maybe bigger things later on.

This post has been edited by Two Jacks: 02 March 2008 - 02:38 AM

Two Jacks, on Mar 2 2008, 12:38 AM, said:

That kind of sounds like it would work for an over-arching story arc. On the individual story level, it might be too open-ended, but then again it worked for the Boxcar Children so it could work here too.

I agree it would be something different than the same-old meh thing, but I'm personally a little daunted by a huge open-ended character-focused story with a completely new cast.

Hm, hm.

If it's not character driven then there's a chase involved. I don't want to do another chase because first off, we just did one and useually only one person moves the story along. The reason I choose my first idea was that it was vague enough to turn into what ever the character came across. Because they lack the needs to survive they would turn to questiong for wealth or doing jobs for people. They would need something to make them all want/need to stick together.

I'm not listing the start of the new TS, I'm just listing some rough ideas that could be used or modified.

I know, and hopefully some other people will pitch in to the discussion.

Maybe something happened to the land and all the farms (or vineyards or whatever?) are drying up or failing, from some kind of natural cause (nutrient-deprived?). The question then becomes how to keep it one coherent story versus five people going off and telling their own individual stories.

Of course, you could take the extreme and say the village was destroyed by a flood or whatever so the survivors have to work together to survive, but I thought the original point was to write a more Cythera-based story, so I don't like the catastrophic disaster idea.

I do agree that we have quite a few "chase" stories, but this time around, if even a band of ruffians stole something/someone, we could try a the angle of our characters being weaker than the ruffians (ie, the ruffians act like real people, not mindless bad guys that get chopped up), so a simple chase and confront wouldn't be the solution (or, at least, it'd lead to a "bad guys win" ending). It also fits in the idea with more human characters, if the average villager could beat up a ruffian in a one-on-one situation without breaking a sweat then there would be no ruffians in the first place. Though it would certainly be neat if a different type of story could work out as well.

A catastrophic disaster could work if one were to go way back into Cythera's history


like...fall of the tyrant type deal


or

what really happened in Abydos?



*shrug*
just spittin them out there

I'm mostly neutral on the village idea, although I'm inclined to agree with Avatara. The village idea might work better for an overall arc of stories than a single one (for various reasons, several of which are described below).

If one looks through recent TSs, he might note that many of the posts do not really move the story along or get anything done (I admit many of my earlier posts suffered from this and some still do, although, I hope, to a lesser extent), and the story stagnates (as Two Jacks alluded to in his mention of chase TSs). I fear that a character-driven story might suffer even more from this problem. As Avatara points out, in this case, it's also quite likely that the story would devolve into everyone telling an individual (rather than a Team Story) story.

In addition, I seem to recall at least one or two points where space was made for character development: one or two people (cache in one instance, I think) developed their characters, and the story ended up stagnating for a period because no one resumed it.

It seems to me that TSs are better if more people participate actively in them (this includes participating in coming up with the plot). People participate more if the story is moving along and is active. Unfortunately, of late, it seems to me that many TSs have to be pushed along by a few people because of low activity.

I'm inclined to favor a simpler idea for the first TS following Pippin's idea (such as a group of peasants or something like that trying to stop a band of ruffians or a monster), although the ideas raised by Two Jacks and Avatara are interesting and could work (dependent on people's participation).

(Note: the above might be somewhat disorganized because I'm somewhat tired right now. By the way, when I mention the slowness of some TSs, I don't mean to offend anyone. I'm simply voicing some of my thoughts on possible issues in current TSs.)

If we had two TSs, I'd post more. Just a random fact.
(Also, I'd visit more. I wouldn't have as many unexplained absences...)

I like the idea of something where the main characters are somewhat more realistic than usual - no hugely overpowered mages etc. That would fit with the village idea, and it could be quite challenging to stick to.