The concept is for multiple Authors to work on one quest story – a concept very similar to quest presented by Nemo of Utopia in his work ‘Orcs And Outposts’. But unlike that story, the characters created by writers will not only share the concept but will also share the story. They would interact with each other, according to readers voting – considering how different it could end up being, we could get some hilarious situations. My propositions for stories: Fantasy themed: The corrupt king (alternatively Queen) tries to secretly squeeze all the treasures he can from his subjects, to get all their gold, without raising taxes (that could cause rebellion – rebellions are bad). To do that, he employs various monsters, corrupt officials, bandits and allows a theme to work in his kingdom in exchange for tribute (they, of course, don’t know that it’s a king who allows them to work freely in the Kingdom). And all would be well... but unfortunately, the kingdom got infested with hero parties. And soon they started hunting down all the ‘evil’, killing monsters, destroying bandits, arresting corrupt officials, etc. The king can’t dismiss them without bringing a suspicion to himself, so instead, he started to send them on quests – either in hope that the villains would defeat the heroes or away from his operations. Rules of game King (a writer) – the Quest giver would show up episodically to send heroes on quests. Heroes (writers) – each writer would create a hero or party of heroes (no more than eight people in the party). They would go on Quests given by the king. Their adventures would be described with Quest story rules. The adventure would end with either team being defeated or successful with their mission (which would mean that they would return and report their victory to [unkowingly] irritate king). Sci-fi themed: Let’s say Star-trek (but could be Star Wars or the original universe or something else). It would follow one of the following races: Federation (preferable), Romulans, Klingons, Cardassians. The Admiral establishes a new base of operations in the sector (space station or planet/asteroid base) of the new sector. He (or she) will be responsible for exploration, defense, colonization, diplomacy in the new sector. To do that he delegates ships on missions. Rules of game Admiral (writer) - quest giver, responsible for sector politics, decisions concerning personnel, giving new ships etc. Ships (writers) – the writer describes the adventures of… the crew of the ship. The author can change the POVs, as long as they belong to the crew of the ship, to describe how the mission goes. Before starting it would be necessary to choose a ship (preferably weak, small to a medium vessel), set the number of crew and describe the most important crew members as well as the captain. Normal themed… Still working on it – any ideas? * So, to sum up, all of the writers would work in the same area and could interact with each other (if they choose to, or their readers choose to). Also, the Quest giver could assign two authors to the same mission. I know the difficulty here - the different speed of writing of authors and story progression. So the quests could be divided into sub-missions. F.E. to prevent the war, you take care of negotiations with race A, while you negotiate with race B. Then both authors make a scene of communicating between each other. What are your thoughts on the concept?
So, a bit of a mix between play-by-post and a quest story. An interestig idea. I don't think I have seen something quite like it before.
I'm with @moonblack, but I do love Star Trek. First question: if it ended up being set in the Star Trek Universe, would the story be set in the 23rd, 24th, or 25th century?
I would lean to 24th or 23rd century because they were widely exploited. EDIT: 24th had the technology, but 23rd Federation had female uniforms with miniskirts... choices, choices. But seriously, probably 24th - All sides know each other by then. As for uniforms, we can have the sector-unique set of uniforms. EDIT2: As for the liege state, we would go with Federation - it's most widely known organization in Star-Trek. Some people haven't heard of Romulans or Cardassians.
I think I'd be down for this with either the Star-Trek version or fantasy, and this reminds me of a game known as "The Quiet Year"...
Oh, oh, OH! New idea for the medieval/fantasy one! There are multiple Kingdoms, each with their own King/Queen, and some are actually outright Evil while others are just politicians, (so, basically, evil lite...) but all of them sponsor a few groups of heroes to deal with the problems caused by the upswing of monsters in recent years, maybe to throw off the scent from their own corruption or maybe because the monsters are a genuine (capitol P,) Problem*. *(This could even be true of corrupt Kings and Queens, not all monsters are going to play by the royal rules...) One author would have to step up as "facilitator" who controls the big picture, while anyone who wants to can join as a King or Queen, but whenever we have at least 5 kings and queens must first participate in at least one other authors game for a month to prove they can stick with it over the long term. (I for one would not be a King/Queen, let alone the Facilitator, I'd stick with writing a single character at most.) Am I just nuts, or does this sound workable?
Sounds kind of like it would be stretching limited resources too far. You'd need an overall controller, plus multiple kings or queens, plus multiple heroes. How many people are there that would write for this?
So, let's talk Star-Trek. The concept is following: It's 24th century. Station (I will be taking this position, at least at the beginning) A station was created in new, uncharted sector (similar to DS9). The station is small, with only base facilities and personnel - it's development will depend on the success of the captains. It's purpose is to support ships (refit, repair), serve as base operations in the sector with the possibility to further develop it with a shipyard, diplomatic facilities, commercial hub, etc. It's also the base of sector Admiral/governor, responsible for the exploration of the sector. Admiral (female), while competent, has a tendency to be arbitrary and slightly corrupt... as well as reward and punish her captains with sex. There will be also few other officers on the station. Ships - each player will start with a ship, with a possibility to later expand it with additional ships or get assigned to the more developed units. The ship types can be found here. Possible starting vessel could be up to cruiser (not heavy cruiser) size as well as science/hospital ships - we don't want to start with overpowered players. The ships from 23th century are acceptable as well, as long the player gives a good background/reason. The ships would be sent on various missions (exploration, defense, rescue, diplomatic, escort, gathering resources, securing the support of new species/planets, helping in establishing colonies, research, etc.). The missions would be given general targets (without too many details), allowing players to describe their own adventures. The dangers would include: rouge Klingons, Romulan (space Elves/Drows!) spies, Cardassians, slave expeditions, Borg, hostile civilizations, asteroids, supernovas, etc. Any ideas/comments/objections? Who would take part in the game?
I would be willing to take part in a fantasy game or in a generic sci-fi game, but given that I have never watched Star Trek, and most of its aliens seem to be humans in funny makeup, I would not be willing to take part in a Star Trek game.
Hmmm, I'd love to do the Star Trek one, but having written some Star Trek stuff on the site already, I doubt it'll be very popular.
The Star Trek Concept sounds good. A suggestion for ships - with it set to take place in the 24th century, might I suggest a number of older ships? Perhaps ones scheduled to be decommissioned in the next decade or so. Namely, the Oberth, Miranda, Constellation, and perhaps even an Excelsior class or two. Rationalizing it away as: it's a new system, and there haven't been any confirmed hostilities. These ships are old, battle worn, and quite simply considered obsolete by Starfleet. Command would rather give them a dignified sendoff by granting them a last few years of peaceful exploration than simply breaking their hulls down after surviving the Dominion War. Just an idea.
I see that there would be problem with that. So, while not all would take part in Star-Trek and the generic fantasy world would probably be the easiest to start with, I have the following proposition: Let's make a generic sci-fi. Hear me out (or read what I have written), before you object. I will create the basic setting of world, f.e. Some history (humanity space is divided into many kingdoms/federations after the fall of great empire), the root of the faction players belong to (let's say players belong to the faction that escaped into unknown territory after failed attempt of coup and are set on creating their own kingdom/confederation), some basic ship characteristics (general categories of ships and weapons, their sizes/crew numbers, way of travel (FTL) - so all ships travel by f.e. jump drive, instead of having one ship traveling by jump gates and others by wormholes, hyperspace lanes, warp drive, etc.). Based on that basic information, each player would co-create te world, the races, the ships, the history, customs, geography - creating a codex of the world. If it works, we can later go with other settings. Of course, if it is too complicated, we can just go with a fantasy setting.
Ok, I see where you are coming from, but I think this is a mistake. STAR TREK may not be universally popular, BUT, I would note that the USS ishtar story on the main site was "Story of the Week" a few months ago... Similarly, a generic science fiction setting is more effort for less gain. STAR TREK has a huge existing fan-base that you can draw on for players, a generic science fiction setting won't, it's the same problem but more severe... Fantasy however is easy to do, and there are many people who like fantasy of all kinds. You thus get the same benefits of having an existing fan base, while also being able to tweak things twards the intrest of making the world unique enough to suit your players tastes... In Closing: find your generic Sci-Fi setting an admirable idea on paper, but feel it would be self defeating in practice; too much added effort for too little gain: and my question from above that you liked when I posted it still stands: "Why don't we we have BOTH?" (I guess now it's "All Three"...)
And this seems like it might trip the same problem I have with Star Trek: too many humans. I know it was an example, but if the faction that escaped into exile and is now returning hasn't had much/any contact with other races, and are human to begin with, then there's almost no chance of having aliens on the ship. So either there has to be a change to the outline of the story (maybe the ships are from a human empire that has no trouble with joining up with aliens and are off to colonise a desolate area of no-man's-land), or I won't be writing for this specific story. Also, I support Nemo's idea.
Okay, the first story (fantasy) is up under the link: link EDIT: I don't know why, but I want to include sir Humphrey (from 'Yes minister') in this story.
