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What Are You Listening To?

_{doesn't matter by christine and the queens
album: chris (2018)}
^{genre: indie pop}

What Are You Listening To?

_{emotionless by drake
album: scorpion (2018)}
^{genre: hip hop/rap}

The Clockwork City

R A C E S

_{H U M A N S}

The proud and the powerful and the most populous of any of the races. Although humans naturally possess the virtue of versatility, allowing them to learn and and become adept at near any discipline, they are most known for drawing their magic from the heavens. The church has made a pact with God in which their continued devotion and practice under Him is rewarded with a taste of divinity.

_{E L V E S}

Wise. Arcana is drawn from nature.

_{F A E}

Traditionally a good natured people, the Fae have been known to be creatures of emotion as well, given to acting on a whim. Arcana is drawn from nature.

_{T H E R I A N S}

Those men and women who resemble and take after beasts of the land. This includes Vampires and Werewolves, the two clans being the largest and most prevalent of any. Although lacking in the arcane, their bloodlines give way to physical transformations.

_{D W A R V E S}

GUILD NEWS // Issue #1, June 2018

Kind of a two-part story about how I discovered Roleplay that leads into why I went looking and eventually found RPG.

Roleplay for me started in a very odd place during a very odd part of my life a little over a decade ago. I was in high school. Wasn't terribly popular. Just your average teen trying to side step every social pitfall in life and maintain what few connections I had with what friends I could keep. It was a struggle on account of having a rather overbearing stepmom. Do we have any Asian kiddies in the house.. or Disney princesses? Do parents still think your shirt being tucked out qualifies you as being in a gang? Does an -A and an F still look exactly the same? Have you mopped the floors yet?

I was allowed a phone for emergencies and a laptop... for... homework of course. Being the good child that I was, I used it mostly for Myspace (remember that?) and one other social netorking site known as IMVU. Introduced to me by my sister, IMVU was (still is) a silly virtual chat client that allowed you to customize an avatar and place them around a 3D space on predetermined nodes, posing yourself in various ways from the rather normal to the obscene. In this way, you could be anyone, be anywhere and more importantly, do anything. A perfect tool for the RPer at heart... and there were plenty to be had there.

My first exposure to actual Roleplay was a conversation I had with a friend of mine. I'll spare the finer details, but she was involved in a particular activity that any normal person, according to my limited perspective on the world at the time, would have rather avoided. I asked why she couldn't just click the 'red X' in the corner of the window and nope out of there. She proceeded to explain to me that she was in fact playing a role and that closing the window wasn't an option. She didn't want to leave because that was exactly where she wanted to be. So... Roleplay.

It goes without saying that I was confused. Heavily. but more importantly, I was also intrigued... and curious enough to want to see this for myself. She agreed to share and thus, pulled me through a door and into the first fantasy world I'd ever explored where a new RPer was born. IMVU allowed you to make your own 'rooms' and this particular room was populated by other players in your usual fantasy getup. Heavy armor. Bladed weapons at the hip. Tails and horns and... oh? Is that an over-sexualized genie? I created my first character there, the core of which I've kept alive today, got involved with their overarching plots and the drama therein and immediately became addicted to the hobby.

What brought me to RPG was the particular style of roleplay. IMVU's client being nothing more than an overly robust messenger, everything was done in real time and although I could keep up, that was all I could do. Additionally, I was stuck "self inserting" myself in the game. It was easier to play as a more fantasized version of me than it was to create and play out a entirely new character I was unfamiliar with. I wanted to explore, but I wanted to do it at a comfortable pace. One that gave me time to think about what I wanted to do, where I wanted to drive a particular story, and really give me a chance to flex my creative muscles. Enter play-by-post. My particular wheelhouse and first discovered perusing the forums on the same site. I quickly fell in love. However, the design of each thread wasn't entirely conducive for RP (IC and OOC were kept in the same place) and after taking part in more failed games than I care to accurately recall, I took to the internet to find a new home.

RPG at the time was still the 'OldGuild'. I want to say a couple years old? Maybe more. Still growing but always remaining for the most part simple in it's design. That's what really drew me in. Easy to navigate. Easy to understand. Easy to find a game at my particular level of writing and jump in. I signed up then as Exitthisway and joined my first 'Free' RP involving your standard band of adventurers on a shared quest. The King's Daughter it was titled. If I could go back in time and find that GM and thank him, I would. Every RP since I've joined has been a lesson in writing, his being the most important. In short, he hated me because I was the obvious Gary Stu. In preparation for his world, I'd done nothing more than press two of my favorite characters from other cannons into one and during the game, had gone so far as to play out a scene depicted in a movie, shot by shot. There was no real creativity involved. No real direction I was trying to take my character. I wasn't yet there for the right reason. It was the first and only time I've ever felt the need to kill my character off as I had written myself into a corner.

My character was trying to be perfect... and nobody likes that.

Fast forward ten years and here I am today, having explored more worlds than I can remember and even dabbled in a bit of GMing myself. I'm not the most well known name around the guild but I've done my time. My take away? The experiences I've shared with a lot of the writers here. The lesson's I've learned and the adventures we've gone on. I can't really put into words what kind of impact it has had on my life but I know I don't regret falling into this... and that's thanks in large part to the Guild and the people I've met here. That's not exclusive to those I've spoken too either. You see examples of great people from all walks of life making time to weave together narratives for the benefit of others. Established GMs who've dedicated years to their games and managed to keep their story alive. OOC they're good people as well and it's inspiring.

It's the parts of the community like them that drive me to do better. I was and still am a terrible writer but I'm ever working to improve. I'm also not as active as I once was. Nowadays, I mostly conceptualize for future projects I plan to start when I have the time and share what new music I've stumbled across that I'm really enjoying. I only ever join a game when if I know I have the time to commit and if the story is intriguing enough and lately, I've had none of the former. I do hope to return and remain active and give back in some way and it's things like the Writing Contest and the revival of our Guild News that help.

Post Deletion Thread

Has there been mention of a possible thread that's dedicated to just deleting posts? I'm not sure if we need one considering it doesn't (probably) happen enough, but I thought I'd bring it up in case no one's bothered to suggest it.

Also brought up because I myself need a post deleted. Here is the thread in question. Please and thank you!

C O N C E P T S ᵇʸ ᴱˣᴵᵗ

_{G A M E}

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sᴇᴛᴛɪɴɢ
So our game consists of two layers. There is our real world counter part that involves the students, the high school and competing schools, and all the drama that entails therein.

The second layer involves the virtual space known as Avalon and more specifically, the fantasy server Horizon that doubles as a full on robust MMORPG. A high fantasy Tolkien-esque setting, Horizon is by far the most popular of any of the worlds that can be visited on Avalon, populated daily by millions of players, and is looking to increase it's player base by nearly double it's size with the introduction of a particular new event.

sᴛᴏʀʏ
A few days ago, word of a competition began to spread, rumors of a prize unimaginable tacked onto the end of a quest line that was to be like none experienced before. A few days after and further details were discovered by happen chance. A barkeep at a tavern outside the main city of Tavalia was one of a few who were surprisingly well versed on the subject. The prize was real world money. Funds in the millions and the quests? Well he would give it himself... when the time came.

A month after the discovery of the tavern, the contest was finally revealed. Completion of this quest rewarded the player with $10 Million in US real world funds... as well as something else that hasn't been revealed thus far.

For whatever reasons we decide, our characters have deemed this prize important enough to sign up for the event.

ᴇxᴛʀᴀ ɴᴏᴛᴇs
We will be starting already in our RIGS, and at the tavern where we will pick up the quest.

Tavern is called the The Twig

High School is Fictional Diamond Valley High

We live in fictional North San Francisco. The entire San Rafael area has been turned into an extension of the city built almost exclusively for higher end homes.

I will do most of the descriptors, filling in the world with details and colors and life so you can see it in your mind's eye. For now, this is our basic setup and our jumping off point for what's to come. I'll continue to develop the game as we play but please, if you want to see something added... anything.. or if you want to change the focus on the story (yes that includes a focus on SMUT you lol), let me know and I'll accommodate.

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_{C H A R A C T E R S H E E T}

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I've kept this pretty simple for ease.. and so there is room for our characters to grow and a chance for us to "learn" about the other. You can copy and past the code and fill in the information from there.

[color=bdbdbd][IMAGE OF RL CHARACTER]

[color=ffffff]ɴᴀᴍᴇ[/color]
[color=ffffff]ᴀɢᴇ[/color]

[color=ffffff]ᴘᴇʀsᴏɴᴀʟɪᴛʏ[/color]

[color=ffffff]sʜᴏʀᴛ ʙɪᴏ[/color]

[IMAGE OF ONLINE CHARACTER]

[color=ffffff]ᴜsᴇʀɴᴀᴍᴇ[/color]
[color=ffffff]ᴀɢᴇ[/color][/color]

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What Are You Listening To?

_{whack world by tierra whack
album: whack world (2018)}
^{genre: hip hop/rap}