Cross Effects 3.0 - The Third Time's the Charm? General Discussion

[Puck-Chan]

I really don't think we need to complicate this, but a timeline graph recording notable events would maybe not be a bad idea.

It wouldn't. You guys think it is. Like I said earlier, I'm just suggesting tags as a secondary thing. Organizing the whole rp events in threads would make it easier to keep track. There's nothing complicated by it. Make a thread and post. Put a "date and place" at the top of the post/thread to know where and when it happened so that it can be recorded in a timeline thread.

The way we have it now is that we all cram everything in one thread, which would make it hard for some of the uninitiated to keep track what happened so far and no idea where to post their characters. Because it's so unorganized and just cluttered with everyone's rp events everywhere. Especially for some people who may have RPed for a while and had to go on a hiatus for number of reasons.

But, well, it's up to Elf, ultimately. If she likes the idea, then I (or Alice) will implement it for her (as long as it doesn't require hours and hours of work...).

Literally just set up new boards with some sparse descriptions. I don't think it requires that much.

Honestly, I don't even know what district Sakura's house is in. The result of this would be extremely fragmented posting that makes it very difficult to follow what is actually going on outside your section of the RP. Or, even, notice what is going on at all.

And? Residential areas are a thing. So what if it is fragmented? You're allowed to read other threads and make the call whether you could try to let your character in or not, lol. No one's stopping you in this regard. Don't just have her stick around and be a boring NPC in some humdrum apartment.

But then again, she actually is. My bad.

Yeah, I guess this is a valid point. I just think it's generally easier to arrange things between players and not to keep demanding things of the GMs.

The way I'd have the tags is that it would first settle between the members to decide if this character can barge in or not. That way GM's don't have to be as busy. But if a consensus can't be reached, GM's have to make the call. I don't think there's going to be a lot of disagreements. Yet. Again, really don't care if tags are implemented or not.

CE already has its own board (albeit a sub-board of the RP board). I don't see how making it a top-level board would change things.

Makes things more organized and maximizes the timeline idea. Since the latter would link towards the rp threads it has recorded.

Well, most likely a timeline thread rather than graph (unless someone is volunteering to draw the graph...), but the idea works fine.

You don't need a graph. Just a small template and organize them in order by time and day. On top of the timeline, GM's could decide if they could set up the weather or moon phases at the time (both are optional) however the hell they want. Like a weather forecast kind of thing you see in Persona series.

Code: [Select]

[b]Date:[/b] (Day #)
[b]Time:[/b] (Self-explanatory)
[b]Weather:[/b]
[b]Moon Phases:[/b]
[b]Participating Characters:[/b] (Self-explanatory)
[b]Thread Link:[/b]
[b]Summary:[/b]


[Alice]

We'd need people to volunteer to help with the timeline so it's easier for me to put everything in place. ...One thing I ain't got is a great memory. ^^" And I haven't been paying as much attention this time, so I'd need at least one person to give me a run down before I can start organizing things in the timeline thread.

[Cherry Lover]

I really don't think we need to complicate this, but a timeline graph recording notable events would maybe not be a bad idea.

It wouldn't. You guys think it is. Like I said earlier, I'm just suggesting tags as a secondary thing. Organizing the whole rp events in threads would make it easier to keep track. There's nothing complicated by it. Make a thread and post. Put a "date and place" at the top of the post/thread to know where and when it happened so that it can be recorded in a timeline thread.

I think the timeline idea is definitely a good one. I don't think we need hundreds of threads for every single interaction, though, it just massively over-complicates things.

The way we have it now is that we all cram everything in one thread, which would make it hard for some of the uninitiated to keep track what happened so far and no idea where to post their characters. Because it's so unorganized and just cluttered with everyone's rp events everywhere. Especially for some people who may have RPed for a while and had to go on a hiatus for number of reasons.

I think it occasionally gets confusing, but I also think that having loads of separate threads would get confusing, particularly with people moving from one to another.

But, well, it's up to Elf, ultimately. If she likes the idea, then I (or Alice) will implement it for her (as long as it doesn't require hours and hours of work...).

Literally just set up new boards with some sparse descriptions. I don't think it requires that much.

We have to work out which boards to have, and to make sure that the concept works without getting horribly complicated.

But, anyway, like I said, it's up to Elf. It's her RP, not ours.

Honestly, I don't even know what district Sakura's house is in. The result of this would be extremely fragmented posting that makes it very difficult to follow what is actually going on outside your section of the RP. Or, even, notice what is going on at all.

And? Residential areas are a thing. So what if it is fragmented? You're allowed to read other threads and make the call whether you could try to let your character in or not, lol. No one's stopping you in this regard. Don't just have her stick around and be a boring NPC in some humdrum apartment.

My point is that people will lose track of what is going on and where.

Yeah, I guess this is a valid point. I just think it's generally easier to arrange things between players and not to keep demanding things of the GMs.

The way I'd have the tags is that it would first settle between the members to decide if this character can barge in or not. That way GM's don't have to be as busy. But if a consensus can't be reached, GM's have to make the call. I don't think there's going to be a lot of disagreements. Yet. Again, really don't care if tags are implemented or not.

I don't think we need tags, beyond maybe "open" and "closed" for places where anyone can show up, and places where you should talk to the players already involved first. The rest are redundant.

CE already has its own board (albeit a sub-board of the RP board). I don't see how making it a top-level board would change things.

Makes things more organized and maximizes the timeline idea. Since the latter would link towards the rp threads it has recorded.

Everything is already organised. We have an RP forum, and we have CE (which is an RP) as a sub-forum of that. I don't see how making CE a separate top-level forum makes it more organised.

[Puck-Chan]

We'd need people to volunteer to help with the timeline so it's easier for me to put everything in place. ...One thing I ain't got is a great memory. ^^" And I haven't been paying as much attention this time, so I'd need at least one person to give me a run down before I can start organizing things in the timeline thread.

And that's the reason why I even suggested the threads in the first place. Easier navigation allows easier run down of what happened so far from when it began and where it ended. Not letting it all clutter into one thread like an autistic tower stack of legos.

I think the timeline idea is definitely a good one. I don't think we need hundreds of threads for every single interaction, though, it just massively over-complicates things.

You over-exaggerate how difficult it is.

I think it occasionally gets confusing, but I also think that having loads of separate threads would get confusing, particularly with people moving from one to another.

Um, hi? That's why the Timeline is also suggested?

We have to work out which boards to have, and to make sure that the concept works without getting horribly complicated.

But, anyway, like I said, it's up to Elf. It's her RP, not ours.

Sure, it's Elf's call. I'm willing to help in any case.

My point is that people will lose track of what is going on and where.

Refer to Timeline comment. And bookmarking threads is also a thing. Just saying.

I don't think we need tags, beyond maybe "open" and "closed" for places where anyone can show up, and places where you should talk to the players already involved first. The rest are redundant.

K, don't care. I repeat again it is a secondary suggestion that I give less shit about. Now let's focus on the other one.

Everything is already organised. We have an RP forum, and we have CE (which is an RP) as a sub-forum of that. I don't see how making CE a separate top-level forum makes it more organised.

Refer to my comment to Rae.

[Alice]

I'm gonna make a timeline thread at least. If someone could be awesome and go through and give me a rundown though, I'd appreciate it a lot.

[Kat]

Threads for major locations would certainly be good.

[Elf]

I do like the idea of it having its own board type thing honestly.

And putting date and RP time would be a good idea as well, not to mention location.  I don't know about the sublets for different locations though. Unless its like major locations.

[Alice]

Giving Cross Effects its own board would be easy enough, you just have to give the word.

As for the date and time stuff, if we started doing that, would we just start after that's implemented as a rule? Or would we have to go back and date all the posts we did?

I don't know about making boards for all the different locations for sure either though. We need to make sure not to overcomplicate things.

[Cherry Lover]

Yeah, moving it to a top-level board is no issue, although I'm not sure exactly how it would help (since it's already a seperate sub-board).

As for the time and date thing, I'm not convinced about that, honestly, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it requires us to actually explicitly work out how long every post takes, which is a pain. Secondly, it causes serious problems when groups get out of sync. Right now, if I'm in a group that has been doing something that should logically take an hour and you're in a group doing something that should logically take 10 minutes, we just overlook that (it happened several times in the first CE, particularly with Rider). If you have an explicit date written, then it becomes impossible for the two groups to interact until they are in sync (which I suspect is unlikely to happen very often), which tends to force us into seperate, non-interacting groups a lot of the time.

As for location, I guess giving that might make sense, although it is a bit more hassle, again, because it means actually explicitly working out where you are.

[YOLF]

Seriously, just a list of notable events that happened each night and day is enough. They don't even need to be chronologically ordered because" the Nexus is weird" is still a good excuse for everything. Like so:

NIGHT 1
- Fight At The Hospital
- Church Burnt Down By Henderson
- Police Starts Tracking A Monstrous Murderer
- <Notable event #4>
- <Notable event #5>
- (...)

DAY 1
- <Notable event #1>
- <Notable event #2>
- (...)

And so on and so forth.

[Puck-Chan]

Blah Blah Blah.

Aaaand, you're just blowing things out of proportion to make it look more difficult than it really is.

As for the time and date thing, I'm not convinced about that, honestly, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it requires us to actually explicitly work out how long every post takes, which is a pain.

And? You can just reasonably discuss with others and come up with how long it took overall in that thread. I mean it didn't take us much to decide when Night 1 or Day 2 started or ended respectively. The thing about this dating system is to allow people to be in separate days if they wish to without clogging up the whole thread that we still share at this very moment. This is why I said it's going to need some organization. And that's exactly what the timeline is for.

Secondly, it causes serious problems when groups get out of sync. Right now, if I'm in a group that has been doing something that should logically take an hour and you're in a group doing something that should logically take 10 minutes, we just overlook that (it happened several times in the first CE, particularly with Rider).

Timeline, putting events in order. Like literally, you're responsible for your own characters. Contribute to the timeline or don't and take responsibility for it. Like, don't bitch about it if you haven't done anything for your characters. Since everyone's supposed to responsible with their own characters.

. If you have an explicit date written, then it becomes impossible for the two groups to interact until they are in sync (which I suspect is unlikely to happen very often), which tends to force us into seperate, non-interacting groups a lot of the time.

Which is why we can always adopt a bit of fluid-time within the RP. So as long as it's recorded in timeline and the event is kept in mind, there should literally be no problem. Just remember not to stray too far away in days and nights while staying in sync with everyone.

As for location, I guess giving that might make sense, although it is a bit more hassle, again, because it means actually explicitly working out where you are.

Because it truly wasn't a problem before when you posted in CE at first, amirite? Not every character is going to be in one place, lol.

Seriously, just a list of notable events that happened each night and day is enough. They don't even need to be chronologically ordered because" the Nexus is weird" is still a good excuse for everything. Like so:

NIGHT 1
- Fight At The Hospital
- Church Burnt Down By Henderson
- Police Starts Tracking A Monstrous Murderer
- <Notable event #4>
- <Notable event #5>
- (...)

DAY 1
- <Notable event #1>
- <Notable event #2>
- (...)

And so on and so forth.

Eh, that works.


While we may have a timeline of what actually happened throughout the whole plot, I also suggest a separate sub-board for a character's own thread compilation of what happened to them and describing what relationship they may have with other characters. In the community of forum RP's, they're called Character Trackers.

It's to give other members a more isolated focus on this other member's character. To give them an idea what happened to them and what relationships they hold with other characters. That way it helps them give an idea how to interact with said character.

[Elf]

PARIAH- Forest can smell the poo on you!

[Cherry Lover]

Timeline, putting events in order. Like literally, you're responsible for your own characters. Contribute to the timeline or don't and take responsibility for it. Like, don't bitch about it if you haven't done anything for your characters. Since everyone's supposed to responsible with their own characters.

My character is literally just following around Bdoom's, there's no point in me adding anything to the timeline.

And, you're missing my point. Working things out doesn't change the time disparity. If one group says it's 10PM and another group says it's 6 PM then the two groups cannot interact unless the earlier group somehow does a time-skip, whereas right now we just ignore the time difference and jump in there.

. If you have an explicit date written, then it becomes impossible for the two groups to interact until they are in sync (which I suspect is unlikely to happen very often), which tends to force us into seperate, non-interacting groups a lot of the time.

Which is why we can always adopt a bit of fluid-time within the RP. So as long as it's recorded in timeline and the event is kept in mind, there should literally be no problem. Just remember not to stray too far away in days and nights while staying in sync with everyone.

Sure, but as soon as you allocate a fixed time to an event, you lose the ability to have fluid time. We need to keep somewhere close, but we don't need exact timings for every post.

While we may have a timeline of what actually happened throughout the whole plot, I also suggest a separate sub-board for a character's own thread compilation of what happened to them and describing what relationship they may have with other characters. In the community of forum RP's, they're called Character Trackers.

It's to give other members a more isolated focus on this other member's character. To give them an idea what happened to them and what relationships they hold with other characters. That way it helps them give an idea how to interact with said character.

I really don't think we need or want an entire thread for each character saying what they've done. For example, Rider's thread would literally be a copy of part of Sakura's. A timeline listing events and the characters involved in them is easily enough.

PARIAH- Forest can smell the poo on you!

Lol.

Also, lol at Saber. "Yeah, it's fine that you tried to murder an innocent person in cold blood just in case, but how dare you actually take the most efficient method of doing so rather than charging in like a moron"....

[Umbra of Chaos]

PARIAH- Forest can smell the poo on you!

Blame Wanderer for not giving the kid a bath.

[Puck-Chan]

My character is literally just following around Bdoom's, there's no point in me adding anything to the timeline.

And, you're missing my point. Working things out doesn't change the time disparity. If one group says it's 10PM and another group says it's 6 PM then the two groups cannot interact unless the earlier group somehow does a time-skip, whereas right now we just ignore the time difference and jump in there.

Uh, sure if Bdoom's filling it in for you, lol. At least one participant in a specific event that posts up into the timeline is just really the minimum. And so what about this time disparity? If you want in the event, then you can just rp in it if your character fits.

Fluidity of time. We can just literally RP as we still do. Just in more organized threads and times just to give a better idea when is when and being there just for the sake of it. No one said ever said anything about you just being completely chained into one specific time and date. But hey, if the idea of time is too much for your mind, then sure scrap it. We can literally stick with Days and Nights if you want.

Or if we're still going with the time, just plan ahead with other partners on how long you want this specific event to last. The time and date is just to give a rather "broad" idea of when something happened. You don't have to worry that much about how long something really lasted. Just give it a ballpark approximation.

I'm okay with Yolf's suggestion anyway.

Sure, but as soon as you allocate a fixed time to an event, you lose the ability to have fluid time.

Doesn't really have to be. You just really think it is. Again, you're over-complicating shit. But hey, since you keep bringing up improbable issues, then let's go with Yolf's suggestion.

We need to keep somewhere close, but we don't need exact timings for every post.

And that's literally the point I'm trying to make here. The time and date is just to give a better idea when something happened. Don't be so hung up about it. You don't have to let it completely chain you. Just try to be active about it.

I really don't think we need or want an entire thread for each character saying what they've done. For example, Rider's thread would literally be a copy of part of Sakura's. A timeline listing events and the characters involved in them is easily enough.

Because Rider totes the main grill of the whole RP, sure, k. I mean, you could literally just have Rider do something than just be a mere babysitter.

You don't want a more isolated timeline, fine.  So how about that summary of the relationship between other characters with yours? You gonna say that's unneeded?