Welcome to Gaia! ::

What is the present state of plumbing in the Cathedral / Negaspace? It's exceedingly expensive and large-scale invasive to try to install indoor plumbing in buildings that old, but with magic in the picture, I have no idea how bathroom needs are met by those who stay for an extended period in Negaspace!

Maybe they just wander out and pop a squat in the Rift & bathe in its gross rivers?

Plumbing is adequate to suit the Negaverse’s needs. While the castle may be ancient, other structures have been built to house characters who cannot return to the outside world; half youma and ascended Senshi may choose to live in the Barracks due to their permanent change in appearance and lack of a civilian glamour. The Negaverse has never had an issue with funds and likely makes renovations on the Castle and Barracks as need be based on the needs of the characters.

The Castle, Barracks, and general living accommodations all have running water; while it has not been ICly addressed it is safe to assume that there is a water source in the ground near the castle. It would have been transported into Negaspace at the time the Earth City was, however is inaccessible.

Why don't guardian cat forms require a birthday? There are two "ages" kitten and adult, but what does that mean for how the mauvians age?

DO they age or are they stuck in a stasis like state, bodies/youth/age stuck in time like chibimoon in the series?

Guardian Cats don’t require a birthday because they age differently than humans. On the forms, we need to make sure that human characters are in the appropriate age range (either to attend specific schools, hold specific occupations, use specific templates, or awaken in specific factions). Mauvians don’t have these limitations and the age at which they awaken isn’t as important. For Mauvians born on Earth, they start off as unaware cats and awaken into their power at any point during their life. You may have a five month kitten awaken as a Mauvian or a twelve year old cat awaken as a Mauvian (as, until they awaken into their powers they live their lives as if they were an ordinary Earth Cat) but the age they awaken at is irrelevant to what powers they come into or what information they can start with when they awaken. For Mauvians that arrived on Earth after going through statis, they would be preserved at whatever age they were when they were put into stasis. Similarly to Earth born cats, they could have been put into stasis at any age but they would all awaken with the same powers and the same information as other Mauvians.

While Mauvians can age, we leave this up to player decision. For example, if they would like to have an older cat that looks like a kitten, they have access to all templates. Many cat breeds, even while adult, can be small or look like they are still kittens, so because of the extreme variation in breeds we do not have age specific templates. Some players may choose to keep their Mauvian in a kitten-esque stage for their whole life, and others may choose to have a kitten they want to eventually grow up. ICly this is fine, but it is not presently an option to purchase Alt-Powered art of Mauvian characters so we ask players to be aware of that before questing a younger Mauvian!

In a plot submitted to the mule, it was replied that:



The agent in question for that plot had died in the presence of exactly one person, who wasn't a member of chaos. There were no members of Chaos in the Plane of Tartaros where the death blow was delivered. There was no witnessable reason for the GQs or Metallia to have a confirmation of death- it begs the question, then, how do they know? The mechanism of that knowing has a lot of plot applicability across the shop.

And once they know, then as answered on May 15, 2015, the rosters are updated within 48 hours of service transfers. So every good soldier in the pseudo-military would know that the agent was no longer and agent. Good soldiers, good commanders, and all the SpecOps in general, would believably make it a habit to check the rosters at every update to see who's new and who's glue.

This brings up several questions about plot sensitivity. By what mechanism is it know that any agent who dies, regardless of method or witnessability, is dead? How is it marked on the rosters? On the Database, such agents are marked out with the strike code by the mods- is this the same for the rosters? How does this interact with marking agents who become Youma? And what about this all-knowing mechanism in regard to purifications? This last question is especially curious, since if it is related to whether Metallia herself feels her power coursing through the agent in question or not, and tells the sovereigns, then no purified agent ever is a secret, which retcons a great many plots already existing where purifications have been revelations between agents and their former colleagues. Similarly, it would make the SpecOps job more one of just waiting for the go ahead of hunt for a specific agent of known name, rather than just not knowing what happened- dead or purified becomes the only question and there is no MIA.

Because this was posted in the MQ&A we can only assume you wanted a public answer; we will try to avoid spoiling any details of the plot you submitted in the event it hasn’t yet been run, however we will need to reference the plot and events related to it to accurately answer this question.

This plot was submitted in January 2016 and involved heavy reference to a deceased character. The player of this character posted a News Bulletin informing the shop that the character was deceased at the end of 2014. Anything posted in the News Bulletin is IC knowledge that anyone can play with; more information and suggestions on what to post here can be found in the first post of the thread. Though the original post has since been deleted, we have no records that this information was not supposed to be IC knowledge, nor does the rest of the player base that was invited to know that information and play with it. Our answer in response to your PM was based on what was at one time intended to be public knowledge ICly, as presented by the player of the deceased character. The NPCs of the Negaverse have never ICly referenced this character, nor do we ever intend for them to, however if other characters were given permission to have this information or were referencing IC knowledge based on the original News Flash post (or player permission), there is a risk that it would have been reported to them and this could have caused a significant hole in your plot. We mentioned this as a concern for your plot only so that you could ensure everyone was playing with the same IC information and wouldn’t compromise your plot by using what was, at one point in time, information the player base was invited to have. If you would like an expanded answer on our response to your specific plot, please PM us and we will be happy to explain our answer in more detail.

In ordinary circumstances, the Negaverse does not have information on who is deceased. Many agents who do not check in after a time are simply considered missing. There is only one character in the database that has their information struck out and to our knowledge, this was done years ago at the time an IC News Flash was announced related to the character’s status. The database has had this name struck out for a significant amount of time and has not been mentioned by the player’s character; if they no longer wish for this to be IC knowledge, the shop will be happy to remove the strike upon their request.

Missing agents are not marked on the roster or otherwise noted in the database in any capacity. General Sovereigns may have a hidden file accessible only to them to note a lack of communication with them, but this is not something the shop will ever explore or push onto a player unless they desire plots to come of it. If an agent youmafies, they would still have a file; they may no longer have the duties of an agent but the youma may still choose to be affiliated with the Branch they served in and assist in missions where they can. The Branch Roster is updated within 48 hours of an agent submitting a transfer; this means they must apply paperwork to do so. This only happens when ICly the character wants to be moved to another roster; if a transfer is not submitted, the character is not removed and there would be no indication that anything has changed.

While Metallia may feel when a large number of agents die at one time, she cannot magically detect when any specific agent dies or purifies; there is no threat of any information or plots being retconned. This information can only be uncovered if a player wants it to be, either by releasing it through roleplay or allowing people to handwave knowledge of it. Posting an invitation for characters to become aware of this information in the News Flash thread is considered an IC reveal as, it is designed to announce battles, events and goings-on that you can reference in your roleplays.



A public answer was wanted, yes, and thank you for the clarification on the IC/OOC ramifications of the News Bulletin function~

Could Silver Millennium (or prior)-era Knights have had weapons that could be used for battle, i.e. legitimately dangerous weapons?

Yes; there is a lot more freedom in Silver Millennium (or prior) Knight weapons than there is in present day, however we ask that if players are planning on altering their weapon from its current incarnation (such as by severely increasing lethality or magical ability), please PM the mule so we can discuss it and sign off on it!

As a general rule though, weapons in the past can be more lethal than their current incarnations because circumstances for taking on a name were different. In the past, Knights were often trained to wield weapons, either in the academy or with their mentor, so they would have been better equipped to wield more advanced or dangerous weapons. In present day, Knights receive no training upon awakening, so do not have the years of training they would have ordinarily had before taking on the title of Page as they would have in the past, so their weapons are significantly less dangerous (and stay less dangerous to help balance them with the other factions in terms of OOC mechanics).

Is there any reason that token or growing claims submitted after a grab bag claim get done before the grab bag claim?

There are some reasons why this could happen, but each situation is unique and might have completely different circumstances. Typically an artist will go down their list in the chronologically order they claimed the art in but if you would like an update on art, the best thing to do is to contact your artist!

Some common reasons why a token or growth claim submitted after a grab bag claim get finished first art:

• Some artists work at different paces or have different waitlist lengths. An artist who accepts a grab bag claim but has five pieces of owed art will probably not finish as quickly as an artist who has nothing on their list and agreed to do the growth posted after it.
  
• Grab bag claims can take longer to claim that directly approaching an artist; sometimes artists pass on grab bag claims because they already have lists or want to work down their list before accepting new art. This means it takes longer for a player to be put on a work list. Some artists are more receptive to being contacted directly to discuss art. Selecting a grab bag does not guarantee that any artist will sign up for the art; it simply makes it known to the artists that you need art and if anyone is available they can select it.
  
• A player earlier in the list may take longer to respond to PMs/approve WIPs than the player after them. If the artist is waiting on the first player to respond and starts the second piece of art, it is possible that they might finish the second piece of art before the first player even approves a WIP.
  
• If a player wants a collaboration, sometimes one artist’s list is a different length than another, which means part of the collaboration might be finished on one list but not the other. If the artist who does the first portion of the collaboration passes it on to the next and begins to do the next piece on their art, it is possible that they might finish the second piece of art before the second artist is even able to begin their portion.

Sometimes things simply get lost though, so if you feel like you have been waiting for too long, please contact your artist for information!

While I understand that it's courteous to always ask or that they are being courteous in allowing the use of a last name, the wording of the answer to my second question does not clarify if it is a requirement or not.

"You should always ask." Should implies that it is not required. Can we get a definite yes or no please?

We have decided that it is now mandatory that you always ask the original player in every instance that you wish to use the last name they have already put into play.

Just a follow-up thought on the above topic. I don't play many characters, and the last name issue has never been of concern to me, but I do play a sideswapped character. Although he currently uses the name Lazarus Klein, my character previously also was named Elijah Bell, and I'd hate to see someone get in trouble for not reaching out to me to ask to use it because they didn't see it on the master list. Would it be possible for the master list to be updated for sideswapped characters to also include their prior names, so that future questers don't accidentally use someone else's last name?

I personally don't mind last name overlap for my characters, but I'd hate to see people get mixed up over last names (or have the overlap get noticed too late by GMs) because that information wasn't on the master list. heart

We can look into this and try to find some way to add this information so there is not accidental overlap!