Welcome to Gaia! ::

The League of Special Individuals Mission Statement: Here at the League of Special Individuals is it our goal to create a fun role playing atmosphere for both advanced and new role players, to help all members to improve their grammar and creative writing skills through role play, and to tell a kickass story. (originally located in the "Welcome to LoSI!" thread)


That being said, we've noticed ourselves not exactly living up to that mission statement, mostly in the creation of "a fun role playing atmosphere" department. A lot of debate seems to have gone on concerning the use of NPC's in the role play, and we informed you almost two months ago that the policies were up for review. Some of us put our heads together and came up with a few guidelines that we would like to propose to you. However, we recognize that it is ultimately you, the members, who make LoSI what it is, and rather than handing down decisions from on high like an evil dictators we've decided to open the suggested policies up for discussion. I will do my best to moderate both sides of the discussion, and hopefully we can come to some form of agreement on the use of NPC's.

That being said, I would like to present the League of Special Individuals policies on Non-Player Character usage.



A Non-Player Character is a player not controllable by multiple players. NPC's include townspeople, guards, shopkeepers, janitors, family, and close friends, etc.

Therefore, in LoSI, we the crew feel that the following guidelines should be followed:

1. NPC's should be limited to close friends or family members, such as "Mary's mom" or "Josh's Parents" or "Taylor's best friend Jill". These characters do not get their own storyline, and should for the most part only be mentioned in passing.
2. NPC's are not allowed to communicate information about the plot beyond what is stated on Channel Q News. Citizens are generally ignorant to the goings on of super-heroes.
3. NPC's of family and friends may not be used by players other than the one that introduced them.
4. NPC's of Guards and Goons (redshirts, for example) or teachers in the Academy may be used by anyone in any way, so long as it does not break any of the other rules of the role play.
5. Finally, members may not use an NPC to further your own storyline in a large way without the permission of one of the crew members. At this point the character is no longer being used as an NPC, it has become a minor character. Once this happens, you must ask the crews permission to use a second character anyway, according the rules already set regarding multiple character usage.

The goal of a role play is to work with other players and characters, not just to play with yourself all the time. We as a crew understand that many of you want and deserve your own storylines too, but you have to earn that privilege. This is where we as a crew stand on the NPC policies, but we would like your feedback.

Is what we have presented here reasonable regarding the use of NPC's? Do you feel they are too loose, and there should be more restrictions? Are they too harsh? Do you see something we've missed? Let us know what you think, and I will try my best to explain our reasoning, when necessary, or to mediate changes if possible.

That is not offensive in the slightest Clean, and quite frankly I agree with you. I do believe that you should be allowed to use small characters to further your own storylines if you have been heavily relying on interaction with other people for a while.

However, there are some people in the guild who I think have been abusing that (hell, even I'm guilty of interacting too much with my own characters recently.) I think on the whole the guild needs to make a move for more interactions between players, but indeed, sometimes you just have to do what you have to do.

On the other hand, didn't you ask permission before launching into the storyline of Geter? I can't remember, but I think you did. Not that it matters all that much, I was just wondering. I can't even remember where I was going with that...

Dang, I have the worst memory... Stupid senior moments.

So long as we're all getting along, I'll voice my own problems on this.

1. These characters most certainly can have their own storylines, as long as it's in between the storyline of the plot. They can also have names. AND there's nothing wrong with having someone beyond family or friends.

2. That depends on if the NPC is filtered through an actual character. Your NPC cannot magically know all the details though. IE. Super-Jerry can't come home to Daddy and have Daddy say, "Hey, I just got word that The Politician is bombing your school tonight."

3. Agreed... unless there is permission given by the creator for someone else to use them.

4. Agreed again, unless of course the NPC obviously has significance to the player's own plot. IE. the military official Austin killed.

5. AHHH! I'd die without the ability to use an NPC. I say get rid of this rule completely.

UNFORTUNATELY Nevi's rules are still the official ones until stated otherwise.
EDIT:
There are still no official rules.... we have to all agree. THAT'S RIGHT!

I'm just throwing this out there, I don't really cares what happens to NPCs. I just don't want fights started because of it.

As to Gatta's suggestion, yeah... I don't know if you know this or not, but democracy kind of blows.
I'm just saying, it weakens the leaders, takes away the ability or even the urge to make hard decisions, and kind of hinders progress in general. I'm just saying.

I'm in favor of permissible secondary characters who are created with the knowledge that they will be minor. (Example: Gatta's character Gatta; sister of Maria. At least, I'm pretty sure you haven't drawn up the full character for her yet, right?) These characters should be made part of the main character, to whom they defer's character page for easy access and information sorting.
Aside from that there are NPCs. These characters will be used just to prove points, move a post along, ad humor, etc. These characters will not be described anywhere outside of IG threads, and no one will get prissy when they are "mis" used because they don't actually remember,

So yeah, basically, if yo want to protect your intellectual property, get permission to use it, and write it down. That way no one will step out of bounds with your ideas.

Again, though, doesn't particularly matter to me, I just think that might be a good way to stop the violence. That and Universally-agreed-upon pillow fights

Don't get me wrong, the Crew loves surprises. It's why we play. Knowing everything beforehand isn't too fun.

(-Stabbing computer, I had to get here three times before I could post!!!-)

Sorry, I had to write that last post incredibly hurriedly, but now I have enough time to explain:
1. I believe that NPCs can have their own storylines, but not to the point that they overshadow the main action.
2. Agreed, save for the cases of families of heroes, in which case, the hero may (OR may not!!! Very important to not assume that all has been told beforehand or during the action... especially since cell-phone posts (for in the action) can get... very irritating to write and then from the crew pointing it out. Sorry, guys, I learned my lesson!!!) have informed them of some of their plans.
3. I think that in this case, I mostly agree, but if there is some extenuating circumstance (such as Toshimi's post where she ended up with Maria's cell phone and I had previously mentioned something about Mrs. Costa worrying, in which case, I think premission needs to be asked. However, I do believe that the use of that facet should be VERY limited.
4. Agreed. By the way, what're your views on creating teachers like that, such as Mr. Stern from Maria's flashback? ...Because I don't wanna step on any toes here!
5. As one incredibly guilty of this crime (I swear, Gatta usage is going to be minimal, except for around the house, and even sparingly then) I have to say that I both agree and disagree. I think that NPCs like Ellen can often enrich and help a storyline along, and have a fairly major part, but not be considered minor characters. However, I do believe that having to apply for a character if an NPC is overused will cut down on overuse of NPCs. (As a story writer who isn't entirely used to NPCs, the whole NPC concept took some getting used to, but profile making is often a b***h to me, so since many think that the character application process can be long (No offense!), this can cut down on overuse, not to mention PM Inbox Fullness, if you understand my point.

Make sense? By the way, Nevi, I broke your rule. I pointed a few fingers (mostly for examples and crew reminders, which are actually knid of appreciated), and therefore pointed 4 fingers... At myself. And I don't give a damn, insulting myself is a million times better than insulting you guys anyway. Besides, I admit that I've made my RPing mistakes. ^^

As to the actual problem, I reommend talking to Mayday, he was the one who, I think had the major problem. My thread was to try to make peace.