Welcome to Gaia! ::

* waves hand *

me, me!

Now, as for leaderness, would this be IC leader or OOC leader? Either or both, but we need to be clear. A person might be a good leader, but not have a sentinal that would be a good one at all.

I don't care for being leader, you can have it!
...and I haven't got a sentinal yet, so....I can hardly be the ic leader.


So...sososo....we need a name.

*branstorms*

Bedlam's Bards?
The Merry Wingmen?
Troop of Fools?

Well, the only owl I have a chance at is one I'd like to be an artisan.

But I'm thinking of it like this:

In the begining a "poor" and small troupe would have mostly actors, and everyone would just have to do their best, without props or paints or anything.

Then, as their popularity grew, they'd gain more actors, and more skill, and perhaps an artisan and/or an apothecary.

So....lesse....


So far as positions, the logical list would go:

Troupe Captain
leader
Second
second in command, perhaps writer/adaptation duties also?
Lead Player(s)
Exceptionally good actors who usually play lead
Other Players / Apothecary / Artisan

And then as many actors as there were.

when we first begin everyone will have to be an player (actor) as well as whatever else they are....and when/if we get more then we can worry more about specialization, don't you think?

I'm happy to be second, if you're offering the position.

Ah, anouther wal of text! XD

Ok, Yah, I definatly agree with you on the complexity. We need something with a bit of structure to make it like a theater group, but it has to be simple enough that people can just log on and perform without everyone on. I have no problem with people performing without me, it wouldn't be fun if it was compleatly controlled. Even the person with the least authority ought to be able to run a quick skit without the rest of us.

A lot of the plays seem like they will be ad lib, as we will have no real rehersals, as rehersals would be boring. I think we need to just put the name of the play in the thread and assign some charecters roles and just wing it as to the action. Plays definatly don't need to go by any strict guidelines as to lines. I would like to have the top people pick the plays, but after that I say let the actors act how they will.

Also, I've been thinking and maybe we're thinking a bit too big. I think we'll be lucky if we can get five owls. Sentinals have other jobs to do, and after all, we are only entertainers. We definatly need to set it up so minders and watchers and other professions can wander in and sing a song or something without being an actuall member of the troop. Kinda like you said, Annchen.

I also like the bit about starting poor and getting better as a performance group, Pearly. That sounds more realistic and more fun to RP. We'll definatly have to start without props, but we may have a little bit of paint at the begining. So far we only have three people, and I only have an egg. I don't think anyone will want to see and egg act, however, so we need to recruite more people. Definatly an older owl with less ego for our IC first in command. But I think we need any owl we can get after that.

Lore (she's still an egg, but this is probably what she's gonna be like)
Skills: Amazing flyer, graceful in the air but no so much on the ground, not a very good singing voice, she can't seem to stay in tune and the high notes compleatly evade her, but good at making things. Creative in pretty much all mediums. (Crafter? Scout who spends more time in the theater than she should? Writer for the troop? Probably not an actual bard, but she'd be happy to play a part whenever she's needed as long as no one minds her bad singing voice.)
She'll have a good grasp of will, and be good at manipulating things, especialy in small details, but not able to move larger objects quite as well.
Will have a companion with a decent intelligence, I'm discussing it with Ranger. It'll be uncommon.

Oh, and what about companions in the theater? Should they be able to act, or only to help with management? I'm all for acting companions, but how do you guys think that would work?

And we definatly need a poll for the name. Everyone will have to like the name. I don't mind it haveing "men" in the name, it's not really that offensive to me, but if it bugs a lot of people we won't use it.

It will take quite some time before Lore can join the group then... Hmmm... If you'd like to get some action earlier you could make up a RP-Sentinel that'd fit the group.

Ad lib can be funny, but I think we'll need a rough idea of what will happen if we're going to have actual plays. A rough outline makes it much easier, trust me. Besides, a lot of "spontaneous" stuff is actually carefully rehearsed. I'm not writing up Birch's songs in the spur of the moment...

I'm not saying that we need to plan everything to death, but it would be fun with a few scripted plays too. Hmm... Even with a script we would be free to roleplay how the Sentinels deliver their lines (or forget our lines). Scripts could be handled with PMs to keep an element of surprise for our audience wink

Just a few things to keep in mind while y'all work on this, eh?
- Hamlet wouldn't exist, nor would any other literary work that we are familiar with. That's not to say that the stories can't be duplicated, but there shouldn't be any 'To be or not to be' soliloquies or anything like that. It'd be best to go with original content (like Annchen suggested and offered to write), stuff that fits nicely into the setting.
- There's no way that the Brigadier would tolerate any troupe using his title in their name... or anything that plays on the Elites or anything like that. At least not in a mocking way. That'd be a good way to get some big smackdown from the big bird! ..although a play on "The King's Men" could be neat, maybe something like "The Brigadier's Bards" or "The Brigadier's Troupe" - but NEVER shorten it to 'The Brig', he's touchy about that.
- Maybe you should troll through the owners list, to see if there are any other Bards? I recall that Methode had one, perhaps you could round up some more members that way.

You're very right about plays that fit the setting better. We'll have to have plays that are a bit more subtle about the allusions, but I don't think we were planning on doing actual Romeo and Juliet or whatever, I was kinda just using that for reference, and Hamlet for a joke.

Also, Shakespeare's Troop, The Kings Men, didn't name themselves that to mock the king, they did it to try to get King James to let them keep acting, because King James really didn't like the theater. If king James even suspected Shakespear's troop were mocking him he would have shut them down and killed them all. I kinda suspect the Brigader isn't going to like the theater, either, so that's why I though of the parrallels of the naming.

The Brigader's Sentinals, maybe? I don't know though, it's hard to make a nice sounding name with "the brigader" in it.

But the owners list is a good idea.... *wanders off to annoy people into joining*

Oh, I know they didn't do it to mock the king. I'm just saying that the Brigadier would respond in exactly the same way you said the king would, if he suspected that the name was meant as a mockery.