Suggesting

[Kailolu]

Hello my dears! I’ve had been wandering hopelessly through other RPG sites in my spare time due to boredom, but I’ve picked up on some interesting things that have occurred on more than one site. Please Note; I know the site is going through some major work ATM. I am not demanding, nor requesting that the below are made part of Spectrum, these are simply some suggestions that can be further discussed once Spectrum’s fur has settled. Hehe, get it?

IC board – On my other main roleplaying site, as well as many others I’ve seen, there is an In Character chat box. All it is, is a cbox or Chatango box that is meant for In Character Role Play. This is simply a way for members to “get something out of the way” that is small and doesn’t require 500+ word posts. Since I’m terrible at explaining, below I have provided an example:

*Member 1* Gary: -sniffs at the air before dropping his gaze to a rustling sound in the bushes- Who’s there? –says with a demanding tone-
*Member 2* Luke: -walks out of the bushes with his tail tucked between his legs- “Gary…Don’t you remember me? –shakes a bit-
*Member 1* Gary: -eyes widen and he jumps forward to playfully tackle his long lost friend- “Luke it’s you, it’s really you!”

You type a few sentences, let your partner(s) reply, and go in the same pattern you would in a normal post. I find it incredibly useful, and others may too. Just last night me and my beloved RP partner from a different site IC’d her character giving my horse character away to another member’s character, haha. We used IC because not all of us had enough time to make long posts and wait for the others to code and reply. It’s a lovely feature, in my opinion, but I honestly believe Spectrum could last without something like this. *Pfft* Spectrum could last without anything because it’s that epic.

Chatango – WOO! GO CHATANGO! This baby is my everything, Bahaha. Essentially Chatango is a Cbox very much like ours, but had the amazing feature of instant replies. I guess it’s like MSN or Yahoo Messenger. There’s no pushing a refresh button to see what your buddy has said, and there’s an awesome feature that tells you who is online and in the cbox so you aren’t just talking to air. (This is if they missed checking the cbox) You can also have a little profile picture, change your font color and size, and post instant pictures. No more URL’s! I love Chatango, haha, and if you want to see an example of it you can check out my other beloved site At the very bottom of the page. If you see me there, say hi! !

Mother Nature – AKA Miss Random! If this happened to be accepted I would be more than happy to run it. I have seen many versions of this, but the most common one is the Mother Nature one.

This is simply “Mother Nature” popping in a random post and adding something completely random that only Nature could do. It provides an interesting, though sometimes meaningless, twist in whatever post. Whether your character gets a bee sting, or is pooped on by a bird, or attacked by a rabid coyote, it’s something that can potentially bring a dead thread to life. Many people, after a few posts without a plot, no longer have a reason to continue that particular thread. BAM Here comes Mama! I’ve provided a few examples below of a random event that Nature could provoke;

Mother Nature: Buzz, buzzz, buzzz! While *Enter character name here* was talking, a little yellow bee stung him/her on the ear. Ouch!

Mother Nature: The smell of rain engulfs the surrounding area, and soon enough the pitter patter of rain is heard. Better find shelter quick, this storm looks like it could go all week. Stay warm!

Mother Nature: The bleating sound of a fawn in the distance rings through the land. The young deer has been separated from its mother for days and is too weak to go any further. This could provide your wolf with a good snack!

Mother Nature: A rustling sound to the left is loud enough to capture anyone’s attention. Before you know it, a herd of elk spooked by a cougar is stampeding your way! One of you is kicked in the knee and won’t recover for 3 in character days. Decide amongst yourself who the victim is.

We can’t control what Nature dishes out, but this could be fun and interesting, especially the last one. Now I know if Mother Nature did pop up somewhere unwanted and caused harm to a character, someone could get upset. If that’s the case, the random even can be changed very easily. So there’s no problems! If you like the event, keep it, if it involves your character and you don’t want it, ask nicely and Mother Nature may be swayed in your favor!

Reminder: I do not expect these to be accepted because they are suggestions that are meant to be talked about! And please, if anyone likes the ideas, don’t pester Forte or the other Staff to get working on it. If any of these get accepted, then they get accepted. If not, life goes on!

[Accalia]

You can add pictures to our current cbox, y'know - Forte just has to enable it. Then, where it says to input an URL, if you link to a picture, it'll show that as a picture beside your name.

Personally I prefer our current cbox, but one thing I would enjoy is if it was moved to the bottom of the page and made larger. That tends to stimulate more discussion. On a lot of sites, people have random llama fights and debates on oranges v lemons in the cbox; on Spectrum we don't seem to, and I suspect that's because the cbox is small, and hidden away in the sidebar.
However, that's a choice Forte's made, that the cbox is small and not an important part of the site. I'm not going to argue with her on that one, she seems to have pretty good judgement as regards the rest of the site. *shrug*

I like the Mother Nature idea, but I feel it would have to be invited into a thread by the players, not just randomly put into a thread. Imagine if two characters were having an epic fight or romance or whatever, and then suddenly this random deer came in... It would really spoil the tension. Or, perhaps the RPers had planned to have the characters take on a giant bear, and then Mother Nature sidetracks them into running away from the rain and they don't get to fight the giant bear after all. Or maybe a random character was trying to set fire to a pack's territory and the pack was getting up in arms about it and they were having tense snarly moments, and then suddenly it started raining... Fire's put out, tension all goes away, nobody's entirely sure what to do.

As for the IC cbox, I like it, but there's no requirement to post 500 words or use a posting table when you're posting on the forums. If all the RPers involved are fine with it, I'm pretty sure there isn't a rule against having threads where everybody only posts 3 lines and doesn't use their posting table.

[Forte]

IC chat - I've thought about this, and I have two reservations: First, I would worry that everyone would post in the IC chat instead of the boards because it's so much more convenient compared with the way our more advanced writers post. I get your reasons for having it, but, as Accalia said, there's no word count on Spectrum so no one has to post 500+ words a post and work with tables and all that stuff, and not everyone does.

Second, it would be a disaster if a bunch of people wanted to use it at one time.

I do think I'm going to allow this, but I want to discuss it further first.

Chatango - You're definitely right about Chatango's cool features, but the one thing I don't like is the style of the app. It definitely doesn't fit with Spectrum's minimalist theme. I'd be cool with it if it were to go down below the site so it wouldn't be so noticeable, but I'm not sure how many people would like to scroll down all the way to see the Cbox.

Discuss!

Mother Nature - Approved. Approved approved approved. Kai, you're in charge: You get a new custom title.

One thing: If people don't want Mother Nature interrupting their thread, they should put "[No MN]" or similar in the title. I trust your judgement when it comes to intense fights and romances and other plots. xD

Bigger Cbox - I'm okay with this, and moving the chat below the site, except for what I previously said about scrolling. Not sure if everyone would enjoy scrolling all the way down to see the Cbox/Chatango.