ooc The Dark Millennium - a combat & exploration RP - updated rules for joining

[Hederik 119]

 

 

I'm waiting to see what their life expectancy is. I also don't really know much about them - the more I know, the better an image I have. Maybe later I'll feel up to drawing whole scenes, complete with NPCs, but for the time being it is beyond my capability (Hence my efforts to draw more unusual things.)

 

Grumble. I take back your experience for going too seriously about the topic. All in all, it's something to look forward to if it should happen though.

 

 

 

Adding depth is something I have never been able to satisfactorily achieve, no matter the medium, and I have no real idea how to go about it with the program I use. The fill / line contrast could only really be improved by making the changeling lighter - and I preferred the darker colour. I suppose I could thicken the lines, but with the amount of bodging I did at the end that would probably end up a mess.

 

I won't even try to advise you there, seeing as all I'm able to do myself is draw over somebody else's lines and fill the end product with a color. Merely offering observations.

 

 

 

I assumed that it was a thickened section of chitinous carapace... and when I saw soldiers wearing extra gear, I liked the idea that it was harvested from unfortunate drones. 

 

 

[Once In A Blue Moon 895]

@@Hederik, @@AzureNightLight, @@Colenso Rivers, @@SilverHeart.

 

Even if the RP seems to have ground to a halt, I'm up for continuing.

 

EDIT: oh yes, holidays. My apologies for my lack of faith.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1xAUfdK9FE

Edited August 15, 2016 by Once In A Blue Moon

[Colenso Rivers 85]

Yeah, I wonder what happened.

[Convergence 83]

Hey guys, I am really interested in joining this RP, so you may see a lot more of me around here shortly I sent Hederik a PM to discuss a slightly different idea for my character creation. I will be posting an actual application pending his response.

Edited August 15, 2016 by Convergence

[Hederik 119]

Yes yes, I'm here, shaking off the fortnight of freedom and digging through the same amount of buildup at work. Due to the second part, expect no update today, but tomorrow we should get back on track and properly start regaining steam.

[honk friend 1,978]

dark millennium more like dank memelinnium

i'll show myself out now

[Hederik 119]

Thanks for the input, you've moved my soul to before uncharted depths. I foresee a terrific future for you in the field of anonymous underage humor.

[Once In A Blue Moon 895]

 

 

Thanks for the input, you've moved my soul to before uncharted depths. I foresee a terrific future for you in the field of anonymous underage humor.

 

If we categorise comedy as art then we can put that down as 'fan art' in the RP statistics.

[Hederik 119]

Here are a few additional matters that have been poked at outside of this topic, but deserve to be brought to attention of anyone following the RP or considering joining it.

 

 

Q: These ponies have leather armor. Is it made of the hides of other ponies?

 

A: Goodness, no. While the picture painted may be rough, borderline cruel with how the academy's attendees are trained and treated, they are in no way inclined to indulge ponicide, cannibalism or using dead compatriots' bodies (methods of death notwithstanding) as materials for creating anything. The very notion would have met with similar outrage as it would in our world.

 

I honestly haven't thought about it before now, but I'd say that since we know something similar to be true in Ponyville, the ponies of the Valley could be keeping cows, pigs and such -- and seeing how the reality is a fair bit darker here than in the show, harvesting leather from them isn't impossible (albeit wasteful, as I can't imagine ponies eating meat -- at least not in this setting). Given that the officers' population isn't unnecessarily large, a good portion of such armor could with appropriate treatment be passed down through generations. And there exists the outside world, and little as your characters do know about it, it may not be entirely unknown to the organization as a whole.

 

 

 

Q: Are the identities of the individuals Bearers of the Elements of Harmony known to the Cadets (like, that the Element of Laughter was a pink earth pony mare, Pinkie Pie)?

 

A: I'd expect any respectable history book to describe the return of Nightmare Moon, the battle against Discord and the invasion of changelings into Canterlot in quite some detail. That's mostly what I meant by "some of the Equestrian history (...) up to and including the events of Season 1 [and 2] (the nation-wide important ones, at least)".

 

[The fact that the Mane Six isn't by and far famous in the show] is pretty silly of the show, indicative, the way I see it, of the fact it is some kind of an animated show for kids. Irony aside, this plays pretty well off the argument I made during Avidity's classes: the ponies of Equestria don't understand strife. They are so rooted in their peaceful ways that they're more inclined to disregard warlike events than understand them. And the lack of recognition is honestly ridiculous in the show - Twilight isn't even recognized as a bucking princess in season four.

 

Returning to the point, however. Even if the feats of the Mane Six went largely ignored in your typical pony's everyday life, that doesn't translate directly into what will be remembered by historians. Small matters and nameless ponies disappear in the abyss of the past; great deeds are remembered. Whatever amount of fame the Mane Six may have had in the days of Equestria is beyond the scope of history books, I'd warrant. But at the very least their names would have been remembered beyond any doubt.

 

I'd venture to say the aforementioned events to be song- or at least poem-worthy, so there's a good avenue for the mares' appearance to pass through the ages. Although if we consider how diverse the coloration of Equestria's dwellers is, it wouldn't be too surprising if a matter-of-fact account included a color table for each of the described personae.

 

 

 

Q: Why are the cadets training to be officers? As in, who will they command when they graduate? Obviously the cadets haven't graduated yet, but at the moment they seem to be being used as enlisted soldiers rather than officers.

 

A: hink about it as a cultural difference in nomenclature. Like, every policeman is called an officer too, right? They are something above and beyond the normal society and this is the title that defines them as such. The training regimen (that the PCs have undergone) does not focus much on leadership. Perhaps the only one to have had some training focused that way would be Azure due to her talents pointing towards being somewhat of a tactician. Normally, these are the skills that are picked only by those chosen from among the graduates of the academy.

 

If you'd like to look at it in other light, think of it thus: in the times of peace a society can afford to only sustain a small force of highly skilled professionals. Yet if something were to happen, these numbers would be insufficient and a draft from among the civilians would be required. Then the title of officers would perhaps get more of the meaning behind it that you look for in it. Not that a thought like that would have crossed the mind of anypony outside of the academy, and since no ultimate purpose of their training is known to the Cadets, they too would be unlikely to think of such dire circumstances.

 

 

 

Q: In several places in the posts describing the world, the setting and the likes, it is said that Equestria has fallen. How then should the world be referred to? Why not Equestria?

 

A: Hm. The way I envisioned it, Equestria indeed was the name of a (rather big) country, but there were lands beyond it, the location currently known as Pony Valley included. As to how the world would then be called... I'd wager that the need for a word beyond 'the world' comes from the necessity of differentiating it from other worlds... The dictionary informs me that Earth was called as such since circa 1400, so by and far the ponies should have a word too, especially since they are proven to have an extensive fiction market. This poses an interesting problem.

 

If we looked at it from the perspective of pre-apocalypse Equestria, I'd be willing to accept the explanation that ponies believe their country to BE the world, or as close to it as makes no difference, and apply the same term to the whole thing. Other cultures living outside Equestria might have different ideas, but let's not go into worldwide linguistics here.

(As an afterthought, this is exactly what has been presented during the Hearthswarming play episode I base so much of my headcanon on. That the ponies came into a new land and called it Equestria.)

 

In the current situation... I'm tempted to say that since the country had fallen, the term was free to use and had been used to refer to the world as a whole since then. Because it's easy and a compromise. But it's also ugly, misleading and plain lazy.

 

I've seen a couple people use the name Equus, but don't agree with this option. None of my own ideas have worked either, so here's the final verdict: I myself will most likely just use 'the world', but won't oppose anyone who chooses to continue using 'Equestria', as long as it doesn't cause unnecessary confusion in the matter.

[honk friend 1,978]

Thanks for the input, you've moved my soul to before uncharted depths. I foresee a terrific future for you in the field of anonymous underage humor.

it was just a joke

no need to be mean about it

[Hederik 119]

@Colenso Rivers, @SilverHeart, @Once In A Blue Moon @AzureNightLight (did I forget anyone?)

Hi! Your worst GM ever here.

It won't happen today, though it might happen this week. It may also not happen at all if disinterest is paramount or if you decide to scold me into the ground (a choice I morally support, truth be told). I have reason to hope for the contrary though, so:

I'm thinking on reopening this session. It's been tremendous fun, I've enjoyed your cooperation a lot, and I did put quite some work into devising a storyline I wanted to share. (Fortunately. I forgot so much without all my detailed notes I don't know if I could recreate where this was heading.)

I still need to reread what we've written - what feels like years ago, and for a good reason. To decide anew what awaits in the depths, and reintroduce you to the world. I'm not averse to reopening signups, either (I guess I'll have to edit the first post too).

That... would be it, I guess. Any takers and questions are welcome. Apologies by the bucket available on the cheap cheap to any parties eligible to claim them.

[Once In A Blue Moon 895]

@Hederik Welcome back. I don't know who else is around at the moment; a quick snoop indicates that

- @Colenso Rivers posted that they were leaving back in 2016, although they are on record as having visited here since (albeit taking no actions.)

- @SilverHeart I've seen around, although apparently not recently (December 2017.)

- @AzureNightLight hasn't been active since the RP stopped.

Still, if you have returned then there is hope that others will - it was a good group. I'm certainly up for resuming it, and I think that the situation the group was in would be friendly to having players fade into the background or step to the fore, depending on whether my fellow players wish to resume it or not. 

6 hours ago, Hederik said:

I forgot so much without all my detailed notes I don't know if I could recreate where this was heading.

I've bricked a hard drive since then, so I understand.

[SilverHeart 741]

I guess you could say you're in luck, because I've been meaning to log on and disable email notifications for a month now. I just couldn't be bothered to do it.

 

I'd be willing to keep going but my vote would be to move away from the forums and to a platform like Discord because I'm not really a fan of these forums. Though this isn't a democracy so its all up to you Hederik.

[Once In A Blue Moon 895]

Ah, good to see you too.

Another platform would be fine by me. 

[SilverHeart 741]

6 hours ago, Once In A Blue Moon said:

Ah, good to see you too.

Another platform would be fine by me. 

And yes hello to you to too.

Its a small wonder the three of us are still here.

[Hederik 119]

So glad to see you respond.

Another platform is entirely fine by me. However, I would prefer forums to Discord - spoken sessions are damnably hard to arrange, especially with our differing timezones, and I'm ever the written-RPG guy, although I have had my fun with spoken ones. I mean, I would not be impossible to convince to a spoken session, but it definitely most likely wouldn't be this one.

4 hours ago, SilverHeart said:

Its a small wonder the three of us are still here.

I read it as "it's small wonder" and kept pondering why you'd think that until I noticed the "a". Ah, the intricacies of the language...

[SilverHeart 741]

1 hour ago, Hederik said:

So glad to see you respond.

Another platform is entirely fine by me. However, I would prefer forums to Discord - spoken sessions are damnably hard to arrange, especially with our differing timezones, and I'm ever the written-RPG guy, although I have had my fun with spoken ones. I mean, I would not be impossible to convince to a spoken session, but it definitely most likely wouldn't be this one.

I read it as "it's small wonder" and kept pondering why you'd think that until I noticed the "a". Ah, the intricacies of the language...

Discord can be used as a text app as well. That's actually where I host my current RPs. I've never had to talk to anyone on it for RPing. The only real irritation is a 2000 character post limit. But that's easy to get around by breaking it up into smaller posts. 

 

Sorry about that. My phone doesn't always autocorrect to the right things. 

[Hederik 119]

Just now, SilverHeart said:

Discord can be used as a text app as well

Huh. Didn't know that. How well does it do with archiving messages? Like, do you need to make backups every now and then, or is it reliable in this regards by itself?

 

2 minutes ago, SilverHeart said:

Sorry about that. My phone doesn't always autocorrect to the right things.

You wrote nothing wrong. I was just commenting on the difference that a small "a" makes in some statements. Other than the "small wonder" example, consider "having few books to read" vs "having a few books to read".

[SilverHeart 741]

As far as I can tell it works just fine. I haven't seen any effort needed on my part to preserve messages. I only checked once but it had messages from several months ago when we started. 

 

Gotcha. 

[Once In A Blue Moon 895]

I haven't used Discord for sending long messages, but I just had a look and it seems to still hold messages from back in early 2016 when I first used it. Having a look at some of the channel functions, it did suggest that there might be options available that would be unavailable or at least harder to implement in the forums. Examples range from area- or theme-based channels and whisper functions to dice-rolling bots. 

7 hours ago, Hederik said:

I was just commenting on the difference that a small "a" makes in some statements. Other than the "small wonder" example, consider "having few books to read" vs "having a few books to read".

I find that whether 'I have few books' or 'I have a few books', it is an intolerable situation to be in.

 

EDIT: Reply number 12^2. 

Edited January 16, 2018 by Once In A Blue Moon

[Hederik 119]

15 hours ago, Once In A Blue Moon said:

EDIT: Reply number 12^2. 

Gross!

Also, I have view no. 3000:

15 hours ago, Once In A Blue Moon said:

I find that whether 'I have few books' or 'I have a few books', it is an intolerable situation to be in.

I can't relate. Cannot remember any moment in time when I didn't have a few dozen books waiting to be read. And the list keeps growing...

15 hours ago, Once In A Blue Moon said:

I haven't used Discord for sending long messages, but I just had a look and it seems to still hold messages from back in early 2016 when I first used it. Having a look at some of the channel functions, it did suggest that there might be options available that would be unavailable or at least harder to implement in the forums. Examples range from area- or theme-based channels and whisper functions to dice-rolling bots. 

Sounds great. I'm slowly finishing on the refreshing, so I'll look into this soon.

[Once In A Blue Moon 895]

Silver Heart - @SilverHeart

 

Spoiler

Filler text, as apparently a picture *isn't* worth 1000 words.