Apr. 23rd, 2013

theearth: (Default)
[personal profile] theearth
Hey Earthlings, a few things regarding activity check and Echo requests.


Activity Check:

AC will be going up on April 29th and will remain open until May 6th. Although failing it this round is impossible, participation is still mandatory for reasons that will be explained below. Therefore the only way to fail and be removed from the game would be to not reply at all.

The reason for this is that this AC will be used to help refine and define the requirements of AC in the future and there'll be an extra bit for giving feedback on how you found meeting the requirements. For those who don't want to contribute to the science of activity check or have joined too early to be capable of meeting it, there will be an option to just remind us you're here without filling out the whole thing.

I know there has been some worry from people in game and out regarding the vagueness of the AC requirements, but by replying in full you can assist in helping us iron things out to get a feel for how exactly things will operate. I will say beforehand that there will probably never be a strict number for how many comments/words need to be in a thread. But by gathering responses from the first two months, when failure is only possible through neglecting to reply at all, we'll be able to get an idea of what players feel comfortable with and what is appropriate for the game.




Echo Requests:

Having considered the number and type of Echoes that have been coming in, clarity of the system and a slight change of policy about accepting the requests needs to be explained.

As it has always said on the Echoes page, Echoes caused by similarity to the previous life are triggered by 'Something happening to them that happened to them in their preincarnation.' We are now putting more of an emphasis on the something happening aspect of this. To put it simply, we will no longer be approving Echo requests that don't actually involve an occurrence similar to the subject of the Echo. Merely hearing about, thinking of or other tenuous connections to the previous life will not work. A quick example would be if in the preincarnation a character was trapped in a burning building. The reincarnation would not receive an Echo from such things as seeing a burning building on TV or being near a fire. They would receive one from being in a burning building or something similar, such as being set alight.

Similarly, Echoes will no longer be caused by mundane activities. Keep in mind that Echoes have been potentially granted for however long the character has been in the Locke area, which for some characters has been their entire lives.

Echoes already approved that do not fit these guidelines will remain valid, but from this point on similar requests will be rejected.

Secondly, I would also like to emphasise that Echoes are more focused than some players are requesting. Some common misconceptions to address are:

They do not grant several memories per Echo no matter how closely related those memories are.

They generally do not mingle different types of Echo (those types being Mental, Physical, Item and Creature). It is suggested that before you make a request you decide what type of Echo it is and cut out aspects that would fall under another category. Some minor exceptions are acceptable. A very small bleeding of one type into another is fine, such as in receiving a scar they may remember the method it was received but not the context.




Questions and comments are welcome, as always. The notes regarding Echoes will be added to the relevant, permanent pages.