Audience Contest - Discussion

[Tooley Bostay]

It's a time of jubilation and triumph! Congratulations to all who made it into the Top 10--I'm very excited to see where you take the story and your characters, and I wish you all the very best. You all are gonna have a blast. =D

Unfortunately, the same can't be said for all of us, and it stinks on ice to miss out on such a great opportunity for collaboration. However, not all is lost! In the past, unofficial side contests have been attempted by the audience, and though there have been varying results of success with those, I'm willing to gauge interest and see if people are willing to give such a thing a shot this time around.

So, if you did not make it into the Top 10, or even Top 30 then send me a PM if you would actually be interested in participating in an unofficial contest. Furthermore, I will be hosting a Skype call tonight at around 7:30 PM EST to hash out details of what that sort of contest may look like, how it'll be run, what to expect, etc. If anyone would like to hop in on that and share their opinions on what they'd like to see, please let me know your Skype handle in a PM and I'll add you to the call.

If there is sizable interest and people are willing to be proactive (this would require a lot of accountability and self-discipline to work), then I'll see about heading up this unofficial side contest.

[Rascal]

I think that would be a cool idea. Role play, games, short stories of your characters, even a parode of those two old muppets that humorously mock stage plays as they watch the arena fight: "Wow, he really lost his head in that match" "Unfortunately it wasn't literally!" "Oh-hohohoho!"

Pretty much anything to give people something to do :>

[Also Airan]

Ooh, pick me, pick me.

I'll try to be there, especially seeing as I've bitten the bullet and was sadly cut. This way maybe I can still write my character and get a little bit out of them.

(Also, with the contest starting soon, I'm moving over to this account until its completion. My other account has administrator privileges, so I'd be able to see all the plans you contestants cook up in the contestant's lounge- and that's simply no fun for the both of us. So, if anyone needs to reach me, for admin stuff or otherwise, please direct your PMs to this account for the time being, thanks.)

[Tooley Bostay]

Mmkay, so I've gotten some PMs and people have expressed some interest, so I figured I'd lay out my direction for how I see this going.

• Let's start with what this is not. This is not a "replacement contest." It would be exceedingly unwise (and uncouth) to compete with the official story and contest, dragging readers and voters between the two.
  My entire point for putting this together is to give writers the chance to experience the collaboration that defines these contests. That is what I would hate for authors to miss out on, since it's the greatest reward from these contests. This all brings me to my next point:

|

• There will be no death votes. It's a key feature of a Survivor contest, and the pressure of wanting to survive from week to week is highly valuable, but this is something that requires a readership to work. We just don't have a big enough community to split readers between an official and side contest. You are free, of course, to choose to kill off your character, but there won't be any mandated, weekly deaths. On the flipside, though...

|

• You must meet the deadlines, or your character will be removed from the story. Survivor contests are held together by trust and accountability, between both the cast and the audience. An Audience Contest will likely have fewer readers, so that trust between writers is increased tenfold. I've seen far too many collaborative stories wilt away because a group waits four weeks for one person, then a month for another, and so on and so forth. Consider this an equivalent to the "pressure" of an official contest, where you're expected to be on the ball with your writing.
  Now, that said, I wouldn't be a jerk about this. If something comes up and you'll be away for a couple days, just let me know! Deadlines can be extended, and we all know how busy and unexpected life can get. We're here to work together, but that also includes being considerate of your fellow authors' time, hence the rule.
  As for the deadlines themselves, I'm thinking it'll be a week to write a post, then after that "round," we'll take a break for 2-3 days to plan out the next round. Pretty much the same as the real contest.

|

• The contest will last anywhere from four to seven rounds. This is largely dependent upon how many authors we have, and how the story progresses. We likely won't have ten people, so there's no way we could afford to do a full ten rounds. The point here, however, is that we are aiming for an end. This won't just be an aimless roleplay that never ends. Be sure to guide your character from beginning, to middle, to end.

|

• To the best of our ability, the story will adhere to the "canon" of the official contest. I'm thinking this will be a sort of "prequel" to the actual contest, set in the Crater several seasons back before the Top 10 ever arrived. This means that killing off Nire is a no-no. Blowing up the entire Crater? Negatory. Those large-scale events are reserved for the official contest, so let's try and be respectful of the Top 10 and not step on their toes.
  I realize we won't be able to plan for everything. I'm sure some minor contradictions will occur, but I don't care about those nearly as much. And likewise, this doesn't mean your characters can't do anything meaningful. Destroying some of those fancy scaffoldings Nire has? Sure. Those could be replaced by the time of the official contest. It's only the irreversible, major stuff that are off-limits.

|

• We'll start after Round 2 of the official story has begun. Coupled with the above, this is so that we have an idea of what the Crater actually looks like and how it's run. This way, the two groups aren't describing completely different places. Doesn't mean that discrepancies can't exist, though. Heck, we already know from Kentrith's app (which is now canon) that losers weren't killed off in the arena, so things could change. Everyone is free and encouraged to be creative, just don't describe the Crater as being on a mountaintop when the official contest says it's underground. =P

|

And that's about all. Any comments or suggestions are welcome, though maybe keep them to PMs for now. I don't want it to be obvious to the readers who is and isn't part of the Top 10, since guessing the identities of contestants is part of the fun. I'll also see about getting us snazzy character profiles and our own private board for discussion/planning out each round, so I'll talk to Airan about that.

If you didn't make it into the Top 10 and haven't yet PMed me, please do! There's still plenty of room, and the more the merrier.

[Tooley Bostay]

Been talking with Airan about setting up a board/section for where this will go. Should be up sometime soon, placed in the Community Hub so as to not distract from MO:IV-prime.

In the meanwhile, if you want in, please PM me the name of your character so that I can create a forum account for them and set up a private Discord chat server.