terra

The scroll announcing the decade's Luthen Fair was sent out to every part of Hevan-mei over six months in advance.  The parchments were lovingly protected by their messengers, never unrolled until they reached their final destination so that the colors that had been hand-inked onto each sheet stayed as vibrant as possible.  Elanna had traced the sheet with her eyes hundreds of times, her neck craned upward to see the announcement tacked up on her town's central message board.

King Navare announces the

LUTHEN FAIR

to occur in the first two weeks of the month of August
of Year 26 of his Realm
at the Campgrounds of the Castle of Hevan-mei

all denizens of Hevan-mei, Jesobe, and Vernasith
are cordially invited

Elanna had been desperate to go the moment she saw the announcement, even more desperate than when the same announcement had appeared ten years ago.  But now she was in a much better position than when she'd been fourteen; then, her parents had been able to coax away her desire with complaints that they couldn't get away from the farm and there was no way she could travel all that way on her own.  Today, armed with her engagement and ten extra years of experience, Elanna had been able to get their agreement to let her and Jeffrey go together, a sort of pre-wedding honeymoon that would negate their need for a post-wedding one.

Their bags were packed and ready for the two-week journey to the Castle, and Elanna was waiting at the town's message board for Jeffrey, reading the blessed announcement one more time.  Grasping at every word on the parchment, Elanna savored their promise; she might even meet visitors from the neighboring kingdoms of Jesobe and Vernasith.  The invitation was extended to those parts as well, and she'd heard that there were always at least a few people from outside Hevan-mei at the Fair.

Outside Hevan-mei!  Elanna laughed to herself cheerfully.  This would be her second town outside her tiny hometown, and she might even meet people from outside Hevan-mei!  Just as she thought she would go mad from her anticipation, Jeffrey appeared alongside their mule, who was carrying the small cart of their belongings.

"Are you ready, sweetheart?" her fiance asked, looking fondly at her.  Elanna smiled and returned his look.

"I simply can't wait," she grinned.

(After writing the post, I found it was a little rambly, so if you want the one-line summary, skip to the end.)

I was wondering what the happy (hopefully) citizens of the Adventure Arena Square thought about how much the creator should be involved in moving the plot along.

My, that was a convoluted sentence.

Anyway, my point is.  In some RPGs the creator of the game has almost complete control over the plot.  A good example of this is Kill Adam, in which James lets the members know exactly who is posting and most of what's occurring.  Obviously he still gives them a good amount of artistic freedom in how whatever happens happens, and the tone of their post and whatnot, but he exerts a good amount of control over the plot.

This may happen in other RPGs too in a less blatant way, like the creator moving the plot along its way without quite stating it in the way the chapters of Kill Adam are set up.  However, in my experience this doesn't work quite as well and can end up with a lot of confusion among the players, who don't exactly know what's going on.

But in still another category of RPG, the creator of the RPG has almost no prior idea of what the storyline will be, and allows the game to just carry on in whatever fashion it desires.

My question is, which method do you prefer?  And which do you think is best?

I ask this mostly because of an RPG I have in Recruitment the Inn right now, Prophecy.  I've left it really open for now, and I'm not sure which way to go about it ... I do have a storyline involving all of the characters in mind, but perhaps it would be better to let members do whatever they want as long as we're all bearing the same premise in mind.  So if anyone who signed up for Prophecy wants to let me know what their opinion is on which route they'd rather go, they should also feel free to let me know :) (by PM or in here, whichever).



In conclusion:
How much do you think the creator of the RPG should be involved in moving along its storyline?

What would your life be like if you were supposed to be a hero?

In the ancient kingdom of Hevan-mei, fortune-telling is a venerable craft.  Fortune tellers are not common, but when they are found they are skilled and wise, well-learned in their profession, and above all, accurate.  Predictions may range from the gender of a child to the future onset of a natural disaster to the exact date someone will die.  The predictions themselves are unpredictable, but if you see a fortune teller, you will learn of something that lies in your future, whether big or small.

In the first decade of King Navare’s reign, a very strange thing happened.  A number of expecting mothers sought their fortunes from separate fortune tellers across the kingdom, and they were told the following:

“Your child will grow up to be a hero of our time, when it is most needed.”

Fortunes of that kind had never been heard before in Hevan-mei, and the fortune tellers themselves do not explain what they see.  The expecting parents, stunned, proud, or horrified, stumbled out of the room, left to figure out how to proceed by themselves.

As time progressed, the parents watched their children closely, waiting for signs of this inherent heroism that was predicted.  But there was nothing in particular that singled these children out; no abilities beyond what might be expected, no miraculous saving of the village with a magical burp.  The children seemed, for the most part, normal.  But the parents always knew, always remembered the prophecy that hung over those children, that they were destined to be heroes.

It is now two decades later.  And today, in year 27 of King Navare’s reign, heroes are most needed.



A little background on Hevan-mei:
Think medieval times, with a little less filth.  Throw in a little fantasy, some magic, swordplay, mythical creatures, a kindhearted king who’s a bit cowardly but means well, knights, an agricultural society, and you’ve pretty much got the picture.  No, honestly, I don’t have the world fleshed out that clearly in my head, so a lot of things will fly … if I disapprove, I’ll let you know.

However, though supernatural stuff exists in this world, your characters still seem to be your pretty much average humans.  Don’t go too crazy with the skills and the powers … though your character’s supposedly a hero, most of them probably haven’t done anything very heroic yet.


Signup:

Name:
Gender:
Age: (between 17 and 27)
Appearance:
Skills: (can include supernatural things, but not in excess)
Personality:
Biography:

Go wild with your biography; who knows what your parents (or possibly just your mother) thought when she heard the prophecy?  Some might have told their children all about the prophecy and sent them to the king’s royal academy, causing them to grow up as snobs extraordinaire; some might have hoped that it would never come to pass and raised their children completely normally.  Detail is much appreciated.

Anyone want a little stress relief?  Oh, I do.  So I'd like a rather non-serious spar with the rules that were employed in this thread.  Basically, each post is in a different genre chosen by the previous poster, but a sort of general overarching storyline was still established (well, sort of, at least).

Uh, yeah.  I'll be back later if anyone feels like responding.

I'm in New Zealand at the moment, and over Easter break (a couple weeks ago) we went to Queenstown, which calls itself the center (centre, I suppose) for "extreme sports" in New Zealand.

There, I went tandem skydiving for the first time -- which involved being strapped to an experienced skydiving instructor and allowing him to force me to jump out of a plane from 9000 feet.  Together, we went through about a 20-second freefall, then the parachute opened and we paraglided down for another five or six minutes.

It cost me $245 NZ (which is about $160 American) and it scared me to death.  But it was amazingly fun, and my friend and I are thinking of driving to another skydiving place some weekend so we can do it again :).

Tomorrow, she and I are going bungy jumping off the Auckland Harbor (... Harbour, technically) Bridge.  I'm a little apprehensive, because this time I'll actually have to do the jumping myself, and I've heard the feeling is really different from skydiving ...

Anyone here ever bungy jumped before, or is interested in doing it someday?  Or done any other "extreme sports" they want to share?