[Eaglesg]

Ok people, as Kerry rightfully suggested we will continue the PM discussion here. For everyone who want to participate here is the previous PMs:

Where is everyone? Is everyone upset that Caymen left? Do we just sit and wait?

Well, assuming the pm's went out to the registered players, we must be prepared to come to the conclusion that the remnants of hobus is effectively dead. With 4 players there is not a lot we can do. I think the lack of cooperative play like in normal rpg's is what's killing this, in all other senses awesome, project.

I suggest a questionnaire on the front page getting the low down on what, if anything, the crowd is looking for in a forum based rpg. Obviously what we're doing now doesn't work.. I do know that the Joint Post concept was a pretty awesome way of poking inactive players back into the game, prompting them into action. Maybe that's what's missing.

regards,
Christ

Totally agree. I was just going to send you guys a similar email. How should we roll this out? If you make the survey, I'll send it around to players and post the link different places on and off site.

If we can't get new recruits, and our inactive players actually dropped us, the four of us could all serve on one ship? Worst case scenario.

Sorry for the late reply, really busy with work these days, but I gave some toughs about this too and I just simply had the same conclusion as you guys : the Hobus mission is dead. I have to admit that continuing someone else mission without the original information is kinda hard for me.

SO

As Allan suggested we have to put a survey quickly. I thought about starting with simply asking what people want for RP :

• Single or multi ships
• What era (including Prime/Kelvin) - Should we include non-canon eras like STO ?
• Multiple eras (depending on participants number/activity)
• If people wants to have mission packs / one big joint mission / made their own mission

We have to do this quickly, and I have more time available this week to put that in place. In the mean time I'll start thinking about some possible stories in the TNG era (I'm more familiar with it). With all of that we could also have perhaps some ad on the UFPAC to bring people.

Thoughts, suggestions ?

Cheers,
E.

[Kerry Malone]

The problem faced is reviving interest in Ares from the ground up.

You may have to accept that the spark that created the project has long since been lost - which was the unique format of the SIM. However, it was never sustainable in the long term. Which was why I pushed Cayman into creating the story-arc, which he then dropped like a hot potato when he got bored.

So - regardless of when, where, who, why or what the story is based on, you need a new story. Something that your writers can latch onto with interest. It needs to be a generic over-arching storyline that allows them to add their own contributions, and perspectives without being overly restrictive.

You as GM's should be navigating the storyline, not controlling it. Let the writers throw spanners into the works, and react to it. Allow the writers to fully control their own destiny within your plot, but not be forced into a scripted saga.

Based on the points raised, I would make the following recommendations (advice!!):

1. Follow the KISS approach - Keep It Simple Stupid. Don't go big and bold out the gate, you'll crash and burn. Have the story be an umbrella setting, but the salient details are written by your players.

2. Set it in an era/timeline people are most familiar with and would be willing to engage in. For example, most people grew up watching TNG/DS9/VOY, and those series timelines overlap, which gives you the most area to play in. I would recommend setting it post-Nemesis, as this is the most popular timeline in text based RPG groups I've ever been part of. Reason being is that most of the ships that people like are both canon and would be in service around this time.

Going back to TOS/ENT would mean people have to create whole new ships using very limited reference material. Going Kelvin would get the new kiddies, but ultimately restrict you, as there's only three movies to go off. Using STO as the baseline would be an interesting idea, but would get very messy when the guys at Cryptic move the goalposts of your fictional realm with new content. Multi-Era's would get sticky as well, and could cause you headaches later on down the line as to what to do with the one guy sitting in the TOS universe whilst everyone else is in TNG.

So, I recommend keeping it post-Nemesis.

3. The original draw of Ares was the idea of roleplaying a ship, rather than a single character on a ship. The upside is that its novel, everyone gets to be captain, they get to have whatever ship they want, and they can pretty much do what they want. The downside to this is that it's often very lonely, and there's little to no interaction beyond the odd comm-call. If you were to reboot to a single ship/multi-crew concept, which is the traditional model for this kind of thing, it would dramatically improve interaction, and also offer career advancement as well as other opportunities, but ultimately would peg them in a single role, doing a single task, aboard a ship - so Chief Engineer or Chief Security Officer. The only real way for people to advance would be dead-mans-shoes. I'm not providing a recommendation here, simply because it needs to be your decision.

4. As above, have one big "fleet plot" (or if you go single ship/multi-crew, a single mission everyone contributes to). Don't do mission packs, it didn't work last time. Also don't do free-for-all, as people get lost that way. One big story, but player driven. You guys provide key events, you even push it along when it stagnates, but let the players react to events, perhaps even shape them. The USS Alpha finds an anomaly, that when scanning, sucks them into the neutral zone. This causes an issue with the Romulans, so they get all arsey about it, causing the USS Beta to have to be deployed along the border, when it encounters a raider... etc etc etc.

Ultimately, how you do all this, is up to you guys. However, from personal experience, you do not want to go off the deep-end. You want simple, straight-forward, interesting and sensible SIMming.

[Eaglesg]

Well those are pretty good advices Kerry !

After reading your message it seems obvious that we should make a TNG/DS9/VOY single-ship mission. If Ares is growing up we would eventual explore those other options (and by growing up I mean having 100 people posting ^^). Anyway, if both Allan and deuZigue agree with that, we can start working on the ship / crew positions (open, etc..) / story right now.

(Oh and expect the PM recap soon Kerry)

[Allan Hood]

I'm all about post-Nemesis and a single ship/multi-crew concept, that's the whole reason I joined with the USS New York instead of creating my own ship.

I've seen people get promoted in-story, oppose to "dead-mans-shoes," whereas the character did something in the story that merited a promotion. I've also see characters role change, such as security to command. It should be allowed under certain circumstances and restrictions. We could also open the door to having multiple characters?

Looking forward to the ship and crew positions. We'll have people submit the positions they'd be interested in writing for and start filling in a duty roster, so to speak? Then submit possible mission choices?

[Eaglesg]

We can start by thinking about the ship class. I wanted to have something that I have in 3D (to make some illustrations). I was thinking about:

• Post-Nemesis Sovereign class (I was working on the Nemesis 3D model with John Eaves, so we would have an almost canon version !): lots of open positions, explorer ship, battle ship, the goddamn big E !

OR

• Nova Class, if we want a smaller ship (but less open positions)

We could also open the door to having multiple characters?

No more than two then

[deuZige]

Wouw... I go two days not logging in here, and suddenly there's like ten pm's amd a whole mew thread to catch up on.
That escalated quickly

[on topic]

I see we've skipped the polling idea and i understand we're going with a post-nemesis era one ship concept. (correct me if i misunderstood.)

I am fully in favor of it, though i would love to find out what exactly was the point of failure in the Hobus project. Hopefully the four of us have the same preference as the potential players we've got among the ufplanets community. A poll would have made me feel more sure about that, but i agree that a poll would again take time in which we could've been rpg-ing happily along.

What i suggest we do is to take our cue's from the simm as it was played back in the USS August days here on ufplanets. Back then that and the writing competitions that were being held here regularly were the reasons for me to join the ufp in the first place. I had so much fun back then being fighter pilot Zotteke Madwan, his son and i think one other npc (guess they weren't N pc's as i played them.... hmmm). If we take the scaffoldings form that simm to build our new on we've got a proven to work framework and don't need to re-invent the wheel. With that i mean the tagging guidelines, the rules for players, the ettiquette and so on.

Ofcourse since rl took me to a place in life where i couldn't be online anymore, let alone play in a simm, i don't know what happened to that simm. Obviously something happened to kill it since it's not there anymore, but i remember it being a fun and prolific simm which ran for a long time, and produced material to be proud of. Judging by what i've been able to find from back then, in the ufp archive for example, it stopped shortly after the simm went from one ship and a crew to a couple of ships and a station. I'm not sure that was the cause of the demise but that does seem like a plausible explaination.

Now i think i can remember something like there were "to many" players in the one ship's crew making it difficult to manage and to keep the simm storyline on track. (disclaimer: my memory has been known, on occasion, to either be completely wrong or to link memories together which have nothing in common with either each other or the topic at hand. Results may vary)

But there's no denying the success of the USS August nor with the fun that was being had by almost all that participated. So the rules, protocolls and etiquette that were being used are solid.

As for a post nemesis era and a single ship i completely agree. My suggestion for ship class would be to go with one that's pretty well known by almost every one and also to take one that needs a pretty big crew and that's multirole role. If you take those requirements then there's only two possible classes you are left with. The Galaxy and the Sovereign. Personally i think that the Sovereign is a bit to new, big and high profile for our purposes Well, maybe that's not the best way to put it, but i can't put my finger on how else to put it....

Anyway, my vote would be to go with a Galaxy class. Ofcourse it would be a refit, fully updated with the latest tech and so on to be ready for the coming decade or so, but still a Galaxy which i'm sure most of us could find our way around effortlessly if we'd ever find ourselves onboard one. Using such a well known class comes with the benefit of having a huge amount of graphics and stuff to choose from for livening up the posts and for creating more immersion. It's nice to have a visual like a pic or something, of a conference room going with a post that takes place there (for example),

As for a story arc i think we'd do well to stick to the StarTrek core and have Starfleet return to its primary mission. To explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations. To baldly.. erm, sorry boldly go where no man (i'm not a HUGE fan of the whole sjw thing that seems to be THE thing right now. but that's probably a huge topic for discussion of its own) has gone before.

The post Nemesis era is also the ideal situation and timing for Starfleet to go do just that. The Dominion war is over, the Borg threat is no longer imminent (or is it, and will the Federation become aware of that because a long range exploration mission stumbles across them on their journey....huh ) and The Federation along with most of the Alpha and Beta quadrants should have things set in place to rebuild and recover from the losses that the past decade had wrought upon them. Perfect opportunity to have at least some of the Galaxy class ships to be sent to do what they were designed to do do in the first place: Explore.

At least that's my personal preference.

[other topics] I agree with continuing our discussions on the simm in here, publicly, so everyone can see what's going on and jump in with their input if they feel the need to. This is also a lot easier to read then pm-s with quotes in quotes which are quoted in quotes.

I wanna thank Kevin for jumping in to provide us with the benefit of his expertise. Speaking for myself i must say that the confidence level took a serious hit the more appearant it became that ressurecting the Hobus project wasn't going to work. Having Kevin with us somehow makes me feel confident we can build ourselves an awesome pbf-rpg-simm worthy of the ufplanets's history, scope, quality and community.

I do have a question though. What are we going to do crew wise for the command staff? I mean i get that normally the simm devision's leader would take the center seat and play the Captain as well as serving in that capacity in the simm's hierarchy. He'd create hte story's start, the direction for the story arc and have an idea of some sort of end to guide the simm to, using the Captain's character as a tool to acomplish that.

At the moment though, and i suspect for the foreseeable future i think Eagles has to much on his real life plate for us to expect him to do that. So maybe its wise for either Allan or me to donn the four pips on the collar and be the Captain. I'd be humbled, honored and happy if, should you agree with that, the choice would be for me to be asked to serve in that capacity. *Not asking or even suggesting the leadership of the UFP devision be changed, just the character in the simm and the role in the simm crew)

There i think that covers everything that you've been up to since i've last logged on two or three days ago... lol... I'll answer the pm's on the UFPAC right after clicking submit reply on this one.

Thank you all for all you've done so far!

[Kerry Malone]

Wow. What a prose there Deuzige.

I would say that my name is Kerry, not Kelvin, but other than that...

1. I vote for the Sovereign, simply because it was designed to replace the Galaxy class in the first place - canonly speaking. It also helps that Eagles has the models for it to do custom graphics, which we wouldn't be able to get using the Galaxy, although I can see the allure of the Galaxy from a romantic POV.

2. As for playing the Captain and the First Officer, I think that should be one of you guys. You can all mud-wrestle for the big chair, I'm not fussed, but Eagles is the Division Lead - so ultimately it should be his decision.

Glad to see things are going well!

EDIT:

Moved thread to GM office due to a change in permissions

[Eaglesg]

Thank you both for your input (and deuZigue, you are a naturally-born writer )

I see we've skipped the polling idea and i understand we're going with a post-nemesis era one ship concept. (correct me if i misunderstood.)

I am fully in favor of it, though i would love to find out what exactly was the point of failure in the Hobus project.

I'll just quote Kerry on that one :

3. The original draw of Ares was the idea of roleplaying a ship, rather than a single character on a ship. The upside is that its novel, everyone gets to be captain, they get to have whatever ship they want, and they can pretty much do what they want. The downside to this is that it's often very lonely, and there's little to no interaction beyond the odd comm-call.

As I said (and it is only concerning me), I realized that continuing someone else project - especially a project like that - was kinda difficult. But Kerry opened our eyes (this sentence is sounding kinda religious )

What i suggest we do is to take our cue's from the simm as it was played back in the USS August days here on ufplanets.

You got the idea

Ofcourse since rl took me to a place in life where i couldn't be online anymore, let alone play in a simm, i don't know what happened to that simm. Obviously something happened to kill it since it's not there anymore, but i remember it being a fun and prolific simm which ran for a long time, and produced material to be proud of. Judging by what i've been able to find from back then, in the ufp archive for example, it stopped shortly after the simm went from one ship and a crew to a couple of ships and a station. I'm not sure that was the cause of the demise but that does seem like a plausible explaination.

I don't know either, and actually I joined the UFP for that ! But it was already dead...

Now i think i can remember something like there were "to many" players in the one ship's crew making it difficult to manage and to keep the simm storyline on track.

If this new Ares will reach that goal (yeah, having "too many players" is a goal for me) then we will update the Division by opening it to another ship, or another era... Like Bear Grylls said : Improvise, adapt, overcome. But we're not here yet: we have to focus on today.

As for a post nemesis era and a single ship i completely agree. My suggestion for ship class would be to go with one that's pretty well known by almost every one and also to take one that needs a pretty big crew and that's multirole role. If you take those requirements then there's only two possible classes you are left with. The Galaxy and the Sovereign. Personally i think that the Sovereign is a bit to new, big and high profile for our purposes Well, maybe that's not the best way to put it, but i can't put my finger on how else to put it....

Anyway, my vote would be to go with a Galaxy class. Ofcourse it would be a refit, fully updated with the latest tech and so on to be ready for the coming decade or so, but still a Galaxy which i'm sure most of us could find our way around effortlessly if we'd ever find ourselves onboard one. Using such a well known class comes with the benefit of having a huge amount of graphics and stuff to choose from for livening up the posts and for creating more immersion. It's nice to have a visual like a pic or something, of a conference room going with a post that takes place there (for example),

1. I vote for the Sovereign, simply because it was designed to replace the Galaxy class in the first place - canonly speaking. It also helps that Eagles has the models for it to do custom graphics, which we wouldn't be able to get using the Galaxy, although I can see the allure of the Galaxy from a romantic POV.

Well, I like both vessels too and I actually have the Galaxy model from DS9 but I'll have to join Kerry on this one: the 8 years old (Nemesis time) Sovereign was designed to replace the 15 years old Galaxy (it's not much, but I read once in a book than Starfleet considered the Galaxy project a failure, with the war era and the destructions of both the Enterprise-D and the Odyssey - we should consider that).

As for a story arc i think we'd do well to stick to the StarTrek core and have Starfleet return to its primary mission. To explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations. To baldly.. erm, sorry boldly go where no man (i'm not a HUGE fan of the whole sjw thing that seems to be THE thing right now. but that's probably a huge topic for discussion of its own) has gone before.

The post Nemesis era is also the ideal situation and timing for Starfleet to go do just that. The Dominion war is over, the Borg threat is no longer imminent (or is it, and will the Federation become aware of that because a long range exploration mission stumbles across them on their journey....huh ) and The Federation along with most of the Alpha and Beta quadrants should have things set in place to rebuild and recover from the losses that the past decade had wrought upon them. Perfect opportunity to have at least some of the Galaxy class ships to be sent to do what they were designed to do do in the first place: Explore.

At least that's my personal preference.

This time I'll join you on that !

I do have a question though. What are we going to do crew wise for the command staff? I mean i get that normally the simm devision's leader would take the center seat and play the Captain as well as serving in that capacity in the simm's hierarchy. He'd create hte story's start, the direction for the story arc and have an idea of some sort of end to guide the simm to, using the Captain's character as a tool to acomplish that.

At the moment though, and i suspect for the foreseeable future i think Eagles has to much on his real life plate for us to expect him to do that. So maybe its wise for either Allan or me to donn the four pips on the collar and be the Captain. I'd be humbled, honored and happy if, should you agree with that, the choice would be for me to be asked to serve in that capacity. *Not asking or even suggesting the leadership of the UFP devision be changed, just the character in the simm and the role in the simm crew)

2. As for playing the Captain and the First Officer, I think that should be one of you guys. You can all mud-wrestle for the big chair, I'm not fussed, but Eagles is the Division Lead - so ultimately it should be his decision.

Well, I have now a flat and a decent internet connection, and I finished the "hard part" of my work (I'll be happy to talk about that to anyone in PM). So I'll be the Captain, but remember, the Captain doesn't go on an away mission, it's Number One

Thank you again guys !

[Eaglesg]

I think that it is time to have some images to help us visualise things and and make a good reboot. So,

Gentlemen, my proposition : The U.S.S. Ares NCC-79116 - Sovereign Class Refit
(Go ahead, it's a Full HD picture)


Bonus is that besides to be a John Eaves approved design, you're the first ones to see it rendered - *THUMBS UP*

[Allan Hood]

I think that it is time to have some images to help us visualise things and and make a good reboot. So,

Gentlemen, my proposition : The U.S.S. Ares NCC-79116 - Sovereign Class Refit
(Go ahead, it's a Full HD picture)


Bonus is that besides to be a John Eaves approved design, you're the first ones to see it rendered - *THUMBS UP*

It's beautiful, I'm all in. Let's go with the Sovereign Class Refit. I don't mind playing a LT science officer instead of a command position; I'm interesting in writing the science bits of the story. All about canon rooted, scientifically founded, techno-babble haha

I was going to recommend Eaglesg ship anyway because I'm an admirer of his graphics and know he'll do it justice.

[Eaglesg]

I'm interesting in writing the science bits of the story. All about canon rooted, scientifically founded, techno-babble haha

No objection from me !

I was going to recommend Eaglesg ship anyway because I'm an admirer of his graphics and know he'll do it justice.

So now we have to specify some of the USS Ares details (fill in the red text, and don't hesitate to suggest additional things if you want):

Base Info
Class: Sovereign (Refit)
Launched: Stardate TO BE DECIDED - TO BE DECIDED Fleet Yards
Role: Heavy Exploration/Assault Cruiser
Docking Base: TO BE DECIDED (Fleet: TO BE DECIDED)
Area of Operation: TO BE DECIDED
Length/Width/Height: 685.3 x 250.6 x 88.2 Meters
Mass: 3 205 000 Metric Tons
Decks: 29
Crew Complement: 855 Standard (6500 Emergency)

Tactical Specifications
Cruise Warp: 8
Max Warp/Emergency Warp: 9.978 / 9.982
Shields: Deflector shields, Extended Ablative Armor
Weapons: 16 Type XIII Phaser arrays, 2 Quantum Torpedo Launchers, 8 Photon Torpedo Launchers

Auxiliary Craft
Shuttlebays: 2
Shuttles: 4 Type 9, 2 Type 11, 8 Workbees, 1 Argo Class (TO BE NAMED), 1 Flyer Class (TO BE NAMED)
Fighters: N/A
Runabouts: Captain's Yacht (TO BE NAMED)

I'm also thinking about the Ares Division page modifications. Oh and Kerry I thought that it would be nice to also have the Ares emblem updates : just the text, changing from "The Ares Roleplay Project" to "Ares Roleplay Division" - I can do that if I can have the emblem's Photoshop file.

We're on the right track people !

[Kerry Malone]

Oh and Kerry[/CL6] I thought that it would be nice to also have the Ares emblem updates : just the text, changing from "The Ares Roleplay Project" to "Ares Roleplay Division" - I can do that if I can have the emblem's Photoshop file.

You'll have to ask in the FAB area for that. Usually its a Jordan/Sharp request

[Allan Hood]

Of course, I went with the Argo Class to be named Phobos with the Flyer Class to be named Deimos, being his children. Leaving the Captain's Yacht to be named Eris, his sister and companion. I'm choosing these three names because these three rode together with Ares in his chariot in the Iliad.

How explored is the Gamma Quadrant? I feel like the GQ is a clean slate, not much has been explored or mapped out that way and we could springboard off DS9. The Delta Quadrant would be good also, but a lot of the characters have already been explored, unless we run into new ones we create out that way, too.

We're going to have fighters, too, right?

Anyone else finding it ironic that the name of the ship has to do with war, even though Starfleet wants to present itself as deep space exploratory and defense service? Is everyone cool with that?

[Eaglesg]

Of course, I went with the Argo Class to be named Phobos with the Flyer Class to be named Deimos, being his children. Leaving the Captain's Yacht to be named Eris, his sister and companion. I'm choosing these three names because these three rode together with Ares in his chariot in the Iliad.

I like that a lot !

How explored is the Gamma Quadrant? I feel like the GQ is a clean slate, not much has been explored or mapped out that way and we could springboard off DS9. The Delta Quadrant would be good also, but a lot of the characters have already been explored, unless we run into new ones we create out that way, too.

Yeah that could be cool to deal with the Gamma Quadrant, we didn't saw it without the Dominion... Waiting for deuZigue toughts on that.

We're going to have fighters, too, right?

Well, I anticipate the next quote, the ship is already named Ares, I don't really like adding fighters... To my knowledge the Sovereign Class doesn't have any fighters (it was just a copy/paste of the old ships recap actually).

Anyone else finding it ironic that the name of the ship has to do with war, even though Starfleet wants to present itself as deep space exploratory and defense service? Is everyone cool with that?

Well, the Sovereign Class is both a Heavy Exploration/Assault Cruiser, and we could say that it has been named after the old Ares Class, or that it's part of the Earth history (like many starships having historical names like that), or that this ship was originally built during the Dominion War (dark times..), or something else... I just wanted to name the only ship of the Division after the Division itself, like that everyone who will be in Ares will be on Ares

But if both you and deuZigue want another name then by all means feel free to submit one

[Allan Hood]

I like that a lot !

Yeah that could be cool to deal with the Gamma Quadrant, we didn't saw it without the Dominion... Waiting for deuZigue toughts on that.

Well, I anticipate the next quote, the ship is already named Ares, I don't really like adding fighters... To my knowledge the Sovereign Class doesn't have any fighters (it was just a copy/paste of the old ships recap actually).

Well, the Sovereign Class is both a Heavy Exploration/Assault Cruiser, and we could say that it has been named after the old Ares Class, or that it's part of the Earth history (like many starships having historical names like that), or that this ship was originally built during the Dominion War (dark times..), or something else... I just wanted to name the only ship of the Division after the Division itself, like that everyone who will be in Ares will be on Ares

But if both you and deuZigue want another name then by all means feel free to submit one

I really like the name and reasoning behind it. I just wanted to have an explanation posted somewhere to explain the irony of it. I'd like to see that explanation posted with the ship, or on the ship's plaque somehow/somewhere.

I like the idea of tying it to the Dominion War and to the Ares Flight Institute, which published the article "Subspace Quantum Phenomena" Data used to find cloaked Romulan warbirds TNG's "Redemption II".