Site News Feed – Molten Aether FFRP

Trello Redux

I have also reorganized the Trello boards, now we have unified boards for Current Plots, Dead Plots, Character Development, and Lore Development.

When the site was updated to use Google Workspace for email and such, it caused a few issues. One of those issues was, it broke Trello. After some time today, I have managed to recover what was in our Trello account and it is now back online! I have also reorganized the Trello boards, now we have unified boards for Current Plots, Dead Plots, Character Development, and Lore Development. Each of these boards centers on plot elements (past and present) which need to be developed in order to do a specific plot or set of plots. As usual anyone is free to join. Thanks to a new policy of Trello we can now have the ability to link files from Google Drive, OneDrive, Box, and DropBox into a Trello card directly.

Please use the Current Plots board for plot ideas that need to be flushed out. The Character Development board should be used for characters (NPC’s and otherwise) being prepared for a plot. Anyone should feel free to move cards into Dead Plots if it was their idea otherwise, please let staff handle that. The Lore Development board is placed there for when a plot line requires background lore to be developed for it.

As always anyone is free to use these boards. Please label a new card with the setting it goes with, since we’re using a unified set of boards for all 3 settings. Happy writing!

Server Changes / Patreon Benefits

I’ve been having a lot of problems with my previous hosting provider ChunkHost – after many years with them. I am sad that they seem to have gone downhill so much. Problems with their name severs, unresponsive to requests for support, and so on… I have since moved everything to Digital Ocean and while their site is extremely heavy on the “hey you can buy these services” from us all over the place, I cannot blame them for that too much. We live in a capitalistic hell-scape and they need to make money. Still, the server is now working very nicely and more responsive than it was previously at ChunkHost.

This move has necessitated the shutting down of my private email server. This is a blessing and a curse. Running an email sever on my own was extremely problematic, thanks to spammers mostly. The server was under constant attack from people trying to break into the system to send out spam email. Since it was a VPS (Virtual Private Server) there were reputation problems with the IP address as well. The email server software (postfix and dovecot) were also extremely problematic to run. Both requiring digging deep into configuration files with somewhat confusing help documentation among other issues. I am not sad to see those responsibilities go! Since I actually use my cyclops@moltenaether.com email address and our web services need a method to send emails, I have signed up for Google Workspace. While it does cost money for every user on the system every month, it is also secure and I don’t have to deal with any of those issues.

I am taking this as a new opportunity! Since I started the Patreon account, I have struggled with what kind of perks to offer. Since I usually operate on the basis that anyone who wants to participate can participate. That kind of means (usually) that anything is just up freely for anyone to do with as they please. A Discord role is worth very little and early access doesn’t always work very well. Now since I have access to Google’s services as part of the domain, those who donate $10 or more will gain access to their very own Google account at moltenaether.com with 30 Gigs of Google Drive storage as well as access to Gmail @moltenaether.com, Google Calendar, and other Google services.

The support of our players has actually meant a great deal to me over the years, not only in seeing how much people value what we do but also financially. Running a web server is not always cheap and the costs for me have just gone up as Digital Ocean is more expensive and there are the additional costs of Google. I don’t expect anyone to pay for these for me, though I believe we all get value from the forum and the wiki being online (and this WordPress). If anyone wishes to support these services, I will gladly accept. Otherwise, I just wanted to give a primer on what had gone on recently and the changes that have happened.

Date and Time Bump

The year has been bumped by one. Angelic Sins runs in real time, so that is no surprise there where the year is the current year.

Blazing Umbra is in the year 2388 now and Embers of Soteria is in the year 1046 A.W. now.

Characters may fudge their storylines to be in 2387 or 1045 for Blazing Umbra and Angelic Sins respectively to maintain continuity.

However, from now on, please use the above dates when creating new stories and plotpoints.

Plot Update for Embers of Soteria

Officially attempting to push forward the major plot for Embers of Soteria; the primary plot point here is going to be the Return of the Fae. Posted an updated casting call for players to play humans / light fae native to Elder Soteria. Also updated how these plots are organized as part of the overarching Weakening of the Veil plot line, which should culminate in the protective runes being repaired.

The major plot has a lot on the line and the returning of the light fae from banishment into the Dark Aether could plunge the entire world into war with the light fae. There is a lot of fear, where once the light fae were seen as peaceful the line has blurred, now many fear all fae and it impossible to say what any of the kingdoms will do upon their return.

This is an important time for the game setting as a whole, participation on either side will help build and define the world moving forward!

Major Plot Arc – Operation Flintlock

I need volunteers to participate in maybe 3-4 secondary events, which will involve scouting ahead and encountering hostile ships. I am not pre-planning how those events go, and how each of these secondary encounters goes will factor in to the main thread. What this means it that each secondary event will be designed to be a challenge that it is possible to be defeated!

As has been discussed, we are gearing up for a major plot arc to bring Blazing Umbra more aligned with Star Trek canon. A brief recap of this effort is; the Romulan star goes super nova destroyed Romulus in 2387, there is no specific date for this. That is the current in-game year and thus, we are preparing for the Solas Tempus effort to rescue the Romulans. Thanks for Star Trek Picard we have more details on exactly what the Federation response was for this.

This is a call to any and all players who want to participate in this. There will be a number of opportunities for play. We’re going to break up the main event, which will have a Solas Tempus escort fleet as well as a transport fleet. This event has not yet been scheduled, but there are some spots open for this. We need characters to command ships of both the transporters and the escorts to pull off the main event.

The secondary events will be splinters of the main escort force which will proceed to potential threats and (hopefully) neutralize those threats before they get to the main fleet. As such, the plan right now is to get the secondary events rolling before we start the main event, this will allow us to be asynchronous and not have to have everyone online at the same time.

I need volunteers to participate in maybe 3-4 secondary events, which will involve scouting ahead and encountering hostile ships. I am not pre-planning how those events go, and how each of these secondary encounters goes will factor in to the main thread. What this means it that each secondary event will be designed to be a challenge that it is possible to be defeated! There can (if there is interest) be secondary events relating to other issues, such as engineering problems or covert action / recon.

Don’t be quiet about this! If you want to join but aren’t sure what you could do, let the staff know! We can find some way of including you / your characters in the event.

Overdue Date / Time Bump

Blazing Umbra is in the year 2387 and Embers of Soteria is in the year 1045 A.W.

Usually I do this on New Years Day but missed it this year. Retroactively, the year has been bumped by one. Angelic Sins runs in real time, so that is no surprise there where the year is the current year.

Blazing Umbra is in the year 2387 and Embers of Soteria is in the year 1045 A.W.

Since this notice is coming so late, characters can fudge their storylines to be in 2386 or 1044 for Blazing Umbra and Angelic Sins respectively to maintain continuity. Some other things such as starship launch dates and character birth dates or other major dates will remain the same unless they cause a problem.

The New Workflow

Pushing along with the efforts to improve the server and revive role playing, another thing that was discussed in our thread discussing server changes was the fact that storylines are few and far between and people have trouble with coming up with plots. Some of the plot difficulty deals with how powerful Solas Tempus is in Blazing Umbra, however that isn’t the only issue. We’ve gotten similar feedback before, about how easy / hard it is to come up with plots for different settings.

TL;DR: New links to Trello boards are posted (please read on for details):

Moving forward we’re still going to be using Trello for project management but I’ve reorganized the Trello boards to demonstrate how a story idea moves from initial inception to a completed story that has been played. The goal is that every user who wants will have a definite say in what goes on from the brainstorming process onward to actual playing. Our ultimate goal is two-fold. We want to both utilize a system where the work of writing and running new plot lines and through use of that system, teach others how to make use of it as well. I know a lot of people have different workflows, the goal is not to squash anyone’s personal way of doing thing. For the server, the intention is to provide a framework where a project can be started and completed by the group in an understandable and easy-to-follow way.

I am also working on templates for what questions to ask / answer in order to fill in the necessary gaps of a storyline or story element. I will, of course, be seeking input on these as soon as I get them up and running. The idea with all of this is to create a way for more people to make and participate in more stories. To this end story ideas will be posted, even if incomplete, and players / staff alike will be invited to take up and story that is incomplete and continue it.

Following that I will be personally casting a more narrow net with regards to story writing. Personally, I will be only moving forward with stories if they inspire me to the point that the ideas flow out nicely during the brainstorming process or when there is broad support. Previously every time a story idea was brought up, it was followed and an attempt was made to develop it. I will personally be seeking support to write elements of the story from players and other staff members. Ideas will still be posted on a regular basis, Trello makes it incredibly easy to just toss an idea up into the system to be followed up on later. A mix of brainstorming posts and their responses along with potentially polls on Discord will be used to determine support amongst players.

I’m not here to force anyone to use a system they do not want to use. I do encourage people to at least try the new system in developing a story. It may seem too much / overdoing it. My broader idea in this is to allow us to link together smaller plots into larger overarching plots, the way I have tried to do before.

The server cannot survive without plots being written and played. While I have a lot more time than I used to, I also am not able to write everything without getting a serious case of burnout. I hope this redesign and addressing of issues makes it easier for players to get and stay involved.

New Positions Filled

The posting of the positions list has proven very effective in the short time since it went live. We already have 3 of the many positions filled, one in each setting.

In Angelic Sins we now have a new Master Vampire for the city of Chicago, Victoria Romana played by Dasfier. Victoria is going to be a major player in future plots taking place in Chicago, being the most powerful Vampire in the area.

In Blazing Umbra we have the new Master Systems AI of Nimbus Station being Neo Akazuli played by Jumping Script. The old character is seeing new life as an AI as discussed with Jumping Script last year. The character was a valuable addition to the station before and now has new plot opportunities open as an AI and the adjustments that must, by definition, come from being an AI that was once flesh and blood.

In Embers of Soteria we now have an owner of the Hearts Refuge Inn. Previously it was stated to be two local brothers, but this didn’t come into play very often as they were not actual characters. Now the owner is Rachel Oxen, played by Dasfier, a minotaur woman who has an appropriately tragic backstory to build off of.

Please seek out some role play with one of these fabulous characters! Thank you to Dasifer and Jumping Script for their contributions.

Open Positions Lists are Live

A list of key roles for important positions in each game are now live and available. This lists may change, those wishing to apply character for such a list should submit a character application through the forum and note which position they are applying for. There is a dedicated list for each setting and additional positions may be added as needed.

The lists are available on the WordPress site listed under Applications (or you can click here).

Applicants will have their character application reviewed by all the staff and the staff will vote to approve / disapprove or request the player to make changes. Characters in positions of power make for more responsibility for the player. Players should consider how they want to play a particular position and if they have the free time to do so before applying.

Upcoming Server Changes

Our survey on things to potentially change on the server was fruitful and we got some really good feedback and discussion, which is still ongoing as we make some changes. Two of the biggest problems for people were about how character applications are processed both for moderators approving characters and players submitting characters. There was not a lot of love for the Google Forms approach. To solve this we’re going back to something we did early on, that is using the forum for character applications. The difference is now there is a default template that can be just filled out then cut/paste directly into the wiki with minimal modifications.

I will also be creating a list of open character positions soon. The page, Current Positions, is up now but I haven’t filled it in yet. Each setting will have a list of open / available positions in that setting. Once the list is up it will have each open spot with a spot for the location the position is in and any notes associated with that role.