Noble Row - Synthetic Writer Application

[Noble Row]

Ckey/BYOND Username: Noble Row
Position Being Applied For (Wiki Maintainer, Lore Developer, Deputy Lore developer): Synthetic Lore Writer
Have you read the Lore Team Rules and Regulations wiki page?: Yes
Past Experiences/Knowledge: I've taken some creative writing courses in high school and college along with some technical writing courses, I've also been working with the lore team here for a small amount of time now.
Examples of Past Work: ByteTheMinute on the Relay, and articles and such for the Silicon Nightmares Arc.

Include answers to the following questions in your app as well.

1. What do you think are the primary themes of synthetic lore? If you got this position, how would you develop them?

Synthlore focusses on the disparity and challenges synthetics face in a spur that rarely respects them. In a world where an artificial intelligence apocalypse has already occurred, along with the rising commonality of synthetics as tools compared to the relative newness of complex thought that could be deemed sentience, synthetics are not respected, if not feared all depending the culture one hails from. This struggle synthetics face show that they are people and want to be respected as such is our overarching ideal, with accessory ties that lead to this ideal.

As synthwriter I would like to develop more cultures and depth regarding synthetics. Over the years they have been consistently demonized, and while that is all well and good, I would like to see a balance of wins and losses that fit within our overall theme. I don't want to change this theme outright, but I would very much like a shift in a direction that applies more depth and dignity to our forlorn friends.

For specifics, things that I have observed in my time here are topics such as the Trinary Perfection. They currently have been used in the lore as tools of destruction and terrorism despite having tenants that are overall positive and societally friendly. The terrorist sect, the Exclusionists, have been waved about so much that it has tainted their image drastically, and most people that play them play them as some sort of supremacist faction when they have no right to be. The Trinary is weak, and armed like hobos, and barely are tolerated on SCC vessels due to this streak of lore terrorism, I find it highly unrealistic for any Trinary priest to be talking down to anyone in game, and the reason we see this I see as a failure on our part to not express the positives and socially acceptable nature of the Trinary.

Themes such as the Trinary express this balance I want to provide. For every negative we must have some positive. We cannot keep hammering in one ideal when our lore states other ideals exist. It removes the depth from our writing and makes everything very black and white when the world rarely is.

2. What do you think is the strongest part of synthlore currently and why?

Synthlore does an amazing job at versatility. Synthetics have had a tremendous effect across our playable spur and have some role in every culture, even if that role is "Expressly excluded." As a synthetic player, you can choose to interact with cultures and races across the galaxy. You can make characters with such complexity, life experience, and depth, that few other race types can compare to. You can make characters who can wrestle with their own mind and their ideals of sapience. Characters who undergo and overcome unique physical struggles. And characters who are very customizable both mentally and physically. As a synthetic, you have a character you can mold like clay, and it is our job as the lore team to be able to give you more tools to mold that clay, which I personally find very exciting and rewarding!

3. What do you think is the weakest part of synthlore currently and why?

While synthlore does have such amazing versatility, I believe the depth in a lot of these aspects is lacking. For instance, the Golden Deep as a faction seems very much a "surface level" faction that does not go in to detail on its society, and feels like a "boys club" where people can roleplay as "Scrooge McDuck" as someone put it in a suggestions post the team put out a few weeks ago. We have such outstanding variety but it is very much up to confused players to create their own headcanon to put some things together when it would not take too much work to add a little bit of depth. Just a bit of tidying up on some aspects such as Synthetic quality of life items like insurance and maintenance and such when not touching other cultures.

4. The Synthetic Team’s arc, Silicon Nightmares, recently finished. Given what happened, what would your next steps be?

I feel like I'm cheating with this question as I know what our next major steps are, however, I can provide a non-cheater version with things I have either already unveiled or not yet put forth for approval and therefore are not on the active radar.

Synthlore has gone through a year of work to get Silicon Nightmares going. Through trials and tribulations the team of both current and former members did an amazing job that I wasn't even there for except at the very end. After this work I believe a small bit of a break is in order and taking on some more house keeping problems should be the next avenue while the next arc for our server is cooked up. As you've seen I have gone and resprited the Baseline chassis, and had seen it done that they have the options for customizable heads. Other things I'd like to put on the docket are the previously mentioned quality of life clarifications, such as "Can an IPC get insurance" "What is an IPC to expect for accommodations when they are owned? How is it different per Corporation/Owner?" "Can we refine the IPC health system to be both fair, and modern?". All of which are easy questions with various levels of tedium, but after glimpsing in to the abyss, having some time to take inventory before we spur the team on to the next big move is what I would do as a project manager. We are a community for fun after all, it's a video game, and while we make jokes about "Sending people to the lore mines", I would like to make sure everyone working on our projects is enjoying themselves and their time first and foremost.

Of course during this time we will sow the seeds, spitball ideas, for the "next big thing", which may or may not already be happening in accordance with a different principle. Stay tuned.

5. What do you think are your strongest and weakest attributes in terms of working on a team, and why?

I like to argue. I used to be a very shy and to myself kid, and up until about two years in to college I was that way. But now I have undergone a sort of transformation and I find myself more outgoing than I used to be and I like to stand up for myself and my teammates, sometimes to my own detriment. I believe I reign myself in appropriately for this community and keep my arguments here civil, though I am aware I can be argumentative.

At the same time, I do believe in compromise, and as long as you are willing to listen to me and work with me, I am going to listen to you and work with you. If you respect me, I will respect you. If you are dismissive and rude to me, I will do so in kind. I do not have the time to stress myself about a video game where we're supposed to be making things that are fun for other people if not ourselves. We are doing all of this for the community, it is pointless to be fighting over it, even if I need to remind myself of that.

6. As the writer of synthlore, you will often find yourself required to work with other teams, primarily the human team, consistently to further your lore, and reach compromises as their lore is highly intertwined with other species. Therefore, how do you think you'll deal with not being able to do what you wanted, either in part or in full?

Yeah it can suck, I've had more than a few of my ideas shot down thusfar in my tenure as a deputy, but I say this to both myself and the other potential applicants reading this. The lore team is made up of good people. I have had a wonderful time working with everyone, highs and lows, whether they like my ideas or not. I'm very much a "shoot for the moon" kind of guy because the worst case scenario is being told "no", and that's okay. Sometimes you have to take things on the chin. Though in my experience here I have had a great time compromising and working with everyone. In the event something doesn't work out you just need to remind yourself that this is a video game, you're trying to put on a good story for a community, there's always other avenues to go.

7. The synthetic writer is a position that comes with two deputy writers under them on the team. It is the writer's job to manage their team, in addition to their duties of moderating the WL. Given that, what skills do you have that you think will assist you in this? On the opposite end, what do you believe is your weakest link regarding management and moderation?

I very much like project management. I've taken a few classes on it, and have held several leadership roles in my life whether I have volunteered for them or have been assigned them. I believe in team communication and taking the ideas of everyone in the team. Often taking ideas in this way helps refine your product and scores you an even better project that not only you, but the entire team, can feel happy about. When a team feels heard and acknowledged and everyone can feel comfortable or even excited to portray their ideas and receive good feedback from, you can get an effort that is not only efficient, but fun. I am also a moderator on the server, and while I know I can be relatively lenient here, that is also because I try to reign myself in. If something needs to be done in terms of moderation, it will be done.

For downsides, the arguing as stated before. But for a unique answer I feel as if I can be overly enthusiastic sometimes. I have the mentality to encourage people to have fun and to work together, but also when I get a passion project going I feel like a train that moves forward, and I'll either pile all of the work on myself or get horse blinders on in terms of my team, leading to some disfunction. Typically I try to remedy this by encouraging my teammates to keep me humble, to remind me that they got things to do too outside of our projects here or are otherwise occupied. It's a team effort and I hate ruling like some sort of overlord. I want everyone, especially in a community like this, to be enjoying what they are doing, and if I am the problem, I want that brought to me so I can remedy it and work towards a better future for the team as a whole.

 

Note:

I feel as if it would be irresponsible of me to not mention this. While I am fully interested in the role of synthetic writer, I have come to the conclusion through my real life work and my hobbies here online, that I do not want to spend the rest of my life every day on a computer. I love this community and the people therein, but I would like to join the US National Guard (which is a part time commitment once training completes) sometime in the future and have already begun the process for it. Should this come to pass, at some point in the future I will have a leave of absence of a minimum of three months without online connection. While that can be cumbersome for any team, I have been having an effective time working with Stryker for the conclusion of Silicon Nightmares, and fully believe any two man team for that period of time can still produce quality work for our community.

 

Thank you all for your consideration, if you have any questions, I would be more than happy to answer them.

[Triogenix]

Hello, and thanks for applying! I have a couple of questions about/things I'd like to see regarding your answers.

48 minutes ago, Noble Row said:

As synthwriter I would like to develop more cultures and depth regarding synthetics. Over the years they have been consistently demonized, and while that is all well and good, I would like to see a balance of wins and losses that fit within our overall theme. I don't want to change this theme outright, but I would very much like a shift in a direction that applies more depth and dignity to our forlorn friends.

You mention the trinary as an example, which is fine, but I'd additionally like to see an example more in line with a majority of synthetic lore. I.E, how you'd accomplish tweaking this theme regarding synthetics in another nation. or do you view it as something that will include the entire species? I.E, if IPCs are demonized here, they're seen as equals here and that's fine. This also ties into my next question;

1 hour ago, Noble Row said:

I like to argue. I used to be a very shy and to myself kid, and up until about two years in to college I was that way. But now I have undergone a sort of transformation and I find myself more outgoing than I used to be and I like to stand up for myself and my teammates, sometimes to my own detriment. I believe I reign myself in appropriately for this community and keep my arguments here civil, though I am aware I can be argumentative.

At the same time, I do believe in compromise, and as long as you are willing to listen to me and work with me, I am going to listen to you and work with you. If you respect me, I will respect you. If you are dismissive and rude to me, I will do so in kind. I do not have the time to stress myself about a video game where we're supposed to be making things that are fun for other people if not ourselves. We are doing all of this for the community, it is pointless to be fighting over it, even if I need to remind myself of that.

1 hour ago, Noble Row said:

Yeah it can suck, I've had more than a few of my ideas shot down thusfar in my tenure as a deputy, but I say this to both myself and the other potential applicants reading this. The lore team is made up of good people. I have had a wonderful time working with everyone, highs and lows, whether they like my ideas or not. I'm very much a "shoot for the moon" kind of guy because the worst case scenario is being told "no", and that's okay. Sometimes you have to take things on the chin. Though in my experience here I have had a great time compromising and working with everyone. In the event something doesn't work out you just need to remind yourself that this is a video game, you're trying to put on a good story for a community, there's always other avenues to go.

Both of these statements seem to be about the same thing and yet contradict each other. On one hand, you say you like to argue, but will always be open to compromise on the other, you talk about taking it on the chin, which I see as just accepting a "no" so I'm confused.

I'm also going to ask a few questions that aren't specific;

1) Both you and NM mentioned the flexibility/versatility of synthlore in terms of character creation, and both in regards to depth; however, do you think this versatility can also be used to create characters with a lack of depth? Why or why not? Is it a problem if so? Do you have any plans to "deal" with it?

2) Concerning themes, how embedded should themes be? An example of a super-embedded theme is with Tajara; all of tajara characters are affected by the fact the species is in a cold war. Whereas the theme you identified for synthlore I'd argue is one that characters don't have to engage with.

3) Lastly, how would you deal with differentiating IPCs from humans?

[Noble Row]

5 minutes ago, Triogenix said:

You mention the trinary as an example, which is fine, but I'd additionally like to see an example more in line with a majority of synthetic lore. I.E, how you'd accomplish tweaking this theme regarding synthetics in another nation. or do you view it as something that will include the entire species? I.E, if IPCs are demonized here, they're seen as equals here and that's fine.

So this really will be a 'case by case' scenario, which makes it difficult to provide specific examples. In synth lore we want you to experience our main theme of "Life is troublesome for you at a bare minimum", but experience it in a way you want to build your character. IPCs are often treated as the punching bags of the spur as every race has a reason to dislike them or disrespect them because they're "just machines". This is a primary theme of ours and is part of the struggle of the synthetic, but some people can only take so much IC ridicule before it's just not fun to play the character anymore. I've personally had this happen to me, so I'd like to make the race attractive in other ways while also accepting the reality IPCs live in. We can do this by adding depth. Yes, your Solarian IPC is rarely trusted with anything of substance, but what is their life like away from the eyes of humanity? When they are left alone, what do they do? Are they friends with their other synthetics? How is this friendship portrayed? So on so forth. Similar to how the Tajarans have undergounds of your own, planets that trample synthetics can have lore written for them to explore the life away from prying eyes. Or, if things are going to well, how are we evening this balance? What negative pressures can we apply to synthetics? But it is almost too easy to apply more negatives to IPCs that it's almost boring.

 

16 minutes ago, Triogenix said:

Both of these statements seem to be about the same thing and yet contradict each other. On one hand, you say you like to argue, but will always be open to compromise on the other, you talk about taking it on the chin, which I see as just accepting a "no" so I'm confused.

Apologies for the confusion but my stance typically is, if I find my argument as reasonable and I have a 'hook' for it, I will argue it. I will argue for my friends. And if I can't get my way wholesale I will argue for some compromise. However, I can also be convinced that my idea is just wrong or unhelpful, or be told that people simply are not interested in my idea. When I have no ammunition, or there's clearly going to be no effect in arguing (even if I may try), that is when I need to step back and re-evaluate myself or just accept the loss and try to workshop my ideas to be something more appealing. It's mostly situational.

 

19 minutes ago, Triogenix said:

1) Both you and NM mentioned the flexibility/versatility of synthlore in terms of character creation, and both in regards to depth; however, do you think this versatility can also be used to create characters with a lack of depth? Why or why not? Is it a problem if so? Do you have any plans to "deal" with it?

Anyone can create any character and as long as they fall along our guidelines and server rules there is not much to be done. We can provide them the tools to make deep, interesting characters, but we cannot force everyone to read the lore to some arbitrary standard. If you make a character with a lack of depth, as long as it follows our guidelines and rules, there's nothing I can do. Sure, you may not be as interesting as another character, but are you, as a player, having fun? If you are, then perfect. My job is done. I've given you the tools to build what you want to build and you've made something you're happy with. The only way I can make this "better" is to provide better lore that captures the attention of the playerbase so they may be enthused to craft high quality characters, but my arbitrary definition of quality should not govern how the player wants to play the game as long as they are following our rules and guidelines set in place.

 

24 minutes ago, Triogenix said:

2) Concerning themes, how embedded should themes be? An example of a super-embedded theme is with Tajara; all of tajara characters are affected by the fact the species is in a cold war. Whereas the theme you identified for synthlore I'd argue is one that characters don't have to engage with.

Synthlore's super-embedded theme is that they can be discriminated against by literally everybody in the spur for a variety of reasons, and it is encouraged to do so. You are a machine. A tool. Why should anyone respect you? Your toaster is asking to get paid, what a joke. No one has to engage with any embedded theme, and people often don't. We've had discussions of people playing the 'odd one out' characters that don't adhere to the norm of our lore, and it happens. But every IPC will eventually encounter someone on the ship that expresses the thoughts that, lore wise, a good portion of the spur share. They will be called a machine. They will be devalued and doubted as people with thoughts. It's not something any IPC can ignore like other races can because every race can, and are encouraged to lore-wise, see IPCs as dumb metal, if not something more sinister.

This theme will always be over the heads of every IPC player, all it takes is for people outside of the whitelist to say an unkind word to enforce it.

 

30 minutes ago, Triogenix said:

3) Lastly, how would you deal with differentiating IPCs from humans?

I've had this chat a few times, and I've come to the realization that there are bots nowadays IRL that can scam you out of your bank account because they're very human sounding. Both vocal, and text based. And this is a phenomena that didn't exist 10-20 years ago. I can only imagine what 442 years of development would do when technology nowadays is already so scary. You can make your IPC behave as you wish, we encourage it as long as it falls within our server rules. You can have an IPC that's little more than a calculator, and you can have an IPC that's near human. We even have lore where there are IPCs who are so akin to humans that they hide from the government and are treated as a national security threat if they go unchecked and untagged. It's a terrifying concept and it is done intentionally. IPCs are both tools, and a threat. Control and Fear.

Though there will inevitably be differences, and I encourage every player to lean in to these differences to make more interesting characters. IPCs and humans for instance are nothing alike physically outside of shells and their appearance. IPCs are outfitted with mechanical cooling systems, they beep, whirr, translate information differently, and have no concept of pain. They won't be able to react to things the same ways humans do when describing pain, touch, taste, because they experience it in a fundamentally different way and have no concept of genuine reaction for it. 

There's nothing inherently wrong with an IPC acting like a human, but I feel like you're just taking an easy way out if you don't lean in to what makes an IPC unique. Any race can act like a human, and a lot of characters from other races do, it's just what the playerbase knows best. Themselves. What makes IPCs such a target for this ridicule is that they are paired with humans. While other races can lean on the crutch of having unique cultures and exotic lands to explore, most of the IPC population is just human culture with human systems of governance, so its just a pitfall that was going to happen because IPCs rarely have anything that is their own.

The psychology of your IPC is yours to make, and while I encourage you to make an IPC that is more robotic because I personally think it is more fun that way, there are also aspects of the lore that have IPCs behave both smarter, and stupider, than my personal preference, and that's the concession that we must make as lore staff.

[Desven]

First of all, I'd like to say that I believe your notice for a potential three-month leave should not be put into consideration for when a new synth lore writer is chosen. Our team consists of volunteers and many (including myself) have taken breaks from SS13 in the past. I think it's responsible of you to acknowledge a potential absence from the get-go, but I don't think it would be fair for that to be a point used to discredit you. However, this is only my opinion.

 

I believe you've been a wonderful addition to the lore team and I think you have a strong potential to be the species' lore writer. I have three questions for you, next to some thoughts I've had on IPC lore. These might not be as big issues as I make them out to be, but I'd like to hear your opinion regardless. You're free to tell me my idea of all these concepts is wrong because I manage a heavily-defined species, that can sometimes be seen as one of the most limiting in game.

 

1. It's undoubtedly true that shells and baseline frames are the two favorite chassis by the players. In the past, people used to play Industrial or ZH mobility frame not so much for what they could offer as characters but for the metagaming bonuses. Next to some limitations on how they can be played in different departments, the presence of these frames has undoubtedly diminished. Now, long ago I asked the IPC team what was the relationship between the chassis and the posibrain, and I was given the answer that there was somewhat of a disconnect and that an IPC sees themselves not so much as their chassis, but only as their internal posi, with the chassis being how they interact with the world. At the time I didn't question this answer, but I've come to believe this is somewhat of a misstep—even if the mind-body connection is severed, surely IPCs behave and portray themselves differently because of their outer appearance. A case in point is that I rarely see a baseline act as a shell, or vice versa. One of the points you mentioned in your application is that IPCs are cool because they're a mold of freedom for you to shape however you want, but this comes with a caveat: too much freedom, instead of allowing more character concepts, ends up limiting them because there's not a clear line as into what is expected from each concept. I guess my question is: How would you make other chassis characters more engaging? Would you be open to providing "mind types" or, in general, a guideline as to how to play each subtype? Do you consider it a "problem" that the other frames have been somewhat abandoned by the playerbase?

 

2. Every now and then I see shell characters that have an accent tag but look nothing like the people from the planet. I won't name names here, but I've seen about three heavily played characters lately that do this. Now, I haven't interacted with them that much, but it's jarring that they can just choose to look whatever they want and be disconnected from their home culture when that wouldn't fly if they were human characters. This is even more of a "problem" to me because, while scheming through human planet pages, it's obvious the lore team has put some effort (though perhaps not as much) into providing concepts for what IPCs living in each planet would be like. Now, I know these concepts are usually general and don't provide too much of a background, but again, I don't think it makes sense for IPCs to not be influenced by the society they live in. One clear example of a background done right, in my opinion, is Eridani and the "suit" IPCs. Other species like mine (Vaurca) or Dionae have had to adapt to living and taking bits of the culture of the "home" culture and I don't think it has ended up limiting the character concepts way too much. If anything, I believe, it has defined them to justify the multiple backgrounds. My questions for this point are: Do you think those "disconnected" shell characters should be allowed? Would you be open to providing more information as to how the planetary background shapes the culture and ideals of the IPCs living in it? Would you rather just provide "general" information and let the characters be something else because you perceive IPC culture to be different?

 

3. As Vaurca lore writer, your ideas on how we can collaborate between both species deeply interest me. When I asked NM what they thought about Vaurca in their application, you pinged me and said we could come up with something. This is good! I didn't do that previously because, historically since I was a deputy, I found the synth team to be apathetic towards Vaurca. This is an issue we have to deal with every now and then because our species, like yours, depends so much in cooperation with other teams. I very much welcome your enthusiasm in working alongside the Vaurca team because, depending on how we take it, either both of our species are in a race for cheap labor or share the same struggles and can be seen as equals in many senses. As I told NM in their app, Vaurcae aren't really "racist" towards IPCs because for them the difference between mechanical and biological isn't that important. They see IPCs as "silicon humans" and humans as "flesh humans." I don't expect the same treatment from IPCs towards Vaurcae (it wouldn't make sense, especially because of how widespread IPCs are), but I ask you this: What do you think both of our teams could do to collaborate more? I mentioned working together in Caprice, but do you have any other ideas of planets or just places where Vaurcae and IPCs could come together? Would you be open to "sharing" an arc with the Vaurca team one day?

[Noble Row]

1 hour ago, Desven said:

A case in point is that I rarely see a baseline act as a shell, or vice versa.

It's funny that you mention this because I made a character a few weeks ago that is a shell in a baseline body, and have a character on docket for when the Golden Deep clothes push through that is a Baseline in a Shell's body.

 

1 hour ago, Desven said:

How would you make other chassis characters more engaging? Would you be open to providing "mind types" or, in general, a guideline as to how to play each subtype? Do you consider it a "problem" that the other frames have been somewhat abandoned by the playerbase?

So here in the Synthetic team we push for freedom of creation as you've mentioned in the questions. We want you to be able to make a character as developed, or undeveloped, as you would like. To pick along the grey area between human and calculator. In terms of a posi brain inside a chassis, I've always viewed it to like how a person drives a car. You know your car really well, but other cars are unfamiliar, and when you swap between them you have to learn the new car and how to use all of its functions to the best of your ability. Providing mind types is something to be considered, but I've always based mind types off of things like the occupation you hold rather than the body you inhabit. Like, an occupation that deals with people a lot more is going to be more human along the scale, especially if they're a more expensive synthetic, but your janitor probably is not going to have a positronic as developed. I believe there are some excellent examples of both ends in our player base, and I do mostly see them follow these themes we provided. We could add a bit more guidance, but I would not base it off of chassis, but add a blurb to speak about how the disparity of advancement would be dependent on past and job, so players are more subconsciously guided as they craft their character.

As to addressing the abandonment of chassis, I believe that a lot of that has to do with appearance and customization. As a Shell, you have the freedom and full customizable ability that every human has. It is VERY easy to make specified characters as a shell because you can visualize them so easily and have the tools to make them your own, other chassis' fall on the wayside there because you simply can't make them as free as you'd like, and I've learned that a lot of our players' motivations are rooted in looks and customizability. For example, I just put up for PR a large amount of clothing based around the Golden Deep, and now we have had a sudden influx of players putting interest in to the faction, even before I released the article on them. Similar for Dominia, it is a faction with a lot of unique gear and clothing, and I believe that is part of the inspiration people have to play a Dominian, is how 'cool' you can look.

I believe to solve these issues we've already taken steps to do so. I've commissioned MattAtlas to add a system to IPCs where people can add customizable and swappable heads, currently the additional options are just for baselines, but it's been set up to be user friendly enough that everyone can contribute more heads to every chassis to help make your character your own. I do plan on going through and adding more options to each chassis to help people be more enticed to these chassis'.

There are also some mechanics tweaks that should be made for each chassis, here on Aurora every chassis has its own statistics, some of which make the chassis unappealing like how Bishops take increased damage for not a lot of payoff. We do hope to work out a proper medical system that keeps the uniqueness of the IPCs while also bringing their medical system to the 'modern era', and that'll help us bring more of these unique balancing concerns to something better and concrete as opposed to a series of brash actions and band-aid fixes.

 

1 hour ago, Desven said:

Do you think those "disconnected" shell characters should be allowed? Would you be open to providing more information as to how the planetary background shapes the culture and ideals of the IPCs living in it? Would you rather just provide "general" information and let the characters be something else because you perceive IPC culture to be different?

We do have guidelines regarding IPCs from given origins, and typically we are alerted when other lore teams are bothered by the decisions of certain IPCs when regarding culture, whether that be appearance or behavior. One thing I do find difficult is that we are so tightly bound to the human team that I have a hard time keeping up with all of human lore in addition to the synthetic lore that we are creating. While the abuse of the joint lore effort can be disappointing, if the character does cross a line I would like to be alerted so we can correct this behavior.

One of my objectives is to flesh out the culture of IPCs across the board, and this unfortunately will probably include the painstaking task of going through each IPC population and detailing how they are different. What unique cultures have formed in response to the unique culture they have on the planet? Right now IPC cultures are a little snippet on each human lore page and rarely show the intricacies that would evolve due to the natural progression of IPCs living together on that planet. Or the lack of them living together. Depending the culture we can use this as a good suggesting point for how "Advanced" an IPC from a given culture could be. For instance, we somewhat address that Solarian IPCs would be undeveloped due to their lack of freedoms. Are Konyang IPCs developed more due to freedom? Is it due to their normal jobs from these cultures? These are all questions we can ask to help define what makes an IPC an IPC and not a human. They're going to process the world differently depending what world they are on.

 

1 hour ago, Desven said:

What do you think both of our teams could do to collaborate more? I mentioned working together in Caprice, but do you have any other ideas of planets or just places where Vaurcae and IPCs could come together? Would you be open to "sharing" an arc with the Vaurca team one day?

I'm still fresh to the lore-writing zone, but if you have ideas to suggest let me hear them. One way to get some amazing content is inter-team workings on projects, it provides such a unique blend of cultures and project styles that we can make something truly great.

Do you think that utilizing a synthetic in say... a VR environment... would host any inherent advantages due to their ability to process all of the artificial data at a uniquely exceptional rate?

[Caelphon]

Hi there! 

Spoiler

1. How do you view Dionae? Please, put your unbiased thoughts. I know the species is generally viewed unfavourably by a large chunk of the playerbase. 

2. You've been part of team for some time now. I can't recall if it was before or after my tenure as Loremaster. Do you think the transparency of the team is adequate, or should we improve upon it, or lessen it? 

3. Do you think being a Moderator helps with managing a species? 

4. What inter-species co-operation are you looking forward to, or what are you not looking forward to?

I was once told by a very wise man @Mofo1995 its how you put your ideas to paper, and not what. Goodluck. There are no wrong answers. 

[Noble Row]

13 hours ago, Caelphon said:

1. How do you view Dionae? Please, put your unbiased thoughts. I know the species is generally viewed unfavourably by a large chunk of the playerbase. 

While I personally am not super familiar with Dionae lore just yet, their physiology and how they are presented in game I do love to see. Each one is a council of little people, each nymph its own personality and voice, all cooperating together to form one larger being. It's just something I find super interesting how you have a whole "Raccoons in a Trenchcoat" dynamic that come together to make an entire person. Plus how you can find Dionae in many aspects of lore as fun little dudes that add to settings rather than threaten them. Like you can find Dionae in the wastelands of Moghes, where they have a pivotal role providing life to a once nuclear hellscape. I really have no negatives to say about them, my own personal failings to read the lore have come from me just having to read other lore first in accordance with my station, and by the time I finish up with that, I am so tired of reading that I cannot pursue other things. I have never had a bad interaction with a Dionae before, even if the interactions are a little rare. They're almost always interesting characters with interesting outlooks on life.

 

13 hours ago, Caelphon said:

2. You've been part of team for some time now. I can't recall if it was before or after my tenure as Loremaster. Do you think the transparency of the team is adequate, or should we improve upon it, or lessen it? 

I'm just after your time. For the lore team as a whole, I have had a great time interacting and cooperating with all of you. Sometimes I have some difficulty contacting certain people in terms of inter-team relations, which unfortunately IPC lore is very reliant on, but those times I've reached out are also times where there are timezone conflicts, and by the time the person has awoken to read the message, or gotten home from work, or whatever, the message has been buried in the activity of the channel. One thing I do believe needs to be worked on is the faith in the respective lore teams, sometimes I feel as if there's almost too much cooperation, and suddenly someone from another lore team or position in staff is hijacking your idea and turning it in a different direction than you intended, and while I have difficulty describing it, it's just really frustrating to have the agency of your position stripped from you.

 

13 hours ago, Caelphon said:

3. Do you think being a Moderator helps with managing a species? 

One of my biggest gripes with the Aurora Staff Role Hierarchy is the unnecessary compartmentalization. While I understand its layout and its reasonings, if I wasn't a moderator and I well... wanted to moderate my lore, I would then have to get a moderator or an admin to reach out and bwoink a problematic individual if I wanted changes in game, as opposed to doing it myself. When you have someone unrelated to the lore team do actions such as these, you're now playing a weird game of telephone through this moderation member, where the person being adjusted is asking questions to the moderation member, and now the moderation member has to ask you questions, and you give a response, and the moderation member has to relay the information or just tell the person to talk to you. This could be avoided entirely by me having moderator. I can police and adjust in game behavior myself to make sure everything follows our lore, and I don't have to rely on the timezones and cooperation of another member to play an unnecessary game of telephone.

 

13 hours ago, Caelphon said:

4. What inter-species co-operation are you looking forward to, or what are you not looking forward to?

The only thing I'm not looking forward to is that I have to constantly nag people like Human Lore for expansions on Synth Lore, since Synth Lore is so dependent on Human Lore due to where Synths are houses and manufactured. Otherwise, I am excited to work with everyone! You're all great and enthusiastic people. I believe you and I have already had a discussion for cooperation between the Golden Deep and the now revised EUM/Hieroatheria, as well as Dseven and I have talked about Synth/Vaurca relations in the future. While these ideas are but seeds in the ground, I do hope that once the situation allows, we can begin some jolly cooperation in making some content the community would love that would also deepen the connections and political webs we weave as lore writers.

[Peppermint]

I wouldn't say I know Noble super well, but all the passing interactions I've had with them have been very positive. I think their temperament would fit in well.

There's always a lot of talk in synth apps around more diverse IPC medical, bioshells, ect. However it's one of those things that everyone seems to apply with, but given it's such a big development hole, never really manages to get off the ground. So I'm curious about what you plan to do/envision for an IPC med system and whether or not there's interest in the latter, as it's one of the things you mentioned. Unless it's just more little tweaks to what there currently is?

[Shimmer]

On 01/04/2024 at 00:25, Noble Row said:

We do have guidelines regarding IPCs from given origins, and typically we are alerted when other lore teams are bothered by the decisions of certain IPCs when regarding culture, whether that be appearance or behavior.

I would like to actually touch on this and my experience with enforcement of this stuff. I've previously asked with the lore team, in particularly Stryker, about my headcanon'd shell model line called 'Edna', and whether or not they can be named that on a planet like NHP presuming of course they follow ethnic appearance guidelines.

The answer given to me was a no, specifically because of the issue that IPC players would be able to use this as a loophole to skirt around and ignore ethnic guidelines intended for planets like Eridani, Konyang, NHP, Port Antilla etc etc etc. This would allow in theory a Jane Janeson to come from Eridani just because they're technically an IPC.

I'm not certain this is a loreteam issue in so much as errant players slipping or skipping by the moderation of those guidelines, but from my personal experience, IPCs are expected to follow what ethnic and cultural guidelines exist for their appropriate origin, and if they do not it is an ahelpable issue.

[Noble Row]

Exactly.

[Noble Row]

5 hours ago, Peppermint said:

So I'm curious about what you plan to do/envision for an IPC med system and whether or not there's interest in the latter, as it's one of the things you mentioned. Unless it's just more little tweaks to what there currently is?

It's something we are still hashing out. It's a rather large task to do it justice and not just slap on a series of bandaid fixes, but I had ideas regarding things such as replacement parts, EMP resistance depending on the chassis, and other tidbits that would effect the overall feel of the race. A coolant system was suggested that would be similar to blood, but would equate to your heat value. I think a topic like this would be interesting to things like balance and making IPCs feel distinctly more robotic while also adding depth to their repair. If we do this right, we can even have IPC self repair to an extent for things like light injuries, while heavy injuries will need to be handled by a machinist.

 

The topic is still very much under discussion, but our goal is to introduce a system that is not a buff or a nerf, but an adjacent side grade that brings a much needed update to the old numbers based system.

To be clear. We do NOT want a system that just copies organic medical. We want something that makes it distinct that IPCs are different. They are synthetic and the biggest difference they have to their organic counterparts is their physiology. We need to ensure this uniqueness between them so people are reminded that they aren't playing a human with a different set of rules. They are an entire race with a unique set of problems and their own unique mentality on how to handle them.

[Peppermint]

11 minutes ago, Noble Row said:

It's something we are still hashing out. It's a rather large task to do it justice and not just slap on a series of bandaid fixes, but I had ideas regarding things such as replacement parts, EMP resistance depending on the chassis, and other tidbits that would effect the overall feel of the race. A coolant system was suggested that would be similar to blood, but would equate to your heat value. I think a topic like this would be interesting to things like balance and making IPCs feel distinctly more robotic while also adding depth to their repair. If we do this right, we can even have IPC self repair to an extent for things like light injuries, while heavy injuries will need to be handled by a machinist.

 

The topic is still very much under discussion, but our goal is to introduce a system that is not a buff or a nerf, but an adjacent side grade that brings a much needed update to the old numbers based system.

To be clear. We do NOT want a system that just copies organic medical. We want something that makes it distinct that IPCs are different. They are synthetic and the biggest difference they have to their organic counterparts is their physiology. We need to ensure this uniqueness between them so people are reminded that they aren't playing a human with a different set of rules. They are an entire race with a unique set of problems and their own unique mentality on how to handle them.

Not to jump on you too quick lol, saw the notification as you posted it ^^.

I would point out that all of those things you've listed are direct buffs, especially EMP resistance and being able to self-repair, though the latter is always kind of wanted given there aren't that many machinists. Likely due to the medical system and how dull opening, add wire, closing panels is. To follow on from this, given it's some kind of law that it comes up in every IPC lore app these days, but does this kind of thing include bioshells? With the obvious caveat of them being the like, mythical aim that doesn't really seem very realistic from a coding pov.

I like the answers tho. Ambition is good. Always been friendly and open on the handful of times I've asked about stuff previously, so good luck with your app. Hope it goes well.

[Noble Row]

13 minutes ago, Peppermint said:

I would point out that all of those things you've listed are direct buffs

I'm actually at work answering this lol and those points were just the ones that came to my head without me referencing the document we're creating. One of the ideas I was toying around with was playing with the weight and bulk of industrials and G2s where they can't repair themselves due to not being able to have the same mobility, but also in order for people to transport incapacitated industrials you'll either need the unique strength Stat Industrials, bulwarks, and Adhomain Strong Men have, be wearing a hardsuit, or utilize a special gurney for transportation. There are other aspects too that are points for nerfs, the coolant system would be a big one.

I want to focus on how each chassis is unique. But again.. going to be a /task/.

 

22 minutes ago, Peppermint said:

but does this kind of thing include bioshells?

So one of the biggest issues were having currently is IPCs seeming almost too human, and while this is for a variety of reasons that can be addressed with time and writing, Inpersonally believe bioshells might help contribute to the human feel too much since one of the biggest differences IPCs and Organics share is their physiology.

[SilverSZ]

Hello, 

Originally I didn't see much reason to comment on these applications. Both candidates are great choices and I would be happy with either of them getting the role. Additionally, most of what I would consider asking has already been asked and I wouldn't want to be redundant.

However, recently I've noticed discussion about the idea of restricting command positions to owned IPC only floated in the general chat, including by people on various staff teams saying they would support such a change.

So, as someone who currently mains a free IPC HoS. I'd like to ask what your opinion on a change to restrict command to owned IPC only, be it a lore development or retcon, would be? Do you support or oppose such a change? Would you actively pursue it given the position or actively oppose it or simply not care. Do you think such a change would be a beneficial or negative one to synthetic lore and it's players?

Thank you for taking the time to respond when you can and best of luck.

[Noble Row]

1 minute ago, SilverSZ said:

So, as someone who currently mains a free IPC HoS. I'd like to ask what your opinion on a change to restrict command to owned IPC only, be it a lore development or retcon, would be? Do you support or oppose such a change? Would you actively pursue it given the position or actively oppose it or simply not care. Do you think such a change would be a beneficial or negative one to synthetic lore and it's players?

I personally believe this to be a negative change. The heart and soul of Synth lore is the debate on whether IPCs are truly sapient, feeling beings, with that debate infecting every corner of the spur with heated opinions. Having free IPCs in command positions as well as owned IPCs contributes to this debate by letting the differences in personality, experiences, and methods of both owned IPCs and Free IPCs and how they effect the department they lead. 

I want there to be a debate. I want to see these debates in game, I want statements such as "Well this person was effective and I like them for these reasons that can be contributed to their owned status." or vice versa where the IPC has a negative effect on their purview. If we straight ban these characters from these positions then it eliminates that debate entirely and removes some of the soul that our players are effected by in our lore.

[SilverSZ]

Thank you for the Response!

You've done a great job as a deputy, and all of the current Golden Deep stuff is amazing so far. Best of luck in getting the big chair, and if you don't. Keep doing what you're doing as a deputy because it's going great in my eyes.

[Triogenix]

After much deliberation, you have been selected as the new synthetic lore writer, congratulations!