Linking Game & Real Time

[Skull132]

Okay, so. This has been discussed before, but I'm honestly too lazy to go and dig up those topics. Instead, let's just go at it again and actually make it happen, if there are no glaring objections! The idea is real simple: instead of every shift forever starting at 1200hrs, and the characters being subjected to going through the same day for about 5 shifts in a row, why not link the game time to real time? Take the real time that's on the server (Chicago time), round it to the closest 30 minutes (to prevent oddities in code, really), and then let the in game tick on from that.

It would make continuity easier, remove a few silly questions as to when dates are rolled over, etcetera. It'd also make deadhour an actual IC thing, being the very early morning shift (between 4 and 10 station time), as per this graph:

 

So, thoughts?

[incognitojesus]

Yes, I feel as though this would definitely help link rounds together instead of just mashing all of the day's events into one long ass shift.

[Dreamix]

Related question, what does the commute of a person coming to work on the Aurora from Earth look like? From the colonies?

Ughhhhh this would be so much easier to answer if shifts on the Aurora didn't last 4 hours. We work less than part-time. Lore-wise it would take a minimum of several hours to transit from Earth to Tau Ceti and it's extremely silly to have a situation where you spend 9 hours in a train to work for 2-4 hours, then transit back for 9 hours. Unless we agree to some hand-wave explanation for how time progresses on the Aurora then honestly I don't know anything that would be reasonable.

http://aurorastation.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=73&t=4609#p46208

So, it may change a few things. Let's imagine that a big-shift lasts 24 hours, but it's just fragmented into 2-3-hour parts, with bluespacing to Central and back, in between them.

So, the phrase 'see you next shift' would actually mean something.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I object to this idea for no good reason except to be a pain in the ass.

+1 good idea

[Killerhurtz]

YESSS do it Skull.

I like this idea for the points mentioned by everyone else - the justification of deadhour, how it makes things simpler, so on.

[CakeIsOssim]

This sounds like a nice idea, but how does one link five shifts (give or take) in the same day? If you board the crew transfer and go back to central command, ohp, five minutes later (give or take) you're back aboard the Aurora for another shift (assuming you play the same character). The only thing I see changing this is not boarding the shuttle.

[Xelnagahunter]

Mandatory Checkpoint return. Come home, take a union break, go back to work.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

This sounds like a nice idea, but how does one link five shifts (give or take) in the same day? If you board the crew transfer and go back to central command, ohp, five minutes later (give or take) you're back aboard the Aurora for another shift (assuming you play the same character). The only thing I see changing this is not boarding the shuttle.

 

If you think you'll play next round why not just stick around on the station or go to cryo? You're not obligated to transfer out.

[EvilBrage]

This does kind of put a hole in my ongoing "this is the same terrible dream over and over" arc I'm playing, though.

(Kidding. Do it nao.)

[Skull132]

Suggestion implemented.