mansionstaff: (Default)
Smash Rising Mods ([personal profile] mansionstaff) wrote in [community profile] smash_ooc2015-03-16 09:34 pm

Audi famam illius - IMPORTANT GAME DISCUSSION

Smash Academy has, for about seven years, been known as a school-setting game. The mods have discussed extensively options for the game's future and what directions it can go in to reflect its current state. We would like to introduce that to you and get your feedback. The pathway Smash Academy can take, is ultimately up to the playerbase, so be honest about what you want and what you think would hold your interest.

As Smash Academy ages, it is evident that it is losing focus on the things that defined it a 'school setting' to begin with. Class logs have become less frequently utilized, we're missing social cliques (jocks versus band geeks, for example), and other 'school' elements like the student council and overall feel of an educational institute. Sometimes there is difficulty incorporating certain "character types" easily into a school setting. Consequently, we're proposing moving said focus away from a school atmosphere and onto something new.

Introducing Smash Manor / Chateau / Mansion / etc.
We propose the concept of an excessively large mansion on the floating island. As you might recall, the Isle of the Ancients was introduced late summer 2014 and has been present since. By doing this, we can continue to hold many of the very popular events like dances, festivals, dormitory logs, blind dates, and kissing / memory mistletoe just as they have been. We would be eliminating events such as graduation and prom, but can easily substitute other appropriate celebrations in their place.



This does not mean we would outright eliminate the academy on the ground. We could leave that present and people looking to satisfy the occasional urge for school antics would be able to do so in either an entirely new and additional dressing room, or in the one we are currently using (which might be better in the long run).

Getting to FDC and its various shops, the contest hall, the bars, and so on, could potentially be relocated to a nearby floating island and become convenient for characters to reach, whereas traveling to the academy itself on the ground would be more difficult (in an effort to more effectively shift our focus off of a school setting).

Topics of Discussion
Questions: what it says on the tin.
State of the Mansion: how the mansion and living arrangements could be.
A Whole New World: how the surrounding area and game environment could be.
Event & Plot Lotteries: player submitted events (ala the game plotting thread in personals, only better organized).
Challenge Mode: introducing new ways to spice up your rp, and get rewards and perks for it.
Game Names: the name of the game is important!



Take some time to think about where you want to see Smash Academy go in the future years. Let us know how you want the game to evolve and change.
icequeen_aran: (smielsle)

[personal profile] icequeen_aran 2015-03-17 03:10 am (UTC)(link)
Thanks for these concerns! It's hard to say how things would ultimately play out, but we would do our best to try and not encourage powergaming and the like, and have rewards benefit individual characters and also benefit the game as a whole.

Maybe a door that acts as an insta-portal to Kanto gets closed for a week, and a challenge must be met to reopen it. Maybe only one character will be able to do it but everyone in the game will praise that character for being the one to open the door--or something like that.

We would like to do special things too, as a driving incentive for the rewards. Definitely not looking to set levels of command. We are not a cosmic demolition crew here except samus.

We definitely talked about free AC strikes while we were crafting this post and we, as mods, all agreed the only way we would give those out as rewards were to people who met challenges like "meet triple the activity requirements". IE people who are EXTRA ACTIVE may only earn AC strikes, and we would also limit those to one per use, like no saving them up and using them month after month or something. That's not fair to anyone.
Edited (that concerns i grammer well) 2015-03-17 03:55 (UTC)