The Energon Pub

Psychout wrote:

Burn wrote:And better yet, why does it need an ongoing storyline?

Because HMW is full of roleplayers who want a structured command, a leader to follow and a feeling of achievement after completing a certain task as opposed to the current monotonous growth with no particular success measure.

In layments terms; Plot to follow.

I'm sure there are plenty of players that also do this on their own too. Although I wouldn't mind seeing a structured story but I think it should leave room for each player to work it into their own storyline as they see fit.

Psychout wrote:

Burn wrote:And better yet, why does it need an ongoing storyline?

Because HMW is full of roleplayers who want a structured command, a leader to follow and a feeling of achievement after completing a certain task as opposed to the current monotonous growth with no particular success measure.

In layments terms; Plot to follow.

But people already do that. Many players have worked on fics together, have bios that are connected to another players bios etc etc.

Very true, and having read some of your excellent fan-fics and bio's Burn I agree that creative freedom is needed, but an official backstory would allow a continuity to any future ones and the opportunity for the game to have a more cohesive feel to it.

All it would really need to be is the equivalent of a novel's prologue covering how the world has changed between V1 and 2, but a pre-amble like that will also give the game's mission writers and rp'ers a framework to build on encouraging continuity.

Also, for the newer members of the community who wont necesarily know the game is not G1 canon, it would be invaluable.

Personally, I don't intend to have a story running constantly. Nor do I think all of the players want that, as it feels that they are always fighting for someone else's goals, rather than fighting for their own.

But there'll be players there who want to get swept up in a story and see how their efforts cause the story to evolve and change. By simply saying "The Autobot commander is standing off against the Decepticon Military forces. His orders are to assist him while the Autobots evacuate the city." as an introduction to a plot, to me lacks personality that gives the TF universe its charm. Replace that with "Chromium Prime is standing off against against Annihilus and his military forces while Autobot officers Derby and Azera frantically try to evacuate the city." And the story could take a more interesting turn. In the first situation if you lose either there's a small and generic aftermath report. But in the second scenario, there's the chance for character development, sub-plots and other future engagements based around characters that I would hope become as iconic to HMW as a whole.

Does that mean we're influencing creativity? I don't think so as many of us have our characters in their own places anyways. My v2 team will exist in my head as only at a time where the bots and cons were the only faction. There will be players whose team of Maximals were stranded on the far side of planet Earth during the Beast Wars (probably, can't say for sure anyways).

The v2 battlemap will be a constantly changing field of war. I personally can't see the big changes happening without a reason.

It'll all basically be trial and error methinks. See what works and what doesn't

I'm sort of half and half. Though I'd like to see a story with characters (leaders or otherwise) I think that it should not go in to too much detail so that players have enough room to fit their team in to the story without compromising their ideas too much.

Uncrazzimatic wrote:I'm sort of half and half. Though I'd like to see a story with characters (leaders or otherwise) I think that it should not go in to too much detail so that players have enough room to fit their team in to the story without compromising their ideas too much.

You mean being able to play and develop their characters the way they want to?

Burn wrote:

Uncrazzimatic wrote:I'm sort of half and half. Though I'd like to see a story with characters (leaders or otherwise) I think that it should not go in to too much detail so that players have enough room to fit their team in to the story without compromising their ideas too much.

You mean being able to play and develop their characters the way they want to?

I think the only limit should be that they can't claim to be leader of the whole faction themselves, other wise yes they should be free to do as they wish. (They could of course however still have high ranking generals and such, just not the very top job.)