State of the Site - July/August 2024

State of the Site - July/August 2024 - Printable Version

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State of the Site - July/August 2024 - Paul - 07-30-2024

So it's been a while since I've done one of these, for which I apologise. I want to get back to doing these partly to document how the site is growing, shrinking or maintaining its size, but also to remind players of what the site is offering.

Bio Updates, Crew Logs, and Mission Summaries

I've noticed these have dropped off recently, and while I am well-aware that 1) we're all busy people and 2) we're here to write our characters in the present, it's really important that we're making regular updates (at least once per mission/adventure) to our bios. That's a running record of what your character has achieved and how they have grown; but if you lack that detail, other players aren't going to see or understand that. I once had a player say to me "well my character's done this, this, and this", but there was no record of it anywhere on the site as they didn't update their bio or post any Crew Logs. Your characters matter to you as players, they also matter to me as Creative Director, and I don't want the contributions you or your characters make to be forgotten.

This also extends to Mission Summaries; tied to Crew Logs, these summarize what happened on any given mission and detail the exploits and growth of the ship and crew as a whole. It can be difficult and time-consuming to do, and I've neglected it myself much to the aggravation of the Wiki Manager. If you have time and the inclination, please volunteer to help your CO by writing the summaries down. Full archives of the mission can be provided in HTML or PDF form depending on preference to assist you!

Membership

Membership currently stands at 38 active, posting members. We've been pretty stable maintaining this number, which has kept a fairly decent pace of posting on all four ships. Nobody is significantly over- or understaffed.

Artemis: 11 (11 PRCs)
Aquila: 9 (9 PRCs)
Titania: 9 (6 PRCs, 3 SRCs)
Yeager: 11 (10 PRCs, 1 SRC)

In-Game Relocation

Over the next few days, you might see a forum pop up and disappear on the boards called "Vanguard Station"; this will be our new Starbase Alpha for those who wish to post there with NRCs or characters on leave between missions. Where will we be in terms of the Star Trek map, you ask, well we're going "South" aaaaall the way down to the bottom of Federation Space.

I had to shrink the map pretty extensively to make it fit in the post without blowing up peoples' devices; we'll be just to the "Northwest" of the "Delta Triangle", nestled comfortably between the Klingon, Tholian, and Gorn Empires, but still giving us easy access to other under-utilised species like the Sheliak Corporate and the Talarians. This is the general area where the original USS Defiant was lost in a dimensional rift, where the Galileo 7 escaped from the giant barbarians, and where the Enterprise crew found a pocket dimension in The Animated Series. We'll also be near several planets mentioned but never seen on screen: Tiburon, Cait, Pacifica, and Grazer.

Why are we moving? Honestly, to keep things fresh. Everyone has been working in or around the Cardassian border for several mission cycles now (over three years since the first mission in that area) and that will be coming to a close following the end of the current mission cycle. The main reason, however, is that being on the borders of the Federation, and crucially not somewhere any of the main shows since The Original Series have paid much attention to, is we get to explore and create our own stuff without risking it being ploughed under by Paramount if another series comes out. Having a central space will also be nice for players to hang out when ships end mission cycles on similar schedules, pilot and tweak new NRCs before they move to their assignments, or put older NRCs to pasture.

CD's note: I am aware of the Vanguard series of novels, and am in discussion with the Creative Team about whether we should add them to our canon or not. Ultimately it does not necessarily matter, as the events of those novels were classified and it's unlikely anyone in the early 25th century is even aware the region exists.

Closing

I'm looking forward to what the second half of the year will bring. As always, if players have any questions or concerns, please feel free to reach out to me via any official form of FS communication!