SWUcast Ep. IV Member Suggestion Thread

[Dutch]

TAKE TWO!

Alright so after finally being able to resolve our technical issues, we are shining the green light for SWUcast Episode IV! I believe Rugs said it best in the original suggestion thread:

Dec 12, 2013 1:10:28 GMT -5 Rugs said:

Hear ye, hear ye, the SWUcast cometh!

So, dear SWUlings, we've agreed that we hope to have a fourth installment of the SWUcast available for you fine lot sometime before the end of the year. Obviously, that depends on staff scheduling and whatnot, but that's the plan.

So, we want to hear what you guys might want us to talk about. There are already a few things that we're probably going to talk about, such as the general state of the plot/what factions are up to around the site, the activity feedback thread, shoutouts to the OTMs, and some other general business and whatever other randomness might come up, like saving Jenno from drowning again.

So, is there anything else you'd like to hear us touch on? Burning questions? Concerns to address? Topics to touch on? We're open to suggestions until noted otherwise, so chime in and let us know here!

With the latest influx of new and returning members, we thought it would be good to ask ya'll once more what you would like us to discuss.

We do this for ya'll, so please drop your two cents!

Current Member Suggestions

- Writing Villains

- Beskar and SWU

- To be a Jedi

- Vices and Virtues

- Review Etiquette/ Profile Posting Procedure

[Pembleton]

I would like to see a piece on writing good RP villains.

Looking at previous SWUcasts, I heard that we had a whole talk about "what is evil," and it was more a philosophical debate, but I'm asking more specifically about a "How to Play the Bad Guy" tutorial. Troperiffic or cookie-cutter bad guys seem to pop up, characters who are just the designated evil person with cliched reasons for being evil and very little purpose other than telling everyone how evil they are, and I think a crash-course in villainy could be useful.

In the Mighty Mods' opinion: How do you build a villainous character? What are ways, outside of the very cliche, that you can shape his worldview and motivations so that you can play a realistic, goal-oriented bad guy instead of Darth Awesome, Antagonist to Protagonists?

[Dire Wolf]

Talk about Beskar

[Dutch]

Jul 18, 2014 15:51:28 GMT -5 Dire Wolf said:

Talk about Beskar

[Dire Wolf]

In all seriousness, though, I think like there just aren't that many well played Jedi on the site. I'm not saying that these are bad characters, not by a long shot, but I can't help but notice how they often don't follow the tenets of the Jedi code. You could also caveat this discussion with "how to be a hero" to contrast it with lizard's idea.

[Dutch]

Added a list of suggested/to be used topics!

Would love to hear from some of our non-staff members though!

Don't be shy <3

[Thaddeus]

Something I would love to hear discussed is how to create believably flawed characters. This is important to whether you imagine your character as a villian, hero, bystander, rock, whatever.

Too often we shoe horn in faults just to make a character imperfect, I would love to hear the peeps discuss how virtues can also be vices; so your character is generous, does that mean they can be taken advantage of, aren't good with managing finances? They believe every being is valuable, does that mean they might freeze up when they have to choose between people?

Also how your skills and abilities also reflect those vices and virtues - and how they themselves can be a vice or a virtue.

Anything that helps us all as writers avoid making either a character without flaws, or a character whose flaws are stuck on like bits of paper to their face, is always useful - and let's face it we have all done it.

Oh and generally would love to hear encouragement of people posting up applications as WIPs, I know some people only like to show the finished product. But I think having it in WIP and people politely and enthusiastically commenting on applications as they develop is an awesome aspect of SWU, that speeds up the process, and makes the writer feel less worried when it does come to the official review.

So chatting about how it is helpful to the sense of community, personal experiences with it, all that sort of jazz.

And I am done, do I get a cookie? Actually would much rather have a scone, may I?

Thad

[Valcor]

Personally, I would like to hear weapons talk, tech stuff. I can understand in a literary based site like this one some of the more realistic aspects of fighting can be lost, but it seems to me that unless someone has Beskar armor, it's pretty much treated as card board. Same goes for Lightsabers, I think most people have in their mind that if it is not Cortosis, Beskar, or star ship hull, it may as well be warm butter. (I think if these issues were addressed there might be less of a problem with too many characters having specialized stuff.)
Anyway that's my newbie two cents, have at it how you will XD

[Dutch]

Jul 21, 2014 12:56:26 GMT -5 Thaddeus said:

Something I would love to hear discussed is how to create believably flawed characters. This is important to whether you imagine your character as a villian, hero, bystander, rock, whatever.

Too often we shoe horn in faults just to make a character imperfect, I would love to hear the peeps discuss how virtues can also be vices; so your character is generous, does that mean they can be taken advantage of, aren't good with managing finances? They believe every being is valuable, does that mean they might freeze up when they have to choose between people?

Also how your skills and abilities also reflect those vices and virtues - and how they themselves can be a vice or a virtue.

Anything that helps us all as writers avoid making either a character without flaws, or a character whose flaws are stuck on like bits of paper to their face, is always useful - and let's face it we have all done it.

Interesting... We can def put this into the discussion docket!

Jul 21, 2014 12:56:26 GMT -5 Thaddeus said:

Oh and generally would love to hear encouragement of people posting up applications as WIPs, I know some people only like to show the finished product. But I think having it in WIP and people politely and enthusiastically commenting on applications as they develop is an awesome aspect of SWU, that speeds up the process, and makes the writer feel less worried when it does come to the official review.

So chatting about how it is helpful to the sense of community, personal experiences with it, all that sort of jazz.

And I am done, do I get a cookie? Actually would much rather have a scone, may I?

Thad

Given the influx of newer members, I was already planning on having a discussion on review etiquette and profile posting procedures. I'll go ahead and put that on the docket here though.

Jul 21, 2014 13:38:45 GMT -5 Valcor said:

Personally, I would like to hear weapons talk, tech stuff. I can understand in a literary based site like this one some of the more realistic aspects of fighting can be lost, but it seems to me that unless someone has Beskar armor, it's pretty much treated as card board. Same goes for Lightsabers, I think most people have in their mind that if it is not Cortosis, Beskar, or star ship hull, it may as well be warm butter. (I think if these issues were addressed there might be less of a problem with too many characters having specialized stuff.)
Anyway that's my newbie two cents, have at it how you will XD

Well, beskar is already on the docket, so no worries there. I'm not really sure what there is to discuss when it comes to Tech though, since most weapons/armors have a description/stat lay out that already describes what they can and can't handle, y'know? Did you have something more specific in mind?

As for lightsabers... pretty much everything except cortosis, beskar, and star ship hulls are like butter to them. They're easily the most lethal and dangerous melee weapons in the galaxy, and there's a reason only Force wielders are capable of using them without turning themselves into a pile of meat.

[Valcor]

Duranium, Thick Durasteel, Phrik, and Neuranium all have been shown to resist lightsabers and aren't mentioned on other threads. And for the armors i really wanted to hear more about firearms vs. armors than lightsabers. Specifically I guess I wanted to hear blasters vs. metals as both have varying intensities and densities.

[Pembleton]

To piggyback off of what Valcor is saying, I think a primer on use of blasters and slugthrowers might be a useful thing. I personally have lots of ideas for non-Jedi characters, but I have no idea how to fight with a character that's not using a lightsaber. When I look through the stock weapon options, I don't know how to compare the different stats and functions, and thus no idea of what different ranged builds would need what equipment, and how they'd use it.

[Dutch]

Half bump, half announcement!

The deadline for your suggestions draws near! You have about 24 more hours to drop your suggestion to us for SWUcast IV:

12/27 @ 12:00 AM Eastern will this thread be locked.

Thank you to everyone who's suggested so far!