Posted by Captain Brian Richards (Fleet Commander, Meridian Fleet) in FCOMM proposal: Fleet bases/stations

Posted by Vice Admiral Sarah Hemenway (CMM) in FCOMM proposal: Fleet bases/stations

Posted by Vice Admiral Daniel Lerner (President / Procedures Guru) in FCOMM proposal: Fleet bases/stations

(snip)

As I have mentioned to Joe privately, I do agree with his suggestion. Just to be clear, my bullet points were not suggested wording - just what the outcome should look like.

I would like to ensure the bylaw says that FComms do have the discretion to allow “role-playing character interactions” on the OOC ships, which the FComm shall be responsible and accountable for. I also think that wording solves some stuff raised above such as ranks/promotions/etc.

Daniel

I think the point you’re missing, Dan, is that they aren’t allowed to have ‘role-playing character interactions’ on OOC Ships because ‘role-playing character interactions’ has official connotations to it and implications based on MOO, other parts of FCOMM, etc. Here are just a few of the questions that come to my mind if you make this an official vector of role-play:

• Is a Member who only has a character on the OOC Ship still a Member?
• Are there any rank restrictions since MOO talks about “role-playing rank” and “character rank”?
• What if there is a dispute between or over characters on an OOC Ship?

If a FComm wants a more structured environment to handle this kind of role-play, he/she could easily put together a group to make an X-Fleet ship. Purposefully leaving this a gray area has allowed greater flexibility in OOC Ship use over the past three decades; trying to legislate this is going to cause more headaches than it solves.

• Sarah

I know you asked Dan specifically but I’m going to be ‘that guy’ and answer as I suggested a line that I think neatly solves those issues you brought up.

I had suggested adding the line “In Character interactions can be allowed by the Fleet Commander at their discretion. Given the nature of the OOC environment any actions or activities taken onboard the OOC area will not be considered valid for STF rank progression. Activities in the OOC environment are for enrichment and entertainment purposes only.” And to address what you had said in order:

1) So the section of MOO that defines Membership (per the library) states” A Member is defined as any person holding an active STF account and at least one of the following; a governmental position, an active roleplaying character, a gamemaster position. These must be held for no less than 30 days to qualify as a Member.” The way I understand the OOC ships, is that there are no ‘characters’ on the fleet OOC ships besides the FComm and AFComm (who shall be changed each election and are not permanent fixtures on the station) , it’s people posting as themselves as their characters as opposed to with a character.

2) Given what I mentioned above that if there isn’t a ‘character’ onboard the OOC ship the rank wouldn’t be an issue as there is no character to give a rank to, if anything should a player decide to RP as say their security chief onboard the OOC ship they would sign off as the rank of that character, but the person would be writing as their OOC account not as a permanent fixture onboard the station.

3) That will be handled like any other issue under the jurisdiction of the FComm and AFComm. Given that it’s an OOC ship with no permanent characters and to be used for that enrichment and flavor purpose only, the likelihood of disputes already is low. I would advocate for these areas to be for special events or inter sim interactions, as a way for ships to mingle like the promenade on DS9 for example. It will never be a hub of activity, but lets take for example the cross sim interactions between the Ogawa and the Athena while the Ogawa was waiting for the new spec to be approved. Starbase 157 would have made a good area for those characters to mingle in real time that would have been reflected on both ships with the ‘real’ characters as well.

In relation to an X-Fleet ship there is a whole host of complications for organizing and getting buy in from those that would want to participate or not, where as the OOC ships are already running and, for the most part, dormant. It would be optional as always, and I understand that’s how it’s been for 30 years but perhaps evolution of those areas is due.

Brian

Brian,

By pointing out that all three of those things are things that work just fine under the current rules, you’ve basically made the argument that we don’t need to change anything here. I don’t know if you intended to do that or not, but that’s a logical conclusion someone could draw from the fact that all three of Sarah’s questions have an answer today, before anything is changed.

Also… just to clarify my own position, since Dan referred to “my suggestion”; my position is that we change nothing at all because there is no problem. Any suggestion I made is merely to clarify our existing rule set without changing it, in the event that anyone is confused. I don’t know that anyone is confused (or was before this conversation started).

Joe