The Welcome Wagon for new roleplayers, and old!

[Crystal Dragon]

For those that celebrate it, Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and Happy Yuletide!

[Ruin Mage]

HO HO HO.

[Crystal Dragon]

Happy new year everyone and yes, classes will be starting up again on the 7th of this month. 

• We have a slide deck to help new mentors keep up with each lesson plan for the classes. (Thank you Diva.)
• We are using google calendar for scheduling class times and to give mentors a chance to sign up for helping host. (The forum built one is reallllly wonky for this, tried and failed at it personally.)
• We have new mentors joining the club to help out! *throws hands in the air in a cheer!* (Yes, we are always welcoming new volunteers!)
• We have two (2) scheduled classes per night with our semesters now. Scheduling them at 5PM and 9PM (EST) Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, with Monday reserved for workshopping (Which will take place at the same time slots.)
• We do have a new years resolution with this club and we hope to achieve it with keeping the community informed, safe, and creatively driven. 
• No changes in the lesson planner so far, everything seems to naturally fall into line for each subject topic for the classes, so if anyone has suggestions, recommendations, or even ideas to help improve our classes, let us know!

[Crystal Dragon]

Welcome Wagons are rolling out this weekend to help new roleplayers just starting out to learn the basics about roleplaying and it's many different aspects! We're hosting tonight's classes at 5PM and 9PM EST in Valhalla-4422

[Crystal Dragon]

Classes rolling out to CENTER-22963 at 5PM and 9PM EST 1/9/2022 for an hour long visit and discussion to close our weekend of learning about roleplaying. :) 

[Crystal Dragon]

*Clubs, Bars, and other base location owners are welcome to send me base codes to host classes in. We look specifically for calm, quiet spaces with less flashing/overly bright lighting. Recommended spaces are needed and the quieter spaces provide the best possible environments for lessons without distractions.

 

Edited January 18, 2022 by CrystalDragon
Correction, Future-5014 was supposed to be Fortune-5014.

[Crystal Dragon]

It's about that time folks, you can hear the wagons preparing to roll out just down the road. Are you ready for a wagon load of RP information and tips? Well here's your chance to catch us rolling through to help uplift and improve our community by addressing the most critical points of roleplaying and teaching the new folks what they need to know to get a roll on their character play and interactions.

Class days are 2/4 - 2/5 - 2/6 with Monday reserved for workshopping descriptions, answering deeper questions and discussing player issues as a community.

 

[Crystal Dragon]

Due to expected events RL wise, I need to step back and make myself available to a old close friends going through a very difficult time. If any mentors wish to pick up the lead for tonight's classes and has time to commit to helping the players attending, please do. I can only offer my deepest apologies for the change in schedule and host for this weekend, I had not expected the news that was received nor the emotional impact it had on me. Thank you all for taking the time to drop by for the first class night and I hope the mentors that wish to pick up the lead are able to carry on the lesson plans for the weekend.

[Crystal Dragon]

Opening up dialog for points to provide clarification or stronger support on roleplaying.

---

I'd like to ask the community users and roleplayers to please leave us comments and suggestions in our thread here to let us know if we need to expand further on a specific topic, or details that we may have missed in the classes as they are. This includes conflict resolution, group searching tools, enhanced details on coping with undesirable roleplay situations and untoward player advances, and other issues the community works around to find roleplaying partners and groups.

 

If you feel we skipped on anything and have attended to know what we teach, please let us know if there's anything we can do to improve what we teach to cover as much as we possibly can during the weekend hours we've set the class time for. If players wish to practice these skills that they are learning about, we need to provide a safe and comfortable space for them to do so that will not judge them for typos, slowness of writing, or reactions. We all started somewhere, let's give them a safe spot to learn and practice what they learn without unnecessary judgement.

 

At this time, we cover consent, informed consent, communication and it's importance to roleplaying and maintaining roleplay standards, red-flag behavior and mental health awareness, personal boundaries and limitations, bad forms of roleplaying (Metagaming/Godmoding/Powergaming), researching character flaws and traits, understanding the need to avoid protected content and material, lore/canon and noncanon, and personal story creation, resources and support groups/channels/discords to meet new friends, respecting the rule of reality over roleplaying, compassion/consideration for the fellow player, abbreviations and labels commonly used by roleplayers, character development and evolutions, finding and joining player groups/stories, and last but not least important, addressing poor gamership (Bad forms in group situations and when is it acceptable and how to find an "out" to escape it.). I'm sure I missed a few points, it's late and I'm out of spoons for the day but I wanted to put this out there to let the community voice opinion and suggestions of what might need to be addressed further in future class times.

[White Cobra]

I attended the latest series of classes and found all three lessons very informative and fun. As also mentioned in your post, a lot of important and helpful ground is covered, and I can confirm that with the absence of any judgment over my typos, nobody else has anything to worry about on that front. So, I wanted to give a huge thank you to you and the whole team for putting in the time and effort to do this.

In terms of other things to cover, I only have a few things that might be relevant to consider.

In yesterday’s class another player brought up the possibility of covering some more “operational” things like binds and macros. On that note, for someone as computer/programming illiterate as myself, it would probably be helpful with a “for dummies” approach if this is implemented as my brain tends to enter a very dysfunctional and uncooperative mode as soon as things like binds and macros are brought up. Like on the typo front, I most likely constitute “lowest common denominator”, so if the classes are not the time and place to sink to those levels I would fully understand 🙂

Another thing I thought of was to maybe have an “advanced” class or forum for storytelling/DM tips where the more experienced players/DMs could share tips on how to run engaging stories/plots and the most important dos and don’ts. Even for people not wanting to run plots I guess this could be relevant to help expand personal storylines and character development and provide tips on elements of character traits and story “conflict” that might help inspire “engagement” from other players and characters.

I hope this makes sense and thank you all again for running these classes.

[Crystal Dragon]

7 hours ago, White Cobra said:

I attended the latest series of classes and found all three lessons very informative and fun. As also mentioned in your post, a lot of important and helpful ground is covered, and I can confirm that with the absence of any judgment over my typos, nobody else has anything to worry about on that front. So, I wanted to give a huge thank you to you and the whole team for putting in the time and effort to do this.

In terms of other things to cover, I only have a few things that might be relevant to consider.

In yesterday’s class another player brought up the possibility of covering some more “operational” things like binds and macros. On that note, for someone as computer/programming illiterate as myself, it would probably be helpful with a “for dummies” approach if this is implemented as my brain tends to enter a very dysfunctional and uncooperative mode as soon as things like binds and macros are brought up. Like on the typo front, I most likely constitute “lowest common denominator”, so if the classes are not the time and place to sink to those levels I would fully understand 🙂

Another thing I thought of was to maybe have an “advanced” class or forum for storytelling/DM tips where the more experienced players/DMs could share tips on how to run engaging stories/plots and the most important dos and don’ts. Even for people not wanting to run plots I guess this could be relevant to help expand personal storylines and character development and provide tips on elements of character traits and story “conflict” that might help inspire “engagement” from other players and characters.

I hope this makes sense and thank you all again for running these classes.

I remember Spazzy mentioning this in a discussion privately. Macros and binds are a difficult subject in and of itself to cover as I'm not fully versed in it and Spazzy simply hasn't the time in his schedule as it is to cover it. But I do know that Macros for the Masses (And keybinds too!) is probably the most comprehensive guide and listing of macros and binds you can use for both roleplaying and regular game play usage. But I do like the idea of an advanced class or forum thread for the storytellers and DM players. I'll pitch the idea around with the mentors on board and see if any of them want to headline that aspect. 

 

And your welcome! We've been trying our best to make sure newer players are familiar with the basics and cover the broad spectrum of things with roleplaying. I'll see if I can get the mentors and vet volunteers together to talk these ideas over and see what solutions we can come up with together. *nodsnods*

[Crystal Dragon]

 

Hosting in Echo Plaza.

This may cover the full weekend 18th-20th Friday/Saturday/Sunday

during the normally scheduled class times. (5PM & 9PM EST)

 

This meet up is intended to offer leaders of the RP community a chance to talk over problematic play, defuse player conflicts, and address key points that the class planner currently isn't instructing, or simply to thinktank multigroup events and ideas.

 

Feel free to reach out to me to offer any suggestions, discuss the project or wish to join the collaborative. 

 

This is a community focused project, we expect players attending to be respectful towards one another, and to help reach understanding and unity within the roleplaying community of Homecoming. The meetup times might override the raid schedule for Friday-Saturday-Sunday and expect the possibility. We will not host another public event like this until the end of the year, so this is the time to meet the mentors, and discuss our planner and any RP related topics that need to be addressed. (Hosting on Everlasting, as the unofficial RP shard.)

Edited February 14, 2022 by CrystalDragon
OOP correction for shard!

[VV]

On 2/14/2022 at 2:07 PM, CrystalDragon said:

This may cover the full weekend 18th-20th Friday/Saturday/Sunday

during the normally scheduled class times. (5PM & 9PM EST)

Is this only for current mentors or can anyone attend?

 

Also, if attending, does one need to be at both the 5pm and 9pm sessions, or is that an either situation?

[Crystal Dragon]

14 hours ago, VV said:

Is this only for current mentors or can anyone attend?

 

Also, if attending, does one need to be at both the 5pm and 9pm sessions, or is that an either situation?

This is for anyone that wishes to attend. I'm hoping community leaders will join us this evening, any and all of them if possible. And no, respectively, it's not needed to attend both, but if one wishes to, they are more than welcome.

Edited February 17, 2022 by CrystalDragon

[Tanklet]

On 2/14/2022 at 2:07 PM, CrystalDragon said:

 

Hosting in Echo Plaza.

 

 

For those of us (me, I am those of us) who are coming back after the dark decade, how does one get to Echo Plaza again...? <.<

[Crystal Dragon]

16 minutes ago, Tanklet said:

 

For those of us (me, I am those of us) who are coming back after the dark decade, how does one get to Echo Plaza again...? <.<

Tunnel Network in AP. :)

[Crystal Dragon]

Following some recent health issues, I need to put my life and health in first priority over fostering a better community. It's with concern for my own wellbeing that I need to resign as a class host to focus on the back curtain work within the Welcome Wagons project. We are still accepting new mentors interested in joining the project, and @McSpazz has invested an incredible amount of time and effort to put forward as much information as we share during these live in-game classes each weekend we've hosted since July. I would like to request the community leaders to please put forth the best efforts to stay in touch with each other, and talk things over in regards to working together to keep the community safe and thriving both for all players new and old. I would like to thank @Grey-Ghost @Greycat @Wylde Fyre @Shadeknight and @GM Kal for giving me this opportunity to create something both educational and helpful for the community itself and allowing the leaders of the community to have a hand on shaping how these classes took form over the last year. Thus, I will be working strictly with organizing and tending to the content the lesson planner covers, as well as working with interested mentors to help open up the classes to cover a more broad access schedule in the future. 

 

I was never given the chance to actually teach anything in my life time, and this had given me a taste of what it's like in a way I had never expected. I met so many wonderful people in the community through these classes both in structuring the format, but also in speaking from personal experiences that taught us all unique lessons about roleplaying that we share in these classes every session I hosted, and assisted with McSpazz's own lesson nights. I know it doesn't sound like much, but this changed my life, and my perceptions on how to teach and given me a window into what it's like to handle lesson planners, scheduling, and problem solving along the way. I hope to simply keep the community on the same page with both lesson content and allowing players that are new or simply joining to refresh their knowledge base, and allow these classes to remain a safe nonjudgmental space for all to discuss the subject as a whole rather than in parts as we have in the last year. 

 

Mcspazz's compiled "overly long discussions" of roleplaying.

Edited March 28, 2022 by CrystalDragon
Meant to add this for those that couldn't attend the classes.

[On-Fire Dude]

On 3/28/2022 at 9:52 AM, CrystalDragon said:

 

Fell better soon, Crys.

Edited March 29, 2022 by On-Fire Dude

[Crystal Dragon]

8 hours ago, On-Fire Dude said:

Fell better soon, Crys.

Thank you, I'm doing what I can, having to cut back a lot of the stress elevating activities to try and give myself the break I very much need.

[Crystal Dragon]

This weekends classes are canceled, however mentors and regulars are welcome to attend the City of Roleplay recruitment fair for SG's and VG's of the server. This is a prime opportunity to meet and greet many of the roleplaying leaders of Everlasting's community and we'll be there to help answer questions about groups and roleplaying as well during the fair! 

For further information: Check this thread!

[Crystal Dragon]

The return to community service~ 

Classes will be held at 9PM EST for this weekend as the 5PM slot interferes with family time on my end, but if mentors would like to join to assist, please let me know. We will be using a single base each class weekend as it gives players a chance to fully explore each of the ones we select to feature. If you are new to the server and to MMO roleplaying, this is a perfect time and opportunity to learn how roleplaying works in gaming and more.