A winterland plotting interest gather/discussion post!!1

[devotedtothecore]

HELLO FRIENDS hope you had a merry winter holidays! A new year is coming, and with it, a new year to plot. Now that the Exsilium story has hit a chapter in which Transports are pretty much running the show for the time being, but it's been a pretty busy time of year for many, it seems like it might be handy to have an OOC get-together to throw around some ideas on Big Stuff For Characters To Do Together, to catch up on plot-and-subplot details (of which I'm not clear on the entirety of myself), for announcements/interestgathers for subplot ideas, and for general asking of questions that other people besides our mods might be able to help answer.

So without further ado:



WINTERLAND SHENANIGANS NEW YEAR'S EVE (AND AFTER) PLOTTING PARTY

Check out the toplevel categories of stuff in the comments, or start your own if I missed any!

Comments

"HELP, WHAT IS GOING ON WITH/TELL ME MORE ABOUT ____"

[devotedtothecore]

Questions by anyone about anything and answers by anyone (hopefully).

[devotedtothecore]

I'd appreciated it if someone could help me catch up on what the DITR is doing lately I want to poke it but I keep feeling the urge to have to read all the related threads and logs of DITR shenanigans so far but time......is no friend.... alas...

I JUST PLAY THE ASSISTANT OTHER DITR MEMBERS DOGPILE ME

[speakveryclearly]

SUFFERING. That's what the DITR is doing. Adapted from here (that "Assistant" character is this one) is a stafflist (note: Sue dropped since this list was made)

DIRECTOR: Saul Goodman
CONSULTANTS: Mike Ehrmantraut, Stephanie Brown
ASSISTANT: Kanaya Maryam
LIAISONS: Alice Roscha (Max B), Feferi Peixes, Sollux Captor, Cesare Borgia, Ella Ellis, Joel (The Last of Us)
GREETERS: Belle, Utena, Anne Boleyn, Jesse Pinkman, Elizabeth (Bioshock)

The organization has a tripartite structure.

1. The GREETERS are the footsoldiers who staff the welcome tent and accepting new Transports. They're pretty much ordinary kind helpful people, and many of the people who work in this capacity aren't formally hired by the DITR, e.g. Ellie from the Last of Us, who is closely involved with cookies.
2. The LIAISONS are more seriously involved in the department. They relay information from the Initiative to the Transports. Example!
3. ADMINISTRATION comprises Everyone Else currently the director and assistant and consultants. They have the most responsibility. The Director most often personally works to arrange direct conferences with members of the Initiative, while the other administration workers help the director make decisions about what to do with this information. These members also coordinate DITR events, for example Kanaya runs the Newcomer-Veteran program, and Stephanie helps the greeters.

This system was invented to deal with Exsilium as it was in 2012, where the Initiative was able to pay 500 marques a month to transports automatically slotted into luxurious rooms of a tall building that tended to stay where it was in a city that stayed fairly constant. Bad things happened monthly, requiring missions, but not changing this overall structure. The welcome tent went up every month without fail, and liaisons made multiple announcements.

How have these things changed after a nuclear bombing, mutiny, and migration to an ice cube? It's more a testament to the principle of inertia that the department still exists at all.

1. The greeters are having more trouble maintaining the welcome tent. The physical location of the transports is changing frequently from month to month and they often have to fend for themselves on resources, even going on supply runs just to secure flour. Their problems are compounded by Jesse Pinkman's "departure" and the upcoming newcomer delay.
2. The liaisons are supposed to relay information from the Initiative's top brass, particularly about the mandatory missions. However, the Initiative's top brass is now dead and the mandatory missions are a thing of the past. For the past several months the liaisons have only been able to function in the context of DITR as auxiliary administration.
3. The administration is aware of these glaring issues with their organization and has to solve them, now completely devoid of the Initiative's authority, while lacking any budget whatsoever that they do not personally earn through full-time Snowsilium jobs.

Updating this model requires a daunting amount of IC legwork, not all of which DITR can personally accomplish. Currently they lack official authority or at least perceive themselves that way because in Exsilium official authority no longer exists and the transports are basically free to run amok. The department isn't necessarily staffed by military experts, more people who like to meddle. Though it would be possible to, for example, assign a liaison to coordinate one of these missions (I will link this post on my deathbed), that does imply they would be coordinating other people, and those other characters can't be forced with a lack of IC authority.

IC frustration with this situation may mean the department won't exist anymore in 2014. At the very least the Director is in talks with Charlie Cutter to get his approval for changing the I to stand for Internal.

TL;DR: DITR has three branches (greeters, liaisons, and administration) and was designed to deal with monthly missions in a static setting. The dynamic setting makes things harder for the greeters, the irregular mission schedule makes things harder for the liaisons, and administration is at the end of its rope dealing with it all.

[devotedtothecore]

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS I feel like I understand the state of things much better now!!

Is the DITR info publicly available in some IC format, like an internal network page or a posting somewhere on a sheet of paper in a moonbase hall or the like?

And also is the DITR making any plans to possibly extend relations-bridging to forming something between the New Initiative and Transports?

[speakveryclearly]

The roster I linked should be available IC as a network page.

Though the Director has been planning talks with the New Initiative, overall the Department has its doubts about the benefits to either side of letting the weak New Initiative boss around the freedom-loving Transports, and the new initiative is not currently the department's #1 priority. Viable #1 priorities are anti-UE war effort and transport aid, the latter of which Consultant Brown (as well as Liaison Peixes) is currently promoting. There's been a new plurk between Lenga/Justine/Tess/Heather (me and Goodman and Brown and Peixes) with discussion of those directions, which I will try to convey some time later, sorry I just got back from an Eve party. Happy new year, incidentally!

[controlledvariable]

Having info ICly available is a really good idea :|a

as Lenga said, there's some discussion going on rn that will be branched out to all ditr players soon and will be followed up with an IC post, but i'll add "a public info page" to the list of ideas

[devotedtothecore]

ALSO HOW ARE THE INITIATIVE NPCS DOING where are they staying is anyone feeding them and changing their cat boxes, I'm really out of the loop here

[outshine]

I CAN ANSWER THIS ONE. Sort of. It sucks to be an NPC right now because they are effectively tethered to the transporter. They're all staying in the same room with it, or at least in the next room over. (I forget the limit to how far they can go, it's something like five miles? But not very far at all, is the point.) Through some small mercy, they've got a bit of an in with the New Initiative, but they technically don't work for them, unless Vennett and Lowell have decided to take up jobs with them-- but seeing as their skills are outmoded by NI's lack of time travel technology, it wouldn't be the same field. Trish just doesn't like them. Either way, something's better than nothing.

I can't exactly speak for the others, but the tone for the NPCs seems to be trying to find a place to exist and otherwise helping where they can. Lowell and Vennett still run the transporter together, and Trish is trying to figure out how to disseminate the med tech she still has. (I've been mulling it over but ultimately saving the plotting for after the holidays!) Together they're also keeping video diaries, in case anything... else... happens to them.

I think they are mostly subsisting on beer and peanuts, but I could be wrong.

I also cannot comment at this time on what Richard or Maggie are up to though! Because I don't know. I am guessing it sucks to be them too.

[maddeninghatter]

How about someone suggesting that Lowell and Vennett unplug the Transporter on the 1st so that more people won't get pulled in and kidnapped? Some sort of IC shenanigans could get it turned on again. Maybe someone decides to go on a beer and munchies run to the past?

[outshine]

You mean in regards to the changes to apps? I think Lowell's and Vennett's player actually have that worked out already! I know there's a post in the works for later.

[devotedtothecore]

Thanks for the updates! I've been mulling over plotting for getting more involved with the NPCs in general, so Chrys might be swinging by to help make their place a little more comfortable in the near future.

Could I also get a quick rundown on the NPCs' backgrounds, actually? I know bits about Vennett and Lowell, but the others...

[outshine]

Well, Lowell, Trish and Vennett are the only... player controlled NPCs, as contradictory as that sounds. :') Was there anything in particular you wanted to know?

CLINIC STUFF

[hymnals]

I have no idea where to put this, so I'll just slide it in here! Adrasteius was head of the ground clinic prior to explosey-time, and while he's fine to still have that ceded to Ashraf, he's definitely going to jump right back in to the clinic and its concerns.

To that end, he's interested in rallying whomever may be interested to find A -- space (ie land) and then materials with which to build a new clinic. I have to go on hiatus imminently (because my brother is getting married; v pesky), but he'll likely post about that once I'm back (near the end of next week).

[outshine]

I think I mentioned this on plurk but you are welcome to Trish's help on whatever you deem reasonable! Space, supplies, etc. I will defer to your judgment on what's reasonable for the setting, and how easy you want rebuilding to be. :') (ofc I'll tag when you post too, but just that you know if you need something from her that doesn't come up on its own, just let me know, we can make it happen.)

[hymnals]

hell yeah girl he'll hit u up

and bring you nice meals

[controlledvariable]

So: Steph is involved in both the clinic and DITR, and she's helping work out how the latter is going to be restructed without the Initiative, and one thing she'd be interested in doing is coordinating more closely with the clinic.

Which could mean stuff like making the DITR staff available to help the clinic with set up/maintenance, helping to secure funds and supplies for the clinic and possibly also expanding the training into being more DITR run, since she was doing a chunk of that personally.

If she contacted Ashraf/Adra about that, would they be interested :|a

[hymnals]

They'd be amenable to a relationship with the DITR! They would also generally agree, though, that the training should sorta remain in-house as much as possible.

[devotedtothecore]

LATE TO THE MEETING WITH STARBUCKS hope it's not over

Chrys is pulling together collaborators for base building/upgrading in general (focusing on a few locations including the Transporter), so if Adrasteius wouldn't mind, maybe they could help out in terms of the materials/building front?

[deadelfwalking]

He wouldn't mind -- he'd be grateful -- but he'd definitely prefer that the neo-clinic be its own independent institution, if you will (i.e. not distant from, but not necessarily placed in the same buildings/areas as a neo-Hold). Mostly because having all the important stuff concentrated in one place increases vulnerability to attacks etc

Re: Potential transport government

[bloodthirsts]

Since there was so much discussion about a council and elections for Transports after the mutiny (especially now they're running the show) is there any continued movement to ICly hold them? Like will there be nominations and voting on keeping this ball rolling anytime soon.

I've been kind of out of it for the past two weeks yaaay

Re: Potential transport government

[highhealplz]

That's a super good question! I haven't had the time lately to pursue this like I wanted to, but ultimately what it would come down to is a lot of OOC organization to set up a system that's as OOCly hassle-free as we can make it, with the goal of pulling group decisions out of the Transports in regards to How To Handle Stuff. This might need volunteers (and I've had a couple already!), because I don't know if I can pull it off alone on top of modding.

Though I honestly haven't even touched OOC opinions on this sort of thing, so I'm not sure if it's a thing that we as a playerbase fully want. That's an important step too. :|a

[bloodthirsts]

No problem. As a player I found this plot super interesting and would like to see it carried forward, so maybe it'd be a good idea to take an OOC poll for overall community interest. After all the discussion it would be a shame to see it die off.

Transporting Transports

[ringthenoise]

I'd like to know more about the shuttle and coming and going from earth to the moon. How often does it happen? How long is the trip? (Confirmation would be nice on it being roughly four hours)

What facilities/equipment if any is being KEPT on the moon?

[crocodilesmiles]

It takes 6-8 hours to get to the moon, 4 to get back. It's timing dependent because why not!

The shuttle only runs on request for a group of five people or more; it's too resource intensive to run often, and the shuttle is docked on the moon when not actively needed, to prevent theft or native discovery in unfortunate ways. (Or more because the AI likes keeping it close to its moon base processors.)

[ringthenoise]

Dammit AI stop doing things that make Raiden suspicious.

And that makes sense! Assume (if it's okay) that Raiden has been making a lot of trips back and forth with the (Old) Initiative to help set up on Earth! He doesn't have tech know-how but he can lift several thousand tons so...literally there for heavy lifting.