[OOC/AU] Critter-specific Roleplay

[skinstealer]

i want to say that anyone can also introduce new critters for people to take/adopt, bc theyre freely recolorable/editable, and people can do what they want with them there. also people can always opt out of choosing them which just leaves them like...open for some other encounter or something? idk, thinking

i also want to say the structure of explorer groups varies, though that brings up the question- what do we want for our starting town?

[Pichi2214]

hmm it does feel like.. having an explorer organization would be the easiest way to handle this for rp purposes, where people can just team up with whoever has time (and if you want you could still go primarily exploring with a specific group and have a dedicated team within that, so that option would also still be there)

[skinstealer]

organization could work, then...but i think itd be nice if there's some solo teams too. maybe some sort of conflict between "oh youre not Registered™, you must be amateurs/con artists" when a lot of the time it's wanting to operate under their own set of rules (for better or for worse)

[Pichi2214]

oooh yea, that could add a little bit of drama to the otherwise comparatively idealistic world too

[skinstealer]

putting this in here

[11:31 AM]Slime Floof Pichi: we could maybe draw inspiration from old morbit knights too with that
at least from what i remember about they do a similar thing with their knight guilds

so hmmmm

knight guilds...shit they kind of function like PMD guilds too a bit LMAO

let me ask como about how they function and get back to you on that

[skinstealer]

[11:34 AM]mortis velasquez: como i have a question for a roleplay thing we're working on on the forums
[11:34 AM]mortis velasquez: how would you describe how knight guilds function
[11:40 AM]comorant: Community based and local under most circumstances. Roles despite the implications are not exclusively combat based and can be anything from paperwork to serving meals as well
[11:40 AM]comorant: designed so a community unhappy with their guild can disband it easily, thus encouraging genuinely charitable actions
[11:41 AM]comorant: has a pool of relief funds collected from contract fees on bigger jobs to both maintain the guild and do big community efforts or even be able to travel out to help towns hit by a disaster
[11:41 AM]comorant: anything from scrap storms to "God caused a hurricane and fucked our town, help"
[11:42 AM]comorant: scale is dependent on the area
[11:42 AM]comorant: Squire system of educating those interested in field work is common
[11:42 AM]comorant: Basically a mentorship
[11:43 AM]comorant: Knights have mounts in guilds that were untouched by local laws trying to weaken their potential for revolt
[11:43 AM]comorant: (assuming there are people who still ride horses)
[11:43 AM]comorant: (or horse adjacent things)
[11:44 AM]mortis velasquez: it's not quite a knight guild, we're working on an AU roleplay thing that takes a lot from PMD and pichi suggested to vary it up a bit from that we can look to your knight guilds for inspo
[11:44 AM]comorant: AH, honestly PMD guilds  are not that far off anyway tbh
[11:44 AM]mortis velasquez: yeah lmao
[11:44 AM]mortis velasquez: but this is good info, ty
[11:44 AM]comorant: It's basically just a extensive community based quest board system
[11:45 AM]mortis velasquez: easy enough, ty

here you go

[Pichi2214]

nice! yea that sounds similar to explorer guild just like.... with more tasks
and maybe a bit more community focused

[skinstealer]

which honestly works with our idea for it being a community-based system of...goooovernment? idk what youd call it

hmmm now im thinking about how actual roleplay formats could be handled...maybe there's chill threads set at specific locations, like a tavern etc, and then people can put up little "tasks" for people to sign up for, both via the guild and independently? and then the thread is focused on that task.

[AceOfNothing]

Okay so are we going with like... there is some organization to things, and teams are *probably* connected to "guilds" but it's not really a requirement?

I'm still here, just busy day

[Pichi2214]

yea that seems to be it, at the very least for our starting town

[skinstealer]

ye that works for the starting town

still curious about my question for How Roleplay Threads Will Work

[AceOfNothing]

I like your idea of there being chill zones that are just... general spots. We need to think of a couple areas and what you do there
Maybe also a "job listing" thread where people can post like "Wanted for retrieval mission, cant find my knitting needles"?

[skinstealer]

oh, a board thread would be good and probably less clutter than people just making threads unprompted and having to figure out parties in the mission thread itself...we could definitely work with that

what would be good chill zones?

also i want there to be more tasks like "need help baking bread" as well as the adventure ones

"watch my pet for a day" and the pet is like, A Fucking Bear

[AceOfNothing]

Place ideas:
Tavern (like you said)
Beach (hang out area)
Nurses station? (For healing/healing items/idk immersive rp stuff)
Farmers Market (People can rp as any kind of merchant here!)
Ice cream bar (idk fight me. Also you can pretend your characters went on dates here)


"Please watch mittens for me" Mittens is snake and they escape and are hiding in the room. I will die for these missions

[Pichi2214]

we could probably start by defining what places all exist in the town and then going from there, figuring out how many of those need their own thread and which can be grouped together

[skinstealer]

maybe the ice cream bar and the tavern can be combined? just thinking about Food Places

[Pichi2214]

personally i feel like ice cream bar + beach would be a fun combination, would also give another reason to visit the beach if the ice cream bar is on/near it
(idk ice cream and beach is just kinda something that goes together in my mind)

[skinstealer]

oh true! thats a much smarter combo

[AceOfNothing]

Yeah I like that combination

Anyone got more ideas? Maybe like... a community garden?

[Wilds]

a community garden would be really cute... i loved the mention of farms earlier on (we've been playing a lot of farming sims and miel is excited about it haha) too... i wonder if there would be any kind of like, animal-raising for critters? that would of course involve More Fuckin Creature Designs but i think it'd be cute if characters could have like, pet bugs or pet rodents and stuff, or even places dedicated to rehabilitating and rehoming injured animals... you could also draw inspiration from purely text-based games like Dwarf Fortress (i think?) and Describe things without having to draw them, too - and/or let people come up with their own designs and critters

i'm also wondering about instant messaging type systems and electronic communication in general - i find those to be a really low-energy form of RPing so they'd be useful for that, but on the other hand a) don't want it to be too similar to felid factor and friendzoo, and b) i'm not sure if it'd mesh very well with the worldbuild so far, and i kind of like the idea of them Not having super advanced tech like phones LMAO so hmm. wondering what everyone's thoughts on those are!!

i have farming sims on the brain rn so i'm leaning really hard into those sort of vibes akjnsdfjkng i want a critter that makes artisan goods and trades them to people--

[skinstealer]

okay, here's what im thinking for thread ideas- i will probably make a subforum for this because we are having Things Happen, it wont be as extensive

BULLETIN BOARD- missions/tasks get posted here, if enough people sign up for one, a thread is made and people go from there. tasks do not need to be any one specific thing, though it's recommended that you post whether something is going to have a DM or is more of a DM-less task. kind of similar to TCPdex RP pocket adventures, if people remember that, but a lot less structured.

COMMUNITY GARDEN/FARMING AREA- people can run their own garden patches here- there are also stables, which is good for our weird little livestock species we're going to make. maybe we should have a horse equivalent someday? would be good for pulling carts and riding around

THREADS FOR "FRIEND AREAS" (need a term for this)/ HOME LOCATIONS (we also need to group critters, i will do this momentarily after posting this- also should i make playscenes in petz for these???), i figure making these into neighborhoods-sorta is a good way for people to interact more and would cause less clutter than individual threads for houses. will still probably get their own section because as critters go through the Expansion process (aka people buying more types or whatever we're calling them), there could be a lot of these

BEACH FT ICE CREAM BAR + DANCE HALL- place where people enjoy the outdoors safely and also gather for ice cream and parties. events probably held here?

INFIRMARY- roleplay your critters being Sick™ here- or being nurses/doctors! if your critter gets hurt during a mission, you can optionally send them here for a bit? after a period of time, they're free to go (how long is up to you? i really want to keep things freeform)

TAVERN + INN- combination indoor gathering place, eatery and place for people who are passing through to stay. very warm and cozy but also people do FIGHT occasionally. bar fights for all (alcohol optional? oh god i dont want to picture these things drunk)

MARKET- buy + sell stuff! ...do we want forum cash to be involved with this? because we totally could. it's a part of FFRP, i don't see why it couldnt also be applicable here? people can also just set up stuff for free because thats a part of the worldbuild anyway- maybe goods are by default free/for some kind of trade, and more special stuff (which is very subjective, but id encourage stuff that's either custom or comes with special assets, be it text blurbs, more extensive writing or graphical assets) could be exchanged with cash?

i think this is actually enough to start aside from figuring out the friend area equivalent (maybe we should just call them neighborhoods?), what do yall think?

[Ignispark]

a haunted snowcone machine, popcorn machine, or some other food vending object could be fun somewhere

[AceOfNothing]

Gache Corner, with vending machines and gache machines and claw machines. Probably connected to the market
I'm only half joking. You could have your critters own a machine here and half to refill it

Maybe the forum cash? Probably easier then making like... an imaginary currency and keeping track. Or the critters could work on a trade system like "I have a pair of mittens I would like to trade for three apples"

I think starting would be great! Maybe maybe we figure out cash first

[skinstealer]

i think people can put whatever they want in the market really...though that raises the question of whether the market should be its own section with people running diff threads so they can list prices and such- i am leaning towards in-character trading, free shit or forum cash though

we should also figure out the neighborhoods, i'll see if echer can respond to wattplants stuff first tho

[Wilds]

i think using the forum cash would be really fun actually akjnsdfkjnsf i like the idea that it's mostly used for special stuff... like, the image i have in my mind rn is of a character putting some stuff up for REALLY low cash trade because they're saving up for something more special that can only be bought with cash - whereas most things are trade-only and if you tried to buy like, food/crops/etc with cash, it would be a very weird thing to do ?? like the reaction would be like "uh. i'm looking for goods of equivalent value" p much.

the question becomes though how is cash acquired at all, what do people think of it, what is and isn't acceptable to use it for, etc etc. hope this at least partly makes sense.

[skinstealer]

in-universe cash could probably be earned in the sense of like...maybe its more...tickets or something given out by the guild for hard work (even to non-guild members, i like to think theyre good about that)- this could also be a way for people to earn cash, through missions...we'd be willing to use our admin powers to do that, so people setting up missions/tasks don't need to spend their own cash on "rewarding" people. i think it could encourage participation a good bit?

[Pichi2214]

Oh didn't we say the starting town Doesn't have money and functions more on a "as long as we have the resource anyone can use it, though tradung's appreciated"? (though obviously if yall prefer the money then I suppose nothing stops us from introducing that)

[skinstealer]

i think these are less directly money and more just...hmmmm how do i explain it

it's more like, you contributed to the community via a task/mission, and thus people in said community can optionally offer special things as rewards for people helping out, there's generally a vibe of "dont make EVERYTHING tickets" or you get yelled at, possibly even by the guild itself? maybe just straight up rules of you cant use them for basic food/ingredients and important supplies, maybe just custom goods (so like, making someone a fancy cake for a special occasion is good, ticket for an apple is not)

[Pichi2214]

Oh shit wait actually, the idea of this being a guild reward is neat however it just occurred to me that if we use forum cash to track this we uh need some place to Get it from
because if the guild is run by a player or some npc either way the person who does that would have to continously pay for it, unless a forum admin spawns the money in for this

[skinstealer]

oh i mentioned that id be spawning it in

[Pichi2214]

OH rip sorry, must've overlooked that in the long messages

[skinstealer]

ye its alright! i figure this would be a good way to reward participation and actually completing a task, similarly to how FFRP generates money via making profiles but...more work lmao

[Pichi2214]

True!
This does also mean I could bring back my bigeye collector.... not like as a bank, but maybe they could work at the guild and handle giving out in character 'money' for rp purposes to critters who successfully completed a thing.. and they probably do some other small tasks around the guild as well
If that's cool with yall

[skinstealer]

yeah thats fine! i dont know Where thatd be roleplayed out or anything if at all but we can go with that as lore, or that there's a couple people working shifts there

[Pichi2214]

I mean I was assuming in the guild hall? ..wait I don't think we specified a guild hall, up until now I've been imagining like a lil building with the quest board in front of it whoops

[skinstealer]

i think there's a hall but the bulletin board is the only Thread ive brought up, idk if i want to make too many locations that serve general purposes but if people are interested in me making a thread for it thats also fine

[Pichi2214]

Oh! That also reminds me, you think there's something like a post office for communicating with other critter settlements? Maybe that could be combined with a guild hall

[Pichi2214]

I have now been possessed by the mental image of tiny mail bats who are like the letter sending pigeons that carry letters between settlements and i think that'd be really cute, so the post office would also be a spot to take care of tired small bats and I just think that's neat (bigger packages would probably require the guild to escort someone there so again it'd make sense to combine the two)

[skinstealer]

yeah that could absolutely be combined with the guild hall

im gonna hold off on making it a thread for now just bc i have no idea what would like, Be The Focus There for roleplays aside from "its a place" and i dont want to have toomany just, generalized places esp when we have a small character base so far

[Pichi2214]

Yep yep, I was just about to post that actually
It can just be in the lore for now, until it becomes relevant enough that people want to rp specifically in that space!

[skinstealer]

CRITTER NEIGHBORHOOD PROPOSALS:

URBAN (city/suburban themed, paved roads, etc, pet-like ones go here)- Pompet, Comfypaws, Inconsolabuddy, Kibbler
BEACH (beach/aquatic themed)- Swirlshell, Flapray, Noodlefish, Leviafriend, Wishtank, Tipsyturvy, Sandfort
SMALLSCALE (household good/object critter focused, small scale things made big everywhere) - Inktrail, Spinnermane, Ringdrone, Kickflipz, Packling, Bootly, Swashbuckler
WILD (animal/plant ones that arent pet-like go here, patchwork of many different biomes)- Tinystep, Rafflemane, Spikeling,
SPOOKY (spooky themes, haunted woods)- Jigglie, Stubbigator, Colorpillar, Witchikins, Bigeye, Scarelouette, Gazer, Skelegeist
WINTER (winter/winter holiday themes) - Snugglobe, Snowpuff,
TOYLAND- for inevitable toy themes
SPACE (space/weather/sky themed)- Slumberwool, Cosmonaut, Hazydaze
CANDYLAND (food themed)- Crinkler, Reesifur, Purrsicle, Swellophant, Softbake, Princecake

[skinstealer]

[7:39 PM]mortis velasquez: dropped my proposal for critter neighborhoods
[7:39 PM]mortis velasquez: critters do not HAVE to stick to their species' neighborhood
[7:39 PM]mortis velasquez: its just where they spawn and are usually able to make homes easier environment-wise
[7:39 PM]mortis velasquez: actually fuck im putting this in the thread

 

[A.VOID]

I am poking in just to say I like the idea of all of the neighborhoods!
Also the 'wilds' could be like, a vaguely?? Fairyland deal? Where things shift and change around but if you Know it you can navigate them. Would be a good explanation for the wildcard biomes.

(also oh my gosh please yes to mail bats, I Need them. But also consider pigeon-adjacent things for day trips?)

[skinstealer]

oh i like that for the wilds!!

[Pichi2214]

question: are the neighborhood areas part of the starting town or are they little settlements (pocket dimensions?) that you can find while you're out exploring?


also re mail bats and day trips, ive just kinda imagined that like.. since they primarily live with critters and are taken care of maybe they arent necessarily nocturnal in the same way? cause there's no need to hunt for food unless the trips are exceptionally long
iirc there's bats on earth too that live in places with enough food available that they aren't strictly nocturnal anymore
(if we want we can still have a bird esque species too for something, i just thought itd be neat to have non birds in this role cause usally i just see bird creatures doing this job :>)

[skinstealer]

hmmmm im going to define this a bit better

NEIGHBORHOOD: a pocket dimension with entrances found all over the world- if you know where you're going, you'll get there, but some locations are near landmarks (so if you want two critters to be neighbors, you can). no one's seen the boundaries of them, and new critters typically tend to pop up within these or in wild areas close by their respective neighborhood's entrance. critters showing up in different areas (both wild and neighborhood) does happen, though!

also i may do some doodles today

[Pichi2214]

ooohh gotcha, that works

also :O!!!! doodles! i should draw critters.....
(on that note just cause im excited, any idea when you'll get to drawing the new critter types?)

[skinstealer]

i think ill be starting today actually, im in the Mood To Stream despite having more important things to do

[Pichi2214]

niceee, stream sounds fun, ill definitely be there if you start soon enough !!

[A.VOID]

Oh yeah that's super super fair Pichi, I didn't actually know that about bats!! (And also yes I am big big for bat mail carriers because bats are love)

I also like the pocket dimension neighborhoods. Do you think there would be any critters that just choose to live outside of them, in the 'wilds?'
Also ngl a very small gacha machine corner for fun little nothings could be fun. Maybe I just want to play imaginary gacha and give people goofy little things tho, idk. (I am not super awake but didn't want to only say one thing lol)