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PLOT ENGAGEMENT
What is Plot Engagement and how does it work within Meadowlark? This is the page where players can come discuss with us how to facilitate plots within the setting. However, there will be occasions where a plot doesn't work within Meadowlark's world, and we'll suggest alternative routes. For small worldbuilding or gameplay details, please direct your question to the FAQ. If you're ever not sure if you're at the right page, don't worry—we'll help you get it sorted out. We know we have a load of info!
In addition, you do not need to have a complete plot in mind when you come to us. We aim for plot engagement to be more of a conversation between us and our players. If we propose a plot angle and it's not to your liking, we're more than happy to work with you to come up with something more to your tastes.
WHEN WILL YOU HEAR BACK?
◉ All Plot Engagement answers go out on Sunday, except during events.
◉ The deadline to submit a question and ensure you'll hear back from us on Sunday is 11:59 PM UTC on Saturday.
PLOT ENGAGEMENT INCLUDES
◉ Player plots! If you'd like your character to become a mafia boss, this is your place to start. Typically, this involves anything that could impact the setting or other player characters.
◉ Character career advancement that gives the character additional power or status within the setting.
◉ Metaplot exploration and information! We plan all events to give characters something to explore after the event ends. This is the place to do it!
SUBMISSION TIPS
◉ Specify what your character is looking for when they're investigating. What questions are they asking and what angle are they trying to explore?
◉ If you have a specific goal in mind but don't know how to reach it, please let us know.
◉ If you link a thread to us, please summarize it! That helps us process the plot in question.
◉ Don't worry about not knowing the setting like the back of your hand before you submit the plot—that's up to us! We're here to help you with any adjustments to get you on the right track.
◉ Plot engagement is meant to help with IC play so that characters can continue to interact. If you're not sure how to loop in others, let us know so that we can work with you on it! While this page is meant to be a conversation between players and mods, we know that the fun part of a plot is how it can change character arcs, spice up CR, and more.
NOTES & THINGS THAT YOU CAN HANDWAVE
◉ Characters always start out in entry level positions. Characters can update their skill sets to the 2512 standard through paid apprenticeships or internships.
◈ If a character is advancing within a major corporation (as noted on the Setting or Locations page) or one of its subsidiaries, we will need to approve this advancement.
◈ If a character becomes a supervisor at a local bar or other small business, we do not need to approve this advancement.
◉ Joining the police force within a city requires three months of IC training (six months OOC). There will be instances where this changes, and we'll keep you looped in on that.
◉ We'll approve whether someone has social media fame, but we will not be providing social media follower counts. Once you have a plot for how to use those followers, that's where we step in!
◉ All Morningstar business goes on our Morningstar page. Please feel free to discuss specific plots here (including joining), and go there for signups and anything else.
◉ Characters getting jobs, finding apartments, participating in the fighting rings, getting married, making workplace friends, the creation of minor NPCs, etc. do not need to be run by us. Please let us know if these expand into player plots or other plot bits!
QUICK LINKS
◉ Archived Plot Engagement: Previous Plot Engagement.
◉ FAQ: For small worldbuilding or gameplay details.
◉ Setting: Our setting page! We'll update as needed.
◉ Jobs: A reference for who's working where!
◉ Locations: Both major and minor locations within New Amsterdam, as well as outlines for other megacities.
◉ Mod Contact: For wider game concerns.
◉ The Story So Far: Gamewide plot events up to current (your CTRL+F best friend!).
◉ NPC page: Includes NPC blurbs and inboxes.
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no subject
So, a couple of things as I try to launch myself back into existence on the earthly plane:
1. In line with the new appearance of Cardinal-adjacent spiritual fan accounts and the inevitable burgeoning of Stephen's already pretty hefty social media presence and real-world recognisability, I was interested in maybe having a fun thing start happening around his changed appearance, specifically his lightning scar.
Post-Aerie he's gone quiet on his social media and will be concentrating on doing any menial and admin tasks that can keep him back of house at Red Wings to minimise any public-facing engagement where possible, BUT he has still been walking around town where everybody's eyeballs function as cameras, so I'd like to play with candids starting to go up on these Cardinal fan blogs and around Cooltalk and discussion starting up specifically around the new scar, and perhaps by extension his seemingly healed hands (though the nature of the discussion around this second part would depend on whether natives also kept any physical changes from the Aerie or just the Displaced, so could you let me know so I can factor that in? You may have already said but I'm perpetually tired and reading comprehension is hard.)
Basically I'd like to start up a following that uses the new scar as symbolism and spills off of the internet. Perhaps in defiance of the regularly shut down cooltalk pages, indie makers and creatives start making little pendants and other jewellery items such as this combining the scar and blue god glow elements to bring the discussion into the real world and sell them to other people in the scene (as well as pre-aerie stephen fans and people who stumble across their pages through pure chance a la the etsy tiktok advertising boom and end up getting overly invested) and the following starts to expand that way. The bulk of it at this level being a benign movement where the wearing of these symbols is a show of support for and/or belief in Stephen Strange.
I'll want to come back to expand on this further in future if it gets the go ahead so wanted to check if this brewing little cult following was alright as a first step.
2. I'd like to know what the reception would be if Stephen tried to reach out (as a citizen, not in any attempted Official Capacity As Red Wing) to Joseph Lynch. Now that Lynch has made it very clear that he's going to continue to side with the Displaced in spite of the UN's investigation and the Aerie has further cemented that he's pro The People/in support of rebel orgs that oppose the Villainous Establishment, with Stephen being both an official face of (the) Red Wings and a Morningstar agent it seems like a good time to begin to develop a relationship.
For now this is literally just a "would he agree to meet with him." If yes, Stephen's angling for an informal unofficial meeting to give Lynch a chance to scope him out and vice-versa. Is there any likelihood of this going ahead?
no subject
1. We are totally down with all of this! Along with being eager to see what Stephen's reaction will be to seeing a jewelry support movement pop up around him. To answer your question about the natives, some of them did also keep physical changes from the Aerie!
2. Even if they've met before, Stephen will still need an in for contact! Both Akechi and Yennefer are in contact with Lynch, but Yennefer is a little shaky right now. While Lynch has spoken out in support of the Displaced, he will be wary of any members of the Displaced who were Cardinals in the Aerie, mainly because he'll be wondering if their "role" within the Aerie is a hint to something true to their nature. So, at least for now while Lynch feels that out, he'll have his office issue a response about him being unable to meet at this time due to having a packed schedule. There's a lot going on in the city, after all!
no subject
I'll come back on point 2 eventually, but for now some follow up on Stephen and his motley lightning crew! It's as long as always so buckle in. Also apologising because it's gone 12am so I only proofread once.
Now that he's coming out of his post-Aerie funk Stephen's going to take time to research the movement and will find that their messaging is for the most part one of forgiveness and appreciation. It started with a focus on him specifically but with time and Stephen's silence they've branched out to talking amongst themselves about how that same forgiveness should be afforded to everyone, the overall sentiment being sympathy for anyone whose Aerie life made them crueller than they are in reality or aligned them with something that doesn’t represent their actual values. There's been a lot of commiseration between people whose family members are now being treated with distrust locally because they were Parliament-affiliated or Quarry workers etc.
Stephen will put in an order for a badge from the woman who first started making them, ready to show his appreciation to the community who have been supporting him, and through this get into chats with her and a few other founding members of the movement. He’ll end up pitching an idea to use his platform to build on what they have and help encourage people to support and listen to one another in the aftermath of the Aerie.
With their blessing, his first effort will be to try and generate a gratitude and appreciation chain on Cooltalk with people sharing stories about members of their local community, family members, friends etc who’ve been doing great work to support those around them and/or overcome their own difficult situations.
He’ll put together a post that includes a photo of some stormclouds/a strike of blue lightning (ie) as a nod of appreciation and recognition to the people who have worn the jewellery for him - as Lance's power is tied up in the origins of this whole thing I’ve also double checked with Ami that using the more realistic lightning as a symbol here is okay and she's happy! He’ll accompany this with a short write up something like the one below:
"🗲 In the wake of the storm, who in your community are you proud of? Whose efforts to support others have you noticed? Whose ability to keep going despite adversity do you admire? Whoever they are, I'd like to celebrate them. Please share their stories and encourage others to do the same so we can all celebrate them together.”
His aim at this point is to encourage positive sentiment amongst communities at the very least in online spaces, in the hope that it also generates discussions around everyone’s situations post-Aerie and how people can support one another. Because (fuck the UN) it’s a lot harder to bamboozle a population when they’re uniting and cooperating and communicating with each other.
Neither he or I have any idea how well that’ll be received or taken up by people who aren’t part of the original jewellery club, so to that end if this gets the go ahead I plan to have him ICly reach out to the Displaced to ask them to engage their own Cooltalk followers with similar messages to try and separate the movement from him as sole influence so it’s harder to discredit it as a whole.
That's what I've got, I think what I need to know for now is:
1. Am I okay to go ahead with this, and
2. If so are there likely to be any immediate reactions once it's posted, from the internet or elsewhere, that I should be aware of before Stephen starts reaching out to try and get other people on board?
(And anything else you think might be relevant for me to know before I get the ball rolling, or anything else you need to know from me.)
Thank you!
no subject
First off: feel free to go ahead with this! We think it's a great idea, and it fits a lot of what Stephen was trying to do before the Aerie, especially given the fact that Judas turned his self-sacrificing tendencies against him in the simulation. Even though the Aerie is still fresh in people's minds, the simulation wasn't so long ago. So, Stephen going back to his roots will help him a lot.
Secondly: responses will be mixed. At first, it will be a matter of positive response, which might be a pleasant surprise for Stephen. That is, until this whole thing starts trending and drawing in more eyes. If you're familiar with Instagram or Twitter comments, you'll probably be able to imagine that the longer the quote-retweet-like function, reply function, and so forth continues to be used, there will be people coming in and making snide responses about Stephen's intentions, as well as the Cardinals as a whole. But on the flipside, there will be people realizing that this kind of response is unfair. And … people bandwagoning the hate to dunk on Stephen's efforts. Either way, it's going to get a lot of exposure. More than anything, it will get people talking—starting with a local trend in New Amsterdam and eventually becoming a global one. Hopefully Stephen knows how to mute notifications for his sanity (and don't worry, that is an available function!).
How Stephen responds is up to you. Will he defend himself on the internet? Block unruly commenters? Retweet the positive-or-neutral responses to try to encourage discussion? Will he be looping in other Displaced to try to get them in on the action? And if so, what will they be doing? You can have him loop people in via a post, or you can plot it elsewhere and have people reply here. Either way, we're curious to know both Stephen's reactions and if anyone else is on board!
One thought we had was that this could easily collide with three other Cardinals' plots: Yennefer with her cult, Homelander's outreach to discharged UNA soldiers, and Loki's St. Augustine-like Confessions book. While these plots don't necessarily need to intersect, we think that, given that they'd be all developing simultaneously in real time, it would be neat to see how you guys would view this growing movement. We're also happy to work with you on this.
If you have any other questions or would like to see this go a different way, we're happy to make modifications that make the plot more interesting for you.