larkers | PLOT ENGAGEMENT (ARCHIVED)

PLOT ENGAGEMENT (ARCHIVED)

> PLOT ENGAGEMENT (ARCHIVED)

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!

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.

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).
◉ 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

◉ 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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> NAVIGATION

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Hey, Emiri!

The money Cassius provides every month is decent, but generally just enough to afford a comfortable, but somewhat budgeted, lifestyle. Think a nice place to live with a bit left over for some fun, but no penthouse apartments or eating out every night. Real estate in New Amsterdam is a very competitive market. Any buildings like the ones you're picturing would be snapped up very quickly.

That being said, if this is something Catra would really love to do, there are a few ways she could manage it! It would likely be a bigger project because she would need a good chunk of change. This would be easier to do by pooling her resources with a group of characters, who would need steady incomes outside of Cassius to look appealing to sellers.

However, in the short term, feel free to have Catra snap up a nicer, bigger apartment so she can stretch out! If you had something more specific in mind other than this that we could help you with, just let us know.

Hi Jessi!

There would be a series of E-Mails regarding Jovavich! They would be compiled together with a password, and Jason would be told that he wouldn't be able to pass it from his neural implant to anyone else's, as it would turn up as nonsense for them. He won't be able to take screenshots of this information, either, so he may want to work on transcribing them manually onto his implant.

The first series of E-Mails would involve Gill-Jade's announcement that she's not running for office, and would include this E-Mail that Peter B. Parker received during the EMP. Along with it, he would get a list of the Pulsar, Vyonation, and Giles Bell board members who received it. All of the above would get it—including Aoi Maeda and her husband—but it would not be sent to any of the heads of any of the subsidiaries for those companies. Jason can conclude that the power for the corporations is largely consolidated near the top.

There are a lot of E-Mails about Jupiter. Some of it is akin to (and thus includes) this E-Mail, but there are other notifications about the difficulty of terraforming Jupiter instead of its moons, especially without scientists at the colonies providing around the clock diagnostics.

Jovavich really does seem to be frustrated by how the colonies are manned by people who are poorly trained and don't have the ability to both maintain the colonies as a source of life and to properly terraform, and there are a lot of tables and graphs explaining how they would be far and beyond in their progress if they had deployed automatons and scientists at the sites to keep them running.

Unsurprisingly, there is a push back against automatons because, for a project this big, a program similar to DAWN would need to be deployed (remember, that's Cassius' old moniker before he claimed a name for himself). Even without the horsepower of hardware behind the automatons, due to the alarmist nature of the media, the public would be wary of using similar technology on a project like this.

Jovavich truly does think that the only way she can change the people manning the colonies is through becoming governor and rising up in the UN's political power and changing things in New Beijing. They won't listen to her otherwise (according to Jovavich).

She's very critical of the Outer Worlds Foundation and what both Lynch and Durcell are trying to accomplish. Charity isn't going to make the people on the colonies more competent, nor will training help when people are off in space and not impacted by people Earthside.

There is a recent flood of E-Mails with the board members for the big three corporations threatening to pull their support if she doesn't make a better showing in debates. Jovavich pushes back that she's the only one who has their intentions in mind "as arranged," but there are few details about this.

Finally, the mysterious JPG! Jovavich has very few E-Mails with him, but they plan to meet in person a lot.

Jovavich will likely strike Jason as being someone with very little sense of humor. She's extremely socially awkward, blunt, and will tell someone she's no longer continuing a conversation if they bother her even a little. She's also brilliant, and seems to send out E-Mails at all hours of the day as an open declaration of her insomnia.

Hi Jessi!

Thanks for the head's up on this. Now we have a clearer idea as to what's going on, we'll be able to better direct things. Let us know if Jason grows impatient and decides to kill Maeda. Because, well, that's completely fair.

Got it! If it's a home installation system that you have in mind, we think that with the money she's pooled together and donations from other Displaced, she'd be able to accumulate enough credits to purchase one. The home systems are still pricey (much like they are today), but not completely outside the realm of affordability.

That amount of space should be enough to allocate, and we'd like to give you some info about the sorts of games that would be available. The basic thing to keep in mind is that the games would have to be contained to what would be possible with something standing in a 10'x10' space. So VR skydiving or something like that wouldn't really be feasible, for instance. The VR of this time is definitely a lot more immersive than modern-day VR because it's hooked into the neural implant, giving players a much more realistic experience. Their senses can be tricked and stimulated, but ultimately they're never going to forget that they're in a game. The system will also be able to track all of their movements, so things like ducking, jumping, and even crawling can be taken into account -- so long as it's possible within the designated play area.

Also, El would be happy to help with setup if it's needed, but the system will have to be kept local and won't be able to have an internet connection for online play for security reasons.

I think that's all you need to know from our end, but let us know if you have any other questions!

Hi Brandon!

All of this sounds like a super cool plot, so we're going to approve it. However, it won't show yet: as people haven't begun to figure out what the relics do just yet, it won't begin to have an impact on him. We'll reach out to you when someone begins to expand the fast travel network. We know a few players have goals in mind for that, so we'll let you know.

Hi Raina!

1. There's one of the paralegals that might be a good choice to befriend! Their name is Reese. He'd have to stick with Tempo for at least a month and focus on this budding relationship. Mason will have to do a little schmoozing to get them to trust him (including spending lunch breaks listening to them yabbering about their personal life and spending time with them during happy hour). To get the information, he'd have to approach with a reason why he'd want it and what he'd like specifically to avoid suspicion. He wouldn't be able to get access to the actual contracts, but if he approached his new friend with certain business requests (false or not), he may be able to spin it to get something that may be interesting to him. Let us know what kind of information he'd be poking around for in this case, and what excuse he'd give Reese!

2. Mason wouldn't be able to get to Hideki at first, he'd need to work on the how a little more. Hideki is notoriously bratty and difficult to please, so phrases of solidarity might get the response of "who are you, again?" especially if Hideki isn't familiar with Mason. He hangs out at very affluent bars and loves to gamble. The prior PCs that had a relationship with Hideki (Cain and Prompto) had a bit of a cheat code in getting in with him the last time, which was the dream plot that went down. That said, Mason might need a wider plan to get his attention. We can turn this around more quickly for you if you want to toss out some ideas on how he might strategically go about friending Hideki while trying to navigate the "spoiled rich kid" personality that Hideki has going for him.

We also wanted to follow up to say that even if Mason does get in with Hideki, it might not gain him access to the room that he's looking to unlock. We want to ensure that the effort that's going into this gives you something!

That's fair! I'll think on it and put feelers out and see how it goes!

I'm gonna work on the rest of this, ftr, but for now I just want to confirm that following the silent auction, Faith will be moving into the security firm that serves Lynch, if that's alright with you! My hope is that by end of IC April or early May she'll be occasionally guarding Lynch himself. Let me know if I shouldn't move forward with that assumption of her day-to-day, and I'll work on digging into and weighing possible options for turning an outing into a possible full-game plot to see if I want to move forward with that part.

1. He can pretend for a lunch, I guess.

For contracts, I think he'd be interested in getting lists of other vendors Tempo works with, that can provide good hints on what resources Tempo might be using, or things that might hint at the kind of weapons they need? Basically he's casing them to build as much of a profile as possible, given how the information is under lock and key.

As for why he'd want to know these things-- at first, he'd be asking about "how this is done" and then really trying to get him to give him an example of "what would you do in xxx case." Or "What's an example of how that contract went wrong?" Stuff that could give examples of companies, and then move into more "Oh, I'm supposed to be helping with a presentation on this, but I wasn't sure who to ask." Basically, piecemealing it?

2. Honestly, getting a good look at his gambling, does Hideki play fair, or would Mason be able to catch cheats? And there is definitely the possibility of him doing gambling to work his way in to that crowd better-- especially since he's good at sleight of hand and cheating. Especially if he can find someone dumb and rich that Hideki likes seeing get beat. That he could challenge and beat at a gambling match. Bonus points if it gives him more money to operate off of. Which can hopefully be used to counter the snotty rich boy act.

Is that a possibility?

Updating 2 after a chat with Strange:

Strange is going to be using his manipulation powers to get Jason an in. So, add that to some shenanigans, I think that should work out for getting and maintaining Hideki's interest?

Hello Mods!

Marta here was a nurse back home and is interested in getting back to that, with a focus on helping the people on the ground - folks affected by disasters, who can't afford healthcare, transient populations, things like that. Do such clinics exist? How long would she be expected to attend schooling for this, or can she get in at an entry-level and work her way up?

Hey Tifa!

Mid-April seems like a good time, especially since Lynch's recent polling successes point toward him being the likely frontrunner by the election in October. He'll be hiring her through word from the grapevine, at least partially because he'd be counting on her to be able to recognize familiar faces associated with Durcell from the casino.

Let us know if you need any additional information on this front! As for the gamewide plot, we suggest pitching it during the Engagement post tomorrow to see if anyone else is interested or on board! That should help provide some direction for you.

Hey Raina!

1. The defense contracts themselves are generally made with the United Nations Treasury with the explicit purpose of producing small, handheld weaponry—this is not common knowledge, as Tempo wants to keep the target off of their back. In the current weapons' industry, they've built their identity on producing technologically advanced weaponry that outmatches anything that's in the hands of radicals. To keep their contracts, Reese will explain, Tempo needs to bid annually against other contractors within the United Nations. While there's no instance of contracts "going bad," per se, Tempo is on thin ice with their current UN defense contract due to a shipment of product lost during the EMP in November. They have to produce a newly advanced weapon and present it to some high-ranking military officials in the next few months.

We know that you probably have a better handle on this sort of thing than we do, so feel free to hit us up with any corrections you think that we should make.

2. Hideki plays badly. It's the reason he lost to (big) Jason in the first place! No cheats, necessarily, just loud privileged kid fun.

Jason would need to find a way to dress himself up as a rich kid to support any attention in the first place. Strange's rewiring will help getting in with Hideki, but his friends won't be keen for any newcomers joining the group. He can get Hideki's attention through gambling, but Hideki isn't a fan of losing, especially thanks to what happened with (big) Jason all those months ago. There will be some unspoken rules in dealing with Hideki, like "help him win" and "let him win," even if it goes against the recommendation of the cards system in play. As for Hideki's friends? They're still pissed about Hideki's hot (and eventually cold) relationship with Cain and Prompto a while back. Those dicks just ditched them, so they'll put Jason through the ringer and try to sabotage his place among them. If Jason's smart, he can use this as an opportunity to cement himself at Hideki's side.

Let us know if this works for you, or if you'd like any other details about Hideki.

Hi Era!

Since this world has universal free healthcare, facilities like what you're thinking of don't really exist, but she could look into getting a job at a hospital in a less affluent area that is primarily treating patients who are of low income/transient, etc. Think of it as this world's version of a county hospital, if that makes sense!

She could work on an online certification to start off as a Medical Assistant and then eventually work her way up to being a Nursing Assistant depending on how she does! Given that she already has training she will likely be able to breeze through classes and whatever testing she needs to get certified, but please keep in mind she'll start as an MA (and an intern! to be clear, interns are paid in this world) and it will take some time to reach any kind of nursing status.

Hope this helps!

This helps a lot! Thank you Mods!

hi mods,

weird question but what kind of jobs are available, piloting-wise? i mean piloting transports and ships that are larger than the average hoverbike, say.

1. Got it! I'm gonna chew this one over, but let me assure you, he's going to keep cultivating this relationship until I can think of the next direction to take it.

2. I see this conspiracy to make him dress up. Fine, he can do that. But also, he's definitely smart enough to pick up that these guys are going to try and ruin things for him, so I imagine a little smart deflecting, or making them look bad will go far? As will the plan of helping Hideki win big against someone he doesn't like. So, hoping this works as far as getting him in with Hideki?

Would any of those meetings with JPG be current enough for Jason to try and track him down?

Hi Mal!

There are delivery vehicles around the city that can deliver goods, but this is centralized within the cities themselves. This is one type of intracity transport, and a natural transition from being a courier! If you're interested in having Kylo Ren pilot shuttles, it'll take extensive training, and it'll take him out of play for months and months at a time.

In terms of piloting transports Earthside, there is no intercity transport. Goods are taken by trains between cities and eventually transferred to delivery vehicles to be delivered to their destination within a city.

Please let us know if you have any other questions about this!

Hi Raina!

Glad to hear it! We look forward to seeing where you take it. As for Hideki, he has his in! Have fun trying not to murder the most shallow rich boy alive, Jason. Some smart deflecting will work, but the issue is that they'll be blunter, less subtle and more likely to try to trick Jason into messing up! Let us know what he does to take care of this. Right now, Hideki will mostly be hanging out with Jason in gambling dens while his friends act as nuisances in his ear, but Jason can try to get him alone for a ... frustrating time?

Hi Jessi!

They are not! The meeting locations are never named, in addition, but Jason will know that JPG is in town a lot (since Jovavich doesn't seem to travel a lot if she can help it).

No, this is excellent thanks. 🤗

Hello, mods!

I'd like to have Maine become a personal trainer! It looks like it takes about three months in the real world (depending on the program). Would it be the same in New Amsterdam? Is there anything I need to do aside from wait three IC-months, then pop a comment on the jobs page?

Additionally, I'm interested in having him do a sssssort of career advancement from a bouncer (initial job) to security escort. I think it could provide some fun plot opportunities down the line! My current plan is to have him switch over around the same time he starts working as a personal trainer. Is that a reasonable timeframe? Anything I need to do aside from comment on the jobs page when the switch happens?

Thanks for your time!

Given that Rey's coworkers are aware of some of her preternatural extracurricular activities with the plants, and given El's excuse for the Everest backpackers, when she returns from her hermitage on Everest, what are the chances of her getting her old job with Riverstone back?

Hi Kas! Just so we're clear and can answer your question correctly, what do you mean by security escort?

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

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PLOT ENGAGEMENT (ARCHIVED)

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