| Welcome to Star Fleet's Elite Forces Email Division!
We are a Star Trek role-playing simulation using Yahoo Group E-mail. This is for people who wish to role-play in the Star Trek world using a mail group to write a joint story line rather than participate in online role-play in a live chat room. I want to review a few guidelines when writing for an e-mail sim. Before you post the first time read all the posting guidelines in this E-mail Sim Manual. The Welcome letter you received was sent to your private personal e-mail address. This will be the address for the bulk of ship business and private mail from the CO and other members. You will receive mail from the Yahoo ship group informing you that you are a member and giving you information sending and receiving mail from the yahoo group sim mail string. If you have not started to receive ship posts within a week contact your CO via his or her private mail addressing any problems you are having. As a reminder, SFEF personnel do not participate in Spam activities nor will your address, screen name or e-mail address be given out to anyone for any reason other than official SFEF business such as transferring to another ship, for promotions, disciplinary action, or the election ballot counting. The Organization of an E-mail ship The structure of the E-mail Division of SFEF is like the AOL live sim division of SFEF. It all begins with a ship. The ship is made up of a leader, the assistant, the department heads, and department assistants. When you completed the application to join SFEF there was a place to select a position on the ship. Those positions were departments and there are 8 departments, Helm (Helm), Science (CSI), Tactical (TAC), Operations (OPS), Engineering (CENG), Medical (CMO), Counselor (CNS), and Security (SEC). Helm is the department while (Helm) is the position identifier, which you will learn more about in "Joint Posts". The Leader of the sim is the Commander (CO) of the ship. The CO is responsible for developing a story line, creating the setting, the important few NPC (non-player characters), and guiding as well as keeping track of what the crew is posting along with the administrative side of tracking points for promotions, addressing crew problems and keeping the Division CO and XO (executive officer or assistant division officer) informed and updated. The XO is the executive or assistant officer on a ship. That person is responsible for assisting the CO in the narrative, performing one on one help for people with writer's block, and other duties assigned by the CO. Each member creates a character and is assigned a position or department on the ship. The welcome letter you first received contained several links, one of those links was a library full of information about the department you were assigned. You are responsible for knowing the material on the links, the bylaws, and participating in the sim by posting at least once a week. Feel free to post as often as you wish. Things happen making it impossible to post once a week. If that should happen to you send a mail to the CO and XO?s personal email address telling them the reason you are unable to write such as computer repair, moving, and vacations include how long you will be unavailable. The Points toward Promotion The reward for writing an email post once a week is receiving points toward the next promotion. Each correctly formatted post is worth points. A post is correctly formatted and worth 1/2 or .5 of a point as long as it is understandable, follows the sim plot, moves the sim forward and is a minimum of 3 complete sentences long. The post should obviously have a great deal to do with your character. Show an action, a feeling or thoughts of your character, or show your character involved in some activity that has something to do with the current plot. It could be a moral dilemma, or a simple problem solving, or some personal quirk that makes your character seem more real. Promotions are based on total points, on e-mail etiquette, and knowledge of your position onboard the ship. One of the links you were given was the AOL Sim Manual, that manual contains the point system used by both the live and email divisions; it also has our rank structure from Cadet to Admiral. You will be notified when you become eligible for promotion in an email from your CO asking you when you wish to take the short promotion test. The Key to getting promoted is writing a post. Here are the guidelines to get you started toward your next promotion. It begins with the basic framework of "The Post". The Basic Framework of "The Post" A post is one person's perspective in a narrative story. It is a snapshot of an event in progress from one person?s viewpoint that is sent in an email to the other people also writing the story. It should enable the reader to move systematically and logically through ideas from a beginning to the last word. It should flow from one writer to the next as they add to the story. When we talk we speak in an active alive way, to get the same effect in a post we write by picking a style or a format that makes it easy to write and be understood. There are many formats in posting to a role-play in SFEF we use two variations, the English grammar and the live sim format. The English grammar format uses paragraphs to separate ideas from dialogue. This is an example of the English format. No sign of Ensign Bean in the first bar. It was all Klingons inside, raucous shouting and crashing of chairs by drunken warriors. He walked to the end of the street and sure enough there was movement in a pile of discarded boxes. It could be just rats he thought until one of the boxes moaned. "Bean, is that you?" He asked. The live sim format uses colon sets (::) to separate paragraphs from dialogue. Below is the same example using live sim format. Some people will add the full formal live sim position identifier along with the colons. If it is a single post the position identifier is not necessary since we know who is writing. The Joint post format is discussed next in detail for now in joint posting the position identifier is recommended. This example is a single post and does not require a position identifier because one person is the writing. ::No sign of Ensign Bean in the first bar. It was all Klingons inside, raucous shouting and crashing of chairs by drunken warriors. He walked to the end of the street and sure enough there was movement in a pile of discarded boxes. It could be just rats he thought until one of the boxes moaned.:: Bean, is that you? Whatever your format choice, pick a format, stay with it, be consistent, be clear, and have fun. If you have any questions, comments or concerns please contact your e-mail ship Commanding officer using their private e-mail address. Once you've chosen a format there are other things about email posting that are important. There are two types of posts, single and joint. The Single Post A single post is one crewmember writing how they think, feel, and believe about something in the narrative. What they are doing or some action that moves the plot along. Our example from above is a single post. It is written in English grammar format. No sign of Ensign Bean in the first bar. It was all Klingons inside, raucous shouting and crashing of chairs by drunken warriors. He walked to the end of the street and sure enough there was movement in a pile of discarded boxes. It could be just rats he thought until one of the boxes moaned. The Joint Post A joint post is two or more crewmembers co-writing a part of the narrative to an email. One person will send it. The subject line will include the words Joint Post and the writers? names along with any other important information. This is an example of a joint post subject heading. Re: [SFEF USS VALIANT] Joint Post of Marsha Thomson & Kenneth Valar - Ready Room A joint post takes a little more coordination since there are two writers. There are several reasons people pair up and write joint posts rather than write single posts. Two of the main reasons are dialogue and proximity. When two people are chatting back and forth in a story it is easier to write one post with the full dialogue instead of 20 short two-sentence posts. Another reason is proximity, when two or more people are involved in a task that requires dialogue while working side by side it is easier to send mail together. Since joint posts are two people taking turns writing on the same email, position identifiers or character name identifiers are the two recommended way to identify who wrote what part. People are award points for each post, for both writers to receive the full point each individual post must follow the email format. When one section of a joint post does not that individual will not be awarded the point. This is an example of a joint post with position identifiers. Notice that Marsha uses the live sim format while Valar uses the English grammar format. (CSI): :Marsha glanced up from where she was standing when she heard the door chime and spoke loud enough for whoever it was to walk on into her office while at the same time closing out the current display on her desk data padd.:: Enter. (CSI)::Marsha smiled warmly when she saw him walk into her office and held out her hand.:: Hi! I'm Marsha Thomson, Chief Science officer of this vessel. (ACSI) Valar heard the officer's voice from within the door. " Alright..", he said to himself as he straightened himself and push the button for the door to open. It opened with a swooshing sound, and after stepping in, he heard the officer's voice say " Hi! I'm Marsha Thomson, Chief Science Officer of this vessel", and she held out her hand. Kenneth took her hand and said graciously, " It's a pleasure to finally meet you ma'am".. Another way that people show which person wrote what part is to place their character name where they began to post. This is an example of the same joint post now using character name identifiers. (Marsha's perspective) :Marsha glanced up from where she was standing when she heard the door chime and spoke loud enough for whoever it was to walk on into her office while at the same time closing out the current display on her desk data padd.:: Enter. ::Marsha smiled warmly when she saw him walk into her office and held out her hand.:: Hi! I'm Marsha Thomson, Chief Science officer of this vessel. (Kenneth's Perspective) Valar heard the officer's voice from within the door. " Alright..", he said to himself as he straightened himself and push the button for the door to open. It opened with a swooshing sound, and after stepping in, he heard the officer's voice say " Hi! I'm Marsha Thomson, Chief Science Officer of this vessel", and she held out her hand. Kenneth took her hand and said graciously, " It's a pleasure to finally meet you ma'am".. Some people send separate mail back and forth until they are satisfied with the product then copy and paste it to the ships group address. While some people arrange to meet in a chat room and develop an interactive post then edit, copy and paste it to the ships group address. The key parts to remember about joint posts are listing all writers on the subject line of the email and show which writer wrote what part of the narrative story. Some common mistakes What Not to DO A word of caution about posting. Email simming takes a longer time to move a plot forward than live simming because some people will only post once a week. The thing to do is; Be patient! The thing NOT TO DO is write for someone else. DO NOT WRITE FOR ANOTHER SIMMER! Interfere with a plot line. It's hard to interfere with a plot line by accident if the crew reads all posts and makes a conscious effort to answer the COs narrative. It is when a member goes off on his or her own by writing that the CO or another crewmember is doing something or being someplace that was not part of the narrative. When that happens it throws the plot line into chaos. The CO must double back and repost something to guide that member back into the plot, sometimes that person is so far off the plot line that it takes private email from the CO and several posts to get back to the plot line. When a member refuses to follow guidance after a private email from the CO that person is in grave danger of removal from the ship. NPCs (non-player characters) The galaxy is a big place. Federation Space if filled with ships of the Fleet, pleasure vessels, private yacht, barges, transports, trash haulers. Drive the interstate at 4pm any day of the week in any major city. There are lots of message traffic from other ships, space stations, satellites, and long distance advisories. The ship is a big place. Most ships easily hold 150 people, has room for them to sleep, eat, exercise and work. It is possible to have casual conversations with some of these 150 people on a daily basis. Ensign Redshirt, Sparky K'mtar, Jaglom the Andorian and his two mates, there's Atoe Yoshi who hands out towels in the gym and 100 other NPC (non-player characters) waiting to liven up a post with a look, a sly comment, a nudge. Use them to your best advantage. Be aware, once you introduce an NPC other crew may wish to have some interaction with that NPC. Remember, NPCs don't get their own separate posts and they don't get points for posting. All NPC must have purpose. For those of you simming for the first time when a CO introduce an NPC that character should play an important part in some section of the ongoing dialogue. The CO should never introduce an NPC without a legitimate reason. The reason may not stand out at that time and will become self-explanatory later. Ships fly 24/7 earth time and we are creatures that weary after several long days so it seems natural that shift change would occur. If you feel the need to send an assistant to someone rather than go yourself as long as the NPC is on an errand, and you are doing something in that post as well you will receive credit for the post. Again, NPCs will not post alone. The CO uses NPCs to give directions, to be the catalyst and antagonist of the story. Since it may not be clear what direction the narrative is going at the time (COs have this flushed out and want to include mystery and surprises) please do most of the hard work of discover yourself and leave your NPC for the errand duties they do so well. :) OOC (out of Character) Bulletins in a Post Out of Character comments should be kept to a minimum on the Yahoo Group mail string, when it is absolutely necessary the bulletin should impact the whole crew. If it doesn't then send the OOC via regular email so the narrative for the sim ship remains intact. COs occasionally provide guidance to the crew for posting purposes. COs will have the OOC :: at the top of the email. The Simple Pattern of Email Simming An email sim is a system that follows this simple pattern "The CO writes an action or multiple elements, then it's the crews turn to decide what to do. The CO tells them the results of their decisions, and that ends the round of role-play. The CO continues with the next event in the plot line initiating the next round. And so it goes unless someone does the inappropriate and interferes with the plot line. When the CO specifically asks a crewmember a question or mentioning them in a paragraph of internal dialogue, or begins a live dialogue with them the CO is inviting them to respond to the narrative. The CO should be fully prepared and extremely curious to see how the member will answer the narrative. The CO tries to give some guidance in his or her posts, clues, some general direction that he or she wants the crew to go. The CO should want the crew to fully express themselves. Some of the best posts happen when someone uses common ideas in a way that gets the job done effectively. The crew can use information from previous posts when choosing an action for the next post they write. Keep the actions feasible and probable without suddenly becoming clairvoyant, telepathic or acquiring unexplained abilities. Past experiences, hunches, going with a gut feeling is sometimes all we have in RL to guide our decisions; it isn't any different in an email sim. Sometimes a simmer needs to perform a certain action, or discover a certain thing specifically, and needs technical information that they don't have, so when they ask, the CO or XO sends them a personal mail with the info they can use for their post. For example, the Captain has suddenly hesitated, he asked about the where abouts of an XO. The CO is hoping the narrative was clear that there is something very wrong concerning the whereabouts of the XO. The COs narrative should indicated what equipment you have that might be useful, giving you the option to use it or not. The CO may encourage the option of a joint post by including the names of members of the crew in the narrative, this gives them the option to Joint post, to post simultaneously or to post separately. After that it's up to you to decide what and how you will write the narrative reply. When the CO offers an action, he or she should be open to spontaneous activity. Use your best judgment and the CO should adapt. It's boring to read a script, Email role-play style is not about writing a drama where everyone has a part and they are just repeating a performance. So if someone lights a match in a room full of fuel vapor they can expect to get blown up. There are no superpowers, Klingons don't break dance, and not every shot hits the target. The CO will call the result of a member's action; it is up to each member to decide what his or her own action will be. There is no wrong paths; just doors, hallways, and rooms. All these places are full of surprises; some of the surprises can get a crewmember blown up. The CO will not kill a crewmember. However, a crewmember can wake up in a biobed and can expect a long and semi-unpleasant stay in the medical unit after a moment of clearly wreckless behavior. Everyone does something they didn't know would get them hurt. That's some of the fun. The other part is succeeding to solve the puzzle, get the bad guy, and work together. A crew is more than two people. Sometimes people will get in a hurry and post before they realize that someone else has posted first and had the same action. It will be very important to keep up with other people's posts before deciding what to write. When you do reply to the COs post be sure to respond to other crewmembers posts as well. You can write two separate posts, one addressing the COs post and one to another member or one that has something to do with the other member, or just one post or whatever you want to do. If it helps, think of the ship linearly. It's a flat grid with areas outlined. The individuals are at separate locations. They are pursuing a goal and converging on the solution. The Captain is leading the group, and directing individual actions to the door with the next new species or old nemesis, or treasure inside. Walk carefully to it and check things out before rushing in. Sending your post to the Yahoo Group Sending mail on the yahoo mail string is normally a simple matter of writing then clicking the 'send now' icon. Once in a while like AOL, yahoo mail is unable to send your mail. You cannot prevent the mail string from going down, and you cannot predict the amount of time it stays down. In the event you are unable to send email to the yahoo group for any reason send it to the CO in private mail. These are the guidelines used in the email group sim ships. The CO plans, maps and knows exactly where the crew is going. The one thing the CO doesn't know is what the crew will do about it. And that's the point of email simming! -=/\=- Flt Captain Gavic Casteclear -=/\=- -=/\=- CO E-Mail Divison -=/\=- -=/\=- Space Fleet's Elite Forces -=/\=- 3 April 2005 This Manual was approved by Vice Admiral TexMist Adder |
| This manual contains everything you need to know about SFEF and Star Trek E-Mail Simming, please read it even if you do
already know how to sim.
And I also strongly suggest you print out this manual. Thank you, Vice Admiral TexMist Adder --President "SFEF"-- -=/\=- Space Fleet's Elite Forces -=/\=- |
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| E-Mail Simming Manual |
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