Network Updates
In case you missed it:
On December 15th, 2019 - Kyle Elliot of the mysterious Northwest purchased Dystopia Rising LLC and took over operations. Link to FB Announcement
On December 28th, 2019 - the new DR LLC team announced the return of National Events and the details on the first of those. Link to FB Announcement
On January 23rd, 2020 - the new DR LLC team gave an update on the status of the network and it included some HUGE leaps in transparency. Link to Blog Announcement
I won’t speak for the other Employees, but you should absolutely talk to them to get their views. We’re all adjusting to the new way that things are between Branches and ‘National’ or ‘DR LLC’. I know for myself I’m cautiously optimistic. I’ve talked to Kyle a few times now, both in groups and one-on-one, and he’s telling me all the things I want to hear from new leadership. Even better is that so far his actions match his words. Future of Dystopia Rising is looking shiny and chrome my friends.
Some highlights? Sure!
Giving creativity allowances back to the branches. Things got a little homogenized previously and we saw dips in attendance across the network. 3.0 is designed, and Kyle is fully pushing that feature of the design, to allow chapters to create their own story so long as it remains in the sandbox of Dystopia Rising. What’s that really mean?
We can make critters, zed and raiders that tell OUR story the best and reinforce that story with mechanics that we create and match to our local player base.
We can make effects, spoopy gravemind or creepy-thing-in-the-woods, that enhance our setting and reinforce that story with mechanics that we create to match our local player base.
We can make items, and bluepriunts, that tell a story fit for our setting and our local player base mechanics. More of this in the next section….
Unprecedented Transparency - and man do I mean that. Kyle is so big on transparency that so far he’s posted stuff publicly without letting us know (causing only a few heart attacks for yours truly). We’ll match strides with him eventually but so far he’s off to a SPRINTING-LIKE-THE-WIND start and doesn’t look like he wants to slow down the transparency train at all.
Annual Plots from LLC woven through regional and local games. That’s right - Seasonal plots that are MOSTLY explored at national events but will reach out and touch local games that want to participate in those plots. The seasonal prints will match the seasonal plot’s theme. :)
Business wise we’re discussing ways to help the branches make enough money to remain open as the #s didn’t do what was hoped/anticipated with the change in price-structure. We don’t know what the changes might end up being, but we’re discussing options.
Reduction of Red-Tape. You may not have known, but behind the scenes there was a significant amount of paperwork that sometimes had to be done. Kyle’s looking to reduce that. 90% of us (including Kyle) work full-time jobs AND run a chapter, and making the chapter less work is good for everyone involved in running them which means we’ll stick around longer and avoid burn out. :)
3.0, You and Plot Requests
So, we’ve found that the scope of our plot requests have changed and no one is quite clear on what this means.
We still want you to send us these, because it VERY CLEARLY tells us what kind of story ya’ll want and allows us to have fun helping you tell those stories and get as many of our friends involved as we can. If you have a story prompt style of idea, but worry it wouldn’t really work as a plot request - you can leave the prompt HERE and we’ll see what creativity it starts!
You can now request a plot to get a local blueprint! The item will only be craft-able and function locally and the blueprint will come with an expiration (each copy will keep the same expiration). This allows us to review prints and change them (mechanically or otherwise) as needed for game balance and/or suggest them as permanent local or regional prints.
HOWEVER - keep in mind that this isn’t “do a mod and get a print for the de-atomizer” and it isn’t a way to get an item that’s outside the genre in any way, we will work with you as much as we can but in the end if it doesn’t fit/won’t work we can’t give it to you. <3
You can request gravemind adventures! There’s literally mechanics on how to dooooo this! Always wanted to get involved in spoopy gravemind stuff? This is how! :)
Local Plot Arcs & Getting Involved (esp. Bluebirds)
Ya’ll asked us to make lots of plots with:
Ya’ll also asked us to avoid plots with these themes:
We weren’t really SURPRISED to see that ya’ll wanted less Politics and War…. Insert us looking at the last 4 years of plot with an evil grin.
So! Our goal is to let ya’ll buy-in to what stories you want to be involved in when it comes to politics and commerce/trade/economy. We’ll be sending those NPCs to the government ya’ll made - if you want to be involved in those plots; get involved in the gubment.
And now, the only reason you’ve read down this far….the thing we want to do to help Bluebirds this season. The Post Office is going to have a list of plots running. Hopefully we’re going to pair them with people who are involved in it (you can help by dropping by and letting the post office know) and then bluebirds who get bored can go to the Post Office and let them know what trouble they want to get involved in and the Post Office will direct them to the more experienced players who get into similar troubles. :)
Also, if you’re interested - we’re making an in-character list of people who are willing to teach things (AND how fast they can teach them) to Bluebirds, this list would be kept by Jay (Ashley Ates, New Player Marshal) and used to help direct Bluebirds to teachers or mentors. Ashley will absolutely steer so that the list isn’t used for nefarious means, but we think this will be a big help in getting players the skills they want to play with. Just drop by the bar and let Jay know what you can offer to Bluebirds and she’ll write it down.