You See That?

He Pulls Out an Update Even Though He's Sick. 

What a guy, right?

Well, honestly, the trick to it all is to make sure that you get an early start so that way you can get stuff done despite working at a slower pace- because right now my head is swimming and my ability to concentrate is kinda shot. Definitely not fun to try and put together something comprehendable when your head thuds and your nose runs like a faucet. Despite that, I decided I had to put something out because I missed the update last week (on account of my new neice coming in the world ;) ) and hd to make up for it.

Speaking of babies, give Syncopy a shoutout for his newest edition to the family. Seems like everyone is having babies- glad I'm not one of them (though, if I had managed it, it would be a miracle that flies in the face of science and it would probably get me rich).

On with the blog!

What's Happening Valucre?

Goblin Games- Hey look, a lottery! Anybody here enjoy gambling? Looks like we have a new system going into place where you can drop some VB and see if you are the lucky one who can win back your bet and a good sized chunk of everyone else's. The rules of the game are simple- purchase you some tickets at 5vb apiece and give three numbers (from 1-6) for each ticket- so ticket #1 might have 6,4,3 and the next 6,5,6. If one of those come up when the house tosses the dice at the end of the week, you win 80% of the pot. If nobody wins, the pot carries over into the next week and the winnings get bigger. Pretty easy, right? Well, go here for other tidbits or to ask questions. 

Nich'e Event: Pacemaker- Got a new event for you guys, this one taking place in Nich'e. There is a tradesman looking to ship goods through Nich'e that may, or may not, be entirely legal. While the goods are questionable and this task a bit risky, the rewards are good and the guy is awfully convincing. Those who do the best job protecting him get the booty. Sound interesting? Ship yourself over here. 

Isélyr Lore Masters- Well, in days prior Isélyr had a team of folks who helped develop lore for the land- that is, until the groups went away. The boardleader is looking to restore this group and get back to building up lore for this land, as it is a young land with much left to be fleshed out and developed. If

Terrenus Quest: Hills of the Lost Hearts- This quest will take you to an archelogical site where it has been discovered that the Witch King once visited this place. You are tasked with finding out when, why, and what he might have level behind. Beware though- this is a level 3 quest, and those level 3 quests carry risk. Good for the thrill seekers, but the meek might want to stay home. Are you up for it? 

Guild Halls for Rent- Looking for some primo space? Well, you might be able to find it in one of the Guild Halls of Isélyr, where you can rent you some space and build up your faction. Looking to build a group with some level of legitimacy in the realestate you claim to control, but don't have the money for sub-board? Well, this might be a good place to start. 

Valucre Awards Debriefing: Still Going- Got another vote up in place for people to take a look at and give us some feedback on what has been discussed so far. I would strongly suggest you drop some votes and give us your take on things. Poll is here.

Valucre 'VB' Points Changes- If you missed the thread, you can find it here. For a quick and dirty rundown, keep reading. The points are back and tallied up for your posts and the donations made. The new system is to give points for 1 per post, 1 per new topic, and 1 per reply in a topic you started, versus the old 4/4/1 model. This means that your points are about quartered, and a such, earnings for VB from donations will be quartered as well. To keep the prices in check (prevent depression), the costs of all market items and other things will be reduced as well. There will be a renewed focus on points coming from Quests and Lore Writing. Staff positions will be switching over to a new compensation model not using VB, as it has been found historically that less than half the staff are worth the VB in the long run (many are barely active and then quit). Those who have been on staff will be caught up on back pay and them given a final payment before going to the new system. If you got questions, go to that thread I linked up above.

Jordancon Coverage 2014- You know what comes in two weeks? If you said April 9th, you are technically correct, smartass. What truly matters is that it will be the kick off the 'Unnofficial Valucre Con' Jordan Con kickoff! I will be bringing you a special edition blog update that night (from the airport and the plane ride, will contain normal update format) with a continued set of special updates (will not be of the normal format) on Thursday night, Friday Night, Saturday Night, Sunday Night, and Monday Night, assuming I remain functional enough to do so- I'm gonna do the best I can. But guys, I gotta know- asside from some recaps and pictures, WHAT DO YOU WANT ON IT? Do you want me to get interviews from people? Do you want me to see if I can get some folks to do some guest writing? Get in that blog thread and let me know!

Featured Read of the Month- I normally stick to things that have more relevant activity, but I had to make an exception here. How this slipped beneath my radar before is beyond me, but it would be an injustice not to recognize this thread (my suspicion is that its post count crept up and took a while to hit that threshold I look for). Anyway, when the opening post is the most liked post on all of Valucre (at a whopping 24 likes) and the thread itself averages 5.3 likes per post (17 posts, 90 likes)- this really says something for the work that went into this thing. Yes, there are a total of 10 participants- but 24 likes suggests at least 25 people have looked at the first posted and given it a like. Taking further into account the thread holds a 4 star rating at four votes (most threads never get more than one anyway)- it definitely underservadly missed coverage. Let's rectify that and give some props. 

Congratulations to Idica Apostate [Thread Author], Blood Soaked Earth, Vasanti, Refrigerator, Aleksei, Garion, Bradapalooza, King, Thaiis, and Alexei on being the featured thread of the month.

Fete Ghede - Pale Libations

Unfairly, this summary will be a bit short as there is so much going on in this thread and I can’t keep my thoughts running straight (sinus issues really mess with me). 

The thread starts out with a focus on a jaded investigator looking into yet another scene that depicts itself as a graphic suicide, but circumstances and frequency whisper contradictions revealing the lies. The officer is one you can get behind quickly, the burnt out sort you feel for because his job has just taken a lot of him in such a short time. A new officer brings him a sample of some new miracle drug said to heal the sick and revitalize the mind- snake oil at its finest, only the dramatic irony here is any understanding of the event this thread is connected with tells you this drug is anything but good news. Bad times for the officer indeed. On the side, hints of the Witch King’s return is given, along with the reappearance of Terrenus’ most wanted villain, a man in connection with many dire catastrophes. His presence alone gives tidings of ill events to come, with much in store for the city of Veelos. 

At the guild, the newly risen leader of the Black Rabbits dabbles in his drugs and works at getting to the bottom of this new product’s origin, hoping to find a way to turn all production over to their site, severing their ties with the supplier. The lab worker can’t figure it out yet, so the guildleader decides to see what he can dredge up at the coming meeting. In the meantime, his right hand woman, a rather nasty type with an artistic penchant for violence, is sent for to attend the meeting. This, while at some distant graveyard, plots are brewing and the living gathers amongst the dead, preparing for a night unlike anything ever seen…

You should definitely go read.

Other Highlights?

Role-Play Archives- Want to use something akin to the Wayback Machine? Want to check out some old role-plays that have moved on to the elephant graveyard of Valucre? You really ought to go down to the bottom of the RP boards (Below Alternative) and check out the RP archives- there are some old gems in there.

Did You Know-  About the Daily Weekly? If not, you really should. It's an area headed up by Offtopic and it is really starting to blossom with him at the helm. Their formatted in a bit of a strange way and definitely filled with some subliminal propaganda, but they are really well put together and extremely entertaining. Better yet- anyone can write stuff up to go in there, so go check it out. 

Closing Thoughts?

I feel a bit bad, because I feel like I am going to end up ‘phoning this one in’ so to speak, given that I’m not doing so well today. It isn’t being tired for once, but a full blown head-cold that is making it really hard for me to concentrate. I have attempted to will myself into writing some closing thoughts here for the better part of the shift, but I have not gotten anywhere with it. Fortunately, I did up the majority of the blog yesterday, cutting down on the work I have for today. Glad I did, because this one is going nowhere fast.

Actually, scratch that. Even as I write this I realize my ability to formulate coherent thoughts just isn’t here today. Instead, I will lean on the works of someone else, and let our closing thoughts be presented by an old great. Perhaps I will follow it up next week with my own interpretation of the subject, but for now, I give you George Orwell’s “Why I Write.”

"From a very early age, perhaps the age of five or six, I knew that when I grew up I should be a writer. Between the ages of about seventeen and twenty-four I tried to abandon this idea, but I did so with the consciousness that I was outraging my true nature and that sooner or later I should have to settle down and write books.

I was the middle child of three, but there was a gap of five years on either side, and I barely saw my father before I was eight. For this and other reasons I was somewhat lonely, and I soon developed disagreeable mannerisms which made me unpopular throughout my schooldays. I had the lonely child's habit of making up stories and holding conversations with imaginary persons, and I think from the very start my literary ambitions were mixed up with the feeling of being isolated and undervalued. I knew that I had a facility with words and a power of facing unpleasant facts, and I felt that this created a sort of private world in which I could get my own back for my failure in everyday life. Nevertheless the volume of serious — i.e. seriously intended — writing which I produced all through my childhood and boyhood would not amount to half a dozen pages. I wrote my first poem at the age of four or five, my mother taking it down to dictation. I cannot remember anything about it except that it was about a tiger and the tiger had ‘chair-like teeth’ — a good enough phrase, but I fancy the poem was a plagiarism of Blake's ‘Tiger, Tiger’. At eleven, when the war or 1914-18 broke out, I wrote a patriotic poem which was printed in the local newspaper, as was another, two years later, on the death of Kitchener. From time to time, when I was a bit older, I wrote bad and usually unfinished ‘nature poems’ in the Georgian style. I also attempted a short story which was a ghastly failure. That was the total of the would-be serious work that I actually set down on paper during all those years.

However, throughout this time I did in a sense engage in literary activities. To begin with there was the made-to-order stuff which I produced quickly, easily and without much pleasure to myself. Apart from school work, I wrote vers d'occasion, semi-comic poems which I could turn out at what now seems to me astonishing speed — at fourteen I wrote a whole rhyming play, in imitation of Aristophanes, in about a week — and helped to edit a school magazines, both printed and in manuscript. These magazines were the most pitiful burlesque stuff that you could imagine, and I took far less trouble with them than I now would with the cheapest journalism. But side by side with all this, for fifteen years or more, I was carrying out a literary exercise of a quite different kind: this was the making up of a continuous ‘story’ about myself, a sort of diary existing only in the mind. I believe this is a common habit of children and adolescents. As a very small child I used to imagine that I was, say, Robin Hood, and picture myself as the hero of thrilling adventures, but quite soon my ‘story’ ceased to be narcissistic in a crude way and became more and more a mere description of what I was doing and the things I saw. For minutes at a time this kind of thing would be running through my head: ‘He pushed the door open and entered the room. A yellow beam of sunlight, filtering through the muslin curtains, slanted on to the table, where a match-box, half-open, lay beside the inkpot. With his right hand in his pocket he moved across to the window. Down in the street a tortoiseshell cat was chasing a dead leaf’, etc. etc. This habit continued until I was about twenty-five, right through my non-literary years. Although I had to search, and did search, for the right words, I seemed to be making this descriptive effort almost against my will, under a kind of compulsion from outside. The ‘story’ must, I suppose, have reflected the styles of the various writers I admired at different ages, but so far as I remember it always had the same meticulous descriptive quality.

When I was about sixteen I suddenly discovered the joy of mere words, i.e. the sounds and associations of words. The lines from Paradise Lost —

So hee with difficulty and labour hard
Moved on: with difficulty and labour hee.

which do not now seem to me so very wonderful, sent shivers down my backbone; and the spelling ‘hee’ for ‘he’ was an added pleasure. As for the need to describe things, I knew all about it already. So it is clear what kind of books I wanted to write, in so far as I could be said to want to write books at that time. I wanted to write enormous naturalistic novels with unhappy endings, full of detailed descriptions and arresting similes, and also full of purple passages in which words were used partly for the sake of their own sound. And in fact my first completed novel, Burmese Days, which I wrote when I was thirty but projected much earlier, is rather that kind of book.

I give all this background information because I do not think one can assess a writer's motives without knowing something of his early development. His subject matter will be determined by the age he lives in — at least this is true in tumultuous, revolutionary ages like our own — but before he ever begins to write he will have acquired an emotional attitude from which he will never completely escape. It is his job, no doubt, to discipline his temperament and avoid getting stuck at some immature stage, in some perverse mood; but if he escapes from his early influences altogether, he will have killed his impulse to write. Putting aside the need to earn a living, I think there are four great motives for writing, at any rate for writing prose. They exist in different degrees in every writer, and in any one writer the proportions will vary from time to time, according to the atmosphere in which he is living. They are:

(i) Sheer egoism. Desire to seem clever, to be talked about, to be remembered after death, to get your own back on the grown-ups who snubbed you in childhood, etc., etc. It is humbug to pretend this is not a motive, and a strong one. Writers share this characteristic with scientists, artists, politicians, lawyers, soldiers, successful businessmen — in short, with the whole top crust of humanity. The great mass of human beings are not acutely selfish. After the age of about thirty they almost abandon the sense of being individuals at all — and live chiefly for others, or are simply smothered under drudgery. But there is also the minority of gifted, willful people who are determined to live their own lives to the end, and writers belong in this class. Serious writers, I should say, are on the whole more vain and self-centered than journalists, though less interested in money.

(ii) Aesthetic enthusiasm. Perception of beauty in the external world, or, on the other hand, in words and their right arrangement. Pleasure in the impact of one sound on another, in the firmness of good prose or the rhythm of a good story. Desire to share an experience which one feels is valuable and ought not to be missed. The aesthetic motive is very feeble in a lot of writers, but even a pamphleteer or writer of textbooks will have pet words and phrases which appeal to him for non-utilitarian reasons; or he may feel strongly about typography, width of margins, etc. Above the level of a railway guide, no book is quite free from aesthetic considerations.

(iii) Historical impulse. Desire to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity.

(iv) Political purpose. — Using the word ‘political’ in the widest possible sense. Desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other peoples’ idea of the kind of society that they should strive after. Once again, no book is genuinely free from political bias. The opinion that art should have nothing to do with politics is itself a political attitude.

It can be seen how these various impulses must war against one another, and how they must fluctuate from person to person and from time to time. By nature — taking your ‘nature’ to be the state you have attained when you are first adult — I am a person in whom the first three motives would outweigh the fourth. In a peaceful age I might have written ornate or merely descriptive books, and might have remained almost unaware of my political loyalties. As it is I have been forced into becoming a sort of pamphleteer. First I spent five years in an unsuitable profession (the Indian Imperial Police, in Burma), and then I underwent poverty and the sense of failure. This increased my natural hatred of authority and made me for the first time fully aware of the existence of the working classes, and the job in Burma had given me some understanding of the nature of imperialism: but these experiences were not enough to give me an accurate political orientation. Then came Hitler, the Spanish Civil War, etc. By the end of 1935 I had still failed to reach a firm decision. I remember a little poem that I wrote at that date, expressing my dilemma:

A happy vicar I might have been
Two hundred years ago
To preach upon eternal doom
And watch my walnuts grow;
But born, alas, in an evil time,
I missed that pleasant haven,
For the hair has grown on my upper lip
And the clergy are all clean-shaven.
And later still the times were good,
We were so easy to please,
We rocked our troubled thoughts to sleep
On the bosoms of the trees.
All ignorant we dared to own
The joys we now dissemble;
The greenfinch on the apple bough
Could make my enemies tremble.
But girl's bellies and apricots,
Roach in a shaded stream,
Horses, ducks in flight at dawn,
All these are a dream.
It is forbidden to dream again;
We maim our joys or hide them:
Horses are made of chromium steel
And little fat men shall ride them.
I am the worm who never turned,
The eunuch without a harem;
Between the priest and the commissar
I walk like Eugene Aram;
And the commissar is telling my fortune
While the radio plays,
But the priest has promised an Austin Seven,
For Duggie always pays.
I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls,
And woke to find it true;
I wasn't born for an age like this;
Was Smith? Was Jones? Were you?

The Spanish war and other events in 1936-37 turned the scale and thereafter I knew where I stood. Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it. It seems to me nonsense, in a period like our own, to think that one can avoid writing of such subjects. Everyone writes of them in one guise or another. It is simply a question of which side one takes and what approach one follows. And the more one is conscious of one's political bias, the more chance one has of acting politically without sacrificing one's aesthetic and intellectual integrity.

What I have most wanted to do throughout the past ten years is to make political writing into an art. My starting point is always a feeling of partisanship, a sense of injustice. When I sit down to write a book, I do not say to myself, ‘I am going to produce a work of art’. I write it because there is some lie that I want to expose, some fact to which I want to draw attention, and my initial concern is to get a hearing. But I could not do the work of writing a book, or even a long magazine article, if it were not also an aesthetic experience. Anyone who cares to examine my work will see that even when it is downright propaganda it contains much that a full-time politician would consider irrelevant. I am not able, and do not want, completely to abandon the world view that I acquired in childhood. So long as I remain alive and well I shall continue to feel strongly about prose style, to love the surface of the earth, and to take a pleasure in solid objects and scraps of useless information. It is no use trying to suppress that side of myself. The job is to reconcile my ingrained likes and dislikes with the essentially public, non-individual activities that this age forces on all of us.

It is not easy. It raises problems of construction and of language, and it raises in a new way the problem of truthfulness. Let me give just one example of the cruder kind of difficulty that arises. My book about the Spanish civil war, Homage to Catalonia, is of course a frankly political book, but in the main it is written with a certain detachment and regard for form. I did try very hard in it to tell the whole truth without violating my literary instincts. But among other things it contains a long chapter, full of newspaper quotations and the like, defending the Trotskyists who were accused of plotting with Franco. Clearly such a chapter, which after a year or two would lose its interest for any ordinary reader, must ruin the book. A critic whom I respect read me a lecture about it. ‘Why did you put in all that stuff?’ he said. ‘You've turned what might have been a good book into journalism.’ What he said was true, but I could not have done otherwise. I happened to know, what very few people in England had been allowed to know, that innocent men were being falsely accused. If I had not been angry about that I should never have written the book.

In one form or another this problem comes up again. The problem of language is subtler and would take too long to discuss. I will only say that of late years I have tried to write less picturesquely and more exactly. In any case I find that by the time you have perfected any style of writing, you have always outgrown it. Animal Farm was the first book in which I tried, with full consciousness of what I was doing, to fuse political purpose and artistic purpose into one whole. I have not written a novel for seven years, but I hope to write another fairly soon. It is bound to be a failure, every book is a failure, but I do know with some clarity what kind of book I want to write.

Looking back through the last page or two, I see that I have made it appear as though my motives in writing were wholly public-spirited. I don't want to leave that as the final impression. All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand. For all one knows that demon is simply the same instinct that makes a baby squall for attention. And yet it is also true that one can write nothing readable unless one constantly struggles to efface one's own personality. Good prose is like a windowpane. I cannot say with certainty which of my motives are the strongest, but I know which of them deserve to be followed. And looking back through my work, I see that it is invariably where I lacked a political purpose that I wrote lifeless books and was betrayed into purple passages, sentences without meaning, decorative adjectives and humbug generally."

1946
THE END

-          Acies   

"We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect."  ~ Anaïs Nin

The Valucre Blog: It Will Not Reproduce by Laying Eggs in Your Corpse

But no one ever said it won't show up in your bedroom late one night, holding on to a bottle of KY and a cucumber. 

Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. 

Okay, I promise the blog isn’t going to come after you like some creepy sex offender with a fetish for summer squash. The blog is not a living person or entity and it isn’t capable of being sex-offendery anyway, so no worries there. Now, if it were a real person, well- you might never know when it’s business time.

Anyway, welcome back to another update on the almost weekly blog- the updates that come all but once a week because going weekly just takes too much out of the old girl- you’d think this were a marriage. Unlike marriage though, this relationship includes lots of communication and happy thoughts, so you can expect plenty of updates this week and certainly better content than the lackluster efforts I put out last update.

So, let’s get this thing kicking!

What's Happening Valucre?

Coconino Barony: New Terrenus Setting- Well, don't I feel more than just a bit ashamed that I missed this in the previous update. Well, I can't take all the credit for missing that one, since a certain boardleader who is usually pretty good about letting me know about important new things dropped the ball on this one too, I feel entitled to give myself an excuse. Anyway, the new bit of lore says this stuff right here: 

Directly north of Ignatz is a loosely governed barony that includes a variety of different wetland creatures. Only a handful of the different kinds of creatures show any interest in being Terran citizens, and even then most are only nominally considered such. These different races congregate in secluded villages and rarely communicate with the outside world or each other. Due to the hostile nature of the marshlands and its inhabitants the Coconino Barony is among the poorest baronies in Terrenus. It's meager economy depends entirely on local trade . . . (continued in link)

Be sure to take a moment to swing by and check it out- you'll be finding new people, new quests, and other new additions to the lore.

The Beginning of a New Era- Hey, this looks pretty darn neat to me and if the chap behind this one is still looking for some people to come join him on this adventure. As the Cold Snap begins to recede, a man frozen in the wastes begins to thaw free and will definitely be a bit of a fish out of water- or a fish out of the ice... which is still water... sort of, though the context in this situation- ah hell, never mind! Anyway, this gentlemen would sure love some people to come write with him. That cool? 

The Great Plague Wars [Gods Must Be Crazy]- Indeed, of course the gods are crazy. Anyway, this project is a rather extensive one as well and still has some roles that need filled in. I believe this one missed out on a blog feature because it went up during a break week and just managed to drift beneath my radar until just now.

This role-play calls for eight individuals to help write the ‘backstory’ to Iselyer- that is, you will be playing out the events that as of right now are only mentioned in the lore. You will get to play the gods as they struggle to hold back the evil god Xaroc, with that ending already determined [SPOILER- it’s not a happy ending!] While the end to this tale is already known, what is missing is the middle- what happened in between the beginning of his rebellion to his eventual escape and rise to power? What struggle did the gods and the ancients and the newly birthed race of man go through in that process? These are the things for you to help with!

There are only eight god roles and as of the time I am writing this, the thread shows three roles left open. The request is for some strong and consistent writers to help build this lore, but if you want to get involved, there are some lesser roles as well. As of right now, it would appear that three of those roles are still open and the promise for more is also given.

If you would love the opportunity to help shape the lore and back history of Valucre’s newest board and help kickstart some additional activity, you ought to go to this thread. Really, I insist. No, seriously, go check that out now. >_>

Cold Snap is Over in About a Week- The big cool off in Terrenus is coming to a close in about a week or so, and I saw a little post from the big man himself saying that doubling up on loot right now can still be a thing- so if you hadn't gone out and tried to acquire some goods, this might be your prime opportunity to do so. Of further note, it was said that new threads starting during this time frame should account for the Cold Snap- so threads starting in the present canon that take place in the affected areas would need to account for the unusual weather- well, that too shall end. Which means that if you start a new thread next week in Hell's Gate in the present canon, you will want to note that everything is defrosting and warming back up. 

Genesaris Artifacts Updated- New artifacts are still going up and now there is record keeping as well- so if you are interested in some potent and special Genesaris artifacts and are unsure of what is still open, you can look them up and see if anyone is currently after it, or if someone already owns it. If  neither is the case, consider that your chance to get something going! 

Halcyon Broken [Renovatio Event]- Another plug for an awesome event with tons of work put in by the 2013 RPer of the year- just to lend a little 'street cred'. 

To Recap, Renovatio has become stricken by a plague started by Alexander (#Villain2013). People are dying off with little ability to fight and their deaths lead to a transition from lifeless corpse to shambling undead. People are bailing out of here left and right as rumors of no cure persist. Worse, Renovatio also endures the loss of the Grand Kommandant, the very force that keeps them skybound (it is a floating land). Random earthquakes and other natural phenomenon create unsettling conditions and an inevitable fall will soon follow- short of some kind of miraculous intervention. 

This RP is designed to be absolutely open and free to sandbox- come in and play the hero looking to save the day or come in and make the situation even worse- totally up to you. All that is asked is that anything you do comes with effort and work, so that whatever your choice is will come with legitimate action and dedicated work to add true value to your contributions- a fair request for such an open platform for RP. If this all sounds great to you (I wish I were not so busy myself) you can come to this thread for more details. Good luck!

Valucre Awards Debriefing: Still Going- Process is still ongoing and young. Involvement has dwindled a bit but I hope people will keep contributing in going forward, so we can come up with something that satisfies the majority. Expect a new set of polls soon to decide on what awards are added and which ones might be cut.

Jordancon Coverage 2014- You know it! Just like last year, I plan to provide the updates and the news about what all is going on at this  year's biggest Valucre gathering- the unofficial 'official' Valucre meet up (it's as close to a Valcon we got right now folks). If you followed last year, you'll remember that you got my usual snarky humor covering the day's events with tons of pictures and opportunities for insider information. At one point we had an Unval-Chat party going with four different laptops hooked up with webcams running so that other members could join in the fun. This year, we're spreading our legs by getting a 4 bedroom house instead of a hotel room, so you can bet that we'll have more to cover. Hell, I myself am not even sure yet what we'll be doing, so stay tuned for updates.

Speaking of which- What do you guys want to see during the Jordancon coverage? Do you want me to try do some brief interviews, get people to tweet as IC entities attending a mass gathering of Valucre's finest, dig up dirt and blackmail material- hey, any suggestions are welcome (just don't expect me to use all of them or even entertain the really silly or illegal ((seriously illegal anyway)) stuff).

Valucre Blog: Opening for an Assistant, and Those Changes- I know, I keep talking about changes and then not producing them. Well, change is sometimes a lengthy process in which you know you will be tossing some things up, but won’t it be that you just haven’t gotten to the point where those changes are ready to come about. There will be changes with the site and with the software we use for these things and so much of my changes are contingent upon other changes first taking place- which means that while I can promise them, I can’t really deliver until other preliminary steps are taken. And, hey, all of us involved in this stuff are working on our own time for free- which means things get done as we’re able to do them. I know I’d love to get paid some good wages to do this stuff- hell, I’d cut back my OT and work on Valucre stuff instead if I had the chance- but that’s not reality. Valucre is a free site that isn’t generating profits and so it is donated time that gets things done.

So- changes, they’re coming, I just don’t when.

What comes with the changes? Well, a new look for one thing. We’ll have the lore back up by then (I hope) as well as some other features maybe. I’ll be revamping how we bring in the new members and hey- I’m taking feedback! If you guys want to see something that isn’t here right now, LET ME KNOW.

Anyway, blog position:

This blog gets to be a lot of work sometimes, especially for a guy who works 60 to 80 hours a week, drives an hour out of town 3 times a week (spending 2hrs on two days and 5hrs on that third day being at that place), has started taking college courses again, manages storytellers and participates in a ton of RP. Not to be tooting my own horn here, but I barely manage to sleep 3 to 4 hours some nights, let alone get some time to put together this blog ahead of time. Much of the time, this sucker is cobbled together the night before its morning release, which means it might get rushed, it might be lower on the quality I want it to be, and it rarely gets proofread- not cool.

I imagine you want to know what this might entail. Well, here’s some things I might have you help me do:

• Assist in compiling RPs for “What’s Happening”, writing up important details and providing a link. 
• Assist in organizing and managing the ‘New Members and Returns Section’
• Cover Forum Highlights 
• Assist in preparing Lore highlights
• Cover closing thoughts in instances where I am unable to produce content, or provide closing thoughts if you have an idea you’d love to see run in the blog.
• Contribute to the Aesthetics and design of the blog if you are artistically inclined.
• Assist in other areas as they come up- I can’t predict everything >>;

So, what are we looking for in a blog assistant? I need:

• A creative person (Alright, that qualifies pretty much everybody)
• A person who is reliable 
• Someone with good attention for detail
• Someone with strong writing skills- not to make anyone feel bad here, but I might want you to cover closing thoughts from time to time, or if you have a great idea for it, I would love to run your thoughts- which means we need so quality writing in there. Strong writing means I hope to see you can organize your thoughts, present a strong voice, express your ideas clearly and in ways that keep the writer entertained, and have a pretty good grip of your grammar and conventions- I can edit, but if I take your stuff and make it look like it got in a fight with a rabid pen, you’re not saving me much time. ;-;
• Perhaps most importantly: You got to have a good sense of humor. 

Think you fit those requirements, well then you should consider applying.

Other Highlights?

Valucre FAQ- Now, you might be thinking: Hey, this bastard already covered this before- well of course I have, but it went down for a while and now it is back! So, if you noticed before that it wasn't available, it is now back up and ready for use. For those of you who are newer and haven't taken a gander at it, you can find things like our RP and Valucre FAQ as well as our walkthrough and guide to canonization- handy stuff! You can find the FAQ on the header bar at the top of Valucre.

Did You Know-  There is such a thing as Randomizers- threads that you can use to either determine a random effect for your thread or to request that someone come toss in a random element- it's actually pretty darn cool. More details here. 

Closing Thoughts?

I find it more than just a little tempting to do a follow-up closing thoughts on the idea of pushing personal boundaries and writing from someplace that you find yourself feeling a little- or a lot- uncomfortable. It’s been the hot topic of the week and it would be appropriately timed, but I have decided to go a different route today. The fact that so much conversation has taken place (much of it good, despite a few off topic segues) that I think jamming more of it into the blog is just too much. I don’t want to take a good topic for discussion and wear out its welcome by beating the now deceased proverbial horse it rode in on. Let the body lie in peace, right?

Let’s switch gears.

Why don’t we talk about art?

Art… makes you think of paintings or drawings, right? Maybe you have other experiences in the art field, which have broadened your definition of it to include things like writing, acting, and music. We often associate art with creation, creation of a product that we can evaluate and scrutinize; we can think about it, talk about it, distill it back down to the core components and then looked at from the broad picture once more. Sometimes the creative process doesn’t produce something so tangible- the actors involved in putting on a play do not create some physical representation of their work, short of a recording maybe. The same for music as well- while we can write the notes and the words, the specific instruments to be used and even perhaps record the final product, that music itself, the product of blending notes and instruments, words and flow- its true self exists only in the moments its played.

I might sound a little pretentious here, so let me scale this back a tad. What I mean to get at is that art does not always have to produce something tangible and physical. Prior to the days of recording, things like plays and songs had no means of preserving the final product, though we could create physical products from their individual parts- it was the human element and action that brought it all together and made the thing of beauty. Regardless of this inability to maintain that product, we recognize it as art; we see it for the thinking it inspires and the thoughts evoked, for the emotions stirred and the manner in which it touches us. Art is not always so much a finished works but an idea, a concept.

That said, why don’t you ponder this:

Role-playing, is art.

Bold statement? Maybe, but I stand by it 120%, and when I say it I don’t say so because the manner in which we choose to portray it involves writing (an accepted art form) or that it can be acted out (another accepted form of art) via LARPing. I mean to stand and affirm that the act of Role-playing is in and of itself an art form- one with the potential for great beauty, harmony, thought, and inspiration. While in our case the product is in the writing, in other cases there is no writing to preserve it but only the memories of those who witnessed it, but as stated before, lack of a product does not mean art has not been created.

There will be people who disagree with me, but that’s part of the nature of art- defining what it is and what truly identifies it is a subjective rather than objective task, as there has never been a single accepted definition. How I perceive and see art might vary with how you see and understand it, and that’s fine. The hope for me is, at the end of the day, we have much more in common with our thoughts on it than we have in differences. Let us rally around what we can agree, and use that strengthened bond to help us agree to disagree on the rest.

I tend to see art as a concept and idea, a way of looking at life and eliciting something from people. It is expression, but in that expression we take what you have brought from within yourself and upon examination, we see what it elicits from ourselves. We role-play for fun (I assume most if not all of us do anyway) and some say they do so as an escape from the sometimes repetitive and dull rituals of life, using it as a bit of escapism to help muddle through those slow times, or those hard ones. It benefits you in this way, but very rarely is a ‘role-play’ one sided- to be honest, if you are RPing by yourself you might as well call it writing instead of role-playing.

While you gain benefit from the role-playing, you lend benefit to others as well. You contribute to their needs as much as they contribute to yours, even if each of you have differing needs from each other. Even here, there is a spirit of art taking place, an exchange of ideas and expression, a form of collaboration to build something and help each other grow- it is in this act that I personally see something artistic. There is something beautiful in the way how we can come together and work, how we have come so far as a species to have developed the capability- take a little bit of developmental or evolutionary psychology- you’ll be amazed by what degree of intelligence and brain functioned is involved in us ‘all getting along’.

Getting beyond the collaboration and the harmony of working together to meet our needs and to accomplish goals, we look to the RP itself. RPing, even just through the simple portrayal of a role, builds a story. We play as characters that react to their environment and their situations, so even if we do not actively build such elements, the actions of our characters themselves help develop the details of which. We create stories, whether we think about it or not. Even with one person leading, so much of that story entails the characters and their actions, it goes back to why we call certain characters the protagonists and some the Antagonists:

One pushes the plot, the other ‘antagonizes’ or holds it back. Both are profound influences on a story.

Another way of looking at it is to look at two of the main components they identify as parts of art:

Form & Content

Form looks at what is actually there- what is the product, or what are its components or how is it put together. What are the colors or images, or what are the words and how do they flow, what is the rhythm to the music or the way the lyrics meld with the rest of the song? Form does not necessary require a physical product, but rather just some form of product we can examine and think about. The form is in the ideas presented and the story it’s comprised of; the details in the characters, the points of the plot, the elements of the story which are clear and obvious. Written down or not, the role-play produces form by thinking about the elements of its story and the identified traits of the characters.

Content takes a deeper look and sees how these aspects of form weave together, and how these ideas might blossom into hidden thoughts and messages, such as the way with metaphors and allusions, or deeply hidden messages or thoughts. Hell, even that creepy little video “Don’t Hug Me, I’m Scared” has a wealth of hidden content once you get past the use of Sesame Street like puppets and the later occurring bizarre and unsettling content. The elements of its form create nuanced layers of content that I have personally spent hours discussing. Our role-plays produce content through the ideas behind character motivations, examinations of people and their choices and actions, things that perhaps you did not think about at the time- but it still exists.

To get down to the point, what I want people to think about- and even embrace- is what you are doing is a form of art. You are creating an idea, a thought, a portrayal of people and culture, and it amounts to something. The practice is good for you on psychological and spiritual level, and it can be enriching and fulfilling. In realizing that what you do is a form of collaborative art, you can truly explore ways to improve, add to it, and appreciate it. Art has existed as far back as the days when we still lived in caves, even then, it was a piece in our lives. It fulfills higher levels needs, and it adds to our lives.

Realize that even you are an artist- even if you aren’t writing books, painting pictures, acting in plays or playing music.

Embrace your art. :)

-          Acies   

"Art is not a thing—it is a way."  ~Elbert Hubbard

What a Weak Sauce Update...

Tell me about it- take my anal-retentive standard of quality and think about how I feel putting forth such a pathetic piece of work. 

Couldn’t decide if I wanted push off doing the blog until tomorrow or if I just wanted to power through it- well, looks like I am powering through it after all. Truthfully, there is little chance that I am going to feel much better tomorrow- if at all- than I do today. I’m running on two hours of sleep again after having spent 19 (yes 19) hours at work and making two out of town trips before getting that pathetic amount of sleep, but then again I am going to be at work for similar hours today and dealing with the compilation of this mounting inability to get proper rest.

Without intending to sound whiney, the point is I’ll probably feel like shit tomorrow too.

Now, today has just been an interesting bit of fun anyway. I had to spend a significant amount of time away from the computer because I had water dripping from our ceiling down onto my head- yes, the house I am working in, a house designed to safely house patients, apparently leaks when facing a rainstorm. We run a state of the art, billion-dollar hospital, yet we couldn’t spring a little extra to keep our group-home style facilities running decently. Yeah, joys of being a state-worker sometimes.

Anyway, despite the threat of leaking rain-water and having no more than half a dozen brain cells firing off at any one given point of time, I’m writing this sucker out and seeing where we can go with it- just don’t be surprised that it is short. 

What's Happening Valucre?

The Chosen: Round Three Stagnates- ~~~~~~

The Beginning of a New Era- Pretty neat concept here, with the cold snap starting to come to an end, a character who has been frozen in the Shawnee Glacier will thaw out and return to the world. He’s going to be in that awkward predicament where he has next to nothing, other than what he wore and carried at the time he got frozen (wasn’t much). Author is looking for three to four other participants to help make an interesting story- see if this sounds cool to you. ;)

The Master Artificer- Not really an interest check for an RP but rather an interest check for a unique market system where you can acquire artifacts from the artificer of our most (in)famous outsider, Roen. These goods are uniquely crafted, certainly intricately detailed and individualistic, and can come with an array of cool powers too. If this sounds like something you could go for, you ought to drop a line stating your interest. ;)

Syndicate of the Mercenaries- A shout out to old members and an invitation to potential new joiners. Based out of Patia, Terrenus, this group looks to take on jobs that may or may not actually involve combat- they take on a wide variety of skill required jobs. As such, they look to take on a variety of members who have some sort of talent they bring to the table. Think you got something special? Go sign up. :)

Halcyon Broken [Renovatio Event]- Because this is so well put together and I don't want to mess this up, I'm going to borrow pieces from the interest check and put them here. With these events, its best just to capture the essence of the hard work put in by the creator. ;)

What's the gist?

Renovatio has been overtaken by a plague started by Alexander Endriel and promoted by Camellia Eglantine. People are falling left and right, unable to fight against this sickness which eventually turns them into undead. The streets are full to the rim with walking dead and those able to survive are struggling to make it to safety. There is supposedly no cure to this sickness, without help more will die and the plague will surely spread beyond the borders of Renovatio. Everyone is taking a chance to escape to Oo'Xora, the only place untouched by the sickness and the only place open for survivors.

As if the plague is not a big enough problem, the death of the Grand Kommandant has shaken the usually strong reserve of Renovatio's inhabitants, because they know without her their land will crash into the world below them, thus destroying anything in its way. Without her, Renovatio is starting the crumble. Random earthquakes ranging from tiny to large and swift changes in the weather make traveling difficult. And of course the normally quiet beasts roaming the land have found a fire lite underneath them, thus causing more havoc. Without Merida we have to find another way to support Renovatio before it crashes down to the ground, taking everyone and everything with it. A cure to the plague feels out of reach without their savior.


What can I do?

Anything. And I mean it. You can destroy a city, you can start rebuilding a city, you can kill as many undead or civilians you want. There is no one to tell you no, unless the goody-goods want to take up a role to keep some peace - there are many ideas for you to pick from. The one and only place that is still in control of the Royal Family is Oo'Xora. Lemoine's reach goes only so far and she isn't willing enough to risk the safety of her people by leaving their haven open for attack. You can either assist her or yourself and your goals. She can't stop you, she won't make an attempt, but once things settle she will make sure that you answer to your sins.

I am giving you this power, so please don't abuse it! I want you to put effort into everything you do, and that means you can't just destroy or take over something in one post. I'm trusting you with something that is very precious to I and another, make us damn proud.


Where do I start?

Anywhere. Either in one of the cities of Renovatio or you can venture on in however you deem fit. There are many ways you can do this, and if you need help please let me know.

Here is a list of any open role-play during this event. When you make an open role-play, tell me and I will add it to the rest of the bunch. When you do make a thread, open or closed, please put [Halcyon] in the title so I know that it is part of the event.

Save our Savior
⇀ Find the Princess Primera!

A Way Home
⇀ Adelaida needs help getting home to the Cold South.

Little Lamb
⇀ Help Yonatan retrieve something very precious to her.
Prizes!
⇀ [1] Golden Spork [2] Prosthetic ® Arm [3] Ring [4] Phoenix Down

Healing Grounds
⇀ Find a way to clean the water in Renovatio.
Prizes!
⇀[1] Pendant [2] Cialo's Will [3] Shield [4] Book of Destruction

Quick Speak
⇀ There's talk about a new God in town.
Prizes!
⇀[1] Ring of Alteration [2] Request [3] Tome of the Holy Trinity [4] Feather

A Man Touched by the Gods in a Garden of Corpses
⇀ Welcome to the Garden of Corpses.

Other Highlights?

'Feature Explanations and Errors'- Trying to keep up on the updates or need a place to go to find out if there is already an explanation for a buggy system on the new site? You can start by looking here. 

Did You Know-  We have bounties and Warrants? Yep, part of canonizing events often entails potential consequences for those who commit crimes. If you want learn more, read this thing, and for others, look here. 

Closing Thoughts?

I saw an interesting video last night. It’s quickly going viral- and with good reason. It is absolutely thought provoking, a sucker punch to the feels that seems to have a way of further aggravating dust allergies- yes, that is my excuse and I am sticking to it. What is special about this video is the way it presents its message- it takes an idea and puts it to a context we are used to seeing in popular culture, but then does a fine job in getting us to think about some worldwide issues much more than we have been. It got me thinking too- thinking about the way we write and the way we use our voice in writing.

Not all of us are going to have an opportunity to write something that could become a nomination for the Pulitzer, but we definitely have the ability and time to write something that makes other people think, and perhaps even remember your story just because of that. The issues presented need not be something going on in the real world, but instead could be focused on nuanced layers of depth that gradually build upon each other and by the end- tell a great story.

That Youtube video made me stop and think- our writing should do that too. Even a great piece of fiction has that capability- you just have to find that subject manner and unique way of presenting the message. Who knows- perhaps someday you will be one of those who win the big award. But for now, we can focus on improvement.

-          Acies   

"An idea can only become a reality once it is broken down into organized, actionable elements."  ~Scott Belsky