What, When, and Where for an International Sim

[D'Mysus Ramson 0]

I think a sim set at a time for those not in the Americas is totally possible. Here's where we find out, by the numbers. There are ALOT more options in the WHEN category but I've listed what I thought were some good and varied possibilities. The what is also open to alot for discussion. The where can be catchy. If no GM can host this I still see no problem with us gathering and doing it ourselves. We would just need the GMs to let us "talk" about it openly and perhaps meet in the STSF chatroom lobby or something. How hard would it be to add a chatroom titled "Non-Sanctioned Events"? We would REALLY need the GMs to be lenient and not let legalism kill this project before it could even start. Assuming we'd have enough interest to make a project out of it.

 

Okay, with the WHERE question, sorry...didn't know you couldn't leave a question blank. Please choose "NOT A GM" to finish the pole. GMs, either just post you answer to WHERE so as not to mess up the numbers for the other questions with random answers or post what your answers were so we can modify the numbers. But, of course answer the above if you answered "willing to host".

[Images 0]

Eep...thats a lot of detail. When I said its not too early to plan for other timezones, it was more along the lines of when the Bush administration says they're planning to stop the icecaps melting. There's probably a memo circling but that's about it.

 

I'd be good if they were at the same times in europe as they are in the states (9-12ish). It wouldn't neccesarily have to be for just people abroad though. The difference would make it an afternoon sim for people stateside.

 

But seriously, it ain't really gonna happen. Not till you get a pair of GM's willing to do the time who aren't already busy with another sim. Its good to bring up this topic and everyone knows I'm all for the cause but its just a bit utopian at the moment.

[Atragon9 0]

But seriously, it ain't really gonna happen. Not till you get a pair of GM's willing to do the time who aren't already busy with another sim. Its good to bring up this topic and everyone knows I'm all for the cause but its just a bit utopian at the moment.

It goes back to your Catch-22. We need to see if there is a real interest for an "off hour" sim and then we might start looking at some of you European LtCmdrs (or the folks in the US with insomnia). Sure, we can put it on the table for discussion.

[Nicolas Lepage 0]

I think it's a great idea to do a poll about it. (And the fact that is is a great idea explains why I didn't think of it.)

Personally I'd be all for a sim which I can attend at a 'decent' time. I don't think anyone should be planning anything like an advanced sim just yet. I fear it's not very likely we'll get enough people simming on it just now. (I might be wrong.) Also, if you find someone who has a great idea for another advanced sim it would be really frustrating for them to see that there isn't enough interest for simming at 9pm GMT and see their sim cancelled.

Anyway, if there were two GMs willing to host an Academy it would certainly not hurt to try how it goes. If the GMs end up to be the only ones attending it well...cancel it.

[STSF Seiben 0]

 

 

Aren't most people free sometime on Saturday?

 

 

 

No. Some of us actually have lives. ;)

[D'Mysus Ramson 0]

Normal rules aren't going to work as well for getting an idea like this off the ground. While an academy would be needed eventually I think the first sim in this venture would need to be something inbetween an academy and advanced sim. A "training vessel" with a small set crew and open to visiting "cadets". So, the regular cast would be considered in "command training" to be department heads and the rest are regular cadets. As the sim grew it could lose it's "training vessel" status and pass cadet training to a normal scheduled academy.

 

Or, we could look around to see what existing sims at these times exists and see if they'd like to join up with us. I have no idea what STSF's policy for admitting pre-existing sims is.

 

I'm not one who thinks "pre-preplanning meetings to plan the planning session's plan for planning the planner's parking spots" is in anyway helpful. So yes it may seem like I'm jumping headlong into this idea. I know things like this Don't pop up overnight. This is just the way I aproach things.

[Nicolas Lepage 0]

 

I'm not one who thinks "pre-preplanning meetings to plan the planning session's plan for planning the planner's parking spots" is in anyway helpful. So yes it may seem like I'm jumping headlong into this idea. I know things like this Don't pop up overnight. This is just the way I aproach things.

 

I think your approach to this is pretty reasonable. There is no point talking about this for half a year before we actually start to make decisions. I also like the idea of a kind of training ship. It would definitely solve the problem that you might come up with a great idea for a sim just to see it cancelled after a few weeks for lack of attendance. The problem I see is that we don't give this thing enough time. In order to get more people from Europe to join STSF and this sim eventually we'd have to offer it for longer than just a few weeks. I mean, honestly, how many of you just kinda stumbled across STSF? I know I did. So, it would probably take a while for a reasonable amount of European players to join STSF.

 

To answer Vatric... a sim in the afternoon is just as inconvenient for Europeans as it would be for Americans.

[Sendai Riko 0]

Obviously I haven't been here long, but as an American with a flexible at home work schedule, I'd definitely be able to attend a European time-slot sim, and am willing to help out if anything comes from this discussion. I think it's great that at least there's a dialogue about this, whatever (if anything) happens.

[D'Mysus Ramson 0]

A couple of things to think about:

 

We would need the existing STSF Euro members to drag in their friends. While their friends may not have been insain enough to get up a 3am to sim... maybe they'd go for a more reasonable time. Something that made Aegis so great early on was Sorehl. Beyond being the best simmer I've ever had the pleasure to serve under... he brought in atleast 4 or 5 people he RP'd with in RL. If the 2 or 3 current members brought in just one person we'd have enough to make a go at it. Which, brings me to point 2.

 

We may be spoiled with the size of most of the sims. It doesn't take 15 or more people to have a workable sim. A Romulan sim I've been apart of for over 10 years has always had an active crew of 6 to 8 players. I've seen STSF sims cancel for the night due to low turnout with that same number. While we need as many as possible to start with, if a reliable "core" group can be maintained then the sim can survive.

 

I think it would be a good idea if someone from recruiting contacted some ST fan groups based in Europe and made ourselves known to them. This wouldn't be a bad idea for the Americas as well.

 

I may post a poll later on asking how many friends you think you could enlist. I'll also ask later on if you're part of or know of any ST groups that could help spread the word.

[Philip Carst 0]

We actually had a couple more Euro players for a while, but they stopped coming.

 

As for a Lepage and Finn sim. How disturbing...

 

And I don't know anyone who I could recruit for STSF. I have one maybe (I've been bugging him for a while), but I don't know anyone who would do it. Probably not nerdy enough...

Edited August 27, 2006 by Philip Carst

[HyperDrive 0]

I think it is a good idea, because Euro players should be allowed just as much of a chance to sim with us as anyone else.

 

However, if we got to developing an Academy sim for the European times, we'd also have to develop an entirely new sim for the European simmers. Otherwise, once they graduated the academy, they'd be back to 4am wakeups to sim.

 

I will say that I served on a sim about a year ago that I was a chief on, and one of my favorite assistants was from Europe. He had to wake up at 5am every Tuesday morning. So, it is doable. It just isn't what most people want.

[Images 0]

I will say that I served on a sim about a year ago that I was a chief on, and one of my favorite assistants was from Europe. He had to wake up at 5am every Tuesday morning. So, it is doable. It just isn't what most people want.

 

 

Back in Hong Kong it was manageable to do Aegis since I was 12-13 hours ahead putting it at 10-11 in the morning. Pretty cool to get up and have my cereal while simming....just sucked when i had a hangover.

[STSF NDak 0]

Or, we could look around to see what existing sims at these times exists and see if they'd like to join up with us. I have no idea what STSF's policy for admitting pre-existing sims is.

 

You'd want to talk to A9 about that, as I know that Excalibur was already running when it originally joined.

 

I think an International Sim would really cool for our world players, good stuff guys ;)

[Atragon9 0]

You'd want to talk to A9 about that, as I know that Excalibur was already running when it originally joined.

I think an International Sim would really cool for our world players, good stuff guys ;)

In order to get STSF up and running when we opened our doors, there were a few pre-existing sims that we brought into the Forum within the first few months of us starting up, the Excalibur was one of those. For any "outside" sim brought into STSF, we had STSF GMs in charge of them. Now with the Forum being 4+ years old, stable and able to support our graduating cadet population, we are not looking to bring in any pre-established sims.

 

We would need to have STSF GMs running anything we sanction and we have never brought in an unknown player and made them a GM right away, so the prospects for pulling in an outside sim, at this point, are not good.

[D'Mysus Ramson 0]

In order to get STSF up and running when we opened our doors, there were a few pre-existing sims that we brought into the Forum within the first few months of us starting up, the Excalibur was one of those. For any "outside" sim brought into STSF, we had STSF GMs in charge of them. Now with the Forum being 4+ years old, stable and able to support our graduating cadet population, we are not looking to bring in any pre-established sims.

 

We would need to have STSF GMs running anything we sanction and we have never brought in an unknown player and made them a GM right away, so the prospects for pulling in an outside sim, at this point, are not good.

 

 

A9, how would you suggest we go about this? I'm hearing what we can't do but not what we can.

[Dumbass 0]

I don't want to put words in A9's mouth, but what I think he is saying is if an outside sim already has existing STSF GMs in the sim's command positions, and those GMs think the players are the material we are looking for (or would be willing to become Cadets and graduate before rejoining the sim), and the players as individuals are willing to "cross over" to STSF, then... yeah, sure, it might be possible.

 

But the odds of all of those conditions happening are slim. It would probably be easier to dissolve the old sim and regroup as an STSF sim with STSF players.

Edited August 29, 2006 by Dumbass

[Captain Huff 0]

Totally cool idea. Let's keep the topic alive to get as much feedback as possible. People in an alternate time zone would find the sim the same way the rest of us wingnuts found ours: They'd be browsing around at the time of day they tend to browse around, and find a chat taking place and stay and watch... Which means we'd most likely need to start a chat with a smallish crew, just to get it started. No big deal, imo. If the time isn't *too* outrageous, we may even get current members to volunteer to play for six months or so to fill out the roster a little. ::chucks in two quatloos::

[Dumbass 0]

People in an alternate time zone would find the sim the same way the rest of us wingnuts found ours: They'd be browsing around at the time of day they tend to browse around, and find a chat taking place and stay and watch...

 

Actually, I was just in the market for some turf-sod.

 

[Terry Riker 0]

I think its a great idea of setting up a sim as a kind of training ship, and going from there. I agree with A9 though on the subject of bringing in a training ship, as in as, its not a real good idea. As for GM's to run this show, im sure we have a few LtCmdr's able to do GM training. I know im one who holds the rank of LtCmdr so i could have a go and i bet there is a few others that could also train as a GM to.

[FredM 0]

Hey there,

 

I'm sorry, but I'm going to repeat some of what I said in another thread. ;)

 

Having lived for six months in New Zealand, simming on Reaent and Aegis at 3:00pm and 4:00pm in the afternoons, I honestly must question realistic feasibility of such a venture. For quite a few months, I would visit STSF.NET at (by American standards) odd hours of the day and never found any activity.

 

Now, what do I mean by this? When someone looks at our message boards, the counter at the bottom of the main screen indiciates that a guest has viewed them recently. You can even see what they are/were looking at/last clicked to see. If there was large interest in the forum at these times, there would have been guests looking at it. And I'm sorry...I can't go for the "They don't know we're here" excuse. We're linked at Startrek.com folks, so if they can't find us there they likely never will. :(

 

In addition, having been part of the founding administration of two simming organizations now, I have seen attempts at a "Academy/Advanced sim hybrid" in the past. They do not work.

 

The idea is a great one, don't get me wrong. However, it puts in place serious complications and quality control issues. What's more, there begins to be a blur between who is an advanced player and who is not. Case and point, does someone on this hybrid have the right to try and join another advanced sim in the fleet even though they have not gone thru a standard Academy graduation process?

 

If such a thing was going to happen, a regular Academy training sim would need to be in place. In the same light, phase two of the approval process for an advanced sim would also need to be underway so that once people graduated from that Academy they would have a place to play.

 

And along the same lines, what exact "time zone" are you going to use for the benchmark? Within the continental United States, Eastern Standard (-5:00 GMT) is used. That makes it somewhat reasonable for people across the country to find a game that fits there schedule. My best guess would be likely something similiar to 0:00GMT (London). It is within one or two hours of most European countries. However, adding a sims in the time zone isn't going to cover the other side of the globe sitting at 12:00GMT. Such a sim might (note that word) also be somewhat feasible for some within the United States who have odd work schedules or don't work at all due to age (sims at 5:00pm in the afternoon ET essentially).

 

So...being perfectly honest...if people are saying there is a need...really need to narrow down "from where." I'm not saying why we can't, I'm just saying that this is not as cut and dry as it seems.

[D'Mysus Ramson 0]

I don't believe you can look at the guest counter on any given day and make a judgement from that. A time may be good for folks but they don't all check in on the same day. And as others have said since they know there's not alot of activity at those times they don't usually check the boards then.

 

As for the hybrid sim, I've never heard of it tried so I can't say how well it would work. As long as the GMs kept up with things I can see it working.

 

Fred brings up something about us being linked to StarTrek.com. Has anyone tried to find us through there lately? I did a few days ago and found nothing. It might be something you wander onto easier that activing seaching for... or I just don't know where to look. I have also looked for sims currently running based in Europe. Again, I found nothing. So, I think there's some value to the idea that they just don't know about us or simming in general (unless they call it something else).

[Nicolas Lepage 0]

Ramson is right, there are no Europe based sims...at least there were none last time I checked. I think the reason for that is that recruiting players in Europe is not quite as easy as it seems. For one thing in many countries the internet is not as readily available to people as it is for people in the states. (Everyone might have internet access but it is expensive. Some still pay per hour or per MB so they would not 'waste' money on simming)

Another reason is the language issue. There are more than 20 languages spoken throughout Europe (only counting official languages of the different countries) and it is, by no means, normal that people are fluent in English. So recruiting Europeans would mostly mean trying to get some British players and the few who speak English well enough to participate in a sim. I know that's the reason why some of my friends haven't tried simming.

So, while I haven't changed my mind about the topic (I still think trying an Academy sim at a decent time for those who do not live in America) I am aware that the whole thing might not be very successful for various reasons.

[Atragon9 0]

I don't believe you can look at the guest counter on any given day and make a judgement from that. A time may be good for folks but they don't all check in on the same day. And as others have said since they know there's not alot of activity at those times they don't usually check the boards then.

 

As for the hybrid sim, I've never heard of it tried so I can't say how well it would work. As long as the GMs kept up with things I can see it working.

 

Fred brings up something about us being linked to StarTrek.com. Has anyone tried to find us through there lately? I did a few days ago and found nothing. It might be something you wander onto easier that activing seaching for... or I just don't know where to look. I have also looked for sims currently running based in Europe. Again, I found nothing. So, I think there's some value to the idea that they just don't know about us or simming in general (unless they call it something else).

If you go to StarTrek.com and Community, you can find likns to us onthe Chat page and if you go from Community to the Message Boards, there is a Board for Role Playing & Sims that has pinned topics about us and where we post sim announcements and briefings.

[Chell Reno 0]

If you go to StarTrek.com and Community, you can find likns to us onthe Chat page and if you go from Community to the Message Boards, there is a Board for Role Playing & Sims that has pinned topics about us and where we post sim announcements and briefings.

 

Thats actualy how I came to know of STSF in the first place..... betcha wish you'd never put up those adds eh? ;)

 

 

Anywho on topic I think a european time simm would be a great idea, just because they (Europeans) dont come on now doesnt mean that once the word gets out they wont. I think it'll be worth a shot. However, I do agree with Fred on the training ship. I helped to start a group scimilar to STSF once myself and we did something very close to that proposed cadet simm idea. It lasted maby a month... but then again that doesnt mean it woulnt work on STSF.... who knows?

 

::drops two cents into the bucket::

Edited September 4, 2006 by Chell Reno

[D'Mysus Ramson 0]

Did some more research. While I've never been able to get into them a forum or email based sim would give the freedom from bad scheduled timeslots. I don't see this as an answer to the Euro-Sim question but it would give an option rather than waking up at 3am. Just a brief aside and not a discussion to distract us from the current subject.