forgive me if things i say make no sense, contradict each other or have glaring omissions, I'm entrenched in coursework right now and have the attention span of a small bird doped up on amphetamines, after having been diagnosed with ADD..what was i saying?
Anyway. Your first ship will be basic and will have no add-ons - you choose a ship class but nothing to go with it. No exceptions. Your early duties will basically extend to simple missions (chart a solar flare type thing) for credits, establish a trade route, hook up with a squad, etc, etc, and indeed, etc. (Note: You choose the nature of your squad in the signup post (as in, self-played, DM-played or other RPers (although you have to persuade them first) but will have to spend a few posts introing the formation of the squad; sadistic and unnessecary maybe, but it gives me an extra week or so to write some storylines
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Ship engines go up to half-light speed, but there are a number of superlight wormholes - basically, you get on a great big ship, enjoy the ride, and unhitch yourself at the end of it. This will be the prime method of intersystem travel. Note that some wormholes can be traversed faster than others - the travel fee for these is higher.
There will be a number of internally-warring factions, plus an uberbaddie alien race who will be gently introduced with the passage of time. Combat will be factional - required missions for your group sometimes, a chance for a few bucks at others. There will also be a few instances where you take the ship down to a planet to blast some hostile native life - or indeed, just clear out some forests/mountains etc for a base to be built. And so on.
Trade and relations will be a large part of the RP. Money makes the worlds go round, and the best way to earn some cash will be either courier missions or simply selling on goods between bases. Smuggling is another, profitable source of income but if you get caught - and you often will - things look bad for your future with that faction.
There will be 3 main modes of play ; ground combat - which will happen at times; space combat and exploration, which will happen a whole lot more; and trading, on and off bases - the bulk of the game. Note that after a while you can build your own base; this will be a steady earner and strategic placing can drastically help how you fare out in the galaxy, militarily and otherwise. As stated above, you can only change weapons at bases - and unless you have weaponry stored there you'll normally have to hire it at less-than-pretty prices. Some weapons will require ship upgrades; these cost ridiculous amounts unless you impress the right person enough...
DMing will occur at least once a week on average - hopefully nearer 2-3 times. Sometimes you'll have vague, non-time-sensitive objectives and missions, other times you'll be playing a structured game - combat scenarios etc. As far as missions go, post them fully - if I decide there's gonna be a twist I'll post it and anything you posted which becomes redundant is ignored - messy, but the only way to stop a simple mission from taking about two weeks instead of two days of RPing. If people want to have a section posted/DMed on IRC - for example, intense combat which would, again, be highly time-consuming otherwise - mention it at the bottom of a post, with an optimal time/date, and I'll try to meet it. Again, messy, but it speeds things up a whole lot.
If there's anything I'm missing here, holler
Linear Mode
