V7 Final Applications are Open (+ Weapon Suggestions!)

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Attention handlers!

V7's pregame has been running for a good while now and preparations for game proper are underway. That means it's time to move into the last stages of pregame (and don't panic; you still have a few more months of that at least).

First and foremost, character applications for V7 proper are now open. This will be familiar to many of you, but for the uninitiated: All characters must be resubmitted for final critiques and approval. Once approved, they will be entered into the student roster and will take part in V7. Any student not submitted for final approval will not take part in V7. If they have no posts and are not referenced by other characters, they will be assumed to have never existed, and their biographies may be reused in a later version or Mini. If they have posts or are closely connected to characters who enter the game, they will be assumed to have simply not been on the senior trip, and will not be eligible for reuse in later games. Characters in either category may be used in the Meanwhile section during the game, however if characters from the first category appear in Meanwhile, they will become ineligible for submission in future versions just like characters in the second category.

We do this second stage of applications for a few reasons. Firstly, information changes over the course of pregame. You may have discovered that some traits do not work for your character as originally intended, or you may have come up with elements of a character's history you wish you had known during the initial application. This is your last chance to change and add things. Serious retcons made after final applications require staff approval and will be unlikely to attain it. Please note that biographies should be updated to contain any relevant information made during pregame plans, such as unusual connections to another character (anything going beyond close friendships, generally, especially improbable or unusual stuff) or any changes that have occurred in a character's life. Things which belong in bios but are added after the fact without staff approval will likely need to be removed, and may result in further consequences.

Final applications also allow staff to double check to make sure nothing inappropriate or questionable is slipping through. Staff members miss things sometimes, and final applications serve as a check against that getting out of hand. They also allow profiles to, in many cases, get looked at with a fresh set of eyes, which may catch things that were previously missed.

Pregame is considered a part of continuity, for the most part. If, however, changes are made or required that render some specific details invalid, that is fine. A large part of pregame is getting a handle on your character, and some changes are inevitable. Similarly, past scenes will not be considered a reason to keep something if a staff member finds part of a profile objectionable.

The opening of final character applications means that, effective immediately, all in-progress pregame character registrations are closed. They are all eligible for immediate resubmission to V7 proper (If you were in the process of making requested changes, please do finish with that before resubmitting. Your critiquer will appreciate it.). Like pregame, final apps will be following a staggered application process. Each handler may submit one character per two weeks from the opening of final applications, up to a possible total of four. Between December 1 and December 14, you may have only one character, from December 15 to December 29, you may have two, and so on. Once a character is approved for the game in proper, they are also approved for the remainder of pregame.

Note that, as always, handlers may have only one character in the queue at any given time; the weekly numbers merely refer to the total number they may have at once. Forfeited or permanently denied characters do not count towards the limit, since they will not enter the game. If this policy becomes a problem or leads to large amounts of extra work for staff, we reserve the right to modify it at any time.

If you have over four characters, you should submit only the ones you wish to bring into the game. Unsubmitted characters will be assumed to have not been on the trip unless they have never appeared in pregame, in which case they will be assumed to have never existed. If you have extra characters who you wish to give to other handlers, you should know that a character, once given away, becomes the sole property of their new handler, who is free to change their biography however they want and do whatever they want with the character. You will have no special preference or advantage should the character later go up for adoption, and you will have no veto power over the character's actions. Arrangements regarding a transfer of a character should be related to the staff before the profile is submitted.

To account for the holiday season, final applications are expected to run a minimum of eight weeks and likely into spring. We are aiming for a mid-spring launch date for game proper, and updates on the timeline and the open status of character registrations will be provided as we approach our intended date. Staff will stop taking new applications as soon as the game begins. In-progress applications will continue to be critiqued until the staff conduct first rolls (usually a few days before they go live), at which point the entire application process will shut down.

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Additionally, staff is now accepting weapon suggestions! For those who aren't familiar, characters are randomly assigned weapons from a list in the same manner that in-game rolls are conducted. For V5 and V6, staff allowed handlers to send in suggestions for weapons that they wanted to see in-game, and since you guys are so good at coming up with tools of destruction, we're doing it again for V7.

The process for this is pretty simple: just send a PM to SOTF_Help with your suggestion. Here are a few guidelines to keep in mind:

1) Only one suggestion per handler at this time.
2) You must submit the suggestion via PM to the SOTF_Help account. Please title your message with "Weapon Suggestion" or we'll get very grumpy.
3) If you post a suggestion in this thread, it will be ignored and it will also make us grumpy.
4) There is NO guarantee that your weapon will make the final list. This is usually because we try to balance the list so it's not solely comprised of dildos, high-powered guns, and guns that launch dildos. Please keep this in mind when making your suggestion.
5) Please ensure your suggestion is practical. In the past, we've got some cool suggestions that sadly are just not feasible. Make sure they are something someone could lug around and something that actually exists. No surface-to-air missiles or lightsabers.
6) We are looking for suggestions that fit under the 3 General Molds of Weapons we look at for each list:
- Weapons: Knives, Guns, Melee Weapons
- Useful Non-Weapons: Extra food, second first aid kit, matches, poison, fishing pole, binoculars
- Gag Weapons: Shake weight, Carol Channing record, water pistol (If you plan on submitting a joke weapon, consider whether it's a one-off or if it has some staying power. The latter is more likely to make the list.)
7) The weapon must be useable. If the weapon is too complex for the average high school student to use, we can't include it.
8) Once you have made your suggestion, you cannot go back on it and say, "I meant ____" You will have to wait and see if we require more ideas. Choose wisely.

And that's it for the this state of the union address. If you have any questions, the informational posts in the V7 Final Applications section likely have what you seek. If you don't find your answers there, feel free to ask a staff member as always.

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Wave 2 of final apps is now OPEN. If you've gotten your first character approved, you are now free to submit another. Remember that you can only have one character in the queue at a time.

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Wave 3 of final apps technically opened yesterday but we forgot to announce it. Once your second character is approved, you may submit a third.

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The fourth and final wave of character applications opens today. Once you've got your characters approved, you can immediately submit more, again up to a cap of four.