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Post by Pearl Forrester on Mar 17, 2013 19:18:21 GMT -5
The following thread is dedicated to the Theme of the game - the mood, setting, limitations of plot and shared pieces of cultural information that will help keep everyone on the same page through the story.
Transformers: Darkest Hours is set within the story of Transformers Prime, drawing on the games Fall of Cybertron and War For Cybertron, the novels Exiles and Exodus, and the IDW comics series for necessary details of Cybertron's past, as well as inspiration for characters, organizations, Neutral transformers and colony worlds.
The game operates as a TACTICAL STRATEGY RPG with ongoing missions, organizational goals, interfactional warfare, politics and intrigue. Interpersonal conflict, character growth and internal power struggles (especially in some factions) are secondary focuses.
Most of the action will take place on Earth, with room for separate adventures on Cybertron, on colony worlds, or in space.
The mood is somewhat serious tone, opting for realism over fantasy, and about equally balanced between cyncism and idealism. The eons-long civil war over the fate of Cybertron has ground the Cybertronian population down to a fraction of what it once was, and the war-weary, resource-depleted factions have brought Earth and its people into the struggle, due to the fact that Earth is rich with Energon seeded onto it by Shockwave millions of years ago.
Both sides have suffered and lost much, and peace seems an almost unattainable, but much hoped for goal. The human race may be the tipping point in the Transformers' struggle.
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Post by Pearl Forrester on Mar 19, 2013 8:30:48 GMT -5
Names for Cybertronians should be Transformer-y, and should reflect something about their personality, function, or unique traits. Things related to weapons, construction, driving, war, tools, space and other mechanical sounding names are your best bet.
Names for humans should be actual human names - foreign names are awesome, but they should still be something you could potentially find in a phonebook.
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Post by Pearl Forrester on Mar 19, 2013 8:35:41 GMT -5
No gods, demons, angels, spirits, magic, occult powers, psychic powers, etc. Transformers is science-fiction, and while some of the technology is a little bit 'magic science' in that it may not be actually possible in the real world, that doesn't mean we're powering fusion engines on fairy dust and unicorn horns.
Characters may have any religious beliefs they want, even made up ones.
Primus, Unicron and the Thirteen Primes are as close to gods as we're getting as far as characters go - they're ancient creatures that occupy multiple realities at once, thus giving them corporeal bodies (such as Cybertron and Earth) they can be disconnected from (temporarily "killed") while they themselves still exist just fine on other planes of reality.
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Post by Pearl Forrester on Mar 19, 2013 9:15:51 GMT -5
This board is not for sexual roleplay. Sorry folks, take the slashfics elsewhere. Transformers do not reproduce like biological organisms; they do not carry tiny little baby transformers in their bodies like a pregnancy and then eject a sparkling later. Spark-merges do not produce young. 99% of all Transformers are produced from the Well of All Sparks/All Spark that was ejected from Cybertron at the end of the Great War. There are instances of Transformers being produced apart from Cybertron (such as on Velocitron) but exactly how that happened has not been revealed in canon. We intend to add methods of new transformer generation as soon as we can agree on something that doesn't sound ridiculous. Transformers do have some romantic feelings towards each other, and do express affection and a genuine committed bond of trust and affection. This can be expressed as a Lifebond Partnership, which is something akin to marriage. Sparkmates is another canonical name for this sort of closely bonded relationship. Transformers also sometimes have romantic feelings towards humans (Though how those feelings get resolved is something that falls outside of the scope and play of this game) and even inanimate objects (some Transformers have been known to hoot and cat-call at non-sentient sports cars). We assume that at least one third of the Transformer population is female (though most of the casts are male) and that male-female affection and lifebonding is standard (though close "bromance"-type relationships do exist in canon between male transformers). Keep in mind that these are giant, non-reproducing robots: What constitutes a close relationship is all happening "upstairs" within the mind. Jokes, flirting, Anime-like "peeping", mild innuendo and some moderate displays of affection (kissing, hugging, holding hands, loving glances) are perfectly fine for this board. If its done for the sake of comedy or is part of an established TF canon behavior (some TFs are real skirt chasers and "womanizers"), that's acceptable. When romantic RP starts moving into actions best kept private, tread carefully, and keep the hot and heavy stuff off the board. Here's a simple guideline: If you would not do it in front of your family or friends in a public place such as restaurant, don't write it on the board. On the subject of abortions, sexual violence and sex-related criminal actions: They are not allowed on this board. These are touchy subjects and are far, far beyond the theme of any Transformers series. Torture, imprisonment, mental hacking, loss of friends and family - these are just about as "dark" as we want it to get. Some helpful links: ReproductionRomance |
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Post by Pearl Forrester on Mar 19, 2013 11:52:56 GMT -5
Transformers: Darkest Hours is largely based on canonical events, characters, concepts and terminology. This is our starting point for the game and its characters. Once the game is up and running, it will start to deviate from canon to a degree, due to new scenarios and ongoing character development. It is, in a way, it's own new "show" or "comic", set within the framework of the Aligned and IDW Continuity.
We use canon in order to give everyone an identical point of reference and set of information to work with, so that when new players arrive, the game is not wildly different from what they imagine or know Transformers to be. It keeps everyone on the same page. Using TF canon also means that character creation and character adaptation is much easier: you have lots of material already available to use.
By nature we will become a type of alternate universe as the game continues, but we should never become completely unrecognizable from the original source material.
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