Regionalization

Currently, we got Region -> Sub-forum. The sub-forums contain an important locale, such as a major city or whatever.

I propose a more even spread of sub-forums, based on activity of course. Many forums have had their sub-forums purged due to disuse.

Basically, make them based on regions within the country, like instead of Concordia, have it be The Concordian Region. That way, threads in that sub-forum will not just take place in Concordia the city. It also allows regional awareness, allowing characters to make reference to regional events. Having it just be that city limits people, and they end up just using the main Corone forum even if they actually want to be in the forests around Concordia.

This also allows themes; certain expectations of settings, culture, history, people. These can be changed on the fly, like if you have a big Empire/Rangers event that makes Concordia change hands, you can apply it to The Concordian Region so the event has region-wide significance.

For forums with few sub-forums, at least make them relevant. Alerar has three sub-forums that are almost unused. What if you broke up Alerar into 'regions', such as Ettermire occupied one, Kachuck occupied another, and Etheria Port occupied the last. Now, you can make assumptions about the setting and form your own canon for that region.

I guess there aren't any completely obvious benefits to all this, but in the long run it makes it easier for canon to be applied to the regions. You can affect the Radasanthian Region (or whatever it would be called) without actually affecting the city itself.

I am pretty much on board with this, but I want to point out that Concordia is a region, not a city (Underwood is the city). I think it could be applied quite well to Raiaera and Alerar, though. A subforum for Eluriand maybe makes sense, but a more general "Central Plains" region that includes the city would work just as well. Anebrilith is almost certainly needlessly specific. The Red Forest is a good one, though. And I'm sure the same could be applied to Alerar.

I like it too. This could also be an opportunity to make some much needed updates for each region.

However, I need to make this simple point just in case someone uses it as argument against this proposal. Alerar isn't unpopular because of its subforums. It's unpopular because the staff hasn't made it attractive and the players are complacent with Corone. It doesn't mean this shouldn't be done anyways.

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Originally Posted by Elrundir

I am pretty much on board with this, but I want to point out that Concordia is a region, not a city (Underwood is the city).

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Woops. Musta been tired when I wrote that. So, I guess Concordia already works as-is, but there's a separate forum entirely for Underwood for learning/practice which makes that example weird.

I also think that people sort of.. know... what's going on in Corone. There's a lot of activity and a lot of content gets passed around that can be referenced and incorporated. The mission board and various info put up by moderators gives people a good idea of what the region is all about and provides inspiration for the types of stories that emerge in that setting. Imagine Alerar.... does anyone actually have an idea of it at all? I know I don't. Ettermire is some steam city, Kachuck (which I still consider the point where Salvar, Alerar, and Raiaera meet) is some dwarf mountain place? What about everything in-between? The only info available is an almanac-esque type of thing. It's easy to relate to medieval humans in Corone, it's a common subject and the town/forest setting is very easy to work with. I think the other regions would get some activity if they had the same work-up that Corone got, stuff like mission boards and info about culture/politics. Raiaera, Alerar, and Salvar have sort of been in a canonical limbo ever since the FQ. The kind of info I'm talking about is stuff that directly leads to threads that PCs can create. Like, not just info describing the political landscape of a region, but with examples of how PCs can utilize such things. Although I fear it may be difficult if you don't polarize the region into two sides- like the Rangers and the Empire, and I could use more info about those organizations as well honestly.

But, that's all besides the point. Regionalization would allow anyone, not just canon masters or other people on the staff, to develop canon for various underused regions, or add canon to established regions in a way that people can use without having to specifically be in Underwood, Gisela, or whatnot.

I like the idea, and I'll work on incorporating it into the forums. It would make things much simpler for writing, no matter who the person is (new or old). Places like Corone, Scara Brae, and Alerar would benefit easiest from this... However, I'm still working on how to organize Raiaera and Salvar, but in the long run all the regions will be cleaner and easier to play in with this type of clean up.

Thank you for the suggestion!


Also, though the wiki is not yet completed, Corone's page is done (I think) and has information on the Rangers and Empire that we're using currently. It's not a ton of info, since I'm going to start working on that more as soon as I can, but it's the information that was on the site about them.

http://www.althanas.com/wiki/index.php?title=Corone