Gossamer: First of all, your contributions vary vastly across a whole host of things. Not only do you moderate, but you create maps, locations, have written World Development articles for card games and creatures, and routinely help people get started with fresh new characters. First, clearly define what you think a contribution is and then can you tell us out of all the things you contribute, what are your favorite activities and why?
Dusk: I think a contribution is something that you do for Mizahar, as a site and as a community, rather than just for yourself. Of course there are selfish reasons to do something - maybe you thought of an awesome monster you want to kill, so you write it up in WD - but in the end that idea, that creation is something you give to the rest of us. It's something we all have access to, part of the great big Mizahar Hive-Mind. Contributing is like taking something of your very own, and just letting it go. And then sitting back and seeing what people do with it, which is sometimes the most awesome part.
For anyone who's ever heard me go on and on, you know that "world building" is my absolute favorite part. When I was younger and thought I would be the Next Great Fantasy Author, I used to spend months meticulously building worlds, complete with intricate political systems, careful maps, histories of why the borders lay the way they did and what happened between the countries to make that, social descriptions, magic systems, how trade met supply and demand, good guys and bad guys and guys just trying to get by... on and on it went, and then I'd finally sit down to write an actual story about someone, and I'd just sort of peter out after about 40K words. Just... pfft. Don't care anymore. Want to make another world. Want to remake this world a hundred years in the past, in the future, redrawn all the lines and figure out what happened. It was my nightmare, and for a long time I thought it made me a failure. I know now that it's just that I need stimulation to write characters - I need interaction, I need roleplay. It's why I almost never write solo training threads, and why my PCs are points-wise so far behind people who started their characters the same week as me.
How does this relate to Mizahar? And why am I rambling? It's because my favorite part is actually making Syliras. Yes, I had an amazing start with what Gossamer wrote up for the city, but she had both the grace and the incredible confidence both in her work and in me to say "Do whatever you like with it, I trust you with my vision." That right there is mind-blowing on its own, but the opportunities it gave me to just build Syliras have pretty much been an ongoing dork-gasm for me. The Knights have gone from a vaguely outlined and sort of unspoken-understanding sort of faction to something much more playable by someone just signing up. I've created locations, I've made a system of justice (The Council of Three is my own private squeal. It's like a half page in the wiki, but I love them so much.), I've made traditions and laws, I've made a society. And at the end of all that, instead of just sitting in a file on my hard drive and being a sad regret from my youth, I get to log onto the internet every single day and watch people take what I've done and interact with it, make it bigger, make it better, butcher it and defend it and honor it. Even the people who butcher it are actually really, really appreciated, because it shows me what I did wrong in my write-ups, what wasn't unclear, what Lore pages I still need to do. I could go on for hours about developing Syliras. On and on. I love it.
Gossamer: If you could do anything on Mizahar at all that you haven’t done yet – oocwise/allowed or not allowed – what would that be and why?
Dusk: I'm... not allowed to do stuff? I'm a DS, dammit, I should have the powers of a god!!! *shakes fist at the sky*
Okay. Ego trip over. Um. I'm really trying to think. Mizahar has given me every opportunity to do what I wanted to do. I've been AS, DS, chat runner, newb greeter, Staff Lounge mediator, CS approver, WD writer, Mizahar policy maker... is there anything left? My first thought was the ability to chatkick/chatban people, but the really bad stuff never happens when I'm in there because people know I lay down the em-effin' law. So I'm not entirely sure that would be useful.
Oh! I know. I wish I could read all of the HD tickets. So I could see some of the requests for gnosis/dire animals/catgirls and laugh and laugh and laugh...
Gossamer: Are your contributions at all linked to your PCs or gaps you notice in the game while playing your pcs? If not, where do you get your contribution ideas from?
Dusk: Some of them definitely are. For instance, the WD article on card games came from Doc's being an avid gambler, and yet me not knowing what any of the card games in Mizahar would be like. A lot of the Skills stubs that I put up were because they were skills my character had and I just wanted something up about them.
Most of my Syliras contributions, though, come directly from player questions. It's incredible. Someone was like "How do they deal with dead bodies in Syliras? And where do Nuit get bodies from?" and suddenly Li Mauta comes screaming out of my brain. I get five squires signed up in a month, and I'm like "They need a place to play. Dormitories!" More often than not, the things I write are written to fill a need. There are some of my pet projects that are solely mine, but those always fall to the back burner in order to meet the needs of Syliras. One day I'll write up the Council of Nine. One day I'll finish the Barkbear WD article. One day I'll get all the Syliras NPCs into the wiki. One day, so help me god, I will write up the Messenger Service. But in the meantime, I'll also end up writing some amazing stuff and coming up with new NPCs whenever people come up with questions. I love how interactive it is. Lovelovelove.
Gossamer: How do you manage to balance contribution, development, moderation, and play in such equal measures?
Dusk: I don't, most of the time. Just ask anyone who's waiting on a thread response from me.
Um, it's tough. I have an awesome team right now, and they make alllll the difference. When I can count on my AS's to handle grading and keeping an eye on the boards, when they step up and take over development of something they want to see in the city or running threads we've talked about that they're really interested in, that means I can focus more on development and moderation and maybe even get a few PC posts in too.
It's really about just being both stressed and having some sort of inspirational ADD. I'll be like "I should work on mod posts... my brain won't give me any, but it's got this great idea for an NPC for that location," and then I'm off on that. A lot of it comes down to whatever mood my muse is in, and I've got no control over that bitch.
Gossamer: What would you like to see more of on Mizahar in terms of contribution? Are their any blatent gaps besides the obvious skills and undeveloped gnosis’? Who do you think could best fulfill these needs and why?
Dusk: I'd love to see more stories. Like, histories, legends, tales that people pass down orally, written up in the wiki. Colombina had some submissions for Chaktawe stories in WD that were just incredible. Sort of like a Grimm's Fairytales or Aesop's Fables or even just children's stories that each of the peoples tell among themselves. Who among us didn't grow up with the Three Little Pigs, or Red Riding Hood, or Robin Hood? There's got to be the same sort of thing for Mizahar, and I would love to see people writing those up in WD and submitting them.
Gossamer: Can you offer new players and people who would love to contribute but may feel shy or at a loss to do so any advice on how to get started and where to pick their niche? Do they even need a niche to contribute to or is a little bit of everything the best course?
Dusk: I think if you have an idea, you should go for it. If you're shy about it, talk it over with someone on the site that you trust. Get someone to help you out with it and make it a collaboration effort. Do research so you're as informed about something as you can be, and then punch us in the face with your creativity and we will love you for it. Every single person who's contributed an article, or joined the staff, or voraciously read the Wiki and answered questions for new people in chat, is incredibly appreciated. You'll make mistakes. We all do it. I've had Jen come to me and be like "You were totally wrong about this stuff" but that didn't mean she didn't want me to keep trying to get it right.
As a bit of a tangent, I think the best piece of advice I can give is that whatever you do, don't personally invest yourself in your development too much. Like, yes, put yourself into it because otherwise it's going to come across as flat. But don't tie your ego into it, don't say "Oh, I got critiqued on this, or my idea was disapproved by my DS, or they asked follow-up questions for my AS application, or my WD concept was rejected, and that totally hurt my feelings so I'm not going to offer anything else." Because you might have fifteen really good ideas but the first one you brought up doesn't fit in Mizahar - but that doesn't mean your other ones won't. Even your rejection might end up creating new rules or guidelines on what/how things can be submitted and that has an impact on Miz for the better. The entire WD submission process came about because someone (who will not be named) wrote a huge, in-depth article of lore that made one of the Founders say "I'm already working on that, I don't need it written up. Sorry." He ended up throwing a fit and ragequitting because he was too egotistically involved in it to deal with being what he saw as unappreciated. We came up with a way to head that off by having people submit their ideas to HD before writing them up. That submission process has drastically changed how WD works and made it so much better, but he couldn't see that. So it's important to understand that while not everything we do will fit into Miz or will be allowed to be developed, that doesn't make you less of an integral part of this community.
Gossamer: In terms of Syliras, what is the single most challenging aspect of keeping your city on track and going strong? How do you make the determination of what constitutes ‘going strong’ and ‘on track’? These terms are different for each city and via each moderator so we’re curious to know what your definition is and why you reach that.
Dusk: Oh god. I think the sheer number of people who are involved in Syliras are the biggest challenge. I feel like I never do them justice - like, there's just not enough time in the day to moderate people as much as they'd probably like. Luckily we're in a phase right now where most of the players in the city are self-sufficient and help each other out fantastically, so I don't need to step into a lot of things. They also let me know when something funky is going on that I need to know about. When I first took over, the game was still small enough that I could take some time to randomly read threads and see what was going on in the city. Now? No freaking way.
I suppose my version of "On Track" is that everyone whose characters are breaking the laws in Syliras are aware both of what they're doing and what the consequences are, and that no one's randomly throwing fireballs at knights. It's been a long time since we've just had someone go buttnuts and rule-break in the city, and I think a lot of that has been my constant reiteration of the rules, and keeping the rules posted in the forums themselves. Having my OOC Announcements thread is also a handy way to keep people informed - I use it to not only update people on new Wiki pages, but also anything that I've come across as a problem in the city so that it doesn't happen again. I find that informing my players makes them and the city so much stronger.
Gossamer: As a moderator, coming up with overarching plots for your domain is often a challenge. Have you developed any big plots for Syliras for the city as a whole to participate in? If so, again can you share a bit about them and what their inspiration is?
Dusk: Ha. Rub it in.
Um, I've come up with over-arching plot for the city. Every time I come up with something, that's the point where I lose an AS for whatever reason and then I'm just scrambling to keep the city running and threads graded so I never get to really implement them. With the additional of Archon, who's got some great ideas for development and is all about working to make them happen (in addition to being a TANK at grading), I think I might be able to step back a little from the day-to-day stuff and start working on bigger projects for the city as a whole. With a place like Syliras, there really
should be some serious stuff going on, and that's my fault for not getting it done. My inspiration for them, though, is reality. I look at the sorts of things people had to deal with in big cities that were along the same lines of technology advancement and population from the past, what large-scale problems they had, what threats they had to deal with. And then I put a Mizahar twist on it and try to screw with my players as much as I can. They love that, man.
Gossamer: Is there anything, as a player, you’d love to see developed IN GAME verses via the world development forum? How easy do you think is it for a person to make the transition from contribution OOC to contribution IC?
Dusk: I would like to see something put together in character for people who aren't combat oriented. Scholarly circles, mages quorums, political groups. Factions, just groups of people getting together for something other than a hunting trip or a fight scene. I mean, I could make those things in Syliras. But I don't want to. I want other people to. And I, as a player character, want to meet other PCs who are interested in that. It's hard to grow skills in things like politics or intelligence or leadership unless you're just doing a thousand boring solo threads. Which I will never do.
Gossamer: Any big plans for the future? We’re always curious as to whats on the agenda next for Syliras or the game in general in terms of your corner of the world. Give us some teasers or hints.
Dusk: You dirty, dirty girl. You want all my secrets! They're mine, my precious!
Okay, okay. I will give you a preview of one of my city-wide plots coming up. Several people will be tapped quietly to see if they want in. They may die. They may get so effed up they won't even recognize their characters anymore. They may get off scott-free. But even the knights won't be able to help them...
(INSERT DRAMATIC MUSIC HERE!)
Also, I'm gonna make a new pub! Woot!
by Dusk on May 1st, 2011, 10:04 pm 
