What's Something New Star Army Players Should Know?

[Wes]

If there were a few tips and bits of advice you could give to every new member here when they join, what would you tell them?

I have a "Welcome" conversation I open with the new members with some things I've thought up, and I'm thinking about updating it, so I figured this is a great chance to ask you guys what you think should be in there. The current version I've been sending everyone is:

Hi E ☾LIPSE.,

I'm Wes, the site's founder and admin guy. I want to take a moment to personally welcome you to the Star Army community. There are many roleplaying communities out there, but not many like Star Army. And I appreciate that out of the vast sea of RP forums, you chose us. It means a lot to me. I'm very proud of Star Army. Our first RP forums were set up in 2002 and you can see on this forum that there are topics going back as far as 2004. So there's a lot of history in this site. Roleplay on Star Army is considered canon unless there's some pressing reason for it not to be, which means that your RP posts will be shaping the next chapter of this universe's story and becoming part of its history.

Here's 5 tips for getting started:

1. In the Introductions forum, you can both introduce yourself to others and also find other players to roleplay with. Like any community, it works best if you start meeting the other people in it and work with others. Some people might try to recruit you there for their RPs, especially if you post details about what you're interested in.

2. If you have an idea for a roleplay, post it as an interest check in the OOC and Planning forum. This helps you find people to RP it with you. All roleplay plots start as threads in Open RP or their faction's forum. If successful (e.g. they complete a thread), they can upgrade to having their own subforum. You don't need to be a Game Master to start an RP thread.

3. Guides for making a character that fits this universe can be found on the wiki: Creating a Character. The trickiest part is probably the history. In particular, one issue I've seen a lot lately is that a lot of the star systems were only colonized in the last 10 or so years, so your character's place of birth will likely be a homeworld like Yamatai or Nepleslia. If you have trouble with it, let me help you figure it out. I'm happy to give you suggestions and ideas to make your backstory work.

4. To submit ideas to the canonical Star Army universe, you can make wiki articles for them and post them in the Settings Submissions forum. If you want to submit a species, make sure it's not just "humans +1" and that you wait 3 months before submitting it. Pretty much everything else can pretty much be submitted without a waiting period. There's a link to the syntax guide on the wiki's page edit screen, which will teach you about the wiki code. Please only upload images you have the rights to use (no Master Chief from Halo, or random stuff saved from the internet). This is for legal reasons and also to keep the site original.

5. If you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask me. You can reply here. No question is too dumb, strange, or lewd! Speaking of which, Star Army has some hidden adult forums. If you are over 18 and are interested in access, ask me. You can also ask questions in the Setting Discussion forum.

Thanks again for joining Star Army.

 

[hyralt]

The most important things I remember from my first few days were:

1. Discord
2. Introductions forum
3. Introduction to the universe. I don't know if I found a great wiki page for this, but I wanted to get a general feel for the setting before diving into making a character or even Open RP.
4. An active Open RP thread. Joining the Open RP in the bar in Ternifac was really what hooked me.
5. Introduction to factions. I'd love this to be less important, but I spent a lot of time being confused about the factions when I joined. Honestly, I'm still confused about some factions.
6. Creating a character