You head out from the Conference, matches arranged, and betting slips in hand. You've made agreements, maybe lied a few times, maybe made some unexpected gains, but now to consolidate it into action: what exactly are your plans for the next three weeks?
Between each session of Ultimate Monster Battle Arena is three IC weeks worth of downtime. This is the time between the regularly scheduled League Conferences throughout Season XXXVI. During this time, players can communicate via e-mail and take actions as conveyed to the GM team through a turnsheet.
We are running an in-character email system for this game. This represents written letters and side-conversations just at the end of the League Conference. Email addresses will be based off the character names e.g. rage@umba.chaosdeathfish.com, and can be found in each character's public bio on the characters page. GMs are copied into all IC emails as well, so as to keep track of plans and developing themes in the game. OC email addresses are never displayed, though OC names will be by the nature of the email system.
At the bottom of your user page should be a series of red links, named 'Turnsheet #'. These link to pages that don't exist yet, so when you are ready to begin writing up your actions, click on the link for that week and then click the “pencil and plus sign” icon on the right hand toolbar to get started. Hovering over it will bring up the “Create this page” dialog.
Once created, the Turnsheet page will have a handy dandy template to save you time and to allow your GM easy reading. You don’t have to stick to it 100%, but similar layouts allows us to quickly and easily see what you are attempting to do with your time.
Once you are happy with your turnsheet, click the save button in the bottom left and BAM - one turnsheet that both you and all the GMs can see. It’s worthwhile doing a quick preview before saving, to check that everything reads how you want it to, but don’t forget to then save. Please do not delete the pre-existing formatting, particularly the tags at the bottom of the page!
You can continue to edit your turnsheet until the deadline (midnight between Thursday and Friday) as nothing will be taken as final by the GMs until that point.
In Ultimate Monster Battle Arena players will be able to take up to three major actions as well as some minor actions over the course of the three weeks.
A major action is something that it would take your character significant time and effort to accomplish. Examples include:
Actions would roughly account for 1 week of in-game time (though this is a guide, not a rule). Your actions should each include an overarching goal of what you want to achieve, a plan of how you intend to achieve it, and a note of what Skills and traits you think might be useful to, or affect the action. Be sure to note other PCs or NPCs who are involved in your action in the relevant section of the template too!
Try an be as concise as possible when writing your plans. Don’t try to achieve too much with one action (a goal such as “find and capture a Monster” is one action, “find, capture, study and train a Monster” is two or three) and remember that longer plans don’t always mean better plans. Breaking a bigger plan into two actions may make it easier for you to achieve the results you want.
If in doubt, ask. Please do contact the GMs and we will do our best to help with any action or Skill based queries you may have.
A minor action is something that takes little time or effort to do, and doesn't advance the plot significantly. Examples include:
You can have as many minor actions as you want within reason, but they should each be limited to one or two sentences of description. The GMs reserve the right to ignore minor actions if they become too numerous / significant.
If your minor action is to accompany other players on their major actions (e.g. “I join the expedition to search for the Abominable Snowman”), you will not be very useful to the action (i.e. your Skills will not be taken into consideration), and will not get any personal benefit from the action. If the action would require significant time or effort just to tag along, the GMs reserve the right to say your character is too busy to attend.
If you are giving an item to another player please note this in your minor actions, even if the actual passing over of the items happens in session, in emails, or in another major action. This makes it much easier for us to keep track of who has what. It can be helpful to list any items you are expecting to receive, but if you put it in your turnsheet and the sender does not turnsheet to give the item to you, the response will likely be along the lines of “You wait patiently, but Mario never arrives with your princess”.
In Ultimate Monster Battle Arena you character will automatically advance at the end of each turn, meaning that they gain a new Skill. The Skill you intend to pick should be noted on your turnsheet where there will be a space for this. See Character Advancement for more details.
The deadline for turnsheets is midnight between the Thursday and Friday after session. This is a strict deadline as the GM team need time to read through and prepare in advance for our meeting on Sunday. This is also to benefit you as it’s really not fair to be kept up waiting for that crucial plan defining e-mail until 3am in the morning. We do know life gets in the way sometimes and late turnsheets do happen, but please do let us know so we can accommodate it into our plans and we reserve the right to be grumpy should it become a regular occurrence or you fail to let us know.
We will aim to get a response to your turnsheet to you on Monday before each session. These responses will be added to the end of your submitted turnsheet on the wiki. Your GM will email you when they have completed your turnsheet response, but it's worth checking your turnsheet to be sure. If you have any questions about your turnsheet response, contact your GM before the start of the session and we'll try to clear everything up.