Your Fandom Weather Forecast for Monday, June 16, 2008

[idontlooktired.livejournal.com]

Ah, Madagascar. The weather today is partially cloudy with a chance of isolated thunderstorms in the afternoon. Highs of 75 (24c), lows of 67 (19c).

Sunrise: 6:12
Sunset: 17:15

The BDE and You: A User's Guide

[ismyhairout.livejournal.com]

Greetings and salutations, gremlins!

Next weekend (June 20-22) is our summer semester BDE! For those who haven't experienced a BDE before, that stands for Big Damn Event. It's an island-wide event that's pretty much impossible to ignore. We only do one per semester, and it's a great opportunity to get your characters out of their comfort zone and doing things they wouldn't normally think to do. Previous examples of BDEs include invasions (zombies, snow monsters, jello dragons), the plaaaaague and the angel statues from last semester.

This semester, there are a few different elements to the BDE and we'll be trying to incorporate all kinds of characters like last time, but hopefully in a simplified form over a weekend instead of a week. Interested? Couldn't care less? Either way, read on!

A few different things will be happening this weekend, but it all comes down to one thing. Or person, if you want to call him that. In an attempt to not have to go back to Tartarus, our very own Vice Principal Hades will be trying to take over Fandom in order to make it the new Underworld. He loves the island, not so much the people, so they simply have to go.

THURSDAY
On Thursday, the barrier between Fandom and the Underworld will be wearing thin and spirits will be floating through to the surface and will be flittering around Fandom. In an effort not to mod anyone's afterlife, these spirits will be non-descript and not actually anyone that anyone here knows. That said, in their ghostly and gaunt form, they will be available for interaction and freaking people out. The catch is that anyone who makes physical contact with them will lose all their strength and their life force will start fading. Don't worry, it's only permanent with prolonged contact. On Thursday, only a few of the first ghosts will appear.

FRIDAY
Come Friday, the place will be littered with spirits. Your characters are going to have to dodge every now and then in order to avoid walking through them all the time. Luckily, the dorms are a safe place and if you don't want to deal with the ghosts, don't go outside. Everywhere else on the island is free game for the ghosties to appear, even in classes if the teacher so decides. Anyone who feels like having their character be suspicious about the ghosts, wanting to figure out their reason for being here or just wanting to be ghostbusters are more than welcome to do so. They're not malicious though. They're just poor trapped souls who don't know what to do with themselves. Hades will mostly be hiding out through this time.

SATURDAY
Hades? Not so much with the hiding. The barrier between the Underworld and Fandom will be open in explodey spectacular fashion. On Saturday morning he's going to announce his plans in grand old fashion, declare himself grand pooba of Fandom and give everyone one chance to get off the island before he starts letting loose bad things on everyone. This will give your character one last chance to get going somewhere safe if you'd rather not participate. Saturday will then involve the splitting of everyone into their usual groups - fighters (who will be taking on some Greek mythological beasties), researchers (to the library, Batman!) and victims (who will be captured by Pain and Panic, Hades' demonic minions). More on that right now.

THE GROUPS
Fighters will have the opportunity to slash and hack and explode things until your heart's content. There will be any number of mythological creatures wanting to tear your heads off, so feel free to get in on the action. You don't need to sign up to be a fighter. Just go for it when the posts go up. Keep in mind that being out fighting will also involve dodging the ghosts, because they'll still be around unintentionally causing trouble and their numbers will be many, so the fight won't be all that easy.

Researchers will be doing the library research thing on gods and how the heck to defeat them. The problem is that Hades is immortal and nigh-invincible and can't get his butt kicked using conventional means. The researchers are more than welcome to think up a bunch of different ways to try to defeat Hades (or even some of the mythological creatures to cut down numbers there). The solution will involve trekking to Mount Olympus to get an artefact (or several different pieces of it) that will remove Hades' immortality, leaving him open to regular attacks. No need to sign up for researching, just show up as you know how.

Victims will be those who get rounded up by Hades' minions and trapped in good ol' Tartarus (now connected to Fandom). Those who sign up for this (and sign ups are essential so we can plan on having enough NPC attention for you) will be treated to a little bit of mental mindfrakkery in the form of having to live through scenarios involving their worst fears. I freely admit to swiping this partially from Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. Go with what works, right? Victims will be taken (either with or without a struggle depending on your choice) on Saturday morning and will stay as victims until the Sunday finale.

Away Team members will be those people wanting to go and face some ordeals on Mount Olympus. Similar to the away teams during the last BDE, they'll face a few trials and get their piece of the artefact identified by the researchers and then bring it home to unite the pieces and make Hades very annoyed. Also, vincible. The number of pieces required for the artefact will depend on how many people sign up for teams. If you sign up, we'll throw you into a team and send you off on your journey on Saturday night. Due to the Greek godly nature of Mount Olympus, transportation will only take you so far, so it's going to take until Sunday morning to get to the top where the ordeals will begin. The action will primarily take place on Sunday.

SUNDAY
So after a night of trying not to get the life sucked out of you by ghosts and not getting eaten by the remaining mythological beasties, Sunday will come. The victims will still be off being mentally screwed with. The researchers will have found their target but will still be trying to figure out ways to close the rift between the Underworld and Fandom (and means of helping the fighters take on the mythological creatures). The fighters can keep on doing their thing, but will also find out where the victims are being kept and will form a party to go and rescue them in the bowels of the Greek Underworld.

There will also be attempts to break into Hades' newly formed headquarters. This will lead to one-on-one fights with Hades (and getting your butt kicked by a Greek god) for anyone who wants one. You will get sorely beaten up, but Hades won't kill because he likes playing with his food/toys too much.

The victims will be rescued and the mythological creatures will largely be defeated.

The away team folks will return late Sunday afternoon with the pieces of the artefact. When the pieces are united, Hades will lose his godly shine and the finale team will be able to beat him to a pulp and get rid of him. They will then close the rift between the Underworld and Fandom, sucking all of the poor souls back to where they're supposed to be.

It's going to be a big weekend.

Let's move to the OCD, shall we?

NB: If you sign up for anything below, please read all of the requirements so you know what you're getting yourself into. Some groups can't double up. We've tried to let you know what availability you'll need for different things and what will be involved. Try not to take on too much if you have multiple characters as you will need to pay attention to the threads you're in to be fair to the other people involved and so as not to hold things up. You don't need to sign up to be a regular fighter or researcher, come and go as you please with that. If you sign up for anything and we need to limit numbers on a particular group, we'll let you know by Thursday if we have to drop you from that group.