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Encouraging people to write for the setting is good!

But bloating the article with contingencies for fringe cases is bad!

But maybe if we encouraged it more, the cases would be less fringe!

I dunno, maybe there's a compromise? Note that you don't have to write missions, and link to a FAQ entry: "What if I don't want to write missions, but I do want to write other PPC stuff?"

~Neshomeh

For those who haven't heard of that, it's basically a multiversal CYOA thing created by the /tg/ board of 4chan. To quote the subreddit:

Here's the set up: You are contacted by an omnipotent entity. a dangerously bored omnipotent entity. It sends you across the multiverse you go on adventures to keep it entertained. Every world you arrive in you must survive for 10 years by whatever means you see fit. From there you can go home, stay in your current world or move on to a new one.
You can keep your new abilities, gear, powers, friends, etc. from one adventure to the next. If you die, however, you are sent home immediately. You keep what you have so far, but your multiversal adventuring days are over.
The Goal? well the original goal was to reach a sufficient power level to survive in the most dangerous of universes (like dragon ball z, Warhammer 40k, etc). At that point the entity would grant you the 'Planeswalker spark' to let you freely travel the universe at your leisure... but to some, the journey itself is it's own reward.

Anyway, it turns out someone wrote up a setting sheet for the PPC. With apologies for the "screenshot of a wall of text" format, it appears that the original PDF has been eaten by Google Drive (Edit: Oh there's a reupload). I can't find it referenced anywhere on the Board, which I guess makes sense, as it doesn't quite fit the PPC's permission system.

Anyway this is... Interesting? I'm tagging this as a plug, but I'm not sure how to feel about this. Apparently, there have been a few chains involving the PPC already, though it's hard to search the saved writeups for them.

Further edit: It's not explicit in the document, but if you actually try and stat out a character in this, it appears that you typically start out with an initial pool of 1,000 Choice Points (the thing consumed by perks and given by drawbacks).

On-site Reading to include the Guides/FAQs:

• FAQ: For Newbies
• Guide to the PPC
• Mission Writing Guide
• Slash-Sporking Guide

Off-site Reading to be something like:

• [The Original Series.] This is, in fact, mandatory. It's the foundation of our canon!
• An [[OFU]] or two, such as the [[Official Fanfiction University of Middle-earth]] (the original OFU!) or the [[Hogwarts Fanfiction Academy]].
• Several different spin-offs in the department(s) you want to write about. The [[Complete List of PPC Fiction]], the [[Killed Badfic]] lists, and the various [[Continuum]] pages are good places to look for some that tickle your fancy.
• Some stories about [[events]] in PPC history.

~Neshomeh

... because in the game, Terraria characters can get pretty absurdly OP.))

((It just sounds like having canon powers, being from World One, and coming from a fiction you wrote yourself. They wouldn't be gone.))

((If Deirdre coming from an original world would disappear, then so would... uh, every one of my agents except Kittyauthor and Paye. And they are still alive, so Deirdre should be fine also.))

((-kA))

AKA about as mess-free and stupid of a solution as could be :) /joking.

They aren't from badfic, so it makes sense that they don't disappear (which, very small side note: What happens to goodfic that had Sues getting defeated? I need to figure that out.), but, in my mind, it wouldn't make sense for their species to disappear. It would be like the death of a parent rather than the ret-gone (is that the right term?) of a person... similar to deleting a Sim without said Sim memories being deleted.

The species won't disappear unless it is Suvian in nature (like, a Sue was the last woodelf on Middle Earth, gets recruited, has a half woodelf child), then that part would probably revert to human.

Additional thing: What happens to canon Sues? David, do you even think before you speak? You could've shpxed up several canons.

Actually...

O'Ryan looked through his bookshelf for a book. He was bored; might as well brush up on his canons.

"Hmm, da-da, nah, not Animal Farm. Is there badfic in AF? Maybe. Da-daaa- wait." His hand hovered. "Where the uryy did all of my House of Night books go?"

"Why are you cursing in rot?" Kitty mumbled, stretching out on her bed.

"My House of Night series is gone," O'Ryan muttered. "It was cool, too! I had gotten some material to bind old books in their canon materials, so I bound them all in sone black fabric from the vampire school." He crossed his arms. "And now they're gone!"

"Well, I still have my copy of Marked," Kitty said, grabbing the book. She opened to the first page.

Instead of blankness greeting her, big, angry red letters spelled out HAS NO ATTACHED UNIVERSE.

"Huh," she replied. "I guess that sort of thing happens." She looked up from the book. "I guess that universe is now gone."

"Which explains the lack of fabric," O'Ryan muttered. "Well shpx."

Whelp, HoN is gone, as well as series with canon Sues in the front (Twilight, the whole Eragon series...). I guess that happens when you wish away all Sues.

-kA

Deirdre's world is hardly described at all, I just realized. I should do something about that.

Wait, would Boadicea, a Terrarian agent who I haven't really done anything with besides RP on the Discord, disappear as well? She does, ah, have powers on account of being from Terraria, i.e. not staying dead if she gets killed, a small hammerspace inventory (or maybe just a large backpack, I'm not sure), and she probably heals faster than a normal human. Come to that, I'm not sure she is human. I am trying to write her as non-Sueishly as possible. I don't really have everything planned out for her backstory, but it's something like this.

After Seth, the Guide, dies and she fights and kills Wall of Flesh, she starts climbing back up to the surface. On the way up through the caves, she falls through a plothole into the PPC HQ. She wanders around, filching food from RCs and getting into a few fights with agents because of it, and eventually gets her own RC and partner and things go on from there. I haven't decided if she's going to meet Rebecca and Deirdre, though.))

having the alternate route of someone planning to worldbuild for the PPC submitting a pitch for what they plan to do makes sense to me. Something like:

Since Agent Hannah Rothberg works in the Arboretum, I would like to further develop the duties of Arboretum workers, including the odd encounters they run into during daily perimeter walks, outreach talks with the students of Digory Kirke and Paul Atreides, and reminding retired agents like Dafydd Illian why planting too many mellyrn could potentially disrupt the native ecosystem of New Caledonia.

Basically touch on main setting elements that might be covered in the writing, I suppose?

We do want to make sure to keep things simple, of course, so I could go either way on citing VM. But if prospies need it for affirmation that this place isn't just about sporking badfic, then it's a worthwhile addition.

Obviously, per the RP going down, Dafydd has vanished in a puff of harps, but what about his kids? They don't come from badfic themselves, so they shouldn't vanish - but they can't still have Evil Maglor as a parent. So do they suddenly turn full human? What if Constance had been from badfic as well?

And that's how far down the rabbit hole I fell before I decided to let Other Minds And Hands tackle this one. ^_^

hS

Is it a good idea, then, to explain that if you don't want to spork badfic but want to extend PPC stuff, you should write a paragraph or two of potentional plans/ideas for the PPC, or is that too daunting? What do you think we should include? Should VM be used as an example of "you don't have to spork?"

-kA, hopefully not being too pushy (and they are not angry, just interested in this conversation)

And yet ended up a PG, because they focused on infrastructure departments?

I was thinking more in the context of guides, but the TOS should be read before applying for Permission.

I think listing TOS would be redundant, but perhaps redundancy is needed for this sort of thing. TOS is our canon, so obviously the canon must be read to understand it, and since we require Permission to write fanfic of the canon, it makes sense to know the canon.

(Also, in terms of the original Permission article, shouldn't we archive it, like we archived the Original FAQ: For Other People?)

-kA

... I had "Wiki article to be rewritten by someone who is neither Nesh or hS". Because I know very well what we're both like, and it is long, detailed, and formal. ^_~

Because otherwise someone might not get the point! It's really, really hard to break myself of this habit, which is why I threw out a deliberately slender draft and will now go hands-off to let people make it better. :)

hS

I totally forgot that was part of the wiki, to be completely honest.

And I still say that we should include "assuming you plan to spork anything at all" to not discourage newbies, but that's more of a personal thing than anything. There could be some people that just want Permission to Setting-build. Perhaps, for those cases, a paragraph or two on what they plan for the setting? Maybe?

-kA

Shouldn't we have the Original Series under Recommended?

Small suggestion, instead of "PG are looked upon for their writing" maybe something like "are recognized for their writing and PPC knowledge"?

I think I've covered some of the same ground? Let's see...

• First mission: We do have a mission-writing guide. We could include a link to that.
• Betas: I think I addressed this.
• PGs: Well, I dunno about being known outside the community. My fics never get very many reviews grumblemuttter I'm not bitter you're bitter. But yeah, I added a bit about knowing the PPC universe.
• Parts of the PPC: covered with a link to PPC Story in the lede, I think. Could link it again, though.
• Parts of the PPC 2: I actually thought about amending it to say "assuming you plan to spork anything at all," but honestly I can't think of a time someone wanted Permission just to write for the setting, so it's probably fine.

Let me know if that works for you!

~Neshomeh

Respected sounds better, honestly, than "known for" lol.

And what would you put under "Guidance: Recommended Reading?" The slash-sporking guide?

Just curious.

-kA

It looks really good; however, I have a couple of things to note:

• "look for something that will make a good mission, and a good ''first'' mission (not always the same thing!)." Perhaps we should find a way to define this somewhat. Maybe make a seperate page: "What Makes a Good Mission?" and include a subheader with "What Makes a Good First Mission?" Or maybe add to the FAQ for Permission. I feel like this could be confusing.

• For "we encourage betas:" "We encourage someone from the PPC community to look over your writing sample or someone not you in general to catch errors in your writing sample." Or something to that effect.

• "PGs are long-time members of the community who are well-versed on the PPC canon and known for their writing skill, inside the community and out, so make the most of the feedback you get! It comes from the heart." (Bolded are my additions) Perhaps this works?

• "Once you've got Permission, you can go and write for whatever parts of the PPC you like, whether that be interludes, missions, AUs, or anything else not listed!" (bolded are my additions). Would this work?

• Also, if we're goimg to say "write whatever parts you want," shouldn't we amend a bit about the "first badfic your agents will take on?" Maybe "first badfic your agents plan to take on" or something to that effect?

I hope these suggestions are helpful?

-kA

You did a bunch of work for me! I respect the fact that you don't trust me to be both casual and brief. I don't entirely trust me with that, either. ^_~

Here's my revision, changes underlined:

Unlike some other collaborative universes you might have encountered, an author requires '''Permission''' to write [[PPC stories]]. This is so we can ensure that new stories are written well and in the spirit of the PPC.

The Permission process was started by Jay and Acacia, who asked people to email them before writing a spinoff; when Jay left, she passed the responsibility on to Miss Cam, GreyLadyBast, and Thalia Weaver, and the [[Permission Giver]]s faithfully carry the torch to this day.

== When can I get Permission? ==

There's no defined timeline for asking for Permission. You should wait until you understand how the PPC as a shared universe works, and until the community knows who you are. Some good markers to look for are:

• If asked, you could say who your favourite non-TOS agent is, and give a solid reason why.
• You've taken part in a range of different community activities on the Board or Chat, including joining discussions that aren't about your own plans for writing agents.
• You can get through the [Permission Self-Check] without too much trouble.
• You feel you have a friend or two in the community.
• {One last thing? No more than 5 points}

== How do I get Permission? ==

The Permission process isn't meant to be particularly difficult: all we really want is to check that you can write decently, that you're going to stick around, and that you understand what the PPC is all about. When you're ready (see above), start a thread on the Board and give us the following:

• Brief bios of your intended agents (200-400 words, give or take). These should be the agent team you're looking to use in your main series. See [[#Guidance: Profiles]] below for more on what we're after, but basically this is so we can check they're not blatant, canon-breaking Suvians or grimdark evil.
• The first badfic your agents will take on. Don't just pick the story you hate most in the world - look for something that will make a good mission, and a good ''first'' mission (not always the same thing!). Include a paragraph or two about why you picked it.
• A sample of your writing - at least 600 words - which you feel represents how you'd write for the PPC. It can be something you've already written, or new for the occasion. It doesn't need to be PPC-related, but can be: some people have used interludes, cowrites, RPs, or the intro to their planned first mission. Make it as long as you want, but be aware that Permission Givers are busy folks - they might not read past the first couple of pages. To make sure your sample is as good as possible, using a [[beta-reader]] is highly recommended. You can ask for one on the Board or in the Chat. Be sure to give credit to anyone who betas for you!

And that's it! A Permission Giver should be along fairly soon to check it out. They'll look at your agents, your writing (both SPaG/technical skill and how "PPC-ish" it feels), how well you fit into the community, and generally just whether you're prepared to contribute to the shared PPC universe we all love. Whether they grant Permission or tell you to do a bit more reading and writing practice first, they'll probably give you some [[concrit]] along with their decision. PGs are long-time members of the community who are {respected? acknowledged?} for their writing skill and understanding of the PPC universe, so make the most of the feedback you get! It comes from the heart.

And that's it! It's not much at all, really. You only need to get Permission once. When you have it, you can go and write for whatever parts of the PPC you like.

== Guidance: Profiles ==

{Basically the current Profiles FAQ.}

For the writing sample, if it's going to be one instead of two, I think the lower limit should be longer than the bios.

I don't know that we'll need other #Guidance bits? Like... I've glanced back and forth between this and the current article a few times, and the only thing I can think of is maybe Guidance: Recommended Reading?

~Neshomeh

Being an oldbie is as much an attitude as a number of years. If everything is all fresh and exciting and just a bit of a shock, you might be a newbie. If you've Been There, Done That, and Seen It All, you might be an oldbie. {= )

~Neshomeh