Why? What is a report going to do for me? - First and foremost these are wholly optional. These are not to gain RPP or required for such, nor have any weight on RPP growth whatsoever. Character reports facilitate communication in two ways. It allows staff to be kept apprised of a character's doings, thoughts, goals, etc. that they may not otherwise be aware of due to not being able to watch every character at all hours. It allows players to witness the evolution of their character and keep a thorough history of their doings, should they desire this.
When should I post a report? - Reports should be posted on Sundays.
How long should I wait on a report before sending in a petition or a support ticket about not hearing back? - We can take up to a week to respond to your report due sometimes having to talk amongst ourselves or do research on your plots and questions. Please do not send in petitions about your report. If your report has taken over a week, a support ticket is much more helpful than a petition. Also please keep in mind, if you have no questions in your report, we are not going to respond to it. We will read it, though. So if you do not have questions, please do not drag some questions into being that need not to be with the fear that without them we won't be reading your report. We will read it, I promise. The moment we log into the ports we will get alerted that your report is there and we'll be reading them.
How? How do I submit a report? - Send an email to playerreports (at) middle-earth.us. This will open a ticket in our support system and we'll respond back if needed.
Your report should follow the template below:
Clan:
Rank:
Current Plots:
IC Goals:
IC Questions:
OOC Goals:
OOC Questions:
Let me break this down:
Clan: This is the clan you are in. If you are not in a clan, put NONE.
Rank: This is the rank you are, or the job you have, in said clan. If none, put NONE.
Current Plots: This is for a brief synopsis of the plots your PC is currently involved in. This is not for future plots, this is not for plots you want. This is about what your PC is doing or involved in. This should be no more than four lines.
IC Goals: This is for a brief list of goals that your character has right now, or is involved in. This should be no more than four lines long and be clear and concise.
IC Questions: This is generally for characters in a clan handled by an NPC. If there is an active character above your current rank-wise or job-wise that can facilitate the answering of your character's question please seek them first. There should be no more than four questions and no more than four lines.
OOC Goals: This is for the goals in which you have for your character. This should be no more than four lines.
OOC Questions: This is for general questions that do not require a support ticket. If it is about a bug, craft, typo, skill-change, stats, skills, game syntax, game mechanics, forum issues, website issues, player complaint, staff complaint, ideas for the game, etc. it should be done in a support ticket. This should never be more than four questions and is for very general questions that pertain to your character on an OOC level.
Let us see this in action.
Clan: Artisan Union
Rank: Inventory Clerk
Current Plots:
Selling information on his boss to a couple of his boss' adversaries against his better judgment and is ashamed about it.
Working tirelessly, and failing miserably at it, to get Ros to notice him at the Inn.
Sliding extra materials off the barge when the Masters aren't looking and blaming it on dock thieves when stopped at Laketown.
Concealing the fact he has a barren wife in Laketown while visiting Ros in Utterby, thinks he's slick about it.
IC Goals:
Win Ros.
Make more money.
Open up a smithy.
Never again see the she-beast he's married to.
IC Questions:
What would the Masters do if they found out Bernard was stealing?
Master Galen keeps telling Bernard to do his bidding even though he works for Master Balen and its confusing Bernard and getting him into trouble, what should he do?
Who would Bernard seek out in the AU if he wanted to express his want of a smithy?
What is the actual law on philandering with a bar-maid while married to a barren woman?
OOC Goals:
Make a memorable character.
See Bernard find happiness with a woman and a shop.
Not die in the second day of playing.
Explore Laketown and learn how best to play in it.
OOC Questions:
Is it plausible that Bernard could open a smithy when there is already two smithies in town?
Bernard is madly crushing on Ros at the Inn, would it be possible to get an animation with her sometime so she can break his heart and he can move on?
My last report had a response that said I had to seek out Master Balen but I haven't seen him online and I sent Hobbitmails without a response for the last week, what should I do now?
I will be MIA starting next week for three weeks due to RL, would it be okay if I played it off that Bernard went to Bree?
What should be in my report? - Clear, concise information. This is for staff to better know your doings as a character and a player with said character and for you to keep historical documentation on your character's growth if you so choose. We know that you love to write, as much as we do, but we also need to make sure our time is also spread evenly elsewhere with the game so keep things short and sweet.
What should not be in my report? - Who you or your character don't like unless it is pertaining specifically to a plot Anything that should be in a support ticket. You are welcome to document 'personas' in your journals as you please to keep yourself apprised of enemies, slights towards your character, how such things grow, etc. but please do not include these in your reports. You can use journals for a lot of things! Please do not use your report as a ledger for sales, withdrawals, deposits, or contracts, either. For most clans there are in-game boards that facilitate this information to get to your clan leads.
How will staff respond to my reports? - We can do this a few different ways and likely will, so there is no set-in-stone way to answer this. We might meet your queries ICly with an animation or we might just hash out the details in the closing of your ticket. How we handle your report is wholly dependent on the situation. The goal is to address what we can address in a ticket response so that you and all of staff can be kept apprised of responses and solutions.