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Contents
* Introduction to the Hive
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* How the Hive Game is Run
. . . .Roleplay
. . . .Government
. . . .Strategy
Introduction to the Hive
Incomplete
How the Hive Game is Run
The Hive is a very active faction, both in strategy and in roleplay. In a roleplay sense we have a very structured government. However, this does not translate to how the faction is actually run and our greatest weakness is in coordination.
Roleplay
The majority of the hive's members spend most of their time engaged in roleplay. The main projects underway are the roleplay story, one sentence story and the newspaper Pravda. The emphasis for both of these is to have fun rather than producing high quality writing. We believe that setting harsh criteria for submitted writing would be detrimental to number of people able to participate.
The one sentence story and Pravda are mainly places to exercise a sense of humour, although several serious articles have been submitted to Pravda. For a new member that wishes to not get deeply involved, the one sentence story is an ideal place to post every now and again. At present there is no official Pravda editor, which has lead to recent declines in the release rate of new Pravda editions. So if a new member enjoys writing and compiling newspapers the position is currently open.
The roleplaying stories are generally serious in nature and there is an unspoken understanding we won't insert silly jokes. Each person is allowed to create as many of his or her own characters as required and can add in their own thread to the story as long as it does not purposefully contradict what has already happened. Plot twists and future plot plans are usually discussed in the story discussion thread. There is no one person organising the direction the story is taking rather it's a group effort. Characters phase in and out of the story depending on whether their writers are busy or not. This allows for high flexibility in participation.
A new project was suggested that involved an interfaction roleplaying story. The idea was to spread some of our roleplaying to other factions and allow them to participate via private messages. The idea was the plot line would be interesting to other factions as factions would only be given some of the details and they would have to interact and make decisions to find out what is going on. However, someone with some free time is needed to organise this project and provide some of the writing.
Government
While our decision making process isn't highly structured we are satisfied with the results. The focus is mainly on decisions made early or fast. Decisions of minor importance are generally made among whoever is available. Generally this is vote among 2-4 people.
More important decisions have information threads posted and members are requested to give their opinions. If there appears to be some disagreement with the chosen course of action, members that haven't responded are contacted for their opinion too. A poll is then made together with an information post that states all the ideas and opinions that have been gathered from the forum and from MSN conversations between the members. When there is a deadlock between opinions and it becomes clear that further discourse is unlikely to break the deadlock. Then the chairman is asked to make a veto decision.
Information on the precise moves is posted before the turn. Usually the precise moves are ready several days before the turn arrives. This allows for problems to be found by members, and allows further optimisations to occur. Rough moves are usually planned 5 turns into the future, and the effects are predicted 10 turns into the future.
When the move arrives the turn player plays the turn while accompanied by at least one other member on MSN. New developments are discussed and any issues caused by other factions or random events are resolved between the people present.
After the turn has been completed the turn chat, details of new developments and a screenshot of the current state of the game are posted.
The main problem with this decision making process is it allows for members to get away with not contributing to the decision making process. This results in the less than critical decisions getting little or no input, as everyone expects someone else to help make the mundane decisions.
Strategy
While the hive actually lacks in experience compared to the other factions the members have made up for this deficiency in other ways. Large amounts of time are spent researching new ideas and precision in every single turn is paramount.
Consequently, a new member can contribute more as all ideas are considered important. Also a new member can learn more as when a new idea pans out it is explained in depth to the other members.
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