Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
So, give me the basics. The cliches. Why are the characters trapped in the Netherworld?
Overlord Baal is a kleptomaniac and stole everyone. They should wake up somwhere in the Netherworld (feel free to place them in a dangerous position) with no idea what happened. They are, however, free enough to leave.
...Oh. So. Wouldn't everyone just leave? Where's the RP?
Well, the Dimensional Gate is broken.
...What.
You heard me. It'll take months to fix that mother, given demon labor.
Okay, alright, but suppose it gets fixed, then all the characters leave?
After that, odds are the Dimensional Gatekeeper, the only one who can operate the Gate, will be on vacation. For a long, long time.
...And after that.
Sick.
Right. Okay. But even if it takes years, the stupid Gatekeeper should eventually be back to work, right?
The Dimensional Gatekeeper of this Netherworld is a fairly typical demon and will almost never show up for work. When she does, she'll likely hit characters with a muddy mess of paperwork to fill out for clearance to use the gate. You'll have to know the exact dimensional coordinates of your home. If you make a mistake anywhere, odds are she'll warp you to somewhere else in the same Netherworld. Somewhere exotic and likely dangerous.
...
...
Okay, okay. What's with the demons?
Demons are, despite the sounds of things, not all that bad. At least, not most of them. Think of the apparent fixation on evil as... culture shock. For the average citizen of the Netherworld, their evildoing hurts few if any people, and usually not much at that. Think of it this way: Ding Dong Ditch is a professional sport in the Netherworld.
Don't think that means you can take them too lightly, though. You still run a high risk of being robbed blind, mortally wounded or otherwise by being around this crowd. And there are always some demons who are very legitimately evil.
I am playing [Superman/Goku/Hercules/a deity/a genie/an adorable little girl with invincible psychic powers.] My character can totally beat the crap out of the NPCs, right?
Considering the Netherworld setting itself is known for Overlords occasionally destroying planets by complete accident, we've put a lot of thought into evening out the power scale for the PCs. Characters can train under both powerful Netherworld natives and each other at the school if they want to fight but are obviously, blatantly not capable of beating people who create giant explosions with their bare hands.
The root of the power curve, however, is EXP! Used as a reward for various behaviors and obtainable anytime via the Cave of Ordeals or by acquiring Felonies. You can use EXP to decide fights between player characters if both players really want, but you might want to make that more of a judgment call and save EXP for a tiebreaker. Likewise, if you feel that a character should remain incredibly weak regardless of how much EXP they have, just let the mods know before it comes up--but a PC warrior's ability to defeat the NPCs is directly related to EXP.
For the most part, the amount necessary to overpower different NPCs will be kept secret until someone actually does it. If you want to stir up some anarchy, there's gonna be an element of risk involved. Just rest assured, the Demonic Devas will require a ridiculously high amount. And there are rumors that Baal himself has infinite EXP...
So, what, this is some kind of crack action RP? I guess I'll just take my profound, psychologically deep bookworm character and leave.
No, no. There should be no pressure for every character to be able to fight. The Netherworld can be a very violent place, but like we said, the majority of demons are harmless, and there should always be more focus on character interaction than on fight logs. Likewise, don't think the RP being zany means plot and characterization are out the window. A major charm of the games it's based on is the ability to balance comedy and genre subversion with nuanced, moving character development. In a perfect world, we'd like to see the Netherworld as a whole pull that off too.
Since the characters are all in the Netherworld, shouldn't there be eternal suffering and a bunch of dead people?
No no no no. The Netherworld is just where demons live, not Hell.
Unless you're a Prinny.
I want to be a Prinny. Can I be a Prinny?
We just said it was Hell for--well, whatever.
Being the Netherworld, characters can appear as Prinnies. Meaning, you can play Prinny versions of characters. However, they need to fit the prerequisites for becoming Prinnies: Being dead and having committed grave sins in life. The characters don't need to be necessarily evil to become Prinnies: if they commit suicide or sacrifice themselves, then they would definitely become Prinnies, even if it had been for a good cause. So characters able to become Prinnies would range from Disney villains to people who killed themselves to save their families/world/whatever.
So, if someone apps a Prinny version of, say, Darth Vader, I could play the non-Prinny version?
No. Prinny or not, it is still that character, so it would be no different than playing the same character from two different time periods, which we do not allow.
What about characters that exist in completely different worlds, like FF7 Cloud Strife and Kingdom Hearts Cloud Strife? Or two characters that are basically the same character but not, such as Ocarina of Time Zelda and Twilight Princess Zelda?
Since in both situations they are completely different characters--in the first example, they live in completely different universes and, in the second, one is a descendant of the other and not the same person--it would be allowed. We would strongly suggest contacting the current player of a character before apping another version of the character, however.
Say, what counts as fictional anyway? Could I play, say, Stephen Colbert's ultraconservative persona? The movie version of a historical figure? Jesus?
Let's... say this is on a case-by-case basis. The first example would probably be a resounding yes, but you could push the boundaries of some nasty controversy with this.
So how do the journals work? Is there more of a focus on journal format or logs?
While there is a log comm, the majority of the focus should be on first person "journal format," for which I use quotation marks becase there are no journals! Most RPs use a PDA or an actual book journal with options for text, voice posts, video posts, etc.; we say 99% of the reason this format is so widely used is that it's easier and faster than prose, and the rules of what could semi-realistically be written in a journal are followed with incredible infrequency in most games.
Therefore, there is no journal system. If the logistics ever become inconvenient, Netherworld philosophy is to totally ignore them and keep playing. No need to specify "action post" or "voice post;" if you actually need the character to write something, feel free to specify instead that they wrote a note for someone or a flyer posted somewhere for everyone. Private posts and Filters can be hackable or unhackable as you please; they'll usually be just private conversations, or characters talking to themselves, or internal monologues.
If you're asking about how the format works, just think of it as first-person, unquoted dialogue. You're free to do as much as you want with action in posts via asterisks, brackets or other obvious denotations, e.g.: *opens door*. Strikeout is generally easily hackable but may be used for unspoken thought.
Housing?
See the Overlord's Castle. Baal's castle is ridiculously huge; there are mass numbers of guest bedrooms that... well, nobody will really care if you come and go. Room assignments will be randomized, but feel free to move and change roommates and what-have-you, as long as you can get the Dark Assembly's permission.
So what about jobs, a money system, and schooling?
We have come with much deliberation to the conclusion that keeping track of money in an RP would be a bitch for the mods. We will say that the currency is Hel, or HL. There is no exchange rate to US dollars or anything, because that'd be confusing. Keep track of it yourself or don't; either way, if you want to spend money, keep it reasonable. There's no need to keep track or report your finances to the mods, so by all means, cheat the system--that's just the Netherworld spirit.
That said, there are job openings with salaries listed, mostly as vassals of the Overlord, and there is a school. Actually doing your duties is a suggestion at best, and attending school is outright discouraged; see the School Post for details and the Jobs post for a list of available positions.
Healing of injured characters? Character death? Characters who are already dead in canon (but I don't want to make them a Prinny)?
These problems are solved quite elegantly by the Hospital! They can easily heal anything for a fee. Characters who get injured frequently will receive fabulous prizes for their continued business.
As for death, that won't usually be possible. Fatal injuries will just... not quite kill characters! It's magic. If you prefer things to make a tiny amount of sense, try to avoid wounds that are blatantly, inarguably lethal.
So what the hell is the Dark Assembly?
All information should be in the links in the profile.
Are fan-AU versions of canon characters al--
No.
Original characters...?
No.
How does constructive criticism work?
Comments for the mods or about rulebreaking can be left screened and completely anonymously at the complaint department. All players are encouraged (by an EXP incentive) to comment asking for criticism at regular HMDs in thenetherregion.
It seems the line between IC and OoC can be blurred pretty easily, what with how not even mod NPCs will be respecting the fourth wall. Isn't that potentially wanky?
The first thing to do is to seriously reassure you: that line won't be blurred to single people out or embarass them. Anything that happens to your character in the Netherworld because of the Netherworld is going to be intended to be funny, and nothing but. By all means, don't OoCly cease behavior that's not working out well IC, and don't go out of your way to avoid it, either. The Netherworld is anarchic IC and the consequences of actions tend to be light. Just relax, don't read too much into things, and have fun. People starting wank will be mauled by starved Baciels, after all.
If things are that chaotic, just what are the characters supposed to do in the Netherworld?
Eat, drink, stab people in the back, be merry, be stabbed in the back, level grind, whatever you can think of. Again, there are few if any IC rules, and hopefully not too many OoC ones. Cheating is encouraged IC and, well, OoC... maybe you, and your character, will fit right in. Just ask yourself one thing.
Do you really want to fit in here?
So, give me the basics. The cliches. Why are the characters trapped in the Netherworld?
Overlord Baal is a kleptomaniac and stole everyone. They should wake up somwhere in the Netherworld (feel free to place them in a dangerous position) with no idea what happened. They are, however, free enough to leave.
...Oh. So. Wouldn't everyone just leave? Where's the RP?
Well, the Dimensional Gate is broken.
...What.
You heard me. It'll take months to fix that mother, given demon labor.
Okay, alright, but suppose it gets fixed, then all the characters leave?
After that, odds are the Dimensional Gatekeeper, the only one who can operate the Gate, will be on vacation. For a long, long time.
...And after that.
Sick.
Right. Okay. But even if it takes years, the stupid Gatekeeper should eventually be back to work, right?
The Dimensional Gatekeeper of this Netherworld is a fairly typical demon and will almost never show up for work. When she does, she'll likely hit characters with a muddy mess of paperwork to fill out for clearance to use the gate. You'll have to know the exact dimensional coordinates of your home. If you make a mistake anywhere, odds are she'll warp you to somewhere else in the same Netherworld. Somewhere exotic and likely dangerous.
...
...
Okay, okay. What's with the demons?
Demons are, despite the sounds of things, not all that bad. At least, not most of them. Think of the apparent fixation on evil as... culture shock. For the average citizen of the Netherworld, their evildoing hurts few if any people, and usually not much at that. Think of it this way: Ding Dong Ditch is a professional sport in the Netherworld.
Don't think that means you can take them too lightly, though. You still run a high risk of being robbed blind, mortally wounded or otherwise by being around this crowd. And there are always some demons who are very legitimately evil.
I am playing [Superman/Goku/Hercules/a deity/a genie/an adorable little girl with invincible psychic powers.] My character can totally beat the crap out of the NPCs, right?
Considering the Netherworld setting itself is known for Overlords occasionally destroying planets by complete accident, we've put a lot of thought into evening out the power scale for the PCs. Characters can train under both powerful Netherworld natives and each other at the school if they want to fight but are obviously, blatantly not capable of beating people who create giant explosions with their bare hands.
The root of the power curve, however, is EXP! Used as a reward for various behaviors and obtainable anytime via the Cave of Ordeals or by acquiring Felonies. You can use EXP to decide fights between player characters if both players really want, but you might want to make that more of a judgment call and save EXP for a tiebreaker. Likewise, if you feel that a character should remain incredibly weak regardless of how much EXP they have, just let the mods know before it comes up--but a PC warrior's ability to defeat the NPCs is directly related to EXP.
For the most part, the amount necessary to overpower different NPCs will be kept secret until someone actually does it. If you want to stir up some anarchy, there's gonna be an element of risk involved. Just rest assured, the Demonic Devas will require a ridiculously high amount. And there are rumors that Baal himself has infinite EXP...
So, what, this is some kind of crack action RP? I guess I'll just take my profound, psychologically deep bookworm character and leave.
No, no. There should be no pressure for every character to be able to fight. The Netherworld can be a very violent place, but like we said, the majority of demons are harmless, and there should always be more focus on character interaction than on fight logs. Likewise, don't think the RP being zany means plot and characterization are out the window. A major charm of the games it's based on is the ability to balance comedy and genre subversion with nuanced, moving character development. In a perfect world, we'd like to see the Netherworld as a whole pull that off too.
Since the characters are all in the Netherworld, shouldn't there be eternal suffering and a bunch of dead people?
No no no no. The Netherworld is just where demons live, not Hell.
Unless you're a Prinny.
I want to be a Prinny. Can I be a Prinny?
We just said it was Hell for--well, whatever.
Being the Netherworld, characters can appear as Prinnies. Meaning, you can play Prinny versions of characters. However, they need to fit the prerequisites for becoming Prinnies: Being dead and having committed grave sins in life. The characters don't need to be necessarily evil to become Prinnies: if they commit suicide or sacrifice themselves, then they would definitely become Prinnies, even if it had been for a good cause. So characters able to become Prinnies would range from Disney villains to people who killed themselves to save their families/world/whatever.
So, if someone apps a Prinny version of, say, Darth Vader, I could play the non-Prinny version?
No. Prinny or not, it is still that character, so it would be no different than playing the same character from two different time periods, which we do not allow.
What about characters that exist in completely different worlds, like FF7 Cloud Strife and Kingdom Hearts Cloud Strife? Or two characters that are basically the same character but not, such as Ocarina of Time Zelda and Twilight Princess Zelda?
Since in both situations they are completely different characters--in the first example, they live in completely different universes and, in the second, one is a descendant of the other and not the same person--it would be allowed. We would strongly suggest contacting the current player of a character before apping another version of the character, however.
Say, what counts as fictional anyway? Could I play, say, Stephen Colbert's ultraconservative persona? The movie version of a historical figure? Jesus?
Let's... say this is on a case-by-case basis. The first example would probably be a resounding yes, but you could push the boundaries of some nasty controversy with this.
So how do the journals work? Is there more of a focus on journal format or logs?
While there is a log comm, the majority of the focus should be on first person "journal format," for which I use quotation marks becase there are no journals! Most RPs use a PDA or an actual book journal with options for text, voice posts, video posts, etc.; we say 99% of the reason this format is so widely used is that it's easier and faster than prose, and the rules of what could semi-realistically be written in a journal are followed with incredible infrequency in most games.
Therefore, there is no journal system. If the logistics ever become inconvenient, Netherworld philosophy is to totally ignore them and keep playing. No need to specify "action post" or "voice post;" if you actually need the character to write something, feel free to specify instead that they wrote a note for someone or a flyer posted somewhere for everyone. Private posts and Filters can be hackable or unhackable as you please; they'll usually be just private conversations, or characters talking to themselves, or internal monologues.
If you're asking about how the format works, just think of it as first-person, unquoted dialogue. You're free to do as much as you want with action in posts via asterisks, brackets or other obvious denotations, e.g.: *opens door*. Strikeout is generally easily hackable but may be used for unspoken thought.
Housing?
See the Overlord's Castle. Baal's castle is ridiculously huge; there are mass numbers of guest bedrooms that... well, nobody will really care if you come and go. Room assignments will be randomized, but feel free to move and change roommates and what-have-you, as long as you can get the Dark Assembly's permission.
So what about jobs, a money system, and schooling?
We have come with much deliberation to the conclusion that keeping track of money in an RP would be a bitch for the mods. We will say that the currency is Hel, or HL. There is no exchange rate to US dollars or anything, because that'd be confusing. Keep track of it yourself or don't; either way, if you want to spend money, keep it reasonable. There's no need to keep track or report your finances to the mods, so by all means, cheat the system--that's just the Netherworld spirit.
That said, there are job openings with salaries listed, mostly as vassals of the Overlord, and there is a school. Actually doing your duties is a suggestion at best, and attending school is outright discouraged; see the School Post for details and the Jobs post for a list of available positions.
Healing of injured characters? Character death? Characters who are already dead in canon (but I don't want to make them a Prinny)?
These problems are solved quite elegantly by the Hospital! They can easily heal anything for a fee. Characters who get injured frequently will receive fabulous prizes for their continued business.
As for death, that won't usually be possible. Fatal injuries will just... not quite kill characters! It's magic. If you prefer things to make a tiny amount of sense, try to avoid wounds that are blatantly, inarguably lethal.
So what the hell is the Dark Assembly?
All information should be in the links in the profile.
Are fan-AU versions of canon characters al--
No.
Original characters...?
No.
How does constructive criticism work?
Comments for the mods or about rulebreaking can be left screened and completely anonymously at the complaint department. All players are encouraged (by an EXP incentive) to comment asking for criticism at regular HMDs in thenetherregion.
It seems the line between IC and OoC can be blurred pretty easily, what with how not even mod NPCs will be respecting the fourth wall. Isn't that potentially wanky?
The first thing to do is to seriously reassure you: that line won't be blurred to single people out or embarass them. Anything that happens to your character in the Netherworld because of the Netherworld is going to be intended to be funny, and nothing but. By all means, don't OoCly cease behavior that's not working out well IC, and don't go out of your way to avoid it, either. The Netherworld is anarchic IC and the consequences of actions tend to be light. Just relax, don't read too much into things, and have fun. People starting wank will be mauled by starved Baciels, after all.
If things are that chaotic, just what are the characters supposed to do in the Netherworld?
Eat, drink, stab people in the back, be merry, be stabbed in the back, level grind, whatever you can think of. Again, there are few if any IC rules, and hopefully not too many OoC ones. Cheating is encouraged IC and, well, OoC... maybe you, and your character, will fit right in. Just ask yourself one thing.
Do you really want to fit in here?
