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[miracle]

Ashgrove hours and nearby attractions

[dmax]

list

[Varin]

[miracle]

email

[LordKinbote]

Come on, guys, it's New Jersey! Those are the only attractions there are!

---Scott

P.S. New Jerseyites, don't kill me.

[miracle]

So I asked Brent about St Paddys Day

[mottjr]

Re: Ashgrove hours and nearby attractions

[ZeusLegion]

"Hi Gwen. You have no idea who I am but I just saw the article in Gardens' Best Magazine and it appears that your prize-winning flowers seem to be making a strange hexagram pattern. Do you think this has anything to do with the BRUTAL BEHEADINGS OF YOUR NEIGHBORS last week?"

Three letters come to mind reading something like that: "WTF?"

Someone sees that, real or character, they're going to think yer a freakin' psycho. "Why would anyone think those two things could be related?" That's probably what the character is thinking unless they actually have insider info. If they don't, you've just made them think you're a nutcase and might have freaked them out to the point they clam up.

With so many emails like that being sent out left and right with little consideration of the content of the email or the mindset of the character, its a wonder more characters haven't clammed up on us like they did when they got 50 emails from Dale demonstrating his "multiple-personality disorder".

Bottomline: Try to get "into the game" by empathizing with what these characters might be thinking when they read your email and the four dozen other bizarre ones they receive. Not every character is guilty or has something to hide, they aren't supposed to know its a game and not every character is a master cryptographer with an undying need to hide information in obscure geometric/algebraic puzzles.

Think of yourself being in the THEIR world, not the other way around.

Doing so might make the game a more enjoyable experience for everyone.

z

[dmax]

zeus

[konamouse]

Imagine the following emails:

Please send me some information.

(about what?)

You don't know me, but I saw your website. What is xxxxx?

(huh?)

This is (insert ingame character), I would like access to my account.

(and the email is different from the signature)

On the other hand, some of the players have had a great time with the HUMOR:email threads and found ingame characters who have fleshed out their characters enought to have fun conversations (that may not advance the game but make it more real/immersive).

To me, this game is about immersion; it's part mystery, part puzzles, part RPG. Some players have created alter egos to fit the situation (i.e. they have a friend or relative who is psychotic, or they are a professor or reporter or student research a subject - so they have a legitimate foot-in-the-door reason for contacting the ingame character). Others have stuck close to the truth (they are part of a collective who received an email from Dale and are looking into his situation). Regardless, we are trying to keep the ingame characters as real life. I think that most players part of CD and UF are knowledgeable enough to continue this. And hopefully wishchasers and Delphi are doing the same. The wild cards in all this are the umpteen individual players out there who might find out information and not share it (but I'm sure we're covering the important parts).

It seems that if one player figures out the key email to elicit necessary info, the PMs will figure out how to make it more public knowledge, so we all advance at the same time (ala, danman_d and dashcat both got CP to devuldge the info necessary to confirm the policy number and that same night Dale's email updated making that same information public to all the other players who may not have seen danman_d's and dashcats posts - because the PMs knew where the next step would take us).

We're still less than 2 weeks into a 6 month campaign......have fun!