Talk:Event E2/Proposal 1shtar

Event details

Mini-event Descriptions

Detailed below are the rules and deadlines for the eight tasks that make up this event. Discussion blanks have been provided for those who wish to provide input.

Casting Call of the House of Usher

WHERE: All Oceans!
WHEN: Submit entry by Friday, March 3rd, 11:59pm PST
WHAT: Design a piratey cast of characters

To participate in this event you will need to read The Fall of the House of Usher. There are three main characters (the narrator, Roderick Usher, and Madeline Usher) and three minor characters (a servant, a valet, and the family physician). Consider the descriptive elements within the story and create a pirate to represent each of the six characters.

Participation in this event requires the use of Quid Pro Clothes' personal design studio tool. To create each character, edit your pirate's appearance under the "My profile" menu section. Then create an outfit under the "My designs" menu section. Take a screenshot of the result and rename your screenshot to CharacterName.png (any image file type is acceptable). Images must not exceed 1280x1024 pixels.

Example

Submit all six character shots to Rummykins@gmail.com. You may also edit your screenshots to produce a single-image line-up of your characters:

Example

While considerate screenshot presentation will not be a formal judging criterion, one should bear in mind that happy judges are generously-voting judges. The deadline for submissions is 11:59pm PST on Friday, March 3rd.

Registration is free, and the tool is amazingly fun, so what are you waiting for?

Discussion

I think this event is a clever ruse to force us to do our high school English homework, lol! You are sneakily creating a world of well-read pirates ;) (er, at least well-Poe-read...) --Elsquido 23:38, 5 February 2006 (PST)

Tell-tale hearts

WHERE: Midnight
WHEN: Saturday, March 4th, time TBD
WHAT: Hearts Tourney

Tell-tale hearts is a hearts tourney with a twist. In round one of the tournament participants will play a match to 50. The winner of each match will be awarded 4 points for the contest and will proceed to a winner-takes-all tournament for 25k poe and the chance for 5 points. The three round one losers will e-mail a limerick summarizing their game-play experience to Ishtart@gmail.com. The losers will receive 1, 2, or 3 points based on the creativity of their limerick as compared to the limericks written by their fellow losers.

All participants will be required to pre-register for this event. Registration will close at 11:59pm PST on Friday, March 3rd. Table assignments will be made and posted on the wiki. A table leader will be assigned to create the table. The tournament will begin on March 4th at <chosen time>. This tournament will take place on one or more frigates (depending upon the total number of entrants). All participants must be jobbed into our crew. Jobbing contacts will be listed on the wiki along with table assignments. Jobbing will begin half an hour before the tournament begins. Any person not present by <chosen time + 10 minutes> will be automatically disqualified. If for any reason a table falls short of four participants (eg: no-shows, total number of participants is not divisible by four) the judges will load your table with an alt who will then dismiss the game and be replaced with a bot.

At the end of the match, all participants must remain at the table until their score is noted by a judge. The table leader will alert a judge when the match is over. A judge will view the table, record the scores, and give permission for participants to leave. Any person who leaves the table before the judge gives permission will automatically be assigned a score of 1. Any round one loser who fails to send a limerick will be assigned a score of 1.

Round one is likely to be hectic. As such, round two will be scheduled to begin an hour later. All round matches will be posted on the wiki. Judges will also be available for those who have questions concerning their round two matches. After round two the number of participants should be sufficiently culled that subsequent matches can be played back to back.

Table Settings
Wager: 0
Standing Range: Able-Ultimate
Private Table: Yes
Local Players only: Yes
Payout Type: Doesn't matter
Play to: 50
Pass option: Left, Right, Across, Hold

Poetry Collage

WHERE: All Oceans!
WHEN: Submit entry by Sunday, March 5th, 11:59pm PST
WHAT: Poetry Collage

The collage event will allow you to demonstrate your creative prowess by creating a collage based off of one of Poe's short stories or poems.

Participants may chose from any Poe work listed here. Based upon the chosen work, the graphical collage may be created in one of two ways: by either digitally composing one with an image manipulation program, or by creating one on paper and submitting a photograph of it.

Here is a simple example of what is expected, based on "The Bells."

Submissions, whether purely digital, or photgraphs of a physical collage, must be sent to Ishtart@gmail.com as an image file no larger than 600x600 pixels before 11:59pm PST on March 5th.

Collages will be judged according to their ingenuity, appearance, and accuracy to the source material, and awarded between 1 and 4 points based on these subjective criteria. The single best submission overall will be awarded 5 points and 25,000 poe.

Hop Frog

WHERE: Midnight, Diamond arch
WHEN: Monday, March 6th, time TBD
WHAT: Sloop Relay Race

"I believe the name 'Hop-Frog' was not given to the dwarf by his sponsors at baptism, but it was conferred upon him, by general consent of the seven ministers, on account of his inability to walk as other men do. In fact, Hop-Frog could only get along by a sort of interjectional gait -- something between a leap and a wriggle -- a movement that afforded illimitable amusement, and of course consolation, to the king, for (notwithstanding the protuberance of his stomach and a constitutional swelling of the head) the king, by his whole court, was accounted a capital figure."

Poe's Hop-Frog tells of the revenge of a crippled court jester of the same name. In our own version of Hop-Frog, we will honor the devious fool by imitating his namesake gait in our own piratey fashion.

Our Hop-Frog is a sloop relay race. Players will enter in teams of three, and will all take one turn solo sailing a sloop on one of the three legs comprising a four-island route (Turtle-Papaya-Byrne-Alpha). Ships, supplies, and charts must be provided by the participating teams.

All team members will be jobbed into our crew. Jobbing will begin half an hour before the event. Jobbing contacts will be Ishtar and Rummykins.

Deported holding ships will be located at each island. Prior to the start of the event all of the team members sailing in the first leg must board the holding ship at Turtle. All of those sailing the second leg will be stationed on a ship at Papaya. Those sailing the final leg will be aboard a ship at Byrne.

After all holding ships are sorted, but before beginning the race, the first sailor of each team will be given an item that symbolizes the baton to be passed. Once he has reached the first island way-point, this sailor must port, board the holding ship on that island, and trade the baton to the second sailor on his team. After this trade, the second sailor may leave the holding ship and begin the second leg of the race. Any participant who leaves his holding ship before his team member arrives and passes the baton will be automatically disqualified. In addition, once the baton has been passed, the first sailor must remain on the holding ship until the end of the race. This process will repeat at the second way-point.

At the final island the last sailor will port his ship and board the last holding ship. At this point the team will be scored as having finished the race. The last sailor will then trade the baton to the judge aboard and his team will be given permission to leave the holding ships and get on with their day.

Each member of the winning team will be awarded 5 points and a 25,000 poe prize. The remaining teams will be split into quarters, and everyone in each group given 4, 3, 2, or 1 point, based on the order of his team's finish.

At no point may there be any more than one person on a competing ship. This will be grounds for immediate disqualification. PVP amongst competing ships will be allowed.

The Power of Words

WHERE: All Oceans!
WHEN: Submit entry by Tuesday, March 7th, 11:59pm PST
WHAT: Writing Competition

In 1850, Poe wrote a triptych of imaginary dialogues -- The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion, The Colloquy of Monos and Una, and The Power of Words -- which he cast as being between "blessed spirits in heaven."

In The Power of Words, two spirits named Oionos and Agathos discuss how the acquisition of knowledge embroadens and brings happiness to the soul. Agathos holds that every word has ramifications that extend forward through space and time, and that by our very act of speaking, we can create:

"They are!- they are! This wild star- it is now three centuries since, with clasped hands, and with streaming eyes, at the feet of my beloved- I spoke it- with a few passionate sentences- into birth. Its brilliant flowers are the dearest of all unfulfilled dreams, and its raging volcanoes are the passions of the most turbulent and unhallowed of hearts."

In our version of The Power of Words, we invite you to demonstrate the lasting impact of Poe's own words by reshaping them into a new form. You may chose, as source material, any one of the following five of his best known short stories:

• The Cask of Amontillado
  
• The Fall of the House of Usher
  
• The Masque of the Red Death
  
• The Pit and the Pendulum
  
• The Tell-Tale Heart

Your chosen story must be recast into a new form: that of one of Poe's well known poems. You may chose from one of the following five:

• Annabel Lee
  
• The Bells
  
• The City in the Sea
  
• Lenore
  
• The Raven

Entries will be scored upon their ability to remain true to the form of the poem, while still creatively and effectively expressing the power of Poe's words by telling the tale of the chosen short story.

E-mail submissions to Ishtart@gmail.com The deadline for entry submission is 11:59pm PST on March 7th.

Discussion

Ishy, can ya give us non-literary idiots (like me!) an example of this? Im not quite sure I understand what to do here. Shandra (Taco)

---

I can provide you with an example, but I cannot take credit for it! I knew when I started working on this event that I wanted it to challenge people with different kinds of talents. Having little writing talent of my own, I turned to Rummykins for advice on what would constitute a unique skilled writing contest. He came up with this idea (he's my co-planner), and provided this example.

The Fall of the House of Usher retold in the style of Lenore.

Ah, broken is the noble House! the spirit flown forever!
Let the bell toll! - a saintly name floats on the Stygian river;
In glory's day, no fairer play, no glade or glen grew lusher!
But now there in the sodden fen, low lies the House of Usher!
Come! let the burial rite be read- the funeral song be sung!-
An anthem for the noblest name that ever died so young-
A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young.

On the whole of a dark dank day, across the grim earth I rode
And I saw how frail and weak grow we, that life and time erode
How shall the ritual, then, be read?- the requiem how be sung
By us- the ones who carry on- by those still in the sun?
For despite my efforts solemn felt, a house has died, and young.

Roderick, a friend once dear, bade me come in haste.
His sister's health was fading fast, his mind had gone to waste.
Days there in that crumbling house I spent in somber tone
Till Rod'rick said, "Fair Madeline's dead, we are, at last, alone."
We gave her rest in cavern low, and left her in the gloom-
Then for serveral days did Roderick roam, as lost, from room to room
Into the depths he gazed, as though listening for a faint but urgent tune.

"Avaunt! avaunt! from fiends below, the indignant ghost is risen!
She has returned from where we laid her in her funeral prison!"
These words he said whilst to him I read in chambers still and dark
Then my door was thrown ajar - t'was Madeline, pale and stark!
Escaped her prison, found us here, a desperate act and brave,
She fell into Rodrick's arms gone mad, and neither could I save:
I fled the house and their bodies still, as it fell into its grave.

In summary, the objective of the event is to take the content of one of the five allowed short stories, and adapt it to the form of one of the five allowed poems. -Ish

The Murders in the Rue Morgue

WHERE: Midnight
WHEN: Wednesday, March 8th, time TBD
WHAT: Murder Mystery

"The analytical power should not be confounded with simple ingenuity; for while the analyst is necessarily ingenious, the ingenious man often remarkably incapable of analysis."

Poe helped create the modern genre of detective fiction with his groundbreaking The Murders in the Rue Morgue. This, one of his longest works, set the foundation for the tales of Sherlock Holmes, which were still 50 years in the future, and every fictional detective since.

Now you can try your wit against that of Inspecter Dupin as you try to solve our own murder mystery. Someone has been killed, and only you -- and your competitors -- can figure out whodunnit! Participants will have to traverse the ocean, solving riddles and deciphering clues, in an attempt to be the first to find out the truth behind our piratey murder most foul.

The inspector who first cracks the case will receive the 25,000 poe prize and 5 points in the competition. Each succeeding solution will receive a decreasing number of points, from 4 to 1, based on where in the final results you fall. All participants must be jobbed into our crew. Jobbing will begin half an hour before the start of the event. Jobbing contacts will be Ishtar and Rummykins.

The Island of the Fay

WHERE: All Oceans!
WHEN: Submit entry by Thursday, March 9th, 11:59pm PST
WHAT: Diorama art

Part of the appeal of Poe's writing is his use of narrative structure, symbolism, and vivid imagery to impose a single and total psychological effect upon the reader. Few of his tales venture outdoors, and those that do are mostly placed in urban settings. The Island of the Fay is unique in its pastoral locale. In this contest you are tasked to reference Poe's imagery to visually recreate the island as a diorama.

A diorama is a three-dimensional scene in which figures or other objects are arranged in a thematic setting against a painted or decorated background. Classically, in schools, students create the diorama using a variety of household items, usually starting with a shoebox, then adding a design or collage into the background, and placing other objects within the diorama to create its 3-D model effect.

Examples of dioramas can be found here, here and here. Instructions for making a diorama can be found here.

To submit your entry, take up to three pictures of your completed diorama and e-mail them to Rummykins@gmail.com. Images must not be larger than 640x640 and must not exceed 1 megabyte in size. Entries must be received by 11:59PST on Thursday, March 9th.

The Cask of Amontillado

WHERE: Midnight
WHEN: Friday, March 10th, time TBD
WHAT: Drinking tournament

In The Cask of Amontillado, Poe tells the tell of the long-wronged Montressor who lures his former friend to his death by capitalizing on his obsession with wine -- especially the fine Amontillado.

In our version of the Cask, you will fare better than Fortunato -- your wine will actually be consumed, and in vast quantities! Yes, our own Cask of Amontillado is a drinking tournament, and you can be sure you'll get your fill.

As we would not want to celebrate Poe's classic legacy with modern drinking, this tournament will feature classic drinking. The tournament winner will receive 5 points and the 25,000 poe prize; his opponent in the finals wll receive 4 points. Semifinalists will receive 3 points, quarter finalists 2, and everyone else, 1.

Drink up!

The Masque of the Red Death (tie breaker)

WHERE: Midnight
WHEN: Friday, March 10th, time TBD
WHAT: Duty puzzle death match

"And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall."

Should there be a tie in the final point standings, the ultimate winner will be determined via a duty puzzle deathmatch. Much like Poe's Red Death, up to nine victims will be sequestered on a war brig, and eliminated, one by one, until but one remains standing.

The war brig will deport with each competitor on a sailing station. The brig will be engaged immediately out of port in a PVP battle, which will last for [how many?] turns. The players with the 6 highest sailing scores will move on to the next round -- the remaining competitors are eliminated.

Six puzzlers will then carp for another PVP session. At the end of this battle, the four best scorers will move on to bilge. One more PVP battle will ensue, and the highest score on bilge at the end will be declared the winner.

If there are fewer than 7 people tied for the win, rounds will be removed, or a smaller ship substituted, as appropriate.