While the Level Guide shows how much EXP a character needs for a certain level, as well as what perks and abilities they get at that level, this guide shows how they get there. There are various sessions one can be involved in to increase his character’s level in Solaris RPG: Questing Sessions, Training Sessions, Role-Play Sessions, and Battle Sessions. The experience gain is based on your characters current level. Each type of session has its own maximum gain based on your level, but the amount you get is also based on how well you do individually. Remember, since your gain is based on your individual performance, you might gain more or less than someone else the same level as you in the same session. One of the members of the Staff will be in charge of determining the precise experience gain using the following criteria: length, detail, and quality. If you feel that a Staff member is biased against you and penalizing your gains, please take it up with the rest of the Staff and they will delve to the bottom of the matter, possibly banning that Staff member from judging your sessions, if need be; but if it has already been decided that you are being treated fairly and you continue to complain, you will receive experience penalties.
Length
The length of a session is initially graded as the total word count of the session; obviously, more words indicate greater length of a session. In sessions with multiple players, this initial grade will be looked at as words per participant because a 2,500 word training session shows that you have gone above and beyond, but a 2,500 role play that involves six people is a little less impressive. Also, an important part of length in a multi-character environment is your character’s interaction in the session. Sure, the session between you and your buddy might be 2,000 words, but if you just sat back while he did all the work, your grade for length will be less than his. Length is weighted as the most important criteria for judging a session.
Detail
How much thought you put into a session is also very important. If an entire role-play at the fountain consists of a single entrance and exit with only text throughout, the session can seem bland and boring. Even if the conversation is lengthy and has some good hooks, the lack of detail regarding your own character in his setting can take its toll on the excitement. Also, immersing yourself in another player’s story and really playing off another’s actions add so much to a story and to the experience of both yourself and the person you are interacting with. Detail is weighted as the second most important criteria for judging a session.
Quality
The overall polish of a session is the break-down of the quality element. This mainly consists of a player’s overall spelling and grammar and ability to convey what he is trying to do. This is not an English assignment, so you will never lose points for the occasional mix-up, misspelling, or typo, but there might be some penalties if your posts are so bad that it is difficult to know what your character is doing. For almost all sessions, the quality criteria should be a player’s free points. Quality is weighted as the least important criteria for judging a session.
What is a Questing Session?
Questing sessions are the primary means for characters in the game to gain credits and, for an added bonus, experience as well. Quests may be completed alone or with a friend in the chat rooms or using a word processor. Your character can only participate in quests in a level range that fit his personal level, but most all quests are infinitely repeatable.
How do I post a Questing Session?
As it says in the “Read me first!” topic in the Pending Sessions forums, copy and paste the transcripts (or text from a word processor) into a new topic in those forums and be sure to title it with “QS-” and a unique name. For questing sessions, the title is usually also the title of the quest, but feel free to get a little more creative with the title (especially if you plan on repeating a quest multiple times).
What are the rewards?
As with all sessions, experience points will be given to each participant involved in a questing session. Also, questing sessions grant a credit gain in addition to the experience; the amount gained is determined by the same criteria that governs your experience gain: session length, detail, and quality. Though rare, some quests can even grant an item as a reward.
Questing with friends...
We encourage the fighters of Elyndrel to team up to finish quests, especially those that take place in hostile environments! Like any session, be sure to do your part and to make up for the extra participants with an extra-long word count. Also, for all participants to get the credit reward, all must be within the level range of the quest!
Things to remember...
All posted questing sessions must be tagged properly when posted! This means overall word count and the list of participants.
If you are caught trying to post repeat questing sessions (the same transcript over and over) you will be unable to submit future questing sessions as that character again. Your character will also lose a total of fifty percent of his entire experience. This is cheating!
Like all sessions the EXP gain is based on Length, Detail, and Quality. For questing sessions, these also determine credit gains for the session.
Even though it sometimes makes sense, characters should not come out of a questing session with any new items unless otherwise stated in the questing sessions rewards.
Questing sessions must be completed as detailed in the description. If it says "go to the forest and gather wood" you must write a session about your character traveling to the forest and gathering wood.
What is a Training Session?
A training session is when a character goes out by himself (or out with a companion only) and performs some kind of personal training. This can vary widely; one could set up targets to shoot them down, one could go for a cross-country run or down an obstacle course, or one could just go and lift some heavy rocks for weight training. Whatever you decide for your character, a training session is only valid if no other characters participate. Training sessions can be done in chat rooms, but since they must be done alone, most opt to use a word processor.
How do I post a Training Session?
As it says in the “Read me first!” topic in the Pending Sessions forums, copy and paste the transcripts (or text from a word processor) into a new topic in those forums and be sure to title it with “TS-” and a unique name.
What are the rewards?
As with all sessions, experience points will be given to the character in a training session. Training sessions give nearly as much experience as role-playing sessions and can even be written when no one else is online.
Things to remember...
All posted questing sessions must be tagged properly when posted! This means to be sure to include the word count of the session.
If you are caught trying to post repeat training sessions (the same transcript over and over) you will be unable to submit future training sessions as that character again. Your character will also lose a total of fifty percent of his entire experience. This is cheating!
Like all sessions the EXP gain is based on Length, Detail, and Quality.
Even though it sometimes makes sense, characters should not come out of a training session with any new items. However, if your character has a “Custom Item” bonus from the Level Guide and you want to introduce it by using a training session, then go for it! Just make sure you do some training in there.
Training sessions don't have to be done in any particular place. A character could go to the forest and practice leaping between branches or he could go to the beach practice his speed by running across the surface of the water. The opportunities for training are endless, so be creative.
There is no limit to how often you can submit training sessions. Just be sure they are all unique.
No training sessions may involve any NPC (creature or otherwise) without permission from a Staff member. Some players prefer to use a training session in order to obtain a companion; this is legal, but make sure to get it okayed first or else the entire session may become null and void.
What is a Role-Play Session?
Role-Play sessions, most commonly referred to as an RP, is the meat and potatoes of SolarisRPG. Role-playing is interactions between characters in the chatroom in practically any way, shape, or form. They can be talks at the fountain in town square, a drink at the tavern, or even just a chat while walking through the wilderness, gazing at the stars. While it does not quite net a character as much as a battle, RP sessions usually are responsible for a vast majority of a character’s experience gains.
How do I post a RP Session?
As it says in the “Read me first!” topic in the Pending Sessions forums, copy and paste the transcripts into a new topic in those forums and be sure to title it with “RP-” and a unique name.
What are the rewards?
As with all sessions, experience points will be given to each participant involved in an RP session. Also, characters might trade items, information, or memories.
Things to remember...
All posted RP sessions must be tagged properly when posted! This means overall word count and the list of participants.
Like all sessions the EXP gain is based on Length, Detail, and Quality.
When judging, the Staff will look at your companion’s word count as your own. Also, if you are playing an NPC (with Staff permission, of course), then you can choose one of your characters to receive credit for your contribution.
What is a Battle Session?
There are two types of battle session in SolarisRPG. The first is sparring. Sparing takes place almost exclusively in the Arena, as a killing blow within those walls is reversed by the technology of the Arena Orbs; this means that two friends having a mock battle won’t have to pull any punches. The second type is fighting. Fighting is done anywhere outside of the Arena, where death is death. These battles can be triggered by seeking honor, a thirst for power, vengeance, or even over another character. Sometimes fighting is frowned upon and sometimes it is exalted, but it can end up in one party getting the crap kicked out of him or even getting killed.
How do I post a Battle Session?
As it says in the “Read me first!” topic in the Pending Sessions forums, copy and paste the transcripts into a new topic in those forums and be sure to title it with “BS-” and a unique name.
What are the rewards?
As with all sessions, experience points will be given to each participant involved in a battle session. In the case of a true fight, the winner (by death or take-down) can take from the defeated corpse or senseless victim three items of his choice, with the exception of runes and items enchanted with “Family Curse”. Also, if a player character kills another player character and those characters are within five levels of each other, the victor nets a whopping 20% of the deceased overall experience (calculated after experience gains from the battle session).
Dealing with death...
Be sure to review the “Death Guide” for more information about how to live with being dead.
Things to remember...
All posted battle sessions must be tagged properly when posted! This means overall word count and the list of participants.
Like all sessions the EXP gain is based on Length, Detail, and Quality.
Spars take place in the Arena in Elyndrel Village. There are exceptions, but remember that a killing blow is a killing blow outside those walls, on purpose or by accident. Fights must take place outside of the Arena - no exceptions - otherwise there would be no point to making the final blow.
Don’t forget to rob your opponent blind after you defeat or kill him in a fight. You are allowed three prizes from his inventory, excluding runes and items enchanted with “Family Curse”.
When judging, the Staff will look at your companion’s word count as your own. Also, if you are playing an NPC (with Staff permission, of course), then you can choose one of your characters to receive credit for your contribution.
Fights can be (and have been in the past) issues of heated and aggressive debate. Admittedly, it can be a very emotional experience if your character is inches from demise, but when “in character” conflicts leak into the world of “out of character” and players start getting at each other’s throats, the Staff reserves the right to nullify any session and give experience penalties to all parties involved in such hostile bickering. Asking for clarification about a specific post is one thing, but inserting four-letter words and other hurtful language is unacceptable. Remember, Solaris RPG is just a game and, really, is it worth losing a friend over?
Multiple Participants Bonus
A lot of interactions on Solaris are either a character on his own (like most quests and training sessions) or between, at most, two characters either in conversation or conflict. However, there are times when larger groups of fighters gather for a grand gathering at the tavern or even a team battle in the arena. Sessions that involve more than two participants will net all involved additional experience gains per participant, meaning that a three-character session will give a little bit of a bonus but a six-character session will give all characters an even more significant bonus.
The reason for this is two-fold. First, sessions that involve so many participants can get a little hectic; while a one-on-one setting will lend itself very easily for a turn-based conversation, adding in more people usually makes people try to get their posts in more quickly, sometimes out of turn, trying to respond to one person’s post before another player says something that necessitates another, different response. Quicker posting can lead to a little sloppiness and so participant bonuses will make up for any penalty to quality that a character might suffer. Second, massively multiplayer sessions are incredibly fun to be in as well as read, so the Staff wants to further encourage all players to try to get in on the action.
Holiday Bonuses
There are three main holidays in Solaris RPG that generate bonus gains for characters for sessions. During the colder months, the week of Frostlore is a celebration of family and fortune, and as such, all sessions will net characters a remarkable four-times bonus to experience gains. On the other side of the calendar, springtime brings with it the week of Restoration, a time to remember the events of the Second Flux and the Undoing and all the sacrifices that were made. All sessions during this time will generate triple credit gains for quests and even when using the Midas Stone. Scattered throughout the year are Double Experience Weekends (these being strictly OOC holidays) that usually stretch from Thursday to Sunday and all sessions during those times will grant double experience gains.
Other Bonuses
The Staff reserves the right to give additional bonuses to players that go above and beyond during sessions in terms of length or detail, help by participating in story-related sessions, or even simply taking the time to role-play with someone new to teach them the ropes.