Speaking of being unavailable: I suffered a back injury while working on Monday morning, and my everything has been thrown off track as a result. It's just one thing after another, it seems. Anyway, I have a draft advertisement below. Criticisms or encouragement (if you think it's fine) would be grand.<br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">CoDS Recruitment Advertisement</div><div class="spoiler_body">Header: Seeking More: The Conquest of Dra Sirdu (NC-Exotic, FATE system)<br/><br/><em>Seeking Explorers!<br/><br/>A tattered and worn sheaf of paper tumbles on the wind, eventually catching against a wagon wheel. The otherwise sun-bleached front reveals the bright seal of Queen Enra the third, descendent of Giris the Younger and ruler of his dominion. It calls for heroes, mercenaries, and adventurers to join the Second Fleet of Expansion departing for the great island of Dra Sirdu to the west. The summons promises the standard rewards one would expect: wealth, glory, titles and honors. But the scant handful of ships that have escaped the isle's sinister pull have brought with terrible rumors with them. Who can separate tales from reality and unravel the island's mystery? Can anyone? Only time will tell.</em><br/><br/>The Conquest of Dra Sirdu is a a plot-centric group game run under the FATE system, available for free from the producer's website (http://www.faterpg.com/). The game is now about half a year old (the original recruitment thread is here (http://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?topic=163672.msg7593400#msg7593400), for anyone who's interested), though it has developed quite impressively from my original vision. This is in large part due to the fact that the FATE system is more narrativist than it is gamist and emphasizes cooperative storytelling. As the game-master, I set and maintain individual scenes, but world-building, character arcs, and even larger plot lines are developed with negotiated, improvised and, sometimes, entirely player-originated material.<br/><br/>As implied by the little chunk of flavor text above, players take the role of adventurers and explorers lured to the cursed island of Dra Sirdu, which was home to a pair of powerful and advanced societies that dominated the mainland of Nuln before their disappearance a bit over three hundred years ago. Only now, the First and Second Fleets of Expansion have successfully established a foothold on the island: the fortress-city of Point Respite. Between working with the exploratory force of the Dominion army and navy, managing personal concerns, and dealing with troubles inside of the fortified city, you will have to attempt to unravel the island's mystery and vanquish whatever evil has haunted it for these three centuries.<br/><br/>The thread's title indicates that the content limit for this particular group game is that of non-consensual or forced acts with various non-human entities, but I would like to stress that it is simply a limit. If the premise interests you and you're uncomfortable with particular sorts of erotic material or are looking for something special, please do let me know. As the GM, I'm mostly interested in telling the story of the cursed island and making sure that players have a good time. I do enjoy a relatively wide variety of material, myself, so just ask!<br/><br/>Now, as stated, I'm here to seek out more players for an established game. I understand that jumping into a group with some significant developed history can be a daunting proposal, and I want to reassure anyone reading that I'll do whatever's in my power to ease the transition. The FATE system has a background-building mechanic that interconnects players' histories, and the common mission of exploring the island has, thus far, helped involve all interested parties.<br/><br/>That said, however, both myself and my other plays have invested a lot of time (around six months worth, at least in forum time) in building and integrating ourselves with this world. We all do want a bit more company on our adventures, but we'd prefer if new players invested themselves as we have. There's no written exam or anything so silly, but I will want to talk and work with any new players to make sure that everything works out for both them and the group as a whole.<br/><br/>Thank for reading!<br/><br/>-The Unholy Potato</div></div><br/>Edit: Also, two quick comments, as I don't think that I can finish my IC post today. Firstly, I won't take the orb from Reliyian. OOC, the line blurs a little more as I've kept you waiting a really long time on the monster stuff, but I don't disagree that, IC, this is a capital-B Bad thing. If you give me an inch, I'll ask for a mile, apparently. Sorry. T_T<br/><br/>And secondly, unless inspiration hits me as I finish my post tomorrow morning, I probably won't have anything for Eshalu for now. Thank you for your patience, again, MdG. (And you as well, Robyn. I know I haven't been the swiftest keyboard in the west, lately.)