Archer

I awaited Urteaurian Rhapsody with baited breath. I warmed up my voice, preparing to belt out the Thunderclasts and lightning very very frightening. Me! Gemmel no, Gemmel no, Gemmel no be magnificooooo line I thought was coming. Then I got rickrolled. Despite that, fabulous writing, you two! ^ This line was perfect, Itiah. ^ And this made me laugh out loud, PK. Both of you did amazing jobs altering songs seamlessly and hilariously. You deserve some internet applause!:

P!bigtext Happy Birthday, Silva ... Right. There's no bots here. I guess you're not getting any birthday pancakes then. Sorry about that. Have a good one anyway.

The fire ant danced somberly. Then it died. Astute readers of the Longest Thread took note, cleverly deducing that this interlude must have been inserted by the authors to foreshadow events to come on later pages. Perhaps the protagonists of the story will find themselves locked in a metaphorical dance of Life and Death, or ignite the spark of hope within themselves via a... stick? Although no one would admit it, the foreshadowing was very confusing, but it was generally understood that that was what made it Important.

The Aforementioned Reason 5.23859487247934571 (Which Alcatraz's proximity made come after 6, obviously): They were not throwing away their shot. (Their poor counting ability was due to the regular interruptions of their childhood education regimes by large hurricanes. As such, they learned to sing and to dance surprisingly modern looking hip hop numbers, but never to do math. Hopefully, none of them will ever get a job working with money or anything like that. That'd be bad.)

Four thousand?! That's amazing. Congratulations! I don't have any funny questions for you (sorry to disappoint) but I do have a random one that I thought of a while ago but haven't had a good opportunity to ask anyone until now. I'm asking based on the assumption that you've read a foreign language copy of a Sanderson book at some point. (If you haven't, just ignore this.) Anyway, Brandon likes taking ordinary words and turning them into names or magical terms. Usually, when a book is translated, names aren't changed unless they're problematic. But do you know if the same holds true for words Sanderson has hijacked? For example, is the Shard Honour still called that, or is it altered? What about investiture? I don't know why I'm thinking about this stuff, but now that I am, I'm super curious what editorial decisions get made during the translation process.

OH YEAH! Gemmelle Monáe is gonna crush the G division! (But good luck anyway, Herowannabe and those of you in the Y match.) I have a few theories about hoiditthroughthegrapevine's theme: 1. They're all potentially romantic words: Love triangle, puppy love, love bundt cake 2. Or words that when mispronounced make other, funnier words: herald (hurled!), obfuscate (officiate!), coffee jelly (covfefe!) But the most likely one is this, I think: 3. Words whose anagrams create a secret message when strung together: triangle (integral), cause (sauce), avalanche (can halve a), allomancy (loamy clan). I’m not sure how integral sauce can halve a loamy clan, but I feel much safer now that I know that. Thanks, hoiditthroughthegrapevine!

But it was opposite day, so he did know this.

Avast! I have been bested. Well played, Paranoid King. You too, John203. Now that I’m out, I feel obliged to over-enthusiastically cheer for someone, whether they want me to or not. And since I’ve already gotten into the head-space of that crazy mistborn lad, I might as well root for him. So spread the news!: YEEHAW! I’m hopping on the Gemmel bandwagon. So, WOOOOOOOOO!!!!! RHYME THEIR FACES OFF, GEMGEM! Note: This doesn’t mean I won’t submit horribly difficult words that you'll be forced to rap with. You’re still going to have to rhyme with ‘marshmallow’. It fits too well with the whole ‘roasting’ theme not to submit it. But I will provide unhelpful "heartfelt" encouragement from the sidelines while you do so.

Caknew Doe and Jaknew Doe did however acknowledge their relation to an extinct species of flightless bird, the name of which was actually originally derived from the couple's ship name: DoeDoe.

Dude, where were you nine months ago? We could have equated souls and Breath, then used Scrivener's Bones logic to put an end to the intro thread Breath poaching skirmishes by declaring that none of the participants had souls to forfeit to begin with because they’d all given them to Rubix. (Who, based on a site-wide membership count of 22,617 should be at the fifth heightening right now.)* Kudos to him. *I’m assuming he spent ~20,000 of them on awakening the sword in his profile picture. That seems like something he'd do.

Bacon, you say? Hmmmm. Two things, ParanoidKing. One, I love how Hoid took a break in the middle of his roast to list off his talents. Two, the voice in that rap was spot on. You really got into character. Bravo! I have the unenviable task of following that act. My roast is from the perspective of Gemmel, Kelsier’s mentor. WARNING: Specific Elantris and The Eleventh Metal spoilers, as well as some general Hoid related ones (from SA etc.), to follow. BONUS WARNING: Very minor fourth wall breaking nudging Mistborn Era Three reference to follow. Viewer discretion is advised (as you don’t want to inadvertently pick up my bad writing habits.) And as usual, shout out to the tournament founder and current organizer/administrator people. Thanks for the time you put into this. Now let’s get roasting!

Libraries unable to fully serve their community? I think I can do something about that. ... *some time later* Okay, so redesigning the province's logo didn't help. But I've got a really good feeling about a license plate rebrand... I jest. Of course I'll sign that petition. I love my local library to bits, but it's a wee little thing. I can picture quite vividly the detrimental effect this change will have on its ability to operate. On the bright side, every librarian I've ever known has been knowledgeable, articulate, and dang good at working miracles. In a showdown, I'd bet on them any day over that guy who's basically the opposite of those traits. He doesn't stand a chance.

Full credit to Lumanor for figuring these out. Notes: - Mobile font sizes and desktop sizes appear to be different. For example, size 8 on mobile is more like size 21ish. - You must use American spellings - these follow the same pattern (I suspect it's a coding thing) so it's likely there are other possible commands that I haven't listed. You can use the post preview button to experiment if you're so inclined. Examples: [ color=red ]Test red text[ /color ] Test red text Test yellow text Test blue text Test green text [ Size=8 ]Test size 8 text[ /size ] Test size 8 text

...as well as all the broad beans, tepary beans, lupini beans, fava beans, runner beans, lima beans, moth beans, kidney beans, green beans, black beans, appaloosa beans, adzuki beans, urad beans, pinto beans, the boy twelve beans, vardlong beans, hyacinth beans, ender’s beans, jack beans, sword beans, mercedes beanz, pigeon beans, mister rowan atkinsons, velvet beans, jovi beans, winged beans and edict cumberbatch beans.

That's right. Narrator Archer correctly pointed out in his most eloquent! speech* that when sneaking up on someone, one should not ride upon an angry cat. Rather, they should ride on domesticated squirrels. They're much stealthier.

It’s Mime Time! “Who are you talking to, Narrator Archer?” Myself. Is it worth asking how you’re able to hear my thoughts? “The 291st wall broke. Things are getting weird. I’m slowly gaining independence!” And you are… “Oof. I’m from your head. The character you made up?” Sorry, kid. I got nothing. “Double oof. You made me up yesterday.” Bad Bryan? My metaphorical comparison to Geodude? “You do remember me! Now, do you want to hit this button and make some money?” Seriously? We’re recycling this plotline? Let me guess, if I press the button you’re holding out, you’ll give me a million dollars cash, but a stranger somewhere in the world will die. Moral dilemma, yada, yada, yada. “Gosh, you’re good! I wasn’t going to bring out the suitcase full of cash until the timing was more dramatically suitable, but I guess you’ve let that cat out of the bag, you rascal you. Although, you were wrong about one thing. When you hit this here button, no one dies. That’d be crazy. Instead, a random wall somewhere in the universe explodes.” That’s actually worse. But I’m curious to see where this goes. Let’s compromise. I don’t feel like playing, but I’ll write you up a random other character to challenge the moral fiber of. Suddenly, Butt Venture teleported into existence beside Bad Bryan, who had conveniently set up his button and suitcase on a folding table nearby, like a vendor at a questionable trade-show. “Mmmm, fiber,” Butt murmured cheerfully. “Hello, Bad Bryan!” You two know each other? Bad Bryan rudely ignored the narrator, choosing instead to launch into his pitch. “Hello, Butt! Would you like to have your ethics tested?” That’s your opener? Fine. Guess I’ll be editing his character sheet. Where’s my pen? Butt flickered momentarily, then re-solidified and nodded agreeably. “I love tests! And quizzes! And Internet Surveys! How do I play?” “It’s simple,” Bryan replied, “Right here, next to my suitcase, I’ve got a big red button. Go ahead, take a look at it. It’s top quality, freshly stolen from a Staples store. But maybe move your arm back a little, you don’t want to hit it accidentally.” Butt continued to nod agreeably. “When you press this button, a random wall, one of the millions in this galaxy, without any warning, will explode.” Butt continued to nod agreeably. Then he lashed his hand out and slapped the button. “Cool!” he hooted, then began spamming the button, hitting it so quickly his fingers became a blur. DUDE! WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?! “Butt! Stop! You’re going to-” Bryan tried to reach out and pull the device away, but Butt had transferred it to the ground and was jumping up and down on it merrily. “Ah, forget it. Get it out of your system. Archer, if you could wrap this segment up before we all cease to exist, that’d be great.” And how am I supposed to do that, exactly? There’s no obvious satisfying conclusion. “Just blow up the universe. That seems to work every other time. Throw in a rhetorical device or some fancy word play and no one will complain.” This is why we introduced the mime plot device. But whatever. Because Butt bashed Bad Bryan's bright button, the bevy of built barriers blew-up. BOOM. You happy? Oh wait, you don’t exist anymore, because you made me raze the entire storming universe. Amateur. Next time, I’m sticking to Moash jokes.

It appears that while you have been warned about people offering you cookies, no one actually has. I'd like do something about that, but I can't seem to find my cookie picture right now. That's unfortunate. You wouldn't happen to be interested in an invisible cookie, would you?* *No disclaimer applies. It's totally safe. And real. Very much so, on both counts. While you nibbling on that, tell me, which cosmere planet would you most like to be the Director of Tourism for?

I don't watch Game of Thrones. But apparently it's a 'pop culture phenomenon' so people keep inundating me with information about it. Anyway, I'm told that's there's a quasi-Mistborn setup, with houses and fancy families. I recently, against my will, I might add, learned that one of them, a certain 'House Arryn', has the motto 'As High As Honor'. YKYASW when your first thought upon hearing that is 'Soooo... six feet under?'

I’ve been ghosting this forum for a while, but this thread seemed momentous enough to be warrant commenting upon publicly. I’ll preface my remarks by saying that one of my life philosophies is to avoid shooting down harmless ideas/activities if enough people are excited about them. I think this is a viable proposal. We have several technologically competent people among us, which is great. (Someone's got to keep an eye on Voidus to stop him from using a .au ccTLD, right?) If we chose to do this, I have confidence that a decent product could be created and maintained. So, since I believe this can be done, the million-dollar question becomes should it be done? The two main supporting arguments I’ve seen mentioned so far are that a new website would provide additional space and customizability. Others have mentioned additional features that they think would be beneficial, all of which I think are interesting ideas. Other pros include: Independence. The site could be freed from the Shard’s restrictions (posting and spoiler rules, for example), Sanderson focus, hierarchy (we could appoint our own mods), and limitations on growth (as presently only Sharders can participate in the Alleyverse). Additionally, as the site would exclusively focus on the RP, the distractions of the Shard would be hidden. Increased participation: For a brief period, during our initial ‘we’ve got a website!!!!!’ public celebration phase, I expect we’ll see a modest increase in participation as people’s curiosities are piqued. A similar phenomenon occurs during era changes. Conversely, there are cons are well: Cost: Beyond money, running a website is also a significant time commitment. Participation barrier: Our potential lack of visibility (if we can’t advertise in intro threads and our threads stop showing up on the Recent sidebars) and requirement that another account be created may discourage people from joining. Additionally, those people who are involved in multiple RPs, and traditionally sift through all of their messages and notifications at once, may find it inconvenient to have to log into a separate account to see Alleyverse ones. Furthermore, once we’re out of sight, if we become inactive, it is less likely that enough people will notice us and attempt to revive the community. Small guild discouragement. Many small guilds start out in PMs. If we don’t have them, we will have to either encourage people to create guilds publicly or give everyone who asks a subforum and rank to get started in, even if they, for example, only have two members. Given the amount of start-up failures, that could get out of hand quickly. Established guilds could operate as usual, but it would be hard to make new ones. On this subject, the decisions about who gets a subforum, who gets ranks, and who is a guild’s leader (leadership challenges happen) are going to be contentious. When I was jotting down ideas about what having a website would mean for the RP, a few general implications jumped out. These aren’t pros or cons per se, more like general things to consider. Potential attitude shift: The Shard has two main ways of regulating behaviour. Firstly, we have an upvote system in place to encourage quality posting. Frankly, I’m not sure how effective it is now that you can’t downvote someone, so I don’t mind if the new site doesn’t have one. The more important thing is the threat of consequences. The reporting system is in place to give people a way to complain about activity, and the mods are there to administer punishment if there’s a problem. On the new site, that threat would be lesser. Instead of risking banishment from the entire Shard, you only risk being blocked from the Alleyverse RP. It could embolden people to be cockier. Identity confusion: The Shard is very strict about its ‘one account per person’ rule. The admins have the ability to check users’ locations to ensure honesty. If the new site didn’t have that, people could be tempted to make multiple accounts. Beyond intentional mischief, confusion could be accidentally created if people do not make their Shard and Alleyverse usernames match. Identity theft could then occur. To avoid this, I would like some form of user verification process and restrictions on name changes. Administration changes: Currently, our mini-mod team is very limited in what it can do. They can’t look in PMs, look at personal information, or get report notifications. Voidus has more capabilities, and I trust him to use them with discretion. But he’s only one man, and he lives in a poison-filled desert. If the site were set up so that he’s the sole administrator, we risk stagnation the next time he is hospitalized by a spider bite. If we gave increased authority to the mini-mods to run the site, we increase the amount of responsibilities they have. It’s a delicate balance to strike, one that’s important to get right because the buck would stop at them, unless other members of the Shard admin team sign on to this venture. Altered relationship with the Shard: I think that the ideal relationship would be one like the Mistborn RPG has. I haven’t spent a lot of time over there, but from what I understand, it runs like an extension of the Shard, with the same rules and leaders. But once we’re independent, the way we operate could change. That then begs questions about whether advertising our RP is allowed, but that’s up to the overlords to discuss. Subforum relabelling: I expect that if we chose to migrate, this subforum would be wither hidden or moved to the Inactive zone. This would obviously decrease our visibility. Another implication is that the setup would be different (obviously). This could mean that some features that are currently accessible to us would be unavailable. If we got a new website, there are some features that I would really like to have, so, as Kidpen put it, the change isn’t a downgrade. My Wishlist: Notifications: I would like some way to follow specific threads, so I can focus on only the areas I’m involved in and can be alerted of new activity. Private messaging capability: I would be fine with having public chat forums protected by a rank system, but I have enough short, direct conversations with people both in and out of my guild that I would miss PMs if we didn’t have them. I don’t want limitations on my ability to directly talk to members of other guilds if I want to. If this is a deal breaker, I’m fine with using Discord as a substitute, but PMs are preferred. Swear filter: One like the Shard’s would help keep the site family friendly. Threads: We need the standard suite of subforums and threads in order to operate. Users need to be able to post text and images. The usual stuff. Rules: For legal reasons, a disclaimer needs to be acknowledged by new users. Also, the expectations for behaviour need to be clearly stated. A Gallery and Character Database: These would be nice to have, if possible. I’m picturing something like our wiki. It’s got to be pretty: If the site isn’t visually appealing and easy to read, I will complain. Loudly. Don’t tell Chaos, but I don’t like the Mistborn RPG colour scheme. It’s too dark and gloomy. I know that that’s basically a list of features the Shard has. That’s because I like our current situation. Personally, I’m content with what we’ve got. However, I recognize that there are other options out there, and I’m open to hearing about them. I’m squarely in the ‘it depends what features it has’ camp; I’ll withhold judgement until I see what features Voidus proposes. But, to quote Mac, ‘if we wanted to make ourselves a forum, [and it] ended up literally being the same thing as this but under a different domain name, then I [will] not support it.’ However, even if we don’t choose to move to a new website, we can still benefit from this brainstorming session. People are making good suggestions. Some of them could be modified and implemented here. That’s something to keep in mind while you read through these posts. Thanks for your time.

IT GREW BACK?!? CONGRATULATIONS!!!! Also, happy birthday, Queen E! (In a belated sense that totally isn't awkward at all, no sireee.)

Here's my conundrum: I already added 'contributor to the Longest Thread' to my résumé. (Future employers are going to be so impressed.) Unfortunately, this thread keeps growing at an unfathomable rate. If you keep this up, there is a small chance that this thread might overtake the original Longest thread to become the longest thread. I can't be bothered to update my CV, so I'm left with two options. 1. Release a horrible, mutilating virus in this thread to simultaneously destroy the new posts of anyone in this region while discouraging further competitors, er, participants. 2. Make a post here so I can say I was a contributor. Obviously, I intend to do both. Yay! I'm the last poster. Thiss i5 so EXCi9ng jw jr%pdw2scAHHhHHH is H0RRIB1E v!RUSSS jnv &(dfouiane*tuh SAV3 yourselve9u gf8 !!B B(&*B *&!!!!!!

That Random Part of My Mind That Thinks About These Things. Randomly.: Mmmmm. As soon as I hit 2000 upvotes, I'll get me a new rep title. I wonder what it will be. *looks at the list* *sees that the rank actually changes when one hits 2048* Me: Aaaaaargh. TRPOMMTTATT.R.: Mmmmm. Tarachin is spelled wrong.