Credits to:
* Talauln Dex for the Advanced SIM Guide concepts and examples
* All the members who helped with the myriad questions I had regarding
how they do what they do.
*_Refined SIMming Techniques_*
Welcome to the Advanced SIMming Techniques Guide. By now you should
have already passed the Basic SIMGuide for your Division, and should be
familiar with the basic rules and standards of SIMming, both on IRC, and
in Email.
The goal of this guide is to pick up where the Basic SIMGuide left off.
To show techniques that members in UCIP have used to further enhance
their SIMming experiences. It should be noted that there is no ‘right’
or ‘wrong’ way to employ SIMming techniques once you have learned the
basics, and each individual will develop their own style and flair for
SIMming.
If you have any techniques that you have seen or like to employ, please
contact the Academy Executive so they can be considered for addition to
this Guide, as we are always looking for ways to further enhance what we
in the Academy teach to our Cadets and students.
This Guide will cover many subjects, and it is hoped that it will be
useful to both new SIMmers and experienced SIMmers alike. If there are
any questions or concerns after having read this guide, please contact
one of the friendly Instructors in the IRC channel #Academy and they
will be happy to direct you to the right place and person to speak with.
If you are not already familiar with the 10 Basic Rules for SIMming,
please review them. They are extremely important to every SIM, and are
included below.
1. Creativity is key, creativity gives life to your character.
2. Pay attention to detail. Keep up with what others are doing
and writing, it just might affect your character
3. Be flexible, anything can happen in a SIM
4. Remember the Golden Rule. Treat others in your logs the way
you would want to be treated in theirs, with respect.
5. For every action, there is a reaction. If you put a phaser to
your head and fire, chances are, you're dead. Don't do dumb stuff.
6. Words are powerful, use them carefully, and write so others
understand what you're doing.
7. Communicate; talk out of character (OOC) with other crew
members in email. It builds cohesion and can add to creativity.
8. Stay involved, you can't always be the center of attention...
but that doesn't mean your character can't do anything. It is a big ship.
9. Develop your character. Make sure you use traits about your
character in your logs. Don't just write a BIO and then play your
character completely different.
10. Be consistent, that way others know what to expect of you. Over
time it can be like ESP.
This course is organized into 9 Sections, organized in order of
relevance to each other. It is recommended you read this document in
full, as each Section builds on things covered in the previous section(s).
1. Character Development
2. Constructing your Character Biography
3. Enhancing your Logs
4. Joint Logs
5. Using IRC to work around Events
6. CART
7. The Weekly Report
8. Taking Advanced Courses
9. Becoming an Instructor
*1. Character Development*
Too many people SIM for ‘power’, rank, and ‘status’. These are
intangible items, and while they can make a person feel good, these
people often forget about the pride you can feel in creating a well
established and well thought out character. Often, they forget to have
fun while on their quest for those items, which, to them, are important
and mean everything.
Character development happens every time you play your character, write
a log, or attend an IRC SIM. Anything you do with your character
results in development. Characters are constantly being defined,
rewritten, and refined. They evolve, just like their players do, and
some of them can be quite complicated.
There are several keys to true character development. One of the first
‘rules of the trade’ is that whatever happens… happens. Adapt. When
something bad or totally unexpected happens to or around your character,
your character should have a ‘natural reaction’. When having trouble
figuring out what that ‘natural reaction’ would be, ask yourself “How
would I feel/react to that if I were that character?” Once you figure
that out, the rest should be easy!
Often in adapting your character past these ‘bad events’, you may take a
few weeks to years for your character to fully assimilate the
consequences of whatever the event was. In most cases, it can be hard
to see past the moment, past that your plans have been tampered with or
altogether ruined. You need to be able to recover and SIM well from
such incidents. If whatever your plans were, were vital to your
character’s development, you may have to postpone them, or alter them to
fit the situation.
Remember, above all, this is SIMming, and the best part about SIMming is
you never know what is going to happen next! Even the best laid plans
can come to ruin by a simple plot twist or unexpected event happening on
your SIM. The best you can do is adapt, and move on. Part of the
challenge is being able to adapt, and these unexpected twists, while
frustrating, can make the game a lot more fun if you learn to employ
them carefully into your own plans! It can be a lot of fun to figure
out how to take the current events and figure out a believable and
logical way around it to your goals.
It is important to remember that whatever happens to your character, it
is really happening to your character. This means it is important to
remember actions and consequences. If your character breaks a bone, it
will be sore for some time afterwards. Remember that at all times when
SIMming, you are playing your character, and should react how your
character would react, not how you, the SIMmer, would react.
Most importantly, consistency is the key to character development.
Through character development, you explore aspects of your character,
and others come to know your character and are able to reliably expect
certain reactions from your character. In time, it can become like
ESP. This greatly enhances your ability to be able to SIM well with
others, as well as their ability to SIM well with you.
*2. Constructing your Character Biography*
A Character Biography (commonly referred to as a Bio) is also very
important to character development. Not only does it save you having to
repeat basic information to new people, but it allows you to keep track
of important events in the life of your character. Your Character
Biography also can help you focus your character during times when you
may loose track of what you are trying to do or where you are trying to
take your character.
Below are some basic elements that are most commonly found in Character
Biographies. They are not ‘law’ and you can be as detailed and flexible
as you want with your character information. You can include more, or
less information, whatever suits your needs. A Character Biography can
be as short as a page, or as long as a dozen pages in length. There are
no hard rules about that. Additionally, many SIM Administrators
(Commanding Officers) require that you have a Character Biography before
you will be granted promotions.
Personal Details:
This should be pretty self-explanatory. Simply enter your character
details, such as; Name, Gender, Race, Description (Appearance), birth
date, birth place, and family information.
Remember, before you pick your race and commit to it, do some research.
Your Character’s physical description should make sense for the race you
choose. As an example, if you pick a Romulan, your character would have
black hair, as blonde and brown hair is extremely uncommon. If you
choose a Trill, the last name will be 3-4 letters long. Vulcans would
be without emotion. A Klingon would hold his or her honor above all
else, they are very proud race with aggressive tendencies.
In other words, be careful, your character, unless you have a back-story
to justify it, will need to be an example of a typical person within
their race.
Previous Posts, Awards, and Promotion History:
As you go through your time in UCIP, you will find yourself holding
various posts. It is important to keep track of what you (and by
extension your character) have done. Dates are important, so you should
use your biography to keep track of everything. This section might look
something like:
USS Cortez – Chief Science Officer – SD 240103.25 to SD 240301.18
SSS Griffon – Chief Medical Officer – SD 240301.18 to Present
Bergen Award – SD 2401.25 – Awarded to the USS Crazybird for excellence
in SIMming
Promotion to Ensign – SD 240103.25
Promotion to Lieutenant JG – SD 240106.18
Promotion to Lieutenant – SD 240110.03
Please note that you can make up information to fill in gaps, such as
when you go on LOA from the group, or to make your ranks fit a little
differently for your character. You should make a note of what
information is ‘real’ and what is made up, by putting an asterisk by the
entry, putting ‘Not RealSIM’ in brackets, or something similar.
Additionally, if you are familiar with HTML, you can add the IMG tag for
the award and rank pictures to your biography.
Character Background/History:
There are two basic ways to do your Character History and Background.
The first is to write it in paragraph form, like a story. The second is
to write it in timeline format as shown in the previous section for
Character Biographies. Either way is fine, and you don’t have to
include every detail, but you should hit upon the major events in the
life of your character. One paragraph is not acceptable. Some of the
best timelines will begin with the birth of your character, and show you
the evolution to present-times. Remember, the longer the better, but
keep it to summaries.
Medical History
Much like your Character Background and History, however, this focuses
on the medical history of your character. Again, either paragraph
format or a timeline is fine, this is mostly for the use of the Medical
Officers and Counselors on your SIMulations. You should note injuries,
psychiatric evaluations, and checkup dates in this section.
Notes/Traits
This is an additional area where you can mention anything else you feel
is important about your character. Remember that balance is very
important in the creation of a character. An example of something to
balance a character is he might be mentally very smart, but physically,
very weak. No one wants to SIM with a super-human character that can
destroy an enemy ship with a super power death glare! It makes it
boring to try and play your character if you never have to really solve
anything. For more information on balancing your character, there is a
section entitled “Guide to Powergaming” later in this Guide. It shows
you what *not* to do with your character.
Advanced Courses
Again, this is pretty simple. Just click yes for any courses you have
officially completed and passed within UCIP Academy. Click “No” for any
courses you have not completed. It is very important to be accurate
with this, as false information is not taken lightly, and can cause you
to receive anything from a reduction in Level, to being banned from the
group (if you have repeated offenses).
*3. Enhancing your Logs*
Good variety is important to getting people to read your logs, and thus,
help to enhance your own SIM experience. UCIP utilizes mailing lists to
make it easier for you to distribute your logs to the crew of the SIM
you are on. It is up to your CO to make sure everyone who is on the
SIM, is on the list, so they do not miss out on anything important.
Writing logs and sending them to your fellow crewmates can be a powerful
tool in developing your character.
It is important to remember that everything you log, and everything that
happens in logs you do not write, can or may affect your character on
some level. As an example, if you write that your character has gone
into the holodeck, and the ship is attacked, the natural result of that
might be the holodeck going offline or malfunctioning.
One technique that people like to use for consistency between logs is to
past the last few lines from their last log into the new log, and go
from there. Not only does this help the person to focus on writing
their own log, but it also helps other people to understand what is
happening, and in what order.
Something that needs to be emphasized is attention to detail. Details
can make your logs come to life. It can make an otherwise boring log
very interesting to read. Below is an example of how a little detail
can make a big difference.
Lt Dex walked out of the turbo lift on his way to sick bay. Upon
entering sickbay, Dex spoke to the chief, “I have come to get my
physical Doctor”. The Doctor looked at Lt Dex and began the examination.
As you can see from that small log, there is nothing technically wrong
with it. However, it is short, and a log of this length is NEVER
acceptable. Now, observe what happens when you add details and emotion
to the log:
Lt Dax strutted out of the turbo lift with the doors swooshing closed
behind him. He slowly commenced his way down the twisting corridor,
nodding slightly as other crew passed by. Dax smiled thinking about
dinner with his girlfriend from the night before as he edged closer to
sickbay.
Dax smoothly walked into sickbay as the doors politely parted, and then
slid closed behind him. Moving quickly, he pounced upon the biobed
grinning like a child with candy at the doctor who was now standing
there with an eyebrow curiously raised.
“Well Doc”, Dax spoke smoothly with a clam and giddy tone, “I’m ready
for my physical!”
The Doctor glared at the strangely happy Lieutenant as his eyebrows
shifted formation. A small smirk appeared on the Doctor’s brow as he
picked up a small scanning device and began taking several standard
readings from the rather hyper trill who could not seem to sit still.
Now, compare the two logs. Exactly the same thing has happened in both,
however, in the second one, emotion and detail were used to describe the
situation more sufficiently, and to create a picture of what was
happening in the reader’s mind. It is the little details that make the
log come to life, and the emotion that shows the mood.
It’s really quite easy to do this once you get the hang of it. Try it
with a few logs yourself. Write something short, and then expand on
it. You’ll be amazed at how quickly you pick up this important skill!
Take note that a decent good quality log will be about one to two pages
long, sometimes more, and sometimes less. If you notice your log
getting longer than two pages, you may want to consider breaking it up
into several logs to stretch over several days. This will give other
crewmembers time to react and respond to what is happening in your logs.
Remember that some COs will require you to do a mixture of personal and
duty logs. You should review the Basic SIMGuide for information on what
that entails. Try to balance out your duty and personal logs so you can
achieve both character development, and contributing to your SIM’s
plots. You can even combine personal and duty into a single log if you
wish!
*4. ** Joint Logs*
A lot of people like to do joint logs, but not everyone is actually
familiar with doing them. A joint log is a great way to bring character
interaction to your Email SIM. You basically get with one or more of
your fellow SIMmers and write a log together with your characters
interacting with each other. Not only do you get to work together on
one log, but you both will get credit for the log!
Joint logs are extremely useful for mission briefings, big duty tasks,
parties, special events, getting to know other characters, and many
other opportunities that will present themselves as the SIM progresses.
There are two different ways you can go about writing a joint log, the
first, and most popular is by taking ‘turns’ writing the log. Simply
write your portion and leave a note at the end for the next person.
Then send it to them, so they can write their portion. Repeat this
cycle until the log is finished, then whoever wrote the last portion
sends it over the mailing list. Unfortunately, this method can take
anywhere from several hours to several days depending on how much time
you and the other person have and what time zones you each live in.
Patience is a virtue however, and you can make a great joint log with
this method!
The second method for writing joint logs is described in the next
section of this document.
*5. Using IRC to work around Events*
Every SIMmer who is able should download an IRC client. The most
popular Windows IRC client is mIRC, which you can download at
mirc dot com For more details on setting
yourself up to use IRC, please review the document entitled “How do I
get onto IRC?” which you can find through the Academy website.
Email SIMs tend to be oriented more towards character development and
detail. They take place at a slower pace than an IRC SIM, and allow
more time for development.
IRC SIMming is a lot of fun, however, it tends to be more action
oriented than an EMail SIM.
IRC SIMs are held at a certain time each week. They require fast
reading and quick thinking. Even if you do not wish to be part of an
IRC SIM, it is highly recommended that you at least Guest on one a few
times to get an idea of what IRC SIMming is about. If there isn’t a
ship you are interested in, there are Cadet SIMs twice a week, and the
Academy is always ready and willing to help you out!
IRC can come in really handy for the Email SIMmer when you need to work
your way through complicated events on your SIM. It allows for faster
paced action, and you don’t have to wait hours or days for others to
respond to what is happening on the SIM.
Just remember that if you intend to do an IRC SIM to help work around
events, and you intend to send a log, do NOT send the IRC log. This is
considered very unprofessional and is a pet peeve of EMail SIMmers.
Instead, convert your log into paragraph format. Not only does this
make it easier to read for everyone, but it also allows you the
opportunity to add details that may have been missed, or to edit
conflicts that may occur within the IRC session.
*6. CART*
This acronym describes four aspects that are very important to any
Advanced SIMmer. It stands for: Communication, Adaptability, Respect,
and Teamwork.
Communication
In character communication is key to the quality of a SIMulation.
Everyone on the SIM needs to communicate with each other in order to
understand what is going on. This is one of the key purposes of the
weekly SIM Report. This is the COs communication to the crew to keep
them informed about what is happening. It is also important to
communicate with your fellow crewmembers. The more you communicate, the
better the SIM will be!
Adaptability
Things will not always go the way you plan for them to go. Surprises
can be just around the corner. You must learn to adapt your plans to
deal with situations as they arise for your character. This may mean
changing your plan completely, or even postponing it for a later date.
Respect
It is important that you respect your fellow crewmembers, and their
characters. No one likes an abusive person, and being abusive can
result in expulsion from your SIM. Remember, that in SIM, you cannot
always be the center of attention, sometimes you need to take a role on
the side and let others run things.
Teamwork
A SIM that does well, is a SIM where the crew all work together towards
a common goal: Having fun. Teamwork is what the other three terms add
up to when you put it all together. Work with your other crew mates.
Even if you do not like some one, you must be able to work with them,
especially when it comes to SIMming. If you are unable to do this, it
can create real problems for you, and the SIM you are on.
*7. Using The Weekly SIM Report*
The weekly report for your SIM is probably the most important document
you will ever receive. This report includes a lot of handy things such
as: Awards and promotions, weekly quotes, current mission/order, a plot
summary for the last week, log counts, information about new crewmembers
and changes happening, places to meet on IRC, etc.
If you read nothing else, read the report. If you are short on time one
week, read the report, it will catch you up on whatever major events
have happened on the SIM. The report is the COs tool to bring the SIM
together and make sure that the story makes sense. If there are
conflicts between logs, they will be resolved in this report.
When in doubt about what is happening, read the report, and ALWAYS check
with your command team if you are going to write a log that will cause a
major change in the course of the plot or what is happening on the SIM.
It is better to seek out permission than it is to have your log
retracted and have to write an entirely new one.
*8. Taking Advanced Courses*
The Advanced Course section of the Academy is dedicated to teaching you
the information to help make your SIMming experience more realistic and
believable. It is highly recommended that you take the Advanced Course
relating to your chosen position on your SIM.
While some of the exams themselves can be hard, taking the courses is
well worth it, as it is like taking ‘extra credit’ on your SIM when
looking for promotions. If you are interested in taking an Advanced
Course, you will need to email the Course mailing lists in order to
enroll. More information on this can be found on the UCIP Academy website.
*9. Becoming an Instructor*
Instructing at the Academy is a great way to become involved in UCIP.
Not only do you get learn more about leadership and teamwork in UCIP,
but you also get to help out new members by passing on your knowledge
and experience to them.
Many people find teaching to be a satisfying and rewarding experience.
People who work in the Academy are not working there for rank, though it
can count as ‘Brownie Points’ when being reviewed for other positions or
promotions. While instructing others, you not only get to feel good for
being helpful, you get to meet and talk to very interesting members of UCIP.
If you have the time and patience, and take pride in your work, you may
wish to become an Instructor at the Academy. This will enable you to
begin to contribute to UCIP on more than just a SIMming level. If you
are interested in becoming an instructor, send an inquiry to
acadex@academy.ucip.org and let the
Academy Executive group know! They are always happy to accept new
people into the Academy Team.
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