Monday, March 21, 2011

Halcyon Calendar

January
January 3: School resumed. Black and White house students return.

January 17-25: Exams. (Black house takes standard exams, White and Grey are tested on shift power, Blue takes some standard exams and some shift exams.)

February
February 14: Valentine's Day. (Girls only)

March
March 14: White day. (Boys only)

March 15-19: Spring break (week long, changes each year.)

April
April 14: Black day. (Singles only)

April 22 - 25: Easter holidays.

May
May 4 - 12: Exams. (Black house takes standard exams, White and Grey are tested on shift power, Blue takes some standard exams and some shift exams.)

June
June 11: Summer ball.

June 20: Graduation for Black house students. (Black house students are the only ones who formally age.)

July
July 4: Summer vacation begins. Black house students are free to leave and visit friends and family. White house students go off on their own for a while, the other houses have organized free time and private vacations.

August
August 29: Summer vacation ends. Black house and White house students return.

September
September 8: School starts.

September 14: Photos for Photo ID taken. (All students must be shown in natural state, shape-shifters/illusioners/etc MUST present their biological appearance.)

October
October 10: Sports day.

October 31: Halloween Ball.

November
November 3: Culture day.

November 7: School festival weekend.

November 11: Veterans/Remembrance Day

December
December 5: Winter ball.

December 17 - 31: Winter holiday. Black house students are free to leave and visit friends and family. White house students go off on their own for a while, the other houses have organized free time and private vacations.

Friday, March 18, 2011

F.A.Q.

If your question is not answered here, please feel free to comment and ask.

Q: What is Halcyon Academy?
A: Halcyon Academy is a high-school fantasy-based role playing and character creation group. Man that's a mouthful. :/

Q: Can I join it?
A: Currently Halcyon is invite-only. However we will be opening applications after we have established the group.

Q: I was invited to the group... what the heck do I do now?
A: You should read the application guidelines. Actually, you should read all the blog posts available. Then you should make your character.

Q: I want to make an animal hybrid character. What kinds can I make?
A: Any kind of animal that isn't extinct.

Q: Can my character switch houses after I pick one?
A: No, you cannot switch houses.

Q: Where do we RP?
A: You may RP in the chats or with characters from HA on other sites.

Q: My character is a teacher, and so doesn't wear a uniform. What should he or she wear?
A: Anything you want! Just keep it relatively modest and school-friendly, and to the time period.

Q: What is the time period, anyway? D:
A: The time period is neo-Victorian. Modern technology, values, and speech patterns exist, however the architecture, clothing, and hairstyles are relatively similar to Victorian times.

Q: I was invited to the group as one of the leaders. How do I invite others?
A: You should invite two people that you feel you'd like in the group via the "invite" button on the group's page. Please invite them to your house's group. If they decline, you can either keep inviting people until two people you've invited have joined, or let me know and I'll add some people of my choosing.

Application Form and How To Join

First Phase Joining:
The group is currently in the first phase and all first-phase members are invite-only.

The first 20 members are the House Leaders. They will pick their roles from the role list, and have first choice. Within the House Leaders roles are first-come-first-serve.

The next 40 members after the House Leaders are invited personally by the leaders. Each leader can invite 2 people, therefore, a total of 60 members. If there are any roles left over from the House Leaders, they will be open to the next 40 members.

The first phase will continue for a little while, then the group will be opened to the general public.

Public Applications:
10 spots open for each house at each public opening, a total of 40 per opening. Members are chosen based on the following:

- Effort : Clear effort in application art and backstory.

- Attitude: Friendly and positive attitude.

- Understanding of group

Basically as long as you follow the guidelines and seem positive enough, you're good to go.

Art Policy
Halcyon Academy encourages applicants to draw their own character applications. However, if you feel you absolutely cannot do so, you may commission someone else to draw the application for you. In the event that you do this, we will completely disregard any effort shown in said application and focus solely on the written part. Please make sure you have a very well-thought-out backstory and personality in this case.

If not commissioned/gifted to you, art must be 100% your own. Please credit the artist if you have commissioned the ref or they have drawn it as a gift to you.

Application Form
You should put this in the artist comments of your ref.

Name: (Your character should have both a first and last name. Middle names are optional. Please try to be creative.)

Age: (Student characters should be between 13-18 years of age, teachers must be 20+)

Gender: (If your character is a shapeshifter, put the gender they were born with.)

Height/Weight: (Yeah... self-explanatory)

Shift Type: (Immune/Mental/Physical/Combination. If your character is a Combination, please put the Mental/Physical ratio. It should be out of 100. Example: Mental: 20, Physical: 80.)

House:(Please make sure a character of your type is eligible for the house you want.)

Role: (If your character has one. If he or she does not, put "student")

Abilities: (Describe your character's shift type or basic abilities here)

Personality: (Balanced personalities are best.)

Backstory: (Please give us at least 2 paragraphs of backstory, more if you did not draw your own picture ref. Basically, as much as possible.)

Additional: (Anything else goes here.)

Character Creation

Simple Guidelines
- Halcyon Academy is set in an odd, neo-Victorian setting. Modern technology (computers, etc) exists, as do modern politics, speech patterns, and social norms. However, architecture and clothing is a somewhat modernized version of Victorian clothing.

- Your character will have a uniform, the colour of which is determined by the House colour. (I'll make uniform examples in a bit.) The uniform is quite layered, so feel free to omit some layers to reflect your character's personality. Please make sure that the character is wearing at least the Basic elements of the uniform. If they have Physical-shift traits that make some parts of the uniform uncomfortable or impractical, feel free to omit them.

- There will be a spot on the application image where you should put any items your character carries. This is not a weapon spot. Unless it's absolutely essential for your character or your character is carrying it for self-defense, you do not need it. This is a school, for crying out loud.

- You may have one character and one character only. If your character is a shape-shifter, he or she needs to act in exactly the same manner no matter what physical appearance they may have at the time. Split personalities/D.I.D are not allowed.

Mental-shift specific guidelines
-Your character's powers are not an excuse to godmod. Your character's powers are not an excuse to godmod. Did I mention your character's powers are not an excuse to godmod? Please remember that supernatural powers of any kind are taxing on the body and mind. Also remember that in a class, all characters are on relatively equal footing since they all posses powers of some kind.

- Almost all powers are allowed, however, the more "powerful" a power is in theory, the weaker that character's individual powers must be. For instance if your character has the power to change his or her surroundings, she or he has to be a weak character with not very much power at his or her disposal, otherwise it would be unfair.

Physical-shift specific guidelines

- If your character is a Physical-shift animal hybrid, the animal traits should be obviously related to an actual animal. In other words, animal hybrids in Halcyon Academy need natural colouring. No pink cats kthanx.

Combination-shift specific guidelines

- The majority of Combination characters have a 50/50 ratio of Physical and Mental shifts in their DNA. Please keep this in mind when designing your character.

- Combination characters in Black and White house, if they have Physical shift features, must be able to cover them with clothing/hats/etc.

About Houses

House Guidelines

Black house has the students with the least physical or mental shifts. They were admitted to the school purely because of their intelligence, which is almost always higher than that of the other house's students. Most Black house students are Immune type.

Black house is one of two houses where the students are allowed outside, as the students in Black house are the "face" of the Academy. They are allowed to return to their families during holidays, and most do so.

Black house students tend to look down on physical-shifters.

White house has the students with the most mental shifts. Most White house students are Mental-Shift type. Combination-shift types are admitted if their Mental-shift powers are at the same skill level as full Mental-shifts.

White house students are generally allowed outside and to go on trips and holidays. They are not, however, allowed to visit any family as it is feared that their powers might be revealed.

The majority of White house students look down on all students not in their house. As they possess the most unusual powers in the Academy, White house students tend to feel they are "special". While not all the White house students share these views, few care to speak out about it.

Grey house has the students with the most physical shifts. Most Grey house students are Physical-Shift type and this house is the only one in which full Physical-shift types are found. Combination-shift types are admitted if their post-radiation Physical-shift are exceedingly apparent (i.e. they're way too visible).

Grey House students never see the outside world. As such, they live in a community of virtually their own design and are have a very rigid class and social structure.

Students from Grey house are the underdogs of Halcyon academy. Despite the fact that almost all are stronger than the other House students, and most have sensory advantages, their physical appearance (despite the fact that it almost never makes them look actually ugly, it's just really weird) gives other students an easy topic to bully them about.

Blue house has the students with a combination of physical and mental shifts. All Blue house students are Combination type.

Blue House is reserved for Combination types with a relatively 50-50 distribution of Mental and Physical shifts (i.e. it's not strong enough for them to be placed in Grey or White house, but not weak enough for them to be in Black house.) Physical shifts on these type take up no more than 50% of their total body's appearance, and Mental shifts are not as powerful as those of full Mental-shift types.

Blue house students may go outside, but must wear clothing that covers any Physical-shift traits. Those with completely unnatural skin and eye colours cannot visit the outside world at all.

Students in Blue house tend to have a good reputation within the school for being team players, as all of the other houses can identify with them.

About the houses

The academy has 4 classes/houses.

Each house has 5 leaders. The leaders are invited to the group by me, the administrator (I'm also a leader of one of the groups.) Each leader can invite 2 more people to their house, which brings the total amount of members to 60.


Roles for each house
The original 20 leaders in the group choose their position from 5 possible positions. This is first-come first serve. Positions are outlined below:

Class President: (PLEASE NOTE: this is an actual leadership job within the group.) The class president manages the other members of his or her class. They tend to have good social skills and a larger amount of mental/physical power or intelligence than their classmates.

Vice President : (PLEASE NOTE: this is also an actual leadership job within the group. :/) The vice president assists the class president in managing his or her class. In the event that the class president leaves the class, the Vice present steps in.

Secretary: (PLEASE NOTE: This is not a leadership position unless the person taking up the job would like to help out with the group.) Er... do I really need to explain this? ;^;

Teachers: (PLEASE NOTE: This is not a leadership position unless the person taking up the job would like to help out with the group.) Teachers are generally of the same shift-type as the class they are teaching. There are 2 teacher positions per class.

In the event that one of the original 20 leaders (who are automatically assigned to a specific group, 5 per group) do not want any of the leadership positions, they can forfeit the right to one and become a normal member of the class. However, they still should invite 2 other members to the group, and we'll work out the roles then if there are any left over.

Shifting

Uses of Shifting in the Academy
The Academy's purpose is to create life forms that have supernatural abilities. Immune types are a "cover" for the other types, preventing the school from losing funding and stopping it from getting close inspection by authorities.

Shifted students do not receive typical education, instead, their education is based entirely around developing their powers. Immune students are the only types who get the same type of classes typically found in a private school.

About "shifting"
Shifting occurs generally 1-4 weeks after a student is enrolled at the academy. It is due to heavy radiation of an unknown substance, which causes a DNA change within a typical human. When exposed to the radiation, a student will be shown to be one of 4 types:

Immune Immune students are recruited by the Academy for placement in Black house. They are the face of the Academy to the outside world and do not shift at all, due to their genes being resistant to the radiation.

Immune students appear as normal humans. They should have a typical appearance for their human ethnicity, unless they are albino.

Mental-Shift Mental-shift types tend to have a very dominating sole personality trait: this creates a mental shift. Indecisiveness would create a shapeshifting power, for instance, mistrust might create a shield or invisibility power. Mental-Shift types are generally in White house, though they may also occasionally be found in Black house.

Mental-shift student's powers are typically not physically apparent (except when in use). They may have odd/unnatural hair and eye colours.

Physical-Shift Physical-shift types have volatile genetic codes that cause them to develop physical abnormalities. Their hair, eye, and skin colour may change, and they might also develop extra limbs or features. Many resemble animal hybrids. Hybrid shifters generally take on some of the sensory traits of the animal they share features with. Physical-Shift types are only found in Grey house.

Physical-Shift students should still be recognizably human, regardless of the changes the radiation may have caused. If they are an animal hybrid, they should not be an animal which is extinct.

Combination-Shift These are a combination of Mental and Physical types. In general, their physical shifts are less apparent than those of a full physical shifts and their mental shifts are less powerful. They are generally in Blue house, but occasionally, though very rarely, found in Black house.

Combination-Shifts should not have strong physical changes.

Quick Info

Halcyon Academy
At first glance, Halcyon Academy looks idyllic: intelligent, well-spoken students with perfect grades. Clean, expansive grounds with refined architecture.

But delving further, one might notice some odd things about the Academy. Why, for instance, does the Academy's paperwork say they recruit at least 100 students bi-yearly, but only a handful of students are ever seen in classes or on the grounds? Why are there no teachers ever available to interview?

Poke around too much, and everything becomes horribly clear.

About the Group
The first group opening will be completely invite-only. Admins and mods will be invited to the group, and then have the opportunity to invite a further two members to the group, bringing the total member count to 60 members.

After the first opening, 10 slots will open for each house every 3 months, a total of 40 new members per opening. Applications are not first-come first serve, they are based on the amount of effort shown in the art/backstory (you don't have to be a good artist to get in, you just have to show effort in one area or the other) and the appropriateness with which they fit into the Halcyon world.

Events
All events are optional. A new event is created every 3 months, one month after each opening. (Smaller events might be created at any time.)

House Points
House Points are given/taken away for various reasons. Some are listed below:

- + After an event, a House gets 1 point for every student who participated.
- + Every time artwork is added to the House's folder, the House gets a point.

- - If rude or disrespectful conduct is seen on chat, points are taken away. (If this persists, the person will be booted from the group and the points taken away returned.)
- - If no members of a House participate in an event, the House loses 10 points.