A Land Far Away

Formal proposals may now be submitted to the DMA or posted here, if you wish. External hosting of proposal documents is preferred over posting the proposal contents here on the forums. Arrangements can be made to host proposal documents externally, please contact the DMA. Proposals will all be posted for public review on April 22, when the submission window closes and discussion by the review team begins. No proposal will be discussed by the formal review team until submissions close but proposals that do not meet minimum requirements will be given back to the server team with an explanation of where they're lacking, so that server teams can resubmit before the submission window closes. Additionally, as we get closer to that April 22nd date and if NWN2 still seems to be targeted for at least end of Q2, I'm not averse to extending that submission end date, if the rest of Admin approves such an extension. April 22nd was chosen as a mid-date through Q2, just in case the developers surprised us with an early release.

Good luck to all server teams.

From the NWN2 Guidelines:

Proposal Criteria - Each proposal must address the region desired, DM coverage, desired target Live date category (Starter/Guaranteed/Expansion) and how the server team will implement mandatory content such as – but not limited to – persistent storage, banks, merchants, static quests and spawns that meet ALFA wealth standards. Mandatory content will include:

• 1. Server Layout - a rough description of what locales will be portrayed (more than just saying what region the server is set in) and how they will be linked together. This would note the towns and adventuring locales to be portrayed in particular.
  2. Server Content
  • a. Plan for PC persistent storage (server *must* have persistent storage easily available to PCs);
    b. Plan for static quests (starting servers *must* have significant static content);
    c. Plan for spawn/mob placement and difficulty, and static encounters in general (related to server layout above) - things like "there's orcs in this general area, mostly CR 1-3 closer to X but getting more toward CR 1-5 as you get closer to Y". The purpose is to get a sense of what the encounter overview would be like;
    d. Merchant availability - either description of the general sorts of stuff available for sale, or even perhaps noting significant merchants. Merchants where any non-mundane items are to be available should be specifically noted in addition to what sorts of items they have for sale (need not be an actual list of items, but things like potion-maker, scroll scriber, etc..)
  3. Server Team - Builder and Tech members, DM coverage, the HDM, experience of the team, etc..
  4. Contribution to ALFA diversity - Terrain types, urban/rural, racial playspace, or anything else the team might think of. It is important to remember that not ever server has to provide something for everyone, only the whole of ALFA does. Racial playspace need not mean a racial village or start point...only that every race has a place it can play and be accepted if not welcomed. Also please note that the release or delay of specific NWN2 regional building content means that some server areas will not have the tools to build until after the developers release expansion content. Server proposals for areas without developer supported content will be scheduled later in the expansion process, by necessity.

Proposals that do not meet mandatory content requirements by in some way addressing each component outlined above will be asked to revise and resubmit before the April 22, 2006 deadline. Such screening will not assess the quality with which each component is addressed, only whether it is or not.

two other minor points:

1. Proposals can be editted/amended at will up until the final submission deadline.

2. Please indicate when you submit your proposal whether you would like to make it publicly available prior to the submission deadline, presuming you hadn't made it public yourself already.

fluffmonster wrote:Additionally, as we get closer to that April 22nd date and if NWN2 still seems to be targeted for at least end of Q2, I'm not averse to extending that submission end date, if the rest of Admin approves such an extension. April 22nd was chosen as a mid-date through Q2, just in case the developers surprised us with an early release.

That early release don't seem to be happenin', so I'm going to suggest to Admin that we extend the proposal deadline another month, to May 23. That would mean that debate on the proposals would begin on May 23 and end on May 30, and voting would begin on May 30 and end on June 6. That gives us a known server roster before Q3, the latest date mentioned by Feargus Urquart in the TotalVideoGames interview.

Seems to me this should wait anyway till after the DMA election. You shouldnt be deciding anything right now.

The proposal window has been extended by a month to May 23, to allow for a Q3 release of NWN2. Of course, if they surprise us and release it earlier, we'll cut the extension short, give a week or so to finish proposals and then begin assessing them as soon as sensible.

Good luck to all server teams.

And again, we've extended the window for proposal acceptance, now til July 31st. Anything here can be revised and anything new can be submitted til then.

I'd like to see those named on proposals to be actually stepping up and saying "Yes, I endorse this proposal and in full faith and confidence will be participating as stated." A name on a document means very little in and of itself. If yer serious, be serious and step up.