PGC - continue? disband?

[islandshore]

So, with Lightning and Hope gone, the PGC is now without its leaders. What I was wondering is if anyone with PGC chars would like to continue the Corps even without Lightning there to lead. In the past, its leadership used to belong to Merlin as well as Ventus, so there is precedent for it to continue.

I was thinking of having Riku throw up a filtered post involving its future sometime within the next week or so. The tricky part is that the Corps is much smaller now, so my initial thought is if it does keep going, a) do we keep the squads as they are? Shuffle people around to compensate for the smaller size? And b) new recruits. With the numbers down, now might be the time to welcome new members into the fold.

So think of this as a general discussion post. Curious to see what you all think!

Comments

[doitrockapella]

I don't have any plans to have Carmen become an official member of the PGC (it's not her style), but in the event that the group does continue, I just wanted to weigh in and say that I'm still open to having her surreptitiously interact with the group similar to the way she did with the Falkner's Birds thing recently. I'm totally fine with the idea of people not really trusting her as an ally or even as a source of information, but I wanted to throw this out there for plotting purposes because in an OOC sense, she can sometimes be helpful in facilitating things, and she's not averse to tipping off the heroes or throwing them the occasional support if need be.

So basically, I'm just here to say that assuming the group continues, she's still a viable resource (?) to them, and I'm open to subsequent plotting if they continue to fight crime in Johto and whatnot. o/

[islandshore]

I can't speak for everyone involved, but I'd definitely be down for that. I enjoyed seeing Carmen's involvement during the return of Falkner's birds player plot, and given her past interactions with Rockets such as Cobra, I think it'd be fun. :)

[these_balls]

Also, this just occurred to me (and I switched to the mod account for Slightly More Officialism as a result) —

I know that the PGC, in the past, has had a tendency to respond mostly to shenanigans caused by our player-controlled Rockets. However, since our PC Rockets get to attack NPCs all the time, it only seems reasonable that our heroes should get to foil NPCs as much as they want, too.

So, with that on the table — if the PGC does continue, I just want to put out there the fact that all of you guys are welcome at any time to come to the mods with hero plots of your own, and we'll be more than happy to line up some Bad Guy Shenanigans™ for you to save the day on. Fair's fair, and I figure that might give the PGC more freedom to, y'know, be heroic, without potentially confining them to having to wait around for the PC Rockets to do something that they can get in on.

(We have plenty of NPC Rockets and a firm love for shenanigans. We would be more than happy to concoct some stupidity for you to defeat and triumph over.)

[islandshore]

Oh, that sounds like it could be a lot of fun! I can't speak for all the PGC players, but I'd definitely be down for it somewhere down the line. What sort of scale were you thinking about?

[doitrockapella]

Assume I'm still wearing my Mod Hat here, just sticking with this account because it's easier. o/

Really, it depends on what you'd be interested in doing. For example, when our Rockets want to wreak some havoc, they get in touch with us and usually give us a rough plan — "I'd like to attack this landmark, I'm going to do it on this day and through this method", etc, etc. I don't see why it couldn't work the same for the heroes, just in reverse — "My hero is in this city and I'd like for them to foil a Rocket plot, maybe they could attack this landmark on this day, and I'd like it to be a decisive victory so here are the types my roster is strong against."

Alternatively, we could also be a little more flexible about it and you could request an attack without a lot of details, and then we'd hand you the scenario and then let you respond to it with whatever plan you can come up with to combat it — for example, we'd say "There's a raid on the Olivine Lighthouse and it looks like there's about five guys with some kind of dog Pokemon because you can see the tracks in the sand. What do you do?" — and we'll tell you how well you succeed (or, if you're open to it, fail!) at it.

Basically, there's no reason why the hero cast can't have the same opportunities to do things as the villain cast; the same method is probably applicable, just reversed to accommodate the good guys instead of the bad ones.

[usedwatergun]

I'd really like to offer something a little more concrete regarding my thoughts on this, but I haven't been a part of it very long, OOC'ly, and I'm still a little bit out of it from the cold, so I hope you don't mind if I just throw out some sorta jumbled thoughts instead. Sorry D:

First, I've already seen several people mention an interest in seeing things continue, so I'm hoping that means that there's enough interest to keep it strong. That said I really strongly agree that now is the time to try to gain some new recruits. One thought I had was that it might also be worth considering to do some kind of leadership hierarchy. Doesn't have to be anything elaborate, maybe just making some of the senior members of the Corps dedicated squad leaders or captains or something- especially if there are enough of them that tend to gravitate within a certain area? Distribute the weight of the leadership a bit if no one or two individuals want to step up to the plate. Maybe put them in charge of assessing new recruits and organizing squads for future dealings in said area?

But like you also said we're pretty small right now, so that might not be totally viable, IDK.

Either way I'm still interested in having Katara help however she can. She's still fairly new to the PGC herself, but she'll probably try to contribute however she can. She's actually already traveling around with a member of another squad at the moment (France) and she hasn't met with Ren yet (her last remaining squad mate) before now, for that matter. Totally flexible there.

[islandshore]

Nah, I like the idea of a hierarchy and multiple leaders. It keeps the PGC from having one authority with the final word and also keeps the pressure off of people by spreading the workload, so to speak.

One thought that crossed my mind was to have a PGC meeting somewhere so that they could all discuss things in the flesh. First, though, I think network discussion would be more convenient given that everyone is probably fairly spread out.

[kuranosuke]

This Ren-mun/saxsongs noting that I would be very much interested in continuing with the PGC. Ren wants to do something about Team Rocket, so if they decide to continue, he's definitely still going to be around.

I also think they'd need to find new members... so many Team Rockets, so little Guardian Corps.

[islandshore]

Yesss. This is exactly my line of thought as well. Ten is a really teensy number, so getting newbies may even breathe more life into the group. That's always a plus.

[bestofthebest]

Rainbow Dash has been eager to officially become part of the PGC once discovering her friend Twilight was in it, and that they fought for a good cause but at the time her Pokémon weren't at high levels. Now that she's been here for over a year -and recently helped Twilight in a way with Falkner's birds- things are different and her determination to become part of the group hasn't changed.

She wouldn't like it at all if the group disbanded and would want them to continue with the Rockets stlll out there. So if they do continue, Rainbow would very much like to contribute to the PGC's cause.

[islandshore]

Seeing how RD is one of Twilight's pals, Riku certainly wouldn't object to her joining. He's not sure how much his opinion counts for since there's no leader just yet, but I figure the PGC will keep going since there is interest.

[friendyousohard]

I'm late weighing in on this, for which I apologize, but I know that Twilight is going to want to keep going, even if it means taking on a leadership position (strategist? organizer?). She'll probably take the opportunity to finally induct Applejack and Rainbow Dash into the Corps as well, and at least bring up the idea of doing some recruiting.

[islandshore]

Twilight would make an excellent strategist and/or organizer! Riku certainly wouldn't object, and I imagine others would be down for it, too. At this point, I think the PGC is going to keep on going, so the main goal at this point, I think, would be to discuss what to do next, get newbies, and plan from there.

[friendyousohard]

Then it's time to get into serious business. Twilight doesn't know as much about running this sort of thing as she'd like, but she'll definitely do her best, starting with taking over duties of sorting people into teams and briefing people, to the extent that Riku's okay with letting her take over, of course.