(Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) OK, hey everyone and welcome to the MST office hours. I'm Dawn Ll...oh wait. I'm Robin, AMST Settings: Chief of Staff. We currently have Andrew as AMST Dark Places, Justin as AMST Rules and Brian as AMST Archivist looking after things, and as you'll have seen from the announcement. So go ahead and PM your questions to Brian and we can get started. After we do a few questions we'll then open things up for a brief wider discussion, and then go back to moderated comments.

Question: A pair of documents were created and placed on the old Invictus wiki. To my knowledge they are not located anywhere else. These documents (the Invictus Title document and the Regional Inner Councils document) purport or imply that they are officially sanctioned changes to canon material, even providing mechanics on IC structures which otherwise developed organically. Are these documents actually in place as fully sanctioned?

Answer: (Justin, AMST Rules) The documents on the Invictus wiki and FirstEstate.org site are helpful resources for players created by other players. These are not official documents created by the Global staff and thus are not a sanctioned part of the chronicle. Any changes to the mechanics listed in the book or Addendum are not sanctioned.

Question: There's recently been a surgette of activity from the Save The Cam bods. Without giving them any more publicity, is there an internal satisfaction audit addressing the same or similar concerns?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) As you may have seen both Dawn and I have commented on the Save the Cam blog, and players raising questions and concerns for wider discussion is usually only to the benefit of the society as a whole. I noted on the blog that a number of the concerns they've raised are issues that we've identified ourselves at Global and are addressing, and we try and gauge feedback regularly from the membership through MST surveys and other means.

Question: Rumors of a possable reset in the next 5 years any truth to that or is it just a rumor? also if it is happing is it going to be a soft reset or hard reset?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff)Going to reiterate some comments from Dawn from last office hours: First, contrary to popular opinion as visible from the lists, everyone does not want a reset according to the membership survey a bit ago. You can find the results from that on the MST website. Overall, I've heard a lot of rumors that I've said this or that or the other thing, or that a reset is going to happen in this year or that. I've never said anything about a reset, so please don't believe these rumors. It won't be leaked quietly to a few people to knowingly go around bragging that there will / won't be a reset in such and such a manner at such and such a time. So until you hear it officially from Kelley / me, don't believe anything else you hear.

Question: Ventrue is it going to be sancioned? and how will the malkavion thing work if it is?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) Ventrue will be sanctioned, and the specifics of that sanctioned are currently being discussed among the Requiem global and national officers.

Question: How can we get in to the global plots?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) Firstly by pursuing plot in general, sometimes it may not be immediately clear that something is "global plot". If there are particular aspects of a venue you want to chase up, or you'd specifically like "some kind of plot" also feel free to email relevant AMSTs direct. I'd also add that some of the most imporatant ways players can get involved in Global Plot are to a) Tell your VST that you want Global Plot. b) RP with other Cammies outside of your Domain/Region/Nation.

Question: What themes are currently being explored by Global in plot

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) The "official" theme of this year for the chronicle as a whole (as suggested by members) is "the price of power". We'll be exploring this in our plot/settings materials in all venues.

Question: What are Global's feelings on plots which do not culminate at a National Convention or ICC?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) I've no in principle objection with widescale plots that culminate outside of a major event, but also acknowledge that those events should also be integral parts of our ongoing chronicle. The issue here is really accessibility to players, and I'd rather plots occurred "live" rather than in large scale proxies.

Question: What is an ETA on an overall updated FAQ?

Answer: (Justin, AMST_Rules) Currently the FAQ is under development. I have hired a project lead to work on answering all the pending questions on cam-rule-answers as well as the previously answered questions in the FAQ, and reformatting them into a new FAQ that should hopefully be more accessible and user-friendly.The majority of the work is in the formatting to make it easier to use.

Question: Will we be seeing an effort to create a an overall metaplot for the Global sanctioned chronicle?

Answer: (Tammie, AMST Special Projects) Yes. Please refer to the March 19, 2008 Office Hours log.

Question: What is the offical word on what VII is? is it the other clan the sleepers or what? Also what would my domain have to do to start up a VII game?

Answer: (Justin, AMST Rules) It has been determined by the National and Global ST ataffs what VII is and how it will work in this chronicle. Due to the rarity of actual VII members, this is best addressed in each specific plotkit as it is submitted. As for having a VII game in your domain, VII is not a sanctioned venue itself and therefore we have no plans to allow such in the future.

Question: I'm hearing rumours - which is never a good start - that custom mechanics are becoming open and available. As vaunted in another location, is there any reason why these mechanics, if known, shouldn't or rather couldn't be available to the general membership. within the laws of the society? What progress has been made in compiling and publishing custom mechanics? What milestones and deliverables are planned for the project?

Answer: (Tammie, AMST Special Projects) We plan on making approved custom mechanics available to the general membership from the MST website. This involves compilation from the Approvals Db. This project has, understandably, been put on hold because of lack of access and trying to get it restored for our STs and Players. There are currently no more details about this project because of other, higher priority issues with the Approvals DB. The custom mechanics that are out there and approved are already available to the general membership in a sense, being passed between PCs in accordance to the laws of the society. The reason for the compilation of mechanics is the next phase of the GSR, streamlining these for both players and STs to process.

Question: What is Global's view on that current process in which appeals of USNST/ANST decisions go to the Camarilla Council (composed of non-Storyteller officers) instead of Global to review? How might this process be improved in the future, so that appeals of ST decisions are reviewed by storytellers rather than coordinators?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) This is a US Constitution question and it's not Global's place to comment on it. Any queries on the process or suggestions for change should be submitted through routes described in US membership material and constitution.

Question: What is the E.T.A. of the Token construction for Lost?

Answer: (Justin, AMST_Rules) The token creation guide is in process, though will take a lot of revisions so I can't give a set ETA on this yet.

Question: What is the E.T.A. for revised approval levels for Oaths in Lost?

Answer: (Justin, AMST Rules) The revised approval levels for the Pledges in Lost should be in the next addendum, which is planned for release in mid to late May.

(Tammie, AMST Special Projects) REMINDER - The Office Hours is not for rules interpretation questions. These take more time to examine than we have for Office Hours. Rules interpretation questions should be asked of your direct ST and if they don't know, they pass it up the ST Chain.

Question: Will they be making brood a venue? If so, when would it start?

Answer: (Justin, AMST Rules) There are no plans at this time for a Brood venue.

Question: Do we have an ETA on publishing all the custom mechanics that have been approved by global?

Answer: (Tammie, AMST Special Projects) No, we don't, and we won't until we get ST and Player access restored to the Approvals DB. All other projects requiring the Approvals DB are on hold.

Question: The recent auction rules that were published reference a limit on custom items, is that being considered?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) I think the issue here is to ensure that custom items aren't the be all and end all of auctions, and also a wider acknowledgment of the approval needs that still exist for auction items. I don't think a hard limit is in the immediate pipeline though.

Question: Are there plans to release any sort of setting guide with regards to ley lines and places of power to help STs, local and beyond, create ley line systems and places of power for their domains in a way that is uniform across the board?

Answer: (Robin, AMST Chief of Staff) To a large degree ley lines and places of power aren't supposed to be "consistent across the board", these are curious and often intangible effects and STs should be allowed a reasonably wide latitude in defining them. So there's no plans for a setting guide specifically for the topic at this time.

Question: In the Addendum, the Merit Tunnel Rat is listed as Mid approval as well as Low approval. Which of these is accurate?

Answer: (Justin, AMST Rules) This was an editting error in the current Addendum. It should be Low Approval for all venues, and will be clarified as such in the next Addendum.

(Tammie, AMST Special Projects) The last question is a good one, but is very open. I'm going to respond to it, but we will be following up with it on the LJ for folks to give more input.
Question: What can we as players do to help the mst staff better?

Answer: (Tammie, AMST Special Projects) Respond to calls for volunteers. Give input when surveys go out. Be respectful, engaged and interested to what is currently going on in your Venues. Help your newer players get involved in the game. Don't make your STs regret that they are taking up their time to help the rest of the Domain, Region, Nation or whatever. Do what you can to bring your A games and make folks thrilled to get involved in plot. :)