Freehold offers more than just high adventure, deep character interaction, and the excitement of building a civilization from nothing. The community also engages in various out-of-character activities to help build and maintain inspiration, creativity, writing consistency, and interest in the game and in one another. We strive to find diversions that keep people coming back to Freehold for a sense of general fun and family beyond the bounds of the game world, and where possible, we prefer to make these educational (or at least thought-provoking), as well.


How's My Driving?

It can be difficult, at times, for players to receive direct feedback on their roleplaying. Specifically, when things get tense and a group must rely on teamwork to survive, it's crucial that everyone involved hear praise for what they did right, and constructive criticism of what they might have done better. That includes the GMs, too. Thus, we regularly incorporate a conclusive "how's my driving?" survive into the wrap-up proceedings of each scenario that includes any significant prospect of danger. Players are asked to rate the adventure and to give concrete explanations for the things they liked or disliked, so that future excursions can be even better. Likewise, they must evaluate both their partners' competence and their own, citing examples of great gameplay as well as areas where they perhaps could improve. These surveys are administered individually, then collated by a GM, and amalgamated results are presented anonymously from the component submissions.

Participation in these surveys is mandatory but relatively painless and, we hope, useful. Experience points for an adventure are not awarded until after all surveys have been received from the players involved.


Open Writing Prompts

Each month, players will be provided with open prompts to which they may respond. We hope that doing so will assist everyone in further exploring dimensions of their characters that they may not have previously considered, or help with improving their writing and thought process. It's also just fun!

Participation in these prompts is not mandatory, but we often award a small experience point bonus to those who join in (usually 400 points). Some prompts might be directed at the players, themselves (in which case, you may choose which of your PCs gets the experience award), while others will require an in-character answer or, at least, consideration of a specific character. For players who have multiple PCs, the prompt must be completed separately with each individual character, not as one post with several answers mashed together. If a prompt potentially involves multiple characters owned by different players, make sure you secure another player's permission via the OOC chat or a private message before including their character in your response, and don't godmod their PC. Prompts will be denoted as either OOC or IC, and participants should respond appropriately: IC memes should be written just like any other in-character post.

Players are free to submit their own prompts for consideration. When you are given permission to post a new one, provide an example using your own PC (if a player) or a prominent NPC (if a GM) in the prompt, so others will know how to respond. When this is the case, the original poster automatically receives the experience award and does not need to reply to their own prompt.

New prompts are posted at the beginning of each month.


Writing Workshops

Freehold is proud to offer writing workshops that center around gaming and character development, with topics running the gamut from successful and engaging dungeon design to planning long-term character development, researching and answering rules questions, and more! Workshops are open to all players and participation, questions, personal anecdotes, and so on are encouraged. These workshops don't stop at simple articles or lectures, but include writing exercises and group exchanges, too. Players are welcome to submit their requests for workshops that cover specific subjects in which they find interest; just contact GM Sionnach.

New writing workshops are opened in the middle of each month.