The Artisanal and Bardic Fellowship

The Artisanal and Bardic Fellowship of Scarlatti

The current contest theme is DUTY and submissions are now closed for judging.

You can view previous Artisanal contest winners here.

You can view previous Bardic contest winners here.

To honour and acclaim your wisdom and artistry, we have decided to encourage the fine arts by holding occasional writing and visual arts contests. The winners of these competitions will be ascribed rank within the Bardic and Artisanal orders in our Fellowship, as well as receiving a healthy reward of the currency known as Credits.

Rules For Submission

Regardless of how many characters you play on Achaea, you may only submit ONE entry toward the open contest.

Bardic entries must:

  1. Be original* works (literature, history, poetry, or philosophy)
  2. Be in written form. Words only; no recordings.
  3. Be distinctly Achaean**, within the proper mythology, culture and worldview.

Artistic entries must:

  1. Be completely original* artistic works, done by you only. This means no clip art, no stock photos, no pre-fab or pre-drawn models, 3d or otherwise. If you didn’t make it from scratch, you don’t use it in your art!
  2. Be distinctly Achaean**.
  3. Not be collages.
  4. Be black and white, colour, 2d, 3d, whatever.

*Originality:
Every part of your piece must be original to qualify. Clip art is not original, even if you fix it up with Photoshop or some similar tool. Stock photos, pre-fab/pre-drawn 3d models, and the like are also not original.

For artistic pieces, a written explanation may be beneficial.

What if it isn’t original?

If it’s not entirely original work, then the entry is eliminated. You also stand a good chance of experiencing in-game repercussions if plagiarism is detected, up to and including loss of your character.

**Achaean:
We ask – “Does this faithfully depict, in a reasonably detailed manner, an Achaean scene (one not likely to be found elsewhere)?” If yes, then it’s very likely to be distinctly Achaean.

If the scene could have been anywhere, or would fit in a number of fantasy environments, then it’s probably not “distinctly Achaean.”

Just any old warrior will probably not make it. Just adding the name of a city or house doesn’t make it uniquely Achaean. Bewinged atavians with runes on their armour and weapons and tattoos on their bodies, or even acting out Achaean abilities – this is more likely to be convincing.

Formatting Your Submission

Artisanal

To submit an Artisanal work, attach the submission to the email with any additional information provided. You may submit .jpg, .gif, animated .gif, or Flash formats. The total size of your submission must not exceed 10MB.

In either case, submitting an entry is a very serious step. When you submit an entry, you are saying:
– that you were the original creator of the material, and
– that there is no material in your submission that is copyrighted by anyone else.

If you submit material that you didn’t create yourself, or that has been copyrighted by someone else, your character or characters will be shrubbed. You may also have BROKEN THE LAW: submitting someone else’s copyrighted material (or any intellectual property) may be a violation of US and International law. ORIGINAL WORKS ONLY!

Bardic

Bardic submissions should be sent either in a plain text file (properly formatted where appropriate), or in the body of the submission email itself. Please do not send direct copy-pasted content from Word or the equivalent!

How To LOSE with your BARDIC Entry – Guaranteed!

Just copy and paste from Microsoft Word. If you have smart quotes anywhere, then you’ll be disqualified instantly!

Use notepad, wordpad, or any other text editor. Or use Writer from OpenOffice.Org, which is free and comparable to M$ Word.

Or learn how to disable smart quotes in Microsoft Word. Look here: Tools -> Autocorrect Options -> Autoformat As You Type, and then make sure the box is UNchecked that says “Straight Quotes” for “smart quotes”.)

How To Submit Your Entry

  • All Bardic (written) and Artisanal (visual) entries for the contest must be submitted by email to either artisanals@achaea.com or bardics@achaea.com.
  • Submissions must include the name of your character and any additional appropriate information required to judge the entry.
  • Please ensure that EVERYTHING you wish to submit is included in this email – multiple emails regarding the same submission are unlikely to be reviewed favourably.

NOTE: Your character is assumed to have created the work in-role. This character will be the one to receive any forthcoming reward.

These contests are held by discretion of the Achaean admin team, typically when in-game events or (rarely) OOC moments of significance provide an inspiring platform for creativity.

The closing date for each contest will always be announced at the same time as the contest itself. After submissions are closed, a judging period of one to two weeks will take effect, after which results will be announced and prizes awarded accordingly!

What Can You Win?

There are 3 levels of success in the contest. One winner, up to three creditable runners up, and any number of minor merit awards.

A character may enter three times per contest.

Success in the contest brings with it the following rewards:

Winner : 4 points and 600 credits
Runners up : 2 points and 300 credits
Merit : 1 point and 150 credits

Winning (and runner up) entries will be announced in game and on the Achaean website! Prizes will be allocated to the winning characters shortly afterwards, and the actual entries shall go on display on the Achaea wiki following that!

Each time you hit increments of 4 points in the Artisanal contest, you will gain a new rank in that Order, as well as some credits. That is in addition to the credits you get for being the winner, runner-up, or merit contestant see above).

There are 7 ranks. Your current rank is displayed in your HONOURS. The rank titles are as follows:

1 – Associate – 100 credits
2 – Fellow – 200 credits
3 – Master – 300 credits
4 – Artisanal Master – 400 credits
5 – High Master – 500 credits
6 – Laureate – 600 credits
7 – High Laureate – 700 credits

Copyright Notice

All submitted works of whatever nature become the sole property of Iron Realms Entertainment, LLC, with all copyright assigned to Iron Realms Entertainment, LLC.

NOTE: The reason for this is that we wish to be eternally free to display winning works on our website. If you still have a problem with this, consider that the only works that will win are ones that have something to do with Achaea, and you couldn’t sell those anyway. We don’t mind you also posting the art or stories on your website however.