It's been a few months since Laveau has been opened and I can't be more happy how well it's been received. While a lot of great stories and committed players have been kicked off as part of the opening for Laveau, there are some major opportunities and areas that require daily attention to help take us past the launch hype phase and into sustained growth.

Announcing Backwaters Council

To really provide the day-to-day attention and care of the community, I've identified the following members to help me prioritize much needed work and attention. This team have been elevated to staff and will have direct access to me daily.

1. Valena/Ted (Valena Vacano) - stepping up to help as Community Manager (CM) of Backwaters; she has a long history of RP and has helped me on numerous projects recently. I trust her to help the community (and me) push Backwaters into the next growth with new and existing leaders.
2. Murphy (Amai Batista) - Stepping up to be part of the Council of Backwaters and staff mentor; she is no stranger to leadership as she used to help me run Dead End City, an old urban noir community that deeply inspired me.
3. Simone Cornivus - Stepping up to be part of the Council of Backwaters and staff mentor; with over 16 years of story making, leadership, and event experience in the Crack Den, she's moved over to help steer Backwaters.

The council will likely grow, but I will leave it to these gals to help identify and nominate the right folks.

Recap on Post Launch Updates

Conjure Expansion & Asylum

We added Conjure next door with a focus on making space for new residents and give Laveau more sprawl. At the border, you'll find an incredible Asylum that will be activating online as soon as the new hospital in District 8 is complete (expanding our medical system to include all facilities across sims). I'm excited for the Asylum (tied to Clinic) as there is a ton of potential with the kind of stories and special roles that could apply.

Discord

The Story HUD now allows members with at least 2 Chapters to generate a link to join our Discord server. As we get closer to 200 active members on the server, it's been incredible to see the stories and creativity on grid leak into the app on my phone. There is more work to be done here as I'm exploring the ability to unlock special ranks and roles based on your Story HUD.

Story HUD Updates w/ Scene Finder

The HUD is now fully integrated with Backwaters (alongside Crack Den, Columtreal University).

I also more fully rolled out an early player-matching system called 'Scene Finder' - by setting your preferences on your character card, your status color (bw symbol over your head) will change color to help visually find players in the same mood; also, if you cross paths between another matched player, you will see the Narrator post a hint in your local chat, along with a racing heartbeat sound effect.

Field HUD & Custom Uniforms for Municipal Departments (e.g. Laveau Fire, Sheriffs, Prison...)

In collaboration with [WZRWRKS], we rolled out high quality gear for these municipal groups in Laveau. The groups also now work with an all-new Field HUD designed to provide reporting capability, some AI NPC magic, and backup calls.

What's Next?

Factions 

After cross-RP observations and cases we've helped moderate the past few months, we believe we have a good formula to help Backwaters really thrive on it's own and add to the broader stories happening across our sims. More specifically, you can expect to see dedicated rosters for factions, territory tagging, and deeper story hooks to help steer the purpose of factions rooted in organized crime to sinister cults.

Prison 

While the gear and groups are ready, there has been some great planning in the works to fully roll out a more meaningful placement of the prison as part of the larger muniicipal system that makes up the entire Crack Den universe, as well as how other communities to connect to the prison to feed it stories / prisoners.

Reports and time spent writing stories at the prison will also have more concentrated impact to areas like criminal street cred, unlocking special roles, and more.

Asylum & Clinic 

Similar the Prison, the Asylum will have its own concentrated impact to characters who play out their sentence or confinement story. Alternatively, the Asylum as the potential of attracting and building its own microcommunity given the right attention. Placed on the Conjure sim, the Asylum will feature its own group, roles, and features to eventually be a Second Life Destination.

The Clinic will also be integrated between all aspects of Medical role-play offered.

Sheriffs 

As sinister stewards of the Backwaters, the Sheriffs are designed to preserve the secrets and lawless nature of Laveau ... for all the flow of sin and greed that flows through these parts of the bayou, the Sheriffs commands their share.

Though the Sheriff himself may be an NPC, I intend to seek a lead to help steer deputies down the wicked and ruthless path that is demanded of the uniform.

Network of Hidden Areas & Sewers

There are a lot of secrete areas around the sim and there needs to be an interesting way to discover or access them ...

In Conclusion...

We're looking for new stories and group concepts to help take Laveau to the next phase. Please bring your ideas to the council, myself, or post on discord/forums. There may be other gaping holes out there, and I want to make sure we're addressing them. I'm excited to be working on these updates for you as I think this will truly allow the community at Backwaters to thrive.