hswcrules

Event Layout

Contents

  1. Event Layout
    1. Main Rounds
    2. Collab Round
    3. Round Work Guidelines
      1. Info Block
      2. Ratings
      3. When Posting:
    4. Round Media Limitations
    5. Disqualifications
    6. Bonus Rounds
    7. Bonus Round Work Guidelines
      1. Formatting
        1. Prompts
        2. Fills

The main bulk of the HSWC is made up by two Main Rounds and one Collab Round. There are also several Bonus Rounds that run throughout the event.

All rounds (whether Main, Collab, or Bonus) present a prompt to the community. Teams and participants then do their best to fulfill the prompt challenge.

All HSWC event rounds are visible to the public. If you want to participate and vote, however, you have to sign up and be on a team. Those who want to vote but not create content can join Team Noir.

Main Rounds

There are two main rounds. Each main round has its own Dreamwidth community where teams will post their round submissions.

This is how main rounds generally go:

A round's theme should inspire the work (for example as a theme or plot device), but it doesn't have to be an intense focus of the work. We need to see the influence, but you don’t have to beat us over the head with it. (Unless of course you want to!)

All submissions must be created new for the challenge. No fan-created content is allowed that has not been made by members of your team specifically in response to the prompt. Mainstream creative content is fine (e.g. popular music, well-known art pieces, Homestuck panels or its soundtrack, Paradox Space comics), but not fanart, fan music, etc.

For example, you can create a parody of a song on the radio but you cannot use an already-existing fan song in your entry, and you cannot take someone else’s fanart and use it to make a graphics set or a fanvideo unless said art was made by someone on your team specifically for that round. You can, however, make videos and graphics out of canon artwork, fanwork made by your teammates for the round (not older work they have lying around, that's not okay!), and well-known art like the Mona Lisa. This is largely to ensure that the original content in your entry is clearly identifiable as distinct from the borrowed content.

In a similar vein, you cannot build off of an already-existing AU such Aquariumstuck or Hemostuck. You can use general AU ideas, such as a mermaid AU or a bloodswap AU, as long as you do not take from any specific, already-existing work that uses that AU setting. Crossovers with other fandoms are allowed but not recommended, as they require knowledge of titles which other participants may not be familiar with.

All work for the HSWC must be made exclusively by that team. You cannot ask people outside of your team for help (with the exception of cosplay, which may use an outside photographer; more info at Round Media Limitations).

Although team members may create many works in response to a main round prompt, each team may only submit one cohesive entry to each main round. Round entries can be multimedia, and can be created by multiple team members, though neither is required. For example, a five member team could create five (or more!) individual entries for the prompt; two members could work on one entry and the other three could work on a second; all five could work on a single entry; or any combination thereof. However, no matter how many works the team creates, only one entry can be sent to represent the team in the round.

After (not before) the round's voting is complete you may post unused round entries anywhere you want, such as tumblr or our Archive Of Our Own collection. For more information, read the HSWC Anonymity Policy.

Your team's entry must focus on the ship you are representing, though there may be mentions of other ships, and even mentions of your team's characters being in other ships (gotta fill those quadrants, after all).

Do not post your HSWC main round creations publicly (i.e., on tumblr, AO3, etc.) until voting ends, whether or not they are chosen as part of the team submission. For more information, read the HSWC Anonymity Policy.

Collab Round

The Collaborative Round is an extravaganza of togetherness and creativity! It lasts for the entire HSWC, opening one week before Main Round One and closing in August. Generally, all the notes mentioned in the Main Rounds section also apply here (entries must be created new for the challenge, etc.). There are only two notable changes:

The Collab Round entry is meant to be a team's showcase piece to demonstrate the true glory of their ship. Get out there and show us what you've got!

Round Work Guidelines

Info Block

Because this event is open to fans of a wide variety of ages and backgrounds, we want to make sure that HSWC is a safe and accessible place for all. As such, main and collab round entries must fill out the following info block in its entirety at the top of their post:

If you are using the HTML code layout to create your post, here is a code box for your copy-and-pasting convenience.

After the info block, you must place your round entry behind a cut when posting it to the main round comm. There are two ways of doing this:

Ratings

G: General Audiences - "This content is suitable for anyone: kids, teenagers, sensitive people."
T: Teen And Up Audiences - "The content may be inappropriate for audiences under 13."
M: Mature - "This is for content with adult themes (sex, violence, etc.) that isn't as graphic as explicit-rated content."
E: Explicit - "This is for porn, graphic violence, etc."

When Posting:

You must put all of your work directly into your submission post whenever possible. Writing should be posted directly to the comm and art/photos/video/etc. should be embedded in the post. However, if you must link to an off-DW entry (e.g., a game, a fic that is too long to fit onto a single DW post, a choose-your-own-adventure-style entry, an MSPA fanventure, a website, etc.), you might include a few safe-for-work previews, samples, or screenshots in your entry post along with your link. It's more eye-catching and gives people a better idea of what they're getting into.

You can use any hosting service for your entries and entry scripts, as long as it doesn't require a sign-up to view, is safe for work, doesn't break anonymity, and doesn't include flashing images (such as ads). Imgur is a highly recommended and anonymous image hosting service, for example. Hosting your entry on an anonymous google doc, DW, or tumblr expressly made for that purpose is fine; hosting it on a team member's tumblr or AO3 account is not.

If your entry uses images embedded in a game, video, or otherwise hard-to-access format that might be hard for the mods to count, please provide a list of the image's filenames. You can add it to the end of your script if you'd like, or on its own if you're not providing a script.

If you're submitting a game, you should seriously consider including a video walkthrough of your entry. That way, people who have trouble loading or playing your game can still get an idea of what your entry is like.

If you're having trouble imagining what your round entry post should look like, check out HSWC 2013's collab round for examples.

You must get your entry's work in before the deadline. If you submit it after the deadline, you'll receive round participation points but you'll be disqualified from the final vote. (Changes to the voting system as of HSWC 2014 have rendered it impossible to add late entries once voting begins.)

We discourage editing your round submission after it's posted because it puts your team at a disadvantage: people may have already read/viewed your team’s entry and made their voting decision, and thus would not see your new content. However, if you do wish to edit your entry, you must edit the current post before voting opens for that round. Never delete and resubmit your round entry.

If you are submitting photos of a tangible object (like a cake or plushie), please try to make sure they are decently clear/well-lit! We won't be doing image/color correction for you, and it isn't our fault if people can't make out what your submission is. Also, we suggest but do not require that you submit 3-5 photos of whatever it is from different angles, just so we can get a better look at it! (Multiple photos of the same object for clarity purposes count as a single image with relation to media limits.)

Round Media Limitations

The Homestuck Shipping World Cup implements these length restrictions on entries:

Writing: 1,000 (min) to 4,000 (max) words.

Art (without words): 20 images.

Combination Art/Writing Entries (any work that includes both, including comics and games): up to 1,000 words and 20 images, OR up to 4,000 words and 5 images.

Gifs/animations included in a larger work (such as a game, fic or comic): 20 seconds in total.

Video/Audio: 4 minutes max runtime (this applies for both animated and live-action video, as well as music and voice acting).

Cosplay: Costumes should be made/assembled at least 50% new for the challenge. You cannot reuse costumes from round to round, though you can use up to 50% of a previous round's cosplay for the basis of a new one.

You can combine media types: for example you can have 4,000 words and 5 images, two of which are cosplay photos, one which is a photo of a sculpture, one a static illustration, and one a gif. However, each individual piece of media must conform to its specific limitations.

If a main round entry exceeds any of these limitations in any medium by less than or equal to 5%, it will be penalized 50 points. If it exceeds the limitation by more than 5%, the entry will also be disqualified from advancing to the final vote. For more information, see the Disqualifications section.

The Collab Round has no hard work limits. Go wild. If you want a guideline for how long your entry should be at maximum, double all the main round work limitations (for example, 8,000 words/10 images). If you go over them, though, there's no penalty.

Disqualifications

Your main/collab round entry will be accepted to the round, but not eligible to move on to final vote if:

Bonus Rounds

Bonus rounds are there for MAXIMUM FUN! Like sweet candy in between meals, bonus rounds are short, more direct challenges in which teams get to take a break from longer, focused works to earn extra points by creating stuff for other ships. Anyone can participate as long as they’re on a team (and that includes Team Noir).

Every two weeks, a new bonus round will open. Each bonus round will have its own main prompt, which will be explained in the post for the bonus round, but most bonus rounds will follow the same basic form:

  1. Members can submit prompts as comments to the bonus round post. These prompts consist of something relating to our bonus round challenge plus a single ship.
  2. Other members come along and fill those prompts. You can fill as many or as few prompts as you like until the two weeks are up!

After a bonus round ends, new comments will be temporarily screened while the mods count up the points. Then the round will be opened again to prompts and fills, though entries to that bonus round won't receive points anymore.

Bonus Round Work Guidelines

Works should follow the criteria laid out for Main Round entries (all fanwork must be new for the round, crossovers are allowed, etc.) with a few additional notes:

Fills must be at least 400 words long, or an equivalent amount of work in other mediums (e.g., 400 px by 400 px or an equivalent area for art fills). Poetry must be at least 14 lines long. (There isn't a word minimum for poetry because we're trusting you not to abuse it; play nice.) There is no max work cap.

Please link to visual NSFW fills and very high-resolution images instead of posting them directly to the bonus round, as you cannot use cuts in comments. You may include a small safe-for-work image thumbnail if you would like to give a preview. Written NSFW fills should be posted directly to the bonus round and be clearly tagged.

If your fill is too long to fit in a single comment, submit the second, third, etc. parts of the fill as a reply to the first part of the fill, either replacing the subject line with something like “CONTINUED” or “Part 2 of X” or making sure that the “Re:” is present. This is so that it's obvious that this is a reply/continuation of your fill and that you aren’t attempting to sneak in a second fill for your team.

Formatting

Format your comment in one of the following ways. Posts not using this format will be understood to be unofficial discussion posts, regardless of what they contain.

Prompts

Comment Subject: PROMPT: TEAM [YOUR SHIP]

Fills

Comment Subject: FILL: TEAM [YOUR SHIP], [RATING]

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hswcrules: Event Layout (last edited 2014-06-19 01:13:32 by HSWC Mod Team)