MATING FLIGHTS - IC

Throughout this lecture I'll be referring to male riders and female riders. What I mean is the rider of the female dragons - golds or greens, and the riders of the males - bronzes, blues and browns. It is taken as a given that men or women could be riding greens, blues or browns.

Blues are quick and maneuverable because of their size, but lack the endurance of the larger males, and so never participate in gold flights. Browns are more maneuverable than bronzes, and have greater endurance than greens. Browns may chase greens or golds, and even win golds, but infrequently. Bronzes have the best endurance, and worst maneuverability. They usually chase golds, but chase, and win, greens on occasion.

The mating Flight progresses through several stages: proddiness, blooding, chase and capture. A female dragon can show signs of proddiness up to an IC week before she is actually ready to fly. The physical signs are a brightening or "glowing" of the hide, though that is often a later sign. The emotional/mental signs of proddiness can differ from dragon to dragon, but often include irritibility, even irrationality. Your normally-placid dragon may start complaining about anything and everything.

The dragon's emotional/mental state affects the rider in the same way - irritability, irrationality, etc. If you start feeling out- of-sorts, or become unusually interested in sex, look to your dragon, she may be proddy and getting ready to rise. In fact, a proddy dragon broadcasts on a wide emotional bandwidth, which can end up affecting others around her, not just her rider. This is particularly true of golds. Male dragons usually feel the effects of being around a proddy female, as do their riders. Even non-riders in the area can feel the effects.

It is for this reason that you should NOT take your dragon from the Weyr if you suspect that she's proddy. Her emotional state is affecting you, and your judgment. People at the Weyr are knowledgeable and tolerant of dragon cycles, while those outside the Weyr know little of this.

However, when the female becomes close to rising, the riders of other females should take their females out of the Weyr, if they are nearing proddiness themselves. While dragons are not normally in the slightest "territorial", proddy female dragons may become possessive of "their" males. This is especially true of golds.

When the time comes for the female to rise, the males will usually sense this first. The males will gather in the feeding grounds and begin to blood their kills. Soon after that, the female will come to the feeding grounds as well.

The female will want to eat her kills, but her rider MUST force her to only drink the blood of the animals. This will not be your familiar, obedient dragon, but one who is intent on her own agenda. So you must be firm with her. Undigested meat sits heavily in the stomach, resulting in a shorter and less-satisfying flight. It is particularly crucial in gold flights, as the faster and further the flight, the better and bigger the Clutch.

During the blooding stage of the flight, the male riders will be a little more clear-headed than the female rider, who will already be mentally bonded almost completely with the dragon.

Once she has blooded, the female takes to the sky and the chase begins. At this point the male riders also become almost completely bonded with their dragons, and aware of little around them. The participating riders then move to a private area, usually one of the ground-level weyrs, or the queen's weyr if it's a gold flight.

During the initial stages of the chase, the female flies fast and strong, glorifying in her freedom and taunting the males behind her verbally, and with convoluted flight maneuvers. The males are completely intent on their goal of catching her. Eventually she begins to tire, and it is at this point that the males begin their serious attempts to catch her. Some males may become tired as well, and be forced to drop out. Males will push themselves to the limits of their endurance during flights, and the occasional stress injury is not uncommon.

Finally, one of the males will catch the female. Once caught, the female capitulates completely to the male. Dragons mate in the air, the male supporting the female by intertwining his neck and tail with hers. The unsuccessful males will return to the ground, and their riders will leave the ground weyr and go to their dragons. The riders will still be feeling the effects of the flight, and will be dazed and confused by the wrenching emotional experience they have just gone through.


 

MATING FLIGHTS - OOC

 

This lecture will discuss the OOC information, which is equally as important as the IC information, if not more important. The most important thing for you to keep in mind is that flights are a spectator event, and something done for the enjoyment of the RP. They are NOT a private contest. Flights are a group "show" put on by the participating riders and "directed" by the female rider. Please feel free to ask any questions about any aspect of the mating flight process, either privately or publicy, of me or any of the AWLMs.

 

Mature greens can rise every 4-6 RL weeks at maximum. These flights should be scheduled in advance if possible, and can be advertised on the Mating Flights bulletin board. Female riders should find out how those commands work, and male riders should get in the habit of checking the Mating Flights board for information.

Gold flights are determined by more OOC than IC factors, and will be scheduled by the Weyrleaders. They should still be "advertised" in the standard way.

Female riders can also "advertise" in advance through their @doings, and through their RP of proddiness around the Weyr and on the DTU. Letting male riders know about your flight is a good idea, so that they're aware and can try and be on for the flight. Some riders I know send out @mail to those riders they're particularly interested in having attend. Many of the male riders like to have a chance to mentally prepare for a flight or come up with an IC reason to be around at the time of the flight, and advance advertisement is a courtesy to them as well as a way to better ensure attendance at your flight.

Female riders, try and schedule your flights around other flights. You can use the DTU to talk with other greens and make these scheduling decisions. When flights are staggered by day and time, you can expect much better attendance from males. Three WEW flights in a week may be a bit too many for the male riders to handle.

Males are expected to participate in at least a few flights once in a while. Female riders will feel pretty crummy if they have a flight and no one shows up. Bronzes are expected to participate in gold flights if they can, and green flights if they wish to.

When it comes to the actual day of the flight, the female will usually RP a bit on the DTU, and ICly/OOCly invite interested males to her Weyr for the Flight. You may also wish to +announce your flight to let potential spectators know about it., and it's usually courteous to hold it in a +watchable room.

After the initial DTU RP, the flight discussion should be moved to channel 'flights'. The female rider should remind the male riders to get on that channel.

The interested riders and dragons then go to the female's Weyr. The dragons move to the feeding grounds and RP blooding. The riders usually gather in the center of the Bowl and RP the effects of the bond with their dragons. Once the dragons take to the air, the riders move into one of the ground weyrs. Female riders, some of the males attending may not be familiar with your Weyr, pro or page directions to the ground weyr.

There are a couple of OOC reasons for the riders to move to the weyr, as well. One is that it cuts down on spam, as you're usually receiving everything through your dragon, as well as seeing it yourself. The other is that almost inevitably, someone makes a goof during the flight, for instance posing oneself blooding, instead of the dragon. This happens all the time, so don't let it ruin your enjoyment of the flight if it happens to you, and don't harass someone else if they make a mistake.

During the entire flight, the female rider is in control. He/she can bar certain males from the flight, can determine if he/she would like a male to drop out of the flight, and will decide who wins the flight. With this control comes the responsibility of communicating with the male riders.

Everyone involved should be as detailed as possible with their dragon poses so that all involved can try and visualize what's going on and which dragon is where. Females should warn the males if they're going to move suddenly, or RP something intricate. You do NOT have to have your dragon zip all around the airspace, all of that can be RP'd with the dragons in one OOC sky room, though you can fly around more if you wish.

Male dragons, if you want to try a particular manuever, you might want to check with the female first. The more communication there is during a flight, the easier and more fluid the RP. You can communicate any number of ways - pro'ing on the channel flight, talking in the ground weyr or paging.

Males, you should ONLY post ATTEMPTS to catch the female, unless the female rider has said otherwise. If five males are tugging on a different part of
the female it is insulting, looks silly, and makes her feel like a piece of meat being squabbled over. Posing grabs instead of attempts is a perfectly legitimate reason for females to start barring you from flights.

 

Read that last paragraph again, it is probably the #1 rule of flights - pose ATTEMPTS to catch the female, not automatic successes.
 

A suitable pose would be:

Blueth reaches out with his tail, seeking to entertwine it with Greeneth's.

An unacceptable pose would be:

Bronzeth snakes his neck around Goldeth's, fouling his wings with hers so that she cannot get away.

Once the capture has been made, the other males should fly home or down to the bowl. It's considered rude to keep trying or hang around the sky. The mated dragons should "fly off into the sunset"; please don't RP out the dragon sex publicly. If you really want to do it, send the dragons home first. TinySex (Or ReallyBigSex in the case of the dragons) is not a spectator sport. Often the dragons return to sleep on the ledge of the weyr where their riders are.

Male riders, try not to get involved in this as some sort of ego contest, or complain and whine that you should have won. Remember that the aim of the flight is RP and spectator enjoyment. You can have just as much fun, if not more, RPing having lost the flight.

Some greenriders have said that as a green rider, they particularly appreciate it when male riders come just to RP, and not to win. This might be something you want to consider doing occasionally. It can be a lot of fun, and add to the enjoyment of the flight for everyone. If you do attend a flight and do NOT want to win, male riders PLEASE tell the female rider.

Most of you are probably wondering what goes on in the ground weyr during the chase. This varies with every female rider. Some people play it strictly RP, with riders posing the effects of the mind link with their dragons during the flight. Other people use it for OOC discussion, what the next move will be, if there are too many riders and one needs to drop out, whatever. Female riders, make sure you either tell the male riders outright what you prefer, or give them cues. And if you go the strictly RP route, you must still communicate the OOC details through page or pro.

And male riders, play along with the female rider's preferences. Things can get really fun in the ground weyr if people RP, but it may be that the female rider has lag, or line noise or just a headache, and doesn't want to deal with it. Also, if you are going to RP something bizarre, no matter how IC it might seem, please do clear it with the female rider first. He or she is running the show.

 

A few words about sex. TinySex should NEVER be expected by any flight participant, whether male rider or female rider. If you have any concerns about this, ask the other rider. Flights are draining RP; it is far more common for people to chat or idle than it is for them to TS. Also, if you are uncomfortable with a same-sex joining even without the TS (or even an opposite-sex joining) that shouldn't stop you from participating in a flight. You can always tell the female rider that you don't want to win. I've never heard of a female rider not honoring that request.
 

On the other hand, ICly your characters have sex. And it shouldn't matter if they are a same-sex pairing. In fact, it's very atmospheric and IC to have same-sex pairings. It disturbs me when I see female riders reluctant to choose a same-sex male rider to win a flight, or to see a male rider reluctant to even participate in flights where the female rider is the same gender. As far as I'm concerned, we all knew what the IC aspects of being a rider entailed, and if you weren't willing to RP that, you shouldn't have tried to become a rider (on the other hand, see the note above).

I'm not saying you shouldn't RP having a Craft or Hold bred background, and be ICly uncomfortable about it the day after or something like that. I've had a lot of fun doing that myself. I am saying that during a flight, you think like the dragon, not like the player, or even the rider. Also, eventually you will become accustomed to weyr life and weyr morals, so that even if your character was very sexually uptight or homophobic, he or she will gradually become more accepting.

Flights vary in length with the number of people and the amount of lag, but a good goal to aim for is about 30-45 minutes for a green flight, and an hour to an hour and a half for a gold flight, starting from the RP in the feeding grounds. Although to be honest, most flights, gold or green, last an hour to an hour and a half, depending on the number of male riders.

Female riders, you may wish to have a friend among the spectators to try and gauge when spectator interest is waning. Also remember that the male riders may have other things they wish to RP that day.

The male rider who wins a green flight has no further responsibilities. This is not true of gold flights. Even if it's only a junior gold flight, the male is committed to attending the Clutching and the Hatching and RPing those. He may be expected to participate in other OOC Hatching duties - descing eggs or hatchlings, and other such things. If you're concerned about that, talk to the gold rider before the flight about what your duties would be if you won.

For gold flights, the gold rider has a lot less leeway about who wins. With senior flights, the winner will be the Weyrleader, and is often decided on in advance. With junior flights, the Weyr may need a gold that Clutch, and so the gold rider will have to select a bronze.

Greenriders have complete freedom to choose who wins their flights. As a male rider, I'd like to say a few words about that. Even though we shouldn't get competitive about flights, many do, and want the flight to be fairly chosen on the basis of RP.

Some greenriders even go so far as to draw a name at random for the winner, or narrow it down to a couple of riders and then choose randomly. As a male rider, I find that incredibly frustrating, but I know that it's the greenrider's choice. Another way greenriders choose the winner is for larger RP intentions - you may choose someone as a catalyst to starting an IC relationship. You may have RP'd your dragon having a particular interest in a male dragon long before the flight, so choose him to win if he comes to the flight. You may deliberately choose someone you ICly can't stand, just to see what happens. :) Weyrmated green riders will often choose their weyrmate if the dragon is of an appropriate colour.

Male riders, please try and look at it from the female rider's point-of-view. There may be up to five or six excellent RPers that show up to the Flight, but only one person can win. Most female riders take making this decision seriously, and are not being cavalier or callous about it.

And female riders, if the outcome of the flight is pre-determined (whether it be your weyrmate or someone to take the next logical step in a TP or whoever), it is only polite to inform the male riders of that in advance. Remember someone may be putting off a RL event or some bit of RP just to attend your flight and even if they're not, they will be devoting several hours to your flight. I am not saying that you shouldn't have the outcome of your flight be pre-determined. I'm only saying that you should be as honest with them as you'd want them to be with you.

In a final note, male riders, there is always another flight. Don't worry about who won and who lost. Don't complain to the female rider. Don't tell everyone you know what a twink the winning male rider is. Because, and trust me it's true, the female riders will hear about it and best poser or not, it'll be a frigid day in Boll before you'll ever win a flight again. Enjoy the roleplay. Enjoy the interaction. Don't worry about winning.

This lecture is almost entirely word-for-word from one of Sionelle's old HRW Weyrling lectures. I'd like to thank her for giving WEW a legacy that can be passed down to future generations.

- Information gleaned from many sources including: The Dragon Lover's Guide to Pern by Jody Lyn Nye & Anne McCaffrey, various lectures from High Reaches Weyr on NC courtesy of Sionelle, M'gan.