This update was added on 10 September 2010.
On the 26th July, we launched the first ever Stellar Dawn competition, offering beta places to the best 5 stories. With around 400 entries we definitely had our work cut out for us!
The first stage of elimination was completed by a range of community management JMods. Our mission was to select 20 of the best stories to progress to the next stage of judging. I can vouch that this was very difficult and almost painful as the quality was impressively high. After initially reading all the stories, and being forced to be utterly brutal, we actually had 88 potentials. So as you can imagine there were many debates, meetings, and sleepless nights before the final 20 were chosen. We may not have all agreed in the final 20 but we were happy with the selection.
Next, the 20 stories we had selected faced the judgment of the Stellar Dawn community. Decisions were questioned, debates were had, and speculation over the final 5 began. The stories were presented to you all anonymously, and voting began. After 2 weeks of voting, I eagerly calculated the results. We used a ranked system to calculate this - players were asked to choose a 1st (3 points per vote), 2nd (2 points per vote), and 3rd choice (1 point per vote). Some votes were very close, especially the final place, which was tied, so we put through the story with the largest number of votes for first.
The final judgment was handed over to 3 members of the Stellar Dawn development team (Mod Captain, Mod Benjamin, & Mod Bennett), and after even more deliberation the winners were selected. So, without any further delay, the winners are:
Story 6: "Five Minutes" by Addiv'
Story 10: "Homecoming" by Moffatclan'
Story 11: "Caverns of the Mortiga" by Ahnvar'
Story 12: "Noboy Knows" by Mr Jeeves84'
Story 19: "First Day" by Orb Master44'
Congratulations to you all!
Rest easy knowing all 5 of you have earned a guaranteed place in the beta. We will be in contact with you all via your inboxes regarding your prize in time for the beta.
Finally, I want to thank you all for taking part in the competition, we have thoroughly enjoyed supporting it.
Mod SallyD & Mod Markg