Pacing:

I won't reiterate things, since I see the responses up above, so just glad you guys are looking into this! Every kind of plot deals with a different pace that works best. In this case, it's a smash and grab — in past experience, I've seen those kinds of missions work best on a tight time frame, to keep people motivated and completing things on time. So I'm glad you're looking into this!

Participation:

a. If plots are going to run once every two months, I suggest actually shortening the penalty time down to "sit out the next plot." Asking someone to sit out as a punishment for two months makes sense and should be motivation enough to participate when you sign up! Having them be unable to participate for four months is more liable to drive them to drop instead of try to improve activity, participation, or engagement.

b. My biggest concern here is now on an IC front. Do you guys have a plan of action in mind to make it viable on the IC front that anyone who has been so badly burned this first time around will have any reason to go along with future missions requested by the captain and/or the ship?

Right now that occurs to me to be the biggest problem going forward, since to stay In Character there are many who cannot have a repeat of this "go in blind, be told nothing, be told even more nothing when they get back, and by the way, you helped enable the genocide of two species and the nuclear winter of their planet."

It doesn't matter what's being offered on the OOC side of things if the IC side makes it improbable to remain IC and still participate in this game's mission actions. Out the gate, the PCs have been set against the entire NPC crew by merit of being kept in the dark and used to these means with no explanation or apology. Which is good, as far as encouraging players to investigate the Eluvio, but it's where I wanted to ask what the mod team had in mind for how and why characters will participate in future missions. Because it is extremely bad as far as building any trust or reason to follow the orders of the captain, and if mission plots hinge on PCs voluntarily signing up, we've been partially hamstrung.

c. I'm also going to agree that having multiple slots for things that are resource missions would make sense, since both small groups threading things out tends to go faster, and resource missions are a good opportunity for people to get down and strike up or build on new CR without feeling the need to be competitive to get a resource mission slot, or have a really big team heading down to pick up the same resources.

Mod Guidance:

Personally, once I know what the limitations and boundaries are, I'm happy to run with whatever and figure things out or make them up as I go. I feel you guys have done a good job with this when it comes up, such as letting us know what kinds of plots do or don't need to be signed off by you! I appreciate those clarifications, and I know I'm still adjusting to properly keep them in mind and run with things as feels fun.

Two points I did want to bring up!

One, when world building, questions like "what is the general tech level" helps me as a player know the framework of what I can then BS into the sunset about existing on world. I know that I personally don't need more than, say, "Industrial Revolution." Or, "Futuristic Sci-Fi." Or, "Stone Age, for the most part, but randomly they have advanced weaponry."

Having questions meant to inform me of basics that I can then build off go ignored was incredibly discouraging. I don't want the mods to feel they need to do the world building. I'm happy to do that with fellow players. But if I ask a question, I'm asking for a reason, because it helps allow me to build things in a framework that works for whatever was generally in the mind of the mod team when designing the plot. I don't feel comfortable ad-libbing an answer when there's a stark contrast between "they live in mud huts" and "by the way there are multiple systems we need high level hackers to get past in this temple" without a word from the mod team saying if that should be normal or not when looking elsewhere on the world.

Two, communication! For these gamma missions with the native species, it felt like to me that the mod team wanted to avoid "direct communication through a shared language or interpreter." However, what I was told was no communication at all would be possible. Saying all communication is impossible, full stop, reads like there's no way to communicate concepts at all, not through body language, not through art, not through interpretive dance, not through song, not through participating in shared activities, not through touch, not through liberally dragging someone through a house, etc.

There are definitely species where that'd make sense, based on other limitations (maybe communicating just through lights and colour, imagine a species of jellyfish-natives, etc, and even then you'd potentially be able to realise they do communicate in colours and light without knowing what the blazes you're saying), but the insistence here that no communication could happen at all was difficult to understand.

If I wave and you wave back even just to mimic the motion, we've just communicated! Maybe not much, but we've acknowledged each other. I can then call out hello and not be understood, but that's a language barrier, not a complete inability to communicate. I know I'd personally appreciate a delineation between "no shared language" and "complete and total inability to communicate at all, because the species differences are just too great" in the future. Though going on a mission to observe a species that's completely beyond a character's understanding or ability to form any level of connection with (antagonistic or otherwise) feels equivalent to watching paint dry, or threading out watching paint dry. Tongue in cheek example:

"The mysterious species of tater tots rolled. They rolled all day, in odd patterns. Then they stood up, stared at each other, sang a single note, before returning to rolling. Day four of observation continues to prove this is completely and totally beyond our understanding. Even playing Taylor Swift provoked no response other than a shift in rolling that appeared to mimic what might have been rain, a tsunami, or even the way beads roll off a line. Maybe it was related. Maybe it wasn't. We just don't know.

Beyond that, I want to thank you for the time and energy you are all putting into Eluvio! The fact you're willing to open up these discussions to hear back and decide on what adjustments the mod team as a whole does or doesn't want to make is encouraging.