I'm making another trailer, but better this time

Let me first take a moment to discuss what happened with the last trailer.

It wasn't very good, why?

Well, the artist I commissioned from Fiverr did everything I asked and more. Based on the criteria I gave and the services I paid for, he did great. It was my vision that was bad. I got overly excited, I rushed it, and I didn't have an actual creative product in mind that was carefully developed with as much time and effort as was needed.

Why am I trying again?

The concept and the subreddit that houses it are doing well. We're coming up on 500 members and the “surface” of the concept has been slowly and carefully developed to a point where it's entirely presentable or “actionable”, as stated in one of the 3 main goals of the sub. However, memes and visualizations on Reddit are only going to generate so many supporters. One thing we know for sure is that Paradox is still not addressing us regarding the concept, so our collective is not yet big or loud enough. After regrouping and strategizing, I have come to the conclusion that my idea to make a trailer was good, it was just poorly executed.

What's the plan?

Stellaris is known for it's profound trailers. Profound, not flashy, not high production value. In fact, it's earlier trailers we're nothing more than panning artistic scenes with voiceovers. As it turns out, I have the ability to write profound short stories and I have enough experience and confidence to edit the trailer. So:

Notice my strategic use of the word “we” lol. Well, I paid for the previous trailer with money I really didn't have. Because I am trying to create a better trailer, I'm going to have to ask for help, however long it takes. So I'm opening this gofundme.

What's the script?

Well, in order to create a compelling narrative, we need to start with the overarching purpose of Career Councilor mode so that we can highlight it. There are many reasons why CC mode would be an incredible development in the world of grand strategy, but if we must choose one: it’s so we can compete with other humans; together. After identifying the main theme of togetherness, I started drawing from various experiences I’ve had with Stellaris. One of these is my favorite pre-made empire, the United Nations of Earth. Combined with a few other factors that I was keeping in mind such as keeping this as simple as possible so that we can save production costs and viola, my script (and scenes):

“Scene 1 (Futuristic but poor black male father is tucking his child into bed. Father should be black because he is unknowingly a descendant of Dolores Muwanga, the most famous President in UNE history(easter egg?). Humans preferred because they tend to be more relatable as characters.)

Child: Daddy? Can you tell me a bedtime story?

Man: Hmm, let's see… did you know that humans once ruled the galaxy?

Child: You mean before the robots?

Man: That's right! And when humans ruled, we made sure ALL beings were treated fairly.

Child: … But how did the robots take over?

Scene 2 (Panorama scene that changes as you pan to the right. On the left is a happy human farmer overseeing robots working their fields. On the right are robots with guns overseeing tired and ragged but diverse looking humans who are mining rocks with pickaxes.)

Man: Well… at first they promised to do all of the boring work for us.

Child: (Getting sleepy) Like chores?

Man: (Smiles, tucks her in) Exactly. Then they started doing all of the hard work like farming and mining, until eventually they were doing almost all of the work!

Child: But isn't that a good thing?

Man: Well, since the robots were doing everything, bad people used them to take over, then the robots became mean. Before you know it, most humans were doing all of the chores and hard work again, except this time, they were forced to.

Scene 3 (Same as scene 1, except now the child is fully tucked in, father looking resolutely/righteously at the camera)

Child: … Daddy, do you think humans will ever rule again?

Man: Yes, yes I do!

Child: But how can humans beat robots?

Man: (Looking directly at the camera, resolutely) By working together…

Black screen: (Epic Stellaris music crescendos)

“Stellaris Career Councilor mode”

Then

“Join the council, work together… @ reddit.com/r/StellarisCCMode”

What is this trailer going to accomplish?

If it increases our member count by 25-100 I’ll be super happy with that! There’s also a chance that the trailer is finally the thing that pushes this concept into the attention span of Paradox devs/executives.

Any other questions?

I’d like to hear your thoughts/ideas/criticism/questions in the sub! http://reddit.com/r/StellarisCCMode