User blog:Aquamarinesandopals/March OTM Voting

Congratulations to the winners of last month, Celes Mochigome, Charlie Djurisk and Gallant du Lac!!

I'm honestly quite excited for this month, because nothing major seems to happen in March ('cept St. Patrick's, I suppose), so this'll probably be the most exciting thing about this month for me which is probably quite sad. oops.

There have been some updates to the rules in general, but especially to SOTM. Please read the rules (changes can be found in the "How to Vote" section). I won't count votes that aren't voted for in the way laid out in the rules. A section about tie breakers has been added as I've received a fair few questions about it.

Additionally, we have had some user suggestions about changes to the OTM system. These will be implemented in the April voting.

Rules

 * 1) Do not vote for your own OC.
 * 2) An OC who has already won cannot win again.
 * 3) A character with the same destiny as a previous winner cannot win.
 * 4) You (the driver/creator) cannot win an OTM twice in a row (you're free to vote for an OC who fits this description but they won't be able to win until a month has passed).

In regards to SOTM:
 * 1) You can vote for a ship you have an OC in.
 * 2) You can vote for a ship solely comprised of your own OCs too, if you wish.
 * 3) OC/Canon is allowed.
 * 4) The ship does not have to be a romantic relationship nor does it have to contain just two OCs. Poly ships or friendships are totally fair game.
 * 5) All the OCs in your ship must be present on the wikia to win the award. You may vote for a ship where only one character has a page, but the ship cannot win until / unless all the OCs have pages up on the wikia.

Here's a link to the list of COTM and SOTM winners, please give them a read.

How to Vote
So, you've read the rules, but you may be thinking "That's all very well and good Spades but how do I vote?"

Well hypothetical confused voter, follow these simple steps!

COTM

 * 1) Comment down below which OC you would like to vote for - You can vote for multiple OCs!
 * 2) We encourage comments about the characters and why you like them.
 * 3) Character names should be given in full.
 * 4) Links should be provided anyway, but especially if you've nicknamed the OC in your comment.

SOTM

 * 1) Comment down below, noting the ships you would like to vote for.
 * 2) Please list both / all the OCs involved and their ship name. (e.g. 'I'm voting for Bobarah, which consists of Bob Smith and Sarah White'.)
 * 3) Once again, we encourage little comments about why you like the ships.

Misc

 * 1) You may vote multiple times and you don't have to do it all at once! If you want to add more votes you may make a new comment or edit your old one.
 * 2) You may vote for COTM/SOTM in the same comment.
 * 3) Please actually list a character or ship! I know it's annoying, but simply saying 'any of x's ocs' does not count as a vote. I don't have the time or energy to research every oc a person has ever made. A character or ship must be named to count.

Things to Remember

 * 1) Don't feel pressured to vote for what everyone else has voted for if everyone is voting similarly.
 * 2) The winner may be unexpected as we count all votes from all previous months when deciding who wins.
 * 3) It would be wise to vote for OCs with active users.

In Case of a Tie
The admin team has no specific protocol for a tie, but in the unlikely event we need to pick between two OCs/Ships, we will consider the following:
 * 1) Which OC/Ship has been on the list the longest.
 * 2) How many votes the OC/Ship generally gets per month.
 * 3) Reasons people have given for voting.
 * 4) How many different people have voted for the OC/Ship.