Over 600 years across dark space, explorers wake up in their new home...
You've signed up for the Initiative. You've slept for hundreds of years. Andromeda is beautiful and nothing like you expected. Are you the new Pathfinder trying to find a home for hundreds of sleeping explorers? Are you a member of a crew? A pirate? An exile? An alien? What's your story?
Welcome to Across Dark Space: A Mass Effect Andromeda Gift Exchange. This is an exchange, run through AO3, that celebrates Mass Effect Andromeda and its numerous worlds both explored and unexplored. Any group or pairing can be nominated as long as it contains a character from Mass Effect Andromeda. This exchange is open to ANYONE who wishes to participate and can draw or write ONE piece by the deadline.
Be sure to follow this page for announcements as we get closer to nominations and sign-ups. We also have a Discord for anyone who would like to join!
Important Dates:
Nominations: November 20 12am US EST - December 4 11:59pm US EST
Sign-Ups: December 5 12am US EST - December 11 11:59pm US EST
Assignments Received:December 12 by 11:59pm US EST
Assignments Due:January 29 11:59pm US EST
Assignments Revealed:February 6 10am US EST
Creators Revealed: February 13 10am US EST
Pairing: Scott Ryder/Reyes Vidal
Word Count: 1,982
Summary: Reyes meets his match in Scott Ryder as they team up to uncover a supply thief.
Read on AO3
My gift for @natsora
Pairing: Sara Ryder/Cora Harper
Word Count: 11,527
Summary: Ryder and crew touch down on an uncharted planet to search and rescue a Resistance expedition team. They find more than they bargained for.
You can nominate up to 20 different characters and/or pairings. The moderators will go through the pairings to check that each contains at least one MEA character from the Mass Effect Andromeda fandom. Any nomination that does not contain at least one MEA character from the Mass Effect Andromeda fandom will be rejected (and if you nominate a single character, they must be a MEA character). Nominations may consist of homosexual, heterosexual, threesomes, moresomes, or platonic requests.
I want to write a ME character/I want to write Shepard in Andromeda:
That’s completely fine. It will be considered a crossover and must contain at least MEA character in the pairing.
How to Nominate:
Go to the Across Dark Space Tagset on AO3 before September 26th at 11:59 US EST. Click nominate (you’ll need to be signed into AO3).
Nominate your favorite pairings/groupings! If your pairing doesn’t autofill, enter it anyway, and the moderators will take care of it on the other side. Please use Mass Effect Andromeda as your Fandom
(Note: when nominating a pairing using a slash “/” means it is a romantic pairing and using “&” means it is a platonic pairing)
When you’re done, hit submit. A moderator will review and accept/reject your pairings/groupings. After your pairings/groupings are submitted and reviewed you will not be able to edit them, but you may submit up to 20.
For the purposes of this challenge, the Mass Effect Andromeda OC Protagonists will be considered different characters based on their gender and surname. This means that there are three options (male, female, and non-binary) for Ryder and any other character. When nominating an OC Protagonist, please keep this in mind and specify which option you want. For example:
Male Ryder/Female Angara or Non-binary Ryder/Jaal Ama Darav instead of Ryder/Angara or Ryder/Jaal Ama Darav
Please do not nominate a custom/individual Qunari OC Protagonist (IE: Maggie Smith/Akksul). When you do your request and pick your pairings you can provide additional details, such as a preferred name or physical description, in your request. Requests are optional - the only part of your request that must be adhered to are the DNWs.
Other original characters are allowed as long as they are “general” characters. For example: “Female Angara”, “Asari Huntress”, or “Kett Chosen” would all be acceptable.
If you would like to participate in the nomination process, but do not have an AO3 account, please reach out to via DM, ask box, or by contacting @wickedwitchofthewilds. We also have a Discord where the moderator can be reached to assist or answer questions or just to talk.
Anyone with an AO3 account can nominate pairings. That does not mean you are required to sign up for the exchange. All pairings can only be nominated once.
If you have questions, ask the moderator.
Tag Set
Nominations Spreadsheet
Nominations Close at 11:59pm US EST on December 4th!
Over 600 years across dark space, explorers wake up in their new home...
You've signed up for the Initiative. You've slept for hundreds of years. Andromeda is beautiful and nothing like you expected. Are you the new Pathfinder trying to find a home for hundreds of sleeping explorers? Are you a member of a crew? A pirate? An exile? An alien? What's your story?
Welcome to Across Dark Space: A Mass Effect Andromeda Gift Exchange. This is an exchange, run through AO3, that celebrates Mass Effect Andromeda and its numerous worlds both explored and unexplored. Any group or pairing can be nominated as long as it contains a character from Mass Effect Andromeda. This exchange is open to ANYONE who wishes to participate and can draw or write ONE piece by the deadline. We will also be trying out nominations for singular characters this year, but they can only be characters from Mass Effect Andromeda!
Be sure to follow this page for announcements as we get closer to nominations and sign-ups. We also have a Discord for anyone who would like to join!
If you are interested in signing up for the exchange, follow these three simple steps:
Go to the Sign Up form on AO3 (you will need to be logged into AO3, if you need an AO3 account please message us here)
Fill it out (detailed instructions below). Please put at least one relationship in each of the three fields, but you may put three relationships in each field and add more boxes to give 10 request boxes and 30 relationships (from the tag set).
You may choose Any as your offer. Any really does mean any pair/group
Sign-ups end on December 11 11:59 US EST. Matches will be received no later than December 13 US EST
How to Sign Up
The Request Boxes
Upon opening the form you will have three boxes. You may, at the bottom of the request section, add more boxes (up to 10). You may put three relationships in each box, up to a grand total of 30 relationships. You must request and offer at least three relationships, at least one in each or the first three boxes. Your gift-giver will pick one of these relationships to create content for.
Relationships: Please put at least one relationship in each box and up to three. AO3 will suggest approved pairing in the tag set. If your pairing does NOT autofill - this is a known AO3 bug. Please enter your relationship as it appears in the tag set.
Characters: You can additionally or alternatively nominate singular characters. When you nominate a single character, you are accepting that you may receive a gift featuring only this character. If you have relationships you don’t mind seeing the character in, you may list them in the description box or in your letter, but there is not guarantee you will see that character in a pairing
Additional Tags: Please choose whether you wish to receive fanfiction, fanart, or both by checking the boxes.
Prompt URL: You may link to a letter or document on Tumblr, Google Docs, Dreamwidth, or anywhere that goes into detail about what you’d like to see or gives extra information about any OCs you’d like to see in the work. This is not required.
Description: Anything that is VITALLY important for your request needs to go in this box because this is the only portion the moderators can guarantee your match can access. Please include general likes and dislikes and Do Not Wants (DNWs). The DNWs MUST be listed, they are the only thing your match is asked to follow to the letter. If you have any ideas for the pairing or prompts, please feel free to put them in this box as well. Prompts are optional and may or may not be followed. Please do not kink-shame or state you have a preference for one pairing above the others.
The Offer Boxes
Upon opening the form you will have three boxes. You may, at the bottom of the request section, add more up to ten. You may put three relationships in each box, up to a grand total of 30. You must request and offer at least three relationships. These are the relationships you are offering to create content for.
Relationships: Please put at least one relationship in each box and up to three. AO3 will suggest approved pairing in the tag set. If your pairing does NOT autofill - this is a known AO3 bug. Please enter your relationship as it appears in the tag set. You may also choose to offer for ANY relationship in the tag set. Any means any relationship, but you may specify which content you will not create.
Additional Tags: Please choose whether you can create fanfiction, fanart, or both.
Comments for Mods: Please use this to inform the moderators of anything you deem relevant for matching and if there is a participant you do not want matched to. This field is confidential and will only be seen by the moderators.
Your assignment will include at least one match between your offer and the other person’s request, but you may not match on all of them. You are also not beholden to complete the request you matched on, although you must complete at least one of the requests.
IE: You offered Female Ryder/Jaal Ama Darav, but see the participant also requested Male Ryder/Evfra de Tershaav and decide to do that one instead even if you did not offer it. You are encouraged to incorporate the prompts/likes if possible, but you MUST respect the DNWs listed.
AN EXAMPLE SIGN UP AND EXAMPLE OFFER ARE BELOW THE CUT IF YOU NEED TO SEE THEM.
Reminder that assignments are due Sunday 1/29/23 by 11:59pm EST! If you need an extension please reach out to me and let me know. If you need to default, please reach out and let me know ASAP! The collection will not open unless everyone has a gift.
Also, if you default, you cannot participate in another exchange that I run (Fornax and ADS) unless you make up your defaulted assignment. You will have to add either a minimum 1k word fic or an artwork that follows the exchange's standards to the collection. It doesn't have to be gifted to your original recipient.
Over 600 years across dark space, explorers wake up in their new home...
You've signed up for the Initiative. You've slept for hundreds of years. Andromeda is beautiful and nothing like you expected. Are you the new Pathfinder trying to find a home for hundreds of sleeping explorers? Are you a member of a crew? A pirate? An exile? An alien? What's your story?
Welcome to Across Dark Space: A Mass Effect Andromeda Gift Exchange. This is an exchange, run through AO3, that celebrates Mass Effect Andromeda and its numerous worlds both explored and unexplored. Any group or pairing can be nominated as long as it contains a character from Mass Effect Andromeda.
This exchange is open to ANYONE who wishes to participate and can draw or write ONE piece by the deadline.
Hi! I was going to sign up for the exchange, and I'm one of those people who like to offer "any", but there's no box to do this even though it says in the rules that you can? Putting "any" into the field doesn't work either. Can you have a look, or let me know if I need to choose pairings after all? Thanks!!
Hi! Thank you for letting me know. Unfortunately, the long and short of it is, I messed up. I can't change challenge settings since there are already sign ups, but I'm trying to find a workaround if there is one. For now, I'm going to close sign ups until I figure out if I can fix it or not. I will be extending sign ups because of this. Sorry!!
