Class dispensing

Areka

@Haven - it wasn't a bait, trolling, or meant to be an insult, it's the perception of your stance. If it is misplaced, I will apologize, though that is what it seems to me that you are saying. 

Moirean

I think for the most part multiclass works well - for the Haven/Areka issue it sounds like someone who is a guild enemy wants to be multiclassed? I think the guild is perfectly within the right to deny that, as long as they are offering ways for that enemy status to potentially be resolved.

My analysis of multiclass's issues are that there are problems in a few areas:

- Guilds being excessively demanding. This is usually spurred by being the shiny new class or through player politics, so I think simply a concerted effort to remember that other player do want to play the game might be enough to help fix this. We can all make efforts to make this process easier on others.

- "Neutral" tethers don't actually belong to neutral guilds. OOCLY the classes can be held by anyone, but ICLY the guilds are firmly aligned to a tether and have no prerogative or RP reason to want to give the skills out to enemies. This is a problematic situation and I think it pushes the guilds into a place where extortion, denial or metagaming are the common default, and that's not a healthy atmosphere to promote. If I were a GM of one of those guilds, I would be incredibly frustrated. A mechanical change for these guilds to help facilitate this issue would take the hard and drama-stirring choices out of player hands and, while it might be unpopular at first, I think it would create a better environment in the end. Players WILL get Syssin and monk and stuff and stressing over preventing or punishing if they do it is just not fun.

- People can do whatever they want with the class. Someone can play nice to Daru and then pick up Zealot and set fire to Enorian over and over, and the guild can only just sit and go welp. I don't want us going back to the days where Duiran could remove skill use from ex-forestals, but it would be nice if there was some sort of stigma or price a guild could put on someone using the class in a complete opposite way from how it is intended to be used, once which could be negotiated or RPd to be lifted. Alternatively, maybe expand the guild sanction command and let guilds give out a more expansive use of class-based stuff to those who earn the privs.

- Guilds don't offer that much outside of class, social interaction and vague "roleplay." Right now, most guilds really are just social organizations and I really liked some of the ideas mentioned about how certain skills work only/better for guilded members. Alternatively, we could see more cool features in the guildhalls (Carni revamp is likely bringing a perk like that with being able to feed the master stone, and options for other guilds along those lines would be nice). 

- Guilds don't have much external power, aside from class distribution. This is a sideways approach to the discussion, but it's an issue we've discussed on forums a few times. Guilds can't really do much to influence the orgs they are part of, so some kind of way to help them have more oomph would be nice, or maybe some sort of guild-based territory thing (we're seeing a war system now, what if each guild conquered territory and that tallied together for the city's total or whatever), etc etc. If guilds had a stronger role, I think the pressure to handle the class management wouldn't feel as strong.

Xavin

@Veovis If you feel that handling multiclass can be an ooc thing, how would you propose that the ic consequences of such be handled? If Ciarelle and her secretaries decides that Angwe is unfit to hold Ascendril class because he facilitated a raid on the Ascendril guildhall that resulted in the loss of 100,000 facets from the Ascendril Master Crystal and then someone oocly decides 'no, that's not cool' and gives him the class anyway, how should that situation be handled if and when it is found out? When it comes to classes, mechanics are roleplay. In this hypothetical situation you have an in character decision that is overturned by an ooc consideration for someone's fun. Should that person be culpable icly? If not, why? They took an in-character action by giving out the class to someone who the guild did not want to have class.

Haven

Moirean said:

My analysis of multiclass's issues are that there are problems in a few areas:

- People can do whatever they want with the class. Someone can play nice to Daru and then pick up Zealot and set fire to Enorian over and over, and the guild can only just sit and go welp. I don't want us going back to the days where Duiran could remove skill use from ex-forestals, but it would be nice if there was some sort of stigma or price a guild could put on someone using the class in a complete opposite way from how it is intended to be used, once which could be negotiated or RPd to be lifted. Alternatively, maybe expand the guild sanction command and let guilds give out a more expansive use of class-based stuff to those who earn the privs.

Nah, those guilds actually do have a power/leverage as far as that goes. You need to be guilded in order to use Firestorm (the ability to start a spreading Fire that actually significantly alters the environment even after it fades [room stays blackened and burned]) with either the Luminary or the Daru. Which I think is a good thing. Firestorm is a perk, not a necessity. I guess they could try to Quicken every place but the effect is not the same since it has no lingering effect once the inroom fire fades. It is as about as game altering as putting up a firewall. Not to mention the guild/city can construe that as an attack and just go collectively kill the person for attacking their asset or at the very least go interact with the person for some arc. Which is a good thing. In any case, there is leverage for those guilds with their classes as far as rogues are concerned.

Moirean

I was just giving one example. Most (every other?) guild doesn't have an option like that.

Veovis

Xavin said:

@Veovis If you feel that handling multiclass can be an ooc thing, how would you propose that the ic consequences of such be handled? If Ciarelle and her secretaries decides that Angwe is unfit to hold Ascendril class because he facilitated a raid on the Ascendril guildhall that resulted in the loss of 100,000 facets from the Ascendril Master Crystal and then someone oocly decides 'no, that's not cool' and gives him the class anyway, how should that situation be handled if and when it is found out? When it comes to classes, mechanics are roleplay. In this hypothetical situation you have an in character decision that is overturned by an ooc consideration for someone's fun. Should that person be culpable icly? If not, why? They took an in-character action by giving out the class to someone who the guild did not want to have class.

I feel that multi-classing can be a meta-character thing if the parties involved want it to be that way. You're assuming that because Angwe gets the Ascendrill class from someone that he he learnt it from them in character. Maybe Angwe wants to learn the Ascendril skills from some NPC hedge mage of his own creation to advance his own story.

So what should Ciarelle do? She should roleplay with Angwe and go from there. There's no real way for her to verify that so-and-so apprenticed Angwe (nor should there be), so all she has to go on in character is that Angwe has managed to learn the Ascendril/lifer mage skills. It's up to them to decide how they want to handle it.

Angwe could decide that Ciarelle has no right to know and PK the daylights out of her, or he could tell her his crazy story about this hedge mage who lives in the forest. This kind of flexibility is what makes the possibilities of multi-class so phenomenal for roleplay and the desire of some players to quash that flexibility so frustrating. 

You make the blanket assertion that class mechanics are roleplay period and that there's no flexibility here. I obviously disagree with that.

Haven

Moirean said:

I was just giving one example. Most (every other?) guild doesn't have an option like that.

I know. I wasn't disagreeing with you per se... I was just correcting the information.

Carivah

Veovis said:

You make the blanket assertion that class mechanics are roleplay period and that there's no flexibility here. I obviously disagree with that.

You didn't even want Bloodborn-classed players in the Bloodborn guild to have mechanical access to Bloodborn skills without approval because you thought it infringed on Bloodborn's guild roleplay.

All the guilds have identities beyond generic sword-swinging and spell-mumbling. Someone might be able to pick up some cantrips from a hedge mage, maybe even a unique view on the practice hearkening back to the older mage guild, but full on Elemancy/Crystalism/Enchantment in such a manner that it's completely indistinguishable from what the Ascendril guild practices, yet learned completely divorced from Ascendril teachings, is really pushing it, I think.

Daskalos

I would point out that I hold the Syssin class. Let me repeat that. I hold the Syssin class. Anyone that knows my history with Spinesreach should know that's not possible. And yet, I got it, by someone who is still in Spinesreach. There are always RP motives, things to exploit. I don't use the class but I gathered it so I could still have venom after Sentinels lost toxins. 

Haven

Daskalos said:

I would point out that I hold the Syssin class. Let me repeat that. I hold the Syssin class. Anyone that knows my history with Spinesreach should know that's not possible. And yet, I got it, by someone who is still in Spinesreach. There are always RP motives, things to exploit. I don't use the class but I gathered it so I could still have venom after Sentinels lost toxins. 

That's besides the point and a misdirection, Daskalos. :-P You got it because someone allowed you to have it (or more specifically because I brokered a deal ICly with someone who shall not be named to get you and several others from Enorian Syssin class at the time when the Syssin guild as a whole officially refused apprenticeship to Enorian.). We're discussing scenarios where people aren't allowed <insert class here> for whatever reason.

Angwe

Note to self, mooch venoms off Dask.

Veovis

Carivah said:

Veovis said:

You make the blanket assertion that class mechanics are roleplay period and that there's no flexibility here. I obviously disagree with that.

You didn't even want Bloodborn-classed players in the Bloodborn guild to have mechanical access to Bloodborn skills without approval because you thought it infringed on Bloodborn's guild roleplay.

I expressed dismay that the puzzles were being supplanted by the full ritual steps being available on SHOWRITUAL as soon as someone gets Hematurgy. I did not say that anyone needed approval to use them. I said I thought it was a bit rubbish that people would get for free what others had to work for. I also said that I understood why report 1485 was being implemented even though I wasn't thrilled about it.

In character, Veovis was a huge proponent of the so-called restricted rituals being used more liberally by the Bloodborn, because Veovis views the Bloodborn as fundamentally different from mundane vampires. They're not supposed to think or act like mundane vampires or have the same attachments. That's been Veovis' consistent perspective for close to 10RL years. I've never said that anyone needs my approval (or someone else's) to use Bloodborn skills, and if you inferred that from my thread on 1485, I'm honestly not sure how you were able to do that.

Calipso

Areka said:

The aministration and developers have seen fit to allow guilds to develop their own  policies regarding multiclass. Templar have a 3 day wait while we discuss and give people a time to vote or voice concerns before either apprenticing or providing training opportunities to get someone up to roleplay snuff to be granted the honour and responsibility of using our holy training. 

That's the entirety of the problem, that it somehow has to be in the hands of other players if we wish to learn a class or not. Players are not administrators and should not be given such powers (for good reason). If it is some sort of powergrip that you (being the guild) holds the class and chooses whom to bestow it upon, then frankly I pity such a guild for not having better qualities.

Daskalos

Players have always had that power. That's what I find most ridiculous out of all of this. Players have always controlled who gets what class. The only difference between then and now is that you don't have to join the guild to get class from players. Before to get a class, you had to join a guild, go through the process to get rank three, and THEN you got the class. Now, you can bypass that step provided the players choose to give it to you. I'm all for ease of handing out class (provided it remains a function of the guilds) but I saw, first hand, what happened in Achaea when it happened. You want the class, play by the rules to get the class. The rules shouldn't be exceptionally hard, and sometimes you'll get rejected (such as being an enemy of the guild\city et cet).

You're all acting like you're entitled to have every class. I challenge you to look at it differently: Now, instead of having to kiss ass in guilds to get class, you can do it without having to give up another class. That's the beauty of multiclassing. Getting said class isn't a right, it's a privilege. RP it out. Look, I don't even know who  got rejected, but a lot of people play really dickish characters -- so if in your roleplay, you decided to be a dick, then you're going to have to live with the consequences. It feels to me like this thread is about someone getting rejected, and now it's 'let's all go on the forums and complain about how unfair it is that a player can reject another player'. Yes, they can. Last I checked, It's a MUD not a SUD. Your actions have consequences, and influence the realm around you, and how you are perceived by others.

Xavin

@Veovis the problem I have with that explanation is that there is, quite literally, no group of npc's out there that do that sort of thing. Not a one. Players can make up what they will about backstory npc's or npc's that they do this, that and the other with, but I really don't feel that that sort of explanation is viable. A member of X guild has to be involved for anyone to learn that guild's class. No matter what, it's an in-character action. There's no meta about it.

Setne

Daskalos said:

SUD

?

Draiman

Xavin said:

@Veovis the problem I have with that explanation is that there is, quite literally, no group of npc's out there that do that sort of thing. Not a one. Players can make up what they will about backstory npc's or npc's that they do this, that and the other with, but I really don't feel that that sort of explanation is viable. A member of X guild has to be involved for anyone to learn that guild's class. No matter what, it's an in-character action. There's no meta about it.

The energy surrounding Lucisa, the Hemic Portent disperses quickly, as she ends
the lesson in Primality.
You have obtained the VITIATE ability!
You have obtained the OVERLOAD ability!
You need to invest approximately 30 more lessons to obtain a new ability.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Congratulations! You have completed the Knowledge is power task!
You have gained 15 lessons!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Somebody from the Shamans has some explaining to do.

Eleanor

The thing that bewilders me about this whole discussion is, Aetolia is a game whose selling point is that it's full of other people. It's a vampire-themed Multi-User Dungeon. Furthermore, it's one that is supposed to be pretty damn good for roleplay. Player-to-player interaction. That thing where you are in a world that has rules and practices and logic that make up the setting as a whole, and the interplay of a few hundred different people interacting and adding content is what builds a complex and lively (unpredictable!) world.

And then we have these people crying because they can't hit a button and get a thing? They are upset because they have to interact on a roleplay level to get what they want, and it concerns them deeply that there may be consequences for their roleplay choices (eg, 'I am a forest-burning rage machine, wait, why won't you give me your special forest arts??' Or perhaps 'I have chosen to be a vampire, hang on wait why can't I have righteous pray-sword powers??') that don't let them get the immediate mechanical satisfaction they want. If you want a game where having the materials and the mechanical ability to have a thing means you 100% definitely get that thing every time, maybe you should go and play Dragon Age. You won't have to deal with other humans there.

Draiman

Lol nope.

Eleanor

Yep, that's a roleplay thing. You've chosen to be a vampire, and the guild lives in Duiran, so yeah, it makes roleplay sense that you get denied. You could get cured! Or find a corrupt Sentaari. You have choices that you yourself can enact without getting the administration to modify the entire game.

Xavin

Draiman said:

Xavin said:

@Veovis the problem I have with that explanation is that there is, quite literally, no group of npc's out there that do that sort of thing. Not a one. Players can make up what they will about backstory npc's or npc's that they do this, that and the other with, but I really don't feel that that sort of explanation is viable. A member of X guild has to be involved for anyone to learn that guild's class. No matter what, it's an in-character action. There's no meta about it.

The energy surrounding Lucisa, the Hemic Portent disperses quickly, as she ends
the lesson in Primality.
You have obtained the VITIATE ability!
You have obtained the OVERLOAD ability!
You need to invest approximately 30 more lessons to obtain a new ability.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Congratulations! You have completed the Knowledge is power task!
You have gained 15 lessons!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Somebody from the Shamans has some explaining to do.

What you're quoting strikes me as more of an oversight than something that negates my point. The example I was countering specifically mentioned someone gaining full training in a guild's exclusive teachings from an npc that simply does not exist. I don't think you would ever see someone take a statement like 'Oh, Trabarg taught me how to use Primality, Shamanism and Naturalism without anyone from the guild teaching me the basics first.'

Draiman

Eleanor said:

Yep, that's a roleplay thing. You've chosen to be a vampire, and the guild lives in Duiran, so yeah, it makes roleplay sense that you get denied. You could get cured! Or find a corrupt Sentaari. You have choices that you yourself can enact without getting the administration to modify the entire game.

Killing every last one of them until I get it is also another avenue of approach that I could take.  But that's also frowned upon. If my RP is going to be jacked to hell because people don't like dying, then their RP can get jacked because I don't want to be cured.

Kerryn

Draiman said:

See, I haven't been debating too much of anything in this thread except the 3 classes that are neutral, because everyone keeps taking it to extremes with forest-burning and Desian stories that I didn't honestly read and enemy status and raiding master crystals and etc. Draiman has never done anything to the Sentaari and hasn't had any interaction with them at all ever in the history of ever outside of fighting a few of them in arena centuries ago. From what I hear, I still can't get class because I'm a vampire and the GUILD is hanging out in Duiran.

Edit: Seriously eff typos.

Okay, just because the class -skills- are untethered. IE: They may be held regardless of alignment. Does not mean that the -guild- is neutral. We aren't. Our role is one of a spirit aligned guild.

Moirean

I said all this above. And offered constructive stuff. Why are we arguuiiing, let's be positiiiiive.

Xavin

A viable in character solution is to find a sentaari and pay them off with a large sum of gold for the class. I'm sure there are people there willing to do so.

Areka

If Lycans go well, could do similar with Syssin and Sentaari in that they disperse into small thieves guild or rogue houses and monasteries and dojos in their own flavourful factions. Would be a lot of work though, to make it. 

Providing more guild-specific skills (meaningful and flavourful) would also be good, to differentiate between rogue and guilded class in a meaningful way. Additionally, something in between and make guild sanctioning meaningful/useful (special access to areas, open up mobs to buy things or special quests - like Thuneron in Spinesreach not buying from non-Spireans, etc). 

Part of me keeps hoping that factions will be a big help and opportunity to help guilds out. It would be great if NPCs and the world reacted to guilds, their accolades, their values, in a more tangible way than they do right now - and if people straying from the guilds/and the guild factions faced different aspects of that story. 

Haven

@Daskalos: The difference between then and now is multi-class. Before, you dropped your class and you did not need the permission of anyone to obtain a new one. Certimene and Kelende served as the NPC-player bypass. The choice was yours if you wanted to go via NPC or try RP with the guild beforehand or whatever. If you so wanted, you could go to Certimene and join the guild and pick up the class you desired. They couldn't just oust you immediately upon joining for utilizing Certimene. I want to say the Admin have always been strict on that.

With the introduction of multi-class, however, the dynamic has changed.

Areka

Certimene did not pose as a player bypass, since you still had to work to GR3 and interact with people to obtain a new class. That hasn't changed. 

Teani

I would like to point back to @Irruel's suggestions made many posts ago. I think they'd be quite excellent, actually, and allow the other guilds to maintain their niches better without being overly tied to class skills.

Aishia

Kinda don't see this conversation going anywhere. But I for one was pretty well against multiclass to begin with! I'd say the only problems atm are things like the Teradrim not letting anyone have class without joining the guild. If everyone in the guild hates you and you can't even con someone into selling it to you I guess that's as much control as we need/get.