Association Laws

Angwe

Also, eh. The Holy War system is fine. It just needs parallels in the larger orgs, like a raiding or a war system. Troops.

Haven

@Angwe

Razmael said:

It is my hope that we will release a new war system in the future, designed anew from the ground up to avoid such flaws. I will not be promising its return anytime soon, but I definitely enjoy the concept of a war system that properly encourages tactical thought..

From Announce post #2014. So they just gotta think up a new system without the same flaws as the old one, design/code/test it then release it. >_>

So doubt we'll get it any time soon considering they have a large abundance of other projects to get to.

Daskalos

@Haven - Aye, I was also one of the driving forces behind the polarization. You think Unity in Life was my idea? Why do you think -divine orders- joined? Because I was told 'you can bring everyone together, draw the line in the sand'. I don't have a problem with the polarization, but I do find it laughable that you think Daskalos likes Duiran. He likes a few people in there, but ask Xavin or Arbre about Daskalos and Duiran. The explosive comments, the insults, the politics? 

Enorian was getting rofflestomped so often that we quit going to lessers. That's when Reach\Loch started fighting each other because we 'refused to play' so to speak. When they split up, we realized we had enough combined to win and we started going again. I would bet money that Loch and Spinesreach have a much larger population than Duiran and Enorian. I'd further wage that Loch is probably close to the other 3 combined.

Haven

I don't think you read what I said.

Aldric

The war system was certainly capable of bringing about some fun, tense RP opportunities, obviously chances to fight, and it certainly added a tangible sort of atmosphere to the game, but it also brought out the worst in a lot of people. Between metagaming troop numbers, badmouthing people on webs, and forcing people to take advantage of being on opposite timezones to attack.. it definitely was one of those things where the pros didn't exactly outweigh the cons.

Minarael

You can't really take into consideration Loch's population. Most of them are AFK. <.<

Angwe

...Metagaming troop numbers... badmouthing people on webs, and forcing people to take advantage of being on opposite timezones to attack.. it definitely was one of those things where the pros didn't exactly outweigh the cons.

People are always gonna metagame. People metagame right now, with lessers. That's a non-issue.

...badmouthing people on webs...

Another thing that is going to happen, does happen right now and will never stop happening. Ever. In any online game.

...and forcing people to take advantage of being on opposite timezones to attack...

Heh. Fight a Holy War in it's current incarnation. In the last one Haern's order had with Chakrasul, we were pwning until about 2am EST when everyone went to sleep. Alexina, Milvushina, Tina (who I think just plain didn't sleep) and other folks chewed through like 20 shrines by 10am the next morning. It's just a consequence of playing an online game. That's always going to happen. It's not even that the players (except maybe Tina, that cad) were trying to metagame anything, they just have a life outside Aet and live in a different timezone.

All in all, I'd say the points you raise have far more to do with the maturity of the playerbase than the mechanic itself. Aetolia is a game, and if you're losing because you don't have enough EU players to take up the night shift, well, tough cookies. It isn't the end of the world, and it can spur an organization to make some changes and put effort into recruiting. Sometimes losing can even be fun. Just my 2 sovereigns.

Ezalor

Alexina is Iosyne's >.>

Angwe

It was awile ago, I might be mixing people up.

Xavin

Edit: Not appropriate.

Irruel

@angwe
War had its moments, sure.
And then it had its moments.

My point in bringing war up wasn't to talk about whether or not is was a good mechanism or a bad one. Daskalos' above essays on why Duiran turned into an Enorian clone are all correct, and were my point - the war system was added back in due to pressure by the players, and then the cities were forced to conform to the polarised, World of MidnightCraft conflict design, because the war system could never approach balance until they did.

Any further discussion on the war system in this particular thread, is just a derailment.

Now that we have no war system, and we do have an external threat (however nebulous it is at the moment) then we do have opportunities to do more than just rp chance, tense meetings with the enemy. If Arbre were to see me spend a few hours with Moirean and bother to ask me what I'm up to, I might reply something like:

"Oh, we're hunting someone that knows someone that knows something that knows someone that knows about the Dreikathi", and that would be the end of that. Because everyone knows that however monstrous the carnifex are, their hounds are cool so its okay  the Dreikathi are way more so.

Irruel

I wish there was an edit function. Is there one and I just can't find it? I'm used to fixing my spelling etc after I click post, not spreading the above painfulness around.

Iosyne

Click the black cog in the top right corner of your post, and it'll bring up the option to Edit. 

Arbre

Daskalos said:

I have no problem with conflict with Duiran, look at everything that went on between Arbre\Dask that lead to Arbre quitting as Duiran's leader. 

At the risk of sounding like a whiner, I'd like to note that the Duirnorian conflict was NOT the reason I stepped down - it was actually one of the few parts I -liked-, especially trying to demonize @Haven.

I stepped down because I had the guilds all over me challenging me just because they could, since I wasn't Sibatti, the Savior of Duiran, I was running -three- Benandanti positions, and ICly people, on a non political level, were trying to ruin my character (and therefore my fun) to the point that I was crying nightly and Ansnom made me step down.

Missari

That sucks.

Corlin

Arbre said:

Daskalos said:

I have no problem with conflict with Duiran, look at everything that went on between Arbre\Dask that lead to Arbre quitting as Duiran's leader. 

At the risk of sounding like a whiner, I'd like to note that the Duirnorian conflict was NOT the reason I stepped down - it was actually one of the few parts I -liked-, especially trying to demonize @Haven.

I stepped down because I had the guilds all over me challenging me just because they could, since I wasn't Sibatti, the Savior of Duiran, I was running -three- Benandanti positions, and ICly people, on a non political level, were trying to ruin my character (and therefore my fun) to the point that I was crying nightly and Ansnom made me step down.

Yay, city leading.

And by 'yay' I mean 'thankless job that only works when/if you can kowtow to the mass vote, even if said vote is retarded.'

From where I'm standing, I'd love if orgs were orgs on their own, and weren't forced to come together to oppose the massive groups that show up when any conflict arises. I'd love if each org had a little pile of pkers or people who were always chomping at the bit.

I know that my main character is generally opposed to Duiran because of their lack of lawful structure and their lack of true dedication to a cause he sees as worthy. So I'd totally be down for some tree felling, even if I was an Enorianite. But as it stands, alienating Duiran just means that when or if Enorian tries to do anything, they get stomped, unless Daskalos is online, in which case, he can tank the initial attacks for a few minutes. Enorian has tried recently to stand behind their lore and purpose - the opposition of the Blood Hunt, assaulting Ciem when Dhar suggested it, to name two recent instances - and generally gets their faces handed to them.  There are plenty of people who might find some interest in inter-org confrontation, but making the Duiranites sit out our fights would leave us with .. Benedicto and Daskalos? It's hard to draw in pkers, since we don't have many, and those who show interest in becoming pkers tend to lose heart when eight people show up versus three at a foci, and only one of the three is an active combatant.

It doesn't stop the participants from enjoying themselves, though. There are plenty of Enorianites who like where they're at, standing against undeath/shadow/corruption, from an rp point of view. There just aren't that many who pk, which means events that lead to player death - foci, raids, whatever - tend to have a low turnout.

Hadoryu

Yay, city leading.

And by 'yay' I mean 'thankless job that only works when/if you can kowtow to the mass vote, even if said vote is retarded.'

Sorry, but that sounds like a whole lot of sour grapes to me.

Corlin

Hadoryu said:

Yay, city leading.

And by 'yay' I mean 'thankless job that only works when/if you can kowtow to the mass vote, even if said vote is retarded.'

Sorry, but that sounds like a whole lot of sour grapes to me.

I don't speak from experience, so my opinion is skewed, obviously. But I've certainly heard of more people quitting politics or the game in general after having been a leader, due to the level of stress that comes with the infighting, backstabbing and general cattiness that leaders are exposed to.

There've been perhaps a handful of leaders I've known across IRE that come away from it saying 'I'd do that again.' - even the ones who enjoy it seem very pleased to be done with it. When being a city leader is making you cry your nights away, as a player, I can't see the upside.

Moirean

I'm having a hella ton of fun being CL, and I really enjoy seeing other people have fun as my thanks. It can be stressful sometimes, but I think it's a pretty rewarding, engaging job!

Hadoryu

Some people jive with being in leadership, others break down, others yet just sort of ... sit there. Being in leadership can be one of the most rewarding experiences hands down - if you do a good job. Not to mention everything comes to you instead of having to look for it - RP, trade, combat etc.

Toward the end I was honestly feeling like I'm just wasting my time if I'm not in leadership at this point.

Daskalos

Being in leadership is both - I quite enjoy it, but at the same time, sometimes I want to strangle people. It's why my tolerance level for things has gone down down down.

Missari

I loved leading Spines, Severn's order, the Syssin and the Infernals, but all four came with their own brand of drama and late nights.

To be on topic...

Association laws blahblahblah. I don't really have much to say about them.