Don't Play in the Arm of the Dragon.

What most players want is to progress their character, usually in terms of skills and resources. Any social or status-related progress is rare these days as that side of the game has become so shallow due to the stagnation of its roleplaying environment, but there are many players who are content to simply enjoy the growth of their character's power. It's the exact same reason people will grind in an MMORPG or play Diablo for weeks on end. There's a great many players to whom actual roleplaying is an afterthought, players who act vaguely IC only because they have to.

That's Armageddon's strong suit: the ability to play it as a text-based survival MMORPG with an extensive history and elaborate setting. It's instrumental to the high player count; I would estimate that at the very least 30-40% of players are only there because of the combination of RPG-like codeplay and the permadeath that make your actions matter to other players. The other RPIs didn't really have this; even SoI at its peak, where it most resembled Armageddon, lacked the ability for people to venture out alone and just play the game like a text-based Skyrim.

It all boils down to a fundamental desire to a) become unfuckwithable so you don't have to let other players embarrass you with their superior power, and b) become able to exert your coded power over others in order to defeat them. That doesn't necessarily mean killing them, but as more and more alternatives to that are siphoned out of the game due to the all-encompassing stagnation and stifling bureaucracy, that does end up becoming the usual result.

The great tragedy, of course, is that joining a clan is often a huge osbtacle to your character's progress as training becomes much more difficult to access and equipment upgrades likewise grow scarce, with the best ones (e.g. enchanted rings, magic weapons) usually ruled out entirely. This, together with a total lack of purpose and support, is what leaves clans like the Tor Scorpions and Borsail Wyverns completely dead, and even mainstays like the militia rarely populated enough to feel functional and healthy.

there were three types of every soldier and it was real confusing. barely remember what it means anymore but here's the ranks. dunno if they changed after i left.

Sworn Private
Triumphant Private
Private Elite
Sworn Corporal
Proven Corporal
Corporal Elite
Sworn Sergeant
Proven Sergeant
Sergeant Elite
Lieutenant
Captain
Templar

the rank structure went sworn > triumphant/proven > elite - so elite was better than triumphant/proven was better than sworn BUT NOT REALLY b/c it was tuluk. So reaaaaally nobody's better than anyone else amirite? laterlal promotions. if you were elite you knew you were the man, but only subtly of course. i think there maybe there was a tiny pay difference in the ranks, like 10 coins or something. does anyone else remember or am i just imagining that?

anyhoo back to pensions, i cant recall if this is totes right but iirc you didn't have to take a life oath unless you wanted to (annoying cause no clarity) you could just serve and then if you got old enough you could "retire" from the army and still get perks for being an old soldier. i bet 1000000 internets that the secret tuluk translation of "retire" that only nyr knows is "you can't really retire because everything around you is so shite and dystopian, but because we are subtle and you are brainwashed you can leave and not work anymore. but you're not really retired." Remember tuluk is harsh just like the rest of this game for real. you will just never know its harsh unless ur subtle, isn't that fun?? pretty sure nobody ever became a pensioner living off the dole anyway cause who gets old in this game besides 1-2 people out of 100

but i honestly don't care what the secret reason of retirement was it was overly complex just like the extra ranks. i am sure the initial idea was giving players something to work for without giving away any real IG power and not making ppl wait 1 rl year per rank increase but it just seemed meaningless to me and most ppl i played with

in allanak you join army, survive to private - bam now you're a soldier of tektolnes and you die for glory, you die for deserting, or you die due to storytellers not knowing how the fucking crim code works, the end. at least that is how it is for now.

i think most ppl would choose to gather rocks if getting a hovel of their own in the city meant memorizing a 20mb text file of docs for that city and solo rping at least 10 hours of city culture off peak to send the logs to the people in charge who actually hate you for bothering them and schmoozing and rping just the right way with players to unlock the magic skill of hovel owning (apprentice). if it was actually attainable in a fun automated way like making a building in fallout 4 will be sure but the way it is now i will forage rocks until i die thanks.

If those opportunities ment that they'll have to join a clan. Be locked in the city for a game year, need to grovel before the templars and nobles, without an ability to just go "Fuck you" and go out into the wastes, follow a schedule that's only partly ment to improve your skills and partly ment to bring you into the same room with other players, instead of going out into the wilds and maximize your skill gains. Yeah ... they're gonna refuse it. None of what you mentioned will be offered to a 0 day character. But get a group of people who arent fragile anymore, who each have their own goals and hopes and dreams. Get different groups like that all in one city. Shit starts to happen. Sometimes epic, sometimes very much less so, but it happens.

Anyone here been part of the Legions before tuluk shit hit the fan? Wanna tell us how many secret tombs and weird shit you've explored, found, annihilated, died to?

i am going to apply to be a storyteller

i'd be the most wicked epic storyteller this side of this mississippi

Staff complaint:

Hey uh, some NPC OOC'd "Not really feelin this scene" then vanished right as my PC was about to kill them. What's up with that?

Player,

The staffer in question was very obviously just not feeling the scene.

Thank you, your complaint as has been resolved.