Guild_Noble?

You choose a mundane guild and subguild for your noble, whichever you like. (Maybe once in a blue moon when the stars are right and the right app comes along they might allow the very rare magickal noble, but I've never heard anything about it, nor do I know how that would be handled.)

When your app is approved, you set up a time to log in with your imm. When you get in-game, they get you set up with the proper clothing/keys/signet ring/etc. and of course your loyal NPC guard, raise you to the proper clan ranks, and show you around the House property if necessary. They'll teach you how to command your guard and use all the other syntax you'll need to know, of course.

I think nobles at one time got a boost to contact, but that won't be necessary anymore since everyone starts at master now anyway. So now if you want any special skill bumps you'll have to special app them.

Hope that helps!

No problem; glad I could help with something.

That makes sense - something of a defining ability for 'em! I've also heard there are books IG that the nobles can read to grant skills. Is anyone able to confirm this?

+1 for this. given the climate of Arm and the hesitation to put anything special in the hands of players i think there's a 0% chance of them being in game

What purg said is correct. The bodyguard NPCs cannot be ordered to kill, subdue, or do anything else that would initiate combat or trigger crimcode. All they can do combat-wise is 'guard' and 'rescue.' And their skills in that area are not even particularly high.

Staff are afraid that nobles are going to start acting like templars if they're given crimcode immunity, but they're sponsored roles and they should be trusted more. All it should take is a little spiel upon rolling a noble, outlining what's allowed, what's not allowed, what's expected, differences between the noble and templar roles and how crimcode immunity should be handled, etc.

All these restrictions amount to is nobles having to pretend to have crimcode immunity--because it makes sense that they would--until the shit hits the fan, at which point they're almost as helpless as Amos the Grebber. So when somebody spits on their boots, they have to impotently run around screaming for a templar.

This warms the black cockles of my heart. It's a perfect encapsulation of so many of the problems in the game's dynamic, ultimately stemming from the staff's evident obsession with controlling *all* players, even those who are supposed to be trusted and are in sponsored leadership roles. Ugh.

(Edited to add: boldface mine.)

The OLD noble stipend, at least from what I recall, was laughable. I remember being given like a thousand sid allowance for the IC month, and then some merchant attempting to sell me a weapon whose cost was like 900 sid. It wasn't even that good of a weapon, though this was ten+ years ago. I remember seeing that a glass of some wine in the Traders Inn cost 50 sid, and coming to the realization I was worth only twenty cups a wine a month to my noble house. I was a Borsail, and the same trader, wanted to work out a deal with me, to where he would equip the Wyverns with good armor and weapons, and I'd acquire him an NPC slave. You can imagine how that worked out.

I was a newbie, but not noobish. I had already gone through my 20 throwaway chars-accounts in the period from 1999-2001, getting all the stupid shit out of my system, like killing orphans in the rinth or sparring for 4 hours straight thinking I'd be getting better. IIRC, it was in like 2002 or 2003, when I tried a serious noble app.

I tried a Tor a year later (who taught at the academy), and that too was fucking stupid. I had thought that Tors were heavily involved in the military, but I soon realized that wasn't the case at all. In fact, it was implied I was doing a bad job by having any military pretensions at all, and that such things were beneath Tor. Apparently, watching a bunch've fucking dwarves spar in the academy and giving the same lesson over and over was not beneath me, but aspiring to military command was. All the while, I did like twenty rp logs of me practicing my own sword use (as I wasn't allowed to spar with anyone), and I never got a single bump. Never got to do anything interesting but follow a templar around once, with all of them being skilled and statted up, and myself equivalent to a day 0 warrior after two RL months. Whose dick did you have to suck in ~2002-2003 to get a little understanding?

Eventually, I just logged out and didn't play Armageddon again for a couple years, until I hooked up with X-D on a random Bynner and learned how to enjoy Arm for what it is - for a little while.

Everything about how Armageddon is set up to manage noble and high politics RP is completely retarded compared to every other political game I've ever played. And Armageddon politics have always been laughable as well. For example, 'My cunning master stroke is to invite you into my estate and ...order my guards to attack you'.

The only reason to RP a noble is for the mudsex. If you don't care about mudsex, then you've got no reason to play one whatsoever. What you REALLY want is a Templar, and even that walks a perilous edge between quickly losing its novelty and/or being a staff alt/staff buddy who acquires insane power and amazing plot antics.

Well guess what? For every infamous templar out there who was central to some major plot, there were dozens who basically checked out after a few RL weeks, and who staff had hardly any time for.