tedium
Clueless newb
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Post by tedium on Oct 2, 2018 16:54:43 GMT -5
If the AoD's authority is so absolute, why haven't they just... retaken the Labyrinth? The region is supposed to be too dangerous for them to routinely patrol, which is why the Guild controls it. None of the in-game reality reflects that in the slightest and has not for as long as I've been playing. AoD and Templars can march in and kill people unless staff are actively monitoring them and hassle them with spawned NPCs and echoes about suicidal child soldiers. Because of this, the Labyrinth clans have been non-functional as antagonists to the political landscape of the city. You just said it yourself: "The rinth sucks as a fortress because Templars can just walk right the fuck in and murder you if they get fed up with your shit."
Soo... Why not make the Guild, at least, a functional clan that can make the AoD and Templars think twice about literally marching through narrow alleys full of escaped mul assassins, criminals, rogues, thieves, and pickpockets? In a straight up fight the rinthers lose, obviously, but it shouldn't be worth the resource expenditure except in the most extreme situations. The layout of the rinth is supposed to be so conductive to guerilla warfare that the AoD can't establish a presence, and yet that has absolutely not been the case when it comes to players.
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Deleted
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Oct 2, 2018 17:03:54 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2018 17:03:54 GMT -5
Lol.
A criminal organization like that already exists. Its called House Kurac.
While the guild definitely has flaws, a lot of them are fixed by players.
Dont want to be allied to everything? Choose not to, or choose to charge so much, that People would think twice before paying up. Dont want to work for templarate? Dont go southside. Dont be so brazenly guild if you do. How many people knew that Nell was a highest ranked pc guild? Dont want to be vulnerable to templar raides? Dont relax in the folley and use sewers more.
The reason why these situations happen is because is because they are 'easy'. Path of least resistance. Its not the gameworld that enforces them.
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tedium
Clueless newb
Posts: 164
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Post by tedium on Oct 2, 2018 17:13:23 GMT -5
Dont want to be allied to everything? Choose not to, or choose to charge so much, that People would think twice before paying up. Dont want to work for templarate? Dont go southside. This often just leads to people getting PKed because that makes the problem go away completely from a metagame context. In reality, a new person should rise up to take the old leader's place (after a power struggle which disrupts existing agreements) and then recoup their costs by taking it from the south. Established contacts are valuable because they keep the peace and provide reliability in dealing with large groups of people. However, because this is a game, you never feel instability caused by struggles over leadership. On the contrary, by killing leadership you basically nullify the entire section of the game for as long as it takes for a new person to decide they want to RP the leader, and then build their own base within the game.
Killing clanleads with a low IC pop to nullify a massive virtual pop of loosely confederated gangs is way more metagamey than attacking stilt lizards, but Armageddon's staff have always been more sword-and-sorcery minded than politically minded, so they've never seen the issue.
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Post by shakes on Oct 2, 2018 17:14:31 GMT -5
Ah, I understand better now what you're trying to do. I don't like the solution, but I agree.
The problem is staff who either doesn't give a shit because they don't care about the Guild, or they don't give a shit because they don't like the people in the Guild, or they don't give a shit because Templars are besties. A Templar storms the rinth and attacks the Guild in the Folley and the city doesn't erupt in riots? Nothing happens? Kurac doesn't get involved? No secret assassins come out of the woodwork? Staff fail. Not a code fail. Not even really a Templar fail. They tried to do stuff and met with no resistance thematically from the vNPC world.
Like a lot of things, players can't be trusted not to ignore the vNPC world if they know or perceive that staff won't stomp them for whatever reason. And staff are often just not interested in helping out in that manner. SOMETIMES they get involved, but most of the time they don't. That's my experience, anyway. Wish it was otherwise.
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tedium
Clueless newb
Posts: 164
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Post by tedium on Oct 2, 2018 17:21:38 GMT -5
Ah, I understand better now what you're trying to do. I don't like the solution, but I agree. The problem is staff who either doesn't give a shit because they don't care about the Guild, or they don't give a shit because they don't like the people in the Guild, or they don't give a shit because Templars are besties. A Templar storms the rinth and attacks the Guild in the Folley and the city doesn't erupt in riots? Nothing happens? Kurac doesn't get involved? No secret assassins come out of the woodwork? Staff fail. Not a code fail. Not even really a Templar fail. They tried to do stuff and met with no resistance thematically from the vNPC world. Like a lot of things, players can't be trusted not to ignore the vNPC world if they know or perceive that staff won't stomp them for whatever reason. And staff are often just not interested in helping out in that manner. SOMETIMES they get involved, but most of the time they don't. That's my experience, anyway. Wish it was otherwise. I think the issue is that staff, realistically, can't babysit a players all the time to make sure that they do the right thing. For example, if we stripped all the NPC guards from the game but said they were there, virtually, and relied on staff to enforce crimcode, I guarantee the amount of unrealistic criminal roleplay in the city would skyrocket -- as well as complaints about staff fairness. People would murder each other in front of vNPC guards because they know that by the time staff get to it, so much RP will have passed that they can't realistically revive all these characters. And that would lead to people making assumptions, true and untrue, about staff favoritism in policing crimcode. That's why we have things like guards and a combat code in the first place. Without them, the game would be virtually unplayable.
Which is partly why the Labyrinth is so unplayable. The only themes enforced by code are poverty, danger, and a free-for-all on theft, and those are only elements consistently roleplayed by players.
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Deleted
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Oct 2, 2018 17:26:40 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2018 17:26:40 GMT -5
Okey. I gotta ask.
In the last 10 years. How many times did Templars raid Folley? It has happened, but you are portraying it like they are doing it every other month.
Any such trip, "does" mean a scheduled rpt with staff oversight.
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tedium
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Post by tedium on Oct 2, 2018 17:34:46 GMT -5
Okey. I gotta ask. In the last 10 years. How many times did Templars raid Folley? It has happened, but you are portraying it like they are doing it every other month. Any such trip, "does" mean a scheduled rpt with staff oversight. This is the least subtle way of asking someone to reveal their player identity.
Here's a better question: In the last 10 years, how many times have Labyrinth clans managed to contribute meaningfully to the game world? Why does it work sometimes, and not other times?
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Deleted
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Oct 2, 2018 17:47:10 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2018 17:47:10 GMT -5
Is it? Last time this happened was over two years ago. Prior to that .... probably 5 years? So roughly every 2-5 years. I might be wrong I suppose. But ... am I?
The usual response to the guild getting too uppity was a rinth blockade. Not a raid. I might be wrong, but I honestly can think of it happening only twice. Ironically one of them was heavily supported by Noted Liar Nergal. In the same way he supported the destruction of some elf gang ran by Inks via some super mul npc.
Thats after the end of the world plots echoes anyway. The usual response were blockades, not raids.
Can you define "contribute"? You mean in terms of fun, or in terms of "changing the world"
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tedium
Clueless newb
Posts: 164
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Post by tedium on Oct 2, 2018 17:58:24 GMT -5
How many times have they acted as a significant party in terms of plots, whether player or staff created, which go on in the game world? I don't mean on an individual level. I don't care that Susan the Aide is angry at the Labyrinth clans because her silk panties were stolen. I'm talking about two or more clans interacting in some way, with the Labyrinth clan(s) participating meaningfully in those interactions.
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Deleted
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Oct 2, 2018 18:05:35 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2018 18:05:35 GMT -5
Henehe. Got a pm and holy fuck did I miss out on some shitload of twinkery. Goes to say some people shouldn't be templars. Shit happens. I recall one templar making random noob people put the gem on and remove it, to prove they are not rogues.
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Post by shakes on Oct 2, 2018 18:14:04 GMT -5
I think the Guild and elves do play a decent role in Allanak city life. They provide a credible threat of violence to politics. Otherwise it'd largely be who puts on the best fashion show.
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Deleted
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Oct 2, 2018 18:20:05 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2018 18:20:05 GMT -5
How many times have they acted as a significant party in terms of plots, whether player or staff created, which go on in the game world? I don't mean on an individual level. I don't care that Susan the Aide is angry at the Labyrinth clans because her silk panties were stolen. I'm talking about two or more clans interacting in some way, with the Labyrinth clan(s) participating meaningfully in those interactions. Well. That is definitely an issue. Alas, the general lifespan of rinthi PCs is not very long. Which prevents the stability needed for significant impacts. That issue is a bane of Armageddon, rivaled (and somewhat related) to aging playerbase. But the deaths are hardly due to templar ability to gallavant into rinth. The sad part is that you probably need a single hand to name the clans that 'did' have major impact on anything in the last 10 years. And the general lack of bodies/short lifespan/ennui are the basic reasons for this. |
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Post by shakes on Oct 2, 2018 18:25:40 GMT -5
I am hoping with the new classes, you start seeing some new longer-lived rinther PC's. Who run things behind the scenes but don't get involved in too much combat.
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