Shattered Kingdoms

My position is strongly against leaders Not being able to join another group. If the leader can be bullied by his other factions leader then they could be bullied with or with out the extra membership. I see it as limiting potential RP and cabal secrecy. Look at the idea of the leader of the peace keepers realizing that he has under his command someone who commands the strength of the hammer of light. Then see what happens when he tries to abuse his leadership role and the cabal tries to have him unseated from leadership.

As to dual leaders. Unless there is a way to change the way leadership flags are passed I am against this. This is because I can foresee leadership being passed as a single unit thus removing one of the identities from the game, effective merging. I do believe there is a better way to stop this than a blanket cant happen rule. I think we should be looking at how this can be achieved. My voting idea had its flaws some else come up with a better one. Duel leadership has its place but it should most likely be limited to one chars life span or less between dual leadership and sperated leadership.

As for someone only having hammer members for example being OOCly knowledge here is an easy way it could be ICly. The leader for the Talons was an ex hammer member thus why he wants hammer in his tribunal. Then he asks "Hey Hammer member I know this guy a hammer member?". How is only wanting hammer members in an organization OOC the PC could have learnt about the hammer ICly. It might not be the best interests of the Talons but it might be in his best interest. This brings me back to there needs to be a way to limit Tribunal leadership abuse of power that goes against the nations best interests. I say only tribunal because Cabals can be abused in such a way and retain their identity. Id rather not trust in players because they have shown before they are not all trust worthy in such situations.

As for the disbanding of the Fists. Im against it because they worked before the changes of Tribunals and CRS etc. Why do you not see them working after a change which is meant to try to regain what was lost by those changes.

I'm afraid this is exactly what I -don't- want to see from dual membership.

Look, if tribunals just want to play soldier, they don't need dual membership characters to help. This is the lowest level of tribunal roleplay.

I want to see all tribunals have the depth of the Midnight Council. They shouldn't be mere enforcers of laws, but shapers of their country. They should be deciding the direction of their nation and trying to mold the world to fit. Exciting plots spring from large goals.

Dual membership will cost tribunals some of their current roleplay activity. (The leadership crisis I mentioned earlier is one such example.) The hope of gains greater than losses is a core reason to support a change. If instead, dual membership characters are going to water down tribunals, then dual membership should go straight to the garbage chute.

I am not really sure of the relevance of what I am about to write, but currently there is nothing stopping someone from leading 2 organisations now. A leader of one trib could effectively lead another cabal through RP and string pulling, could they not?

If there was an amicable way to create larger tribs it would be fantastic. Imagine if there were enough peace keepers, talons, etc so that within the group 'secret' arms could spring up. Working to their own agenda, they could do all sorts of things. Twisting the trib to their own ends until they become prominent enough to take leadership.

Would it be an option to add another 'level' of membership to a tribunal, for grunts / people who wish to be affiliated. The leaders could induct immediately those that wish to join and only after a probationary period give them access to skills / NPCs etc.

The relevance to this thread would be if you are allowed to me a member of more than one org then you would join the trib at grunt level. Leaders have a certain amount of protection, grunts can be the spies they wish to be, hopefully more people will join (though of course turn around of members will likely be high) and people will join hopefully for more than just access to skills / NPCs (as they will need to prove themselves to get the benefit).

Just a thought

My personal opinion on dual membership is I think I prefer it as it is, one or t'other. The only thing I would like is the moving between cabals / tribs be at the discretion of the leader of said organisations, not a hard and fast rule as it is now. I know there are people who will try to move around like a bad case of VD, but then it will be up to the players IC to put a stop to it. Maybe oathbreaking is set (or not) by the trib / cabal leader that the player left. And only the player setting the flag can remove it (or an IMM if someone is being OOCly vindictive).

To all the posts between the second and this one: write with greater brevity and stop niggling.

1) Cabal robes should prevent the "look," "peek," and "glance" skill from displaying any personally identifiable info (name/desc/eq/inventory). They should not stop "locate object."

2) Cabal skills and abilities should continue to have echoes: the robe disguises the person.

3) Leaders should be allowed to join other factions, but not lead both. It doesn't require all that much talent; it requires time. The truly talented can "pull strings" and get their goals accomplished with or without a flag.

4) Group spells which affect other lands are (or will be) redundant in light of the finished economy system. Long-term siege should be economic, not magical.

5) Cabal "headquarters," if they even exist, should have no pretense of secrecy. Members can conceal themselves with robes, and can use cabal chat to arrange meetings in random locations if secrecy is required.


I spent 4 minutes typing this post, and 10 minutes paring it down to be brief.

I’ll try to keep it brief

The reason locate object is included is so that a member’s identity can’t be discovered by using that spell. As long as that isn’t possible, then I would agree.

The echoes need to be removed for secrecy. If they are not then a member could not use the ability without giving themselves away. Cabal Robes is to allow members to meet without revealing one’s identity. Besides if one had to wear the robe to use skills in secret, a dual member would very rarely (almost never) be able to use his skills without revealing himself.

I’m just wondering why you take the middle ground here? Is “time” your only concern? Personally, I see very little difference between actually leading two organizations, and being able to forcibly order the leader of an organization around.

You are right that sieges will have economic effects. But part of the beauty of the proposal is how cabals and tribunals interact. The group spell is to give cabals a “bargaining chip” in which tribunals will respect, but have that chip used sparingly. It really just adds to cabal and tribunal interaction by encouraging tribunals to seek out a cabal’s help for wars between tribunals. Or by the cabal offering help or hinderance for whatever help they wish from the tribunal. It is not an I win spell mind you, more of a buff or malidiction spell for cities.

You are right, there isn’t even a need for headquarters. I’m just use to the fact there always have been and until CRS there was at least the illusion that they were secret. Ultimately, the safe houses that current cabal HQs are would need to be changed. If there are or aren’t HQs would be up to the Imms and cabal leaders.

Lei Kung

LK, gentle criticism: I appreciate your need to respond to every topic, but you don't have to respond to every point -- especially when you have nothing to add but still take four sentences to say it (e.g., point 5). Please don't respond to this.

Two counterpoints:

1) Cabals members should have the potential to remain anonymous, but it should involve effort. That means you don't use your cabal skills around people you can't trust unless you robe yourself. Even if the echoes were removed, you'd not be able to use the skills in public without arousing suspicion sufficient to discover you.

2) Cabals and tribunals are supposed to be fully separate and distinct entities with differing political motives (tribunal has a country to maintain, the cabal an agenda to fulfill). Hence there is no practical reason for a cabal to be able to influence a tribunal/country so heavily as a group spell would imply, any more than a tribunal should be able to exert influence over a cabal (thus the removal of the HQ).

I think a number of ideas LK in his original proposal are unnecessary changes.

IA) Restricting leadership does not address the number one goal. It makes people disinterested in leading a group. Your reasons for this are weak a leader should be ready to step out of another group if that group is trying to bully them but it is their RP that will guide them.
IB) A blatant Ruling that could go against many RP situations and seems to run against the core of the mud and its freedoms in RP.
ID, IE) Are nice extras but are not really needed in duel membership I feel is a completely different issue. To be added later perhaps. I will ask how the proposed "completely secret organizations" oath breaker flag info gets to other groups.

II B 1) Cabal members can be secret with out this to hide your powers should be the cost of this.
II B 2b) Unless you are of one cabal (with this ability) you should have to show your face to others to talk to them. There are other ways to get around such things like telling another member to speak on your behalf. You are never going to be secret from everyone the leader will always know you.
II B 3) Waste of effort and unneeded if you want to tell someone tell them. Dont need to say your a cabal member if you want to be secret about it.
II B 4)This is for lazy people who want to keep secret. If you want your identity hidden go about it the hard way and not be able to speak your mind at a big meeting or will have to do it in proxy.

II C) Why ? I dont see a strong reason or logic behind this idea other than to promote the leader restrictions as not being a bad thing. With duel membership you no longer have to chose between a cabal and a tribunal there is even less reason for this. Cabals will always have more appeal than tribunals because cabals are concept tribunals are nations. You build a char with a concept with in this concept you pick a nation.

III) Although a good idea this to me is also another issue outside dual membership. One that I believe is being looked into.

IV A)Cabals can already effect nations by means of RPK. Why do they need this ?

IV B)If you remove the total need for all cabals to be hidden then this is another unneeded change.

If this gets implemented I'm going to have to go out and become leader of the Fist and the Peacekeepers and make everyone's life miserable.

Time to resurrect Dalryn!

Oh oh! Someone else needs to take control of the Druids and KoS and then someone else can have the Hammer and Talons. We can have three people run six of the most active organizations in the game!

Given the quality of player leadership on SK, I see this as BEING REALLY FUN!

Apology
I would like to take a moment to apologize to everyone interested and following this thread. I let myself get into a pissing match with Jardek. Even though it was about the topic of the thread it ended up as a distraction from it. Him and I also ended up dominating it so far and again I apologize for that. I’m sure I will respond more then most because of the position I’m in with this subject. But I will try to avoid pissing matches and being overly long winded/excessively point by point, but no promises.

Thread Purpose
Just to be clear, this thread is to discuss topics relevant to dual membership and its application. This is not just to state feelings, rather to make your statement and give your reasoning. In a discussion just stating you think or believe or feel such a way does not contribute to the discussion. By all means have and share your feelings, beliefs, and thoughts, just share why you have them.

Topic at Hand
I opened the thread with the summary outline, but I followed it up with a discussion on the goals for dual membership. Unfortunately, we were side tracked into specifics right off the bat. I was hoping to work our way there. Below I’ve shown the very basic, bare bones, of what is needed for dual membership. The summary outline simply shows a way to accomplish these in a very complete way. Although, maybe it would be worth while to state the bare bones again, hopefully we will not have to go through the entire evolution process again. And maybe we will find other solutions that work as well.

Bare bones:
1. Allow dual membership so that each organization retains their RP, purpose, independence, organization integrity, and organizational stability
2. Change cabals so that members can be/remain secret while gaining benefits of membership.
3. Create an atmosphere for tribunals to fully represent their nation’s governance, which must include some form of kingdom warfare.

**2 and 3 are needed to give meaning to dual membership.

Lei Kung

We already have a form of kingdom warfare - city raids. They've been a part of SK's roleplay for years. They just need tweaked a bit, to account for how much larger tribunals will be under dual membership. To help avoid defensive overload:

* Adjust the spawning rate of bounty NPCs based on online tribunal members.

* Consider giving tribunals a few level-limited NPCs that can be used in other countries. (Mentor+ NPCs are too strong for unlimited use.)

If we decide we really want a mechanical system, let's take advantage of what we already have: judges installed in each capital city. The death of such a major official could reasonably penalize a tribunal for a while. But a mechanical system isn't necessary for dual membership.