Shattered Kingdoms

Easy enough compromise. Deduct five obsidian per faith each month for temple/shrine upkeep.

Interesting idea. What happens when a religion's account goes empty?

Radi Kenga took it!

High followers lose their flags.

I like this idea.

Needs to be more requirements that flagged people -do- things.

With PVP recently dismissed as a deciding metric in the outcome of RPPK conflict and the starting of religious wars, it would seem necessary to have some sort of measurable metric of the success or failure of a faith from an RPPK standpoint.

Of all the types of factions with leaders in SK, religions remain the only one where there are absolutely zero ways to prove or test strength in a no-drama, objective mechanic. I would go so far as to advocate faith diplomacy and global chat channels.

For the cavalcade of loyalty tokens brought into existence each month for religious leaders, it just doesn't seem like there's a lot of activity nor expectation there to justify it.

Or just remove the LTs from HF flags. That'd be a step towards making 'hero' actually mean something, too.

As it stands, the hero flag means absolutely nothing except that you got a flag (usually a religion flag, because those are much easier to hoard indefinitely when the HF is often the only person even in the religion) and sat on it forever (generally with large absences in actually playing the character that eventually got 'hero'.)

It might be appropriate to discuss a relevant elephant in the room. The religious situation could be vastly improved if the blemish command was removed from mortal characters. Any situation warranting blemishing ought to be forwarded to a patron, and in that situation a patron ought to have oversight and the ability to put the kaibosh on drama by approving, turning down, or placing conditions on such a request. High followers could instead get access to the reward command and encouragement to use it for appropriate religious RP. Tokens would then wind up more where they belong: on people who demonstrate voluntary skills and time investment above and beyond the normal requirements.

Many of the kinds of players who can maintain long-lived religious leaders are probably going to be more productive and engaging when trusted with carrots instead of sticks. Now that we have one person who handles punishment, it seems appropriate to actually let her do that job.

I don't mean this as a jab against anything in particular, but I do know for a fact that plenty of faiths are avoided by plenty of players because people don't want to be subjected to the oversight of inactive, capricious characters who selectively avoid aspects of gameplay and seem to demand others do the same.

Also of note is that an entire class, and anybody who is pantheist gets dumped on in the race for 'hero points' by having a whole section (that requires no work/effort aside from sitting back and collecting) of points that is unavailable to them.

Inaccurate.