A Tier System for Multiple Characters

[Synthesis]

(I decided to repost this as a new topic, to avoid the clutter of the other thread.)

Here's a more complete idea:  tiers of stored characters, based on how interested you are in continuing to play them.

Tier 1:  This would be the current character you're most interested in playing.  This is probably a "newbie" PC who is working his way up through the ranks, or skilling up, or whatever.  When you created this character, you didn't have a good idea how active your area of the game was, or whether you'd be interested in continually roleplaying around the other PCs in the area.  Maybe you have "buyer's remorse," or maybe you don't.

Tier 2:  This is your "old standby" PC.  He's a Trooper or a Corporal and moderately-very skilled.  The thrill and excitement is gone, but his story is incomplete and you're still moderately interested in playing him.

Tier 3:  This is the RPT-only or flavor-role, stop-gap PC you log in with when you're waiting for a Tier 1 application to be approved.  This could be either a skilled veteran whose role in Armageddon's overall storyline will be no more than "unambitious House employee until he dies or retires," or the street-sweeper or prostitute that nobody really wants as a long-term character, but wouldn't mind playing for a RL day or two.

Rules:

1) Designating characters as Tier 1, 2, or 3 takes place via the Request Tool.

2) Switching between Tier 1 and Tier 2 characters imposes a 2 RL week minimum playtime restriction.  I.e. after you switch, you have to play that character for at least two weeks before you can switch back.  (This is primarily to prevent wanton switching.)

3) Tier 3 characters can only be played by three means:  a) Staff approval, to take part in a specific, scheduled event (to accommodate RPT-ready roles); b) one login allowed per RL month (to accommodate flavor roles) or c) becomes your default character option when your current Tier 1 character unexpectedly kicks the bucket.  In the case of (c), you can choose to switch to your current Tier 2 character instead of submitting another app.  However, the Tier 3 character remains Tier 3...this is a permanent designation.

4) If you have no Tier 2 character (either because your Tier 1 died and your old Tier 2 was moved up to Tier 1, or because you never had a second character at all), your next submitted character application is by default moved into the Tier 2 slot.  You can begin playing this character at any time by switching between Tier 1 and Tier 2 via the request tool.

5) The Staff may demand (and other players may petition the Staff thusly) that a certain character be played for a certain period of time, in order for certain IC events to run their course.  Examples include being wanted by a city-state, being fired from a clan, and participating in upper-class political events.  When such demands are made, the Staff will make it clear ahead of time the prescribed time-limit.  For example, one RL month to evade capture for bounties, or one RL evening to take part in a Senate meeting.

6) Abuse of these privileges will result in their being removed from your account, and in the permanent storage of your Tier 2 and Tier 3 characters.  At the time of removal, a Staff member will ask you which character (Tier 1 or Tier 2) you want to play, and the others will be permanently stored.  I imagine this would go along with loss of karma and temporary banning, in accordance with previously established rules regarding cheating.  Abuse is defined as sharing IC information between characters or using alternate characters to the advantage of your current Tier 1 character.  Examples of abuse include, but are not limited to:  spying with alternate characters, and using that information to plot with a Tier 1 character; using an alternate character to kill NPCs or PCs that are hostile to your Tier 1 character; griefing with a character and then switching to an alternate character to avoid IC consequences.

[mansa]

I can see this being a successful addition.

[RogueGunslinger]

I'm a fan of this.

[netflix]

I have to give a thumbs down. I've been on other RPIs that allow, to varying degrees, multiple characters. It never turns out well. There really is no way to guarantee that a conflict of interest will -never- pop up between various characters, be it directly or indirectly.

Even if you have one char that never leaves Tuluk, and another that never leaves Nak, there's still that chance that your Tuluki's char's best friend ends up in Nak in a life or death situation that your Nak character has a chance to influence. I'm not even talking about outright cheating, here. I'm talking about just subconscious influences on your decision making process.

It -will- happen. Maybe not with everyone, but it still will. Just as how you may find yourself being more friendly/meaner then usual toward one of your recently dead characters friends/enemies, this would both magnify and prolong that. The deeper you get into your new char, the easier it can be to fend off these things. But -continuing- to have influence of two active characters, it would simply continue.

Even if it's just an RPT only role... how many people can -really- say that what your throw away RPT secondary character does through thought an RPT would -never- be influenced by your existing, primary character? As far as I know, we don't have any robots playing PCs, so this would be a "no one".

[Agent_137]

i like the tier 3 idea, but feel tier 2 would require too much oversight to prevent OOC carry-over of current information, be bad for the folks you play each of those characters with because you disappear for two weeks every month, and be confusing for you too.

you need to  make tier 2 much more restrictive to swap to. Two weeks is just ridiculous. (i suggested 6 months in the other thread.)

btw lol at splitting the thread. this thread is basically the idea but with the addition of tier 3. (which i do like)

p.s.

With two week swap offs you could even have your characters share the same fucking apartment! You'd need a go-between buddy to actually own the apartment, but it'd still be VERY easy to do.

p.s.s
stuff like this:

5. ... When such demands are made, the Staff will make it clear ahead of time the prescribed time-limit.

will never and should never happen.

[Winterless]

Like *thumbs up*

[Thunkkin]

Bureaucratic nightmare.

[Cutthroat]

I wouldn't mind keeping a Tier 1 and a Tier 3 character as you define it. Tier 3 seems to fit things like staff's call for gladiators April of last year perfectly: RPT-only special characters for that your Tier 1 character can't be a part of or watch. I'm not sure that I would like for players to be able to log into these outside of RPTs, even if only once a month, because that can still be used to check up on other areas for information that your first character could possibly use, even if only unconsciously.

The Tier 2 idea can work if the time you must wait to switch between Tier 1 and 2 is very long. Otherwise, this undoubtedly will increase staff workload, and may even cause cases of confusion during enforcement or otherwise cause a roleplaying quandry:
- Imagine if a Tier 1 and Tier 2 character of a single player make a common enemy (which isn't outside the realm of possibility, so long as there is a very mobile trouble-maker to make enemies with). The Tier 2 character kills that enemy. Will this be understood as IC action, or misconstrued as a way to help a Tier 1 character?
- A Tier 2 character is in Arm of the Dragon, and that player's Tier 1 character is in the Sun Legions. A Tuluki templar tells a Tier 1 character that his unit will go out to the Red Desert in a month. Player gets bored and switches to his Tier 2 character. An Allanaki templar tells the Tier 2 character that his unit will ambush a Sun Legions unit out on the Red Desert in a month. Will the player participate in the destruction of his main PC's clan, or try to switch over as fast as possible to help defend it?

Another concern of mine is how this would work with sponsored roles. Staff apparently try to keep a certain number of nobles, templars, and Merchant House members in the cities so that they stay active. What tier would they fall into? And if a player chose to switch away from their sponsored role to another character, would staff hold their spot for them (potentially slowing things down for other leaders and players in that area) or replace them?

[jstorrie]

No thanks.

[Synthesis]

How about with a 1-month mandatory minimum playing time before switching between Tier 1/2 characters?

What about a mandatory 3-5 day waiting period before you could even log in with the second, after the switch?

The combination of these two would make it a serious decision whether to switch or not.

As far as bureaucratic workload is concerned, I'm not going to comment because a) I don't know how long it takes to resolve investigations of cheating, b) I don't know how burdened the staff are already, and c) nobody knows how many more cheating investigations would need to be launched if something like this went into effect.

The idea is to arrange it such that a) if your clan dies, or you get non-terminally bored with a character or b) you create a new character and the zone you created in is DOA, you can jump into a new character or back to an old character without the possibility of losing a significant amount of invested time.

Also, keep in mind that the average character lifespan is something like...two, two-and-a-half weeks (according to Gimf's last estimate).  Most characters aren't currently surviving long enough to even have the chance to jump to a reserve character.

[Agent_137]

i don't think the average person needs this solution. the pain is with long-lived characters. Not 1 month old characters. I don't even think being able to temp-store a character more than once is a good idea. It would be a serious departure from this MUD to turn it into multiplay-lite.

If you've had more than 5 characters in the last year, I don't think you really need a solution like this. I've only heard long-life players complain of burn-out. How many short-lifers out there have the same problem?

[Synthesis]

i don't think the average person needs this solution. the pain is with long-lived characters. Not 1 month old characters. I don't even think being able to temp-store a character more than once is a good idea. It would be a serious departure from this MUD to turn it into multiplay-lite.

If you've had more than 5 characters in the last year, I don't think you really need a solution like this. I've only heard long-life players complain of burn-out. How many short-lifers out there have the same problem?

This would help with medium-term characters, also.

For example, if you rolled up a pickpocket in the 'rinth, but it turns out the 'rinth is completely dead.  You'd play the pickpocket for a month, then you could switch back to your previous character.  A month later, you could try the pickpocket out again, if you so chose.  Or you could store the pickpocket and roll up another app.--after a month, you could play this one...or you could play it immediately if your Tier 1 character unexpectedly died.

But no, the Tier 1/2 switching wouldn't be of any use to people who can't keep a character alive for a solid month, except that it would give them a pre-approved character app slot, so they could immediately start playing the game again after dying, without waiting 4-24 hours for a new app. to be approved.  The Tier 3 option would still be useful, however.

[janeshephard]

I'm not a big fan of this at all.

There are so many problems with it:

* Less playtime on current characters.
* More room for abuse, despite added staff time toward managing this.
* Complex systems never integrate well. Small incremental changes do.

Let's start with a throw-away arena account everyone gets. Roll your arena mul, what have you, and play during scheduled RPTs. From there, see what else can be done.

My 2 'sids.

[Delstro]

I don't like it.
As a Bynn Sargeant, I'd have to bend over backwards even more now to keep my followers not only alive, but interested. If this tier system would be implemented, I could foresee this happening a lot. I could see this pretty much shutting down entire houses because everyone wants to be apart of the clique going on in Allanak (or Tuluk, this is a detail, don't get hung up on it.)

How annoying would it be to have an entire crew of hunter/crafters that disappear for a month to go do something more interesting, come back for a month, and then leave for three months and then come back for four months?

I do not like it.
I could never be sure of when my followers were going to be around, so I would get tired of being around. I would also catch on fast when my lead crafter disappears for a while and a Bynn Sargeant is only around when my follower is stored. Even if it wasn't true, perception is just as deadly as reality some times.

[Akaramu]

Delstro summed up my feelings well.

[Synthesis]

If your clan or house isn't interesting enough to keep people playing in it with the tier 1/2 system in place, why would you want to FORCE people to stay around in it?  That strikes me as...a little rude.  If someone doesn't enjoy playing around you, I don't think you have an inherent right to their continued presence in your clan.  I don't think the game benefits by having bored players sitting around doing nothing.

I mean, seriously.  Some of you people are acting as if the game is fundamentally based on people being bored most of the time.  Worst-case scenarios are worst-case.  If things really got that bad, the Staff could simply change things back to the current system.

As far as players disappearing for a month at a time...so what?  How often do you -ever- have a character consistently logging in for an entire month, anyway?  If someone really wants to basically run two characters by logging in with each for a month at a time...why is this a bad thing?  You can't adapt to the fact that they're going to be a vNPC every other month?

I think this could easily be handled responsibly, by responsible players.  For example, if there's something major about to go down in your Tier 1 clan...it would be responsible not to switch to your Tier 2 until that major event is finished.  But...if there isn't anything major happening, I don't think it's in anyone's interest to keep people bored while they're sitting around waiting.

And yes, as a Byn Sergeant, you should have to bend over backwards to keep players interested.  It's essentially part of your job description when you accept that responsibility.  On the bright side, with a Tier 3 in place, you would at least possibly have more Troopers showing up for RPTs, instead of rolling out with three n00bs and a prayer.

[zanthalandreams]

I don't really like it, even though the average longevity of my characters tends to be around two or so RL years.   I don't like it for the same reason I don't like undying NPCs camping out in leadership roles.   I want the old to move aside for the new, if the role is getting stale.  If you live that long and are still in an insignificant role, then . . well. . .I don't see how having another PC to refresh into will enrich the game for you (but more importantly for me.)   

[Synthesis]

The rules would probably have to be modified for PCs in limited-availability leadership positions.

[zanthalandreams]

I'm talking about any kind of leadership role. . . or any role above recruit cannon fodder.  I guarantee you, even some upjumped Corporal has someone under him waiting on him to die so they can do a better job.   

[Akaramu]

How often do you -ever- have a character consistently logging in for an entire month, anyway?

All the time. The same is true for some of the others I end up playing with fairly often. The long-term plots can be beautiful, the most interesting PC I've ran into lately, with the most interesting plots, had been played consistently for some 8 months.

[spawnloser]

I keep looking through this and I keep not liking it.

I would be okay with this if the only idea was to improve the world.  I don't see this improving the world but simply giving a means for some people to enjoy the game more while other people think the game is being not improved but the opposite.  If we could change this so that it would only improve the game, and by that, I think a good measure is how much it improves OTHER people's enjoyment.

For example, I would be okay with something like this if we had a primary character and two or three flavor characters, characters that are just cogs in the machine that are around not to be key hunters or officers or magicker lazor cannons, but the peons and the cannon fodder.  They're only brought out for RPTs and only when asked by the staff.  I think that'd be cool.

[Synthesis]

The discussion is pretty much being dominated by worst-case scenarios, at this point.  That's how things on the GDB go, I guess.

[roughneck]

I would like to see a multi-character system in place for certain role only.  Roles such as gladiators, low skill gith (there for enjoyable, animated pc fodder, not pc murder) and perhaps noble and gmh slave guards or hunters.  Roles that can be difficult or impossible to devote a full time play to but would benefit the game by having someone fill the role here and there.  It would keep people from getting bored and limit abuse because the character your playing has a well-defined role very much separate from your main character.

[Akaramu]

Yes, it would definitely be nice for slave roles.

[Is Friday]

So long as this idea is implemented with heavy monitoring, only granted to higher karma players, and only allows people to play very limited roles such as slaves/gladiator-types, I wouldn't have a problem with this. I'm very paranoid about an easy way to switch characters, however.