World Plots versus Personal Plots

[Sam]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

[Marshmellow]

Sam, you're misinterpreting what the GMHs' interests are, I think.  They aren't in conflict with each other because their target markets are very different, on the whole.  The only overlaps are hardly worth mentioning because they are low-priority for one House, the other House that has it high-priority being a clear victor in the economic conflict there.  Why would they go to war?  They have too much to lose.  They will only war on someone smaller than them, someone against which they are sure to win with minimal losses.

IMHO, having them go to war because the players think it would be exciting is meta-gaming.

[Sam]

Who said anything about open war? Subversion, interference, and manipulation.

[Barzalene]

We used to be able to rely on metagaming from above. Now we need to make our own. Perfect? No. Better than a game where nothing happens? Yup.

[hyzhenhok]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

Your mistake is you're assuming wealth is zero-sum, when even in Zalanthas it is not. The merchant houses can all grow richer without stealing wealth from one another.

Though I do think there's no reason they couldn't have low-level conflict. PC agent A can harass PC agent B's business without trying to take on the entirety of Agent B's house.

[Zoltan]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

Your mistake is you're assuming wealth is zero-sum, when even in Zalanthas it is not. The merchant houses can all grow richer without stealing wealth from one another.

Though I do think there's no reason they couldn't have low-level conflict. PC agent A can harass PC agent B's business without trying to take on the entirety of Agent B's house.

Yeah, these sorts of manipulations happen. By their nature they tend to be sekret and low-impact, however. It will forever be the problem of political play: from the outside looking in, nothing seems to be happening.

[Cindy42]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

Your mistake is you're assuming wealth is zero-sum, when even in Zalanthas it is not. The merchant houses can all grow richer without stealing wealth from one another.

Though I do think there's no reason they couldn't have low-level conflict. PC agent A can harass PC agent B's business without trying to take on the entirety of Agent B's house.

Yeah, these sorts of manipulations happen. By their nature they tend to be sekret and low-impact, however. It will forever be the problem of political play: from the outside looking in, nothing seems to be happening.

makes it easier to pin the blame on some random douche walking by. probably better if they were human, commoner, not actually affiliated with your house, and appearing as least somewhat disreputable. (humans only are involved with merchant houses for the most part, nobles are better, and don't get into actual trouble with anyone, according to the whim of the highlord nearest, so just say this guy killed one of your reputable merchants, when in fact you did it, for political purposes, and had a hell of a time rping their death last night.)

[Sam]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

Your mistake is you're assuming wealth is zero-sum, when even in Zalanthas it is not. The merchant houses can all grow richer without stealing wealth from one another.

Though I do think there's no reason they couldn't have low-level conflict. PC agent A can harass PC agent B's business without trying to take on the entirety of Agent B's house.

Finite resources = zero sum game.

Wealth is a zero sum game when you are dealing with monopolies. It isn't a zero sum game when you are dealing with two "satisfied with their lot in life" houses. You don't have that kinda merchant house in Arm. Merchant houses in Arm can only get soo rich before they must start taking it from the other houses by either direct or indirect force. Only one merchant house can be the richest. Only one merchant house can be the most powerful. One house may be both, or two may be either, but two houses cannot be the richest and most powerful. Who would be satisfied being second place?

[hyzhenhok]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

Your mistake is you're assuming wealth is zero-sum, when even in Zalanthas it is not. The merchant houses can all grow richer without stealing wealth from one another.

Though I do think there's no reason they couldn't have low-level conflict. PC agent A can harass PC agent B's business without trying to take on the entirety of Agent B's house.

Finite resources = zero sum game.

Wealth is a zero sum game when you are dealing with monopolies. It isn't a zero sum game when you are dealing with two "satisfied with their lot in life" houses. You don't have that kinda merchant house in Arm. Merchant houses in Arm can only get soo rich before they must start taking it from the other houses by either direct or indirect force. Only one merchant house can be the richest. Only one merchant house can be the most powerful. One house may be both, or two may be either, but two houses cannot be the richest and most powerful. Who would be satisfied being second place?

There are no more finite resources in Zalanthas than there are on Earth. Specifically, there is no shortage of resources left unclaimed on Zalanthas. I'm not sure what a world with all resources claimed and in use would look like, but Zalanthas is certainly not it.

[BleakOne]

That wasn't my theory, number13.
My theory is this:
Kurac and Kadius are in indirect conflict already because they both want to get richer and Kurac owns several markets and Kadius owns several markets.
Kadius owns: Hunter's Paradise, a material-for-sale building, and various others.
Kurac owns: The majority of tribal trade (which includes weapons, materials, etc), spice, wagons, and others.
Bynn owns: Security
Salarr owns: Weapons, and other secretive things (like all the rest)

If you look at what Kurac is apart of, they are in direct conflict with Kadius and Salarr. Kurac owns a large portion of the weapons industry. Kurac owns a large part of the clothing industry. Kadius owns a small portion of the materials trade.
For anyone of them to get richer, they need to interfere, subvert, and manipulate the other houses to build favor among nobles and templars. Open war would be too easy and Tuluk hates open war, Allanak loves it.

Your mistake is you're assuming wealth is zero-sum, when even in Zalanthas it is not. The merchant houses can all grow richer without stealing wealth from one another.

Though I do think there's no reason they couldn't have low-level conflict. PC agent A can harass PC agent B's business without trying to take on the entirety of Agent B's house.

Finite resources = zero sum game.

Wealth is a zero sum game when you are dealing with monopolies. It isn't a zero sum game when you are dealing with two "satisfied with their lot in life" houses. You don't have that kinda merchant house in Arm. Merchant houses in Arm can only get soo rich before they must start taking it from the other houses by either direct or indirect force. Only one merchant house can be the richest. Only one merchant house can be the most powerful. One house may be both, or two may be either, but two houses cannot be the richest and most powerful. Who would be satisfied being second place?

There are no more finite resources in Zalanthas than there are on Earth. Specifically, there is no shortage of resources left unclaimed on Zalanthas. I'm not sure what a world with all resources claimed and in use would look like, but Zalanthas is certainly not it.

I mostly agree there, although feel the need to point out that the Known isn't anywhere near as big as Earth, and some of the resources on it are quite scarce compared to Earth (metals, food, water supplies and such)

[hyzhenhok]

I mostly agree there, although feel the need to point out that the Known isn't anywhere near as big as Earth, and some of the resources on it are quite scarce compared to Earth (metals, food, water supplies and such)

The population is much smaller, too.

But the main thing is that there is plenty of untamed wilderness, filled with obsidian, glass, wild animals, wood, and other valuable resources. It's arguable that occasionally, a House might see more gain and less risk in an operation to steal clout/business from a rival than some other expedition or initiative. But all the time? Certainly not.

[Semper]

I mostly agree there, although feel the need to point out that the Known isn't anywhere near as big as Earth, and some of the resources on it are quite scarce compared to Earth (metals, food, water supplies and such)

The population is much smaller, too.

But the main thing is that there is plenty of untamed wilderness, filled with obsidian, glass, wild animals, wood, and other valuable resources. It's arguable that occasionally, a House might see more gain and less risk in an operation to steal clout/business from a rival than some other expedition or initiative. But all the time? Certainly not.

The BIIIIIG difference between Earth and Zalanthas is the transportation/travel capabilities. There are entire countries that are sustained only on the import of food, and could not possibly sustain their population with their own agricultural capabilities.

The thing with Zalanthas is even if there are a lot of untamed wildnerness, it's not accessible to many of the civilized city-states/GMH's because of the dangers involved to access them. Thus, there IS a shortage of resources.

[number13]

There's a discrepancy between resources available in game via code and resources available in the world via fluff.  The average PC (esp. clanned) isn't going to ever really want for food. Yet, there's starving NPCs littering the streets.

#1 thing that could promote conflict between PCs is if there was some constraint on available resources.  For example, what if there was just one obsidian quarry available to PCs?  Now you have a point of contention between obsidian miners and a natural gathering spot.

Or just a few available rooms for safe timber logging might prove a better example, especially if directives from up on high set multiple House agents to procuring wood for construction.   There's all sorts of conflict and interaction that could arise from that sort of thing : fending off independents, hiring guards to protect workers from halflings, dealing with whichever noble has charge over the Grey Forest, hiring thugs or elves to raid another agent's work camp or aggressive thieves to raid a storage. And since the job to chop wood would end up in the hands of the lowly grebber PCs, the activities surrounding the conflict would be more visible to the playerbase than the typical skulky, backroom dealings.

[Barzalene]

I like this idea.

[musashi]

I think it's true to say that most PC's do not feel the pinch when it comes to Zalanthas being a resource scarce world according to theme.

That's a code issue. Resources are codedly infinite. Animals always respawn. You can forage constantly in the same room until Arm2 finally comes out.

And then on the flip side, PC's will seriously feel conflict over the silliest things just becasuse code-wise, they are rare.

Imagine how many people would kill just to possess a blind-fold that codedly worked; or a mask that hid your mdesc. You know, staff loaded things that you can't get anywhere else.

I don't have a ready solution to these problems aside from saying: Try and keep the game world in your mind when you RP and remember that just because the code allows something, it doesn't mean you should do it.  

[Nil AlSahni]

I think it's true to say that most PC's do not feel the pinch when it comes to Zalanthas being a resource scarce world according to theme.

That's a code issue. Resources are codedly infinite. Animals always respawn. You can forage constantly in the same room until Arm2 finally comes out.

And then on the flip side, PC's will seriously feel conflict over the silliest things just becasuse code-wise, they are rare.

Imagine how many people would kill just to possess a blind-fold that codedly worked; or a mask that hid your mdesc. You know, staff loaded things that you can't get anywhere else.

I don't have a ready solution to these problems aside from saying: Try and keep the game world in your mind when you RP and remember that just because the code allows something, it doesn't mean you should do it.  

1. If everyone reported responsibly (and even sometimes when they likely don't), places would change to reflect things. I'm sure many people here know of at least 1 fairly popular wilderness room which you can no longer get resources from.

2. (Though it was a different poster who suggested it): Yes, having just one of those places sounds like a great way to drive conflict and so on and so forth - until you take into account the people who hoarde, and if you're a burglar, you get to see how many this is, too - who have tons and tons and tons and tons of shit. So it's all fun and games until they take their dwarven ranger with the focus to collect all the raw obsidian in the world there, and start cleaning the entire thing out, all the time, every day, keeping anyone who DOES need it from getting it - and then quitting out or hiding to keep from facing consequences.

3. There were masks that hid mdescs once. They were taken out because of the ridiculous amounts of abuse. Just like apartment keys that didn't rotate, and people who would collect keyrings of all the apartment keys in the known and then go pick them up with their new pcs, etc. So really, I doubt staff would load them, considering they existed and have been taken out for a reason, like sandslits with glass lenses and sandwiches.

[musashi]

My point had nothing to do with advocating for masks that hide your mdesc to once again be available in game.

My point was that people will enact lots of conflict over things that are codedly scarce resources, even if the resources are not scarce according to the game's theme.

And on the flip side, even if something is supposed to be scarce according to the game's theme, if it isn't codedly, people tend to treat it cheaply.

[hyzhenhok]

I mostly agree there, although feel the need to point out that the Known isn't anywhere near as big as Earth, and some of the resources on it are quite scarce compared to Earth (metals, food, water supplies and such)

The population is much smaller, too.

But the main thing is that there is plenty of untamed wilderness, filled with obsidian, glass, wild animals, wood, and other valuable resources. It's arguable that occasionally, a House might see more gain and less risk in an operation to steal clout/business from a rival than some other expedition or initiative. But all the time? Certainly not.

The BIIIIIG difference between Earth and Zalanthas is the transportation/travel capabilities. There are entire countries that are sustained only on the import of food, and could not possibly sustain their population with their own agricultural capabilities.

The thing with Zalanthas is even if there are a lot of untamed wildnerness, it's not accessible to many of the civilized city-states/GMH's because of the dangers involved to access them. Thus, there IS a shortage of resources.

Not really. As long as sunlight is adding energy to the ecosystem, it's hard to have finite organic resources. Inorganic resources besides metal are likely present in abundance in the earth's crust (like obsidian---a volcano recently appeared near Allanak. I doubt they'll run out of obsidian any time soon).

And my point was that while many resources available in the wild are dangerous to exploit, they are much less dangerous to pursue that picking a fight with one of the other Great Merchant Houses. As long as there is anything that can possibly be taken from the wilds, it's wrong to say Zalanthan economics are zero-sum. If it appears zero-sum, that's because Nenyuk scoops up and hoards the wealth of all the dead PC's.

Scarcity of food and water is a problem for a masses. It doesn't apply to GMHs. One of the reasons the masses are so screwed is because of GMH monopolies, after all.