Conflict: Striking a Balance

[Taven]

Would staff invest the time if they thought this many players could benefit from a plot? I'd sure like to think so.

I guess I'd like to find a way to have external conflict without requiring staff involvement.  (ETA: Staff support, sure, like usual support for PC-driven events; and also staff would be required to step in and give yellow flags to those who ignore the virtual world or whatever via the normal player complaint process.)

I have a hard time imagining an external conflict that doesn't have staff involvement.

Could you think of a few possible examples to illustrate what you mean a little better?

[nauta]

We're on the same page, yeah.  Just two points I want to emphasize:

I think prolonged conflict and the mini-plots that external conflict can generate are good. Burning shit around Tuluk? Absolutely go for that, yes. However, in the ultimate long run, someone has to "win". This isn't just because players want to win, but because if you have a conflict that drags on forever, people eventually stop caring about it, and it ceases to have meaning. Usually "winning" involved a combat finale.

It's not so much about winning, a lot of our PCs will die in battle and never know what happened.  It's more about the possibility of winning.  That's point one.

Point two is to go back up to what started this off: external conflict (that involve PCs, IMHO) is something that will be good for new players.  I started in late 2013/early 2014, and while the Tuluk/Allanak thing might have been stale to vets, it was very real to me as a new player.  And it's not just new players, it's new characters out of chargen: they don't have to wait for the 'internal conflict' plot of a clan to get a real sense of something inspiring to do (they can ignore it or not, that's fine): but the idea that there is an enemy at the gates, a real intelligent enemy driven by PCs with some virtual world backing them (i.e., not raider-of-the-week)... that's the idea I'm going for.

I have a hard time imagining an external conflict that doesn't have staff involvement.

Could you think of a few possible examples to illustrate what you mean a little better?

Well, I said what I want is external conflict that doesn't require staff involvement, over and above the regular (enforcement), and setting up the initial parameters (documentation about the virtual world).  I think what makes external conflict feel a bit stale is that, in your example, all the enemy there is entirely virtual -- maybe you meant the example to be when Tuluk was open, in which case it makes a lot more sense.  But nowadays, that entire scenario would involve staff as the enemy with no PCs.  That's a lot of work for staff, and likely would only happen now and then, with a lot of potential for cries of 'railroading' or, even worse, the butthurt from being tossed down by staff (when a PC slays your PC, you are kinda ok with it; when staff slays your PC, you are kinda less ok with it).

So, an example.  Here's some, off the top of my head, just to give a feel for it:

The Tuluki Expatriots.  This is a clan.  You can role up a PC inside it.  They have a compound that's pretty hidden, which has NPC guards, maybe even a small battalion, perhaps some virtual backing from a few ex-patriot Tuluki templars, etc. -- large enough to be a bona fide threat to Allanak, but small enough that it doesn't require too much staff overhead or too heavy of a PC population inside it, so that the antagonist PCs can make decisions that will affect things, and also so that they won't get stomped easily.

Tuluk minus everything else but the army.  Again, you'd play in a clan -- the Legion -- but that's all that would be open in Tuluk.

Mean Desert Elves.  Again, a clan.

Mul slaves

The Sandlord

And so on.

The rough idea is that

(a) the players that roll up PCs inside the clan know what they are getting into;

(b) there is staff support for the clan: documentation that makes them an actual threat and gives them a virtual presence; a clan board and all its benefits; perhaps a rough storyline for them to flesh out as PCs, and so on; some ground rules to let the PCs know that their role is to be antagonists and not griefers (karma restricted, let's say); etc.

(c) the threat would be one felt on all levels inside Allanak, new players and old players, indies and clanned (not just a given clan (AoD));

You could rotate out different ones, change focus, and so on -- tie this into Lauramars' idea from the player retention thread of multiple bad guys and so on.

[Dresan]

First of all, if there are people who don't want to see internal plots here on the GDB, i haven't seen them. What I have seen is people commenting on why most internal conflicts wouldn't make sense in the current setting.

Secondly, its taking the virtual world into account that is usually the biggest obstacles in almost any plot these days because of how high the virtual power ceiling actually is. Lets go back and take a look at the spy plot.

This was an excellent and fun plot overall, but it was done in a city with a sorcerer king who's mind-bending abilities still comes second to the fact that he can also see the future. This isn't even mentioning the templars that served him at the time.  Again an excellent and fun plot, that didn't make any sense whatsoever until Nyr came out and said, something to the effect that; yes, all virtual factors were taken into account and countered somehow. Well then I guess I need to take his word for it, and I have to suspend my utter disbelief or just try make sense of it somehow, maybe Muk wanted this to happen? No idea, the people in better positions to question ICly were as confused as I was I think.

This was very jarring to me, and along with other changes I eventually didn't want to play in Tuluk. Again story-lines and plots are the meat and potatoes of this game, they need to make some sense at least for me.

The ridiculous virtual power levels prevents many cool epic story-lines that actually make sense. Ultimately the end of every plot/conflict is basically the same, the red robes, black robes or sorcerers king takes notice, waves their fingers effortlessly and everything gets fixed and/or someone finds themselves falling into a deep hole. Everything returns to normal. The end. Some people here have argued that they are often too busy doing other things to notice, but sometimes the are not, sometimes they can do X, sometimes they can change Y. There is really no limit to what they can do, or interfere with, they can pretty much do whatever staff needs them to do, whenever staff needs them to do it.

And this is what is really sad, that the few times it has not work this way, it becomes hard to suspend disbelief or at worse, it feels like it is either staff oversight and/or favoritism for the character(s) attempting to accomplish something.

There is a reason why they've been trying to tone down superman in recent years too, give him more weakness then just kryptonite. His latest power, having the consequence of practically making him a regular human for time. No longer do you see him sneezing and sending entire planets out of orbit. How good you think a batman vs. superman movie, if superman still had the power to punch an entire planet to tiny bits without even a scratch on his fist? It would be silly at best.

Its the same thing with this game, the virtual powers are so damn strong that it makes almost everything that happens or that we do irrelevant. There is never really a sense of urgency for anything or there are never any real threats. Sure you can still fight for some of the crumbs left but a lot others have already won those crumbs too. It just ends up feeling stupid for anyone to ICly cause anymore conflict or problems beyond killing the person who stared at your boyfriend too long.  

[Taven]

It's not so much about winning, a lot of our PCs will die in battle and never know what happened.  It's more about the possibility of winning.  That's point one.

I think that the possibility, ICly, of winning is important. I'm on the same page as you there. However, I also think that OOCly, there's just a culture of wanting to win, period. It's the latter that I dislike and think is unhealthy for the game.

Point two is to go back up to what started this off: external conflict (that involve PCs, IMHO) is something that will be good for new players.  I started in late 2013/early 2014, and while the Tuluk/Allanak thing might have been stale to vets, it was very real to me as a new player.  And it's not just new players, its new characters out of chargen: they don't have to wait for the 'internal conflict' plot of a clan to get a real sense of something inspiring to do (they can ignore it or not, that's fine): but the idea that there is an enemy at the gates, a real intelligent enemy driven by PCs with some virtual world backing them so they aren't raider-of-the-week... that's the idea I'm going for.

I like this idea in general. I think it's worth trying for. I also think that players have a habit of ignoring the virtual world or other impacts to just try to ROFL-stomp things into the ground, which is what I strongly dislike.

The rough idea is that

(a) the players that role up PCs inside the clan know what they are getting into;

(b) there is staff support for the clan: documentation that makes them an actual threat and gives them a virtual presence; a clan board and all its benefits; perhaps a rough storyline for them to flesh out as PCs, and so on; some ground rules to let the PCs know that their role is to be antagonists and not griefers (karma restricted, let's say); etc.

(c) the threat would be one felt on all levels inside Allanak, not just a given clan (AoD);

You could rotate out different ones, change focus, and so on -- tie this into Lauramars' idea from the player retention thread of multiple bad guys and so on.

I agree with the general premise, and like the general idea. All the goals you've outlined with this are good, adding to player conflict is good.

Repeating myself a bit, I just worry that you can't have a threat to everyone active all the time. It does have perks--But it also needs to be balanced out by breaks, or a focus more on internal plots. Otherwise, it's just "oh, another big large threat". If that makes sense.

[Taven]

Well, I said what I want is external conflict that doesn't require staff involvement, over and above the regular (enforcement), and setting up the initial parameters (documentation about the virtual world).  I think what makes external conflict feel a bit stale is that, in your example, all the enemy there is entirely virtual -- maybe you meant the example to be when Tuluk was open, in which case it makes a lot more sense.  But nowadays, that entire scenario would involve staff as the enemy with no PCs.  That's a lot of work for staff, and likely would only happen now and then, with a lot of potential for cries of 'railroading' or, even worse, the butthurt from being tossed down by staff (when a PC slays your PC, you are kinda ok with it; when staff slays your PC, you are kinda less ok with it).

My example in this post is how the "Tuluki Hands" plot could have been handled differently--Tuluk was open at this time. If Tuluk had only been a staff entity, it wouldn't have nearly as fun possibilities. I agree that the good part of the conflict is when PCs are brainstorming against other PCs.

My example in this post is also from when Tuluk was open. I think the idea was to have staff-sponsored PCs generate potential conflict and excitement for Tuluki PCs. I think the reality was really that most of what they did was secret (again, not against the players, who had wonderful PCs that were well played), so it didn't really generate any extra excitement. Mostly, it was just an "ah-hah! We have done this!" moment. And then for Tuluk, largely a "what the fuck" moment. Nothing really ultimately came of it besides staff-pushed effects (bye bye Hlum), because Tuluki PCs were told by NPCs in power "shhh this never happened". Could Tuluki PCs have decided to rebel against that and do something anyways? Maybe. It still felt stale.

So, an example.  Here's some, off the top of my head, just to give a feel for it: [stuff]

Alright. So let's take a step back and talk about other Types of Conflict.

There's two main ones that immediately come to mind: Overt and Covert.


Overt conflict is something like raiding, killing spiders, smashing in faces, and so on.

Covert conflict is something that is more subtle. Use of spies, scouting, planning, to ultimately take an action. It's less obvious.

The best conflict is both.


In my example, there was a lot of steps taken by Allanak that were covert. This would be the "prep work". Ultimately, it lead to an overt action--The assault on the caravan.

When talking about player antagonists, I worry about both sides being too overt. It's really easy to just murder all the PCs in a particular group, and ignore the virtual world. Typically, you're either going to have action that is too overt (trying to ROFL-stomp the clan out of existence), very covert (which a lot of players might not see), or some mix. Usually, mixes require staff support.

You also want staff support, so we're not in disagreement there. Your goal (or even the general goal) is to have players be able to plot and do things without staff around all the time. I think a clan would allow for that. I also think that any "large" actions usually require staff support (because they usually need to take the virtual world into account or want to make a lasting change, and that's what staff is for).


Basically, what you should take away from this post is that I think player "antagonist" clans could be interesting. I think they're only interesting if player behave realistically and think long term and outside of the box, rather then trying to use extreme overt action to pursue the OOC version of the desire to win. I also believe that while it would allow players to do something without staff, ultimately staff support is vital.

[nauta]

Repeating myself a bit, I just worry that you can't have a threat to everyone active all the time. It does have perks--But it also needs to be balanced out by breaks, or a focus more on internal plots. Otherwise, it's just "oh, another big large threat". If that makes sense.

Yeah, we're on the same page about the rough idea. 

One thing:

Can you spell out this worry a bit more?  I'm having a hard time appreciating it.  Let me give you an example: in the rinth, there is westside and eastside conflict going on all the time -- it's nice, it's part of the background noise, gives you something to define your character by, etc.  I actually think it's a really good thing to have a background credible threat cranking away, maybe two or three of them.

But was it all just hack-and-slash conflict?  Not at all.  There were massive lulls, and that was partly natural and partly enforced by the people roleplaying in the rinth: sometimes populations on one side of the conflict or the other were small (natural lull), sometimes there were 'cold war style' treaties, sometimes there were third threats (southside) that unified the two groups, and so on.  (ETA: there was also the covert and overt style conflict you mention -- nice distinction by the way.)

Dresan's point is pretty pertinent here too: Allanak is just too damn powerful to really come up with very many credible threats (other than Tuluk).  We might consider making Allanak a little less virtually powerful, with Tuluk's demise (that is, with its becoming non-playable).  Just a thought.

[Taven]

First of all, if there are people who don't want to see internal plots here on the GDB, i haven't seen them. What I have seen is people commenting on why most internal conflicts wouldn't make sense in the current setting.

When you say "internal conflicts wouldn't make sense in the current setting", what is it you actually mean? Because I don't get it.

I can get how having something to add to internal conflict would be good, I can see how internal conflict is less immediately accessible, but I really don't get what you say when it "doesn't make sense in the current setting".

The ridiculous virtual power levels prevents many cool epic story-lines that actually make sense. Ultimately the end of every plot/conflict is basically the same, the red robes, black robes or sorcerers king takes notice, waves their fingers effortlessly and everything gets fixed and/or someone finds themselves falling into a deep hole. Everything returns to normal. The end. Some people here have argued that they are often too busy doing other things to notice, but sometimes the are not, sometimes they can do X, sometimes they can change Y. There is really no limit to what they can do, or interfere with, they can pretty much do whatever staff needs them to do, whenever staff needs them to do it.

[...]

Its the same thing with this game, the virtual powers are so damn strong that it makes almost everything that happens or that we do irrelevant. There is never really a sense of urgency for anything or there are never any real threats. Sure you can still fight for some of the crumbs left but a lot others have already won those crumbs too. It just ends up feeling stupid for anyone to ICly cause anymore conflict or problems beyond killing the person who stared at your boyfriend too long.

I'm not entirely unsympathetic to what you're saying, but there's also the Size and Scope of plots.

Most of the plots that feel like they're not realistic is because they have a vast size and scope. The Tuluki Spy plot was not realistic, IMHO, because the size and scope was so large. The plot was something that would affect the entire city and well beyond that. You've got sneaky stuff around epic level NPCs, you've got becoming a pseudo-noble, you've got giant mountains moving around. I agree that on an epic-scale, things PCs do seem irrelevant.

However, I think what a lot of this misses is that there's also a lot of stuff PCs can do that's not epic level. There's smaller plots that matter as well. I guess it just feels like that gets missed a lot, because everybody wants something big and awesome and cool happening all of the time, but there's a lot of awesome cool plots that can happen at a smaller scope and scale as well. These plots are usually internal plots.

[Taven]

Repeating myself a bit, I just worry that you can't have a threat to everyone active all the time. It does have perks--But it also needs to be balanced out by breaks, or a focus more on internal plots. Otherwise, it's just "oh, another big large threat". If that makes sense.

Can you spell out this worry a bit more?  I'm having a hard time appreciating it.  Let me give you an example: in the rinth, there is westside and eastside conflict going on all the time -- it's nice, it's part of the background noise, gives you something to define your character by, etc.  I actually think it's a really good thing to have a background credible threat cranking away, maybe two or three of them.

But was it all just hack-and-slash conflict?  Not at all.  There were massive lulls, and that was partly natural and partly enforced by the people roleplaying in the rinth: sometimes populations on one side of the conflict or the other were small (natural lull), sometimes there were 'cold war style' treaties, sometimes there were third threats (southside) that unified the two groups, and so on.  (ETA: there was also the covert and overt style conflict you mention -- nice distinction by the way.)

Well, let's see if I can elaborate a little more, using your example of the 'rinth. For me, the rinthi plots and challenges are internal plots. Yes, there's east side and west side, but they're all bound in the singular geographical location of the 'rinth. The complexity you're seeing I would all attribute to being internal conflict. I suppose that's another thing about internal conflict--You usually assume it can't entirely wipe the other guy out. This is especially true with noble houses--Whatever plot you have, the goal isn't usually to destroy them, it's to cripple them, or slow them, or reduce their power base. Basically, I think internal plots are usually also more covert-centric plots, or at least have more covert elements.

I'd argue you could say 'rinth-Nak conflict was also internal (they're all bound in the city of Allanak, neither side is going anyplace soon), but lets assume its external for a minute (you could well argue southside is an external threat). My concern is that when there's "always a big bad guy", it would be as if southside was always constantly and actively trying to destroy the 'rinth. At what point is it just "well, Borsail got ANOTHER new mul to try to smash our faces in. At least he'll be more fun to stab then when Oash tried to get 'gickers to wipe us out with fire elementals. Hey, you think Tor will try with their soldiers sometime next week?".

I guess that's really getting at the tension of a plot. Plots are the most exciting, breath taking, and immersive when the tension is high. But you can't have high tension all of the time. High tension must be balanced out by low tension. It can't be 100% all of the time, or there's no contrast.

Looking at your 'rinth example, I can see you agree. You appreciate the lulls, the different forms of conflict, and look at it evolving over time. Generally, having a stable, long-term antagonist can also do this (Allanak Tuluk relations have varied a lot over the years, and even within the war there was more or less focus and tension), but it can also peter out ("Oh, we're still at war with Allanak? That's nice."). Looking at your rinth example, you seem to sort of understand how things can become "background noise", too. It's a hard balance.

But I don't feel (and I could be wrong) that players are generally asking for long-term antagonists. Or, they don't behave in a way that suggests they want long-term antagonists (the OOC "playing to win" thing). It feels like people want a new scary "flavor of the month", to try to keep the tension at 100% all of the time. And that's what my worry is.

[nauta]

Yep, yep, all in agreement, although I'd say the east-west conflict is more external, whereas the various vying factions for power within any given side is 'internal' (blues vs. reds and so on).  But that's a quibble -- the basic point remains the same -- and it goes to show that internal plots can turn into external plots when viewed from a certain perspective.  To use your term 'scope', the conflict I'm interested in (which I think is lacking right now) is one which has the scope of Allanak vs. Blank where you fill in the Blank with a (perhaps minimally) PC-populated virtual power -- a wide enough scope so that new players can hop in and go: Ok, I'm a Nakki, there's my hook.  (Just as a new rinther can hop in and go: Ok, I'm westside, there's my hook.  Not my only hook, but it's there.)

But I don't feel (and I could be wrong) that players are generally asking for long-term antagonists. Or, they don't behave in a way that suggests they want long-term antagonists (the OOC "playing to win" thing). It feels like people want a new scary "flavor of the month", to try to keep the tension at 100% all of the time. And that's what my worry is.

Dunno, I kind of think you are creating a bogeyman here, unless I'm misunderstanding Dresan and Norcal and the others posting in this thread.  I, at least, want one (or more) credible long-term intelligent threat that is populated by PCs cranking away in the background.

[Dresan]

First of all, if there are people who don't want to see internal plots here on the GDB, i haven't seen them. What I have seen is people commenting on why most internal conflicts wouldn't make sense in the current setting.

When you say "internal conflicts wouldn't make sense in the current setting", what is it you actually mean? Because I don't get it.

I can get how having something to add to internal conflict would be good, I can see how internal conflict is less immediately accessible, but I really don't get what you say when it "doesn't make sense in the current setting".

I mostly mean any serious internal conflict would most likely end like this:

The besieged Borsail estate, declared to be treacherous, is sunk into a pit of lava shortly thereafter by the Black Robe Tarith Kasix, effectively ending the gith threat.

In some ways similar to how external conflict have ended:

Exactly one year after the beginning of the siege of Allanak, Tektolnes reappears in the guise of a dragon and breathes death upon the sieging army - the army ceases to exist.

I guess you are right in the sense that if the scale and scope of the 'conflict' is kept tiny and petty then it would fit in the setting. For example, small rivalries that really don't amount to much in the great scheme of things and don't cause too much disruption. Otherwise you might have red robes taking notice and give rinthis a little IC love tap on the wrists.  I guess noble houses can go up or down in rankings(?), or disappear, that might suck from an ooc level for people who want to play something involving them but not sure if anyone would really notice or care at an IC level. Especially because nobles are rich and influential because a sorcerer king says so, not because they have any real good connection to the public, economy or armies though I'm sure some still do because why not.

The spy plot was perfectly fine in many ways. The challenges the spies had to face were interesting and cool,  the outcomes were interesting, and some of us were having suspicions before shit hit the fan so to see who was a traitor was nice. However, because of how ridiculously high the power ceiling is in tuluk, with a sorcerer king that can see the future and his templars with their own insane power levels then yes, I agree with you, the size and scope was too high. Due to the ridiculously high power levels that exist in Tuluk, it makes this perfectly good and interesting plot seem unrealistic and to me it was very jarring.  

I wish that would change, because I want to see more interesting plots like the spy plot. I would like to see the virtual power ceiling to come down in order to allow the size and scope of plots like those be more realistic and make more sense.  This would give people a sense that they might just win ICly or at least see some consequences caused by their defeat. I think we all understand OOCly that we cannot always win but it shouldn't feel so pointless to try.

Anyways I'm never against any idea to add internal or external conflict as you've been describing, just pointing out an overlying problem that I personally see(its just my opinion) to making any conflict be meaningful or considered an actual threat to anything but the most trivial things.

[Taven]

Yep, yep, all in agreement, although I'd say the east-west conflict is more external, whereas the various vying factions for power within any given side is 'internal' (blues vs. reds and so on).  But that's a quibble -- the basic point remains the same -- and it goes to show that internal plots can turn into external plots when viewed from a certain perspective.

Yes, internal/external can be more complex, and the 'rinth is just a very odd area in terms of defining things that way! Because it's part of Allanak, but not part of Allanak. It is a whole (the rinth) but also actually has geographical sub-areas (east side/west side). Clan-wise, though, I don't think eastside within itself or westside within itself have internal plots. I think they're largely dominated by one clanned group. You can certainly have inter-clan conflict, but that's another thing again.

To use your term 'scope', the conflict I'm interested in (which I think is lacking right now) is one which has the scope of Allanak vs. Blank where you fill in the Blank with a (perhaps minimally) PC-populated virtual power -- a wide enough scope so that new players can hop in and go: Ok, I'm a Nakki, there's my hook.  (Just as a new rinther can hop in and go: Ok, I'm westside, there's my hook.  Not my only hook, but it's there.)

I get what you're saying here. Having something immediately accessible to an unclanned PC in a certain area to provide a focus and sense of danger and purpose. I think that can be good, I think your argument for it drawing in newbies is also good.

But I also want to point out again that internal plots also have build-in plots. No, they're not as immediately accessible to newbies, since you need to be in a clan to access them, but they're there and intended to stimulate conflict. You're a Borsail? Hate Oash. You're a Tor? Hate on Fale. There's a lot of room for plots there, if people wished to pursue them. (And I'm not saying you don't see this, I'm just pointing it out in general).

[nauta]

Yes, internal/external can be more complex, and the 'rinth is just a very odd area in terms of defining things that way! Because it's part of Allanak, but not part of Allanak. It is a whole (the rinth) but also actually has geographical sub-areas (east side/west side). Clan-wise, though, I don't think eastside within itself or westside within itself have internal plots. I think they're largely dominated by one clanned group. You can certainly have inter-clan conflict, but that's another thing again.

Tiny derail, but my biggest peeve with the rinth was the lack of a clan for the eastside -- nothing that defines them, like the Guild or whatever -- but just as an OOC convenience.  In an ideal world, there'd be two clans in the rinth: Westside (aka Guild) and Eastside.  In an even more ideal world, there'd be dynamically generated clans that operate like genus and species: clan Allanak, clan rinth, clan westside, clan The Reds.

[Taven]

[Stuff]

So you gave two examples of plots being squished by virtual power level:

• The besieged Borsail estate, declared to be treacherous, is sunk into a pit of lava shortly thereafter by the Black Robe Tarith Kasix, effectively ending the gith threat.
• Exactly one year after the beginning of the siege of Allanak, Tektolnes reappears in the guise of a dragon and breathes death upon the sieging army - the army ceases to exist.

The first example about Borsail happened during the Gith War. The Gith were an external plot, not internal. Sure, Borsail was mixed up in it, but there was a definite threat from outside of the city. I don't count it as an internal plot.

The second example is when Thrain Iornsword decided to try and wipe out Allanak. Again, I'd argue that this was also an external plot. You could argue that Thrain was from Allanak, freeing slaves from the city, but they intentionally set themselves apart as a group external from the city.

Internal conflict is about inter-city or inter-locale groups having conflict with themselves.

So while your examples are examples of how Allanak might be "too big", and has too much virtual power, in your opinion--It's still not internal plots you're looking at.

I guess you are right in the sense that if the scale and scope of the 'conflict' is kept tiny and petty then it would fit in the setting. For example, small rivalries that really don't amount to much in the great scheme of things and don't cause too much disruption. Otherwise you might have red robes taking notice and give rinthis a little IC love tap on the wrists.  I guess noble houses can go up or down in rankings(?), or disappear, that might suck from an ooc level for people who want to play something involving them but not sure if anyone would really notice or care at an IC level. Especially because nobles are rich and influential because a sorcerer king says so, not because they have any real good connection to the public, economy or armies though I'm sure some still do because why not.

I don't think everything is or should be a world-changing plot. I don't think every plot has to challenge the status quo. I think if every plot did do that, it would take away any stability the game has.

Do I think that maybe Allanak or Tuluk could be smaller so things could feel more more threatening? Sure, maybe. I'm not inherently against this idea.

I think the reasoning behind it, though, feels like people want every plot to be an EPIC PLOT that CHANGE THE WORLD. And I don't think that's viable.

[Taven]

The spy plot was perfectly fine in many ways.

The basic idea of the spy plot is good. Having people go in, collect information, and use it to fuel a greater plot. Awesome, good stuff, some covert conflict that could involve people.

I don't like that it was something a normal non-sponsored PC could realistically do. There's a few reasons why they couldn't. I agree that part of it is the virtual power levels. I also think that it has to do with the nature of Tuluki power in general. There's also the third nebulous territory of getting a PC who could do it, which involves if they could get the staff support. There's the question of if people wouldn't just immediately recognize a "spy" if they had started as a normal PC. So on, so forth.

I wish that would change, because I want to see more interesting plots like the spy plot. I would like to see the virtual power ceiling to come down in order to allow the size and scope of plots like those be more realistic and make more sense.  This would give people a sense that they might just win ICly or at least see some consequences caused by their defeat. I think we all understand OOCly that we cannot always win but it feel so pointless to try.

There's lots of little spy plots that can happen--Internally. Noble houses spying on each other, noble houses spying on the rinth, rinth spying on the byn, GMH spying on each other, whatever.

You can even do a little bit of External Plot spying. Go plant a spy in Luirs, go plant a spy in Storm, go have someone pose as a Tribal and spy on the Pah.

Generally, however, it's a little less dramatic then what happened with Tyn Dashra. Volcanos don't fall from the sky everyday. I don't want them to, either.

[Taven]

Tiny derail, but my biggest peeve with the rinth was the lack of a clan for the eastside -- nothing that defines them, like the Guild or whatever -- but just as an OOC convenience.  In an ideal world, there'd be two clans in the rinth: Westside (aka Guild) and Eastside.  In an even more ideal world, there'd be dynamically generated clans that operate like genus and species: clan Allanak, clan rinth, clan westside, clan The Reds.

There actually is a clan for elves on the eastside, it's just been closed for a number of RL years.

[Dresan]

I didn't mean specifically plots that involve spying in particular, I mostly mean plots with the depth, size and scope of the spy plot.  I've had character who happily sold information for extra coins, most of the time there was never anything exciting to tell anyways. They were only worth listening to because there was nothing better to do.

The spies in the spy plot though could have gotten caught, could have failed many times, when we remembered what they were like before they betrayed the city, some of their actions began to make sense. But despite this at the end, they managed to succeed against the city. That is awesome and it was mostly the players making things happen for themselves. The staff only came in on the end, and used their actions as an excuse to make the IC changes they wanted.....not to mention the staff also made sure that Muk or one of his templars didn't appear out of nowhere and killed them with a single wink because they could have just as easily, if not for 'reasons'.

The only way plots of this size and scope can happen more easily, make sense and be more realistic without being utterly jarring is if the IC power levels around the known are toned down .

[Taven]

[P]lots with the depth, size and scope of the spy plot.  I've had character who happily sold information for extra coins, most of the time there was never anything exciting to tell anyways. They were only worth listening to because there was nothing better to do.

Yeah, but... Not everything is going to be that opportunity and scale all of the time. It's not realistic, and it would quickly lose meaning.

[Dresan]

That's fine and reasonable, I'm all for plots of all sizes and scope. However as things are currently with the ridiculously high virtual power levels, there aren't many very realistic opportunities for any real meaningful conflict.

At the end the spy plot was ultimately pretty jarring to me because the setting in Tuluk, and its high power level at the top made the entire thing feel unrealistic. If it wasn't for sorcerer kings and templars, the spy plot would have been a nice plot, not a insanely grand story like the entire invasion of tuluk, but just a very cool sub-plot that accomplished something meaningful.

[nauta]

Tiny derail, but my biggest peeve with the rinth was the lack of a clan for the eastside -- nothing that defines them, like the Guild or whatever -- but just as an OOC convenience.  In an ideal world, there'd be two clans in the rinth: Westside (aka Guild) and Eastside.  In an even more ideal world, there'd be dynamically generated clans that operate like genus and species: clan Allanak, clan rinth, clan westside, clan The Reds.

There actually is a clan for elves on the eastside, it's just been closed for a number of RL years.

(That always was salt in the wound -- it's even there!  Anyway, it's derail-ville on that, but I was just thinking Eastside Clan, not some particular elf clan, and as a pure OOC convenience - no culture, no docs, no nothing.)

Do I think that maybe Allanak or Tuluk could be smaller so things could feel more more threatening? Sure, maybe. I'm not inherently against this idea.

I think the reasoning behind it, though, feels like people want every plot to be an EPIC PLOT that CHANGE THE WORLD. And I don't think that's viable.

Yeah, I get you on that.  You know my reason for it: it's hard to come up with an antagonist that might be a viable source of external conflict for Allanak-as-a-whole granted the way things stand, although not impossible: just plop a sorcerer among those mean desert elves, I guess.  It just sort of makes everything kind of volcano-level dramatic when it doesn't have to be.  (Maybe a bad analogy: if the USSR and the USA didn't have nuclear weapons, the cold war would have been a lot more exciting.)

[solera]

The cold war was  pretty exciting, because we believed that a twitchy finger coild lead to the obliteration of the northern civilization. For a few weeks, the sorcerer kings were primed and it was just one move away from the first cast. There were books written and films made, and half of us thought it was as inevitable  as global warming.
Then new leaders, or a change in the state departments, or a new political theory, who knows, times changed. And changed again.
I was hoping the analogy would lead back to our game, but I seem to have lost the thread.

On topic, it's hard having a small group who are going against the flow. With time zones , and limited playing time, it takes a fair number of PC to make a stable group, even if they stay in the shadows.

[nauta]

The cold war was  pretty exciting, because we believed that a twitchy finger coild lead to the obliteration of the northern civilization. For a few weeks, the sorcerer kings were primed and it was just one move away from the first cast. There were books written and films made, and half of us thought it was as inevitable  as global warming.
Then new leaders, or a change in the state departments, or a new political theory, who knows, times changed. And changed again.
I was hoping the analogy would lead back to our game, but I seem to have lost the thread. Then they closed the USSR to players.

FTFY 

(Just to be clear, I'm not advocating opening Tuluk back up to play.  I'm advocating for a (playable) antagonist for Allanak-as-a-whole, whatever that might be.  Might be a dumb idea.)

[Desertman]

I didn't read everything before this post. Just a heads up.

I have some thoughts on the idea of a lack of meaningful conflict in the game however, especially as it pertains to Houses.



When it comes to the GMH's in game and even the noble Houses in some regards we have a very interesting system in place. It's a system that seems fundamentally designed at its very core to ensure there is NEVER any meaningful conflict.

We wrote a massive beautiful desert world with extremely limited resources where the entire focus behind most conflict WOULD naturally be the friction created by said lack of resources. Then, we established super powers who all specifically work in completely different fields so that they NEVER conflict with each other over said resources. They have absolutely no reason to. They have all agreed for thousands of years at this point to not deal in each others goods, and they seem to stick to that.

So, we created this awesome world where the conflict for resources SHOULD be the primary starter of most conflict......then we specifically wrote in every major power so that we can make sure that conflict doesn't happen.

That seems a lot like building a waterpark and then specifically outlawing water in any way.

You can look at the awesome super structure and all of its potential, but, that's all it's for....looking at and giving the appearance of awesome without actually putting in any awesome.

I've also discovered that not only are the major powers holding to this status quo, so to speak.....but staff WANTS it this way. Not only do they want the current powers to stay this way, but they want to ensure anyone "coming up" also conforms to this system if at all possible.

That's an entirely separate issue, but one I believe is very telling. We've created a system where there is no conflict for resources, and we want to ensure if at all possible that such conflict IS NOT created at any meaningful level.




My solution?

Get rid of the great monopolies. Keep the Houses in place but turn them all into "Trading Houses". They aren't Weapon's Houses, or Silk Houses...they are "Trading Houses". Their trade is exactly that...trade.

They all trade in "Goods". Not specific goods. Their goal is to turn a profit. Not maintain a single monopoly for profit. Their goal is to trade in everything for maximum profitability.

Right now we have this system:

Chrysler Vs McDonalds - Zero conflict. They don't deal in the same things. They have zero reason to have conflict.

We need this system:

Wal-Mart vs Target - Two totally different "Houses" who have an extreme reason to have conflict regularly.


That is the change we need in my opinion.

Please note: I do not mean I want these two House sending massive NPC armies at each other on the reg.

I would however like to see their PC hunting crews having a reason to give each other the stink-eye on the reg. Perhaps they have a reason to come to blows in the desert against each other at times.

Maybe Merchant A from House Salarr has a reason now to try and wipe out Merchant B from House Kadius beyond, "She stole my boyfriend and now I'm seriously roflcopter-angry-for-realz"."

That sort of thing. An on-going reason for PC's to translate their professions within these major organizations into reasons for conflict but not necessarily massive staff-ran NPC armies wiping each other out every week.

[Desertman]

Adding:

I also feel the ONLY reason our current system is in place is because we needed an IC way in the very beginning to ensure people had "Houses to join." and "Places to buy basic gear.". So we created constructs to fill those needs. We needed that way back in the day when peak playtimes were 19 people.

At this point I think we are holding to that design for no other reason than it would be a massive undertaking to change it....so we are keeping to that design.

The problem I see is that we aren't only keeping to that design...we are doing our best to ensure that design isn't changed, even by the players over time.

I think the best course of action would be to rip the Band-Aid off, but I also would not be the one doing that massive workload and I know our staff is already pretty taxed out in terms of available time to take on major jobs.

It's a problem I don't think we can fix, but a problem I think needs to be pointed out.

If you create a system that is fundamentally designed to ensure a lack of conflict, you get a lack of conflict.

[Narf]

I think rather than completely changing the structure of the existing houses it might be easier to just come up with resources they both would seek and put them in the game.

There are a lot of components that go into both weapons and jewelry.

There are even more components that go into both armor and clothing.

[nauta]

I think rather than completely changing the structure of the existing houses it might be easier to just come up with resources they both would seek and put them in the game.

There are a lot of components that go into both weapons and jewelry.

There are even more components that go into both armor and clothing.

Agreed.  The tension, I guess, is between having some form of meaningful (not just virtual) external conflict (between Houses in this case) and allowing room for internal conflict (drama within a given House).  If your experience in Salarr is entirely fuss with internal conflict (who is sleeping with whom, etc.) then it isn't very fun; so too if it is entirely external (race to grab the salt mines from Kadius), it isn't very fun.

You need both, and probably in the case of the GMH houses at least the external conflict is pretty light (both virtually and in terms of PCs).

I was in Salarr for about six months or more when I first started, and we had some very lively Kadius vs. Salarr stuff going on (spying, pranks, even bounties and the like), but a lot of it was... under-motivated (or only motivated by personal animus against the persons on the other side, not motivated by some institutional animus): kudos to the leadership there for getting things going, but it strikes me now, in hindsight, that the structure wasn't in place to really sustain and motivate that sort of institutional conflict, for reasons Desertman outlined above.