Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Guildlords 12-18-06, 02:30 PM	There has been a lot of speculation and assumption going around about what folks want/expect from the guild system. It's clear that everyone is interested in different things, and rather than say things like "a majority of guildmasters are unhappy with the imbalance of power" or "no one but Cat really wants to mess with the guild wars," we should find out where actual opinions lie. Here's how I'd like to handle this. I will list several potential aspects of a guild system here, some of which we have now, some of which we don't. I'll add to this list as our discussion continues--please suggest anything I didn't think of that's important to you, one way or the other! For each aspect, I will take note of who feels what about each. I don't expect to reach a consensus very quickly; this will be an ongoing discussion until most of us are satisfied, or at least everyone has expressed every opinion they're going to. For the sake of simplicity, it would help if everyone used a Likert-type scale in their comments. For each attribute, whether it's currently on my list or not, please state whether you: Strongly dislike, Moderately dislike, Slightly dislike, Indifferent or ambivalent, Slightly like, Moderately like, or Strongly like. This will help me to evaluate what the most important aspects to include or avoid are. Troop combat (regiments) Strongly dislike: DSugui, Erithmu, MindWandererB, nightbanegod, NiQil, SauroGrenom, SoulLord, waywreth Moderately dislike: Hirumajoe, Zevox Slightly dislike: Macbrea, MitzaVolchenko, Vathelokai Indifferent/ambivalent: McJarvis Slightly like: TheMagister Strongly like: Caterane Having a "Winner" at the "end" Strongly dislike: DSugui, McJarvis, NiQil, SauroGrenom, TheMagister Moderately dislike: Hirumajoe, MitzaVolchenko, SoulLord, Vathelokai Slightly dislike: Caterane, Macbrea, MindWandererB Slightly like: Erithmu, Zevox Moderately like: waywreth Strongly like: nightbanegod Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Strongly dislike: SauroGrenom Moderately like: Caterane, DSugui, Erithmu, Hirumajoe, Macbrea, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko, SoulLord, Vathelokai, waywreth Strongly like: McJarvis, nightbanegod, NiQil, TheMagister, Zevox Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Strongly dislike: NiQil, SauroGrenom Moderately dislike: SoulLord, waywreth Indifferent/ambivalent: DSugui, Erithmu, Hirumajoe, Macbrea, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko Slightly like: Zevox Strongly like: Caterane, McJarvis, nightbanegod, TheMagister Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Slightly dislike: MindWandererB Indifferent/ambivalent: Erithmu, NiQil, Zevox Slightly like: nightbanegod, Vathelokai Moderately like: Hirumajoe, MitzaVolchenko, SauroGrenom, TheMagister, waywreth Strongly like: Caterane, DSugui, Macbrea, McJarvis, SoulLord Using territory and expansion (limited space) Moderately dislike: MindWandererB, SoulLord Indifferent/ambivalent: DSugui, SauroGrenom Slightly like: Erithmu, Zevox Moderately like: Hirumajoe, nightbanegod, Vathelokai Strongly like: Caterane, Macbrea, McJarvis, MitzaVolchenko, NiQil, TheMagister, waywreth Using single-player (mini)quests Indifferent/ambivalent: McJarvis Slightly like: Erithmu, Hirumajoe, MindWandererB, nightbanegod, NiQil, TheMagister, Zevox Moderately like: Macbrea, Vathelokai Strongly like: Caterane, DSugui, MitzaVolchenko, SauroGrenom, SoulLord, waywreth Using multi-player (mini)quests [DISCUSSION] Moderately like: nightbanegod, NiQil Strongly like: Caterane, DSugui, Erithmu, Hirumajoe, Macbrea, McJarvis, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko, SauroGrenom, SoulLord, TheMagister, Vathelokai, waywreth, Zevox Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Indifferent/ambivalent: TheMagister Slightly like: Vathelokai Moderately like: DSugui, Erithmu, Macbrea, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko, SoulLord, waywreth Strongly like: Caterane, Hirumajoe, McJarvis, nightbanegod, NiQil, SauroGrenom, Zevox Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly dislike: waywreth Indifferent/ambivalent: McJarvis Slightly like: DSugui, Erithmu, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko, nightbanegod, Zevox Moderately like: Hirumajoe, Macbrea, SauroGrenom, SoulLord, Vathelokai Strongly like: Caterane, NiQil, TheMagister Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly dislike: McJarvis, SoulLord Moderately dislike: waywreth Indifferent/ambivalent: Erithmu Slightly like: DSugui, Hirumajoe, NiQil Moderately like: Caterane, Macbrea, MindWandererB, SauroGrenom Strongly like: MitzaVolchenko, nightbanegod, TheMagister, Vathelokai, Zevox Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Indifferent/ambivalent: DSugui Slightly like: Hirumajoe, McJarvis Moderately like: nightbanegod, NiQil, TheMagister, Zevox Strongly like: Caterane, Erithmu, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko, Vathelokai Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Strongly dislike: DSugui Moderately dislike: MindWandererB, NiQil, SoulLord, TheMagister Slightly dislike: MitzaVolchenko Indifferent/ambivalent: McJarvis, Vathelokai Slightly like: Erithmu, Hirumajoe, Zevox Moderately like: Macbrea, SauroGrenom, waywreth Strongly like: Caterane, nightbanegod Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly dislike: Macbrea, MitzaVolchenko, NiQil, SauroGrenom, SoulLord, TheMagister Moderately dislike: MindWandererB, Vathelokai, waywreth Indifferent/ambivalent: DSugui, Erithmu, Hirumajoe, Zevox Slightly like: nightbanegod Strongly like: Caterane, McJarvis Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Indifferent/ambivalent: Hirumajoe, MindWandererB, SoulLord, waywreth Slightly like: Erithmu, NiQil, Zevox Strongly like: Caterane, DSugui, Macbrea, McJarvis, MitzaVolchenko, nightbanegod, SauroGrenom, TheMagister, Vathelokai Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike: DSugui, Erithmu, Hirumajoe, McJarvis, MindWandererB, waywreth, Zevox Indifferent/ambivalent: NiQil Moderately like: Macbrea, MitzaVolchenko, SoulLord, TheMagister, Vathelokai Strongly like: Caterane, nightbanegod, SauroGrenom Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Strongly dislike: McJarvis Moderately dislike: Hirumajoe Slightly dislike: MindWandererB Indifferent/ambivalent: Erithmu, NiQil, waywreth Slightly like: TheMagister, Zevox Moderately like: DSugui, SoulLord Strongly like: Caterane, Macbrea, MitzaVolchenko, nightbanegod, SauroGrenom, Vathelokai Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Indifferent/ambivalent: NiQil Moderately like: Erithmu, Hirumajoe, SauroGrenom, Zevox Strongly like: Caterane, DSugui, Macbrea, McJarvis, MindWandererB, MitzaVolchenko, nightbanegod, SoulLord, TheMagister, Vathelokai, waywreth
waywreth 12-18-06, 03:47 PM	Here are my thoughts on the matter: Troop combat (regiments) Strongly dislike: Waywreth Having a "Winner" at the "end" Moderately like: Waywreth Please note - in this sense, I took end to be a relative term. I would prefer to see a leader board, where it shows which guild is leading (by virtue of whatever stat we decree - be in power rating, wealth, etc.) Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like: Waywreth Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Moderately Dislike: Waywreth Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Moderately Like: Waywreth Using territory and expansion (limited space) Strongly Like: Waywreth Using single-player (mini)quests Strongly like: Waywreth Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like: Waywreth Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like: Waywreth Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly dislike: Waywreth Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Moderately dislike: Waywreth Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Moderately like: Waywreth Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Moderately dislike: Waywreth Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Indifferent/ambivalent: Waywreth Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike: Waywreth Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Indifferent/ambivalent: Waywreth Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly like: Waywreth
Zevox 12-18-06, 04:38 PM	Troop combat (regiments) Moderately dislike. To be specific, I don't dislike the idea of having troops overall, but I'm definitely not fond of them in their current incarnation - that is to say, as an aspect of the game that is absolutely necessary to build up if you don't want to be mowed over by anyone who does have them. I don't know if it would be possible to institute them any other way, but thats my opinion about them. ...and I think they're slightly over-complicated with all the equipping options, siege engines, leaders, etc, but thats another story altogether. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Slightly like. I'm a bit conflicted in this - while I'm not of fond of the idea of destroying Guilds so their players can no longer enjoy them, I'm less fond of the idea of an endless system where we're likely to just end up with one Guild thats more powerful than the others but can't do anything about them anyway (the way the original Guild system was). Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Strongly like. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Slightly like. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Indifferent. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Slightly like. Using single-player (mini)quests Slightly like. Good idea, though the impact on pitlord supplies isn't that good. Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Strongly like. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly like. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly like. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Slightly like. I think the amount of damage that can be done currently is rather high (and I'm not fond of the PR-based system used now for operations), but the principle of being able to hurt Guilds in opposition to yours is one I like. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Ambivalent. As I said above, I'm conflicted on this. In principle, the idea sounds good, but I don't like the idea of denying members of said Guild the ability to continue playing in it. Perhaps if we simply keep the ways to win that don't involve destroying Guilds totally, that would resolve that in my mind. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Slightly like. Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Slightly like. Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Moderately like. Zevox
MindWandererB 12-18-06, 04:56 PM	Added an item: Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Again, I encourage everyone to add aspects of the guild system that they might like to see, or would want to avoid. My own commentary: I pretty much agree with Zevox about the troops: too complicated, and impossible to ignore. I have mixed feelings about having a winner. I don't really like the idea of eliminating guilds from the system (although I might be in favor of a system like the original Civilization had, where eliminated cultures could be replaced with new ones mid-game). I'd rather not have a winner at all if it's a reasonable possibility for other guilds to catch up. If we just end up with a huge and unchangeable power disparity, that's no fun. I find that the single-player miniquests don't really do much for the guilds--it's hard to care about a single-player quest that isn't your own. Multiplayer is another story. And the pitlord drain is a problem. Sauro and I were juggling ideas that involved the method for growth being unchanged by the growth itself. For instance, with the current system, if you screw up your guild's expansion progress, you fall behind in your ability to grow, and the further you fall behind, the more difficult it becomes to catch up--in other words, success builds on itself. We were thinking that a system whereby the rate of growth was independent of your previous growth might be nice. It's a thought.
Macbrea 12-18-06, 04:57 PM	Ok, will give my opinions on these Troop combat (regiments) Slightly Dislike: the game bogs down to building forces until one side attacks and destroys the other. Then what? Having a "Winner" at the "end" Slightly Dislike: You cannot win a Roleplaying game. You can win a board game. The only thing putting a winning condition on this means that everyone builds for a military victory and the game is over in half a year. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like: Ok, gathering resources for some reason seems like a good idea. The only real problem is what are you spending them on? The non-abliity to affect the arena results in the only purpose of gathering the resources as a means to destroy your enemy guilds. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Don't really care what the resources are. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Strong Like: Ok, a system has to have advances and setbacks else it is just kind of there. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Strongly Like: This is a fine method of doing it. Using single-player (mini)quests Moderately like: This seems a good way to actually see how the characters deal with the real world rather then the arena. Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like: Ok, this is probably the best thing guilds actually do. It puts people together to try and accomplish a task. It also results in good roleplaying and teamwork. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like: This is fine. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like: This is fine Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Moderately like: This seems fine. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Moderately like: This is needed in order to produce setbacks. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly Dislike: OK, in Coco the only place character ever seem to roleplay is Campaigns, Quests, Guild thread. My personal favorite character (Lord Frost) didn't fit into any of the guilds and therefore only gets to roleplay by random comments in the tavern thread. Removing Guilds just removes another roleplay avenue. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Strongly like: It gives them flavor. Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Moderately Like: It gives the world flavor Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Strongly like: These are probably more of a nessessity in order to actually make it appear to not be a group of guilds with nothing going on around them. Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly Like: These don't seem to harm anyone they should be there. Now, having answered that. I currently have no characters in any of the guilds. The reason for that is the following: Izumi - Never really seem to fit in any of the guilds. None actively tried to recruit her so she didn't actively go looking for them. Lord Frost - Originally, Frost was made to be a Thief hating warrior. He lacked the original Qualification to join WAR. That at the time was Prof (all martial or monk weapons). The guild system changed to not require it after he got frozen. I haven't been playing him because I hate messing with him if he cannot benefit or be harmed by any action he does. He should pay for his losses and wins as he does them. Relanex Thines - Rel is my testing of can DPS out do buffing. I looked about but didn't see any guilds he wanted to join immediately. I haven't really been to worried about it with him. Since, there is no thread for roleplaying that isn't a guild thread. I just am fiddling around with a build and ignoring all the threads and events.
Erithmu 12-18-06, 07:26 PM	Troop combat (regiments) Strongly dislike: MindWandererB, waywreth, Erithmu Moderately dislike: Zevox Slightly dislike: Macbrea Having a "Winner" at the "end" Slightly dislike: Macbrea, MindWandererB Slightly like: Zevox, Erithmu Moderately like: waywreth Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like: Macbrea, MindWandererB, waywreth, Erithmu Strongly like: Zevox Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Moderately dislike: waywreth Indifferent/ambivalent: Macbrea, MindWandererB, Erithmu Slightly like: Zevox At least 2 resources would be nice. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Slightly dislike: MindWandererB Indifferent/ambivalent: Zevox, Erithmu Moderately like: waywreth Strongly like: Macbrea Using territory and expansion (limited space) Moderately dislike: MindWandererB Slightly like: Zevox, Erithmu Stongly like: Macbrea, waywreth Using single-player (mini)quests Slightly like: MindWandererB, Zevox, Erithmu Moderately like: Macbrea Strongly like: waywreth Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like: Macbrea, MindWandererB, waywreth, Zevox, Erithmu Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like: Macbrea, MindWandererB, waywreth, Erithmu Strongly like: Zevox Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly dislike: waywreth Slightly like: MindWandererB, Zevox, Erithmu Moderately like: Macbrea Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Moderately dislike: waywreth Indifferent/Amb ... Erithmu Moderately like: Macbrea, MindWandererB, Strongly like: Zevox Allows for some lesser used skills to have function w/in the CoCo, but I dislike the mechanic that is used. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Strongly like: MindWandererB, Erithmu Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Moderately dislike: MindWandererB Slightly like: Zevox, Erithmu Moderately like: Macbrea, waywreth Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly dislike: Macbrea Moderately dislike: MindWandererB, waywreth Indifferent/ambivalent: Zevox, Erithmu If the Guild is going to die anyways that is ok, but if it is something that many Players want to keep, I think keep it around. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Indifferent/ambivalent: MindWandererB, waywreth Slightly like: Zevox, Erithmu Strongly like: Macbrea Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike: MindWandererB, waywreth, Zevox, Erithmu Moderately like: Macbrea Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Slightly dislike: MindWandererB Indifferent/ambivalent: waywreth, Erithmu Slightly like: Zevox Strongly like: Macbrea Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Moderately like: Zevox, Erithmu Strongly like: Macbrea, MindWandererB, waywreth Put my comments/votes in my normal color. 2 things 1) Player initiated situation rather than Guildmaster initiated options. There is always the lone wolf guy that goes off, does something dumb, and then the rest of the guild has to clean up the mess. Other times there are times when the lone wolf does the right thing, or comes out smelling like roses. There can be some regulation of this in having members of the guild try to slow down their own guild member. The options are kinda limitless in what could happen. (inner guild issues w/ alignment/belief issues are worked out through those means, and have guild discipline structure that is set up by the individual guilds.) 2) The less work the better. Simple is good. I still like the quest driven system, and it might be possible to further some of the situations by simply allowing challenge fights be a reasonable option for measure of guild status (think of an honor type of ranking.)
Zevox 12-18-06, 08:02 PM	Added an item: Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Hm, sounds like an interesting idea. Moderately like. Zevox
McJarvis 12-18-06, 08:45 PM	Troop combat (regiments) Neutral I don't like the idea of troop combat that is not D&D based-> but I love the idea of strategizing for mass-troop combat.(10vs10 type things). I haven't really read anything on troop combat in the current system-> so I don't know if this is what it will look like. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Strongly Dislike. I don't like the idea of having a "winner", but I do like the idea of having mechanics for destroying other guilds. Thus a guild could decide they would "Win" if they were the last guild standing-> but it is not an arbitrary goal forced on every guild. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Strongly Like. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Strongly Like I like it-> but I think it could be alot simpler than it currently is. Look at successful RTS computer games like starcraft or warcraft-> there are only 2 or 3 resources that can be used to build all tech trees. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Strongly Like Without consequences for actions, actions mean nothing... Using territory and expansion (limited space) Strongly like. What can I say? I'm territorial. Using single-player (mini)quests Indifferent Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly Like. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Strongly Like But only for RP reasons... Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Indifferent Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly Dislike. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Slightly Like. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Indifferent Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly Like But it should be HARD to do Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Strongly like I heart politics Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike. Realistic, but dumb strategy wise. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Strongly Dislike If I wanted to play a game of dice, I wouldn't play D&D, oddly enough... Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly Like Here are my responses
MitzaVolchenko 12-18-06, 10:01 PM	Troop combat (regiments) Slightly dislike. Wastes a lot of resources and becomes easily imbalancing. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Moderately dislike. We are looking for a living world, not Armageddon. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like. It works. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Indifferent/ambivalent. Meh. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Moderately like. The past affects the future. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Stongly like. Motivation to strive! Using single-player (mini)quests Strongly like. Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly like. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly like. It isn't all about who has the biggest sword. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Strongly like. And let non-guild folks play too! Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Slightly dislike. We have seen that there are some characers that can just wipe out a structure without blinking. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly dislike. Until permadeath for characters becomes a reality, there is no reason to think that they should stop associating with their chosen guild just because they live in a burned out husk of a guildhall. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Strongly like. Why should a bunch of flappies start the same way as a bunch of assassins? Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Moderately like. Good and bad things really do happen. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Strongly like. The world is alive...things happen. Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly like. See above.
MindWandererB 12-18-06, 10:47 PM	Updated. I should also point out: don't be intimidated by all those items! You don't have to have an opinion on all of them. Just state your feelings where you have them. But if you do have an opinion, and I suspect most if you do, please speak up.
NiQil 12-18-06, 11:58 PM	Let me preface these responses by stating ahead of time that I have a somewhat jaded view of the guilds as they stand now. Take all of these opinions with a grain of salt. Troop combat (regiments) Strongly dislike: I never liked this portion of any of the guild incarnations. Our forum has always been about the individual PC's. That should remain the focus. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Strongly dislike: While I agree that competition is needed and fun, having a winner means there also has to be a loser. These guilds should not be a part of a game, but rather a substructure of the World we have and continue to construct on this forum. I thing the competitive side of the guilds should be a touch more informal, such as (for example) simple rankings that show how wealthy each guild is or how popular each guild is in a certain district, etc. In short, it should be a race that never ends. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Strongly like: It's as good as anything to use, and something everyone is familiar with. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Strongly dislike: I don't think an economic system should ever be based on anything but money. Having other resources is just a different kind of money, so I don't see any reason to make things more complicated. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Indifferent/ambivalent: Meh...no opinion here at the moment. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Strongly like: This goes along with my suggestion above about a never-ending race where the guilds are simply ranked in various categories. Plus, we have a whole city to fan out in, not to mention the rest of our world map. Using single-player (mini)quests Slightly like: I think that quests and miniquests are an integral part of the guild system. My main concern is that since this has stepped with the most recent incarnation of the guilds, it seems to drain our pitlord resource rather severely. Using multi-player (mini)questsModerately like: This helps alleviate my concerns with single-player mini's, but it sometimes hard to make happen in just one week's time. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Strongly like: Guilds need to compete. The arena is, was, and always will be the focus of this forum, so it should also have an integral part in our guild system. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Stronly like: This is where the roleplaying should come from. A member of WAR and TAO get paired to fight? Let them role play around it, maybe start a rivalry or an inter-guild battle around it...this should be where the ideas come from. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Slightly like: This is more personal taste than anything, but I can see the need for this. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Moderately like: I think these are flavorful additions and go well with the guild substructure. Want to build rapport with a rival guild? Go catch a monster and fight it in the arena together. Want a team guild vs team guild clash? Go fetch the flag. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Moderately dislike: I don't like the idea of working to eliminate a guild, and that is what this leads to. Being able to indirectly deal damage, such as sabatoge, etc, is still competitive while not causing people to be in fear that their guild will go under. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly dislike: The guilds are part of our world. They need to remain. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Slightly like: This adds flavor and competition, but should not be structured in a way that provides an unfair advantage to anyone. Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful I'm of two minds on this one. I like the idea of random events, because they make things more like TT. At the same time, however, they can quickly throw things out of balance. If something can be done from a balance perspective, then I would say slightly like. If not, then slightly dislike. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Same as previous Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Same as previous I also wanted to add in here that I see the guilds first and foremost as a roleplaying vehicle. Any game designed for the guilds should always be secondary to that. But I don't see why they can't co-exist. I personally dropped the guilds as a whole quite some time ago because I didn't like the direction they were headed. They went from a role-playing/strategy game in their first incarnation (the one with PC taxes based on winnings) to an almost solely strategy game as it stands now, in my opinion. Strategy games are all fine and good, but that's not why I play D&D. Strategy is, was, and always will be a part of D&D, but it should never be the main focus....and I don't think it should be with our guilds either. Also....one of my biggest concerns with the guilds as they stand at this moment is the use of frozen characters. I realize that many people like the ability to use their frozen characters again, and I think that is great....but I think it is part of what is causing problems with the guild system. I don't think that when the game in it's current form was designed, it was done with the idea that the frozen characters would be used for awhile. I think they are throwing the balance of things off. I have no factual basis for this feeling, but it is my opinion, nonetheless. So as I said at the outset, take this all with a grain of salt, and do with it as you will.
Hirumajoe 12-19-06, 02:14 AM	Troop combat (regiments) Moderately dislike D&D in my mind has always been about the characters, not the armies they lead. How a small group of adventurers can go out and change the world, even if the big bad guys control an entire empire and the heroes only have the shirts on their backs. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Moderately dislike A winner at the end means someone is going to be striving for that, and sooner rather than later. Which is going to end things or force a reset. If the idea is to have a roleplaying vehicle then you want long continuity. Which means this is counter productive. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like 3.0 and 3.5 D&D *runs* on gold. :) Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Ambivalent Unavoidable. Characters are resources and seem to impact the econonmic viability of guild. Admittedly they're unbalanced resources at the moment, but they are there. Plus you have all the NPCs working in buildings and such which are another resource. Oh you mean abstract numbers... Its just another form of gold. If its done properly, doesn't hurt anything. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Moderately Like As McJarvis said, actions need consequences to have meaning. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Moderately like The guilds need something to argue over. Otherwise they don't have any motivation to do anything or interact. Conflict is interesting. Peace is boring. (Which I think is why every campaign I've ever run has some major war starting up, going on, or just finishing up...) Using single-player (mini)quests Slightly like Its a question of balancing the number relative to the arena pitlord needs. Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like Its where most of your RP comes in. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Strongly Like See above about conflict being interesting. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like Not everything goes as planned, and this reflects that. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Slightly like Heart of the CoCo isn't geared towards that, but in Table top, half the game *is* the out of combat RP with skill rolls and what not. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Slightly like Again, we've got the combat thing down pat, but spicing it up for more unusual (and hence more Table top like) situations doesn't seem like a bad thing. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Slightly Like Actions have to have meaning. An action to move your guild ahead is similar to having an action to move another guild behind. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Ambivalent On the one hand, actions have to have meaning. Plus it can make for great RP (the fall of guild X in the year Y due to the actions of Z). On the other hand it leads to an obvious win condition, i.e. Last guild standing. Depends on how one handles the situation. Do you automatically restart another guild, providing as many RP possibilities before, and is that new guild not so weak as to be unable to do anything meaningful relative to the established guilds? Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Ambivalent Variety is good. The hard part is balancing them. Also, don't forget there will be a trend in the strengths and weaknesses the individual characters a guild attracts, since each guild will attract different archetypes. TAO would attract alot of mages and WAR would attract alot of fighters. In the interactions between their characters, those difference will shine through. At the end of the day, where are these differences coming from? Your npc workers all still come from the same population, they all earn the same type of gold. I think its the unique individuals that define the strength of the guild, not really how the unknown members are governed. Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike In a competitive game, what fun is it being hammered by the dice if there was nothing you could have done to minimize the risk (or chosen to take the risk), when its just the roll of the dice each week? Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Moderately dislike See previous Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Moderately like Adds flavor and roleplaying possibilities. I like the current world event, since in principle all the guilds have equal opportunity to do so. Unfortunately, not all the guilds do, because of staffing issues (like if McJarvis doesn't finish up my miniquest this week, LOY will have a single ECL 7 character to attempt the world event with, hint, hint). Which may be a issue that needs to be addressed. I'll throw this possibility out there, and feel to shoot it down as its only an idea. What if, to encourage people to join the guild system, each person was allowed to create a single high ECL character (level to be determined, but lets say ECL 9 for now), that they could keep so long as it was in a guild? This might allow more guilds more access to high level characters and even the playing field some. Since at least looking at LOY and the current system, they need some heavy hitters to compete. And believe some of the other guilds are in similar situations.
TheMagister 12-19-06, 09:50 AM	Troop combat (regiments) Slightly like. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Strongly Dislike. New Idea: I think the guild system would benefit most greatly if the guilds were loosely allied together in an RP fashion against "The Evil Council". This would encourage guild interaction, guild growth, and guild power-base building. It would also provide the neat little Catch 22 of the mythical Council being the "Random Universal Event" that hurts the guilds/provides for World Event Opportunities ["The Council has summoned the Githyanki to help combat the guilds! Save Gladius, guildmembers!!"]/Council isn't defeated until everyone gets tired of playing and Cat (or other GM) cries "Uncle!". Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Strongly like. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Strongly Like. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Moderately Like. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Strongly Like. Using single-player (mini)quests Slightly Like. Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Indifferent. We get enough of this in the Arena. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Strongly like. I love irony. Situations plotted by the aforementioned "Evil Council" that throws the guilds into conflict should be numerous and inventive. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly like. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Moderately like. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Moderately dislike. Only because I dislike the guilds being enemies at all. Disagrees with the "Save Gladius/Help Gladius Recover" theme of the post-Angosh period in which the setting is placed. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly dislike. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Strongly like. Encourages teamwork to offset weaknesses. Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Moderately Like AS IS. Strongly Like in the US vs. THE COUNCIL scenario. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Slightly like. Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly like.
SoulLord 12-19-06, 11:01 AM	Troop combat (regiments) Strongly dislike RP:I don't see why the city goverment would allow a big army building inside tactical: its about the players not a risk game. Having a "Winner" at the "end" moderately dislike sure there are guilds who are more influential than others but that doesnt mean the rest lost because they dont have the influence of teh big guild. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like gold moves the world keep it simple Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Moderately Dislike gold works fine why add more resources to it Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Strongly Like RP: of course ater failing to rescue the town from the orcs theyll be more reluctant to assist Using territory and expansion (limited space) Moderately Dislike it feels to me like an artificial solution we can always expand be it up down outside etc.. Using single-player (mini)quests Strongly like Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like Some times peopel are after the same goal Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly dislike I propose this be turned to quests or miniquests Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Moderately dislike Again I think the city goverment would not like to see a guild arson the buildings of another. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Strongly dislike As long as their members are around they should be able to rebuild. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme tactical: Some guilds could get affected while others benefited from this Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Moderately like as long as they are not so frecuent. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Moderately like Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly like The thing I enjoy more is the RP at the guilds from here I can go to missions to advance the cause of the guild.
TelinArtho 12-19-06, 11:04 AM	Just to confirm that I am here and that I do have an opinion, I am going to express that I am neither for or against anything in the guild system as my involvement in it is minimal and will continue to stay that way. I am not here for the guild system - I am here for the arenas, quests and such that I work with. The one thing I do support heavily is the use of quests/miniquests - but only insofar that an adequate supply of questlords are available.
SauroGrenom 12-19-06, 12:00 PM	Troop combat (regiments) Nope. Don't like it. It's not thematicially appropreat for private armies to march around inside of a city. Also any sense of realism requires that armies destroy things, armies loose win and wreck everything. Unless we want the feel of our collective world to be apocalyptic, we need to avoid anything like this. Strongly Dislike Having a "Winner" at the "end" Nope. Games with a winner end. RPG games and RPG formats shouldn't have this kind of finite end. In RPG games the end happens when the story is finished being told. Since we are in a collective group telling a story all together, that end shouldn't be required to happen. Strongly Dislike Having an economic system based on at least one resource Nope. Management of a limited resource is one thing, but economies are totally different. Economies are some times interesting to think about, but managing lots of resources that interact in complicated ways turns the game into a war of dueling accountants. Another major issue is that resources are usually thought of as being required for growth. This creates a positive feedback loop that allows those with a small early lead to develop into a much bigger lead later on. The third concern with resources is that this is a game element that makes me think of stuff like ages of empires or warcraft where you get a resource as part of your strategy. I'm not interested in playing that kind of game. What could be interesting is if guilds had resources from within... What I mean is an ability that can be used only once in a while or that recharges after a particular trigger or some such. This makes the resource into an ability you need to be carefull how you use it. It's more like a memorized spell or a spell like ability 1/day. That kind of resource management may be the way to go. Strongly Dislike (with reservations on how resources are used, this may be a strongly like) Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g.PTS) Nope. As above. Strongly Dislike (Same reservations as above) Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Sort of. There needs to be some sense of history. If all previous events have no effect on the present or future, then history is of no importance. However, setbacks and successes cannot cripple a guild or make it invulnerable. Moderately like (as long as setbacks are not permanent) Using territory and expansion (limited space) Sort of. Territory is a great way to introduce competition and conflict. It's also thematicially appropreat for some guilds like TLT and EHTC. For other guilds like TAO or LOY territory doesn't make so much sense. TAO is an educational institution, and LOY is a group of aristocratic socialites. However in all cases the guilds are not governing bodies, and it should be possible for a guild like CEF and TAO to live together peacefully in the same district and not compete since they interact with very different aspects of the populus. So I think territory should have some kind of in game effect, but I think it should also be possible for a guild to grow and compete with rivals by other means as well. Ambivalent (depending on implimentation can be better or worse) Using single-player (mini)quests Good to the extent that it doesn't drain the number of QL's available. Strongly Like Using multi-player (mini)quests Great. This is where most of the RP that guilds are ment to foster takes place. Strongly Like Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Great. This is where great RP happens. These kinds of rivalries are important to keep the players interested and to keep the whole game world living. Stongly Like Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Sort of. As long as there is no lasting effect caused by these unintended "mistakes" then these can be an interesting contribution to the game as well. Moderately Like Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Sort of. Guild members need to be able to contribute to the game in multiple ways to make the players feel a part of the game. This is one of those ways to make that happen. Moderately Like (Depending on implimentatin) Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) I reserve comment on this one. It's an interesting idea I haven't thought about much. There are clear pro's and con's but I'm not sure how to weigh them right now. Unknown Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Good in some ways. Damage shouldn't be permanent. In the arena, you rival foe can destroy your sword or wad with a sunder, but at the end of the 3FC you get it back. We should apply a simular approach to the damage guilds cause to each other. A destroyed building is gone for x weeks while it's being repaired. A damaged wall is repaired in Y weeks. So on. Moderately Like (depending on implimentation) Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Nope. This violates the central philosophy of CoCo. All our gladiators loose from time to time. But they are returned and they come back latter to win again. We should preserve this philosophy and apply it to the guild system as well. Strongly Dislike Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Great. Thematicially appropreat abilities and weaknesses are a must. All the guilds need to have them to help give them personality. Strongly Like Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Good. As long as the harms are not permanent, and there is some mechanism for guilds to actively avoid or decrease the harms. Strongly Like Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Also Good. Same as above. Strongly Like Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Good. As long as they contribute to the game environment in some meaningfull way. If these events are just random things that everyone ignores, then they are meaningless fluff. Moderately Like My thoughts on guilds: The more that I think about the guild game, the more I'm convinced that guilds should grow and interact in a maner that's more akin to the way that characters do so. Each character class has a distinct flavor defined by it's abilities. All the characters at the table grow at their own rates, and you only continue to grow if you keep defeating foes of increasingly greater power. Our current guild game is realy a strategy game with an ability to plug some RP and character action into effecting the strategy elements. I'm thinking we need to turn that around and make the guild game into an RP game with some ability to plug strategy elements into it.
DSugui 12-19-06, 03:07 PM	I will briefly comment on the given topics, then I'll present some of my thoughts on how the guild system should be. Troop combat (regiments) Strongly dislike. This is D&D, troops just don't fit in. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Strongly dislike. This is RPG, the concept of "winning" shouldn't be part of it. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Moderately like. As long as it is simple, resources can be an interesting way for the guilds to compete. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Indifferent. As above, it should be simple. If multiple resources complicate things, then no; otherwise, no problem. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Strongly like. Every action has a reaction. This should be true everywhere. Using territory and expansion (limited space) Indifferent. I don't see why two guilds cannot influence the same area, but then, I don't care much about this. Using single-player (mini)quests Using multi-player (mini)quests Strongly like. This should be the kernel of the guild system. Players (and parties) going on mission to get the guild resources, making allies, solving problems, increasing it's history. The guild system should improve RP experiences in CoCo, giving the players (and questlords) to add their touch in Gladius history. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Moderately like. As long as they have RP reasons to compete, it should be fine. One guild shouldn't antagonize another jsut for strategic reasons, though. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly like. Same as above. If two rival guild members are after the same objective, they shoudl "accidentally" meet each other in combat. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Slightly like. Adds a nice differencial, but can result in characters not combat effective (which is the main goal of the CoCo). However, can be a focus for those who seek a deeper RP experience. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Indiferent. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Strongly dislike. No matter what reasons, I just don't see people razing buildings amidst of a city (unless you are in a guerrilla site). Guild interaction should be done by political means, or by their characters. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Indifferent. If there is a RP reason for that, I see no problem. When this happens, though, another guild should arise to take place of the fallen one. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Strongly like. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses. Guilds should not be different Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly dislike. This can be very frustating if the dice gods are in bad mood. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Moderately like. But a little of randomness don't harm anybody. Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly like. Nice way to increase RP experience. ----- Now, some personal ideas. Part of this come from my MMORPG experiences, part from board gaming. First, Guilds should be about the characters. What is a guild other than people with common interests joining forces for mutual benefit? We have thematic guilds here - this should encourage characters with a strong background and motivations. But his is rarely what we see. So I think the guild system should encourage more RP, not only characters participation in the guilds actions. Quests/Miniquests to join should be meaningful. Characters actions should be done throught quests/miniquests, and reward the guild in some way. For example, guilds could have XP just like a character does. When a guild member completes a quest for the guild, the guild gains gold and XP. When a guild levels, it gains abilities, like more member capacity, special abilities for the members to use in quests, etc. The guild could have a trophy room, where relics and artifacts are kept and can be used by worthy guildmembers. These are just some ideas. Some of them would require starting everything from scratch, but others may be implementable. I just want the guilds to be a tool to increase RP, not a game with winners and losers.
Guildlords 12-21-06, 05:04 PM	Since this topic has moved off the first page of the forum, I'll start a discussion by way of a bump. We'll start off with something simple, and the strongest-held opinion of all: Multi-player quests. The current system discourages them, but they're both more fun and easier on the pitlord load than single-player quests. So I propose the following: Missions require 2 CAPs, regardless of the number of characters involved (up to 3). If two or three guilds collaborate on a quest, it costs each of them only 1 CAP each. Opinions? Especially from Cat and Sauro? Note: comments on other items are still welcome. But I want to use this thread for focused discussions as well. And I want to bump it, too.
Caterane 12-21-06, 05:27 PM	Sounds like a good idea. Any more ideas for cooperation?
MindWandererB 12-21-06, 05:36 PM	More random ideas: World Event quests could require at least two characters. Some of the "non-battle" challenges could be multi-player, although we'd have to hash out the nature of those challenges first. We could also use more operations that aren't offensive in nature. The Errands was a good idea, but something else to miniquest for might be a good idea. Right now, all there is is paramilitary groups, and for most of those, the EL is just unreachable. Perhaps there could be more low-level groups--preferably ones that aren't obstacles on the map, so it doesn't get crowded.
spasheridan 12-21-06, 08:26 PM	II saw a post yesterday about having some series of mini-events that folks could do in the quest system. I was thinking about options that you could have: 1) Open a new city / outpost as a trade route. The guild that gets the route open would receive some economic benefit for a short time as it reaped the windfall from it’s short monopoly on the route 2) Rescue a city council member from kidnappers. The grateful councilman gives the guild a tax break for a short time (translating into a small economic bosot) as a reward 3) Clear out an area of some maurading evil. The guild that finishes this event opens up a previously uninhabitable area on the map and gets some small outpost in the area – the HQ that they took from the baddies 4) Recover an artifact for a temple. The guild that returns it gets a small bump in popularity in the zone that the temple resides in 5) Buried Treasure! Rumors hit gladius of a stockpile of building material or some valuable materials. The group that finds and retrieves it gets a one-time bump in it’s cash as the loot is put in the guilds vault. These are all normal / vanilla quest like themes, just tack on a reasonable (and small) reward at the end. Each event should have a short notice so folks could prepare / plan. The questlord could be a rotating seat – each time one guild is barred from the event and that guild is responsible for providing the questlord. Or the seat could be forced on the guild at the “top” of the guild pile, so these perks only go to a struggling guild.
nightbanegod 12-21-06, 10:15 PM	Troop combat (regiments) strongly dislike. i would say this because it reminds me too much of axis and allies with regiments and really that takes away from the whole DnD theme that should inherently be CoCo. Having a "Winner" at the "end" Strongly like: it just makes sense...it IS the point of any game Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) Strongly Like: gives the game a hard line that everyone can use as currency or at least a measurement of accomplishment Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) Strongly Like: see previous comment, additionally, gives different teams the ability to capitalize/monopolize on a particular resource, thus gaining an edge. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential Slightly like: nothing like being held accountable Using territory and expansion (limited space) Moderately like: give a more defined sense of accomplishment and it would make accounting of resources easier by giving a figure for different territories... see axis and allies without the units. Using single-player (mini)quests Slightly like: its fun and helps develop plot ALOT Using multi-player (mini)quests [DISCUSSION] Moderately like: much more interactive than single player and allows for stronger/more significant guild actions in the world Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members Strongly Like: sometimes you just need to smack someone down, usually the guy that just tried to swipe your woman. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members Slightly like: nothting like starting a little sibling rivalry to stir emotions :P Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) Strongly like, allows for more creative builds and doesnt just keep players optimizing twards one goal. ie solely combat oriented masses. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) Moderately like: very much an RP factor that would promote excelent reading materal for other non participating people... and still would allow a character to over-come, and futher his guild in more materialistic ways Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild Strongly like: gotta get some people out of thier comfort zones and have to make people react, that way if you think someone is getting too strong in the guild system, you can try and slow them down, but there must be drawbacks, like if you attack someone else you leave yourself that much more vulnerable for a short time Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild Slightly Like: this is a good idea as it helps decide an official winner by establishing terms that elminate a group/team from actually being able to win. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme Strongly agree: this is EXCELET diversity, and allows specific groups to function better at what they specialize in... this is just by far the best idea when it comes to the guild system Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful Strongly Like: nature is a *:censored: * and sometimes you just have to cope with life Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful Strongly like: see previous comment Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild Strongly like: see both previous comments
Caterane 12-22-06, 07:54 AM	Troop combat (regiments) - Strongly Like Many of you say you need regiments to survive but a defender behind walls and turrets is at a much greater advantage than an attacker with an army. Some of you say it doesn't belong to D&D but that's also not true: there are many books out there about strongholds and mass combat which all use the d20 system. Except for the rules about Morale, regiments use the same mechanic as a character. We haven't seen one single battle so before we say anything about that we should probably first see it in action. The regiment system is too deeply entwined in the guild system; removing it will be a hell of work to rebalance. Besides, we have not enough character options to base the guild game on characters alone. The removal of regiments would tear a hole into the guildhall of gladius. What we can do is to change their impact on the guilds; I don't mean 'lessen' but have them go into another direction. I have no idea where and I don't want to think about it because I'm happy with this part of the system anyway. Having a "Winner" at the "end" - Slightly dislike "Then why is it in there" you may ask. Well, I felt like there should be some kind of incentive. I remember this old computer game back when I was a brat, called Sim City. I played it once but it totally sucked because there was no victory condition; no matter how many supertowers I had built on the map. I am not in favor of a winner but I can currently see no real alternative. We could remove the victory conditions, no problem, but in order to have no winner at the end, we need to make Guildhalls immune to damage. This however would be totally wrong! Imagine Guildhalls would take no damage and the end-war would've broken out last week. You destroy all CEF structures but since you cannot take CEF out CEF destroys all your structures one by one and you cannot do anything against. The system would degenerate to a farce. While I don't think we need a winner, I am strongly in favor of having losers. We could use MWBs suggestion here. A destroyed guildhall means the guild is out of the game but like Civilization (a computer game) a new guild takes its place. However, I think especially later in the game, a new guild would have no chance from the beginning on when other guilds control three districts each. I think the same was the case with Civilization; not sure if they fixed it in later versions of the game since I've only played the first version. Maybe someone knows that? Or we could just remove the victory conditions except for last man standing. This however is not a mandatory goal! All guilds could coexist peacefully for years. No need to win by erasing them all. Maybe you guys have some better ideas or help me to flesh it out. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold) - Moderately like In our previous version, we had another ressource called Prestige. I would love to have a second ressource but when I created the new guild system I couldn't think of such a mechanic and I wanted the system to start now. But else, it's the same we do for our characters. Earn gold and buy stuff. Ressource management belongs to things like an organization. Having an economic system based on multiple resources (e.g. PTS) - Strongly like I've already said a lot about that so no reason to comment on it further. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential - Strongly like Not sure if I understand this correctly but if you mean that your actions should have an impact, then yes, of course this has to be in there. Why should I ever do something if its to no avail. Using territory and expansion (limited space) - Strongly like You're really questioning the whole system, ain't you? This is the best thing about the whole system! Here, you can actually see what your mission, your operation does, and how your guild expands instead of having it written somewhere in your guild thread where no one reads it anyway. Territorial expansion make your activities meaningful. Using single-player (mini)quests - Strongly like This is ridiculous. We have not many options here in coco, or in D&D so what else can we use to carry game mechanics?? Using multi-player (mini)quests - Strongly like That's a good idea. We should encourage more inter-guild interactions. Interactions should be more beneficial or cheaper than doing it alone. Let's see where the discussion goes. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members - Strongly like Again, this is a moot point since we have no other choice but to use combat as a carrier of game mechanics. It's like questioning wether Battles of Gladius should stay in coco. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members - Strongly like There're only two such mechanics in the system: Interceptions and the Kidnap Character Operation. While we haven't seen the last one yet, interceptions enrichen the game by providing us with a way to interact. How boring would it be without interceptions... Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) - Moderately like I thought we should have ways other than combat for characters to shine. Look, Tan would have had a good chance of getting Ixenthor into prison with his Intrigue Operation while he would have stood no chance in combat. However, I'm not 100% satisfied with this mechanic as I think it can be made more interesting than just two opposed rolls. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) - Strongly like Very nice ideas and they were already on the table when I wrote the system. I am all in favor for fleshing out such an add-on. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild - Strongly like Should it be possible to deal damage to a gladiator in a Battle of Gladius? This has to stay. Period. We're not playing puzzle. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild - Necessary (Strongly like) Actually I don't like it but it is necessary. See Point 2 above. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme - Strongly like So far, we only have the ability to proccess 500 and 250 PTS of your home traits. We tried to find some more distinguishing abilities but such a thing is always hard to balance. We could however come up with a list of guild abilities to which all guilds have access. Could be something like "Tycoon" or "Prophet" that a guild has to activate somehow, or personal traits like "Greedy", "Honorable", etc which can be bought with ...Prestige Points? ... and grant a benefit and drawback. Similar to the 2nd Edition Player's Options. Furthermore, these traits then interact with each other, so a militaristic guild and a pacifist guild might get negotiation penalties against each other. Random events (all three points) - Strongly like They definately enrichen the game. I hold my breath every time when I open Guildlords post on wednesday. Seems like a good mechanic.
Hirumajoe 12-22-06, 08:17 AM	Since this topic has moved off the first page of the forum, I'll start a discussion by way of a bump. We'll start off with something simple, and the strongest-held opinion of all: Multi-player quests. The current system discourages them, but they're both more fun and easier on the pitlord load than single-player quests. So I propose the following: Missions require 2 CAPs, regardless of the number of characters involved (up to 3). If two or three guilds collaborate on a quest, it costs each of them only 1 CAP each. Opinions? Especially from Cat and Sauro? Note: comments on other items are still welcome. But I want to use this thread for focused discussions as well. And I want to bump it, too. I admit, I'm not Cat or Sauro, but I'll throw in my two cents. Not only would this give incentive to doing multiple people in one quest, it also somewhat balances the playing fied of the other resource in the game, characters. While LOY doesn't have a single ECL 10 character, they can scrape together an ECL 10 group. Thus, activiting a single ECL 10 character doesn't become the ultimate in efficiency, and if you don't have one, you're forced to be less efficient simply because of character roster. That's fine in a RPG, but in a strategy game thats not so good. I guess from a strategic gaming perspective, I expect and perhaps demand balance. The only thing affecting the game should be your strategic decision making. You can have random dice if you want, but you know the odds, you know what affects them, and everyone has equal chance to affect those odds equally. I dislike having at the outset severe differences in capabilities, simply because more characters fit one guild's concept than another's. This somewhat helps that. The other way you could do this, is in stead of CAPs you could have EAPs. ECL Action points. Instead of 2 CAPs a turn, you could have 20 EAPs. Activation of a character costs his ECL. Of course then you could run into the situation of 6 ECL 3 characters being activated, so perhaps it would require too many artificial additional rules to keep the Pitlord drain down. P.S. I should point out that my favorite strategic game is Go, which has absolutely no dice or randomness. It scratches a seperate itch from my dice loaded, one shot in a million RPG games. :)
McJarvis 12-22-06, 11:14 AM	The other way you could do this, is in stead of CAPs you could have EAPs. ECL Action points. Instead of 2 CAPs a turn, you could have 20 EAPs. Activation of a character costs his ECL. Of course then you could run into the situation of 6 ECL 3 characters being activated, so perhaps it would require too many artificial additional rules to keep the Pitlord drain down. Initial thoughts: This would encourage diversity(a guild loaded with ECL 10's is not that great since they can't mobilize everyone), but at the same time guilds loaded down with ECL3/4's(like LOY) might be able to take advantage of tax collection matters(not that anyone things a limitless gp supply is bad...) About multi-player quests: Obviously, I'm a huge fan of this. Quests are simply more interesting with multiple people.
Hirumajoe 12-22-06, 12:27 PM	Initial thoughts: This would encourage diversity(a guild loaded with ECL 10's is not that great since they can't mobilize everyone), but at the same time guilds loaded down with ECL3/4's(like LOY) might be able to take advantage of tax collection matters(not that anyone things a limitless gp supply is bad...) Umm... How much does one ECL 10 bring in tax collection and how much does 2 ECL 3's and an ECL 4 bring in tax collection? Looking it up I find: A ECL 10 earns 5,800 gp, and brings 7% to the guild for 406gp. A ECL 3 earns 900 and brings 15% to the guild for 135 gp. A ECL 4 earns 1200 and brings 14% to the guild for 168 gp. So 406 vs 438. I wouldn't call a 7.9% advantage in tax collecting all that great. Not sure how the %'s were chosen, but I'm guessing it supposed to roughly be linear with ECL. As it stands now, an ECL 10 tax collection is worth roughly 3 times an ECL 3 tax collection, but they cost the same amount of CAP. Edit: Another nice thing about this is you can *always* get new ECL 3's into a guild. Its much harder finding ECL 10s to join the guild. :)
MitzaVolchenko 12-22-06, 12:45 PM	Having a "Winner" at the "end" - Slightly dislike "Then why is it in there" you may ask. Well, I felt like there should be some kind of incentive. I remember this old computer game back when I was a brat, called Sim City. I played it once but it totally sucked because there was no victory condition; no matter how many supertowers I had built on the map. I am not in favor of a winner but I can currently see no real alternative. We could remove the victory conditions, no problem, but in order to have no winner at the end, we need to make Guildhalls immune to damage. This however would be totally wrong! Imagine Guildhalls would take no damage and the end-war would've broken out last week. You destroy all CEF structures but since you cannot take CEF out CEF destroys all your structures one by one and you cannot do anything against. The system would degenerate to a farce. While I don't think we need a winner, I am strongly in favor of having losers. We could use MWBs suggestion here. A destroyed guildhall means the guild is out of the game but like Civilization (a computer game) a new guild takes its place. However, I think especially later in the game, a new guild would have no chance from the beginning on when other guilds control three districts each. I think the same was the case with Civilization; not sure if they fixed it in later versions of the game since I've only played the first version. Maybe someone knows that? Or we could just remove the victory conditions except for last man standing. This however is not a mandatory goal! All guilds could coexist peacefully for years. No need to win by erasing them all. Maybe you guys have some better ideas or help me to flesh it out. Millions of people have played hundreds of millions of hours of games like Civ, Sim City, and omg D&D! The point is not where you end up, it is how you get there. In theory D&D never has a victor. The adventurers have victories and setbacks, but the story always goes on. I suppose the exception is when the characters get old and retire or die from old age. Back in the day, we ran a campaign that started at 1st level and still occasionally gets together to play at the Immortal level (AD&D 2nd ed rules still rock! We shifted to them, but still balk at going 3.0-3.5). I have literally been playing one character for decades. She has died and been reincarnated, true ress'd, thrown into the Pits, exalted among celestials, buried three husbands, and perhaps thirty party members. Her only original surviving companions are the dwarfven fighter and the elven cleric. None of the stats matter...only the story that stretches from a lonely day as an outcast from her people in that run down leaky inn to the heights of the battlements of her keep on her very own little plane of control matters. The losses, the setbacks, those are of as much value as the heights and thrill of standing atop the corpse of her first red dragon kill.
MindWandererB 12-22-06, 02:19 PM	Troop combat (regiments) - Strongly Like Many of you say you need regiments to survive but a defender behind walls and turrets is at a much greater advantage than an attacker with an army. Some of you say it doesn't belong to D&D but that's also not true: there are many books out there about strongholds and mass combat which all use the d20 system. Except for the rules about Morale, regiments use the same mechanic as a character. We haven't seen one single battle so before we say anything about that we should probably first see it in action. The regiment system is too deeply entwined in the guild system; removing it will be a hell of work to rebalance. Besides, we have not enough character options to base the guild game on characters alone. The removal of regiments would tear a hole into the guildhall of gladius. What we can do is to change their impact on the guilds; I don't mean 'lessen' but have them go into another direction. I have no idea where and I don't want to think about it because I'm happy with this part of the system anyway. Are you saying that a defender behind walls, with no army whatsoever, is in a good position? Or if they have no ranged units? Not so; investing in an army is 100% mandatory. It doesn't have to be as strong, but it has to be there. And Cat: please note that so far, only one person other than yourself likes the idea at all. We shouldn't deal with this first, but we should at least consider a replacement for the army material. It's just not the game we want to be playing. Having a "Winner" at the "end" - Slightly dislike "Then why is it in there" you may ask. Well, I felt like there should be some kind of incentive. I remember this old computer game back when I was a brat, called Sim City. I played it once but it totally sucked because there was no victory condition; no matter how many supertowers I had built on the map. I am not in favor of a winner but I can currently see no real alternative. We could remove the victory conditions, no problem, but in order to have no winner at the end, we need to make Guildhalls immune to damage. This however would be totally wrong! Imagine Guildhalls would take no damage and the end-war would've broken out last week. You destroy all CEF structures but since you cannot take CEF out CEF destroys all your structures one by one and you cannot do anything against. The system would degenerate to a farce. While I don't think we need a winner, I am strongly in favor of having losers. We could use MWBs suggestion here. A destroyed guildhall means the guild is out of the game but like Civilization (a computer game) a new guild takes its place. However, I think especially later in the game, a new guild would have no chance from the beginning on when other guilds control three districts each. I think the same was the case with Civilization; not sure if they fixed it in later versions of the game since I've only played the first version. Maybe someone knows that? Or we could just remove the victory conditions except for last man standing. This however is not a mandatory goal! All guilds could coexist peacefully for years. No need to win by erasing them all. Maybe you guys have some better ideas or help me to flesh it out. As Mitza said, SimCity was an incredibly popular game--the best-selling game in America at the time. The Sims was the #1 game during its time, as well. So games without a win condition are not necessarily pointless. With the guild mechanic as it is, introducing a new guild in the middle would be tough. I was thinking more globally, of an entirely different system where starting with only the guildhall and one structure in Week 200 wouldn't be suicide--Sauro and I were playing with some ideas like that that might have worked. But that would be a wholly different incarnation. Do guildhalls have to be vulnerable to damage? Do structures have to be vulnerable to damage? No, not necessarily. I personally don't like this mechanic at all. But we shall see. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential - Strongly like Not sure if I understand this correctly but if you mean that your actions should have an impact, then yes, of course this has to be in there. Why should I ever do something if its to no avail. This was another idea I played around with with Sauro. In the current system, success leads to success; the more of a lead you have, the more of a lead you can gain. The rich get richer. I'm sure you can see the disadvantage to that. Using territory and expansion (limited space) - Strongly like You're really questioning the whole system, ain't you?Not so much questioning as assessing. Although I'm slightly against it myself, because I'm very anticompetitive. Territory means limited space; limited space means population pressure; population pressure means conflict. A time will come when you can grow no more, and all you can do is fight for someone else's space. I'm not looking forward to that. Using single-player (mini)quests - Strongly like This is ridiculous. We have not many options here in coco, or in D&D so what else can we use to carry game mechanics??Again, I'm not questioning, just assessing. In case we did, or will, build an entirely new system, I wanted to see what the most important aspects were. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members - Strongly like There're only two such mechanics in the system: Interceptions and the Kidnap Character Operation. While we haven't seen the last one yet, interceptions enrichen the game by providing us with a way to interact. How boring would it be without interceptions...Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of errands, where neither side really picks the fight. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild - Strongly like Should it be possible to deal damage to a gladiator in a Battle of Gladius? This has to stay. Period. We're not playing puzzle."Should it be possible to deal damage to a gladiator in a Battle of Gladius?" No. It shouldn't. And it isn't, not permanently. Thus my question. Random events (all three points) - Strongly like They definately enrichen the game. I hold my breath every time when I open Guildlords post on wednesday. Seems like a good mechanic. Yet I note that since the previous incarnation, you eliminated the most powerful events. So clearly you dislike the ones that are significantly helpful or harmful. -=-=-=- Again, I'm not saying that all of these opinions gave to be implemented now. But you've mentioned the possibility of yet another restart in the far future, and we should keep this in mind for then.
Caterane 12-22-06, 06:26 PM	Again, I'm not saying that all of these opinions gave to be implemented now. But you've mentioned the possibility of yet another restart in the far future, and we should keep this in mind for then. Oh yes, that's true. This guild system won't be the last. But it's more than okay to play now and considering the work that went into it we should give it a chance, and most importantly, learn from it. We have a lot of time to gather ideas for the next incarnation.
Zevox 12-22-06, 08:16 PM	If I may make a suggestion, theres a couple of issues with the system I think I have suggestions for: As Cat mused not so long ago, it appears as though CAPs are too powerful. Simply the fact that we can talk about one Guild destroying several others within a few weeks using just them seems ample enough evidence of this to me. I'm of the opinion that theres two reasons for this - first, they have been made too accessible again (we limited them to a flat 2/week before to avoid the mass-CAP-kill game, yet here we are again with Cat talking about using up to 5 of them in one week); and second, the power rating-based damage calculation. The former has the obvious off-balancing effect of permitting any Guild to overwhelm another with attacks; and the latter not only allows for huge damage from gladiators with high ratings, but makes highly successful gladiators twice as useful to a Guild and less successful ones twice as useless - a high PR character is already a huge boon in that hes more likely to succeed on operations/missions he is sent on, but the current system compounds that by making him do more damage when he succeeds to boot, and the reverse is true for lower PR characters. So, if I may, I think this may be fixed relatively easily. For the CAPs, remove the ability to convert GAPs to them. This effectively sets a 3 CAP maximum for everyone, which is much more reasonable than the 5 or 6 you can get now with GAP conversion and buying one. Personally, I'd also prefer if the "buying CAPs" option was removed in favor of a room that gives an extra CAP too, but perhaps theres a good reason not to do that which I'm not seeing. And with the damage, remove the PR-based system. Obviously, its unbalancing if the Guild with the most successful gladiators not only has the best chances of succeeding in its operations, but will also do more damage when it succeeds. Now, as to precisely what should replace it, I'm not sure. Perhaps a more static amount of damage, reduced by defense (the current formula with a permanent number input in place of PR perhaps? A static 1000 or 1200 or something like that?)? Perhaps someone else has an idea that may work better? Just trying to be helpful :) . Zevox
MitzaVolchenko 12-22-06, 08:21 PM	So, if I may, I think this may be fixed relatively easily. For the CAPs, remove the ability to convert GAPs to them. This effectively sets a 3 CAP maximum for everyone, which is much more reasonable than the 5 or 6 you can get now with GAP conversion and buying one. Personally, I'd also prefer if the "buying CAPs" option was removed in favor of a room that gives an extra CAP too, but perhaps theres a good reason not to do that which I'm not seeing. Interesting idea. And with the damage, remove the PR-based system. Obviously, its unbalancing if the Guild with the most successful gladiators not only has the best chances of succeeding in its operations, but will also do more damage when it succeeds. Now, as to precisely what should replace it, I'm not sure. Perhaps a more static amount of damage, reduced by defense (the current formula with a permanent number input in place of PR perhaps? A static 1000 or 1200 or something like that?)? Perhaps someone else has an idea that may work better? Zevox Very good idea. This removes the penalty to using characters that have been unlucky enough to have half their fights in the 1/4th chance of a win caused by FFA's/Hunters. The guild system needs to be playable by all characters. It is a neat draw and a nice source of rp.
Caterane 12-23-06, 09:39 AM	I like the idea to remove the option to convert a GAP to a CAP. I'd like to have the buy CAP option stay because it's something that has a new use for money. We could up it to 2000 gp. Another idea would be to say that interceptions do not cost a CAP. That way you can always intercept. The effect would be that there's now no reason anymore to save a CAP but that might not be bad. I think this could be a key to reduce the power of CAPs and Operations. As for the PR system, I agree that there needs to be something done for low PR characters. However, a fixed amount won't do because our whole ops system (defense points) is based on it. Perhaps there's a way to get both... We could say that every character has a base damage potential of 1000. This can be modified in certain ways. +100 for Mid-level, +250 for High Level, +500 for Epic Level, +250 for Great Renown. Create a Development called "Character Training" that adds +100 damage to a character and must be researched anew every time for every +100. Drawback: accessible only for researching guilds and I don't think EDU needs another boost. Or... As above but instead of a development, you process guild points (REC probably but they're already very useful) to "Train Operator". New Rooms, one for each operation type: War Room, Espionage Center, Propaganda Room. Each such room adds +100 damage to operations of that kind. Or... As room but structure instead. The main difference is that they can now be attacked while rooms are immune to operations. Personally, I like the rooms option best.
Caterane 12-23-06, 09:46 AM	I think I'll start with the first proposals to improve the guild system. If you have ideas on your own, please state them here (especially about those new multiquests or Capture the Flag things) Remove Winning Conditions. There'll come a time when all districts are taken. I think there should be a way to play on peacefully if all guilds wish to do so. We can always invent new character options to keep the game interesting even in times of peace. Destroying a guild to kick it out still must be in there. Headhunt Staff: This is a Peaceful Operation but its mechanic and offensive nature makes it more of an Intrigue Operation. I'll propose to move it there. Uniform Staff: Atm, every structure and HQ has its own staff. I propose to make it all one kind of staff. It's easier to track. Staff can be reassigned to another structure with a Free Action or GAP. I'd say 10 Staff per week with a Free Action. New Structure Upgrade: In order to make structures more secure against operations, we could add a new upgrade (requires a structure slot, like a facility) that adds +1 EL to the miniquest. As a new development, this can be increased to +2 EL. This is also in line with the opening of higher leagues because once there are ECL 15 characters, the EL 9 structure won't be too impressive. Para-Military Groups. We need to define their reactions better. When do they attack? How much damage do they do? Can you prevent that? Rioters deal 10*EL each week automatically. We can use this. Errands have a great game mechanic. I hope to find more uses for it. Example: "Ressource Gatherer", either room or development, adds +10% to ressources gained with errand. Unique Guild Boni. A prestige point system. Gain Prestige Points for certain actions or as rewards or whatever. With these points you can buy guild traits from a list (like greedy, honorable, lucky, etc) which have certain effects, like Greedy: gain +X% income. Additionally, those traits interact with other traits, like honorable and tricky could oppose each other, ie guilds with these traits gain a NEG penalty against each other.
Vathelokai 12-23-06, 10:41 AM	Troop combat (regiments) slight dislike -if it could be countered without the defender needing their own troops, it would improve to indifferent. Having a "Winner" at the "end" moderate dislike -it's motivational, but there are other motivations. D&D is not that kind of game, and the guild system should reflect that. Having an economic system based on at least one resource (e.g. gold moderate like -it's fun to build things up, especially since characters don't get any kind of bonus from building their own homes or developing non combat items. Having a system where previous successes and setbacks affect future potential slight like -there should be a minimum potential threshold. Using territory and expansion (limited space) moderate like -I think once things get too cramped we could expand the map. Using single-player (mini)quests moderate like -they're great for advancing story, especially individual character stories. Using multi-player (mini)quests strong like -if only it were easier to get them done on time. Using intentional, direct combat between rival guild members slight like -good for story, allows realism. Using unintentional, direct combat between rival guild members moderate like -great for story, slightly less realism. Using skill-based conflicts between guild members (i.e. Contests, Covert Ops) strong like -this is the closest to what my home games are like. Multiple organizations only revert to open conflict because of theme or as a last resort. Using conflicts that are neither normal combat nor opposed rolls (e.g. obstacle courses, PvM contests, Capture the Flag, etc.) strong like -the more non-violent, non-confrontational options the better. Being able to deal direct damage to an enemy guild indifferent -keeping with the setting, the nimbus should repair such things rather quickly. It should be more like shutting down a structure, than damaging it. Being able to completely eliminate an enemy guild moderate dislike -dosn't keep with the D&D themes that I like. Organizations are based on membership. Even without buildings they should continue. Since the nimbus stops the extermination of members, I feel it dosn't fit our setting. Having the guild begin with different strengths/weaknesses based on theme strong like -every guild should be thematic and unique. Random events that are significantly helpful or harmful moderate like -they should have the ability to change the course of the game, but not determine outcomes. Random events that are minimally helpful or harmful strong like -makes the world seem alive Random events that don't necessarily benefit or harm any particular guild strong like -makes the world less centered around the guilds. World Event quests could require at least two characters. slight like -each world event could have it's own criteria; some solo, some pair, some party, some non-caster only, some evil only, etc. -I like the idea of frequent world events. They're good for setting and just fun. Some of the "non-battle" challenges could be multi-player, although we'd have to hash out the nature of those challenges first. moderate like -the more non combat challenges the better. We could also use more operations that aren't offensive in nature. strong like -I want my guild to be able to act without offending other guilds. Notes I think opening the para-militarys to be attacked by non troop means is great. Going after the church of Denth by covert means would be fun. Long ago there was an idea to have a 'computer' player in the guild game that just did operations against whoever was the strongest at any given time. I think some method of having all the npc groups act would make things better. Perhaps each NPC group has 4 possible actions (1 being nothing), and the guild lord just rolls what they do every week. They would have static stats based on their CR. Also, allowing non guild characters to participate in the guild game is a good idea. There are rules in the dmg for buying houses and such. They shouldn't get CAPs ro anything, but having the ability to do something would be fun for many.
Abyssal Stalker 12-23-06, 04:12 PM	Para-Military Groups. We need to define their reactions better. When do they attack? How much damage do they do? Can you prevent that? Rioters deal 10*EL each week automatically. We can use this. I think it would be nice if Para-Military Groups would have an effect on the characters. I haven't figured how to determine when they attack, but when they do so, the characters would need to defend their guild. (I don't know if this is already in the rules. If it is, just ignore this.) For example: the "attack" of the PMG is announced this week. Next week one of the guild members must "intercept" their attack, meaning a MQ to stop them. Just like intercepting another guilds attack, but this time the attack isn't based on other guild's actions but instead on a somewhat random and partly preset condition. If the attacks are based on partly random method, these situations would require reacting.
Caterane 12-23-06, 04:52 PM	Wow, nice idea there! That would bring PMG to life. So a group can send an operator of an ECL equal to their strength. It attacks the guilds with the alignment farthest away from them and/or closest to their district (we'd need a pattern). Such NPC operations can be intercepted by the targeted guild. Sicne there's no MQ for NPCs, the interception is the MQ but it therefore needs no CAP. Technically it's a monster fight.
Zevox 12-23-06, 04:56 PM	Another idea would be to say that interceptions do not cost a CAP. That way you can always intercept. The effect would be that there's now no reason anymore to save a CAP but that might not be bad. I think this could be a key to reduce the power of CAPs and Operations. Interesting idea - the only issue I could see is that the lack of motivation to save CAPs may lead to problems when the monthly competitions come around, if everyone is loading on errands all the time. Otherwise, sounds like a pretty good idea. We could say that every character has a base damage potential of 1000. This can be modified in certain ways. +100 for Mid-level, +250 for High Level, +500 for Epic Level, +250 for Great Renown. Except for the great renown part, I'd be fine with this (again, that'd mean more powerful operators dealing more damage all other again, just with a preset amount and it only counting for those with PR 1500+). It does however seem as though what Mitza mentioned about the Guild game being playable by everyone is slightly hurt if lower-level characters are made less useful like this. Create a Development called "Character Training" that adds +100 damage to a character and must be researched anew every time for every +100. Drawback: accessible only for researching guilds and I don't think EDU needs another boost. Or... I think the drawback you listed is enough for me to say I'd prefer we go another route for this. As above but instead of a development, you process guild points (REC probably but they're already very useful) to "Train Operator". Blech, no thanks. That'd mean whoever can produce/process the most of whichever point is chosen has an easy edge in that regard. New Rooms, one for each operation type: War Room, Espionage Center, Propaganda Room. Each such room adds +100 damage to operations of that kind. Or... Now thats not a bad idea. Equally accessible to everyone, and works for all characters. Only drawback is that there are already so many rooms that even Guildhalls fill up fast. Even so, I'd support that. As room but structure instead. The main difference is that they can now be attacked while rooms are immune to operations. Eh, I think I like rooms better. Outposts/Chapter Houses/etc may fill up fast, but districts do so faster. And I don't think theres any real need for these to be attackable. Go with rooms I say. Headhunt Staff: This is a Peaceful Operation but its mechanic and offensive nature makes it more of an Intrigue Operation. I'll propose to move it there. Sounds good to me - definitely seems to fit there better. Uniform Staff: Atm, every structure and HQ has its own staff. I propose to make it all one kind of staff. It's easier to track. Staff can be reassigned to another structure with a Free Action or GAP. I'd say 10 Staff per week with a Free Action. *shrugs* Works for me I suppose, though I can't help but see the irony of the fact that we specifically changed it from this a while back to make it more realistic. Oh well. New Structure Upgrade: In order to make structures more secure against operations, we could add a new upgrade (requires a structure slot, like a facility) that adds +1 EL to the miniquest. As a new development, this can be increased to +2 EL. This is also in line with the opening of higher leagues because once there are ECL 15 characters, the EL 9 structure won't be too impressive. [/list] Considering the rule that requires them to be EL=ECL at minimum already in place, this seems a bit redundant, don't you think? Para-Military Groups. We need to define their reactions better. When do they attack? How much damage do they do? Can you prevent that? Rioters deal 10*EL each week automatically. We can use this. Damage calculation sounds good. Weekly attack, no way to prevent it if you're in their district - seems fair enough to me. Though I do think Vath and Abyssal are onto something with the idea of making them more fluid in interacting with the Guilds. I'll see if I can brainstorm something to go with that. Unique Guild Boni. A prestige point system. Gain Prestige Points for certain actions or as rewards or whatever. With these points you can buy guild traits from a list (like greedy, honorable, lucky, etc) which have certain effects, like Greedy: gain +X% income. Additionally, those traits interact with other traits, like honorable and tricky could oppose each other, ie guilds with these traits gain a NEG penalty against each other. Hm, seems like a rather over-complicated add on just to give unique bonuses to each Guild if you ask me. I'd rather just give each Guild an appropriate one of said traits personally (e.g. EHTC - Greedy, CEF - Honorable, LOY - Persuasive, etc.). Keep it simple - the system is complicated enough as is. Zevox
MindWandererB 12-23-06, 06:50 PM	I like the idea to remove the option to convert a GAP to a CAP. I'd like to have the buy CAP option stay because it's something that has a new use for money. We could up it to 2000 gp. Another idea would be to say that interceptions do not cost a CAP. That way you can always intercept. The effect would be that there's now no reason anymore to save a CAP but that might not be bad. I think this could be a key to reduce the power of CAPs and Operations. As for the PR system, I agree that there needs to be something done for low PR characters. However, a fixed amount won't do because our whole ops system (defense points) is based on it. Perhaps there's a way to get both... We could say that every character has a base damage potential of 1000. This can be modified in certain ways. +100 for Mid-level, +250 for High Level, +500 for Epic Level, +250 for Great Renown. Create a Development called "Character Training" that adds +100 damage to a character and must be researched anew every time for every +100. Drawback: accessible only for researching guilds and I don't think EDU needs another boost. Or... As above but instead of a development, you process guild points (REC probably but they're already very useful) to "Train Operator". New Rooms, one for each operation type: War Room, Espionage Center, Propaganda Room. Each such room adds +100 damage to operations of that kind. Or... As room but structure instead. The main difference is that they can now be attacked while rooms are immune to operations. Personally, I like the rooms option best.Rooms are good. Problem is that the cap goes up too high. But then, defense is 250/room (although it's district-specific). Great Renown is bad, as Zevox said. I'd rather not go with level, either, since it's still sightly unbalanced (in favor of CEF again). If there's no reason to save CAPs again, we have two problems. One: there still isn't enough to do with CAPs that isn't hostile, and two: certain reactions (like the Contest, or World Event intercepts) need to have a limit. Wow, nice idea there! That would bring PMG to life. So a group can send an operator of an ECL equal to their strength. It attacks the guilds with the alignment farthest away from them and/or closest to their district (we'd need a pattern). Such NPC operations can be intercepted by the targeted guild. Sicne there's no MQ for NPCs, the interception is the MQ but it therefore needs no CAP. Technically it's a monster fight.I'd like to see this as being a bit more flavorful. For instance: Slightly random or variable EL. Assassinating their leader is the group's EL--they send the leader on all their operations? Perhaps it's just always an NPC of a fixed class (like druids for the Initiates, psions for the Way, and so on), with a CR equal to that of the interceptor. Slightly random target. You may be the closest and the most hostile, but they might not target you. Some kind of weighting would be nice--I can use my stats background to come up with an appropriate formula.
Caterane 12-24-06, 04:03 AM	Well, higher-level characters should be better. After all, they require better rooms. Especially once you want High or Epic you need to invest badly into it. They should not be just characters who cover different ELs. Additionally, +100 damage is not really game breaking. Against a district with +250 defense, it jsut deals 80 damage more. I also think Great Renown should make a difference! Again, the damage is not game-breaking. Comparing it to what we have now, it'd be a huge difference! I'd almost say Failure PCs gain -100 damage. Operation Rooms add +100, Guard Posts +250. Guard Posts are district specific while Operation Rooms are global but Guard Posts work against all Ops while Operation Rooms only work for one Ops type. I think that it evens out. Let's get on to the next points. - Unique Guild Stuff - NPC Operations - More peaceful CAPs
Hirumajoe 12-24-06, 12:00 PM	Well, higher-level characters should be better. After all, they require better rooms. Especially once you want High or Epic you need to invest badly into it. They should not be just characters who cover different ELs. There are two point of views to look at this from. The role playing game and the strategy game view. In the role playing game view, this makes perfect sense. Low level characters save small villages, Epic level characters bring down world spanning evil empires. They operate on different scales. However, in the strategy game game case, unless once you build those high and epic level rooms they're automatically filled with appropriate level characters, its not going to balanced due to metagame reasons. Its essentially an advantage to those guilds whose concepts mesh the best with higher level characters that the arena already has. Fundamentally, player characters are a resource in the guild system. However, they haven't been balanced the way gold or the various guild trait points like NEG and LEI have been. Does a guild filled with 10 ECL 3 characters stand a chance against (or impact the game world in the same way) a guild filled with 10 ECL 10's? Unless there's a way for a guild master to add whatever ECL characters he wants and needs, it can't be balanced. And balance is one of the fundamental tenants of a fun strategy game. At the end of the day, this may be fine, if people are willing to play more in the roleplaying mindset rather than the strategy game mindset. But everyone should realize that the supply of characters and their impact on the guild system is not balanced in the current incarnation.
MindWandererB 12-26-06, 01:00 PM	I also think Great Renown should make a difference! Again, the damage is not game-breaking. Comparing it to what we have now, it'd be a huge difference! I'd almost say Failure PCs gain -100 damage.It's not game-breaking, but it's an advantage that there's no way to "buy." CEF has a bunch of Great Renowns, other guilds have one or two. It's really not fair. Besides, what does "Great Renown" mean? It's a reputation tag. Are more famous characters more adept at setting fires? I don't think so.
Caterane 12-26-06, 07:38 PM	No but they are obviously more dangerous, more lethal. This should be reflected in additional damage. We're making a huge leap from PR based to a flat 1000 base which is more than enough to allow for some room for modifiers. Until we have some better mechanics for reputation tags than +2 leadership we should use opportunities to make them meaningful.
MindWandererB 12-26-06, 07:49 PM	My thinking is exactly the opposite: we have the great renown tags because of the Leadership feat. There's no other reason for them, nor should there be. Those characters are already harder to beat in a fight; that's enough advantage. I'll agree that other modifiers might be a good idea, but not that one. It seems that the 2 CAP/mission rather than 2/character has met with general approval. I'll add it to the rules.
Zevox 12-27-06, 01:18 AM	I'm with MWB on the Great Renown issue - hell, the only reason I've never complained about the +2 leadership it gives is because its a core rule. If it weren't for that, I'd say it should be for bragging rights only. I do not believe it should grant any other benefits, since its obvious that anyone capable of getting that tag has no need to be made even more powerful, or more useful to their Guild - they already are both more so than any characters who aren't Great Renown. Zevox
MindWandererB 12-27-06, 02:32 AM	I'm thinking about the new forms of challenge and PMG hostilities, and I'm thinking they could be combined. Each week, there could be about a 25% chance of a "special challenge." These challenges could include: Paramilitary group attacks! A random group attacks a guild. The target guild is determined by the following weighting: 10 - # of intervening districts to closest district - attitude categories above Hostile. For instance, if CEF and LOY were the only two guilds remaining, and the group in Yurynwood attacked, CEF would be weighted 10 - 3 (intervening districts) - 0 (Hostile) = 7, while LOY would be weighted 10 - 0 (adjacent district) - 1 (unfriendly) = 9. 1d16 would be rolled, so CEF would be attacked on a roll of 1-7, and LOY on 8-16. The target guild could send any character(s) they liked on the interception, and the enemy NPC would be matched. Each PMG would have a class and race associated with them, and the NPC would be a member of that class, of appropriate level. Monster plague! A horde of monsters has invaded Gladius. A monster is rolled completely randomly on the encounter tables (EL 1d8+2). The EL of this challenge is defined as the monsters' CR+2. (CR 1 monsters might appear, if multiple monsters are rolled; the number is irrelevant for this situation). Up to four guilds may participate in the hunt; if five or more sign up, the participants are chosen by initiative check. The battle begins with six of these monsters on the map, at random coordinates (reroll if inside an obstacle). When one is defeated, another manages to find its way into the area (again, at random coordinates). This continues for 30 rounds or until all PCs are slain. Most kills wins the challenge. Reward is similar to that of a Contest, plus cash or resources. Treasure hunt! A random EL (3-11) is declared. As above, up to four guilds can participate. At the start of the challenge, 12 treasures are hidden at random locations on the map. Gathering up a treasure is a full-round action that provokes, and each weighs 20 lbs. The PC must bring the treasure back to their starting box for it to count. Each treasure is worth 100 gp to the guild. (Or, alternatively, is a 100 gp gem or work of art.) Capture the Flag: As above, but there is only one treasure, at the center of the map. Collecting it takes 3 consecutive full-round actions that provoke. King of the Hill: A region at the center of the map is designated as "the hill." Winner is determined by the number of rounds, out of 30, for which your character is the only character occupying that area. These are very rough ideas, as you can tell. And some of them would be a lot of work for a pitlord. But they have a lot of potential to be fun.
Caterane 12-28-06, 11:53 AM	I went ahead and made some of the modifications that were undisputed so far. Uniform Staff. There's now only 1 type of staff out there. It still needs to be assigned to a structure but it can be moved with a Free Action. Headhunt Staff is now an Intrigue Operation. Conscripts are now also technically the staff. Any conscript lost in a battle is one staff less after the battle. Conscripts do not regenerate like regiments but must be rehired as staff. That mechanism makes it clearer how conscripts work. A new countermeasure that increases the EL of the structure or HQ where it is build in by 1. It needs Production Points. I called it Impr.Security System; I'm sure you have a better name for it. The Victory Conditions are on hold. I don't want to remove them from the Guildhall yet until we've completely discussed that but for now, there's no victory condition other than eliminating all guilds (which need not necessarily become reality). I've also added 2 Operation Rooms for HQs which increase the damage done on operations. A third room increases opposed rolls.
Caterane 12-28-06, 12:14 PM	I'm thinking about the new forms of challenge and PMG hostilities, and I'm thinking they could be combined. Each week, there could be about a 25% chance of a "special challenge." These challenges could include: Paramilitary group attacks! A random group attacks a guild. The target guild is determined by the following weighting: 10 - # of intervening districts to closest district - attitude categories above Hostile. For instance, if CEF and LOY were the only two guilds remaining, and the group in Yurynwood attacked, CEF would be weighted 10 - 3 (intervening districts) - 0 (Hostile) = 7, while LOY would be weighted 10 - 0 (adjacent district) - 1 (unfriendly) = 9. 1d16 would be rolled, so CEF would be attacked on a roll of 1-7, and LOY on 8-16. [I think we can make this both more realistic and easier for you in that we say that friendly guilds are excempt from that roll. It would be utterly illogical for a PMG to attack their fanatic ally. So you just check Hostile, Unfriendly, and Indifferent Guilds. The modifier needs to be adjusted a bit though. I also think we should remove the distance modifier since it's still one city, not the other end of the world. That way, every group plays an important part, not just those adjactent to you] The target guild could send any character(s) they liked on the interception, and the enemy NPC would be matched. Each PMG would have a class and race associated with them, and the NPC would be a member of that class, of appropriate level. [Sounds good] Monster plague! A horde of monsters has invaded Gladius. A monster is rolled completely randomly on the encounter tables (EL 1d8+2). The EL of this challenge is defined as the monsters' CR+2. (CR 1 monsters might appear, if multiple monsters are rolled; the number is irrelevant for this situation). Up to four guilds may participate in the hunt; if five or more sign up, the participants are chosen by initiative check. The battle begins with six of these monsters on the map, at random coordinates (reroll if inside an obstacle). When one is defeated, another manages to find its way into the area (again, at random coordinates). This continues for 30 rounds or until all PCs are slain. Most kills wins the challenge. Reward is similar to that of a Contest, plus cash or resources. [The idea is nice but it doesn't work technically since you cannot say who killed whcih monster when more than one damaged it. Even a bane spell has an effect on the demise of a monster. And of course, since the EL is fixed, there's no reason not to send your highest ECL PC. The idea with the monster plague is very nice though and with a better mechanic, we can employ it. Perhaps an Errand: Monster Hunt that results in a monster fight with a special reward if successful?] Treasure hunt! A random EL (3-11) is declared. As above, up to four guilds can participate. At the start of the challenge, 12 treasures are hidden at random locations on the map. Gathering up a treasure is a full-round action that provokes, and each weighs 20 lbs. The PC must bring the treasure back to their starting box for it to count. Each treasure is worth 100 gp to the guild. (Or, alternatively, is a 100 gp gem or work of art.) [I don't get that. What's the challenge here? To gather as many treasures as possible? And the EL? Again, this can be made an Errand although I'm not sure how we can make this work smoothly] Capture the Flag: As above, but there is only one treasure, at the center of the map. Collecting it takes 3 consecutive full-round actions that provoke. [Hm. I'd say you have to hold it for some rounds instead of retrieving it as 3 full-around actions (it's not Excalibur is it?). Perhaps 10 conscecutive rounds in your home box.] King of the Hill: A region at the center of the map is designated as "the hill." Winner is determined by the number of rounds, out of 30, for which your character is the only character occupying that area. [And how do you get someone out of the area? Bullrush is not a popular feat and you can enter the area on your turn again. Perhaps we can make it work differently. The one who was there first gains the Round Count as long as he is in there. He has to be chased off or defeated so that the counter jumps over to the next one who entered the hill.] These are very rough ideas, as you can tell. And some of them would be a lot of work for a pitlord. But they have a lot of potential to be fun. ...
Abyssal Stalker 12-28-06, 12:17 PM	Paramilitary group attacks! A random group attacks a guild. The target guild is determined by the following weighting: 10 - # of intervening districts to closest district - attitude categories above Hostile. For instance, if CEF and LOY were the only two guilds remaining, and the group in Yurynwood attacked, CEF would be weighted 10 - 3 (intervening districts) - 0 (Hostile) = 7, while LOY would be weighted 10 - 0 (adjacent district) - 1 (unfriendly) = 9. 1d16 would be rolled, so CEF would be attacked on a roll of 1-7, and LOY on 8-16. The target guild could send any character(s) they liked on the interception, and the enemy NPC would be matched. Each PMG would have a class and race associated with them, and the NPC would be a member of that class, of appropriate level. I think that you are on the right tracks here. My idea was that the method that decides whether a PMg attacks or not must be so that it is impossible to calculate the exact time of the attack beforehand. I think that PMGs with a friendly attitude towards a guild shouldn't attack them. I'm not quite familiar with the attitude system, but I think it should be the key here, along with the location of the PMG. Maybe something like: -The attitude of a PMG doesn't change, if the guild is more than one district away from the PMG -The attitude of the PMG goes worse if the guild occupies the neighbour district or the PMG's district and keeps changing unless the guild negotiates with the PMG -There should be a way to affect a PMG's attitude towards other guilds. Agitation or something like that. -A PMG shouldn't attack a guild they are friendly with -A random roll should decide if a PMG acts or not, something like a 10% chance per guild that the PMG is hostile with and a 50% hop if they have been attacked the previous week. So if Black Hands are hostile towards TLT and LOY, and LOY would have attacked them last week, they would have a chance of 70% to act this week. Then the target would be decided by a method close to what MWB suggests.
MindWandererB 12-28-06, 12:45 PM	Okay, so for the PMG attack, how about this: Weighting: 1 for Indifferent, 3 for Unfriendly, 5 for Hostile. Doubled if you have a structure in their district, tripled if you have a headquarters (or upgrade, but not an outpost) in their district. Chance of attack: Flat 25% chance of having any sort of PMG attack at all. Two options thereafter: Either add all the weightings of all groups to all guilds and roll from that table (which would make it so that PMGs that hate more guilds are more likely to attack), or just make it equal chances for each PMG (and if they are friendly to everyone, there's no attack at all). The second option would make my life much easier. It's also not stated in the rules that attacking a PMG worsens their attitude toward you. This should be a given. Re: Monster hunts: I really want to get away from the standard battle formats for this. There are enough reasons to get into a standard monster fight. I don't think it would be horrible to say that the deathblow gets the credit for the kill, "vulturing" tactics are a perfectly legitimate strategy in such an oddball challenge. It wasn't clear, but when I said that the EL of the encounter = the monsters' CR+2, I meant that the participating PCs had to match that EL as normal (so basically, +/- 1 ECL, since they get only one participant and no monster handicap). Re: Treasure hunt: The idea here was that each treasure is worth an award, and there isn't any "winner" or "loser" per se. Re: Capture the Flag: I was thinking that the treasure might be buried (or sunken in the case of the forest or sewer map), and thus take a long time to collect. But perhaps holding it in the starting box for a few rounds might be a better idea. King of the Hill: Yeah, this is the weakest idea, IMO. Ideally, it should encourage the current "king" to fight back, rather than just turtling. Not sure how to achieve that.
Caterane 12-30-06, 11:13 AM	PMG: Actually, the first option is not much work. You have to create such a list only once, and only change a value if there's a change in attitude. You can always just roll on the same table otherwise.
Vathelokai 12-30-06, 03:22 PM	Ideas floating about... Cannot convert Gaps to Caps, but can buy 2 Caps per week -dislike; dosn't solve the problem of having too many caps Intercept without spending Caps -Great! After implementing more non attack actions for Caps this will work well. This would accentuate the need to have a harder limit on caps. Power ratings for damage start at base 1000 +100 for Mid-level, +250 for High Level, +500 for Epic Level, +250 for Great Renown. -I like it, but the great renown bonus is too high. A low lv great renown character would do as much damage as a high level character. Perhaps a +100, or +10%. Rooms to improve operations -good, more diversity in structures. Unique guild boni -I think comming up with a third set of guild points is a bad idea; there's too much book keeping as is. Other rewards could be good. Unique guild boni items (like what we are doing with the world quest), seem like the best way to do this. New Errands -First thing I think is that they need tweaking right now. All errands so far have been for taxes for two reasons; money is important for low power guilds and you have a guarentee as to what you are getting as a reward. The guild points are important, but the odds of getting the ones you need are very low (unless you need REC and have a 3rd lv. character). -Possible new errands (all temporary, but possibly 2 weeks): improve security at a location, increase number of conscripts in a location, process more guild points, activate an inactive structure/ruin, increase district trait by 1, rally believers, find items (like the mission 'explore ruin' but for non magical items), escort messanger (could be changed to an errand), Paramilitary group actions and stats and Non agressive Caps -I'm working on some ideas... be back later.
TheMagister 12-30-06, 08:03 PM	I'm no statistician (looks at MWB). How about it actually costing more CAPs to activate higher level characters? We could use the Bedroom ECL dividers as a starting place, for example: ECL 3-6 = 2 CAPs ECL 7-11 = 3 CAPs ECL 12-16 = 4 CAPs ECL 17-20 = 5 CAPs So if we leave the CAP system as-is (i.e. - the most recent incarnation: 2 CAPs + buy CAP for 1000 gp + convert GAP => CAP) then a guild like the CEF (since its the most powerful, I'll use it for the high-end example) could only activate ONE ECL 7-11 character (spend 2 CAP + buy 1/convert 1) or two ECL 3-6s (spend 2 CAP + buy 1 + convert 1). I don't like the idea of interceptions not costing CAPs, because it encourages offensive-minded thinking ("It's use-'em or lose-'em...might as well attack!"), and because it means that such an offensive-minded guild is never vulnerable to counter-attack if it gets caught with its pants down in a week where it mobilized a high-level or combination of high/low level character(s). Interceptions should still only cost 1 CAP, no matter what level the intercepting operators are. The more I think about it, the more I like it. This means that even LOY can mobilize two operations a week if it goes full out (two low level operations = 4 CAPs), while WAR can mobilize one high and one low (5 CAPs, but remains undefended) and CEF can do the same (with the same result). The quantity of high-level characters doesn't matter as much, and the pace slows way down (which everyone wants). Rules for the activation of regiments could be instituted that correspond with this method of thinking (low level regiments cost X REC, mid-level cost X+1 REC, etc.) where X is a manageable number, and the +1 mod is an integer that makes that many points pretty hard to lay your hands on (i.e. - you might have them but processing them is a problem!). What do you think?
MindWandererB 12-31-06, 03:31 AM	That actually turns into an advantage for guild with lots of low level members. Instead of CEF attacking with up to 5 ECL 10 characters, which no one can block because they don't have enough people to intercept, let alone CAPs, we have LOY attacking with some of their six ECL 3-4 characters--which is actually harder to intercept, because you need to match the ECL much more closely (no ECL 1-2 characters). In the current incarnation, the ECL of a character has little to do with their effectiveness. It determines their maximum effective miniquest EL, and affects attitude change, but that's it. There's little reason to make higher ECLs cost more CAPs, except to arbitrarily gimp the guilds that have them. And that particular chart is problematic because if/when we even do gave ECL 17 characters, a guild would have to both spend 1000 gp and give up their valuable GAPs just to use one. 99 times out of 100, they'd rather use a GAP to amass or attack with troops.
Hirumajoe 01-01-07, 05:18 PM	That actually turns into an advantage for guild with lots of low level members. Instead of CEF attacking with up to 5 ECL 10 characters, which no one can block because they don't have enough people to intercept, let alone CAPs, we have LOY attacking with some of their six ECL 3-4 characters--which is actually harder to intercept, because you need to match the ECL much more closely (no ECL 1-2 characters). I see your point, although I would argue any guild can choose to have lots of low level members. The reverse is not true. Can you or can you not a guild build an extra basic living quarters in their guild hall, which holds 5 low level characters for 2000 gp and 20gp a month. And if you can, then its trivial to intercept 6 ECL 3 characters. Since I can create 5 ECL 3 characters right this minute, have them added to the arena roster and then have them instantly added to any guild without a mini-quest. Ok, so it might take a week to get up and going. But if I, as a single player can intercept 5/6 of that swarm with the creation of a single structure, how is this in any way a handicap to the guilds that are currently heavy on the high end? They can *choose* to add low level members. Low level characters are easy to get. Its the high level ones which are hard. In the current incarnation, the ECL of a character has little to do with their effectiveness. It determines their maximum effective miniquest EL, and affects attitude change, but that's it. There's little reason to make higher ECLs cost more CAPs, except to arbitrarily gimp the guilds that have them. Umm... Didn't you just say in the first paragraph that CEF can send 5 unstoppable missions with 5 ECL 10 characters? How is that not a strategic advantage based on ECL? Actually looking at the rules, I see what you mean in regards to damage on operations and such. Thats based off of PR. But what about errands? Doesn't an ECL 10 character collect 3 times as much as an ECL 3 character? At the moment, as far as I can tell, guilds with only low level characters are arbitrarily gimped relative to high ECL guilds, if only because of interception issues. LOY could at most intercept a single ECL 10 character, as far as I can tell. So for example, they can't actually send a group on the world quest *and* intercept another guild. Is it me, or is that a strategic handicap influenced purely by RP and metagame reasons? Is LOY gimped arbitrarily? Is there any *strategic* game mechanism or path they can go down to fix their PC supply problem? Ideally, I'd like to see neither high ECL or low ECL characters being gimped. Such that any and all characters are likely to be sent on mini-quests or errands and that they all have equal chance at influencing Gladius. Which mostly likely means eliminating *all* dependance on characters' ECL. Whether thats worth the work necessary, I don't know. And that particular chart is problematic because if/when we even do gave ECL 17 characters, a guild would have to both spend 1000 gp and give up their valuable GAPs just to use one. 99 times out of 100, they'd rather use a GAP to amass or attack with troops. That I won't argue with. The specifics would have to be fairly carefully balanced between effectiveness, cost, and access. -------------------- I'm probably obsessing far too much over exact and precise balance between the guilds. But this is the thread for opinions. :) But, as it stands, I wouldn't play as a guildmaster in the strategic guild game. On the other hand, I like playing as member of the guilds... Since I've done more RP and miniquests in the last 3 weeks than I have in the last 3 months. So I do like the guilds. And I'd definitely prefer to have them around as is, as long as I'm not the one doing the winning/losing/strategizing.
MindWandererB 01-01-07, 05:28 PM	There is a limit on how many low-level characters you can recruit, unless the guildmaster makes them all himself. As for CEF's unstoppable characters: that's partially because of which characters they are. CEF has not only a large number of ECL 10 characters, they're all very good characters. Even if you have enough manpower to attempt the intercepts, succeeding is another thing altogether.
Hirumajoe 01-01-07, 06:10 PM	There is a limit on how many low-level characters you can recruit, unless the guildmaster makes them all himself. Oh didn't realize that, in which case, yeah, you are trading one bad situation for another bad situation. Browsing through I must of missed that limit. As for CEF's unstoppable characters: that's partially because of which characters they are. CEF has not only a large number of ECL 10 characters, they're all very good characters. Even if you have enough manpower to attempt the intercepts, succeeding is another thing altogether. That is a very true statement. However, the one (I.e. the player running them being good at tactics and going to win anyways) is not an excuse to let the other (the strategic advantage of simply being uninterceptable in the first place) slide. One applies to a specific instance of a game, and the other applies to the overall balance of the game, irrespective of the players. Basically, I consider a strategy game balanced if players of equal ability played all sides, then any side is equally likely to win. If we took the best player we have (i.e. Cat), cloned him, and put him in charge of all the sides, and ran the guild game a million times, would each guild win roughly the same amout of times? Given the current guild rosters of characters (ignoring the guild buildings, gold reserves, troops, etc) and the current guild system rules and taking the above scenerio, would you believe each guild would get roughly an equal number of "wins"?
TheMagister 01-01-07, 07:08 PM	I like reading his posts! He makes such good points... How about an option that allows the strengthening of existing Para-military groups? We can already create them, how about supporting them? I like italics!
Guildlords 01-31-07, 02:53 PM	Never responded to that last one: I like the idea of being able to bolster PMGs. Without that, they all die eventually. I propose that you can increase their EL by 2 with an operation equal to their new EL. The World Event obviously needs some discussion. It's just too darn hard. But then again, the prize is pretty good (or can be, depending on your guild's needs). I propose the following changes: The deadline be extended to 8 weeks. Only one interception be allowed per attempt, but unlike typical missions, that interception can be announced before any of the three weeks. If multiple guilds announce an intercept at the same time, only one actually does. The artifacts should perhaps be weaker. The +1EDU artifact would have allowed an EDU-less guild to build EDU-primary structures anywhere they liked, which could be a huge boon. I'm thinking perhaps something powerful but expendable, like an object that can be expended to instantly generate and process 2,000 PTS of a particular type, or create an effect of equal magnitude (like raising the attitude of a district and any PMG within it by 1000). This also has the advantage of being of more or less equal utility to all guilds, unlike the +1trait artifacts, which are clearly of more use to some (*coughCEFcough*) than others. The proposed timing would allow a guild to attempt for two weeks, be intercepted and fail, announce a new attempt, and still be able to complete the mission in time even if intercepted again. That seems much more appropriate to me, and makes it so that this failure by forced delay is only possible for a guild that gets a late start, or that has the bad luck to beat their first interception and then fail in week 3.
Erithmu 01-31-07, 08:09 PM	I would like to consider announcing world event intercepts on Wednesday and having those subject to intercepts by the guild, rather than as reaction on Tuesday. This is only in the case of a world event. This gives the feeling of the 'guild' as a whole going for the goal. Granted this would require intercepts to be announced while the party is on the first week, or second week if you are not expecting an intercept. It might be worth in this case for the intercept to still occur if the party completes the third week.
Caterane 02-01-07, 10:29 AM	Time to catch up on the guild stuff. There were some ideas floating around: Fixed Powerratings: 1000 Base, +100 Mid-level, +250 High, +500 Epic, +250 Great Renown, -100 Failure, +100 per associated Operation room. Problem: With the option to repair damage, however, it might quickly become futile to attack a structure or headquarter. You have to defeat a tough monster, likely an interception aswell and if you breach the defense points, you'd do like 500-1000 damage. One repair GAP repairs 500 hp. More if you supplement that with CON-PTS. Living Para-Military Groups: A flat 25% per week that one PMG attacks someone. The chance is based on the attitude towards the guilds based on Weighting: 1 for Indifferent, 3 for Unfriendly, 5 for Hostile. Doubled if you have a structure in their district, tripled if you have a headquarters (or upgrade, but not an outpost) in their district. Add all the weightings of all groups to all guilds and roll from that table. New Operation: Strengthen Para-Military Group by EL+2 Attacks on PMGs worsen your attitude towards them. Special Events: Like the world event, once in a while a special event happens which is not as lucrative but happens more often. This is something that happens to Gladius and the guilds can participate. It might result in battles with up to 7 players (plus allies) though which can be a hell to pitlord. Capture the Flag: You have to retrieve a flag from somewhere in the arena (maybe you have to find it first), then bring it to your starting box and remain there for 10 consecutive rounds to win. King of the Hill: One area on the map is designated the hill. To win, you have to remain in this area for 10 consecutive rounds. Treasure Hunt: Items of value are strewn across the map (their location must be known beforehand) and can be collected by bringing them to your starting box. Has to be developed some more though. Monster Hunt: Monster starts at EL-2, and everytime you kill one, a new one comes out with +1 EL. XP are divided evenly among everyone who participated in killing it. Problem with assessing this patricipation. World Event: Extend deadline to 8 weeks. Make a fixed list with artefacts. More Errands and Non-Aggressive CAP Uses: Ideas? The most important thing however is that we come up with more uses for gold. It's already the case that some guilds earn more than they can spend and money should definately be the most valuable ressource. CAP Actions Assign Errand: Free Escort Convoy: 250 gp Deliver Message: 250 gp Launch Operation: 1000 gp Embark on Mission: 100*ECL gp Join Guild Campaign: 5000 gp Sabotage Powercenter: 5000 gp Quest for a Global Event: 5000 gp CAP Reactions Instead of reserving CAPs for interceptions, interceptions cost money instead of CAPs. Proposal: 1000 gp per interception. Research & Negotiations Whenever you process RES-PTS or NEG-PTS you have to spend an equal amount of gold (like with all other point types too) Free-Actions Similar to CAPs we assign a price to each Free Action (except for Confirm Bookkeeping of course). Like 250 gp. MARCH! You have to pay gold to get your regiments involved in battle. The cost is equal to their cost in REC-PTS.
McJarvis 02-01-07, 10:42 AM	Research & Negotiations Whenever you process RES-PTS or NEG-PTS you have to spend an equal amount of gold (like with all other point types too) While NEG-PTS are useful, I don't think they are useful enough to merit spending gold. Which is more valuable-> 1,000 PTS of NEG processed or...(obviously I find all of these more valuable) 1,000 hp of a building added on Adding a room Researching 1,000 pts Etc, etc The main problem, of course, is that NEG seems to only be useful for defense(the district likes you, it defends you) and RP(in the end I'm not sure how much Guildmasters are expected to pay attention to the attitude of thier guild...? If they MUST abide by it, then of course Gp for NEG is good.(otherwise LOY might just make everyone fanatic about them & start waging war against them while pushing Political manuvers to escape the opposing guild being allowed to reciprocate.)
Caterane 02-01-07, 11:12 AM	Wether it's as useful as other GAPs is a different matter. Fact is that you need NEG sooner or later.
McJarvis 02-01-07, 11:43 AM	Wether it's as useful as other GAPs is a different matter. Fact is that you need NEG sooner or later. I think that if a gp cost is associated with it, it needs to be made more useful. It not having a gp cost associated with it is a large reason why I've set up LOY the way I have.(not incredibly high gp income, high NEG processing power. The plan is to use NEG whenever I need to save gp & use gp whenever I need to save NEG.)
Caterane 02-01-07, 01:24 PM	Sure. Since you're the official NEG-Guild now you could provide some ideas for improving NEG :)
MindWandererB 02-01-07, 03:21 PM	Time to catch up on the guild stuff. There were some ideas floating around: Fixed Powerratings: 1000 Base, +100 Mid-level, +250 High, +500 Epic, +250 Great Renown, -100 Failure, +100 per associated Operation room. Problem: With the option to repair damage, however, it might quickly become futile to attack a structure or headquarter. You have to defeat a tough monster, likely an interception aswell and if you breach the defense points, you'd do like 500-1000 damage. One repair GAP repairs 500 hp. More if you supplement that with CON-PTS. I also still stongly disagree with Great Renown/Failure making a difference. They're already more likely to succeed in the attack; why make them deal more damage? To be consistent with this, Great Renown characters should need higher-quality bedrooms, as well. (I'm not actually proposing that, just trying to add perspective.) Living Para-Military Groups: A flat 25% per week that one PMG attacks someone. The chance is based on the attitude towards the guilds based on Weighting: 1 for Indifferent, 3 for Unfriendly, 5 for Hostile. Doubled if you have a structure in their district, tripled if you have a headquarters (or upgrade, but not an outpost) in their district. Add all the weightings of all groups to all guilds and roll from that table. New Operation: Strengthen Para-Military Group by EL+2 Attacks on PMGs worsen your attitude towards them. I like all of these. A bit of setup time for the first one, but the idea is great. One consideration: PMGs have defensive abilities both on the small scale and on the large; perhaps not right away, but perhaps they should have the ability to launch an attack with troops as well? Of course, that would force all the guilds to develop armies for defense, but I think they will all have to eventually anyway.... Special Events: Like the world event, once in a while a special event happens which is not as lucrative but happens more often. This is something that happens to Gladius and the guilds can participate. It might result in battles with up to 7 players (plus allies) though which can be a hell to pitlord. Capture the Flag: You have to retrieve a flag from somewhere in the arena (maybe you have to find it first), then bring it to your starting box and remain there for 10 consecutive rounds to win. King of the Hill: One area on the map is designated the hill. To win, you have to remain in this area for 10 consecutive rounds. Treasure Hunt: Items of value are strewn across the map (their location must be known beforehand) and can be collected by bringing them to your starting box. Has to be developed some more though. Monster Hunt: Monster starts at EL-2, and everytime you kill one, a new one comes out with +1 EL. XP are divided evenly among everyone who participated in killing it. Problem with assessing this patricipation. Clearly these have a lot of details to be worked out, but I would like to try. The Monster Hunt would work better with more, weaker enemies (to make it more probable that they can be defeated by a single PC, and cut dowm on vulturing). More Errands and Non-Aggressive CAP Uses: Ideas? The most important thing however is that we come up with more uses for gold. It's already the case that some guilds earn more than they can spend and money should definately be the most valuable ressource. CAP Actions Assign Errand: Free Escort Convoy: 250 gp Deliver Message: 250 gp Launch Operation: 1000 gp Embark on Mission: 100*ECL gp Join Guild Campaign: 5000 gp Sabotage Powercenter: 5000 gp Quest for a Global Event: 5000 gp CAP Reactions Instead of reserving CAPs for interceptions, interceptions cost money instead of CAPs. Proposal: 1000 gp per interception. Research & Negotiations Whenever you process RES-PTS or NEG-PTS you have to spend an equal amount of gold (like with all other point types too) Free-Actions Similar to CAPs we assign a price to each Free Action (except for Confirm Bookkeeping of course). Like 250 gp. MARCH! You have to pay gold to get your regiments involved in battle. The cost is equal to their cost in REC-PTS. First of all, I still disagree that gold is as unnecessary as you claim. TLT is still using nearly every penny it makes, and adding to "necessary" expenses would be a burden. I think a better solution would be to increase monetary costs geometrically, the same way overbuilding in a headquarters costs 1x, then 2x, then 3x, and so on. For instance, adding multiple abilities to a Guardian could cost more (double for the 4th-6th increments, triple for the 7th-9th, etc). Although frankly, if we expect the guild game to go on for many months or years, I don't think we need to increase gold expenses at all, since although we'll be making a lot of money by then, expanding our bases will be incredibly expensive and we'll have a ton of upkeep to pay. Second, I think those prices are exorbitant! Escorting a convoy already costs a CAP, and frequently it's escorting only a little more gold than that! And 5000 to attempt the world event!? No one will try it at that price; it's just way too difficult. And the Free Actions need to be free; launching a convoy, regenerating damaged regiments, moving or equipping regiments, reassigning staff, escaping from prison, ransoming a prisoner... all of those should clearly be free or it's just not cool. Some of the others might cost a little, but we use those so seldom it's hard to judge. I also don't think money should be used for interceptions. It's hard to do 1000 gp worth of damage in an attack; it's often better to just let them succeed. It also makes it so that the wealthier guilds are more resistant to attack, which is just the kind of "rich get richer" philosophy that I want to avoid more than anything else. RES could cost money; that's not unreasonable. But one of the things I've observed by being a FAI guild is that it's really, really nice to have some options that cost money and some that don't. Ideally (perhaps not until guilds version 4.0), all resources will have that characteristic. We could do that with NEG now, and perhaps RES as well.
Caterane 02-01-07, 06:29 PM	Okay, let's resolve items we agree on quickly before it gets lost again. NEG (except Ransom Prisoner) and RES cost an equal amount of gold now. Also, the FAI Option Agitate Citizen costs gold too. (The remaining FAI options, Convert Citizen/Regiments/Ruins are there to safe money. In no way is the GAPs+PTS+Gold worth the amount of gold the believers or reduction in regiment upkeep brings in) March! costs gold equal to the troops activated in REC-PTS "Strengthen PMG" Operation PMG Operations against guilds I'm doing the changes in the rules except for the last point. Can you take care of the PMG Operations please? --------- I'd like to propose a cheaper set of gold costs then: CAPs Assign Errand: Free Escort Convoy: 100 gp Deliver Message: 250 gp Launch Operation: 500 gp Embark on Mission: 100*ECL gp (except 'Adventuring' which is Free) Join Guild Campaign: 2000 gp Sabotage Powercenter: 2000 gp Quest for a Global Event: 2000 gp Free Actions [Confirm Bookkeeping] Free [Deliver Message] 100 gp [Equip Regiment] Free [Move Regiment] Free [Regenerate Regiment] Free [Assign City Watch] 250 gp [Patrol District] 250 gp [Reassign Staff] 250 gp [Launch Convoy] 100 gp [Ransom Prisoner] Special (Ransom Cost) [Escape Attempt] Free [Execute Officer] 100 gp [Purchase CAP] 1000 gp
MindWandererB 02-01-07, 06:40 PM	Sure, I'll take care of the PMG operations. For the time being, they'll be PvM only; we'll add regiments later. As for those costs: Deliver Message (both CAP and Free) is way too much, since you need it for trade agreements. It needs to be so cheap as to be negligible for that purpose. Join Guild Campaign is similar; sure, the troops are nice, but the trade option is nohow worth 2000 gp. Sabotage Powercenter is rarely going to be worth it, either, since it'll cost you more than your opponents. And still, the reward for the Global Event had better be darn good--too good--to be willing to gamble 2000 gp on a low chance of completing it. Remember that I'm arguing for easier events with less powerful rewards. Reassigning staff should probably cost per unit (a retraining fee), but only if they are changing occupations. Reassigning them to a building they used to work at but got destroyed and rebuild should be free. Launch Convoy should either be free, or a percentage of the goods value being shipped (for goods). Perhaps 5% of shipped gold, PTS, or value of equipment, no more than 10%. For other convoys (prisoner or artifact), I could go aloing with 100. Edit: The PMG Attack part is done. The rules for it are in the Miscellaneous=>PMG section, and the Districts=>Map Information sblock contains the rolls and the race and class of aggressing NPCs. Note that I decided most of those races and classes somewhat arbitrarily, and I'm more than willing to entertain other options.
Caterane 02-02-07, 07:52 AM	I noticed you put the Freedom Fighters into the table but they've disbanded. You can leave them in there for now because they will resurface in Upper Merx albeit with different attitudes. Otherwise, great work. Edit: I think instead of always targeting the Guildhall, we should make them attack randomly (structures and HQs). It's not too difficult to secure your home district so that they cannot do considerable damage. Deliver Message (both CAP and Free) is way too much, since you need it for trade agreements. It needs to be so cheap as to be negligible for that purpose. [We're talking about 100 gp here] Join Guild Campaign is similar; sure, the troops are nice, but the trade option is nohow worth 2000 gp. [Sigh. 1000 then?] Sabotage Powercenter is rarely going to be worth it, either, since it'll cost you more than your opponents. [Sigh. 1000 then?] And still, the reward for the Global Event had better be darn good--too good--to be willing to gamble 2000 gp on a low chance of completing it. Remember that I'm arguing for easier events with less powerful rewards. [Sigh. 1000 then? If it costs money, we can extend the deadline further. Btw I'm arguing for a new mechanic: Special Events with lesser rewards (see above) but more frequent occurance, and leave the World Event as is] Reassigning staff should probably cost per unit (a retraining fee), but only if they are changing occupations. Reassigning them to a building they used to work at but got destroyed and rebuild should be free. [Agreed] Launch Convoy should either be free, or a percentage of the goods value being shipped (for goods). Perhaps 5% of shipped gold, PTS, or value of equipment, no more than 10%. For other convoys (prisoner or artifact), I could go aloing with 100. [We're talking about a mere 100 gp and we should make it as uniform as possible]
Abyssal Stalker 02-02-07, 08:52 AM	Looks like there's a mistake in the PMG table. Shadow Stars have an attitude of friendly towards EHTC, so they probably shouldn't be able to attack them at all, or? Is strengthtening a group the only way to improve their attitude?
Guildmaster (CEF) 02-02-07, 09:20 AM	You don't improve the attitude by strengthening them. You need to process NEG-PTS.
Zevox 02-02-07, 12:52 PM	@ MWB - Yeah, what Abyssal said. The Shadow Star Assassins are friendly with the EHTC, so there shouldn't be any chance of them attacking us. Time to catch up on the guild stuff. There were some ideas floating around: Fixed Powerratings: 1000 Base, +100 Mid-level, +250 High, +500 Epic, +250 Great Renown, -100 Failure, +100 per associated Operation room. Problem: With the option to repair damage, however, it might quickly become futile to attack a structure or headquarter. You have to defeat a tough monster, likely an interception aswell and if you breach the defense points, you'd do like 500-1000 damage. One repair GAP repairs 500 hp. More if you supplement that with CON-PTS. As MWB, I very much so disagree with Great Renown and Failure factoring in here. Otherwise, I'd be fine with it, though as your observation indicates it may be necessary to alter the numbers a little for the damage to be meaningful as time goes on. The most important thing however is that we come up with more uses for gold. It's already the case that some guilds earn more than they can spend and money should definately be the most valuable ressource. So we're basically looking to put a gp value on almost everything now? *sigh* I was afraid of that. No offense Cat, but from what I can see, only the CEF, PSI, and maybe TAO are really in the position you indicate. I know the EHTC is going to need a couple more structures before we're in that position, and MWB said TLT isn't exactly there either. Besides, there are still more expensive things out there for most of us to buy too (Grand Hall? Improvements of Chapter Houses to better structures? Walls?). So, yeah, not particularly a fan of this idea, though I imagine its going through in one form or another anyway. Zevox
SauroGrenom 02-02-07, 02:38 PM	I feel it's necessary to pipe up with my opinion on the whole issue of paying gold for everything a guild does. I think this idea sucks. First I don't think it will lend balance to the game. The effect will be that the most established and wealthy guilds will be more capable of everything. This dumps on the weaker guilds who are now only a few months behind in the wealth race. Second is that I don't want to keep track of new expenses every week and getting nothing in return. This idea increases my work load (accounting duties), decreases my fun factor, and results in no new options to increase fun. Third and most important is there are better ways of accomplishing the goal of making gp wealth have more uses. For example, you could allow people to spend more gold/GAP on constructions that don't make money (like walls or chapterhouse upgrades or unique structures). This just increases the guild's ability to spend money. Or you could allow guild to spend 5x the typical gold cost and get things that usually require points and gold to acquire. Or you could allow a guild to "buy" a multiplier that increases a point processing action by 2 or 3 fold depending on the amount of money spent. There's lots of ways to increase the options to spend money w/o pitching the whole guild system into an unnecessary mire of tracking and accounting gold cost for every little thing.
TheMagister 02-02-07, 02:41 PM	There's lots of ways to increase the options to spend money w/o pitching the whole guild system into an unnecessary mire of tracking and accounting gold cost for every little thing. Agreed. We should K.I.S.S. the guild system. Keep It Simple Stupid!
Caterane 02-02-07, 02:42 PM	I like your suggestions but could you elaborate them a bit more please?
SauroGrenom 02-02-07, 03:02 PM	Here are a few ideas: Just allow guild to spend 2x gp cost for an extra 1000 hp on the non-income earning structures. So the 1000gp/hp is for the first 1000hp on the building. Then pay an extra 2000gp/1000hp for the next 1000hp. Then pay an extra 4000gp/1000hp for the next 1000hp on the structure. So with 1 GAP the guild could pay 7000gp and build 3000hp of structures. Don't allow people to do this on structures that earn income, because that just allows the rich to get richer faster. But for structures like walls and chapter house upgrades and unique structures/district improvements. This allows you to build defenses a bit faster at increased cost. Or make a new technology that unlocks the ability to do what I describe above. Or allow a guild to "replace" a guild point cost with 5x the gp cost. So if I want to build a simple vault for my chapterhouse in gauterix, I can fork over 5000gp to replace the 1000 PRO points required for the item. The thing will cost me a total of 6000gp. Or make some new technologies that unlock that ability and change the gp cost multiplier. Or allow a guild to "throw money at the project" and get something done faster. Say that PSI want to research the super cool technology "Winning The Guild Game III". It costs 50,000 RES points, and we can process only 1000 RES points with one GAP. So allow us to spend 5000gp as a free action (or whatever) and buy a multiplier, say x3. This allows us to multiply the effect of our processed RES points by 3. So with 1 GAP and processing 1000 RES points we are now 3000/50,000 on the way to the new technology. Perhaps we could spend 9000gp for a 4x multiplier. Or make a new technology that unlocks this ability.
MindWandererB 02-02-07, 03:11 PM	Looks like there's a mistake in the PMG table. Shadow Stars have an attitude of friendly towards EHTC, so they probably shouldn't be able to attack them at all, or?Fixed... I think, but not they way you meant. I can't find any reason why the Shadow Stars had a Friendly attitude toward EHTC in the first place. Reduced to Indifferent. I feel it's necessary to pipe up with my opinion on the whole issue of paying gold for everything a guild does. I think this idea sucks. First I don't think it will lend balance to the game. The effect will be that the most established and wealthy guilds will be more capable of everything. This dumps on the weaker guilds who are now only a few months behind in the wealth race. Second is that I don't want to keep track of new expenses every week and getting nothing in return. This idea increases my work load (accounting duties), decreases my fun factor, and results in no new options to increase fun. Third and most important is there are better ways of accomplishing the goal of making gp wealth have more uses. For example, you could allow people to spend more gold/GAP on constructions that don't make money (like walls or chapterhouse upgrades or unique structures). This just increases the guild's ability to spend money. Or you could allow guild to spend 5x the typical gold cost and get things that usually require points and gold to acquire. Or you could allow a guild to "buy" a multiplier that increases a point processing action by 2 or 3 fold depending on the amount of money spent. There's lots of ways to increase the options to spend money w/o pitching the whole guild system into an unnecessary mire of tracking and accounting gold cost for every little thing.Heh... I may not agree with Sauro very often, but I certainly do this time. New GP expenditures definitely seem like the way to go. Some ideas: I like the idea of spending gold in place of points (perhaps 4x or 5x to duplicate the use of PTS--such as outsourcing your research at 5 gp/1 RES). Few of the nonstandard structures are worthwhile at this point--for instance, I figured out that the Monument takes 25 weeks just to pay for itself--so improved versions of those, or just better ones, might be nice. You could also improve efficiency of existing gp expenditures--for instance, where you could pay 1000 gp and a GAP to get something done now, perhaps you could accomplish twice as much with 3000-4000 gp and 1 GAP? Although I would worry that this might provide too much of an edge to the more successful guilds (rich get richer). Another, though more murky option, would be to increase the action potential of each guild. Perhaps by making the [BUILD] option not cost a GAP, or by allowing one "free" GAP per guild that involves one of their two guild traits (so CEF could [PREACH] or [NEGOTIATE] once per turn w/o a GAP). Or by adding a moderately expensive Guildhall room option that would give you this ability. I am still of the opinion that this isn't even a problem. CEF lacks a grand hall yet, and not only can they not afford one even if they had the space, but their expenses will increase by 50% when they do. They'll have no trouble spending money at that point, at least until they finish another structure or two. Then with overbuilding, upkeep of countermeasures and especially troops (good armies are crazy expensive to maintain--overbuilt barracks plus high-level troops plus officers and their overbuilt quarters plus equipment and overbuilt armories and stables and sick bays...), and the effort required to actually try to win the game, the budget could be well under control.
Zevox 02-02-07, 03:17 PM	Fixed... I think, but not they way you meant. I can't find any reason why the Shadow Stars had a Friendly attitude toward EHTC in the first place. Reduced to Indifferent. Er, pardon, but if memory serves, alignment determines the starting attitude of Para-Military Groups to Guilds, correct? Friendly for the same alignment (as with the Shadow Stars & EHTC - both LE), attitude lowered by 1 category per step of different alignment? Or did this get changed when I wasn't looking? Zevox
MindWandererB 02-02-07, 04:15 PM	Your memory is close, but off. This is the rule, and except for the addition of the last sentence, it has never changed: It is now up to the guild diplomats to make something out of this contact. If the alignment of guild and group match, the initial attitude of a group is indifferent. For every step the guild alignment is away from the group alignment, the attitude starts one step worse. The initial attitude always starts at minimum points. The group's initial attitude is determined based on the alignment of the guild when they first come into contact (through an operation, a mission, warfare, or by building in their district).
Caterane 02-03-07, 09:23 AM	Wow you guys are onto something! I like these ideas (although we should keep my ideas in mind when income starts to get out of hand). Still we should check the effects before we implement anything... Just allow guild to spend 2x gp cost for an extra 1000 hp on the non-income earning structures. Example: So the 1000gp/hp is for the first 1000hp on the building. Then pay an extra 2000gp/1000hp for the next 1000hp. Then pay an extra 4000gp/1000hp for the next 1000hp on the structure. So with 1 GAP the guild could pay 7000gp and build 3000hp of structures. Don't allow people to do this on structures that earn income, because that just allows the rich to get richer faster. But for structures like walls and chapter house upgrades and unique structures/district improvements. This allows you to build defenses a bit faster at increased cost. It would apply to... Special Structures (Fountain, Street Lights, etc). Since they cost only 1000 gp anyway, this would allow you to build multiple such structures with one GAP? Headquarter Augmentations (Keep, Fortress, Castle, etc) This cold lead to a quick expansion of your base. With 10,000 gp I can upgrade my base one step with 2 GAPs, instead of 5,000 and 5 GAPs. I'm sure that's worth the increased cost. Walls and Wall Upgrades (Gatehouse, Turrets, Towers, etc) Same here. With but a few GAPs you can make your headquarter an almost impenetrable bastion. For 2 GAPs and 10,000 gold you'd get... - Wooden Wall around a Fortress (1500) - Wooden Gate (500) - Gatehouse (1000) with 2 Wooden Porticulis (500) - Machicolation (1000) with Boiling Water (500) - 5 Turrets (5000) Do that again and you have 10 additional turrets for 15d8 damage a round. With 4 GAPs and 20,000. Normally such a formidable defense takes an eternity to build. On the other hand, without that you will never be able to build Iron walls or better for that takes years if you can spend only 1000/week. Chapter House Rooms and Facilities (Barracks, Chapel, etc) Again, 10,000 and 2 GAPs and you have 5 rooms. I like this idea but it's too cheap as it is. I think the increment should be a cumulative +2500. Example: 1000 gp <> +1000 hp 2500 gp <> +1000 hp 5000 gp <> +1000 hp -------------------- 8500 gp <> +3000 hp That way we can easily have it apply to pretty much anything. There can even be a new technology that reduces this multiplier. Or allow a guild to "replace" a guild point cost with 5x the gp cost. So if I want to build a simple vault for my chapterhouse in gauterix, I can fork over 5000gp to replace the 1000 PRO points required for the item. The thing will cost me a total of 6000gp. Awesome idea! It always bothered me that I can't even buy some stupid swords without having PRO or TRA. What does it do concretely? - Can you process any amount of points? - Do you have to have the points in your storage? Maybe we can make two different sets of functions: You pay 2.5 times the cost in gold to buy either Processing power or Guild Points. You pay 5 times the cost in gold to buy BOTH Processing and Guild Points. Example 1: you have 1000 Production Points in your storage (maybe from a IND district) but you have no facilities to process it. You could then pay 2500 gold to hire a company to do that for you, plus of course the gold cost the produced item costs itself. Example 2: you have a Production processing capability of 1000 PTS but your storage is empty. You could buy 1000 PRO-PTS for 2500 gp. Example 3: you have neither PRO-PTS nor can you process them so if you want to produce something worth 1000 PTS, you have to pay 5000 gp plus what the item itself costs. There should be a cap of 500 PTS you can generate/process in that way. Technology can expand that cap. And another technology might make it cheaper. Or allow a guild to "throw money at the project" and get something done faster. Say that PSI want to research the super cool technology "Winning The Guild Game III". It costs 50,000 RES points, and we can process only 1000 RES points with one GAP. So allow us to spend 5000gp as a free action (or whatever) and buy a multiplier, say x3. This allows us to multiply the effect of our processed RES points by 3. So with 1 GAP and processing 1000 RES points we are now 3000/50,000 on the way to the new technology. Perhaps we could spend 9000gp for a 4x multiplier. I think the square of the multiplier*1000 in gold. x2=4000, x3=9000, x4=16000. Plus a technology that reduces that. We should start carefully with such an option. Another, though more murky option, would be to increase the action potential of each guild. Perhaps by making the [BUILD] option not cost a GAP, or by allowing one "free" GAP per guild that involves one of their two guild traits (so CEF could [PREACH] or [NEGOTIATE] once per turn w/o a GAP). Or by adding a moderately expensive Guildhall room option that would give you this ability. I love this idea! Here's our unique guild bonus. We should limit it though. 2 Options... Once a week, you can process one of your guild traits as a Free Action but only up to the inherent bonus, in effect +500 / +250. So CEF could process 500 FAI or 250 NEG once a week. We could also say it's 4x the price in gold (here: 2000 gp for FAI, 1000 gp for NEG) Once a week, you can process one of your guild traits as a Free Action but you have to pay twice the cost points and quadruple gold. Say CEF could process 750 NEG-PTS it has to pay 1500 NEG from the storage and 3000 gold. That would definately make each guild more unique and more to what they should be. @Zevox: We only lifted the attitude for districts by one step, not for PMGs to who the guilds are rivals.
MitzaVolchenko 02-03-07, 10:50 AM	Simpler. That is my answer to the question this thread asks. I have finally gotten to where I sort of understand about a tenth of the new guild rules, and ya know what? It has become a monster. An absolute monster. Everytime I think I have something down, it changes again. One thing that I am four square against continuing is the xp/gold rewards for activations of characters that are being paid for by guild actions. This week Indivara ran into the double booking issue. I surrendered one fight and skipped the second because the absolute effect was that I could not complete the held over fight first and thereby legitimately fight the interception which in essence causes me to surrender the second which hands an ECL 9 credit for defeating an ECL 10 without a full fight. MWB picks up gold and exp without paying to activate a character and in a manner that would not normally be put into play. 2 ECL6's just picked up gold and rewards for defeating an ECL10. They paid nothing to activate the characters and they gain a huge bonus. Why didn't the other level 10 get sent on the intercept instead of the 6's? Answer, the 6's accomplish the same thing and actually benefit hugely from it. This has got to stop. It is dirty. It is wrong. The people that get to make the guild decisions are the only ones that benefit from this system as far as I can see...except the rp...and the rp can be had without giving advantages to the characters engaged in it. Make the guild game the optional extra it is supposed to be and remove the rewards that actually assist characters in the arena against non-guild characters. Please.
MindWandererB 02-03-07, 02:58 PM	Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that this all makes the [CONSTRUCT] => Build option pretty much worthless, except when applied to money-making structures (of which the map will be full before terribly long). It will need to be improved or altered to become viable. For instance, why pay 2 GAP, 3000 GP, and 1000 CON to build 2000 HP to a structure when you can pay 1 GAP and 2500 GP? Same goes for using your guild trait w/o a GAP. If TLT wants to use [CONSTRUCT] => Build, we pay 4000 gp for 500 HP? Absurd. I don't think this needs a multiplier at all; it's an extra expense, effectively a 3rd/4th GAP, that will cut down on overflowing treasuries. Of course, the "throw money at it" multipliers could still be used.
Vathelokai 02-03-07, 05:47 PM	I'm going to have to put my vote in with Mitza and Magister. We need to simplify and streamline things. We made a rule, then 2 rules to fix that, then 2 rules to fix those... et cetera. Time to dip out of this thread before I stick my foot in my mouth again. :)
MitzaVolchenko 02-03-07, 11:19 PM	FYI I printed all guild rules sections a few months ago. Comparing them to the system now is pointless. The similarity ends with the list of guilds...and even that is only similar with EYE being replaced by LOY. Vath, it is better to stick your foot in your mouth because you opened it wide enough to do so than get a foot applied to your backside because you didn't open your mouth.
MitzaVolchenko 02-07-07, 03:28 PM	New rules, again. These'll hurt a bit. They come into effect next week. * The following GAP actions now cost gold equal to the number of points spent: o [RESEARCH] => Research Development o [NEGOTIATE] => Befriend District o [NEGOTIATE] => Befriend Guild o [PREACH] => Agitate Citizen * [MARCH!] also costs gold, equal to the REC value of the troops involved. Hmm... that might be a bit steep, now that I think about it, but we'll see. * Paramilitary Groups can now be strengthened as well as weakened. The mechanic is pretty much the same: an operation with an EL equal to that of the group will raise their EL by 2. * Paramilitary groups will now occasionally attack the guilds, based on their attitude and with whom they share a district. 25% chance each week of an attack. They will send an NPC of fixed class and race but varying ECL; the targeted guild can intercept with anyone they like. If the agent gets through, they perform arson on a random structure. More changes are being considered. Alternatives to and fixes for the World Event are the most exciting; watch this thread for more info as it becomes finalized. Stop doing this! every on the fly rules change is one more aggravation to those that are trying to get any kind of handle on the thrice benighted system. I dare say that there is not even one single person Cat and MWB included that really understands all of the guild rules at this point. New (old) Topic This week saw me hit the breaking point where the guild mess is concerned. I actually sent a PM to Pitlords quitting. MWB did the right thing and asked for the removal of Besthirah's fight with Indi from the record, but this does not fix the problem. Cat has promised me that he will review the issues as soon as he has time (as in this weekend). I have taken that as a sign of possible progress and have not quit. My issue list for review, feel free to add to it: 1)Unfair advantage to guilded characters as they receive free quests which still earn them rewards. Note that I have a character on guild action at the moment. I am perfectly willing to spend my credits for the quest or take no personal rewards/losses if we are going to continue the 'double booking' system. 2)Rules changes, rules changes, and more rules changes. The changing of rules every time we turn around has got to stop. It is like playing chess where all of a sudden rooks get to move like rooks and knights. The guild game cannot survive becoming Fizz Bin (and anyone that points out that some moron actually extrapolated full rules to that game needs to get a life) . 3)Events. Could be fun. Could be exciting. Rules as written now, don't work. You don't have to play to win...just play to prevent others from winning. 4)Unfair advantage being given to guilded characters...I mentioned that one, didn't I? We are swiftly reaching the point of becoming a haves and have nots community. It worked great for the Russians, didn't it? Want to see what I mean? Grab a copy of Animal Farm...an hour's reading well worth the time. I am reserving judgement and counting on the CoCo community to actually give some serious thought to the rules as a whole rather than just what benefits their own interests. Wehave had some pretty major upsets in the past, and eventually things have worked out. I hope this will be the case going forward.
hogarth 02-07-07, 03:33 PM	Stop doing this! every on the fly rules change is one more aggravation to those that are trying to get any kind of handle on the thrice benighted system. There's one good thing that comes out of this -- ever since Cat started focusing his attention on tinkering with the Guild system, changes to the rest of the Core Coliseum have fallen drastically. That's all I care about! :D
MindWandererB 02-07-07, 03:52 PM	I dare say that there is not even one single person Cat and MWB included that really understands all of the guild rules at this point.Agreed. I don't catch Cat at it very often, but it does happen occasionally. And I'll be the first to admit that the regiment stuff is well beyond my understanding at this point. 1)Unfair advantage to guilded characters as they receive free quests which still earn them rewards. Note that I have a character on guild action at the moment. I am perfectly willing to spend my credits for the quest or take no personal rewards/losses if we are going to continue the 'double booking' system.True, to a certain extent. However, the alternative is to make people pay for things that don't benefit them in any way, either in credits or in activations (which are equal to credits or time). 2)Rules changes, rules changes, and more rules changes. The changing of rules every time we turn around has got to stop. It is like playing chess where all of a sudden rooks get to move like rooks and knights. The guild game cannot survive becoming Fizz Bin (and anyone that points out that some moron actually extrapolated full rules to that game needs to get a life) .The problem is that we are effectively beta-testing the game. With most games, you don't change the rules on the fly because the game ends and you can change the rules for next time. Since this game lasts years, we don't have that option. The result is changes on the fly. For my part, I do try to argue Cat into a minimum of these, but he's a hard man to argue with. 3)Events. Could be fun. Could be exciting. Rules as written now, don't work. You don't have to play to win...just play to prevent others from winning.Agreed. And that will be fixed the next time we run one, or at least we'll try to. I am reserving judgement and counting on the CoCo community to actually give some serious thought to the rules as a whole rather than just what benefits their own interests. Wehave had some pretty major upsets in the past, and eventually things have worked out. I hope this will be the case going forward.This is tougher than you make it sound. We all have ideas as to what would be fun, and we try to make this place fun. And none of us are very good at noticing when a rule is fun for ourselves, but for a minority of others. Ultimately, that call falls to the GM, for better or worse. Cat likes complex systems, and is positive that others will like them, too, once they get used to them. I started this thread so people could express their opinions about what they wanted out of the guild system. As you can see, there are several items on which the majority disagree with Cat, most notably the armies and the option to obliterate a rival guild. He has chosen to disregard those opinions at this time, mostly because changing them would involve revamping the rules from the ground up, and he already spent a lot of time on their current incarnation. I have high hopes for the next incarnation, but that won't happen until either we hold a revolution or someone wins. Based on the rules as they are, I'm guessing the former will happen first.
Caterane 02-08-07, 04:54 AM	Dear Mitza, from what I have read you disagree with the following points Missions should cost credits for the player involved. Guild Miniquests should count as their quest/level. Double-booking should be removed. Let me answer these in detail. One reason why Quests cost credits is because you reserve one questlord for you alone and if that'd be the only reason I would agree with you that you should pay aswell for a mission, basically for the "fun" you get. However, a quest is also beneficial to your character in that you gain a quest goal, be it an ally or the fulfillment of a prerequisite, which a mission doesn't share. It would be unfair if Joe gets an ally for his 3° (quest) while Marge comes out with nothing from her mission. Worse, if Marge fails her mission, she will not gain any rewards but has spent ressources ...and payed 3° for all this. That aside, there's an even more important point in not having missions cost credits: not everyone has or is willing to spend credits (especially if she comes out empty-handed at best). That would just not work. Guildmasters use 2 CAPs to send someone on a mission; they've already a short list of available characters (EL must fit, Player needs to have time, etc) and if we now set a credit cost for dangerous missions, I'm afraid that this list vanishes completely. What we can do is to 'fix' the only hole in my reasoning: that one player occupies one questlord by making it mandatory to send at least 2 players on a mission. If that helps our pitlords or just burdens our questlord with an additional character that would have been idle in the arena is a different question. The reason for not making them count as their quest/level is both lack of benefit and simplicity. Lack of benefit is that you don't gain anything out of a guild miniquest (unlike a regular miniquest where you can get allies etc). There's no reason why we should tax the player in that way. And why should the player agree to go on an operation that doesn't benefit him in any way when that means he cannot quest for another level? From ECL 3-10, you know how long it takes to get up there, you can quest 7 times. If the guild sends you on a mission and three operations there's not much left for your character and no one, including myself, would agree to waste quest slots on such things. You see it wouldn't work. Worse is the second reason, simplicity. Imagine a guildmaster has to check, in addition to all other stuff he has to take into consideration, if that character hasn't already quested that level. Extra work for the guildmaster. Pitlords and Guildlords need to confirm that too. Extra work for both board accounts. What happens if the character's CAP was announced on Jan 31 (to start on Feb 07) but on Jan 31 the character already miniquests? Abort the CAP and let it be wasted? Or another example: the character is on a quest when the CAP is announced, then the character dies on week 3 of the quest thus doesn't earn XP thus doesn't level up thus doesn't have a free quest slot for the CAP? That's overly complicated for no gain. I still don't see why you spend so much energy on that. Double-booking ONLY happens if (Example) on JAN 31 a CAP was announced (say an operation that starts on FEB 07) but the arena fight the character is in on JAN 31 is held over. That's a scenario that doesn't happen very often. I think 2-3 times during the last year. But IF that happens, we have to have a solution to that issue because the guild system is time-sensitive, arena fights ain't. What you call "Double-booking" is an emergency solution for a rare occurance, and you cannot rely and plan or exploit on that at all. I'm always glad if someone gets involved in the discussion, Mitza, but your points if pushed through complicate things, create holes that are currently fixed and would need to be fixed again, and all for no gain other than "equality" between two different system? I am even strongly convinced that the guild system gives you no advantage at all other than roleplaying. And that's what it should be all about. Finally I'd like to address the rules changes you and others have mentioned. You should know that we currently play this game for the first time and no one, not even I :D, can create a system that works on its first run. Games are being playtested. D&D was surely playtested thousands of times before it was released and even then they released a 3.5 Edition. But as MWB said, we cannot restart every time something pops up. While a normal game takes hours to complete, this system takes years. So we have to fix things as we go. Despite MWBs comment about me, I'm trying to keep these changes as few as possible. But the changes are for a very good reason! I have to consider the Core Coliseum as a board that exists 'eternally' which means the guild game that lasts only 2-3 years is vanishing beyond that eternal shadow. We now play the guildgame and improve it as we go in order to have a much more improved version once we're finished playing it (because someone won or a stalemate happened). We started this game with bathrooms, professions for our staff, no CAPs, a non-working economy system, and now we're beyond that. The system will not stay as it is ...maybe we'll remove the regiments in the future or improve this section so that everyone is delighted by it. We cannot say that now because we haven't really seen it in action. Enjoy the game now and know that every fix we make, every change we make, is a step to a perfect 4.0 Guild System. Without these changes we'll never get there.
TheMagister 02-08-07, 07:16 PM	{raises hand timidly} I'd like to point out that a character on a mission gains xp and gold that equal a quest's rewards. Quests are (in my opinion) easier to "win" because of the post-by-post nature of the battles compared to the "write tactics and let someone else interpret them" randomness of the arena. So what Mitza may be referring to (and forgive me for putting words into your mouth, M) is the ease with which the "Guild Club" members (i.e. - those involved in and running the guild game) quest each other up the ECL rankings. The inherent randomness of the Arena matches make it a more volatile environment for the leveling of a character, and the control allowed to quests/missions make them a "safer" environment. Now, I know that a character is limited to 1 quest/level. But is there any such limit on missions? TM
MitzaVolchenko 02-08-07, 09:00 PM	{raises hand timidly} I'd like to point out that a character on a mission gains xp and gold that equal a quest's rewards. Quests are (in my opinion) easier to "win" because of the post-by-post nature of the battles compared to the "write tactics and let someone else interpret them" randomness of the arena. So what Mitza may be referring to (and forgive me for putting words into your mouth, M) is the ease with which the "Guild Club" members (i.e. - those involved in and running the guild game) quest each other up the ECL rankings. The inherent randomness of the Arena matches make it a more volatile environment for the leveling of a character, and the control allowed to quests/missions make them a "safer" environment. Now, I know that a character is limited to 1 quest/level. But is there any such limit on missions? TM Pretty close, TM. My solution is allow double booking and all guild actions are out of cycle, frozen, and treated as if they are fight one so held to 1/3rd. They cost and gain the player nothing. No more easy level up for the 'Guild Club.' No more never seeing the arena or another PC unless you choose to or someone intercepts. By doing that the credit cost is eliminated, the benefit except for the guild's gain is eliminated. This way only those that are actually interested in the guild game have any involvement or interaction whatsoever. Now, the argument can be made that it is taking pitlords to run these things (which it already does), but I believe that those that actually enjoy and wish to participate in the guilds will take up the slack. Gods all know that I am generally willing to pick up slack for anyone whenever possible.
MindWandererB 02-08-07, 09:48 PM	They would then have to cost no activations, either, to truly cost the player nothing. It would indeed take more pitlords due to double-booking, and just having more characters active in general. I think the main problem would be that there is very little slack to go around. Without Mitza, we'd be in a State of Emergency right now, big time.
MitzaVolchenko 02-08-07, 11:30 PM	They would then have to cost no activations, either, to truly cost the player nothing. It would indeed take more pitlords due to double-booking, and just having more characters active in general. I think the main problem would be that there is very little slack to go around. Without Mitza, we'd be in a State of Emergency right now, big time. If we can't cover the guild activations, they take a back seat and don't happen. This board is NOT about the guild system.
Vathelokai 02-09-07, 12:10 AM	This board is NOT about the guild system. Must... not... make snide comment... :cool:
NiQil 02-09-07, 12:30 AM	Must... not... make snide comment... :cool: You know you wanna :P
MindWandererB 02-09-07, 12:34 AM	If we can't cover the guild activations, they take a back seat and don't happen. This board is NOT about the guild system. <sigh> Problem is, that creates imbalance in the guilds. Week 1: CEF: We attack WAR! Pitlords: Okay. Week 2: WAR: We attack CEF back! Pitlords: Sorry, WAR, we're out of pitlords. WAR: ... Week 3: CEF: We attack WAR some more! Pitlords: Okay. WAR: ...!
TheMagister 02-09-07, 01:04 AM	:rofl:
Caterane 02-09-07, 09:05 AM	Mitza, let me get this straight so that I understand you: - You think quests are easier to win than arena fights; so much easier that you call it "easy rewards". - Since missions are like quests without credits, you gain "easy rewards" for no credit cost Did I get this right? First of all, it is highly doubtful that quests are simpler than arena fights (where you can also encounter monsters from the monster tables or human players with bad tactics) so I would start to object to your assumption. IF - and that's a BIG IF - ...IF there is a difference in difficulty between quests and arena fights, then it is in NO way so steep as to say Quests are easy rewards!! That's just not the case. And as said, I'd not even say they're easier at all in the first place. Secondly, as already said several times, missions do not have a "Quest Goal" from which the character benefits, like quests do. So it's actually the opposite of what you claim: both - questers and missioners - have the same chance to fail and gain no rewards. Characters on quests however have the chance to gain a quest goal reward (eg ally) while those on missions don't get that. Even three lost fights in the arena earn you more XP/GP than a failed mission. While writing that I'm just beginning to think that we should change that and give those on missions loser rewards if they fail. So. As shown, what you claim is not true at best, and as I've pointed out actually the opposite of what you say. And for that "Problem" - that's in your eyes so big and unfair that you consider quitting :confused: we should start a huge reformation of the guild system just to end up with a lot of problems that the holes we would tear open create? I can't believe you're serious.
hogarth 02-09-07, 09:16 AM	First of all, it is highly doubtful that quests are simpler than arena fights Cat -- I don't know what you're smoking, but out of the 18 most recent quests/miniquests, 16 were successful. Are you saying that the average gladiator should win 89% of the time? By the way, I have no problem with allowing free guild quests/miniquests. That's the only part of the guild system that interests me at all, and it's certainly the only part of the guild system that has anything to do with D&D!
Caterane 02-09-07, 09:35 AM	If that's the problem, then we would have to fix quests, not spend months to reform the guild system and refix currently closed holes we would open.
Abyssal Stalker 02-09-07, 09:36 AM	Come on, the guild system isn't that bad. I at least enjoy it, allthough I'm a bit messed up with the rules. Still, that doesn't make it wrong or bad in anyway. I can't see any major issues with the quests/missions and the rewards. What's this nonsense about being fair anyway? :) Life's unfair but I still enjoy it. Seriously, the only thing that I feel like needs fixing is the double-booking. If that happens, then you are prevented by some strange coinsidence. Yes, this allows cheating and manipulation from the pitlord. He could sabotage some guilds actions by not running the fight on time. I don't believe this community is that rotten, so it shouldn't be a problem. The guild game is a bit complex, but can anyone honestly say that D&D would be simple? We are just more familiar with D&D rules.
hogarth 02-09-07, 09:47 AM	If that's the problem, then we would have to fix quests, not spend months to reform the guild system and refix currently closed holes we would open. I'm not saying the high success rate on quests/miniquests is a problem. If other people want to run their characters through easy quests, why should it bother me? It's really no different than starting your character at a higher level in the first place. I just have no idea where you get the statement: ...IF there is a difference in difficulty between quests and arena fights, then it is in NO way so steep as to say Quests are easy rewards!! That's just not the case. If you can come up with some statistics to the contrary, I'll gladly eat my words.
Macbrea 02-09-07, 09:59 AM	Ok, I have a bit of a problem with the whole system. Basicly it's seven people playing a game. And the option is given for the rest of the board to be pawns in those seven people's game. If a guildmaster wanted to he can maniplulate characters within his guild to only go against optimal opponents. This can easily result in broken standings. What prevents a guildmaster from making a character. Then only sending it out on intercepts against opponents it knows it can beat. Unlike the randomly generated fights, this determines that the character will advance at a rate that is always determined by the player. It also, pretty much determines that character will have an artificially inflated ranking. The arguement that a character has to be able to handle everything in it's league is silly. Some characters fair much better then others against certian types. Since, the guild system has no system to add new guilds that means those same seven people always get to play the game and the rest of the people can basicly be pawns. With the continued devalueing of credits. This means those seven people gain more for being guildlords in the first place. Basicly, they get to choose what fights they really want to send their characters on. They get credits for doing simple accounting. They make about and average of 2 to 3 posts for an addition of 1o. The guild system as a roleplaying element seems horridly slow. Sending characters on quests for the purpose of roleplaying seems pretty much the only way to actually get any roleplaying in. For a person like me that can only afford to run one quest a week. The loss of mapping credits pretty much means I won't be sending characters on quest very often. Miniquests appear to have fallen into just being 'Hey, can you send me tactics for a monster fight!' Miniquests and Quests should be roleplaying with a monster/NPC fight in them. The laziness of not interacting with each other except sending tactics is getting horridly boring.
Zevox 02-09-07, 01:32 PM	Re: Quest difficulty - I do agree with Mitza/hogarth that quests are generally easier than arena fights, and that to the direct control of characters rather than using tactics is a factor in that. However, I don't think thats so much the primary factor to the high success rate of quests as is the questlord himself. Theres a few who do have a high kill rate - such as Telin, who my brother found when researching quests and miniquests run by him had about a 50/50 success to failure rate (if my memory isn't faulty) - and then there are some who rarely have quests fail. King Uther is an example - in all the quests he ran for my Asran (a sub-par character as is, especially before he got Leadership), only one had any real difficulty, and that was mostly a result of the dice. Even in his campaign, only a few fights were really potentially deadly, and one of those was largely because of the dice. Heck, I even recall him mentioning that he was aware that his quests tended to be easy because he preferred to focus on the RP, so he was conscious of it himself. Now, why exactly questlords like Telin get the kind of kill rate you'd expect from arena battles while others almost never have failed quests, I'm not sure, but its a fact thats out there. Zevox
TelinArtho 02-09-07, 01:56 PM	Before an inquest into the reasons why quests and such have a better win ratio, you should systematically remove quests from the sample that are not at the characters' EL. For instance, I have run 23 quests total, 4 of which were cancelled before they were done. Of the remaining 19, I've had failures in 9 of them. Of those 19, only 1 was above the EL of the characters involved (and it did result in a failure). For miniquests, I've only got 11 on my list (I may have done more before I kept track), and of those only 2 have failed. However, take out the ones that are not the EL of the character involved and my list drops to 4 - still with 2 failures. As to the reason behind some questlords having a "good" rating, while others have a "killer" rating - I think it very much depends on the style of the questlord.
Caterane 02-09-07, 02:26 PM	Whatever. Keep that topic in mind. We can discuss an increase in difficulty for quests later and if that is solved so are in return missions and Mitza is happy. This thread is reserved for guild stuff. Let's please continue with our old topic because we are onto something there. Just for the record: I am convinced that Telin is one of the best Questlords we ever had and that's not despite but because of his high rate of failures - which is actually the normal rate, how it should be.
Macbrea 02-09-07, 02:34 PM	Ok, what are the rules to starting new guilds. I might wish to play the accounting game also.
MindWandererB 02-09-07, 02:35 PM	First of all, it is highly doubtful that quests are simpler than arena fights (where you can also encounter monsters from the monster tables or human players with bad tactics) so I would start to object to your assumption. IF - and that's a BIG IF - ...IF there is a difference in difficulty between quests and arena fights, then it is in NO way so steep as to say Quests are easy rewards!! That's just not the case. And as said, I'd not even say they're easier at all in the first place. Now hold on, Cat. Remember the discussion we had when we first implemented the 1 quest per level rule? I expressed concern that if a PC failed a quest for an ally, or for a PrC prerequisite, they might screw up their character development, or at least cripple them badly for a level. You said that anyone who couldn't pass a quest at their own ECL deserved such a fate, and they should probably think about scrapping the character. That is not compatible with a 50% win rate. You made the assumption then that miniquests were easier than arena battles, because you didn't think it would be bad to penalize anyone who failed such a quest. Now you think they're equally difficult? Now, granted, the quest results are somewhat biased, because a majority of quests are performed by characters with above-average win records. They should be passing quests more often. But not that much more. Another point is that many quests are tailored to the PC, whereas guild quests involve random monsters which might present an easier or more difficult challenge than would be really appropriate. I don't think it balances out, though. I think there are two simple solutions. The first is the more important one. 1) Guild miniquests are monster fights. Pure and simple. They can have a plot, and a seperate thread, but the battle itself follows arena rules to the letter. Random, standard map, tactics, the works. 2) Those random numbers of monsters be scrapped. Really, they do more harm than good. And frankly, it really ticks me off when I get an encounter an EL or two above my ECL, and then my high-powerrating character drops as if s/he lost a battle to a PR 1000 PC. Plus my loss reward is capped. Whereas if I win a battle against a low roll, I still get less reward. Mitza's option would be fine, IMO, if not for the extra workload. @Macbrea: There is no way to create a new guild, at least until the next restart. The best bet would be to become someone's backup. PSI could use a new one (since DSugui is being two backups at once right now), and I don't know how attached Krytos is to his spot, since he's rarely around.
Macbrea 02-09-07, 02:52 PM	The point of my asking the question is I know that no system was ever created to create new guilds. And therefore, guildmasters have permanent positions. As such, they earn credits that are unavailable to other players. Guild membership is decided by the guildmaster. And the make-up of the guild is completely decided by that guildmaster. If a character doesn't fit within that mold the guildmaster has the right to tell the character to go away. As a result the missions characters are sent on are decided by the guildmaster at time of doing CAPs based off personal preference and choices made in running their guild. The guild in which they have no real chance of loosing. So, the guild system as written is being played by seven players. Who get to decide what type of mission they send their guild members on. And since, there is no method of making more guilds or replacing a guildmaster this means that the game favors those seven people. Nothing against you guys, but I as a non-member of the guild system as a whole am forced to then read through your rules if I want to pitlord. Why? Because, if a mission is put forth, I am required to run by your rules. So, the more complex you write your rules on information that must be reported the less likely I am going to be to look up the data for it. You need to put a second in simple terms for rewards. What your rewards means in the pitlord section of the Rules. If I hadn't read through the majority of the rules I wouldn't know exactly what 'Escort mission, EHTC' means for writing up the rewards.
MitzaVolchenko 02-09-07, 03:16 PM	Ok, I have a bit of a problem with the whole system. Basicly it's seven people playing a game. And the option is given for the rest of the board to be pawns in those seven people's game. If a guildmaster wanted to he can maniplulate characters within his guild to only go against optimal opponents. This can easily result in broken standings. What prevents a guildmaster from making a character. Then only sending it out on intercepts against opponents it knows it can beat. Unlike the randomly generated fights, this determines that the character will advance at a rate that is always determined by the player. It also, pretty much determines that character will have an artificially inflated ranking. The arguement that a character has to be able to handle everything in it's league is silly. Some characters fair much better then others against certian types. Since, the guild system has no system to add new guilds that means those same seven people always get to play the game and the rest of the people can basicly be pawns. With the continued devalueing of credits. This means those seven people gain more for being guildlords in the first place. Basicly, they get to choose what fights they really want to send their characters on. They get credits for doing simple accounting. They make about and average of 2 to 3 posts for an addition of 1o. The guild system as a roleplaying element seems horridly slow. Sending characters on quests for the purpose of roleplaying seems pretty much the only way to actually get any roleplaying in. For a person like me that can only afford to run one quest a week. The loss of mapping credits pretty much means I won't be sending characters on quest very often. Miniquests appear to have fallen into just being 'Hey, can you send me tactics for a monster fight!' Miniquests and Quests should be roleplaying with a monster/NPC fight in them. The laziness of not interacting with each other except sending tactics is getting horridly boring. Cat, please address this. This sums up the sort of issue that I see. Keep in mind that I have been active in the guild system for my entire stay in CoCo and have pit lorded since my second week. Try really hard not to make this into personal 'appease the whining woman' mudslinging. Yes, I said if the BS with Besthirah getting ECL 10 xp/gp for a fight that couldn't even take place due to delay went up, I would quit. Why? Because that would be showing to me that this really is corruption and not just bad circumstances and changes that add up to bad things happening without intention. The problem, I guess, is that the people that get to finalize decisions like things the way they are and are not looking at how new people might feel about it or in the case of Macbrea and myself, old people. I'll leave the devaluation of credits over the last year for another time and thread. Yes, I get benefits from the guild system...mostly RP as far as I am concerned. Yes, I am willing to pay for those benefits and do extra work to keep my add-on game from affecting others who are not interested in my add-on game.
MindWandererB 02-09-07, 04:23 PM	This might be a good time to point out that if the guild system were simpler, it wouldn't be necessary to award credits for being the guild master. @Macbrea: to pitlord a guild fight, all you need to know is who is involved. The rules for guild fights are the same as the rules for any other fight, you just need to figure out who gets surprise rounds. The rewards also function like any normal fight, although I'm a bit fuzzy myself on the rewards for a fight with a monster ally as a handicap.
Macbrea 02-09-07, 04:31 PM	So, your saying you helped write the rules but are fuzzy what the reward should be? I sent the following to pitlords account on this matter: Because, I don't have time to read through the entire guild rules that are changing continiously and I am not participating in any guilds of CoCo. I formally ask to be excluded from running any fights related to or requiring the knowledge of the guild rules. Please, leave me at one arena fight per week. So.. Macbrea <one> [No Guild Related Fight] I guess it's the only way not to play with the system.
MindWandererB 02-09-07, 04:39 PM	Don't overestimate my role in the rule-creation. I'm an advisor at best. A stooge at worst, perhaps.
Macbrea 02-09-07, 04:51 PM	The point of the matter is without some reasonable way for the pitlords to be able to find the effects of a mission. They have to search through the entire guild thread to determine what weird and odd effects occur. Example: Level 9 character goes on mission and is intercepted by 3 level 5 characters. First of all this doesn't seem like it's possible by normal arena rules so. I have to check here following link to here. Page down to post 11. Now, checking what the effects of a matched encounter would result in you find out that the three 5th level characters get a suprise round. You will notice that I just did all the work to search through the entire threads nessessary to figure this data out. But, in doing so I spent nearly 30 minutes doing so. That is a tad rediculous.
TheMagister 02-09-07, 07:33 PM	Wow, has this ever exploded... Macbrea, if you want to get involved (which I don't think you really do, but it's hard to read sarcasm in print), I could REALLY use an assistant guildmaster who isn't already a guildmaster of another guild. Currently, Sauro is GM of PSI, and my assistant. Not exactly the best situation. On average, it takes me about two hours to update my guild pages per week. I think that's worth a credit. I dunno about the other GMs, but I only send the people who want to go and say they have the time out on missions. Since the de-escalation of the WAR/CEF thing, I'm having trouble finding worthy missions for my combat-loving members, so things have been quiet. I could use a dose of fresh RP in the Alliance guildhall. My current role in this game is as an RP outlet, so I don't feel like I'm doing my job to the best of my ability. Having someone take a little of the load off my shoulders would free me for some more RP-oriented thinkin'. Also, to my knowledge, there's no way to pick and choose a member's fights. True, you can select your defenders, but the attacker is usually well-suited to combat your troops (at least they have been in my experience). TM
MitzaVolchenko 02-09-07, 09:35 PM	Points with inadequate answers: 1) Guild game is limited by the guildmasters and their decisions. This denies control and access to the average community member. 2)There is no way to add guilds under the current system. 3)Guilds currently give a very limited number of people the advantage of essentially choosing their fights. This is something that costs the average player credits. 4)If pitlords are limited, the guild fights should be trimmed off rather than declaring a state of emergency. Otherwise you are placing the guild game ahead of the game which this board is meant to support. A comment was brought to my attention by more than one person, though I have not yet located its exact place. This was essentially that Caterane no longer has any interest in the arena fights. Caterane, if you are only interested in the guild game, that is fine, but as the gamemaster for an arena board, the arena has to take precedence. The guilds cannot continue to impact the rankings and efficiency of the arena. As MWB said above, you can't have it both ways. Either quests are easier or they aren't. I know why mine are...the player maintains control and gets to choose their own ground and tactics more or less as they go. In cases where I am running late, I ask them what I am allowed to use, and then I improvise for them since there is no opposing player taking a loss for my improv.
NiQil 02-09-07, 09:44 PM	<tip toes through the discussion> Shhhhhhhh!!!! Be vewy vewy quiet. We'we hunting wabbits. Huhhuhhuhhuhhuhhuhhuhhuh.
Abyssal Stalker 02-10-07, 03:19 AM	I don't feel that I'm limited from participating in the guild game. I'm not a Guildmaster or an assistant, but I am still allowed to address my points in the guild. I PM every now and then Zevox and ask of the plans and situations we are in and then give my opinions how we should act. Zevox is always open to suggestions and doesn't seem like advancing his own cause via the guild. I am talking about EHTC and Zevox particularly because it is the only guild I'm in. I have no reason to think that other guildmasters would act differently. We all should remember that anything we post on the guild thread is open to anyone and effectively ruins the possibility of surprise. This is probably why we don't see too much of open discussion of guild activities.
Caterane 02-10-07, 10:01 AM	Alright, I'll once again take the time (for the third time) to address your (once again new) concerns in detail. Ok, I have a bit of a problem with the whole system. Basicly it's seven people playing a game. And the option is given for the rest of the board to be pawns in those seven people's game. If a guildmaster wanted to he can maniplulate characters within his guild to only go against optimal opponents. This can easily result in broken standings. What prevents a guildmaster from making a character. Then only sending it out on intercepts against opponents it knows it can beat. Unlike the randomly generated fights, this determines that the character will advance at a rate that is always determined by the player. It also, pretty much determines that character will have an artificially inflated ranking. The arguement that a character has to be able to handle everything in it's league is silly. Some characters fair much better then others against certian types. The guild system is not a game played by seven people. If that'd be the case, then no players other than guildmasters would be in a guild. In reality, the majority of guild characters is owned by players who are not a guildmaster so this argument of yours is moot. Then. Every player can participate in the guild game as much or as little as he likes. It's obviously pretty stupid to post guild plans publically for everyone to read ("Psst let's ambush CEF next week") so just because you don't see any technical information posted in guild threads doesn't mean the members are not involved. If you check the post counts in guilds, you can see how many posts have been done by the guildmaster and how many by non-guildmasters. It's in the rules that guildmasters have to ask the player for permission before they send them on an operation or mission so you bet that there's a healthy interaction between guildmaster and members for every single action. That also renders your third argument useless, and not for one but for three reasons even. (1) While it is true that guildmasters can determine the interceptor, so do those who agree to go on an operation clearly see by whom they can be possibly intercepted. It's no coincidence that WAR didn't send any ECL 10 characters against CEF when CEF has six great renown characters up there and ready for interceptions. You know your possible opponents in advance. (2) It also works both ways. You cannot only be intercepted but also directly attack other guild members. So any guildmember can be set to attack any other guildmember. The guildmaster's characters can be targetted by anyone, and that might be an assault with a fight, a covert operation, or an intrigue operation where skills are involved, and that character in turn can also be intercepted. So since it works both ways, it's fair and even. (3) It's true that not all PCs of the same level are equal. But! Practically, Interceptions have very limited options. Since the opponent guild knows who can intercept their agents, they'll plan ahead and the guildmaster can NOT just pick any operator who he can defeat but can sometimes even be glad if he has an interceptor of the appropriate level available at all. Since, the guild system has no system to add new guilds that means those same seven people always get to play the game and the rest of the people can basicly be pawns. As said above, this statement is just plain wrong. And the system does not need rules for making new guilds. It's neither compatible with the system nor would it work out because the coco has not enough members to support more than seven guilds. With the continued devalueing of credits. This means those seven people gain more for being guildlords in the first place. Basicly, they get to choose what fights they really want to send their characters on. They get credits for doing simple accounting. They make about and average of 2 to 3 posts for an addition of 1o. Since you've never been a guildmaster I don't think you're qualified to make such an assessment of the workload a guildmaster has to do. That's a mere assumption based on nothing but your (false) impression. I can assure you that guildmasters do as much work as a pitlord, maybe even more. And of course: it's only up to the Game Master to decide which job gets how many credits. The guild system as a roleplaying element seems horridly slow. Sending characters on quests for the purpose of roleplaying seems pretty much the only way to actually get any roleplaying in. For a person like me that can only afford to run one quest a week. The loss of mapping credits pretty much means I won't be sending characters on quest very often. Miniquests appear to have fallen into just being 'Hey, can you send me tactics for a monster fight!' Miniquests and Quests should be roleplaying with a monster/NPC fight in them. The laziness of not interacting with each other except sending tactics is getting horridly boring. Well, that's your personal impression; others see it differently. In any case, this statement has little to do with the guild system. Ok, what are the rules to starting new guilds. I might wish to play the accounting game also. You know that there are non so I don't understand that question although I think what you want to say here is "Look, there are no rules for starting a new guild so the system is crap". Which is of course an equation that is completely pulled by the hair. Just because there are no rules for playing a monster without a LA given (or whatever) doesn't mean that the CoCo is crap. And just because the guild system has no rules for starting new guilds likewise doesn't mean it's crap. There're very good reasons for not allowing that function. The point of my asking the question is I know that no system was ever created to create new guilds. And therefore, guildmasters have permanent positions. As such, they earn credits that are unavailable to other players. Being Game Master, Pitlords, Prisonlords, Scribelords, etc are also permanent positions with credits that are unavailable for other players. I don't see why that should be the case, or even a reason to make modifications on the system. It's definately not an argument, and as said above you have little idea how much work this job (guildmaster) entails. Guild membership is decided by the guildmaster. And the make-up of the guild is completely decided by that guildmaster. If a character doesn't fit within that mold the guildmaster has the right to tell the character to go away. Technically yes but it only happens if someone really doesn't fit into the guild. Or do you think Lord Frost should have been able to join CEF without anyone objecting?? I'm glad we have that power to turn down unfitting PCs.
MitzaVolchenko 02-10-07, 12:16 PM	Now that you are done thrashing someone with absolutely no content, please drop the defensiveness and answer the posed questions/address the posed concerns. You seem to be boiling you response down to "you don't know what you are talking about." I shall be following this post with a minor statistics project soon.
Rauul 02-10-07, 01:29 PM	Well here is my 2 cents as a newbie looking in.. you have 6-7 guilds, with players playing multiple charaters sometimes in different guilds.. guilds have no "Subscribe only" feature.. your not allowed to Start a new guild so you can fail from the tons of paperwork.. IMHO.. Guilds should be Seperated.. made Subscribe only appoved by the Guildlord, and no haveing 1 charater in each.. Players should have EVERY right to start as guild just as the original 7 did.. and not at the Start.. make it a GP and Credit cost to start a guild.. Guilds should have Different Power levels GL 1-10 JUST like Ecl's.. Guild members should be watching the charater fights in the Arena and recruiting new members. As for the complicated guild rules.... you need to do 1 thing.. learn the meaning of K.I.S.S (keep it simple stupid) People don't want to spend 3-5 hours 6 nights on things... or have to have a Rocket Scientist to figure out the guild rules.. And Guilds should have a way to go on Global event Quests without other guilds knowing who is doing what to who.. And if a guild did manage to leak info the Guild should be able to do a Quest/miniQuest to find the person.. yes 1 person against a whole guild... (thats why spys exist and don't Exist for governments) Nothing i have said is to helpfull on the Subject.. Since after 4 weeks i have yet to make heads or tales of the guild system (and this is coming from someone who was a Dm when D&D was called chainmail)..
Caterane 02-10-07, 01:32 PM	@Mitza: I have no idea what else you want from me. I've taken a lot of time to type up my responses, even added quotes to reply directly and explain the why behind the system and it's make-up, backed it up with examples so that it's easy to understand. Yet you say it has no content. All that talk in the last 2 days took me 2-3 hours of my free time and I'm beginning to think that you won't be satisfied unless I agree with you. @Rauul: As explained above, starting new guilds is not compatible with our current system and it is not a desired function because we lack the members to open up a huge number of guilds. We're not the Guildhouse Board but the Core Coliseum; the guilds are an add-on.
Rauul 02-10-07, 02:03 PM	@Rauul: As explained above, starting new guilds is not compatible with our current system and it is not a desired function because we lack the members to open up a huge number of guilds. We're not the Guildhouse Board but the Core Coliseum; the guilds are an add-on. Then why do we have guilds in the first place.. if they are not Compatible.. All i am Saying is make a System that works for all that is compatable to the Coliseum, All i honestly see in the guilds is people who can and have manipulated the system when it started.. I have a charater in a guild for RP purpose only. Since thats all i see the guilds good for at this time.. A Guild system could be so much more.. But what I see now is a Formula for Disaster.. Can any guildlord tell me all the guild rules.. Or even where to read them in 1 centralized location as the getting started rules are? Guilds can build thier power via guild mini quests.. Thieves guild getting into the protection rackets, Fighters getting into the bodyguard busness, or Monsters for monster fights busness, Wizards and Sorcerors getting into a guild to strenthen thier magic and to learn more, Clerics Starting Cults.. All very much roleplayable and all very much in theme for Quests and miniquests.. all within a guild being in a Guild should also show a benefit for the charater.. cheaper costs for materials, (asking a PC thats a weaponsmith to build your axe for materials +1/4 instead of 1/2) Wizards trading and selling spells to each other.. being able to donate magic items to your guild that you no longer need... (I also thing free for all and Monster match winners should get a randomly rolled magic item for winning) shrug.. Have no clue in how to help the System as is...bandaids never fixed the Gushing wound caused by a Sword
Caterane 02-10-07, 02:12 PM	I rather meant "Creating new guilds is not compatible with the GUILD system". Again: we do not want to create new guilds because we have not enough members in the core coliseum to support more than seven. We've already had all that before: KISS. Simple stupid guilds, anyone could open one, very basic rules that fit into one code box, and what happened? They all died a slow painful death. The system we currently have is the one that works best by far compared to previous incarnations. What you guys propose is a completely new system. I would have to type up that one and then, others step up and are not happy with it either. I know that I can't make everyone happy at the same time; others enjoy the game as it is and we never had so much roleplaying in any of the previous incarnations than now so to me it seems we're on the right track. It's not perfect but a good direction.
Rauul 02-10-07, 02:26 PM	I rather meant "Creating new guilds is not compatible with the GUILD system". Again: we do not want to create new guilds because we have not enough members in the core coliseum to support more than seven. Honestly.. you don't have enough members to support 1 guild let alone 7.. We've already had all that before: KISS. Simple stupid guilds, anyone could open one, very basic rules that fit into one code box, and what happened? They all died a slow painful death. The system we currently have is the one that works best by far compared to previous incarnations. Did they have FUN Dieing the Slow painful death.. or at least trying to do as thier charater would want.. What you guys propose is a completely new system. I would have to type up that one and then, others step up and are not happy with it either. I know that I can't make everyone happy at the same time; others enjoy the game as it is and we never had so much roleplaying in any of the previous incarnations than now so to me it seems we're on the right track. It's not perfect but a good direction. And this is any different that what your doing now... rewritting a syatem as you go? if you were on the right track.. the title of this thread wouldn't be.. Re: Discussion: What should the guild system be like?
Zevox 02-10-07, 03:03 PM	@ Rauul - I'm not entirely sure about this, but what you're describing seems to be much like what I've heard Guilds in MMOs are like (correct me if I'm wrong - I've never actually played any major MMOs myself, just heard a bit about them from friends), which is not what we're going for here. Certainly the part you mentioned about Guilds giving members benefits has been deliberately avoided - the Guilds here are an add-on to the CoCo, and we don't want to put those who do not wish to participate in them at a disadvantage against those who do (hence the reason behind some of Mitza's complaints). RP purposes only is pretty much what they're supposed to be, and the separate game that exists between them is supposed to be conducive to that. Zevox
MindWandererB 02-10-07, 03:23 PM	Nothing i have said is to helpfull on the Subject.. Since after 4 weeks i have yet to make heads or tales of the guild system (and this is coming from someone who was a Dm when D&D was called chainmail)..FYI, Chainmail was a different system from D&D, and they existed at the same time. There were some similarities, but it was an entirely different system. Honestly.. you don't have enough members to support 1 guild let alone 7.. This definitely seems like you're going for the MMO model. We certainly have enough members to support five or six guilds, the way we treat them. Seven appears to be a stretch; one guild always seems to have trouble attracting members. There are thing to be learned from both extremes. For the most part, folks are happy with the guilds as they are. Some people complain about some aspects, but overall it's a pretty good system. This thread was designed to identify a true consensus, and with only a couple of exceptions, this system gets it right. The old system had a bare minimum of rules. This one has too many. Next time we'll go for a compromise. One of the best elements that adds content but doesn't change complexity is sporadic events; when Guildlords announces a new challenge or a random event, the guildmasters and members don't have to know anything except for how that affects them--which is described when the event is announced. No need to know ahead of time. The current system started off goal-oriented, with everyone trying to "win." We scrapped that idea (although the win conditions are still in the rules) because it turned out almost no one wanted it. Now, we'll end this game when we decide to try a new system, which will probably be a long time from now. Although Cat, Sauro, and I are all juggling ideas around already, based largely on this thread. But what the old system lacked, that this one has, is long-term change. Most people, it turned out, liked the strategy game aspects--they liked the economics, the long-term growth of the guilds, the territorial expansion, the way that success or failure this week will affect all weeks to come. They also liked the fact that conflicts between the guilds, as represented in fights between the members, made a difference to the guild as a whole. Really, if you look at all the improvements over the original system, what we have is pretty good. I think the things we'd keep the same, at least in principle, vastly outweigh the things we'd change.
MitzaVolchenko 02-10-07, 05:08 PM	@Mitza: I have no idea what else you want from me. I've taken a lot of time to type up my responses, even added quotes to reply directly and explain the why behind the system and it's make-up, backed it up with examples so that it's easy to understand. Yet you say it has no content. All that talk in the last 2 days took me 2-3 hours of my free time and I'm beginning to think that you won't be satisfied unless I agree with you. 1) Guild game is limited by the guildmasters and their decisions. This denies control and access to the average community member.Not always a problem, but it is a solid argument against your assertion that the guilds are open to all. I suppose you missed that a lot of folks agitated to continue the conflict against CEF but backed off after you got upset. 2)There is no way to add guilds under the current system.So you failed to include a way for people not interested in the current concepts to add more thereby telling folks like it or lump it. How hard is it to say, sure, you can have this section and a month or two attack free to build up/make deals/get ready to rumble? 3)Guilds currently give a very limited number of people the advantage of essentially choosing their fights. This is something that costs the average player credits in challenges. It happens, and you have shown nothing to inllustrate that it doesn't nor why it is acceptable. When was the last time you participated in a random arena fight. 4)If pitlords are limited, the guild fights should be trimmed off rather than declaring a state of emergency. Otherwise you are placing the guild game ahead of the game which this board is meant to support.No response. Another thought, we have delayed higher levels opening in the past paritally due to lack of pitlords...guilds holding that up is absolutely rotten. A comment was brought to my attention by more than one person, though I have not yet located its exact place. This was essentially that Caterane no longer has any interest in the arena fights. Caterane, if you are only interested in the guild game, that is fine, but as the gamemaster for an arena board, the arena has to take precedence. The guilds cannot continue to impact the rankings and efficiency of the arena. As MWB said above, you can't have it both ways. Either quests are easier or they aren't. I know why mine are...the player maintains control and gets to choose their own ground and tactics more or less as they go. In cases where I am running late, I ask them what I am allowed to use, and then I improvise for them since there is no opposing player taking a loss for my improv.No response. Sniping at Rauul and Macbrea is not answering my points, nor is pontificating on the virtues of the system. I notice very few of the points that were tallied when this thread was opened have been addressed in any manner that favors what the majority said they wanted from the system.
MindWandererB 02-10-07, 05:38 PM	I'd like to respond to some of these. 1) Guild game is limited by the guildmasters and their decisions. This denies control and access to the average community member.Not always a problem, but it is a solid argument against your assertion that the guilds are open to all. I suppose you missed that a lot of folks agitated to continue the conflict against CEF but backed off after you got upset.Not every guild is open to all, but they're pretty flexible. CEF even has nongood members, though admitting a white dragon would have been a stretch. I'm not sure what that last sentence has to do with this argument. Folks were interested in beating CEF down because of the imbalance of power, not because of control. And as a guildmaster, let me say that I try to give my guildmembers control at every opportunity. I send out progress reports, I ask for input about important decisions, like whether and how to get involved in the WAR/CEF thing--and I might add that my guild disagreed with me, and we would have gone with what they wanted over my own preference, had it come to that. I try to put forward RP opportunities. And I get very little response, unless I directly ask someone, "hey, is your character available to do X on X day?" My impression is that they are perfectly content to hand me the reins when it comes to the development strategy and use of character actions, for the most part. 2)There is no way to add guilds under the current system.So you failed to include a way for people not interested in the current concepts to add more thereby telling folks like it or lump it. How hard is it to say, sure, you can have this section and a month or two attack free to build up/make deals/get ready to rumble?It would actually be very hard, due to the territory system. Adding a guild to the territory already claimed or eyed by another would give both a tremendous disadvantage. Two months of freedom from attack would just mean that the more-established guild would be at least somewhat gimped in the meantime, and would leap on and crush the newcomers as soon as able, treating them like a PmG. No fun for anyone. 3)Guilds currently give a very limited number of people the advantage of essentially choosing their fights. This is something that costs the average player credits in challenges. It happens, and you have shown nothing to inllustrate that it doesn't nor why it is acceptable. When was the last time you participated in a random arena fight.It's a lot less flexible than you claim. For instance, if my guild members want to "choose their own fight," first of all we have to live with the long-term consequences of instigating a conflict. Second, we have to choose from the guilds we're willing to tangle with, and no guild has more than one or two opponents that they're willing to do that with. Third, okay, we send them, but the defending guild can send one character with an ECL +/- 2 from the attacker, or a team of lower-level characters. For instance, if I sent Antalya [ECL 7] against EHTC, they could potentially send any of their guild members to intercept except for Asran and Indivara. That's not much control. As for choosing someone to intercept an attacker, yes, you get to choose exactly who you send against the specific PC, but the attackers have already considered all the options, and they're at least somewhat confident they can win. Again, not much control. The exception is with interceptions of things not specifically directed against a guild, like quests, or with the "Kidnap Character" operation (which should probably be removed--there's horrible potential for abuse). 4)If pitlords are limited, the guild fights should be trimmed off rather than declaring a state of emergency. Otherwise you are placing the guild game ahead of the game which this board is meant to support.No response. Another thought, we have delayed higher levels opening in the past paritally due to lack of pitlords...guilds holding that up is absolutely rotten.The guild fights, with the exception of the ones involving frozen characters, would be fights anyway. The characters involved would just be in the arena instead. And as I said, choosing to cancel guild actions as a function of pitlord availability just isn't fair. Sniping at Rauul and Macbrea is not answering my points, nor is pontificating on the virtues of the system. I notice very few of the points that were tallied when this thread was opened have been addressed in any manner that favors what the majority said they wanted from the system.Not many have been addressed because, to my surprise based on all the complaints, most of the opinions were in favor of the system as it is. The tally thus far of things that were in dissent: Army combat. Addressed but not fixed. Unfortunately a core aspect of the current system. Removing it would call for a total rewrite. Having a winner. Addressed. The win criteria are suspended indefinitely. Multiplayer miniquests. Addressed. They are now much more feasible. Unintentional combat between guild members. Not addressed. New challenge types. Addressed, and we're thinking about it. We'll probably try the first one after the Iron Man. Being able to destroy an enemy guild. Not addressed. Fortunately not a concern at the moment, but we'll have to deal with it at some point, otherwise one guild will try to defeat another and there will be much bad feeling. Thematic guild strengths and weaknesses. Addressed, and was under discussion until this argument derailed it.So there you have it: of all the things that people didn't like about the current system, only two remain unaddressed, and only one is beyond hope as things stand.
Caterane 02-10-07, 07:57 PM	1) Guild game is limited by the guildmasters and their decisions. This denies control and access to the average community member.Not always a problem, but it is a solid argument against your assertion that the guilds are open to all. I suppose you missed that a lot of folks agitated to continue the conflict against CEF but backed off after you got upset. The guild system is not a game played by seven people. If that'd be the case, then no players other than guildmasters would be in a guild. In reality, the majority of guild characters is owned by players who are not a guildmaster so this argument of yours is moot. Then. Every player can participate in the guild game as much or as little as he likes. It's obviously pretty stupid to post guild plans publically for everyone to read ("Psst let's ambush CEF next week") so just because you don't see any technical information posted in guild threads doesn't mean the members are not involved. If you check the post counts in guilds, you can see how many posts have been done by the guildmaster and how many by non-guildmasters. It's in the rules that guildmasters have to ask the player for permission before they send them on an operation or mission so you bet that there's a healthy interaction between guildmaster and members for every single action. 2)There is no way to add guilds under the current system.So you failed to include a way for people not interested in the current concepts to add more thereby telling folks like it or lump it. How hard is it to say, sure, you can have this section and a month or two attack free to build up/make deals/get ready to rumble? As said above, this statement is just plain wrong. And the system does not need rules for making new guilds. It's neither compatible with the guild system nor would it work out because the coco has not enough members to support more than seven guilds. Past incarnations proved that already. 3)Guilds currently give a very limited number of people the advantage of essentially choosing their fights. This is something that costs the average player credits in challenges. It happens, and you have shown nothing to inllustrate that it doesn't nor why it is acceptable. When was the last time you participated in a random arena fight. (1) While it is true that guildmasters can determine the interceptor, so do those who agree to go on an operation clearly see by whom they can be possibly intercepted. It's no coincidence that WAR didn't send any ECL 10 characters against CEF when CEF has six great renown characters up there and ready for interceptions. You know your possible opponents in advance. (2) It also works both ways. You cannot only be intercepted but also directly attack other guild members. So any guildmember can be set to attack any other guildmember. The guildmaster's characters can be targetted by anyone, and that might be an assault with a fight, a covert operation, or an intrigue operation where skills are involved, and that character in turn can also be intercepted. So since it works both ways, it's fair and even. (3) It's true that not all PCs of the same level are equal. But! Practically, Interceptions have very limited options. Since the opponent guild knows who can intercept their agents, they'll plan ahead and the guildmaster can NOT just pick any operator who he can defeat but can sometimes even be glad if he has an interceptor of the appropriate level available at all. 4)If pitlords are limited, the guild fights should be trimmed off rather than declaring a state of emergency. Otherwise you are placing the guild game ahead of the game which this board is meant to support.No response. Another thought, we have delayed higher levels opening in the past paritally due to lack of pitlords...guilds holding that up is absolutely rotten. MWB and I have told you about five to six times already that the guild system is time-sensitive and cannot be interrupted like that. Plus those guild characters would then just be in the arena. A comment was brought to my attention by more than one person, though I have not yet located its exact place. This was essentially that Caterane no longer has any interest in the arena fights. Caterane, if you are only interested in the guild game, that is fine, but as the gamemaster for an arena board, the arena has to take precedence. The reason why I do not create any more add-on's for the arena is that every time half the board rises and complains. THIS was posted just 3 days ago. I have invested a hell of time, energy and passion into every add-on in the past, from 3FC to 1/3 Rule to Random Arenas to anything else you can find in the rules yet there was always a heavy resistance; you were often involved. There came a time when I asked myself why I'm still trying to improve the board for the guys when they don't want it, and now that I did what the community incl you requested you suddenly say I'm not interested anymore?? Why my characters are not fighting in the arena anymore, you ask? Because I've seen it all already and I have no time for playing in my free time. I do board work instead. Do you think someone spending several hours a day here can be considered "not interested" anymore when other GMs on other boards sometimes vanish for weeks? I'll stop this now. I've taken a lot of time - not to forget the suspension of our current topic - to explain everything to you and two others in detail (I just did it again in this post) yet your next post just says I didn't address anything. That's a barrel with a hole and I'm not pouring any more energy into that. And you know what? I don't have to. I have learned that I cannot satisfy everyone here. No matter which rule I propose there will always be those who don't like it. I still try to explain it to those because the coco is by far the most democratic board around and I want to give everyone insight into the final decisions but there's a point were it's enough with trying to convince the opposition. And if I now see that this free democratic setup of coco where everyone can participate in rules discussions leads to bad feelings of some (incl threats of quitting) when something doesn't turn out the way they like it, we should maybe just close down the Council of Gladius and threads like this one and run this board like all others. Mitza, I would really pay to see how you would do in my position...
NiQil 02-10-07, 08:35 PM	Alright....I've tried to stand by and watch this....but that just isn't happening anymore. First off....Mitza...Cat....you two need to shake hands, kiss and make up, or whatever it is that the two of you need to do...but this stuff has to stop. This is getting more and more inflammatory as the both of you progress in the tones of your posts, and it needs to stop now. I'm not taking sides, I'm not laying blame...I'm just saying that it needs to stop. Nothing we do on this forum is so important as to need to cause personal enmity between anyone. Now...that being said.... Most of you know that I no longer have anything to do with the guilds. I was once very involved with them, but I disliked some of the changes that came down the pike, so I stepped aside. But I still keep tabs on discussions like this, because I still want to help this forum be successful, even if it is something I personally want no involvement with. Everyone here has to realize that nothing on these boards will please everyone. To even try is to doom yourself to failure. Cat and I have had our clashes. Without trying to be disrespectful, Cat is a dreamer. He thinks big things for these forums. As the DM, that is what he needs to do. It's up to the rest of us to make sure that those dreams evolve into a workable, playable setting. I, on the other hand, am a cynic. I always look for the worst in things. So Cat and I clash often, just because of our opposite personalities. He says his piece, I say mine...we both argue about it (sometimes heatedly), but once we have what we want to say and made the points we want to make, a decision gets made, and we move on from there. Some of you will remember that I was one of the biggest detractors of the 3FC when we first introduced it. But I have learned to live with it, and have moved on. My point is this: No one is forcing you to participate in the guilds, or in any other aspect of the forum. Take what you want from the forum, and don't worry about the rest. If you don't like the guild game...guess what? Don't play. If you don't like quest...guess what? Don't do them. Campaigns? Stay away. Are we sensing a theme here? If all you want out of the guild is roleplaying...then that's all you have to do. There is not one guild rule that says you have to be involved in any other aspect of the guild. Will they ask you to? Most certainly. But that doesn't mean you have to say yes. I haven't participated in the guilds in several months. I haven't opened a guild thread in even longer. They no longer interest me in their current form, so I just ignore them. If you don't like something about the guilds, and you have made your arguments about how to change them, then let it be. No one is forcing you to play. And before anyone says otherwise, no, I do not want anyone to leave the forums over this. I want this forum to prosper, and only more members will make that happen. But there is nothing wrong with using the arena as I do, and leaving everything else alone. Getting upset and fighting over things you don't like isn't going to help anything except to antagonize everyone else. Make your case, and then let it be. Disclaimer: This rant is not in any way directed at any one or more individuals, but rather is meant as a comment on the discussion to date. It should not be taken as meant to be offensive, and should not be treated as such. This message will self destruct in 10 seconds.
MitzaVolchenko 02-10-07, 09:50 PM	@NiQil As far as I know, Caterane and I are not in a hairpulling match. People that run games and are engaged in their hobbies have strong opinions and generally quick wits. This makes for spirited debates. I have no problem with that. I believe this is all boiling down to we get to live with what we have and pretend that the incessant issues and rules changes are just precisely what we always wanted and dreamed of. They aren't, but in the absence of any willingness to bend or shift on the part of the powers that be, that is what we get. I know when to give up on a lost fight, and yet I still write do not surrender in tactics for some reason. /me shrugs It is a matter of perspective. If we go into state of emergency, I will not run anything related to a guild fight. I will decline to activate any of my characters for guild action, and when Sybil quests for WAR next week, I expect the credits to be deducted from my account. I will not participate in any interception (either defending or attacking) that involves a double booked opponent, nor will I permit double booking of my characters. I can't make anyone else see that this sort of thing is wrong and disadvantages the non-guild player, but I can refuse to be a part of propagating it. I would still like comment from Caterane on his degree of interest in the non-guild game. It is what this board was founded for.
Caterane 02-11-07, 07:23 AM	@NiQil As far as I know, Caterane and I are not in a hairpulling match. People that run games and are engaged in their hobbies have strong opinions and generally quick wits. This makes for spirited debates. I have no problem with that. I wholeheartely agree with that. It's actually quite the opposite of what you think Niqil: it is because I value Mitza as an important long-standing member and part of this board that I take so much time to reply in detail. I could have just aswell ignored it or written 2 sentences. As said I know that I can't make it right for everyone at the same time and that's why I always try to explain it to those who oppose my proposals, to get them to see the good things in it ...for some I take more time than for others. I would still like comment from Caterane on his degree of interest in the non-guild game. It is what this board was founded for. lol Mam, I have answered it 2 posts above. You are reading my posts ain't you? Just for the record: my interest in the non-guild game is as strong as always, it surpasses the guild game by far. But! It is currently contained in a small frame because of the general dissatisfaction with new developments. Sauro and I have started an awesome add-on some time ago where characters can buy houses and business buildings that earn income by using their skills, get land grants and titles and much more such stuff but it's slumbering on my disc ever since I promised that we'll make a long add-on break after I had to push the 3FC through. If the majority changes from opposition against new add-ons to support, you bet that I'm aflame on the same day! As for my characters all (except Harvester 3) are frozen so I can't fight in the arena. But I can at least miniquest and that's what I do frequently. If you check my "Cat's Alley" you'll find that I have created a lot of new character concepts recently but since they're all ECL 11+ I have to wait a bit more. I hope that answers your question now.
Rauul 02-11-07, 08:27 AM	Sauro and I have started an awesome add-on some time ago where characters can buy houses and business buildings that earn income by using their skills, get land grants and titles and much more such stuff but it's slumbering on my disc ever since I promised that we'll make a long add-on break after I had to push the 3FC through. If the majority changes from opposition against new add-ons to support, you bet that I'm aflame on the same day! A house and Busness... comeon these things would ROCK My half-orc would love to be able to make money off his armorsmithing and weaponsmithing skills.. by owning his own shop instead of using someone elses to make his eq.. IF done right without 30 pages of everchangeing rules... that would be great..
hogarth 02-11-07, 08:39 AM	-- oops --
Caterane 02-11-07, 08:49 AM	Just allow guild to spend 2x gp cost for an extra 1000 hp on the non-income earning structures. Example: So the 1000gp/hp is for the first 1000hp on the building. Then pay an extra 2000gp/1000hp for the next 1000hp. Then pay an extra 4000gp/1000hp for the next 1000hp on the structure. So with 1 GAP the guild could pay 7000gp and build 3000hp of structures. Don't allow people to do this on structures that earn income, because that just allows the rich to get richer faster. But for structures like walls and chapter house upgrades and unique structures/district improvements. This allows you to build defenses a bit faster at increased cost. It would apply to... Special Structures (Fountain, Street Lights, etc). Since they cost only 1000 gp anyway, this would allow you to build multiple such structures with one GAP? Headquarter Augmentations (Keep, Fortress, Castle, etc) This cold lead to a quick expansion of your base. With 10,000 gp I can upgrade my base one step with 2 GAPs, instead of 5,000 and 5 GAPs. I'm sure that's worth the increased cost. Walls and Wall Upgrades (Gatehouse, Turrets, Towers, etc) Same here. With but a few GAPs you can make your headquarter an almost impenetrable bastion. For 2 GAPs and 10,000 gold you'd get... - Wooden Wall around a Fortress (1500) - Wooden Gate (500) - Gatehouse (1000) with 2 Wooden Porticulis (500) - Machicolation (1000) with Boiling Water (500) - 5 Turrets (5000) Do that again and you have 10 additional turrets for 15d8 damage a round. With 4 GAPs and 20,000. Normally such a formidable defense takes an eternity to build. On the other hand, without that you will never be able to build Iron walls or better for that takes years if you can spend only 1000/week. Chapter House Rooms and Facilities (Barracks, Chapel, etc) Again, 10,000 and 2 GAPs and you have 5 rooms. I like this idea but it's too cheap as it is. I think the increment should be a cumulative +2500. Example: 1000 gp <> +1000 hp 2500 gp <> +1000 hp 5000 gp <> +1000 hp -------------------- 8500 gp <> +3000 hp That way we can easily have it apply to pretty much anything. There can even be a new technology that reduces this multiplier. Or allow a guild to "replace" a guild point cost with 5x the gp cost. So if I want to build a simple vault for my chapterhouse in gauterix, I can fork over 5000gp to replace the 1000 PRO points required for the item. The thing will cost me a total of 6000gp. Awesome idea! It always bothered me that I can't even buy some stupid swords without having PRO or TRA. What does it do concretely? - Can you process any amount of points? - Do you have to have the points in your storage? Maybe we can make two different sets of functions: You pay 2.5 times the cost in gold to buy either Processing power or Guild Points. You pay 5 times the cost in gold to buy BOTH Processing and Guild Points. Example 1: you have 1000 Production Points in your storage (maybe from a IND district) but you have no facilities to process it. You could then pay 2500 gold to hire a company to do that for you, plus of course the gold cost the produced item costs itself. Example 2: you have a Production processing capability of 1000 PTS but your storage is empty. You could buy 1000 PRO-PTS for 2500 gp. Example 3: you have neither PRO-PTS nor can you process them so if you want to produce something worth 1000 PTS, you have to pay 5000 gp plus what the item itself costs. There should be a cap of 500 PTS you can generate/process in that way. Technology can expand that cap. And another technology might make it cheaper. Or allow a guild to "throw money at the project" and get something done faster. Say that PSI want to research the super cool technology "Winning The Guild Game III". It costs 50,000 RES points, and we can process only 1000 RES points with one GAP. So allow us to spend 5000gp as a free action (or whatever) and buy a multiplier, say x3. This allows us to multiply the effect of our processed RES points by 3. So with 1 GAP and processing 1000 RES points we are now 3000/50,000 on the way to the new technology. Perhaps we could spend 9000gp for a 4x multiplier. I think the square of the multiplier*1000 in gold. x2=4000, x3=9000, x4=16000. Plus a technology that reduces that. We should start carefully with such an option. Another, though more murky option, would be to increase the action potential of each guild. Perhaps by making the [BUILD] option not cost a GAP, or by allowing one "free" GAP per guild that involves one of their two guild traits (so CEF could [PREACH] or [NEGOTIATE] once per turn w/o a GAP). Or by adding a moderately expensive Guildhall room option that would give you this ability. I love this idea! Here's our unique guild bonus. We should limit it though. 2 Options... Once a week, you can process one of your guild traits as a Free Action but only up to the inherent bonus, in effect +500 / +250. So CEF could process 500 FAI or 250 NEG once a week. We could also say it's 4x the price in gold (here: 2000 gp for FAI, 1000 gp for NEG) Once a week, you can process one of your guild traits as a Free Action but you have to pay twice the cost points and quadruple gold. Say CEF could process 750 NEG-PTS it has to pay 1500 NEG from the storage and 3000 gold. That would definately make each guild more unique and more to what they should be. EDIT: We should also add operations that damage rooms (except Guildhall-specific rooms, like Living Quarters and Halls)
MindWandererB 02-11-07, 02:31 PM	I hate to derail this, Cat, but I think there are other discussions of higher priority at the moment. Only CEF has a surplus of money right now, and based on my last conversation with you, I'm not sure that's true anymore, either. Besides, this nerfs the new use of CON to facilitate construction, and PRO to facilitate the adding of rooms, so either those will need to be improved, or this new option needs to be tweaked. Perhaps we can consider the unique guild bonus option only for now, and see if that is sufficient for both the gold surplus and the guild uniqueness issues. One point: things that cost no gold should cost gold with this option. Otherwise, TLT and probably CEF will just convert followers constantly, etc. On the other hand, if that does cost gold, it becomes a pretty crappy option. Edit: Ooh, I just had the best idea for this! Forget the ability to pay for overproduction. Make it a function of buying PTS! If you want to speed up construction, use CON-PTS, paying for the storage and/or the processing if you don't have them. Same for PRO and rooms, or for REC and employees, or anything else for that matter. One mechanic, two answers.
Caterane 02-11-07, 07:28 PM	Ooh, I just had the best idea for this! Forget the ability to pay for overproduction. Make it a function of buying PTS! If you want to speed up construction, use CON-PTS, paying for the storage and/or the processing if you don't have them. Same for PRO and rooms, or for REC and employees, or anything else for that matter. One mechanic, two answers. Wow that's indeed a great idea! We could also let guilds sell stored points or process for NPC organizations to make money. Here's how it could look like: - You make deals of up to 1000 Guild-Points with NPC organizations in Gladius <|[b]Buy Guild Points: You buy any number of generated Guild-PTS for a 2:1 ratio. <|Order Processing: You buy any number of processed Guild-PTS for a 3:1 ratio. <|Commision Project: You buy any number of generated and processed Guild-PTS for a 5:1 ratio. <|Sell Guild Points: You sell any number of stored guild points to NPCs for a 1:1 ratio. <|Offer Processing: You process any number of guild points for NPCs for a 1:0.5 ratio. Examples You want to buy a 1000 gp counter-measure: Bucket Brigade Buy Guild Points: You have a processing capability of 1000 PRO-PTS but no PRO-PTS stored. You use one GAP to buy 1000 PRO-PTS for 2000 gp (delivered immideately). Processing is another GAP though. Altogether: 2 GAPs and 3000 gp. Order Processing: You have 1000 PRO-PTS stored but no way to process them. You use one GAP to let your points be processed by NPC firms for a 3000 gp fee, plus the counter-measure itself for 1000 gp. Altogether: 1 GAP and 4000 gp. Commision Project: You have no way to generate or process PRO-PTS. You pay 5000 to hire an NPC firm plus 1000 for the counter-measure. Altogether: 1 GAP and 6000 gp.
MindWandererB 02-11-07, 08:12 PM	I don't get "Offer Processing," though. It seems like free money. If you have 1000 TRA processing, for instance, you just pay a GAP and make 500 gp? That seems... strange. But probably not bad; it's worth the GAP for a guild that needs the money, and not worth it for a guild that has enough money already. Some foresight can make you meet a threshhold you're just short of otherwise. Important to note that you can't process the same PTS yourself in the same week, since your facilities are busy on commission.
Caterane 02-12-07, 07:09 AM	Alright, let's try it out. I've added the following to the rules: [COMMISSION] - You make deals of up to 1000 Guild-Points with NPC organizations. You can use each option only once per week. <|Buy Guild Points: You buy any one type of Guild-PTS for a 2:1 ratio. <|Order Processing: You order processing of stored Guild-PTS for a 3:1 ratio. <|Commission Project: You commission a project in Guild-PTS for a 5:1 ratio. <|Sell Guild Points: You sell any one type of stored guild points to NPCs for a 1:1 ratio. <|Offer Processing: You process any one type of guild points for NPCs for a 0.5:1 ratio. A description with examples can be found in the Miscellaneous Section, or below: Commission By using the [COMMISSION] GAP option, you can circumvent the requirement of having stored points or facilities to process them: you commission NPC organizations in Gladius to do the work for you. This, however, comes at a much higher price than doing it yourself. To prevent confusion, we've clarified each option below with examples. Buy Guild Points: You use one GAP to buy 1 Guild Points for 2 gp. The maximum amount you can buy is 1000 PTS a week and all must be of the same type. The points are delivered at the end of the week, added to your storage, and are available for next week's Guild actions just as if you had generated them this week. Order Processing: You commission an organization to process your stored guild points (max 1000). You must have these points stored in any storage and these points are then deducted from your storage. You pay 3 gold per point as commission fee. For example, to fabricate Signal Fires (1000 PRO) you have to pay 3000 gold plus deduct 1000 PRO-PTS from your storage. The price for the project itself is already included in the fee. Commision Project: You commission an organization to fabricate a project for you. You do NOT have to have guild points stored nor do you need any facilities; the NPC organization provides all that for you. The maximum amount you can commission is 1000 PTS and you have to pay the 5:1 fee. For example, to fabricate Signal Fires, you have to pay 5000 gold fee. The price for the project itself is already included in the fee. Sell Guild Points: You can use a GAP to sell stored Guild Points. You must have them stored in your storage, and you can sell only points of one type. For every point sold you gain one gold. The maximum amount you can sell a week is 1000 PTS. Offer Processing: You use your facilities to fabricate a project for an organization (max 1000). For example, you process 1000 PRO-PTS with your Assembly Halls to earn 500 gp. You do NOT use up any guild points as they are provided by the NPC organization. Important Note: Since your facilities are busy on commission, you cannot use these facilities for anything else! With this new option, I decided to exclude income-generating structures from the [CONSTRUCT] GAP with Construction Points, but in return reduced the ratio from 1:2 to 1:1 to compensate. Every guild now has a new unique special ability: Trait Specialist : Each guild has the option to process guild points associated with their Primary and Secondary Guild Trait as a Free Action, once a week and only up to their free base capability (500 and 250, respectively). This, however, comes at an increased price: the gold cost is 4 times as high as normally; for options that do not cost gold, deduct twice the amount of processed guild points in gold. Additionally, you cannot use a GAP for this point type in the same week, and you can do that for only one trait, not both. Example: as a Free Action the CEF can process 500 FAI-PTS to "Summon a Guardian" but it costs 2000 gp instead of the usual 500 gp (4 times the price). Alternatively, the CEF could have "Converted Citizen" with 500 FAI-PTS and 1000 gp (normally, converting citizen doesn't cost any gold). They could not use a Free Action to process NEG-PTS (their Secondary Guild Trait) in the same week, nor can they use a [PREACH] GAP this week. We'll probably add some new technologies that increase Commissioning a bit later. For now, this should suffice to have enough options to spend money and make it attractive again.