DM Factions
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Folks, we've had the two main DM factions–the Plebian Court and the Citadel Council for awhile. The DM team is curious how the player perspective is on these to help us guide future changes or ideas with factions.
How are they working? What's right, what's wrong?
What else could we have? New factions, changes to existing ones, adjustments?
What ideas, improvements, features could we add for factions?
If we brought back a "militia" kind of faction, what would it look like? What would be the allure of it?
What's your dream faction? -
As far as I've seen, DM factions have always been healthier for the community as a whole. Player factions are GREAT, and there have been many successful ones, but DM factions have always set an ambiance that provokes conflict on its own without needing too much effort from the players. People know and recognize the factions for their credibility. People know who their enemies are, politically or otherwise, and it's easier for them to mold a plot to fit around a faction they think could catalyze it.
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Sexy elf faction.
In seriousness… I would adore an 'anti-arabel' faction.
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Things I like:
Easy to join and are capable of maintaining an extremely wide variety of concepts.
Nice access to some loot/chest/resting as a benefitThings I don't like:
Vague goals.
With only two factions, you can easily find yourself having played in the same faction multiple times. You can only play a King/Advisor so many times.Things I'd like to see changed:
For the Pleb Court I think it would be a good idea to extend the faction to include all three gangs and let a pc choose which to join off of entering the faction whether its Chaos/Pleb/Palace right off the start.
Push players in a direction and just let them go. The wonders you'll see from just giving people a nudge in the right direction.
New fresh factions would also be a bonus.(Thayan's? Mage guild?)Dream Faction: Adventurer's Guild, Zhentarim, Custodians of Candlekeep.
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Personally i'd prefer factions with clear set goals and specific alignments in mind rather than the try and shoehorn as many alignments as possible into a faction that the Plebians and Council seem to have going for them. The plebs seem to alternate between rebels trying to overthrow Hardcastle to bloodstone dealers depending on the PCs at the time.
As for improvements perhaps a faction wage for certain factions so they can use funds to help involve people in plots by giving out rewards rather than have to quest just to have money.
Dream Faction would be War Wizards. I enjoy powerful wizard factions
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The disclaimer here is that bad faction ideas can be a success because of one player with a good idea, and great faction ideas can fail because it just didn't get players for whatever reason (the players that could run wild with it had other concepts among other simple things).
That said, the meta faction idea is a good one, but one that needs arrows pointing in the right direction. The Mage's Guild had a lot of dull periods, but it also had some exciting ones. It was a heavily adventure oriented faction that was all about the magic and history of faerun, with a political end that wanted to see itself take over the city. Plenty here for all sorts of people. Eastway Rebuilders was extremely broad, and without any end goal, except to build a new town based on the efforts of players. This metafaction had at least 4 or 5 player cliques/factions that had different and outright opposing goals, yet they were still oriented towards the same outcome, a new town.
I find that the current factions lack this. The Citadel has the benefit of being modeled after the Mage's Guild, with mentors and a central faction headquarters with full support for PCs, but it doesn't really have much flavor, if any behind it. The idea I think was for it to be a political machine, where people contested with each other to sway the city rulers. But there's never been much of any actual politics, so I've always felt it was really dull, but not impossible to spice up. And like I said, the Mage Guild had in your face flavor (even if it wasn't particularly unique). It was a wizard guild, and magic was the theme. The Citadel doesn't seem to have one. It's just a city, and these are the people that have done the quest that gave them a cloak, and now they have storage access, and can claim to be advisors, but they have no one to advise about nothing.
The Plebian Court was a good idea that worked in a way, but not as intended. The idea of a faction of outlaws of all moral outlooks working towards the common goal of overthrowing the Citadel was good. Aulten eventually earned the Knight title, and was a very active in the fight against Hardcastle, but for a guy that was doing everything he could to be heroic, I struggled to find anything good aligned even in my good aligned actions. I'm willing to accept I may have just not been clever enough this time, or done enough research, but it was frustrating all the same. The faction is and was evil to the core, it just suckered good guys into joining by pointing out that Hardcastle was also a bad guy. This is some perspective, but isn't relevant to any actual problems that the faction may have.
The predominant flaw with the Plebian Court as a faction is that it's only real goal is PvP. Yes it's true that a player could come up with a hundred other things to do, like rebuilding Old Town, and the road towards beating the Citadel is paved with really epic and amazing possibilities, like a mass break out of the Pit, it's ultimately just about PvPing guards and trying to kill Hardcastle.
As metafactions, these groups need to be more broad so that any PC can find a reason to be involved, but as a result they end up with a lot less flavor. I don't think it's wrong, or they were bad. But faction design may need to change from time to time. I love metafactions but not for the sake of just having a faction. I'd rather that there be a big plot that a metafaction is formed around, like rebuilding the East Way, etc. In the mean time, it would be cool to see some really specific factions come back. Not noble houses that are noble houses just because they're noble houses. I don't like club factions. Clubs are dumb. What I liked was Halfling Gypsies, Eclestian Order, Custodian's of Candlekeep, Greencastle. Very specifically planned and designed factions with a plot.
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Dream Faction: Adventurer's Guild, Zhentarim, Custodians of Candlekeep.
Why? What was great about them?
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What was great about the adventurers guild was, there were a couple of DMs almost constnatly running unique events for it. In truth, that would make… any faction awesome, but it's not always practical.
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Dream Faction: Adventurer's Guild, Zhentarim, Custodians of Candlekeep.
Why? What was great about them?
What I liked was Halfling Gypsies, Eclestian Order, Custodian's of Candlekeep, Greencastle. Very specifically planned and designed factions with a plot.
I think golw summed it up pretty well. "Team Citadel" and "Team Old Town" factions can only get you so far. Factions based solely off one or a few plots I find are much more interesting. With Candlekeep we spent most of our time researching the rift and figuring out how to access it's power and I found that to be far more interesting. With Greencastle our goal was to take over east arabel… With Adv Guild we spent our time going on different adventurers looking for exotic creatures/people to save/things to explore... etc
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I made Duke in the Plebs and it can be challenging to forge your own path without alot of NPC support. Not everyone can do it. I find separate factions with clear goals and direction to be easier for the more casual player.
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In fact, I loved Eastway Rebuilders because that had a plot too, even if it was loosely planned. It had a clear narrative. The Mage's Guild was fun periodically because it lasted for ten thousand years and had ups and downs.
Unfortunately like Zool said, any faction is good if it has a DM running it. Maybe that isn't necessary really, just as long as there's an actual narrative? A metafaction doesn't need to be a blank page. It can be super open and inclusive, as long as there's a theme and a definite story that's being told with player's affecting it heavily.
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Speaking solely as a player, both myself and Andros Olen were often the only PCs in the Custodians (at separate times). For me, it was the lore, the connection to the setting and a clear story arc that kept me sticking with it, not DM attention to the faction itself. I did get DM attention for pushing plots, but it was seldom a "faction" storyline or a "faction" event as such, like the Adventurer's guild.
That's just me, though. Zool is correct in that DM attention to any faction will get it full pretty quick, but when that DM attention dies out, so does the interest. Some factions endured and were popular with or without DM attention, like the Mage Guild. Clearly, not all the interest in factions comes from DM attention.
Disclaimer: This is my view from my time as a player.
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I am not happy with the Citadel vs. Old Town stand off because it polarizes the server too much.
To bring up an example, when we used to have Sheriffs, Mage Guild and Red Harts, those were factions that were not particularly fond of each other but were forced to coexist and collaborate in the same framework. This led to a vast field of opportunities for intrigue and did not encourage all out pvp between factions.
Agents and Court members are pretty much pitted against each other. This atmosphere kind of greenlights pvp solutions for most encounters where characters' interests clash.
I like me a bit of tension between factions but not the black and white attitude when it comes to telling friends from foes and certainly not the predetermined pvp.To be more on topic, I'd like to see more factions who are not automatically mortal enemies to other factions. I also want to see faction goals to not clash all the time. Basically, I wish faction players had more freedom in their views on other factions and more opportunities for intrigue.
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What i wanted to say, golw said it first.
Also, this applies to factions as much as it does to just about everything else: When you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing noone.
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Glow and Direfish are spot on and nearly reflect my feelings 100%. They have hit the problems directly.
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A Faction should have a clear, defined goal. It shouldn't be a generic one, "save Arabel," but more, turn Arabel into an image it desires. Religious factions should seek to convert the city to their faith and philosophy, Noble factions should seek to plant their Lord as the heir apparent to the title, Warden of the North, evil factions should desire to subvert and such…
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Just some thoughts on this post .. I hope they are helpful.
How are they working?
Even though some players didn't like or understand the Eveningstar Settlers player faction, It got players to work together in someway for a goal. Trying to make sure their factions had a say and effected the outcome … yes some more than others.
What I noticed and it was thanks to the DM team, is when players had seen something was happening, they took more interest in the project. I was always about changing the server in someway but using DM factions that were in place to involve people. It worked for a time (3-6 months) but got stuck at the end ... for a number of IG reasons.
What ideas, improvements, features could we add for factions?
I always believed a third DM faction was better for the server. I never liked us vs them ( court vs citadel ), got boring at times. Like alignments in away, good working with neutral … neutral working with evil and in some cases good working with evil. Just adds that third option. ( I think House Drachorn is like this .. maybe it is :) )
I strongly believe you need the DM factions as a base but need support for player factions. Alot of the time the DM factions player involve themselves in these player factions because of goals of these factions or attention they are getting.
Maybe like player applications for things, we could have application for factions? Give the faction a kick off and know the goals/direction from day one ... like a forum, gear and a base ( if approved ). Always good RP when you see a player walking by in a different suit of armour or clothing .. even a number of them.
What's your dream faction?
At the moment for me would be a Nature/Druid faction
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I loved the group of factions based around CoA v2/3 with the houses. Each house had a character and goal of its own that directly opposed goals in other houses. However, all the houses were brought together for the defence of Arabel. This gave opportunity of PvP between Houses and also a reason for players in opposing factions to join in the same party to work together. In this time of fewer players, providing valid goals and reasons for the DM factions to work together means that when there are smaller numbers on line you can still party up with your nemesis and do something "For the Good of Arabel." Having reasons to spend time working with your nemesis gives you more opportunity to develop PvP that isn't just combat focussed, which is great for when that Combat PvP finally comes true. You've spent time with your nemesis, simmering that pot of hatred on the hob and you've already rewarded the player who's character you're about to destroy, with great RP over a month or so whilst in the same party furthering a City Wide plot.
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having the factions working together seemed to help a lot in the earlier days, now having factions set up to directly compete, as opposed to doing it in secret seems a bit divisive
pvp events though a necessary evil (depending upon your perspective and tastes) do take a toll on the player base, during the 55/55 days the loss of players was not so noticeable, today one person leaves and it does leave a gap, before anyone says "they should stop being babies we are better off without them" think about it, losing players for whatever the reason is bad
i seem to remember in the v4 days each major pvp event would be followed up by at least one player walking away, many times the ones walking away would be the ones who initiated it and expected to win and would give less quarter than they expected in return, returning to a system where the players are joined against a defeat able foe might help a bit, but that would mean more events which would mean our over worked DMs would be faced with yet more work
so far i have had no negative input from the DMs as to how i play, which i presume means i am doing just ok (save for that one scare a couple weeks back when a DM did ask me a question via tell in game, i heard nothing back, so i am guessing things are ok)
i like the DM factions, but not when they are geared and designed around PvP, Bhaliir and Deshurr worked together as did other houses against outside threats, and in the shadows were competing and even PvPing each other. Do we have a population base for that? i think two DM factions, possibly a third might be what we can support, and done right it may bring some people back, but i would prefer less direct PvP between factions, we get enough of that with certain interesting characters in the game should they survive long enough to make enemies (and that has happened a few times lately with good entertainment for all involved i hope)
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It wouldn't be a proper GD post without PvP slowly becoming the topic… ;)