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A probably impractical way to resolve the number of orgs ‘problem’.
Came up on Disord so rushing out this idea I’ve been mulling over for a bit. I get that the mechanics of this are possibly too much. But maybe it’ll inspire the Admin.
Lusternia has six organizations.
One way to reduce the number of orgs would be to use the Lusternian concept of Alternative TimelinesTM.
The players of the basin could experience time Fluxes which could take one or more orgs out of play. Resulting in players taking up alternate versions of themselves in other orgs.
Simple example for illustrative purposes (not meant to be a suggestion of what should/could be done):
Opposite Timeline orgs
Timeline 1: Serenwilde, Celest, Hallifax
Timeline 2: Glomdoring, Magnagora, Gaudiguch
Original vs Interlopers Timeline orgs
Timeline 1: Serenwilde, Celest, Magnagora
Timeline 2: Glomdoring, Hallifax, Gaudiguch
The mechanic. Timeline fractures: Some orgs are made ncp (doesn’t have to be three, that’s just the example). People in those ‘frozen’ orgs are tossed out into 1) A void, 2) Trapped within the Mirror of Tzarazinko, 3) the Wheel of the Goloths, 4) crap what did Gaudiguch and Hallifax just do? 5) does it matter for this example?
Inside you have to choose between ‘all the other yous that are possible in this reallity.’ Your skills shift into your new org’s skills. In short, pick a new org and join that one (this mechanic allows for staying with your spouse).
That’s it in a nutshell. You reduce the ‘active’ orgs without overly penalizing the players. You give them more things to do by embracing a second org. It will probably have some effects on alliances, etc.
Comments
I've mentioned in the past I have worked on mud, but that wasn't an IRE one. So guessing the best way to code this is a bit beyond me.
I suggested the Limbo as a place where the player could make the choices the game needed to work things out. You'd have to limit a lot of actions or people will escape (death, smokestep, haven, etc.). That was easy in the game I admin for as you could trap all commands in a room and only let specific things though. I don't think the ire engine works that way.
It could be done by lookup tables, if you have x in this org it is the equivalent of x in that. Then it would be like classflex plus.
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As an aside, @Estarra remember way back when the overhaul was proposed and there was some talk of I believe it was called 'skins' for the arena. This is the sort of cool things you can do with a game that is designed that way. Would also let you become odd things in the game or 'go back in time' and relive a historical event.
It's "neutral" in the sense of "we want to be left alone" but there's also the element of "we're the last pure forest" which is not a neutral stance to take imo.
Regardless, I don't think Niwynne's statement was that deep and the point of their comment had nothing to do with any of this.
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Merging Celest and Serenwilde would basically destroy not just the identity of at least one of the orgs involved, it'd ignore the events we've had over the years featuring interactions between the Ethereal and Cosmic planes.
After picking through the confused mess that is Serenwilde's history, it would honestly be less immersion breaking if they decided to form a Faethorn org with Glomdoring than merging with a city.
I think for this to work it'd definitely need to be such that class skills get totally refunded and people get a free classflex because I wouldn't want folks who don't have a plethora of lessons around to suffer for it.
One thing I like about Lusternia's lore is that for any given pair of orgs there's a reason why a given org could be okay with them and one or more reasons why that same org would hate them. Given that I don't think you'd need to be as structured as in your example, you could have it be totally random and I promise you that players will create that RP distinction between the orgs.
In short I see the following benefits from this:
All of that being said I do have a few concerns/challenges to note about this:
theatre due to the snowy weather.
hungering malice.
FTFY
If timequakes, the new daily credits system, and the huge amount of work being done to make the game more newbie-friendly aren't enough to bring activity levels back up, then yes, I'd be down to consider nuking orgs. But we need to give these new changes a chance to have an impact.
Not sure how I feel about forced alting. I'd enjoy it a lot but I feel like it might disengage many others and make it twice as hard for newbies to get their footing. Not to mention the nightmare of coding all of this from a practical perspective.
I think it would be better to come up with a much more robust and complex alliance system, in which allied orgs have very strong incentives to interact, fight, and rp together. This adds to the game, rather than taking away.
I actually wouldn't be all that opposed to this idea, personally.
Delete guilds entirely. We belong to the org and the orders associated with it. Leadership positions could be based on government type.
- Delete the communes and give us Jojobo to start fresh as the only approved Faethorn associated commune, Maeve believes she can then focus on her duties rather than constantly switching allegiances. May have to change or kill off commune gods. Keeps skills from both orgs OR introduces Lion/Sun.
- Merge Gaudiguch and Hallifax as a secular transmortal research community believing they can do better than the gods/half formed and finally defeat the Soulless. Keeps skills from both orgs. No time shenanigans needed (Unless that is how Hallifax gets destroyed). Would possibly need to create a new form of semi-divine capable of acting mechanically similar as an org pantheon.
- I got nothing for Magnagora and Celest. Maybe some attempt to taint/cleanse Celestia and Nil. The two forces merge and manage to raise the Demon Lords and Supernals in to full Divine. Keeps skills from both orgs to represent this new duality of Light and Taint (Light to purify the divine essence of a Soulless and repurpose it. Kind of a Wyrd 2.0 maybe?)
One commune focused on commune stuff like empowering nature and Ethereal to better fight off Soulless. One ruthless collective willing to do anything to better mortality believing they are best capable of finally defeating and sealing away the Soulless. One city believing wholly in the gods and raising up more to fight off the Soulless..
3 new orgs and a fresh start.
I would also get my long desired Sun druid