Feature Cut: Buying Regions

[Sacha]

Things to do with a big family fortune:

-Running investments on a regular basis. Which can be a tremendous benefit to any realm.
-Using family gold to ransom yourself out of jail. Not sure how exactly it works, but it could basically be a 'get out of jail unbanned' card.
-Fame points.

I think there are some other uses besides these, but I can't think of any right now.

And, perhaps we could use this as an opportunity to think of some new uses for a big family fortune.

[Indirik]

- Buying family influence for equipment repairs and entertainment in foreign, non-allied realms.
- Getting financial aid from your family
- Placing a bounty on someone with family gold.
- Moving your family home. (Doesn't that take some gold form you, and some from your family?)
- Higher starting gold for your new characters.

[JPierreD]

I'm not saying that this particular feature should be one of those things. I'm saying that the argument of "Why should we have a feature that not everyone can use" simply doesn't hold water.

Why can't we all be kings?  :-\  :P

[Peri]

Things to do with a big family fortune:

-Running investments on a regular basis. Which can be a tremendous benefit to any realm.
-Using family gold to ransom yourself out of jail. Not sure how exactly it works, but it could basically be a 'get out of jail unbanned' card.
-Fame points.

Pay the ransom with family gold is an option that appears usually when you can already be banned. As far as I could se it is not really a "get out of jail unbanned card", unless the amount of family wealth influences the day when the option appears, which would be then a different thing.

- Buying family influence for equipment repairs and entertainment in foreign, non-allied realms.
- Getting financial aid from your family
- Placing a bounty on someone with family gold.
- Moving your family home. (Doesn't that take some gold form you, and some from your family?)
- Higher starting gold for your new characters.

All what you and Sacha said are nice things, but they are available to someone with already 3-4k family gold. An appreciable difference between someone with 3k and 10k was given basically only by the chance of buying regions. Not a valid reason by itself to keep the feature, but still it was one of the main advantages in my opinion of a very wealthy family as opposed to a moderately wealthy one.

[vonGenf]

It is never played as intended (i.e. most players don't accept it as a legitimate title), and I don't think it really adds all that much to gameplay. I do believe that it can be replaced by something better, in the future. And for the moment, I don't think many will miss it all that much.

I know this wasn't a thread about "How to improve buying regions", but now that you got me thinking about it.....

What if you could buy elections through family gold instead of regions?

By that I mean that when the election is run, you could pay gold for a chance to simply decide what the results will be. The outcome would be one of:

-You fail, nothing happens
-You fail, you get caught, the realm is aware (maybe you get thrown in jail)
-You succeed, the election runs its course but instead of displaying the counted votes it shows whatever you want it to show. The realm is unaware anything happened.

This wouldn't work for appointed posts, of course, but that's fine. On the other hand, you could buy a government position if you were so inclined. And in most cases it would be seen as legitimate. There are cases where it won't be seen as legitimate because it flies in the face of everything the characters expected, but this will be an IC indignation and not meta-gaming.

PS I know this is a far cry from simplifying the code... sorry.

[Indirik]

Pay the ransom with family gold is an option that appears usually when you can already be banned. As far as I could se it is not really a "get out of jail unbanned card", unless the amount of family wealth influences the day when the option appears, which would be then a different thing.

The option to pay ransom from family gold shows up whenever the normal ransom options hows up. Whether r not you can be banned for whatever landed you in prison has no relevance.

All what you and Sacha said are nice things, but they are available to someone with already 3-4k family gold. An appreciable difference between someone with 3k and 10k was given basically only by the chance of buying regions. Not a valid reason by itself to keep the feature, but still it was one of the main advantages in my opinion of a very wealthy family as opposed to a moderately wealthy one.

Someone who has more family gold can do them more often, without needing to "recharge".

[Peri]

The option to pay ransom from family gold shows up whenever the normal ransom options hows up. Whether r not you can be banned for whatever landed you in prison has no relevance.

I am pretty sure it doesn't. The option "pay ransom" is there since the very beginning of your stay in prison, but usually requires far more gold than what you have with you. Then, it starts to go down and one day also "pledge the ransom" appears. As far as I could see, it never appeared before the 2nd/3rd day in prison, that is the time needed for the judges to ban you if you were caught in a situation that allowed them to.

An alternative explanation could be that since the pledge is twice as high as the ransom and my personal guess that the pledge option appears only when this amount is not above a certain % of your family wealth, coupled with the fact that my family has never been that rich, it coincidentally never showed up in useful time for escaping angry judges :p

[Jens Namtrah]

Thing is, family wealth isn't like anything else in the game. Fair enough, you can say things like becoming a world class infiltrator require a lot of effort, sacrifice and all that, but that's a decision you take with a character and anyone can come along and have a crack at it. If you want to hit several thousand family gold and have the option to buy a region, that's a decision you're really taking as a player, and something you're utilising all your characters towards for some meta-goal. Sure, there should be perks for enriching your family, but I don't think it should be a right to buy out a duchy whenever you feel like it. Why shouldn't just anybody have the chance to get some dubious claim to a region recognised? Or is that our punishment for not being 'ambitious' enough?

why is that an OOC decision? money = power; you think a character wouldn't want to raise enough money to grease all the right palms to get his hands on the title to a region?

There was a lot more ordinary backroom dealings in those days than you seem to think.

Read Henry V for  so thoughts on the importance of "dubious claims" being recognized, and their importance.

the problem isn't buying regions, the problem is players not engaging it fully. don't punish the imaginative.

[Sacha]

I think the problem Revan suggests is that Duke Johnny on Atamara suddenly up and decides he'll be sending assloads of gold to his family so his relative Knight Jimmy, who he hasn't spoken to in years, can buy himself a region on Beluaterra.

[Valast]

Remove...

I have never seen it used without the realm refusing to accept the persons title.  I would prefer to see something with better results take its place in the future.

Perhaps requiring support from the knights of that region or some such.

[Indirik]

Keep in mind that the current implementation of buying regions does not allow you to buy the lordship of a region that already belongs to your realm. It only allows you to buy a region that is not a part of your realm. It immediately becomes part of your realm and you are the new lord.

Personally, I have seen this used several times. The only time anyone ever complains is when when the region being bought is part of a friendly realm, or a realm with which the leaders do not want to be at war. The realm from which the region is bought... I don't think they ever consider it to be legitimate. :P

[vonGenf]

Keep in mind that the current implementation of buying regions does not allow you to buy the lordship of a region that already belongs to your realm. It only allows you to buy a region that is not a part of your realm. It immediately becomes part of your realm and you are the new lord.

Ah. That's... strange. I would have thought you would have changed allegiance rather than your region.

[Kain]

Personally I think it should stay and be expanded.

As many ways as possible for corruption and intrigue is good.

I think the idea to manipulte elections with family gold is awesome. Imagine the drama that can create, just the idea that it is possible is enough for doubt to exist about the new Kings legitimacy to the throne.

Also to bring back the old option of buying a lordship in your own realm. That is the one that was never accepted by the players, but it could still be used for dubble crossing. For example buying a lordship of a city in the realm and then seceeding or just a townsland region in the outskirts of the realm and then switch to another realm with it.

[vonGenf]

Ah. That's... strange. I would have thought you would have changed allegiance rather than your region.

To be clear: I knew it often happened that nobles would bring the new region as a "gift" to their realm, but I thought it was done through auto-changing allegiance or seceding.

[Tom]

I like the "buying votes in an election" thing. That's a really cool idea, someone should flesh it out and make it a feature request so it doesn't get forgotten.

As for "Buy Regions" - we'll remove it. Thanks all for the feedback.