Clan in Fontan and Aurvandil

[Indirik]

It seems to me that the argument only became prevalent after Aurvandil began to win its war.

This is not strictly correct. These trends in behavior have been tracked over the past few years. This isn't just the current Aurvandil/Fontan situation. It goes back to Averoth and Thulsoma before that. From what I can see, there is a clear trend of behavior. A small/poor/weak realm has, either quickly or over the period of a few months, a large infusion of players. For the most part these players are quiet, do what they are told to do. Dissenters are ridiculed. (When someone questions why a lord was banned without any debate or reason, they are told "Be quiet. If he was banned, he deserved it.") People from outside the group are generally not given positions of power. (Although sometimes they let them be banker, because, to be honest, that position doesn't matter.) Although the realms are technically Republics or Democracies, the elections are mostly a formality. Once the clan is firmly in place, only one person runs, there is no campaigning, and that person is elected with a minimal number of votes, most people not even casting votes. The realm in question makes a stereotypical 180 degree turn: from being a small-time realm with little hope of advancement or success, they suddenly become a hyper-efficient military powerhouse. For the most part, orders seem to come out of nowhere. There is little or no IG discussion of plans/policies/treaties/etc., even in closed councils. A specific group of people is always available to follow orders. (Orders given 2 hours before a turn with no warning, and 100% movement of 40+ nobles (>90% of the realm) follows, reliably, time after time.)

This is a repeating pattern that we have seen happen in multiple realms over the course of a few years. The current Aurvandil/Fontan case is not a sudden thing. It has just taken this long for things to build to this level.

We're not saying that everyone in the realm is involved. It is possible that some people in the realm may not know what is going on. But just because they don't know about it doesn't mean it's not happening.

[rowan1364]

Has the question been asked to compare the government type to other governments that are around? Fontan is a democratic realm, while still adhering to the principles of feudalism, the distribution of power (and therefore wealth) is more evenly divided among lords and nobles. If one link in the chain is weak, we try our best to see that it becomes strong.

So when you say 'numbers that other realms have a hard time managing' you might consider also that most realms are also not democracies. While that's obviously not the only reason, it may be enough of one that it's causing unnecessary suspicion.

[Vellos]

Yeah... I don't think IC government system really matters at all for OOC clanning.

[Draco Tanos]

I think the point was that it's easier for a clan to sieze power in a realm that has frequent elections for leadership than a tyranny, monarchy, or theocracy.

[NoblesseChevaleresque]

Specifically not the economy as in how much the regions make, but the tax collection and distribution. As someone mentioned, gold gets sent to people who need it. In many cases, it gets send without a request for gold. So how do the people who distribute it around know who needs how much? We haven't found an answer to that question.

All the gold I send, comes with at the request of a noble, and if you can read the messages of Aurvandil, you will be able to verify that, and verify that when needed I go and ask other nobles if they need gold when I see their unit to be understrength. As for anyone else, well as far as I can see requests are made, gold is distributed. If not, it could simply be the case of seeing a noble who appears to need gold, and sending it to them along with a letter asking them to use it on their unit, happens in other realms.

If this is really the best argument anyone can make, then this is faltering accusation of clanning at best. The realm functions entirely in character, Mendicant even makes a point of involving other people, replying to everyone, always sharing his messages and taking the time to write to other nobles. If the realm functions entirely in character, and the clan does not control any power, or hold any influence or have the means to change anything in the realm short of seizing power, then said clan isn't harming the gameplay, it's functioning entirely as you would expect of players who aren't in a clan.

Really, I'm still waiting for some one to make any sort of genuine accusations against Aurvandil, other than "Well you have some nobles from the north" or "You have a strong military" (which we've always had, but it only came into question when we stopped losing battles in Tower Fatmilak, but was in existence for months prior) and I am also waiting for some one to explain why this is a bad thing for the game when everything is done in character, through in character means, for in character reasons, and there is no outward use of clanning to influence that, I'm not even sure what this clan is meant to be at current the standard definition appears to be "nobles from the north", no one has defined who is the clan, what the clan activities are, how it is bad for the game and how they are a clan, this thread is a waste of time until some one does.

[DoctorHarte]

I didn't mean to imply that there was cheating. It's simply a fact that if you look at Aurvandil's performance, it's a major outlier. I'm sure everything is handled through existing game mechanics, however your average realm (even your above-average realm) would be very hard pressed to reach the kind of numbers and averages observed in Aurvandil. Incidentally, that is why this group of players keeps getting singled out. From Thulsoma through Averoth to Aurvandil and Fontan, the realms that are populated by these families enjoy eyebrow-raising levels of coordination and economic efficiency that are simply beyond the grasp of most realms in the game, if not all of them. This is why suspicion and accusations tend to follow them wherever they go. There is all sorts of evidence that the realm, as a whole, is min-maxing, which is really just another word for power gaming even if it's all comfortably within the designed mechanics of the game.

After you look at Kabrinskia's total CS these days, your logic doesn't add up. They had over 30,000 CS 10 days past and sit on a single-duchy city just like Aurvandil did. In fact, Aurvandil didn't touch 30k until we had over 40 nobles. You see, it is possible for other realms to achieve this "unusual economic efficiency".

[Vellos]

All the gold I send, comes with at the request of a noble, and if you can read the messages of Aurvandil, you will be able to verify that, and verify that when needed I go and ask other nobles if they need gold when I see their unit to be understrength. As for anyone else, well as far as I can see requests are made, gold is distributed. If not, it could simply be the case of seeing a noble who appears to need gold, and sending it to them along with a letter asking them to use it on their unit, happens in other realms.

To reiterate; whether gold distribution is explainable through IC means alone is not really up for debate. The devs have determined it isn't. The question now is whether or not this system is against the social contract.

After you look at Kabrinskia's total CS these days, your logic doesn't add up. They had over 30,000 CS 10 days past and sit on a single-duchy city just like Aurvandil did. In fact, Aurvandil didn't touch 30k until we had over 40 nobles. You see, it is possible for other realms to achieve this "unusual economic efficiency".

Kabrinskia has Golden Farrow, and Astrum's support.

[DoctorHarte]

Out on another limb, if some of the Magistrates are the accusers in this situation would they be taken out of the council who'll make the final decision? Or will Tom himself do so? I don't believe it would be fair to include the Magistrates who made the accusations as they would have an unbiased opinion.

[Geronus]

As Tom pointed out, we've maybe gotten off track a bit. At this point, the behavior that has been reported is not in question, as in "Hey, that's awfully suspicious - I wonder if they're a clan". It has been confirmed by the Devs and is as described by Tom and Indirik. The only question we're really left with is "does what Tom and Indirik have outlined violate the clause of the Social Contract that Tom has cited?". That would be the fair play clause.

Personally, barring further evidence, I believe it does. The fact that this group of players appears to organize and coordinate on a large scale with minimal IG messaging suggests that they rely on other means to coordinate, which gives them various advantages. They also appear to stick together and support each other no matter the circumstances. They are thus able to form an impervious power bloc in any realm that they have elected to set up shop in; with total unity, they never have to worry about spies or betrayal, or whether everyone in the group will vote for the clan's chosen candidate.

It's almost like multi-accounting, and isn't fair to the rest of the player base for similar reasons. After all, if every account in the clan simply obeys whatever orders are given without question and is 100% loyal, what is the difference between them and if one player simply created an equal number of accounts that he used as his puppets? It suggests an overall focus on control and winning over the enjoyment of other players, whether they be realm mates or enemies.

Finally, the reaction of other players says a lot. Realms win and lose all the time, yet we only seem to get this reaction when it involves this specific group of players.

[Geronus]

Out on another limb, if some of the Magistrates are the accusers in this situation would they be taken out of the council who'll make the final decision? Or will Tom himself do so? I don't believe it would be fair to include the Magistrates who made the accusations as they would have an unbiased opinion.

I don't think any of the Magistrates were involved in making this complaint, either about Fontan or Aurvandil, though some of the Devs among us may have been involved in the investigation.

[Kellaine]

After you look at Kabrinskia's total CS these days, your logic doesn't add up. They had over 30,000 CS 10 days past and sit on a single-duchy city just like Aurvandil did. In fact, Aurvandil didn't touch 30k until we had over 40 nobles. You see, it is possible for other realms to achieve this "unusual economic efficiency".

When I joined Kabrinskia coming from Morek I brought with me 5000 gold to distribute that I had saved up in a secret societys vualts for months.  And before that I delivered 2000 gold to them while I was banker of Morek. by I, I mean Katayanna.  She was almost banned for "steeling" gold though shadow banking.  She was guilty so she left the realm immediately before she could be banned. That is a total of 7000 gold that I put into Kabrinskia and now with the new system in place I even get a better tax then I did in Aegirs Deep where I was getting as much as the lord of Aegirs deep before Katrina was made Duchess.

And I am not the only noble to bring with him/her a large sum of gold to hand out.  I do think I brought in the most.

[feyeleanor]

I've been a Fontan player since 2007, with a break from the game in 2010 for personal reasons, and during that time I've seen it run both highly efficiently and lackadaisically via IC means as the fortunes of war ebbed and flowed. Much of the political tension which made the realm so much fun flowed from the desire of our military to plan in a private realm message group whilst the guardians of the democratic tradition wanted oversight - much like the tension in ancient Rome between Senate and Emperor. At times we achieved incredible efficiency even with 100+ players because people wanted to play regularly and engage IC.

I therefore appreciate the argument the Aurvandil players are extending for why that realm is doing well, and why they run it the way they do. And I don't doubt that they're sincere in their defence. However I suspect they're missing the bleeding obvious.

The Auvrandil contingent who've joined Fontan in recent months don't seem to communicate with the wider community, have no apparent IC commonality beyond Aurvandil, don't involve themselves in the public institutions which traditionally orchestrate Fontanese society (The Assembly and Ministry of Defence) and lack even the very basic historical knowledge a random peasant would possess. The latter could be remedied with either a half-hour reading the wiki or a few days talking to existing characters.

No one should ever be punished for not doing basic homework, but it's clearly rude in a friendly game to move in en masse and completely ignore everything that's gone before. To my mind it's indicative of a mindset which - regardless of vehement protests to the contrary in forum threads - not only excludes players who aren't part of a self-identified group but also values success by the metrics of financial gain and military success more than it does building a fun shared playing environment.

My particular bugbear though is that the current general is run by a player who still insists on issuing both realm wide and individual orders without in any way seeking to include marshals in that process, despite this having been addressed both IC and OOC. Such behaviour runs directly counter to the advice given in the manual on how to play a Government Position and this raises the spectre of power being abused to deliberately favour one group of players in Fontan at the expense of others.

These orders are issued on a turn-by-turn basis with very little explanation of a broader strategy and only characters of this particular group seem privy to any of the "special" orders relating to looting, which further adds to the impression of cliquishness.

I've played positions of authority and there are times when an order outside the usual feudal chains of command makes sense for IC reasons. The natural break on doing this regularly is the pushback IC from those holding the feudal rights which have been compromised. It's certainly not something that should be the norm.

[Vellos]

Out on another limb, if some of the Magistrates are the accusers in this situation would they be taken out of the council who'll make the final decision? Or will Tom himself do so? I don't believe it would be fair to include the Magistrates who made the accusations as they would have an unbiased opinion.

To my knowledge, no Magistrate is in Fontan; dunno about Madina or Westmoor. If they are, decisions about recusal will be made internally by the Magistrates. We do take into account issues with bias and conflict of interest.

Tom has no vote on Magistrate rulings, and no Magistrate is a plaintiff. So far, it doesn't appear that any Magistrates show signs of needing to recuse themselves.

[Shizzle]

Though I cannot bring anything concrete in the discussion, I would like to testify that Mendicant has indeed been responsive to my messages, and I must say I have enjoyed our interaction. Regarding the distribution of gold I can also say I've frequently sent gold around to people without having received a request. If you're a supplier of money and used to sharing, you develop some knowlegde regarding the means of your realm-mates. Today I probably send gold around more often without than I do with a message.

Just my 2 cents, feel free to delete if deemed irrelevant :)

[Dante Silverfire]

My particular bugbear though is that the current general is run by a player who still insists on issuing both realm wide and individual orders without in any way seeking to include marshals in that process, despite this having been addressed both IC and OOC. Such behaviour runs directly counter to the advice given in the manual on how to play a Government Position and this raises the spectre of power being abused to deliberately favour one group of players in Fontan at the expense of others.

These orders are issued on a turn-by-turn basis with very little explanation of a broader strategy and only characters of this particular group seem privy to any of the "special" orders relating to looting, which further adds to the impression of cliquishness.

I've played positions of authority and there are times when an order outside the usual feudal chains of command makes sense for IC reasons. The natural break on doing this regularly is the pushback IC from those holding the feudal rights which have been compromised. It's certainly not something that should be the norm.

Yes, this is annoying, but I don't see any reason that this breaks the Social Contract. I have played generals now and in the past and I know you can lead in many different ways. One way (although not good in the long run if you want to keep your position) is to just be highly controlling as the General and issue as many orders as you can in person. However, i think this is an IC decision and one that which can be opposed IC, instead of an OOC decision to exclude players. When I was a controlling General I was highly successful, but I also made enemies within my own realm. It sounds to me that this is exactly what is happening in Fontan, and so I don't see how this is an OOC or Social Contract issue at all. Protest the General, hold a rebellion, or do something to oppose his rule. Have the Marshal directly contradict the General and claim direct control over the army. Any of these are legit IC actions and promote the fun of the game.

The entire argument of this thread hinges upon whether the clanning activity which is occuring, is harmful to the game or breaks the Social Contract. I would argue that neither is occuring. (For reference, I have no character on East Island, and my only character on Dwilight has no personal stake on either side of the Aurvandal-Madina conflict). This clan, and for the purposes of this argument, I am assuming that there is in fact a clan, as the Dev Team suggests, is taking actions IC which have plenty of room for IC conflicts. From what I have heard, these clans are simply acting like any other like-minded body of nobles. However, they are bullying their realmmates in certain cases and trying to take control of a realm.

They are taking control through solely IC means, and have left open plenty of room for opposition or joining by non-clan members. Someone gets elected without sending a message to the whole realm? How does that say anything about them not campaigning for the position? The same thing happened in Coria, but I am 100% certain that there are hidden power blocs where the campaigning actually did occur. Sending a letter to the whole realm is usually pointless in most realms anyway. If you really want to get elected you have to privately contact those you want votes for, and those who can influence others to vote for you. Perhaps they just did this? Even if they get elected, you can oppose their actions. They invite others to join with them, so they aren't being exclusive.

With all of these things taken into mind, they aren't violating the Fair play part of the Social contract because none of their actions go against something that someone could do quite legitimately if they weren't part of the clan. I know for sure I have my own "pseudo clans" set up via other players that I have played with now in the game for years, and whose families trust mine and I trust theirs. Does that mean that we are breaking the social contract because long time of play has allowed us to work together more often than not? These relationships were built IC, but they are just as tight as if they were made OOC. Does my character need to know who to send gold to without having requests for gold? Absolutely not. However, I will sometimes send the letters asking anyway at random times.

Does it violate the fair play agreement to maximize one's realms resources? No. The game has the resources in place, and if characters wanted to they could convince others to help maximize those resources as much as possible. The fact that most players don't is just because they don't want to take the time to go through it. Tom stated himself that those who put more time into the game are more likely to do better in the game. Is there something wrong with that? No.

I think the point that the Magistrates need to focus on is whether a clan is being exclusive and preventing others from joining in their goals: If they refuse to allow others to join in on their plans or to oppose their plans through IC actions then they are violating the Fair Play part of the social contract. Otherwise, the whole military aspect seems perfectly legitimate to me.