Friends and Enemies

[Ehndras]

This sounds like an EPIC idea that will bring much intrigue and RP to the game.

[Arundel]

Oh, more ideas! Considering every family has a "home region", you could incorporate that into Dante's idea. So Poryatu, for example, is my family's home. If Malus Solari hated my house, he could sack or loot the family's estate, stealing gold from my overall family's gold. To defend it, you could draft militia like you would for cities. This would lead me to request a "head" of the house, who controls the standings and functions. I'm thinking Tywin Lannister here, in terms of the respect the head of house would be given.

Restrictions:

• You can only change the head of your family once a season, or at the death of the character who holds the position.
• You can only loot an estate/draft militia once a week.
• There should be a limit to how much gold is taken.
• A limit to how many guards your family's estate can hold. Having thousands would defeat the purpose... and probably not fit in the estate.

Oh (these ideas are hitting me as I go,) you could also have the guards take a continuous wage from the family's overall wealth. This would give you an additional reason to send bonds to your family, instead of only using it for investments... occasionally. The richer the family, the more seemingly powerful they are.

[Indirik]

Intrarealm fighting = bad.

[Dante Silverfire]

Intrarealm fighting = bad.

Agreed, but this is not intended as a means for promoting intra-realm fighting. In fact, safe guards could be put in place to highly discourage this if need be.

What this is intended is to allow fighting between nobles of realms who may not normally fight or even if they do, to allow feuds to actually take place.

Sure, some small amount of intra-realm fighting may occur, but this will not be made such that large fights will occur. At most 2-3 nobles per side is what I'd expect.

I mean there is a possible exploit of a Duke demanding all of his vassals naming him their friend, but we can come up with a solution for that so it doesn't lead to intra-realm fighting.

[Norrel]

Intrarealm fighting = bad.

Why?

[Indirik]

I mean there is a possible exploit of a Duke demanding all of his vassals naming him their friend, but we can come up with a solution for that so it doesn't lead to intra-realm fighting.

Why would that be an exploit? Sounds perfectly legit to me. In fact, if I were Duke Kepler, and I didn't like Duke StrongBad, I'd tell everyone in my duchy how evil Duke StrongBad is, then have them all Friend me, and I'd declare hatred for Duke StrongBad and all his cronies. Or, everyone in my duchy would pick someone else and make them an enemy. And Viola, intra-realm duchy warfare.

Why?

See prior posts about Teams. Probably in other threads. In short, it destroys the concept of Realm as Team, makes things nasty and confusing, and basically screws the realm over.

[Arundel]

See prior posts about Teams. Probably in other threads. In short, it destroys the concept of Realm as Team, makes things nasty and confusing, and basically screws the realm over.

Since when has realism been a bad thing?

[Foundation]

When it conflicts with game balance and fun, which take precedence.

[Arundel]

When it conflicts with game balance and fun, which take precedence.

Conflict = fun.

Intrarealm conflict, as a form of conflict = fun.

If realism wasn't fun, Dwilight wouldn't be so popular.

[Darksun]

Perhaps a limit on the number of "friends" or "enemies" that a family can have, based on the only other metric that families have - fame.

You can spend up to X number of fame-based points declaring friends or enemies. These points are not refundable (unless the target family is removed from the game), so they would need to be chosen carefully. Over time, of course, you accumulate more fame, but you also accumulate more friends and/or enemies. Seems to me to get away from any gaming of the system as resources are relatively finite and slow growing.

Otherwise, my guess is that everyone would default to being friends with everyone else for whatever assigned effects that entails.

Thoughts?

[Dante Silverfire]

Why would that be an exploit? Sounds perfectly legit to me. In fact, if I were Duke Kepler, and I didn't like Duke StrongBad, I'd tell everyone in my duchy how evil Duke StrongBad is, then have them all Friend me, and I'd declare hatred for Duke StrongBad and all his cronies. Or, everyone in my duchy would pick someone else and make them an enemy. And Viola, intra-realm duchy warfare.

Its an exploit only because it causes intra-realm warfare as Tom doesn't want. If it weren't for that, I'd be all for it.

However, I like my idea, (obviously) so I think finding a method to prevent that from happening while still allowing dueling feuds would be good. If we do not, I am sure it would be shot down.

[Arundel]

Perhaps a limit on the number of "friends" or "enemies" that a family can have, based on the only other metric that families have - fame.

You can spend up to X number of fame-based points declaring friends or enemies. These points are not refundable (unless the target family is removed from the game), so they would need to be chosen carefully. Over time, of course, you accumulate more fame, but you also accumulate more friends and/or enemies. Seems to me to get away from any gaming of the system as resources are relatively finite and slow growing.

Otherwise, my guess is that everyone would default to being friends with everyone else for whatever assigned effects that entails.

Thoughts?

Hmm, you present a good concern. What about having two positive standings and two negatives? The extremities would present the in game bonuses, having a max of 3-5 families to chose from for each, while the other two are roleplayed. So "Good" and "Poor", "Honor Bound" and "Blood Feud."  Perhaps a reason as to why the families are honor bound/feuding could be supplied when making the standing, in treaty format, so people can better identify the Rpers from the exploiters.

[Ehndras]

Aye, I don't see the problem with limited intra-realm combat. This isn't something that would happen constantly, nor rampantly, and could be tightly controlled with specific triggers and conditions. I also like the limited amount of permanent or semi-permanent friends/enemies. I'd say a maximum of 3-5 enemies and 3-5 friends is the most you'd need. I mean, !@#$, it'd make you think twice about declaring fealty or bloodfeud unless its seriously necessary and important both mechanically and RP-wise, rather than being a feature to be abused. I think 2-3 of each at semi-permanence to account for the fact that a declaration of friendship or bloodfeud would take a long time to 'remove from the system' due to the long-standing and widespread feelings involved in multiple members of the family both player and NPC, which would once again reinforce a more serious mechanic where being sloppy with your friends and enemies will only screw yourself over.

[Foundation]

Intrarealm conflict => Why have more than 1 duchy?

In fact, why have more than 1 duchy with the ruler being duke and margrave?  Creating a new duchy can only lead to a weaker realm.

[Ehndras]

What do duchies have anything to do with individual nobles wanting to shank each other? I see no relation. If two noble houses are out for blood then it doesn't matter what realm, duchy, or region they're from or in, they're going to try to kill each other if their settings are set to aggressive/murderous toward their enemies ;-) You can bet your ass that if I ran into the one guy who robbed 100,000 dollars from my mother 6 years back in Belo Horizonte, I'd break both of his legs and feed him his severed testicles.