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I'd like some opinions of GD, because apparently a recent message of mine was judged vulgar and people agreed. I can't even think of what could possibly be deemed vulgar in this message.

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Etiquette Issue   (just in)
One of your recent messages, reproduced below, has caused many raised eyebrows among your peers and fellow nobles agree that this way of talking is unbefitting of a noble. Your respect among the nobility falls, resulting in a loss of a point of honour.

The Message:

Quite the gathering of nobility we have here. I've never seen so many soldiers gathered together.

Perhaps some of the Darkans here can help me and my friends end a little dispute we've been having. We're trying to decide why Darkans are so good at and so ravenous about fighting battles. We've come up with a few ideas:

1. Darka's women are so ugly, that your soldiers have to fight their way to foreign lands in order to find a lay that they can be with while sober.

2. Darka's women are so viscous, that Darkans have to rape their own women in order to reproduce and so they don't know how to do anything else while abroad.

3. Darka doesn't actually have any women, and this volcano which you speak of is really just a boy hug fest, so your entire realm joins the army so that hopefully they can rather die than return home to that misery.

Any chance I'm close?

Eragon Silverfire
Knight of Barad Falas

So, interesting situation which has arisen on Atamara.

CE is forcing the realm of Eston to split into two realms by duchies. The terms dictate that they must stay this way for a period of 6 months or so. Now, the interesting part is that my current understanding of the rules is that it is against the rules for two realms to merge. What this treaty then effectively does is it uses a meta-game OOC rule to forcibly prevent players who already peacefully play together from ever peacefully playing together in the future in the same realm. (in this geographic spot)

Should it be against the rules for the two realms: Hawthorne (the new realm to be) and Eston to rejoin peacefully after 6 months have passed? They never wanted to be split in the first place and all of the characters are originally from the same realm.

Alternatively, if it is deemed that it is still against the rules for Hawthorne and Eston to rejoin, then should it not also be against the rules to forcibly enact realm splits by treaty, if realm mergers are prohibited? This creates a situation where a realm has to invent a farsicle "war" against their other half in order to rejoin themselves and let the other side surrender before rejoining. Obviously this is an exploit of game mechanics, but this situation is far from having two realms simply join together to make themselves stronger, or for any of the other reasons I've seen argued thus far.

I am interested in hearing from the Magistrates and/or Tom on what they feel these circumstances entail with this ruling.

So, under the old estate system, if someone was elected as Ruler they sometimes lost their other titles such as Lord, duke, etc... depending upon the circumstances.

My question is does a Duke that becomes Ruler lose their ducal position upon becoming Ruler under the new system?

Hello everyone.

I'm looking to possibly make a new character either on East Island or the Far East. I once played a character in both Ohnar West and Arcaea in the past.

So, I'd like to hear reasons why I should make a character on the Far East and what realm I should join. Any realm interested in having a Silverfire come aboard? (Feel free to pitch your own realms and let the in game biases show through)

Hello everyone.

I'm looking to possibly make a new character either on East Island or the Far East. My very first character on this account was made in Perdan ages ago, and in 06 on a previous account I had a character in either Itorunt or Ibladesh, I can't really remember.

So, I'd like to hear reasons why I should make a character on East Island, and what realm I should join. Any realm interested in having a Silverfire come aboard? (Feel free to pitch your own realms and let the in game biases show through)

Title: Remove Royal "un-bannable" perk

Summary: I believe current usage of the royal mechanic has created an atmosphere of gameplay which is toxic to sustained growth and play of battlemaster. The ability for a past ruler to not be banned from their realm incentives rulers to "retire" into duchy/city lordship positions and essentially permanently lock out any other player from gaining that position ever again. If the un-bannable perk was removed from the royal rank it would promote position turnover and encourage more responsible gameplay.

Details: Keep the Royal rank to identify past rulers, but remove the provision that makes this rank unbannable from a realm.

Benefits: Currently and in the past lack of position turnover has been a big problem in the game. Stagnant holders of positions cause new players to be discouraged about what they can achieve in the game, and also makes the game very linearized. Under the current system, one can create a guaranteed safety net for themselves by seeking a lordship, and retiring into a Duchy/Margrave seat as fast as they can. This causes dukes to not have any responsibility to the rest of their realm or any incentive to really encourage good gameplay with their vassals and fellow realm leaders. They can't be removed from their positions and can't be banned from the realm, so they can simply zone out and ruin the fun for many other players once they reach this position. By removing their protection from being banned, players in the realm are given additional recourse against those characters which have stopped realm fun and engagement and simply want to sit on a gold mine.

Exploits: None.

Request from Brom Silverfire
Message sent to: Alice Arundel
Your Majesty, Queen of Luria Nova, One and True Ruler of Luria,

With the utmost humility I would like to request permission to briefly visit the cities of Luria that hold a temple of Sanguis Astroism.

As a Consul of Sanguis Astroism, I am on a holy pilgrimage to each city that our faith has spread to in order to better ascertain the way that the stars affect nobles throughout Dwilight. Only through such study and meditation do I feel I can gain a greater understanding of the Bloodstars in the lives of men and women.

I bring with me only a small bodyguard of troops and come in peace. I vow to harm no one within the cities that I visit, or plot any harm against you, your realm, any of your holdings, or your subjects.

Under Their Light,

Brom Silverfire
Knight of Nimh

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Letter from Alice Arundel
Traitor, Murdered, Coward, Puppeteer of the Wicked,

I would be more than eager to welcome you with open arms, so that I may grab a hold of your face, with my own bare hands, and peel away the cold skin from the rest of your face. I would keep you alive, however, and set you upon the breaking wheel for continued entertainment. I would then proceed to club your limbs to shards between the spokes, and chant feverishly while I did so. After that, I would leave you to the crows, so they could nip away at your exposed flesh, perhaps even your eyes, while all of Luria watched in glee and celebration. Then, and only then, would I drive a rusted dagger slowly into your ice cold heart. We'd create spoons and knives from whatever bones of yours remained, gather wine distilled from your blood, and feast gloriously for days on end.

So my answer is yes, you may come to Luria if you so desire. However, a temporary stay would be out of the question. Permanent residency, as it were, would be your only option.

Eagerly yours,

Alice Arundel
Queen of Luria Nova

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Letter from Brom Silverfire
(Personal message to Alice Arundel)
Ahh Your Majesty you flatter me. I would like to note that perhaps its more appropriate to start with dinner first or maybe a kiss before such treatment as such that you propose.

At least that's what I'm used to doing before the lovemaking begins. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you share Katerina's joy of roleplaying things but I've just had such bad experiences with it in the past. The last time we tried it she took it way too seriously and tied her ropes too tight. Well we both know how that ended. At any rate, its been a while since I've...had...an Arundel. Your cousin certainly was beautiful. Granted, the fun will be a bit different because I hear you're blind. I guess we can make that work. Certainly prevents you from watching your husband's death, although I guess that's too predictable. Katerina relished watching that sort of thing, so she got her wish. That way we were able to be together. I know, your husband still has eyes, we could just make him...watch. And don't worry, I'm very experienced, so you need not be shy. I can show you a thing or two.

Yours,

Brom Silverfire
Knight of Nimh

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Letter from Alice Arundel
Traitor, Murderer, Coward, Puppeteer of the Wicked,

My lady-in-waiting suggested I have a jester read your letter, and so I listened to her and let the jester try. He proceeded to make sounds of ghastly nature that my son perpetuates when he excretes. Now, for all intents and purposes, I believe my jester can read, so I am quite surprised that you could write to such an extraordinary standard. Surely, you are translating the majority of your thoughts to parchment, in an effort to convey a message. I wish I had that kind of ability, but alas, I am blind and unable to write properly.

Well done, surely. I hope you will continue with this beautifully enlightening discourse.

Yours in admiration,

Alice Arundel
Queen of Luria Nova

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Letter from Brom Silverfire
(Personal message to Alice Arundel)
Dear Her Royal Majesty's lady-in-waiting,

You would be doing your Queen, and yourself might I add, a great favor to help her understand the many assets that I bring to the bedroom. Since it appears that she is unable to read a letter, perhaps using her ears to listen into the enjoyment which she is missing out on would aid her in her quest to be 'conquered' by the Serpent of Luria. I'm sure you're probably already being treated to a side-show with the Prince Consort, so its not like you'd be new to the ways. After we've given her a demonstration, I'd be happy to help her use this wheel of hers and work on stabbing her with my rusty dagger. By the end of the night, I'd be sure to have hit her heart.

His Highness, Prince Consort of Pian en Luries,

Brom Silverfire
Knight of Nimh

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More to come or will Brom die first?

P.S. Comments are welcome.

Okay, so I'm wondering what people's thoughts are for what the future of Atamara will be like. For all intents and purposes, the Great Atamaran War is coming to an end soon. Eston has surrendered unconditionally, CE and co are looking north to possibly attack Darka and/or BoM, Abington II (Suville) is twiddling their thumbs, CE and Tara Federation sits astride the center of the map continuing to split Atamara into thirds, and many new smaller and medium sized realms are in the north and one in the south.

What's next?

[Your Duchy cannot contain the realm's capital.]

Title: Allow Dukes to Secede a multiple city duchy that includes capital

Summary: The new Duke/Margrave separation mechanic has created a new situation of judging secession mechanics. Under this mechanic dukes can be liege over multiple cities making the restriction on duchy secession an outdated mechanic. Just because one of the multiple cities a Duke controls is the capital shouldn't stop him from seceding if he meets all other requirements.

Details:

First let me list the complete set of current restrictions upon a seceding duchy.

You must be Duke.
Your Duchy must contain at least one city.
Your Duchy cannot contain all the cities in the realm.
Your Duchy cannot contain the realm's capital.
You must be in the city (within your Duchy) that you wish to become the new capital of your realm.
This city must not have high independence/low control.
You must have been in both your duchy and realm for at least 2 weeks.
You must have at least 6 hours available.
You cannot already be the ruler of your realm.
You cannot be in an NPC realm (pretty much moot nowadays, save for bugs).
You cannot have a family member who is already a ruler on the continent.

There is also a difference between a Duchy containing the capital being able to secede and change allegiance:

Duchies containing the capital of the realm cannot secede. They can, however, switch allegiances. To even begin considering either of these two options there must be another duchy containing a city.

I propose making the simple change of allowing Duchies that hold multiple cities to be able to secede their duchy even if one of their cities is the current capital of their realm and ALL other current requirements are made.

Benefits: This change will eliminate the current dichotomy in addressing duchies that contain a capital of a realm. Why does it make sense that one can change allegiance while Duke over the capital region, but they can't secede if they are duke over the capital region?

Two arguments I presented in the helpline thread:
1. It makes sense to me that a Duke can't secede if his ONLY city is the capital of the realm. However, if he chooses to secede and create a new realm while having more than one city, and he makes the capital of the new realm a different capital than the old one you have a completely different set of circumstances than ever seen before.

2. I guess I'm confused what is trying to be restricted here. Every single other restriction I can think of a reason for it to be in place, but this one baffles me. What is different about a Duke seceding a three city duchy(in a 4 city or more realm) and a duke transferring the allegiance of his three city duchy to another realm, (perhaps a one city realm).

Exploits: None that I can think of. Most exploits are taken care of in the other requirements.

So, under the new estate system, who is able to secede?

Can only Dukes secede from a realm to create a new one? (Assuming they have a city or stronghold within their duchy?)

Or can Margraves of Cities/Strongholds secede to create a new realm as well.

Some other restrictions perhaps?

I was wondering how different people viewed interactions between current and former members in the feudal hierarchy and whether or not people felt that holding a position formerly offered the character any manner of additional respect on top of that with regards to their current posts.

Also, are non-feudal titles and positions worth anything regards to manner of hierarchy respect or deference in comparison to feudal titles?

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To be more specific:

Would you consider former rulers of your realm to always hold the level of respect or deference of that of ruler? (or perhaps they'd be viewed on par as current dukes? Lords? regardless of current feudal holdings?)

What about former rulers of other realms?

Do former dukes or lords mean anything to you, or do you only view them by their current ranking? (For instance, My duke character calls all former lords of *his* duchy "Lord ____" instead of "Sir" or "Dame" or "Knight" even if they no longer hold a lord title)

Do foreign dignitaries of non-feudal titles hold any particular manner of respect to you? Would you perhaps place any ambassador of a foreign realm with the same level of respect as perhaps one of your dukes? (Address them as "Your Grace, Ambassador _____" Instead of just " Sir Kepler, Ambassador of Keplerstan") I don't, but perhaps some do.

Would you grant founders of religion a measure of respect equivalent to a ruler or perhaps a duke regardless of their feudal ranking or if you're a member of their religion? For example, does The Prophet of SA deserve to be treated with a measure of respect by non-SA rulers of at least placing him equal in power as a secular ruler when discussing things? Would his regent deserve the same? (I personally think that all religion founders should be granted that measure of respect, unless you're trying to intentionally anger them)

Also, feel free to bring up other cases I missed.

So please take a vote, and if you'd rather not comment there is no need to. However, comments are welcome as far as I'm concerned.

Darka suddenly loses its ability to produce extra large armies on an instant as all of its dukes and most of its lords jump from 10k family gold to 20k family gold overnight.

Hammarsett and Carelia watch as the average family gold grows and theirs stays constant or drops.

The Dukes across the continent decide to build less fancy palaces and more stored away.

The Dictators build more shiny palaces just because they can.

CE uses the increased family gold in other realms to convince other realms to not fight CE.

Suville is declared the next Abington even though their lords continue to put their gold into the war effort.

The knights of Atamara watch as the rich get richer and their lords have another reason to increase the taxes...

Summary: Currently all council members are able to contact their "peers." These consist of the respective council members for that same position from every other realm on the continent. My proposal is that this is expanded to allow Dukes to contact all of their peers on the continent.

Details: Add a new peers messaging group for Dukes only. (Note: Not Margraves, but only Dukes)

Benefits: Opens up many new avenues for communication and interaction between leading members of realms. Could lead to increased intrigue and cooperation and allows those outside of the realm council to better influence events. Will likely help counter stagnation as Dukes would no longer be dependent upon the realm council for communications with foreign realms. Would lead to more active and engaged Dukes and allows for both internal and external power struggles.

Possible Exploits: The only exploit is now being able to talk with those unable to before, and having an easy access to it. However, I can't think of any uses for this that are bad for the game.

Okay, so the IR in question is: Everyone has a right to recruit any type of unit that they wish. (Infantry/Archers/MI/Cavalry/SF)

The question is: Does it violate the IR to tear down all recruitment centers of a certain type within one's realm in order to encourage recruitment of the other types of units instead? (Also thereby preventing anyone from recruiting a certain type of unit)

Known violations of the IR:

1. Any member of the realm telling a noble to recruit X type of unit. (Whether a request/order/letter, etc...)
2. Any member of the realm telling a noble that they can't recruit X type of unit.
3. Any member of the realm saying that nobles recruiting X type of unit will be given Y punishment. (won't be given lordships, given fines, or even just not considered helpful, etc...)

Known non-violations of the IR:

4. A member of the realm giving encouragements to recruit a particular type of unit to the realm as a whole. ("Anyone who wants to recruit infantry will be given 100 gold towards recruitment of their unit")

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Situation A:
So, would it be against the IR if a realm didn't want any Mixed Infantry in its armies, so it decided that it would tear down the 2 Mixed Infantry centers that it had in its realm? By doing so, it eliminates the possibility of any of the cases 1-3 from occurring as listed above. Their nobles are still able to recruit any unit that they wish, but they simply don't have access to Mixed Infantry, so they have to choose another unit type.

Situation A assumes that all lords of the regions with those recruitment centers agree with the idea of eliminating the centers.

Situation B:
A realm doesn't want any mixed infantry in its armies so it decides to tear down the 2 Mixed Infantry centers in its realm. However, one of the region lords who has a mixed infantry center in its region refuses to comply with this standard. Is it against the IR's for the Duke of said lord, to raise taxes in his region for as long as the mixed infantry center remains in the region, so as to "encourage" the lord to destroy the mixed infantry center?

Situation C:
A realm doesn't have any mixed infantry centers in its realm and hasn't had any mixed infantry centers in its realm since the beginning of the realm. Is this realm in violation of the IR for not allowing all of its nobles to recruit mixed infantry if they wanted to?

Situation D:
A realm doesn't have any mixed infantry centers in its realm and hasn't had any mixed infantry centers in its realm since the beginning of the realm. A noble states publicly that they want to recruit mixed infantry. Is the realm in violation of the IR if they don't immediately comply and build mixed infantry centers to accomodate this noble?

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For the purposes of this IR situation, "mixed infantry" could easily be substituted with Infantry, Archers, or SF.

I have included Situation's A-D because I feel that all four are inter-related and address situations that would possibly arise should any one of them be allowed. I have based all of my "known" situations based upon what I've read at some point in the forums or the discussion list. I ask this question because I don't want to breach the IR when implementing a policy in one of my realms.

Greetings my fellow BM players,

I am looking for anywhere from 4-14 other players to work together with me in trying to see if BM's current player base is capable of putting up a fight and playing the military aspect of the game to its best potential.

The goal would be for us to all send either one or two characters to the same realm on Atamara or East Island, (or any continent really that can take more than one noble per family) and join together into an army with the intent of being the strongest military power that we can. We will not be taking over the realm but instead will be integrating ourselves into the way the realm is run. This could be a realm that some members already have nobles in or it can be completely new. We would try to form our own personal army and seek to have 100% movement rates within our army as well as due to our activity, we could move out from whatever region we are in as late as possible, thus ensure hard predictability of our movements. These things would not be required, but if we are able to do so, we would try as it gives us the best chance of winning militarily.

Any of our members would be free to run in whatever elections they would like, but are not required to support each other in any way there. The main goal would be to simply become a military powerhouse and test our abilities against those who would oppose whatever realm we join.

If you are interested, you can post here or contact me privately.

Edit: Interested players:

1. Silverfire
2. BardicNerd
3. GoldPanda?
4. Indirik?

Hmm, pretty low on noble count. We can still try it out but not many seem interested.

So, here's an idea that I have been thinking about because apparently people are bored with the current war on Atamara.

Have every realm on Atamara agree to the following:

On the first day of every month, a realm is randomly chosen from among the realms of Atamara, and for the duration of that month every single other realm declares war on them and fights them utterly. At the end of the month, peace is immediately offered, and the process is repeated. Any realm which chooses to break this agreement, will have the entire rest of the continent declare war on them until they are destroyed, then the process continues.

Discuss.

So, I was under the impression that a change was made a while back that units could be dropped as militia in different amounts other than one's entire unit. I thought there was an option for "half" of your unit to be placed as militia as well as a number to select the exact number of troops to place into the militia unit out of your own. This change happened as there was no need to have to drop one's entire unit as militia but that it would be possible to simply reduce the size of one's unit by placing part of it as militia.

Is this no longer true? I just tried to drop part of my 38 unit on Dwilight as militia but was not given the option as listed above, only an all or nothing disband and an all or nothing militia drop.

Can someone clear this up?

I cannot remember for sure what the status of this is or if it was changed at some point recently.

So, for a long time as long as I can remember, neither priests nor Infils could be government members. Does this still hold true, and if so, why?

So, I am wondering about how a particular situation may be thought of in relation to the IR. One of my characters, and many players in the realm that I play in are quite bored and I have been trying to think of something which could increase the fun and interaction for the characters and players involved.

One idea that came to me was that of a realm theme. Realm themes have been used in the past to give specific realms particular feels of RP as well as in game intent of actions which allows the players to more easily RP and develop character interaction. (Examples include: Darka as a mercenary realm, and Vikings in Norland/BoM on Atamara)

So, the idea that I was considering was that of a politically neutral infiltrator/assassin realm. The idea would be that it would be perhaps a theocracy dedicated towards some sort of religion based around a "death god". Being an infiltrator and carrying out assassinations would be considered a type of worship in this religion. The religion would be open to nobles of all classes, but advancement would be limited depending upon whether one was an infiltrator or Priest, or otherwise.

In addition, the realm would be open to nobles of any and all classes, but the roles that they would fulfill would simply be different than they may find in other realms if they were the same class.

Infiltrators would receive increased funding, and governmental protection as well as working directly as the sort of "military" of the realm, as the government would take private contracts from individuals up to realm governments and then the realm would choose infiltrators specifically for each contract to carry out.

Courtiers would operate pretty much the same as they do now, caring for the realm regions and otherwise.

Traders would also be able to operate the same as now, to bring food and gold into the realm and could receive extra government funding if needed.

Priests would be operating under the religion of the government to spread the religion and gain firm hold over the peasantry, but would also be revered somewhat by the realm on a similar level as infiltrators.

Warriors are really the only class which would operate significantly different. The realm would not operate an army in the same way that all other realms currently do. Those who chose to be warriors would be free to do so, but receive somewhat less funding than those who took the infiltrator path. These warriors could act as mercenaries for other realms or simply go and fight alongside foreign armies as they chose.

I'm not sure how such a situation would be looked upon and if this would be considered any type of IR breach. My gut instinct is that since each player is still free to choose their own class, but would simply operate in a different manner than if they were that class in another realm, that it would be acceptable. But, I do want to know ahead of time, because taking such a course of action and then apparently breaking a rule in doing so would not be good.