Author Topic: Phoenix Talk, with Jenred Kindon-Bedwyr or Matthew, as you choose  (Read 27161 times)

Bedwyr

  • Mighty Duke
  • ****
  • Posts: 1762
  • House Bedwyr
    • View Profile
I thought I'd bring back two things I always liked.

1. I've heard tales of people on the FEI originally talking about plans and the like OOC so that those who couldn't be in the loop for IC reasons could still hear about the fun stuff.

2. A few newspapers used to do interviews with various nobles, and I always liked reading them.

So!  Anyone who's interested, ask away.  Just direct the question to Matthew for OOC questions and Jenred (with titles as appropriate) for the IC ones.

For those who just want to level accusations and question Jenred's sexuality and the like, keep it IG.  This is just for a bit of Q&A.
"You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with 'til ya understand who's in ruttin' command here!"

Gloria

  • Noble Lord
  • ***
  • Posts: 206
    • View Profile
Heehee. 
King Jenred of Arcaea, do you....

Nah.

 Hey Matthew.  What's up?

Indirik

  • Exalted Emperor
  • ******
  • Posts: 10849
  • No pressure, no diamonds.
    • View Profile
Well you asked for questions, so here goes.  If this is over-the-line in OOC discussions of IC plans, let me know and I'll delete it.  :D

How go the plans for the Arcaean Empire? Have you finished allocating all the cities on the entire island yet?

I'm actually helping with the new island realm, being in the assault on Enlod. (Best battle I've seen so far on FEI. Too bad I got wounded in the second battle. Though that did save me from having to plow through all the post-battle trash talking.  ::) ) Is the CTO actually running? I can't see region details, being wounded and all...

Then there's rumours of a secession that will happen after that. So that's three realms that will owe fealty to the Empire.

I'm curious to see if you can pull off the "rulers swearing fealty to an RP'd position" thing. Seems awfully fragile. With so much of the game being dependent on communication and interaction, I'm not sure how you're going to prevent the resentment of owing fealty to a "foreign interloper" from developing. Seems to me that with Jenred being in the new realm, the people in Arcaea will, over time, come to resent the implied subservience. All it will take is one ruler who doesn't feel like following along with it, and at least some people in the realm willing to go a long with it, and it will fall apart.

I remember when Sanguis Astroism formed on Dwilight we discussed various plans for the realms owing fealty to the leader of the church. One idea was that the church was to decide who would be the judges in the various theocracies. Over time, though, as the nobles in the realms were out of contact with each other for longer periods of time, they were less and less willing to pass along power to a foreign realm. "Who are you to tell us what we should be doing?"

It's an interesting idea, but I wonder how it will work in actual practice.
If at first you don't succeed, don't take up skydiving.

vonGenf

  • Honourable King
  • *****
  • Posts: 2331
    • View Profile
Morek tried to pull off the same kind of thing with Aquilegia, the idea being to send a Morekian to serve in Aquilegia's council. In the end, the problem was no one wanted to do it! People don't really want to leave a realm they like.
After all it's a roleplaying game.

Bedwyr

  • Mighty Duke
  • ****
  • Posts: 1762
  • House Bedwyr
    • View Profile
Not out of line at all, especially since it'll be going public in (hopefully) short order.

And no, CTO isn't running yet as loyalty is too high.  Which is an annoying mechanic, even if it does make a certain amount of sense.

Indeed, three realms are going to be swearing to the Empire.  I think there are a few things that are going to make it viable.

1. We're going to have (the guild has been built, just need to finish the fighting so everyone has time to join) an empire-wide guild.  Now, Arcaea currently has discussions in three main ways: The whole realm, the Phoenix Court (where most everything gets discussed), and the Military Conclave.  The guild is going to simulate that with the all guild, full members, and elder members.  The idea being that a good portion of the conversations will shift to empire-wide instead of realm-wide, helping with the unity problem.

2. I fully anticipate that over time (though probably a long time for Jenred if he stays in the position) people in one of the other realms will decide they don't like someone from a different realm being in control.  This is one of the (many) reasons why there is going to be an internal war system with internal rankings.  Each realm will have a rank, which will also determine what percentage of their taxes have to go to the Imperial throne, and the highest ranked realm chooses the Emperor.  The Emperor then stays in position until their realm loses their rank and a new Emperor is chosen.  Ranks change via a formal challenge where no outside assistance is allowed and the two realms fight from the first day of Spring to the last day of Autumn, with the winner taking the higher of the two ranks and the loser the lower of the two ranks in dispute.  Determining winners and losers may be non-trivial in some cases, but I think a system where the loser is whoever has the worst change in weighted production (production of a region multiplied by its population) on a percentage basis over the course of the challenge would work well enough.

3. The secession you referred to is going to be Topenah and Talex duchies, leaving the Kingdom of Arcaea with Lasop, Remton, Nocaneb and Niel in an excellent defensive position but not the best offensive position and being much less scary without the context of the Empire.

4. One of the (probably few) powers of the Emperor is going to be the ability to declare whether a campaign season is open or restricted.  Open means each realm of the Empire can fight whatever wars it pleases (challenges, other internal wars, external wars, what have you).  Restricted means wars require the approval of the Emperor as there may be a situation where the entire Empire need work together for some goal.  Clearly there needs to be some check there, and Jenred is going to set a very firm precedent that restricted campaign seasons are only used sparingly.

5. The empire is certainly going to have the one position per family per realm rule Arcaea does now (at least after the initial colonization stages where it may be unavoidable) and I'd really like to make it one position per family for the entire empire.  The idea is to suck as many interested people in as we can by making positions more available than they are most places.

I'm happy to explain more if you have further questions (hey, this helps me organize my thoughts for the big speech Jenred's going to have to give about all this, which is handy).
"You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with 'til ya understand who's in ruttin' command here!"

Vellos

  • Honourable King
  • *****
  • Posts: 3736
  • Stodgy Old Man in Training
    • View Profile
If my advie can ever get some unique items, I'm excited to see where this goes. The idea of simply awarding the title of "Emperor for the Year," as it sounds like, is kind of odd though.

My real question is about powers. It sounds like the only powers of the emperor are to declare open or restricted seasons. Anything else? Power to... define common external diplomacy? Legitimize (or de-legitimize?) rulers of participating realms?
"A neutral humanism is either a pedantic artifice or a prologue to the inhuman." - George Steiner

Bedwyr

  • Mighty Duke
  • ****
  • Posts: 1762
  • House Bedwyr
    • View Profile
The precise powers of the Emperor vs the constituent Monarchs is...Unclear as of yet.  (Fairly) definitive powers at this point are:

1. Control of X% of each realm's income, where X is their ranking, delivered each winter (going to try and make winter the party/tournament/RP season).

2. Right to set campaign seasons.

3. Right to influence diplomacy if there is a major benefit to the empire as a whole.

4. Right to disallow religions/guilds/nobles throughout the empire (though /not/ to force acceptance).

5. Right to all communications upon request.

Some of that is, of course, vague.  We may leave it that way, though I'm not sure yet.

Common external diplomacy will sometimes fall into point 3, but again that should be a power used sparingly if ever.  Emperor will have no direct powers over the legitimacy over member Rulers (though informally having the Emperor as your enemy would make life quite difficult).
"You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with 'til ya understand who's in ruttin' command here!"

Perth

  • Honourable King
  • *****
  • Posts: 2037
  • Current Character: Kemen
    • View Profile
This sounds really cool if it works out well.
"A tale is but half told when only one person tells it." - The Saga of Grettir the Strong
- Current: Kemen (D'hara) - Past: Kerwin (Eston), Kale (Phantaria, Terran, Melodia)

Gloria

  • Noble Lord
  • ***
  • Posts: 206
    • View Profile
My "What's up?" was a question. 
Anyway, did my character really torture Tammo?  How did he get injured if not?

Foundation

  • Honourable King
  • *****
  • Posts: 2526
  • Okay... you got me
    • View Profile
    • White Halmos
So, Matt.  This is the experiment of an empire of reals that you are running on FEI?  Maybe I'll join you there.  Seems fun.  :)
The above is accurate 25% of the time, truthful 50% of the time, and facetious 100% of the time.

Bedwyr

  • Mighty Duke
  • ****
  • Posts: 1762
  • House Bedwyr
    • View Profile
Gloria:

Everything Jenred sent to you is true so far as he and I know it.  I confirmed with various people OOC, and while it is possible they were all lying, I rather doubt it.
"You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with 'til ya understand who's in ruttin' command here!"

Gloria

  • Noble Lord
  • ***
  • Posts: 206
    • View Profile
Weird.  As far as I know, Ortisia only tortured a commonner... but I don't remember who Tammo is. 
Was he the one crying about silk slippers and chocolate?   I swear I don't remember, and I don't drink and play.   

Bedwyr

  • Mighty Duke
  • ****
  • Posts: 1762
  • House Bedwyr
    • View Profile
Sundar's the one who talked about slippers and stuff.

Guy who played Tammo shot me the torture report, as I recall, so unless he decided to forge that OOC to send to me as well as lie repeatedly since then about it, I'm pretty sure it happened.  Maybe a misclick/misread?
"You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with 'til ya understand who's in ruttin' command here!"

Heq

  • Noble Lord
  • ***
  • Posts: 199
    • View Profile
What?  She didn't torture anyone?  Feh!  I was really, really hoping I was out peddling a huge passel of lies.

I think this could really work out well provided the more "set" realms can get into it.  This isn't so much a question as just an overall agreement that this last war has worked out pretty well from an RP standpoint, really seems to have gotten a lot of folks (at least in Arcachon) back on their horses.

If Ohnar West hadn't gotten inovolved it would have complete snoozefest pretty fast.

Anyway, any plans on how to get the really stodgy realms to get more active once the empire is formed?  Some sort of formal challange system?


Bedwyr

  • Mighty Duke
  • ****
  • Posts: 1762
  • House Bedwyr
    • View Profile
Well, Cathay is crumbling, with people leaving on a semi-regular basis, and I keep thinking James is going to auto-remove out.

Aenilia is willing to fight so long as there's no possible risk for them to do so...But Xarnelf's latest trip to Enlod is going to make things very interesting, and I might be able to spin a war out of that.

Zonasa and C'thonia are fighting with Kindara getting more annoyed that the two aren't listening, and Kindara is worried about Zonasa getting more powerful, so you may see the southern war get bigger shortly.

And if all else fails, we wait and do internal wars until the peaceniks collapse or start a war in desperation...But I really doubt it'll get that far.
"You know what the chain of command is? It's the chain I go get and beat you with 'til ya understand who's in ruttin' command here!"