I can't answer the question, but we have kind of turned Theander's vanguard discussion into a lore discussion!

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I've read through the thread and it seems absolutely everyone has an inaccurate understanding of the Vanguard and its purpose. Because the Vanguard was my creation, I will address some of these issues to explain how I look at my creation:



Creation:


As Laktavian and Gondor noted previously, the previous academies (Magthere and Sorcere) were lore accurate, however they were running on skeleton crews (1-3 active members at most) which quite frankly meant they served little to no purpose beyond existing by the time of the Vanguard's creation.

The Vanguard's intention was to consolidate these two academies into one, with a simplified ranking system, a new purpose and a single leader to make the decisions. This reduces the decision making burdens that plague Drow role play to ensure our events are 90% action, 10% discussion and not the other way around.



Purpose:


This is where most people have incorrect assumptions. The purpose of the Vanguard is not solely to be Nec'perya's guard force, nor does it operate in the interests of Nec'perya's houses.

The Purpose of the Vanguard is to work for the benefit of "The Empire" (a metaphysical ideal) which basically means "Drow and those who join them as a whole." The reason why is simple: the Vanguard is getting the Drow's reputation back. Nec'perya and its protection is one aspect of this (and a noted one considering its creation and Nec'perya's founding were near-instantaneous), but the Vanguard reaches far further then just Nec'perya:

If it serves the best interests of the Drow, the Vanguard will work in conjunction with House Zau'tar in L'Obsul.

If it serves the best interests of the Drow, the Vanguard will work in conjunction with houses who reside in L'Obsul or Underport. We have already done this.

If it serves the best interests of the Drow, the Vanguard will work alongside other Underdark races towards a a beneficial goal. The Vanguard will even recruit other races who prove themselves willing to fight for the benefit of the Empire. (the reason why we haven't already done so is because none have come forth or expressed interest)


There is a reason why its called "The Vanguard" and not "Nec'perya's Defence Force." You need to think outside the Nec'perya box.



What do you get out of joining the Vanguard?


I have a simple rule when it comes to recruitment: you join because you choose to. Not because you were told to.

Because of that, the Vanguard players are motivated to get results. They -want- to do their part and its paying off for them ICly. You can ask them for further clarification on this individually.




The Structure and philosophy:


This is another area with which people have a very clear misunderstanding about the Vanguard.

The Vanguard is not the Melee Magthere and the Sorcere with a designated Commander overseeing both. It's an entirely different beast with an entirely different philosophy.

The Heralds of Discipline and Knowledge do fulfill a mentorship role very similar to the former Ul'Saruk (Commander) and Ul'Faeruk (Arch Mage) for their designated specialties, but that is only one lesser aspect of their duty. The weakness of the individual is overcome by the strengths of the whole working in unison towards glory: That is what differentiates the philosophy of the Vanguard from its preceding academies.

Mages will work alongside warriors and vice versa. They are not solely branched under the direction of their specialist Herald: such introverted specialisation is a weakness of the former academies.

Which basically means that the structure is simplified to the following:


- The Lord Commander is in charge and directs the Vanguard (the brain)

- The Heralds are the lieutenants that keep the show running (the lungs and heart)

- The Vanguard are the body.


The Queen's whip as Laktavian mentioned is an advisor to the Lord Commander; a representative of the Temple who oversees the Vanguard's work. She's both part and not part of the Vanguard at the same time.




In summary:


In order to understand the Vanguard you need to do two things.

Firstly, you need to think beyond Nec'perya to the larger picture as a whole. That's how the Vanguard operates: with Nec'perya in mind, but not revolving solely around it.

Secondly, you need to forget everything you know of the Drow Academies: the Vanguard's philosophy is entirely different to its predecessors.






To answer your question, 180 Drow + the PCs were what escaped to Nec'perya. That number has probably decreased since we landed due to Skum attacks.

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Plays:

"I'll think of something once Amia:EE drops."

God. I love it. Thank you so much Galenson. Here's one who have renewed faith entirely.

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You should put your faith in the players who make this a reality: Theander, Gondor, Genar_Detkasa and Foo Ling. Without them and other players like them wanting to make a difference, the Vanguard can't achieve what its set out to do.

There are also positions open for you to contribute towards it as well.

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Plays:

"I'll think of something once Amia:EE drops."

Pfft. We wouldn't be anywhere if you hadn't set the ball rolling.

Hell, we still wouldn't be anywhere without you at this point, as evidenced above we've all still got certain conflicting ideas of the Vanguard and you're the brains that are keeping us in line/in check/correcting us. So without you... we'd kind of screw it up.

Probably.

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Unuldor d'Vilrath - Herald of Discipline
Nadrin Vlos - sadistic torturer, physician and
Brognar Steerinsport - crazy dueregar monk
Saul Rephaim - Sane

>_> If that's the Vanguard's 'mission statement' from creation it was certainly kept secret. Also, as far as I remember the Vanguard was not recruiting non-drow, there was an old OOC post you did about that where people didn't seem to approve much. Or maybe they did I can't recall and don't feel like checking the thread.

But yeah unless things have recently changed the Vanguard is a lot different than what I've been informed both OOC and IC.

Zrae, and possibly some others, might have a fair number of reservations about people of the city somewhat saying 'screw you guys' of it doesn't suit their interests. Do remember that nearly every single person that came from Edonil swore a blood oath to Lolth and Nec'perya; and that counts for a lot of the Vanguard personnel. It just seems like there's not a huge conflict of interest, and if so some things might end up changing a lot. Having the Vanguard go off to fight for L'Obsul or something and leave the city defenseless is not going to sit well with, well, anyone, commoners included.


As for the structure, that's what people have been describing (or at least I have). They are two branches, in a sense, but they work as a cohesive whole. Or are supposed to, at least, haha. But yeah they are not divided, the Heralds just have their specialties they can work with members regarding.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

I will reiterate what I stated above.

The Vanguard serves the interests of "the Empire:" The Scholar, Naltyrr and even Unuldor have spoken these words since day one of its conception. That metaphysical ideal, "The Empire," includes Nec'perya. However, it is not limited to just Nec'perya: the Scholar's ambitions, his great game, reaches far further then that. Power in Nec'perya means nothing if that power does not translate to the world around them: The Vanguard are ensuring that this happens, by acting in the interests of Drow as a whole.

It is a very delicate balance yes. The Drow of Nec'perya need to be appeased on one hand, but the rest of the playerbase can't be ignored with the other. We have achieved both so far and it is contributing to our overall success.

I'm rather proud of our efforts.

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Plays:

"I'll think of something once Amia:EE drops."

The problem just seems to be that nearly everyone in the Vanguard (and outside the Vanguard) thinks that is not the case. Soooo if that's how the Vanguard is supposed to operate, nearly no one knows it. And if it is, well, there might be IC issues with that D: I dun want issues, I wanna be big happy* drow family



*Disclaimer: Happy drow family does not mean we won't try to kill each over from time to time every now and then all the time <3.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

I'll say that different characters have had different ways of envisaging what the Vanguard is for as a bottom line. Up until now we've been pretty much united in securing Nec'perya, so its never come up.

The differences in vision should be resolved IC, until then, what the Vanguard will become is pretty much up in the air I imagine. So yeah, IC thing! (Which will include maiming and torturing like all good drow discourse does. )

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I'd say something but I seem to be chopped liver at this point >_>

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@Thanatopsis#6293

Not going to lie, this is kind of the reason I wanted to get a draft of the primer out there.

It should not only clarify things but also start giving people objectives to aim for.

More to the point, the whole 'empire' thing, the thing to remember about that is this is thinking LONG term. We're not proposing that the Vanguard run off and leave Nec undefended, more to the point, the vanguard's focus right now is building Nec. However, it's not working on the assumption that it will always be restricted to Nec, just that this is it's focus right now. So the idea of the Vanguard supersedes the needs of the moment, but its actions are focused on the moment.

That makes sense. Yes. Sorry, been thesising all day. Brain is tired of trying to figure out how my supervisor could be that bad at maths.

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Unuldor d'Vilrath - Herald of Discipline
Nadrin Vlos - sadistic torturer, physician and
Brognar Steerinsport - crazy dueregar monk
Saul Rephaim - Sane

The academies were at times down to that amount (and less) although that was a direct result of the drow player base having one of its drops in population, making having higher numbers very difficult.

as for consolidation, really the fact that the majority are listed as vanguard personnel is rather misleading since they are still split up in their leadership under the heralds which means the in simplest terms what was done was the academies just merged their ranks into one level and then a leader over the academies was added. As for the action to discussion numbers, well that was always due to the matrons arguing and wasn't an issue on the academy side.





It seems to me that the Vanguard is a PC led (with the minor exception apparently of the leader of the spiderguard oddly) and controlled group, and futher more on that still takes its orders from the Matrons council. Which is to say that despite what it might have been "create" with in mind of, its purpose is actually whatever the players and more importantly their characters decide that it is.




That has kind of always been the case, I mean you can try to force characters to join and people have done that, but unless the players want to then it becomes entirely futile.




The "philosophy" may well be different but from what I've seen, for most practical purposes it seems to be functioning rather like the academies but with an overall leader put on top of it. The warriors seem to be doing warrior things (And following the herald of discipline) and the mages likewise doing mage things (Under the herald of knowledge). There doesn't seem like a huge amount of cross over.

Additionally, the the Magthere and Sorcere had been working together in joint functioning and projects for long before the vanguard existed. Although admittedly it was more limited than I would have liked, but that was in large part due to that fact that often the things that the mages and warriors want to do aren't hugely compatible a lot of the time.

As for the lord commander, that just fills a roll that we had talked about having one of the academy leaders fill depending on the task. (Although a position that usually a matron or Ul'at'tallar, demanded to fill anyway making it all rather pointless)





Its not really entirely different, perhaps different priorities and out look but really the philosophy seems to be very similar to what the academies themselves had all along. Once again not that it ever mattered as much as it should since the academies and now the vanguard are NOT the ones that come up with the philosophy that is actually the one that will be followed for most things since when it really comes down to it they are still taking orders.



As a side note Nec REALLY needs to be opened up properly (aka being able to actually get there if you haven't) sooner than later.

So far the in game vanguard has not had any troubles with the merger. The vanguard personnel is not 'divided'. My soldier works directly with the Herald of Knowledge whom has another focus, approach to things than the Herald of Discipline. I recall several attempts and several events in Ultrinnan and Edonil where both the 'Sorcere' and the 'Melee Magthere' worked together, sometimes trained together and were given lessons together, but the standard view has always been: "Cobbler, stick to your last!"

While the structure of the vanguard may change, for example the titles given to vanguard personnel (soldier X, mage X, etc), it'll only change if in game, IC, the vanguard evolves. The current metagame may, under influence of a lot new characters, transform the vanguard's structure but once those characters vanish (as we all know periods of inactivity), other new characters shouldn't be forced to accept the structure other characters set in place. The idea is that the vision/idea of the vanguard remains, but the body adapts to the views of the character.



As far as I'm aware, the Vanguard works together with the 'council'. Together with the d'Vilrath, Ussen'd'vhid, other individuals Nec'perya has been created. The current view of the vanguard is being contested in game by some characters, and we're resolving it IC. So you're right, the vanguard is what the characters decide it is, but there are lot of characters with different views. The discussion about the vanguard and the creation of the constitution Theander is working on is the view of his character Unuldor.




Agreed, but only as an action of characters.

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Hopefully the actual colaboration between, the mages and warriors and really any other types works out. It was one of the things that I was rather passionate about when I was leadin the Magthere, but IC stuff rather hindered a lot of that more than I would have liked. Seeing that as well as more dealing with other UD races would make me happy, the magthere was even setup to house a division for other races but with Edonil then basically banning them all that would have been hard to do.


As for the opening Nec up though well idealy it could be done by players... If it can be done soon then great, but its taken over a month to move spiders off a boat (still don't know why that needed a DM).
Also even with the best intention having a "city" controlled by basically one house and only really one (maybe, two or three) characters for too long almost always ends up badly in terms of causing both IC and OOC shit storms.


Edit: Also, I know it is listed that ranking vanguard members can be challenged for position but an actual method of how those challenges work would be nice to add, especially if they include a non combat means to challenge them, for example no confidence vote/ backer having far more vanguard support type thing.

Could always go "I challenge you, bitch!" and voila - If you win you get the rank of him, if you loose ... Well haha

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Yeah... But the best leader isn't always the one with the best build. Its why I like other methods being possible. Although Zeke really only got like one challenge in the two years I was leading and that was a combat one so it unfortunately never came up.

Yeah but who cares! It's like the best method eveeerr!

It does not need to be a system - But if the other player accepts ... FIGHT!

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I know there have been some replies since but I wanted to stick this in anyways as an outsider perspective:


They really are not separate they are supposed to be working together. The Heralds have their skillsets but the Vanguard was made so they academies would work as a united whole instead of just doing their own thing. It was very necessary because organizing -anything- was a hassle before it was done, heh.


The DM position in there was to give the DM in charge (Dusty) a say in things as well. We like to keep the DMs in the loop instead of demanding we be totally PC controlled. I've seen how that goes and it's not good.


There hasn't been a ton of it yet but the Vanguard merging is also to allow the coordination of training of warriors and mages together. Being that both 'sections' are in the Vanguard, part of the point is to sort of force them to play nicely together.

The nice thing about the Lord Commander and other positions is that they are males currently. While the drow society is female-driven there is something to be said about nto being squeamish about males having power and how that can subconsciously keep the other males in check so to speak. Hell, Zrae even alluded to Sol once that it was a boon in that the non-divine people would not feel as if they have a high up female breathing down their necks and allow them to feel a more 'solid' presence with each other. Of course, she didn't quite phrase it that way, but the point go across.

Certainly a female could also get those positions eventually as well, it was just how things worked out based on player base and PC activity.


We know :p Dusty has been busy RL so the progress has slowed, but he's back around so we can keep doing events. People keep mentioning this and I have to keep telling them we are working on it! lol


Because we like DM involvement? And Nec' is still a hostile environment so the Skum could attack en masse which would present a realyl fun challenge for the players to protect the spiders. Can't exactly do that without a DM, can you? Besides, it hasn't been -that long- IG time. Dusty can say it's only been a week if he wants to :p

And again in regards to opening up Nec', if you are talking about to other UD races keep talking about it OOC all you want. I don't mind the idea, same with other players. However you have to remember that we are not our characters. Zrae, for one, is a bitch and elitist and far more zealous and hardcore than most which means bringing outsider races to Nec' grates on her just a wee bit.

However the necessity is recognized, and she actually wouldn't have a ton of issue with it to be honest, but Nec' needs to be more completed. It's be kind of stupid to bring outsiders in when the city is hardly defensible and anyone could look at it and judge them as being in a weak position. Even though they are not really, it's still something to take into account. There's a lot more going on in regards to that than most realize, so I'll need to leave it at that.

Don't forget also that stuff like that is IC, and in order to be done right you have to take into account actual IC reactions to things.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

Everyone likes DM involvement, but it is good to remember that its not always needed. Especially since we only really have one full time DM and DMs can get busy, that and its a new settlement some things need to get done and its nice to do that a fluidly and quickly as possible.

The opening it up I more just meant making it possible for other drow to actually get there to start with (without needing DM or player help to do it that is).

Yep we get that with the getting a shipping route to us, but part of the issue with that is that the waterways are so 'clogged' with faerzress that they are hard to navigate. We're working on fixing that, but at present the only way to get there is by ley travel completely because of the environment.

And yeah a fair number of it has to do with wanting to make the right appearance to those not joining the settlement. Giving the outward impression that we are well defended is nice, but it's good to be able to show it too haha.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

Speaking of nothing - Can't you include what you just todl us in the vanguard topic?

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Not yet. I want to see what Theander comes up with first.

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Plays:

"I'll think of something once Amia:EE drops."

And Theander is going to come up with something more ASAP: However see Absinth topic for the delays.

As for the separation of mage and soldier. Non-existent.

For those of you who haven't noticed, Unuldor has been mostly a forum presence since June. This has entirely been due to internet issues and my thesis which is due in 17 days. Naltyrr has been running EVERYTHING.

That is something that could not have happened under the previous model.

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Unuldor d'Vilrath - Herald of Discipline
Nadrin Vlos - sadistic torturer, physician and
Brognar Steerinsport - crazy dueregar monk
Saul Rephaim - Sane