AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic

Hey all.

Recently a concern has come to my attention. It involves people with multiple characters, and those characters being in different factions. Lately a trend of interfaction warfare has arisen, and as a faction leader, I'm concerned that some of my people on my roster not be avaliable should Rp conflict arise, because they have a character in the faction that we are becoming hostile to.

I'd like to hear some opinions from the playerbase about this. Do you think that people should be restricted from having more then one character in a faction? I'd like to hear some of the DM's opinions also. Has this been discussed by the DM team before? Also other faction leaders, are you as concerned that you may not beable to call on people as I am?

Any thoughts on the matter would be great.

This is a problem I foresee possibly happening in the near future with me.
I suggest that if a conflict does arise, pick one toon to deal with that situation. Yes, your other toon will be notably absent, but the rest of the faction is still there.

I can see why it's a concern. I think it's ultimately up to the player in the long run who they play and when. We've chittered about it topside, but nothing as far as disallowing it.

The only time I raise an eyebrow is when I'm afraid metagaming's going on. I personally do find it a bit dodgy when people are part of like, 6 or 7 factions but currently there's not really a rule against it. It's a valid concern you have, but even if we cut it down to like, two factions per player, a player has only two mains in two factions and the factions suddenly go to war, there's really not much we can do. It's up to them on how they decide to play.

Well as leader of the war knights, if something broke out and one of my players left to join the opposing faction, I'd be pissed. Real pissed. To the point where I would consider banning the player from the faction while I was in charge. As it would seem very unfair to me that I suddenly have one less person to call on because they wanted to join the other faction. If we heavily outnumbered someone that may be okay, but if we didn't, I'd be really hurt to be honest.

We've discussed it topside and come to the conclusion to more or less cut the playerbase enough slack to do things your own way and to do it the right way without any troubles.

My personal opinion differs. If I had my way, there would be a fairly considerable overhaul to "rules" regarding the number of factions, the involvement in factions, and how those factions interact with themselves and with the world, and overhaul that I fear would be too much to handle in trying to recognize that Amia is both a game and a liberally told story.

Just be glad I don't get my way most of the time.

It's always been a matter of self discipline mixed with common sense. Unfortunately most people lack both of the above. However, to better understand the concern, one must understand the causes and one of the most obvious is the seasonal rotation of factions, players and trends. For one month you'll be playing Banites, the next you'll be playing Paladins.

I'm on Selvec's side with this, however I'm going to take it a step further and say that faction leaders should look into the players before they mindlessly recruit them into their own factions. If you know they've got characters on the other side, its your fault as much as theirs for recruiting them in the first place.

I can understand the concerns had by Selvec, and to be truthful I am doing what I can at least on my own end to try to keep myself more or less aligned towards the good aligned side, especially with Vaelmith's promotion.

I can also agree with trying to keep Amia as open as possible within reason.

At this point I can safely say Vael's my primary , with my other factional characters mostly serving as limited support roles, and should the faction's leader wish to address the matter with me I am always willing to do so.

We've always discouraged people in the Banites from having characters in more or less constantly opposing factions (Paladins, Cyricists) because of the reasons you've mentioned, Selvec.

But we've never denied anyone to become a member of the faction because they also have characters in directly opposing factions.

Some players are able to handle being in several opposing factions at the same time. But it's quite tricky to do, and nothing I would recommend for anyone.

Having just one character in a faction comes with other benefits as well though. And in regards to these matters, I am actually quite in line with how Yossarin perceives how this stuff should be.

During a faction war, I have always run with the policy of only playing ONE character if two of the factions I am in, are at war. I also make it a golden rule, that I do not snoop into the hidden forum or whatnot, of the side, I'm not playing on.

This stems from my time on EoE, where it was a golden rule and players obeyed it. You would tell the DM team, which side you were going to play on, during conflict and you would -not- play the opposing side's character until conflict were at an end.

I think such a policy, makes a great deal of sense, where two opposing factions exist, where the player has two toons, one in each.

soundofastream wrote:

During a faction war, I have always run with the policy of only playing ONE character if two of the factions I am in, are at war. I also make it a golden rule, that I do not snoop into the hidden forum or whatnot, of the side, I'm not playing on.

This stems from my time on EoE, where it was a golden rule and players obeyed it. You would tell the DM team, which side you were going to play on, during conflict and you would -not- play the opposing side's character until conflict were at an end.

I think such a policy, makes a great deal of sense, where two opposing factions exist, where the player has two toons, one in each.

Agreed, I play my Faction toons the same way, as should we all.

I am in 100% agreement with your concerns Selvec, for I have had the very same thoughts myself.

The Honour system, does have its flaws, and faction whores, should be shown to the doors.

O'Raghailligh wrote:

I am in 100% agreement with your concerns Selvec, for I have had the very same thoughts myself.

The Honour system, does have its flaws, and faction whores, should be shown to the doors.

What my trusty follower said.

I can understand why some may want to have a character in all the factions they can, but I don't foresee anything good coming from it at all. It's not always easy to choose, and if you have characters everywhere, my prediction is that you will have to choose eventually, and the outcome could be bad both IC and, sadly, OOC.

It's okay if the character changes sides ICly, the faction can then get revenge, or do something about it. But when the player just switches characters to the opposing faction and fights against the other faction, thats lame. As you can't do a thing about it, but your down one person.

At the moment, I think it's best if every player carefully thinks each such situation through if they have characters in opposing factions. It's always a smart idea to exclude (at least) one of such characters from getting involved in hostilities with the opposing faction, for example. Best to assume you are the weak link and prone to metagaming, instead of being overly confident it won't happen.

I trust common sense.

If you have numerous characters in numerous factions, your sharran application will not get very far. Allthough players believe they can handle knowledge coming from different sources and not overlapping them past experiance has told me alot of players cannot.

Subconcious metagaming has occured many a time, but more to the point it ruins possible surprises down the line. Which is one of the best things about playing in a faction. Overall though this is not for the DM team to decide on, its for faction leaders and players within factions to decide on. A player should not be blindly acepted into a faction in my oppinion, you should at the very least come to know a little about the character and player.

It's a faction leader decision. A Faction Leader can deny an application, and even remove someone from their faction, for OOC Reasons if necessary such as metagaming concerns.

I think that if you have players in allied or factions on good terms it's all good. I particularl only have two characters in two factions, each on good terms.

Though I always see a problem or a chance for someone to metagame if their characters are on opposing factions, their may be even some who go as far to make a secondary account and get some characters on that account to join enemy or other factions.

Selvec Darkon wrote:

It's okay if the character changes sides ICly, the faction can then get revenge, or do something about it. But when the player just switches characters to the opposing faction and fights against the other faction, thats lame. As you can't do a thing about it, but your down one person.

They would still have switched factions ICly.

A problem arises when you have two main characters that you play often, and they're in opposing factions.

Whenever this happens to me, I try very hard to only play -one- of the two. And, for instance, if Faction A were planning an attack on Faction B, I would play with my Faction A character because the initiation of the interactions came from Faction A. Thats how I decide, anyway.

In the meantime, my other character was simply a face in the crowd. He could be still involved in the action, but you arent going to "see" him IG. Its more or less like an old news report. Maybe, sending a PM to Faction B leader -after- the brawl and tell the fate of your other character. It would be smart to make him part of the majority of the outcomes. (2/3 faction died, he died too. Faction B survived completely, he did too.)

BUT, the rule I personally follow the most is this: If you've got some supportive Roleplay with a certain faction, (Even though your toon of your other faction is more of a diehard, fanatic,) and you've been asked to attend more roleplay the following day- Do it. And then be understanding and nice about it. Send PM's, congratulating people for incredible roleplay, on both sides!

Remember, the hardest part about Amia is that we're all supposed to be winners. With Roleplay, we cheer our victories and congratulate our defeats. Its all a part of a single, persistent story written by 100+ individual, very different authors. Its unique in this sense. Just Role with the Punches, eh?

(It must sound like complete rambling, but its my rationale! I've had characters in opposing factions, and never have I upset anyone..)

Silvarus wrote:

I trust common sense.

As a player I choose the character who has more importance, aka for instance Sharina as she leads a faction, and the other character remains pretty inactive during the conflict. As a factionleader I dont have the problem if someone is in two factions and seem slike a person that I dont have to worry about seeing metagame. Now, if they are in a lot more factions or I dont like/trust the player, they just dont get access.

Mr Mago wrote:

Selvec Darkon wrote:

It's okay if the character changes sides ICly, the faction can then get revenge, or do something about it. But when the player just switches characters to the opposing faction and fights against the other faction, thats lame. As you can't do a thing about it, but your down one person.

They would still have switched factions ICly.

That's all good if it is a character switching factions ICly, absolutely no question about it, that is cool. But, If a player, has multiple characters in multiple factions, that is where problems can, and will arise.

For instance, a Player has a character in Faction A, but the same Player also has a character in Faction B. A conflict arises In-game between Faction A and B, where does the players loyalties lie? Do they support Faction A or Faction B, or both? It seems a near impossibility for a Player to have characters in opposing factions without some sort of meta-gaming potential to arise.

Ah.

That was me misreading the quote which Selvec made.

WonWon wrote:

It's a faction leader decision. A Faction Leader can deny an application, and even remove someone from their faction, for OOC Reasons if necessary such as metagaming concerns.

Yups.

Re: Players, I have my own strong feelings about alts but no one likes that opinion so I won't get into it.

I think Won basically summed it up. It's a player concern - you can always lay down the hammer on an OOC basis (e.g. should conflict arise, you are expected to assist with this faction, or leave), but it's up to the players (and by that I mean not the DMs).

I think it should ultimately be left up to the players and the factions themselves.

Personally, I like having multiple characters in different factions because when no one is on that I can do some faction-RP with on my main, I like being able to swap over to my Banite or my Maskarran when all the other Banites/Maskarrans are on so I can enjoy some nice RP with them.

I don't really think it would be fair to force a player to stick to one character and miss out on loads of very fun/interesting RP just because of a few bad eggs that don't know how to not metagame the factions. It's a very hard thing to do at times, but one must learn how to separate OOC knowledge from IC knowledge and it's something that has to be constantly practiced to be used effectively.

So far, I've found it fairly easy to not metagame the factions and I take special care not to join a faction that has conflicts with another that I'm in - at least not on a main character. And if it came down to war between two factions I'm in, I'd partake in the exact same practices that sounds outlined up there.

However I urge faction leaders to not bar someone for playing in a faction for a /very/ good OOC reason and in the case of some factions that an OOC reason is not good enough. Such as the Shrine of Eilistraee for the example. To turn a drow away when they are seeking to join is utterly outside dogma and if the leader was a cleric or caster class I would suggest that they become Fallen if they did.

*shrugs* Course my awnser is to only play two max and try and keep the alt out of a faction beyond his race. I'd almost suggest putting a PC cap on the vaults of two or three but I know more then a few players that would string me up

One main char and one side char in a faction is pretty much enough, if someone would ask me. Faction whoring doesn't really contribute much.

Jyro X wrote:

I think it should ultimately be left up to the players and the factions themselves.

Personally, I like having multiple characters in different factions because when no one is on that I can do some faction-RP with on my main, I like being able to swap over to my Banite or my Maskarran when all the other Banites/Maskarrans are on so I can enjoy some nice RP with them.

I don't really think it would be fair to force a player to stick to one character and miss out on loads of very fun/interesting RP just because of a few bad eggs that don't know how to not metagame the factions. It's a very hard thing to do at times, but one must learn how to separate OOC knowledge from IC knowledge and it's something that has to be constantly practiced to be used effectively.

In fact, I think I've helped Jyro X's paladin character as my paladin, although I know OOC that his other character plans to murder my own paladin. I am perfectly happy to trust that his good characters are not used to gather information in a metagaming fashion.

So far, I've found it fairly easy to not metagame the factions and I take special care not to join a faction that has conflicts with another that I'm in - at least not on a main character. And if it came down to war between two factions I'm in, I'd partake in the exact same practices that sounds outlined up there.

I agree with this person here.

I also find that playing diametrically opposed, or at least truly different characters helps to prevent players from becoming overly attached to a single character, helping them to understand other players' points of view on issues.

hendrack wrote:

One main char and one side char in a faction is pretty much enough, if someone would ask me. Faction whoring doesn't really contribute much.

QFE

I think you're overlooking why people join factions in your haste to blast them with "faction whoring". If I want to play a paladin, it makes sense that she...hangs out with other paladins. She joins a group of people that have the same goals and drives as she does. The only faction I've been involved with, out of all of them, that has actually had any kind of need to keep secret, is the Banites.

I'm in the Sallies, and something tells me Elrien isn't guarding top-secret plans in the midst of healing the ill. I'm just saying.

Don't assume just because someone's in multiple factions, it's because they want to metagame. It may be they're actually /looking for RP with people that their characters would interact with./

I wasn't speaking of metagaming. One main and one side char in a faction is enough if you want to spend time with them. Thats just my opinion, mind. Lets call it faction +1 crowd instead.

I think that depends on your idea of spending time. I might be happy RPing an hour a day on one char, whereas you, to feel like you've spent adequate attnetion and time, might need four.

Leave this whole business to the players involved. Faction leaders can handle such things on an OoC level. Part of the responsibility of running a faction. If somebody is suspected of playing both sides (on an OoC level), and Leader doesn't want to handle it, they can always report it to a DM as it is metagaming at that point.

I think most players understand and can handle limiting themselves to factions, anyway.

Silvarus wrote:

I trust common sense.

Seriously? :lol:

Not to say that people are idiots or anything, it's not like that, but common sense just differs so much from one to the next.

With that said, I haven't ever seen any major metagaming trouble with any of the factions I've been in, and parting ways doesn't have to be that dramatic. When I was tossed from The Eternal Order, it was completely IC and Phearnun pimpslapped me more because he wanted me there, than because my character's personality (who Sharina had shaped in many ways, even) simply made him break some rules.
When I parted ways with The Shadowflames, it was, in the first case, based off Eir's own feelings of being a part of the family. In the second case, with Missandria, it was an OOC dispute that became real ugly, real fast.

With that said, I don't think that there's any bad blood, and that's a testiment to common sense I suppose. Players can handle a lot themselves, and as long as that's the case, the DMs shouldn't waste time worrying about this (possible) issue. Which it seems they don't, so that's good!

hendrack wrote:

One main char and one side char in a faction is pretty much enough, if someone would ask me. Faction whoring doesn't really contribute much.

And here we have ...contribute to what? To the factions' development? Probably not. To your own personal enjoyment? That's up to the player. Some people like some extra variety in their RP.

I've seen this happen before in one of the worst scenarios possible...one person was the leader of two opposing factions. The player in question preferred his darker characters to his lighter ones, and our faction wound up often without a leader. It was frustrating, terrible, annoying and eventually the staff had to intervene.

That is the most extreme case you can find of this, but even on a minor level it can be frustrating. I'm not a huge fan of dual faction membership but it can work. It is important though when actual conflict erupts to pick a side and stay with it for the duration of the conflict. Do not flip flop back and forth.

Yurell wrote:

hendrack wrote:

One main char and one side char in a faction is pretty much enough, if someone would ask me. Faction whoring doesn't really contribute much.

And here we have ...contribute to what? To the factions' development? Probably not. To your own personal enjoyment? That's up to the player. Some people like some extra variety in their RP.

When you join the faction, you agree that you're there to help the FACTION grow, develop, and roleplay though. You become part of something bigger than yourself and your own selfish needs and desires.

Well, pretty much what Tormak said. If a person is in only one or perhaps two factions, I can still trust they will help keep the faction active, work to provide fun for others as well as themselves. When the person has 20 characters in 15 different factions, then I do no longer share that believe.

TormakSaber wrote:

Yurell wrote:

hendrack wrote:

One main char and one side char in a faction is pretty much enough, if someone would ask me. Faction whoring doesn't really contribute much.

And here we have ...contribute to what? To the factions' development? Probably not. To your own personal enjoyment? That's up to the player. Some people like some extra variety in their RP.

When you join the faction, you agree that you're there to help the FACTION grow, develop, and roleplay though. You become part of something bigger than yourself and your own selfish needs and desires.

Really? I joined mine for IC reasons - because my character would. Not because I OOCly wanted to make the faction strong.

There's too much concern about meta-gaming on Amia in my opinion.

The biggest problems I've seen in the many times I've tried to start factions and the many times I've joined one, is simple lack of participation. People will join or say they'll join and then don't really do anything or jump ship after a month tops. Hence, I find it very odd that people complain that certain players are trying to get involved with many things. If I was a faction leader, I'd only be concerned if a player was involved in multiple factions to the extent that they'd be neglecting time doing things with mine.

However, if I had my way, I'd set up "factions" on Amia to be more like an RvR type thing with DMs determining and supporting major towns/areas and players running them (kind of like how Ultrinaan was) rather than a thousand mini-factions of four or five people and factions popping up every other day only to die within a week or two.

The whole meta-gaming thing is not only blown way the hell out of proportion, clouding other real problems, but rather hypocritical to me honestly. I don't see how it's not meta-gaming to use superior knowledge of DnD mechanics to tweak builds and have "build plans" rather than take feats/skills naturally like a character really would, the former is essentially using OOC knowledge to try to make your character powerful and respected ICly. And that's just one example, which is built into the DnD way of gaming no less, there are many others that people ignore.

It's inevitable that there will be subconscious or conscious meta-gaming anyway, which is why I've also suggested in the past that the "pro-wrestling" approach to conflict story-telling be taken. I don't really care about being surprised though personally, I care more that things get to play out without being abandoned or degenerating into whining about how they did. This is another problem though, folk want to act like they are more "mature" than they are rather than just implementing realistic measures to deal with problems, such as scripting how a conflict will end but letting players improvise up to that point.

/rambling rant

tl;dr = Faction meta-gaming is not actually a player issue, it's an issue with how factions work here, everything is a made a personal issue of player morality to avoid looking at that.

Well, there is no point in really discussing this much as it also concerns the personal preferences of the faction leaders more than the members. I am sure the Eternal Order has been lead ooc in a very different style to other factions. I personally dont have a problem with members being part of other groups, but I dont like them being part of all groups or most.

I see both sides of the argument, but I think making more restrictions would be bad. Players should just use common sense, and have fun doing what they want.

I think that there are so many factions on Amia, that there is almost never a consistant story evolving within any one group (with some exeptions at times).

Here is a question; Would factions shrink if players could only have characters in only 2 factions?

Three of my characters are my mains.

All three of them could be involved with Eilistraeens.

Two of them could become part of.. say.. a Monk faction based off of Lemur, if BnA goes on with it.

If all three of them truly become Eilis (or in the case of one of the three, an ally to the Eilis since he is not Drow - thus maybe part of them), I will have no problems.

But if I decide to go instead for some Monk stuff, I might have only one of the three being part of a faction and the others going "free lance", if not temporarily retired.

It will all depend on a series of factors currently being weighted.

Selvec's concerns are the same as mine and I approached it a couple of times in the past month in some of the threads in the forums.

Murex wrote:

I see both sides of the argument, but I think making more restrictions would be bad. Players should just use common sense, and have fun doing what they want.

QFE

Yurell wrote:

TormakSaber wrote:

Yurell wrote:

hendrack wrote:

One main char and one side char in a faction is pretty much enough, if someone would ask me. Faction whoring doesn't really contribute much.

And here we have ...contribute to what? To the factions' development? Probably not. To your own personal enjoyment? That's up to the player. Some people like some extra variety in their RP.

When you join the faction, you agree that you're there to help the FACTION grow, develop, and roleplay though. You become part of something bigger than yourself and your own selfish needs and desires.

Really? I joined mine for IC reasons - because my character would. Not because I OOCly wanted to make the faction strong.

And when you ignore that character because you have 5-6 other alts all also in factions, you hurt EVERY faction but not being able to full participate and take part of any of them the way they deserve. It's a disrespect to the players in those factions and the faction in general.

I have to agree I was kinda... faction-tastic in the number of seperate factions I was in with various chars but I've trimmed it down some and the plan is to stick with the characters I have now, Vaelmith being my primary and Kiyomi and Illyana played when I am able to and is suitable.

My other characters at current are on hiatus but I am not killing them off.

TormakSaber wrote:

And when you ignore that character because you have 5-6 other alts all also in factions, you hurt EVERY faction but not being able to full participate and take part of any of them the way they deserve. It's a disrespect to the players in those factions and the faction in general.

IMO, that's just hurting your own character more than the faction. 6 characters mean 1/6th of the time for each one in general. Does that mean I'm hurting the server by not being as present with them as I would if that were my only one? Possibly. But regulating how many characters you can have in factions would be as bad as regulating how many characters you have in general. As Yurell cited, IC reason -> IC choice.

Alts. aren't the problem. If any, it'd be "insider-outsider trading", so to speak. Which is a problem of metagaming, not alts. themselves.

I never said we would regulate what you do with your characters but it is undeiable that the more characters you have, the less you "do" with each character, which can and will affect every character and faction those characters are involved with, because you cannot be depended on to be around for anything at a given playtime you are normally around. You do not contribute, cannot contribute in the way a dedicated player can because you are busy playing other PCs, and through this, the other players and the faction suffer but your own selfish choice.

I have no issue with characters spying either. As long as the character that spy's leaves the faction they have joined to spy on, and returns to the original faction at some point, then stays IC. If someone makes a character and joins a faction to spy, and has no connection with the opposing faction in any way with that spying character. Then I think that lame.

As long as there are chances icly to catch the spy in the act, then it's all good.

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