The End of the Regency

[The_Last_Good_Dragon]

Edit: Removed by Moiself.

[Temi]

One of the big complaints about court that we have heard now is that they don't really have a real purpose, a job to solve in the city. We have had people bring up multiple times wishing for them to have some real part to play in the dynamics of the city. We have a couple of ways we could go on directing them - let the court play things on a more kingdom level, play the politics with the dukes, drive kingdom-wide plots through the plot system, or we can bring them in and focus them on Lithmore, where we play. The kingdom level stuff is exciting and allows a grand sort of politics, but it doesn't really support RP on the grid, and has to be primarily supported by staff. The second option focuses on Lithmore and RP and we think it's the better thing for the game. We discussed this, and we want to move in this direction... but we think we can do this better by going further. Not just giving this task to the court, but reimagining the court into a council sort of idea. I don't think of it as getting rid of the court, but adjusting its scope and refocusing on it. We definitely want to ensure the nobility have a place of direct importance in this system, and that there is room to support underlings who want to play politics, but perhaps not on the GL or noble level.

By which I mean to say, if we let the court continue on separately, as something different than this, we would be taking away pretty much all they have besides noble social club and fancy titles, and the guild would be even more disatisfied than they are now.

[Leech]

I'm worried that giving GLs yet more mandatory meetings to attend will lead to more burn out and less GLs. Also worried about the usage of plots and city metrics. Lithmore has gone through floods, plagues, magic attacks, political upheavel, near civil war, verges on apocalypse... The list goes on. What new plots can city metrics bring to the table? Why should I care about city metrics, and are they ever going to really get low with the number of ways people have of boosting them? Why would I want to keep them high if I get events to play to when they're low? City metrics has always been like the places code to me: a great concept on paper, but one I haven't really seen people take advantage of.

I've generally looked outside of Lithmore for action because the setting isn't all that fun for me anymore. It would be great if it were again, and I hope this is the first step towards that!

[Pixie]

I've been pretty distracted away from TI the last couple (few?) weeks. Still very sad to see the Court on its way out.

Personal opinion, here:

Even if Court -was- just a social club with fancy titles, that wouldn't exactly be against theme for nobility, especially considering they all come from the far(ish)-away lands where their titles are relevant to socialize, make alliances, and politic with other nobles in the capitol.

The "pettiest" (not meant as an insult!) and most self-absorbed nobles in Court use Court as a platform to big themselves up and socialize/politic with other elites. There's nothing wrong with that. It fills a nifty niche in the social landscape. The other noble-types spearhead a pretty fair number of wide-reaching things. There's nothing wrong with that either. (Note: Without Court as a guild, I don't see the two "types" having any compelling reason to interact). Margaux's never-ending list of projects -- all of which draw people in from all walks of IC life -- are wonderful evidence of what Court accomplishes outside itself. Ofelia is another fantastic example of the latter type of Court member using their Court-appointed title to create RP outside the guild. What Court -does- is be Court. What its members do with their influence is up to them.

That said, I don't think a guild necessarily needs to accomplish anything outside itself to have value. They're kind've by definition niche organizations with exclusive members. By existing and providing that niche, they've already done their job. If members enjoy each other (and by extension enjoy their time logged into TI), I tend to believe that's a good thing.

I'm probably codedly inactive right now and thus couldn't say much about my own plans as a Court member being relevant, but it... does suck a bit that long-term work will effectively fizzle into nothing. This is more my weariness with the process than simply "Court is going away", but I donno, guys. Just the idea of tackling a new guild set-up, readjusting to the process/system/members, getting things re-approved IC and what not exhausts me. I'd rather just not do them, and that's kinda bleh.

[The_Last_Good_Dragon]

I've been trying to put down my entire round of feedback now that I've read a few clarifications and justifications. Overall I really, really do like the idea and am very excited about focusing RP risk/reward cooperation/conflict into the rid of the game, but I really worry that, if implemented poorly or half-way it could really harm the overall RP of the city/game rather than help it out. Most of my suggestions involve ways for dissenters to have a meaningful impact without taking the lion's share of control out of the group of PCs who work together against the darkness.

1. Court will be dissolved to be formed into a new body, the City Council. The City Council is comprised of all non-covert GLs and all active nobles.
I really do like this approach. One of my main complaints about Court was that it was nigh impossible for me, playing a Noble who was often somewhat less-than-courteous, to have -any- kind of influence after Farra got removed from the Court. Having automatic and limited membership is, to me, awesome as it forces people to interact who maybe don't much care for each other. After thinking it over, I kind of hope that this is only TITLED nobles (ie, not Noble spouses.. Sorry Emma and Brynieve you know I love you :< ) mostly only because I think it'd be unfair for a single family to have two votes.

2. City Council Members (ie GLs and nobles) will be able to 'vote' for a city metric with an IC action that they're taking that period.
This is a bit pedantic and maybe doesn't even need to be said -- but is the vote a physical vote or just a general 'policy' decision? I would very much hope it would be something other than a physical statement or -always- be a council, as thematically setting the IC action as a 'this is just what my people are going to be doing for now' allows more leniency with dissention and keeps pressure off of physical meetings, which can often be difficult to arrange in busy IRL and IC schedules.

3. The metric that garners the most votes that week will go up by a large amount. The two runner up metrics will also go up by a smaller amount, and the least voted for or one-to-three random metrics will go down in line with the upward swing on those metrics that got the votes.
I have two key bits of feedback on this: 1) a one-week timeframe is a huge strain on players. Just staying active is sometimes difficult, and dumping an already potentially significant increase in workload on GLs on a weekly basis could really be the 20lb weight that breaks the camel's back. I've seen some timeframe suggestions below, but what about making the votes be centered around the Seasons? Votes could happen every two weeks, with mid-season votes providing smaller impact than the more important Seasonal votes, which would determine a Guild or Noble's general policy for the upcoming season; ie: 'This winter the Order is focused on repairing sections of the walls and increasing winter patrols to keep banditry down. -- City Metric: Defense.'

The second bit of feedback is the strict idea of a winner/two runner ups. I worry that, with this, a single, potentially small, group will come to completely determine city policy, and I think that would be lame. What about selecting the winner by lottery based on the votes received. For example, if 4 people voted for Religion, 2 voted for Defense, and 2 voted for Class Relations there'd be a 50% chance that Religion gets the big increase and 25% for the others. To prevent the minority from having -too- much impact, having something like 66% of voters select one thing could auto-award the #1 spot, as well as always having the most-voted metric be guaranteed at least the first runner-up. This would help naturally create 'villians' that players could then deal with. I could, for instance, see Farra voting for 'Morale' or something, undermining a coalition that -really- needed a big Defense boost, and give people an impactful reason to 'deal' with her over that. 'The best laid plans of mice and men...' could be a good summary of this mechanic, which I think would really, really, really be awesome to see included, so stated from a 'Heel' noble.

4 + 5. All city metrics will be supplied with impacts on the game. We are working out what those impacts are and intend to have them in play by the time this system comes into play.. Once per month, the staff will roll on one of the three lowest metrics to kick out a city event. For example, if health is low, perhaps there will be an attack of dysentery in Southside. If infrastructure is low, a section of the sewers under Church Street might collapse. If defense is low, some brigands might set up a toll booth on the road outside of the west gate, etc, etc.

I would love to see more codified penalties come into play for this. I LOVE this idea. I would personally love it if they impacted things like economy, heal rates, aggressive npc's being present.. Goodness anything, really. Low health might lead to injuries taking 33% longer to heal; low morale might result in slightly reduced. In general, though, I hope to see penalties be felt by the entire game in most cases; city metrics should be, I think, directed by the upper class (as these changes are meant to do!) but also greatly affect the city as a whole, not -just- freemen or -just- people outside the gates or -just- Knights. Giving people a kind of general low-level 'This shit is what's bad right now' to RP against is an awesome idea to go along in conjunction with the larger, more terrifying staff-run events. I'd personally like to encourage the staff to not hold back their punches when considering bad things to happen. Noble income lowered for the next season? I'm game. 10% increase to all NPC shop prices? I'm game. Sneaky Thief vNPCs on the streets? I'm game. Brawlers from Southside leaking into the rest of the city? I'm game. I'd love to hear what other people think about having a monthly 'Shit Going Wrong' event going on and how impactful they'd like it to be. Something generally really annoying but not requiring every resource pointed at it would be what I'd like to generally see, with some obvious variance.

6. A new role will be set up that is ALSO on the city council, the Sensechal. This role is open to any player in the game and has a six-month term limit. To achieve it, you need to put your hand in and go through the bid system to get elected (we think bids will work better if the pool of people is the whole game). If elected, you get: 1) a command that tells you what the current voting status of council members is so that you can coordinate and affect the vote prior to it being tallied and finalized, 2) a sweet stipend of silver, and 3) a posh office in the Palace or Town Hall (maybe both). <-- we acknowledge this role may not work out. If it does not, we will remove it.

I think the whole pool of people would work out best; maybe even exclude City Council members from directly voting ("The lesser peoples must decide on someone they trust to represent them." might be the IC excuse for this). Is the 6-month term IC or IRL time? I'd vote for it to be the latter, and make sure that there's no IC rules against consecutive terms. Seneschal could be, I think, a Noble OR a Gentry as the way it's worded, to me, grants more a representative responsibility rather than societial powers; the Seneschal couldn't order a GL/Noble to vote a certain way, for instance, if I understand it right? It'd be very much a duty rather than an authority, unlike how the Regent of pre-Caitrin worked?

7. Rewarding Greed.

The only aspect that I think was missed in these changes that could be a huge potential bit of awesomeness is including reasons for Council Members to be greedy with their votes. The general state of the game will almost certainly be 'Cooperation over Personal Gain'. That's Davism, after all, and that's just the most common state of players: people want to work together against a common foe, in this case being the bad events that will happen.

But giving players a reason to be jerks in a game like The Legacy: Inquisition is, I think, something the Staff should really look at. Give potential gain -- even if just short-term! -- for the Guild Leader who is greedy and not afraid of ruffling feathers (shout out to Romeo!), or the Noble who is more concerned ICly about the state of their home Duchy over that of Lithmore. To that extent, two suggestions to promote the idea that the decision to look after yourself or after the city shouldn't always be easy:

1) Seasonal Goals for Guilds and Noble Houses.
Like long-term pvents specialized for guilds and noble houses (I would be so okay with helping write these up, btw!) which reward those involved for obtaining certain levels of the City Metric; this could reward both maintaining the current good level or improving it. These often might run counter to what the 'city-wide' policy would benefit from being, though certainly not always, and would give GLs and nobles the conflict of having to choose between gain for themselves (these Seasonal Goals would always give bonuses, never penalties) and the health of the whole city. Successfully completing these goals would give a reward of QP, XP, or Silver (maybe depending on what the specific event is?); Guild goals could be more custom-tailored by Staff whereas noble events could be generated from a list, or whatever! I know that Guild Income is already influenced somewhat by City Report, but I don't think a lot of people or guilds care about this -too- much; heck most guilds have huge silver stockpiles, from all I've seen! These little goals could provide tons of fun diplomacy opportunities when taken in conjunction with having three winners for City Metric improvements; "Oh, Seneschal, do you not think it more wise for me to invest my time in defense this month and let the Order handle religion with the help of the Bards?" [While secretly getting a +200 silver bonus if Defense goes from 'Ordinary' to 'Average' as a merchant from Vavard is willing to ship exotic silks to Lithmore if they feel its safe enough.] Rewards for these could even go on to gentry/freemen who support the noble, giving people reason to support savy Noble Households. (The Seneschal probably shouldn't get these goals, as they already would get a stipend?)

2) Brotherhood Veto.

As I doubt the Tenebre is going to attend any Councils, how awesome would it be if the Brotherhood got to cast a Nega-Vote each session and had goals related to weakening the metrics? I'd say the same for Mages, except they don't have a guild anymore.. And they'd probably just use compulsion to force the vote anyways. Jerkbags.


tl;dr attempt:
1. Allow GLs and Nobles to enact a policy without requiring a full-fledged meeting. More work for GLs = Ew Gross for everyone.
2. On with #1: one-week time-frames sounds way too short. Why not have larger timeframes with more impact; (ie, the changes from 4 weekly votes concated to 2 bi-weekly votes with the vote at each season being more impactful/important than mid-season.).
3. Lottery Pick for the "Winning" Metric, unless a super-majority of Council votes for 1. "The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men..."
4. Global-reaching but more "annoying" than "drastic" (re: plz no plagues :< ) would be awesome. Love to have smaller, more randomized undercurrents to RP around than always the big "ARGH EVERYTHING IS GOING TO SHIT" that the more world-altering and impactful Staff-Events are!
6. Seneschal: yes to vote to all; maybe don't allow members of the Council to Vote, to mix things up? Seneschal rank open to Nobles and Gentry alike?
7. Potentially Reward Player/Guild Greed. Seasonal Goals for Guilds and Nobles that potentially reward individuals for going against what is 'best for the city'. Also don't forget the Brotherhood in all of this!

[Pixie]

Pedantic counterpoint: If you thought it was miserable being outcast by Court, imagine how miserable it'll be being outcast by a guild which contains every GL and noble in the game.

EDIT: ... Not that that will happen to Farra, necessarily, but it'll inevitably happen to -someone.- The guild that's taken "we're the elites" to a whole new level is going to be crippling to go up against.

[The_Last_Good_Dragon]

Pedantic counterpoint: If you thought it was miserable being outcast by Court, imagine how miserable it'll be being outcast by a guild which contains every GL and noble in the game.

As I read it, one can't be cut out from the Council. If eligible as a GL or Noble, you're in. Nobody can kick you out. Is that right, staffies?

[Pixie]

Basically every single one of my complaints in this thread is this:

[Giftherz]

Basically every single one of my complaints in this thread is this:

I second this- but I am a minimal player these days and try and hang on by my fingernails with all of the changes that get put through since my time started here years ago.
Are the Xblocks at the Palace going to be removed then? Or changed to something new?

[Kinaed]

Hi guys,

Just some comments about where I'm at now having read this stuff:

- We'll start with one week and probably move to fortnightly, but I think it'll be easier to find out weekly doesn't work and move fortnightly than to tighten it, and we're already on a weekly rhythm. I am very open to fortnightly, so please don't stress about this too much, I just want to see what weekly feels like.
- The system is designed to be meeting-less - you can vote from your phome, you can vote from the local tavern, you can vote from jail. You probably ought not to be able to vote from jail. I'll make a note of that.
- The intent of this is slightly more OOC than IC, so we haven't finalized the 'thematic powers of the City Council' - so it's entirely possible that the city council will be able to raise things to Caitrin, press charges for treason, etc. We just haven't decided, but those decisions are pending.
- I think a topical voting system may need to be added to this so the council can 'vote out of session' on voting issues to prevent people from getting bottle-necked around meeting times. I'll add that to the list of things I need to spec up for this work.
- Membership is automatic, non-transferable and a right, not a privilege. Therefore, if you don't like Bob the Noble because he keeps mucking up your votes, better do something about him. Maybe kill him, maybe get him thrown in jail, whatever, but telling him he can't vote won't fly.
- The votes are not necessarily a 'vote' per se. We were thinking they'd be a 'focus', we're just calling it a vote because we tally it. I'm not sure what you mean by 'physical'?
- I love The_Last_Good_Dragon's comments about using percentages to determine the random likeliness of winners and losers rather than just having it be a simple majority to let minority blocks win out now and again.
- Off city metrics, we intend to have both coded penalties that are ubiquitous as well as rewards when metrics are quite high. Thank you for the suggestions!
- I like rewarding greed. Staff had a similar idea where each player would have a focus or a bane that they would get a personal kick-back for attaining, and this is a similar game. We decided to hold off on that in the first pass because we have enough work to do, but we do like the thinking and may consider it for future layers of complexity.
- Love the idea of covert guilds having a counter vote. That's awesome and I'll see what I can do to work it in.
- It also begs the idea of people to be able to focus on 'voting down' a metric. I'll look at adding that.
- Yes, only titled nobles and GLs will be City Council members (maybe only primary GLs at that just to keep communication lines manageable also...)

Finally, I agree that Court has intrinsic value that is not related to what its game function is, but rather is related to its mythos and our game's theme. Where I get caught up is that structurally, Court is built into the massive, kingdom-level government and politics, which staff specifically want to move away from supporting. The ideal world is that what we have in game and what our mechanics support match. It probably wouldn't kill us to have Court around, but we retain the risk of players playing (and rightly so because the theme for it exists) at that macro level we want to avoid.

With regards to people losing long term projects and needing to get things re-approved, I don't think that would happen and wonder why this is an assumption. I'd think at worst case things already approved would remain so, and I'm not even sure that all projects that exist long term would need approval by the city council depending on how we scope them out theme-wise.