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+--- Thread: Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance (/showthread.php?tid=17340)
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - tfmachad - 03-07-2009
I don't know if the best way to discuss this is to keep throwing just about every other questionable issue around and say, "Hey, those guys over there also do something strange, so let us have ours."
The question I proposed doesn't involve gameplay mechanics, as the arguments contrary fall into the realm of, "Our fraternity, as opposed to theirs, was comparatively small and could use the extra numbers," or other such meta game issues. If you ask me, I think that the whole bipolar separation of the criminal factions amassing either around the Outcasts or the Corsairs to be very detrimental for the entirety of the lesser criminal factions throughout Sirius. I mean, this worked when the game was small (for Vanilla), but Disco is so much bigger than Vanilla. Most of the factions gathered under the Outcasts or the Corsair wings have little to none reason to be together any more, even with their primary "sponsors".
As I said in the RFP proposal, factions need identity to strive and when you put them all under the same generic umbrella you remove that from them, which is actually hurtful for everyone. For me, being "allied" is very different than being "friendly", which in turn are very different than not being hostile/neutral.
I think yes, that we ought to ask ourselves each time more, and with a clinic eye, how beneficial in fact is this generic Outcast/Corsair war that seems to gather everyone into two happy groups. How really occupied are the Corsairs with the matters that concern the Gaians? Or how really preoccupied are the Outcasts with the people of Rheinland? Or better, how can the popular revolutionaries live with themselves when they allow the Outcasts to poison their people with drugs? There's an extrapolation of friendliness towards forged alliances which seem not to be ever questioned under a keen eye of each faction's motivations. And, most of the time, the justifications end up falling under the category of meta gaming issues, and I really think we shouldn't content ourselves with that, specially in a strong RPing context. I'm not saying, "Change right now!" What I'm saying is, "Ask yourselves. Think about it." And more than anything, if there's indeed that duality of thoughts, portray that in game. Those concerns are what will add depth to the characters you're bringing to life. Not a washed out, blank faced, "I'm allied with this one"/"I'm hostile to that one".
Back to the topic and summarizing a bit, the only real answer to my question, "Why doesn't the Order take exception to the possibly harmful (in a Nomadic/Dom'Kavosh sense of the word) Corsairs' Artefact unregulated and indiscriminate distribution to the general population?" were:
1. It's not that they don't care. They are probably standing close as to keep an eye out for trouble. In fact, what looks like an alliance of convenience is in fact the Order keeping the Corsairs and their distribution of Artefacts at arms reach.
2. They need the ships and the manpower, so they simply oversee the Artefacts smuggling. After all, nobody knows if they're really dangerous.
3. The Corsairs needed the extra friends in their big alliance type thing, so they called dibs on the Order.
While I still think it to be somewhat shady, I can live with the first option. I'd really like to see it being better explored by the Order players and I think that alone would grant some new and possibly nice aspects to their RP.
As for the second option, the Corsairs were a bad choice. The Hessians would make a better one. Even though, in a general sense, their revolutionary days are long gone (when have in mind that the criminal life has been embraced by a good number of them), I think there's still room in the organization for some moral high ground, which would be the key to the Order approximation of them. I mean, speaking of letting go of some principles for the practicality, it's preferable to ally with the occasional pirate than with the people that are disseminating (Nomad/Dom'Kavosh) Artefacts left and right.
I can't really fit the third option as a valid on in my simulationist mind, as I understand that as a solution to a meta gaming issue which in itself is debatable. Do we really need this bipolar thing going on? I could understand that in a much smaller context, where you'd have the eventual Hessian and Molly player here, a couple of Outcasts there, then yes, you'd need a strong motivation to bind those people together so the game could be more interesting for everyone (it's a multiplayer game after all). But as the game grows, having specific identities for the factions is not only welcomed, but necessary. Think of it as a higher resolution in reasoning, permitted as the game broadened in size. The simplification of the factions under the Outcast and Corsair flags is a setback for those who are under them. Bundschuhs, Gaians, GCs and everyone else need room to flourish by themselves without being ever brought back to the same old bucket.
Not that I think I'm supposed to be made happy about it. I'm just voicing out some thoughts I think are relevant.
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - Thexare - 03-07-2009
' Wrote:The simplification of the factions under the Outcast and Corsair flags is a setback for those who are under them. Bundschuhs, Gaians, GCs and everyone else need room to flourish by themselves without being ever brought back to the same old bucket.Er, GC? The ones who use cardamine in their ceremonies? Shouldn't be allied to the Outcasts?
Did you maybe mean Blood Dragons? Because I'd be with you 100% there.
Also, the Bundschuh are neutral in the Outcast/Corsair war. Were you maybe thinking of the Red Hessians?
Despite my nitpicking, I do agree that this Corsair/Outcast war's a bit ridiculous and cutting into RP. Keep the logical allies - Corsairs/Hogosha, Outcasts/GC/Hackers. Rogues, I think, should be neutral. Mollys and Hessians should be hostile to the Corsairs, but I don't think they should be Outcast allies. Drop The Order from the Corsair ally list and leave them at friendly or neutral.
(note: above Corsair logical ally list incomplete. I don't play Corsairs.)
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - Xoria - 03-07-2009
I think those are some exceptionally important issues that you raised in your last post, Gronath, and I wish you had brought them to the Development forum a long time ago, but it's not too late in an ultimate sense. Strategic thinking would be a breath of fresh air after months of niggling over details and stats.
From the perspective of Outcasts and Corsairs, I can see both of those groups striving very hard to build hegemony for themselves among the other outlaw groups. I can also see some of those groups chomping that bait, and others pushing back against it. The history of organized crime is one of my areas of personal study, and the main thing it demonstrates is that there are really no hard and fast rules or logic to determine how working relationships pan out. Watching pop culture you might think that the Italian New York five families ran everything, but there was a period of time not long ago when one black guy in Harlem was able to hold major sway over all of them. How? He had the connections that they didn't, and they needed what he could offer. So what "should" happen from the standpoint of reason and the surface level view of organizational structures is not always the inevitable outcome.
Of course, the problem here is that we're just making all of it up as we go along, and the power plays are designed and not the result of actual opposed outcomes. So logic and reason plays a part, but I think there is plenty of room for "weird" outcomes. Truth is stranger than fiction all too often, after all.
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - Agmen of Eladesor - 03-07-2009
I think we could also call this, effectively, an alliance of convenience simply due to the common enemies. You still have the BHG Core wanting Nomad items for their own exploitation. And with there really only being two ways to get to Delta - a lot of times they're going to have to go through Gamma.
What I find when I'm out there in the boonies is that my RP with an Order pilot is entirely different from the Corsair pilots - and that's pretty much no matter what character I'm playing, including my non-bounty hunters. What's interesting is, as was pointed out by someone else, the closer you get to 'civilized' space, the more someone that's Order ID'd and tagged, the more their behavior tends to mimic a Corsair.
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - tazuras - 03-07-2009
I think one thing that hasn't been touched on yet is access to Order space from the rest of Sirius. The options are:
-through Alaska, which is a no due to liberty forces,
-through Outcast space, which is a no because they could tell the nomads or the nomads may have "ears" in their space
-through Nomad space, this one is pretty obvious
or
through corsair space. Now I think The Order would want to be at least friendly with the Corsairs for this reason alone, so their shipments wouldn't be constantly getting jacked or taxed. And from a continuing supply standpoint the alliance makes even more sense as the Corsairs have an extensive network to help them obtain any resources they need which the Order could use to get supplies. Having the Corsairs do this for the Order would also allow them to focus on the Nomad threat and help keep knowledge about The Order away from the people in Sirius who would want it the most (as Order supply pilots would know a lot more about Order space than Corsair supply pilots).
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - Kuraine - 03-07-2009
The idea in 4.86, ultimately, was to make the Order and the Corsairs neutral to each other. Perhaps neutral/friendly, but certainly not allied. The Order and the Blood Dragons striking up their alliance again, with the Blood Dragons being completely neutral to the Outcasts, and even unfriendly in a lot of ways.
Neither the Corsairs nor the Outcasts really offer anything to the Order that they cannot obtain through their various Liberty government/LSF contacts and through their Zoner allies. With the large Zoner infrastructure, Zoner Freeports all over Sirius etc, that would be the perfect area to recruit from and gather informantion rather than from Corsairs. Although I daresay there are still Corsairs in the Order who are ideologically in favour of what the Order are trying to do.
As far as I (and others) see it, the Order would NEVER hand over extremely advanced technology to a bunch of cutthroat pirates, especially not the Osiris battleship or cloaking devices etc. It just isn't in the interests of humanity to hand such advanced equipment and ships to pirates who are only interested in serving their own goals. They would never have needed the Corsairs to build any of their ships anyway (Zoners have shipyards), in theory. Either way, even if they did permit the building of Osiris they'd have stripped out all of the valuable technology from the design schematics and handed them a seriously dumbed down version.
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - Derkylos - 03-07-2009
' Wrote:I think one thing that hasn't been touched on yet is access to Order space from the rest of Sirius. The options are:
-through Alaska, which is a no due to liberty forces,
-through Outcast space, which is a no because they could tell the nomads or the nomads may have "ears" in their space
-through Nomad space, this one is pretty obvious
or
through corsair space. Now I think The Order would want to be at least friendly with the Corsairs for this reason alone, so their shipments wouldn't be constantly getting jacked or taxed. And from a continuing supply standpoint the alliance makes even more sense as the Corsairs have an extensive network to help them obtain any resources they need which the Order could use to get supplies. Having the Corsairs do this for the Order would also allow them to focus on the Nomad threat and help keep knowledge about The Order away from the people in Sirius who would want it the most (as Order supply pilots would know a lot more about Order space than Corsair supply pilots).
Why does everyone always forget that one can enter through Kusari?...
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - tazuras - 03-07-2009
The entrance through Kusari goes through nomad space, that is the nomad space entry, also it is Tohoku, which is a pretty heavily guarded system in RP I thought.
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - tfmachad - 03-07-2009
' Wrote:Er, GC? The ones who use cardamine in their ceremonies? Shouldn't be allied to the Outcasts?Sorry for the unexplained example. What I meant when I mentioned the GC is that it strikes me like a faction that seriously needs to get out of both Outcast and Blood Dragon influence. Sure, in RP they are still most dependent of the Outcasts, as a good number of their population is addicted to Cardamine (though I really don't like absolutisms). Anyway, despite the obvious political benefits, one has got to step outside of their parents shadows to really conquer something, and that's what I meant when I cited those factions. Even though in RP the GC, for example, may be yes very dependent of the Outcasts, I wouldn't want to see them simplified and summarized by that dependency. They should have something of an identity that supersedes that dependency. Otherwise they have absolutely no reason to exist as a separate faction.
Did you maybe mean Blood Dragons? Because I'd be with you 100% there.
Also, the Bundschuh are neutral in the Outcast/Corsair war. Were you maybe thinking of the Red Hessians?
Despite my nitpicking, I do agree that this Corsair/Outcast war's a bit ridiculous and cutting into RP. Keep the logical allies - Corsairs/Hogosha, Outcasts/GC/Hackers. Rogues, I think, should be neutral. Mollys and Hessians should be hostile to the Corsairs, but I don't think they should be Outcast allies. Drop The Order from the Corsair ally list and leave them at friendly or neutral.
(note: above Corsair logical ally list incomplete. I don't play Corsairs.)
However, those were mere examples. I pointed out the more sensible ones (the smaller and more specifically oriented factions), but that goes for all of them. Even Outcasts and Corsairs. Some things every NPC faction player should ask themselves is this:
How is it that I, through my role, pursue the objectives of the faction I represent? How is it that I reinforce or deviate from the RP "spine" as proposed for my NPC faction's standard role? How can that beneficial to further enhance not only mine, but everyone else's enjoyment and perception of the overall ambiance cast by the faction and all the people that portray it?
' Wrote:I think those are some exceptionally important issues that you raised in your last post, Gronath, and I wish you had brought them to the Development forum a long time ago, but it's not too late in an ultimate sense. Strategic thinking would be a breath of fresh air after months of niggling over details and stats.I don't know, Xoria. Even though it's interesting to have such matters and decisions hard coded into the mod, we don't really need them. Mollys weren't stopped (for better or for worse) from cutting a truce deal with the Bretonian government, even though their NPCs still shot each other. The Mandalorians weren't stopped from accomplishing diverse and unorthodox deals, even though managing to accomplish and maintain a proper character reputation board to match those deals is very hard. And that happens all around. Players will break this mod in two, canon wise, every next day. It's an exercise of futility to try and keep up, let alone anticipate, what will come up next. But I guess that's not necessarily what you're proposing.
From the perspective of Outcasts and Corsairs, I can see both of those groups striving very hard to build hegemony for themselves among the other outlaw groups. I can also see some of those groups chomping that bait, and others pushing back against it. The history of organized crime is one of my areas of personal study, and the main thing it demonstrates is that there are really no hard and fast rules or logic to determine how working relationships pan out. Watching pop culture you might think that the Italian New York five families ran everything, but there was a period of time not long ago when one black guy in Harlem was able to hold major sway over all of them. How? He had the connections that they didn't, and they needed what he could offer. So what "should" happen from the standpoint of reason and the surface level view of organizational structures is not always the inevitable outcome.
Of course, the problem here is that we're just making all of it up as we go along, and the power plays are designed and not the result of actual opposed outcomes. So logic and reason plays a part, but I think there is plenty of room for "weird" outcomes. Truth is stranger than fiction all too often, after all.
Anyway, I do apologize for not bringing this in a better time for it to be acted upon from a mod maintenance and altering standpoint, but I'd say that if the perception doesn't exist amongst the players, then the mod specifics aren't really important important this or that way, people will just play what they are presented. If they do, then the mod specifics is irrelevant, because they'll become much larger than anything that can be predicted or hard coded.
Again, sure, it's interesting to have some of the mechanics actually supporting what's going on in game, but it's not absolutely necessary.
Ask Discovery: Order/Corsair Alliance - Tenacity - 03-07-2009
Quote:The idea in 4.86, ultimately, was to make the Order and the Corsairs neutral to each other. Perhaps neutral/friendly, but certainly not allied. The Order and the Blood Dragons striking up their alliance again, with the Blood Dragons being completely neutral to the Outcasts, and even unfriendly in a lot of ways.
I'd like to see this happen =) I had been doing some RP with a few blood dragon leaders working towards an alliance a few weeks ago, after my attempt at an alliance with kusari failed.
Quote:As far as I (and others) see it, the Order would NEVER hand over extremely advanced technology to a bunch of cutthroat pirates, especially not the Osiris battleship or cloaking devices etc. It just isn't in the interests of humanity to hand such advanced equipment and ships to pirates who are only interested in serving their own goals. They would never have needed the Corsairs to build any of their ships anyway (Zoners have shipyards), in theory. Either way, even if they did permit the building of Osiris they'd have stripped out all of the valuable technology from the design schematics and handed them a seriously dumbed down version.
Order high command members are planning on setting up a restriction post in the future, preventing any of our allies from using our ships (primarily the new gunboat, destroyer, carrier, and bomber, the nephthys/anubis and osiris were planned to be less restricted).
Quote:The entrance through Kusari goes through nomad space, that is the nomad space entry, also it is Tohoku, which is a pretty heavily guarded system in RP I thought.
The unknown system is no longer considered 'nomad' space, the lair there is dead and nomads have zero npc presence there.
Tohoku isnt a heavily guarded system either - it's a barren system. Now, the fortress there, tekagi's arch, IS heavily guarded... but it's only one base and easy to fly around. Blood dragons have ryuku base there as well, and it'd be awesome if the order sets up a deal with the dragons to use ryuku as a supply base.
All in all, i'd much prefer to see us allied with the dragons and nuetral-friendly with corsairs. It would get us out of the corsair-outcast war, which the order has no business being a part of in the first place.