The Kusari Exiles

[Xoria]

I think a distinction needs to be drawn between leadership necessary early in a faction's life, and leadership necessary in a mature faction. If I had been as active in the Lane Hackers early in its life as I have been over the past 2 years, I seriously doubt it would have survived, much less thrived. At this stage, however, there is an institutional memory that exists in the faction that is passed down even without my active presence. In other words, there are Lane Hackers now who behave in ways that I and the early members pioneered and that we have never had to directly teach to today's new members; they learn it from other members who learned it from other members, and so on back to the original crew. But the key is that the faction became an institution largely because it had strong leadership when it began.

Dusty's point is still a valid concern, since whether or not Zelot can devote adequate attention to the faction really is a key issue. It would seem to me that the ultimate proof of this is to be found in the actual performance of the faction, however. If he can't be a decent enough leader, then the faction will fail. If he can, then it will be more likely to succeed. The members attracted to it are of course relevant to those outcomes, but the leadership they coalesce around is key. That means, of course, that the faction ought to go through a normal trial period just like every other new faction nowadays. These aren't the days of 4 years ago when a proposal could get approved just for being written up well.

Finally it is inevitable that this proposal is going to reek of nepotism, favoritism, and elitism. Zelot was a key member of the Dev team, a key developer of this npc concept, and is also an Admin. Nobody in those positions will be able to create a faction without looking like he's engaged in self-serving and exploitation of his position. As I have contemplated creating a new trade faction lately, I've been concerned about the same issues. Appearance is not necessarily reality, however, and expertise does transfer across domains. Naturally the person who develops an npc concept is in a unique position of knowledge to create a player faction off of that concept. The same is true for the developer of the mod's economy creating a trade faction. It simply can't be helped. But neither is it a death knell.

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