concerning factions and their influence

[Mao]

@Katherine:
I read Mimir post and he didn't come with a solution or an idea. All he did was bashing official factions for being lazy and unpopular but not even a suggestion on how they could become popular. I've seen people like this for years coming and going... hell, I've been one of them, bashing official factions for God knows what but never coming with a solution.
I've also read jinx post and I got to tell you that, as an indie player, those things he proposed would not attract me at all. Maybe point C.

WALL OF TEXT
Have you guys played F2P MMOs lately? I played World of Tanks a lot. I'm gonna describe their Clan System for those who are not familiar with it. In WoT there are 2 currencies: silver (credits) and gold.
You get silver for fighting in random battles and you use it to buy modules, ammo, tanks, all kinds of stuff.
You get gold if you pay real money, if you win contests or if your clan holds provinces on the global map. With gold you can buy premium tanks that are better at certain aspects that don't make them overpowered and don't break the gameplay; with gold you can buy garage slots for more tanks or you can buy premium account that lets you advance quicker.
Now, the global map is a browser application that lets you move tanks on some territories and attack other provinces. Once you initiated an attack on the browser map, you'll get a battle in game, with the owners of the said territory.
The thing is that last year, Clan Wars was loosing popularity and many players were complaining that there's not "end game achievement". The competition was stagnating because all the top clans were allied on the map, they had lots of gold in their pockets and they were getting bored.
So, the devs had a problem (similar to what we have here): Clans were losing interest. Everyone was playing random battles (indies!). Some clans tried to start wars with huge alliances involved but they were wiped out pretty fast.
Now, what did the devs do? They came up with all kinds of events and competitions and included them in Clan Wars. Now, the clans had to attack provinces all the time if they wanted to stay the best and get the rewards. The reward was another ton of gold (they already had tons), unique medals (interesting for some) and an unique tank (while it wasn't exactly the most useful
tank, it was a tier 10 -> max level -> battleships in FL and it was fricking unique! as in, only the best in the campaign would have it).

Now, let's take all that and translate it into Disco and our current situation:
Our "clans" have activity problems because they're bored. They already have everything that you can hope to have in this game. Same goes for indies. They also have everything and new players, new indies can have everything pretty fast.

Organizing "campaigns" in different systems where more events would shape the future of the lore is what I propose for official factions leaders and the admin team. For example: Gallia vs Bretonia - Battle for Leeds System

Event 1 - Setting the stage
In this event, Gallic trade factions will have to bring X amount of stuff to Y base. Bretonian trade factions will have to bring X amount of stuff to Z base. Teams can register a max of two 5k transports, and 5 additional ships, up to bomber class. The team that delivers the materials first, wins the upper hand for future events.
Make their routes intersect at some point and see what happens. They can ambush the opposition, they can risk it all on speed and cargo capacity with only a scout. There are all kinds of variables that can be modified.
Event 2 - First encounter, scouting parties
In this event, each team (BAF and GRN) will have to fly 6 light fighters and one gunboat, meet at some coordinates and blast their heads off. The battle will take 20 mins. How do you win?
a. Defeat the enemy in 20 mins;
b. If both teams are still fighting after 20 mins, the team with more ships standing is the winner;
c. If the enemy retreats, you won.
Now, why would my team retreat? Well, if you retreat you get to use your ships in the final battle. If you don't, all the ships that took part in this event, won't be able to take part in the final event.
Event 3 - supplies for frontlines
Another trade event. In this one trading factions have to supply their armies with stuff. The routes will be sent to pirate factions to wtfpwn the convoys. The team that reaches the destination gets to add cloaking or jumping (fuel) to their capital ships during the final battle. The convoys will be made of 5 transports (not 5kers) and 7 support snubs, up to GB. The pirates will bring one transport and 6 support snubs. The odds are not in favor of the pirate faction and they shouldn't be lore-wise. If the pirates manage to steal supplies, they get to use cloak or jump in the next events of this campaign.
Event 4 - random skirmish
As repercussion for the pirate attacks, the navies decide to send in a small force to deal with them. 7 vs 7 system and teams get to choose their set up, without knowing what the enemy will bring (fog of war). If navies win, they won't be attacked by pirates during the final battle. If pirates win, navies are screwed during the final battle because they'll have their behinds drilled by those scums.
Event 5 - final battle
Set-up: partial known vessels, partial fog of war
Participants: depending on past events: Navies, pirates, possibly trade factions security wings.
Duration: 1 hour
Known vessels: each navy can bring one Carrier/BS/Dread (depending on what they have available), two smaller caps as support (Destroyers/Light Carriers/Cruisers) and 5 ships up to gunboats. The pirates can bring a wing of 3 snubs, up to GB class.
Unknown ships: whatever they have docked on those caps.
The battle: will take place at set coordinates. Snubs will fight snubs at first, they will not target the caps! Capital ship captains have the final word if they launch their support ships or if they keep them in reserve. Don't forget that it's possible that the pirates will attack you if you lost Event 4 or if you didn't take part. If a team of snubs obliterated the enemy team, they can move on the cap, with support from their own capital ships. So, caps are only watching for the most part of the battle. They are the coordinators. Now, keep in mind, that a lost capital remains lost for the official faction and re-building it would take time (say... one month) so that's why you have the opportunity to bail out if you can. You can retreat and save your ship but the territory you were fighting for is now lost to the enemy.

This is my idea and if I'd have the time I'd love to organize something like this but I don't... Now, I think that this would give the official factions an edge without taking anything from indies (I'd still like to restrict some caps )

Also, the idea can be extended to include the strategic position that a POB may have in a system, as in... if you're attacking the capital system of a house, you'll have to bring your caps and fight around one of their POBs, giving the defender the home terrain advantage. There are countless opportunities that can be exploited and organizing events like this should bring activity and new members for official factions.

Oh and the big picture would be like this: This week, we focus on this campaign, next week, we go have a look at order vs bhg vs order, next week, we organize liberty vs rheinland, next week, we organize colonials vs kusari or gallia and so on, giving time to factions to do something else in the rotations and attend to their POBs or whatever their RP projects are. We don't want to keep them busy only with Campaigns.

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