Should official factions have more power?

[ProwlerPC]

I read the entire thread last night. You know, I couldn't come up with an answer - just thoughts.
I slept on it and when I woke up I seem to still find myself unsure as what this may mean or lead to.
I'll try my best to organize my whirling thoughts on this.
I've already felt that official factions always had RP power and an influence on the details of the mod's development. I've seen it in the past and confidant of this knowledge have, with the other leaders of our official faction, excercised presicely that. We've managed to have the Cruiser class and Battleship class ships removed from our associated ID as they did not fit with the in-game lore and the overall NPC faction at all. If this is the kind of power being talked about that I know official factions already have it. It's actually a pretty hefty power and one that can go overboard if not challenged for it's seriousness. Our appeals to remove two ship classes from an ID was indeed challenged but we held our ground confidant with the information we had from in-game and in the end the change was made. There probably is numerous smaller influences official factions have on the mod development that we don't even know of. You'd probably be surprised how one post can suddenly affect a change without directly realizing it.
If the increase in power means enabled flhook commands that have, for example, a large general effect on the behaviour of the NPCs towards a char than I'd say I'm a bit nervous at the idea. I'll use myself and an flhook command that would cause the NPCs I'm associated with to become hostile to a player character. I don't lead a faction that has the RP to go steamrolling ourside their space, the most intrusive aspec in fact is the exploration unit. However, I am an oak when it comes to the ZoI of the faction I lead. I hold to the in-game lore so strictly that I have indeed frustrated other groups, who are exploring the boundary's of RP, by staunchly refusing other militant ships in our ZoI and keeping our ZoI seperate from all. Now the biggy: If there is an flhook command that can be used as a solution instead of using an RP one, what kind of monitoring and punishment could be set in place? If I had turned to a power instead of RP'ng a better solution I oughta get a whack for that.
The idea of a council scares me even more. This 500mil fee has somehow been seen as the only pre-requisite to becoming official. I ask those who believe that to go look at the Faction Requests forum and ask the ones who have been waiting for approval or have been turned down if they believe the same thing. It took an intense amount of research to mirror an NPC faction. It took longer to put it all in order and organize it into faction post that follows the format needed for approval. It went through an even longer period of forum scrutiny and in-game scrutiny (yes you are expected to be very active during the process to prove your in-game worth). Through this you are judged at your factions consistancy in keeping to the RP that was posted in the proposal (the more detailed and consice the easier to judge). For those who succeed they have achieved not just the approval of the admins but the approval of the community. If there was a council of say 8. Are they all willing to put as much time and research for every single NPC faction. It would be necessary in my opinion if they are going to "correct" the faction on NPC RP. It's a big job that I do not believe is possible to fulfill. I would be hardpressed indeed to want to hand the helm of the faction I lead over to 8 people who may suddenly find themselves controlling all in-game RP. Ouch!
See I am still just full of whirling thoughts that will go in circles. I'll vote later as I think more on it.

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