I have reviewed several of the posts about things people didn't enjoy or felt were flawed. Quite a few complained about the gangs/mass logins at hero and the cabal system.

My thought is that the current cabal system is flawed. It was nice to have all of these cabals when we had 100+ players. Now there just aren't enough people to support the current system. In addition we now have multiple people playing multiple cabals. This only adds to the problems. Because now you have heros that count in the cabal numbers, but rarely log on.

What I'd like to see happen is a reduction in the number of cabals again. Anyway, I thought this would be a good topic to get me through the work day.

4 cabals.


1-Empire/Tribunal combine again but change philosophy. A take over of all towns and civilized lands.
2-Outlander/Battle combine in some format. Wild barbarian tribe that views magic as dangerous to the land. Oposes the empire/scion.

3-SHadow/Scion unite and begin their work using wild magic to bring forth eternal night.
4-Knight/Fortress combination-To oppose the shadow/scions.

THink if each of these is fleshed out good we would have a more dynamic cabal war system.

Don't remember if it was mentioned in this threat or another place but someone had a pretty awesome idea about how to merge the cabals. Could put the Empire and the Tribunals together, the Outlanders and Battle together with different groups, so that you have the wild-like ones who don't hate magic but don't trust it either since it's against nature, the Nexus and the Scion combined with the mages in the Outlanders to make the Masters of Magic again, and maybe throw in the Fortress's mages, but that's not that big of a deal, and the Fortress on its own against the evil people in all the other cabals.

I think making the cabals straight forward good vs. evil, chaos vs. order is kinda bleh. Multi-faceted systems are more interesting anyways.

Mayby get rid of tribunal, and let empire take over guarding protected cities - perhaps with a twist.

Outlander is fairly interesting as an outlaw cabal.

Ragerrrrs are necessary, because it's an awesome diehard mentality and good for the game in general.

Goodie cabal I guess is necessary.

Right now, all the cabal choices are really, really great, and diversity is always fun, but I think limiting people to a fewer cabals would inevitably result in more group on group action, which in return results in more carrion for the fields.

Two cabals that have some compatible interests, such as Nexus and Scion, could fight over who is the dominant partner in their alliance. Maybe as long as Nexus has Scion's cabal item, then Scions only get access to their cabal powers (including the power to recruit new Scions) as long as the Nexus leader allows it. However, this also puts Scion leaders in the line up for potentially becoming the next Nexus leader. In the meantime, Scions could attempt a coup to get their item back, and maybe they'll even get the Nexus item while they are at it.

This creates broader organizations on an as needed basis. The smaller a cabal is, the easier they are to conquer and keep under control.

You'd still find that wimps won't log/stay on if their side is outnumbered.

I too, need to get through my work day.

What if we just took it down to four cabals that represented good, evil, chaos, order. Basically make it Empire, Fort, Outlander, Tribunal. This would still nearly every kind of role, and the magic oriented cabals like scion, rager, nexus, could turn into religious organizations like scarab.

I think this would, in fact, reduce some of the problems you mentioned with pendulum swinging and the like.

I would change Empire for Scions.

Tribunal: Orderly - Any Align

Outlander: Chaotic - Any Align

Fort: Good - Any Ethos

Scion: Evil - Any Ethos

On a side note, I wouldn't go down to four cabals, but if we did, I would use those four.

If you have 10 people in range, instead of them being spread out over 7 cabals, they are spread out over 4. You could argue either way whether that would decrease the pendulum swing, or increase it. I think it would make the situation better. Playing 10 on 1 is no fun at all. But if it's 5 on 1, and the other 4 people are sort of neutral, well, it's not any better on the 1, but the 5 don't have to feel as guilty for the one sidedness.

Not sure if that makes sense. I am headache.

I ended up with the same 4 cabals after thinking about it, but for different reasons. But the end was the same.

Random idea: Merge Battle, Nexus and Scion. Have the cabal's idea by 'Only we should use magic, because only we are worthy'. The cabal has 2 sects. Those who use/study/improve magic (Nexus/Scion like powers) and those who don't use magic who's job it is to hunt down and kill those who dare use 'freelance' magic. (For you die hard battle players).

Former nexans believe that magic just is, and are somewhat scholarly. Former scions believe that magic should serve the cabal, and are aggressive. The two work in tandem, much the way that Acolyte and Maran work together now. Opposing forces of the same goal.

This is actually a pretty cool take on the merger idea. Would take some serious RP event to make villagers like "magic isn't ALL bad, so long as it's controlled and used only by those worthy to control it" from the present view of "all magic corrupts!"

It would be an interesting opportunity to beef of the powers of all five cabals as well, and leave Fortress, Outlander and Scion all reliant on the veil. Allow orcs to enter cabals again but only Ragers and Scions. Get rid of thief guilds since they give a bare minimum of RP and disadvantages that thieves don't need and other guilds don't have. If I had my way, either the MUD would get smaller or Tribunal would go the way of the Dodo (but not both) but hell would freeze over before that happened.

>In addition we now have multiple people playing
>multiple cabals.

Now? When haven't we had that?

(Obviously, lots of people do only play one character at a time, and always have.)