The "cap Scion plz" post made me think of this.

What if you had a cabal with no membership and awesome powers. Except, only some small number of members (like, maybe, whatever the current scion member cap is) actually get to use those powers. Everybody else gets jack crap.

Have the game automatically grant powers to whomever's it deems the most "useful". Kills during the last 72 RL hours? Something like that. Leaders get perma-powers, along with anyone else deemed sufficiently "cool" by cabal imms. Perma-powers for non-leaders are revoked if/when a cool person stops being cool. Or stops logging in often enough.

Basically it creates a situation where, one hand, current members don't really want there to be new members because that creates more competition for the limited number of "powers" slots. On the other hand, it's easier to raid, rank, defend against raids, etc. when you have more cabal allies. Also, if you're a badass, then it's no skin off your back if more people join since you can be pretty sure you're going to keep your powers regardless.

Wouldnt the biggest problem of it all be, those kickass players would essentially be surrounded by the equivilant of bloodoaths, and then you just have massive gangsquads.

The gap between strong and weak would become larger. And newbies would suffer.

Also you have the issue of how to measure "useful". Offense characters will get more pk than the defense shifter. Healers won't get as much, but I'd argue they tend to be the most useful.

People without wands won't accomplish as much, and they'll then be further disadvantaged.

Personally I think the current system works ok, although I think leaders need to be less "selfish" to the extent that I think if game balance would be better served by a cull of membership, the leader should look to drop one or two people. Or at least make induction harder. Or declare war against another cabal to create more enemies etc.

Couple random thoughts:

1. Scion is already newbie unfriendly, and it seems like that's partially by design.

2. If it's not possible to gauge usefulness in an automated way then make it non-automated. It would be kind of like how there's a set number of elite spots in empire, and the mortal leaders get to decide who occupies them. Except in this case it would be an "on or off" thing as opposed to a gradual progression of increasing power levels.

3. Or just leave it automated, and let the result be that all the "powerhouse" characters that are able to generate lots of kills have to make do without any support classes as cabalmates. It would be a sort of mitigating factor.

4. You could do it like Nexus does with Rhyme/Riddle. Have all the cabal members vote, once a week, with nobody able to vote for himself. Whoever the top vote getters are, those are the people who get powers for that week.