Newbie Friendly?

[Kirkus]

I think that will be a big help... now I got another question to pose since this has become somewhat of an open discussion. Feel free to move it, but I don't think there is any other discussion like it.....

I know there are restrictions of the organizations that can be joined. Such as, if you join the Zhentarim you can't joint the Waterdeep City Watch and so forth. My concern is that this restriction holds back characters joining any organization. I myself have multiple characters that might join an organization but I have always feared closing off the rp of one of my other characters.

I feel the reasons probabily were valid when they were put in place. But now I feel they should be rethought. Yes it would be easy to abuse knowledge gleaned from one character in an opposing group but it would be so blatant that I doubt that any would even think of such a thing. It would be too easily spotted.

To me it appears that the Zhents have never done anything since I have been here, I don't know, perhaps I have missed some activity...

Oh just had a thought, these groups can be a good thing for new characters. Think about the evils for a bit. You get out of the temple and there is precious little for you to do, the Zhents come in and say 'Hey there, grunt! we got a little job we don't want to waiste our soldiers on, what do you say?' And then the new evil character is told to go to waterdeep and make contact with a spy and report back. It gets the new evils crossing the world and so on... Do a couple more easy evil quests then around level 20 let em' join

[Selveem]

I never liked rules like this, either. I always thought they were frivelous and really punished only people who played by the rules. In all reality, any one of us likely has enough contacts to know what is going on on the MUD at all times. I know I certainly do, if I really cared that much to know.

The real issue is not people learning things like that, but abusing said knowledge. To me, it is no different than someone doing a quest on one character then later doing it on another. Let's face it - every long term player has done at LEAST 3 quests that another of their characters have already done. Why? It's something to do that doesn't compromise who your character is or is becoming. Caveat: That is not to say you should do quests that you do not feel fit your character.

I have always felt that all the organizations are extremely underrepresented. Even the faiths, in my opinion, are in dire need of filling with higher-standing members willing to teach/quest new members. We are not a huge player base. As someone else stated, if we were, none of these would be problems (or what I consider to be a problem).

[Lathander]

I still don't like the idea of allowing multiple PCs in an account to belong to different organizations. While we do have players who would be mature about the dual-knowledge they gained, we will still have those who will not. It is not a punishment for those who obey the rules, it is a rule itself. I think that word ("punishment") is over used in many contexts, but that's an issue for another day. Even a slight change in a PC's action can come from the player knowing things the PC would not. Just because a player has the ability to redo quests on different PCs is not, in my opinion, an argument for changing the policy here. Some things are more controllable than others, and this is a controllable one. The argument that everyone has "sources" from whom they can gain any information they desire actually strengthens the point that players should not have PCs in opposing organizations. I commend Selveem for stating that he doesn't have the desire to know everything that his "sources" could provide. However, not everyone is as steadfast in their fight of temptation. I don't think that having multiple PCs from the same acccount in opposing organizations will spark rp in those groups. Sure, it might in the short term, but that's about all. A steady increase in our player base is what is needed where opposing organizations can grow, not merely be filled by alter-egos of the same player.

[Nedylene]

When looking at the rule concerning organizations I personally detest and hate it. Before the rule fully went into play I had one well known character in the Harpers and one well known character in the Zhentarim. I did have to choose which plots I would be a part of on each side and will admit that my Harper sometimes went off on her own personal quests to avoid a plot on the good side and my Zhentarim went off to her own spiritual mischeviousness to avoid some of the plots on the dark side. When the rules went in and were fully enforced Sharni approached me and basically chose for me which character would stay in the organization and which would be cast out. Do I regret her decision for me? Sometimes... but she did it because the organization I stayed in needed the members more and she felt that I would be a better asset to it at the time. Looking back I am glad she made the decision for me because I would of hashed over it for a long time.

When in both organizations I could very clearly see why the rule took place. Some players back then could NOT keep their characters seperate and certain information that they had NO WAY of knowing on their alternative characters got passed around. It is the classic way of the few ruining it for the whole. When coming into the situation of addressing why this rule still remains it is for the simple fact that we have no way of guarenteing that everyone who has a character in an opposing organization has the maturity to keep their characters and their IC information seperated. If the rule is terminated how can we control this? Do we accept applications and risk offending someone's feelings when they are denied? How can we create a system that avoids looking like we are playing favorites? Maybe the simple way is only closing the doors to SOME organizations if you join one. For Example ....

Harpers are opposed to Evil and fight against Organizations such as the Red Wizards of Thay, Zhentarim, Shadow thieves and Cult of the Dragon. If you join the Harpers these three organizations (if all of them are fully implimented) are off limits for your alts.

Zhentarim have their hands in many affairs and fight against the Harpers and the Knights of Myth Drannon so joining them would close the doors to those organizations.

You can catch the drift from there. There are some organizations that I believe should not interfere with your restrictions to other organizations. For example, organizations based on City. The Night Masks is a Westgate organization ONLY. Yes, you may occassionally travel to a different city for information or to locate someone but you hould NOT be involved with the going ons of other organizations. The Waterdeep City watch is made to defend Waterdeep, keep the peace, settle disputes etc....

Even with those examples and those opinions it comes down to one solid fact. Can we ensure that the players are mature enough to keep their characters seperate and approach situations when one group may clash with the other even if the event is highly unlikley. While you, the read, may be able to... Ask yourself seriously if you think the entire populous of the mud would be able to. If you cannot answer the question of maturity for the entire player base and those who may come to join us ... Then we should let these rules stay. As much as we may not like them and may want them altered to open up more roleplaying options for the indivisual (I know I am spelling that wrong).

[Kirkus]

I don't think applications would be out of line. I think that would be enough of a deterant from abuse. It would give us a list of known players with characters in opposing organizatons. Then when ever there was a hint of cheating there could be an intervention with strikes involved....