Currently Ambassadors are glorified chipmunks. They meet and greet newbies, incitizen those who need a city or want to change their current one and thats it. I understand the ambassador position was made in the vein of GoodWill Ambassador to the city but.......

Why not have ambassadors BE ambassadors as in the political sense?.

In each city there should be a single room embassy from the other two cities that when entered and surveyed will list that room as being part of Magnagora or Celest or Serenwilde, its their embassy so naturaly the ground theirin should be considered their city property. It would have a locked and only the ambassador and the ruler of the city would have a key to it.

The ambassador would have immunity within the city they are posted to, but could be dismissed by that city at anytime and its embassy could be closed down by that city as the need arose. The embassy could also be closed by the city who owned it should they wish to sever all lines of diplomacy with the city its in....usually a pretext to war.

Also the embassy would be a saferoom for traveling citizens......citizen A makes a trip to city B and is attacked by an angry mob. He runs to the embassy to escape the mob. Obviously if the embassy harboured people who were blatently causing problems within the city the embassy would be closed in short order so the ambassador would have to be very careful who was given shelter.

There so many more avenues for RP this would open up it would be awesome. So basicaly for the addition of 6 rooms the basin would get some really good RP potential and a level of realism it currently lacks.

But we aren't meant to like each other, or make alliances with each other, or have any sort of diplomatic leanings towards each other...

That makes no sense. Diplomicy has nothing do with being on good terms with another city its about keeping the doors open to discussion on a political level.

Lusternia was never meant to be about total warfare hence the need for diplomacy. If Im wrong and the cities are meant to be in a constant state of open warfare and rampant pvp like we have now (and I dont mean competition for villages or resources which is great btw) I hope a divine sets me straight so I can leave the game before I put too much real life money into it and leave it to the PvP's who it was made for.

Embassys would be a great addition to the world and add another layer of RP.

And the fact that there isn't supposed to be too much PK on the primes... supports the fact that there isn't supposed to be total warfare, but also reduces the need for embaseys.

Besides, they don't have to just be 'overglorified chipmunks'. Some of us do take the initiative to do more. I'm currently working on security, as well, as part of being Ambassador (which includes getting a file on anyone whose been an enemy, why, how many times, the fine....and trust me, that's a headache.) Not to mention, other things as well. I can only assume the other Ambassadors work on something, too, seeing how just incitizening newbies can be a bit boring.


As for your idea....not bad, in the real world, but for here? No. People wouldn't agree to having enemy territory within their city just for an embassy room.

I do like the idea, but I think we need to brainstorm how we could flesh it out to give it real purpose.

Would the Ambassador meet with ministers of the city they are posted to to discuss trade deals, treaties, amnesties, etc? Would they simply run a safe-house for visiting citizens? Would they need a permanent staff base?

I think, especially once more cities/communes are added, that true ambassadors should happen. However, there is nothing in the way that I see them that requires hard coding, merely the consent of enough of the cities that it holds together.

1. Ditch the embassy idea. Its just going to get abused and make politics and war MORE problematic, and with no real purpose.

2. If a few cities can agree, name one person from each city that is ambassador to EACH other city. Not one master ambassador, but one to each. That ambassador would not be able to attack the city they were ambassador to (although no doubt self defense, city defense, even defense of a citymate in the same room would be excluded), nor would the citizens of said city be allowed to attack the ambassador (excepting the situations related above).

3. Much of the diplomacy between cities should pass through ambassadors. Ambassadors need not know everything, however. For example, pretend Olan is the Mag Amb. to Serenwilde. Nikua contacts me when he has a beef with a Mag citizen, or wants to work out something between the cities. This unburdens Daevos some, though of course he'd be the ultimate decision maker, likely I could handle citizens that were killing Serens for no reason or raiding or whatever.

On the other hand, maybe Daevos has a super diplomatic strategy for the next influencing season. I don't know the secret plan, he just tells me to make overtures to Seren, keep them talking about working together, but never give a good enough offer that they agree...the goal being to keep them distracted from Celest while we cement an agreement with Gaudiguch, so that our enemies will still be disorganized when we are ready to roll. I get to claim I was offering everything I was allowed, and say I don't know of any such plan from the beginning (diplomatic immunity, baby!), and everyone has a fun and interesting time.

This only really requires a few cities to be committed to at any one time, since if a few cities do it and, say, Celest refuses, they are going to have a much harder time finding friends then everyone else. Hell, Daevos could tell them to either rejoin the ambassador circle or they don't even get to talk. "Take this up with Valek, the ambassador we sent your way. Send him away again, and you can rot in Nil."

I think this sort of setup manages all the interesting RP without needing either problematic safe rooms or, technically, divine backing/assistance. Of course, adding in city positions for ambassadors to list on HELP cityname and such would also be good and handy, I'm just saying this is something we could do ourselves with a little organization and RP'ing.

This would probably be up to the particular ambassador, city, city leader, and time period. If, continuing my example above, Mag and Seren are getting along well, Daevos might give me the thumbs up to work with the trade ministers from both cities to arrange some comm trading to benefit both. On the other hand, if we were expecting them to back out of agreements at any time, he might tell me to act like I'm somewhat interested, but bog things down in details so that nothing happens that might hurt us right before they betray us. I still see the city leader as being the main figure, just using diplomats to add more intrigue and RP to the world.

Ambassadors won't work well in Lusternia, unless there was a plethora of cities to ally/enemy. Our world, it works fine. Imagine if there was only Canada, the U.S. and Mexico.

No jokes about that, it was used to provide a visual.

*500 posts*

Grats on the trans, Richter.

I just noticed your sig though. And that is NOT what I meant. That was a threat, damnit. >_<

I think as Lusternia continue to age, we will see alot of changes and hopefully a Military System and a navy

Problem with creating an ambassador position without anything added to the current listing of commands they have is the why factor. Why have an ambassador take a confidential msg between two leaders when currently if your the leader you just write a msg directly to that person? or if your feeling daring write it on a letter and send it by mail. Point being no chance for intercept or copying.

The ambassador would have to actually have a function that counted. If its just RP then all that is needed is an agreed upon title between the cities and you have an intstant foreign ambassador post.

It basicaly would allow cities to talk to foreign leaders in a face saving manor without resorting to direct private msg's or letters which tend to get a bit personal and heated in times of conflict. By giving a cities response to an ambassador it forces the leadership to sit down and write out their demands vs the current method of nasty private messages usually consisting of how much the other person sucks. Or worse, shouting matches and soapbox speaches on the Public boards. Sure you could give a msg like that to the ambassador but at least it will be a formal YOU SUCK, vs a personal one.

From Aetolia.

I've always felt abbassadors are underused ministries...

give them some cool powers!

You aren't meant to go either way. Things were designed with conflict in mind, primarily to discourage long-term alliances or "quasi-alliainces" (like happened for quite a while with Shallam and that 4th city whose name I forgot). Nonetheless, if players want to make alliances then there's nothing that forbids it. Indeed, my own personal opinion is that if I were a player in a weak city then I'd be trying to drum up support for an "alliance of convienience" that could be quickly discarded. Though granted this is hard with only two cities/communes. Perhaps there will be more of this as more open up!

Gods, please no. The military system in Aetolia was inefficient. In effect, it was a drain on comms and money and a -lot- of time. Few people wanted to learn how to use it, and fewer ever figued it out. In addition, they used it to make it utterly impossible for some people to play, because they'd be attacked by a legion of soldiers if they walked into the wrong room. The main benefit came from comm production from lands (for which we have villages, and I would rather it stayed that way) or from forcing another city's leadership to be someone specific.

Plus it was easy to abuse, and easy to break. Any Aetolian who was involved with the war in Ashtan will remember how impossible it was for over four thousand soldiers to capture a city with only three hundred defenders, when both sides were within the walls. I am fully against any sort of military system like Aetolia had, it was nothing but a detriment and another way for people to slake bloodlust. Use the bloody arena.

Real war is a waste of commodities and time.

*cough*Plausible deniability*cough*

Perhaps if cities are at peace, the ambasador can read the news board of the other city as well (or at least write to it).

In the long term, there really needs to be more peace. Occasional conflict is fine, but wearying. Nobody is going to stick around for long if there isn't at least occasional peace time.