All private cartels come with a channel and a bank account. This is because they start out as clans and are 'upgraded'. Now, I don't necessarily see a need for a channel for Commune and City Cartels. Many of them don't really have so many members it's necessary. However, not having a bank account really doesn't work well. Commune and City Cartels are forced to either have their TM hold the gold themselves or purchase a clan just to have a bank account. Guilds, Communes and Cities all come with bank accounts. All clans come with bank accounts. Why do Commune and City cartels NOT come with a bank account?

Cuz they're free?

I've always thought they should have them, it makes -more- sense for public cartels to have channels and bankaccounts (more members, possibly more people donating gold). I think it's something that's needed to be addressed for a bit, but I've never really posted anything about it because I don't use our public ones.

I hadn't realized guilds weren't free. Does that mean if we pool our resources the commune can buy a new one? Hmmm...

:0p
Rhosyn

I want a channel. I don't much care about the bank account.

I got the impression that the city/commune cartels were tied to the guilds, and thus used their account/channels. Although I guess I've only ever had characters active in forging cartels...probably the exception to the rule I suppose.

No, the city/commune cartels are tied directly to the community itself, and having nothing to do with the guilds.

They actually exist in a sort of limbo, with no powers of their own beyond a board to post on and the trademaster's ability to submit patterns. No power to even limit their membership, short of ejecting someone from the commune -- and I should know, because that's the only reason I didn't get kicked out of Moonlace long ago.

Calling the community cartels "cartels" is almost a misnomer, the way they currently function, and hardly anyone understands them.

Basically the trademaster is a public servant, whose sole reason for holding the job is to make more patterns available to the citizens of his community. The other cartel "members" aren't so much members as citizens who happen to have those tradeskills.

But there isn't a way to buy a guild. There is a way to buy a cartel. The way I see it, you can be in the free, public provided one, or you can shell out the half million gold for the slightly better one, with a bankaccount and a channel.

No, it's a million gold. 500k for the clan, 500k for it to be made a cartel.

Well, you get the idea...

This isn't about membership. Joining/forming new cartels will never kick you out of the commune/city cartel as long as you are a citizen.

That's like saying you can be in a guild or you can spend 500K and form a clan.

Your either/or situation doesn't happen.

This is about money. This is about 'public' money.

The way I see it, the commune/city cartels are the only organization set up by the admins with no bank account. And, because of the cost to submit private designs, the trademaster is forced to hold money for the cartel.

If the cartel was allowed a bank account it would be easier: to keep cartel money separate from personal money, for cartel members to donate toward design fees, and to transfer the cartel funds from one trademaster to the next, just to name three advantages.

I personally just went through this. The last trademaster's best time to be on was 2:00 am for me. It's just not feasible for me to be on at that hour. We finally had to find someone to act as go-between. But, if there were a cartel bank account, then the money would have moved with the position.

I could invest 500K to make a clan for a group that already has a board. We would then have a channel that no one would use, but we'd have a bank account. But, why should I be forced to pay the 500K when every other default organization except cartels get a bank account for the convenience of the membership?

:0)
Rhosyn