Elcyrion wanted some ideas about Culture, but everybody focused on the libraries, so I didn't see anybody answer the culture stuff.

I'd like to see motivations to build more culture in Lusternia. Some ideas on how this can be done with the points system.

1) Rewards for "putting the culture stamp" on Villages. Maybe this is accomplished via paintings and statues in an acquired village, since these are technically arts. Or maybe there is a reward for paintings. This could also be done in the city. You could have a formula to measure diversity as well--to prevent people from creating the same staute everywhere.

2) Richness of Religion/Worship ads to culture. One thing I noticed in another thread is people are afraid of shrines not dedicated to the city patrons. Perhaps there can be a culture reward the more diversity one has in shrines. For instance, if Magnagora decides to allow a shrine of Isune, Elcyrion, Shikari, or Lacostian, they could get points for being diverse. With a few notable exceptions, people seem to think shrines are nothing more than worldburning devices, and not the holy font of the gods.

3) News posts--maybe the more people write on the public news, some small amount to the culture score is added. This would also get more in game arguments than on the forum. You could also measure the city one in terms of posts, etc.

4) Perhaps a way to measure how many cartel designs are used and by whom. The city ones would have more impact, but you could measure how many times an individual design is forged and that would have a "fashion" impact. Even private cartels could default to the leader's city. For instance, Ialie jewels would impact the rise of Serenwilde culture, while Richters would impact Glomdoring.

5) Shop sales to non-city members. You could measure the sales of items from a shop to foreigners and that would show what type of economic impact is created. This would actually encourage trade instead of trade-bans as well. Imagine if Serenwilde started losing points because of all the stores that will not sell to Glomdoring or Magnagora.

Any other thoughts?

I don't like this idea. This isn't what culture is about at all. Religious diversity within a given area simply does not equate to something being more cultural.

What kind of message would you be spreading to an area when you erect a shrine of Lisaera and then a Fain shrine four rooms away? Hell, I imagine Lisaera would be uber ticked off and start firing silvery bolts of lightning at whoever allowed such a disgrace to her.

I'd prefer if culture was more refined not "who can erect the most shrines and sacrifice security."

I don't like this idea either. First, you just have to be from Serenwilde to understand. We currently have 1466 news posts. 95% of them are utter bs/garbage. We don't want to promote idle posting on unimportant, trivial matters.

And, predictably, I'm going to disagree with the last one, because there's no reason culture has to be accepting of other cultures to be strong. You could just as easily say that if Serenwilde started selling to enemies it would -lose- part of its identity (and therefore its culture).
The cartel design thing might be okay though.

And news posts? Eh...unneccessary...public posts are pretty much useless anyway, even if you did put all the arguments there - look at the crud that makes it onto the board -without- the mechanism.

EDIT: Ninja'd on the second point.

4) This is a good idea, but private cartels shouldn't count. Just the city/commune ones.

5) I dislike this one. Again, culture is not about who can whore themselves out the most.

All these are highly abuseable.

1) Just throw a statue up in every outdoor room and a painting in every indoor one. Bam, power.

2) Every city/commune would end up clogged with a shrine or two to every single God.

3) Just... no. No one wants to wade through 20 half-wit public posts every time they log on just because everyone wants power. And some leader would start offering CFs for making 'em, I know it.

4) People would all submit the max amount of designs each month. The quality of each design would decrease.

5) Trade bans are fun! Anyway, Serenwilde would just have a few shops sell hundreds of Snowballs at 1 gold each and then an army of Celestians would sit there buying them and getting their gold refilled from the shop owner moving back and forth between the storeroom.

Yes, because everyone knows serenwilde is the utter abuser of all things, and that magnagora is the pinnacle of just when it comes to the culture score

Nah, I just don't like you guys, so I get to plug you into all my negative "What-if" examples. *Nodnod*

2. i don't know, i think that it would add more of a conflict to it(do we want the power from allowing them in, or do they go against our virtues?) and they'd have to choose. like that i think glomdoring would still not allow anyone else's inside of it.

1. maybe they have to be something of relevance? like it can't be a random cow or something, and they'd all have to be different? such as places near the center could have paintings of different gods, while the more influential people of the game might also be on it too, and maybe the nil lords/angel people of celest/moon avatars/night avatars and things like that.

Still, just get a sketch of Estarra, Elohora, or Luciphage and use that to throw up statues and paintings of 'em all over.

The only one of these ideas that doesn't seem too abusable is number 4, the one about the cartel designs. I like that one.

In any case, libraries need fixing before we add MORE ways to get culture.

1) Considering that villages already ARE filled with statues, it's like throwing free power at people. Besides, those statues would get wiped out and replaced next time the village was taken over. Just adds to the power gained from a village.

2) Interesting idea, but far too easy to abuse and it stimulates people to break their RP.

3) OMGNO!!!!11!ONE I already stopped reading news posts due to excessive idiocy. And like Guido said, people would start CFing people who post. Bad idea.

4) Good idea, although this doesn't make much sense with private cartels that have members from everywhere. City/Commune cartels only.

5) Wonderful idea. It makes sense that a community that shuts itself off to trade loses culture points while cosmopolitan cities that sell to everyone gain a few. This shouldn't have too much impact, only just enough so that sticking to the organization's RP (Which can very well change) can be a sacrifice if it involves being bigoted.

A few more of my own:

6) Evey citizen that shares an organization with a member of another city/commune generates a little Culture.

7) The explorer ranking of citizens raises Culture.

8) Gods can gift some culture to a city during a player-started event, ritual, etc.

No. No. No.

Mechanics should not be encouraging bad RP.

4) Perhaps a way to measure how many cartel designs are used and by whom. The city ones would have more impact, but you could measure how many times an individual design is forged and that would have a "fashion" impact. Even private cartels could default to the leader's city. For instance, Ialie jewels would impact the rise of Serenwilde culture, while Richters would impact Glomdoring.

Actually, i'd be kinda cool if the commune/city with the best design recieved a little bonus or something. It shouldn't be to hard to go through and judje the submitted designs each time they update them

I was about to suggest this and I think it would increase the number of player events, like festivals, rituals, performances, and even weddings (if they are the fancy kind like mine was that took me 2 hours to put together the script alone..).

You could give the Divine the ability to give points for the event, like they would divine favors, but make sure that someone has to look over the actual event or log before awarding it. It would be horrible if a divine saw some people talking at their nexus and decided "Hmm.. I wanna help the city out.." and give them 1000 culture points..

It already does. There's an economic incentive to disregarding RP and selling to Taintscum/Wyrdscum/Cityscum/Serenscum. It generally doubles the amount of possible clients. Good RP involves, among other things, making sacrifices - doing things that harm your character/org because that's what the character/org believes is right. Also, no RP is bad RP. Roleplaying someone with an active interest in other cultures who trades and talks to them freely might be uncommon, but it's not bad RP.



No matter how much some gods defend their cities, they're not like that OOCly and won't just throw Culture points at their orgs for no reason. I like to think that the RP gods and admin can be trusted not to unbalance the game. After all, I'm pretty sure Hajamin could intentionally change the code to give New Celestians an advantage in combat; he doesn't do it because he's responsible. He could also Truefavour every single Celestian fighter right before they go into a village influence, maggot Magnagora's top fighters, and so on.

Just an explanation.

1) I was thinking on how to put an artistic stamp. Perhaps they can have a more complex formula to determine what types of art spice up the culture, not just a sheer number.

2) My point with this was to prevent shrines from just becoming worldburn devices, which is where they seem to be going. I'd rather see some diversity. Now, while I wouldn't expect a Hajamin shrine in Magnagora or a Viravain shrine in Serenwilde, shrines to the more "neutral" or in synch gods can make sense. Maybe they have start having pilgrims go to shrines and then if you have more, it's worth more culture-wise.

3) I actually like the news posts. The Serenwilde one is very detailed and you get a sense of the history and conflict there. Magnagora's is kinda boring since they tend to use it for "draft writings" at times. It's also a motivation to lessen the "let's discuss it on the forums".

4) Again, a complex formula for calculating it. The city cartel would be worth more, but a private one could provide a small benefit.

5) Verithrax, you got my main point. I'm not trying to say "don't have trade bans", but there should be a cost. A society that does a lot of exporting has an impact--German Engineering, Swiss Chocolate and Watches, Japanese Autos and Anime, Italian Food, etc. Those who practice trade bans end up losing their impact on their neighbors, thus lessening their cultural impact on the basin.

Addendum to previous post:
Also, sharing organizations with people from other orgs isn't bad RP, depending on the character you're playing. I know it's not bad RP for Verithrax, and for several other people, including a few Hartstone.

Since no one here has exclusive skills, beyond militarily valuable ones, you can't really apply it to chocolate and such. It's not cultural influence to not sell you enemies weapons, or ways for them to field more combatants.