In my perfectly honest and humble opinion, the conflict is stale:
About one and a half to three real-life months of relative quiet times, with about two to three times a week Celest/Mag will have to clean out a couple of people killing Angels or Demons, but nothing serious.
Then about one to one and a half real-life month of heavy back and forth, raid, counter-raid attacks which has the potential to knock out a couple of cosmic beings, if not a majority to all of them.
Then repeat.

Now I haven't been in the Communes for a while, but on deathsense I have noticed a lot of commune-lings dying to other commune-lings more and more in recent times.

As for amending this, I have no idea save re-writing the entire backstory of Lusternia to have four neutral orginizations which will periodically go to war, either by admin or player action.

Is it common at all for leaders of opposing orgs to "sit down" with each other OOCly and work out longer-term events and consequences for conflict?

It seems to me that relying solely on what the game mechanics make available, you're always going to run into a barrier of what conflict will and won't accomplish. We raid them. They raid us. We destroy their symbols of power. They destroy ours. Everything is back the way it was in an hour or two.

If players would agree amongst themselves and people were willing to sometimes be the "loser" in a given event (I may have just answered my own question right there, but I hope not), it seems like there's relatively untapped potential for more. Occupations. Revolutions. Captivities. Negotiations. Subversions. The game doesn't supply mechanical options for these things, but players could if IC opponents were willing to work out some ideas in cooperation OOCly.

I'm relatively new to Lusternia, still, so if these kinds of things have been tried and been spectacular failures, I apologize for bringing up things that are already painfully obvious to everyone else why they won't fly.

These things have never been tried outside of the scale of a few individuals being kidnapped (or whatever) before...and that was pretty contrived when it happened.

I don't think it'd work anyway though. And I bet no one wants to be the losing side either. On top of that, leaders really can't control player's RP except via negative reinforcement: and "resisting occupation by our invading Magnagorans" forces would look awfully funny on a CDF in the logs.

No, actually I think it's their IC personae that encourage this. Quite sure the admins wouldn't push a part of the playerbase into grieving the other, by any definition. And the answer to this? Simple. Agree with the entire "BURRN THEM" part but don't make it your goal to raid 10 hours per day. After all, your character has other things to do as well and if you manage to keep it balanced, I don't think you'll have Viravain or any other god asking you why you're not raiding every 2 minutes.

I was thinking of something similar right before I read this. I was thiking something like some quest thingies -that arent org. dependant- such as new mobs with a different essence or something. Goal would be to gain a certain amount for a benifit to all in the org., kind of like org Karma.

I think I like your idea better though. A group karma blessing could lead to forcing. Group cursing ability after too much grief though... awesome! and IC

Very true.

While I see that the idea of the leaders sitting down OOC and disscussing stuff a good one, the issue comes up, who WOULD want to be the loser? Nobody.

Another problem with the conflict is not only is it repetitive (as I stated above) but on the idea of a loser, there can be no loser by game mechanics. There is no way in the game to beat the other guy to a pulp, and the players would never agree to an ingame surrender type thing, so there really is no way to end the conflict, aside from some agreement that would make 99% of the playerbase puke ICly. Celest and Magnagora signing a Peace Treaty? Like hell that would happen. The in game dogma of the two orgs percipitates a conflict, that when combined with the game's mechanics will never end.

It just comes down to one word with the conflict: Stale.

And again, how do you amend this without completly re-writing the history of the game, and the orgs?

No, but if they're ordering the Commune as a whole to attack, issuing a countermanding order that says "Back off" is less plausible, which was Arel's point.

The back story is not the problem.

The four organizations--which started as three, as setup in the help files, have their own philosophies, but there is nothing in those help files stating that they are at a constant state of war. Nowhere. Magnagora is not the Old Celestian Empire. There are quests that can create conflict, but ultimately it is the players (and possibly some Divine) who decide if a conflict has to be undertaken. In fact, note that Magnagora's help file says that they don't want to brutally conquer, instead learning diplomacy. Just because a conflict quest existed doesn't mean you have to undertake them.

About the only thing I can think was a miscalculation was the creation of Glomdoring. It's being worked out, but when the dynamic moved from three orgs to four orgs, this happened:

The classic axis of good-neutral-evil became good-good / evil-evil. While there was potential for this to became nature vs. civilization or such, players didn't bite.

The Ethereal Plane is too easy to access. At least with Celestia and Nil, and the elemental planes, you have to take long paths to get there. The proximity of the Ethereal plane makes it too easy to start a fight there.

Player-developed culture caused problems--this is where things got crazy. Since Glomdoring was "new", it needed to be protected so it could grow. Serenwilde players saw them as enemies, and the player-written philosophies caused exceptional levels of conflict, especially around the fae. Meantime, Glomdoring had it's own RP generated from strict philosophies, and caused some problems when conflict was meant to lessen. There were miscalculations on all sides--the Seren community, the Glom community, and the admin (as Estarra had admitted).

Honestly, the only way I see that could lessen conflict is perhaps considering a fundamental change in the way the nature microcosmos works. There needs to be a way to separate the proximity between the two communes. One idea could be the following.

Have a sundering of Ethereal. What happens is Faethorn, Serenwilde Ethereal, and Glomdoring Ethereal become isolated zones in the Ethereal Plane. Perhaps an unknown elemental plane, the plane of Nature (or a nexus of the four elements) is discovered, with gates to-from Faethorn, Seren, and Glomdoring areas, and gets to Earth and Water. The nexuses still work as they do but there's no way to leap from one zone to another without going through that zone (or through aetherbubbles). Maybe you could use this to change certain cosmological areas--have other ethereal planes dealing with fae, maybe different types in different bubbles?

Eh, never got any orders. Only very strong suggestions , suggestions which I do my best to ignore when I can't be arsed to raid or I'm lagging or whatever. No wonder I hardly get any favours :>

The idea would be that there would be give and take, here. Obviously, no one organization is going to want to lose every conflict, nor should they.

As far as whether or not anyone would want to play the losing side in a particular conflict, that just comes down to what people want. If you want -meaningful- conflict, someone has to lose, and the loss has to mean something. Personally, I'm willing to "lose" for the sake of a more interesting game/plot overall, especially if I get to "win" later, but I realize not everyone is cut from that cloth, and that's fine.

I just think it's skating uphill to try to implement -solely- mechanical changes and expect that to make conflict fresh. People will get bored with new areas, eventually. They will get bored with new orgs. They will get bored with the endless cycle of getting bored and getting new stuff. Yes, these things need to be part of the plan, but I can't help but feel the ultimate solution to boring in-game phenomena is in the direction of creativity, cooperation, and energy from the players rather than depending on admins and/or changes to Lusternia, itself.

But it does take a certain amount of give and take to do that.

While maybe this was true when Glomdoring first came out, but it doesn't seem to be the case now. Celest is on far better terms with Glomdoring, the "evil" commune, than with Serenwilde, the "good" one.

True, but the way those philosophies are interperted eventually becomes the dogma, and eventual live-by, die-by codes of the Orgs. Celest's primary philosophy is to spread the Light from one edge of the basin to the other. Mag's primary philosophy is to spread the Taint. Celest's 'mission' is to end the Taint. The way magnagora looks at the past and eventually makes it out be is the Light was an enslaving force and the Taint is the liberation to that. Thus we have a conflict of interests (orginization histories etc.), game mechanics to support it (conflict quests), player fanatacisim to bring it on (GWAR!! GLORY OF THE TAINT! GLORY OF THE LIGHT! GWAR!!), and an Admin push (Fain: Terenteia sucks. She's part of New Celest, therefore New Celest sucks, and both must die. Terentia: Fain sucks. He's part of Magnagora, therefore Magnagora sucks, and both must die) to send it over the edge. The Admin are always there. While the playerbase could recycle itsself over time, the admin are always there, and egging the new generations on, combined with the players who have been playing since day 1, it doesn't end.

Also, there's really no viable option for the forests vs the cities. I always liked that idea, but in reality the cities would get destroyed, since we'd have no access to potions or elixirs, and limited access to some important herbs. The communes can live without enchantments, the cities can't live without alchemy.

EDIT: Also, the Admin have the right idea by encouraging conflict. Leaving several neutral organizations to sometimes war simply doesn't cut it. That is basically what we see in Achaea, and it is characterized largely by a lack of conflict. Lusternia was purposefully designed so that everyone can have an 'enemy' all the time. It's not always open conflict, but there is always someone to oppose. That's part of what I love about it - if the admin tried to soften that too much, conflict would eventually just die out.

And on a completely different topic, I really hope the forums get fixed quickly! I had to log in four times for this one stupid post!

I wanted to reply to a few posts, but then I realized how many I would have had to quote for that so I'm just going to give my two cents:

I agree with people that say tha we have too much conflict but also with those that say we have too little. It depends from which side you see it. The conflict that easily gets too much is when you get raided by a superior number of players but you -have- to go up there and defend and die die die. That easily burns people out to the point of where -any- conflict is too much for them.

On the other hand there are people that want to raid and harm their enemy organizations. For them there isn't enough to do. If I wanted to harm Glomdoring all I could really do was kill the daughters. Aspects reset anyway, avatars I can't take on my own (and I'd be beyond surprised if Seren ever got the people together to take on an avatar), shrines.. sure but either I get ganked immediately for defiling or no one is around to hear and I get bored because of that.

There is a certain monotony to conflict. The same few people that you can kill, the same few you die to when defending.. or the same few places you can raid, the same few things you can actually do when raiding.

As mentioned by some others, I'd like to see some kind of conflict that was entirely voluntary to participate in but also with some small rewards to do it in the first place (and no loss if you died etc). I liked the wargames in the ascension event for that matter. I love group combat, especially in a group that can work together and also against other groups.. not random people that you just slaughter.

EDIT: Also, something that has been bothering me for a while are village influences. It's basically the same all the time and it either turns into a debating fest or a demesne war.. but basically each village is the same and you have to do them again and again. And yes, it's again a conflict that you -have- to do. There was a time when I enjoyed it, but after my.. 20th or 50th village all I can say is 'no thank you'.

If we're looking into improving conflict...I wonder if there could be ways to make individual conflicts while representing an organization improve. Maybe some sort of privateer or champion system, to sort of encourage different types of conflict.

For instance, Magnagora has an assassin's guild, Celest has a sentinels guild. Guild members can setup conflict with the other guild. Members are encouraged to attack a member of the other guild in a 1-vs-1 manner. The winner claims x power for the city based on the player's power level and it's deducted from the other cities power. This could allow for skirmishes. Or, perhaps such guilds can get a solo contract against another member who partook in a raid. Make it so nobody of this guild can practice vengeance.

Just an idea. How we can make it fit the RP of the realm is something--maybe a special declaration from Avechna or something. I'm trying to make it easy to have little skirmishes that might benefit the game.

There were a lot of things I completely disagreed with in your posts but this point in particular deserves a response. Serenwilde never has been neutral. Never. The first major war in Lusternia involved Serenwilde and Magnagora. It would take a lot to convince me that the "classic axis of good-neutral-evil" was ever designed to be applied too much to the orgs of Lusternia. Every org has their own interests to advance and no side can claim they haven't done both evil and good, most of the time simultaneously.

Also, there hasn't ever been enough done to shift conflict towards nature vs. civilization. Its not just that the players don't bite, its that there isn't enough by way of mechanics to work with there. When conflict quests existed the cities never had one to hurt Serenwilde. Their only option was the Glomdoring quest which ceased to be an option once Glomdoring was made a player org. The lack of any meaningful conflict over the civilisation vs. nature issue is further reinforced by the lack of effort on Serenwilde's part and the idea that the Glomdoring has that its forest is just as natural as Serenwilde's.

As far as the original topic goes...

Conflict consists almost solely of a group of raiders getting together and attacking angels/demons/aspects.

From the attacker's point of view its incredibly frustrating because you can't do anything to effect any kind of change. Thirty minutes after you raid its as if you didn't do it at all.

From the defender's point of view its equally frustrating because generally you won't have enough people to stop the attackers. Having a slew of guards is no help at all even if they do kill all the attackers. This is because guards don't stop you from realising how powerless and futile your own efforts are.

Conflict has become very one-dimensional. Lack of options funnels conflict into a contest of "who has the bigger group of fighters" with the winner of that contest getting to have their way with the revered symbols of their enemy. It shuts out anyone who doesn't have the ability/means/stamina to engage in extended PvP from participating at all.

A number of people here have said that they want conflict quests back in some form but definitely not the way they were set up in open beta. Conflict quests have always been the thing that set Lusternia apart from the other IRE games in that they allowed far deeper and varied forms of conflict for people to use.

Having said that, if conflict quests are implemented again here are some things I think should be taken into account.

- A conflict quest should not inflict continual damage to an org until a counter-quest is finished.
Example - If Magnagora successfully completes a quest to attack Celest, Celest should not continue to lose power or access to skills until they complete a counter-quest. The actual damage should be a one-time thing.

- Conflict quests shouldn't always be high-stakes things. Conflict becomes off-putting when its always about the things that orgs value most.
Example - If Glomdoring successfully completes a quest to attack Serenwilde, it will likely be directed at the White Hart. This means that even if the White Hart is not killed, Serenwilde is more or less obligated to treat it just as seriously as if he had been.

It would be interesting if conflict quests were two-pronged such that at some point in the quest it forked and presented a choice before you could continue. You could choose to do a quest that was easier to complete but less powerful in its effects or you could choose to do a quest that was far more difficult but with more ability to cause harm.

Lastly, it would be interesting if conflict quests had effects that weren't entirely negative. For instance, if Celest successfully completed a quest to attack Magnagora, the result could be that angel denizens start spawning in Magnagora. The angels would have to be hunted down and killed in order to be removed. This I think would be acceptable for both cities since Celest got to send angelic hosts against Magnagora and Magnagora got creatures to bash for gold, experience and essence.

I think personally that the conflict is dull because there's no reality to death. Atropos will always spare the thread of those who die, because, well, basically she's programmed to, that's the journy of death without conglutination or vitae or whatever people have these days.

What I would like to see is people actually fearing death, rather than just "It's okay, I'll conglute." or "I'll just vitae" or "I'll pray and then come back". There's no fear there. People don't care if they die, and that, to me... Is really not that fun. I would love to see something set up where there's a random chance that Atropos WILL cut your thread, and if you die, you go to the Underworld (or some sort of Lusternia-related death-place... Sheol, maybe), and have to find your way back, much like what they have in Imperian. I think it would be a lot more fun to have it be random, then to have it happen all the time, or not at all... Where for once, Atropos' sisters can't talk her out of sparing the thread.

Edit - And how does this relate to conflict? Well, maybe people will think twice before they decide to go raiding, because they don't want to spend however much time it takes for them to get out of the Underworld.

But I'm sure I'm going to get flamed for even suggesting the idea.

I think this is an interesting idea and would certainly add flavor but a lot of people in the thread have pointed out that raiders generally raid when there isn't much risk to themselves. Which is frustrating to the defenders who are dying repeatedly.

If on top of the dying repeatedly their thread could get snipped and they'd have even more misery I think we could guarantee a mass exodus.

I personally like Anarias' idea about low-stakes, one-time hits, but the fact is, we have those, and they don't seem to bring much satisfaction to either side. You can run in and kill pixies in Serenwilde, drain 2p from their nexus, and run the essence back to the Wyrdling for 1-5p of your own. Raiding Celestia and Nil is, most often, killing lesser angels and demons. You hear the cityfolk complaining about the monotony of that.

I don't know that there's going to be a good balance in the conflict goals of different players. I'm wracking my mind here, but I just can't figure one out. On one hand, Auntie 'Tarra has numbers that correlate the removal of conflict quests with an increase in playerbase activity. More people is a good thing. On the other, I would venture to guess that the majority of players who've been here from the beginning were drawn by resource competition and conflict quests. Resource competition became watered down as resources became more abundant. Conflict quests are gone. The lowered entertainment value for reallylong-term players isn't going to send them all packing right away. We have a vested interest in the game, and we're likely to stick it out through a number of experiments. Higher numbers doesn't always mean a happier playerbase. (And besides, Danielle Steele sells more than Nicholas Sparks, but how many more authors would rather follow Sparks' path?)

I don't envy the administration here. Someone's going to be upset no matter what is decided, and I think we all know how much they dislike disappointing us. They take it quite personally. So would I, honestly.

Anyways, my two cents: it's not the level of conflict, it's how the conflict is embodied.

I like conflict. I like competition. I think everyone here will agree with me on those two points.

I like competition with other people better than conflict against a computer. I like competitions that I have a real chance of winning, even if the odds are stacked against me. I like competitions that have significantly more to do with my skills as an individual than some random or arbitrarily limiting factor. I also think that everyone here will agree with these, but these wants aren't exactly synergistic.

I like PK, because it's engaging, fast-paced, and actually uses the skills and artifacts that I've invested in. I dislike competitions that are refereed by involved parties (i.e. "strictly RP" conflict), because I find it to be arbitrary, unskilled, and too easily biased. I like PK as a means to an end, rather than an end in itself, because the PK talent gap puts the American income gap to brutal shame. Tully will never, ever, ever kill Xavius in a fair fight, and it's not something that Tully can fix in a day or two of dedicated learning. However, I think questing is a more easily learned talent. I'm not a particularly good quester, but hey, I have PK to make up for some of my shortfalls. However...I say this fully aware that old school Faethorn and Achaean landmarking were horribly failed experiments, and fully aware that this last paragraph is not going to be universally agreed upon.

So yeah. I don't know. Condolences in advance to Estarra and Roark.