There is, but I'd like to imagine that the administration isn't trying to encourage lower order participation.

There's at least some measure of variety! Thankfully, all of our older orgs have at least two active gods (Lisaera/Maylea, Morgfyre/Fain/Raezon, Viravain/Nocht) - and Terentia isn't innactive, either. Considering that that's nine admin right there, I'd actually consider it quite a lot (with two more, Kalikai and Elostian, in the new cities).

More than some other games have, I'm pretty sure? Though, getting people into god roles isn't easy - it's like building. Most people enjoy making 'evil' areas, just as most people enjoy playing 'evil' roles.

It's very lonely in Celest... Terentia and I want someone to pick on!

Well, come up with some suggestions then! Gods are entirely able to acquire (more) order emotes, their order items can do more. They can expand their realm, include quests, etc - it's not 'easy', but it is doable (I think mine has 3 quests in it now, and there's always more down the road).

But see, that's the thing. You see nine gods. We used to see nine gods. Now suddenly, we're encouraged not to see nine gods. We're encouraged to see two (and Terentia is still a flavor of inactive, even if it is a delicate one). Two is not much variety, not when you're talking about archetypical characteristics.

I'm still not real clear on why this is. The most verbose answer we ever got from Estarra was that she always envisioned orgs and orders being more tightly bound together. Without a good conception of the end she's reaching for, it just looks like a hastily erected obstacle.

And affinity doesn't work toward the goal of binding them closer, it works against having foreign members. Those aren't the same thing, though they may appear to be.

And yes, we don't have nine gods. We have about two now, and the rest don't really count.

May just be me, but I thought it'd be a better idea to get rid of all of the PK perks of orders. It would make Order RP actually mean something rather than another avenue for people to get their perks.

I'd be all for that. Although I do love my shrine heal; does that count as a pk perk?

I think there has to be means by which a person can join any or participate by some means in any of the Pantheon tied to a city/commune. Each pantheon provides a variety of different elder gods, but there is no means to participate in said variety. The problem with the ways orders exist now is that it is totally dependant upon the divine being active. A system in which is not 100% dependant upon an active divine would be good as it would open the pantheons of each city and commune. We currently have Outer/Middle/Inner order. Perhaps have Cults for each divine, where by which anyone could join which reside on the outer outer order of each divine. People get some small incentives. It can be made so you would have to reside in the city the divine is part of the pantheon of and if you leave the city you are automatically booted from the cultness.

It is a PK perk, but I think it's more like a PvE perk. War-shrines are the main PK perks, what with Gravity and Invasion and so on.

Anyway, "just go orderless" is a rather poor argument. If I'm in an order, it is because I want to be there, and every single order is incredibly distinct. The only orders that seem even remotely alike are Raezon/Elostian and Auseklis/Lisaera, and even they have some pretty major distinctions. Enough that you can't just "choose the one in your city". And even then, what if you're a knowledge-seeking Gaudiguchan. Raezon and Elostian could be perfect for you, but you're severly discouraged from joining them, so you either have to switch organization, unlikely with the severe cost in lessons, or remain without an order/join the order of someone who isn't like you at all.

Essentially, to reiteriate what is said before. The basin no longer has eleven active divine for the player. Only three at most.

So we need solutions that aren't "scrap affinity". I'd like to see a decent discussion and not keep having these close. I'd love to kill affinity as much as everyone, but it's not going to happen. So let's take all the angst and hatred we have for it and put it work buffing up orders to be nice and shiny, ok?

Wouldn't it be better to give ideas instead of repeating previous posters?

I've already given my idea, which was an order-related pet of some kind. Would also like to see the quests expanded to more Orders (like, say, mine!)

I'm thinking still.

1) Allow each god to declare a secondary affiliation, such that members of that city/commune offer neither benefits nor penalties. Each god can only have one of these. This will help with those gods that have a natural tendency to span multiple organizations.

2) The biggest headscratcher of the whole thing is how order members with the wrong affinity suffer a penalty to the value of offerings which non-members, even order enemies, don't suffer. So Arix's offerings are worth less to Maylea than would be the same offering from Tandrin (who isn't in the order), or Doman (who is in neither the order nor the commune), or even Xenthos (who is an order enemy). Makes no sense. They won't remove the penalty, but maybe they could recalibrate it: halve it, then extend it to also cover the unaffiliated neutrals (Tandrin and Doman), and then apply the full penalty to order enemies.

3) Tiny perks can be good enough. Give order members with positive affinity a new emote that negative-affinity members can't use (and let each god make up that emote for their members). Or attach some kind of no-mechanical-impact special effect to order items (like our bindis) that only positive affinity people can use. Or just deny the existing order-emotes and/or touch-item effect to negative-affinity members.

4) Allow negative-affinity members to cancel out their penalty entirely by doing something for the order. For instance, you know how if you empower ten of your godrealm denizens you get a blessing? If you're a negative-affinity member, the first time you do that in a particular weave, instead of getting the blessing, you disable your affinity-related penalties for the duration of that weave. (Second and subsequent times get you the blessing normally.) This way you can mitigate the effects if and only if you're willing to do some extra work for the benefit of the order. (Yes, you already could by making up the essence loss by offering every month... but I think people will find it more palatable to be temporarily disabling it, than enduring and then overcoming it. It has a different feel. Besides, empowering ten dryads is a lot less than earning the esteem to cancel one high-ranking member's essence loss -- and you can't buy it on Market, you have to earn it by doing something for your order, so it makes more sense.)

Most organizations have enough gods to cover every aspect of said organization (I will, however, grant that not all are active). Currently, Gaudiguch doesn't have a 'knowledge' god, but given it's an infant organization, that argument is pretty hollow (in my opinion, anyways). Gaudiguch will not have anything close to a full selection of gods until it is actually a full organization - same with Hallifax.

I think people look a bit thinly at what gods are - and who they are. Gods align with organizations for a reason, and there's generally a reason as to why organizations do not get along. There's aspects of every god outside of Celest that makes them rather incompatible with the ideologies of the Light, and really, it's that way with every organization.

Is it feasible to have the existing god-players take on multiple gods, a la alts? I'm sure for some, the idea may be distasteful... everyone has their favorite flavor of character, and individual playstyle and personality likely factors in significantly to the behavior they instill in their gods. But if it isn't currently done, perhaps consider it as an option?

Gonna call shenanigans. Elostian was Celestian. Lyreth could easily flit on over to Hallifax and fit equally well in either. Isune is co-creatrix of the Wyrd. Terentia is a long-time favorite of militaristic Serens. Shikari's tenets read awfully close to Terentia's. I can't see anything in Kalikai (once you get past that she'd probably try to goad you into taking yourself less seriously) that would be incompatible with the Light.

We're not talking about Fainites in Celest and Viravain's Singing Seren Spinner Squad. There's a ton of cross-compatibility in the middle.

I like the idea of questing to remove your penalty. That would complete the three-way XP system for offsetting penalties, too (esteem/corpses/questing).

As has been said before, cut the offering malus for distant ordermembers, it makes no sense.

Also, as a bonus for non-distant ordermembers, how about 'godbixes' that take you to the Godrealm/Temple/Fulcrux/Aligned Nexus if you're in the Order, in the Inner Circle, and affinitied?

Lyreth is a very Celestian god (to argue otherwise, I suspect one would not know him very well - or one does not know Hallifax very well. To be fair, he was not around for very long, I don't think?). Isune co-created the Wyrd, and promptly decried it, claiming it was a falsity, tainted and an abomination (saying she had been manipulated/abused into it by Viravain, and, I *think*, more recently said it was flawed and imperfect). Terentia also views the Serenwilde as barbarians needing to be beaten into place, and has said such at several points (Eventru, too) - even going so far as to encourage Celest align with Glomdoring (if my memory serves. Terentia and Eventru are very heavily Celestian gods). Shikari and Terentia, while some tenets may be close, are hugely far apart in some pretty key areas (Terentia is not a merciless woman who tortures her prey for amusement), and Kalikai, like Gaudiguch at large, is probably the least 'offensive' out there, in terms of relation-possibility with the Light/Celest.

And Elostian having been a Celest god is kind of a misnomer. He was a god in Celest, though he (willingly) left the city and went neutral because he felt rather out of place (having been designed towards a more Hallifaxian entity, as I understand?).

Edit: Anyways, I'm really not going to keep arguing it, heh. This is all stuff that can/should be explored ICly! Though I'm fully encouraging more ideas for 'bonuses' for being in a positive affinity order!

While I quite like this idea, it is exactly what this system is meant to prevent: the feeling that gods are enforcing certain alliances on player-run organisations.

I have always been a big protagonist of adding more 'RP-perks' and utility powers to orders, but this is a cry that does not appear to have been echod by a substantial amount of the playerbase, sadly. I notice Arel posted an idea for a skillset in the other thread, perhaps that is something that can be worked with, or can at least provide some inspiration.

As for me being a celest god. Anyone who was around at the time will remember the general dislike of my more moderate and logical teachings, they really just didn't fit in the Celest extremism field very well. Eventually we decided that Elo was causing nothing but internal strife and therefore moved him away. This was wholly my own fault of course, as I am just not very good at playing a light-suffused crusader.

You're just too ninja