Was thinking of ways to boost the value of being in an order, now that affinity has shaken things up. Random brainstorming time:

* TELEPORT TEMPLE
Would teleport order members to the entrance of their god's temple or godrealm, same restrictions as TELEPORT NEXUS.

* A baton similar to the one guildmasters get.
Gives a measure of experience to people for participating in order rituals, limited to orderhead and such.

* Special lines in your description.

* More (cheap and/or RP, preferably) personal shrine powers:
- Adds a line to your room entrance/exit for a bit, "trailing flower petals behind him." or something for Maylea
- Scry order members.
- View who/what is in the room of another shrine.
- Weave illusions in the shrine room. (Combat potential, of course, but you could prefix it with something or otherwise limit it.)
- Summon order members on a long, interruptable balance.
- Summon order members from another shrine.
- Teleport to another shrine.
- Occasional room emotes throughout the shrine influence for a day.
- Endurance/willpower regen while in the shrine room.
- Summon an order mob (same as invasion) that follows you around looking cute and doing nothing.
- Summon an order mob that provides some small benefit.
- Teleport to the temple from a shrine.
- While at a shrine, boost the range of your communications, same as is allowed by higher planar.
- While at a shrine, eavesdrop on/broadcast to all other shrines, regardless of plane.

* Customized influence messages for certain types depending on order.

* Special order influence gained by order rank, similar to village influencing. Generates no esteem, but adds more essence to your god then they would have gotten through the standard amount of esteem from influencing it with something else.

* Line on your race or just in your description based on order membership, if you choose.
"He is a bouncing, floral furrikin and is..." Sylphas, Talnara (Male Floral Furrikin), Nejii Talnara (Hermaphroditic Floral Changeling Vernal Ascendant), etc

* Imbuing certain items boosts the esteem it's worth to your god.
For example, imbued flowers would be worth 66000 to Maylea instead of 65535.

Generally it should have some sort of 'effect' - ie, having a mob that follows you around that does nothing except 'look cute' won't garner much attention.

True, but I was just writing them down as they popped into my head. Having bashing effects wouldn't be too bad, I suppose, having pvp effects would be kind of annoying, so I tried to stick with pure utility and flashiness.

It could be a bashing pet that randomly blocks mob-given afflictions!

Like RoA, but for afflictions, and only fires if delivered by an NPC. Woo!

I like the idea of flavor for being in an order. Something that, perhaps, gave you a cool effect, both RP and mechanic wise, while still not being spamable. While there is obviously the new mechanic of affinity, you could play on that a little more, bringing in ways to change it, or expand it.

For instance, look at the idea of a godrealm quest. Each time you complete it, per day (or hour, or such. You could even do it by degrees, making them work on it different times over different hours to stack it), you boost your affinity to that God. If you are a non order member, it satiates your drain to the God (while at the same time, maybe, say, removing the ability to donate, or still keeping the essence penalty). The idea something akin to Devotion; a mortal, by doing the quest, is bringing his soul temporarily into line, or more in align, as the case warrants, with the God. This would bestow a flavor aura on the person, such as a golden glow for Eventru followers, or a stifling cloak of shadow for someone following Viravain. Of course, should you be already in the affinity of the order, the increased affinity would procure greater benefits. Being more in tune with them would allow you to teleport to their temple, give you an aura only emote having to do with their new found close affinity to the God (Jack closes his eyes and whispers a phrase, and you feel the questing probe of an alien mind probe the depths of your mind, or, Jane smiles at the heavens, and a joyous laugh is heard as flower petals suddenly rain from the heavens), and maybe some nice flavor power, like applying a glowing symbol of the God to your forehead. Maybe even an essence boost as well. It also might stand to reason the farther up in the order you are, the easier it would be to do the quest.

Basic point is that it is something that would make outer city members go out of their way to do, to satiate their essence drain (just like true devotion, while not requiring absurd amounts of essence gathering), while allowing the truly devoted a way to prove their affinity to a god, and therefore give them benefits that show their affinity to others who don't believe.

Neat in theory, but might not be so great in practice.

People tend to not like "upkeep requirements" that make them do a tedious task repeatedly.

This.

That would be pretty cool.

I like most of them except the line in the description bit. Wearing or wielding an item is probably enough for those of us who sometimes hide our order affiliations.

Unless it's an order power, or something.

I like the idea of custom room/entry/exit messages.

Maybe:
- given when you make an offering
- get a favour

With the effect amping up based on:
- amount of essence given
- circle you're in
- type of favor

So for Maylea you'd have:
Exuding vivid hue, Sylphas Talnara is here, starkly colourful against his surroundings.
Glowing with colour, Sylphas Talnara is here, verdant foliage springing forth from beneath his feet.
Amidst a shining floral aura, Sylphas Talnara is here, luminous petals falling around him.

Or for Nocht:
Wisps of fog curling around her feet, Rancoura is here, casting an impossibly long shadow.
Black tendrils of creeping up her form, Rancoura is here, cloaked in a chill darkness.
Within a fog bank of freezing night, Rancoura is here, surrounded by a forest of stygian icicles.

Et al. Those were fun to write.

The thing I wonder about custom entry/exit messages is why everyone's so keen on them in Lusternia when everyone's always shrouded anyway.

Maybe people figure they'll all shroud less if instead of entering from the east, they can enter from the east trailing bright red threads of flame.

Actually, I never shroud...

I may have exaggerated slightly for comic effect.

As a low magic Tahtetso, I am never shrouded. I am always painfully, painfully in plain sight.

That being the case, I really like the idea!

Because it at least sounds like something easy to code and really simple, so it gets thrown on almost every list of cool RP stuff.

It's because it's something we've always refused, heh.

You just burst a multitude of bubbles.

I think we've agreed with/decided it can be allowed in the instance of the ever elusive 'demigod shop' system - though messages would need to be pre-written (not doing custom enter/exits).

You reformed most, if not all, of the bubbles!