As it is at the moment' date=' each cabal immortal has his own set of rules by which he decides when to do the two things mentioned above. Not just that, but some immortals generally promote faster than others. [b']We have 7 PK oriented cabals who are constantly in war with each other
Here, I think, is the crux of the issue. These cabals are at war. Inevitably there will be a wax of one and a wane of the other. This is the nature of conflict. If everything were evenly balanced, it wouldn't be conflict. From a player enjoyment perspective, sometimes you don't get promoted as fast as you like but it's fare more likely you haven't reached your cabal immortal's expectations rather than they've simply 'overlooked' you. If you don't like your cabal immortal's reasons, that's another matter which you should take up with that immortal and - if you still feel cheated - their superior.
I don't think you have enough evidence to blame the system as a whole.
Inevitably' date=' real life takes its toll from time to time, and sometimes some of the staff are gone for rather large intervals. [/quote']
I wont deny this. Sometimes we do get pulled away. Remember that we're volunteers, and it happens to the best of us. Despite your sarcastic dismissal later in the post, we do have other immortals look after our cabal when we have to go. We make posts in imm-only that we're leaving and anyone who's available will step up.
- When an immortal wants to make positive impression, he starts handing out fast (undeserved) promotions.
Again, you have no information to support this other than conjencture. Further, undeserved is a subjective term - what might seem undeserved to you may be different from what others feel. You also aren't privy to information such as their personal RP with an imm, how many pks they have, how long exactly they've been logged on in a given month, and much more.
Which on its turn leads to:
- No matter what you do, certain cabals will get promotions faster (slower) than others and there is no way you can influence this.
You can and indeed should influence this. Write notes suggesting promotions and inductions for members. Take part in active recruiting (no one does this but for the 'knight is looking for people!' notes), and more. Not only with this invariably improve the perceived problems you're stating, it'll probably also get you a promotion for doing the work.
...but I've noticed that that lack of promotions and immortal interactions is one of the major factors that makes players leave their characters and eventually the game
Again, you have no numerical values but for a link that shows this to be a 'major' factor. I'm not denying that things like this may contribute to someone giving up their character - maybe even the game - but it isn't as endemic as you make it sound.
Also, this again points to the subjective nature of those who feel they deserve promotions when they may in fact not. I wouldn't promote someone in my company simply for being around a long time, even if his best friend in another department is running the place now.
So, to define the problem:
- Very different speed of promotions/inductances for different cabals.
Again, I don't see this as a problem. Its a part of the cabal in question, and fluctuates more than you would like us to believe.
- Lack of cabal immortal interaction
This does happen, and I'll answer this one personally since I can't speak for the others. I have different time zones than most, and sometimes when I do see someone I'm involved with something else or have nothing to say. This doesn't mean I'm not paying attention to what they're doing, or that I need to be present to promote if i don't want to RP with them. We have specific imm commands to deal with that problem specifically, on top of writing notes and such informing other imms that we'd like soandso promoted if they're seen on.
- Failure to bring balance between (natural) enemy cabals:
Once more, you're looking for absolute balance in these cabals, which is frankly stale. Sometimes one is stronger, sometimes the other, but never forever. It changes, and some of the thrill of a character is fighting against what may be seen as insurmountable odds.
Keeping an absolute balance would hurt someone in the long run. Under your directive, I may have three stellar people in despair who more than deserve a spot in my cabal, but since there isn't anyone in knight, nor anyone in Hope, they'll just have to sit there - which they will think is unfair, and by your logic quite their character, the game, and curse us for all eternity.
You might argue that we could then make joining a cabal easier, which would be a different discussion, for one, but would also require us to stop vetting for character immersion and investment and would cause the value of cabals as a whole to decrease.
To illustrate the problem in my third point, I would use a character who (imho) has been hugely overlooked, promotion wise - Secundus
Alright, I'll grab this not-so-veiled jab at me. Secundus is in my cabal, and has done wonderful things. At the time I was enjoying some time with my fiance who I recently proposed to. And Secundus, I love ya bro, but my future wife comes first.
Now Nexus has the coup system in place for the strong to overcome the weak and take their position. Secundus did that. Also, Anume was watching the cabal in my absence and states later in this thread that she thought he was ready for a promotion. So he was covered twice over.
A cabal immortal must have some very good reason to not promote such a member of his' date=' especially when we are talking a promotion from V to T.[/Quote']
Whether or not hanging out with my fiance is a good reason to you foxx, I don't know. If it isn't, then I dropped the ball, and you feel free to pick it up for me.
Instead of having seven different people responsible for one cabal each, have 1-2-3 people responsible for all the cabals.
We do this already in practice, just not in name. How would we justify having a demon in charge of knight, syndicate and nexus? Can you imagine the cries of favoritism? The accusations of 'you like this cabal better so you pay more attention to them?'
It would also effectively lock the imm out of any inter-cabal RP. If I were in charge of Knight and Nexus, as Celerity mentions later in the thread, how am I to do ANYTHING RP-wise with either one? I tell my Nexuns to steal the commandments, I tell thek nights the nexuns are about to steal the commandments. Even despite Volgathras being the imm of chaos and probably getting a HUGE kick out of this, it just doesn't make sense from an RP perspective.
To go back to what I said earlier, we do this in practice. I could provide many threads where we discuss the promotions and inductions of people in a cabal amongst ourselves, but I wont because these characters still exist in many cases. But the truth stands that EVERY immortal watches EVERY cabal (as well as EVERY applicant for ANYTHING), but leaves the final decision up to the commanding immortal.
Even a small internal system can be created where the immortals in charge can suggest and vote on promotions on ALL the cabal members. That will bring much more balanced environment as a whole.
It may create the cabalnce you want, but that balance, as I have stated, would be stale and un-interesting. Further, it would slow down all imm activity and promotions to a CRAWL if we had to go through every single one.
Not to mention that the same management can be used on qthings to speed up the process of approval/denial.
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but we've VASTLY improved the acceptance/denial stage of qthings...
Edit: After going over this a few minutes later, I realise it comes off as a little combative, and it is. I won't edit the words or phrasing, for two reason. One, I think my points stand and two, the post shows that administrators are fallible and human, with feelings.
Despite the defensive nature of the post, f0xx, I and in fact the administration as a whole does value your thoughts and input. I hope that my response shows that not only do we think about what players think, but it affects us as well, emotionally and intellectually, sometimes deeply.
Thanks Demi.
