Factional Classes For Hashan And Cyrene

Anedhel

Tbf, it's hard for me to justify coming up with a factional class for groups that want nothing to do with the outside world in any significant measure. Would it be cool? Maybe. Would anyone outisde Cyrene/Hashan give a shit? Prolly not. And that's fine, y'all play the game how you want to play the game, but I neither see those two places getting their own classes as a door for them to take an active interest outside their little spheres of attention, nor a valid reason for other places to start taking them seriously; so where 'enlivening the game' is concerned, I really don't think new classes'll do anything, one way or the other.

Re-appropriating Runewarden/Shaman as factional classes'd do much more for the fabric of Achaea, honestly, since that'd actually be a point of contention (as opposed to adding a little spice to an all-too-watery soup), although if recent experience is anything to measure by, the conflict and its outcome will probably be dissatisfying and weak.

Sorry, Hashan/Cyrene. I promise I mind you all less than it seems like I do.

Achimrst

Melodie said:

Jules said:

Mel, I've said before that I'd be perfectly fine with people, especially certain "oldies" retaining their classes.  The example I used before was something to the effect of "we're not going to tell Czanthria she can't be a Paladin anymore, are we"?  

Not saying you weren't, I was saying it's not really as big of a problem as I think you and Silas are making it out to be. It has waned significantly lately, as bad as it was when I first came back two years ago or so and the Lumeni were almost dead, with no real leaders or anyone around to talk about... anything.

I think they gave the Diaspora as a way to say "sink or swim", and right now, it's starting to sink more than swim. Obviously personally how I would like it to work out is different, but that's just plain facts from watching the population.

I'll be honest and say I don't know much about the Diaspora or Devotion. Although I thought the Diaspora was a way of limiting Devotion users and slowly bring them in line to Targossas so that eventually those of the Diaspora would be more dedicated to the Bloodsworn. I mean if someone told all the priests and paladins of Cyrene to quit the city and join Targossas or become an enemy and lose Devotion, would anyone really be happy about that situation? And as Melodie said, if a lot of Devotion users are switching or joining Targossas, it's kind of doing the job of sorting them for the admins without forcing it.

Edit:
And elaborating on this idea, if Twilight/Ourania/Valnurana came together and made something similar to the Diaspora for Shaman or even Alchemists it could essentially do the same thing without forcing people. They would either accept the religion based out of Hashan by the Hashani gods or even build on what is already existing.

Nellaundra

Achm, you really don't know much/anything about Cyrene, the Diaspora, or Targ at all so most of your views are pretty biased.

Achimrst

Nellaundra said:

Achm, you really don't know much/anything about Cyrene, the Diaspora, or Targ at all so most of your views are pretty biased.

That was exactly what I said....

Nellaundra

And that's what I get for opening this, going away for fifteen minutes due to issues, and then posting.

Achimrst

Nellaundra said:

And that's what I get for opening this, going away for fifteen minutes due to issues, and then posting.

It happens to everyone, don't feel left out.

Rethel

I've been reading this and hopefully I haven't missed any part of it so I don't say anything that's been said before.
It keeps getting mentioned that Hashan is Darkness or Misdirection. So why not have all of the Marks and Champions reside there? It just doesn't make sense for me to trust an assassin(who is open PK for that matter) even if they are a member of my city. The same could be said for thieves. So why not make it role play for them to be bound to Hashan because they can only trust each other. In doing so they could also have better control of the market and make the prices more regulated. I think the last Mark I hired cost me a few hundred gold which just isn't realistic in any role play world. It costs me more to buy diner. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying I don't like the assassins in my city but if you can make better role play out of it then why not do it?

Xith

I always thought that while the merchants were there. Mercenary city, cause gold right?

Except no, because unfortunately fighters don't follow the money because they've spent multi-millions on artifacts that can't be earned back. So they survive on their own credits. Therefore mercenaries in Achaea do so for experience and practice. And bragging rights

Anedhel

Even if your idea flew regarding Assassins (which I don't buy), I don't see why Champions should be lumped in the same group with the Assassins.

The fact of the matter is that the Marks have been independent of Cities, which is why their historical homes are in different geographic areas (Jaru, and then the tower in the Sangre Plains for the Ivory Mark, Quisalis Den under Thera for the Quisalis Mark). Even their denizens' histories are independent, and while they're mentioned in a few instances within the Cities' histories, I think they very much have always been their own organizations.

Joining the Marks is a watery thing, but I assume in a more strict roleplay environment, membership in the Marks would come with some kind of oath or code to tie down the member's behavior and allegiance (definitely in the case of the Champions, perhaps not in the Assassins, though I can see it going either way).

I can't see Atlantia living in Hashan, or being particularly close to Darkness. I somehow can't see Derillin, Dakrol, Isiva, or Nevon taking orders from any City Leaders for reasons other than gold, either. The idea of mercenaries being tied to a single City is ludicrous, if only because it's easier to make gold if anyone can pay you, so I can't see them taking a side like that, watery as Hashan's identity on the world stage may be.

Jhaeli

Once upon a time, before Autoclass, the Runewarden Guild and the Shaman Guild had monopoly on totems. While I am more familiar with it from the Runewarden POV, it essentially meant that you had to go to one of these Guilds to get your stronghold/city/house totemed and repaired. It added a lot of flavour and added to the "Merchant City" feel to Cyrene (which, to me, has always really been THE Merchant city, despite the House. We had Prospero after all.) It also added weight to Cyrene's trade bans and gave others a reason to play nice with the neutral city.

Playing up the aspect of being a city for tradesmen and artisans feels very appropriate to Cyrene. Restricting Runewardens and Shamans to their respective cities (grandfathered in, of course) would do a lot for both cities imho.  

Tharvis

Jhaeli said:

Once upon a time, before Autoclass, the Runewarden Guild and the Shaman Guild had monopoly on totems. While I am more familiar with it from the Runewarden POV, it essentially meant that you had to go to one of these Guilds to get your stronghold/city/house totemed and repaired. It added a lot of flavour and added to the "Merchant City" feel to Cyrene (which, to me, has always really been THE Merchant city, despite the House. We had Prospero after all.) It also added weight to Cyrene's trade bans and gave others a reason to play nice with the neutral city.

Playing up the aspect of being a city for tradesmen and artisans feels very appropriate to Cyrene. Restricting Runewardens and Shamans to their respective cities (grandfathered in, of course) would do a lot for both cities imho.  

in hashan, the spiritwalkers still have the monopoly on totems, so technically, nothing changed there for us (though in reality nobody cares about that fact and just asks anybody to totem)

Penwize

Tharvis said:

in hashan, the spiritwalkers still have the monopoly on totems, so technically, nothing changed there for us (though in reality nobody cares about that fact and just asks anybody to totem)

I can remember, back in the Qashar days, trying to get totems re-inked in Hashan before the next raid and having people argue about it loudly because it had to be done only by someone approved by the totem council, even though we had Runewardens in the Lotus totally able and willing to do it.  That city always had so much drama for every little thing.

Rohe

Vansittart said:

There's a lot in this thread about how factional classes don't necessarily fit into Hashan/Cyrene right now and a lot of it is right.  The alchemist intro event does make it difficult to "take alchemy away" from the other cities.  Runelore sits quite well in both Hashan and Cyrene. 

But! One of the awesome things about Achaea is that it changes.  Do people really remember how much of a massive shitstorm it was (still is, to a certain extent) when Shallam reclaimed Devotion properly?  And now it just feels like the way of things.  It would be a very easy thing indeed to re-orient Achaea so that Hashan and Cyrene do get a factional class.  (Unstudied use of alchemy poses another danger to the world, the Masters return and do a big event so that it becomes "protected" knowledge with the path to the metals barred from the unstudious (i.e. everyone who doesn't study in the Hashani planetarium).  Also easy to do with runelore/shamanism (the spirits aiiee! They are restless!).

The foundational question is "would this be cool and the right way to go"?  It's a difficult, but interesting, question.  I think it would be great, personally.  The factional/class dynamics in Achaea right now feel a bit "work-in-progress-y".  It just doesn't feel *right* that Hashan and Cyrene are left without their own class to control.  It makes them feel a bit less important and, although they certainly haven't helped themselves in that regard in a lot of ways, I think Achaea would be better if all six cities were firing on all cylinders.  Class control for cities (like guilds before them) gives heft to an organisation - makes it feel essential.  And yes, there are pitfalls in that (see also: guilds), it's a potentially awesome thing.

Also people would yell a lot and that is always fun to watch.

I'm not for any city being able to control an entire class, but that seems to be the way things are headed. But what happens to those of that class when this transpires? They're forced to give up their class and play another that they don't really want to? What about their investment in Achaea as a whole - I'm finding that quite often people have specialised their roleplay, traits, and artefacts to match their class as well. In a lot of ways, the control essentially strips them of the opportunity to do what they've been doing without issue since whenever they started playing Achaea and forces them to invest more (real life) money to play characters they are not as enthralled with. I can only imagine that this might cause some people to just leave the game all together or play in a fashion that is less than savory and accepted (becoming the type of nuisances that are so often complained about on these boards). 

Edit: Yes, I realize some cities already control classes. My point was mainly to shaman and any other class this might eventually impact. If it doesn't impact those who are already of the class after the change is made, I don't see the issue. Although I had heard there was something that could strip such players of part of their skills in some cases (?). 

Bluef

Penwize said:

Tharvis said:

in hashan, the spiritwalkers still have the monopoly on totems, so technically, nothing changed there for us (though in reality nobody cares about that fact and just asks anybody to totem)

I can remember, back in the Qashar days, trying to get totems re-inked in Hashan before the next raid and having people argue about it loudly because it had to be done only by someone approved by the totem council, even though we had Runewardens in the Lotus totally able and willing to do it.  That city always had so much drama for every little thing.

This was before totems became repair-able, I think. There also used to be quite a bit of roleplay surrounding totems around that time because only someone who had implanted a totem could repair it. That died when totems changed and now anyone and everyone can lay their inky hands all over the things as long as they're appointed a city totemer. It might make defense a lot easier, but the integrity of a long held roleplay consideration was lost as a result. Not sure it was a perfect trade off in the end.  

Bluef

Tharvis said:

Jhaeli said:

Once upon a time, before Autoclass, the Runewarden Guild and the Shaman Guild had monopoly on totems. While I am more familiar with it from the Runewarden POV, it essentially meant that you had to go to one of these Guilds to get your stronghold/city/house totemed and repaired. It added a lot of flavour and added to the "Merchant City" feel to Cyrene (which, to me, has always really been THE Merchant city, despite the House. We had Prospero after all.) It also added weight to Cyrene's trade bans and gave others a reason to play nice with the neutral city.

Playing up the aspect of being a city for tradesmen and artisans feels very appropriate to Cyrene. Restricting Runewardens and Shamans to their respective cities (grandfathered in, of course) would do a lot for both cities imho.  

in hashan, the spiritwalkers still have the monopoly on totems, so technically, nothing changed there for us (though in reality nobody cares about that fact and just asks anybody to totem)

I must probe your city's totems more than your city does. Most of them bear the marks of people who aren't even citizens anymore. That sort of thing used to be frowned upon for the roleplay of it - not because they couldn't be repaired, etc. The Spirit Walkers can't possibly hold the monopoly on new totems either though, because there just aren't that many shaman within Hashan (see Achimrst's post on that above). The majority of us are either rogues, Ashtani or Eleusian. Calling the shaman brethren home is a nice RP idea, but I would hope that there would be an equal opportunity for everyone to return "home" then. 

Accipiter

When was the last factional class introduced? Apostates or I guess Occultism? Financially it doesn't make much sense for IRE to put all that effort into a new class and then limit it to a certain faction, because it restricts the people who will transfer into the class/make new toons to play with it.

Bluef

Tahquil said:

... I'm going to have to come in and say a no to Alchemists being factionalised. I think a lot of people are looking at Shaman and Alchemists as what they are now and not the lore behind it.

Alchemist anchors are split over the five cities that chose them and each city has it's own unique anchor. Alchemists draw on that specific alchemical energy to do whatever they need to do with it. If they didn't the energies of Sapience would build up and go out of control and you would have animals turning into various metals again. The spread between different cities helps keep them in check. Factionalising Alchemist would be, from a storyline perspective, a bad thing.

As for Shamans they've had a solid footing in Hashan from their birth until the Curia decided to split off. However that doesn't negate the fact that they had heavy Hashani ties beforehand.

(The fuck... did some of my writing suddenly went a size up?)

A few problems here. 

First, Shamans originated in Tomacula, not Hashan.

Second, the ties to Hashan were based on the Shamans Guild once serving as Twilight's laity. That's not the case anymore - at least not right now.

Third, Firefox who founded the Shamans Guild left the Spirit Walkers and is now a Curia member. So if we're going to argue where shamans have a strong RP foothold right now I'd have to put forward that the clan has more active shamans than the House or City and a greater legacy factor. 

All that said, the Curia has always roleplayed that a Restoration would come after the Awakening of Twilight. 150 years IC and we've not deviated from that storyline. So if this faction thing is a go, I certainly hope the powers that be consider that as a quick way to gain back some experienced shamans to the fold and don't allow personal issues to be a detriment to the potentially cool roleplay.

Kaie

 I'm completely against the idea of locking more classes than already are down to specific factions. I'm all about roleplay and support the idea that factions should be allowed to choose who is permitted within it. However, I'm not interested in the whole calling "dibs" on everything. What are you, like 8? You'll create stagnant roleplay where people are locked into a predetermined role, offering only a fraction of the possibilities that exist when people are not locked into it. The whole stripping of skills thing isn't even a great feature, it forces those who play a certain class that's owned to either join up or kiss ass to people whom they may not even get along with which is actually really counter productive. Especially since opting out of a faction is typically done because either you do not agree with them, or do not get along.

That you're not calling for that "unfair advantage"  to be lifted and instead ask for the power to exert control on other people suggests to me that it's hardly about roleplay and more about getting your foot in the door when these "massive" changes happen. There is nothing currently stopping Hashan from roleplaying as a faction that Shaman's are the "Priests" of Hashan. The only thing I can see possibly getting in your way is the majority of Shaman class members which seem to exist outside Hashan rebelling against the notion and rising against you, which is also within their privileges as roleplayers in the community. Same applies to Cyrene and the notion that bards or runelorists should be exclusive and controlled by Cyrene. It's one of the remaining features that are rather shitty, and if we spread that further, you'll get to eventually be victim of, "I don't like you, and I'm going to ruin you." skill strips. 

I hate to say this, but at this point in time the less control the playerbase has of skills or anything that another player has actually invested hard work or money into the better. From what I've seen, the player base as a majority (I'm sorry to those of you who are, but got lumped into this.) is not responsible enough to have such control or power.

Vayne

It is interesting to see how varying personal motivations affect one's opinion on these matters.

Achimrst

Since were talking about Shaman and limiting the class, I want to go on the record as saying I still think Alchemist fits Hashan more than Shaman. The Spiritwalker house is full of Occultists and Alchemists, they have very limited Shaman although the IC RP calls them all Shaman just as the IC RP for the Curia Spiritus does as well.

Now that we have my stance, the split between the Curia Spiritus and the Spiritwalkers is an IC one built on religion. Thoth is the patron of the Curia Spiritus and a potential enemy to Twilight, although they aren't officially hostile in the ORG RELATIONS. Not to mention that in an IC capacity there are ultimately OOC feelings which stop both organizations from coming together. So while Shaman would be a great fit for Hashan, there are a lot of things honestly limiting it from happening. Curses from an IC standpoint are often talked about as being the most basic form of magic, afflicting someone with the 'spirits' of malady. Spirits from what I can find IC have nothing to do with Darkness other than Twilight was the patron of the spiritwalkers. Vodun is supposed to be a form of magic that links a person with a doll to afflict them, again not really related to darkness, it is again a basic form of magic where an object afflicts someone with the power of the 'spirits'. Than there is Runelore which is gained from the power of the world tree itself. I have IC references for all of this, which doesn't mean it is all true from an IG stand point but there is nothing refuting it either.

I mean my character is built upon this RP heavily, I have written books and other things about it IG and invested a lot into this type of RP. So really, I wonder if these two groups of the Curia Spiritus and the Spiritwalkers are not coming to a point where the gods patroning us have to decide which of our RP makes the most sense and move from there on what to do about the two groups of Shaman existing. I am bias obviously because I have worked hard within the Curia Spiritus and my character, IC, has a lot of problems with the Spiritwalkers as do many others. I like to think I am a very active Shaman and very involved in the RP of the class, which is one of the reasons I decided Shaman made most sense for my character.  I might hate totems, but I love the class as a whole :P

#AlchemistsforHashan :P

Achimrst

Vayne said:

It is interesting to see how varying personal motivations affect one's opinion on these matters.

I can tell you my personal motivations are not to be forced to join Hashan just because they need more people and a class to make them feel like night. Shaman are spirit based not darkness based, everything in their RP points at that.

Dji

Kaie said:

What are you, like 8? 

Yes.

Which brings me to my next idea; my Dad can beat up your Dad.

Xith

As I touched on earlier, the factional classes would have to have raid presence to make their military appeal matter enough to attract "combatants". Having more than one shaman in a raid group is unfortunately useless unless they're gonna take turns propping -- okay, so more than 2 shamans is useless.

It's the one thing I've always found "sketchy" about Shamans: Runelore. (pun)

Curses and Vodun have this sort of synchronicity and then - Runes. It's mainly for the scarcity of runewarden and shaman RP (although I think the Cyrene house or somebody does special greetings with their names). It's what makes them "mystic" classes, but on the same tangent, aside from some small-time demonstrations and rituals, Spirits only have a fleeting presence in events. Mhaldor and Targossas have their deities to flock to for spiritual direction, as does Ashtan in a way. But Hashan has that whole fuzzy purpose thing going on with their patrons, like someone else said.

Confusing RP is part of what contributes to Shaman's unpopularity. So when Runewarden changes come around it might be nice to see Shamans get some attention regarding Runelore or something.

At the same time I'm just hoping that Twilight coming back means something significant for Hashan.

Bluef

Xith said:

As I touched on earlier, the factional classes would have to have raid presence to make their military appeal matter enough to attract "combatants". Having more than one shaman in a raid group is unfortunately useless unless they're gonna take turns propping -- okay, so more than 2 shamans is useless.

It's the one thing I've always found "sketchy" about Shamans: Runelore. (pun)

Curses and Vodun have this sort of synchronicity and then - Runes. It's mainly for the scarcity of runewarden and shaman RP (although I think the Cyrene house or somebody does special greetings with their names). It's what makes them "mystic" classes, but on the same tangent, aside from some small-time demonstrations and rituals, Spirits only have a fleeting presence in events. Mhaldor and Targossas have their deities to flock to for spiritual direction, as does Ashtan in a way. But Hashan has that whole fuzzy purpose thing going on with their patrons, like someone else said.

Confusing RP is part of what contributes to Shaman's unpopularity. So when Runewarden changes come around it might be nice to see Shamans get some attention regarding Runelore or something.

At the same time I'm just hoping that Twilight coming back means something significant for Hashan.

My disagree above relates only to the combat portion of the comment. Shamans have utility in raid defense and offense beyond propping totems. In an offensive ranged group we can thurisaz, othala, hugalaz. In melee, if one is specialized and traited properly, a shaman can be helpful in essentially immobilizing the target with a high priority loop. 

It's been proposed before that some kind of a "Spirit Council" emerges and the Guardians of the Veil that have been roleplayed for a long time come into being on a faraway astral-like plane that only shamans can reach, etc. I think this would be great. But @Kaie's comments above are spot-on. What would happen is this: 

1. Guardians of the Veil emerge.

2. Hashan converges on their location, if possible.

3. The Spirit Walkers ally with them. Let's be honest, the Curia and others wouldn't even get a shot at this. We've been around for 150 IC years and we can't even get a sesquicentennial event in the RP pipeline. I'm sure this will be explained away with some terrible history lesson that points to Twilight as the source of all spirit or something equally bizarre.

4. The Curia and anyone else that the leaders of this House don't like, or who aren't in Twilight's Order, are enemied or become unwelcome to those on the plane and lose a portion of their abilities for no reason other than the fact that some people like to  flout make believe power in Achaea. I think it must make them feel grand or something. Maybe they were shaken as a baby and feel the need to hurt others now. I don't know what causes it, but I do know that it's the basis for pretty much the last 150 IC years of hostilities between the clan, the House, and the City.

5. The people who have played shaman for years - or like me, over a decade - are forced to pay real-life money to switch class because they're not offered any other reasonable or roleplayed recourse -- Much in the same way that Targossas was happy to call on shamans to prop totems, sketch runes, and offer raid offense/defense when they were in New Hope, and then kicked them all out when the new city came into being (or told them to pay RL money to switch class).

Daklore

I only skimmed this, more or less... too much effort... but I was baffled by how people were pegging Cyrene wrongly... even the Cyrenians.

To truely understand Cyrene's stance of "neutrality" in a political sense, you have to go back to when Cyrene was initially founded during the initial Ashtan-Shallam wars, where people wanted to escape the war and founded themselves little 'ol Cyrene in the middle of nowhere some two or three thousand in-game years ago. Apparently they destroyed a forest in the process and such, that's a vague thing that gets thrown around about the relationship between Cyrene and Eleusis.

Fast forward to the modern era, where Runelore that is, but wasn't but still is, comes to fruition, and we have Czanthria re-founding Cyrene. Cyrene's theme isn't necessarily the arts, Cyrene is a refuge from all the warring. We want to live in peace; and what do people at peace invest themselves into? Art ... and apparently cupcakes.

Neutral-good comes out of an ideology that we want to be free to choose, free to live our lives, and able to determine our own future... but we place morality highly on that decision and follow a process of law meant to better everyone. Which is where the "good" (lower-case good, not upper-case Good) comes from in neutral-good. More or less. Cyrenians could, and will, debate this point until the cows come home, and then keep arguing about it while using respect as a sword-and-shield. Don't ask... just... don't ask.

Now, should Cyrene become "factionalized"? No. Cyrene's ideology would never allow her people to become "factionalized" in the sense that Targossas, Mhaldor, Ashtan, or Eleusis would be considered. When Alchemists came about, the big question was "What do?" Most people felt there was no viable reason for the ... whatever-their-name-is to demand Forestals and Alchemists couldn't live together in the same city. That's Cyrene's identity, we want to accept -everyone-, even though we oppose the destruction of creation[typod: Because I wrote chaos... derp] and refuse to support the forces of Mhaldor(Evil) because of our heritage. Sorry, we just don't agree with oppression :P

And yes, most of us are aware, and counting down the days, months, and years, until Targossas finally recalls Devotion. We're not foolish, we know it's coming. But we'll still cherish every moment we have where we can have Devotion in our melting-pot culture.

Now, go back to arguing about Hashan's identity. No, seriously, I'm curious about Hashan's identity and why they deserve to be classified as Factional and deserving of a faction class. (Also, yes, I'd love to have totem control in The Wardens of the Cerulean Spire's hands again... but the rest of Sapience might not like it...)

tl;dr: Cyrene isn't factional, doesn't need a factional identity or class. No idea on Hashan, because, honestly, I don't know what Hashan actually -is-.

Mathonwy

On paper, City-specific classes can help to breed some sense of factional camaraderie. In practice, though, it's a supplement to a strong RP base of great Gods and good RPers at best and, at worst, an unremitting headache for the people who have to police it. Having played in Hashan and Cyrene both, I just really don't see the point in having factional classes in either of those places. It's not because I think they're useless/worthless/LOL WAHTS A HASHAN GET IT GUYS, but rather because they're both modeled on being more open and less exclusionary, I guess you could say, than Mhaldor/Targ are (although for their own reasons, of course).

I should say, too, that I'm citing Mhaldor/Targ here because the only two groups of classes I would even consider 'factional' in the sense that people want to use the term here are the Devotion and Necromancy ones. Occultism's widely accepted by any City that doesn't directly disallow them (and was even moreso before Rho's shenanigans), and as long as you don't do a couple of really blatant and terribly dumb things (literally, I can only think of two things, and they're the kind of rules you really have to go out of your way to break), you're not going to get Domination revoked. The same was true of the forestal classes before every City independently rejected them for alchemy.

Achimrst

Xith said:

As I touched on earlier, the factional classes would have to have raid presence to make their military appeal matter enough to attract "combatants". Having more than one shaman in a raid group is unfortunately useless unless they're gonna take turns propping -- okay, so more than 2 shamans is useless.

It's the one thing I've always found "sketchy" about Shamans: Runelore. (pun)

Curses and Vodun have this sort of synchronicity and then - Runes. It's mainly for the scarcity of runewarden and shaman RP (although I think the Cyrene house or somebody does special greetings with their names). It's what makes them "mystic" classes, but on the same tangent, aside from some small-time demonstrations and rituals, Spirits only have a fleeting presence in events. Mhaldor and Targossas have their deities to flock to for spiritual direction, as does Ashtan in a way. But Hashan has that whole fuzzy purpose thing going on with their patrons, like someone else said.

Confusing RP is part of what contributes to Shaman's unpopularity. So when Runewarden changes come around it might be nice to see Shamans get some attention regarding Runelore or something.

At the same time I'm just hoping that Twilight coming back means something significant for Hashan.

Just want to elaborate on what I thought Xith meant on this. Confusing RP does make shaman a bit unpopular, not to mention the treatment given to anyone who has an opinion differing from the Spiritwalker house which immediately gets them enemied as Bluef had mentioned in her posting. When I was in the Spiritwalkers house there were so many things broken it was frustrating and just stupid, I mean it wasn't until I joined the Curia Spiritus to explore 'Spirit' RP that I even found out what the heck a spirit was. The Spiritwalker house has so many of the books that Bluef has preserved missing from the library it's just funny that they even try to go along with the RP. Many of the Spiritwalkers that I was friends with in the house had no idea how the Spiritwalker house even fit into Hashan, and I brought this up and no one even cared.... So I regret that the two organizations can't come together and I have tried on an IC capacity and been stopped on an OOC capacity... So I mean it's like if your not in the Spiritwalker house your supposed to ignore that 'spirits' exist or do anything with them, which to me isn't RP. While the Spiritwalker house just sits in Hashan with members who have no idea how they fit into the city at all and are supposed to be happy with it. Most of the spiritwalkers who are in Hashan, in my view, are Occultists who do not want to join the Occultist house in Ashtan or Alchemists who stay because of the Institute of Alchemy RP that they get. While the Curia Spiritus has fully formed RP based around 'spirits' that we are just supposed to give up because Hashan needs people in a failing house who can't even get their RP straight.

Edit!
Also, yes I agree that I hope Twilight fixes Hashan! Yay Twilight!

Aerek

As much it would warm the cockles of my heart to see Runewarden and Shaman relegated to their home cities, forcing the ever-warring factions to again pile lavish gifts and lucrative contracts upon the neutral parties to maintain their totem networks, I agree that doesn't need to happen. Runewardens, especially, represent the only way for non-Good, non-Evil factions to get both forged goods and totems for their factions, and those are kinda necessary in this day and age. Taking them away would be amusing, as mentioned above, but I think that would be detrimental in the long run.

As far as new classes, I'll only briefly echo what others have already offered. An aligned class is a powerful tool to establish the RP of a given faction. Cyrene and Hashan, by contrast, don't have a clear central premise, for the most part. Sure, Cyrene has an artsy and idyllic theme, and Hashan has a dark and seedy theme, but they're both very much "grays" in the otherwise black-and-white world of Achaea, and would be very difficult to come up with some new class that represented the ideology of either. (Unless you a Bureaucrat class in mind) The four major axes of alignment already have their factional classes, and so I think what makes Cyrene and Hashan unique is that they don't have one, they're free to chart their own course without being anchored to one set route of RP, and I think that's a good thing.

Achimrst

I had another thought as I was meditating from hunting. If Shaman are made a Hashani only class, then Occultists should be taken from the city as well and made exclusively Ashtani.

Bluef

I'm actually fond of the idea of shamans becoming a faction class. My biggest issue with the idea is that the current model in Achaea may connect with divine and their realm's roleplay, but relies too heavily on cities to regulate such efforts. This doesn't work well for all the reasons that have already been mentioned.

A great analogy for this might be the way laws are enforced in the U.S. Congress passes a bill and it becomes law, but they don't enforce it. To do that, they create regulatory agencies like the EPA. These enforcing agencies gain power by doing what they were established to -- that is, the broader their application of the law, the more power and control they gain over everything it pertains to. The problem with this is that America is made up of individual states -- in much the same way classes are made up players -- and inevitably when regulation becomes too strict or when there is dissension about a law, the states fight back (with legal courses of action).

A faction system in Achaea based on city regulation would disallow that type of roleplayed recourse. If someone in a city's leadership doesn't like you and/or doesn't wish to roleplay resolution to past issues, you're potentially able to be cut off from certain skillsets as they apply the power that has been handed them. Extending such powers to players just isn't right unless there is very extensive divine oversight, and if the last few years in Achaea have taught me one thing it is that the volunteer divine don't want that type of responsibility thrust upon them.

I really hope these types of things are taken into consideration before the new House system and multiclass goes in, and definitely before any further factions are established or enforced. I also hope that some serious thought is given to the rogues of the realm, who are consistently shut out of events, games, and the like simply because they disagree or choose not to be a part of organizations that go against the libertine way in which they choose to roleplay their characters.