Should guild affiliation endure beyond death

[Raleigh]

      I have reasons to not engage in Guild Wars besides the lousy combat system and of lack of manpower. Because unlike others, I know how to accept defeat and wouldn't unrealistically make my "guild" even continue existing after all the members are dead. From me, a radical suggestion, a war that involves two whole "guilds" going in the places where the authorities have less or no control should have as a potential outcome: the complete annihilation of one of the sides. This would definitively make people think twice before getting medieval.
     Also, I think that once(REALLY SOON(TM)) masonry becomes available, making a "government" will be possible once you have resources and manpower to make your way into the Labyrinths(SOON(TM)). This sounds more believable and I think will make less risk of potential griefing than having a group of players controlling the government of Yliakum.

[Natrina]

 I agree that if that was an option (to kill your own leader), then it should be something decided upon it's creation and not something the leader could change. Yet, between crafters it makes no sense to have such "savage" system, as well, crafters are not fighters and their system, as the game in general, should not promote them to be make use of force (and most surely not give superiority in crafter guilds to warrior-crafters).

 Once again this is a question of our notion of death. Once the DR is quite bigger, I'm not sure this problem would be posed. If it took weeks (or even months) for members to get out of the DR, the problem of affiliation would be solved by the guilds themselves, depending on what they do to their members' inactivity.

[bilbous]

You bring up something I do not think has been considered before. In the PS world the DR is just another map and communication with those currently situated there is routine and effortless. Perhaps some system could be developed whereby the only way to communicate past the borders of the DR would be through some kind of divination spell. Thus, guild members within the DR could communicate amongst themselves on the guild channel as could guild members in the living world but without difficult magic the two channels would be completely separate and not accessible from the other realm. The same would go for the other channels as well, people in the DR should be completely cut off from the living world under normal circumstances.

As far as warrior crafters go, most anyone with money could hire an assassin and poison could be as effective as the point of a sword. I am not suggesting your particular guild has to embrace the model but it could be available for others of a different bent.

[neko kyouran]

Guild channel is OOC.

You are trying to bring something that is OOC into character.  The two don't mix.

[Raleigh]

Guild channel is OOC.

You are trying to bring something that is OOC into character.  The two don't mix.

    I think probably there are magics in both Yliakum and death realm that allow the dead to communicate with the alive and the alive communicate with the dead, alas, this is one of the real world meanings of the word necromancy(communication with the dead).

[bilbous]

@neko Well it is and it isn't. The character can only access the guild channel if he is in a guild and the player cannot access the same guild channel with another character that is on the same or another account but not in the guild. It is certainly true that does not require chat that is in character but it is tied to the character all the same. Probably a distinction not worth mentioning but the thought was spurred by my inference from:

If it took weeks (or even months) for members to get out of the DR, the problem of affiliation would be solved by the guilds themselves, depending on what they do to their members' inactivity.

that somehow characters in the DR would be inactive in the guild which would not be the case if the guild could instruct the members in the DR as well as anywhere else which is already the case.

[neko kyouran]

now you are confusing player vs character.

player == still in guild and active.
character = in DR, dead.

[bilbous]

I am sorry I cannot accept either of those equations. I have a character in the klyros, only that character is in the guild (and not very active at that). Outside of the game I can access the guild website but in the game only that character is in the guild. In Character is only In Game except for one or two forums here. I am not at all confused about that.

Characters in the death realm are not dead they are "just visiting." They are only dead when they cease to exist, i.e no longer have the will to leave the DR or even hold their essence together in the DR. At least this is what I inferred from reading the new tomes in the DR library which were written by someone who can no longer leave the DR except under extreme conditions without turning to dust, figuratively and possibly literally. I may be a little confused on this point but the fact that some guilds are projected to make their bases in the DR sometime in the future would seem to rule out your second equation.

Of course all this serves to do is to render the original topic moot so you might as well lock it. You may very well have your cake and eat it too but mine disappears as fast as I cram it down my gullet.

[neko kyouran]

death realm... death.... dead characters.  so they are dead. they may come back from the dead, but while they are there, they are dead.  You get a system message when your character dies, telling you as the player, that your character is now dead.  where does that character go after that? death realm.  so, character in DR = dead character.

dead characters do not talk with the living ones like they are next door neighbors.  so, you as a player still have abilities to talk to the guild through the ooc use of the guild channel, but your character most likely does not.

guilds based in the DR are just that.  they all have dead members.  just like guilds based in the land of the living have all live members.  characters may be still in the guild if they move form one plane to the other, but character communication will be very difficult, or most likely none at all, until they return to the plane where the guild is based at.  While at the same time, the player behind the character will have full access to the OOC guild channel keeping the player in touch with the guilds other players, but their character will not have decent communication with the other guilds characters.  so the player is active in the guild, the character may not be.  my stupid little equation post stands. (in the preceding paragraph, plane refers to DR or land of living.)

[bilbous]

It seems to me the whole disagreement we are having is semantic in nature and as such is rather pointless. Dead men tell no tales but in this game they age (slowly unless magically bound), write books, amass libraries. Things are born, live and die in the death realm (carkerasses, wrathrats, whatever it was whose bones make up part of the citidal). What is considered to be true death has no part of the DR, prisoners executed by the crystal do not go there. People in the Death realm are more undead than dead except the state is not permanent. To me dead characters do nothing but rot.

If you want to preserve the illusion that it isn't just another map you should really disallow the OOC channels from being effective across the divide. Let dead people talk to other dead people in their guild but not to living ones. Anything else invites abuse. The help channel is the only one that needs to be worldwide. If they want to communicate across the divide they can do so outside the game, an irc channel, teamspeak or whatnot. The game does not need to allow it.

What good does it do to kill that spy that overheard your plans before he can report when he can report from the death realm? Heck, he was probably reporting as you went along so it is already too late. How many guilds will be able to ignore such ill-gotten information? How many will be able not to when faced with enemies who do?

So if you want to define death as you have fine, and if you want to say that the guild channel is OOC that is fine too but you will not convince me that the reality is that simplistic but by definition you are correct.

[neko kyouran]

Its not the games fault that people can't distinguish between what is OOC and what is in character.  Why would you want to limit what people can do in game becuase a few people can't separate the two?  Don't you think that's limiting the people who can tell the difference?

[Raleigh]

I think this is a question for the Settings team: Whether there are(hard to attain of course) magics that allow the dead to communicate with the alive and so on or not. The answer to this question will have influence on the question pointed in this thread. However probably most won't have access to such chanels of communication if they exist, so it's safe to say that in most cases, those who die lose contact with their guilds while they are dead. And as bilbous said, being dead is not so literal, because it is being dead in Yliakum while being "alive" in the Death Realm. And if there are tenuous links between both realms, it is not something impossible that exist ways of communication between them.

[bilbous]

I would code for human nature and not for ideal situations. I do not see why it is such a problem for you, you can argue against it all you like if it should be discussed amongst the devs. Certainly I won't be privy to those talks in the off chance they even occur. I do not make suggestions because I expect them to be adopted, I make them because they seem logical to me and they have no chance of being adopted if I don't. Of course my logic isn't always on the button.

You haven't said yet why being cut off from your living guild-mates shouldn't be one of the penalties for dying, you just assume that because it is an OOC perk for a supposedly IC function (guilds) that it cannot be affected by an IC situation. I think it is a hybrid IC/OOC function to begin with and am adding an IC constraint.

Maybe I just like it because it isn't likely to affect me much in any event, and it is a slight restriction on something that goes against the putative emphasis on Role-Play. Why do you need to talk to dead people?

[neko kyouran]

  I'm not for or against your idea.  Quiet frankly, I don't really care either way.  I just am trying to point a flaw in your logic.

Why do you need to talk to dead people?

Again, I repeat, you aren't talking to dead people.  You are talking to other players who may have dead characters.  Your character may not be talking to the dead characters, but why should that limit you from talking to your fellow guild mates?  Again, you are trying to bring an OOC channel, IC and that simply shouldn't be done.

[bilbous]

So guilds are OOC? That is the only conclusion I can come up with if I can talk to my guildmates regardless of IC considerations. Somehow I do not think you will agree with this conclusion but this is the apparent contradiction. An OOC channel can be attached to an IC function but should not have IC restrictions applied to it.

Really I don't care either but I am trying to understand. We seem unable to see it the same way, perhaps someone else could take a stab at explaining it to me.

 I suppose the big difference between our outlooks is that you seem to think there is a distinction to be made between a character and its player whereas the only distinction I can see is between the various characters of the player. In other words the character is always the player but the player is not always the character. This of course depends upon the player respecting the no-sharing rules, without that caveat all bets are off.

So what do I tell people who try to use the guild/group channel for role play, that they are breaking the rules? Is the Auction channel OOC as well? I was chided yesterday for yelling at my buyer when I mentioned a price in that channel to someone who had already agreed to buy my merchandise. Apparently IC/OOC contradictions abound in the world.