@ Bina: I guess what bothers me more is the idea thrown around of investing dev time and effort into modifying the existing code so that there's no longer guild restrictions and anyone can join any guild regardless of alignment.
First of all, we all know dev time and resources appear to be very limited and we have scarce few new patches coming out. So I'd MUCH rather see that time invested in new content (such as new missions and occupations for marauders as Virg suggests, those are sorely needed) instead of modifying guild restrictions.
Secondly because gameplay wise, if you are to make guilds free for all, then you might as well just discard the whole concept of Kami and Kara and factions, throw that out of the window, give the same PR TPs to everyone and be done with it. Then discard the whole concept of civ as well, give full NH rewards for everyone, and that's it. No more civs or factions, just guilds. And I know that'd suit some players just fine, but it just goes against the whole concept of Ryzom as a game.
@ Soyeok: No matter what the devs decide to do, it WILL piss off some players and loose some subs. There's no magic choice here that will suddenly make Ryzom flourish because it pleases everyone. As a matter of fact, you could argue more subs are lost by people dropping out of game for lack of RP than for lack of "free for all" guilds. Someone recently told me Aniro had OP wars in which 200+ players attended. Where are all those players now?
Also there's no "direction its headed" Soyeok. Ryzom guilds have worked like this since forever (or at least very early on in its development). There's always been the alignment restriction in place. The reason for this whole discussion is because marauder is a new organization. It only came out a few years ago, therefore all the code is new. And as Placio already explained, it was technical difficulties, limitations, oversights or whatever it was that have kept them from following the same limitations other factions and civs have always had. And they have been trying to fix that. As simple as that.
First of all, we all know dev time and resources appear to be very limited and we have scarce few new patches coming out. So I'd MUCH rather see that time invested in new content (such as new missions and occupations for marauders as Virg suggests, those are sorely needed) instead of modifying guild restrictions.
Secondly because gameplay wise, if you are to make guilds free for all, then you might as well just discard the whole concept of Kami and Kara and factions, throw that out of the window, give the same PR TPs to everyone and be done with it. Then discard the whole concept of civ as well, give full NH rewards for everyone, and that's it. No more civs or factions, just guilds. And I know that'd suit some players just fine, but it just goes against the whole concept of Ryzom as a game.
@ Soyeok: No matter what the devs decide to do, it WILL piss off some players and loose some subs. There's no magic choice here that will suddenly make Ryzom flourish because it pleases everyone. As a matter of fact, you could argue more subs are lost by people dropping out of game for lack of RP than for lack of "free for all" guilds. Someone recently told me Aniro had OP wars in which 200+ players attended. Where are all those players now?
Also there's no "direction its headed" Soyeok. Ryzom guilds have worked like this since forever (or at least very early on in its development). There's always been the alignment restriction in place. The reason for this whole discussion is because marauder is a new organization. It only came out a few years ago, therefore all the code is new. And as Placio already explained, it was technical difficulties, limitations, oversights or whatever it was that have kept them from following the same limitations other factions and civs have always had. And they have been trying to fix that. As simple as that.
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"We are Kami. We are here to be you. We are many as you are of many minds. We are one as you are one in Ma-Duk."