Nobility Revamp
#31
I posted my suggestions and ideas in a private thread. Other than that, as I've said, I just disagree.


Edit: The disagreements and the solutions that I put forward are also in that post, JV. Just so that I uh, notate in here I'm not just saying "I disagree" without elaboration.
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#32
Wo. Gone for work and I come back to a full blown discussion o o

Regardless, what I meant with the clans is the Wiki page with all the information. When it was formed, what they do, etc. It would help those orc/troll/tauren lovers find a home with other players. Some clans are made in game, but it takes months for a thread to be posted. It would be neat to see player made orcish clans on the Wiki so people can join them and promote racial rp!

I wasn't really talking about monitoring though, just something new and old players could search on the Wiki and find. (Lets face it, finding old posts on the forums is hard enough)
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#33
I enjoy this and actually found it to be a little lax, for with Nobles a lot is on the line and in fact I think the rumors idea is great, maybe even a way of warfare for noble houses, spreading rumors of their enemies. To the point I play Nobles on actual Table Top and other RPG forums and we have to go in extremely specific detail about servants and stuff of the like, I personally find it great fun! How you get your funds is important especially for noble families because they rarely work themselves. The few restrictions will help to make sure that the families are thought out. Those are my two coppers.

Oh I also would like to know if Trolls can have "Noble" families. Though these would obviously not be as grand as Blood Elf Nobility in resources, but there are some ways that families of such "savage" races be as powerful as noble houses. If this was already possible then disregard this post...
In darkness we are born, in shadows we are raised

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#34
(12-19-2013, 05:21 PM)Ormica Wrote: Oh I also would like to know if Trolls can have "Noble" families. Though these would obviously not be as grand as Blood Elf Nobility in resources, but there are some ways that families of such "savage" races be as powerful as noble houses. If this was already possible then disregard this post...

Troll society is one where wealth isn't as much about material as it is about having connections to people. This is why a Troll man is considered wealthier when he has a lot of wives: it means he has more connections, having married women from different families. There's not much that can be inherited other than those connections, so I wouldn't exactly consider nobility a concept that can be done with Trolls.
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#35
Draenei, Trolls, Night Elves and Gnomes don't have any concept of nobility -- they all believe more in the ability of a single person, beyond that of one's family. I am curious, however, about the Forsaken. They do have that guy trying to get the deed to where Scholomance is; do the Forsaken still have landed elite?
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#36
Forsaken appear to be some sort of militarised authoritative society, where the Executors lord over land holdings. The Barovs fighting over Caer Darrow is likely an exception.
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#37
If I might offer some thoughts and conjecture as a frothing Forsaken fanboy and someone heavily studying medieval and early modern history:

(12-19-2013, 08:10 PM)FlyingSquirrel Wrote: do the Forsaken still have landed elite?

When Lordaeron fell to the Scourge, its aristocracy collapsed with it, and while surviving nobles may have fled to other human nations as émigrés, the situation of lords and ladies who succumbed to undeath and subsequently regained their free will is unclear. The case of the Barov brothers is interesting, but unique in the game. It's fundamentally concerned with the inheritance of a family fortune and the legal ownership of their parents' properties. While these are, understandably, massive concerns for members of noble families -- noble power tends to be cemented and secured by land ownership and wealth, after all, even if it connotes other legally recognised rights -- they are far from specifically aristocratic worries.

Alexi Barov certainly conducts himself as a noble from being one in his past life, and he might be trying to inherit gold and own land as a noble ought to. It's almost confirmed in the quest text that through acheiving these things, he's trying to revive his dynasty's power among the Forsaken, but so far as we can see, he doesn't appear to enjoy any of the legal privileges or exemptions under the Forsaken nation-state that an officially recognised aristocrat would in living Lordaeron.

Why do I think it's unlikely he'd be recognised as a nobleman by the Forsaken government? Well, historically, it's always been the struggle of the absolute monarch to neuter or render complacent their landed nobles in some way, so as to concentrate their power within themselves. Louis XIV of France brought his gentry to Versailles to distract them with court intrigue. Ivan the Terrible waged a campaign of terror and oppression against his boyars to keep them in line, going so far as to employ death squads and primitive secret policemen. Charles I's attempts to limit his aristocracy's influence led to the English Civil War. Really, unless you're relying on the preexisting institution of aristocracy for revenue from taxation, they're probably more trouble than they're worth.

The playing field has been levelled for Sylvanas entirely, so why would she build it back up again? I'm not sure if a leader as consciously autocratic as her would want to divide her power with a landed elite, especially after the Scourge so conveniently destroyed the influence of the kingdom's previous one. She has the monopoly of force, she is the recognised and adored leader of her people, why would she want to build up potential rivals by setting them legally above the masses?

However, if we look to the example of Varimathras for a moment and consider how he managed to achieve the position of Sylvanas' majordomo and the head of her intelligence service, we could perhaps extrapolate from that that the various warlords and petty leaders of Lordaeron's undead who bent the knee to the Dark Lady during the Scourge Civil War may enjoy lesser but similar positions of power, responsibility and privilege in the military and state. But in light of Varimathras' catastrophic betrayal, and with the increasing centralisation of authority within the Forsaken nation after Cataclysm, it seems reasonable to assume that any such individuals are being kept on a tight leash.

By all means, there might be Forsaken individuals (or even groups of them, or even families) who can exert power through wealth, land ownership, reputation and other forms of influence, but I'm not sure if the government would legally, formally recognise any kind of aristocratic status on these grounds.

EDIT: Rob raises an excellent point, as the Queen's Executors and High Executors appear to also serve as the magistrates and administrators of her lands. Still, I think the evidence suggests that the position of Executor is fundamentally a meritocratic, military position, and that they're each often given responsibility over a specific settlement or territory probably has more to do with how the Forsaken army is organised.
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#38
I mostly like all of this, good work for the team designing the process. One thing really rubs me wrong.

This makes perfect sense:

Quote:Nobles seen being romantically involved with a friendly faction, but still outside their own race, can be subject to ridicule. It may effect IC trade from puritans [a vast majority of NPCs really] as well as harm reputation in the eyes of the other houses. This is not to say it cannot be done, but keep in mind the repercussions of dating outside your characters own race.

This, to me, does not:

Quote:Yes, this means having a human noble date a blood elf puts them at risk of losing nobility. Should it be found that the whole family knew of it and did nothing to stop it, they too will be punished. A characters actions represent the whole family, so keep an eye on those who create characters of relation.

The binary world of the WoW-game is not the Lore World. We live in the Lore World. In the Lore World, bigots (many many bigots) hate other races, totally. And fraternising with the other faction (as in the institutions of the enemy faction) is treason, totally. But in Lore World, you actually can have a couple of Sin'Dorei trading with permission inside of Stormwind, and plenty of "other-faction race" employees about, etc. Valeera comes to mind. Yes, lore figure, but then again, still main example of such, and of the character "Stormwind" reacting to Sin'Dorei.

What I'm saying is that throwing a blanket over any relationship with an "other-faction race", to the extent of implying nobility itself is at risk seems overkill. I empathise with the overkill, since abuse in this area is quite likely and frustrating, but I think a well executed relationship could work, even with the public aware of it. Upset? Pressure against? Boycott? Sure. I just don't see a noble being taken down for having a "turncoat" consort as in line with the lore. I suggest a more case-by-case approach.
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#39
(12-20-2013, 12:31 PM)DaveM Wrote: I mostly like all of this, good work for the team designing the process. One thing really rubs me wrong.

This makes perfect sense:

Quote:Nobles seen being romantically involved with a friendly faction, but still outside their own race, can be subject to ridicule. It may effect IC trade from puritans [a vast majority of NPCs really] as well as harm reputation in the eyes of the other houses. This is not to say it cannot be done, but keep in mind the repercussions of dating outside your characters own race.

This, to me, does not:

Quote:Yes, this means having a human noble date a blood elf puts them at risk of losing nobility. Should it be found that the whole family knew of it and did nothing to stop it, they too will be punished. A characters actions represent the whole family, so keep an eye on those who create characters of relation.

The binary world of the WoW-game is not the Lore World. We live in the Lore World. In the Lore World, bigots (many many bigots) hate other races, totally. And fraternising with the other faction (as in the institutions of the enemy faction) is treason, totally. But in Lore World, you actually can have a couple of Sin'Dorei trading with permission inside of Stormwind, and plenty of "other-faction race" employees about, etc. Valeera comes to mind. Yes, lore figure, but then again, still main example of such, and of the character "Stormwind" reacting to Sin'Dorei.

What I'm saying is that throwing a blanket over any relationship with an "other-faction race", to the extent of implying nobility itself is at risk seems overkill. I empathise with the overkill, since abuse in this area is quite likely and frustrating, but I think a well executed relationship could work, even with the public aware of it. Upset? Pressure against? Boycott? Sure. I just don't see a noble being taken down for having a "turncoat" consort as in line with the lore. I suggest a more case-by-case approach.

This isn't quite right!

You're taking this from the perspective of contemporary times. Warcraft really isn't based in today's society (or today's stability) in any sense at all. Of all the cultures to suggest having inter-factional relationships, Blood Elven is possibly the most suicidal. Nobility even in ordinary medieval society was cutthroat - this is well known, supported by countless anecdotes of houses actually crushing eachother economically for perceived weaknesses (usually a slow economic death, most of the time).

Now, imagine if those houses were also naturally cunning, insidious and intelligent just by nature of birth and upbringing (far, far more than IRL nobility). Now imagine the leader of a house deliberately putting himself into the lion's jaws. At that level of blatant disloyalty, it wouldn't benefit anybody to not take down the house, be it through stifling their coffers, rallying their own people against them or just plain marching to the gate and killing them outright. The Regent-Lord sends a message to any potentially subversive nobles, the other nobility get the defeated nobles' lands and the people are happy that another traitor is dead.

It can be paralleled with human nobles pretty closely, too. I mean, a quest has the player assassinating a high-ranking noble just for working with the Defias - let alone doing the bed dance with a member of another faction (keep in mind that the overwhelming majority of Stormwind's population experienced being chased out of their own homes, all their possessions burned and, in unlucky cases, the loss of most of their family). I imagine human nobility to be less malevolent, but envision the political climate - Varian killed Onyxia a few years ago, nobility are put on a tight leash, the people are madder than ever at nobles for being flippant and spending for themselves while the poor are cast out - now imagine a noble going out of their way to spite their own people by shacking up with an Orc or something, in the face of their entire faction. Lore figures are the exception (and generally very stupid exceptions thanks to Blizzard's amazing writing) - using them as examples for stuff never flies well, and it's the same for this situation

The paradigm is different between nobility and the normal populace - I see absolutely no situation where a noble can just flippantly get away with a relationship of the opposite faction without repercussions. At the very least (and this would be in the event of extremely good conduct, huge political clout, etc) they would slowly lose face among their own people until they start losing peasants and gold just by nature of people not wanting to associate with such a deviant. At the very worst, they'd be summarily executed (and there'd be nothing that says they don't have the right, at that point).

Apologies for the long-winded thingy. This isn't to say, however, that I blanket-disapprove of inter-factional relationships for nobles - it's a unique facet of RP. But if it's not done in secret, I can't imagine the characters in question being able to run through the tulips merrily for long at all. To not be totally contradictory in this post, I've figured a few situations where it could work:
  • Where the noble conducts the relationship in secret (many avenues that could support this, especially as a mage, warlock, etc)
  • The noble relinquishes his/her title for the power of love, flees his lands
  • With less contentious match-ups (Human - Goblin, would be seen as disgusting, but it's actually got a chance here instead of instant curb-stomping)

I suppose my point is 'it's possible, but a lore figure could barely get away with this, let alone your average noble' - but the point with CotH is to be creative. I don't think the regulation is to blanket-deny all inter-factional relationships, as if one with a particular amount of care, crafting and sense comes along I'd approve of it. How I see it, though, is that a lot of these potential relationships would be for novelty value.

In closing - before I accidentally make another paragraph of stupid waffling-rambling junk - I'd like to see people try it properly, but I'm not sure if it can be pulled off. I do want someone to prove me wrong, though!




Move him into the sun—
Gently its touch awoke him once,
At home, whispering of fields half-sown.
Always it woke him, even in France,
Until this morning and this snow.
If anything might rouse him now
The kind old sun will know.

Think how it wakes the seeds,—
Woke, once, the clays of a cold star.
Are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides,
Full-nerved—still warm—too hard to stir?
Was it for this the clay grew tall?
—O what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth’s sleep at all?
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#40
One of my paladins went with someone of the other faction for a while, it was one of the better romance scenarios I've found myself involved in. From the perspective "I must obey the law" to coming to the conclusion that doing the right thing, or what she perceived to be the right thing was more important then the law. It was fun, though she wasn't a noble by any means.

If people go out of their way to far zones, pick places where neutrality rules then noble or not, I see no problem with it. Hearsay isn't solid evidence, eye witnesses can be bought both to claim the law breach or to deny ever seeing a thing. If a noble masks his/herself properly, goes to say Ratchet, to move further into the Barrens for their more secluded meeting under the disguise of a business arrangement or whatever excuse the noble comes up with, it shouldn't be smacked with harsh penalties.

Ratchet, Shattrah, Hearthglen and Booty Bay come to mind right off the bat. There's more places out there, outside of towns and cities as well, far from societies laws and wishes. Just make sure you aren't followed, or, if you feel like involving it in your RP, make sure to take a handful of loyal personal guards (who know better then to speak against their lord/lady) with you and deal with any loose ends. Spying, alternatively following/tracking someone is a dangerous pastime same as a romance with the other faction.
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