This is a Semi-Native RPG

[ifireallymust]

OP's basic point is solid. The fact is, there were many small nations here, instead of huge nation states/empires like in Europe and China, India, and parts of Africa, and like the Maya. North America was tribal prior to European invasion, and Xsyon is tribal. But games like Darkfall are closer to feudal.

[randomt]

So whereas DF and MO and now ER are basically about going around pvp'ing everything you see, with little in the way of PvE.. is Xsyon going to be more along the lines of living in a virtual world, doing your thing, and sometimes you might have to pvp, or is it also going to be a deathmatch arena?

What's the popular verdict on that?

[FabricSoftener]

I think its important for everyone to understand that if he implements all the basic rules of darkfall he should expect the same result as darkfall. some might consider that good others consider it bad but to assume the same rule set but with different results is not insanity, its stupdity.

[Dubanka]

the basic tenets of society since the dawn of recorded history apply.

If you can't protect it, don't build it, lest it be taken away

If you can't protect yourself, join with someone stronger that can

In the end, ideals and ideology are only as strong as the sword that protects them

hoping and praying that the big bad wolf outside your door will go away, is highly unlikely to motivate said wolf to go in search of another meal. Solution: shove a spear down his throat, make a coat, a hat, AND get a big pot of wolf stew for supper.

[ifireallymust]

the basic tenets of society since the dawn of recorded history apply.

If you can't protect it, don't build it, lest it be taken away

If you can't protect yourself, join with someone stronger that can

In the end, ideals and ideology are only as strong as the sword that protects them

hoping and praying that the big bad wolf outside your door will go away, is highly unlikely to motivate said wolf to go in search of another meal. Solution: shove a spear down his throat, make a coat, a hat, AND get a big pot of wolf stew for supper.

Excuse me a moment, my Irish, Scottish, and Welsh ancestors are trolling me for forgetting their tribal societies.


Okay, they're quiet in their graves again.

Fact is, the Native American tribes had no horses, so a lot of the mobility and industry necessary to widespread conquest wasn't there, and Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and for that matter Mongolia are so mountainous, cold, or isolated that long-standing conquest was impossible in those places until technology advanced beyond the knight with his horse and his sword.

In any case, forcing a game to fit Dubanka's (correct) historical summation is not necessarily a good idea, since what kept nation states from rising and spreading in the past are things a game cannot or probably should not incorporate. Real consequences for death is of course the primary one, but there is also terrain, language barriers, and I'm sure other obstacles I'm not thinking of. Without the obstacles to the 'march of history', consolidation and conquest will happen swiftly. Numbers mean everything, and a lot of the players in these games seem to have that 'will to power' personality. It doesn't take much fortune telling skill to know how that will end up. Just look at a different history. The history of ffa, full loot mmos.