Factions of Amia

[Jes]

On Amia, players can freely start IC factions for their characters, whatever their goal may be. This thread includes vital information and rules regarding player factions.

• Factions: General
• Faction Leaders
• New Faction Proposals
• Faction Settings & Controls
• Faction Moderation
• Underdark Drow House Insignias

[Jes]

Factions: General

• Creation: Starting a faction does not require DM permission. At the most basic level, a faction is a group of characters interacting with each other for some common goal. You must ask DMs if you want NPCs to acknowledge or interact with your faction, however.
• Requirements: Factions may have different requirements for membership. Faction leaders decide these requirements ultimately, and they may choose to delegate decisions to other members within their faction.
• Membership Trust: Faction leaders have a responsibility to make sure their chosen new members are trustworthy players. In case the leader has reason to suspect the player abusing information available to him via a faction, or 'metagaming', he or she may choose to not accept this player into the faction.
• Sub-Forums: Factions may be given a forum sub-section for their communication needs when they have established their roleplay on Amia. To receive a sub-section forum, the faction leader must submit a request to be recognized as an official faction.
• Entry to Faction: Faction leaders have the right to refuse entry to any characters/players they choose. The DM Team will not force a faction leader to grant entry to someone. Members can also be removed at the leader's discretion under the same terms.
• Faction Leadership: Faction leaders can be removed at any time, and for any reason, be it IC, OOC, or a combination of both, with a majority vote of the faction's players. The faction leader in question cannot cast a vote.

Definition
Any group of 4 or more characters who band together for a common purpose or vision. Factions may choose whether they want a faction base or not, and whether they want to be housed within a settlement or independently.

Maintenance
Factions will have a gold upkeep cost, determined by the size of their faction area(s). This cost will be less than those of settlements and will grant factions a Faction Rating. The Faction Rating will determine eligibility for module development. (Factions that have no faction area are automatically eligible for module development of a faction base whenever they wish to proceed with it.)

• Note: This is not implemented yet. Keep an ear out for updates regarding when this will be required. For now, just roleplay your hearts out!

Guidelines
Factions will have the following guidelines:

• Factions and their minimum number of four characters must be active for at least three weeks before they will become recognized. (Note: This has been decreased from two months.)
• A player may have only one character who leads a faction. This character may lead more than one faction, however.
• A player may have one character who leads a faction, as well as one other character who participates in settlement leadership. They do not have to be the same character.
• A player with a settlement leader character cannot house their faction within the settlement they oversee, unless the faction leader is also the settlement leader.
• A player may have only one character in any single faction, but may have other characters in other factions.
• Players may formally join factions with up to three characters. This means that a single character may join as many factions as they want to, but this would not be possible for numerous alternate characters. Settlement participation (as a leader or just a citizen) does not count toward this limit. You can help other factions with more characters than this, but you will not be able to join them formally (cannot be placed on a member list and will not be acknowledged by DMs when necessary).
• Factions will have no supported settlement trade resources, regardless of their size or location.
• Faction areas which are left unattended for two months without any word from any faction members may be repurposed by the DM team for plots and events. The faction will also lose faction status and all benefits described below. This means that at least one faction member must maintain a regular presence to keep the area "reserved" for the faction.
• Returning factions finding their areas repurposed must be active again for three weeks before they can reclaim their areas and return to faction status.
• There are a number of areas within the module that are classified as faction areas, but have no player factions attached. These areas are primed for factions to take over. (They will be indicated in-game as determined by the DM Team over the coming weeks.)
• Factions that wish to be elevated to settlement status may submit a request for revision at any time, provided they meet the definition of a Settlement and agree to the new guidelines and benefits (found here). Factions that are housed within a settlement already are not eligible to reach settlement status.

Benefits
A faction receives the following benefits:

• One public or private faction forum, listed independently or within the larger region/settlement where the faction is housed
• A Faction category in the Factions & Settlements Discord server
• Access to a Faction Rating
• Access to module development requests for the faction, as determined by the Faction Rating
• Freedom to decide whether NPC residents are happy, if applicable, and what they may be doing day to day without needing DM input.
• Access to a Faction Insignia
• A portal to the faction base, located in the Faction Room off the Travel Agency

[Jes]

Factions Leaders

There are certain rules and expectations that leaders of recognized factions face. Whether a faction is "recognized" is determined by the Staff after a request is submitted. You can see these guidelines here.

• The leader of the group must be a frequent player. If you're not around a lot, leading a group is probably not the best thing for you. A faction should not wither to death in the absence of an active leader, but get a new one.
• No player can run more than one group at a time with different characters. One player simply cannot fulfill the leading roles of two factions in any satisfactory manner at the same time, and so it is restricted to prevent both conflict of interests and one faction suffering from preferential treatment from any single player. If the two factions would be led by the same character, then that is allowed since it is not splitting time from the leader character.
• The leader must be accessible. You are required to maintain a forum account where people can communicate with you. You must be available to answer DM and player questions about your faction in a timely manner.
• You must roleplay your part as a leader while you are logged in, handle issues that your group members have, and communicate with the DM staff to let them know about events, plans, and problems.
• Some factions require leaders whose builds are suitable for the position: Llothite Matron Mothers must have a final build of 17 cleric levels (though you need not have reached it yet), and leaders of other religious groups or churches are subject to similar expectations. An Arch Druid must be a druid, and so on.
• If your participation wanes over time, or a backlog of complaints are filed, then the DM staff will contact you and let you know about the issues so you have a chance to rectify them. If things do not improve, the DM staff may find a suitable replacement and transition control using a story.

[Jes]

New Faction Proposals

You can submit proposals in the Faction Proposals sub-forum in the Requests section of our forums, or you can copy the form that populates there and send it to a DM instead, if you would rather your proposal is kept private. These proposals will determine whether your faction is recognized by the Team, which can grant your group the following perks:

• A sub-forum within a settlement forum or the Faction Corner, where you can organize your group and have private (or public, if you want) discussions and planning.
• A Discord channel in the Amia Factions discord server, if you want one. Using this makes it easier to coordinate with DMs for oversight requests or official questions.
• A Faction Wand for members, which lets you add or remove members in-game. This gives each member a token they can use to identify themselves as a member of the faction.
• A Faction spawn point in your chosen faction location, when appropriate (sometimes requires building/purchasing a location).
• The opportunity to work toward building or taking over a faction area. Module changes need DM approval and can be posted here.
• Recognized factions generally receive more DM attention and plotline potential as a group because they have established that they are active and want to create RP for others.

Keep these requirements in mind when applying for faction recognition:

• You must have a determined faction leader. Even if you run in a "Council" sort of system, one faction leader is necessary for the sake of a point of contact for the DMs at the very least. This person must be able to meet the requirements listed here.
• You must have been consistently active as a group for at least three weeks for a Discord channel in the Factions of Amia Discord server and for a sub-forum. Faction area module change requests can take place at any time after this.
  • Note: Activity guidelines are less strict for Factions than for Settlements, but Faction areas which are left unattended for two months without any word from any faction members may be repurposed by the DM team for plots and events. This means that at least one faction member must maintain a regular presence to keep the area "reserved" for the faction.
• All members must have followed these guidelines regarding alts.

Running a group is a privilege, not a right. It must not only be earned, but also maintained. If the staff receives enough complaints about your management of a group then we will have a discussion to decide how to proceed. This may result in arranging for a new faction leader, if the problem cannot be fixed.

Sub-forums

• If granted faction sub-forum privileges, group leaders will moderate their sub-forum so they can add and remove their own members. These sub-forums allow groups to synchronize and organize events. These sub-forums will be read by the DMs, and in many cases will receive replies, as well. Factions will not be considered for addition on the forums unless the above steps are completed.

Faction Areas

• This does not automatically include granting of a faction area in the module. Faction areas are to be requested separately, and IF granted, will be built by the current Dev/Design team. Player-submitted faction areas will not be integrated into the server. However, if granted a faction area, the Dev/Design team will reasonably work with the faction as far as trying to implement the faction's ideas/goals for said faction area. Once an area's rough design is decided upon, a material cost will be calculated to be given to the faction, so that they can go about collecting materials to have their area constructed. These will not likely be exactly what you may have built for explaining what you're going for, as Dev time is often reliant on inspiration. We make an effort to make it close, but don't be surprised if it's not exact.

Activity

• To reiterate from the above list of requirements: both a faction sub-forum and a faction area require steady contribution and activity for three weeks before being granted. There is no additional time beyond this required for module change requests related to the building/acquisition of a faction area, but these do require DM oversight/approval. This may be flexible if the group is especially active, or if there are special circumstances.

[Jes]

Faction Settings & Controls

How to control your faction

First, UCP. UCP, otherwise known as the User Control Panel, is your place of call to moderate the groups your leader of. To access this page in the UCP, you must click the left menu link known as "Usergroups". When doing this you'll find yourself on a page with a list of the groups your apart of. First things you should note are that each faction has two groups, those being your primary faction list, and your moderators list. Your moderator group is the group your apart of as the faction "owner", it also lets you appoint moderators to your faction. That will be explained later. For now, take note of the left menu again.

Edit Memberships
This page is actually a little confusing to anyone reading the title. It doesn't actually let you edit the membership of your group. Rather, this page lets you apply to join a group, resign a group, or demote it. Quite frankly you should ignore this page and its options, as doing any of this should theoretically require informing the DM team of the factions demise, and from there it will be handled by the DM team. So this page is pretty useless to you unless you wish to check out a faction’s membership by clicking a faction link. Doing so will show you the membership of any faction who has their group type set to "open" or "request". It will also show the membership of the faction you are currently a part of.

Manage Groups
You'll see in the left menu a link called "Manage groups.". Clicking this will take you to a page that shows your groups again. But this time, on the right side of each name will be the choices of edit, and options. Edit will take you to a page that contains the faction's optional details, mostly name and description, but also a few other selections that will be detailed in the Edit Faction Options section. Click Manage Users will take you to a page that will allow you to essentially add and remove users to the group.

Edit Faction Options
Clicking edit faction options will bring up a window with a bunch of information. Here's a list of what each does:

• Group name: Name of the faction.
  Group description: Description that appears for each faction. Example: The Anti-Bird Brigade is an Earth Genasai only faction dedicated to the eradication of all flying creatures
  Group type: Open, Request, Closed & Hidden are the types you can choose.
  • Open lets anyone join your faction, and see inside the forums. It also lets everyone see your membership.
    Request makes people request to join, but they can still see your membership list.
    Closed won't let anyone in except via invite, and you can still see the membership list.
    Hidden hides the group from people, and hides the membership list.
  Group colour: Just changes the colour of members usernames. So want your group to all have red usernames when posting? Then change it to red. Only really useful for making the owner and mods stands out, or if your group type is set to open.
  Group rank: Touch this and die. Simple. Basically you’re not allowed to change your group rank, and why this is even an option is beyond me.
  Current image: Image used for your group. So have a group devote to Shar? Put an emblem in for that group here, maybe a dagger over a purple/black circle.
  Avatar dimensions: Just what it says, the size of your avatar.

Manage Users

Okay, this is the all important window you'll spend most of your time in when doing faction leader stuff. Here you can add users, remove them, accept them and deny them. Basically this is your control window.

• Adding a User
  To add a user is actually very simple. Simply type in the blank box at the bottom under "Add User" the name of the user you want. Commas separate the names, so you can put more than one name into the box. Make sure the name is spelt right, and is the user's forum name. Putting in their NWN account name will not invite them if their username on the forum is different. Click submit, and they will be added.
  
  Below the box is the find user link. Click that to find a user on the forum if you can't quite spell the name right. Put an asterisk at the end of the name to do a wildcard search. Lots of other details you can search here, all pretty self explanatory.
  
  Deleting a User
  Select the circle beside the user you want to delete. Select the option at the bottom of the list, before the add user box, select "Remove Member from Group", then click submit. Bam! the little plonker is gone.
  
  Approving a User
  Only useful if your group is set to request. If someone requests to join your faction, they will appear here. Simply do the same as deleting a user, except when you select an option, change it to "Approve Member", and then click submit.

[Jes]

Faction Forum Moderation

Moderating your Forum

What's a Moderator?
A moderator helps maintain the threads in your faction forum. He/she has no control over who is added to your group, who's deleted, or the faction’s preferences. What the moderator can do is merge topics, delete them, and lock them. They can assign stickies and such. Think of a moderator like your secretary, they do all the paperwork.

Why should I assign someone as a Moderator?
This is a good idea simply because if the owner goes on an extended hiatus, the faction forum can still be run by someone. Even if that person never does any moderator work up until that point, it will mean there is at least one person who is able to deal with the day to day paperwork. It's probably also going to be the person that the DM team is likely to make temporary leader of a faction till the leader gets back, simply because they know what they are doing. It's good practice to set your factions second-in-command as Moderator. If you prefer to keep the Moderating to the Faction Leader, however, that's fine. This is just a suggestion.

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Edit Commands
When you edit a post or make a new post, on your faction forum, you'll notice that some of the boxes below have appeared. The main ones you need to be aware of are Lock Topic and Lock Post. Lock topic does exactly what it says. It locks the topic so nobody can post in it again except a moderator or owner. Lock Post does the same thing, but only to a post. Which is useful if you want to take control of another users topic without stopping replying. Clicking either of these boxes before clicking submit will put it into effect.

Moderator Control Panel
At the bottom of your page when you open up your faction for the first time is a link saying "Moderator Control Panel". Clicking this link will take you into a window with a HEAP of information. A gigantic list of threads will be on the right, and a few extra options will be on the left.

• Main
  Main page, shows all the threads that are in your faction forum. Here you can select the threads you want and do what you wish with them. Its the easiest way to merge threads, or delete them. Basically select the box on the side, then go down to the options toolbar, and select the option you wish to take.

• Merging
  This can be a little tricky, so here's how to merge. Merging is done by clicking two or more threads you wish to merge, then selecting merge from the options. Click submit, and a new page will load up. Above the threads you have not select previous, you'll see a link saying "Select to Merge". Clicking this will pick this thread to be merged with the others. If I remember correctly, the one you pick here will be the one that is still showing after the merge.

• Move
  This will not be needed, since faction forums do not have sub-forums.

There will also be a bunch of other options on the left side of the screen. Again, these are not required, as Amia doesn't really use them for moderating faction groups. If for some reason you think it's essential you know how these are done, say in the odd situation that a player is put in charge of moderating an open forum, please contact a member of the DM team for instructions.

[Jes]

Underdark Drow House Insignias

Underdark-Only Drow House Insignia Powers List

Established/Recognized Underdark drow House factions may request a Drow House Insignia for their faction item. Drow House Insignias may have one power from each of the 3 groups below (uses per day and caster levels noted for each option) on their House Insignia item.

Minor Insignia Powers
Choose one of the following:

• 1. Mage Armor 3x/day CL 2
  2. See Invisibility 3x/day CL 3
  3. Web unlimited/day CL 3
  4. Shield 2x/day CL 5
  5. Ghostly Visage 2x/day CL 9
  6. Displacement 5x/day CL 9
  7. Prismatic Spray 1x/day CL 19

Intermediate Insignia Powers
Choose one of the following:

• 1. Hold Person 3x/day CL 3
  2. Knock 3x/day CL 3
  3. Darkfire 3x/day CL 5
  4. Ultravision 3x/day CL 6
  5. Charm Person 3x/day CL 10
  6. Animate Dead 1x/day CL 15
  7. Ethereal Visage 1x/day CL 15

Major Insignia Powers
Choose one of the following:

• 1. Improved Invisibility 1x/day CL 7
  2. Summon Monster IV 3x/day CL 7 (includes free summon reskin for House-specific flavor)
  3. Protection from Elements 2x/day CL 10
  4. Charm Monster 5x/day CL 10
  5. Elemental Shield 1x/day CL 12
  6. Greater Dispelling 2x/day CL 15
  7. Control Undead 1x/day CL 20

Rules

• 1. Drow House Insignia are to be given only to members of the House which that insignia represents. If, after receiving an insignia, a character chooses to leave that House, it is up to remaining House members to retrieve the insignia from the ex-member.
  2. Every insignia for a given House will have the same exact powers as all other insignia from the same House.
  3. If option 2 under the Major powers is selected:
  • a. Each member who receives an insignia of that House will receive the same reskin for the summon, but may choose a slightly smaller/larger version (at the faction leader's/DM discretion) to provide a bit of diversity between House members.
    b. If, as in rule 1, a member chooses to leave the House at any point after receiving a House insignia, any associated reskin will be taken away upon said insignia being returned/taken back by the House.