Belariath

Good idea generally but as we see occasionally, they stand and fall by the presence of the noble. As this can affect quite a lot of players who have characters employed by the House and long-term storylines which don't require the presence of a specific character noble, having one go awol can upset a lot of others.

To avoid this happening again, with immediate effect, noble houses will be considered as either fiefdoms or provinces within the structure of the game. Each will have either a valid or a spurious responsibility for some sector of the empire.

THIS WILL HAVE NO DETRIMENTAL EFFECT ON EXISTING HOUSES

The base premise is quite simple. The empire operates on feudal lines already. Specific areas including Valencia, the North East, Thallis, the Southern lands and Nanthalion will be provinces or the equivalent. Other noble houses will be fiefdoms of some area, normally off-map. Nobles are 'appointed' to these areas though they may well spend most time in Nath to be close to the court life. This is also how a noble acquires the funds to run a household - by the local peasants paying for the 'benefits' of his/her presence. Nobles may also be appointed to special positions of responsibility which require them to have a staff.

Again, this will have no practical effect on existing Houses unless a noble wishes to incorporate their house into other aspects. Nobles of existing Houses will be given full support to keep running their Houses as they wish with only a minor adjustment to imply they were appointed at some time in the past.

In all cases though, if the noble poofs, the house will continue and a new noble will be appointed to rule it, by and on behalf of the emperor. Those on the payroll will have the ability to remain there and so continue storylines with maybe just minor modifications, rather than having to abandon them when a house is dissolved due to a lack of leadership.

Further details may emerge once Dev have finished burning my effigy for giving them even more work

This is GREAT news to me in regards to House Kathahles.. thank you so much, SB!

Very glad to see this and thank you SB.

This is awesome, just read it after posting a looking for work which I deleted. This will keep a long story-line kept in tact.

I really like this idea, and I hope that this also gives an opportunity for others to step into noble positions. One of the reasons I say this, is that I have hopes IC wise that Boannan will be able to build herself up within the Empire, to a position of nobility. In fact, when you have time, I would love to speak to you about the ideas for this, and see if there is anything I can do IC or OOC wise to help.

1. Don't hold your breath

2. Be prepared to wait about 5 years

3. Those who do the most without looking beyond wanting to help others instead of to gain recognition for themselves are the ones who the Ops (who see all and say little (well apart from Takao but he's exempt on the grounds of being drunk)) notice and remember

4. Those who just want to run their own events and get attention and are a little too self-seeking also get noticed and remembered

These can be read generally not specifically aimed at any one person. We do notice those who jump in to help newcomers, are always ready to help others run events, initiate roleplay just for the fun of it, without counting how much they get back in return. That's enough clues. SOme people do it naturally because of who they are. Some don't.

nice to see some thing good come of this