A couple of the guys told me on IRC that it's too early for this stuff, but I disagree. Since Josh recently just stated that factions are currently in heavy flux, I'm just going to throw some ideas out there. These aren't necessarily recommendations, just considerations of how things could work. Wherever possible I'm going to be specific. These are in no particular order.
Startup mechanics
Starting a faction should be pretty simple; all that's needed is a name. You can call your faction anything you like and then start operating underneath it (i.e. you turn up to a station owned by another faction and just start using the new faction name). If you want you should be able to put out a recruitment invitation for people to apply, as below.
Joining mechanics
I reckon there should be two ways of joining an existing faction.
- By application
- By invitation
Joining criteria
Joining criteria would need to be a set of rules that can be set by the faction leader. These would be optional, but include:
- Joining fee
- Standing with the faction
- Standing with allies
- The ability of the ship you're flying/fleet you command
- Accomplish a mission
- ?
Once you're a member, a new set of criteria are applied in order for you to stay a member. These include (once again, optional and set by the faction leader):
- Yearly fee
- Sharing tech ordinance
- Sharing maps ordinance
- An obligation to help other members of the faction if they are being attacked
- Obligation to complete n missions per time period
- ?
Membership benefits
Pretty much the membership criteria above, but applied to you. Possibly a profit sharing option... not sure about this one, could depend on seniority (see below).
Projects/operations
For the things that the factions does I think Josh should just use what he's already figured out for projects and metaprojects. I'm sure this is his intention in any case. These would also not be predefined, but would essentially centre around:
- Mining and refining
- Policing
- Military
- Infrastructure
- Manufacturing
Factions don't have predefined structures; they're simply groups of people with associated projects/metaprojects. Clearly however there is always a leader that makes the calls, s/he's the top of the pyramid in call cases. When the faction is small, the leader will run all the projects, but when the faction gets larger then the leader can appoint members of the faction to run projects. At that point, the project manager gets approval to appoint his own sub-commands. I'm not sure if the player should be able to be appointed by a NPC faction leader as a project/operation manager; I just don't know how feasible it is.
Faction seniority
It strikes me that members of the faction that have been around for a long time should get recognised as such. The benefits of seniority would be lessening in the membership criteria and perhaps some form of profit sharing? More thoughts welcome.
I reckon something like this would allow a large degree of emergent gameplay but remain manageable. In my head I see this being another screen similar to Projects (i.e. Faction management) that gives access to all factions you're a member of and all factions you control.
That'll do as a start; flame on.