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Thread: Direction of Neutrals

  1. #1

    Direction of Neutrals

    I'm getting a little confused over the direction we are heading into with Neutrals. Over the years the Neuts have evolved from what was orginally planned at launch and have turned into their own faction, which is great since this is an evolving storyline which is partly driven by player action.

    We've seen great additions for Neutrals which have further increased their standing as an independant faction:

    Newland City Council
    Neutral faction ID cards
    Neutral STs/LTCs who have chosen to become Neutral.
    The JOBE scientists who chose to leave Omni-Tek and become Neutral.
    Neutral faction representative
    etc etc.

    However, recent discussions regarding Neutrals and their lack of represenation in the NPE lead to Genele saying how Funcom decided to stop treating Neutrals as a faction years ago, and apparently it isn't a choice even when the story itself proves it can be. Going from what Nina said here it seems that we are furthering the Neutrals position; which is great - but to me contradicts what Genele has been saying.

    Personally, i'm all for furthering the Neuts and their position as a faction and think the ideas Nina mentioned are brilliant - but what are we doing in a strict storyline sense? Moving away from Neuts being a faction or furthering it?
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  2. #2
    It helps not to think of neutrals as a collective of people who share similar goals, because unlike Omni-Tek or the Clans this isn't the case.

    Think of the neutrals more like an independent, where each "neutral" merely takes the official stance of indifference to the war for whatever purpose they deem fit. Some neutrals are just that - neutrals - who just want to farm and live a peaceful life. Some of them are mercenaries and traders seeking the benefit of trade for both sides. Some are visitors from other corporations, which are tagged as "neutral" as they neither belong in OT or with the Clans. Some neutrals collected and managed to gain a legitimate government, like Newland.

    It's impossible to cover it all though, as most neutrals are unique and all have their own agendas, but for the sake of sanity it helps to roughly class them all under the "neutral" bracket and try to represent as many facets of "neutrality" as possible.

    So, no, neutrals are not a faction (they don't fly under one banner at all), but they are a sort of... general classification for those that don't fit in the two main factions (and I've always thought "neutral" was a rubbish name for that).

    I don't know the precise opinion of the devs and ARK but that's been the stance I've tried to convey, and hopefully once things are worked out, different facets of neutrality will be highlighted rather than all the eggs in the Newland council, like Ninanna mentioned.
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  3. #3
    So.. What exactly will happen to the NLCC with these changes?

  4. #4
    'Citizens' would be a better way of describing them.
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  5. #5
    I'm not sure I can jive with what's been said. A lot has been taken out of context. Not only that, but there is a serious issue with how people approach the system in Binary terms.

    Omni-tek is not always a single entity, and never has been. There are factions within Omni-tek that can be considered sinister, but not the whole of it. Even as an outside this has always been apparent to me, despite my IC inclination to believe that all of Omni-tek is evil. It's really not. Its a generalization. I'm not completely up on the inner workings of that, but it was through the entire Tarkhan Zora device that galvanized Omni-tek to xenophobia. Ross and all previous leaders of OTRK had varying ideas and lengths about how to deal with clanners. So taking a step back away from that, we can clearly see only during certain regimes has it ever been that they are out to eradicate everything that isn't Omni-tek. Its not even philosophically viable to think that, nor is it even an attribute off a sane mind.

    Clans are likely the best example of how independent nations while share similar goals, do not always have a sense of how to reach those goals together. Despite some similarities, there are quite a few disparate notions on how to achieve common ground. Being on the inside has given me the long term vision of this. The Council of Truth seemed to me more like an entity to help the Clans sort of come together to help us find the path to teamwork, but serves to only bring a singular example of how that's being accomplished. Therefore I'm not inclined to agree that all the Clans are united under a single common purpose. Freedom is the problematic generalization here. If you were to state its Freedom from Omni-tek, then that's not entirely true either. Simon Silverstone is a prime example of how a functional despot can thrive under the Clan banner. And there are plenty of Legacy clans that actively work with and beside Omni-tek representatives. So, the clan sense of Freedom has the potential to be very muddy in certain spotlights.

    Neutrals seem to be more like the Clans, but instead of gravitating toward groups like the previous two have, that Neutrals are more similarly aligned towards their particular city-states. The largest examples being Borealis, and Newland. And even then, there is a spectrum of dissimilarity there as well, as any one particular person could be leaning politically towards Omni-tek, Clans, or the ICC. The ICC is also stated as neutral, but does not seem to be particularly aligned with the various other Neutral City states.

    I agree with Agrestus, the word 'Neutral' just seems to really generalize and not convey how individual each 'Neutral' person may be. But, I've never been a big fan of how near impossible it is to remove the stigma of how binary things are approached in terms of RP.

    The stereotypes really kill it for me, and the longer I went on playing different characters the more pronounced the stereotypes are husbanded, whether through action, inaction, proxy, or just using the stereotypes to validate certain attitudes to take advantage of ambiguity, which carries a level of dissonance that makes it impossible to roleplay with certain people.

    Take this perception, and then apply it all the structure its been played up to be. Then add in the different directions its taken by anyone who was qualified to take up the banner. Before you know it, the spirit of the thing has evolved so much we have no idea what the whole of it was designed to be. We only have opinions, and no access to the canonical measure it started with.

    But I'm past waiting for any particular change to take place. This is something Pants and I both struggled with our entire time playing and roleplaying in this particular universe. I'm of the opinion no one has any real answers, or those that do aren't going to discuss them outside of the binary platform.
    Last edited by Towerblock; Aug 14th, 2014 at 17:51:29.
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  6. #6
    My personal feelings on this matter are well expressed with what Agrestus said. I don't have any over all answer to what ever Funcom had in mind. I really dont know. It changed with the change of people mouthing it, and often with no apparent regard for the realities of what was actually going on in game. IC or OOC.

    As far as what will happen to the NLCC? I dont know, that like the other meetings is up to player initiative and directive. Mayor Toog King is still around, as is General Hekkat. Obviously a few of the old ministers are still around, and consider themselfs active. I could see those ministers or even Mayor King, being part of what ever this future neutral United Neutrals Council.. or what ever you want to call it to be (and PLEASE we are open to ideas and suggestions). But I do not see those people being the sole platform for all or any of what is neutral. I dont see the ICC being that either. But the ICC seems to be (IMHO) a better focus for a general neutral interest meeting.

    What will come of all this? I dont know. We are trying to setup potentials, and situations/characters to help support some kind of initiative. I am not at all certain what Funcom's official position would be, or even that of ARK. I am mearly the LTC Coordinator in Events. And I can at best put forth my own personal take on this. Which seems to be mirrored by Agrestus at this point.

    Over all I am glad to see the discourse. But I do not want to see us stuck into the same situations that caused so much frustration and burn out in the past. There is a lot of potential, and ideas out there.
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