Returning Player - State of Factions?

Ostrich

Hello Starmourn! Been a while. I've been thinking about coming back to the game but had a question regarding the factions in game. The game was set up to give the factions reason to have conflict with each other. The general attitude of the player base at the time I left was lol nah. We just wanna fly our space ships and sing in rock bands. Good things! But give me conflict!

Second was the factions were still forming identities. Have those taken shape? Is there still slavery in Song? Does Celestine still rely on lifts where everywhere else has faster travel? Inquiring minds want to know! Everything else I've missed I can learn IC, but I'm curious as to the state of conflict and of the three factions. Are there still 3? lol. I have no idea.

Thanks in advance!

Squeakums

Welcome back! This is an amazing time to return.

All three factions have lots of activity lately, which is great. It's cool to check COSMPIERCER MAP and see four colors almost equally spread around (three usual factions plus one for Ishvana, which takes over some CP over time).

I haven't seen too much action on caches, but I may have just missed them by chance. There are a fair number of people who PvP in every faction. If you meant more the RP side of conflict, there isn't currently any big war of any kind to my knowledge, but that doesn't mean that there isn't an opportunity to get things heated up between factions for whatever reason.

Celestine used to be the smallest for a really long time, but there's been a huge influx of players and interest and now it's doing great. No matter what faction you prefer, you'll have a good time and cool people to meet.

Jaidyn

Agree totally with the previous post. Cosmpiercers are currently the biggest faction on faction stuff. And about every week to every other week there's some sort of fight either on the piercer or in space surrounding them.

CA has better map management! Yay!

Overall though I think the faction competition is more like "we can do better at getting more rewards or accolades than you" as opposed to "go rot and die you swine". Heh. Either way, content is coming out at a really fun clip and it's a great time to come back!

Cubey

CA is very active nowadays. Like, I just logged in to check updates and over 50% players online were from CA. That almost never happened in the past, now it's a regular occurence.

Faction identities seem to have crystallized pretty solidly. CA is the stonks/enterprise mixed with the generic good guy "we care" faction, Song is same authoritarian business as usual (didn't have a Lord Commander change in literal years), SH's anything goes attitude resulted in most activity centered around a few large dynasties/corporations owned by active and enterprising players. Which frankly is what happens in unchecked anarchy states like SH.

There isn't really any open conflict and frankly I wouldn't expect any, ever. Raids on each other's capitals, PvPers fighting each other in the open? That's just not happening and if you ask me, good. Cosmpiercers are very active but I'm not sure if any actual pvp is involved, since there's plenty of unclaimed ones still. PvP arena events are alive and well, though meta shifted recently due to massive balance changes for each class.

Ostrich

Cubey said:

There isn't really any open conflict and frankly I wouldn't expect any, ever. Raids on each other's capitals, PvPers fighting each other in the open? That's just not happening and if you ask me, good. Cosmpiercers are very active but I'm not sure if any actual pvp is involved, since there's plenty of unclaimed ones still. PvP arena events are alive and well, though meta shifted recently due to massive balance changes for each class.

Idealogical conflict that spurs on other conflict is what I'm looking for. So this is disappointing.

Ostrich

Squeakums said:

I haven't seen too much action on caches, but I may have just missed them by chance. There are a fair number of people who PvP in every faction. If you meant more the RP side of conflict, there isn't currently any big war of any kind to my knowledge, but that doesn't mean that there isn't an opportunity to get things heated up between factions for whatever reason.

In the absence of interfactional conflict, and RP is my favorite of that, what spurs on character growth?

Also, thanks everyone for the replies so far! It is appreciated.

Steve

I think now's a good time to get into the game if you want to push people and factions towards fighting over the systems we have, but probably not a good time if you want to jump into an active PVP scene. So if you want to develop RP around conflict, that might be cool, but it also might mean you, as a player, arrive and the party hasn't started yet, so to speak.

CA has finally rebuilt but is still blossoming; many newer players. Song's been hanging out ready for whatever for a long while (and is doing organized PVP content weekly, but I hear there's not much actual fighting). SH is in the middle with a mix of older and newer players.

Zoe

Regarding the lack of open interfactional warfare, I'm going to say that it's not only a (very) good thing, but it doesn't signify a lack of interfactional conflict or personal character growth. In my opinion, constant open warfare as is typical in many other games is in fact detrimental to nuanced conflict and character growth. Characters in those situations too often become two-dimensional zealots, either in reality or in the perception of their opponents which is, to me, incredibly boring. I think that one of Starmourn's biggest strengths, both in mechanics and RP, is the abundance of alternative forms of conflict. I love being able, as one of the current leaders of CA, to go to another faction's territory to watch a concert and have everything be tense under veil of etiquette. 

aesan

“I love being able, as one of the current leaders of CA, to go to another faction's territory to watch a concert and have everything be tense under veil of etiquette.”

Tense how? If there is no open factional conflict (there is literally no conflict whatsoever imo) how could things be “tense under veil of ettiquette” I get if the music is tense and crazy or something. Literally not a shot across the bow, just wondering how this is being percieved.

Also to the OP did you ever come around and play or did you veer off?

Ostrich

aesan said:

“I love being able, as one of the current leaders of CA, to go to another faction's territory to watch a concert and have everything be tense under veil of etiquette.”

Tense how? If there is no open factional conflict (there is literally no conflict whatsoever imo) how could things be “tense under veil of ettiquette” I get if the music is tense and crazy or something. Literally not a shot across the bow, just wondering how this is being percieved.

Also to the OP did you ever come around and play or did you veer off?

Took a bit but I'm here.