Re: [A]The Community of Light - date: December 14th

[Jeanpierre]

I'm taking it's a new order, but I'm interested in seeing them

As for the discussion with Amaryl... I'm feeling the sharp or patronising tones in some arguments will bring us further from a consensus, rather than closer. It's odd, since we seem on far more friendly terms in everything else
But we don't seem to be getting anywhere constructive, nor seem to find any common ground. Let's try to turn that around.

It seems you question the very existence of anything with a rank within this community. While that's a fair opinion, it brings us back to the question that was asked a few months ago. "Do we want a rank system to measure the progression of a character's development?"
(see thread Light community - Setting it up)
The idea was welcomed positively and passed a vote, even. So to me, it seems proposing such a system is answering to a desire from this community. I won't hide, it's also a desire from me. I think I'm the one who asked if such a system could be added.

Of course, it was subject to debate. It seemed the main discussion wasn't whether we wanted it, but how such a system could be implemented. In particular, there was a conflict in views about the authority that could come with such a rank system, much like you expressed in your doubts. It seemed we couldn't escape relating character development with authority.

My original question wasn't designed to give an overall authority based rank system but to deliver an academic path of progression to people who -want- to RP a developing character. That is why my first step in my proposal was to separate the development from any form of authority. I'm not as interested in the authority rules and stuff myself. I'm more interested in the character development. I thought it would be interesting if our community could not only be a discussion board for conflicts but also a meeting point, starting point and evaluation point for practicioners of the Light who seek guidance or who seek ways to enrich their knowledge or views on the Light.

Do you feel any form of such development should be removed from this community entirely?

[Amaryl]

and thirdly, since both you an gahalla missed answering several of my questions:
how do these "ranks and titles" relay to paladins, draeneis, shadowbreakers, worgen?

I guess I didn't answer it because I don't understand the question.

If you are referring to titles such as Confessor, then I don't see how race/class/profession are relevant. The question this system proposes is that the community asks itself whether or not they judge this person valid for the position.
If, on the other hand, you are referring to the progression from neophyte to priest, then... well I don't see how race/class/profession are relevant. Does a Draenei want to be acknowledged as a Priest by this community? Then what would this community ask of such a Draenei to prove his worth?
Does this system prohibit paladins? If you want a paladin development path parallel to this.. Feel invited to make one!

the point is your current "progression ranks" are solely catered to human priests. while it should cater to every single form of light worship.
sure that's a lot of work, but if you want a community of light for every single race and every single different interpretation thereof. your rankings should reflect that. now I'm only seeing priest for the church of the holy light represented.

As for the discussion with Amaryl... I'm feeling the sharp or patronising tones in some arguments will bring us further from a consensus, rather than closer. It's odd, since we seem on far more friendly terms in everything else
But we don't seem to be getting anywhere constructive, nor seem to find any common ground. Let's try to turn that around.

tsk , debates aren't there to hold each-other's hand and say what a great job you did, its about pointing out the flaws in the system and making it better. being sharp or patronising, usually helps cut through the bullshit.

It seems you question the very existence of anything with a rank within this community. While that's a fair opinion, it brings us back to the question that was asked a few months ago. "Do we want a rank system to measure the progression of a character's development?"
(see thread Light community - Setting it up)
The idea was welcomed positively and passed a vote, even. So to me, it seems proposing such a system is answering to a desire from this community. I won't hide, it's also a desire from me. I think I'm the one who asked if such a system could be added.

Of course, it was subject to debate. It seemed the main discussion wasn't whether we wanted it, but how such a system could be implemented. In particular, there was a conflict in views about the authority that could come with such a rank system, much like you expressed in your doubts. It seemed we couldn't escape relating character development with authority.

My original question wasn't designed to give an overall authority based rank system but to deliver an academic path of progression to people who -want- to RP a developing character. That is why my first step in my proposal was to separate the development from any form of authority. I'm not as interested in the authority rules and stuff myself. I'm more interested in the character development. I thought it would be interesting if our community could not only be a discussion board for conflicts but also a meeting point, starting point and evaluation point for practicioners of the Light who seek guidance or who seek ways to enrich their knowledge or views on the Light.

Do you feel any form of such development should be removed from this community entirely?

I do think this community is the perfect platform for new Rpers and unaligned Rpers to find mentors and teachers and that we should cater for that? Yes.

Do i think this is the perfect platform for RPers in training to get guidance, idea's for rituals, tests and the like to further there development, yes.

Do I think its a good idea to have humans judge dreaneis and dwarves or vice versa on merit. anethioneans on other light worshippers and vice versa? No, I don't. since It doesn't make any sense what-soever. (( though ICly i would gladly use/abuse that right )).

Do I think its a good idea to give this community of light any authority what so ever to give out ranks or titles or anything else? No, we're a discussion platform, not a political entity, or we shouldn't be.

Do I like your idea about peer-review so that the community of light can get a certain idea about the 'prowess' of different characters? Yes but why attach a certain value to it with a title?

but once again my biggest gripe at the proposed system is that the CoL shouldn't be a human clergy community it should cater to every form of light worshipping.

[Jeanpierre]

I'm not objecting to this being a platform for Draenei priests/vindicators/prophets either. The question I'm left wondering with that is, are there enough numbers to support it? If there are but 1 or 2 Draenei in this, then it's hard to deem it a central gathering point for religious Draenei RP.
I don't know that many Draenei. And half of them are evil or twisted in some way. Quite the Light blessed population

The second a Draenei requests guidance in his practical development as a Light practitioner, I expect our community to work just as hard on giving him the parenting/teaching/guidance he needs, by Draenei if possible. I don't believe Draenei should be measured by Human standards at all. It just happens the desire for such guidance "in the community" is far greater for Humans than Draenei. If the Draenei want their own measures and what not, then I think many people in the community will be very much interested in following it nearby, and the CoL is an excellent platform for that.

[Amaryl]

I'm not objecting to this being a platform for Draenei priests/vindicators/prophets either. The question I'm left wondering with that is, are there enough numbers to support it? If there are but 1 or 2 Draenei in this, then it's hard to deem it a central gathering point for religious Draenei RP.
I don't know that many Draenei. And half of them are evil or twisted in some way. Quite the Light blessed population

The second a Draenei requests guidance in his practical development as a Light practitioner, I expect our community to work just as hard on giving him the parenting/teaching/guidance he needs, by Draenei if possible. I don't believe Draenei should be measured by Human standards at all. It just happens the desire for such guidance "in the community" is far greater for Humans than Draenei. If the Draenei want their own measures and what not, then I think many people in the community will be very much interested in following it nearby, and the CoL is an excellent platform for that.

And now you come closer to my argument. I understand that the desire for guidance is greater for humans. but the point is that CoL is about -All- the light worshippers and not -Mainly about humans with a bit of sauce on the side" - if ere argus comes they will have their spokeperson in the council for that meeting, likewise with the dwarves. likewise with the worgen.

so why justify making the schism between human priest rankings and we'll work something out if others want to be judged?

this is once again a community for -All- light worshippers.

and it should be treated as such.

i do agree that both people that want mentors and help should be able to approach the council, and they can choose their mentor from all the different forms of light worship that offer it.

i do agree that rpers can show their merit to the council of light without facing a specific judgement. but with added commentary through your Peer-review system.

but I disagree creating the gap between the different forms of light-worship by alienating non church of the holy light worshippers, by a select form of titles and ranks.

[Melnerag]

I know that it is too late to turn everything upside down, but why not simply set out several 'paths' like:
-Evangelism (preaching, missionary work, proselytizing)
-Ritual (masses, weddings, funerals)
-Fortification (healing, fortifying)
-Exorcism (exorcism, purification)
-Attonement (confessions, forgiveness, repentance)
-War (battle-healing, offensive holy magic)
-Inquiry (investigation, truth-finding, cultist-busting)
-Guidance (teaching, counseling)
-Justice (arbitrating, making verdicts)

And instead of giving people ranks, allowing them to prove their competence in any of these paths, or letting them get training from people experienced in these paths.

People get to keep their race/guild specific ranks while still having a degree of community-recognition.

"Mister president, we have a problem. There are demons in keep basement, can you send us somebody who can help?"
"Of course, your grace, we have Shadowbreaker Gunther who has mastered the paths of War and Exorcism, or Anchorite Suuten who has mastered Exorcism and Attonement. Which would you prefer?"

Not to mention paths give greater variation, are race/guild neutral.

[Jeanpierre]

@Amaryl:
In essence, you're saying to scratch the system as a whole. The very concept of progression measurement is broken down. You agree that the CoL could be a good peer review platform for discussing one's development, but any form of measurement is refused.
What is left to peer review?

The town clerk probably isn't interested in how I parked my car, until I start demanding a driver's license. In similar fashion, I don't think the platform can yield RP without any measurement to be tracked.

We could scratch the ranks, sure, according to your view on it. The only problem I'm left with is... The community itself voted "yes".

@Exaythe: replace "Rank" in my post with "Path" and we should have nigh the same proposal. Obviously, I'd agree with that. The Human ranks were supposed to be "one of many" paths.

[Melnerag]

One slight difference JP! You can't have two ranks, but you can be qualified in more than one path.

If CoL ever grows in numbers, and demand for progression increases it could even be possible to add 'steps' to the paths.

[Jeanpierre]

Actually, the acolye->priest was supposed to be one "path", and every other profession was its own path that could run in parallel. Not trying to counter you, but simply wanted to show how close my view lies with yours. Only the acolyte to priest path had steps in it since that was part of the original question.

However, as we have you here now, Exaythe.. Perhaps we could check something far more fundamental. There was a shout out, not so long ago, for the lack of Draenei RP. I could easily say it's an under represented race in our CoL. And apparently, letting the community thrive on the races that are well presented yields heavy debate.

Perhaps there is something the CoL could do to towards the Draenei community? Perhaps we could hold the next meeting in the Exodar and try to get a bigger gathering of Draenei for a change. If the Draenei race is more represented, the RP around it is more likely to thrive (within the CoL, I mean).

[Melnerag]

I think it is worth a shot, for instance we could dedicated next meeting to a quintessentially Draenic topic like building society on the Light? That justifies presence of more Draenei, not necesserally priests, telling how they as non-priests/paladins live in such a society?

And now that you mention it, your system and my suggestion are very much alike. Only real difference is in terminology and form.

While effect and end-results are the same, in your system a novice is congratulated on his rank of Confessor after passing the trials, while under my suggestion he is congratulated on having mastered the path of Attonement after passing the trials. In both cases this guy is recognized as the guy you contact when you need to redeem a villain.

[Jeanpierre]

Quite. And I like the idea of the Draenei focus. I'm not sure if Fortesgue had it in mind so literally, but I do think he meant to emphasise on the different races, in a round robin with the intention of getting them together (and let the RP ensue from it).

Perhaps... It could offer a path that lies in between Amaryl's view and ours. Rather than judging as community who is acknowledged as a vindicator, we could visit the Draenei and have them hold a presentation of their views, their different paths of, say, a vindicator and then we have an open discussion on how we (each guild/race/faction/individual) reflect on that or can relate that to our own views and our own professions within the religious orders.

Rather than defining the paths, it raises the questions and brings up the studies on what paths are currently in existence. It certainly could be a fun promotion for the Draenei (Light) RP.
It pushes the actual discussion of ranks to the side, but it could help towards it;

Oddly enough, this seems like an IC solution to an OOC debate

[Melnerag]

Think that would result in infinite complexity of ranks, or complicated convertion-tables. And then we will also have to visit Arathorians and Anethioneans to discuss their interpretations!

Other than that, the act of doing that discussion is awesome RP.

[Jeanpierre]

Well, the purpose is not to incorporate all those paths into our system! Jeesh that would be murder indeed

But yeah, discussing the different views and interpretations might have a double function. On one hand it is great RP. On the other hand it 'promotes' the different views, allowing people to see what's out there in an IC way.

OOCly it may help bring understanding, which can only be beneficial if we ever are to bring some ideas together.

[Melnerag]

If you want a progression-system in place, we kinda still need something simple and neutral.

Race/faction specific ranks are awesome, cater to all, but are complicated
Paths/Jobranks are neutral, a bit restricting and fairly simple

Some more alternatives:
-Have ranks for position inside CoL, tied to CoL only. "Junior Member, Member, Honored Member" or whatever other names one may come up with.
-Scrap ranks and paths, but have CoL recognize extraordinary individual Achievements and award titles/medals/cerificates. This can start with something fairly simple as (at last) mastering the three virtues, to epic like making the evil Chapter realize their wrongs!

[Amaryl]

@Amaryl:
In essence, you're saying to scratch the system as a whole. The very concept of progression measurement is broken down. You agree that the CoL could be a good peer review platform for discussing one's development, but any form of measurement is refused.
What is left to peer review?

The difference lies in the face that the goal of peer-review is to show your skills in a particular task. discuss how the person in question handled the events and have a debate about why he made certain decisions over others. and that in itself is a testament of Skill, shown towards the entire community of light. Where everyone can make up both its own opinion as well as teach and learn

I see no reason to ratify this with a title specifically created to prove entitlement.

We could scratch the ranks, sure, according to your view on it. The only problem I'm left with is... The community itself voted "yes".

on one meeting there was a yay vote to try and find a way to implement an evaluation based on skill/merit... and even then we couldn't even agree on what would be a good teacher. due to the grave differences between anethion and other forms of light worship that do use the 3 virtues.


That said,

I'm still in favour of some-form of evaluation method of people infront of the CoL meeting.

and in that respect, I prefer Exaythe's idea of Training in certain "paths" and showing your exploits towards the CoL.

without having to have done 3 of this one of that and 4 of thus to be awarded the title of adept in exorcism and then 6 of this 2 of that and 7 of thus to be awarded the title of master in exorcism...

but more along the line: you have shown multiple succesfull actions in exorcism so the community thinks: Hey this guy is pretty devoted to exorcism he's pretty good, why don't i give him a call when i need something done.

or

you want to learn the ways of exorcism? This guy has some experience in that maybe he wants to teach you.



and i like the idea of going from place to place where a specific group has the spotlight for once. i think that was one of the goals of Fort also.

[Gahalla]

Spotlighting the various forms of worship is definantely something we should do. Definantely part of the main purpose of the meeting. And it should always first and foremost be a discussion forum for our participants.

As for the reason the human-centric titles. The thing is... those ranks are actual priest profession. A priest of war? A chaplain. A priest focused on healing and caring for people? A deacon. A priest focused on preaching? A presbyter. A priest specialised in ritual and ceremony? A minister
Those are the actual words for priests doing that. What's so wrong using those? (will address the human sounding part further down)

I absolutely agree that one shouldn't be locked down in one. You should be able to attain several of them. Someone playing as both a confessor and a deacon should be allowed recognition as both.
And I agree with Amaryl in that all that should be required is that the person does that in a good and immersive way.

As for them sounding too human/priest centric. Well it's a bit difficult to avoid since technically it's all we have to compare to and draw inspiration from. Isn't it?
But at the same time. The Worgen have the same titles, don't they? The only dwarven priests I've seen are priests/high priest (the dwarves have in fact the only male high priest npc), so it's not too far off for them either.

As for Paladins... well. Isn't half their progression militarily based? So do the CoL even have anything to say in that? Something to debate for later if this passes a vote perhaps?

As for Draenei... here it becomes tricky. They really only have Vindicators and Anchorites. But the former is the complete armed branch of the draenei society and the latter their community leaders are they not? And isn't the role of an anchorite far beyond the scope of the CoL as a whole? Since they have so much more than a religious role.

As for the vote. I will bring up the vote again, this time a whole lot clearer. Since as Amaryl says... it is a bit unclear what we actually voted through.

---

But again, this is just a formalized recognition-system really. If someone does an aspect of the faith well, this is a form to celebrate and acknowledge that. That is what I see as it's main goal anyways. Titles yes. But earned titles. The reason they're so "human-centric" is because the words are there, available and actually fits very well.

[Melnerag]

Yes, there are huge differences in lore-cultures and imagined cultures. If I am not mistaken, dwarves even got their own player-made holy book with additional virtues.

And chapter Lector is, ironically, closer to draenei Anchorite than normal Church Priest. Since Anchorites and lectors focus on administrational, leading and political duties aside religion.

[Amaryl]

Gahalla the problem isn´t that it `sounds´ human its that the ranks only reflect the views of the church of the holy light, and not every other philosophy, which the CoL should be bringing together.

[Gahalla]

I'm not sure what you mean now...

What other philosophies (I assume Holy Light philosophies)? I thought I managed to take all into account?
Opting for the CotHL-esque titles (allthough I have yet to see a single deacon, minister, presbyter or chaplain in the game) seemed like the neutral alternative. So that all individual denominations (guilds, argent dawn/crusade, scarlets and such) could have their own structures untouched.

[Melnerag]

And you probably have one last issue to consider. People who claim, and most importantly -act- the titles but do not want to be part of the CoL. Will other RPers aknowledge them, or say "You are no priest, CoL did not approve of you!". I think it is something you should be aware of, your impact on wider community that is, and try to prevent such things from day 1

[Drustai]

As for Draenei... here it becomes tricky. They really only have Vindicators and Anchorites. But the former is the complete armed branch of the draenei society and the latter their community leaders are they not? And isn't the role of an anchorite far beyond the scope of the CoL as a whole? Since they have so much more than a religious role.

It's a bit more complex than that. Anchorites are spiritual leaders and can fulfill a community leadership role. Exarchs are war leaders and can be community leaders. Vindicators and Harbingers are the armed branch.

Magisters (not a mage title) and/or Triumvirates are community leaders. But they can be pretty much any class.

[Jeanpierre]

And you probably have one last issue to consider. People who claim, and most importantly -act- the titles but do not want to be part of the CoL. Will other RPers aknowledge them, or say "You are no priest, CoL did not approve of you!". I think it is something you should be aware of, your impact on wider community that is, and try to prevent such things from day 1

It's something I did mention in my proposal. Such RP should -not- be impacted by our CoL. CoL should, at the very least OOCly, try to embrace that as much as a person RP'ing a noob.

[Amaryl]

And you probably have one last issue to consider. People who claim, and most importantly -act- the titles but do not want to be part of the CoL. Will other RPers aknowledge them, or say "You are no priest, CoL did not approve of you!". I think it is something you should be aware of, your impact on wider community that is, and try to prevent such things from day 1

It's something I did mention in my proposal. Such RP should -not- be impacted by our CoL. CoL should, at the very least OOCly, try to embrace that as much as a person RP'ing a noob.

look at that... we agree on something

[Lexgrad]

It will be like the council wont it? If you dont want to rp with the CoL it then dont. I doubt not engaging with the college will harm your RP in any way.

[Amaryl]

No, the idea is that you can rp with CoL without taking an interest in the ranking system, and rp whatever you like to be if you wish it so and you can still be apart of Col. or atleast that should be it.

[Lexgrad]

Meh, once i convert you all to the Words then it wont matter!

Also i thought they where paths not ranks?

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