Board Thread:News and Announcements/@comment-37190983-20190311171558/@comment-68.2.211.33-20190712020904

2001:16B8:5759:FE00:C96F:A3A3:9DB9:4F75 wrote: Also, with the help of commands you can turn them to neutral to each other or whatever you want. Then you can have both as lovers. Also, getting angry about a feature that makes the mod coming more and more alive seems very.. stupid. Its a lotr mod. Of course Mordor and Gondor should hate each other. And of course you have to decide between those two strong opponents. As if in "RL", like if you lived in Middle Earth for real, why would they let you be best friend with the faction they hate to death. Seems silly. Also, just download 34.3 if you don't like it at all. Have you never known an individual who gets along with two people that dislike one another? Israel gets along with both the US and China. Getting along with two enemies is realistic, though a difficult balance to maintain. What's not realistic is that factions are omniscient and every member of a faction automatically knows who any given individual's friends and enemies are, so don't pull out the BS realistic card here. Simplistic faction mechanics are not at all realistic to begin with while being friends with two enemies is not at all unrealistic.

The biggest problem with the change with regard to "neutral" players is that it is vindictively punitive. If, for instance, a formerly neutral player with positive faction with both Mordor and Gondor pledges themself to one or the other, their faction standing with their chosen side will go down until the oppositional side gets to zero. A position that took no little effort to establish has suddenly become a liability due to a capricious design decision. This can be fixed by editing save files, but not many players have the wherewithal to do that.

A more reasonable design decision in light of the legacy would be to simply reduce the lower of the two factions at double the current rate or to recognize the pledged and allied factions and only reduce the oppositional factions at double the rate. This allows the formerly neutral player a chance to not have all of their faction standings get pulled down at once and retains the need to keep one's hands clean and continuously make nice with the faction the player has "infiltrated" and is directing NPC raids against.