View source for Knights Become House

I'd like to change the Knights from a group of Enaerai followers to a general 'Knights of Balance' house.  Some reasons:

* The group has become a pretty stable fixture in Avendar over the last couple of years, and I think the Enaerai-group to balance-house leap isn't a far one. Enough people have liked the concept and found it playable (even if others have a hard time with it) that it is basically a house just waiting to happen. They have a house-like area, a full organization and a history behind them, but have lacked useful and basic features like the house chat and notes to house.

* The original "we aren't into the house thing, we just want RP" focus hasn't really proved that significant or meaningful, ultimately.  With all of the development the knights have had, more and more players view it as an unofficial house rather than the original concept of a player-led RP group--and I and other imms have as well.

* Changing their duty from the "align/ethos balancing" to balancing stones of power would put them in the same ball-game as the houses, and remove some of conceptual problems/confusion that people have had with the knights (though any Enaerai followers among the knights would presumably still be concerned about align/ethos balance, it wouldn't need to be a general knight thing persay).

* I'd rather give Enaerai sigils to only the deserving, rather than having it serve as the mark and prog-carrier for all knights, and turning it over to players to pass out.  

* There are a lot of ways that dedicants to neutrality could be played, and this gives more options--and doesn't limit neutrals to Enaerai philosophy/zealotry.


How would knights work with the stones and try to balance them out?  Here is one approach that could be taken:

They'd be rewarded with greater power for better distribution of the stones.  For fairness, some of the stones would need to be in the knights vault for them to access powers (and give raiding incentive for other houses).  They would only want 1-2, though, as they'd loose access to higher powers by having more.


 Stones together         Power knights      
 in any house vault      can access
 2                       5th (strongest)
 3                       4th
 4                       3rd
 5                       2nd
 6                       1st (weakest)
 7+                      none 


Ideas for powers:

1st: Weight of Power: gives the location of the Stones of Power.  If held by a character, gives the room name of the character also.

2nd: Brand of the Scale: weapon enchantment, weapon does x1.25 damage if non-neutral in align or ethos, x1.5 if non-neutral in both align and ethos.

3rd: Mind of Equilibrium: cast during combat only, adds the knight's and opponents current mana, then gives each half.

4th: Arm of Equilibrium: cast during combat only, same as mind but with hp

5th: Reveal Soul: shows character's alignment, ethos, and perhaps BG (unless a certain bitnumber is flipped, which Gods could use to protect their secret servants).


Your responses below, please! -Dov

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* I like this idea a lot. It's an innovative use of the stones, and helps to make them more easily balance-able. --Yendri

* [ARKHURAL] I think most of the reasons are good.  However, I think some more explanation needs to be done before this really happens.  Here are my questions:
** Why does "balanced" only mean that the Stones are evenly distributed?  Why not just have them tossed around in the world, giving power to no one?  Better yet, why don't they just keep it themselves and just not draw power, so they can be sure that no one is overwhelmingly powerful?
** I thought this was the Order of Enaerai?  How is this conceptually distinct from the people that actually follow Enaerai?  I could see Knights that maybe weren't dedicated enough to be sigiled, but they should nominally still believe in all of the same things as your followers.
** The first power seems kind of weak.  Most scholars can do it already, no? 

* [Dov] Re: Arkhural: 
** "Tossed around the world" doesn't seem feasible to me, really, as it is so easy for anyone to go pick up the stones.  It would be nigh impossible to try and maintain that state--can be hard enough to keep things in vaults, at times.  Storing the stones and not drawing power might be an approach some knights would want to take, and may work for them in some situations.  I think it should be an alternative, rather than the main goal though (as the 'evening the stones' is so much nicer thematically).
**I suggest that the Knights of Balance be much more general balance/neutrality adherents.  Enaerai has a particular concept of balance (the absolute mandate to maintaining equal amounts of the polar opposites, esp good/evil and law/chaos).  I'm assuming that Knights of Balance would be for anyone who is dedicated to neutrality is some way, not necessarily in the zealous Enaerai way, and not necessarily be mandated to impose their concept on everyone else.  For example, a Knight of Balance character might focuse on the balance of nature, in balanced personal virtues and behavior, in the balance of life vs. death, in mind vs. matter, solely in good vs. evil, etc, and do so without a mandate to impose their concept as the Knights of Enaerai have done.  I imagine the Knights of Balance would have a much more philosophical, less militant bent than the Enaerains have had--perhaps "Knights" wouldn't be the best term for such a house.


*[Iand0r]
1.5x damage to most players as their 2nd lowest power seems kind of abusive.

I do think Knights should be a regular house though, as long as we have an imm around as their patron.