See below for rules relating to Factions Projects on Seattle by Night.

Faction Projects

For information regarding the Factions, refer here.

Faction Projects are a homebrew system meant to allow characters who are members of a given Faction to have a collective impact on the setting and change it over time. Once a Faction Project is finished, the rules relating to channels on the server might change, or new channels might be created. Faction Projects are also intended to be the most common way to gain Status Points.

Faction Meetings

The first step for any Faction Project is a Faction Meeting. This will be a hybrid of OOC decision-making and IC results to expedite the process of choosing a Project which will take place in the Faction Channel. Players can put forth ideas which will then be voted on OOC. Whatever idea has a majority of support will be pursued by the faction, and during the IC meeting, either the character of the player with the suggestion or a faction SPC can present the project. If the players are unable to reach a majority, STs/faction SPCs will help determine which project will be pursued.

STs will coordinate the calling of Faction Meetings; all Factions will start working on each round of Projects at roughly the same time.

What Can Faction Projects Do?

Currently, factions will be able to Develop their territory. Plans are in the works for adversarial Faction Projects which will allow for Acquiring territory from other factions, or other faction vs. faction objectives, but these will require fine-tuning before they are possible. Please do not suggest adversarial Faction Projects in the meantime.

Some examples of what factions can accomplish to Develop their territory are:
– Creating a new Faction Location
– Adding Amenities to a Faction Location
– Improving Amenities at a Faction Location (i.e., increasing Library rating)
– Adding new areas to a Faction Location, including Faction-Only areas.
– Lowering Hunting difficulties in a faction channel for members of the faction (minimum 3, excludes set Resonance locations).
– Increasing Hunting difficulties in a faction channel for members of other factions (maximum 5, excludes set Resonance locations).
– Protecting Faction territory from SI difficulty increases.
– Granting access to bonuses to Skills when used within Faction territory.

This isn’t an exhaustive list – as long as it impacts channels on the server in some way, an idea may be possible. Faction Projects do not result in Merits in the way that Clan Projects do. They’re meant to change the setting, not character sheets.

At the end of the meeting, there should be a clear goal for the Project, such as Create a Pioneer nightclub Location with a Pioneer-only VIP section or Lower Hunting difficulties in #university-district for Illuminare and allies. Parameters should be defined as best as possible, and STs will do their best to help ensure that the Faction is getting what it wants out of the project.

Faction Project Sign-Ups

Once the Faction Project is decided on, sign-ups will begin. Players will have two resets to sign their character up for the Project. Once sign-ups have ended, existing characters will be unable to participate until the next Project, but newly created characters can join existing Projects at the next reset if they wish.

Faction Project Rolls

Once sign-ups are finished, STs will determine the overall threshold of successes required for the Faction Project to be completed and devise a series of Project Rolls that characters can make. These rolls will be designed to give every character a chance to make progress toward the Project, spanning Physical, Social, and Mental Attributes and Skills. A post will be created in the Faction forum with the Project Rolls.

These rolls will reflect tasks that help complete the Project. Characters can make this roll once per reset in #plz-roll-here as they would normally and write the results in roleplay. Here are some notes on Project Rolls:

– Project Rolls are Attribute + Skill only. Specialties, Merits, Backgrounds and Disciplines that would modify them are not applied, even if they would be RAW.
– When you make a Project Roll, just include “Attribute + Skill [Faction] Project” in the Notes field and nothing more.
– Project Rolls can be Blood Surged and re-rolled with Willpower normally.
– Project Rolls have automatic results for Messy Criticals (the roll is treated as a failure as the Beast thwarts completion of the task in some way) and Bestial Failures (the roll is a failure and also subtracts 1 success from the progress toward finishing the Project). Regular Criticals have no special effect other than to make faster progress on the Project.
– Project rolls can be Teamworked, but the rules for this are a little different than normal. Teamworking a roll still requires that the character have at least 1 dot in the relevant Skill, but instead of rolling the largest pool once, roll for each character involved in the scene with the relevant Teamwork bonus included, up to a maximum of +3. Example: A, B, and C are all working on studying old manuscripts with Intelligence + Academics. Each of them would roll their own Intelligence + Academics +2 for the other two participants.
– Project Rolls must be linked into the Project Roll post in the Faction forum no later than 9pm Server Time (PST) on the last day of each reset. Missing the deadline or forgetting to roll means that the roll won’t be counted for that reset. Managing Projects is going to result in a significant commitment of ST time, so please be as timely as possible.
– Project Rolls can be used to level Attributes and Skills per the homebrew.

Project Rolls will have the following elements:

Narrative: What the roll encapsulates narratively for the sake of referencing in roleplay.
Dice Pools: The combination of Attributes and Skills that can be rolled, including what action the pool reflects.
Difficulty: The number of successes a roll must achieve for its results to be counted toward the completion of the Project.
Channel: The channel where roleplay should be posted. If no channel is specified, it can be posted anywhere in the Faction’s territory.

Each Project will have a specific threshold of successes required for completion, tracked by STs. The requirements will be scaled based on the number of characters signed up for the Project to reflect the organizing efforts needed with more members in addition to its complexity and to balance the larger factions with smaller factions. STs will inform the Faction at reset when the Project is successfully completed.

Status Point Rewards

Participating in Faction Projects is the easiest and most consistent way that a character can advance in Status within their Faction. Status Points will be awarded upon completion of the Project, once tallied by the STs. We ask for patience across the board with this process as we try it out and get used to it. Status Points from Faction Projects may increase or decrease over time if people are gaining Status too quickly or too slowly.

Status Points will be awarded based on how often characters roll rather than the number of successes achieved for the sake of fairness and reducing the stress that might come with failures, Messies, or Bestials. The minimum and maximum Status Points awarded will be close to one another so that players don’t feel required to participate even when they might need to take some time off from roleplay.

Example Faction Project and Rolls

After a meeting, the Illuminare decided they’d like to keep their territory protected from SI difficulty increases caused by Masquerade Breaches.

Narrative: Stop crime before it happens
Traits: Strength + Intimidation (scare criminals off) or Resolve + Awareness (patrol)
Difficulty: 4
Channel: #university-district, #wedgewood

Narrative: Monitor activity in the area
Traits: Stamina + Investigation (patrol) or Intelligence + Technology (tap into surveillance)
Difficulty: 3
Channel: #university-district, #wedgewood

Narrative: Recruit petty criminals and street people as informants
Traits: Manipulation + Persuasion (convince them with smooth words) or Wits + Insight (offer them what they want)
Difficulty: 3
Channel: #university-district

Narrative: Organize the operation
Traits: Charisma + Leadership (deliver assignments) or Intelligence + Academics (develop the strategy)
Difficulty: 3
Channel: #cutters-number-cafe

Narrative: Dig up dirt on police and other officials
Traits: Dexterity + Stealth (getting physical evidence) or Resolve + Technology (getting digital evidence)
Difficulty: 4
Channel: #university-district or #wedgewood for Dexterity + Stealth, Haven or other secure location for Resolve + Technology

Narrative: Employ the dirt against police and other officials
Traits: Wits + Larceny (break in and plant threatening letters) or Manipulation + Intimidation (blackmail and veiled threats)
Difficulty: 3
Channel: #university-district or #wedgewood