CLOK BBS

This thread is for comments I've noticed or been informed of from ESP/CHAT that I'd like to clear the record on. Feel free to open additional threads for further discussion on any subjects raised here - I'm locking this thread to keep it tidy as I'll likely be adding to it fairly often and don't want to make people have to sift through chaff to get the "official" word on things here.

Also note that some things that I hear that are clearly wrong, I won't post about, because there's always misinformation, misunderstanding, and rumor. This thread is more for stuff that I think is a genuine (and innocent) misunderstanding or misinterpretation. I won't be posting the names (or ESP colors) of people who said these things, and I hope none of them take offense or feel "called out" - I just really want to nip some of these things in the bud before misinformation spreads and becomes widely-believed/accepted.

"Slavery is a perfectly respectable institution in the Parr Isles, for example."

Source? I don't remember establishing that anywhere. Parrens are generally so easygoing and freedom-loving that they're probably the least-likely culture to accept slavery. I've always considered Parrens to be the most innocent/childlike culturally, in that they tend to maintain a sense of optimism and idealism, strive for simple pleasures of life, have that childlike energy and curiosity (especially when it comes to exploring), and just tend to be fundementally good-natured with an ingrained sort of innocence to them. I think the concept of slavery would strike a definite chord of "wrongness" in Parrens, because why would someone want to make someone else live a life of misery and servitde (and have to be constantly watched and overseen) when they could just befriend them and be willing allies or assistants instead? I think that's how most Parrens would think.

Not that all Parrens exhibit the above qualities - every group has their variety, ones that go against the norm, bad eggs, villains, selfish greedy people, and what-have-you.

A final and stern word on the subject of the above: I said child-like, not child-ish. I don't want to see people roleplaying Parrens as a bunch of little kids or baby-talking or anything like that because of the above comments. Do so, and your character will not be long for this world. For reals. I detest the wiggly giggly baby-talk "look at me I'm a little kid" archetype. Sorry if anyone likes that stuff and is offended. I can't stand it. The minimum age I have in mind for any player characters in CLOK is going to be somewhere around late teens, anyway.

(General talk regarding Bloodglass making peerless weapons/armor)

Bloodglass is quite brittle. It's kind of like a superdurable obsidian, but not quite as sharp. That said, "superdurable" is relative - it's still brittle in comparison to pretty much all other metals. It holds an extremely keen edge, but it's going to degrade/break fairly quickly in comparison to anything made of other weapon-appropriate metals. So yes, it makes fearful edged weapons, like swords and axes and stuff. It's got a reputation for having an amazing cutting power to it, while being able to be durable enough to be practical as a weapon of war, albeit a relatively short-lived one.

Bloodglass wouldn't be very good for weapons that don't utilize an edge. You would get the downside of the brittleness with no upside of a keen edge in something like, say, a hammer. You'd be better off using common steel, it'd be far more efficient and practical.

But the biggest reason I chose to comment on this one: Bloodglass would make pretty awful armor. It would shatter and break far too quickly and "repairs" would probably require melting the whole thing down and just making a new piece, minus the shards and pieces that have shattered off from it during the wear and tear, meaning you'd have to add more bloodglass to the mix to come out with the same piece since a significant portion would have been lost.

Can bloodglass even mechanically be made into armor? I thought that wasn't possible, but if it is, be prepared for some "interesting" properties being added to using bloodglass armor.

[request] can the randomly spawning wilderness danger things have weapons that match their skills rather than things that will hit for 60-80 damage? <3

Not having skill doesn't mean they can't wield powerful weapons. Some critters/areas are more dangerous than others of the same skill range.

[player question]No no, not how do I become a monk/templar. How do I join the church?

[player response]There aren't people in the church, i.e. members, only monks and templars.

Regarding the question: If you read the book in the Shadgard sanctuary it talks about the history of the first thaumaturge (St. Vito) and the founding of the Church. The Church was actually formed and organized by people who wanted to support/follow the example of the thaumaturgers, and not by the thaumaturges themselves. There's no mechanical way to "join" the church in-game, like "ask NPC about join church" or something. There's really no need - if you want to count yourself a member, you're free to do so. No paperwork required, no rites or baptisms, etc. Of course, it would require a little more if you wanted to be an official of some kind, but just being a "member" takes nothing more than simply proclaiming you are one.

Regarding the response: I assume it was meant that there's no way to mechanically "join" the church and have some character flag that says "this is a church member", but the way it was stated could have been easily confused to mean "The Church is made up solely of monks/templar, and there aren't any members other than them" which is not the case. People who can actually channel thaumaturgy (their "Inner Light") are quite rare, but the Church is a huge organization made up primarily of "normal" people with no ability to channel thaumaturgy. Church organizations also differ by area - there isn't any one "grand master" of the whole church, or some president or prophet or pope who leads the whole thing. As an example, churches in Karnath probably don't communicate with churches in Ivial, and there could be differences in how the locals in each place think their churches should be run or organized. As mentioned before, it's a volunteer organization made by the people who want to help, support, and/or follow the example of thaumaturges by dedicating themselves to helping their fellow man in any way they can.

Lastly, just to clear up a frequent misconception: The church doesn't worship any deity, Serafina or otherwise. There might be some individual sects that have taken to actually worshipping Serafina, but it's not a common thing within the Church or a "core belief" or anything. On the contrary, Serafina encourages people to find the light and goodness within themselves, instead of looking to another (like a deity) to provide it for them - hence "Inner Light", not "Light of Serafina" or "Light of the Goddess" or something like that. However: Serafina -is- the patron Immortal of the Church and she is looked to for inspiration, information, or guidance via prayers and such, and it's generally believed that she has personally intervened or sent her aengels to assist mortals in some cases.

(General complaints about not beng able to resurrect a hiresword and other NPCs)

Resurrection is a rare thing. It may not seem like it to PCs, because all PCs are resurrectable. PCs just happen to be the select few whose souls linger intead of passing on when their bodies are broken (and a few NPCs as well). Players should assume that if an NPC dies, they're going to stay dead - that's the norm. Thus death still has meaning in the CLOK world. Murder is still very much a big deal. A lot of people in the CLOK world even resent, or fear, people who are able to come back to life, believing it's unnatural, or that it makes them reckless, power-hungry, egotistical, dangerous, and grates away at their own sense of morality, mortality, and the weight of matters of life and death (see player characters, heh heh).

It'll become slightly more apparent why the souls of PCs don't "move on" after death when I finish these new death mechanics. Or at least, there'll be some hints that people can speculate on. The whole "every PC soul is tainted a little bit, which keeps it from moving on" is obsolete; that'll be retconned away.

(General comments about the overzealous stableboys that go out to round up horses in the wilds)

The stableboys don't run out into the wilderness to find lost horses. The horses get tired of waiting around in the dangerous (and often very cold, recently!) wilds for owners who never return, and wander to the nearest safe place they can find. Once they're somewhere safe, that's when someone decent sees an untended horse and has someone come to round it up.

"I wish there was some way to exclude some items from being foraged. For example I have little use for rosemary, yet it keeps coming up."

Leaving the stuff you don't want is actually counterproductive. If you foraged everything but rosemary, soon all you would be able to find was rosemary, since it would quickly grow and take over in the absence of other competing growth.

I guess that's what I get for attempting to jump over a gorge

I think it's funny how many people try to jump that, when its description specifically says that it's narrow, but not enough for someone to jump across, and goes on to say what in the room could be used to provide safe passage across it.

Rias wrote:

"I wish there was some way to exclude some items from being foraged. For example I have little use for rosemary, yet it keeps coming up."

Leaving the stuff you don't want is actually counterproductive. If you foraged everything but rosemary, soon all you would be able to find was rosemary, since it would quickly grow and take over in the absence of other competing growth.

There is a way! Simply forage for what you want, and you've automatically excluded everything else.

(The frequency of people referring to Dwaedn Vil as "the Vil")

Know that "the Vil" shouldn't be assumed to be an abbreviation that solely refers to Dwaedn Vil. It shouldn't be used in the same way that people sometimes refer to Las Vegas as just "Vegas". "Vil" is just a Faewyr word that roughly translates to "populated place", and usually refers to smaller population levels such as hamlets, villages, small forts, or outposts. Dwaedn Vil is the mountain village populated primarily by Dwaedn Wyr and their families. Note that it does not always mean "place populated by [the word previous]". There are other "Vil" areas such as Steinnvatn Vil, which is a populated place by a lake which is named Steinnvatn - it's not populated by the lake itself.

So when someone says "Let's get drinks at the Vil", it's basically saying "let's get drinks in town." It works, as long as the people you're speaking with know which town you're referring to. Not a good idea to use it when someone who doesn't know you or where you are, and is asking where to meet, though, as "the Vil" could technically be any hamlet, town, camp, or outpost in the Lost Lands.

(Like the above: People referring the members of Dwaedn Wyr by the abbreviation "Wyr")

This is just like the previous - "Wyr" is a FaeWYR (eh? eh?) term meaning "people". Thusly we have the Faewyr, the Dunwyr, the Dwaedn Wyr, etc. - all groups of people. So boastfully saying "Yeah, I'm a Wyr!" is basically saying "Yeah, I'm a person!"

If you must abbreviate Dwaedn Wyr, better to say "Dwaedn". Sorry, I know it's more letters and harder to spell with the whole "ae instead of ea" thing.

(Various re: Valeria)

Questions, confusions, and misconceptions about Valeria seem to spring up constantly and all over the place.

"Why is it all destroyed and fire-blasted? What's the history?"

Answer: Nobody's sure. It was a big, powerful, prospering city in the old kingdom of Aetgard (it wasn't called Valeria back then - that's the name the Viali gave their garrison they established in the ruins), but when the Plague hit, Aetgard's population dwindled to almost nothing, and lots of cities became ghost towns with terrifying rapidity. What happened between then and now is unknown (or those who do know aren't talking), but SOMEthing crazy obviously happened to the place other than the population dying off from the plague.

"My character grew up in Valeria/has visited Valeria in years past/has relatives native to Valeria ..."

Valeria is not a longstanding city. It's a garrison established in the old city ruins, and has only been occupied by its current Viali occupants for a year or so. It has become more town-like as the families of the stranded Viali have moved to the Lost Lands to join them, but it's not a big bustling city or anything.

"Why don't they let me in? I'm a good person/I just want to help/I'm Viali!"

It's a military garrison with strictly-enforced security. They won't let people in simply due to their goodness of character or their bloodline, and besides, those claims are pretty unverifiable. It's kind of goofy to claim "But I'm a good and honorable person - surely you've heard of me and my life of good deeds, and will let me in!"

(Regarding a character's religious views that bear a suspicious similarity to real-world Christianity/Catholicism)

Your character is free to have their own convictions, of course, but there's really no CLOK equivalent of Christianity or Catholocism, or a "one true god", so expect the CLOK world to treat you with hushed bemusement at best when you make such convictions known.

(Comments regarding an area's ridiculous weather varying wildly throughout the day)

Zany, isn't it? Oh by the way, the weather stats grab data from real-world weather stations. Those temperature changes from cold to sweltering hot are actually happening here on our very own Earth. Fantasy is reality!

People putting full meals and other similar items in backpacks.

There's no Tupperware in the Lost Lands.

"I got a distress alert from the gaea due to too much logging, but it was the first tree in that room and there's no signs of recent logging, so it must be a bug."

We get this a lot from all sorts of different people. It's not a bug. There was a bug with commune, but the bug was causing it to not happen often enough. There are no current commune bugs.

You're not going to see signs of logging all the time. It is not a switch that is flipped as soon as somebody fells that first tree.

The gaea is not human. It is not rational and doesn't understand that it shouldn't be upset just because it was the first tree to fall in that room. There isn't some magical number that, once you get past it, now it's okay for the gaea to be upset that you're knocking down its trees. Maybe there were other trees being chopped in the general area. Maybe you chopped down a particularly old tree, and that really upset the gaea. Maybe it's just feeling abused. It's not going to work to say, "You have lots of trees and I just started chopping them down, so you shouldn't be upset yet."

soul shards

I see this a lot. Shreds. They're soul shreds. This isn't World of Warcraft.

templer

I see this frequently, and for some reason it drives me batty. TemplAr. The second vowel is an A, not an E.

Stave off the stable boys from nabbing horses ...

This still seems to come up a lot. See my previous post in this thread, which states: "The stableboys don't run out into the wilderness to find lost horses. The horses get tired of waiting around in the dangerous (and often very cold, recently!) wilds for owners who never return, and wander to the nearest safe place they can find. Once they're somewhere safe, that's when someone decent sees an untended horse and has someone come to round it up."

Why isn't [NPC name] listening to me/responding to the situation/whatever else I expect the NPC to do?!

Sadly, our GM team is very small, and there are a stinking lot of NPCs in the world. We can't make them react to everything that happens. Please give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they actually do do more than just stand around. Aelwyn, for instance - you can safely assume she frequently goes out to do templar-y things. Guard Captain Pierre in Mistral trains his guards and sentries instead of just standing around in the guardhouse all day completely motionless/silent.

My biggest pet peeve is when people use this as an excuse or justification to pile judgements or hate on NPCs/organizations. "Town X was attacked, and nobody from nearby town Y came to help! And where were the Templar and Monks, aren't they supposed to help in situations like this? Clearly, Town Y doesn't care about Town X, and the Templar and Monks are a sham and don't really care about people!" Please consider the following possibilities: 1) People from Town Y, and Templar and Monks, all came to help. You just didn't specifically see them. Oddly, not everything that happens in the world happens right next to you where you'll notice every detail. 2) If NPCs reacted to everything like this, we could just have them solve everything. Town under attack by nethrim? Don't worry, Templar and Valeria will take care of it. Infested invasion? No stress, Tse Gaiyan's got it. As much fun as it would be for us to use our own NPCs to solve all our own events (that was sarcasm, it wouldn't be fun), we try to give the actual players a chance to get involved. That requires the NPCs to not instantly respond to and solve events. Please give us some leeway and don't use that as an excuse to say these NPCs or their organizations are lazy/not tending to their duties/a sham/don't care/never do anything/whatever.

Another example: "The Coalition burned down, and nobody came to help except a few people (who are PCs)! There weren't even any Coalition NPCs helping put out the fires!" Again, please give NPC entities/organizations the benefit of the doubt. We're just a handful of GMs, and we can't control a whole Coalition's worth of NPCs to run around and put out the fires with you. You can safely assume that when the Coalition was on fire, there were several members of said Coalition trying to save the place, even if you didn't specifically see it.

"Is anybody in Shadgard/Mistral/Wherever right now?"

Players aren't the only ones on the ESP network. Of course there are people in most of the places you'll ask about (potentially not exotic wilderness locations), so there are much better ways to phrase this question.

When asking about the weather: "I wonder if anybody could tell me what the weather is like in Shadgard." or "Is it still way too cold down south by Shadgard?"

There are lots of ways to ask whatever you might want to know, without only appealing to the players that might be there. Yes, we know that's who's going to answer, but it's bad RP.

"Any monks around?"

First of all, around where, but that's not the point.

Of course there are monks around. They regularly show up in hamlets and cities. Of course, there may not be PLAYER monks around, which is what you're asking. So ask if there are any monks working, or on duty, or willing to help you out, instead.

(Said in-character) The Chapterhouse is a maze.

Nothing about the picture below even remotely resembles a maze. It's four rectangular buildings inside a bigger rectangle. You may have difficulty navigating it because it's not all "go infirmary/store" and "out," but that's on the player, not the character.

Using Sir/Lady as prefix titles in-character

I've seen a large increase in this practice lately, and it confuses me. As a pronoun of respect, they're great (although ma'am makes more sense in that instance than Lady)- "Thank you, sir," "I'm on my way, ma'am." But using them as a prefix would be reserved for people entitled to those terms (nobility or other titled individuals), which doesn't really exist in the Lost Lands. So when you say "Lady Jane" or "Sir Jack," realize that the NPCs that can hear you (and there are almost always some around) think you're talking to somebody who is actually nobility, or at least a high ranking political official.

Personally, because the Lost Lands is a frontier, I see the people there being very independent and not interested in anything resembling nobility or rank. Because of this, I would see a lot of them viewing the use of these terms as prefixes, considering there is no formal structure for it, pretentious. But not everybody would feel this way (NPCs are all individuals, after all). So there's no rule against using these terms, but you should realize some of the things it signals when you do. General culture in the Lost Lands would be to use Mr./Mrs./Ms. as titles of respect, not Sir/Lady.

[REPORT BY (redacted)]: having a problem here

Reports like this are generally ignored. Please be clear and informative when you use the report command if you're having an issue.

there is confusion in code between copper bar and trash bar. someone suggest they change all trash barrels to trash bins.

I wouldn't say the code is confused - that suggests there's an error where the code should be doing something that it isn't (I don't consider the code "knowing" which unspecific "bar" you're referring to as in the scope of what the code should be able to determine on its own). Try being more specific, like "put copper bar on anvil" or "put tin bar in trash barrel". Or even less keystrokes: "put c bar on anv". It just takes one letter and a space to distinguish between a copper-bar and trash barrel.

arg, where is all this burden coming from

Most likely your armor. Armor wearers, particularly those who wear heavier armor like chain or plate, are always going to be burdened.

hmm i hose Nuum for my race but for my background can i say i was a slave at one point or .. would that go aginst the .. rules of that race. it doesn't say much about who they kept as slaves

Sorry this isn't very clear on the wiki page (I'll have to update it soon). The Nuumic slave class is mostly made up of fellow Nuum who are incapable of doing anything deemed worthy of note by the upper-class Nuum. Basically, if you don't have any considerable talents (and make frequent use of them), you've got a chance of being considered worthless and kicked into the slave class by higher-ups whose job it is to evaluate such things. This is more common in the core populated cities and such, while on the outskirts of Nuumic civilization things are less rigid. Another good way to get into the slave class is to get caught performing a crime - particularly one against higher-ups.

I could also see the Nuum keeping foreigners as slaves occasionally, both illegally (i.e. by sheer force, just because they could, and considered the foreigners barely worth recognizing as actual people) as well as legally (some kind of indentured servitude sort of thing, prisoners of war, foreigners caught on Nuumic soil without legal rights to be there, etc.). If your character is one of these foreign slaves, then their race shouldn't be "Nuum", but rather that of their birth race.

The whole thing could use more detail and hammering out, but for now, suffice it to say that most Nuumic slaves are Nuum themselves, with a sprinkling of foreign slaves as well. I don't think they engage in any kind of formal slave trade or anything, as I can't think of any other cultures that would endorse slavery openly, but I could see some of the shadier Nuum buying slaves from various illegal groups that might capture people for the sake of selling them as slaves.

I imagine the slavery thing is a big source of conflict between the Nuum and their Viali neighbors who find it abhorrent, though I could also see this as being seen as borderline hypocritical of the Viali by a few outsiders, who would consider some of the peasantry and other lower classes of Ivial to be little better than slavery. How the lower classes are treated in Ivial would differ by territory, though - in some places they're indeed little more than slaves to their territorial masters (though said masters probably try to keep this hidden from the King and make things out to be better than they are in official reports), and in other places they have a relatively good amount of rights and autonomy. Ivial is a complicated place.

Anyway, rambling.

Someone on ESP wrote: For some reason, I am not admitted to Valeria. I never did them any wrong.

Every time you bring this up again, the Blood Cult sacrifices a kitten.

I didn't know about Viali speak when I made my Viali templar, I just made him Viali, cause, you know, templar. Now that there's such a focus on Viali speak, I feel like I can't play him anymore.

While Viali that adhere to the formal cultural speech patterns make me happy, nobody's required to do so. There are several reasons one might not:
- They came from humble beginnings. Most lower-class Viali don't bother with the formal speech (and those who do are often seen as pretentious by their peers).
- They came from a place where formal Viali speech isn't as prevalent. Nordarida in particular is quite loose on the typical formal speech expectations, as is Corodeangelo (both of which territories have significant differences from the common Viali culture).
- They've fallen into more casual, relaxed speech as they've spent time away from Ivial.
- They feel the Viali back home are stuck-up and want to avoid being seen the same way.
- They want to blend in better in the Lost Lands.
- They feel it's rude to speak formal Viali speech in the Lost Lands when they should instead be adopting the local customs or making the locals feel more at ease.
- They feel that formal Viali speech is only applicable when speaking Viali, not Common (this is a bit of a stretch, but isn't unbelievable).

All that said - anyone claiming to be Viali who doesn't adhere to the formal speech will likely be looked down upon to some degree by any more proper Viali NPCs they encounter. And again, I love Viali who stick to the formal speech! I hold no ire against those who don't stick to it, though. Well, maybe just a little.

(More OOC comments regarding the Church of Light being corrupt because hey, it's a church, and churches are always corrupt)

This is a fantasy world that I made. You have "word of god" on this one: The Church of Light is not corrupt. Stop bringing your OOC personal baggage and prejudices in with you. I find it just as offensive as if you brought in prejudices against peoples of specific skin colors or social statuses.

If my character sees someone pick locks or steal, they're right to automatically assume that other person is a member of the Guild of Thieves.

They're going to be colossally misinformed, then. See some of the reasons:
- Your character even knowing a formal Guild of Thieves exists is in itself suspect. It's common knowledge to players, because it's one of the guilds their characters can join and we like to let them know OOCly that that's a possibility. It's not common knowledge IC. There are certainly rumors flying around about it, but that's far from sure knowledge, and the rumors are likely highly varied.
- It's completely unbelievable that the Guild of Thieves can coerce every person who has ever picked a pocket, stolen from a store shelf, or picked a lock to be in their guild and under their influence. I think the absurdity of this is pretty self-evident.
- There is at least one other PC-accessible organization that has a focus on picking locks. Not to mention any number of NPC organizations/individuals who can pick locks.
- Lockpicks, while distribution is strictly moderated, can still fall into the hands of anyone. Who's to say that person picking a lock didn't find a used lockpick in the trash, or got it from a shady connection, or lifted it off someone else? Or maybe, gasp, they're part of a locksmithing organization that isn't the Guild of Thieves. The Guild doesn't have a worldwide monopoly on the practice by any means.
- I think the absurdity of "anyone who steals something must be a member of the Guild of Thieves" is even more obvious. Stealing things doesn't even require specialty equipment as picking locks does - it's simply taking something that isn't yours. Trust me, a good number of non-Guild PCs do this, to say nothing of NPCs both specific and inferred.

Ultimately, it just sounds like a lazy way of justifying trying to bring OOC knowledge and logic IC. I've seen similar mindsets where people see someone perform a tumble, or kidneyshot, or a footstomp, and say "Oh, I recognize that as a move used exclusively by the Guild of Thieves, ergo you're a Thief." Those are all mundane, non-magical abilities that could conceivably be performed by anyone - they're just restricted mechanics-wise because this is a game that we try to keep a few balances in amongst guilds. Listen to the following phrase a moment: "I saw you stomp on someone's foot, so clearly you're a member of the Guild of Thieves." Sound a bit silly? I think so. OOC, yes, it's an indicator, because we know that mechanically, some moves are restricted to the Guild of Thieves. IC, not so much.

Anyone can pick a lock or steal things. I've had several NPCs that use abilities that are normally mechanically reserved for the Guild of Thieves, yet the NPC is not in any way affiliated with the Guild of Thieves. If your character maintains this mindset, I'd put them in the "basket case conspiracy theorist" category. I'd also assume the player is taking OOC knowledge/logic IC.

Where was [insert group here] during all this?!

This comes up fairly frequently, and inevitably when especially combat-heavy events happen. While this bugs me in general and I've brought it up already a few times, I'm bringing it up again. During two recent events where the infested were getting uppity, I've heard a steady stream of "Where were Tse Gaiyan in all this?!" Fun facts:

1) Members of Tse Gaiyan were present and fighting during both events, and in the same groups as the people I've heard crying out against Tse Gaiyan for their lack of response. What, do they not count because they're not NPCs?
2) Tse Gaiyan doesn't have a massive army of NPCs they can dispatch for every mention of infested activity. This is the Lost Lands. Resources are scarce. The majority of their members are not undying, and thus are understandably wary of running suicidally into danger as the Undying PCs are wont to do. What NPC members there are who are actually qualified to deal with these things (i.e. not just shopkeepers, records keepers, inventory clerks, map updaters, recon scouts, informants, etc. running day-to-day things) are scattered all over the darned place, because the influence of the resen is everywhere. They can't really be expected to all drop whatever job, mission, or combat situation they're already involved in to come rushing just because there's other infested action elsewhere. That'd be like a bunch of headless chickens running around, because the infested are always up to something somewhere. I mean sure, some will come and check things out and fight the good fight, and ... oh look, they did! The PC ones! (Kudos to you guys, by the way. You're a credit to your organization.)
3) We don't like to use NPCs to save the day. At least, I don't. That's what the PCs are there for. You guys are the heroes. And, as stated in Fun Fact 1, Tse Gaiyan PCs were present in all major infested events that I can recall in recent history.

So come on. Stop calling for the NPC rescue squad to come save the day, or saying this organization is dumb and unresponsive or that organization is hypocritical and don't do their jobs, just because an army of NPCs from said organizations don't come saving the day every time some badguys cause a little ruckus.

I mean, unless you really want we GMs to just come solve all our events with our own NPCs. I can do that. It'd be kind of lame, essentially solving my own events with my own NPCs, but if that's what people want ...

Actually, scratch that. I can't. I'm not a guru of any of the guilds! Hmm. I could have the Shadgard militia be the ones to keep saving the day, that'd be fun ... riding in on their horses, flintlocks blazing, gloriously and heroically ... oh, wait. It's a town militia, not an army.

Well, Mistral Lake could always benevolently assign more protectorates.