Welcome to the beginning of the political system in TERA!

Starting today, TERA players who meet certain requirements can register as candidates for vanarch. It's not always easy to convince everyone to vote for you instead of your esteemed opponents, though, so we'd like to provide you with a place to discuss your plans, make campaign promises, and show that you are the best-suited character to become a vanarch.

Think of this thread as a televised debate. Everyone's eyes are on you and they're eager to hear what you have to say. They're all waiting for you to assure them you are their champion, and that you will work to make their lives better in TERA!

So if you are a vanarch candidate on Basilisk Crag, give a short introduction of yourself and your vanarchy platform. Heck, start an actual debate if you like. Has another candidate said that good vanarchs should look after their guild first? State why you think that's a bad idea! Do you think declaring war against a smaller guild is great way to promote PvP? Make a stance! The people deserve to know what you believe in. If you aren't running this time, this is an excellent opportunity to find out about the candidate to make an informed choice!

Better yet, challenge the other candidates with your own questions! This is a public debate! Here are some sample questions you can use as a starting point for political discussion:

• What are your priorities for using policy points? Skill trainers? Specialty stores? Raise or lower tax rates first?
  
• What would be your agenda as a vanarch? How do you plan to enact this agenda? With force? With rewards? Will your guild members help with enforcement?
  
• How do you plan to receive feedback or questions on your rule?
  
• If a conflict arises between what's best for the province and what's best for your guild, what will you do?
  
• What makes you the best candidate?

This thread is for vanarch candidates to discuss their stances on various political items. Feel free to address other candidates directly and answer their questions, but please remember to follow the official TERA forum rules. We want a healthy and courteous debate, so be respectful to the other candidates. Remember, the public is watching you!

(Please do not reserve a spot for your post.)

The following video was made to promote the candidacy of Ostgarath Vanarch for Zeroden of the Kiith-Sa Hunter. The video is informative and discusses our stance on some of the hot topics such as low level griefing in the province.

http://youtu.be/f3VcwNebnf0

We also have a thread that discuses a bit about who the Kiith-Sa Hunter are located here:

http://tera-forums.enmasse.com/forums/basilisk-crag/topics/Zeroden-Vanarch-Candidate-for-Ostgarath

Hi. I am a candidate for Veritas District, and all taxes will be set to minimum, none if possible. All NPCs will be up the entire time. This is what every other vanarch should do.

A debate thread, quite interesting.

I am Mizugami, GM of Luciform. I have a thread with a bit more detail about what I am about, though to give a short version I want a Vanarchy to improve the general fun of the server and game through events, competitions, and progression in the game.

Howdy.

I am Pimsley, the GM of Malum Factum. I am currently running for Vanarch of Ostgarath. Our mindset for running the province is to make any and all merchants, vendors, etc. available at all times with minimal taxes.

More detailed info can be found on our thread here:

http://tera-forums.enmasse.com/forums/basilisk-crag/topics/Breaking-News-A-new-Vanarch-candidate-enters-the-race

A question for the current candidates in this thread. You may have answered this question in other threads, but for the purposes of consolidation I'll pose it again.

Zeroden, Suwayer, Mizugami, Pimsley:

If elected Vanarch, what is your stance on griefing? Additionally, if you oppose it, how do you intend to control it (allies, hired help, faith in the community to take care of it, etc)?

I believe that it is completely unfeasible for a Vanarch to attempt to "control" griefing or be expected to (griefing defined as constantly being killed in PvP over and over, killed by higher levels, killed by other insurmountable odds, or possibly other situations depending on your opinion). Regardless if you have 300 members or 50, a billion gold or 10, you will not be able to stop it entirely or in any major fashion at all times and locations (in and or out of your zone).

At the same time, I think griefing is more of a community/server/guild thing. You have to rely on your community to (or not to) grief. Your server to have (or not have) a large amount of that action. Your guild to support (or ignore) you during such an event. A Vanarch COULD persuade the community (not entirely, but generally) for or against griefing if desired, through events, rewards, and possibly other means.

It also depends on what your definition of griefing is. Some people love OWPvP and being challenged by more people, constant fights, etc. Some are in the middle and like it here and there but not all the time. While others would classify such actions as griefing. Once again, it depends on your opinion of such a term.

It comes down to what you believe griefing is and what the situation is. If a group of people were constantly killing a person over and over and refused to stop after being (POLITELY) asked, I would see no issue in sending a few people over to at least fight a bit. If you have the capability to kill people in any fashion, you should already accept the fact that you are also open game for being killed. Though this could be done by any guild, since something like that would not be restricted to a Vanarch. I also think that (generally) trying to persuade the community to not TRY to purposely make other people's game experience miserable would be okay. Though at the same time, you will not persuade everyone and cannot ever "control" something as such, unless you turned off PvP (which I am 100% against!).

If I did not answer the question to your liking or you would like to ask any other questions, please feel free to ask!

Greeting Everyone,

I'm Star GM of Carebear Club. My guild and I are currently seeking for Vanarch of Poporia. We love elin and the popori!

I want to make the gaming experience for the lower and mid lvls a nice and friendly one. Reasonable taxes and all vendors being active is one of our primary goals. Also lending a helping hand to players in the poporia province!

Hello again players of Basilisk Crag,

Dragonought leader of The High Five here. I am currently running for Vanarch of Poporia! You can find my previous thread. http://tera-forums.enmasse.com/forums/basilisk-crag/topics/A-Stoner-as-Vanarch-Why-would-I-vote-for-you-Well-let-me-tell-you-why there but I will talk into more detail about my campaign here as well.

Q: What are your priorities for using policy points? Skill trainers? Specialty stores? Raise or lower tax rates first?

A: I plan on first placing specialty stores within difficult areas such as Eldritch Academy and right outside the teleporter of Sinestral Manor. Following that I will be lowering taxes for said specialty merchants finally followed by conveniently placed skill trainers. All the money I get from taxes will go towards the prizes for special events I will be be hosting throughout the zone via use of the zone wide messaging tool, some of these events include but are not limited to...

Hide and Seek
Sinestral Manor Clear Times
BAM Hunt Challenges (lots of creative ideas for this event, will be very fun)
PvP Death Matches 1v1's 2v2's 3v3's, 5v5's and 10v10's.
PvP Foot Races
and much more.

Q: What would be your agenda as a vanarch? How do you plan to enact this agenda? With force? With rewards? Will your guild members help with enforcement?

A: First on my agenda is to grind the necessary policy points needed to turn my ideas into reality. My guild, along with the help of some ally guilds, will be grouping up for as many quests or hunts needed to get the policy points. Once the policy points are collected and spent. After this my goal is to turn Poporia into an ever-changing zone filled with rewards, events, pleasant memories and ultimately to leave Poporia saying (I had a lot of fun not just simply leveling, but playing and really experiencing in the zone.)


Q: How do you plan to receive feedback or questions on your rule?
If a conflict arises between what's best for the province and what's best for your guild, what will you do?

A: You can give me feedback via in game or on the forums, I will take any CONSTRUCTIVE negative feedback as a learning experience to better prepare myself for future elections. I do not believe a conflict will arise between what's best for the province and what's best for my guild considering the goal of my campaign AND my guild is to create a thriving and enjoyable community within the zone/guild. If some conflict were to arise between the two though I would pick what's best for my province and explain to my guild my decision in which I'm sure they would understand.


Q: What makes you the best candidate?

A: I belive what makes me the best candidate is that I want to go above and beyond simple things such as taxes, PvP, and NPC's. Those should just be key things a Vanarch is required to do for his/her people anyway. I will be putting not only my mind but my heart into ruling over Poporia making it the most enjoyable zone to play in. I want players to leave Poporia after moving on to the next leveling zone with fond memories of their experience in the zone, With the beautiful landscapes and wonderful environments in Tera Online that En Masse has provided in their game, I want to bring those features out and create an exciting and entertaining community within it.

Quote: Kragen on 05/19/2012, 12:24 AM - view

I'm going to paste my reply from the other thread, since the question is more or less the same:

That's a solid question, and not an easy one to answer. I appreciate you asking this for one big reason: Realism.

Bear with me while I explain a few of the moving parts, and how we're going to approach it;

I've said since the beginning that I have no intention of making lofty promises I can't keep. I can't control what other people do. I can control what I do, and to a good extent what my guild does.

That being said, on the Vanarch side of the house; you're right, the Zone WILL be PvP enabled. However, having had the opportunity to participate in MMO communities for over a decade now, I fully understand that griefing incoming (low level) players is a great way to make sure people do not want to continue playing this game. Why pay for something that's just going to piss you off, right?

While some PvP'ers find that fun in theory (to make someone so frustrated they quit) all that spells out for us in the long run is a smaller, less active, community. Since that's not fun either, even veteran members may either quit or simply transfer to a more active community. Amongst the max level players, PvP is elder content. We want to encourage high level PvP while discouraging high level players from distracting low-level players with griefing. Ostgarath has a huge spread of levels in it's zone. This is where it becomes a challenge.

PvP will be enabled in the usual safe spots, but what do we do outside those safe spots? This is where the community needs to step in and help. I take great strides to recognize players for their efforts, and one way we can do this is to set up a group of regulators. Most griefers are usually alone or in small groups. When our regulators step in, we can wipe them out. All it would take is for a low level player to identify areas where griefers are hiding out, or making their stand. Our regulators can go there, and wipe them out, as well as providing a pseudo security detail to his risk players. This does not have to be just members of our guild, but also friends and allies of the Kiith as well. A monetary reward can go out to the group of most recognized regulators, to make it both fun AND rewarding. We can get a bounty list for regular offenders, and keep the combat both fun and relevant.

Like I said before, I can't control what other people do. If someone kills a lowbie and moves on, that's not really griefing in my eyes. If they keep coming back for more, then it's a problem that I am more than happy to fix. Once we explore the Vanarch system fully, perhaps there will be more tools at our disposal (like turning certain level ranges into sanctuaries for the zone). I want to get in there and mix it up. See what we can do, and what's best for everyone.

I'm sorry if that's not the answer you were looking for, but it's what I know I can do at this time, RIGHT now. When we've got more power to help shape the zone a little bit, I'll be able to answer your question better.

I do want to note that if I can create a hot-bed of PvP in high level areas in this zone by disabling certain safe zones, I will. This is a PvP server, and I want players who aren't forced to lose due to level differences to search for PvP solutions to their problems.

-Zeroden