Noble\Church\Guild membership as a problem

[Tadeus]

Hi guys,

I'm playing FS for many years now and always had one problem - all the player characters were members of different factions and had different lords and superiors. Even if they, for the moment, worked for a specific noble patron they still ought loyalty to their organizations. And most of the organizations in the Known Worlds have conflicting interests! It's close to impossible to find a logical reason for them not to betray each other.

Ok, you can always give them “end of the world” scenarios where working together is absolutely necessary for a greater good, but most of the scenarios and stories in FS deal with normal motivations like gaining wealth, reputation or finding some lost wisdom – they seem perfect seeds for a conflict between the characters.
How do you handle it? Do you, as player, distance yourself from your organization during the adventure, risking that your character will suffer the consequences once his superiors find out?

[Angelman]

The Patron-client system is quite different from Western individuality-based social structure, but this is (IMHO) one of the strengts of the setting. It should not be too difficult to play this out with a minimum of conflict if you approach the issues of loyalty a little more relaxed. So, you have a group consisting of a Scraver Archaeologist, an Eskatonic mystic, an al-Malik courtier, and a Vorox Death Commando. On the surface you might imagine severe disfunctioality within the group, but only if you regard the characters as identical to their faction. If you take a current day analogy, a University employed Archaeologist, a New Age healer, a wealthy businissman, and a Special Forces soldier should have little if no trouble being friends and sharing schemes and goals - these people AREN'T their work/organization memberships, but are instead individuals with quite different backgrounds and social circles.

[Tadeus]

Well, yes. The characters aren't their factions but in most cases they’ve spent the whole life in those. They have worked hard to gain some rank and reputation and I see no reason to give this all up for some “adventuring friends”. Sure, they can work together when there is nothing to gain, but once they find something of great value (it happens always in Fading suns adventures) they are obliged to use it in ways that help their faction. I’m sure that if a Scraver, an al-Malik and an Escatonic would find an ur artifact, each one of them would have other plans for it. And if their superiors would find out that they hid it from them (or gave it to another faction) it wouldn’t end without consequences to the rank and reputation of the character.
Sure, you can skip or bend this whole feudal hierarchy system, but why do you play Fading Suns then?

[77IM]

[77IM]

(Oh, and nice job seeding the new forum with topics, btw!)

[Angelman]

Good summaries here.

Also, specific loyalties (personal patron/employer) almost always trumphs general loyalties (faction). And usually, the lower your rank within a faction the less responsability you'll have to them. In many ways, factions are not monolithic entities but rather an individual member's contact network, cultural background, education and training, and the group to whom s/he owe taxes (well, one of the groups anyway).

[Sir Marco]

I LOVE the internal conflict these loyalties sometimes make.

Example.

I had a Reeve character that was assigned to an Amalthean nun. She consulted him on Banking and Legal matters. One adventure had us on Criticorum and some nasty world devastation took place thanks to a demon and things. Turns out that after the bloodshed and mass chaos, my character was one of the few Reeves with enough rank to do certain things.

I immediately set about offering loans to the survivors and calling in outstanding markers left to the reeves. The Chainers came to me and asked if I could draw up some new slave contracts for a few refugees. I agreed.

The Amalthean heard about some slavery going on and phones Orwell (My Character) right away.

"Orwell! People are being sold into slavery! How can we stop this?"

"Well Sister, I've looked over this already. These contracts seem pretty solid. There is not much I can legally do in this situation."

I made bank and the Sister.. well she never questioned it. To the other players credit they never "meta-gamed" and never probed the situation because the character was a trusting sort.

[Calvin]

No faction is truly a united, monolithic organisation in the sense we expect of a nation-state, a corporation or the Catholic Church. A guild is a collection of individuals and companies within a similar trade that offer mutual support, Houses are divided along family lines and the limits of interstellar travel and communication. What's more interesting is the ties between the factions. None of them stands truly alone and isolated from the other, they are all co-dependent on maintaining the current order. There might be shifts in influence and territory, but they need eachother.

[Danos]

I'm a guilder. A Reeve, to be exact. I belong to a guild called "The Florida Bar". It allows me to practice as a Reeve in my home state, but I do not work for the Florida Bar. I work for an agency doing contract work for the state. This is an important distinction. My first loyalty is to my employers, but I follow guild rules and pay guild dues or I couldn't have this job at all.

The way I've always built parties is as a noble entourage. The Muster member of the group works for the noble. He belongs to the Muster, and follows guild rules, pays guild dues, but his paycheck comes from and his loyalty belongs to the noble who holds his contract. The Charioteer flies the noble's ship. Some Charioteers own their own ships, but they don't have noble protectors, and they have to pay their own docking fees. The priest is assigned as a confessor, meaning that the church has assigned them to care for the spiritual needs of a noble and his entourage. The priest is usually the person with the closest ties to their own hierarchy in my games. Even the nobles are usually scheming against other house members as much as other houses. In my view, guilds are not employers (or not usually), guilds are licensing boards and placement agencies. That's how I run it, and it makes for close-knit groups in my campaigns.

[Calvin]

I usually see the Orthodoxy as one of the more closely united groups. Overall, the Church has the advantage of being one of the widest organisations in the KW. There is a country priest almost everywhere, they all speak a common language and adhire to a common set of laws and principles in the Omega Gospels. The Patriarch is one of the more stable positions of authority in the KW. There are divisions inside the faith, the Church is still closer to the early Christian church than Orthodox Christianity or Catholicism.

Guilds are the most diverse subfactions. The Muster works like a union/work agency. It takes care of you (and a bit of your paycheck) and will have your back in case your employer screws you over or abuse your contract. No Muster shall ever kill Muster, for example. Muster members are organised in their own teams, work crews and companies and it's usually these entities you hire. The Charioteers have a strong, arcane buerocracy formed from the logistical demands of interstellar travel and their assignment of routes to pilots, and consist both of more independent freelancers and big merchant houses. There is a constant game between the merchant houses for sweet trade spots and concessions. The guild as a whole is both this administrative buerocracy and a lobbying agency for general trade interests. The Scravers are more of a cover for a group of criminal families, the guild itself has no more influence and power than the individual families back it with. Loyalty to the family is always strong. The Reeves are like a bar association and lobbying organisation for a number of banking interests. Their work aligns them with clients from all over the KW, and integrity and professional loyalty is one of their strongest assets. The Engineers are an odd academy/sect/trade guild of specialists. Engineers are usually individuals, with specialists brought in to form teams as the task dictates. Some teams work long-term assignments like overseeing a plant, while others form and dissolve when the project is complete. Loyalty inside the guild is strong, with layers of secrecy between it and the clients, while at the same time involved in its own competition for prestige, higher security clearance and resources.