*a strong pull on his cigarette and the man steps onto stage cutting through the wall of smoke*

Good Evening Ladies and Gentleman

I have come to speak about an issue that has been troubling me for some time now, something that has been exacerbated over the past few days with a flurry of new auths.

The issue is; for lack of a better word, that of "ghost HQ's". Essentially these are individuals who are authed when there is a clear lack of like minded working individuals to meet the availability. We live in prosperous times, money has never been easier to come buy, we murder feverishly with little consequence or repercussion and we all want a taste of bold life. 

The reality is however, we weren't all destined to be lead and our community needs followers just as much as it needs leaders. There is very little point in creating a society full of leaders with no followers. I am not here to take shots at the new or existing auths but to rather examine the system that has created this epidemic and perhaps identify a few solutions to the problems.


The issue of cities:

When our world shifted from 6 to 4 and we embraced the system of districts within those cities we drastically altered the way we do business. We now sit with 3, 4 or 6 Godfathers in a city and wars very often involve a lot of "infighting" within those cities. The merits of the above can be debated back and forth and ultimately the issue should be that as new districts flourish and open up in time so to should they close when wars decimate cities. A perfect example of this was recently the Bronx opened up for business in New York and before it was even occupied it the entire city was removed. In this speakers very humble opinion the district should have been closed when not occupied for that period, if the city returned to a prosperous and profitable state again the district could look to be reopened, and our friends; the evil NPC's should need to be defeated once more. It stands to reason that cities should expand and contract based on it's current position, it should not remain inflated indefinitely. Whilst districts are given autonomy in most cases allowed to auth freely there should be a maximum number of members allowed in each district so as to keep a balance of population and we don't sit with 60% of our workers in Chicago... 

Realistically I'd like to see something along the following lines. 60 Max Members per district, with a maximum of 3 leaders in each district. If we are to examine HQ sizes as well I would suggest that if we aren't happy to shrink districts that we shrink the sizes of our HQ's to say 25-30 so that we don't sit with massive empty family headquarters on each corner. I also feel it would be wise to impose some limits on new auths, once we have X number of vacancies within a district/city no new auths are possible until X has been met. (Whether these measures are implemented by gods or by our own hand is largely irrelevant). 

Perhaps I am being overly critical, but with over 400 vacancies and a LOT of empty buildings at present I just don't see the point in exaserbating the problem with new auths and new empty buildings. We are living too long and too risk free with far more leaders than members. This is not a sustainable model.

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

*the man walks away opening the podium up to all*

The issue is; for lack of a better word, that of "ghost HQ's". Essentially these are individuals who are authed when there is a clear lack of like minded working individuals to meet the availability. We live in prosperous times, money has never been easier to come buy, we murder feverishly with little consequence or repercussion and we all want a taste of bold life. 

I don't think the issue here is that no one wants to work for them. I think it might be the fact that they have only been bold for less than a day. Surely one cannot judge an individual solely on a single days work. Perhaps more time is needed to come to such conclusions sir.

On to your statement about letting district close down. I can certainly understand your reasoning behind suck an opinion. However, this is something the god frown upon. As we saw the loop get invaded by a group of NPC thugs, when a Detroit district was not filled fast enough. Do I agree with it? Not at all.

I would like to close with thanking you for bringing this topic to light. As I'm sure it has been weighing heavy on a few minds. Myself included.

It appears to me that this is nothing more than a cycle, re-occurring once more ever since the districts have been habitable.

I agree that there should be some form of limit on numbers per district, even a limit to the amount of families which reside there. Me personally would rather see a smaller number of families, full; than a larger number of families with lots of capacity. 

Obviously we need to tailor this based on our population however I am a firm believer in, if it's not broke, don't fix it.

This IS broken.

There are FAR too many crew leaders at the moment, and far too few members to go around.

The 5 new auths in Staten Island is a quite ridiculous number for the state of the game right now, and this free for all in Brooklyn is, at best, insanely timed.

I have to question the amount of thought that has actually gone in to these ideas. They are nice platforms, but the timing can be just as important as the move you make itself. And I feel personally like the timing of these two contests has been awful.

Ok i am gonna try and answer some points as i can from my point of view, taking into account, i was not GF when either was thought up, but have heared some talk regarding the negotiation process and was round for the attempts on final details on Brooklyn.

First Communication has to improve regarding these matters, an attempt was made to think up ideas for Staten Island and things were  slow and laborious.  Some people wouldn't talk, others talked while others were away.  Crime never sleeps and don't come with a regular shift pattern that way.  Watching the attempts to sort the Brooklyn contest over a day, i saw limited contact in the whatsapp cafe over several hours, and it was decided in the end to push things before the NPC spawn comes, rather then let them shoot at those who took down brooklyn.  I know some people would be happy with dead leaders, but we prefer them alive most of the time.

As for Numbers4Glory, I will try and state my opinion but yet again these are my opinions.

1. I think the idea of too many leaders has been that for a long time as people horde ia's just for the +1 to defence in their mind knowing how hard it is to fill the space if they shoot the person.  I won't like is hard finding recruits especially good ones at stages as about a third of what i recruited went ia over months with Bip, Drunky and on my own.   I do agree  that so many leaders can be a pain, and is most noticed in the feverish attempts post war to grab war orphans.

2. I honestly think if you have the right structure in place, it makes the job a lot easier but if a leader is not active enough then of course problems can arise.

3. I believe a 2 week time zone for the return of an NPC army is perfectly fair, HQ's, forts, selection of a candidate especially post war can take time and yet again problems with discussions regarding the GF council and splitting the pie  as mentioned occured, i was moving not long before an NPC invasion. 

4. It doesn't matter where people live be it cit or district numbers wise, recently the pack mentality has been shown more then ever, as mutliple cities or multiple districts of different cities  set like wolves on district in a common cause.  It doesn't matter where you live and what numbers you have, people will always kill whether from their own city as with Chaosspike, Cray and Lynch or Paul Klint against LadyFighter.  Wherever you live war comes to you and will decimate districts.  I honestly never realised all the divides in NY till the war.

5. Risk free, we have seen the BG count drop massively, are recouperating from a multiple wars  and never know when the next one will come.  We have a possible blood bath in brooklyn coming where families next of kins may be re-absorbed into families and i do expect the numbers to drop in SI the same way especially with the rumour mongering already started by bitter people.  It is not that we live risk free, is that we don't see whats coming till too late sometimes.  Is why at stages is such a gap between top and bottom and more wars increase it.

This is just my opinion, but i am always willing to listen to further thoughts.

Thanks for your thoughts.

When I was talking risk free I was more referring to the amount of risk that has been removed from our world in recent time. We have far fewer mishaps with our weapons and people are able to build these cannons. The argument has always been that once someone is able to shoot through the "cap" the limit on protection would be raised, I am confident this isn't the case at present and even if it was raised I am sure it would only worsen the problem.

I would like to see a lot more volatility, more NPC crews you can be rest assured 2 weeks for someone to step in to take over a profitable business would definitely be regarded as lazy in my books. I would like to see our regular Durden vistors pose a lot more threat to our protection and defensive structures, they are nothing more than a "lolz pwnfest" as someone said to me the other day. There is no reward without risk or cost. If you are a regular killer of Durdens they should come for you, Tyler, Marla and Robert should punish families who miss them by destroying a fort or two. (A normal +1 comes with a cost of 1Credit or 500k approximately, I don't think it is equitable for durdens to cost the same but when a Gangster shoots at a Durden Wise Guy and misses there should be some financial reprocussions so that 1) Families take better control over their members, 2) Durdens require a bit more strategy 3) People remember killing people is supposed to be dangerous.

Districts left abandoned for a period of time should have NPC's come a lot sooner, and it should be structured that "X" amount of work should have to be completed after occupying the city before it is considered open for business (Family would be required to do X amount of Petties etc, so we don't get quick fix auths)

I know I am ranting here and I apologise my thoughts tend to spill out at times, but this system is the furthest thing from sustainable, and whilst the current auths are not entirely thought out within the context of the present climate, leaders are protecting their memebers from the nasty NPC's and working within the gods guidelines.

With regards to communication I agree wholeheartedly, unfortunately the more CL's you have across a multitude of timezones and lifestyles the harder it is to find a time that is convenient for everyone. Democracy is crippling the system as there are just too many leaders.

The biggest issue is trying to carve out a way forward that both our leaders and the gods can agree on.

As much as the NPC armys, especially those led by Tyler Durden the truth is it is hard, yes it's true anyone can be a hitter these days and for a long time all their risk is can be only some jail time or losing a gun.  The skill and  danger of a hitter is to a large degree is gone until war time or a fail for no reason that happens regularly to some when on a good run. 

Am i sure revenge of durdens will work not really, recent i have seen members of other crew even at earner shooting at marla looking for a 1%, now when they died i had little sympathy as i have no sympathy for an untrained gun doing something so stupid in my eyes.  Should a boss be questioned for it, yes, could a leader be punished by NPC's i am not so sure.. sometimes i think the embarassment is enough.

My worry is punishing people if they regularly shoot durdens would creae a seperation with big guns getting bigger and smaller guns growing slower.  Also if a member decides to do something stupid no matter the warnings and help you give them it could damage a family as a whole.  Nearly every family has had an idiot, and this would be a cheap way for them to cause damage for shits and giggles in my mind.

Yeah i find a big problem with NPC's in place sooner especially after a devestating war the cost of private flights have drained coffers. so i never even had gold on the exchange to sell and many others were in the same boat.  The truth is it is understandable that the system is not perfect, the truth is though everyone is trying hand over fist to bring people in.   Everyone wants to be stronger, bigger, richer and is the largest amount of choice and in theory chance of position i have seen for a long time.  Some auths will bring people who have left for the old country, others will just make people scratch their head.  The hard point is that middle line of whats benefiting us from bringing people to the shores and what just makes us thing how long till someone in that disticts gonna use this person as target practice.

Forgive me if they have changed something but...

You've seen Earners shooting at Marla and dying?

Sooo, their CL has trusted them enough with perm auth and they are shooting at Marla? You don't think that the crewleader is at fault here? In the literal sense he has been trusted enough with absolute autonomy to shoot at anyone he wishes and he has exercised that trust by shooting at a Don RHM of which he had no realistic chance of hitting.

You are quite right the embrassment must sting, but more so imposing some sort of Penalty for this error (like a few forts attacks or a BG wave) will encourage leaders to be a little more cautious who they offer perm auth too, who they give Made Man too (People have really forgotten what is supposed to come with that rank) and generally take a bit more time in teaching members about wacking and how it works properly.

You say it will cause a bigger divide between the big guns and the little ones, I do acknowledge there is a possibility of this happening. I do also recognise that the art of killing use to require a lot more skill than it does these days and particularly in an age of massive, risk free, durden spawns; building a cannon could be done by hard working monkey (like an actual monkey, it really wouldn't require much training). I think Crewleaders and indeed Hit Squad Leaders (Anyone remember that role and what they use to do? A lot more than just keeping tabs on Hits/Misses on a board).

I don't know what can be done to rectify the current state, but their needs to be a lot more volatility in our world to accurately reflect the nature of the work we are involved with. I wouldn't even call my rantings suggestions but just thoughts on how we can curb these problems.

Once upon a time i remember hitters making their own lists not having a HSL give them the softly softly approach, i remember the only targets being ia's, i remember crewleaders actually teaching members things and people being authed due to what they did not who they were but that was a long time ago and the soft approach of city hall combined with with a decay in standards at some stages, and from some crews my line has served in kinda says to me a lot of things need a kick in to touch either by members, cl's or godfathers.