For as long as I can remember, it's been widely accepted that *everyone* should adhere to the four crucial foundations of Italian organised crime. Onore, to always conduction yourself in an honourable and respectful fashion. Famiglia, to always remain utterly loyal and devoted to one's Leader and crew. Sangue, to always look after one's own flesh and blood. Omerta, to adhere to the strict code of silence in the face of authority.

Obviously, as this is a game, the meaning and application of these terms is altered and somewhat distorted for it to make sense. For example, rather than sangue appyling to taking care of one's own wife or children, it instead becomes ensuring the reputation of your bloodline is good. Omerta being the most obvious example evolves from being silent in the face of law enforcement to not divulging secrets to other families. However they've evolved or changed though, they remain a constant, a strict set of enforced guidelines that everyone is expected to follow. There may have been a time when this was more lax, but I cannot remember it.

Similarly, it is never questioned that a new person/account/character will join one crew and continue to work for them throughout the entirity of their lives, or the duration of the account. There has never been a time, disregarding post war and post reset, that working for more than one crew has been tolerated.

For all of the above, this is an absolutely correct representation of the Mafia and the way we should be playing this game to truly make it a role playing simulation...provided this is all applied to accounts that are or are above the status of made. For those who are below made, it loses all realism. Many people will know me as the sort of person who continuously brings up realism, suggesting things that will make the game more realistic but ultimately less of a playing experience. I consider it one of my greatest faults in regards to this game that I often fail to see where the compromise must be made between playability and realism.

So, I thought I'd get the opinions of the masses on this one. Why are concepts that in reality are fundamentally applied to the inner circle of mafia families applied to mere peons on this game?

If we take the structure of an Italian/Italian-American Mafia syndicate (ie the model on which ranking et cetera is based on) of almost any real life family, whether they were based in New York, Chicago or even in Palermo, they will always have one thing in common. Those below made, unless they had vey good connections, were considered totally expendable. Those below Wise Guy often did work for much more than one family, largely menial jobs like running alcohol, taking bets at bookies, the kind of jobs the made guys didn't want to dirty their hands with.

It's only as they got more connected with certain Mobsters that they began working exclusively for one family. This fact renders any assocation of Omerta and Loyalty quite unrealistic when applied those who are unmade. 99% of the family's I've been in request you to sign a thread upon joining, stating your total loyalty - something in real life you would not have to undertake until you'd joined the family proper, or in other words become made.

Is this unrealistic measure an essential one though? Concessions always have to be made in certain areas to make the game easier to play, but I really can't tell if this should be one of those areas. I know many leaders already have in place certain rules and guidelines to diffrentiate between the wheat and the chaff, so to me this suggests that it is widely acknowledged that there is a very clear difference between those who are Made and those who are not.

Additionally, the introduction of the sponsor/associate feature further adds weight to this line of thinking. It slightly diminishes the direct bonds between Leader and unmade member, and instead strengthens the bonds between (obviously) sponsor and associate, which reflects reality.

So, the accepted facts are that the system of applying concrete concepts to those below made seems to be universally regarded as 'not right' in the RP way of looking at things, but what's up for debate is how necessary they are. Is there any way to induce more reality in this part of the game without creating undue confusion and ultimately a lack of organisation in what is supposed to be organised crime?

I apologise in advance for the rambly nature of this thread, I just opened word and started penning my rambly thoughts as they came to me. Probably best if you just throw some replies out and it can be discussed in more detail then, np.

Love ya.

This is a game. This will never be the real mafia. There are too many things that make this game un-realistic, and not all of it is in the codework.

There are "OOC Entities" that never change between characters. People die, people come back, nothing really changes. People stay friends, despite what family they are in.  These OOC connections cause OOC behaviour in a lot of circumstances. People are friends OOC, and do not want to act like mobsters around each other In-Character. I can understand business associates, and alliances, but sometimes people just refuse to act the way mobsters should behave. Staying in-character at all times is usually complicated, especially since IRC has become a necesity to the game. 

In my opinion, the way it should be done, is that each person takes on a new persona with each character. Marietta helped with this, with her thread "Understanding your Character". So, until people can allow themselves to become their characters, they will not care much about these foundational concepts. People view this game as a game, and play it as so. Until we can put the emphasis on being in-character, we will continue to act this way, probably even getting worse.

While everything you say is mostly true, Bandit, the thing Noah is addressing has been an issue since the very beginning - long before the game started being played on IRC and during the old .org days when the userbase was so large that it was more than one big happy humpfest.

The reason Wiseguy and below have been treated like family members is because that is the way the game has always been coded. They are invited to a family, they can be HQ wacked, and they have to buy out to leave a family. Essentially, they are treated no different from the Made members. This was never questioned until recent years, when we began debating more about the distinctions between Made and non-Made members. While these distinctions were debated in years long since past, the focus then was always on what being Made means, not so much on what it means to NOT be Made.