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Meshwesh Times Special Edition: Factions

Factions may be a controversial addition to the game, but they’re here nonetheless. Everyone has to pick a team when they leave the tutorial. If you’re reading this newsletter, you probably picked the right one! Still, faction play can be a bit confusing. As an elder of the Meshwesh Faction Council, I get a lot of questions about what’s happening. Here are some of the answers.

Each faction has four Home Regions that never change hands. They will always have faction-chat, but they will never have bonuses. Ours are East Sinai, Lahun, South Sinai, and Meshwesh Delta. Other regions are contestable and can be controlled by any of the three factions. Take a look at the Atlas to see how things stand.

Claiming a region is a blind-bid system that uses tokens as the currency. Whichever faction places the most tokens at a region’s Tribute Post will gain control of that region when the cycle ends. You can check your in-game calendar to see when the next Day of Tribute is coming up. (Presently we’re in a cycle that began on September 15th and will end September 22nd.) If no tokens are placed on a Tribute Post, that region reverts to neutral. If an equal number of tokens are placed, the defender wins. Factions can only claim regions that are next to ones they already own. For example, Kush or Hyksos could stake a claim on Bahariya Oasis next cycle. Meanwhile, insulated regions like Zau and Cyrene will remain ours as long as we place a single token on them.

There are three benefits to holding regions. 1) The more regions we hold, the lower the cost of researching technology. 2) Regions can provide bonuses to whichever faction holds them. Right now, Timna grants +3 Flax Yield. Other regions are offering bonuses to ore, veggie, and wood yields. 3) Faction-chat only reaches areas we control--unless an Elder spends 10 tokens to build a chancery there.

Meshwesh Tokens are currently only available at the Great Hall in Tanis. One token becomes available each hour. Each player is allowed to pick one up every few hours, depending on how many they’ve collected. There are very few uses for tokens other than claiming regions or building chanceries.

If you get a token, it’s your choice what to do with it. I recommend checking the Tribute Sheet to see if any regions around you need a token to be maintained for the next cycle. You can also donate your Token to the Faction Council by placing it in the Token Box located in the compound directly behind the Great Hall. Any tokens that land there will be used for maintaining and protecting Meshwesh regions or building chanceries along the border.

A few other points:

• An Elder has the ability to invite people into their faction (currently bugged.)
• They can also kick people out of faction.
• Only paid accounts can pick up tokens.
• You cannot learn or acquire supplies from schools or universities in regions that are not controlled by your faction.
• You can donate to research at any university within your faction.
• Tokens may be used to transfer skills from one player to another at a later point.
• Tokens from a different faction currently have no use--a Meshwesh cannot spend a Kush token at all. (Yet.)
• Click on a Tribute Post to see what the upcoming bonus will be.
• Treaties among all three factions are being negotiated by elders and leaders. Please don’t try to claim regions beyond the ones we currently hold without talking to the Faction Council.
• You can settle outside your faction’s regions, though you’ll need to wait for a chancery to have faction chat there. (Let me know if you’re in this situation!)
• There’s another great guide to Factions here.
• If a university changes hands, it retains knowledge. For example, if Meshwesh take a region with a UArch that has technology we lacked, we can learn from that university while it’s in our control.
• If for some mad reason you want to switch out of Meshwesh, Merek is the Elder of Kush and Telanoc or Brucette will be the Elder of Hyksos. (Gabrielnight is the Elder of Meshwesh.)

In summary, Factions really aren’t that big of a deal. It’s lonely to go without faction chat, but once we get chanceries up on the borders that won’t matter. Although the bonuses are fun, they randomly rotate every week, so there’s no way to count on them being available. It’s my hope that we can maintain relative peace between the Factions. I wasn’t around for the wars of T8, but I’m assured they were no fun for anyone at all.

If you have any other questions, suggestions, or additions feel free to /chat Coyote in game or Discord.

September 15, 2019

Welcome to the first issue of the Meshwesh Times!

Tale 9 kicked off two weeks ago, and it’s been a productive time for Meshwesh. We’re keeping up with research, have several Tests open, and are busy working on advancing out of the stone-age. Current census lists 326 Meshwesh citizens.

This week we unlocked the technologies of mining and glasswork, which opens up a lot of opportunities. Folks have been dowsing for ore veins and finding iron, copper, and tin. Once we’re able to cook dowsing food, we’ll be looking for the other 11 types of ore. For now, grilled carrots give a +2 boost to Perception, which is enough to find the basics.

Five Tests are available to start. Some of them are fun and they all provide coveted Talent points. You can find Singing Cicada, Oyster Catcher, Bedouin, and Acrobat at the UBody. Hope you enjoy travel! If UArch’s Obelisk Test is more your style, consider signing up for the queue—or risk the social consequences of cutting in line. Bedouin was broken for the first week, but devs assure us that it’s now fixed.

Meshwesh just finished our first Elder elections, and Gabrielnight passed with 60% of the vote. (And I did quite respectably with 40%!) When asked what he’d like to say to Meshwesh, he responded: “The title may have changed, but the name is still the same. Family, friendship, cooperation and fun, all the important parts that make Meshwesh such a unique and wonderful place to be. Meshwesh continues to be both mine and others home here in Egypt, and I am positive it will stay that way. A great thank you to all of your support so far, I'm very much looking forward to what the future brings to us all here in Meshwesh.”

Please remember to visit the Great Hall and vote for another Elder Election so that Gabe can get some more hands on deck. We need 50% of Meshwesh to request the election, so hop over there when you can!

Other Things that Happened

• People have peppers! Seeds remain scarce.
• Cabbage and onion seeds have been successfully duped.
• Mausolus finally got a camel.
• Public mines opened near Tanis. (800 6647)

Please give me a shout (/chat Coyote in game or Discord) if you have guides, ideas for this newsletter, or events you’d like shared. For now, I leave you with an anthem for the advent of mining.