You all have raised fairly valid points - I'll try to address them individually:
Skwisgaar Skwigelf, on 23 January 2012 - 11:15 AM, said:
If the St. Ives rebellion is allowed then I bet you will see the Skye March try to same thing......
The difference here is that the St. Ives Compact achieved independence several years before MWO takes place, and had more than a handful of worlds under it's control. The Skye separatists never controlled much of anything - and their biggest uprising came in 3056 - 7 years in the future.
Ralinos, on 23 January 2012 - 11:34 AM, said:
I feel like if you have the St. Ives Compact being separate, what about Isle of Skye, Periphery, Andurien, or Tikonov? There needs to be a decent line, so we don't have 50 factions.
Though it would be interesting to have a Davion faction that are the St. Ives Separatists.
Once again Isle of Skye was not a separate body - successfully - ever. Ives was independent from 3029-3063ish. Thats a decent chuck of time. As for the periphery - they never played a huge roll on IS politics like the St. Ives compact did - and they weren't sandwiched between two huge powers. The Andurian Secession Crisis occurred years before the timeline of this game, and never was a separate entity again. And finally Tikonov was one planet. The St. Ives Compact is not a simple regional rebellion as were common in BT. It was essentially a small separate nation - that was independent for the entirety of this game's timeline.
Dihm, on 23 January 2012 - 11:50 AM, said:
From an RP perspective, I'm all for St. Ives and Skye being free.
From a gameplay perspective... very small factions, likely a very small player base, and we already have 6 factions (plus more with the Clans coming, assuming they are opened to players). Seems like it would split things more than is prudent.
Probably - but I fail to see why splitting would be a terrible thing - especially if they already have such a small power base. The St. Ives compact was unique compared to other examples as it was more than a handful of worlds - had a military - and was closely allied with the FedCom. At the least it shouldn't be Capellan. That just makes no sense.
SMDMadCow, on 23 January 2012 - 12:01 PM, said:
I think the devs are missing a big plot hook for Liao players. The CapCon invades St Ives in 3060 to reintigrate it, if St Ives is already a part of the CapCon now in 3049, then that whole story line goes to waste in game. Thats why I think that if St Ives doesnt get to be a faction, then it should at least be part of the FedCom. It makes sense because it separated from the CapCon and had bad relations with them, being pro Davion, and it would give the Liao players something to look foward too or at least something to achieve later in the game.
Exactly - at least make it FedCom allied. Give the poor Capellans something to strive for. People would be able to get into their faction more if they had things to look forward to. Why deny them the opportunity to try to take St. Ives back.
Thorn Hallis, on 23 January 2012 - 12:17 PM, said:
Do I smell fear? Does this Davion agent try to stir up some kind of rebellion in the St.Ives Communality in hopes to turn the attention of the Confederation away from Tikonov, Sarna, Chesterton and Liao?
Do I smell the fear that you couldn't take a few measly planets back and need to have them on your team to start with?
Damocles, on 23 January 2012 - 11:08 AM, said:
How long do you expect St.Ives to last between a vengeful Capcon and an opportunistic House Davion?
And If you were just puppetized Davion then what is the point?
First off we are the Fed Com and not the Federated Suns any longer. Second of all if we are allied with them - why would we want to take them over. It would be really easy for the devs to make them a protectorate - and it would give us somewhere else to spank the Capellans.
EDIT - Thanks Sturm for backing me up on some of those examples. They really are different things. If the St. Ives Compact appeared as a rebellion during the timeline - fine. But as an established power for almost 20 years - they deserve a little more respect than that. Bottom line is this. Even if they shouldn't be independent - that there aren't enough people to play them - can we all agree that they at least shouldn't be part of the Capellan Confederation at the start of the game?
Edited by Listless Nomad, 23 January 2012 - 01:02 PM.