Everything you Always Needed To Know About Clans

[Merestil Haye]

... but Didn't Know you Needed to Ask.

One of the features of the Malazan game is that, although you're in it for yourself, you'll find it easier with some buddies. How do you get those buddies? You form clans.

The Authors, acting in concert, have prepared the following handy-dandy guide to clans, in the form of questions we think you might ask.

If you think of any more questions as you read the following... ask them and we'll provide aanswers (or tell you to RAFO, to borrow an acronym.)

Read on to learn about clans!

[Merestil Haye]

The Malazan Clan Q&A.

1. What is a clan in Malazan?
A clan is a group of up to four players who have banded together to attempt to win the game as a group.

2. How can I form a clan?
A clan is formed when one to four living players agree to form a clan and tell the Authors about that decision in a PM. Each player must PM the Authors separately. The PM should give an agreed name for a clan, and list all the players in the clan. Once the Authors have received all the PMs and verified them, the clan is entered into the Clan Roll.

The Authors will not prohibit any particular set of players from forming a clan; however they retain a limited veto over the name. If the chosen name is already taken by another clan, or is very similar to the name of an existing clan, the name will be rejected. For this reason, it is advised that the players come up with Primary and Secondary (and maybe Tertiary) names, just in case. If multiple names are put forward, the Authors will take the first unused one.

If the players fail to submit a name, the Authors will give the clan a unique name.

If multiple groups of players set up clans with the same name, priority will be given to the group who submits all their PMs first (as measured by the timestamp on the final PM received for each clan).

3. How do we know what clan names have been used?
Each Day at Dawn, the Clan Roll will be updated to show the names of all clans that have been formed since the game began. Don't use a name you find on there.

You can always ask the Authors if a clan name has been used. The answer will be accurate (when it is given, anyway). Also, if you pick a name that someone else picked earlier that Day, the Authors will tell you (and give you a chance to pick a new name for your clan).

4. If a clan has gone defunct, will you take it off the roll? Can it be used again if you do?
No, once a clan is formed it stays on the rolls even if it becomes defunct. There will be no recycling of clan names.

The Authors consider a clan defunct when all it's members are dead.

5. Can I join an existing clan?
Yes, providing that the clan has less than four members, and that your membership is acceptable to all living members. Once you ask for membership, all living members must then PM the Authors stating that they accept you into the clan. Once that is done, you are part of the clan. However, if you are rejected by even one of the existing members, you will not be accepted.

6. Will I be told why I was rejected?
No. Just that you were not accepted by the clan.

7. What happens if there are already four members in a clan?
Your application for membership fails.

8. Will I be told why it failed, in this case?
No. Just that you were not accepted by the clan.

9. Once I'm in a clan, what do I have to do?
Clans are trying to win the game together. I suggest you talk with your clanmates and coordinate activities. Or go to toga parties. Whatever takes your fancy, really.

10. How do I talk to my clanmates?
The Authors don't really care about how you talk to each other. It must be through a text-based medium, and the Authors must be copied in on the exchange. You can PM (Proboards don't set a limit on the number of PMs you can have), set up a board somewhere (in which case the Authors require access) or email (in which case please cc the Authors at mezlamafia {at} gmail {dot} com.

11. How many clans can I be in?
As many as you want.

12. So.. what's to stop me forming clans with everyone and guaranteeing my winning the game?
Nothing, except maybe the time it would take. Oh, and the fact that you have to nominate a Primary Clan, and that's the only clan you can win with at any given time.

13. Primary clan?
Yes. All your clan memberships are equally valid, but not all of them are equally useful, at least not if you hope to win the game. The only one you can win with, at any time, is your Primary Clan.

14. How do I choose a primary clan?
You may nominate a Primary Clan at any time during a Day. PM the Authors with the new Primary Clan.

15. How often can I do this? As often as I want?
Afraid not. You can nominate a Primary Clan a maximum of once per Day. Once you have made that nomination, you can't change it again until the next Dawn.

16. What happens if one of the clan members dies?
Not a lot.

A dead player is still considered a member of all clans he was a member of at the time of their death. They cannot join new clans, or change their designated Primary Clan. They can still win, if this Primary Clan achieves a winning position.

17. Ok, so I'm in a clan and it looks like the other players are losers / actual enemies of my role. Can I leave the clan?
Not formally, no. Once a clan is formed, it exists for the rest of the game. You can simply stop talking to your clanmates. You can even tell them that you have stopped cooperating with them. (This may be a more honourable course.)

18. I'm in a clan with a couple of others, and two of us are miffed at the third. Can we expel them from our clan?
No, it's not possible to expel someone from a clan. There are other ways to achieve the same end.

19. What happens about the dead? Do we get to know which clans they were in?
When a player dies, their clan memberships, and their designated Primary Clan, will be revealed.

20. Is there any other ways that we can learn the clan memberships of a player?
You could always try asking them; they might even answer truthfully. Certain roles may also be able to come up with clan information, but who or what we ain't saying.

[Holy Moley!]

This seems to involve an awful lot of out-of-thread communication. Is this one of those (rare) games here where private communication is allowed / encouraged? Or can you only communicate in PMs with your clan-mates (in which case I'm not sure how you can form clans secretly in the first place)?

[NAF1138]

Private communication is allowed/encouraged as long as you keep the authors (us mods) in the loop.

[luvbwfc]

sorry, pm's are allowed after forming a clan, or also during the forming?

[Merestil Haye]

PMs and other out-of-thread communications are allowed at all times during the game. So yes, you can PM another player before forming a clan with them.

However, once you're dead you can't talk to the living players about the game any more.

[Total Ullz]

And every PM forming and communicating with a Clan has to include ALL mods?

[Total Ullz]

And when can we start the clans?
Night 0 or from this moment?

[Merestil Haye]

That's a good question.

It's actually something we haven't discussed the logistics of. I suggest it would suffice to copy one Author in.

The game has not yet started, so you can't do it now. We'll announce when you can start negotiating with others to form clans.

[NAF1138]

May 14, 2010 16:10:41 GMT -5 Total Ullz said:

And every PM forming and communicating with a Clan has to include ALL mods?

We are currently discussing assigning players to particular a particular author or possibly having an "Author" member account that gets copied on all PMs.

We'll figure that out before Night 1 starts.

You can start forming clans as soon as everyone has received their roles.

[Total Ullz]

Can you win the game if you're not in a Clan?

[NAF1138]

You can declare yourself to be a clan of one and try to win that way, sure.

[Total Ullz]

May 14, 2010 12:23:41 GMT -5 Merestil Haye said:

A clan is formed when two to four living players agree to form a clan and tell the Authors about that decision in a PM.

But that doesn't seem to be a "real" Clan...
So what happens if no one will allow me to join their Clan?

[Holy Moley!]

May 14, 2010 15:43:49 GMT -5 NAF1138 said:

Private communication is allowed/encouraged as long as you keep the authors (us mods) in the loop.

Tasty.

[sinjin]

So I've heard a lot about Clans, what can you all tell me about Cla?

[peekercpa]

hey mods:

i just sent ulla a sexually explicit picture of myself dressed as a goat.

do you need to be in on this shit as well?

[The Authors]

The Authors have decided to go down the route of a central Authorial account.

PMs between players should be copied to this account, rather than to the individual Authors. It's easier for everyone that way. For one thing, it ensures that if one of the Authors goes missing for a few days, your PMs will still be accessinble to the rest of the team.

[Total Ullz]

May 14, 2010 17:38:36 GMT -5 peekercpa said:

hey mods:

i just sent ulla a sexually explicit picture of myself dressed as a goat.

do you need to be in on this shit as well?

Oh, yeah. I forgot to say thank you - love it to bits

[Renata]

Suggestion for communication among clan members: www. quicktopic.com. I use it a lot on another site (for mafia, masons, townie groups -- out-of-thread communication is generally encouraged there), and it works very well as a means of keeping all information in one place. How it works is, at least one member of a group needs to register there and start a topic. The topic will have its own URL assigned. Anyone given the URL can read and post to the topic (you don't have to be registered or signed in to post, which has its own dangers, see below); however, anyone not given the URL has roughly zero chance of guessing it, so it's quite secure. If you are registered with Quicktopic (I suggest using the same login name as you have here, or something close to it*), you can subscribe to the topic and get email alerts when it is updated, if you wish. Functionally it works like a chat board, though the post-editing functions and the like are next to nil.

So the positives of quicktopic -- primarily its ease of use compared to a regular board, especially when you may be trying to maintain several topics at once, because there's no need for registration and all that rigmarole. And like a board, you get to keep all your information in one place, rather than scattered around dozens of PMs.

The negatives -- really only one, but under the right circumstances it can be a doozy. As mentioned above, you do not need to be logged in (or even registered) to post to a QT, as long as you have the URL. You get a little box to enter your name in; you type it in, you type your post, done. As a result, QTs work very well for semi-anonymous groups (which may or may not be the case in this game; haven't quite absorbed it all yet). You simply post as your chosen username (typically your role name for the game) every time; there's no way to connect the posts back to you unless you slip up somewhere in the actual text.

The problem is that at times in the games I play, you may wind up in several of these semi-anonymous groups at once, and Quicktopic always saves the last name you used. So you might post as "John the Cop" in your "townie" QT, then as "The Spy" in your mafia one, return to the townie one without checking the name field and ... whoops. Now there's a post there written by "The Spy". And you can't delete it. You can edit posts; you can delete posts, but it takes administrator action to delete the username attached to the post in question. And odds are you're not the administrator of that board. And anyway a fully-deleted post will draw attention in itself.

So if anyone uses Quicktopic *and* uses more than one username to post there, be very, very careful. I love the service, myself, but it has caused more than one meta-game catastrophe, in my experience. Best to use the same username everywhere on QT unless absolutely necessary.


*** I'm registered at Quicktopic as RenataCFC, so by default will post as that if I start or join any QTs in this game, not as Normal Phase.

[Merestil Haye]

Thanks nphase. That looks promising.

[Holy Moley!]

May 14, 2010 17:38:36 GMT -5 peekercpa said:

hey mods:

i just sent ulla a sexually explicit picture of myself dressed as a goat.

do you need to be in on this shit as well?

Forward it on to me please. Purely for research purposes, of course.

[peekercpa]

May 15, 2010 14:53:00 GMT -5 Holy Moley! said:

May 14, 2010 17:38:36 GMT -5 peekercpa said:

hey mods:

i just sent ulla a sexually explicit picture of myself dressed as a goat.

do you need to be in on this shit as well?

Forward it on to me please. Purely for research purposes, of course.

well here is the r rated version.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-FdZiUFRP0&feature=related

i won't speak to the other partcipant *cough* buff you felt great.

[peekercpa]

btw, doing a google search on goat sex brings up some really odd sites.

[special]

Human-goat sexual intercourse is one of the more common types of bestiality. Of male zoophiles, 28% admitted sexual attraction to goats, ranking fourth. In female zoophiles sexual attraction to goats is very rare or non-existent. Actual levels of sexual use of goats were lower than this however.[1] The act is usually performed by a male human upon a goat of either sex. Male goats do not commonly take the initiative to copulate with a human female although some cases have been reported.[2]

[Høøpy Frøød]

May 15, 2010 18:09:57 GMT -5 peekercpa said:

btw, doing a google search on goat sex brings up some really odd sites.

And no doubt brings up the old classic eyesore goatse.cx .

[peekercpa]

May 15, 2010 20:27:40 GMT -5 Special Ed said:

Human-goat sexual intercourse is one of the more common types of bestiality. Of male zoophiles, 28% admitted sexual attraction to goats, ranking fourth. In female zoophiles sexual attraction to goats is very rare or non-existent. Actual levels of sexual use of goats were lower than this however.[1] The act is usually performed by a male human upon a goat of either sex. Male goats do not commonly take the initiative to copulate with a human female although some cases have been reported.[2]

gd, if i didn't kind of trust the mogs i'd say we have a scum mason on our hands.

[Mahaloth]

When will you tell us the name of your joint mod account?

[sinjin]

May 16, 2010 8:12:38 GMT -5 Mahaloth said:

When will you tell us the name of your joint mod account?

I think the name is "author" See this post above.

The Authors have decided to go down the route of a central Authorial account.

PMs between players should be copied to this account, rather than to the individual Authors. It's easier for everyone that way. For one thing, it ensures that if one of the Authors goes missing for a few days, your PMs will still be accessinble to the rest of the team.

[Rysto]

May 14, 2010 16:15:35 GMT -5 Total Ullz said:

And when can we start the clans?
Night 0 or from this moment?

Please wait until Day One to start forming clans or communicating off-board. Day One will start once everybody has their role, which should happen within the next couple of days once we have the last few kinks worked out in a couple of roles.

May 14, 2010 16:31:52 GMT -5 Total Ullz said:

Can you win the game if you're not in a Clan?

The standard win condition in this game will be some variation on the following:

You win when all members of the House of Chains have been eliminated and your Primary Clan cannot be prevented from killing all other players before all Primary Members of the clan itself is wiped out.

There are two caveats to this:
a) Some players may have a similar but not identical win condition. Those players will have one or more additional conditions in addition to the two listed above.

b) There may be a small number of players with a completely different win condition.

So while you can try to win in a solo clan, doing so would be unlikely.

May 14, 2010 15:38:48 GMT -5 Holy Moley! said:

This seems to involve an awful lot of out-of-thread communication. Is this one of those (rare) games here where private communication is allowed / encouraged? Or can you only communicate in PMs with your clan-mates (in which case I'm not sure how you can form clans secretly in the first place)?

NAF and MHaye have already answered this question, but I want to stress to everyone that this is not a normal game, and many of the normal rules(like prohibitions on off-board communication) don't apply. We want to encourage you to be creative, so if you want to do something that's traditionally not allowed in a normal game, ask the Authors whether we have a rule about it. If it's at all workable we'll probably let you go nuts.

On that topic, you may quote, in whole or in part, any PM or communication that you have received from the Authors or from any other player. You may also lie about any communications that you have received and invent false communications/PMs from any mod or other player. The mods will not confirm or deny whether a quote is indeed genuine, except in obvious situations where a player's claim goes against publicly available evidence(for an example of what I mean by this, check out Kelly's failed false claim in Cecil Pond on SDMB. The short version was that Kelly claimed a role whose mechanics hinged on when the Spawn appeared in the game. Kelly's claim said that the Spawn appeared during the Night, but the rules clearly stated that the Spawn appeared at Dawn. Chronos, the Mod, was forced into confirming Kelly as a liar. It was too bad for Kelly, but as a fellow scum I know Chronos did exactly what he had to do. If you choose to lie, don't make the same mistake. And of course there are roles that can get truthful information from the mods who may be able to contradict your lies. If you claim to be a Doctor and a Role Cop investigates you, the Role Cop will of course get your true role)

[zuma]

Is this damn game ever going to start? I've already formed 3 clans.