Building a Better HNM Linkshell, Part 1

[Not Kuno]

Machiavelli only wrote the Prince to impress a rich family in Florence (the Medicis?)so they would allow him to return there. Its very possible he didn't believe in what he was writing.

That is not fact, that is an issue that's currently being debated by historians and also a question that may never be answered. Yes the family was the Medici family. If your professor/teacher told you that that is the absolute truth, then they are horribly wrong.

His teacher probably also told him Pluto was a planet, too.

I can't wait to tell my kids "When I was your age, Pluto was a planet!"

We also had to walk uphill both ways in 10 feet of snow just to look into the sky.

[DeadLegend]

I actually did have to walk uphill both ways in elementary school, shit was in a bowl surrounded by hills.

[Xiona]

recognize why people play a mmo and suit your LS around it.

people play ffxi for 2 reasons, to get the best gear for their jobs, and to interact with friends. so basically make friends with all your members and claim the shit they need.

btw its impossible to claim enough to keep the LS moral high unless you use a bot, sorry. if you retort, "we claim all the time and we dont bot" then obviously you do =p

the big thing thats a maker or breaker is not giving a shit what anyone else thinks about you besides youre own LS mates. if you have a solid friendship with youre LS mates you dont need anyone outside of your LS to accomplish anything. so many cry babies in the game think they can actually affect what happens to a LS by soiling the illusion of reputation.

maybe it would matter if there were actual peer consequences, but this is a game where you cant pvp or boycott anyone (hello gil sellers and anyomous AH) just play for your friends and yourself and ignore the cry babies, youll be happy.. theyll never be

[Talint]

Mach's implication of fear is not the implication you are thinking about. When Mach says it's better to be feared, it doesn't mean that you have to be a despot and turn the state in to a horrible place where everyone is always in fear of dying.

Mach himself says that love and fear can co-exist, just that too much love makes the people have high expectations.

I humbly disagree with the interpretation of fear, since I've always read Machiavelli as being an absolute extremist, being the man who coined, "The end justifies the means."

Of course, I haven't read "The Prince" in years, so my interpretation may have waned over time.

For a LS leader, the people will be happy as long as you don't take the priveledges they have earned from their hard work and you don't take away their time by not being properly rewarded.

I do agree with this though.

[Ashira]

The same can be said for an endgame shell. If the leaders act like despotic tyrants, the members of the shell will be encouraged to leave. And should do so.

Some will, maybe.

Others continue to stay, and one wonders why.

[Daahan]

Mach's implication of fear is not the implication you are thinking about. When Mach says it's better to be feared, it doesn't mean that you have to be a despot and turn the state in to a horrible place where everyone is always in fear of dying.

Mach himself says that love and fear can co-exist, just that too much love makes the people have high expectations.

I humbly disagree with the interpretation of fear, since I've always read Machiavelli as being an absolute extremist, being the man who coined, "The end justifies the means."

Of course, I haven't read "The Prince" in years, so my interpretation may have waned over time.

For a LS leader, the people will be happy as long as you don't take the priveledges they have earned from their hard work and you don't take away their time by not being properly rewarded.

I do agree with this though.

It might have waned, because Mach makes a clear and concise contrast between being feared and being hated, because those are two very different things according to him.

edit: I recommend you read Mach's Discourses on Livy, if you haven't already, because it will give you a better understanding of some of his concepts.

[Ferien]

>.> I can't let an argument about Machiavelli go by...

Talint, I'd suggest you reread The Prince, with an open mind, attempting to ignore what others have said about it. I've had many people tell me that he suggested only that you be ruthless and treat your people like shit, when they're basically taking one quote out of context.

Essentially, he says that without fear, you cannot control your people. If you bend to your people's wishes too consistently, they will learn to walk all over you. Conversely, if you treat them unfairly (by taking away their property or their women), they will rebel and overthrow you.

It may be better to be feared than loved, but what's best is the middle ground between the two.

[Eaglestrike]

The same can be said for an endgame shell. If the leaders act like despotic tyrants, the members of the shell will be encouraged to leave. And should do so.

Some will, maybe.

Others continue to stay, and one wonders why.

True strike. Definately had that happen to me. I left an LS because of how amazingly shitty the leaders were. My friends in the LS were completely aware of how shitty the leaders were, but they stayed (until server migration when the leaders migrated and half the LS stayed).

[Merryck]

A good LS should ideally have 3 or 4 utterly incredible and dedicated tanks, all other jobs are filler.

yeah right... and then you go cut yourself when the healers are jerkin off to animal porn and you wipe to NQ behemoth

my ls has 4 relic shields almost 5 now(damn rich plds).. we seem to do ok

Anyone seen the latest video of the four PLDs taking on Behemoth by themselves?

Oh, right, there isn't one.

lol, 4 pld's with Aegis could take down NQ behemoth easily

I'm sorry, yes, I neglected to place "King" at the beginning of the name. If three gilsellers can take him down (as per today's Bahamut claim), I would certainly hope that four PLDs, with or without Aegis, could do the same.

As for one PLD taking on King Behemoth -- I'm skeptical.

Edit: Upon rereading the post by the blatant ass at the top of this page, I'm not so skeptical about a PLD with Aegis holding KB for 14 minutes, but the initial point that I intended to make stands. Four good tanks does not equal a good LS.

[aurik]

I think they were talking NQ behemoth.
Which is a joke. It's been soloed by thf before. And I bet I could do the same on my mnk.

[Lordwafik]

The same can be said for an endgame shell. If the leaders act like despotic tyrants, the members of the shell will be encouraged to leave. And should do so.

Some will, maybe.

Others continue to stay, and one wonders why.

True strike. Definately had that happen to me. I left an LS because of how amazingly shitty the leaders were. My friends in the LS were completely aware of how shitty the leaders were, but they stayed (until server migration when the leaders migrated and half the LS stayed).

A big reason people stay in LS's is because they dont want to feel like they're betraying anyone. Because of stupid mentalities, instead of being rewarded items, people instead are made to feel that their koenigs, crimsons, heca, etc are all leashes, which no matter what you have done for the LS you will always "owe" them.

[Merryck]

The same can be said for an endgame shell. If the leaders act like despotic tyrants, the members of the shell will be encouraged to leave. And should do so.

Some will, maybe.

Others continue to stay, and one wonders why.

True strike. Definately had that happen to me. I left an LS because of how amazingly shitty the leaders were. My friends in the LS were completely aware of how shitty the leaders were, but they stayed (until server migration when the leaders migrated and half the LS stayed).

A big reason people stay in LS's is because they dont want to feel like they're betraying anyone. Because of stupid mentalities, instead of being rewarded items, people instead are made to feel that their koenigs, crimsons, heca, etc are all leashes, which no matter what you have done for the LS you will always "owe" them.

If an item drops and no one is there to claim it, does it ever exist?

Skewed metaphor, but I personally don't believe in the LS property concept. It's going to someone, and it usually (except in certain cases, which I will not name) goes to the player in the LS who is most deserving of the item. Saying that it belongs to the LS is, as Lordwafik said, nothing more than a leash used to keep people from leaving. Unfortunately, that would fall under the category of "ruling by fear," which has yet to lead to prolonged periods of happiness and prosperity in the history of mankind, so far as I know.

[Norelco]

I'm pretty sure it has been mentioned already, but the first and most important step to running a successful linkshell is: no drama.

The next steps are define what the goal of your LS is, what you define success as, and what steps you are going to take to ensure that "no drama" occurs.

If it's an HNM linkshell, the first thing as a leader is to recognize that everyone in your linkshell is there for progression of some sort. Whether that progression is the best gear, or just killing big things, you need to realize that everyone just wants a fair crack at an item.

From there, define what steps it takes to make sure the LS drop policies remain fair...etc. etc.

Trickle down

[Talint]

>.> I can't let an argument about Machiavelli go by...

Talint, I'd suggest you reread The Prince, with an open mind, attempting to ignore what others have said about it. I've had many people tell me that he suggested only that you be ruthless and treat your people like shit, when they're basically taking one quote out of context.

Essentially, he says that without fear, you cannot control your people. If you bend to your people's wishes too consistently, they will learn to walk all over you. Conversely, if you treat them unfairly (by taking away their property or their women), they will rebel and overthrow you.

It may be better to be feared than loved, but what's best is the middle ground between the two.

See, I've associated this with Aristotle's Politics; the virtuous man taking the average of two extremes. I've always dug Aristotle, save for that whole; "rule by the elite" deal. But I really digress now...

If an item drops and no one is there to claim it, does it ever exist?

Skewed metaphor, but I personally don't believe in the LS property concept. It's going to someone, and it usually (except in certain cases, which I will not name) goes to the player in the LS who is most deserving of the item. Saying that it belongs to the LS is, as Lordwafik said, nothing more than a leash used to keep people from leaving.

Deserving is such a... interesting word. While I agree in theory, in execution it is easily abusable. I suppose part of being a good leader is knowing when you seeing abuse of the rule; while maintaining integrity - not an easy task.

[*Shinzon*]

The Basic reality of the linkshell I help run is this: People earn they're items, they're entitled to whatever their points will buy them. For instance a member leaving, requested to spend points on roughly 7.2mil. Its perfectly allright in that sense because he earned.

With items its a bit different because of the sometimes "tough" competition, legit or not. I get frustrated when white mages who join get a nobles from kirin in a couple of weeks and then leave, but its their item.
I think that one reason people tend to believe they "owe them one" is simply is because they in some ways feel guilty. Thats of course not referring to the people who flop around from one endgame shell to another simply to loot whore as much as they can.

It all comes down to the people you play with, kinda why I like my shell even though we as a shell don't do ALL the things I'd like, we're slowly progressing there. I'd rather be in my shell where people respect each other to help camp/kill items for other people, than have a person who owes us one who'll be the killjoy of the camps.

[Elondir]

I think most of this can be summed up with a need for maturity and patience from the majority of your members.

With this maturity comes leaders who don't give in to people who pressure them for items (and lose E. Bodies from their allys), members who don't complain when someone with a greater commitment is given something ahead of them etc. It's pretty rare in general, but they do exist.

No matter how you try to set-up your LS, you will get whiners, leeches and just plain idiots, it's a leader's job to either kick them or just not give them anything they don't deserve (my preference, leads to them leaving or sometimes even changing, in the mean time you have use of an extra person).

[Omfg_ffxi]

•Your leader caring what is best for your LS/What your LS members want instead of what everyone other person on the server thinks.
•Good WHMS
•Good Tanks
•Good Redmages
•An army of Blackmages

[Makochin]

A good shell starts from its leader or leaders. You need a core of people that are here to stay and not leave when a stronger shell waves their hands to them.

There are usually 2 types of people in HNM shells, people that build HNM shells, and people that join HNM shells. The people that join shells are those that want to accomplish things in this game, whether for items or for big kills. In order to achieve these goals, they look for HNM shells that best suit their interests. People that build shells on the other hand, can share the same goals as the second group of people, but their satisfaction lies in the process of taking a shell through the accomplishments rather than the accomplishments itself. For example, say 2 people both killed Fafnir. The first person is happy because he just killed his first Wyrm and got a ridill out of it. The second person also killed his first wyrm and got a ridill, but he isn't satisfied because he had nothing to do with organizing the kill.

I'm not saying that either type of people are better, but every successful shell need a solid group of linkshell "builders." There are many examples where a person tries to create HNM shells eventhough he is more of a group 2. Most likely the shell that he makes will not be successful. Same with when someone that is suppose to build HNM shells joins a shell. He will most likely have conflicts with the leaders of the shell and either gets booted or becomes a bad member.

Of course, not everyone falls under these characteristics. There are some basic leadership and playskill qualities that you must have in order to do anything significant in this game.

[geno]

•instead of what everyone other person on the server thinks.

Thats a big one!

[edgarfigaro]

See, I've associated this with Aristotle's Politics; the virtuous man taking the average of two extremes. I've always dug Aristotle, save for that whole; "rule by the elite" deal. But I really digress now...

That's silly. Just because there are 2 extremes does not mean the right answer or correct position is the average...it's the grey fallacy.