I have started two factions--one on this server and one on another. In both cases, I gave them away after they became "successful". Also in both cases, I kept in touch with leaders of those factions as well as others who were leaders of other factions or who wanted to begin one. In doing that, I have heard a lot of the trials and worries and views on factions and thought I'd share some. My BIGGEST concern is that FREELANCER continue. It is playable with current tech and is compatible with Windows 7 which means it can have some real longevity ([potentially). Along that line (and as a segue), what could be done is Microsoft could be "petitioned" by the mod community to include a link to the the new server list workaround on its website as many first time players will go there [that's just a stray thought here but, what the heck--can't hurt].
About factions...
My own personal view of a faction is that it should have the goal of facilitating play for player groups and the server that it is on. My goals are not to become "big and successful", "have the coolest members" or grow to a multi-server legendary legacy group". My goal is simply to make play on the server I am on more fun and better--in a long term way. Meaning, If I leave or the faction passes hands, it still benefits the game there.
So I shoot for what is in the long-run a successful concept. One that will outlast me or the current members and player politics. One who's base idea is good enough to make people want to play it long after I am gone. The Harvesters are one such idea. I hope the Congress will remain one too.
Creating "the" player faction for a game faction (Junkers, Hogosha, etc.) isn't the same. They are already there--built in. Claiming your group is "it" doesn't guarantee success and more importantly, doesn't add much to play that isn't already there anyway. So what do I shoot for?
An innovative concept that stretches and shows the potential for extended types of play within a group. Junkers can do more than collect scrap, the LWB can do more than fly around pirating Rheinland freighters, etc. It takes little imagination to play vanilla--that's already been imagined. The VALUE of player factions is to flesh out and develop greater role play as an example of how a vanilla group can be played creatively and in a way that expands everyone's idea of the faction.
I don't mean unrestrained as in, "We found the USS Enterprise, stripped the warp nacelle's and phasers from it and now are fighting in little Enterprises with the surviving human and Vulcan members of the Federation. I am focused more on taking whats already in the game and stripping that and working with its survivors.
Those who want to narrowly define role play of the factions they are interested in often have those narrow definitions because they want others confined within their own role play--to not go beyond it. That is not interactive or inclusive...its exclusive.
Exclusive role play does not help the server as in wanting to force everyone to be in "the" faction to "make it work". If it really was the faction, it wouldn't take forcing people for it to "work".
"There are too many factions. If role play was inclusive, it would work with any number of factions--interaction with the big group would get the smaller group noticed, etc. The trick is not to create an RP that keeps other groups from participating with it or forces them to drop their core RP to do so. A successful faction will do this.
As to the number of people to make a faction work? Its two. Two people with a well thought out and well crafted RP willing to invest in-game and on the forum can create a viable in-game alternative for others to be involved with. If you want to be official, then you need fivecommitted players. That is successful.
The game is too varied in personalities that play it and options that exist to "hold on" to large numbers of people. They key for the community is to keep the good ideas alive by cross-referencing one another in our role play. It may be that long dormant faction will catch the imagination of a new group of players and if it genuinely has a unique offering it can.
So there are three kinds of players--those who invent and create the ideas and put them out. Others who work to build and see them developed. And, finally, those who simply play within them while they are interested. the latter come and go but the former two create the reality. that doesn't take more than two-five people.
It's their job to present something playable and fun but its the rest of our jobs (all of us) to reinforce and reference it when it is. That's what will keep the server going and factions successful. It takes all of us. Discovery is the "last, best hope" for Freelancer at present. Those who can build in create keep doing so.