Being the leader of a faction that applied for officialdom I can share insight on why we applied for officialdom in the first place. The answer is to have an RP "vote"/"say" on the development of the story of the faction. The RP of discovery is so appealing as compared to other games (say, ESO that some members of the community play) is because you can actually have an impact on the development on in-game world, i.e. dynamic story. One can model diplomacy, inner politics, warfare scenarios, research, you name it. All other benefits of the officialdom, like perks or special ID lines are not the goal themselves, they are means of achieving the primary goal of RP impact. I do realise that there are PvP official factions and trading factions that are not seeking RP impact, usually. Yet even military PvP factions like Mike said want to win a war if they fight, official traders, IMHO, can request a perk of increased profits for certain goods/routes as a return of stocks inRP, whatsoever.
In this regard, small rewards will not solve the issue - logging for the sake of logging and not playing is something very detrimental to server's atmosphere. Either money or scidata will only contribute to logging for the sake of logging, it is not a solution. IMHO, to contribute to the latter what we might benefit from is:
- progressing of the stories. If the story moves nowhere, well, then there is no that appealing dynamic story I have mentioned;
- more RP events, not just mindless pew that can be arranged any time in Connecticut. Or, if it is a pew like that, let it have an RP consequence;
- possibly, more diverse perks for official factions making them truly unique and worth applying for and putting your time into developing the RP of your character/faction. Otherwise, one can just comfortably play as an indie/unofficial and be good without losing nothing.
The main point, though, is story progression. I do realise that the Admin team is not a pantheon of omnipotent gods and can not follow the endless demands of the community. In many cases, however, the players drive the story themselves and the team just need to slightly assist them by, say, editing infocard (possibly, even written by the player and, if is adequate, can be implemented) or announcing some developments via announcer tool. Internal political changes even less so require admin interference, maybe just a verification. IMHO, we need less events with the cultists wherein everyone just rushes for the data and often disregards RP, but more inter-factions events.
I know that the suggestions are not panacea and have drawbacks. I am just sounding my opinion.
P.S. it would be nice if a science faction in-RP can somehow get bonuses out of being a sci-faction. Generating scidata is an option, although a boring and imbalanced one. Maybe a perk to create/use unique equipment, reducing tech-nerf or just some other distinctive in-game features.
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