The allegiance system is based on a tree structure. For the purposes of this discussion, we'll divide the system into two basic types of trees: experience trees and rank trees. There can, of course, also be hybrid trees. If we understand the two types of trees well, we will also be able to construct more efficient hybrid trees, which can maximize the benefits of both.

A lot of players are concerned with the experience distribution that results from the allegiance system. But, I suggest that the real value of an allegiance structure is to create rank, not to garner incremental experience.
That being said, there is a lot of experience "wasted" if we don't consider the implications of experience transfer mechanics as well. When built properly, a tree built primarily to generate experience can result in at least doubling experience gained.

[big][big]Experience Trees[/big][/big]

Experience trees are created to generate experience for patrons. Rank has less meaning in experience trees. The purpose of the "experience despot" (I use the term "despot" here because it is one character who largely gains the benefits. This is done
usually by "paying off" his or her supporters with favors of a more ephemeral sort than experience gains--which, within the context of the AC world, is the permanent benefit) is to gain experience as rapidly as possible through the efforts of other players and their characters. Since experience is filtered through other followers on an alleigance tree as it moves upward (percentages of percentages will rapidly shrink the ultimate gain of the monarch), the ideal situation would be to have the maximum number of direct vassals with maximal loyalty skills. The maximum vassals a patron
can have is one vassal per level or a maximum of 12. The vassals would preferably be all magic user sorts, since magic users naturally have high loyalties due to their high self focus. The game also rewards player loyalty since the longer a patron-vassal relationship exists the greater and greater the percentages for experience transfers become.

All this should light up the eyes of budding young despots. However, there is a problem. The non-experience benefits that are provided by the monarch are generally of use to vassals that are just starting out. Once a vassal has learned the system or
has reached a level in the teens, there is little more that a patron can provide directly to recompensate the vassal for this gift of experience (which, in fact, costs the vassal nothing but does provide a perceived inequity between he and his patron).

The result of this problem is many short-lived vassal-patron relationships. The despots actively and aggressively solicit newcomers with gifts and promises, but are off actively courting the next potential vassal almost as soon as the first is enticed. I suspect that in most cases the time and goods spent would be better served applied towards
mana charges to power magic items that would allow for more effective and aggressive hunting by the despot. I suspect this is so because the low-level newcomer by definition generates little real experience (at least in terms of the kind of experience needed by high level characters). In a nutshell, the payoff is minor.[p]Such a problem won't exist though if the despot succeeds in building a real and long-term relationship. Such a relationship is possible as long as there is perceived benefits trickling down to vassals once the "stuff" phase is over. These benefits might include:
recognition, friendship and companionship, and perhaps constant direct character aid in the form of supporting spells, etc. I see the magic users oriented towards support roles (life, item and creature magicians) as best positioned to build long-term experience trees along with some specialist classes such as cooks and/or alchemists. These support characters can benefit their vassals by helping them to gain experience, which is particularly useful since these classes have more difficulty gaining experience on their own compared to the fighters or war mages they may employ as vassals. Thus,
incentives seem to exist for both patron and vassal.[p]The most efficient experience tree is simply a patron with twelve vassals (disciples?) directly beneath himself or herself. If the vassals have vassals of their own, they will, of course, slightly boost the patron's experience as well. But, experience is most efficiently transferred if transferred directly, so a wise despot will seek to tie the twelve best (most active and most loyal) vassals directly to himself or herself. The despot should push his leadership skill up as high as possible to maximize the efficiency of experience transfer,
as well as bribe, beg, or cajole his vassals to push their loyalty up 20 points or so from their starting numbers. The ideal tree is twelve mages giving experience to one uber-mage. How likely is it to find twelve unselfish and co-operative mages to play? Uh, yeah, thought so...[p]Thus, the major failing implicit in building experience trees is the failing of human nature: we want to get all the benefits ourselves. We don't mind too much if someone else shares the benefits, but we hate to see someone else getting something we don't. In most cases a more democratic, or equitable, arrangement is
a better to provide long-term satisfaction for all concerned. The rank tree is clearly superior in this regard.[p][big][big]Rank Trees[/big][/big][p]The purpose of rank trees is obviously to create higher ranks. Aside from the perceived status of higher ranks, there is a good reason in terms of game mechanics that these sorts of hierarchies are desireable. For example, some magical items require higher ranks for activation.[p]The other advantage of this kind of tree is that it is possible to build a hierarchy that distributes experience bonuses more equitably and elevates the
ranks of all those involved to at least third and probably fourth level or higher for about half of the players. For a rank tree to generate the maximum rank (10), a monarch will have to have a minimum of 510 players in his alleigance. Astute monarchs will note that a promise of at least rank 3 for everyone in the alleigance would make the possibility of gaining such a large amount of vassals more probable.[p]The structure for most efficiently "pushing up" ranks is a tree is by creating a tree in which each member of an alleigance controls two vassals. To move up one level in rank, a
character is required to have two vassals of equal rank beneath himself or herself. If the vassals are of unequal rank the patron's level is that of their highest ranked vassal, which for our purposes is inefficient (but may be of use in establishing something more equitable, as we shall see later on).[p]To build the most efficient tree that would create a rank 10 position requires that a character have rank 9 characters beneath him, which means a total of 2^9-2 positions must be filled beneath those two vassals in a dual branched structure. The bulk of a monarch's very active players should
be "placed" near the monarch for maximum benefits to those involved.[p]The tree then would look like this:

[p]This tree scales back in a dual manner, of course. If the aim is to make as many rank 3 characters as possible, a much smaller group of players can do so relatively easily. For example, three players constructing an efficient tree can create two rank 3 characters and one rank 4 character through cross-pledges:[p]Seven players can create four rank 3, two rank 4 and one rank 5 positions.[p]Of course, there is no perfect equity. Someone will get the top position in the tree. But, the benefits of one more rank or even two more past rank 3 are not as great as the benefit of simply acheiving rank 3, especially if the character involved was not expecting to rise to even rank 2.[p]An alternate tree, and perhaps one more suited to those obsessed with fairness, would be a capped rank tree. A group of players could build an equitable arrangement by having only one-to-one relationships above a certain rank. Since it takes two vassals of the same rank to boost a patron up a
rank, this would result in an unlimited number of positions of a certain rank. To create a new high level position, simply add someone to the top of the chain. The last character added will gain the "monarch" title, but no rank benefit would actually be accrued. If this causes a political fracas, the chain could be broken and remended anywhere at no cost as long as the monarch creates the break and then each subsequent new monarch down the line breaks until you can re-form their positions.[p]A capped rank tree with a target of rank 4 (which requires four players) would look like
this:[p][p]To create an equitable capped tree to achieve rank 5 would require at least eight player accounts.[p]Such rank trees suppose the extensive use of "mule" characters. Most players use them in any case as walking banks or specialist tradespeople, so I would suggest slotting them as much as possible into the bottom levels of the allegiance tree where they can add one more useful function to their repertoire. If we assume three mules are created per account (which I am
assume is equal to the number of players--though truly dedicated players could drastically shrink the tree's player logistics by contributing two accounts a piece), leaving two "playable" characters per player for each account on that server (and not all mules are unplayable; I routinely work up my tradesperson), a minimum rank of 3 can be achieved for at least one of each players' characters. To make the distribution more equitable, you could require those with the highest ranked characters to fill only the lowest slots in the tree with any further characters they create. A
reasonable method of distributing positions can be ahieved with a standard rank tree in this fashion, or a capped rank tree could be employed instead.[p] [p][big][big]A Return to the Experience Issue[/big][/big]The issue of experience imbalances cannot be ignored in these sorts of trees as such imbalances may produce strife. To minimize this problem in a tree aimed at balance, several things should be considered.[p]True "mules" will create little experience. In my experience with an ID mule, experience gained from IDing does not produce transferable experience.
The only experience transfer I saw upwards from that character appears to have been due to actual kill-related experience: she killed a lot of rabbits and a few gnawer shreths and drudge skulkers, and suddenly a small experience shift happened. Thus, despite making three levels (6-8) on the experience gained from IDing since pledging, to date she's generated less than 200 exp for her patron. Thus, true "mules" will contribute little to experience transfers. Tradesperson "mules" may contribute a bit more as they may actually be played a bit to gain experience to boost the
trade skills at issue. Still, in the long run, most of the experience will come from the actual "real" characters.[p]One way to diminish the strife over experience distribution, and increase the equity, is to keep a one-to-one relationship among the "real" characters. Set up the tree with one "real" character paired with one mule at each node. This way only one character ever feeds experience up to another. However, this method decreases the efficieny of the rank structure tremendously. It may be too high a price to pay for perceived equity.[p]Perhaps a modified
solution is better for all, but such a solution would call for a tree more clearly "devoted" to a single character, and one which mandates multiple "real" characters. In this case, the structure can be balanced well as it is in the rank balancing suggested above. If two "real" characters are required at each node and there is a balance of play between the two, something closer to equity can be achieved. Ideally, players should get back roughly what they contribute. They may get back from a different player than the one to which they give, but the net gift and gain
of experience can be at least roughly balanced among all the members of the alleigance.[p]A tree might look like this:
[blockquote]
[p align="center"]

legend: Player#.Xx, where # is the player ID, X is character type [m-mule, r-real] and x is the character number for that player.
[/blockquote]
[p]The logic in creating this kind of tree is that since Player 1's main real character gets the premium rank and experience from two real characters, but he receives no more "good" rank slots and no other strong experience feeds. Additionally, he will also have the responsibility to work two (rather than one) more "real" characters to feed some experience back to the other players' characters. Each of the other two then get a second and third tier rank slot, with experience feeds for each.[p]To boost the equity, minimum levels of loyalty could be required for the
"real" characters. Also, there could be an agreed upon ratio of main to secondary character levels that need to be maintained so a player doesn't play the top tier character excessively and ignore his or her other "real" characters without violating the agreement. Or, players could simply commit to giving as much net experience as they get by adjusting their ratio of play with the other characters on the tree until they have "given back" what they have gotten. Many players will not be able to help playing more than this system requires though.[p][big][big]Final
Thoughts[/big][/big][p]In conclusion, understanding the working of the allegiance trees can better help players create structures that support the alleigances in which they wish to participate. Trees can be structured towards their ultimate goals, rather than thrown together ad hoc. Considering alternative ways to use mules and other "non-played" characters can greatly enhance and accelerate the formation of efficient and equitable trees.[p]I wrote this essay as an exercise in understanding the allegiance system myself in an effort to better structure an alleigance I have
been planning to help build. If anyone else benefits, and, on a larger scale, if the many alleigances in Asheron's Call gain some small benefit from this essay, I would consider that a welcome bonus for the time and thought I put into writing this.[p]Any despots out there looking to reward me for making their schemes more efficient can e-mail me. If we share servers, I'll gladly accept any crumbs thrown my way (As if any of those despotic types would consider giving away anything they don't have to... No, I will not become your vassal!).