Factions

Factions are the groups that hold Valdaria, including settlements and their councils, raiding bands, cults, garrisons, and even beasts that hunt as one. A faction has leaders, ranks, and claimed territory, and its members act on where you stand with the group, not just on what you did in front of them.

There is no reputation screen, so you find out where you stand from how the world treats you, from who trades and who talks to who draws steel.

Standing

Your deeds move your standing with a faction, and standing changes surface as updates during play. Word of what you do travels along a faction's own lines, so members who were not there learn of it, which means helping one settlement patrol reaches the garrison and robbing one caravan reaches the guild's other posts.

Standing works in both directions. Win a group over and its members stand down for you, even ones that would normally attack on sight. Turn a faction against you and its shops, members, beds, and roads all close at once.

What standing changes

Faction members decide by your standing:

• Who trades with you, as described on Merchants.
• Who will join your party or fight beside you.
• Where you can rest safely.
• Who attacks on sight, and who lets you pass.

You can win a faction over far enough to take it over, and its people will then answer to you.

Territory

Factions claim ground, and creatures that appear inside a faction's territory belong to that faction. A wolf on a pack's gathering ground answers to the pack, while the same wolf in the open wild answers to nothing. Wild creatures outside any claim are as dangerous as they ever were.

Beasts hold territory the same way people do, so a hawk matriarch's eyrie, a herd's grazing run, or the automatons still guarding a dead tomb all answer as one to what you do.

Knowing who you are dealing with

Some groups fly their banner plainly, such as a fort's garrison, a village council, or a clan hold. Others keep no visible banner at all, and you only learn who runs certain camps and shops by dealing with them. Striking at one hand of a hidden group can close doors you did not know it held.