Aristocracy

Aristocracy, when in context to the Regalian Empire, refers to the upper-class citizens of the empire, which includes but is not limited to very wealthy families referred to as New Money, noble families with titled land referred to as Old Money, and Knights and other associated government-titled individuals. This Page will set out a variety of both OOC conduct rules, as well as IC mechanics through which there is a class-divide in Roleplay in Regalia, which we believe helps reinforce the historical-like setting in a fantasy world. This page also contains other useful links and referals for things to do with Aristocracy, so it should generally be sourced as first to-go place for information.

Social Conduct

Many of the interaction mechanics surrounding Aristocracy rely on common sense and good faith participation. As is expected of any concept that induces conflict, which often occurs among the Aristocrats who compete for power, players who struggle with anxious thoughts and concern over loss of face or embarrassment of their Character should not partake, or remain on the safe sidelines as a lesser component of a bigger family. Secondly, we expect all players who sign up to any of this, to do so in good faith, and to be serious about their roleplay intentions. Lore Staff will moderate what they consider meta-gaming, which in this case would be using OOC connections to provide in-roleplay system benefit, for example by recruiting large droves of unserious roleplayers who barely log on to pad system interactions in one's benefit. We expect players to want to participate, and to show a minimum of effort in return for the services provided by Lore Staff.

Classes of Aristocracy

Currently, there are several ranks of Aristocracy. These currently cap off at the County level of the hierarchy, at least for nobles, but there are theoretically many more titled individuals. We as Lore Staff have just decided that to give players more freedom in roleplay, that they should not be playing the equivalent of bishops, dukes, princes, and royals. Count-level nobles are still able to drink with commoners in the tavern, while the other ranks would just be confined to their government position or title lands, and would not be able to roleplay with 85% of the server population, which gets boring quickly. All titles are distinguished as Male/Female suffix/Non-Binary suffix.

• Palatine/Marcher Count/Countess/Countirh, are the prestige-honored versions of Counts who have special regard or some kind of higher prestige among their peers.
• Count/Countess/Countirh, are the current highest normal form of titled nobility. This rank owns several valleys or dozen hectares of property, with cities and castles.
• Viscount/Viscountess/Vicountirh, are a rank lower than Counts, owning usually a city and some hamlets and estates, or a few castles. This title can sometimes just sound nicer than Count.
• Knights (Unisex), are not formally ranked, but even when they are not titled nobles, gain some aristocratic preferential treatment. When in armor, they are treated as Knights, and their higher ranks are ignored.
• Baron/Baroness/Baroq, are vassal families of Viscounts and up. Barons usually only manage or control one city or town, or one castle. This title does not confer wealth, only access to aristocracy.
• Gentry (Unisex), The Gentry are wealthy citizens who to the chagrin of old money must be tolerated to be around other Aristocrats. They don't have any formal titles within the Peerage, but are still part of it.

Social Class Rules

Each Class of aristocracy is bound to specific social conduct rules, and several rules dictate how one is viewed in context to other titleholders. It is especially relevant for Knights and Gentry, who may belong to more than one Rank.

• Palatine Counts, Counts, and Viscounts, are all considered to fall under Court Protocol (see below). Court Protocol is a basic behavior code for the representatives of the Emperor. As dictated by the Creed of Unionism, the Peers or titleholders are his secular representation in the Regalian Empire who must rule the small corners of the Empire in his stead. As a result, they must embody certain qualities of the Emperor and be above the common folk of the Empire. The Court holds that if any of the Peers act outside of the scope of their title, and they disgrace their name and the Emperor, then their Peer status may be ignored and all privileges do not apply to them anymore. In short, a Noble who acts like a Commoner, should be treated as one.
• Knights can be members of multiple social classes at once, as many Knights are also title holders or just wealthy family members of New Money. Knights however socially exist in a rank between the Gentry and the Barons, and higher-titled Nobles. Even if in courtly robes a Knight might be of the same rank as a Count, while a Knight is in Knight duty (in armor), they are ranked as petty nobility and thus are outranked by the Viscounts, Counts, and Palatine Counts. They still however are considered of higher social class than Commoner and retain their higher authority rank while off-duty in civilian clothing.
• Baron titles are not inherited. This means that while Viscount, Count, and Palatine Counts can ennoble certain families by bestowing them with a Barony, that when the title holder dies, the title reverts back to the person who granted it or their family. It is possible to create pseudo inheritance by re-affirming the title to the next of kin, but generally speaking, Baronial titles are more like managerial positions. While the higher Peer ranks come with some modicum of wealth and prestige, Baronial titles do not afford any money since most of the taxes go directly to the overlord ruler. Barons do get access to noble privileges and social events to some degree but are never pulled up to the same rank. Baron actions are also considered as part of the bigger overarching overlord family. That is to say, if Family A is a Vassal of Family B, and they act out in public and get put on trial for treason, Family B also takes a social hit from this, because they are considered responsible for their Vassal families. Generally speaking though, Baronial families are safe and easy ways into Nobility without too many expectations. There is no expectation for Barons to participate in court politics, they can, but if they mostly just make use of the fruits of their access and prestige legally speaking, then they won't be at much risk of being plotted against. Barons or their relatives are somewhat expected to behave by Court Protocol, but are not punished for transgressions.
• Gentry are wealthy, and not expected to behave by Court Protocol at all. Being Gentry also doesn't strictly mean being the bottom of the barrel in terms of wealth and power. With Regalia transitioning into a pseudo industrialized nation, some families of new money have become astronomically more wealthy than old money, so there is a reasonable chance many of the titled nobles are in fact quite poor, because landed titles do not generate as much money as capital investment and business enterprise. In most cases, 70% of the finances generated off land tax are passed off to the higher ranked Dukes and the Emperor, meaning old money can in theory have accrued wealth over time, but cannot spend it as luxuriously as the Gentry could.

Formal Address

One of the most important rights of the Peers is to be correctly titled to show deference to their rank. Refusing to do so after being corrected, is considered a Low Law violation in the Regalian Empire and can land a person in prison. There is no need to memorize them all, title holders will just correct ignorance, the crime is only in continuing to mistitle on purpose. Titles are also streamlined, generally speaking, to avoid confusion. There is some wriggle room with formality, meaning in private some nobles choose to use nicknames and friendship names, but generally speaking, while any stranger or mere acquaintance is present, Court Protocol is in effect.

• Palatine Counts should be called "Palatine Count of such family name or primary title place", or "Your Esteemed Lordship/Ladyship/Lirhship" in all settings.
• Counts should be called "Count of such family name or primary title place", or "Your Lordship/Ladyship/Lirhship" in all settings.
• Viscounts should be called "Viscount of such family name or primary title place", or "Your Lordship/Ladyship/Lirhship" in all settings.
• Untitled relatives of all of the above ranks (siblings, children, cousins, and so forth) should be called "Lord/Lady/Lirhship in all settings.
• Widowed parents of all the above ranks should be called "Title of child-Dowager of such family name or primary title place", or "Your Lordship(Ladyship/Lirhship)" in all settings.
• Spouses of all the above ranks, should be called "Title of Spouse-Consort of such family name or primary title place", or "Your Lordship(Ladyship/Lirhship)" in all settings.
• Adopted Commoner Relatives into Noble Families never have titles, unless they are a commoner married to the title holder, in which case they are just "Consort Name", or "Sir/Lady(Dame)/Ser" in all settings.
• Knights default to Knightly title privilege, meaning just "Knight-Title surname", or "Sir/Lady(Dame)/Ser" in all settings.
• Barons and Gentry both have the same title privilege, meaning just "Sir/Lady(Dame)/Ser in all settings, including their extended families.

Family Titles

At a base line, only the "Family Head" can own the full title of Palatine Count/Count/Viscount/Baron. It is not permitted to have multiple family members with equal rank titles. It is permitted to vassalize a relative, but in such a case, they leave the overarching family and start their own branch lineage. If this process is abused to farm Palatine titles, Lore Staff will force relatives back into their overarching families. Outside of all this, family members can be rewarded with largely meaningless titles, like Lord of such and such or Lady of this Castle Valley, including but not limited to peer orders like Lirh of the Golden Swan. These are not formal titles of addresses and will not be recorded anywhere, but family members can use them for bragging purposes, and friends or allies can use them to stroke the ego of the individual or show their support and loyalty. At a baseline, if a player plays a Character belonging to a Noble family, they must always have the family name in their Nickname, if they do not, they are not Noble. Family members can be disowned from families, but this should be a last resort because it signals an inability to control one's own family, which is a weakness. Finally, family leaders should OOC consider their actions of adding family members. When a family member has been granted, they cannot be retconned out of the family by the family owner anymore, only by the player. The player of the character always retains full rights to their own Character.

Vassalage

Vassalage on MassiveCraft should be considered a form of "loyalty reward" for players who manage to pull either new players on the server, or bring back old players to include them in their ongoing roleplay, or just generally engage existing roleplayers to spend more time on the server by including them in their noble business. Every rank of Noble (Palatine Count, Count, Viscount) can ennoble a commoner family to become their vassal, where they enjoy expectations and privileges alike. It is important to note that Vassalage should be considered a vehicle to encourage roleplay. If Lore Staff deems Vassals to be unengaged/inactive slot fillers for the sake of padding the title of the Overlord, the ennoblement will be reversed. While there is no strict expectation for them to engage in high-stakes politics, they should at least show the capacity to independently exist in Roleplay without only ever being wallpapered to the activities of their Overlord in Roleplay. To engage in the visualization of a family, a Ticket must be made to Lore Staff on the MassiveCraft Discord Ticket Bot to notify the ennoblement. Currently, the maximum of ennoblement is 3 Families, and the minimum requirement for the Overlord to be classified as Palatine/Marcher Count is 2. Vassal families are not hereditary, but (as seen above) do get title privilege, and access to all noble-aligned events and venues, while also being seen legally as Nobles in the eyes of the law. Single-man Vassal families are permitted, but sometimes Lore Staff may intervene and request that Vassal families be merged. A vassalage cannot currently be terminated without having the Court strip a Vassal of their title. As such, it is recommended to be careful about who to ennoble, as your Character(s) will deal with the consequences long term. Viscounts and Counts can also be Vassalized by other Counts. In such a case, they would be demoted to Baron, but the title would be hereditary, and they take all the money they had in their previous family with them. This is a useful step to take if a family just wants to opt out of noble politics largely speaking and outsource the thinking to someone else.

Family and Registration

There are several types of themes or designs that one can apply to either new-money or old-money families. The first consideration that has to be made, is whether a family is Constitutional or Administrative. Constitutional families are families who believe in the divine right of Nobles to rule, and that all their privileges are inherent to their social class that cannot be alienated from them. Constitutional Nobles rarely if ever involve themselves in the running of their land, they rely on a competent class of bureaucrats and administrators to do tax and legal work for them, and mostly just spend their time doing noble things like hunting, fine dining, and politics. Administrative families are families who believe in meritocracy, and who educate their children to be as efficient rulers as possible, thus putting most of the work of managing their fiefs on their shoulders. Such Nobles spend less time and money on noble activities, and more on checking tax ledgers and deciding legal disputes of the peasantry. Constitutional Nobles look down on Administrative Nobles for being nothing better than washed-out bureaucrats, while Administrative Nobles look down on Constitutional Nobles for being state parasites and outdated. The truth lies somewhere in the middle, where the Court is more fond of Constitutional Nobles in diplomacy due to their increased esteem, but more fond of Administrative Nobles in state management due to their perceived competence. It is not possible to do a little bit of both, as any type of administrative work by definition means a person is no longer a Constitutional Noble, whose delicate hands must not touch any work befit for commoners.

Secondly, the design of a family is more related to what kind of money-makers they are. There is a distinction between Court families who actively try to get very involved with court politics, blue families who are just wealthy nobles but are a little apathetic to the runnings of the Empire, and red families, who are not nobles, but have money or temporary titles (Gentry and Barons). Crime families in theory also exist, because new money does not necessarily need to have made their money in investment or business, but there is an expectation that crime money at some point transitions into formal money so they can interact with the upper classes. Foreign money is not really recognized, unless this involves the literal meaning of nobles fleeing a foreign land and arriving with ships full of cash on Regalia's shores. This is not always a guarantee for inclusion, because Regalia does not look fondly on foreign nobles, and is likely to tax the hell out of any migrant who brings money to the fore. Consult with Lore Staff on how to incorporate Foreign Nobility into the Regalian Empire, for example families who have switched allegiance, or fled their homeland for whatever reason. Aristocracy is opt-in, but not application-approved, essentially just registration. Lore Staff will check over an application to ensure nothing in it is wildly contradictory to lore, but generally speaking, nothing really stops an request from being registered correctly. Explanations on how to submit a registration can be found on a Thread on the Forums Here.