Organized Crime: What Better Way To Hop?
Gangs and Syndicates
In recent articles, we’ve been discussing the future gameplay integrations that come with lilyPADs, such as the Land Mechanics, the token emissions of the Notorious Frogs, bribery and other interactions with the Planning Commission. Today, we will be exploring how Gangs and Syndicates form, their purpose and differences, and how they will be useful for players and creators.
Gangs
Gangs make up the social layer of gameplay. At any point, any Froghodlr can hop into the discord and ping Lollihops or a mod to start their own gang, complete with a private chat room and role. Similarly, joining a gang is pretty easy — some gangs have requirements or an initiation ritual to join, but typically it’s more of a matter of asking than anything else. The Toadex has a continually updating list of gangs with their public lore and information to explore. Gangs can be formed around anything: the traits of the frogs, boosts or clothing, or something more abstract; a shared goal or interest, even friendship — or a common enemy. No matter how they start, the gangs play an important role in community building.
The formation of a gang begins the process of both individual and group story and character creation. By working with others for a similar goal, idea, or connection, they develop an influential piece in the Frogland puzzle. As we discussed in A Frog of a Different Ribbit, co-creation is not something that flourishes in a small, dark room with limited brains involved. Being able to work together to utilize each other’s unique skills and ideas, a small spark of an idea can form into a clutch of eggs, ready to be hatched into the world.
Once a gang has a solid foundation of members, goals and backstory, they are invited into the frog role playing game (FRPG). The FRPG helps expand their lore, characters, and problem solving in a fun and lighthearted setting, further encouraging co-creation. Presenting a newly formed team with a challenge to overcome helps develop the identity of the gang and the individual characters, giving them more depth of experience and character. Galvanizing a gang adds depth, collaboration, and relationship building to a nascent idea, helping it grow from spawn to tadpole.
Gangs do not need to progress past this point — as with everything in Frogland, it is up to the user to determine the level of involvement they wish to have with either the game or the development. However, if they wish to do more, forming a syndicate is the next hop.
Syndicates
The syndicates are the natural progression of gangs with interests beyond the social layer. Traditionally, these are called ‘guilds’ in other Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORGs). A syndicate is formed by successfully progressing through the gang’s FRPG storyline, then working with the Frog Team to define what exactly the syndicate’s area of interest is. In the present and near future, this includes how they can help develop and create the game and world — but in the further future it will also have gameplay mechanics similar to the Planning Commission.
For example, the Nazar Frogs, HipHOP Anonymous, and the Magic Guild began as gangs but have progressed through their storyline such that they now have their own syndicate, or are in the process of formalizing one. The Nazar Frogs make up their social layer, while the Aquatica Casino is run by their syndicate, managing the in-game gambling and assisting with the economic balance of the world. The HipHOP Anonymous Gang has launched their syndicate of Sapo Studios, a music production studio offering their services to community members in Frogland and IRL. Similarly, the Magic Guild’s syndicate is currently developing the crafting and magical mechanics of the gameplay alongside the Frog Team.
These are just a few examples of gangs and their syndicates and how they can be utilized not only to build out Frogland, but to develop beyond the simple 10k membership package of the Notorious Frogs, and get involved on a much deeper level.
Gangs VS Syndicates
Gang and syndicate memberships are not mutually exclusive or inclusive. Users can join as many gangs as they would like, or none. Being a member of one gang does not mean that you have to be a member of that syndicate, or preclude you from supporting another syndicate.
As described earlier, gangs are social and a “lightweight” way to play. Syndicates will have a ‘founding team’ that will work with the Frog Team to denote their internal operational structure, such as a council or DAO system, and will accept pledges for membership. Syndicate members receive more of a formalized benefit structure for being a member than a gang member might, but also require a standardized offering or entry fee to receive these benefits. The benefits and pledges required will be determined by each syndicate and the Frog Team, and disclosed as we progress in development.
Pledging to a Syndicate
Syndicate membership is limited by how many Frogs and/or lilyPADs you own — one pledge per land or Frog NFT. The membership fee required by a syndicate is up to that syndicate’s internal organizational structures to determine. There could be no fee — free to join — a donation style fee, a creative contribution request, an amount of resources, or a token based fee.
By harvesting the resources from your Frog or lilyPAD, the player will have a certain amount of resources to trade or pledge directly to a syndicate for benefits specific to that syndicate. Some amount of the resources gathered from each will make up your membership fee to a syndicate. However, the pledges are not necessarily fixed, nor necessarily token or resource based — it could be a creative contribution that your syndicate requires for membership, like producing beats or stems for Sapo Studios. Pledges may be accepted in the form of raw resources, a liquidity pool token, or a mixture of both. A syndicate could also offer free membership, or a “give what you can’’ donation based membership.
Pledging will occur on a regular basis to allow for a shift of memberships depending on current needs of players. Pledging will likely start at the beginning of each season, but will possibly occur more frequently than that.
Bribing With A Syndicate
Syndicates, as larger groups, have more power and resources available for bribery. As such, a benefit for members could be bribing a Planning Commission, or other similar entity, for priority treatment for their members. This will help balance the scales so users with only one Frog still have the opportunity to bribe their way to the front of the lines as a benefit of pledging some resources to a syndicate, and not be overrun by those with huge tracts of land and an army of Frogs.
TL;DR
Gangs are the social layer of co-creation and community building and can be formed by any Froghodlr based around anything the founder would like.
Gangs provide an intentional smaller community, a clear group identity, and a deliberate unity of purpose. This may be for friendship, story creation, gameplay, just for fun, or to develop a larger idea.
Syndicates are the notorious twin of the traditional ‘guilds’ in MMORPGs (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games). They can be used to develop or manage a particular area of gameplay, or to launch a community generated project within Frogland.
Syndicates accept pledges in return for membership. Being a member grants the syndicate’s protection, power, and influence of choice on larger gameplay mechanics that an individual might struggle against alone.
Pledging opportunities occur regularly (once a season or more frequently) so there is plenty of opportunity to adapt your pledges to suit your needs.
Pledges may be free with no fee, donation based, or measured in creative contributions, or resource tokens. The pledge necessary to join a syndicate is at the full discretion of the internal operational structure of the syndicate, not the Frog Team (though we will happily advise).
Each NFT (Notorious Frog or land) held can pledge resources to a syndicate — so a player with one Frog and one lilyPAD could pledge to two different Syndicates and receive benefits from both per pledge cycle.
Syndicates can be used by smaller holders to increase the likelihood of their bribes being accepted by bigger entities — for example, the Planning Commission when wanting to move a Device to a new lilyPAD.
