Leadership in Albion Online is a world which is wide, wild, wily, and wise. Often the interactions and perspectives of leaders and diplomats happen outside of the view of the common line member and gatherer. This interview is an attempt to bring some of that hidden perspective to light.

As part of my interview process with the significant leadership, diplomats, and shot callers of Albion Online, I used a standard set of questions for each person that is being interviewed. These views and expressed opinions are their own and except where the interviewee is the alliance leader, are not reflective of the views or official position of their organization at large.

The following interviewee is none other than Tawaria.

VOLTEL: For those who are unfamiliar with you, who are you and what do you do?

TAWARIA: Hello, my name is Tawaria. I´m a loyal member of Crimson Imperium Reborn and an alliance-shotcaller for the Partnership of Equals also called PoE. Which is the oldest alliance in Albion right now.

VOLTEL: What can you tell me about yourself and what you do; i.e. your role in your alliance.

TAWARIA: Since I’m a shotcaller, I create content for my guild and alliance most of the time. This means I lead all kinds of PvP-activity like ganking, diving enemy dungeons, skirmishes up to ZvZ fights for territory attacks/defenses, war camps, castles and Invasion Day’s. You’ll find me up at the frontlines of the battlefield pretty often. I´m also always around to make sure the alliance’s open world objectives get achieved.

VOLTEL: How´d you get your start in Albion? Did you start with planning to help run an alliance?

TAWARIA: I started the game with about 15 real-life friends at release creating our own guild called “Augusta Vindelicorum”. We didn’t really know what to do at the beginning as we had zero experience, so we just did “something”. After having non-stop fights against CIR in a royal red zone, we all came together and talked a bit, which was followed up by us joining PoE. A lot of my real-life friends ended up quitting the game pretty early because the game didn’t fit them, so I was the last-man-standing and finally merged into CIR. I was happy to create content and enjoy the game so I guess that’s how I got to where I’m at now.

VOLTEL: What, for you, was the hardest part of growing (into) your alliance? What do you struggle most with now?

TAWARIA: The alliance already had a good environment when I joined up, so it was easy to grow into it. The hardest part in this game for me was to grow into my shotcaller role. I was very inexperienced, without knowledge from the Beta and fighting against a lot of established shotcallers and organized guilds. It took many of my Zergs getting wiped, to improve and get on a competitive level. Having all the responsibility for each death on the soldiers following you can be hard. Back in the old Cumbria days Team Casualty broke my Zerg a dozen times. Special thanks to Ellipses and PlebicusDerpicus for bashing me into improvement.

VOLTEL: How does diplo currently – or continue to – shape your day-to-day and the experience of your members?

TAWARIA: I think we can see/feel the impact of Diplomacy in this game by a daily basis in PoE. Everybody is adapting and going with the flow as we have strong trust in our leaders and diplos.

VOLTEL: From the high-level, what´s the unspoken or unsung role of diplos and leaders that most people don´t get to see?

TAWARIA: Depending on the role, the design of this game can be like a second workplace. Sometimes it’s just exhausting leading PvP-groups for hours. Solving problems of different people. Improving your guild’s and keeping members in line. I think every person with responsibility in all those guilds/alliances have these weights to lift each day, so all the other players around it can enjoy their gaming time even more.

VOLTEL: Do you ever feel leaders are sometimes in the position of creating more problems than they solve?

TAWARIA: Sure, when they get too emotional and make decisions based on that. Staying unemotional as much as possible is the goal to achieve here.

VOLTEL: Let´s talk regional – A lot of recent attention has been paid to Mercia and their residents. What are your thoughts on the region and the diplomatic and political situation?

TAWARIA: I think it´s healthy for the game that finally someone decided to go on a full-out War against PoE which has been holding a lot of land lately. The landscape is changing daily and there is much more traffic in-between the zones which spices things up a little bit. On the political front it´s basically SAVE vs POE vs SQUAD. Also, with the most recent patch there´s no need to hold and conquer a lot of territories anymore. At this point it´s just a luxury having more crystal towers, a chest for deposit, a safe-space in the zone and mages that generate some income.

VOLTEL: Does the situation in Mercia differ greatly from Cumbria and Anglia?

TAWARIA: No, I don’t think so. Well since the last Invasion day (reset) things have changed a bit. Usually it´s just split between EU/NA and the 2-3 most competitive alliances.

VOLTEL: By your assessment, are there problems that leaders and Diplomats are incapable of solving?

TAWARIA: In my opinion there´s not a single problem that cannot be solved. It always takes one way or another.

On another Note my apologies for this being the first article or interview posted since before the holidays. I have personally been extremely stretched for time in Real life and have not had any time for Albion and very little for much of anything else. That being said we will be announcing some very good big news soon as well as we still desperately are in need of editors, graphics folks, and of course more people to write articles about what they care about in the sandbox that is Ablion Online! If you are interested please join are discord. https://discord.gg/6rPPdJA