Announcement

**Googlie** · June 27, 2004, 22:25

Junta Officers (so far)

(Rank somewhat arbitrarily assigned as per the Spartan Information Screens

Chairman of the Junta (pro-tem, during Santiago's indisposition) - and turnplayer: Lt. Colonel Maniac

Head of Diplomacy: Captain "General"Tacticus

Minister of Defense: Major Jamski

Quartermaster: Major Skanky Burns

Minister of Information: Captain Kassiopeia

Head of Covert Ops: Major Googlie

Head of the Admiralty: Lt. Commander Dissident

**Skanky Burns** · June 27, 2004, 22:26

Turn Order:

**Googlie** · June 27, 2004, 22:35

This was originally posted by Maniac in the Archived threads

Originally posted by Jamski
Everyone should get a unit to command as a priority

Originally posted by Kassiopeia
Above all, we need ranks. Lots of them. Also we need branches of the armed forces, a strict system of organising these forces (battalions, escadrons, fleets, flotillas, squadrons, and so on).

For ranks and rates I'd like to refer back to a post I made a while back in this thread:

It sounds a nice idea to let everyone have a unit they command. (Though do I assume correctly it would still be allowed for others to offer suggestions what to do with all those units and coordinate our efforts?)

As for army organization in battalions and squadrons etcetera, I'd like to refer to this site I found a while back:

http://usmilitary.about.com/library...inofcommand.htm

I have also been thinking a bit about how many soldiers should be in one in-game unit, and how we should call such a unit. Based on the link above, I concluded calling our seperate units batallions, containing at minimum 300 soldiers and commanded by a Lieutenant-Colonel, would be most realist. I got to that number like this:

1> One pop in SMAC is 10000 people.

2> Even in the countries with the largest percentage of military of the total population, the percentage is "only" 2%. I assume that this can't be much different for the Spartans, at least in peace time. However let's assume we'll be at war most of the time and thus have a larger military all the time and let's also count police forces to the military, and thus say our military is 4% of our population.

3> Looking at the military sizes in the current ACDG, I'd say it would be a good estimate that we'll have one military unit per one to two pops.

> 4% of 10000 = 400 military in one pop, and each pop supports between a half and one unit.

That way we about have the minimum size of a battalion (300) per unit and we can all call ourselves to the very least Lieutenant-Colonel if we command one. (Yeah, not such a steady argumentation, but it's better than nothing )

Originally posted by Kassiopeia
For instance, the leader could be the Commander in Chief, with the honourary title of Colonel (of course). All the other nodes of the spider web, who feed the information to the CiC, could be Generals of their possible different specialties (we could call these branches, like Intelligence, Military, Research, and so on).

Originally posted by Drogue
I'd go for Commander in Chief, then Major General for 2nd in command, and Generals for each department.

AFAIK a Major General is a lower rank than a General, so that would sound rather contradictory for a second in command.

I'll throw in an alternative proposal for discussion:

Commander in Chief

= turnplayer. Unlike the system we had in the Consciousness, IMHO the turnplayer doesn't necessarily have to be the "leader" of the faction though. Eg in the Hive Kody was for a long time the turnplayer AFAIK, while other people had the highest official positions of Chairman and Deputy Chairman etc.

President

= guardian of the consitution, takes care of nominations and elections, and fills in for absent officials. More or less the job description of the Alpha Talent and the Second Function in the previous ACDGs. The "President" wouldn't have powers such as presidents like in the USA or France though. I'd rather see it as a "President" such as in Italy or Israel, where IIRC it is more a ceremonial function. Likewise here it would mostly be a "meta-game" organizational function, and (unless officials are absent) thus without in-game powers. Therefore it seems fitting not to give this job a military title.

Ministers

= the Directors and XX Functions of the previous ACDGs. Kassiopeia and Drogue proposed to call them all Generals. However I was thinking: let's give all the government officials the title of 'Minister', but allow them besides that a military title of their choice. That way you don't force everyone to be a General, but everyone can besides 'minister' still pick a more personalized title of their liking, eg Colonel, Field Marshall, Admiral of the Fleet, etcetera.

Oh yeah, perhaps a title especially reserved for the 'Minister of Military Affairs' (and thus the supreme commander of the entire army, fleet and air force) could be 'Generalissimo'.

Originally posted by DeathByTheSword
hmz i dont think we should go above colenel...

Originally posted by Kassiopeia
I respectfully disagree. A faction of any size would have far too many levels of hierarchy in its military to have so few ranks. We'd have to place Colonel on the top of a standard hierarchy you have in real life, today. I'd prefer reserving it for the CiC and removing it from the lower rank status it has altogether, so that there will always be only one Colonel (with a capital C) at a given time in Sparta.

If I recall correctly I read once that Colonels have such a "special status" because they are the highest rank that still have soldiers directly under them and command them themselves from the field. All the higher ranks such as generals would more or less perform their job from behind their desk and make battle plans for the army from there, and thus hardly see soldiers directly.

So making Colonels the highest army official as DBTS proposes (and thus as a consequence give them the desk job the generals currently have) or making "Colonel" a title only reserved for the supreme Spartan leader as Kassiopeia proposes, would remove the exact reason why 'Colonel' is such a special title. I'd therefore say to leave them what they are: the highest ranking commander that is actually with their soldiers on the field, and therefore has greater respect from the common soldier.

If, such as Kassi proposes, you really want to give the supreme Spartan leader the title of Colonel, a work-around could be to name one of our elite units the "Factional Guard" (hint towards the 'Praetorian Guard'), keep it in Sparta Command at all times, and place it under direct command of the Spartan supreme leader. Since the leader would have direct control and always be with his soldiers "on the field" in Sparta Command, the title of "Colonel" would then be justified.

**Googlie** · June 27, 2004, 22:46

Followed by:

Originally posted by Jamski
Generals is better than Chiefs, but I prefer Captains, myself.

The C-in-C would be Colonel Maniac, or Colonel Jamski etc, the second-in-command would be Lt.Col. Skanky etc..

Then the people in charge of particular depts. would be Capts.

then, in reply:

Originally posted by Skanky Burns
Available official positions in the Spartan War Machine:

The Turnplayer - Commander in Chief which can be shortenend to CiC

The person to authorise others into our forum - Director of Domestic Operations or Quartermaster

A person who is the "official" contact point with other factions - Minister of Propaganda.

Due to the military nature of our faction, it would probably be best if all position titles could be converted into TLAs.

Commander in Chief seems to be well accepted by now. I suggest we keep it.

The CiC will have the rank of Colonel (ie: Colonel Maniac or Colonel Jamski)

The 2iC will have the rank of Lt.Col.

While Quartermaster suits, it doesn't lend itself to shortening very well. QM to my mind sounds too similar to GM or DM.

DDO seems ok, but I would like to see the first initial as A or I. If we could think of something appropriate that started with either letter...

Minister of Propaganda sounds fine. That is, until you TLA it into MoP. Which may be appropriate considering the military view of the media.

**Kassiopeia** · June 27, 2004, 23:30

Originally posted by Googlie
Head of Diplomacy: Captain "General"Tacticus

Minister of Information: Captain Kassiopeia

I did volunteer for the position of head of diplomacy too on the pre-Apolyton private forums. We could share the task, of course, but there was a consensus that one person ought to have that particular job. Not that I'm too concerned with titles, but I'd just like to take part in foreign affairs. What's your input on this, GeneralTacticus?

**Skanky Burns** · June 28, 2004, 00:21

I have Kassi as volunteering for Diplomacy as well.
We can let you two "sort it out amongst yourselves" or if that doesn't work out, poll for it.

**GeneralTacticus** · June 28, 2004, 03:10

Well, I offered to take the position in the original Spartan thread, but I wasn't around when the topic was brought up again on the Aimoo forums, where you volunteered. If you really want to deal with Foreign Affairs, I'd be happy to let you, I'd just like to have something to do other than post suggestions for the turnplayer.

**Kassiopeia** · June 28, 2004, 04:05

Considering that it'll take quite a few turns for us to get contacts in the first place, Foreign Affairs will be quite a quiet post for some time.

Ancient Sparta had two kings and managed fine - two heads of the diplomatic department ought to manage as well. In Foreign Affairs I'm more interested in the pensmanship and facets of propaganda involved, rather than studying the intricate webs of interfactional relationships as such (hence my interest in running the factional newsletter).

In that sense, I could stay as Minister of Information, and merely act as the "voice" of Sparta. You could be the "intent" of Sparta, the one who polls for opinions and ponders the general guidelines we go by, plans the strategy and so on. Naturally we could, in name of general flexibility, work in both roles, and act as an advisor for the other.

To maintain the appearance of mild disinterest and isolationism, though, it'd be better to have only one clear figurehead for Sparta in the diplomatic circles (that would be me

). It's a clear message when a meeting is held with a legion of attaches and assistants sent by the other side, while the other party sends a single official. Quite a striking image, especially in negotiations for surrender, although I don't see the Spartans accepting anything else than unconditioned surrender unless we're doing really badly.

Of course, if we can find you something else to do, I'd be more than willing to assume the diplomatic duties completely. There just isn't much more than advising the turnplayer, considering that the basic idea of running Sparta, as set down by Major Jamski, relies on the principle of people as a web feeding the turnplayer in the centre information.

**GeneralTacticus** · June 28, 2004, 04:16

Hmmm... looks like a pretty good idea. Just to make sure I've got it right: you would do the 'public relations' side of things, by publishing stuff and sending messages to people, and I'd be the one to pick over all the diplo stuff and make recomondations based on it?

**Googlie** · June 28, 2004, 10:27

we don't know how active Jamski is going to be yet, and I don't know that he did volunteer to be the "War Minister", (he wanted to control that starting Rover, suggesting more of a reconnaissance role) but we do need someone (eventually) to specialize in the military - what to produce and where to deploy, etc

And do we need (eventually) a Naval Commander? An Air Force General?

And Ogie is a powerful player - talking of whom, where is he??

If we look sequentially at what lies behind any given turn, we can see where team members can offer input and direction

**Kassiopeia** · June 28, 2004, 13:49

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
Hmmm... looks like a pretty good idea. Just to make sure I've got it right: you would do the 'public relations' side of things, by publishing stuff and sending messages to people, and I'd be the one to pick over all the diplo stuff and make recomondations based on it?

Yes, that's the plan. Unless you want to work in the War Ministry as Googlie suggested above, Jamski is on leave for an indefinite period and we do need someone to specialise in the military from day one, not day 3411 when we finally encounter someone.

**Maniac** · June 28, 2004, 15:09

Originally posted by Maniac
I concluded calling our seperate units batallions, containing at minimum 300 soldiers and commanded by a Lieutenant-Colonel, would be most realist.

Most Spartans are currently captains though, so we could for the moment assume each unit is a Company/Troop/Battery, containing 62 to 190 soldiers, which is commanded by a captain so it seems.(Link)

IIRC Skanky or Kassi suggested way back that once our faction and military started growing (and we thus get the ability to command more units etc), we should also all gradually increase in rank if we wanted. Should we use that idea?

Originally posted by Googlie
And Ogie is a powerful player - talking of whom, where is he??

Yeah, a pity he isn't here.

**Skanky Burns** · July 4, 2004, 23:50

Rollcall:

Andemagne
ChairmanSlick
DeathByTheSword
Dissident
*Drogue
GeneralTacticus
Googlie
*HongHu
Jamski
Kassiopeia
*Kody
Maniac
*Method
Ogie Oglethorpe
Skanky Burns
Snoddasmannen
Zeiter

*CMNs

**Maniac** · July 5, 2004, 19:12

I'm not sure where I should post this.

I'll do it here.

I was thinking about posting a "Factional Datalinks" thread where we post the links to all important threads. It would provide easy access to threads without having to search for them, and we could limit the number of topped threads (eg the CyCon had 8 at one point in the game

). Would this be ok?

Links to include I thought about are:

* General information

-Member list and perhaps some extra info about us - is the Command Center for this, or should we use Googlie's Spartan site?
-Turn report thread
-Spartan map thread

* Strategy

- Link to the mod3 excel file & Spartan-specific research planner
- Link to the turn simulator
- Planet : A Survivalist's Guide: a thread where we post all the analyses for Spartan or SMAC-general strategy.

* Roleplay & propaganda/recruitment

-Googlie's website
-Spartan Command Nexus in the general forum
-Our newspaper thread when we get one
-Interfactional IC story & comments thread
-Base/unit/landmark naming thread

* Spartan Entertainment & Recreation

-The Mess Tent
-Training Room (a link to some body building site?

)
-"While we're waiting" game
- Thread with some literature and movie tips to get in the Spartan mood, eg Starship Troopers etc.

Later we could perhaps also include links to diplomacy threads for each faction, or thread for specific government department, eg Googlie & a Covert Ops Centre thread.

Would this be ok? Anything I forgot to include?

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