SOCIAL ENGINEERING/GOVERNMENT (ver2.1): Hosted by Bell

[Jon Miller]

quick post

M@ni@c, one of the biggest differences there is is that between those that work in factories/office buildings (workers) and those that work the land as farmers and miners (resource producers)

my structure not only makes it more fun to govern your own people it is also realistic

of course it is the who model as you call it

it is my plan

the values of a nation are defined by those who rule it

Jon Miller

[Jon Miller]

Hi M@ni@c again

your change to protectionism might be ballanced

tell me what other se choices are available in that tech range

thanks for explaining happiness (is more worth while now)

but with a mercantalist - wealth selection you will not be forced into -3 police with its 1 unhappy person per unit, this would be a lot worse for a warring country than your -2 happiness factor which can be fixed by the great amount of trade the civ would have

in civ republic did not have better corruption, it was the only reason to go to democracy

in smac fundamentalism had a probe and military bonus (forgot which)

this makes it viable

yours just has a wimpy happiness value

you cared about reputation

I tried once, no matter how good your reputation at the end of the game if you are winning they all gain up on you any ways

got to go

Jon Miller

[Zorloc]

Geez. I seem to be one of the few to propose something that M@ni@c overlooked in his posts (unless I missed it). But Theban did respond.

Oh just to remind people, I proposed that the effects phase in starting with the penalties:

Turn 0: Old SE bonuses and penalties
Turn 1: Old SE bonuses and penalties, New SE penalties
Turn 2: New SE penalties
Turn 3: New SE bonuses and penalties

Theban proposed that they should phase in equally plus a happiness penalty.

I agree that Theban's proposal would work, and probably work better with his system of slider bars, but the advantage of my system is that the penalty instead of just being a standard happiness penalty is that the penalty is directly related to the change that is being made in your civ. This not only creates greater variety it also is more realistic. Take Eastern Europe's move from a totalitarian gov't with planned economy to democracy and a free market. It took a while for the reforms to generate the benefits that could be derived from these SE choices, but many of the inequities/disadvantages of the system were quite clear, which led to unhappiness. Thus with my scheme unhappiness can result, but not just as some mysterious unsettlement, but as a result of a real impact on the society.

There is an additional problem with just penalizing happiness. It can be bought off. With some proper prep, it is easy to maintain some reserves with which to buy off your citizens, be it through more food, less work, or less taxes (if the CTP system is used). And since the effect is directly on happiness you can use whichever factor you are strongest in. But with my system if you are under an industrial penalty, you would have use other means.

jbw

[Theben]

Zorloc,
I agree that such a system would work if button selection is used; I even posted a very similar idea in the CHEAT thread (July 23). However, it's awkward to use with slider bars, thus the happiness penalty.

[Zorloc]

Agreed

[Maniac]

Harel :

"Once more, I have many comments on your posts Maniac. But I just don't have enough strenght to argue with you."

What do you mean, not enough strenght?
1) You can't beat my arguements?
2) You don't have enough time?

OK, let's assume we have 'evil' and 'enlighted' despots.

All the evil despots have to rule by strong police. So always the same effects.

But that enlighted ones are nasty guys, cause none acts the same as another.
That one wants to make the people happy; another wants to improve the economy; a thirth wants to give his nation power.
Well, yes this can all be represented by other choices.
But my point is, I don't see any special extremes those guys have in general.
BTW, most enlightend despots still have to use police to keep in control.

"The numbers derive from the names. They are not the important thing: beta testing will always find flaws in every system which will need mending. You can't get the perfect balanced system in one go. You need to change and adapt the numbers."

Yes, I know that. In the meanwhile, while we can't playtest (and never shall), we can try and make the best of it. Give Firaxis guidelines.

New proposal to Firaxis : all the ones giving advice may playtest their advice.

"You, however, think the numbers are the critical thing. But a good SE is more then numbers: it's several distinct possiblities."

I have distinct possibilities.
In government I have 4 different strategies.
->Monarchial
->Absolute
->Free
->Theocratical (does that word exist?)

In Economy I have a wide range of options from very closed (Communism) to very open (Free Market).

"And I can give you a historial explantion of the Shandarin over e-mail if you want."

How long would it be? Haven't got all time, but I am very interested in history.

BTW, Feudalism is renamed Manorialism. That is the economy.
So Feudalism is Monarchy - Manorialism.

"Several times in feudal states the upper class over-ruled the king desicison ( like a senate ) to go to war. If you know a bit about england history, you know what happened there."

England with Magna Carta, Declaration of Rights, Petition of Rights is a perfect example of a Monarchy evolving to a Republic.

"My idea? You don't have to agree with my model. I only ask for one thing: try to take the SE options I presented, without changes, and give them balanced numbers."

How can I give it effects if I think some choices of you are the same?
Socialist, Happiness...

Will :

"Thank you for the responses to my post. I think they miss my main point -- all of the systems I have seen are too darn complex. Thirteen or fourteen factors, with seven or eight SE categories is an immense amount of variation."

Don't worry. You'll get used to it.
I began with this model 20 days back and I know everything out of my head (is the expression 'out of my head' English?).
Why wouldn't you be able to?

BTW, variation, isn't that good? Better than SMAC where you had seen all possibles strategies with the model after three games.

Deleting Army is no problem.
Deleting Research is opional.
Without Religion my model is unbalanced, then I would rather delete Structure.

"Happiness also seems to me to be the effect of the SE choices rather than a separate SE factor,"

???????

"Ditto on urbanization -- the rate and limits of city growth seem like things that the computer can handle adequately without player intervention."

Have you got SMAC? Don't you know what Growth does?

With your way of thinking, you could say : "The computer can handle everything without player intervention. Let's delete SE."

"since I always thought it was unrealistic to think that particular forms of government limited a civ's ability to determine where it spent money,"

Does my Tax factor affect where you can spent money? I didn't think so.

"On second thought, I also think we could dispense with nationalism. The computer could generate emigration/immigration rates based on relative happiness and wealth levels."

The most important effect of Nationalism is Spy things. Should I rename Nationalism to Reconnaissance.

BTW a high diplomacy for communism doesn't sound right.

Will and Theben :

10 factors and 16 choices.
BTW, in my first long post to Harel, I have a beautiful list of the maxima and minima of each model, also SMAC's.

"-Nationalism should be a social tech. As far as our history has shown, once you get nationalist sentiment in your people it's there to stay."

Now I definitely have to find another name for it.

Theben, have you found the factor posts?

Harel :

MONARCHY

"I still belive that a Monarchial system is not fitting for "no pos, no neg" but the control section, since monarchs should give a big tax bonus."

Wrong! That big tax bonus is inherent to Feudalism/Manorialism.
When I first began my model, I was too thinking about giving Monarchy +Tax. But it's not monarchy that has the bonus! After a while you will realize you can't give Monarchy real bonuses.

That Urb penalty is for Manorialism.

In general, you gave all the bonuses that belong to Manorialism to Monarchy.

TOTALITARIANISM

"->Totalarism: +4 Sup, +2 Pol, -2 Dipl, -2 corr ( Hap minus is wrong )"

Hap minus wrong?? Would you be happy to live in an oppressive regime?

MERCANTILISM

"Marcentalism, by defination is just "trade"."

With Mercantilism I mean the English and Dutch trading systems.

CONTROLLED

"Tell me what you think about controlled. Good corruption cause it's effiecent"

Russian Communism was controlled and it had very large corruption.
I thought from the fields to the state shops, there was a waste of 70%!

"Religoun

Best of all worlds. Tell me what you think."

In that list Prosecution is redundant because it's no religion type. It's a behavior against certain religion.

Jon Miller :

"M@ni@c, one of the biggest differences there is is that between those that work in factories/office buildings (workers) and those that work the land as farmers and miners (resource producers)"

Sure I know. But how are gonna represent that difference when all the people in CivX work on the fields?

"in civ republic did not have better corruption, it was the only reason to go to democracy"

It had much better corruption rates. Perhaps you don't really notice it when you are playing perfectionist, but if you have a large empire of 50 cities, the difference is big, believe me.
But yes, you're right. The corruption jump from democracy to republic is much bigger than the one of republic to monarchy.

"in smac fundamentalism had a probe and military bonus (forgot which)"

That option is now in the religion category.
Somewhere in a far past ( a week or two weeks ago?) I explained why I made a difference between Theocracy and Fundamentalism.

"yours just has a wimpy happiness value"

Wimpy? Happiness is very important when you have a large empire. You're right. When you're perfectionist, it isn't that important.

"I tried once, no matter how good your reputation at the end of the game if you are winning they all gain up on you any ways"

I remember that in the year 1000 AD every civ's reputation worsened drastically. If they would change that, reputation and diplomacy in general would become more important.
Perhaps we should ask Harel with his Civ2 to recheck my AD 1000 story.
And if trade becomes dependent on how a civ likes you, as in real life, all diplomacy will increase in importance.

Ancient :
Despotism, Monarchy, Republic, Barter, Currency, Banking, Survival, Power, Knowledge, Wealth, Tribal, City State, Animism, Natural, Practical

Middle Ages :
Theocracy, Feudalism, Federal, Establishment, Fundamentalism, Prosecution

Renaissance :
Mercantilism, Protectionism, Humanitarian, Explorer

Industrial Revolution :
Totalitarianism, Communism, Confederate

Modern :
Democracy, Free Market, Environment, Commonwealth, Religious Freedom

Near Future :
True Democracy, Utopia, Transnational

Updated List :

Government :

Despotism : +2 Pol, -2 Corr
->Totalitarianism : +4 Sup, +2 Pol, -2 Hap, -1 Corr
Monarchy : no positives or negatives
Theocracy : +2 Hap, +2 Tax, -2 Res
Republic : +1 Centr, +2 Corr, -2 Mor
->Democracy : +2 Corr, +2 Hap, -2 Mor
-->True Democracy : +2 Corr, +2 Hap, +1 Eco, -2 Mor, -2 Sup

Economy :

Barter : -2 Tax
->Currency : no pos or neg
Manorialism : +3 Sup, +2 Tax, -1 Centr, -1 Urb
Mercantilism : +1 Eco, +2 Urb, -2 Mor
Protectionism : +2 Centr, +1 Tax, -1 Dipl, -1 Eco
->Communism : +3 Centr, +2 Nat, -2 Eco, -1 Corr
-->Utopia : +3 Centr, +2 Nat, +2 Env, -2 Eco, -1 Corr, -2 Tax
Banking : +2 Eco, -3 Pol, -4 Sup
->Free Market : +2 Eco, +2 Corr, -5 Pol, -3 Env
-->Transnational : +3 Eco, +2 Corr, +2 Centr, -8 Pol, -3 Env, -2 Mor

Value :

Survival : no pos or neg
Power : +4 Sup, +2 Mor, -2 Centr
Knowledge : +2 Res, +1 Corr, -2 Tax
Wealth : +1 Eco, +1 Centr, -2 Hap
Environment : +2 Env, +2 Hap, -1 Centr, -1 Urb

Structure :

Tribal : +2 Sup, -2 Centr
->City State : no pos or neg
Federal : +2 Corr, +2 Nat, -2 Hap
Confederate : +2 Hap, +?, -2 Centr
Commonwealth : +2 Dipl, +1 Eco, -2 Pol, -1 Nat

Research :

Wise Men : no pos or neg
Nature : +2 Env, -1 Urb, Economic Science is 75%
Humanitarian : +2 Cult, -1 Mor, Social Science is 75%
Practical : +2 Sup, -1 Res, Military Science is 75%
Explorer : +2 Res, -1 Hap, Academic Science is 75%

Religion :

Animism : -2 Res
->with the invention of Polytheism the Research penalty disappears, resulting in 'no pos or neg'.
Establishment : +2 Cult, +1 Urb, -2 Tax
Fundamentalism : +1 Mor, +2 Nat, -2 Dipl
Religious Freedom : +2 Hap, +1 Res, -2 Nat, -1 Cult
Prosecution : +2 Pol, +2 Cult, -2 Hap

[Maniac]

AAAARRRGGGGHH!!!! I forgot something. How terrible. I'll kill myself.

Serious.
On exactly the 50th post of this v2.1 thread, Theben said that he found SE switching too easy in SMAC.

1) So I suggested this :

Turn 0: Old SE bonuses and penalties
Turn 1: Old SE bonuses and penalties, New SE penalties
Turn 2: Old SE bonuses and penalties, New SE penalties
Turn 3: New SE bonuses and penalties

2) You suggest this :

Turn 0: Old SE bonuses and penalties
Turn 1: Old SE bonuses and penalties, New SE penalties
Turn 2: New SE penalties
Turn 3: New SE bonuses and penalties

3) Harel suggested a fix penalty for each category.

Wonna know what I think?
I don't care. Everything is good as long it's 3 turns and it has something negative.
Your and my idea are very similar, so no real problem.
That second turn (neither the first) isn't important to me. Do what you please.

[Koyaanisqatsi]

M@ni@c: Yup, the whole proverbial ball o' wax.

[Theben]

Jon Miller, wow, those are some great ideas. I like the the varying strengths, differing happiness per citizen type, and using education/propaganda to change values. I'm not sure if I agree completely with how they work, and I prefer my ideas for how happiness functions, but the concepts are valid.

Harel (and Maniac),
For now actually providing numerical bonuses to any SE is pointless, IMO. It is enough to say that "X gets a bonus to ECONOMY, and a penalty to EFFICIENCY" w/o going into details that will be altered in playtesting. Any detail should be limited to "gets strong [x] bonus, and weak [y] and [z] penalties."

Will,
SMAC currently has 9 or 10 factors with 12 SE choices, though each faction is limited to 11. By your standards this is too complex? As for simplifying, I always try to do this when I post ideas, as micromanagement is a great concern of mine. As to your points:

-I also would delete army, as this is covered by MORALE/EXPERIENCE
-Religion should be limited to a single value; whether the civ has strong or weak religious beliefs
-I'd keep Research
-Happiness is the backbone of my idea, so no way!
-Not knowing what Urbanization is supposed to do, I can't say. If it affects city growth, it would be covered under HAPPINESS and GROWTH.
-Taxes. This should also probably go; taxes should be raised/lowered on the main screen, and maybe in each city's screen.
-Nationalism should be a social tech. As far as our history has shown, once you get nationalist sentiment in your people it's there to stay.

That's what I'd do. I can't speak for anyone else.

[Jon Miller]

Hi all

another responding post

USSR tried to do communism, it did not acheive it rather it had a planned economic system

no M@ni@c all people do not work in the fields

this is shown in civ by the population of a city

1 pt - 10000
2 pt - 30000
3 pt - 60000

the 10000 population diferrence between 1 and 2 pt represents the greater number of workers in the city and the increasing ammount shows that more and more workers are neccesarry in a city the larger it gets

you did't think that all 10000 people of the first pt worked one square and in a 2 pt city the 20000 difference works the other square did you?

the thought is frankly hilarious, civ shows the difference between an agrarrian/resource producer civ (one with a bunch of small cities) and an industrial civ (one with large cities)

I am a profectionist expansionist (expansionist before profectionist and that expansion is peaceful), I usually build 60 + cities and place them close together to get more use from them, I am profectionist in that I do not like to go to war until every city has built everything and all my land is improved

how many theocracies were in the middle ages

happiness is easy to fix

done responding

Jon Miller

[Diodorus Sicilus]

I am going to offer comments on the last version of M@ni@c’s SE system with a list of my alternatives and a discussion of my reasoning. This is going to make a long post, so I’ll put off until later laying out my alternatives to the system of + and - factors that seem to have become the sole basis for discussion in this Thread. In a nutshell, I think there are far too many factors attributed to various elements, while the Special Characteristics of social, economic, and political systems are underestimated. Along with that,I think the idea of having a Slider Scale so that you could precisely ‘tweak’ factors to your content is only partially applicable. It assumes, for one thing, that governments or rulers have the capacity to apply such precise calculations to themselves and their countries, and there is no evidence in history or current events for that. To take another view of an example that was used, current economic forecasting in the stock market by computer analysis is so unprecise that over the past 10 years, buying stocks completely at random would have given you a better return than 80% of the Mutual Funds did with all their analysis (Consumer Reports study) and last week a report indicated that 70% of day traders lose money - and this is in a generally rising stock market!
On to the discussion and commentary. In each case I’ll give M@ni@c’s complete listing as of his 1 August post, then a discussion of it, then my suggested alternate Categories or Titles and a discussion of them. I will not include plus and minus factors for my alternates here, because as stated above I’m taking a somewhat different approach to the whole thing and want to lay it out all at once in one place to make it easier for the vultures to rip into its carcass all at once...
M@ni@c’s Government:
Despotism : +2 Pol, -2 Corr
->Totalitarianism : +4 Sup, +2 Pol, -2 Hap, -1 Corr
(Anarchy : -4 Corr, -3 Nat, -4 Hap)
Monarchy : no positives or negatives
Theocracy : +2 Hap, +2 Tax, -2 Res
Republic : +2 Centr, +2 Corr, -2 Mor
Democracy : +2 Corr, +2 Hap, +1 Eco, -2 Sup, -2 Mor
Discussion:
Despotism isn’t actually the earliest government system around in 4000BC: the earliest is the Tribal Assembly, a very ‘direct’ form of Republic or Democracy. Despotism is a Strong Man rule not backed by Law so that the government’s actions are subject to whim of the ruler. It either turns into a Monarchy or other form of ‘legalist’ government or it disintegrates in a generation - by definition, there is no way to legitimize the Despot’s successor, so civil war usually breaks out as soon as he/she dies.
Theocracy is sanctified as a government type by SMAC’s model (sorry about that, but I couldn’t resist!) In fact, what does it mean? The priests or even the archbishops have never, to my knowledge, directly ruled in any society: they influence, sometimes dramatically and decisively, through secular rulers such as monarchs or despots. To use a modern example, the Vatican City is a theocracy in that the entire city is a religious foundation, but it is ruled by a bureaucratically-administered despotism: the ruled have no say or selection in who rules them (the Pope is selected by non-natives of Vatican City!), but they are happy with it because they share the Values of the ruler, and those values happen to be predominantly identified with religion. For another (modern) example, the Ayatollah Khomeni was both a religious and political leader in Iran, but in game terms he was a Charismatic Leader who led an overthrow of a Monarchy. His successors have been elected by an Iranian Democracy, ruling a country with a Value System which is religious.
By modifying government types with the category State Organization, we can represent all the types and variations of government with about 50% fewer ‘governments’. In addition, each government has Special Characteristics that have to be addressed.
My List
Governments
Tribal Assembly Default Start Option
Republic Ancient type, limited franchise
Democracy Modern, extended franchise
Despotism Alternate Start Option, possible Default at any time (Charismatic Leader!)
Monarchy Destabilizes to Anarchy if Random Event = No Heir
Totalitarian Can be based on Secular or Religious Ideology
Discussion:
The Tribal Assembly is the most Direct Participation Government: everyone in the Tribe has a say, so it keeps everyone involved (+ Happiness), but requires that the political unit remain small. It CANNOT be used with a State Organization other than City State until Instant Communication (Internet, Telepathy, etc) turns it into what has been called Virtual Democracy. Democracy, as defined here, is Representative Democracy, the ‘full blown’ version of Republican government with a much wider franchise than the ancient Republics, which were actually oligarchies (in Rome and Athens both, the actual percentage of the population that had a vote that counted was less than 20%, and voting was restricted by class). Despotism requires that the Despot keep everything under his own control, so increases the centralization of state organization and police power, but unravels fast if the subjects (other cities) are far away, unless modified by Bureaucracy and State Organization (see below). Monarchy should have modifiers if we adopt a system similar to CtPs, based on the following: the monarch provides a personal figure to identify with the State (+ Nationalism), he also has to keep a personal eye on things (+ Centralization), his court sucks off tax money for its maintenance (- Taxes) and, in a Flavor thing I can’t resist, Monarchies have a + Diplomacy factor ONLY with other Monarchies - because they can offer state dynastic marriages with other Royal Families to cement diplomatic ties - something no other form of government can offer to another!
The government types are listed as Primitive to Advanced Representative and Primitive to Advanced Controlled. The tendancy, heavily modified by other events, is for Primitive Representative to evolve to a more advanced form of the same representative type, and same for Control Freak governments.
M@n@ic’s Structure (State Organization)
Tribal : +2 Sup, -2 Centr
->City State : no pos or neg
Federal : +2 Corr, +2 Nat, -2 Hap
Confederate* : +2 Hap, +?, -1 Centr, -1 Nat
Commonwealth : +2 Dipl, +1 Eco, -2 Pol
Discussion:
Tribal is really appropriate only for nomadic or barbarian players. As soon as folks moved into cities, the Tribal organization broke down in practice even when it was still used as the basis for ancient republican organizations (the Athenian ‘demes’ and tribes and the Roman Tribal Centuries). The City State is the earliest (Default) setting for cities, replaced in historical practice by the Imperal organization: control by governors or satraps sent out from the center, very centralized in theory. Confederate is the next step towards Centralization from City States, which are totally decentralized. The Leagues organized by Greek City States in the 3rd century BC are an example of early Confederations. Why Confederate should get more cities in any area than another type escapes me. Commonwealth is really another term for Confederation: essentially independant political entities which let a central power handle some things for them, but are ready to pull out at any time. Federal, with the structural power now tilted towards the central power, is the next step from Confederate. In addition to Imperial, also left out is Fuedal, in which the entire state organization is based on Personal Privilieges and Relationships between the ruler and local leaders.
My list:
Tribal Default Start Option for Nomadic Civs and no city starting positions
City State Default Option after first city is founded
Fuedal Can develop from either social or military factors
Confederation Develops from City State or Fuedal
Federal Develops from either Confederation or Imperial
Imperial Earliest ‘advance’ for central control of multiple-city civs
Discussion:
Tribal or City State are the Starting Defaults, but are utterly unsuited to any large state if you intend to actually control that state - the first Empires (Egypt, Assyria, China, Persia) all used the Imperial structure. City States naturally evolve into Confederations if they aren’t conquered first, while Tribal evolves into City State or Fuedal. Federal or Imperial are actually the most common structures in the modern world, but much modified by Bureaucracy, Literacy, and other technological and social advances. In fact, the structure of the government in many cases is less important than other factors, such as communication technology and resources (especially population density) and Values shared by the civ.
M@ni@c’s Economy :
Barter : -2 Tax
->Currency : no pos or neg
Feudalism/Manorialism : +3 Sup, +2 Tax, -1 Centr, -1 Urb
Mercantilism : +1 Eco, +2 Urb, -2 Mor
Protectionism : +2 Centr, +1 Tax, -1 Dipl, -1 Corr
->Communism : +3 Centr, +2 Nat, -2 Eco, -1 Corr
Banking : +2 Eco, -3 Pol, -4 Sup
->Free Market : +2 Eco, +2 Corr, -5 Pol, -3 Env
-->Transnational : +3 Eco, +2 Corr, +2 Centr, -8 Pol, -3 Env, -2 Mor
Discussion:
Just a nomencalture note: let’s try not to use the same term or word for a Social Factor and for a Technical Advance, Improvement, Unit, or Wonder: it’s a recipe for confusion. Therefore, Currency should not be used for an Economic system type if Currency is also a Tech Advance. With the invention and spread of coinage/currency the major development was that of the Market Economy. Unfortunately, we got Markets in the City Improvements so I suggest that we use Commercial, since it also fostered long distance Commerce. Banking is also not a good title for an economic system. When banks were developed the major result was to allow the movement and use of Capital. The resulting economic system is, you guessed it: Capitalism. Classic Mercantilism of the 17th-18th centuries in Europe was Protectionism: protecting your own economy and trade while trying to take Trade and $ away from other economies and amassing wealth to finance wars. It is, therefore, big on Centralization, Trade, and Taxes, but bad for Growth - Mercantilism assumed that Trade and Income was a fixed sum, and that anything someone else got therefore took away from what you could have. Definitely not conducive to growth! Transnational is simply the result of Capital flowing beyond State Boundries, made possible by Trade and unstoppable by Electronic Commerce. I suggest, therefore, that the same result can be obtained by Modifying Capitalism (or other forms of Economics) by the Technical Advance of Internet or Electronic Banking.
My List:
Barter Default start option
Manorial Decentralized economy not requiring any tech advances
Commercial Varying amounts of government involvement: money without capital transfer
Capitalism Development of Commercialism with free use and abuse of Capital
Mercantilism First System of Government-controlled economics
Communism Most developed system of Government-controlled economics
Discussion:
Until coinage/currency is developed, the economic decisions are simple: you got Barter, under which you can still Trade but without getting any cash out of it (strictly goods for goods), or you have Manorialism, in which every economic unit (city in the game) is virtually independant economically: deadly for trade and collecting taxes by any centralized government. With currency markets and long distance financially lucrative Trade developed: the first Commercial Empire was Athens, whose coinage (obols or ‘Owls’) were spendable from the Crimea to Italy. Banks (Capitalism) allowed the relatively easy transfer of capital and its concentration for large economic projects: bankers financed wars, the openning of major new trade routes, and explorations. Mercantilism was the first formulation of a theory of how governments could control the economy for their own purposes - which were defined as collect lots of money to finance wars by fomenting your own trade, sabotaging everybody else’s trade with tariffs and price-fixing, and encouraging industries that would make a profit or supply the state with what it needed (like gold and weapons). Communism is complete government control of the economy, and unless modified by a combination of extreme need and major resource allocation (USSR in WWII) it has severe productivity and growth penalties.
M@ni@c’s Values:
Survival : no pos or neg
Power : +4 Sup, +2 Mor, -2 Centr
Knowledge : +2 Res, +1 Corr, -2 Tax
Wealth : +1 Eco, +1 Centr, -2 Hap
Environment : +2 Env, +2 Hap, -1 Centr, -1 Urb
Discussion:
Survival has definite Positives and Negatives: it leads people to invest in military armed strength to defend themselves! The ultimate Survival Value is the pursuit of Power, in which Survival is equated with Being Bigger and Badder Than Any Possible Opponent, so both those Values can be combined. In addition to Growth, Wealth, Knowledge, and Environment, which correspond to increased interest in Population, Money, Research growth and lowering Pollution, you left out the major ultimate goal of most people: Happiness. the advantage of including this is that the pursuit of that goal frequently leads in a ‘spiritual’ direction, so picking Happiness as a Value can lead to increased interest in Religion, and possibly to Fundamentalism or Theocratic values in government.
My List:
Survival Default starting option
Growth Primarily Population increase, but also includes geographic spread
Wealth Increased wealth, if distributed, also increases Happiness
Environment Not available to city-building states until Very Late
Knowledge A luxury option: will not be selected if survival of civ or population is at stake
Happiness Once survival is assured, this is the next Default Option: includes religion
Discussion:
Values aren’t always a Choice: if your civilization is getting destroyed in war, Survival will become the Value regardless of the player’s desires: cultures are not, by nature, suicidal even if individual leaders might be! Likewise, if the overall Happiness level of the population drops far enough, they will turn to Happiness as a Value because that’s their chief concern - and you may end up with a Theocratic government or an essentially Fundamentalist one as a result. Finally, if the population totals drop suddenly, as for instance if CivIII includes Plague and other natural disasters (which have been suggested elsewhere), then (population) Growth will automatically become the principle Value of your population.
One option to consider is to provide only one modifier for each Value. That is, they would each affect one thing, and you would not pick a Value but prioritize your values: assign each a value of 1 through 6 in order of Importance. This order could be changed at any time, but the more radical the change ( 6 to 1, for instance) the longer before any change actually takes place, and the more possibility that your people disagree with such radical thinking and revolt. As a corrolary of this, certain government types and structures would be more amenable to change: Republics, Democracies, Tribal Asemblies can change because the people themselves are deciding to change, to some extent - you might have to expend resources to ‘campaign’ for the change, but they aren’t likely to revolt against it, just accept it more slowly. Despots and, to a lesser extent, Monarchs could decree a change, but are more likely to have open revolt on their hands and much slower (grudging) response from the population.
M@ni@c’s Research:
Wise Men : no pos or neg
Nature : +2 Env, -1 Urb, Economic Science is 75%
Humanitarian : +2 Cult, -1 Mor, Social Science is 75%
Practical : +2 Sup, -1 Res, Military Science is 75%
Explorer : +2 Res, -1 Hap, Academic Science is 75%
Discussion:
You already have a Research modifier, so what’s the point of this? If you do want to slant research in a given direction, why not use SMAC’s system of defining research categories by the major goals of the game: Conquer, Build, Discover, Explore? Alternately, use whatever categories the Tech Tree is divided into. There has been considerable discussion in other Threads about ‘blind’ research or using a SMAC-type semi-blind system. This set of modifiers appears to be simply adding complexity where none is required. If you want to increase research, build research infrastructure and perhaps use the infamous Slider Scale to specify percentage of research resources going into each category.
M@ni@c’s Religion:
Animism : -2 Res
->with the invention of Polytheism the Research penalty
disappears, resulting in 'no pos or neg'.
Worshiping : +2 Urb, +2 Nat, -2 Cult
Evangelism* : +2 Cult, +?, -2 Dipl
Fundamentalism : +2 Mor, +2 Sup, -2 Dipl
Religious Freedom : +2 Hap, +1 Res, -2 Nat, -1 Cult
Prosecution : +2 Pol, +2 Cult, -2 Hap
Discussion:
This is a mess! Animism is a primitive religion. Evangelism is from ‘evangelize’ which means specifically to convert to Christianity. Worshipping is an individual or group action, Religious Freedom or Prosecution are government policies, and Fundamentalism is a religious reaction to Rational Humanism (see below). In other words, this is a hodge-podge, neither a good set of modifiers to religions or descriptions of social or government reactions and relations with religions
M@ni@c’s State Religion:
Atheism
Christianity
Islam
Hinduism
Buddhism
Discussion:
This is absolutely and completely a Bad Idea. First, it is wretchedly incomplete. With the exception of Hinduism, none of these religions existed when the game starts, so what State Religion does the Roman Empire or Egypt get? And please don’t tell me the God King Pharoah of Egypt and the Pontifex Maximus of Rome had no religious component! In addition, it ignores the major differences among sects of the major religions. Some of the deadliest religious wars were waged among Christian Catholics versus Protestants or Islamic Suni versus Sufi. Also, Atheism, to nip a ridiculous discussion in the bud, is not a religion. What numerous posters and postees have dribbled about in the threads is Humanism: the belief that Man and His Works are the measure of all things. Sometimes called Rational Humanism, although like most belief systems, it is seldom very rational. It develops with the Rational Philosophers of the 18th century, gathers speed as scientific advances lead to the belief that Man can accomplish anything, and is the direct cause of the Fundamentalist reactionary movement in Religion - in Christianity as well as Islam today.
Finally, and I’ve said this before in the Religion Thread: DO NOT use actual religions in the game. Read some of the other posts in Religion: people cannot even discuss religion with each other without getting into arguments - put their religions into a game and Firaxis is asking for major trouble.
Besides, it’s not necessary. What we really want to simulate is the Effects of Religion on cultures, societies, governments, and their development. The specifics of religious belief are, in most game terms, Totally Irrelevant. What is important is how the religion affects the population and its leaders. Therefore, all religions can be defined as follows:
Religious Types:
Animism Default starting religion
Polytheism Can develop spontaneously, through conquest, or trade
Monotheism Developed historically by Charismatic Leaders - random events
Humanism Develops after Advances lead to Rationalism philosophies
Religion Characteristics:
Proselytizing Seeks converts from other religions
Passive Not actively seeking converts
Tolerant Able to coexist with other beliefs
Intolerant Demands exclusive allegience: required for ‘Theocratic’ states
Religious Events:
Schism a random event= charismatic leader or new philosophy ‘splits off’ a new sect of
the same type as your old religion, but possibly with a different Characteristic. Can lead to
revolt, separatism, and other government problems.
Fundamentalism a reaction to Humanism, triggered by lowered Happiness due to Advances and
other events. Religion becomes extremely Intolerant of all other religions and advances.
Discussion:
You NEVER research religion. Everyone starts with Animism, and new religions develop or start as Random Events, sometimes triggered by specifics such as Charismatic Religious Leaders or contact with another civilization and its religion. A Proselytizing religion of any kind, Polytheistic, Animistic, or Monotheistic, will lead to Clerics or Missionaries going out to religiously convert or conquer other religions. If strong enough, it should also allow you access to ‘religious’ units such as Crusaders or Conquistadores: invaders fortified by their fanaticism. A Passive religion will not try to convert others, and will tend to be replaced by other religions unless (random event) it has a High Culture or Philosophical rating (Buddhism) which gives it more staying power.
Government Reactions to Religion:
Symbiotic (Theocracy, Divine Right Monarchy)
Proscribing (Religious Persecution)
Supportive ("One Nation, Under God")
Tolerant (Religious Freedom)
Discussion:
Not all of these are choices all the time. An aggressive, proselyting religion with a strong organization (Bureaucracy) may become Symbiotic with your government unless you take active steps to avoid it! Being Tolerant of religions when your own ‘native’ religion is a very Passive one could result in major upheaval in your civilization when outsiders start converting your people right and left. Supportive is a good compromise (Example: Church of England) but the tendancy will be for an aggressive religion to try to swing or convert that policy into Symbiotic, while as Humanism develops as a belief system there will be pressure to convet government policy to Tolerant.
M@ni@c’s Army:
First, a bad term since it should include air and sea units.
Military:
CTP Military Readiness system
Don't know specifics.
Don't know the CTP names.
Off guard?
At Alert?
At War?
Discussion:
CtP made a scrabbling attempt to model something better than CivII/SMAC, but its model was far too limited to show all the historical patterns of military forces. Specifically, it didn’t begin to show the range of mobilization and readiness patterns of actual historical military systems. I posted the basics and backgorund to this elsewhere in another Thread, so here are just the Military Forms:
Levee in Mass
The army is raised from the population based on who can supply their own weapons and equipment. This is the standard pattern for all barbarian, nomad, and most ancient city states.
Professionals
The army consists entirely of those who make it their business. This is the Roman legion in the Imperial period. This was also the pattern for the 18th century European armies, based on the fact that the long drill required to make a good musket unit was considered too time-consuming for ‘amateurs’ to have a chance to master it. This is the most expensive army to maintain, because they have to be paid all the time
Military Caste
The army consists of those who have the weapons and know how to fight in the population, but they are only called up as needed. This is the classic fuedal system, in which knights had (ostensibly) no other profession than to carry arms. Even then, it was usually supplimented by ‘calling up’ a portion of the (amateur) peasentry as footmen. This is slightly less expensive than paying the Pros all the time, but since they have to be supported while they train on their own, it still makes a deeper hole in the economy than any system other than No.2 above.
Draft
The conscript army consists of Everybody who can possibly serve. However, most of them serve only for a couple of years, then go into the Reserves which can be called up in case of war. This requires a large standing army to train everyone, but allows a huge army to be quickly mobilized from the trained reservists. This is the European system common since 1815, and modifications of it persist in virtually all armies today. By providing a ‘sliding scale’ of % called up and training time, you can adjust the size of the standing army, and reserves available to the economic resources you want to spend on the military. In Democracies the Happiness will also vary (sometimes dramatically) with the % called up each year and the amount of time they have to spend in uniform.
Equipment for the Host is provided by the troops in Systems 1 and 3, must be provided by the State in System 2, and must be provided and stored for the reserves in System 4.
all navies and air forces will fall into the same patterns as the armies: usually nos 2 or 3.
Discussion:
Support and Morale are peculiarly military concerns, and frankly do not belong as modifiers to government, economics, or structural systems. Men don’t fight better because of their government type. The best armies of WWII were formed by countries with Government Systems and Structures of Democratic-Federal (USA), Despot-Imperial (USSR and Germany), Democratic-Confederate (Great Britain - constitutional monarchy is indistinguishable from Democratic and Commonwealth is virtually same as Confederate). What makes a military good, bad, or indifferent is the training and leadership of the individual soldiers and units, and that is a factor (in the game) of Military System (see above) abd Morale of the unit. Starting Morale (the base-line for a civilization’s units) should be set by the Military System primarily, and by the resources devoted to the military by that civ. If you spend enough to keep a large professional army, you will also have a large professional career group of officers and NCOs to train other people up to standard. Add Military Academies, Barracks, and other Enhancements, and you can also raise the base line and possible high level Morale. Ancient Sparta, for example, had high morale military units because the state had a No.1 priority value of Survival and put most of its resources into the military: kept most of the male population under arms virtually all the time and had an extensive system of barracks and training time.
Military Industry is not required as a specific model. Countries get high levels of military production by allocating resources to it and taking them away from somewhere else. The classic modern case is Germany and USSR in WWII: Hitler was so worried about German civilian morale that he didn’t start converting industry to full military production until 1942 - consumer goods were considered a requirement to keep the people supportive (keep Happiness Levels up, in game terms). In the USSR, all production went completely to military goods, with a combination of high Police (250+ regiments of NKVD troops) and Survival (Germany’s stated aim was "lebensraum" in Russia, making it pretty obvious that a lot of Russians were going to be removed first) to keep the population in line. Even so, The USSR ended up dependant on US Lend Lease aid for trucks, special alloys for industry, protein supplement foodstuff (meats and fats), and electronic gear (we sent them 1200 radar sets, among thousands of other items of signal equipment).
So, if you want a Military Industry at high levels, just start producing military units and goods and figure out another way to keep the rest of your civilization going: it’s the classic tradeoff, and there ain’t no shortcuts around it.

Well, now that I've posted this I see that Manny has an update of the 1 Aug post posted already. Most of the above comments still apply, with one additional proviso for everyone:
A lot of arguments in this thread seem to me to arise because people are using nomenclature that is not understood the same way by all concerned. Remember, in the bottom line, the game will use terms that are easily understood and recognizable by the mass of gamers. Therefore, while they may or may not use Manorialism or Mercantilism, you can bet that Communism, Fuedalism, Capitalism, and Democracy will be used, even if the game definitions and usage isn't exactly the same as the historical model. Thems the rules of marketing, and all the historians and semanticists in the world aren;t going to change them.
Therefore, although the USSR never, in fact, had pure Communism as an economic or political system, that's the term that will be applied to describe it in the game!
I urge everyone to make certain of your terms and if you are using a recognizable term for game purposes, define it for us. It'll save a lot of postie toasties back and forth...

[Theben]

Well, that's it, I fold...

DS,

Actually I do very much like my HAPPINESS system and it affects many other categories, so I won't give that up yet...

Another thing is your stated reason for not having sliders, that rulers had little control over the fine-tuning of their empire. I agree, as would sofar as to say that they had almost no control over how things were run except in the most tyrannic systems. However, months ago I proposed a system that would only allow players to attempt to influence changes in the SE choices, and that idea didn't last very long. Whether or not it's realistic, people like to have control over their games.

Another problem I have with buttons is that the SE effects are static and often wildly varying, even in the same categories.

I do agree with the SEs you said were unnecessary, such as religion & 'army'.

[Jon Miller]

quick post

Historian guy

you got communism wrong (you may have got the USSR implementation of it but the USSR seriously messed up, that is why it collapsed)

I am sure, you being an historian and familiar with classical literature, that you know where to look to fix your misconceptions of communism

Jon Miller, ex-communist

[Jon Miller]

another quick post

historian, what do you think of the beginnings of my se idea (in particular the value portion)?

communism is the perfect and most effecient social structure if the citizens are not very individualistic/selfish

historian, what time period are you am historian of may I ask

a note, add in my values portion a value slider between individualistic and socialistic (better name?)

historian guy, I like how you look at religion by far the best of any heard yet also like what you say about the millitary

historian guy, perhaps take back earlier comment on communism but I still say that I want to try theoretical systems of government

Jon Miller

[Jon Miller]

Hi all

back again this time to post on my system

I am continueing into government although my populace systems values part has not been completed yet (if the est needs tweaking please inform me)

I am still trying to think of the perfect values, please suggest

the values I'm looking for are ones that have two poles and both might be good like in pacifism----power, they each have bonuses and negatives and how good they are for you depends on how you play and how your government is set up

the values affect how well the se choices of government and economics work, like an individualist people will not do well in communism but will add corruption and other things to it

economy will not be done by a slider (It could be now but before there were lots of choices not between socialism and free market)

if you think about it if those who are not able to be part of controlling the nation are stronger than those that are countrolling it of course there is going to be a revolt

(enough for the preamble)

NATIONAL

the nattional has many things on it's screen

it has overal happiness, strength of the groups that rule, all the other groups combined strength, national values

the choice to declare revolution

and STRUCTURE, GOVERNMENT, and ECONOMICS

STRUCTURE

in structure a slider would work perfectly between centralized and uncentralized

GOVERNMENT

government is not by slider because there are several different important forms and not all fit by a steady change

governments (and centralization and economics) do not so much have specific modifiers themselves as facilitate how the national values modify (if people had the right values, free market would not do well)

what this means for anybody who missed it is that the governments and economics just affect what different national values do

they are also affected by which group(s) are in control

how much corruption there is depends on the values, government, and economy (like if your economy is communist and your national values are individualest than your corruption is really high)

government and economic choices might modify certain national values one way and others another way depending on what choice it is

there is democracy (this is true democracy for those who want its definition)

it is where the group(s) that rule vote to direct the government

the player has weaker control in this one

democracy affects to make national values modify very strongly (the masses are not hampered from tyranny)

democracy can only be used in really small civs (where the numerical strengths of the groups that rule are very very very small) or after a certain technology (internet or something)

there is republic (represnative government, the difference from modern democracy and old republic is gotten from the groups controlling and national values)

it is where the group(s) that rule vote in representatives who direct the government

control is also limited in this government structure but not as much as in democracy

the national values are more limited in their effects than in democracy

republic is discovered early as it is in civ, arround the time of greece

there is tyranny (greek definition of tyraany (not bad), despotism is just a short term monarchy, both are tyrannies)

this is where the group(s) that rule are the ruling class with a king over them and all other groups as those with no rights below them (like in serfs)

there is much more control in this system than the previous two

national values are overall not as strong

tyranny was one of the earlier government settings (perhaps the first for civilizations which had enough excess to develope a civilization)

there is beaucracy (it is a real life government actually, China used it and meritocracy a few times, I'm going to consider meritocracy a beaucracy with knowledge values, also if you want a discription of one refer to my previous one, or look up chinese history)

it is where the group(s) rule through a civil and military beaucracy

this can have little control or great ammount of control based on national values

national values are overall not as strong

chinese are to my knowledge the first to use beaucracies

there may be more

ECONOMICS


________________________
end for tonight

I got tired earlier tonight so I am stopping sooner, government will have a lot more work done to them and i have not even started economics yet

I know I need to do a lot of fleshing out, especially of values and I will work on it later

(I am vacationing the 16th-20th so my posting time is limited any way)

often where I used values in this thread I meant something else than each group's values, often I meant national values or I meant something else entirely

I will fix this later (really sorry I got tired at this time)

my idea of having governments and economies mostly just modify the national values which do the actual modifying, is realistic in that governments like democracy would not neccessary make the senate limit you, what if your pepole were hawkish, then the senate in real life would declare war

also a peaceful civ could have high moral and a warlike civ could have low morale if that is what the values are

in some governments you can use police, but they will make those that rule more unhappy the longer they are in place (and it would take a while of not using them for happiness to return)

happiness is gained or lost per turn, you can't do something to piss of your people and have them forget about it the next year can you?

i still have to do economics and finish government

Jon Miller
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Jon Miller (edited August 13, 1999).]</font>