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SOCIAL MODEL
Overview :
--------------
The social model is used to modelize the people in Clash. It will give the player a
"living" civilization/nation to rule, adding an inner-politics dimension to the game.
This model will simulate the behaviour of the people acoording to their class, their
religion and their culture. Each culture and each religion has a set of attributes which
describe them and allow for diverse behaviours and diverse situations. These attributes
will evolve with time, tech research and the various events that happen in the world.
The behaviour of the model will have impact on many parts of the game. It will fe modify
the way the people accept or refuse a new tech, a new form of government, how they
contribute to economy and production (productivity, corruption, crime...), it will also
allow for new, interesting situations like religious wars, nationalist troubles,
secession wars...
The strength of the influence of this model, as well as how it will constrain the player.
For example, this model should be able to simulate the kind of situations that have
created revolutions; in such a case, should the model create the revolution, enforcing
the player in a new form of government, calculated by the model? Or should it just
slightly worsen the genral situation of the civ and give the player clues that he should
modify its government? IMO this could be linked to the game difficulty/level like it has
been said on the forum.
This documet is intended to give you an overview of the system I plan to use. The
specific attributes and implementations features that will be used are still TBD for a
part.
General architecture of the model :
---------------------------------------------
The model deals with the following elements :
1. The civilization is the empire the player rules. It embeds every other elements.
2. The province is the one designed by Mark.
3. The classes are those designed by Hrafnkell.
4. The cultures define the general cultural background of civilization's native people.
When a grouo of people migrates, it carries its culture, allowing for different cultures
to live inside a civilization.
5. The religions are defined as independant elements, at they can exist at worldwide
level (montheistic religions); they consist of a set of values that are used to modify
the cultural attributes. Several religions can exist in a same civilization.
6. The events are messages that are sent to the people to represent their perception of
the world. Every war, econ. crisis, ruler decision... will send events that will be used
to modify the cultural attributes and compute the actions of the peole.
7. The actions embed everything that the people can do : revolts, migrations, settlements
...
At the civilization level, groups are created to group people sharing the same class, the
same culture and the same religion. The general behaviour of each of these groups is
calculated at this level, using the attributes of the class, culture and culture of this
group. This will give the civ-level behaviour of this group. It can be of two types : an
action; or a set of modifications that will be applied to tech acceptance (a modifier to
the impact of this tech); tech research (a modifier to the RP produced by this group);
econ productivity (a modifier to this group's econ output)...
If any action is triggered by a group in a given turn, then the model goes down at the
province level. Each province records demographic statistics of the people that inhabit
it. Thus, for each province you know the repartition between cultures, religions and
classes. So when an action is triggered for a given group, each province which hosts pop
belonging to this grop will compute the precise behaviour in this province, as well as
the reactions of the other groups of this province. This allows for province-level events
to appear, and to depend on the particular situation of this province.
The civilization :
----------------------
Civilization is the element that civ-level elements. The government is civ-level, so the
civilization stores the description of the classes and their political power.
Also, the civilization stores the cultures, and knows which is its "native" culture (even
if this native culture can be influenced by the other cultures it hosts).
Finally, the civilization stores copies of the religions it hosts. These copies may or
may not be different from one civ to another.
Eventually the civilization could also store legal status for each class
(privileges/human rights), cultures (apartheid), religions (official/forbidden).
The genral behaviours are calculated at the civilization level, and refines at the
province level when necessary.
The province :
-------------------
When the probability that an action will be taken by one or several groups, each province
that hosts at least one of these groups will calculate the specific action that will be
taken in this province, and the reactions from the other groups.
Thus province stores province-specific data, like wealth, health, the
class/religion/culture of the province-ruler if any, and the demographic repartition
between classes, religions and cultures. All these parameters are used to make the
computings.
The classes :
-----------------
The classes are those designed by H, thus they have a specific political power. They also
store the life-level (wealth) of the class. Plus they store a hate-slider for each of the
other classes of the civilization. This allows for class-specific actions.
The cultures :
------------------
The cultures store the following attributes (0-100 scales) :
- traditionalism; (modifies how new techs/ideas/people will be accepted)
- social rigidity (modifies how political/social modifications will be easy)
- nationalism (modifies the reactions vs other cultures)
- education (modifies quite everything, from war barbary to tech acceptance/research)
- familial shape (modifies reaction vs other cultures)
- physical appearance (idem)
- language (idem)
Also, like the classes, cultures will have hate-sliders for every other cultures they
know.
The religions :
------------------
There should be two types of religions, poytheist and monotheist.
Ideas here are only for polytheist religions.
Attributes :
- tolerance (modifes reaction vs other groups : class, religion, culture; modifies
culture's traditionalism and social rigidity)
- individualism (people live for themselves or for the community; modifes culture's
attributes like social rigidity, education, nationalism... modifies how people are
willing to sacrifice for the group; how they obey the orders and revolt...)
Also there will be hate-sliders.
The events :
----------------
Exemple of events are :
- war events (beginning, end, victory, defeat...)
- diplomatic events (treaties, encounters of new civs...)
- tech events (new techs)
- political events (new forms of governments, revolts, new laws...)
- economical events (crisis, boom ...)
- religious events (scission of a religion, appearance of a new religion, conversion of
the reuler to a new religion...)
Each event will show how they interfere with the goals of the groups, thus eventually
triggering actions from these groups.
The actions :
-----------------
Here are exemples of the actions that can be taken :
- revolts against a ruling class or the ruler (many intensities, from demands to
revolution)
- religious/cultural oppression (many intensities)
- migrations (for econ, political, cultural, religious reasons)
- secession of a province
- strikes and class struggle (diverse intensities)...
Ideas on the model/player-interface :
------------------------------------------------
First, as I mentionned it, the strength of the model on the gameplay should be dependant
on the difficulty level or something like that (there could even be different level
sliders, one for this model, the other for the strength of the IA-player ...)
IMO in this there are actions that the ruler can not ignore, and others that he could
pass.
There could be an interface like this : every turn the ruler can consult a news-paper
which tells him everything that happened (inner-politics, diplomatics, economics,
scientific... sections) and read details on any of them, or just ignore the news-paper.
But when some thing happened that the ruler can't ignore, then an advisor would pop and
tell him there is something to do.
So if the player reads carefully the news this gives him an advantage, as he eventually
can forecast events before they appear (and the advisor tells him), and he can also
eventually micro-manage in the fileds he's interseted in. If he ignores the news, he wont
miss important things since the advisor will pop.
Fe, in the case of this model, many actions will be taken that dont concern the ruler
directly (fe peasants revolts in a faraway province, handled by this province leader)
and he probably wont have to micromanage these things. But if he doesnt care at all,
maybe the disontentment will last and spread, leading to a civ-wide revolution that will
put the player in a bad position.
How the ruler will interact with the people? IMO he should be given many tools that he
will or wont use if he does or doesnt want to micromanage.
One idea is to have a simple system of law, which would give different legal stauses to
the different classes, cultures and religions. This would inculde appartheid laws,
anti-slavery laws, the problems of privileges of the upper classes that have led to the
french revolution, the laws on religion etc...
Also, the player should have +- limited control on the settlement of the people.
Through how he will control the tech tree he will also interfer with this model and the
wants of the people.
OK, this is a rough sketch of the model. Details of implementation will come later.
Suggestions and feedback welcome.
Overview :
--------------
The social model is used to modelize the people in Clash. It will give the player a
"living" civilization/nation to rule, adding an inner-politics dimension to the game.
This model will simulate the behaviour of the people acoording to their class, their
religion and their culture. Each culture and each religion has a set of attributes which
describe them and allow for diverse behaviours and diverse situations. These attributes
will evolve with time, tech research and the various events that happen in the world.
The behaviour of the model will have impact on many parts of the game. It will fe modify
the way the people accept or refuse a new tech, a new form of government, how they
contribute to economy and production (productivity, corruption, crime...), it will also
allow for new, interesting situations like religious wars, nationalist troubles,
secession wars...
The strength of the influence of this model, as well as how it will constrain the player.
For example, this model should be able to simulate the kind of situations that have
created revolutions; in such a case, should the model create the revolution, enforcing
the player in a new form of government, calculated by the model? Or should it just
slightly worsen the genral situation of the civ and give the player clues that he should
modify its government? IMO this could be linked to the game difficulty/level like it has
been said on the forum.
This documet is intended to give you an overview of the system I plan to use. The
specific attributes and implementations features that will be used are still TBD for a
part.
General architecture of the model :
---------------------------------------------
The model deals with the following elements :
1. The civilization is the empire the player rules. It embeds every other elements.
2. The province is the one designed by Mark.
3. The classes are those designed by Hrafnkell.
4. The cultures define the general cultural background of civilization's native people.
When a grouo of people migrates, it carries its culture, allowing for different cultures
to live inside a civilization.
5. The religions are defined as independant elements, at they can exist at worldwide
level (montheistic religions); they consist of a set of values that are used to modify
the cultural attributes. Several religions can exist in a same civilization.
6. The events are messages that are sent to the people to represent their perception of
the world. Every war, econ. crisis, ruler decision... will send events that will be used
to modify the cultural attributes and compute the actions of the peole.
7. The actions embed everything that the people can do : revolts, migrations, settlements
...
At the civilization level, groups are created to group people sharing the same class, the
same culture and the same religion. The general behaviour of each of these groups is
calculated at this level, using the attributes of the class, culture and culture of this
group. This will give the civ-level behaviour of this group. It can be of two types : an
action; or a set of modifications that will be applied to tech acceptance (a modifier to
the impact of this tech); tech research (a modifier to the RP produced by this group);
econ productivity (a modifier to this group's econ output)...
If any action is triggered by a group in a given turn, then the model goes down at the
province level. Each province records demographic statistics of the people that inhabit
it. Thus, for each province you know the repartition between cultures, religions and
classes. So when an action is triggered for a given group, each province which hosts pop
belonging to this grop will compute the precise behaviour in this province, as well as
the reactions of the other groups of this province. This allows for province-level events
to appear, and to depend on the particular situation of this province.
The civilization :
----------------------
Civilization is the element that civ-level elements. The government is civ-level, so the
civilization stores the description of the classes and their political power.
Also, the civilization stores the cultures, and knows which is its "native" culture (even
if this native culture can be influenced by the other cultures it hosts).
Finally, the civilization stores copies of the religions it hosts. These copies may or
may not be different from one civ to another.
Eventually the civilization could also store legal status for each class
(privileges/human rights), cultures (apartheid), religions (official/forbidden).
The genral behaviours are calculated at the civilization level, and refines at the
province level when necessary.
The province :
-------------------
When the probability that an action will be taken by one or several groups, each province
that hosts at least one of these groups will calculate the specific action that will be
taken in this province, and the reactions from the other groups.
Thus province stores province-specific data, like wealth, health, the
class/religion/culture of the province-ruler if any, and the demographic repartition
between classes, religions and cultures. All these parameters are used to make the
computings.
The classes :
-----------------
The classes are those designed by H, thus they have a specific political power. They also
store the life-level (wealth) of the class. Plus they store a hate-slider for each of the
other classes of the civilization. This allows for class-specific actions.
The cultures :
------------------
The cultures store the following attributes (0-100 scales) :
- traditionalism; (modifies how new techs/ideas/people will be accepted)
- social rigidity (modifies how political/social modifications will be easy)
- nationalism (modifies the reactions vs other cultures)
- education (modifies quite everything, from war barbary to tech acceptance/research)
- familial shape (modifies reaction vs other cultures)
- physical appearance (idem)
- language (idem)
Also, like the classes, cultures will have hate-sliders for every other cultures they
know.
The religions :
------------------
There should be two types of religions, poytheist and monotheist.
Ideas here are only for polytheist religions.
Attributes :
- tolerance (modifes reaction vs other groups : class, religion, culture; modifies
culture's traditionalism and social rigidity)
- individualism (people live for themselves or for the community; modifes culture's
attributes like social rigidity, education, nationalism... modifies how people are
willing to sacrifice for the group; how they obey the orders and revolt...)
Also there will be hate-sliders.
The events :
----------------
Exemple of events are :
- war events (beginning, end, victory, defeat...)
- diplomatic events (treaties, encounters of new civs...)
- tech events (new techs)
- political events (new forms of governments, revolts, new laws...)
- economical events (crisis, boom ...)
- religious events (scission of a religion, appearance of a new religion, conversion of
the reuler to a new religion...)
Each event will show how they interfere with the goals of the groups, thus eventually
triggering actions from these groups.
The actions :
-----------------
Here are exemples of the actions that can be taken :
- revolts against a ruling class or the ruler (many intensities, from demands to
revolution)
- religious/cultural oppression (many intensities)
- migrations (for econ, political, cultural, religious reasons)
- secession of a province
- strikes and class struggle (diverse intensities)...
Ideas on the model/player-interface :
------------------------------------------------
First, as I mentionned it, the strength of the model on the gameplay should be dependant
on the difficulty level or something like that (there could even be different level
sliders, one for this model, the other for the strength of the IA-player ...)
IMO in this there are actions that the ruler can not ignore, and others that he could
pass.
There could be an interface like this : every turn the ruler can consult a news-paper
which tells him everything that happened (inner-politics, diplomatics, economics,
scientific... sections) and read details on any of them, or just ignore the news-paper.
But when some thing happened that the ruler can't ignore, then an advisor would pop and
tell him there is something to do.
So if the player reads carefully the news this gives him an advantage, as he eventually
can forecast events before they appear (and the advisor tells him), and he can also
eventually micro-manage in the fileds he's interseted in. If he ignores the news, he wont
miss important things since the advisor will pop.
Fe, in the case of this model, many actions will be taken that dont concern the ruler
directly (fe peasants revolts in a faraway province, handled by this province leader)
and he probably wont have to micromanage these things. But if he doesnt care at all,
maybe the disontentment will last and spread, leading to a civ-wide revolution that will
put the player in a bad position.
How the ruler will interact with the people? IMO he should be given many tools that he
will or wont use if he does or doesnt want to micromanage.
One idea is to have a simple system of law, which would give different legal stauses to
the different classes, cultures and religions. This would inculde appartheid laws,
anti-slavery laws, the problems of privileges of the upper classes that have led to the
french revolution, the laws on religion etc...
Also, the player should have +- limited control on the settlement of the people.
Through how he will control the tech tree he will also interfer with this model and the
wants of the people.
OK, this is a rough sketch of the model. Details of implementation will come later.
Suggestions and feedback welcome.
. Two classes might actually Like each other.
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