Unknown2009-04-01 20:00:31
As stated, unless it's changed, how the governance style of a city/commune (Benign, Neutral or Despotic) makes a difference to an org's standing with a village doesn't exist. Every organization currently sits on Despotic for the better power and commodity incomes, because there's no reason not to be; village revolts are cyclical and can be approximated based on recent history. The entire thing is a throwback from the old style of revolts.
So here's my idea on making it better, and making more use of the governance style.
Each village will have a favored governance style:
Benign (Favors Benign the most, then Neutral, then Despotic)
Neutral, Benign (Favors Neutral the most, but would he happier with Benign then Despotic)
Neutral, Despotic (Favors Neutral the most, but would be happier with Despotic then Benign)
Despotic (Favors Despotic the most, then Neutral, then Benign)
In the short term what this would mean is that the farther away your org is from the favored style, the harder it is to influence and keep influenced that village. IE: The denizens are more resistant to that org's village influence abilities, and maybe that org would need to influence more denizens and vice versa.
In the long run, having the right or wrong governance style can make a difference.
For example, while being Despotic with Benign favoring villages might get you some fast power and commodities, over time as the your relationship with the village deteriorates, they will start giving less and less and it will be harder and harder to win the village back under your control. If your Benign with Benign favoring villages, it might mean less power and comms now, but overtime they might end up giving more then they would with being Despotic as you can hold onto the village easier and they'll be happier under your control, so they'll work harder because they like you so much.
Other things that can go into this system can be owning or not owning a rival village, doing commodity quests, doing the honors quest etc. While killing denizens loyal to the village might hurt your org's relations with it.
I'd think that the best way to keep track of this would be with numbers (sort of like Culture is).
IE: typing POLITICS DAIRUCHI would give something like this:
********************POLITICS OF THE VILLAGE OF DAIRUCHI*********************
Sphere of Influence: The Righteous Principality of New Celest
Village Leader: The Most Venerable Dairuchi, Shimotabi Xiim
Government Preference: Neutral Benign
Relations:
Serenwilde: Friendly (+525)
Governance Style: (Neutral) +250 (+50, Neutral for one cycle)
Commodity Help: (Minor) +75
Problem Solving: +200 (IE: Someone helped out with the rockeaters recently)
Glomdoring: Courteous (+250)
Governance Style: (Neutral) +300 (+100, Neutral for two cycles)
Rivalry Support: (Minor) -50 (Someone's been stealing spiders for Angkrag)
Celest: Honored (+650)
Governance Style: (Benign) +100
Commodity Help: (Major) +200
Problem Solving: +200 (IE: Someone helped out with the rockeaters recently)
Rivalry Help: (Mediocre) +150 (Someone's been stealing spiders from Angkrag)
Magnagora: Cold (-250)
Governance Style: (Despotic) +0
Rival Village Owned: -100 (Owns Angkrag)
Rivalry Support: (Mediocre) -150 (Someone's been stealing spiders for Angkrag)
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I think this system would keep the organizations on their toes a little bit and think ahead a little bit when it comes to villages. You have to shuffle around your style to maximize your income and holdings, if you have your eyes set on a certain village, it might behoove you to be nice towards that village (IE: If you're planning on taking Paavik, it might help to send your younger city or commune mates to do commodity quests there) etc.
Other things to go into the system perhaps:
If the owner of a village doesn't support them against their rival (IE: Celest owns Dairuchi but doesn't do a damn thing to keep or bring spiders to the town), then that would hurt the relation for example.
So here's my idea on making it better, and making more use of the governance style.
Each village will have a favored governance style:
Benign (Favors Benign the most, then Neutral, then Despotic)
Neutral, Benign (Favors Neutral the most, but would he happier with Benign then Despotic)
Neutral, Despotic (Favors Neutral the most, but would be happier with Despotic then Benign)
Despotic (Favors Despotic the most, then Neutral, then Benign)
In the short term what this would mean is that the farther away your org is from the favored style, the harder it is to influence and keep influenced that village. IE: The denizens are more resistant to that org's village influence abilities, and maybe that org would need to influence more denizens and vice versa.
In the long run, having the right or wrong governance style can make a difference.
For example, while being Despotic with Benign favoring villages might get you some fast power and commodities, over time as the your relationship with the village deteriorates, they will start giving less and less and it will be harder and harder to win the village back under your control. If your Benign with Benign favoring villages, it might mean less power and comms now, but overtime they might end up giving more then they would with being Despotic as you can hold onto the village easier and they'll be happier under your control, so they'll work harder because they like you so much.
Other things that can go into this system can be owning or not owning a rival village, doing commodity quests, doing the honors quest etc. While killing denizens loyal to the village might hurt your org's relations with it.
I'd think that the best way to keep track of this would be with numbers (sort of like Culture is).
IE: typing POLITICS DAIRUCHI would give something like this:
********************POLITICS OF THE VILLAGE OF DAIRUCHI*********************
Sphere of Influence: The Righteous Principality of New Celest
Village Leader: The Most Venerable Dairuchi, Shimotabi Xiim
Government Preference: Neutral Benign
Relations:
Serenwilde: Friendly (+525)
Governance Style: (Neutral) +250 (+50, Neutral for one cycle)
Commodity Help: (Minor) +75
Problem Solving: +200 (IE: Someone helped out with the rockeaters recently)
Glomdoring: Courteous (+250)
Governance Style: (Neutral) +300 (+100, Neutral for two cycles)
Rivalry Support: (Minor) -50 (Someone's been stealing spiders for Angkrag)
Celest: Honored (+650)
Governance Style: (Benign) +100
Commodity Help: (Major) +200
Problem Solving: +200 (IE: Someone helped out with the rockeaters recently)
Rivalry Help: (Mediocre) +150 (Someone's been stealing spiders from Angkrag)
Magnagora: Cold (-250)
Governance Style: (Despotic) +0
Rival Village Owned: -100 (Owns Angkrag)
Rivalry Support: (Mediocre) -150 (Someone's been stealing spiders for Angkrag)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
I think this system would keep the organizations on their toes a little bit and think ahead a little bit when it comes to villages. You have to shuffle around your style to maximize your income and holdings, if you have your eyes set on a certain village, it might behoove you to be nice towards that village (IE: If you're planning on taking Paavik, it might help to send your younger city or commune mates to do commodity quests there) etc.
Other things to go into the system perhaps:
If the owner of a village doesn't support them against their rival (IE: Celest owns Dairuchi but doesn't do a damn thing to keep or bring spiders to the town), then that would hurt the relation for example.
Xavius2009-04-02 03:42:22
The whole feelings affecting initial influence difficulty thing is tried and failed, unfortunately. I like where you're going with this, but it's something that didn't work last time.
Estarra2009-04-02 18:28:31
I'd like to revisit it too but it's tricky. The reason we disbanded village feelings was because it became too easy to influence a village (within minutes) and villages became too entrenched (even more so than now).
Desitrus2009-04-02 18:29:56
Unless you kill the baby.
/canofworms
zing
/canofworms
zing
Shiri2009-04-03 02:00:33
It's still possible to influence villages within minutes, heh. Even peaced ones.
Xavius2009-04-03 02:56:36
I see two separate issues here. One, when you get a village, you don't usually do much with it besides honors quests or, in the case of the mining villages, fetch dwarves. Only metal commodities are worth fighting over, and the villages don't have great gold output (and no xp output) for anyone over, say, level 35.
The other issue is that one of the government axes is simply less-middle-more, but the ideas that justified that didn't work out so hot in practice.
I propose changing the government axes to ideals and consumption patterns. Ideals would be religion, patriotism, and expansionism. Consumption patterns would be artistic, militaristic, or commercial. The ideals axis would set different goals for the governing org. The consumption axis affects how the commodity quests benefit people.
A religious ruling org wants to spread its message more than anything else. If more villagers are influenced by the ruling org than any other org, then the village gives more power. If they fail, the village produces half power.
A patriotic organization wants to protect its own. If no villagers are killed in an RL day, the village gives more power. If someone is killed, the village produces half power, minus the power hit already suffered for villager death.
An expansionist org wants to bring the world inside its borders. Village power gain is affected by how many of the mobile producing denizens that the village has (farmers, spiders, dwarves, cattle). If the village has all of the denizens for its village, power gain is doubled. If the village has none, the village produces no power. Power gain would scale between the two.
An artistic org would siphon off a portion of the soft/luxury goods produced by players (cloth, silk, food, flax) and put it towards the culture score.
A militaristic org would siphon off a portion of the durable goods produced by players (metals, wood, marble, coal) in exchange for a reduction in guard power cost.
A village under a commercial org would offer double the gold reward for a commodity quest in an effort to encourage people from all orgs to sell their stuff there and thus increase tithing.
Shiri2009-04-03 03:21:26
And make a pacifist miner-grabbing method like furrikin stealing so that 
isn't so annoying.
isn't so annoying.