Good day, Fanatica, and welcome to my State of the Nation Address. The idea here is to lay out my goals for the upcoming term, as well as begin a dialogue on all of the issues that face our great nation. All in all, I believe that the State of Our Nation is promising.

Before I give you my assessments, let me first give you the chat schedule for the coming week:

Tuesday, June 3rd - 2100 GMT(5pm EST)
Friday, June 6th - 2100 GMT(5pm EST)

Almost all of my chats will happen on weekdays at this time, though I will try to schedule a Sunday chat somewhere if possible. OK, here goes.


The State of our Democratic Process is in dire need.

I hate to be the one to say it, but I believe we have lost our way when it comes to determining the will of the people. Too many game decisions have been made without polling the citizenry. Too many turnchats have been started without adequate instruction, due to lack of discussion. Too many decisions are being made in the chats for this same reason. On the flipside(and just as alarming) is that the people are either unaware or don't really seem to mind that they are being left out.

I would like to begin repairing this problem immediately, but I will need everyone's help to do so. Our leaders can best serve our country by posting any relevant discussion within 24 hours of turnchat's end, following up with a poll if there is any dissent on a matter, and posting thorough turnchat instructions well before the chat begins.

Citizens can help the cause by staying involved in the discussions, and holding leaders including myself accountable for their actions, or lack thereof. Together we can bring spirited debate and the peoples' will back to the forefront of this game.

The State of our City Management is adequate.

That may sound bad, but it's really not. My only complaint here is that a lack of unified vision has made the governor's job a nightmare, as he struggles to adjust queues based on our changing needs. My mission is to lead the way in determining what that vision should be, and will consider my presidency a personal failure if we do not have a solid idea by term's end.

In order to make things easier, I would request that our Governor re-open discussion on City Classifications and get them in place as soon as possible.


The State of our Military is promising.

As everyone should know by now, we are starting this new term at war with Egypt. While this isn't exactly the way I had planned to inherit this office, please know that I am in full support of the diplomatic decision made by Chieftess and am capable of directing our troops with the help of the Military Department. To ensure the quickest possible resolution, I recommend that early emphasis be placed on upgrading our troops, starting with our frontline Warriors by way of the Barracks in Aureus.

Discussion has been started by CivGeneral here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=54750).


The State of our Domestic Agenda is promising.

During the last few days of Term 1, we managed to make great strides in regaining parity with other civs in regards to cities founded. While I am very pleased with our rapid recovery here, I do take issue with the placement of two of our newer cities and the fact that they were not polled. Funkytowne was built on a site that will have no access to water for quite some time and will therefore halt at Size 2 until we can dedicate workers to this task. Nur Gisnod was founded one tile away from the coast, which gives us three water tiles that cannot be improved. While I am not as worried about Nur Gisnod's fate(it will thrive on its abundance of Grasslands), I cannot help but think that putting these sites up for vote may have yielded different results.

Going forward, I would like to work with the Domestic Department to see that prospective city locations are polled on a site-by-site basis, instead of rubber-stamping an entire region. This will hopefully ensure that our future city placements don't get lost in the big picture.

Also, the time has come to consider adding a new province to our great nation. I would like discussion and resolution on this matter right away.

Finally, I don't want our war with Egypt to be an excuse to halt our westward expansion. With all the grassland yet to be claimed, we should be able to gain land by both conquest and peaceful settling.



The State of our Foreign Affairs is in need.

Please don't read too much into the status here, as it is affected by recent events and is in no way an indictment of our Foreign Affairs Advisor.

Our current war with Egypt demands that we consider founding embassies with the other nations on our continent in the hopes of gaining an alliance against our enemy. While I believe that this may not be necessary, I am still looking for feedback from our citizenry on how to handle this.

Discussion on this matter has been properly re-opened by SaaM here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=54010).



The State of our Trade Relations is promising.

We discover Literature in 4 turns, and I don't want this event to be a chatstopper. Currently, all nations on our continent are without this tech and have 4 techs to trade us(that we know about). This is a golden opportunity for us to get back in the Tech Race. We should try to determine what we should be willing to give to make these trades happen, should Literature alone not be enough in some cases.


The State of our Science Research is in need.

Granted, we have Science research set at 10% at the moment, but we shouldn't let that keep us from promoting a national dialogue on our research goals. We should always be thinking two steps ahead in this regard, as our science queue defines the nation we are to become.

First order of business should be an absolute decision on whether we should become a Monarchy or a Republic. That discussion can be found here (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=54638).



The State of our Culture is in need.

It is true that we lack culture, but at this time our efforts should be geared toward the war effort and our westward expansion. As our newer cities inherit the burden of becoming Settler Factories, we can then introduce a bit more culture to our core cities.


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Please feel free to respond to any part of this agenda. If you have any questions that you feel I may not have addressed, please fire away and I will give you an answer.

Unfortunately, Mr. President, I tend to disagree with several of your views.

Firstly, I believe the placement of Funkytowne was very good. Without it, we would have needed to wait many more a turn for us to gain access to iron, something that we need right now.

Next, of culture: While certainly a very important part of our civilization, we must remember that wea re at war. Any attempt to dedicate sheilds to temples and gold to their upkeep would surely result in a successful capture of one of our great cities. The core cities will need to be dedicated to building up our military for some time.

Otherwise, I tend to agree with your accessment. This is a good start to Term 2: Good Luck!

After reviewing the 430bc save I see that once again Gorina has been set adrift on its usual course of mismanagement. It's too bad the requests and pleas of the citizens go ignored, but I guess that's the norm for a Demogame. How difficult would it have been to change the laborer locations as requested? If those had been changed, the temple would be done in two turns. But instead growth has been chosen so that unhappiness will soon take over. I can see how the people who are elected to office know alot more about the game compared to us regular citizens. I guess that's why you don't have to give a f**k about what we say. Why should we participate in your discussions when what we say goes ignored? But like I say, this is very typical of a Demogame.

Cyc, another thing that is very typical of a demogame or RL democracy is that you don't always get your way. You are sometimes outvoted or elected officials simply don't do what you desire. The only solution to that is to elect other leaders in place of the current ones. You should also keep the different gameplay strategies in mind. Your strategy is probably different than someone else's who was elected President. You should also keep the whole demogame in mind. Gorina is probably being managed the way that most people think is best for the demogame.

I applaud our new President's initiative with this State of Our Nation Address. I would like to point out that information regarding what is going on in our nation is not readily available on the forums. The first I heard about the war with Egypt was from this very address. I wonder how the war started and why it all came down to a diplomatic decision by our domestic leader. That is not a topic of this thread but it does show how citizens who do not look at the saves and read the chat logs or attend the chats are left in the dark. Add to this the situation in Gorina (where there is information on the forums and two unelected but dedicated and capable officials whose management suggestions go unnoticed) and I can see why our citizens spend less and less time in the demogame.
The biggest contribution you can make as President is to establish a tradition of getting information to the citizens via the forums. Your department leaders should be responsible for placing relevent information about their respective departments on the forums. Do not be afraid to make decisions in the absence of citizen input but do not take the fall when you do so. Put the onus back where it belongs - on the leaders who do not do their jobs. Everytime you have to make a decision for lack of citizen input write it down. Post a log of the decisions you make and as part of each log entry tell us which leader should have left instructions. This will allow the citizens to see which of the leaders they've elected are doing their jobs and which aren't.

I agree with the presidents view of the FA department. Unfortunatly, we were not fully prepared for this. As stated, the embasy discussion has been reopened and I plan on polling for an embasy with Greece, to see if mabey they can help us. (Also to check on the status of the Pyramids, which are also being built in Athens). As stated, Literature is to be discovered in 4 turns. I will work with the Trade advisor (which position is CT taking, anyway?) to make sure that we can claw our way back up there tech wise. Also, I do indeed hope that perhaps Alex will do an alliance for lit and mabey a few gpt. Also, I wish to remind everyone that the moment our first legion wins, we are catapulted into our Golden Age.

and @donsig- Cleo demanded a TM and 15 gold. We had a 8-0 spotvote which told her to get lost, promting her to declare war on us.

Just wish to mention that the FA thread is up

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=54804

Originally posted by Stuck_As_a_Mac

and @donsig- Cleo demanded a TM and 15 gold. We had a 8-0 spotvote which told her to get lost, promting her to declare war on us.

Why were citizens never asked what should be done if demands are made upon our country? That's something that should have been done from the git go and the fact that it wasn't only fortifies the sentiments I outlined in my post above. We are now in a war soley because our first term leaders have failed to do their jobs. I am not happy that we are at war because such a decision was left to eight citizens who happened to be in the chat at a crucial time. I am even more unhappy that information on our war readiness is not available on the forums.

Everyone, I just spent about 45 minutes responding to your posts, only to have it eaten by my new crap browser. Thankfully, I can still use my old browser so this won't happen again. Now I am a bit pressed for time so let me paraphrase my original "lost" statements.

Keep in mind, my original responses(most notably to Cyc) were more thought out and articulate, so my apologies if they seem curt.

@Oct - Funkytowne: Get the Iron, of course, but bad placement. I fought for an alternate location(with Iron), but it was ignored and never polled. This city will not expand beyond size 2 w/o lots of work.

Culture: Read my assessment and you will see that I agree. However, the fact that we can't presently do anything about it doesn't change the fact that we are in need, so it must be mentioned.

@Cyc - Wasn't me. Relax and let me fix this for you.

@donsig - Leader accountability was a cornerstone for my campaign, and I will everything I can to ensure that things run smoothly. Sorry for not expanding on it here.

@SaaM - Great ideas. Please be sure to post them in the appropriate discussions if you haven't already.

@donsig - I will try to stay ahead of the game on matters like the one you mention.


Once again, my apologies. Keep posting your concerns and I will continue to respond.

Quoting Donovan Zoi:
@Cyc - Wasn't me. Relax and let me fix this for you.
_________________________________________

I trust you will, DZ. Sorry I went off on you like that.

I would have liked to have read your 45 minute reply. Disappearing text has happen to me also. When I was politically active (election-wise), I would spend 30-45 minutes writing a reply, only to have it vanishe when I tried to post it. My problem was I had unchecked the automatic log-on box in the profile options page. CFC would automatically log me off after about 15 minutes and I would lose everything I had written. Better luck next time.

Good luck on your Presidency.

@donsig-A decision on tribute demands really has to be made on the spot. Tribute demands from Egypt are very different from tribute demands from, say, America. A spot vote is the best possible way to resolve this.

Actually I would agree with donsig here, Boots. It would be perfectly possible to post discussion on general policy regarding whether we are inclined to give in to demands and why. We could easily have classified the known civs and assigned threat response policies to each group, or come up with individual policies for each seperate civ. The only reason a spot-vote was needed for that particular decision was the shameful lack of preparation on our part.

Keep in mind the level of demands. If a nation demanded a TM only, it would be very different than demanding half our treasury and the WM.

Also plannable. Thresholds can be set beforehand, with seperate policies for demands above and below a pre-defined boundary.

Eklektikos,

That's a good idea, and might help in the future. It's been some time since this DG crew had to deal with demands before, and I think we (as a collective whole), just didn't really think about them. We knew about them, just not at a concious level.

-- Ravensfire

Well, us old timers who remember the Domino Wars also remember that back in DG1 this very subject was brought up before any demands were ever made on Phoenatica. What's the difference between then and now? The chat was non-existant in the beginning of DG1, now the chat is an established phenomenon. When there was no chat in DG1 we all had to plan ahead or pay the price. Now there is no need to pre-plan since things are handled as they arise in the chat. This of course disenfranchises much of our citizenry.