Wouldn't it be reasonable to hold off on such resounding and long-winded critiques until we have a clear understanding of how it works?
I have said, repeatedly, that I might be wrong here, and that we don't know the full picture.
But IF policies all stack, then their only options are to:
a) have players able to benefit simultaneously from policies that cannot be logically combined OR
b) not have any policies that cannot logically be combined with others - which excludes many of the most interesting potential social policies, like free speech, censorship, monarchy, democracy, free trade, mercantilism, serfdom, slavery, oligarchy, quality-focused army, quantity-focused army, etc. etc. etc.
I don't think its unreasonable to see a problem with this, as long as its suitably caveated (as I have nearly every post) with noting that we don't have the full picture yet.
These "protection" warriors are trained in the use of tower shields, shield combat, and discipline. The "fury" warriors are trained in dual-wielding weapons, harnessing bloodthirst, and raw aggression. There is just as much dichotomy between the two, as there is between running "opposing" social policies that seems to be nearly ruining your life.
Nonsense.
There is no logical contradiction in being good at both good training with shields, and good training with dual weapons.
Presumably you'll be better at one if you specialize, but there's no logical reason to not be able to use both (though if you only have two arms you can't really use a large shield and two weapons at once - so I bet some of the abilities *are* mutually exclusive).
[As to whether there is a logical contradiction between using "fury" and using "discipline", that somewhat depends on the metaphysics of the universe in question.]
But there *is* a logical contradiction between "power rests with a hereditary ruler" and "power rests with a commercial elite" and "power rests with a group of people elected by the population". Because not everyone can have power at once - or they don't really have power.
Similarly, there is a logical contradiction between having censorship and a free press.
* * *
Edit:
Exactly more choices=more options.... if I get Mercantilism+Free Market+State Property Then I am giving up Slavery+Serfdom+Emancipation... and Every Other combination of 3 policies.
But mercantilism + free trade is a logical contradiction! Mercantilism is, by definition, not free trade!
What if you always elected the eldest Bush? it was 'understood'... what if you have a one party state where the party machinery so dominates elections that the party leader essentially chooses thir successor...
If there is no choice to elect anyone but the Party, then its not a democracy. China is not a Democracy. Iraq under Saddam Hussein was not a democracy. A democracy means that there is meaningful choice by voters. If all they can do is rubber-stamp, then they don't actually have any real power.
in what way is society really different from a democracy.
If the monarch is *required by law* to implement only those policies that people vote on, then the monarch has no power and so it isn't really a monarch.
If the monarch can ignore the population and do what he likes, then even if he sometimes holds polls, it isn't a democracy because the public doesn't get to choose the policies or the person who does.
Also, can you please provide a historic example of a monarch who only implemented policies based on public elections?
religiously France is Very different from the US
... yes, but religious *policy* by the government is very similar.
When you choose a policy you aren't choosing "how religious are my people?", you're choosing what the government attitude to religion will be. That's why its a policy.
Organized Religion or Theocracy.
The US is not organized religion or theocracy. There is no state church that people have to be members of or support, and religious leaders have no say in the running of the country. Suggesting otherwise is absurd.
No but I can imagine a number that is "evenish oddish"... say 14 or 5
14 is even, 5 is odd. How are either 14 or 5 "evenish oddish".
If you have the 'democracy' social policy that does not mean your society fits the strict definition of democracy....it means your society is LIKE a democracy in important ways.
Sure. But it is impossible to be both like a democracy in important ways AND like a monarchy in important ways, because the important thing is whose preferences get implemented as policy.
s.
