Turn Chats

This is an informational poll:

Turn chats have been becoming longer and longer (granted, the last one in May was 3 hours); the last turn chat lasted 6 hours! I was thinking of giving it a few more tries, but with Industrialization around the corner, this means more units for everyone (and MUCH longer waits). This means that we'll soon be spending hours moving units around.

The other reason is the growing number of cities through culture - this means more queuing and checking to see that every poll and request are met.

So, I propose that we either shorten the length of the turn chats, adjust the ingame settings (animations), or have time-intensive tasks (i.e., queuing) be checked each turn chat by the governers.

For Example:

Suggestion 1: Limit to 5 turns per chat, however, if 5 turns can be done in less than 2 hours, do another 5. Or, put a time limit on the turn chats (i.e., turn chats will last 5 hours max.).

Suggestion 2: Set preferences like animations off, in other to speed up things a bit.

Suggestion 3: Instead of queues like this:

Plexia (our newest city, I believe): Temple (c), Library, Marketplace

Do something like this:

Temple [3/10], Library [0/5], Marktetplace [0/12]

Where the [X/Y] is [ Current turn / Turn completed ]. That is, the current turn is how many turns the improvement/unit has been worked on. The next number is the total number of turns that it will take to complete it. So, you can then see how long it will be until the queue is complete. This would reduce re-checking.

another suggestion would be to separate turn0 and the game-chat to 2 days.
with enough time to poll in between:
thursday=turn0-day
sunday=turn1-10-day
together with you build-queue proposal this would split time about in half.

Or we could just remove them and allow the president to play the turns at his/her leisure, after being given clear instructions.

With the length and complexity of the chats, having the President fly solo on the game turns is seeming more and more like a good idea.

I was hoping chats could be kept under 3 hours if possible. GF used to be able to meet that kind of timing. 3 hours is about 3am here, which is about as late as I'd like to stay up

ct: Temple [3/10], Library [0/5], Marktetplace [0/12]

Click to expand...

This can give a rough guide but is not always exact since cities grow.

The reason the last turn chat was so long was because we did not have adequate instructions from all departments. It is the stopping to ask what to do, the debating and voting on these things that takes up the time. When we had full instructions the turn chat flew by.

The president could play the game without the turn chat but I think that may cause more problems that it will solve. There is already the feeling out there that those who can attend the turn chats have too much power. Having the president play the game on his or her own would only concentrate that power even further into one person. It should be known up front that if I play the game with out the turn chat I will not hesitate to make any decisions on my own when there are no instructions in the turh chat thread. That does not seem like a democracy to me.

It seems to me that the answer is for the various leaders and governors to get the instructions for their respective departments and provinces into the turn chat threads. If they do that and if they consult with the citizens about what is wanted then not only will the turn chats be completed in a reasonable time, we will see less and less charges that those at the turn chats have too much power.

Turn chat instructions for 6 hour turn chat

Turn chat instructions for 3 hour turn chat.

Good points, Donsig. I'm wondering, if the populace forces you to "fly solo", will you be able to log the moves in some manner to help us understand your reasonings? You know, either in a Word document or run a private/open chat room and log it. As a citizen, I'm still wanting documentation each time the save is opened. Just as a safeguard.

Another option to prevent runaway turns is to absolutely limit the time. Say that 3 hours is how long the game will be played. At 3 hours, save the game and close up shop whether 2 turns or 20 were played.

Also, with the existing rules, there's nothing to prevent the President from running through the turn zero stuff whenever he wants. He's not allowed to hit the next turn button but that's about the only real restriction on pre turn activities.

Another option to prevent runaway turns is to absolutely limit the time.

Click to expand...

At present, this may not be efficient since it takes some time to get going, unless the flow of the chat itself is made much smoother.

Also, should we implement a few of the above ideas? maybe a separate poll should be held for each idea.

Originally posted by donsig

The president could play the game without the turn chat but I think that may cause more problems that it will solve. There is already the feeling out there that those who can attend the turn chats have too much power. Having the president play the game on his or her own would only concentrate that power even further into one person. It should be known up front that if I play the game with out the turn chat I will not hesitate to make any decisions on my own when there are no instructions in the turh chat thread. That does not seem like a democracy to me.

It seems to me that the answer is for the various leaders and governors to get the instructions for their respective departments and provinces into the turn chat threads. If they do that and if they consult with the citizens about what is wanted then not only will the turn chats be completed in a reasonable time, we will see less and less charges that those at the turn chats have too much power.

Click to expand...

Clear instructions from all departments and provinces will limit the decisions to be made to very menial (worker movements) and the rare, major decision. I suggest that officials be required to post instructions in the turn thread or post that their deputy will need to give them, or, in the case of a governor (although if a governor can post anything, he or she should be able to post build queues) notify the domestic department that it will be impossible to post build queues. If this is not done in the case of a governor, the president decides what to build (or a representative from the domestic department, should it be at a turn chat), and in the case of a leader, the president also decides what to do. The first time an official does not fulfill the required duties, an official letter of warning is sent. The second time, an impeachment hearing is held. Note, that this only occurs if the official does not notify the forum of an impending absence and does not have a very good excuse. This will keep the president from having too much power while playing the turns, as officials will take more care to post their instructions. I hope that made sense.

When I vote for president, I base my vote mostly on that persons honesty and dedication to the game. I fully trust President Donsig to follow the instructions he is given, and to keep the interests of Phoenatica ahead of his own. Thus, I voted for him for president even though I was also in contention, and I am glad I did. I would much rather have the person I voted for for the highest government position making decisions on his own than those decisions be made seemingly at random by the majority of those who can attend turn chats.

I think the pacing of the chat is the responsibility of the player and something they should be very mindful of. A few key points to keep turn chats speedy, IMHO:

- Preturn carried out by the player in silence and without interruption. There is no need for the player to discuss preturn alternatives.

- Votes be organized by the player. Player organizes a few minutes for discussion, calls a vote, then acts. No need for further discussion. Move on.

- Emphasis by the player not to get distracted into too much conversation in the room. While interesting conversations increase the fun factor in the chat, and the player is entitled to fun too, there comes a point in time where it slows things down if the player isn't "playing".

- Ability to make mundane decisions. Hard to draw the line here, but the current list of presidential decisions include among other things nonspecified worker locations, military movement, & citizen worker tiles. Lets keep these decisions to the President in the interest of time.

- Absence of instructions beforehand. Good initiative from Eyrei to discuss repercussions on officials who do not post instructions.

- Governors queues. Governors perhaps should raise a red flag on actual changes from turn to turn so the player will better know what they actually have to do. Of course, the player can still verify the queue is ok, but this way, they will be able to identify their work quicker.

I'm not sure if Chieftess opened this thread for discussion on ideas, so let me know if I'm outta step here. Of your suggestions, I only like 3, but I like it a lot. I think it also might force governors to take a look at how long some buildings actually take to build too.

Silence in room:
that was the problem we solved by voicing only one rep per dept. this was an awful move, as this drove away many citizens, though.
so thats our dilemma:
if we include citizency, its in the nature of the game to have long turn-chats.
if we exclude it, we loose citizens.

There is much to reply to here and I may end up jumping around so please bear with me.

First, I think much of this should be left up to the designated player. An absolute time limit on the turn chat is something I oppose but another might like so it should be up to the individual that is playing.

Second, I see nothing wrong with the player doing the pre-turn stuff in silence and/or before the scheduled turn chat begins. The only trouble, again, is not having adequate instructions. Chat room noise does not bother me. When I'm playing the turn I can't see the chat room window. I go back to the room window to explain something that has happened or to ask for input. Telling everyone that Ghandi wants to talk and then asking those in the room if we should trade maps does not take much time.

Third, I'm not so sure that requiring instructions will help. I think we would end up with some impeachments to further distract us from the policy formulation discussions that we should be having. We should certainly encourage leaders and governors to be responsible and post instructions but I do not want to be involved in another round of rule changes.

The key question is how do we handle things that are not covered by the turn instructions. Who makes the decisions in these cases (the desiganted player or those at the turn chat) and what should their decisions be based on? Should the decision maker(s) search the forums for citizens views on the subjest or just decide on his or her own? Either way has disadvantages.

The biggest problem I see with the whole game is that there has been very little discussion about policy making. We spend more time talking about rules than we do about which wonders to try to build! We ended up building Shakespeare's over Newton's on a 3-2 vote. There is an investigation about this because it didn't follow a poll in which 13 citizens voted. For crying out loud I got more than 13 votes in the presidential race and that was no where near a majority of those voting! It is darn near impossible to follow the will of the people if 1) the people don't express their will and/or 2) the people are divided on the issues.

Finally, regarding the question of the designated player 'flying solo'. Speaking for myself, I could do that if that is what is decided upon and could provide some sort of log or summary of actions taken and why. I would hope that if we do away with turn chats then the expectations of the desiganted player will be reasonably spelled out.