Better RoM: Government Civics

[Killtech]

ok so let's get a bit more concrete. my first suggestion would be:

Govermens:
Disorganized (formerly Chiefdom):
+100% Mnt. for dist. to Palace (no government organization)
+100% Mnt. for number of Cities (no government organization)
*no Civic Upkeep
*does not allow to pick any non-default power civic

Monarchy (alternativly Monocracy):
+60% Mnt. for dist. to Palace
+40% Mnt. for number of Cities
*low Civic Upkeep
+50% , , in Capital (centralized)
+10% , , , in 2 larges Cities (centralized - for Gigantic maps...)
+1 unhappiness in every City (no voice in the Government)

Commonwealth:
- 50% Mnt. for number of Cities (federal)
*high Civic Upkeep
+1 unhappiness in every City (no voice in the Government)

Republic:
+50% Mnt. for dist. to Palace
+10% Mnt. for number of Cities
*normal Civic Upkeep
+30% , , in Capital (centralized)
+15% , , , in 2 larges Cities (centralized - for Gigantic maps...)

Federation:
-50% Mnt. for dist. to Palace (federal)
-50% Mnt. for number of Cities (federal)
*very high Civic Upkeep

EDIT: the list contains only Maintanance Cost, Happiness and centralization bonus so far. I'll add further properties later.

i did not add Revolutions boni/mali because this should be quite balanced without that. so i would like to hear some comments on the numbers. too high? too low?

i'm not sure for how many largest Cities the centralization bonus should apply to. in practise this number should be dependant on the map size!
a small legitimation on the centralized bonus: fashist Germeny under Hitler pumped enourmous amount on money into Berlin to make the representation of Germanys might and to be world's number one in every category. and of course there was lots money spent on the university... with focus on weapons research of couse. simular applies to other centralized states (Athenes, Paris, ...)

 

[Afforess]

ok so let's get a bit more concrete. my first suggestion would be:

Spoiler :

govermens:
Chiefdom / Disorganized:
+100% Mnt. for dist. to Palace (no government organization)
+100% Mnt. for number of Cities (no government organization)
*no Civic Upkeep

Monarchy / Despotism:
+60% Mnt. for dist. to Palace
+40% Mnt. for number of Cities
*low Civic Upkeep
+50% , , in Capital (centralized)
+10% , , , in 2 larges Cities (centralized - for Gigantic maps...)
+1 unhappiness in every City (no voice in the Government)

Commonwealth:
- 50% Mnt. for number of Cities (federal)
*high Civic Upkeep
+1 unhappiness in every City (no voice in the Government)

Republic:
+50% Mnt. for dist. to Palace
+10% Mnt. for number of Cities
*normal Civic Upkeep
+30% , , in Capital (centralized)
+15% , , , in 2 larges Cities (centralized - for Gigantic maps...)

Federation:
-50% Mnt. for dist. to Palace (federal)
-50% Mnt. for number of Cities (federal)
*very high Civic Upkeep

EDIT: the list contains only Maintanance Cost, Happiness and centralization bonus so far. I'll add further properties later.

i did not add Revolutions boni/mali because this should be quite balanced without that. so i would like to hear some comments on the numbers. too high? too low?

i'm not sure for how many largest Cities the centralization bonus should apply to. in practise this number should be dependant on the map size!
a small legitimation on the centralized bonus: fashist Germeny under Hitler pumped enourmous amount on money into Berlin to make the representation of Germanys might and to be world's number one in every category. and of course there was lots money spent on the university... with focus on weapons research of couse. simular applies to other centralized states (Athenes, Paris, ...)

It looks okay so far, but it could use some tweaking. I don't think Monarchy and Despotism should be lumped together. From a historical perspective they are often very different. Also, the number of largest cities does scale with mapsize, don't worry about that.

 

[Killtech]

It looks okay so far, but it could use some tweaking. I don't think Monarchy and Despotism should be lumped together. From a historical perspective they are often very different. Also, the number of largest cities does scale with mapsize, don't worry about that.

yeah, it needs tweaking but it's a bit hard to do it without a real testing on the field. but i'm eager to hear ideas.

i know the naming issue is a problem and yeah monarchy usually stands for something very different than despotism. but in my concept this difference would in the power civic (despotism and dictatorship are at martial law, while the term monarchy rather suggests a hereditary law or an elected king.) one needs to see that the goverment civic only specifies how the government is structured: rule by one leader or a group of individuals, centralized or federal organized. i didn't find proper names for that. in priciple a very strong persidential sytem would still fall under the monarchy civic because the rule is primarly in the hads of one.

maybe someone else has a good name for rule-by-one government system that could apply to any situation where the primary power over the state is in one hand? i prefere Monarchy as the most fitting one (a monarch can be a despot, but not every despot is a monarch. problem still is that a monarch is usually adressed as a king so it's hard to think of a president or fashist leader).

 

[Arrorn]

The difference is huge. Dictators are usually self-imposed and do not pass the rule to their children. While that may seem small, it means the populace has no idea who will hold the "throne" for the next succession. It's hard to cement yourself as a god if the rule changes to a new family each time. With Monarchies, often, the royal line is "divine" and therefore the populace are much more likely to identify with them. That's why Monarchies were much more common than dictatorships.

Actually the difference is not that large.
I am sure you meant that there is a difference in hereditary monarchies and dictatorships. That I will give to you.

From Wikipedia:
A self-proclaimed monarchy is a monarchy that is proclaimed into existence, often by an individual, rather than occurring as part of a longstanding tradition. It is thus at least initially the opposite of most hereditary monarchies, although if a self-proclaimed monarchy is successful, it will evolve into a hereditary one.

I think that the names of the government civics are still far too vague. I think we should choose one form of monarchy and one form of democracy and try not to please all forms of those governments.

From Wikipedia:
Popular sovereignty is common but not a universal motivating subject for establishing a democracy. In some countries, democracy is based on the philosophical principle of equal rights. Many people use the term "democracy" as shorthand for liberal democracy, which may include additional elements such as political pluralism, equality before the law, the right to petition elected officials for redress of grievances, due process, civil liberties, human rights, and elements of civil society outside the government.

From Wikipedia:
In contemporary usage, the term democracy refers to a government chosen by the people, whether it is direct or representative. The term republic has many different meanings, but today often refers to a representative democracy with an elected head of state, such as a president, serving for a limited term, in contrast to states with a hereditary monarch as a head of state, even if these states also are representative democracies with an elected or appointed head of government such as a prime minister.

We must choose a form of government for each government type and stop paying homage to our favorite type of that civic... as you can see "Democracy" is far too vague of a term for a governmental civic. There could be thousands of interpretations and each modder will have his own.

I propose a poll for what forms of government we should have in ROM, as it is enormously unlikely that any modder will take the time or effort to put most of the governmental types in existence into ROM, and try to keep them as historically accurate as possible, and feasible. This would cut down upon the debate as to what interpretation of "Democracy" or "Republic" as we use the terms today. It is also highly unlikely that any governments at all stick to one form of government absolutely.

To summarize my "rant" above: The terms that we use as civics, especially the governmental civics, are too broad and incorporate too many ideals and forms of governments, some of which are contradictory to others. What we should do is rename the civics as to eliminate future interpretations that go against what we had in mind.

It is always a bad sign if Wikipedia cannot make up its mind on the definitions of contemporary terms!

 

[Killtech]

^^^
what you propose is more or less to fuse the 'government' and 'power' civic groups into one so we can name each civic accuratly. this is possilbe but it means that you will have a lot of civics in this category giving tons of different boni/mali

on the other hand splitting this into two groups as it is now allows a wider choise (with more vague naming). in my proposal you have indeed 4*7 = 28 (Chiefdom gov not counted) different possible government types.

 

[Killtech]

finally i found the right word: Monocracy. it exactly translates 'rule by one' and its meaning is as broad as the term republic: presidential systems are monocracies as well as monarchies and dictatorships.

there's only a German article on the wikipedia on this: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monokratie
the english wiki refers to autocracy which implys the absolute power of the leader - thus it's not the same.

i've updated my prior post on that topic:
Governemt Civics: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8800113&postcount=41
Political System Classification: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8797606&postcount=30

 

[Xoatl_169]

finally i found the right word: Monocracy. it exactly translates 'rule by one' and its meaning is as broad as the term republic: presidential systems are monocracies as well as monarchies and dictatorships.

there's only a German article on the wikipedia on this: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monokratie
the english wiki refers to autocracy which implys the absolute power of the leader - thus it's not the same.

i've updated my prior post on that topic:
Governemt Civics: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8800113&postcount=41
Political System Classification: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=8797606&postcount=30

You just created a new viable english word. Congrats!

 

[Afforess]

I think we're going about this all the wrong way. I don't have as big of issues with the new civics I have in better RoM at the moment. Federal should probably be renamed Federation, but Democracies and Republics are different entities, and so are Despotism and Monarchies. I do have one idea for Democracies and Republics though, to make them more realisitc and less powerful at the same time.

What if moving the tax rate up by 10% caused a turn of anarchy (moving 30% down would cause 3 turns...)? Moving down would have no effect (Who cares if you lower taxes), but raising them would be hard. It seems that it would simulate the citizens reaction to higher taxes. (And the anarchy would make Republic and Democracies potentially worse for Revolutions if you adjusted them too often).

 

[Biggan]

I think that Communism and planned are totally useless, if we look at USSR, Yugoslavia, North Korea ect, they all have/had large armies. And they all made huge effort in reasearch (then I mean in military weapons) becuase "communism/planned" is "self dependence" they should not be "depended" on other countries.

I mean maybe communism should have some points in reasearch??
It allready have "high upkeep" plus -60 gold?? you cant even have an large army becuase your income su*k completely.

If we look at USSR, they were far ahead in space reasearch and they made their own military equipment ect. I dont know but I really think does two civcs are totally useless.
By the way every AI takes Fascist lol.

Maybe let them two have only high upkeep and not more minus in gold, or put some extra buildings for does two civics, then I mean special buildings that you can build when you are having the civics enabled.

 

[Killtech]

I think we're going about this all the wrong way. I don't have as big of issues with the new civics I have in better RoM at the moment. Federal should probably be renamed Federation, but Democracies and Republics are different entities, and so are Despotism and Monarchies. I do have one idea for Democracies and Republics though, to make them more realisitc and less powerful at the same time.

What if moving the tax rate up by 10% caused a turn of anarchy (moving 30% down would cause 3 turns...)? Moving down would have no effect (Who cares if you lower taxes), but raising them would be hard. It seems that it would simulate the citizens reaction to higher taxes. (And the anarchy would make Republic and Democracies potentially worse for Revolutions if you adjusted them too often).

my problem is just this: i learend it in school and read it in many books that democracy is not a government type while republic and monarchy are! same as despotism is rather a characterization of a tyrannic rule and does not yield a strict description how the goverment is composed. german wiki even says that despotism term is mostly used for absolute monarchies that keep their power through force. therefore i'd describe despotism with my civics as: martial law (power) monarchy (governemnt).

reading the article on wikipedia concering republic i read the most general definision is a non-monarchic government. the wiki again lists different forms of republics that are very convientient with the power civics i wrote (democratic rep., aristoctatic rep., ...).

therefore i find it convienient to split up the governing structure form the power civics.

but i geuess our both languages gave all thouse terms different meanings over time. this would explain the big differeces in descriptions and of all the terms and their classifications between German and English wiki. so it might be a bit hard to find compromises on that. but then again i have a question for you: what is your understandig of the power civics and their relation to the government civics then? if you want to put democracy and republic in one group i just don't see what the power civics should be (excepf for another possibility to get some specific boni for your Civ in game).


a word about taxes & anarchy: well i'd say that in republican systems (including democracies) there will be an increased unhappines but since you can voice your opinion freely you don't need to expect an anarchy. at the other hand in authoritarian systems where there is no room for debate you can rather expect your people react with violence and therefore you can assume an anarchiy phase if the taxes become too high (see french revolution).

 

[Afforess]

my problem is just this: i learend it in school and read it in many books that democracy is not a government type while republic and monarchy are! same as despotism is rather a characterization of a tyrannic rule and does not yield a strict description how the goverment is composed. german wiki even says that despotism term is mostly used for absolute monarchies that keep their power through force. therefore i'd describe despotism with my civics as: martial law (power) monarchy (governemnt).

reading the article on wikipedia concering republic i read the most general definision is a non-monarchic government. the German wiki again lists different forms of republics that are very convientient with the power civics i wrote (democratic rep., aristoctatic rep., ...).

therefore i find it convienient to split up the governing structure form the power civics.

but i geuess our both languages gave all thouse terms different meanings over time. so it might be a bit hard to find compromises on that. but then again i have a question for you: what is your understandig of the power civics and their relation to the government civics then?

Government Civics = Executive Branch of the Government
Power Civic = Legislative Branch of the Government

 

[Killtech]

Government Civics = Executive Branch of the Government
Power Civic = Legislative Branch of the Government

this separation does not work too good, because there are a lot of governments that do not respect the seperation of power along Montesquieu and Locke. for example: despotism/fashism, most monarchies (absolute, constitutional), communist single party states, theocratic states, military regimes, ancient republics and even direct democracies violate that sepeartion. only a minority of modern democracies do follow that ideal.

 

[Afforess]

this separation does not work too good, because there are a lot of governments that do not respect the seperation of power along Montesquieu and Locke. for example: despotism/fashism, most monarchies (absolute, constitutional), communist single party states, theocratic states, military regimes, ancient republics and even direct democracies violate that sepeartion. only a minority of modern democracies do follow that ideal.

I think the seperation works fine for our purposes. You could democratically elect a absolutist kind, for example. I'm not going to promote a certain play-style.

Moving forward on my previous idea of Anarchy for raising taxes (In Republics and Democracies), I just finished coding it, I'm curious to how the AI will handle it, and if I will need to tweak them to be more aware of it. It should make player's much more aware of their tax rate.

 

[Killtech]

I think the seperation works fine for our purposes. You could democratically elect a absolutist kind, for example. I'm not going to promote a certain play-style.

Yeah, you are right. but that just meens nothing else than this is NOT a split between legislation (law making) and executive (military command, diplomacy, administartion, ...) branch but between goverment organization and power basis.

your example is exactly my thinking: "You could democratically elect a absolutist kind, for example" => power = democracy/univeral suffage, goverment = monocracy/monarchy (the slashes are there because i'm not sure about the best name choice.)


EDIT: so i see there are just two disagreements between us:
1.: IMO democracy does not belong into the same group as republic and federal. my reasoning can be reduced to a simple example: Germany and the USA have both a federal sytem and are without doubt democracies. further France is a republic and is a democracy too.

2. although we both agree that despotism and monarchy differe, i state that this difference is only in the power civic because the government organization between both is indistinguishable in general: one powerful leader that stand over all institutions. therefore despotism belongs too into the power civic-class - but is better named military junta/martial law or military rule. this power civic would grant very simular boni and mali like your initial suggestion of despotism... maybe mixed up with some of the boni form fashism.

 

[NBAfan]

Moving forward on my previous idea of Anarchy for raising taxes (In Republics and Democracies), I just finished coding it, I'm curious to how the AI will handle it, and if I will need to tweak them to be more aware of it. It should make player's much more aware of their tax rate.

Could you make it so Anarchy only happens when you end the turn? I would not like it if I went into anarchy just because I hit the + button.

 

[Afforess]

Could you make it so Anarchy only happens when you end the turn? I would not like it if I went into anarchy just because I hit the + button.

Yeah, that's the way it works. To help players, I changed the main screen to show your tax rate right below the science rate. You can adjust your taxes all you want, but when you end the turn, they must be at least as low as last turns.

 

[civ_king]

Yeah, that's the way it works. To help players, I changed the main screen to show your tax rate right below the science rate. You can adjust your taxes all you want, but when you end the turn, they must be at least as low as last turns.

this is off by default right?

 

[Afforess]

this is off by default right?

Depends what you mean by default. It's part of Better RoM, but if you don't install Better RoM, it won't be in the game. And it only affects Republic and Democracy. You can tax to your heart content with all other civics. And even in Republic and Democracy you can increases taxes, there just is a short period of anarchy (New Tax Rate - Old Tax Rate / 10).

 

[NBAfan]

Yeah, that's the way it works. To help players, I changed the main screen to show your tax rate right below the science rate. You can adjust your taxes all you want, but when you end the turn, they must be at least as low as last turns.

This will not slow the game down will it?

 

[Arakhor]

For the record, the United Kingdom is not a monarchy in the governmental sense. It founded the Westminster Parliamentary style and is a representative democracy. The monarchical commonwealth represents the state, not the government, as the Queen has only ceremonial power.