Breakdown Of Term 2 Cabinet Tasks

[Provolution]

Excellent summary, it is now possible to negotiate and discuss concrete differences in the proposals.

The existing structure for term one groups military with foreign, and trade with science.

Pro

• Trade and Science go hand in hand. It is impossible to plan a strategy for one without planning a strategy for the other. We should only be researching towards things we can sell, and we should be buying everything else.
• FA and Military at this point of the game are both about classifying our neighbors. This means keeping on top of who is stronger, who we can and should fight vs. who we cannot win battles / wars against and need to remain friends with.

Con

• Culture as a standalone is inherently weak.
• Resources & Technology has a larger share of the work than other departments
• DG culture is focused on military being a strong office, and it is effectively absorbed by FA

The proposed alternative groups FA with Trade, and Science with Culture.

Pro

• FA and Trade are both actually conducted on the F4 screen. At least this version of the proposal recognizes that FA is not large enough to stand on its own, in the early game.
• Science and Culture at least have in common that Culture depends on the right techs being acquired, since culture improvements are impossible without the techs.
• In the DG culture some people will be more comfortable with Military being separate.

Con

• In a strategic / tactical split, the military office cannot be easily split between strategy and tactical. The vast majority of the work is still tactical in nature.
• Separate science and trade plans are inefficient at best and problematic at worst. One or the other must be the leader and the other is relegated to following. If science is dominant then trade ends up being forced to bargain under science's plan, and if trade is dominant then science ends up being the same old job of polling which tech to research, one at a time.

I look forward to focused discussion on the actual differences, now that we have a concrete proposal and not just gloom and doom about the sky falling.

Excellent Analysis Daveshack, and I would like to borrow this summary as a template for crafting the specifics to the improvement proposal.

About the cons for the new proposal, I would like to reassess them one at a time.

Military Strategy-Tactical Split

The military can indeed be easily split into a strategic and tactical level.
We just need to think about all the strategic work done at the military level.


Science vs. Trade vs. Foreign Affairs Dilemma

Whatever we do, offices must cooperate, and whatever we do, the relationships with science and trade, science and FA, Trade and FA will always be complex. However, the Foreign Affairs need ready access to the gold budget, luxury and strategic resources in order to engineer the international balances of power. Yes, even science should follow this system of international relations. We may sell iron-working to someone without iron, and give luxuries to a threatening neighbor, and give horses to a minor Civ to survive longer. I would strongly advocate putting FA/Trade together, as a peace treaty, MPP and so on requires full integration of trade in its planning, as all policy agreements have a built in economic value.

This means the FA/Trade deals with International agreements and economics, where Finance, Science and Culture deals with the national sovereignty and national budgets. Since FA/Trade compete for the same funds as the military, we need to separate Trade from Finance. This is all about Checks of Powers in the game. Military and FA/Trade HAS to be separate, not only because of the volume of information and decisions they process, but also because of checks of balances and the differing nature of their scope.

At the Director Level, we need to figure out which long term military planning tasks not covered by the Commander of Armed Forces.

1. Commander of Armed Forces - Micromanages the military
operations against foreign countries and unit
(excluding worker, settler, and non-military transport)
movements.

Military Consul

Discuss Military target size and budget (upkeep and budget/slider related)
Discuss Military Formation sizes and locations
Dicuss Military research strategy and lobby Finance and Technology
Discuss legitimate war aims for all nations (target cities for conquests)
Discuss Rules of Engagement (When to attack threatening units)
Discuss Major Military Upgrades and Disbands (related to target number)
Discuss use of Military Heroes
Discuss and poll policies

This shows how greatly the military impacts the economy, so long term military economic planning is key, as well as the orderly organization of the military into formations, as well as adjusting the upkeep level and finally predetermining military war objectives by FA interests. Also add military rules for engagement, which should overrule foreign policy when agreed on.
Military disbands are key as well, determining the upkeep level, the criteria for obsoletion and finally where to disband. A good military planner on the strategy level may impact the slider 10-20 % positively. This is clearly not covered by the present Commander, who gives military movement instructions.

 

[DaveShack]

Now if someone else cares to join in the discussion, we'll be moving in the direction of finding out what the people want.

Military Consul

Discuss Military target size and budget (upkeep and budget/slider related)
Discuss Military Formation sizes and locations
Dicuss Military research strategy and lobby Finance and Technology
Discuss legitimate war aims for all nations (target cities for conquests)
Discuss Rules of Engagement (When to attack threatening units)
Discuss Major Military Upgrades and Disbands (related to target number)
Discuss use of Military Heroes
Discuss and poll policies

This looks like a cut & paste of something you wrote before.

Rebuttal on how this would be accomplished in today's structure.

Military Consul

* Discuss Military target size and budget (upkeep and budget/slider related)

Today this would be done by the External Consul, who is also responsible for determining the people's will on who are our enemies and friends. Without knowing who our friends and enemies are, it is not possible to determine who we need to fight or what resources we need.

* Discuss Military Formation sizes and locations

I see this as a tactical responsibility. The formation size and location depends entirely on the specific objectives, terrain, and what is known about an opponents military, and it comes down to unit by unit analysis.

* Dicuss Military research strategy and lobby Finance and Technology

The general principle of build what you're able to build comes into play. The current R&T Consul needs to be asking the people what their research priority is. If the people want advanced units, they are perfectly capable of reflecting this desire in R&T discussions.

* Discuss legitimate war aims for all nations (target cities for conquests)

This is dependent on deciding who the victim is, at the national level which makes it FA's responsibility. Determining which city to conquer is largely a matter of tactics, for example terrain, available units, resources in the area, expected resistance, and so forth.

* Discuss Rules of Engagement (When to attack threatening units)

FA has always been in control of when to go to war, and this should not change. If we're already at war, then attacking threatening units is a tactical decision, again based on type of unit, position, and the nature of the threat.

* Discuss Major Military Upgrades and Disbands (related to target number)

If we have the money then upgrades are always a no-brainer. If we don't have the money then it should belong to whomever owns the budget. Sure we need a lobbyist, but can't the military commander do that?

* Discuss use of Military Heroes

SGL's and MGL's are currently in the President's domain, and probably ought to stay that way to allow future occupants of that office to have some responsibility other than blindly following orders when playing the save.

* Discuss and poll policies

Umm, every leader does this.

 

[Provolution]

Basically, you are satisfied with the present structure and want to keep it as it is ?

 

[DaveShack]

Basically, you are satisfied with the present structure and want to keep it as it is ?

I am satisfied with things how they are, but have always been open to doing what the people think is best -- if a majority of them actually say they want something different. I would welcome more widespread discussion on this most recent proposal, beyond the 2-3 people who are adamantly against the current structure and the 4-5 who are adamantly in favor of it. I'm glad you're willing to make concise and concrete suggestions, as it focuses debate on the issues themselves and not on personalities.

 

[ravensfire]

Nice looking discussion here! Let me ponder a bit - there are good points on both sides.

-- Ravensfire

 

[Provolution]

I will address your concerns DS.

Military Consul

* Discuss Military target size and budget (upkeep and budget/slider related)

Today this would be done by the External Consul, who is also responsible for determining the people's will on who are our enemies and friends. Without knowing who our friends and enemies are, it is not possible to determine who we need to fight or what resources we need.

With a Military Consul, we would make plans for every conceivable threat, and be prepared for the worst of scenarios. We are at Emperor level, so we probably put more energy into military planning, especially as we plan to run shorter wars in Republic with relatively small armies. This means that we need some long term military planning on all neighbors, analyzing statistics of military forces and so on. We may need a long term military plan on how we want to scale our unit builds through a term.

* Discuss Major Military Upgrades and Disbands (related to target number)

If we have the money then upgrades are always a no-brainer. If we don't have the money then it should belong to whomever owns the budget. Sure we need a lobbyist, but can't the military commander do that?

Should we have 50, 100 or 200 units in a term, how many percentage of the slider should the military upkeep, and how much should be put away for major military upgrades. These things needs to be seriously thought about or planned. The Military Commander is a micromanagement position as written in the constitution, and is not responsible for any high level planning tasks on the Consular level. The Armed Commander, as the previous Deputy or General in the old system is responsible for the operational and tactical level of wars.

* Discuss Military Formation sizes and locations

I see this as a tactical responsibility. The formation size and location depends entirely on the specific objectives, terrain, and what is known about an opponents military, and it comes down to unit by unit analysis.

Indeed formations is a good way to make the game more accessible to new players, instead of randomly scattering our units around in the land, we may as well set up ready force compositions of in e.g. 10 units each, possibly one typed or mixed. Some people miss this organization from last game, as more people could relate to the military planning. The placement of formations and their compositions is a causative for what we can do, where, with which troops at a certain time. The formations dictate the military objectives, the military objectives should not dicate our formations, since that means we are planning only by emergency and not proactively. The unit-analysis and terrain analysis will also be premade, as we know exactly what units we got where and for what purpose and why we planted them in that terrain 40 turns back.
I am sure we got many good long term military planners here.

* Dicuss Military research strategy and lobby Finance and Technology

The general principle of build what you're able to build comes into play. The current R&T Consul needs to be asking the people what their research priority is. If the people want advanced units, they are perfectly capable of reflecting this desire in R&T discussions.

Hardly a valid argument, as the Culture Consul must go through the same ordeal for Wonder builds. The Military Consul should present what kind of militaries he seeks for the term, as the Domestic Consul has his input and the FA his own. The Science Minister does not focus on the military capabilies, and would need some solid convincing from the Military Consul.

* Discuss legitimate war aims for all nations (target cities for conquests)

This is dependent on deciding who the victim is, at the national level which makes it FA's responsibility. Determining which city to conquer is largely a matter of tactics, for example terrain, available units, resources in the area, expected resistance, and so forth.

Actually, we never know who we wants to war with. A good Military Consul would forecast most potential military conflicts and develop predesigned solutions for all of these. This means developing long term military scenarios and plans for the term the Armed Commander is free to interpret operationally. Last game, we could predict exactly which cities we should take and so on. We already know the terrain for the entire term, we can plan which units to build with a good forecast, we already know the resources in the area in many circumstances and we can investigate their cities on occasions to know the expected resistance. In fact, nothing stops us from creating a long term office. We had long term military planners before, we may have it again.

* Discuss Rules of Engagement (When to attack threatening units)

FA has always been in control of when to go to war, and this should not change. If we're already at war, then attacking threatening units is a tactical decision, again based on type of unit, position, and the nature of the threat.

"Indeed, the FA should conceivably decide on peace and war issues, as long as it is covering international relations and meeting civilizations in their lands or neutral lands. However, we should give the Military Consul the opportunity to develop rules of engagement for handling trespassing units, which is more a question of national sovereignty enforcement than foreign relations. We should make the FA Consul the overseas security Consul and the Military the domestic security consul. The FA and Military must then cooperate if they want to make a complex overseas operation. I truly miss the FA-Military interplay dynamic of last game, it was good fun.

* Discuss use of Military Heroes

SGL's and MGL's are currently in the President's domain, and probably ought to stay that way to allow future occupants of that office to have some responsibility other than blindly following orders when playing the save.

I say transfer the military and science leaders to the respective Consuls, who are in charge of the wonder planning. We strengthened the Presidential leadership role for monitoring the grander strategy, handling non-instruction decisions and so on. However, the President should be given Mobilization, War Economy and Government change debates, which would make more sense.
We should also handle the use of nuclear weapons to the President, as the use of this will impact foreign relations and environment.

* Discuss and poll policies

Umm, every leader does this. :lol

Correct, and this leader would cover long term military debates on long term intended force composition as a guideline for the Armed Forces Commander, poll these and let that long term military plan be the base for the Armed Commanders military role. This will save the Armed Commander a lot of military preplanning and allow to focus on the operational military plans, terrain calculation, risk ratio, the sequence in which units should attack and so on.
The volume of information for the military units is tremendous, long term and short term, and having only one short term official to handle this is no good.

 

[Provolution]

I hope the citizens jump into this debate now that Culture 130K may be the main mission.
This means that all offices will be needed, and balance of Consuls even more important.
Culture alone is still a too small portfolio to keep as an elected office.

 

[mad-bax]

I would make the Presidents role much more powerful. I would make that position responsible for creating a coherent overall strategy based on individual consular strategies, which in turn is based upon the will of the people.

How the strategic offices are divided up doesn't really bother me, except in that they should be made interesting. More power and fewer positions would increase the competition for positions and make the polls more interesting. The first poll discussions for this game were a bit toothless I thought, and lacked any real passion.

FWIW I think that the infrastructure job should go too. Let the governors use the workers they build. The governors could then horse trade between provinces. "I'll sell you a worker in exchange for a rifleman to defend Xville" kind of thing.

 

[DaveShack]

I would make the Presidents role much more powerful. I would make that position responsible for creating a coherent overall strategy based on individual consular strategies, which in turn is based upon the will of the people.

How the strategic offices are divided up doesn't really bother me, except in that they should be made interesting. More power and fewer positions would increase the competition for positions and make the polls more interesting. The first poll discussions for this game were a bit toothless I thought, and lacked any real passion.

FWIW I think that the infrastructure job should go too. Let the governors use the workers they build. The governors could then horse trade between provinces. "I'll sell you a worker in exchange for a rifleman to defend Xville" kind of thing.

If fewer jobs are the cure, then we shouldn't have any standalone consul jobs. We could go for this:

• Domestic & Culture
• FA & Military
• Trade & Science

The president is indeed supposed to facilitate a merge of consul plans into a cohesive whole, but we don't have all the necessary pieces and no conflicts between consuls have arisen yet. It's a bit of a mindset change to do long term planning in a DG.

The one big area which needs to be filled in is which of our neighbors is the first victim and how soon we assimilate them into our growing empire.

 

[mad-bax]

This looks good to me. I would vote for it, and I would be interested in filling any of those roles (hypothetically).

Your point about about possible victims is well made. So in procedudural terms what happens in the event of a lack of policy. Does the president make it up as he goes along or does he stop the game and wait? If the former, then I don't see a problem. If the latter then I will teach my children to play civ so they can tell me how the game ended.

 

[Bertie]

I really like the idea of reducing the number of offices and giving officeholders more to do (and also allow them a little more freedom to act). I would also agree with giving governors more power and reducing or eliminating the number of infrastructure positions. Mad-bax’s point about fewer offices leading to more spirited campaigns for office is excellent. I would hope the candidates in their debates would take the opportunity to more fully develop their strategies for how they intent to conduct business for the upcoming term. Then once they take office they can spend more time accomplishing rather than formulating their goals.

I’m a n00b so I’m somewhat unschooled about the mechanics of the Demo Game anyway, but I find it confusing that in some cases we have similar, related discussions spread out among several different threads. I think combining related duties and functions in fewer offices would lead to more focused discussion and a better-played, more enjoyable game.

 

[DaveShack]

This looks good to me. I would vote for it, and I would be interested in filling any of those roles (hypothetically).

Your point about about possible victims is well made. So in procedudural terms what happens in the event of a lack of policy. Does the president make it up as he goes along or does he stop the game and wait? If the former, then I don't see a problem. If the latter then I will teach my children to play civ so they can tell me how the game ended.

I was about to PM you to ask which slot you want to be nominated for.

I'm trying to push the responsible parties towards discussion on the missing items without taking over. Certain political elements would take pleasure in pointing out any undemocratic activity. There is also a principle at stake, I can't argue against others making unilateral decisions and then justify them when its convenient.

That said, if we don't see the right kind of discussion soon then a President can only go so far in the direction of coaching others on their roles before it will be necessary to intervene.

 

[Provolution]

I think we should have the same amount of Consuls, but reduce tactical directors to two, that would make the elections more competitive again, and focus would be on long term planning, with enough people to implement them.

I would say that the following positions would make sense:

Domestic Consul
Military Consul
Foreign Affairs and Trade Consul
Science, Culture and Finance Consul
Director for Armed Forces and Expansion (also Foreign Affairs and Trade)
Director for Commerce and Technology


Workers given to governors in Province labeled worker groups of 4 given to each province.