DG2 - Build as You Go Rules

[donsig]

It follows that we should have a poll with 4 options, or two independent polls.

A poll with 4 options (or 5 if we include other or abstain, six if we choose both) would be better than two independent polls. I'd rather we discuss these four possibilities a bit more before polling. I would also like to remind everyone that if we start out with easy then it should be easy to switch over to difficult if we decide we want to do that after the game starts.

 

[donsig]

We seem to have a difference of opinion about the relative importance of:

1. How easy vs. hard it is to change
2. How much is strictly defined vs. how much is left to interpretation (loose)

I want to be able to choose the combination easy, loose.

Why do we have to make this choice now and more importantly, why must we define all offices the same way? Can't we have some offices thsat are narrowly defined and others that are broadly defined? Can't we have offices that are difficult to change and some that are easy to change? Perhaps we want a president with a broad description (The president is our leader) and a governor with a narrow description (This governors is responsible for cities A, B and C and may only post instructions regarding tile usage within these cities). We prolly want the judiciary's role to be stable (difficult to change) while making expirimental offices easy to change.

Why lock ourselves into one way of doing things?

 

[zorven]

Haven't you guys gotten this democracy thing perfected yet?!

Looks like you are starting a new game...maybe I will try to catch up on where you are this weekend. Who knows, maybe I can try to play along this time....

 

[Cyc]

Hey zorven. Good to see you again.

 

[zorven]

Thank you Cyc.

I have a question for those that support the build as you go approach. This approach is premised on starting with a reduced set of leaders at the beginning of the game and adding, as deemed necessary, additional leaders during the game. My question is how do you see that happening during the game? What leaders do you think will be implemented that would not be under a more traditional approach? Won't we just end up adding the usual leaders during the game instead of at the beginning?

If this is what happens, all we have accomplished by using the build as you go method is to keep the leaders position empty until it was deemed necessary to utilize said leaders. Could we not take the middle road and define the leaders that will be used during the game but keep them unfilled until such time as the Citizens decide the leader is needed?

 

[donsig]

My question is how do you see that happening during the game? What leaders do you think will be implemented that would not be under a more traditional approach? Won't we just end up adding the usual leaders during the game instead of at the beginning?

That's possible but this is only the second demogame. The first withered on the vine since we were losing. We tried moving the Civ III DG offices to the DG and it seems not to have worked. For instance I don't believe we had an office devoted to religion. Also, the old set up never really worked anyway. Who was in charge of trading technologies? Was if the trade minister, the foreign minister or the science minister?

If we start with a blank slate we might end up with a religious leader, a tech trade guru, a resources minister and a wonder czar - absolutely NONE of which we need at the beginning. Maybe we'd start with a city site selection manager, an exploration leader and a techie. If we base our offices on the decisions we need to make in the game - as we need to make them - then maybe, just maybe, we won't get our arse handed to us again.

Also, I think this approach would minimize the number of available offices producing some real competition for them.

 

[zorven]

If we base our offices on the decisions we need to make in the game - as we need to make them - then maybe, just maybe, we won't get our arse handed to us again.

Don't we all have enough experience with the game to know what kinds of decisions need to be made? My fear is that without defining what leaders will be in the game (even if we don't fill the positions early on) that we will end up never creating new positions - you know that once a game gets started very little ever happens with modifying the ruleset in place at the beginning of the game. With that said, I am not against trying it.

 

[DaveShack]

We changed positions during the game in DG6, DG7, and Civ4DG1. The key difference with this proposal is that offices can be changed without changing "the law", in this case the Constitution.

A lot of legal wrangling happens at the fringes between offices. We can divert a lot of that energy from the courts to the citizens by limiting the definition of office duties in the formal law which is subject to review, and putting it in citizen initiative based decisions which can be overridden by a simple majority poll.

 

[donsig]

Not really DaveShack. Initiatives will still have the force of law. All we're doing is making clearer the distinction between the constitution and lower forms of law. While initiatives can be overridden by later initiatives we will still be bound by the wording of initiatives and we will still have the option of having the judiciary interpret initiatives. The legal wrangling could be even worse depending on how badly initiatives are written. But as I've tried to say many times, it is not the rules that cause the legal wrangling it is trying to make decisions in an unfair manner that causes problems. The private poll issue last game is a good case in point. All we had to do was poll the issue. Then we'd have had a clear indication of what the majority wanted. I put up a poll but it was shot done because it was private - which was legal under our rules. Yet those who shot it down didn't post a version of the poll they claimed to be legal. I never got a decision from the judiciary on the matter and so it was left in the air. Then when I was on the judiciary and left something hang I took heck for it. Where is the fair play? Where is the decision making by the majority? We had rules to cover all this yet it was a sad situation. Rule making is not going to make these bad situations go away. If we are not fair then we will have legal wrangling even under this system.

 

[DaveShack]

Not really DaveShack. Initiatives will still have the force of law. All we're doing is making clearer the distinction between the constitution and lower forms of law. While initiatives can be overridden by later initiatives we will still be bound by the wording of initiatives and we will still have the option of having the judiciary interpret initiatives.

I think it will be a mindset thing. When the amendment process takes a long time and has a high vote requirement, legal action is the only recourse that some people want to take. If we start with the expectation that the way to solve a disagreement about official duties, or the rules in general, is with a poll, then that's the method people will use.

 

[ice2k4]

Cant we force the President to hold a poll atleast once a term asking about the distribution of powers and offices, via Constitution. That way even if the citizens have no real leader, and aren't as proactive as they should be, a poll will voice the opinions of all citizens, helping others realize that they aren't the only one's who think there needs to be a change (whether it be an addition, removal or redistribution.)

Also just wanting to point out again that this system let's us control the number of offices based on the number of active citizens. Defining offices but not having them filled just tempts us to fill the office the second a decision that may pertain to it comes up, although in reality, that decision could just be made by someone else. Such as defining an office on building wonders. Sure we leave it unfilled, but when a serious proposal to build a wonder comes up, many people will say by law, that the office should be filled then, however such an uncommon decision could easily be made by someone else.

 

[donsig]

I think it will be a mindset thing. When the amendment process takes a long time and has a high vote requirement, legal action is the only recourse that some people want to take. If we start with the expectation that the way to solve a disagreement about official duties, or the rules in general, is with a poll, then that's the method people will use.

You've got a good point DaveShack but once again you miss the main point. Unless we all agree on how polls should be posted then we still have the same problems and will have the same results. I guess my example of the disagreement over private versus public polls last game didn't quite hit home, did it?

 

[DaveShack]

Unless we all agree on how polls should be posted then we still have the same problems and will have the same results.

I don't think we all have to agree on anything. Just a majority.

 

[donsig]

I don't think we all have to agree on anything. Just a majority.

True, but once again you fail to address the whole point. The example I brought up shows we need more than a majority to agree on how we determine what the majority agrees on.

On the private versus public poll issue I would have gladly accepted the results of a poll. If someone had posted a public poll on the question I would have even voted in it. No one saw fit to post such a poll so I posted one and made it private because that's how I felt it should be done. Instead of everyone just voting on the issue so we could get a decision and move on, the poll itself was derided and compromised. If the majority is to rule we have to be consistent in how we measure the answers to questions we put to citizens so we will all know when the majority has spoken. If we are to have an enjoyable game without risking losing many participants then we must also be fair in how we determine what the majority wants.

 

[Falcon02]

I personally have no problems with a 2/3 majority...

on Amendments and Ratifications of course...

 

[DaveShack]

True, but once again you fail to address the whole point. The example I brought up shows we need more than a majority to agree on how we determine what the majority agrees on.

Actually it shows that the minority needs to stop once something is decided.

Why would someone who believes the status quo is correct want to change it? It's not the majority's job to revalidate over and over -- someone who disagrees has to be the driver of change. That change must occur within the existing rules.

 

[donsig]

Actually it shows that the minority needs to stop once something is decided.

How many times will you skirt the real issue DaveShack? The point (that you continue to simply ignore) is that a decision was not made!

Why would someone who believes the status quo is correct want to change it?

Again, you overlook the obvious. There was (apparently) no agreement on the status quo since we were working from different perspectives. I was not part of the pregame rule making process for the last game so I had no memory of the discussions leading up to the rules that were adopted (and no time to research those discussions). I was also inactive since DGIII. All I had to go on was my recollections of the early DGs and the current rules themselves which clearly did not prohibit the use of private polls. From my perspective private polls were certainly allowed. You and some others had a different perspective. Since my view was that the status quo allowed private polls why (as you so eloquently put it) would I want to change it?

It's not the majority's job to revalidate over and over -- someone who disagrees has to be the driver of change. That change must occur within the existing rules.

Umm, once again you ignore crucial aspects of the situation. I did try driving the change. I posted a poll and the poll itself was (incorrectly) invalidated. I sought redress through our judicial system and the case was never completed. All I could do was hammer away at the Censor which finally succeeded when you yourself grudgingly admitted that making a poll private was not in and of itself reason to invalidate the poll. By then the game was shot anyway.

If we are going to try the build as you go approach then we have to respect all polls no matter how poorly written. We have to adhere to the bad polls as well as the good ones. People won't like that but ignoring or undermining bad polls also undermines the good ones. Under any system there will be loopholes that can be exploited by discontented people. The answer is not to try writing rules with no loopholes. Nor is the answer to accept gridlock when one person disagrees with something. The answer is to have a clearly defined, objective and fair mechanism in place for making decisions.

 

[DaveShack]

Umm, once again you ignore crucial aspects of the situation. I did try driving the change. I posted a poll and the poll itself was (incorrectly) invalidated. I sought redress through our judicial system and the case was never completed. All I could do was hammer away at the Censor which finally succeeded when you yourself grudgingly admitted that making a poll private was not in and of itself reason to invalidate the poll. By then the game was shot anyway.

Once again you overlook, or deliberately talk around, the obvious. You were told exactly what behaviour you could change which would give the result you wanted -- post your poll as public. If you had just obeyed the rules as accepted by the majority of the time that issue might have been resolved within days of the first time you raised it. Instead you chose the hard way.

If we are going to try the build as you go approach then we have to respect all polls no matter how poorly written. We have to adhere to the bad polls as well as the good ones. People won't like that but ignoring or undermining bad polls also undermines the good ones. Under any system there will be loopholes that can be exploited by discontented people. The answer is not to try writing rules with no loopholes. Nor is the answer to accept gridlock when one person disagrees with something. The answer is to have a clearly defined, objective and fair mechanism in place for making decisions.

Remember that badly written polls can be and often are unfair. Leaving off the alternative option is the simplest one to explain:

Invade France?
Immediately
Later
Abstain

We clearly cannot allow the result of such a poll to stand, especially if most people have been saying NO in the discussion. There MUST be some limits, or the door is left wide open for the subset of people who are capable of turning it into a one-man show via poll manipulation. If our only recourse is another poll to overrule the unfair one, we'll get two groups polling the same issue back and forth until next year.

Do I know how to limit it and make it a fair and objective limit? No, not really. The polling standards were intended to keep this from happening.

 

[donsig]

Once again you overlook, or deliberately talk around, the obvious. You were told exactly what behaviour you could change which would give the result you wanted -- post your poll as public. If you had just obeyed the rules as accepted by the majority of the time that issue might have been resolved within days of the first time you raised it. Instead you chose the hard way.

I'm talking around the obvious? Try reading what you post DaveShack! Let me get this straight. YOU interpret the majority's decision to prohibit private polls and I interpret the majority's decision to allow private polls. So in order to clarify which interpretation is correct I have to accept your interpretation first? Is that what you're saying?

Remember that badly written polls can be and often are unfair. Leaving off the alternative option is the simplest one to explain... We clearly cannot allow the result of such a poll to stand, especially if most people have been saying NO in the discussion. There MUST be some limits, or the door is left wide open for the subset of people who are capable of turning it into a one-man show via poll manipulation.

I agree DaveShack. Now if I can get you to focus on the main point. Of course we need limits. I'm trying to say we have to be very careful how we set those limits. We need limits that are fair, objective and clearly defined. My advice is to build these limits as we go adding to them a little at a time. Until we get limits in place we will have to accept any poll, no matter how bad. The good part is we can ratify the constitution and begin working on the limits right away. BTW, an easy fix is to require an abstain option and a true majority for any option to win.

 

[DaveShack]

I'm talking around the obvious? Try reading what you post DaveShack! Let me get this straight. YOU interpret the majority's decision to prohibit private polls and I interpret the majority's decision to allow private polls. So in order to clarify which interpretation is correct I have to accept your interpretation first? Is that what you're saying?

Not just me -- 3 (or was it 4) censors, several justices, and every citizen posting on the matter believed the same thing. At the time of that first poll, I don't think there was anyone else who disagreed that the intent was to limit binding polls to public only.

OK, there might have been some, but even if there were, it was clearly not a majority.

Edit: there was a bit of disagreement on what should be done about private polls, whose responsibility it was, etc. But I don't recall any significant discussion of the specific subject of private vs public, at that time.

I changed my legal position only after the majority opinion changed.