Slaves, Hostages and Prisoners of War

[Yudishtira]

As a first step towards implementing prisoner exchanges/ransoms, I suggest we need to make Captives tradeable. I thought prisoner exchanges only dated from the (high) medieval, so I was quite surprised to read of a formal prisoner exchange during the Peloponnesian War in 421BC.

 

[Thunderbrd]

There's been much discussion about whether we should be calibrating these modifiers with the expectation that the influence of knowing the enemy's captive treatment policies and societal structures can somehow be reflected in these modifiers.

I suggest to abandon that thought entirely. YES it would make a big difference and as a result perhaps I should make a new set of tags for influencing your unit's capture and resist capture based on your opponent's civics. (Rather it would be easier to have it tally the modifiers from your own and apply it to your opponent's capture and capture resistance values.)

But to try to incorporate the unknown X factor (which can GREATLY vary) with an assumption of the value of X where we don't have any data on what X is would be a grave mistake that would throw off the rational in these values significantly.

So for now I'd urge us to take out of consideration entirely what the opponent's civics are and think of these only as internal forces - modifiers from the way YOU run your civics, not the way your opponent runs his.

Civic | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes Government
Anarchism|-20|-30
Chiefdom|5|5
Despotism|10| -5|
Monarchy|10| 20
Republic| 0| -20
Theocracy| -10| 30|Strongly dependend on which religion, but this could be handled via buildings/Promotions.
Democracy| -20| -10
Totalitarism|15| -10|
Technocracy| 0| -30

I believe that the more the individual soldier feels like he is fighting for his own cause the more he'll be resistant to capture and the less he feels like he's fighting the fight he wishes to fight, the more likely he'll be to give up when the going gets tough and surrender.

I believe that the will to capture is instilled into the military stronger when the government seeks more subdued human resources. Those governments that must bend to the will of the public would be compelled to be setup for captives to come in.

Those that do not care much for these motivators to capture wouldn't be compelled to setup to receive captives nor to train their units on how to admit them.

One factor that may REDUCE the chance for capturing here would be if the government has cause to fear the influx of citizenry, even deeply subjugated citizenry, that bring with them a resistant counter culture to the nation. Those would be compelled to teach their units to AVOID capture and slay surrendering enemy units instead. Such Leaders may be ones that commonly exert power over others with fear and would seek to make this lesson known to all who would oppose his authority.

Thus my suggestions for Government civics would be:

Civic | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes Government
Anarchism|-20|-30
Chiefdom|-5|-5
Despotism|-10|-25|
Monarchy|5|5
Republic|10|15
Theocracy| -10|20|
Democracy|15|25
Totalitarism|-15|-20|
Technocracy|0|-10

Rule | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes
Obedience |-20| -10
City States| 10| -10
Magistrates| 0| 10
Meri t ocracy| 10| -20
Bureaucracy| 0| -10
Vassalage| 30| 10
Confederacy| 0| -20
Federal| 0| -10
Martial Law| -20| 50
Grid| 0| 50|Added as Hydro explained what it is
Mind Control| 20| 100

Here, the reason for capture resistance modifiers applies much the same as the above. If the soldiers feel their treatment is good in the service they are in and the treatments of their families are good in their society, they'll be more resistant to capture.

Here, though there's the extra consideration of the individual will of the soldier to achieve within the structure of his society and how that is interfered with or promoted. If a soldier operates in a society structure that values personal achievement, he'd be very resistant to capture so as to make sure he is never seen as having given up. If he already feels his will is taken from him in his society he'd be happy to subject to being captured - may lead to a better way on the other side of the fence.

Promoting the cause to capture over kill and round up stragglers as potential human resources for the empire are those societies that are quite happy to bend the will of their citizens. But if the power structure would tend to release the new 'captives' into society and potentially face great complications from this, as well as perhaps generating political entanglements from obtaining the captives themselves, they may teach their soldiers to accept no surrender or let go of those who surrender right on the battlefield.

Thus:

Rule | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes
Obedience |20| -20
City States|5| 10|I think there could be said to have classically been fierce loyalty among city state soldiers - the unity of the community as a mini-nation makes all soldiers feel they are putting it on the line for family and friends and not faceless citizens back home somewhere.
Magistrates|0| -5|There may be a perception of abuse of power in this rule base that undermines soldier loyalty but there could also be some appreciation for its structure assuming it's not terribly oppressive. Overall a little negative.
Meri t ocracy|-10|20|Strong resistance to capture due to a refusal to potentially be viewed as shamed among their people.
Bureaucracy|-15|-15|The captives would present a new headache to the highly ordered system and soldiers would be not only annoyed with occasional abuses of power but also with the feeling that wars may have nothing to do with their own agendas and may be serving some cleverly concealed political maneuver instead.
Vassalage| 25|-10|Only leadership would feel terribly loyal here. In most vassalized states, the soldier mentality would be to do only what they absolutely must to stay out of trouble with their authority figures. They usually don't care much for the wars they fight because they realize they serve petty lords that have no concern whatsoever for the well-being of the people beyond the ability to retain the power and wealth those people bring that lord. AKA, the people feel like tools (because they are.) Since human resources are a thing to horde and command like any Natural resources, yes, the troops would be well treated if they bring home captives.
Confederacy|15| 5|Unique reasons for resisting capture. Either the soldier is a fierce loyalist or a begrudging one forced into battle AS a slave - however, while it may seem like the slave warriors would be quite happy to give themselves up, they are too conditioned to fear the consequences of attempting surrender (consequences that would be delivered by their captors) to be very willing to attempt it.
Federal|-10|0|A bit of a pain in the butt to take in captives and resocialize them so a little more hesitant to. Not much of a factor for or against morale and loyalty as such a power structure can have both positives and negatives there.
Martial Law|10|15|The soldiers would be resistant to capture only because they have it good - they're on the right side of the fence between them and the citizenry so their endowed with more personal control in the streets. But not quite so overwhelmingly loyal - it's only selfish motivation that they've been given so much power that makes them content. They may still, in the backs of their minds, admit to themselves that the current national situation (and with some guilt over the corrupted way they are beginning to behave while endowed with so much personal power) isn't the greatest and that there are big problems here and perhaps, on many levels, it would be relieving for them to be taken out of this environment. So 50 seems far too extreme.
Grid| 0| 50|Added as Hydro explained what it is (he hasn't explained it to me so I'm not sure what to say here...)
Mind Control|30|100|Makes sense on both accounts. Bring more into the fold and do all we can to because that's our directive (no complications whatsover for the society to accept new captives - very easy to subjugate them entirely and immediately.) And the troops would be so mindlessly loyal without a thought to put self over what the government is telling them to do that they would be next to impossible to capture alive.

Power | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes
Strongman| 10| 10
Matriarchy| 20 |-10|They are mercifull and therefore take the beaten enemy with them instead of killing them.
Patriacrry| 10| 10
Junta| -20| 20
Souvereignity| 0| -10
Legislature| 10| -10
Divinge Right| 20| 50
Seperation of Powers| -20| -30
Single Party| -30| 50

I think from what I see here I'd have to agree with much of the thinking but some of these ones are just too strong for balancing out the system very well.

Power | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes Power
Strongman| 10| 10
Matriarchy| 20 |-10|They are mercifull and therefore take the beaten enemy with them instead of killing them.
Patriarchy| 10| 10
Junta| -20| 20
Sovereignty| 0| -10
Legislature| 10| -10
Divine Right|5|30|Yeah, maybe a bit more motive to capture to bring home something to impress the divinely appointed leader(s) and some strong resistance because religion makes them believe they serve the will of God(s) directly and this would be fairly widely accepted but not believed by all so not quite as ultimate a modifier as 50 there I think.
Separation of Powers| -20| -30|Without suggesting an adjustment directly... why so modifying here? I'd almost suggest 0/0 as it would seem to me completely non-interactive to capture and resistance
Single Party| -30| 50|I'm not sure what this is supposed to mean... rule by a single political party? If so... again... why so modifying? Again, I'd think nearly inert at 0/0. But I'm not catching the spirit of the consideration that's been given here apparently. It seems to me that whatever party IS in control would be the factor, not that it's controlled BY a given party, thus the positive or negative factors introduced by this rule vary to the point that it doesn't really play a significant role directly without other civic considerations taken into account - which we can't in relationship to this civic so I'd leave it at 0/0. Again... I might be way off on my presumptions about the meaning of the civic.

Society | Capture Chance | Capture Resistance | Notes
Primitive| -10| -10
Tribal | -10| 20
Caste| 10| 20
Bourgeois| 0| -30
Proletariat | 30| -20
Feudal| 20| 10
Egalitarian| 0| -20
Nationalist| 20| 50
Marxist| 10| 10
Corpor-Nation| 0| 0

Aside from suggesting nationalist be reduced to 30 resistance I like these. The thinking makes sense here to me.

As I said, I have not much knowledge about civics. Most choices were made based on how strict the form of goverment is. If you add all starting civics together, they even out at -40% Chance but also -40% Resistance, so if these two units fight against each other, the standard value is used.
Comments are very appreciated!

My suggestions probably aren't keeping that -40%/-40% ratio in mind so could be tweaked to get those back in order (impressive you managed to pull this off and is a good overview ideal to strive for) and perhaps in playtesting, during certain ages and common civic choices among those stages of the game, we'll see other common imbalance points that could be brought back into more moderate alignment.

I'm just hoping to have added some further considerations and rational. I'll take a look at the second segment in a bit here.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

As a first step towards implementing prisoner exchanges/ransoms, I suggest we need to make Captives tradeable. I thought prisoner exchanges only dated from the (high) medieval, so I was quite surprised to read of a formal prisoner exchange during the Peloponnesian War in 421BC.

Which means you need to store the source nation of the captive some how. This is possible in python. What else do we need to keep about the captive.

Prisoner exchange is where you trade some of theirs for some of yours with or without compensation on either side. The AI wont know about this. It will need to have something written. Such exchanges should reduce tension between the two nations but not beyond some maximum.

Slave trade is where captive are traded to a different nation.

BTW with the introduction of the Neanderthal civ I probably need to change the way captives work Adding a civilian Neanderthal captive and having that nation able to upgrade Neanderthal captive to its various units but not the normal captive.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Which means you need to store the source nation of the captive some how. This is possible in python. What else do we need to keep about the captive.

Prisoner exchange is where you trade some of theirs for some of yours with or without compensation on either side. The AI wont know about this. It will need to have something written. Such exchanges should reduce tension between the two nations but not beyond some maximum.

Slave trade is where captive are traded to a different nation.

BTW with the introduction of the Neanderthal civ I probably need to change the way captives work Adding a civilian Neanderthal captive and having that nation able to upgrade Neanderthal captive to its various units but not the normal captive.

Storing the unit type and its promotions would be useful for when it's returned to the original it can be returned to service as it was rather than simply as a captive.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Storing the unit type and its promotions would be useful for when it's returned to the original it can be returned to service as it was rather than simply as a captive.

Which of course means that

1) the exchange mechanism should take that into consideration when deciding the value of the trade

2) the possibility of learning something from the unit. Perhaps an megafauna or punk great wonder. I have been thinking of how we can steal/learn about these special techniques and figured that a National Wonder that you cant build but you can get through espionage and maybe capture and interrogation of units may work. It would probably have to be implemented as a pop-up asking where you want the Wonder built. Either that or a special unit. The captive may be lost, or converted into the special unit.

Similarly if you capture the mount or equipment and you don't have the tech then you should be able to sacrifice it for towards the tech.

 

[Faustmouse]

Great feedback TB!
It's funny how you also have a different point of view than me and Yudishtira.

1)Why, for example, did you reduce Monarchy resistance so much? It strongly depends on what king you have. It is a good one and if he is beloved, the people would be very loyal and thus avoid getting captured by all means. If it's a bad and hated king, well.... But I suggest Monarchy should have one of the highest resistances in this category.

2)I also don't get the strong values in both for Republic. Or the even stronger ones for Democracy. I think we all overrate democracy since it is the kind of government most of us grow up with. We get "propaganda" that it is the best king of government and there are some good reasons to think that. But if the parties you can choose from are crap, than the whole system is more or less meaningless. Votings can be manipulated, promises can be lies... It is not an all positive uber civic. Basically every person I've met had something to complain about their government. This is true for monarchies, democracies, possibly everything. So why giving a democracy with crappy parties a 2.5 fold higher resistance then a monarchy with a great king?
It's hard to seperate a democracy in civ, because in the real world you won't really find a democraya paired with junta, martial law, slavery and a feudal society...
And why should a democracy have a stronger need for more people? A military despot has a much greater need for captitives I'd think. I'm afraid we will discuss the Government civics a lot Maybe we should keep them until the other civics are discussed and then have a look at them again?

3)

If he already feels his will is taken from him in his society he'd be happy to subject to being captured - may lead to a better way on the other side of the fence.

You must be REALLY desperate if you think that enslavement by a human sacrifice cult or cannibals is better then your life at home...
But still, I like ALL your Rule adjustments. And Grid is like the 1986 Novel from Orwell - total surveillance. Because the surrenderers are watched all the time they would feel more ashamed if they surrender because everyone would know.

4) I agree with weakening Nationalism a bit, thus it would be definetly one of the biggest impacts I guess. Let's see how it works out ingame. If we raise something, I'd suggest that nationalism is one of the stronges candidates.

5) Single Party is what the Nazis had: One party is "allowed" and this party has the ultimate power. There are elections but yeah... why wasting paper huh? They are also common in communistic states. So basically take out a list of states america had conflicts with in the past and voila: Cuba, North Korea, Vietnam... My justification was that they are a very strict regime thus surrendering is a a no go. And (only based on the nazis, could be totally wrong here), they won't take captetives because they feel superior to other races.

Great work!

 

[voskhod]

Quick question: Is there any reason captured civilians cannot be turned into slaves and/or build slave buildings, or is that just a glitch? I've noticed in my game that only military captives and neanderthals can actually be enslaved, while civies only hurry production or join the city's population.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Great feedback TB!
It's funny how you also have a different point of view than me and Yudishtira.

1)Why, for example, did you reduce Monarchy resistance so much? It strongly depends on what king you have. It is a good one and if he is beloved, the people would be very loyal and thus avoid getting captured by all means. If it's a bad and hated king, well.... But I suggest Monarchy should have one of the highest resistances in this category.

The quality of the King is an unknown factor that we therefore cannot take into account and must consider merely the concept itself independent from the quality. When looking only at the governmental form itself and an average of the quality of Kings, one must realize that it's still a form of government where the people don't get a say at all. Therefore, the direction of their nation has nothing to do with their own will. They may religiously believe the King to be following the will of a God (Divine Right - as this is a separately defined civic it's not inherent in Monarchy despite most Earth Monarchies being based on this concept which is what I think is skewing your perspective on the capture resistance value of this civic because nations with both would compensate this low resistance on Monarchy) but without this factor, it's just a groomed ruler that stays the ruler for the extent of his life and his heir takes the crown thereafter. The difference between Monarchy and Despotism is almost minimal where the will of the soldiers aligning with the will of the nation is concerned.

2)I also don't get the strong values in both for Republic. Or the even stronger ones for Democracy. I think we all overrate democracy since it is the kind of government most of us grow up with. We get "propaganda" that it is the best king of government and there are some good reasons to think that. But if the parties you can choose from are crap, than the whole system is more or less meaningless. Votings can be manipulated, promises can be lies... It is not an all positive uber civic. Basically every person I've met had something to complain about their government. This is true for monarchies, democracies, possibly everything. So why giving a democracy with crappy parties a 2.5 fold higher resistance then a monarchy with a great king?

1st, we do not live in a Democracy. We live in a Republic and a Representative Democracy but not a Democracy which really only historically existed in Greece, where there were no appointed leaders - only the will of the vote of the people. It has its weaknesses but morale is its ultimate strength. The will of the nation IS the will of the people. The soldiers would thus be the most loyal you can achieve. The will of a collective is humane and thus would strive to capture rather than kill.

We cannot assume a Monarchy has a good King. Most did not.

It's hard to seperate a democracy in civ, because in the real world you won't really find a democraya paired with junta, martial law, slavery and a feudal society...
And why should a democracy have a stronger need for more people? A military despot has a much greater need for captitives I'd think. I'm afraid we will discuss the Government civics a lot Maybe we should keep them until the other civics are discussed and then have a look at them again?

Answer given:

the government has cause to fear the influx of citizenry, even deeply subjugated citizenry, that bring with them a resistant counter culture to the nation. Those would be compelled to teach their units to AVOID capture and slay surrendering enemy units instead. Such Leaders may be ones that commonly exert power over others with fear and would seek to make this lesson known to all who would oppose his authority.

3)
You must be REALLY desperate if you think that enslavement by a human sacrifice cult or cannibals is better then your life at home...
But still, I like ALL your Rule adjustments. And Grid is like the 1986 Novel from Orwell - total surveillance. Because the surrenderers are watched all the time they would feel more ashamed if they surrender because everyone would know.

Again... we're not evaluating with any assumptions about the opposition's civics or worldviews. We can't include that here because that's an unknown ANY of the above setting. I can develop that side of it next cycle but on THESE evaluations, we must assume an average moderate enemy. THEN when we take the enemy's details into consideration it will balance out.

4) I agree with weakening Nationalism a bit, thus it would be definetly one of the biggest impacts I guess. Let's see how it works out ingame. If we raise something, I'd suggest that nationalism is one of the stronges candidates.

Any modifiers over 30 would dilute what we'll be able to do with promos far too much and I'm already worried we may want to halve all of these since they will be additive with each civic choice.

5) Single Party is what the Nazis had: One party is "allowed" and this party has the ultimate power. There are elections but yeah... why wasting paper huh? They are also common in communistic states. So basically take out a list of states america had conflicts with in the past and voila: Cuba, North Korea, Vietnam... My justification was that they are a very strict regime thus surrendering is a a no go. And (only based on the nazis, could be totally wrong here), they won't take captetives because they feel superior to other races.

Or they'd take captives to enslave the other races under their superiority. Isn't there a better term for this civic? Single Party sounds so innocent compared to what you're explaining it to be! But the idea of a competition-less political party like Communist or Fascist makes sense in this context.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Quick question: Is there any reason captured civilians cannot be turned into slaves and/or build slave buildings, or is that just a glitch? I've noticed in my game that only military captives and neanderthals can actually be enslaved, while civies only hurry production or join the city's population.

In theory a civilian captive is three times the number of individuals that a military or Neanderthal captive is.

If you take them back to your capital your leader convinces them that they should join your nation and they can be converted into a Settler or Immigrant. Although I thought they could be converted to an Immigrant at any city but it may depend on buildings in the city like the conversion of the military captive into a military unit requires buildings.

I am not at my modding PC or even one that has C2C on it at the moment to check.

 

[voskhod]

In theory a civilian captive is three times the number of individuals that a military or Neanderthal captive is.

If you take them back to your capital your leader convinces them that they should join your nation and they can be converted into a Settler or Immigrant. Although I thought they could be converted to an Immigrant at any city but it may depend on buildings in the city like the conversion of the military captive into a military unit requires buildings.

I am not at my modding PC or even one that has C2C on it at the moment to check.

Seems really arbitrary, really. I dont think a despot would care if the captives that were brought to his palace were civilians or military or neanderthals. They would just be enslaved anyways.
If there's 3 times more captives, oh well, 3 times as many slaves!
Really though the ancients weren't very picky about who they enslaved.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

The very ancients would just join them to their population since the civilians would be mostly women and children and these have been slaves in many cultures right up to the modern era even in so called western democracies.

It is for game balance.

 

[Yudishtira]

And (only based on the nazis, could be totally wrong here), they won't take captetives because they feel superior to other races.

Feeling superior to other races is nearly always the reason that captives are taken. Even for the Nazis: Auschwitz ("Arbeit Macht Frei") was (officially) a (slave) labour camp.

 

[Faustmouse]

The quality of the King is an unknown factor that we therefore cannot take into account and must consider merely the concept itself independent from the quality. When looking only at the governmental form itself and an average of the quality of Kings, one must realize that it's still a form of government where the people don't get a say at all. Therefore, the direction of their nation has nothing to do with their own will. They may religiously believe the King to be following the will of a God (Divine Right - as this is a separately defined civic it's not inherent in Monarchy despite most Earth Monarchies being based on this concept which is what I think is skewing your perspective on the capture resistance value of this civic because nations with both would compensate this low resistance on Monarchy) but without this factor, it's just a groomed ruler that stays the ruler for the extent of his life and his heir takes the crown thereafter. The difference between Monarchy and Despotism is almost minimal where the will of the soldiers aligning with the will of the nation is concerned.

So you basically think that the morale of the units is a much bigger factor than the fear of the consequences for surrender?

1st, we do not live in a Democracy. We live in a Republic and a Representative Democracy but not a Democracy which really only historically existed in Greece, where there were no appointed leaders - only the will of the vote of the people. It has its weaknesses but morale is its ultimate strength. The will of the nation IS the will of the people. The soldiers would thus be the most loyal you can achieve. The will of a collective is humane and thus would strive to capture rather than kill.

Ok, makes sense if you talk about the ancient greeks democrary. But the civic Democracy is unlocked at the tech Representative Democracy, while the ancient Democrary Tech unlocks Republic

Again... we're not evaluating with any assumptions about the opposition's civics or worldviews. We can't include that here because that's an unknown ANY of the above setting. I can develop that side of it next cycle but on THESE evaluations, we must assume an average moderate enemy. THEN when we take the enemy's details into consideration it will balance out.

Probably... But I actually thought this was your intention with this quote:

If he already feels his will is taken from him in his society he'd be happy to subject to being captured - may lead to a better way on the other side of the fence.

Any modifiers over 30 would dilute what we'll be able to do with promos far too much and I'm already worried we may want to halve all of these since they will be additive with each civic choice.

Probably... I might be a bit to loose with these values, for me it's hard to tell how they work out in game... But if we had at least a tendency of each civic this would be great.

Or they'd take captives to enslave the other races under their superiority. Isn't there a better term for this civic? Single Party sounds so innocent compared to what you're explaining it to be! But the idea of a competition-less political party like Communist or Fascist makes sense in this context.

Or this. So what would you suggest then as Single Party stats?

 

[Thunderbrd]

So you basically think that the morale of the units is a much bigger factor than the fear of the consequences for surrender?

Yes. Consequences for surrender is a non-factor in this evaluation since we don't have data on the enemy. Consequences by your own people is a factor but I'm not thinking it makes much difference in this category so much as in more social organization categories. Again, we don't know if a King would be merciful to those who surrender or not - an unknown factor to which we must assume the moderate answer.

I'll say more later - gotta run.

 

[Yudishtira]

1st, we do not live in a Democracy. We live in a Republic and a Representative Democracy but not a Democracy which really only historically existed in Greece, where there were no appointed leaders - only the will of the vote of the people. It has its weaknesses but morale is its ultimate strength. The will of the nation IS the will of the people. The soldiers would thus be the most loyal you can achieve. The will of a collective is humane and thus would strive to capture rather than kill.

I don't think so (although that's what we - the more enlightened drones of the collective - are striving for). It was still the will of the majority, and for a large minority that can be very disheartening. Secondly, one valid translation of democracy is "mob rule". The collective can be whipped up into a bloodthirsty frenzy if incited using fear or the need for revenge (or even just racial superiority - oppression of a minority is often sanctioned and indeed popular under majority rule).

 

[Thunderbrd]

Ok, makes sense if you talk about the ancient greeks democrary. But the civic Democracy is unlocked at the tech Representative Democracy, while the ancient Democrary Tech unlocks Republic

I don't think so (although that's what we - the more enlightened drones of the collective - are striving for). It was still the will of the majority, and for a large minority that can be very disheartening. Secondly, one valid translation of democracy is "mob rule". The collective can be whipped up into a bloodthirsty frenzy if incited using fear or the need for revenge (or even just racial superiority - oppression of a minority is often sanctioned and indeed popular under majority rule).

Ok, so our current system is what the current civics mean by Democracy. But let's be honest. If the public finds out that our soldiers aren't taking surrendering and/or wounded troops captive and are instead slaying them there on the spot how do you think we'd react? And for all the propagandic methods there may be to manipulate the hell out of us (trust me - I'm as conspiracy theorist as they come) people are basically good at heart. Therefore we're making up our opinions on the best information we can but it's also under the best we think we can make. Nevertheless, the Government, by structure, is given to hand over its primary source of power into the hands of the people. If we aren't happy, we CAN call for ejection of our leaders and not revote them in etc...

The problem with our current situation here is that there is a Shadow government that makes sure that every candidate that has a running chance to be voted in will serve their agendas before ours. As we look back on the structure of our country and those that put it together, the intentions seem pure at first but then you look at the roster that put that invented the structure and see that the loopholes were placed there intentionally. Our whole system was build by and for the underlying agenda of secret society so that the people could FEEL that they have a powerful say in their government while really not having much of any say at all. Nevertheless... consider that the illusion is necessary to maintain that the people have authority. Therefore if sentiments are allowed to grow to strongly against the going agenda, the powers that be must reign in and give us some leeway and find a new strategy to achieve their goals - usually further propaganda and giving it enough time for us to forget the reasons we resisted the first time.

Anyhow... my point is that the people of even a modern so-called democratic society tend to BELIEVE (at least until the conflicts between the elite and the common man become strong enough to start peeling back the illusion) that the nation is guided by the will of the people.

Imagine how we would react in the US if we were to suddenly initiate a nuclear first strike on other nations... we'd revolt overnight because there could be no excuse that could warrant such an act. A Monarchy or other Dictatorship would have a revolt perhaps but not one that could be legally backed up by all established laws of the land.

Anyhow, this illusion of the Government acting on the will of the people tends to make more loyal troops. And to show the people that the government is benevolent, prisoners of war need to be generally well treated. We throw a living fit when we hear about torture - what other form of government needs to worry about this much resistance and disapproval from its people from such actions?

Just think of this... if our soldiers had been surrendering to the Iraqis, do you think we'd have gotten the same kind of welcome as we gave the Iraqi soldiers who surrendered in droves during the first gulf war? We were quite civil to those once-enemies. When the shoe was on the other foot though... I think you can recall some of the beheading videos sent to us in such scenarios.

The action to capture vs not capture once you've defeated a unit is an act of mercy and perhaps some selfish desire to now use those captives as tools to further the national agendas. Democracies have every reason to capture.

 

[Faustmouse]

Ok, my general error was that I always assumed that Capture a unit is equal to get this unit into slavery. If you consider Prisoners of War as well, then ok, capturing is way more human then slaughter them.
I don't want this to end in an endless political discussion about propaganda and the US Government, so let's end this here and I now say that you were right about your general idea of the stats for democracy.

Let's come back to Despotism. Is it really THAT bad for your peoples morale? It is almost as bad as Anarchy, while Chiefdom is "ok". I don't really care, since Despotism is a Civic that is only used between Bronze Working and Monarchy, but never after that (at least for me) because of the high Maintenance penalties. But still, it just appears as too bad in my eyes. It does not have to be linear with Chiefdom (I think just for game purposes this is boring), but it just appears a little bit odd. How about -5/-15 (instead of -10/-20)?

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

A benevolent dictator is considered the best possible form of government. It is just so difficult to maintain into the next generation.

 

[Faustmouse]

Excactly DH! Maybe AI can achieve this, so this could result in a good new Civic perhaps. But normally, dictators are not very beloved, so let's assume that as a standard here.

 

[Thunderbrd]

The problem with Despotism is there is no real cause for the people to accept the leader. He may be good and just and kind but he took power on no authority of the people or of law or custom. Saddam, Qaddafi, Napolean... most Despots usually fall to internal revolution than external war unless they invite that war too only to find out they have very little loyalty among the majority of their troops. Most examples of a 'Good Despot' would probably be a Monarchy as if inheritance of rule from the previous ruler is what put the ruler in place its a Monarchy rather than a Despotism and the people are a little more in agreement with the rulership due to a recognized need to have a ruler and a contentment with the way that ruler is assigned.

Chiefdom, if we model it after Native American and classically early cultures, wouldn't be all that bad. Chiefs were not considered ultimate sources of law and authority. They were military and hunting commanders but their authority was more akin to a father figure than a 'do what I say or be beheaded' concept. Usually the Chief was well known to his people and there were other political powers such as wise folk and elders that could speak with him on equal footing. It's only due to the fact that tribes outgrow this kind of leadership and population diversity introduces too many new problems for such a system to handle that it becomes obsolete.

Now... this is not to say that all chiefs were perfectly benevolent. It often was a Might Makes Right situation. But in those more barbaric chiefdoms, the chief could be challenged by a strong warrior for the title. So those following the chief's direction did so with an understanding that he was the most fit to survive thus the most fit to 'rule' thus had a firm established 'right' to lead. That ability to see the right of your leader to guide you is the primary glue involved in establishing unit morale. It's not a perfect system because it doesn't reward leadership to intelligence, only physical merit - and that means the leader in such a system is usually very justifiably contested by those with more wisdom around him and can lead to resentment among the intelligent ones he leads.