If the term in practice seems too long or too short, should there be any option for changing it? For example unanimous vote of all nobles involved.
I'm not sure which question you are asking so I will answer both:
Is there another way to depose (force to leave) a Monarch aside from the 15 turn succession vote?
Yes, there are 2:
- If 85% of the registered members of the House of Merlot write the Administrator in a 24 Hour period stating that they wish to "OVERTHROW THE KING" then there is a bloody rebellion in the land and the King is overthrown. This is purposefully hard to do. I don't anticipate that it will ever happen, but it is meant to be an "out" if someone ever gets into power that is purposefully destructive to the House of Merlot. It would mean that many of the people that put him in power inevitably turned around and then actively changed the vote against him. The percentage is so high as to avoid "sore losers" from banding together to overthrow someone who rightfully won a plurality among many candidates.
- The Administrator retains the ability to call an early succession vote if he deems that the King is AWOL with no one acting on his behalf or informed to act on his behalf (as King, making certain that at least the Administrator is aware someone is acting on your behalf is a good thing). This is purely at his discretion but the guideline I am using is 2 missed turns. In some cases 2 missed turns may mean total annhilation for our game, and in those cases the Administrator has the flexibility to act more quickly in calling a succession vote.
can the nobility vote to change the 15 turns to some other duration?
This decision isn't ever going to be a poll or a democracy. This will always be strictly a decision made by the Administrator and completely his call. However that doesn't mean that it can't be changed. In the spirit of our team, if you have a good point support it thoughtfully. It doesn't matter how many people support a bad idea, it matters how logically a good idea is supported. The person you need to skillfully convince in terms of the duration of the succession vote is me, the Administrator. And I am willing to be convinced about it.
What are the current biases of the Administrator for the succession vote being changed sometime moving forward in the game?
So far people seem to like 15 turns for many of the same reasons I thought 15 turns was a good number. One idea I hadn't considered was changing the number at some point mid game. With an open mind my preliminary inclination is against this, and here is why:
- Simplicity: The simpler we make something the more successful it will be. There is elegance and depth in a simple solution.
- Understanding: If we change it at some point we have to make sure people understand it, it has the potential for misunderstanding. This creates the potential for all the bad that comes from people misunderstanding something.
- Beauracracy: The more complex something is the more that needs to be done to explain it, reexplain it, correct people about it, and so on. Saying, "Every 15 turns forever" is a lot easier for me to do and understand then trying to explain to people some other shifting pattern.
- Favortism: If it is something that is going to change it needs to be set in stone from the beginning so that there is no percieved favourtism down the road. People will be offended - or they will take things the wrong way - no matter how much you explain it to them.
Most importantly, I don't see that there is any benefit that cannot be also accomplished in the current system. I understand the benefit is that during particularly slow times we can potentially give someone a longer period as King, however, the nobility already has the power to do that by simply supporting him for a second 15 turns.
In fact this makes for a very cool and involving Role Playing Opportunity. As an advocate of a King during a "slow time" you can gain support for him by approaching people and suggesting that everyone need more time to get to know the King. This gets people involved.
My final point is more of a gut feeling - I don't believe that the role of king will revolve every 15 turns in any case. I could be entirely wrong on this as I have no foundation to base this on, but I feel that most Kings will have terms that last at least a few succession votes.
Those are my overall thoughts on changing the succession vote somewhere midgame. To sum up: Is it possible? Yes. Does it have benefits? Absolutely. Do the benefits out weigh the negatives? I don't currently see it that way. Can the benefits be gained through a different channel? More or less, and with other benefits.
Cheers.