This is what we should really be doing, especially to bring in more players, and to bring back the ones that left.
1 - Have a backbone ruleset that we'll use for every demogame. This includes what posistions there are, how noms/elections are held, how turnchats work, and how the game will progress. This should be static, and cut out atleast 33% of the legal bickering that goes on.
2 - Mimic the game. This means having all of the advisors (science and culture should be brought back). Yes, they may be "slow positions", but they're perfect for someone who doesn't have much time on their hands, and should be advertised as such. Culture, atleast, should be given a more forum-responsibility in that they keep track of the history, and top provinces in the game. (Try to keep the names the same, too...) The origanal intent of advisors was to Control what the ingame advisor sees on their advisor screen. (This is why domestic controlled the budget and sliders).
3 - Be more inclusive. I've been watching the demogame become more and more buerocratic and elitist (few posistions that can really do anything). This means expanding the posistions, and allowing runner ups to be deputies. It's less work for the winner to find someone to be the deputy.
4 - Have world-based provinces. That is, the larger the map, the more cities you need in your province. The larger the landmass, the more cities you need. The smaller the landmass, the less cities you need. For example, a 60% pangaea on a huge world would require 15-20 cities per province. A standard world with 80% archipelago might only need 5-7 cities per province. This is to prevent the problem of having too many provinces, which we saw at the end of DG1, and during DG2. We techincally didn't have that problem last term since the invasion of the other continent went rather quickly, and we didn't exactly have a domestic advisor.
5 - PIs/CCs. These worked perfectly in DG2. A citizen posted a complaint, in which a PI thread was posted within 24 hours. Discussion was about 48 hours long or so, then immediately, a guilty/innocence poll was made, followed by a sentencing poll if needed. They only took 5-7 days to complete, not like 5-7 months now. Yes, there's a remedy phase, which seemed a little too secretive for my liking, but posting the whole PI proceedings in the forum was part of the fun in DG1 and 2.
6 - Legalese. This was the bane of DG4. For 2 terms, 80% of the threads were either, reviews (labeled with criptic letters, like JR1_1B3a2D). It really cluttered the forum with probably 10 recent reviews, and only 2 or 3 discussions that seemed to die after a day. I think the problem here is that people were so pre-occupied in following the judicial reviews, or debating, that they simply forgot the game.
7 - Don't restrict instructions to just being in a turnchat thread 1 hour before the turnchat. If an advisor doesn't post, then the president can find a new advisor. The reasoning is that, not everyone is waiting to see what everyone has posted. Some governor, or advisor postings may conflict with another advisor. (see my post in the other thread on some of the reasons). Instructions should still be followed as long as they're backed by the will of the people, whether through discussion or polls. This could easily be checked. Even if an advisor doesn't post an instruction (there can be many reasons - something came up in RL, Internet connection isn't working, user was banned, etc.), discussion and polls should still be followed.
8 - Advisory and spot votes. I can hear many of you cringing, but bear with me. First, Advisory Votes. The president can give one of these (i.e., lack of discussion, and instructions), but these votes are not binding. Second, Spot Votes. Suppose an advisor gives an instruction that's impossible to carry out. (i.e., a worker in 1 when the town grows to size 2 in 5 turns (the president, or domestic could adjust the queues accordingly), or if a trade with the Egyptians can't be carried out because the Japanese declared war on them, blocking the trade route).
9 - Give advisors more control during the turnchats. The reason the turnchats stopped so frequently in terms 1 and 2 was because no one had control over anything. If one little thing was off, the chat stopped. Advisors are elected for a reason. As it stands now, advisors and governors are techincally not even needed. The president can make any decision as long as there's no instructions (another reason why they should look at discussions and polls). Even deputies should take over automatically if the advisor has to leave the turnchat for some reason (i.e., turnchat took longer than expected, and the advisor needs to sleep, go to work/school, eat, etc.).
1 - Have a backbone ruleset that we'll use for every demogame. This includes what posistions there are, how noms/elections are held, how turnchats work, and how the game will progress. This should be static, and cut out atleast 33% of the legal bickering that goes on.
2 - Mimic the game. This means having all of the advisors (science and culture should be brought back). Yes, they may be "slow positions", but they're perfect for someone who doesn't have much time on their hands, and should be advertised as such. Culture, atleast, should be given a more forum-responsibility in that they keep track of the history, and top provinces in the game. (Try to keep the names the same, too...) The origanal intent of advisors was to Control what the ingame advisor sees on their advisor screen. (This is why domestic controlled the budget and sliders).
3 - Be more inclusive. I've been watching the demogame become more and more buerocratic and elitist (few posistions that can really do anything). This means expanding the posistions, and allowing runner ups to be deputies. It's less work for the winner to find someone to be the deputy.
4 - Have world-based provinces. That is, the larger the map, the more cities you need in your province. The larger the landmass, the more cities you need. The smaller the landmass, the less cities you need. For example, a 60% pangaea on a huge world would require 15-20 cities per province. A standard world with 80% archipelago might only need 5-7 cities per province. This is to prevent the problem of having too many provinces, which we saw at the end of DG1, and during DG2. We techincally didn't have that problem last term since the invasion of the other continent went rather quickly, and we didn't exactly have a domestic advisor.
5 - PIs/CCs. These worked perfectly in DG2. A citizen posted a complaint, in which a PI thread was posted within 24 hours. Discussion was about 48 hours long or so, then immediately, a guilty/innocence poll was made, followed by a sentencing poll if needed. They only took 5-7 days to complete, not like 5-7 months now. Yes, there's a remedy phase, which seemed a little too secretive for my liking, but posting the whole PI proceedings in the forum was part of the fun in DG1 and 2.
6 - Legalese. This was the bane of DG4. For 2 terms, 80% of the threads were either, reviews (labeled with criptic letters, like JR1_1B3a2D). It really cluttered the forum with probably 10 recent reviews, and only 2 or 3 discussions that seemed to die after a day. I think the problem here is that people were so pre-occupied in following the judicial reviews, or debating, that they simply forgot the game.
7 - Don't restrict instructions to just being in a turnchat thread 1 hour before the turnchat. If an advisor doesn't post, then the president can find a new advisor. The reasoning is that, not everyone is waiting to see what everyone has posted. Some governor, or advisor postings may conflict with another advisor. (see my post in the other thread on some of the reasons). Instructions should still be followed as long as they're backed by the will of the people, whether through discussion or polls. This could easily be checked. Even if an advisor doesn't post an instruction (there can be many reasons - something came up in RL, Internet connection isn't working, user was banned, etc.), discussion and polls should still be followed.
8 - Advisory and spot votes. I can hear many of you cringing, but bear with me. First, Advisory Votes. The president can give one of these (i.e., lack of discussion, and instructions), but these votes are not binding. Second, Spot Votes. Suppose an advisor gives an instruction that's impossible to carry out. (i.e., a worker in 1 when the town grows to size 2 in 5 turns (the president, or domestic could adjust the queues accordingly), or if a trade with the Egyptians can't be carried out because the Japanese declared war on them, blocking the trade route).
9 - Give advisors more control during the turnchats. The reason the turnchats stopped so frequently in terms 1 and 2 was because no one had control over anything. If one little thing was off, the chat stopped. Advisors are elected for a reason. As it stands now, advisors and governors are techincally not even needed. The president can make any decision as long as there's no instructions (another reason why they should look at discussions and polls). Even deputies should take over automatically if the advisor has to leave the turnchat for some reason (i.e., turnchat took longer than expected, and the advisor needs to sleep, go to work/school, eat, etc.).