Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

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Red Ropes
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Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Red Ropes » Wed Jan 23, 2019 6:37 pm

So, basically after spending many years now on Arelith and learning the ins and outs of how the government systems work. I've come up with some feedback in regards to it. This specific post is about citizenship and the voting privilege.


So, basically as it currently works - anyone can pay 10k and become a citizen. Previously I believe you had to be level 7 before joining up in a settlement. This was changed to be just 10k more recently, I think a year or more ago. While I like how this has opened up the horizons on people being able to get involved, I don't really think the long term and actual issues of this have been thought out, along with there also being the removal of the '1 citizenship per character' thing from olden days. We have two things, I like to think of issues:

1) Every single person can have multiple characters each with their own citizenship.

2) Every single person who buys into citizenship has immediate voting privilege.

Why do I think these are issues? These are issues because while most people can keep it in their pants there are some folks who might understand why crossing the streams is bad and there might be moments of OOC drama that create scenarios of folks mass voting, alt logging, and so forth. These are matters that CAN be handled by DMs - and I am quite aware in my time as a player that they have been handled adequately by DMs.

I think, however, this system could be made better and more kosher so that DMs never have to really look into stuff, that the system could police itself, and some sort of "sense" could be provided to the system.

I think citizenship should:

1) Only be active on one character you are currently playing. Other characters may take up citizenships, have access to the benefits of those citizenships, but will lose the ability to vote in ANY election across the isle. (Unless of course they're a harper, unique entity, or whatever).

2) New citizenship should not = to the immediate benefit of voting/running for office. I think it is healthier for voting to be something that is planned, done responsibly, and done through the lens of bureaucracy. This still allows for the buying of votes, loyalties, and citizenships but absolutely requires for there to be long term goals and build up RP. A cool-down of some kind should be in effect, probably like 3 days IRL.

3) The switch between your active citizenship should also have a cooldown, perhaps of a similar length - unless a citizenship is in effect, then the cool down is the election event time + the cooldown.

4) Citizenship removal should be a power of a sitting settlement government once more. I don't know why this isn't a thing anymore as it should follow the same rules as anything else on the grounds of exiles, eviction, and so forth. Citizenship lists should also be available. (In the case of Harpers they can buy fake citizenships so they can benefit from them, show up in lists, but still retain their multivote ability).


I just think in general this would help take a load off DM shoulders, make things fair and neat between players, and otherwise establish a healthier political environment.
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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Emotionaloverload » Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:17 pm

I do agree that there should be some kind of period between getting your first citizenship and being able to vote. It has never made sense, to me, rp wise that someone can just turn up (if it is their first citizenship) and vote in an election that they have nothing to do with/do not contribute to the faction/settlement/community.

I also very much agree that a settlement should have the power to remove citizenship. This can act as another tier of punishment that factions can use AND it helps clean up the list of non-contributing faction/settlement members. To add to this, I think that allowing, once again, the ability to see citizenship lists will aid in making the rp for settlements that much better.

I see where you are coming from by putting cooldowns between characters or allowing only the main to vote but I'm not entirely convinced that this won't stifle rp more than it would help it. Personally, I only ever play one character at a time but many players have the time and patience for two characters that can both be equally active within their faction. This option may unfairly penalize those players from participating in faction rp that they have invested time in.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Shadowy Reality » Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:20 pm

I vaguely remember that in the past you could only vote with one character per player. Is this no longer the case, was this never a thing?

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Morderon » Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:26 pm

You can only vote once per player in a single settlements election.

3) The switch between your active citizenship should also have a cooldown, perhaps of a similar length - unless a citizenship is in effect, then the cool down is the election event time + the cooldown
Switching citizenship already gives you a cooldown from voting and running in elections (unless if you're a harper obviously)

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by magistrasa » Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:45 pm

I think a distinction should be made between voting privileges and "citizenship" because being a citizen nowadays means more than just voting. The fact that citizens gain access to settlement storage is kind of amazing for someone who has many characters playing at once - and only one of those characters can own a quarter. I would be sad to see permanent storage removed for all but one character at a time.

Other than that concern, I'm totally in favor of a more fair and well-considered voting process, rather than the present system where you can buy citizenship just to cast a ballot. A lot of people use the system in poor faith - openly and proudly, in some areas. When I was new to the server, I was encouraged to conduct elections like they were a gold sink, where grabbing newbies and marching them to the citizenship manager with promise of wealth was the only thing to do if you wanted to win. Granted, that might just be because that's just kinda how things roll in the underdark, but it did feel a little cheap when little roleplay or consequence for anyone involved really ended up being borne of it. I know that it's not necessarily a flaw in the system and more something that goes against my personal tastes, but I also don't quite know if that's behavior that should be addressed in-character, because from my experience, it's so ingrained into server culture and enabled by the system that it's just kinda assumed that's how things are "supposed" to be. All systems working as intended.

I think the somewhat recent addition of a voting eligibility cooldown from switching settlements was a really good move on the devs' part, but I agree that more could be done to improve the voting experience and make it feel less cheesy. Some form of wait period affecting even those new to citizenship entirely, is something I think should be considered. Along with the base level requirement, as I feel like it would see a much more "educated" electorate - in so far as the fact that no one is getting grabbed fresh off the boat in an area whose politics they are utterly unfamiliar and told, "Vote for me and I'll [INSERT EMPTY PROMISE]!" To be clear, I have nothing really against buying votes, I think it can lead to some pretty hilarious roleplay, but I just feel like it would be a lot more interesting if those who took the bribes had a little more understanding of the situation they were being paid to influence. Which maybe isn't the point, I know, but

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Red Ropes » Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:46 pm

I am coming from a point of all citizenships.

You can have multiple characters, multiple citizenships.

At any point I could have a character in each settlement. All of them citizens, all of them eligible to vote. The current system doesn't deal with this and while some people healthily distance themselves and their characters, not all of them do. This part relies completely upon DMs to pay attention to individual elections - if the system in house policed - then DMs would not need to do this.
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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by lakhena » Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:52 pm

I think one vote per player is a bit too heavy-handed, as some people can be active in multiple settlements, if they have the time.

I also think that there should be a way to receive reports on people who switch citizenship more than once. It would be great if the settlement's leaders can get that report so they can either approve the citizenship or deny it. So, for example, if Johnny Half-Elf is a Cordor citizen, but then switches to Myon, but then decides to switch back to Cordor, the rulers of Cordor would get a report that says Johnny Half-Elf has unusual citizenship request activity. It could make for interesting RP if they decide to investigate whether he's a Myon agent.
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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Nitro » Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:03 pm

I think limiting voting to active characters would be a pretty good idea. If a character hasn't been played in X days, it needs to be active again for say a RL month before being allowed to vote. That way someone can be politically active in different settlements with different characters, but not dig up a character that's been on hiatus for a while to fling a vote in an election without being active on the character first.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Memelord » Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:21 pm

I think that rulers definitely should be able to both see and remove citizenships again, particularly since exiles are tied directly into the number of citizens you have now. Remove a bunch of citizenships? Congratulations, you've just made a fair few enemies - and no longer have the means to actually keep them out of your settlement short of catching them and enforcing a status of "persona non grata" in person.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Hazard » Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:33 pm

Memelord wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:21 pm
I think that rulers definitely should be able to both see and remove citizenships again, particularly since exiles are tied directly into the number of citizens you have now. Remove a bunch of citizenships? Congratulations, you've just made a fair few enemies - and no longer have the means to actually keep them out of your settlement short of catching them and enforcing a status of "persona non grata" in person.
Yes, it's very awkward that the leader of a settlement can't tell who is or isn't a citizen in their settlement anymore.
I'd like to see those things return too.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by The GrumpyCat » Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:35 pm

Again, this is a fun discussion guys- but remember the suggestion box is closed, so it's worth bookmarking this in the back of our minds - then when the suggestion box is reopened, slapping this in there.

For my own thoughts - I'd be in favour of removal of citizens IF there was some sort of cost or limit to it, as with Exiles. Otherwise it would be way too easy for a leader to just shut down elections perminently.
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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by CosmicOrderV » Wed Jan 23, 2019 10:00 pm

Definitely feel like citizenship audits on the part of faction leaders should cone back in some capacity.
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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Marsi » Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:15 am

Citizenship auditing was removed in 2012 or so, unless I'm misremembering.

From what I recall, the list could be used to pre-emptively snuff out political opposition and their voting bloc when suspects appeared on the list. I can't remember if you could revoke citizenships or whether it was just a case of exile. Maybe that's not totally accurate, but in general there was a feeling that it enabled a level of micromanagement and efficiency that was poisonous to RP and storytelling; it turned settlement leaders into annoying middle-managers who spent their days policing house/shop ownership.

With that in mind, I do think it's an essential function that settlement leaders really deserve. All that's needed are ways to bluff and cheat the system (like the afore mentioned Harper powers) so that they don't enjoy too much safety and predictability.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Durvayas » Thu Jan 24, 2019 1:03 am

Marsi wrote:
Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:15 am
Citizenship auditing was removed in 2012 or so, unless I'm misremembering.

From what I recall, the list could be used to pre-emptively snuff out political opposition and their voting bloc when suspects appeared on the list. I can't remember if you could revoke citizenships or whether it was just a case of exile. Maybe that's not totally accurate, but in general there was a feeling that it enabled a level of micromanagement and efficiency that was poisonous to RP and storytelling; it turned settlement leaders into annoying middle-managers who spent their days policing house/shop ownership.

With that in mind, I do think it's an essential function that settlement leaders really deserve. All that's needed are ways to bluff and cheat the system (like the afore mentioned Harper powers) so that they don't enjoy too much safety and predictability.
That change also went in before the assassin system did. There is now counterplay to just exiling or removing citizenship. Serious counterplay. As feedback, I think the ability to see who is a citizen should absolutely be restored. Remove people at your peril, the assassin's guild accepts all employers. :P
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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by clanogrady » Thu Jan 24, 2019 1:55 am

Sorry but no. The assassination is so narrowly limited that unless assassination of settlement leadership didn't require an active contract then it would be worth while.

Then the whole issue of ghosting. As the assassination is only effective against the Official leader of the settlement. All they have to do is roll their character or just not log and have the people with permissions carry it out.

If citizenship removal were strictly limited to Leader only, and they had to be the one in person to do it... then it might be feasible. That way, if you know they are gonna go to you. You had better have your team of assassin's ready.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Dirac » Thu Jan 24, 2019 1:58 am

magistrasa wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:45 pm
A lot of people use the system in poor faith - openly and proudly, in some areas. When I was new to the server, I was encouraged to conduct elections like they were a gold sink, where grabbing newbies and marching them to the citizenship manager with promise of wealth was the only thing to do if you wanted to win. Granted, that might just be because that's just kinda how things roll in the underdark, but it did feel a little cheap when little roleplay or consequence for anyone involved really ended up being borne of it. I know that it's not necessarily a flaw in the system and more something that goes against my personal tastes, but I also don't quite know if that's behavior that should be addressed in-character, because from my experience, it's so ingrained into server culture and enabled by the system that it's just kinda assumed that's how things are "supposed" to be. All systems working as intended.
I agree whole heartedly and think that (1) thru (3) should be implemented immediately.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Nitinious » Thu Jan 24, 2019 2:23 am

1-3
Yes
Either a cool-down or disallow new voter registration during active elections.

Only part I disagreed with was point #4
..because there's supposed to be a way for people who don't like current leadership, to vote them out.

If I'm a settlement leader, and make a 'payroll' and anyone who's a citizen is a known ally, theoretically I can remove everyone else, and stay 'in power' eternally. (which leads to stagnation)

How can they vote them out when their citizenship is simply removed instead? (which would make them ineligible to vote)
*viewing citizenship is different to removing citizenship
p.s. Harpers should have an evil-counterpart if that's the case and exceptions are allowed (like assassins or something, evil-secret forces that counter harpers, etc)

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Cerk Evermoore » Thu Jan 24, 2019 3:22 am

It's already pretty much impossible to depose a tyrannical city leader without a large group of people who are usually OOC friends or a sleeper agent moving into a city and disturbing the power balance.

It is pretty hard to knock out an incumbent already without having to worry about every member of the opposition being taken off voter registration.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by TimeAdept » Thu Jan 24, 2019 5:28 am

1) Only be active on one character you are currently playing. Other characters may take up citizenships, have access to the benefits of those citizenships, but will lose the ability to vote in ANY election across the isle. (Unless of course they're a harper, unique entity, or whatever).

2) New citizenship should not = to the immediate benefit of voting/running for office. I think it is healthier for voting to be something that is planned, done responsibly, and done through the lens of bureaucracy. This still allows for the buying of votes, loyalties, and citizenships but absolutely requires for there to be long term goals and build up RP. A cool-down of some kind should be in effect, probably like 3 days IRL.

3) The switch between your active citizenship should also have a cooldown, perhaps of a similar length - unless a citizenship is in effect, then the cool down is the election event time + the cooldown.

4) Citizenship removal should be a power of a sitting settlement government once more. I don't know why this isn't a thing anymore as it should follow the same rules as anything else on the grounds of exiles, eviction, and so forth. Citizenship lists should also be available. (In the case of Harpers they can buy fake citizenships so they can benefit from them, show up in lists, but still retain their multivote ability).
Strong agree on all counts

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Sea Shanties » Thu Jan 24, 2019 5:29 am

magistrasa wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 7:45 pm
When I was new to the server, I was encouraged to conduct elections like they were a gold sink, where grabbing newbies and marching them to the citizenship manager with promise of wealth was the only thing to do if you wanted to win. Granted, that might just be because that's just kinda how things roll in the underdark, but it did feel a little cheap when little roleplay or consequence for anyone involved really ended up being borne of it.
I dunno, when a certain former Orog ruler of the Sharps did that for my first UD character after many years away from Arelith I thought it was awesome. Corrupt, sure, but that's the fun of it. It also opened many RP doors where usually when I create a new character down there it's a struggle to get anyone to pay much notice.

Elections should be fair from a player to player standpoint but in game I'd say we need more ways to be shady and corrupt. Just make sure there's always a counter and everyone has access to the same rulebook, and the corruption comes from in-game and not OOC from people gaming the system with alt voters etc.
Nitro wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:03 pm
I think limiting voting to active characters would be a pretty good idea. If a character hasn't been played in X days, it needs to be active again for say a RL month before being allowed to vote. That way someone can be politically active in different settlements with different characters, but not dig up a character that's been on hiatus for a while to fling a vote in an election without being active on the character first.
Something like that would be be a good idea IMO. I'd also say there should be mechanically enforced terms limits for leaders. Not a short one but they should be rotating every 6 months or so to keep from stagnation.

I don't like booting citizens. That encourages ostracizing marginal players. A leader doesn't recognize someone's name so they boot them even though that person may just play less frequently and in a different time zone. Or maybe they don't like the player or their other characters and don't want to deal with their style of RP, even though there's no good in-game reason. It all gets back to the playground mentality where the cool kids call all the shots, but settlements need their weirdos and outliers and naysayers around too. Any active player who wants to be a citizen of a settlement should be unless exiled for a valid RP reason.

I do think citizen numbers might be up since storage of items is now a benefit. I mean I have a few alts who took citizenship because they can't have quarters but aren't politically active at all, and I doubt I'm alone in that. Maybe the ripple effect from this is something to examine.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Lady Astray » Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:25 pm

I don't even want to be a citizen of any settlements now. Leaders have too much power as it is.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Nitro » Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:39 pm

I wouldn't call the power to exile 3-7 people and the ability to revoke shops/quarters "too much power" for a settlement leader to be honest. On the opposite I'd say settlement leaders are kind of powerless without a lot of people supporting them to act as enforcement for their rules.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by Lady Astray » Thu Jan 24, 2019 1:50 pm

Nitro wrote:
Thu Jan 24, 2019 12:39 pm
I wouldn't call the power to exile 3-7 people and the ability to revoke shops/quarters "too much power" for a settlement leader to be honest. On the opposite I'd say settlement leaders are kind of powerless without a lot of people supporting them to act as enforcement for their rules.
I respectfully disagree.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by JubJub » Thu Jan 24, 2019 3:56 pm

Hazard wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:33 pm
Memelord wrote:
Wed Jan 23, 2019 8:21 pm
I think that rulers definitely should be able to both see and remove citizenships again, particularly since exiles are tied directly into the number of citizens you have now. Remove a bunch of citizenships? Congratulations, you've just made a fair few enemies - and no longer have the means to actually keep them out of your settlement short of catching them and enforcing a status of "persona non grata" in person.
Yes, it's very awkward that the leader of a settlement can't tell who is or isn't a citizen in their settlement anymore.
I'd like to see those things return too.
I think one of the reasons this was removed because it started to become a common tactic for a leader to remove citizenship of people that might challenge them with little rp that came down to you are a threat to the settlement you are no longer part of the town. So they would simply remove citizenship of their opponents and followers. It was an easy way to stop any challenges plus doesn't cost resources like exiling your opponent would.

I have always said voting should be one town per CD key. This would make voting mean something as players can't camp characters in towns and affect a town they aren't really active in. I shouldn't be able to affect multiple towns leaderships.

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Re: Voting, Citizenship, and how it could be better.

Post by clanogrady » Fri Jan 25, 2019 1:57 am

I think that something that should be implemented is, no new citizens while an election is ongoing.

That will cut down on the 30-80+ new citizens that can show up during elections.

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