Do you actually want the other non-voting election methods?

What with Steven saying we won't get any other election method than voting at the start of alpha 2, it got me thinking about if I even care if they ever implement the other types.

It's a bit of a mixed bag for me, tbh.

The Economic node one, where the mayor is determined by the highest blind bidder is the least interesting to me. And the biggest downside is how it incentivizes RMT.

The Military node's trial by combat might be fun, but it really comes down to how well they implement it obviously. It's probably the one with the least downsides of the three non-voting methods I think, if they nail the implementation.

The Divine node's PvE favor based system is something I on the surface would be more likely to be successful at with my playstyle and time I can spend on it, but it also sounds exhausting and grindy if you want to be mayor more than one month in a row. The constant grind might kill the enjoyment for me, and there won't be much time to actually spend on being a good mayor, and dealing with all the politics.

All three methods suffer from the same thing, which is that the election methods require little to no political and leadership skills. Odds are we'll get people who are good at doing one of those three things, but suck at doing the actual job of being a mayor.

Obviously, we'll test it and see how it goes, but my current feeling is that I would be ok if Intrepid end up completely dropping the non-voting election methods.

Thoughts?

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Depraved

eh i think voting incentivizes rmt more than bidding. idc tho xD

Otr

I want to see the other election methods too and see how players use them.
They represent how things work in real life too, some are dictators, some have a lot of money to buy their position or control from outside. And some are good at doing things but not to use words to manipulate others.
All 4 of them can lead to having a mayor who is not good at organizing and citizens will have ways to prevent them destroying the node.

Noaani

Nerror wrote: »

it got me thinking about if I even care if they ever implement the other types.

I don't care, personally.

I think they are all quite weak. Economic obviously encourages RMT. Divine encourages account sharing. Military encourages collusion and bribery (which also encourages RMT).

That said, the vote is also not perfect in an MMORPG setting.

Voeltz

I do, but sadly all of them appear to be easily overridden by sheer numbers.

Scientific- simply vote their candidate in (more people=more votes)
Economic - zerg guild pools their gold to one player
Military - zerg all other smaller groups to death
Divine - Flag/declare war on any opposing party trying to build favor to slow them down or prevent them.

Ludullu

Yes, I want them all. Ideally the military one would go back to champion-based pvp, rather than just a fucking "the more friends you have the better".

All other node elections are already based on how many friends you have, so I want at least one to NOT be about that.

oOKingOo

I do want the other methods 100%. I dont think voting is a cool systhem as the single systhem because then you will have to be a streamer to become mayor. The other mathods are all more open to players who are not famous. Its good if you need to be the best pvper or have the most money or be the most grindy but just being famous outside of the game shouldnt be required to become mayor. Its fine tho if its only one of 4 ways to become a mayor.
Personally i think millitarry should be a 1v1 tournament instead of a battle royal just becasue you can cheat the systhem less.

Laetitian

NiKr wrote: »

Yes, I want them all. Ideally the military one would go back to champion-based pvp, rather than just a fucking "the more friends you have the better".

All other node elections are already based on how many friends you have, so I want at least one to NOT be about that.

Not saying it's not a threat, but to be fair - it doesn't necessarily have to be how many friends you have; it might potentially just be how many people agree with you, if you present sufficiently charismatic or persuasive politics. You probably can't do it alone, but I can absolutely see many larger clans being convinced to pass the chance to members of smaller clans with a clear political directive - even if those larger clans originally had members with political ambitions. Definitely not everywhere, but in some nodes with more civilised communities.

And I get that you might just be saying "I want fun ways to make the strongest strategy or power house dominate the political tone of at least some node types, rather than non-gamified politics," and that's definitely an intriguing prospect to increase variety across the community interactions.
Just pointing out that Highest number of supporters =/= highest number of friends.

I've just been having this discussion with a friend I've been informing about Ashes, and my biggest conclusion here is: No matter what the outcome of the design decisions or these discussions will be, these will definitely be debates the community will have on a monthly basis once this game releases.

Ludullu

Laetitian wrote: »

Just pointing out that Highest number of supporters =/= highest number of friends.

Potato potahto. I meant friends as "literally anyone who's willing to help you". Obviously groups should always have an advantage, but I want at least one node mayorship to not be determined simply by numbers.

It would also make sense to have a government that's built on "the strongest person around gets to tell others what to do".

GrilledCheeseMojito

NiKr wrote: »

Yes, I want them all. Ideally the military one would go back to champion-based pvp, rather than just a fucking "the more friends you have the better".

All other node elections are already based on how many friends you have, so I want at least one to NOT be about that.

If it's champion-based PvP I think it could be interesting. Note I don't necessarily think it'd be good, the devil's in the details here, but it'd be extremely interesting for it to be this way as it means any random citizen can come up to wrassle the mayor, and it would lead to a different kind of culture overall. Making it anything else is kind of boring honestly, I agree that having something purely determined by individual strength adds flavor in contrast.

Ludullu

GrilledCheeseMojito wrote: »

Note I don't necessarily think it'd be good, the devil's in the details here, but it'd be extremely interesting for it to be this way as it means any random citizen can come up to wrassle the mayor, and it would lead to a different kind of culture overall. Making it anything else is kind of boring honestly, I agree that having something purely determined by individual strength adds flavor in contrast.

Yep, that's what I want. Obviously there should be several ways to minimize the exploit of this system (namely thrown fights), but that's all in the design and testing. The current design doesn't really need any testing, cause it simply "zerg = good".

Military nodes being, potentially, controlled by sole tyrant travelers would add so much fun to the servers. And if one of those tyrants uses his power for absolute good - that's a huge piece of game history to tell, and a potential attractor to the server as well.

GrilledCheeseMojito

NiKr wrote: »

Military nodes being, potentially, controlled by sole tyrant travelers would add so much fun to the servers. And if one of those tyrants uses his power for absolute good - that's a huge piece of game history to tell, and a potential attractor to the server as well.

That's a story I definitely want to tell. Someone whose will to change things is so strong they train nonstop to beat the crap out of some dumb tyrant and run a tight ship ever since, without needing to convince 1000 people to make accounts and join a guild. That could be a very strong differentiator for Ashes, and I feel like Intrepid is underusing the potential that this model could hold as a result. If you want to be bold and innovative, you need to think outside the guild box.

Otr

NiKr wrote: »

GrilledCheeseMojito wrote: »

Note I don't necessarily think it'd be good, the devil's in the details here, but it'd be extremely interesting for it to be this way as it means any random citizen can come up to wrassle the mayor, and it would lead to a different kind of culture overall. Making it anything else is kind of boring honestly, I agree that having something purely determined by individual strength adds flavor in contrast.

Yep, that's what I want. Obviously there should be several ways to minimize the exploit of this system (namely thrown fights), but that's all in the design and testing. The current design doesn't really need any testing, cause it simply "zerg = good".

Military nodes being, potentially, controlled by sole tyrant travelers would add so much fun to the servers. And if one of those tyrants uses his power for absolute good - that's a huge piece of game history to tell, and a potential attractor to the server as well.

if the military vote ends up being a zerg vs zerg, then might be similar to the democratic vote. The difference being that skill and gear can grant you more "weight" to influence the result.

Nerror

What if the economic node bids are in Glint rather than Gold? It kills the RMT incentive, since Glint can't be traded, and puts the onus on the potential mayor to get friends to grind Glint with them, and letting the wannabe mayor be master looter.

If they wanted to add some PvX chaos into the whole thing, stolen glint could be used as well at one fourth the value perhaps. The downside to that is it reintroduces RMT again, since stolen glint can be traded.

RocketFarmer

There’s a trust factor in this game that players won’t screw things up no matter what method of selecting a mayor.

Ludullu

Nerror wrote: »

What if the economic node bids are in Glint rather than Gold? It kills the RMT incentive, since Glint can't be traded, and puts the onus on the potential mayor to get friends to grind Glint with them, and letting the wannabe mayor be master looter.

I kinda expect this to be the case tbh. This is ultimately still a "who's got more/stronger friends" situation, but at least it would take slightly longer for the guilds to boost their candidate to the top, and this longer period would also lead to more GvGs, which is a huge plus.

tautau

I like having different selection methods for different node types.

As discussed above, there are ways for large groups to attempt to manipulate all the different methods, but I suspect that the direct elections would be the easiest to manipulate so I am glad we have the other methods as well. It will be fascinating to see what happens over the course of time.

The concept of mayors and their selection is just one of the many delightful innovations which AoC is giving us. Incidentally, these innovations are what make other discussions of server mergers, player retention and comparisons to other games somewhat irrelevant.

Percimes

I think all voting methods will be interesting at the lower stage of a node, village. Past that, when things get more serious, players will act as players and game the system as much as they can. So, places doomed to stay small, either because their progression is locked in their ZoI or to far off to ever gain the population to grow past stage 3, will be the nodes where those who want to actually use the mechanics "as intended" might find them.

But on the personal side of the subject, I don't really care about it.

AlpineW

I want all types of election systems, but realistically in areas controlled by larger guilds it won’t matter what the election type is. In strategically important nodes, guild leadership or their alts will always end up as mayor.

Note that I’m not strictly complaining about this. In fact I can’t wait for another game where guilds actually mean something; I just think that the only true elections will happen in very small, backwater type nodes that are lower level/don’t have a huge strategic value.

Aszkalon

Nerror wrote: »

I see the Pros and Cons here, i think.

Voting sounds pretty clean to me, but it is kinda same as prone and vulnerable to "Corruption" as bidding with the highest Money - and also same as flawed as in Trial by Combat. Well i guess in the latter i just mentioned People with superior Reflexes and Skills may find some fun in.

" If " - and that may as well be the Case,
the Person with the highest Money as a Bidder for becoming Mayor is very good at gathering Money : it might benefit the Node real good.

I am aware i sound naive. It "might" benefit the Node. If such a Mayor will care for his Node and be it only for the Money he can make from it, is a different Page. ^.^

I forgot the fourth Option if there is any. Oh dear. And this as someone who is so incredibly thirsty for Knowledge about Nodes. x'D

Otr

Percimes wrote: »

I think all voting methods will be interesting at the lower stage of a node, village. Past that, when things get more serious, players will act as players and game the system as much as they can. So, places doomed to stay small, either because their progression is locked in their ZoI or to far off to ever gain the population to grow past stage 3, will be the nodes where those who want to actually use the mechanics "as intended" might find them.

But on the personal side of the subject, I don't really care about it.

I doubt there will be such a case that node is " too far off to ever gain the population to grow past stage 3".
Players will want to have freeholds and some will want to be mayors and if a node can grow, will grow.

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