The last update revealed the mandates, which they say it will be https://youtu.be/JvsXn43Gak0?t=1918
an energy system mayors get to use to enact things
they generate mandates by having citizens participate in these activities
the more citizens like what a mayor is doing the more power the're going to get to do more things and the less citizens like what they are doing the less power they are going to get to do things
Probably this is the reason why Vaknar adjusted his OP and is asking
Do you care more about certain biomes or strategic locations?
Do you plan on changing the way you play, based on your node?
Do you want the node you choose to determine how you play the game, or based on the way you play the game will you choose whatever node is best for you at the moment?
Added some follow up questions to the OP
To me it will be important to find out guild is behind the mayor and what is my guild's relationship with that guild. Or if the mayor is following the advice of a common greater inter guild decision system or not.
Because doing what a mayor wants might be like doing what another guild wants.
And what I think should be important is to cooperate with the metropolis.
Things get more complicated after a few sieges when nodes belonging to a metropolis end up in a different metropolis system.
I wouldn't want to be a mayor talking with 20 guild leaders and suddenly having to move to other discord channels and figure out who I can trust if if I should just pretend that I do that and stay with the old group.
Most likely I will end up exploring the map and not stay much in a particular node unless they make it really important for my character to have to do that.
An interesting political dynamic to observe will be when a siege is successful and a node is destroyed. Will the former mayor try to run in one of the neighbouring node? Is there a difference if the destroyed node was a vassal or the dominant one? I think it might feel as if someone had shuffled the deck of card and a new round was about to begin.
Steven wants the mayor to be like a political leader. If they can become mayors without help from guilds they still end up listening to guild leaders who control their players. But maybe there will be also guilds which are permissive and tell players "do what you want". I think few guilds will be like that.
But most likely mayors need support from guilds and guilds will support players they trust.
So when a node gets a new vassal, former mayors probably will also be replaced.
But who will play in level 3 nodes doing things for the small mayor?
Defending caravans?
Collecting low tier resources? I think low level node will not have high level NPCs on it's ZoI which probably means there will be no high tier resources either.
I'm 200% a soloplayer. I'm fine with not being a mayor. I don't want that responsibility Being a mayor in this game will literally be a fulltime job, except you're not getting a paycheck. SO I'M GOOD!!!
If the majority of players will be more solo oriented, teaming up near bulletin boards, then their opinion will actually count more than guilds.
Traditionally in MMORPGs you're going to see a larger population of casual players than you do of hardcore players; and that's just the way the cookie crumbles from a population standpoint. And because of that and the way that nodes collect experience and advance as a result of player activity, those casual players will actually have more impact on node progression than the hardcore players will: at least as I predict, because of the sheer quantity disproportionate between the two different groups of people... You may see in Ashes the smaller hardcore group of players progress further into the late-game content, right. But they don't have the numbers to influence the nodes in those locations as quickly as the more casual... larger population has near the outskirts.[2] – Steven Sharif
Will be interesting to see how guilds will try to manipulate solo players.
Comments
https://youtu.be/JvsXn43Gak0?t=1918
an energy system mayors get to use to enact things
they generate mandates by having citizens participate in these activities
the more citizens like what a mayor is doing the more power the're going to get to do more things and the less citizens like what they are doing the less power they are going to get to do things
Probably this is the reason why Vaknar adjusted his OP and is asking
To me it will be important to find out guild is behind the mayor and what is my guild's relationship with that guild. Or if the mayor is following the advice of a common greater inter guild decision system or not.
Because doing what a mayor wants might be like doing what another guild wants.
And what I think should be important is to cooperate with the metropolis.
Things get more complicated after a few sieges when nodes belonging to a metropolis end up in a different metropolis system.
I wouldn't want to be a mayor talking with 20 guild leaders and suddenly having to move to other discord channels and figure out who I can trust if if I should just pretend that I do that and stay with the old group.
Most likely I will end up exploring the map and not stay much in a particular node unless they make it really important for my character to have to do that.
But most likely mayors need support from guilds and guilds will support players they trust.
So when a node gets a new vassal, former mayors probably will also be replaced.
But who will play in level 3 nodes doing things for the small mayor?
Defending caravans?
Collecting low tier resources? I think low level node will not have high level NPCs on it's ZoI which probably means there will be no high tier resources either.
If the majority of players will be more solo oriented, teaming up near bulletin boards, then their opinion will actually count more than guilds.
Traditionally in MMORPGs you're going to see a larger population of casual players than you do of hardcore players; and that's just the way the cookie crumbles from a population standpoint. And because of that and the way that nodes collect experience and advance as a result of player activity, those casual players will actually have more impact on node progression than the hardcore players will: at least as I predict, because of the sheer quantity disproportionate between the two different groups of people... You may see in Ashes the smaller hardcore group of players progress further into the late-game content, right. But they don't have the numbers to influence the nodes in those locations as quickly as the more casual... larger population has near the outskirts.[2] – Steven Sharif
Will be interesting to see how guilds will try to manipulate solo players.