Politician Archive
Thread: Was Politician everything you had hoped it would be as a profession?
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NAGANO1
Sun Aug 29, 2004 4:29 am
#1
Just curious:
I'm not a politician but I did have a friend who was one and we help build a city together. This was the day that cities were introduced. It was quite a chore gtting people, but at least there was some promise back then.
I guess my question is now that cities have gone full circle, and many cities appear to be nothing but storage and ghost towns, was this the profession that many of you dreamed and hoped that it would be?
I would think that in some ways SOE dropped the ball with the whole city thing, because as I see it, I don't see many improvements from the old days of just house dropping in groups. Comments?
Var NAGANO - Kauri
josslyn
Sun Aug 29, 2004 5:28 am
#2
... is it everything i thought it would be? Definately NOT! Now don't get me wrong... I absolutely love being mayor of "our" city. However, the Politician Prof. is one of those forgotten professions. I've been Mayor for 5 months now, and have loved every moment of it. Sure I have my down days and think to myself wth am i doing wasting 77sp on this for? Simple answer... I love the fact that when i go to my city there is ALWAYS someone around from either my guild or just one of my many Imperial Citizens. I love knowing that i have a player city to call home where i can go around and rearrange without having to go out into the galaxy and NOT have to kill. And well, crafting... boring 
So I chose to run as City Mayor back in our "Korona" days on Naboo. After about a months worth of struggling to get the votes needed to beat out the past mayor I had finally been voted into office. Thus began my Politician Career 
When I first started working on things our city in Korona was quite filled with inactives homes and being on Naboo we knew the chances of us ever moving up in Ranks were going to be pretty slim. So we moved and created what is now known as Solace on Dantooine. When i first started getting my politician xp it was great.. because we had new things to drop in the city or specialize in, etc. But now with Master you get absolutely nothing for all the time some of us do dedicate to keeping our cities alive. It's really quite a waste other then getting one of the rarer seen badges 
Even with each city expansion that's kept it interesting.. but as of Tuesday night our city will hit a Rank 5... so now comes the "what do i do now".... I've planned montly city events, such as home deco contests, pvp events for citizens, upcoming celebration of reaching a Rank 5, etc. But really... I would love to see so much more added to make our sp's more worth while. I wouldn't mind giving up 77sp to at least get even 1 lousy thing at master.. even a Mayor title would be nice at this time. As you can see, there are so many things both negative and positive about this profession. The now ghost town cities give current active cities bad names. I hope there will never be a day that i go "home" and see nobody in Solace.. I would be rather worried at that point. But as of right now I can only hope that the DEVS will come to their senses someday about this great profession and what it does have to offer if only they would allow it.
So I chose to run as City Mayor back in our "Korona" days on Naboo. After about a months worth of struggling to get the votes needed to beat out the past mayor I had finally been voted into office. Thus began my Politician Career When I first started working on things our city in Korona was quite filled with inactives homes and being on Naboo we knew the chances of us ever moving up in Ranks were going to be pretty slim. So we moved and created what is now known as Solace on Dantooine. When i first started getting my politician xp it was great.. because we had new things to drop in the city or specialize in, etc. But now with Master you get absolutely nothing for all the time some of us do dedicate to keeping our cities alive. It's really quite a waste other then getting one of the rarer seen badges Even with each city expansion that's kept it interesting.. but as of Tuesday night our city will hit a Rank 5... so now comes the "what do i do now".... I've planned montly city events, such as home deco contests, pvp events for citizens, upcoming celebration of reaching a Rank 5, etc. But really... I would love to see so much more added to make our sp's more worth while. I wouldn't mind giving up 77sp to at least get even 1 lousy thing at master.. even a Mayor title would be nice at this time. As you can see, there are so many things both negative and positive about this profession. The now ghost town cities give current active cities bad names. I hope there will never be a day that i go "home" and see nobody in Solace.. I would be rather worried at that point. But as of right now I can only hope that the DEVS will come to their senses someday about this great profession and what it does have to offer if only they would allow it. Chasity
Solace City Mayor
Master Politician/TKM
PloMaster
Mon Aug 30, 2004 10:23 am
#3
i couldnt agree more ^^^ Thought it would be alot better and might get some work done to it but i still would never drop it..........
Krisskar
Wed Sep 01, 2004 5:14 am
#4
--Well, as a master politician (who still has the boxes) I was selected as our mayor six months before I got into the game (I had to wait for a new computer). We came from Sosaria (Ultima Online) where the Raiders of Valor had existed since 1999.
--We had great expectations of our Player City.....here they are, and my comments on how it worked out:
1) A place for us all to live close. Yes, but we didn't really need a city for that.
2) A place for us to gather to start our events. Actually, on our weekly events, this hasn't worked. We gather near wherever the event is.
3) A centralized location for our vendors. We had some vendors, and a vendor tent, but until last week (when we finally got a shuttleport) business sucked. Since the shuttle we have added two more vendor tents.
4) A nice layout. The *$%^ terrain makes this nigh unto impossible. We even moved our city to a "flatter" section of Tatooine, but even the slight hills and dips really make a nice layout impossible. I wish Master Politician had a "terraforming" skill.... or maybe get more "terrain forgiveness" if the mayor places structures...
5) Ability to control rude and unwanted players. One word here: "NERFED"
--As Mayor, my expectations and comments:
1) Ability to control the nasty unwanted visitors through use of the militia and "citywarn"......There are unfortunately rude people we would prefer to not have in our city. They can come and irritate our citizens with impunity.
2) Ability to have our city militia strengthened for participation in the Galactic Civil War. I don't mind overt faction players coming in and fighting overt citizens, but I wish we had a bit of the promised boosts to the militia.
3) Ability to manage the city finances. Now it is true you can set spending amounts, but without an accounting of income, you are to a large extent working blind. I have tried to be frugal and we have done pretty well, but not knowing the source of all income makes management quite difficult.
4) Some kind of "higher purpose" for mayors. It isn't there. We cannot affect content, although there are existing game mechanisms that could be opened up for mayors to use (making missions for mission terminals, publishing newspapers for sale on the bazaars, etc)
5) Some kind of special recognition as a Master Politician Mayor. I get Nada, not even "mayor" title. Some kind of special mayor uniform or something? sigh
6) I didn't expect to have to waste 77 skill points. and get exactly nothing for attaining "master politician"
--Being a mayor consists of "tell hell" from citizens and visitors. It is quite time consuming. You have to learn to type while doing other things.....like trying to stay alive in a battle. You do a lot of newbie helping, which can be gratifying. Sometimes you get lucky, as when a slot opened up for us to get a shuttleport, and the populace is happy with you. Sometimes you find divisions amongst your citizens, and a PA might pick up and leave (happened twice for us, first the rebels, then the hard core PVP imperials....) And you must constantly recruit and advertise your city, else it will die, as I have seen many cities die already.
--Truly Player Cities are not what they could be, and mayoral powers certainly are inadequate. All in all, Player Cities and the position of Mayor have not lived up to the great expectations I had back before they were put in the game. The economic justification for improving Player Cities is not there for the Company, so I suspect that what we have is all that we will ever have.
Arrya
Wed Sep 01, 2004 8:37 am
#5
Definitely not. It was a great start to a great idea, but the devs have not followed through on anything since. I'd be curious as to what the devs vision is for cities - because it sure doesn't seem to match most mayor's visions. Do they see it as anything other than a money sink?
Erann
Wed Sep 01, 2004 9:34 am
#6
It's not a gloy job at all..
enemy guilds see you as the leader and tend to mkae no distinction between city and guild. two real seprate identities.
begging for Tax money isn't cool
like the lady said, in theory it's great, a place to start and end you day.. but everyone has thier own agendas.. so it becaomes a city of storage lockers that are the ultimate in gold sinks. but if somethign happens to the city it's your fault.
the few good things about being a mayor is status, you get a rare badge.
you are like a walking bank, a rich begger
you have the abilty to rename you section of the world
you can control somewhate what gets places in the circle...
My wish list includes:
- The mayor should be able to place any and all structures, then hand the structure off to the new resident, thus maintaining strict zoning rules.
- The mayor should be able to Evict with consent of the mailitia
- Mayor Xp should also include zoneing bonuses.. but I can see the exploit.
everything but player houses should be city assets, this should include bases that fall under factional cities.
- Mayors should be able to place a pavement square down like a garden patch
Politicians should help direct the course of the gcw in relation to voting for plot ideas. weekly / monthly vote at the planets capital or a galactic senate.
- Rebels should not be able to register thier city this doesn't make sence unless the planet is hostile or neutral to the empire. you would think the imperial empire would investigate and have influenc eon such political activites and would try to control the cities.
- politicians should not be charged for SP useage for the skills these should be non chargeable profession that benifits are rewarded as is by size and time spent..... Apart from locking someone in a house and or banning them from the city resources.. what is the point?
-Mayors should have a master key to enter all structures in the city to check on maintenance and be able to deposit funds.
-Mayors should have the ability to "auto levy" a structure preventing it's removal to prevent a mass exodous. it's not fair but it'd give politicians more power and control... think condo associations.
ThakrenTempest
Wed Sep 01, 2004 10:41 am
#7
We have kind of lost the momentum we once had back at the start.
The loss of /citywarn was hard. Getting griefed by people "squatting" in your city is another concern.
Cities grow and opposing faction have placed structures around our city to be absorbed and put obscene titles on their buildings or use them to stage raids.
We need some strength here again.
We need to have the skillpoint sink fixed - Politicians need to be viable characters too!
We should have the ability (as mayors ) to be able to relocate those unwanted hooligans from our city.
We should be able to smooth the ground over for development, we should be able to do a lot of things.
We need to have some kind of bonus for the Master Politician box.
We should have a role in the GCW.
The mayor needs some power back. and for contentious decisisons ; like removing a derelict structure or a house full of nasty , griefing players - perhaps having a byelection vote or something , so it isnt just absolute power....
Even just the ability to eject the structure to outside city limits would be grand.
If we keep on working on this, we can get *some* strength....
Erann
Thu Sep 02, 2004 12:32 am
#8
The master politician would be more effective if he/she could craft a wrecking ball weapon.. In-game placeable that constantly damages a player's structure until it runs dry of HP and Credits.. Having an ability to wreck a player structure is SOOOOOOOOOOOOO needed.
C'mon boys it's time to clean the mos-espa race track. Ah dangnabit! First we will skillfully zone the entire track with city halls.. and then.. Dangit they built it our clean up wake!!!!Is there no end to this crazy placement of unwanted machinery! *screeM* Arrgh! the wrecking ball got hooked on the heavy miningharvester again!!
Hvzeda
Thu Sep 02, 2004 9:42 am
#9
Master merchant was much more fulfilling with abilities and content than master politician.
/sarcasm off
Erann
Thu Sep 02, 2004 10:10 am
#10
yeah I'd hate to be a newb artisan trying to peddle 100 items on a vendor.
Bashful
Thu Sep 02, 2004 10:44 am
#11
I sat through the discussion groups at FanFest, and talked personally with several SOE employees. The feeling I got was, SOE is scared to death of any possibility of one player griefing another. They probably have learned from market reasearch, or experience in other games like UO, that most customers object to having their gaming experience "upset" by another player.
This is why we'll never see nonconsensual PVP, this is why we can walk through furniture, and also why I don't think we'll ever see citywarn again.
It would be nice if they had some "Lord of the Flies" servers, where anything goes. I'd give that a shot. Not everyone is a care bear lol.
Hvzeda
Thu Sep 02, 2004 11:22 am
#12
Or a server where you had to choose a side in the GCW and you stayed overt and you had to use faction points to become covert.
Bashful wrote:
I sat through the discussion groups at FanFest, and talked personally with several SOE employees. The feeling I got was, SOE is scared to death of any possibility of one player griefing another. They probably have learned from market reasearch, or experience in other games like UO, that most customers object to having their gaming experience "upset" by another player.
This is why we'll never see nonconsensual PVP, this is why we can walk through furniture, and also why I don't think we'll ever see citywarn again.
It would be nice if they had some "Lord of the Flies" servers, where anything goes. I'd give that a shot. Not everyone is a care bear lol.
PsychoticChipmunk
Fri Sep 03, 2004 12:16 am
#13
Nope, but seeing how they haven't touched politician/player cities with a 10 foot pole (beyond bug fixes and upping the cap once)I'm not surprised either. However it will get better as time goes on. You have to realize that they are still busy completing the game (STAR Wars, remember) let alone adding meaningful parts to it. So eventually we'll get some love and have intersting stuff to do.
Part of it is also apathy on my part. We could have an actual senate on Corellia if I bothered to spearhead the project and came up with ways for it to work...but I haven't so it doesn't. Same for everyone else, if you really try you can come up with some amazing things in this game content wise the devs don't have to do it all, although them doing anything would be nice wink, wink, nudge, nudge.
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