Politician Archive

I have an idea that will simplify the militia and meanwhile make it more structured. It will basically allow the mayor to have more control over them compared to now or be completely removed from the militia by and large (depending on what (s)he prefers).

Basically what will happen is this. In order to get a militia in your city you need to place a new civic structure. It will only require a rank 1 outpost and martial policy 1. The building, militia station house, will basically be to the city what a PA hall is for guilds. I envision it looking like a courthouse for the first room with a raised dais, then 2 rooms connected to it one being a break room that has a terminal and the other looking sort of like a jail with cells lining the walls. But that is besides the point (just a visual for developers if they like the idea) the purpose of the structure will be to make and manage the militia.

The mayor of the city will be given the power to choose the head of the militia; this means that they themselves can become head or someone else can shoulder the responsibility. After this initial choice the mayor has more or less no power over the militia. (S)he can change who the leader is on a whim, however, if powers are being abused or things just aren’t going the way you planned but concerning direct power mayors are castrated (unless you choose to be the head of the militia yourself).

The militia leader will be given the real power over the militia which he can control via the terminal placed inside of the “stationhouse”, basically accepting members and granting them the various powers that the militia does, and hopefully will, have. The leader will be able to allow various members to use city mail, /grantzoningrights, /cityignore, /cityban, and /citywarn (on top of whatever dreams you can think of as militia powers) as well as assign ranks. Now the ranks won’t really mean squat they’ll just be the same as titles in a PA but still it would be nice to have a way to do this in game without having to make something up on your own. This way you can have the entire population in a militia but only people you feel you can really trust can use the higher power skills that being a militiaman entails. Every town needs a grunt but not every grunt needs to be able to grant zoning rights willy nilly.

Because this is such a large idea and since it more or less just focuses on the militia as a whole rather then the skills that they should get I didn’t think I should put it in the top 5 request thing. Also I’m a bit of a realist since I know that no matter how much support this idea would get it would take a lot of development time and effort and likely wouldn’t be introduced for a long, long time. Any comments or tweaks are more then welcome, feel free to nit pick as much as you like.

This sounds very simliar to ideas I proposed in my Concepts and ideas to improve player cities, militia and the politician profession (Note: I've divided sections as separate replies).

Specifically:

• Implementation of a "militia" mailing list
  
• Implementation of a new city structure, the militia headquarters (requiring 5 lots) by any citizen who has attained master rank in any combat profession provided the mayor has Martial policy I.
  
  
  
  • Militia HQ is accessible to only militia members (as selected by the mayor) and the mayor
    
  • Militia HQ will have a PvP arena located inside the structure for militia members to practice
    
  • Presence of a militia HQ will then allow mayor to hire NPC guards (see Part II: NPC guards).
    
  
  

However, from your idea I have a concern regarding the militia leader being able to grant powers. I think it important that the mayor still be the one to select the militia members, though divide them into ranks. There could be militia leaders (with mailing rights, /citywarn, /cityban, /cityignore, /grantzoningrights) and your basic grunt (with only /citywarn, /cityban, and /cityignore).

Being able to allocate abilities on a pick-and-choose basis has been a popular suggestion. I'll try to make sure that they know it is something they want if and when they get around to giving politicians and militia a re-design.

As far as the other ideas go, it makes an interesting game design philosophy debate. How much do you bother to hardcode, versus leave to the players to organize out of game. In-game tools are great, they support activities, steer gameplay in directions you as a developer may be interested in seeing, but of course they take development time, and in many cases leave you with a less flexible system. My PA has a system much like what you describe, with a "captian of the guard" who chose his own militia members, and an "armory" building as the military headquarters, all done either through off-line organization or using existing tools like just using a regular large house as a headquarters.

With every feature, its interesting to look at how far to hardcode and how much to let things develop more organically.

Yeah I did see yours and it was pretty nice, however I don't think it should count against someones lots, or if anyone maybe the militia leader. Plus I had this in my head for awhile just never bothered to get it down. Always better to show several perspectives to the devs then just one so they can steal a little from mine and a bit more from yours.

The way around your concern would be rather simple, make yourself (mayor) the militia leader. That way you have all the powers just as it is under the current system. However if you're a crafter mayor and don't really want to be in the militia, or don't follow on what prof would make a better member to pick up where you're lacking then you don't necesarilly have to. I like being mayor, however being that, leader of the militia, and a PA leader just is a little bit much. My attention gets spread too thin and that's a bad thing. Basically the militia will just be a mini PA that has powers in a city, in fact that would be a good power to add to the list, invite people to the militia and the leader has to accept them.

Well I personally feel that a civic structure is more or less a must. Cities are supposed to be unique and interesting, and as it stands outside of a few buildings and gardens we look just like a random allotment of homes that have existed for months. Also I feel that the person in power does not necessarily need to be the mayor. Always have that option, and let the mayor have some control but some people dont want to be head militia-man I"m sure. Just another idea to help out, and if TH sees enough of these all being similiar in a few ways probably won't hurt being an attention grabber.

I don't see a problem with a militia structure counting against someone's lots. We already have cantinas, and med centers so why not a militia HQ? Combat characters are usually ones with free lots anyways.

And to me one of the perks of being mayor is in selecting the militia; they are, afterall, representatives of the city and yourself (as mayor). An overall leader of the militia makes sense. I would suggest a compromise that militia leaders are chosen by the mayor and the militia leaders are able to select "grunts" to join the militia.

As for the actually militia HQ (or armory) structure, I like your layout ideas so long as their is an arena of some kind available also.

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Bajeezus wrote:

As far as the other ideas go, it makes an interesting game design philosophy debate. How much do you bother to hardcode, versus leave to the players to organize out of game. In-game tools are great, they support activities, steer gameplay in directions you as a developer may be interested in seeing, but of course they take development time, and in many cases leave you with a less flexible system. My PA has a system much like what you describe, with a "captian of the guard" who chose his own militia members, and an "armory" building as the military headquarters, all done either through off-line organization or using existing tools like just using a regular large house as a headquarters.

With every feature, its interesting to look at how far to hardcode and how much to let things develop more organically.

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I don't see giving players in-game tools as "limiting" but rather as liberating. The less I actually have actually maintain out-of-game the better IMO. What we are requesting is not for hardcoding of systems but rather a level dynamic-creation of system and hierarchy within the game. And I feel a definite need for specialized buildings; not just armories, but shops, research facilities (crafters, BEs), zoo, etc... as well.

Part of the problem in MMORPGs is that so much still has to be developed outside the game.

Yes, that is part of how the militia gets formed. The leader is chosen by the mayor and the mayor can replace him at anytime, choosing a random person or themselves. I guess it doesn't matter if it takes lots or not really just means a PA leader can't do it as well. Maybe the dueling pit can be on the roof sort of like PA halls, that's where I' planned on putting mine all it needs are a few braziers to look neat plus it allows items to be hung so it can look like an armory if wanted.

I like the idea of having a militia HQ as well. Currently our city has a Captain of the Militia appointed by me and then his guards to do with as he pleases. This of course is strictly a roleplaying aspect of the game at this point but still we have fun with it anyway. In our city hall we are setting up the office with the structure terminal as the militia office currently but it's own building as you described the layout would be nice. In game tools to grant levels of power to the militia and allow the captain to manage them would be nice though. Also, I just can't help but add an extreme dream to this one. A very interesting ability to grant militia would be to allow them to arrest people (/arrest). This ability would come after a player had been city warned and given the appropriate amount of time to escape if they wanted. After that time expired you could simply /arrest them and they would be placed in the city jail (militia HQ jail cells) for ten minutes or so. Give them an arrested flag with a timer preventing them from leaving the cell area.

Could someone pass the pie please?

Actually a way to makethat ideaa bit more interesting would be causing /citywarn to warp you inside of a cell. You get a timer (the 10 minutes you said or whatever) and afterwards you can walk around town without being able to be /warned again for an hour (tweakable) since you served your time. If you feel that sitting on your ass for 10 minutes is unnacceptable then you can leave the cell but a TEF gets activated and you have to fight through all the militiamen that can scramble for the prisonbreak.