Hello there o/ ,

I have a rough draft for a browser game and trying to finalize details. I have a problem about political system, first in order to give brief information,

- There are two systems, first one is presidential second is parliamentary.

- Each country have regions where a regional governance consisted of elected mayor and council members in addition to a governor appointed by government is present.

- Presidential system gives president (elected by citizens) more authority but regions have more autonomy

- Parliamentary system gives prime minister (elected by deputies) less power but regions have less autonomy, central government interferes more.

- I intend to implement a preferential vote in case of tie, mayor's if presidential, governor's if parliamentary.

My current problem is to figure out how to set jurisdiction of government and city council especially for a scenario mayor is hostile against government.

For example, what would be appropriate for constructing a military base in a region? If it's fully at mayor's discretion, it will be rejected. If government can force for anything, it tampers autonomy and open to exploitation. What would best course ( composition of decisive authority ? ) be?

Thanks in advance

Sorry, I am really trying to figure out what you're asking.

Didn't realize question was cryptic :) Let me try again :)

- Each country has government (which may have one of two types Presidential or Parliamentary) and each country is consisted of regions where each region has a governance consisted of Mayor, city council and governor appointed by government

- Basically Presidential system grants more autonomy to regional governance while parliamentary is more central oriented.

Problem here is mayor is elected by residents (who aren't necessarily citizens or disciples of government) ,for example Country A invaded Region X of Country B, in such case mayor isn't expected to be fond of invading government.

Question is :) In such scenario, what would best course be for deciding who decides what to do in a region (for example a military base) both from presidential and parliamentary point of views?

k, I'm going to try my best here. Can you clarify a few terms you use for me.

Mayor: what is a mayor's obedience and autonomy to each form of government, presidential and parliamentary?
City Council: what is a city councils obedience and autonomy to each form of government, presidential and parliamentary?

Governor: what is a governors obedience and autonomy to each form of government, presidential and parliamentary?

Apart from the differences between how a Mayor, City Council and Governor interact with the government, are there any other differences between the three and why would a player choose one over the other?

I think maybe the terms you use have a lot more meaning to you and others with a similar education, but to me it's like asking

"If Zolts and Bops want to build a Military base and Glibs don't like Cups and Zolts do like Cups then what course of action should Cups take ??"

So you're basically describing a system with multiple independent AI controllers, and asking which AI should ultimately issue the commands?

I'd suggest that each AI be given a weight of importance. The local AI has a strong weight for issues relating to itself, the parliamentary AI is made up of many local AI and could take the most popular option among them, and the presidential AI could take consider a small weight to affects within the nation but a high weight for effects outside the nation. Whichever combination has the highest weight for the decision is the one that happens.

The AI decisions don't need to be particularly complex. The local AIs and the Presidential AI each could check how a few variables compare to a few other variables and return their decision and their weight. The parliament counts the number of each decision and takes the biggest.

Ok :)

First Disclaimer : It's a browser game where every citizen is a player; therefore mayor, governor or council members (ofc also congressmen , president et al) are real players and all of them exists in political system.

Mayor / City Council : Mayor is elected by residents of region (with citizenship of Country A (core region) and Country B (invaders)) and head of regional governance. City Council is also elected by residents and it is practically regional governance. Both Mayor and City Council is strictly about in-region affairs. (Building stuff (roads etc), zoning , utilities (power, garbage etc) . Sometimes it also involves money transfer from/to government.

Governor : Governor is appointed by government and represents government's interests in region and has vote in City Council. Also governor has direct authority and responsibility about regions defence (in order to avoid a rogue mayor blowing it)

(According to current plan) In presidential system, region has more share in revenue split (aka taxes) between region and government in comparison to parliamentary system. Also Governor doesn't have preferential vote over Mayor unlike Parliamentary system.

In hypothetical case of "Country A invades Region X of Country B";

Mayor doesn't want a more powerful Country A military presence that would be against Country B when trying to get region back. But if we give government absolute authority, then they may intentionally "ruin" some regions.

Maybe there can also be involvement of congress/parliament in such case ? :)

Ok, I have come up with a solution making sense technically but not sure if it does realistically :) I'd like to hear your opinion

There are 5 tiers of region based on population ( Town - Large Town - City - Large City - Metropolis ) and higher tier has more influence on outcome.

It's something like

Tier - Congress vote veight - Local governance vote weight

Metropolis - 0% - 100%

Large City - 25% - 75%

City - 50% - 50%

Large Town - 75% - 25%

Town - 100% - 0%

Calculation is easy : if total of (weight * percentage of yes votes) >= 50 then it's passed.

Problem is I seriously doubt such political mechanism existed ever :) and doubt it makes sense :/

Important question, do countries in your game are real or fictional? If real then you can ignore the local government vs central government disagreement because player's motivation would be patriotism and a mayor who does not support the country would not get any votes and lose the office.

I have made a game with similar dynamics (Europe1300) and always there was a strong focus of players on wellbeing of their country. Countires acted as a single body with very low internal problems and power struggles. A single persona (sometimes with a second person very near and they shared responsibilities) was elected the king by popular voting and it never changed unless the ruler became inactive or resigned. The only exception was when some iberian kingdom was taken by English speaking players, when Spanish players came in, they populated the kingdom, overthrew the English speaking ruler and installed one of their kins :)

Well... countries in the game are real but,

In a scenario that Country A invades Region X of Country B , considering mayor will be elected by votes of residents with Country A and B citizenships , it's very likely that there will be a conflict of interest between Mayor X and Government A. It needs a dramatic change in demographics in favor of invaders to replace mayor with a Country-A friendly one.

And yet another problem is PTO (Political Take Over) , a troll or rogue government may take place and ruin regions intentionally.

So, unfortunately need a mechanic governing this. But apparently I'll stick to either vote weight as outlined above or simply a table like

Tier - Who decides at presidential system? - Who decides at parliamentary system?

Metropolis - Local govt. - Local govt.

Large City - Local govt. - Parliament

City - Congress - Parliament

Large Town - Congress - Parliament

Town - President - Government

but still I am open to suggestion :)

Well... countries in the game are real but,

In a scenario that Country A invades Region X of Country B , considering mayor will be elected by votes of residents with Country A and B citizenships , it's very likely that there will be a conflict of interest between Mayor X and Government A. It needs a dramatic change in demographics in favor of invaders to replace mayor with a Country-A friendly one.

Ugh... so players are tied to regions and the game might force them to switch countries... Are you sure you want to do it?

Why any country would want to invade regions then? Since it grants citizenship to the enemy they might take over their country from inside...

It should be another way, citizenship is fixed, region provides resources. Citizens of a country that won a war gets riches (their country got a new region).

Also think about communication channels (critical for such a game). Is there a country chat/forum? What happens when player's region got conquered, do they move to another chat (which they do not understand since it's populated by players who speak another language)?