New official NPC thread (August polls coming, campaigning open)

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Quick clarification: do the campaigns done by me and Scott count? If not, we can probably repost them.

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As Labor chair, I'll officially declare that due to their varied life experiences (which include being bullied or seeing people they care about being bullied due to their race) that no Labor governor will make a racist statement, due to it being directly against their moral philosophy.

I mean if LT can retcon the race of his candidate I should be able to do this, no?

[OBD]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Labor Party and Democratic Alliance have agreed to April NPC election Alliance

Leaders of the Labor Party and Democratic Alliance have agreed to the following conditions for the current cycle of NPC elections:

1.) Fusion tickets
- The Democratic Alliance and its candidate, Henry Edmondson, have agreed to withdraw from the Oklahoma Gubernatorial election. Edmondson will now join Labor nominee Hank Boomhauer on a Labor-DA ticket as its nominee for Lieutenant Governor.
- The Labor Party and its candidate, Judd Laurel, have agreed to withdraw from the Indiana Gubernatorial election. Laurel will now join Governor Peter Donnelly on a DA-Labor ticket as its nominee for Lieutenant Governor.

2.) Preferencing Arrangement
The Labor Party and Democratic Alliance have agreed to encourage our voters to second preference each other's candidates in applicable races during the March 2021 cycle.

This agreement will additionally be signed by Labor Party Chair Oregon Blue Dog and Democratic Alliance Chairman Weatherboy.

X ReaganClinton, Founder, Democratic Alliance

X OBD, Vice President and Labor Party Chair

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Clarification: is campaigning now closed?

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Couple questions:

1) are all the days being counted in Eastern Time?

2) are campaign limits still being enforced? And how are multiple campaigns that fit into one post counted?

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Are the parties not allowed only one event before Election Day, even if that one event includes multiple speeches from different people? Cao has posted several different events well past the deadline.

Peanut has not given any indication that he has changed Lumine's policy on that. As far as I am aware, Lumine has allowed events posted before midnight EST regardless of whether daylight savings was in operation.

Hopefully the GM can provide confirmation on this. Frankly as everyone is using daylight savings at this time it feels like these events were late to me, but up to Peanut I guess.

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The WAP (Lincoln Chapter) will be in coalition with Labor for all elections, in effect indefinitely.

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Looks aight.

My only concern is that Michael Engle (Fed-IA) is miscolored but otherwise I see nothing wrong with these polls.

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F

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F

Fear not! Here are the polls.
[/quote
G

[OBD]

Clarification requested, specifically regarding the campaign limit and time zones.

I have done 4 campaigns today, but if I post 4 more after 12AM EST I should be fine, right?

This seems pretty obvious but timezones are confusing me sorry

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Hate to be that guy but I’m pretty sure Poirot just violated the campaign limit in MA.

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Hate to be that guy but I’m pretty sure Poirot just violated the campaign limit in MA.

Is there actually a limit?

4 daily per person, imposed by Lumine. Labor has been abiding by this strictly so it would be quite alarming if the GM office decides to disregard it without warning.

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Hate to be that guy but I’m pretty sure Poirot just violated the campaign limit in MA.

Is there actually a limit?

4 daily per person, imposed by Lumine. Labor has been abiding by this strictly so it would be quite alarming if the GM office decides to disregard it without warning.

Poirot hadn’t broken the limit at the time you posted your initial complaint (though he has by now, of course):

RULES CHANGE FOR FEBRUARY

Brief Summary

A.- CAPS: We will experiment with the first attempt at party and personal caps to see its effects on the arms race, the system will be subject to changes depending on how well it works (or not). Current February caps are setat 80 events per party in total, and a personal limit of 5 per day.

Wait it was 5 the whole time!?!

Balls.

[OBD]

And I have been very lax with upper limits on campaigning this go-around. I've considered several variations on Lumine's limits, but none apply for March. We'll see if April brings changes to that.

Never saw anything further on this, so I assume it's still "very lax".

Regardless, rules are rules. I would appreciate some GM clarification on this next round, because I'd much rather have no campaign limits or campaign limits that are consistently enforced as this current limbo state can result in unfair situations where the misinterpretation or lack of rule enforcement leads to advantages for one party (clarification is probably needed on what counts as an event and how ads/fliers play in).

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ARE YOU READY FOR RESULTS? ? ? ?

Yes.

If this doesn't materialize tonight ur fired

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In the absence of results, I hereby use my authority as Vice President to declare every election a GLORIOUS LABOR LANDSLIDE!

Questions and comments will NOT be accepted!

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RED FREMONT RED FREMONT RED FREMONT POG

(guam is not included in this for promotional reasons)

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Are we still on track for the mid-turn update tomorrow?

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Having different systems for the states is pretty confusing. I personally think we should've stuck to what we were doing before

Seems to be more of a Lincoln thing than a Peanut thing here. Regardless of our personal opinions on this change, it's pretty clear Peanut is playing with the hand he was dealt by the General Court here.

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NJ campaigning closes in half an hour.

I was under the impression it would be midnight like everything else

How, when results are supposed to be out tonight? Anyways, your last few posts count. Did you have any more planned/written up? I wouldn't want to hurt you disproportionately, but I need to know before I compute results because I intended to do it early in the evening.

I mean considering everyone was caught off guard by this announcement (Personally I had to speedwrite an additional event in 15 minutes, and I was planning to do at least a few more events tonight) I don't think anyone was harmed disproportionately here.

[OBD]

NJ campaigning closes in half an hour.

I was under the impression it would be midnight like everything else

How, when results are supposed to be out tonight? Anyways, your last few posts count. Did you have any more planned/written up? I wouldn't want to hurt you disproportionately, but I need to know before I compute results because I intended to do it early in the evening.

I mean considering everyone was caught off guard by this announcement (Personally I had to speedwrite an additional event in 15 minutes, and I was planning to do at least a few more events tonight) I don't think anyone was harmed disproportionately here.

I was going to do some events tonight as was Ninja, so idk if Peanut wants to like, extend it so everyone has a bit more of a chance? It'd be a bit odd but so was that announcement being so close

It would be unfair to go back on this directive. Labor was also planning events tonight and we would have spent this interim period writing them, rather then pausing due to the campaign pause. While more advance notice would have been appreciated it is not fair to revert back now.

[OBD]

NJ campaigning closes in half an hour.

I was under the impression it would be midnight like everything else

How, when results are supposed to be out tonight? Anyways, your last few posts count. Did you have any more planned/written up? I wouldn't want to hurt you disproportionately, but I need to know before I compute results because I intended to do it early in the evening.

I mean considering everyone was caught off guard by this announcement (Personally I had to speedwrite an additional event in 15 minutes, and I was planning to do at least a few more events tonight) I don't think anyone was harmed disproportionately here.

I was going to do some events tonight as was Ninja, so idk if Peanut wants to like, extend it so everyone has a bit more of a chance? It'd be a bit odd but so was that announcement being so close

It would be unfair to go back on this directive. Labor was also planning events tonight and we would have spent this interim period writing them, rather then pausing due to the campaign pause. While more advance notice would have been appreciated it is not fair to revert back now.

In the end it's up to him I suppose

Indeed. It's my position though that this directive - while unexpected and slightly jarring - did not result in partisan advantage for one party, and should thus stand, but we'll see what Peanut has to say.

[OBD]

Post NJ Thoughts/Suggestions:
1. The timing debacle way unfortunate to say the least. I was under the impression that I had all night to do more events, then I find out its too late, and then you did extend it to 10 but by that point I had already given up and decided to do other things that evening. So please communicate deadlines well in advanced as much as possible.
2. I don't like or see the need for states to have any electoral system other than IRV. I'd say that in the case of NJ it just made the experience worse and provided nothing in return, unless you're a Laborite happy that it helped them. But from a general player's perspective, it took away a week of gameplay. It makes no sense to me that this was ever done. Lincoln, please repeal.
3. Defense is hard, and I don't think this is exclusive to any state or party. It just feels like its constant grasping at straws, because there's not much to go off of. You would think that you're campaigning on what your government accomplished but I have no idea what my government accomplished. I think this inherently makes offense the stronger position, because you can just campaign on whatever you want that way, and I wouldn't be surprised if we gain other seats while losing the seat we had to defend this month. Though I am not sure what solution to offer that doesn't involve writing longer summaries for each state.
4. NPC elections are at severe risk of becoming repetitive. Perhaps this is why Lincoln passed those other voting systems but it has utterly failed. It feels increasingly like a chore to churn out speeches over and over again now, so I personally don't have much motivation, and I don't think this is exclusive to me. Something has to change here.

Here are my thoughts on these points -

1. This is your point that I probably most agree with. While it doesn't appear to have affected the result significantly (and both parties probably lost out on potential events), I was definitely blindsided by both the suddenly imposed deadline and the subsequent 2-hour extension. Peanut's been good about giving us notice so far though so I think this was just a one-off blip. But in the future, advance notice for these things would definitely be appreciated - for instance, we could have been told the polls were closing at 8 EST yesterday morning.

2. I mean, this was kind of Lincoln's thing, and to be frank I wasn't even aware this went through until Ishan brought it up. I personally think it adds a little novelty to some elections, though I haven't seen enough data to determine whether it is good or bad overall. I think the parity issues this time - when NJ closed a few days earlier than expected - will be smoothed out when all competitors are aware of the new rules next cycle. Though I wouldn't object to the GM reiterating the new rules in the pre-election updates so my remaining brain cells don't have to do the rememberin' , and I will admit that more advance notice about New Jersey's new system would have also been appreciated.

3. This is one of two points I take object to. Obviously, defense is hard! That is built-in under all political alignments that are remotely modern, and I can testify that I have had much more trouble deciding what message to run on in states we held then states we're trying to pick up. And honestly, it rubs me the wrong way that you are complaining about this. Peanut literally threw the entire kitchen sink at our Utah government, forcing us to change horses and messaging mid-stream and throw more resources at the state then we did during the infamous Texan storm - and we did not complain about it! Relative to that, defending New Jersey was a walk in the park. Also it's worth mentioning that this literally does not create a competitive disadvantage. If anything, it harms Labor, who is consistently defending way more seats then y'all. You can't complain about a competitive wrinkle in one state and take advantage of it in three others.

4. NPC elections are most certainly not a failure. That is an insult to Peanut, Lumine, and everyone, on all sides, that has churned out massive effortspeeches to try and get victory for their parties. Maybe it is a chore to churn out speeches, but that. Is. Politics. You can't just expect us to hand Utah and New Jersey over on a silver platter. And, I am actually of the opinion that NPC elections have become less repetitive under Peanut (no offense, Lumine)! The new stories (and potentially game mechanics) have given us things to campaign on and have altered the campaigning landscape in interesting ways that we have to figure out how to handle/take advantage of. Yes, we could use a little more detail on what governments have done (though Peanut already does this for certain states like Texas and it can be inferred from government approvals). Yes, new mechanics like separating Governor and Legislature would also be nice to further reduce repetitiveness. But to imply that NPC elections have failed is entirely wrong, and based on what I'm seeing here seems to be based on partisan concerns. If you can't bring the heat, don't come into the kitchen.

[OBD]

Tbh OBD, you put words in other people's mouths enough during in-character campaigning.

Buddy, I play the game within the bounds set by the GM, and judging by the results thus far, I play it well. And I most certainly don't b*tch and moan at the GM when things don't go my way.