Impeachment of a Guild Master

[Easton]

It would be nice to have a sort of "vice guild leader".

Someone who is picked to replace the guild leader if somethign were to happen. [to give an example: there is an RL problem with the guild leader so he has a trusted person to take over in his lead. But i have no idea how this should be run.

But really, I think that each guild leader should be smart. If they want to be safe, they should give one person the permission to edit permissions. this way they can at least get some basic things done if the actual leader is incapacitated. I know a guild who has lots its leader for a while now, and they are stuck not being able to invite new people to the guild because they do not have the permission. if only they had the edit permissions option, they could at least keep the guild with sufficient numbers.

Easton Ghent

[Pestilence]

@zanzibar

That happens in reallife aswell? When? I have never seen that a overtaker declared that 95% of an organization wasn't a member anymore and then declare himself leader of the organization with just the flick of a few buttons. If someone would try that normally the 95% would laugh in his face and declare him a fool.

The few cases I can imagine somewhat resembling this would be when force is used to supress the opisition and although this may be an option it is in no way easy and more often fails then succeeds.

I haven't seen any system where there aren't huge holes in how this will be used OOC. As I said RPwise I think it should be possible. But Gamemechanicwise it's just not that simple.

[zanzibar]

@zanzibar

That happens in reallife aswell? When? I have never seen that a overtaker declared that 95% of an organization wasn't a member anymore and then declare himself leader of the organization with just the flick of a few buttons. If someone would try that normally the 95% would laugh in his face and declare him a fool.

The few cases I can imagine somewhat resembling this would be when force is used to supress the opisition and although this may be an option it is in no way easy and more often fails then succeeds.

I haven't seen any system where there aren't huge holes in how this will be used OOC. As I said RPwise I think it should be possible. But Gamemechanicwise it's just not that simple.

Committees, governments, boards, and councils.  Underhanded dealings, betrayals, and people stabbing eachother in the back for the sake of personal gain is not limited to the RPG universe.

Let's say you're part of a board that elects a director for something like a summer camp.  Let's say that you want the camp to move in a particular direction and you have a director in mind.  What someone might do is:

- find reasons to kick people off the board who don't think like you
- get elected to the board people you can control
then:
- schedule the meeting for a time which is inconvenient for everyone except you and your friends
- make sure that all your friends on the board are aware of the meeting where the director will be elected
- don't bother to tell the rest of the board about the meeting if quorum has been met

1)Maybe instead of paying 20k to make a guild, maybe it could be that when you reach a certain power level (Like the system monitoring your damage) and maybe if you once do more than 300 damage or something,2) you can go to some NPC, ask him for a form to fill out to make a guild, and Whala, a guild is formed. 3)And if you go to the NPC too early, he says "You don't look strong enough to be a leader yet... I don't think you'll make it "
That's my 3 tria for THAT. 

Oh dear.

Yes, I can hit for 300, therefore I get a discount when making guilds!  It makes perfect sense!

And yes, strength!  The only kind of strength which is important in a social context is how hard you can hit!

[Pestilence]

True but I'm not saying that it shouldn't be possible Zazibar I'm saying I don't see a system that represents the effort it would take to overthrow someone and would also be fair.

I mean for example
- find reasons to kick people off the board who don't think like you
- get elected to the board people you can control

These things you can already do and are already done you don't need a gamemechanic for that. The question here is how a gamemechanic should work to remove a guildleader without his cooperation. If for example you are sure noone is kicked out a council without having to find reason you could have an election about it, but with it being only a press of a button the person doesn't need a reason exept that he finds the button so aluring so voting doesn't work in my opinion.

The problem is that gamemechanics are absolute. In RL there are many shades of how you can do things and how people can respond to it even outside the rules. In RP you can find this.

[Kerol]

Oh dear.

Yes, I can hit for 300, therefore I get a discount when making guilds!  It makes perfect sense!

And yes, strength!  The only kind of strength which is important in a social context is how hard you can hit!

I'm about to start loving your irony, Zanz   

I dislike the idea of having a guild restriction based on stats, too. It would _so_ promote powerleveling and discourage RP at the same time.
However, I'm not for the impeachment idea at first hand because it's possible in RL to kick peoples butts, betray and powerstruggle; all that could be RPed out. As said, I find it more important to have that option for OOC reasons. If it can be used for RP, the better

To be true, I haven't thoroughly thought about the pros and cons of the vize leader idea, yet. Wouldn't an impeachment system make having a vize leader redundant? Just pondering..

[Pestilence]

Vice-leader who can in some cases impeach a guildleader

Pros I see: You can get rid of inactive guildleaders

Cons: OOC-misuse: From Guildleaders who don't appoint one or one of their alts so they can't be impeached. To Vice-leaders who deletes all members exept himself to be the only one who is able to vote for the impeachement when he knows the guildleader is on vacation.

[zanzibar]

Oh dear.

Yes, I can hit for 300, therefore I get a discount when making guilds!  It makes perfect sense!

And yes, strength!  The only kind of strength which is important in a social context is how hard you can hit!

I'm about to start loving your irony, Zanz   

I dislike the idea of having a guild restriction based on stats, too. It would _so_ promote powerleveling and discourage RP at the same time.
However, I'm not for the impeachment idea at first hand because it's possible in RL to kick peoples butts, betray and powerstruggle; all that could be RPed out. As said, I find it more important to have that option for OOC reasons. If it can be used for RP, the better

To be true, I haven't thoroughly thought about the pros and cons of the vize leader idea, yet. Wouldn't an impeachment system make having a vize leader redundant? Just pondering..

You either insulted me, or misused the word "irony".

The problem with RPing a takeover of a guild is that everyone "involved" at the top has to consent to it.  You're basically forcing everyone in a position of power to be the "dungeon master", so they can't really enjoy things unless they're the kind of person who enjoys writing out a script then acting it out online.

[Robinmagus]

You either insulted me, or misused the word "irony".

I think he misused irony

[ThomPhoenix]

Having a kind of vote system in the guild would be cool. You would be able to hold simple polls about guild decisions. But also polls which will actually affect the guild. The second in command would be able to hold a poll about betraying the guild leader, if the poll would succeed the guild leader would be auto-booted out of the guild, if it failed the second in command would be auto-booted out of the guild.

[I'd really like this myself, adds realism, but also avoids problems with inactive members. I'm in a guild myself were the guild leader just quit playing PS. I'm second in command so I can still do everything, but I'd really like to be able to set up alliances and such and have the rank for RP reasons. One option is this system, another option is me tracing him down and prod him about making me leader]

Another option is making a official second in command or "vice president". If the guild master hasn't come online for 2 months, all power is transferred to second in command.

Impeachment would be handy in both RP and RL situations.

[Pestilence]

I think noone seems to really think it's a bad idea for it to be possible. The big question however is how? With a vote? or a vicelader that can take control when the leader hasn't been on for a certain amount of time? And how do we make sure misuse doesn't happen.

Personally I like the idea of a vote for when the guildleader has not been on his account for something like two/three months. For thhis to work however I would think that deletions should be disabled while the vote is taking place so you don't get strange OOC behavior. Would still allow alert viceleaders to delete people just before the vote ofcourse but atleast then he wouldn't be sure the vote would actually start and would have some trouble if the guildleader returns before the deadline. I also said last on the account for a reason and not last on that character as that way the viceleader couldn't be tottaly sure when the deadline would be.

Perhaps make the vote a little random having the vote start +/-5 days from the deadline to make it even more unpredictable.

[zanzibar]

Maybe there could be different things you could vote for as part of the game mechanics.

Maybe there could be different kinds of guilds (totalitarian, tribal, egalitarian).

Then, different kinds of guilds could have different things members could vote for. 

[Kerol]

Maybe there could be different things you could vote for as part of the game mechanics.

Maybe there could be different kinds of guilds (totalitarian, tribal, egalitarian).

Then, different kinds of guilds could have different things members could vote for.

Agree on the first sentence, disagree with the third.

This would fix guilds beforehand in their structure, making internal changes unnecessary difficult.

I disagree also with the proposal of Pestilence, to record the off-time of the leader and base the voting on that.
If the leader got banned or left for good, so there is little chance that he will come back to change guildstuff, there is no reason to wait for 2 months or longer, as it is already clear that he won't come back.

I propose following system:

The voting system is used to overrule any privilige a leader has (name of the guild, motd, secrecy, changing privileges, alliances and war, promoting somebody to any level including lvl 9 (exchanging the leader = impeachment).

Anyone opens a voting (maybe it is best to restrict the possibility to open votings by setting a privilege for it, even if it sounds strange).
A dialogue pops up, to choose the purpose of the voting, looking like this:

[ ] toggle secrecy
[ ] change guildname to .........
[ ] propose *somebody* else for *level*               #*somebody* is a list of members, *level* a list of the guildlevels
[ ] change motd to ......
[ ] propose alliance with ...
[ ] propose war with ....

(changing priviliges dont look that easy on first glance)

One can only choose one item and also has to choose the deadline (minimum should be fixed to 3 days =72 hours).
When the voting has started, an email automatically is sent to each account of the guildmembers, stating the deadline of the voting and the item.
While the voting is running, a popup opens for a guildmember who logs on with the voting and the possibility to vote with yay, nay and abstain if he hasn't voted yet.
All Yay and Nay votes are counted while the voting is running, only the votes cast are counted, the maximum number of members in the guild are disregarded as there can be a lot of inactive people.
On the deadline, the system counts the votes. If the yay votes are over a given (percentage) line, the system automatically executes the item of the vote. If the yay votes are not over the given percentage, the system doesn't execute the item.
For both possible results (50-50 votes should be counted as nay, i think) another automatic email is sent to the emails associated with the accounts of the members, stating the result.

I propose to set the percentage limit to 50% per default but can be changed by the leader in a range of, let's say 30% to 70%.
A totalitarian leader would set the percentage to max in order to make it as hard as possible to get kicked, an egalitarian leader would set the percentage to min because he wouldn't have to fear opposition.

This system would make it possible to restrict the ability to open votings to only one level, which can pretty much be seen as choosing a vize leader.
Of course, it should be discouraged to think that one can live without and not allowing anyone to open votings as it would create the situation we have today.
This system allows the use in egalitarian guildsystems as regular means to change things by direct democracy, and by setting the percentage limit to max it serves the impeachment function in totalitarian systems.

[Pestilence]

Well if someone is banned ofcourse an exeption can be made but it that case asking a GM is already an option is it not? I mean I hope that wouldn't happen so often one would have to make that the main argument for something like this.

As for leaving. Normally the problem is that the guildleader left without telling so you don't know that he really left till he is really gone for a while. If that happens the members will normally wait a while to see whats up anyhow so 2 months isn't that long really.Specially if the members know that vote is coming

OK

scenario 1: Viceleader wants control. He waits till the leader goes on vacation deletes all members exept himself and the guildleader ofcourse and starts the vote. He is the only member who can vote he wins

scenario 2: active guildleader is being a jerk and someone starts a vote. The guiildleader deletes all oposing and uses his alts to win the vote using multible accounts. (4 per account wouldn't take him that much effort)

Scenario 3: viceleader wants control. He somehow is prevented from deleting. He "recruits" several alts and wins the vote. He takes the privilidge to start a vote away from anyone but his alts.

As I said I like the idea but how do you stop things like massdeletions and massaltrecruiting? I mean these are extreme examples but getting in a few alts to make sure votes go your way I fear will be comon practice this way.

And how do you make sure the leaders don't change things like the guildname right back after the vote? I mean if they agreed their wouldn't be a vote afterall.

I mean in democratic guilds this might not be a real big problem, but I don't think those guilds need this gamemechanic as much as the guilds where the leader keeps all the power to him/herself. And in those guilds the leader might not even give anyone the priviledge to start a vote or give it to an alt.

[Kerol]

As I said I like the idea but how do you stop things like massdeletions and massaltrecruiting? I mean these are extreme examples but getting in a few alts to make sure votes go your way I fear will be comon practice this way.

A leader who would do that won't be leader for much longer, as his members will just leave the guild.
If you try to overrule a leader by such unfair OOC means you will have to expect him to react accordingly by kicking you off the guild, for instance.
You, as leader, wouldn't allow your members the possibility to vote with the minimum limit and giving everyone the "right" to open a voting, if you don't trust your members that they won't do anything that appearantly is against your mind.
If you don't trust your members in that case, you need to raise the limits, that simple. A voting that appearantly is against the leaders mind won't have any chance if the leader wasn't able (by checking the mail and getting ingame) to react accordingly. He can undo every possibility in voting, except an "impeachment".

Edit:

I mean in democratic guilds this might not be a real big problem, but I don't think those guilds need this gamemechanic as much as the guilds where the leader keeps all the power to him/herself. And in those guilds the leader might not even give anyone the priviledge to start a vote or give it to an alt.

Programmers try all the time to create fool-proove programs.. the universe tries all the time to create greater fools.. so far the universe is winning the race..

[Pestilence]

*laughs*

True indeed, but I think these are pretty big holes. Trying to make it fullproof will obviously not happen as I know what I suggested still has big holes aswell, but you should never make things to easy or appealing to cheat a little.

I mean the votes about all the other things I don't think need high security, but impeaching someone shouldn't be something easely manipulated as it's not something that can be simply reversed and affects the whole guild.