Eco News

This week we’re going to take a break from Civics to talk about another feature coming up in Eco 9, the Ecopedia.



Jumping around in our schedule a bit, here’s the series so far:

1. New Government system: Constitution
2. New Government system: Elections and Elected Titles
3. New Government system: Demographics and Wages
   
4. New Government system: Laws Part 1: Using the system
   
5. New Government system: Laws Part 2: Taxes, Ownership, Property, and Wealth
   
6. New Government system: Laws Part 3: Tour of different actions, and Executive Actions
   
7. New Government system: Districts
   
8. New Crafting: Work Parties
   
9. New Crafting: Labor System
   
10. New Crafting: Modules and Efficiency Redesign
    
11. New Crafting: New Tech Tree
    
12. New Building System: Hammer and new Building Styles
    
13. New Mining System: Mineral Dispersion and Drill Usage
    
14. New Mining System: New Processing Path and Pollution Info
    
15. New Animal System: Attacking Animals
    
16. New Ecopedia System (This blog)
17. New UI
    
18. New Audio
    
19. New Hosted Worlds System

[h2]Ecopedia[/h2]
The game has grown in complexity over the years, and it’s with Eco 9.0 we're putting in a lot of love to assist that learning curve with the Ecopedia.

Eco is a game about ideas, and we wanted to make something special that explains those ideas, so we’ve created a comprehensive guide that explains everything in the game, from ‘Getting Started’ to the major concepts of the game, to getting help on specific objects, to a reference of all the items (both natural and player created) in the game.

This is especially useful for civics, as we’ve added a lot of new parts that can get complex, so having the Ecopedia as support is critical to allowing users to get the most out of it.





In the ‘components’ section, we describe each component in the game and how to operate it, giving examples of the interface:



The Reference section shows all the items and objects in the game.



I especially like the selection animation our developer Sergey added when you change pages:



In the World Index, you can see all the citizen-created items, a list of each entity in the game, where you can get tooltips to get more details.



And on top of that, its really easy to add mods to this. A custom server can simply drop in an XML page and all citizens will get that in their Ecopedia when they connect to the server.

We’ve made getting to these help pages easy, each tooltip that has an associated Ecopedia page will have a button in the tooltip, like in the top right here:



And on each component here:



With these changes we’ve made it significantly easier to understand the features of Eco, especially the new forthcoming features in the 9.0 update. One thing we’ve heard a lot of feedback on during Early Access is the learning curve of the game, and this should give a big boost towards understanding how all the systems of Eco work together and how citizens can use them to achieve success. It also sets us up for the future as we add more and varied systems, and lets server owners have complex modding cases that can be properly explained to players.

As always catch me and the team in our Discord or email me, always great to hear feedback from players, the community is really the heart of what makes this game awesome and we’re grateful to have such an amazing and supportive one.

- John K, Eco Designer, CEO Strange Loop Games

Hi citizens, our Eco 9 series continues with a look at Elections and Elected Titles:

1. New Government system: Constitution
2. New Government system: Elections and Elected Titles (This blog)
3. New Government system: Demographics and Wages
   
4. New Government system: Laws Part 1: Using the system
   
5. New Government system: Laws Part 2: Taxes, Ownership, Property, and Wealth
   
6. New Government system: Laws Part 3: Tour of different actions, and Executive Actions
   
7. New Government system: Districts
   
8. New Crafting: Work Parties
   
9. New Crafting: Labor System
   
10. New Crafting: Modules and Efficiency Redesign
    
11. New Crafting: New Tech Tree
    
12. New Building System: Hammer and new Building Styles
    
13. New Mining System: Mineral Dispersion and Drill Usage
    
14. New Mining System: New Processing Path and Pollution Info
    
15. New Animal System: Attacking Animals
    
16. New Ecopedia System
    
17. New UI
    
18. New Audio
    
19. New Hosted Worlds System

[h2]Elections[/h2]


Elections are one of the most fundamental parts of a democracy, and with 9.0 we're adding a lot of flexibility for how they can be used (or not used at all, if you’re more into the dictatorship thing). Prior to Eco 9, elections in Eco were only used to elect the World Leader – with 9.0, they can be used to make virtually any civic decision as well as elect player-defined Elected Titles. This means no more single world leader, but potentially a whole slew of different elected leaders, each with different responsibilities. Polling the populace can now be a core way that a world makes decisions.

Elections are tied to Civic Actions, which are things Citizens can do that affect the government, in a way defined by the Constitution (see last week’s blog). An example of some of the civic actions you can perform in the game:

• Add, change, or remove a civic object (law, civic article, demographic, elected title, election process, etc).
  
• Perform an Executive Action (ie, tax all players with time in world > 5 days).
  
• Remove a leader from office

Elections are started automatically based on the rules of the Constitution. The constitution sets which actions need an election to pass, and who can propose it. Every civic object contains a handy list of what privileges you get from the constitution at the top, so you can always tell what you’re able to do, in the form of your civic duties:

Here's what your civic duties might look like on a court, for example:



You can see it outlines all the things you can do there, as well as the articles of the constitution that give you that right.

You can also see all your civic duties for every type of civic object in the government menu:



Then when you edit a law, it will go to election:



From there, everyone gets notified in their new notification tab:



Then voting can happen by visiting any ballot box (or just going to the web ui of the server):





On the webpage, you can review the proposal, see the current votes and election details, and participate in discussions about the election.



Each election has a forum attached, where you can add graphs and maps arguing for your point of view. Arguments can easily be rooted in actual data from the world, encouraging citizens to formulate and debate using scientific reasoning.



Once the election is finished, the law will either pass or fail. If it fails, it can be edited and resubmitted.

[h2]Election Processes[/h2]
So the way each election works is also something that can be determined by citizens. In fact, the election process is simply another civics object that can be changed, either by fiat or election, depending on what’s in the constitution. You can create these at a Board of Elections object:



Each Election Process defines a set of properties for how the election works, from basics like who can vote and veto, to advance rules like how often the election may occur.



As with every feature in Eco 9, we’ve added popup help text to everything, with the aim to create powerful features that allow for complex societies but are still easily accessed and understood by everyone.



Election Processes let you do cool things like design different tiers of government, creating representatives who are elected and then are permitted to vote on laws (you would create one type of election for choosing representatives, and another for letting them change laws). You can add protections in the form of vetoes that are limited to a subset of leaders, and determine how rapidly you want elections to happen and finish, balancing stability of government with adaptability to changing conditions.

[h2]Elected Titles[/h2]
Before this update, there was only one elected title for everyone to fight over, that of the world leader, and they had tremendous power. This didn’t allow much flexibility in leadership, and would easily lead to a crisis if that leader ‘went rogue’ or left. Now you can create many titles, and divvy up powers for them in many different ways. To add a new Elected Title, you can set them at a Government Office:



Each position has a big set of properties that can be used to configure how the elected title works. You can pick the Election Process that elects the leader, decide who can run, requirements of candidates, etc. Positions can be held by multiple people, and a variety of privileges can be assigned to the office holders.

Here's a look at the properties that players get to configure:



You can see above that each position has special privileges to some government features, like adding global markers (markers in the world that everyone can see), setting tax rates in the treasury for things like sales, fees, and contracts, and creating and managing government bank accounts. Lots of power, which is wise to divy up accordingly.

Elected Titles can be specified anywhere you pick a citizen, and this is how you give special access to the leaders you choose. For example, we can go back to our election process described above and revise it to give this Minister of Finance special veto powers:



As you can see here, you can select options that are currently in a draft form, or under election, and if/when they become active they will automatically take effect in the new setting (but not before then). This allows you to compose a set of civic objects that reference each other and get them all passed simultaneously, instead of having to wait for them to each pass before you can set the next one.

Once the position is added, you can then start elections and enter them as a candidate from a ballot box:





Then let the campaign begin! Citizens can vote in the election at a ballot box in the same manner as described above:



The critical difference with elections for positions is that voting is performed using Ranked Choice Voting, which allows citizens to choose the order of preference of candidates, instead of selecting a single candidate. This has a number of positive effects on elections, especially when there are many candidates running: you don’t have to commit solely to the candidate you think will win but can choose your favorite preference and select a separate one as your second/third/fourth/etc choice. Then if your main choice doesn’t win, your vote goes to your next preference.

[h2]Connecting it All Together[/h2]
These three parts of the system: elections, election processes, and elected titles really shine when connected all together and to the rest of the game. One of the most difficult problems of building a society is giving power and flexibility to act quickly in a way isn’t destabilizing. By carefully defining how decisions are made, who makes them, and giving lots of checks and balances that ensure those decisions stay positive for society, you can craft a government that can last the ages and successfully steward your society to success in the race against the meteor, while preserving the ecosystem upon which the populace depends.

There are lots more civic objects that get added to the mix and make this even more powerful including districts, demographics, executive actions, and especially laws.

Stay tuned for future blog posts on them. Public playtests of Eco 9 are starting! Chat to D3nnis3n, our community manager in our Discord server if you’re interested in helping out.

No stream this week, but expect a double feature next week. Chat soon and can’t wait to see what people build with our new systems, and always feel free to send me and the team feedback.



- John K, Eco Designer, CEO Strange Loop Games

Hey Eco citizens, we’ve been heads-down working on getting Eco 9.0 ready and it’s getting close, REAL close, date to be announced soon! Don't miss todays stream at 2pm PST / 23:00 CEST (in about two hours from the time of publishing this blog). One of the main focuses of this update is the government system.



So to start the hype train up for 9.0 (choo-choo) we’re starting a series of blogs and streams, launched each week on Friday. We have a LOT to share, here’s the tentative blog and demo schedule:

1. New Government system: Constitution (This blog)
2. New Government system: Elections and Elected Titles
   
3. New Government system: Demographics and Wages
   
4. New Government system: Laws Part 1: Using the system
   
5. New Government system: Laws Part 2: Taxes, Ownership, Property, and Wealth
   
6. New Government system: Laws Part 3: Tour of different actions, and Executive Actions
   
7. New Government system: Districts
   
8. New Crafting: Work Parties
   
9. New Crafting: Labor System
   
10. New Crafting: Modules and Efficiency Redesign
    
11. New Crafting: New Tech Tree
    
12. New Building System: Hammer and new Building Styles
    
13. New Mining System: Mineral Dispersion and Drill Usage
    
14. New Mining System: New Processing Path and Pollution Info
    
15. New Animal System: Attacking Animals
    
16. New Ecopedia System
    
17. New UI
    
18. New Audio
    
19. New Hosted Worlds System

We’ll be releasing Eco 9 somewhere in this lineup, and then keep going. So start us off, here’s the details on one of the cornerstones of the new update, the Constitution.


Prior to Eco 9, the government was a fill-in-the-blanks affair, you can create very custom laws of course, but the workings of the government – how elections are held, what powers leaders have, how decisions are made – was largely hard-coded. No longer with Eco 9. To start a new government, you’ll need to build a Capitol:



By opening up this object you’ll get access to a Constitution:



In Eco 9, there is no government until a constitution is ratified – this is the first piece that must be created for a government to exist, and it defines how the government will work. So players will not only run their own government, but design it as well.

How does that work? Through the addition of Civic Articles.



A Constitution in Eco is basically a list of Civic Articles, and each Article designates how something works in the government. In the example above, this Civic Article defines how laws are created. Row by row, you can see the settings that can be configured. First, what it applies to (laws), then what types of laws, which can be several options:



You can also set the specific actions which are regulated by this civic article, if you want to get really detailed:



The bottom three settings, Executors, Proposers, and Election Process, determine how the law is created or changed.

• If you’re an Executor, you can add, remove, or change laws at any time. In the example I’ve set myself as this of course (promise I won’t let the power go to my head).
  
• If you’re a Proposed, you can start an Election to add, remove, or change laws.
  
• That election will be run using the specified Election Process.

Stay tuned for a future blog on how election processes work, but basically they allow you to define all the specifics about how an election works, and you can have many different types of elections in a single world.

So in this example above, laws are either created by me by fiat, or through a Basic Election which can be proposed by Everyone. That ‘Everyone’ tag is an expanded Demographic feature and can be defined by citizens as well. There’s a few that come with every world for convenience. This lets you divided up the populace in various useful ways and use it for anything government related, from Constitutions to laws to taxes and more. I’ll post more on that in a future update.



So that’s a single Civic Article, but a typical Constitution will have 8-10, designating powers for all the different government features. So as not to overwhelm, we create a default set of these that work pretty well, with everything requiring elections, and let the founding citizens customize it. Here’s a zoomed out look at a few more default articles:



I’ll go into how these other government features work in a future update, but I do want to explain how one special civic object works, Amendments. These are created on a separate Amendments object, and represent Civic Articles added after the Constitution is created, allowing citizens to make changes to the government as needed.

Once a Constitution is ratified, you can no longer edit it, thus to make changes you must create amendments. An amendment is just like a civic article, but it can specify existing articles to replace. Say, for example, I went mad with power to enact any law I wanted, and that power needed to be removed. Citizens could create an amendment like so (ignore the in-progress UI art, still finishing that):



This amendment removes the existing Law Changes By Election article I showed above, and replaces it with one that has no executors, meaning the only way to make a change at all is by a Basic Election, and changes proposers from Everyone to Active, which is a subset of players who play frequently. This amendment can then be put forth in an election, and if it passes, it will replace the old one, which will then look like so on the Constitution:



It's still in the Constitution, just crossed out and no longer has an effect! If something were to happen to the amendment, however, say it was repealed, then this civic article would come back into effect. Using these tools, citizens have the ability to change their government to better suit a changing society. Anticipating all the challenges a population will face in the future is a monumentally hard task, and citizens that allow for changes to their original decisions, and a defined-process for how to make them, will have a lot more flexibility in adapting and changing the government to suit the current needs.

Of course, it comes with dangers as well: a populace can make ill-advised changes that can create terrible circumstances as well. Designing the government to both stay powerful over the tests of time while also being flexible enough to changing needs will be a major challenge. Much debate should ensue as citizens design their initial governments.

[h2]Ratification[/h2]
Lastly, a tour about Ratification. In order to take effect, a constitution must be ratified, that is, it will be put to vote in a Basic Election. It will not take effect until this election has successfully passed, meaning the constitution must reflect the will of a majority of the people to start. From then on, the Constitution will remain in effect, as long as the building that holds it stands and remains a valid room.

However, there is a safety mechanism to a rule of law that no longer serves the people: citizens can organize to overthrow the government. This is accomplished by building a second capitol which is grander than the first – meaning, it has a higher room value by 50%. The Constitution in this second capitol will then show if it can overthrow the existing one:



Here, 'Constitution the Sequel' has a higher value than the current government, and can thus overthrow the existing government if it passes the ratification election. This allows citizens a way to finally overcome a government that is too limiting, if none of the measures of change within the existing government (amendments, etc) are proving sufficient.

[h2]Government Beginnings[/h2]
Building a constitution sets the rules for how your growing society will function, and designing the inner-workings can lead to incredibly different styles of government. Over the coming weeks, we’ll give examples of those different kinds of government, and all the parts that can go into creating a diverse set of rules to suit the people’s needs.

This has been something I’ve been excited to get into Eco from the beginnings, and forms a key part of the philosophy of the game, which is that the government is one with the people, they create it, they run it, they are it, and they have no one to blame but themselves if it becomes malignant. By allowing the government to be essentially programmed by its citizens, Eco provides a super valuable tool, and creates an event that, within the context of the game, is historic: the formation of the government. In a world that you invest in, care about, and hope to save, that can be an incredibly powerful moment, and the thoughtful discussions, plans, and forethought among players that goes into that is what Eco is all about.

Stay tuned for more, and follow us on Twitch, YouTube, or Facebook to see the streams I’ll do along with these blogs, where you can ask questions too. Can’t wait to see the governments people design and run with this system when we launch Eco 9.

- John K, Eco Designer, CEO Strange Loop Games

As we are approaching release, the first of a series of livestreams about the upcoming Update 9.0 will start this Friday, 2pm Pacific Time (23:00 Central European Time). We'll be showing everything you need to know about the new Constitutions feature and answering all questions about this feature you may have.



The stream will be broadcasted mainly on Twitch, but will also be available on our YouTube channel and Facebook page. Additionally we try to stream it directly here on steam.

For those that are not able to watch the stream live, we'll be uploading an edited version to our YouTube channel on the weekend.

We have released Patch 0.8.3.3 with the following small hotfixes:

Bugfixes

• Fixed an issue with money transfers not working if some accounts in the list have special symbols in their names.
  
• Temporarily removed "Exclusive Full Screen" mode from the game due to it crashing on some user configurations. (Will be reintroduced after Unity has released a fix)