Bridge Over Troubled Water

I won't be able to post on the Quest3d website because I do not have the program, but I do have one suggestion for Bridge Over Troubled Water. The game does not have a Knesset that you have to worry about. I liked the Knesset in Conflict: MEPS. It showed that Israelis won't march in lockstep with the Prime Minister.

There are two ways to implement it, the easy way and the hard way. The easy way would be to have Knesset call a Vote of No Confidence on the Prime Minister if Israeli Public Opinion drops too low. The hard way would be to program in a Knesset with two major parties (Government and Opposition) and several minor parties that you have to sway with either
a) following their foriegn policy
b) giving them some money directed to their favorite pet projects

And the goal would be to manitan a coalition government for 15 turns until the next election (where you would hopefully trimpuh). If you fail to manitan a coalition government, a Vote of No Confidence is held, and you will be forced to resign.

In this idea, the parties would either indirectly be affected by popular opinion, or they will end up being able to sway popular opinion, based on the strength of the leadership of the party.

If you like the idea, I can elborate on it, but I won't be able to code it in. I could do research on the minor political parties, and then randomized could decide what political parties are allied to either the Government or the Opposition.
 

I left this reply on quest3d forums also, I saw you managed to post there too.

I like both ideas, especially the appeasement of minor parties inside the coalition.
I'm actually following another project, so I don't expect to make changes to the game soon.
However I always collect ideas for what might be a sequel, with more politics and less military tactics maybe. Unfortunately I didn't receive real reviews, so I just don't know what works and what doesn't from the players' point of view.
 

I cannot access the forum topic itself now though, so I assume access to quest3d is blocked off.

Well, I did post the link to an earlier version of Bridge Over Troubled Water, and they preferred the original better. This later version seems a bit more improved, but I haven't tested out the battle system yet. I may be thinking of doing an "Let's Play" of your game though...

Anyway, after thinking about it a little bit more, it would be better to not have "Government" and "Opposition" Parties, and rather just have the game randomly determine if each Israeli Party joins up with the Government or the Opposition.

What may be harder is determing how to program in the positions of the parties. Here's what I could suggest (by looking at Wikipedia), altough I realize they don't exactly fit the views of the parties in question:

*Kadima: 29 Seats
--Support Palestianian Independence
--Support Defense of Israel (waging wars against Middle East nations)

*Likud: 27 Seats
--Againist Palestianian Independence
--Support Defense of Israel (waging wars against Middle East nations)

*Labor Party: 13 Seats
--For Palestianian Independence
--Support Good Relations with All Middle Eastern Nations

*Religious Zionism Bloc, Composed of Shas (11 Seats) United Torah Judaism (5 Seats), The Jewish Home (3 Seats)
---Against Palestianian Independence
---Support Defense of Israel (waging war against Middle Eastnations)

*Left-wing Coalition [composed fo Hadash (5 Seats) and Meretz (3 Seats):
---For Palestiaian Independence
---Against Nuclear Weapons (I can only confirm that Hadash cares about this issue, according to Wikipedia)
---Against Invasion of Middle East Nations

*Yisrael Beiteinu (15 Seats):
---Support Palestiaian Independence, But With Some Major Preconditions (Such as stripping away citizenship of Israeli Arabs)
---Support Defense of Israel (waging war against Middle East nations)

*Israeli Arabs [composed of United Arab List (3 Seats), Balad (3 Seats)]
---Support Palestianian Independence
---Support Good Relations with All Middle East Nations
---Against Invasion of Middle East Nations

Altough, you may have to decide for yourself what minor parties to add. It might be better to take Likud and Kadmia out and replace them with a "Government" and "Opposition" Party, with the Government Party always loyal to you, and the Opposition Party always against you.
 

Another idea I have is having nations be able to respawn (thereby allowing for the game to be played past the first "mandate"). All governments except for Iran start out with the government type "Secular Dictatorship". Iran starts off as a "Islamist Republic". Once the country get destroyed, the country gets in the process of rebuilding itself for about 3 turns before it chooses a new leader, and a new government, allowing for you to interact with the new regime.
---If the Islamists launch a military coup, the country becomes an "Islamist Republic". The starting relationship between Israel and that country will start off very low.
---If the Democrats launch a military coup, the country becomes a "Democracy". The starting relationship between Israel and that country depends on the Popular Opinion within that country (if the people love Israel, then they'll vote in pro-Israeli politicans. If the people hate Israel, then they'll vote in anti-Israeli politicans).
---If there is a civil war between Democrats and Islamists, the Islamists win (there needs to be more penalities for allowing a civil war to occur on your watch). Alternatively, the game can randomly chooses between the Democrats, the Islamists, and the Secular Dictatorship.
---If the leader gets assassinated, the previous government carries over. So, if you assassinated the head of the Secular Dictatorship, the new government will also be a Secular Dictatorship.
---If you invade/nuke the country, the country becomes an "Israeli Puppet". The starting relationship between Israel and that country is very high. Also, you automatically enter into a military pact with the Israeli Puppet (since the puppet has to depend on you to survive). However, an Israeli Puppet will have to deal with more potent Democrat and Islamist insurgent groups, and the Israeli Puppet leader is usually considered weak and malleable.

As for what I thought of the game, I personally saw the game being more complex and at the same time more easier than Conflict: MEPS (due to the access of more information). I didn't actually like the concept of the war mini-game at all, I really like Conflict: MEPS abstracting it, but I did like how there were two different insurgent groups out there, and the idea of elections. Sorry if I can't write more detailed stuff, I need to play the game more to come up with more criticism.
 

Alright, um, two things I should have edited into my second post:
1) Lebanon should start off as a Democracy, not as a Secular Dictatorship.
2) If a country succeds in invading another country, the second country will adopt the same political government as the victorous nation.