[DRAFT] A Ghastly Decision

[Empirical Switzerland]

I decided to try making my first issue so here it is! Feel free to critique me, but just don't be too harsh, as this is my first ever. So I tried, and without further adiue, here it is:

Title: A Ghastly Decision!

Following the recent death of @@RANDOMNAME@@, one of the most active speakers within your political parties, and your biggest public supporter, many @@DENONYM@@s have been mourning him and commemorating his grave. While at his(or her) funeral today, you notice something quite odd.

Invalid for nations that don't hold elections and nations where religion is banned.


"Whooooo! I'm a ghost!" Shouts the ghost of @@RANDOM NAME@@, in the middle of the Church Aisle, "I can't believe it! This is awesome! But it kinda sucks that I can't vote in elections for you, @@LEADER@@ anymore!" He begins to rub his(or her) ghostly chin, "Y'know, you should totally let us here ghosts vote! It would be great!" His ghost is passed through by some crying family members moving to their seats.

Result: Voting polls usually turn up numbers over the population of the nation.

One of the family members walks up to you and introduces herself as @@RANDOMFEMALENAME@@, @@RANDOMNAME@@'s mother. "It's a pleasure to meet you @@LEADER@@!" She says as she wipes the tears from her cheeks. "May I inquire however, what were you just staring at over there?" You tell her and she gasps, "A ghost you say?!" Her face turns so pale she looks like she's the one that saw a ghost. "A-and he(or she) said they wanted to be able to vote from beyond? T-that's ridiculous! Just let him (or her) rest in peace! Oh! And tell them I love the-"

Result: Poltergeist haunting reports are higher as ever as ghosts are outraged from being denied the right to vote.

"Surely this is all a load of crap!" Says the man in the seat in front of you as her turns around to face you. "@@LEADER@@, you've gotta be kidding me! All this supernatural and spiritual stuff is a whole bunch of hokey pokey. It's even got a hold of you! You certainly couldn't have seen the ghost of @@RANDOMNAME@@! That's ridiculous!" You should just outright ban this kind of nonsense, then we wouldn't have dumb arguments about stupid stuff like this!" He turns around as the ceremony begins and the ghost of @RANDOM@NAME@@ appears again, begging you to ignore this man.

Result: Following the recent ban on religion, ghosts are forced to flee the country so they can attend their own funerals.

(I hope you enjoyed this issue draft! Tell me if it's good or not!)

[Verdant Haven]

Hey there! Welcome to the world of Got Issues :-D

While I think this issue in its current form wouldn't fly (see discussion below), I think there could be a nugget of a very entertaining issue contained within, if you want to run with it.

So, in terms of why I think it wouldn't work in its current form: this issue outright declares a world-state in which ghosts are real. That is very much not compatible with the meta for a great many nations, nor with the sort of "modern or somewhat near-future" setting that is fairly consistently held across the non-easter-egg issues. Basically, declaring ghosts are real? No go.

In terms of what I think could work as the core of an issue, dead people voting is definitely something worth exploring. We've probably all heard about the notorious claims of voter fraud (immortalized by Simpsons among many others) in which the voter rolls are filled with the names from local cemeteries, to cover some kind of ballot-stuffing in the bad-old days. What if instead of the dead voting being a case of fraud, this were something like a psychic medium claiming to be in contact with a departed person, and that person's family begging you to let them "express the wishes of the departed" by casting their ballot for them. That would give you all sorts of options to pursue with psychic mediums (deliberately fraudulent or otherwise), political parties claiming super powers, consultants appealing to "the dead vote," plus the obvious debunkers and rationalists all having their argument about whether or not you'll allow this. Probably would need to put a validity on it for either high religiousness, high primitivism, low scientific achievement, or something else along those lines, but definitely could see that being a good issue to develop, and totally respects the rights of players to maintain their own head-canon about the possibility of such things.

Beyond the subject of the issue, just some tips to help with your writing style for this purpose (bearing in mind that I'm just another author, not an editor or official voice):

- Try to limit yourself to one dialogue tag per speaker. Don't break up the text into more than two chunks, unless completely necessary.
- Effect texts (results) are never capitalized on the front, and don't end in periods or other punctuation. They will be inserted in to the middle of a sentence when needed by the system.
- Try to make sure the issue is posing a specific decision. Just seeing something odd, for example, isn't a decision. A medium coming to you asking to be allowed to vote on behalf of the dead? That is!
- Similarly, try to make sure the option speakers are offering active solutions that are more than what the dismiss button does. "Just ignore him!" isn't an action that changes anything. "Require a certification program for those who want to vote on behalf of the dead" would be though, for example.

As long as there isn't another issue already about allowing the dead to vote, I would love to see you work this in that direction if you think it would be interesting!

[Empirical Switzerland]

Hey there! Welcome to the world of Got Issues :-D

While I think this issue in its current form wouldn't fly (see discussion below), I think there could be a nugget of a very entertaining issue contained within, if you want to run with it.

So, in terms of why I think it wouldn't work in its current form: this issue outright declares a world-state in which ghosts are real. That is very much not compatible with the meta for a great many nations, nor with the sort of "modern or somewhat near-future" setting that is fairly consistently held across the non-easter-egg issues. Basically, declaring ghosts are real? No go.

In terms of what I think could work as the core of an issue, dead people voting is definitely something worth exploring. We've probably all heard about the notorious claims of voter fraud (immortalized by Simpsons among many others) in which the voter rolls are filled with the names from local cemeteries, to cover some kind of ballot-stuffing in the bad-old days. What if instead of the dead voting being a case of fraud, this were something like a psychic medium claiming to be in contact with a departed person, and that person's family begging you to let them "express the wishes of the departed" by casting their ballot for them. That would give you all sorts of options to pursue with psychic mediums (deliberately fraudulent or otherwise), political parties claiming super powers, consultants appealing to "the dead vote," plus the obvious debunkers and rationalists all having their argument about whether or not you'll allow this. Probably would need to put a validity on it for either high religiousness, high primitivism, low scientific achievement, or something else along those lines, but definitely could see that being a good issue to develop, and totally respects the rights of players to maintain their own head-canon about the possibility of such things.

Beyond the subject of the issue, just some tips to help with your writing style for this purpose (bearing in mind that I'm just another author, not an editor or official voice):

- Try to limit yourself to one dialogue tag per speaker. Don't break up the text into more than two chunks, unless completely necessary.
- Effect texts (results) are never capitalized on the front, and don't end in periods or other punctuation. They will be inserted in to the middle of a sentence when needed by the system.
- Try to make sure the issue is posing a specific decision. Just seeing something odd, for example, isn't a decision. A medium coming to you asking to be allowed to vote on behalf of the dead? That is!
- Similarly, try to make sure the option speakers are offering active solutions that are more than what the dismiss button does. "Just ignore him!" isn't an action that changes anything. "Require a certification program for those who want to vote on behalf of the dead" would be though, for example.

As long as there isn't another issue already about allowing the dead to vote, I would love to see you work this in that direction if you think it would be interesting!

Thanks so much! I will use this info to the best of my ability! This is great advice!

[Honeydewistania]

[…] Church […]

Even if it’s valid for religious nations only, it’s bad to assume they’d be a Christian nation.

[…] @@NAME@@ […] @@NAME@@ […] @@NAME@@‘s mother […]

In issues, @@NAME@@ means nation, so it’d be Honeydewistania’s mother instead of your intended effect. Use @@RANDOMNAME@@.

[Empirical Switzerland]

[…] Church […]

Even if it’s valid for religious nations only, it’s bad to assume they’d be a Christian nation.

[…] @@NAME@@ […] @@NAME@@ […] @@NAME@@‘s mother […]

In issues, @@NAME@@ means nation, so it’d be Honeydewistania’s mother instead of your intended effect. Use @@RANDOMNAME@@.

Okay! Thanks!

[Australian rePublic]

Unfortunately, this is too unrealistic, as NS tries to be close to real life, and IRL, we don't know conclusively whether or not ghosts exist