IdioC in 'Conclusion of Inquisition' wrote:I strongly argue to Amazeroth that the Cultural Protocols also be repealed as they are impossible to enforce without a lengthy amount of time. The game engine comes first, if players want to preserve royal lines, they have the Wiki for that information.
Let's ditch em. They're not enforced (they can't be by nature. Cultural protocols should protect the language of titles, should require party names translated into the language etc., but can't because of the 'game-comes-first' rule), and when they were created they were crappy as it was. We have Zulu nations next to Celtic nations next to English nations next to Jelbek nations next to Terra's 2375 America clones. Let's forget the whole thing altogether and let ourselves play again, why not. Make people defend their crap or let it die, because if nobody cares enough to fight for it why let it be mandated anyway? And as I said, it's hardly "protected" when moderation is all that's upholding something, anyway. English is always allowed, so who cares if Jelbania is protected, the EMPIRE OF JELBANIA will always be allowed.
Let's cut the charade. Let's let players play and quit it with this middle ground nonsense. I'll cite the Zulu stuff Aquinas is trying to do now in Ikradon, with no malice intended in my statement, I use it only as an example:
For thousands of in game years Ikradon has been a pit of nothingness. Boredom. Socialism. Those are what come to mind with Ikradon. There is a discussion on Ikradonian culture introduced ages ago with all sorts of nonsense thrown in but who really cares, because they're all dead and gone now.
Now, Aquinas is bored and believes Terra needs a sub-Saharan African nation (it does. Should have been Talmoria but that was screwed up ages ago too). So he checks the Cultural Protocols to try and figure out where is protected and where isn't. Naturally the Protocol thread is of almost no use. The index in the front lists what, 8 nations as protected? How many more have applied and been OK'd for protection? Almost everywhere! But to ask Amazeroth to update the list is tedious and overly time consuming, just as IdioC pointed out in my opening quote, and it's pointless to update it anyway: Gaduridos is a "Caribbean-esque Spanish-Italian" (now the "Federal Union of Gaduridos"), Wantuni is an "Oppressed Christian Greek majority governed by Arab minority owing to political upheaval" (now the "Hegemonic Kalopian Kingdom" under everyone's favorites the Maratonite dynasty, famous in Lourenne and who the heck knows where else), and until Dynastia rescued Jelbania it was English, and so on and so on.
And so the thread is useless, but Aquinas is thorough and checks nations for posted cultural protocols before he enters! Good! He's found a spot, Ikradon, with no passed Protocols. "There isn't a single African-themed nation in the whole of Terra, and with so many nations Cultural Protocolled up, there aren't many places where an African culture can be introduced." So Ikradon it is! It's open and he's unopposed and with the snap of a finger a Cultural Protocol is passed giving us the first African nation in Terra.
But this is how all the nations were protocolled in the first place! One player decides something needs to happen and the right moment hits and there you have it. And thus the nonsensical tapestry we get. Zulu next to English next to German next to Gaellic.
So let's quit pretending it makes sense. I like culturally diverse nations as much as the next guy and I will protect the nations I think work by traveling there and protecting them when I need to. But stop pretending Jelbania is "protected" when LordStephen is in power, and stop entrenching nonsensical protocols that encourage people like Aquinas to put their Zulu right in the middle of Terra's Europe (I know you don't agree with that statement Aquinas, but I firmly believe there should be some regional consistency, and if the rest of Artania is Germanic/Northern European, a Zulu nation there doesn't make sense). If other nations weren't protected, if we ditched the ideas of Cultural Protocols altogether, rational people like Aquinas could bring real improvement to places that are as of now off limits because somebody had the bright idea to make Talmoria Pakistani.
