VICEROYALTY BRAINSTORMING ZONE
If the enemy is going to howl for our blood for our supposed crimes when we’ve basically been adorable, huggable kittens for months, there’s never been a better time to show the galaxy what we’re capable of when the gloves come off for real: scalable conquest and subjugation of our foes, regardless of the new game mechanics behind sov. Yes, this is pure meta, yes, it scales, and no, it cannot be stopped – but by god, they’ll try.
Our pacification fleet arrives on the border of a region near Imperium territory, but outside our zone of direct sovholding. A messenger contacts the residents with a simple message: accept our generous benefits package in return for sensible, reasonable monthly fees, or be exterminated. The messenger and his team are responsible for the care, feeding, and annihilation of rebels within a region not under direct Imperium sov-control. That messenger is our Viceroy, and he or she will be the worst nightmare nullsec has experienced. At first most will refuse and examples will be made. Those residents who replace the purged refuseniks will learn the benefits of becoming an Imperial subject. Those territories behind the pacification fleet will no doubt see rebels and traitors attempt to shirk our ‘just rule’, which will be violently put down by our power-projection SIGs. Meanwhile, the taxes from each region collected by our Viceroys go into a common coalition pool, benefiting everyone – the coalition system we worked out with PBLRD works perfectly with this.
Paradoxically this is possible now only due to the quirks of Fozziesov attempting to break everyone else in nullsec into tiny, shattered groups inside one region, where we stand unbroken. Previously blocs opposed blocs; now, what can stop us from extracting taxes from a region like Cloud Ring or Fountain?
If you’d like historical references:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satrap
https://en.wikipedia…iki/Black_Ships (Bonus for naming our agreements with subjects ‘Treaties of Amity and Commerce’)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ViceroyThis is not GSF-only. Anyone in the Imperium can be a viceroy, and the tribute goes into a coalition-shared pool of income just like PBLRD. Viceroys will be powerful, influential, and wealthy – they will receive at least 5% of the total revenue generated for the coalition from their designated region to ensure that they are constantly looking for more for the motherland.
We’ve now fleshed the system out, but want to open up brainstorming to everyone on two particular topics: benefits to subjects and stuff we should tax. We want some subjects to bend the knee and be pleased to be loyal taxpayers, while we also want to extract maximum value while not constantly putting down endless rebellions. Below is a draft; be creative about random shit we could offer subjects with one hand, and be creative with stuff we can rightfully take from them with the other.
We haven’t settled on the name for this whole thing, but viceroy rolls off the tongue better than satrapy. Imperial attache, governor, messenger, Mr. Morden, emissary are some of the names which have been spitballed – we welcome additional ideas before we ink this.
We expect that the process of bringing civilization to an unenlightened region will take at least a month of raw violence and horror before subjects are found to bend the knee. After the first few viceroyalties are established and first generation of rebels are crushed, we can expect more submission and less resistance – but let’s be honest here, it’s the resistance and howling and subsequent crushing that’s the fun bit.
Heresies: Things We Will Not Do
- No Blue standings with subjects
- No Defense Obligations to subjects
- No Logistics Work for subjects
- No Sovholding by us
Duties of Viceroy
- Extract as much value as possible from Region
- Train assistants for future Viceroyalities
- Work with Black Hand to seed agents and influence defectors
- Work with Corps Diplo on whatever they need in the region
- Oversee and confirm delivery of taxes from subjects on calendar
- Coordinate with military regarding crushing rebels
- Identify and recruit high-value talent from subject alliances into the Imperium
- Tracking changes in taxable holdings (moons, etc) between subjects
Possible Benefits to Imperial Subjects
- Discounted high-investment goods: XL Citadel BPCs, + Titan/Supercarrier BPCs, Outpost BPCs
- Supercapital Construction: Subjects can put an altcorp in GSF and build supers/titans for their own members (not the open market)
- Intel and Connections: the Viceroy can give information and contacts across the galaxy to aid a subject, at the Viceroy’s discretion.
- Best Practices: the Viceroy can reward loyal subjects with information on how to better manage their alliance etc.
- Guides to set up Reaction Chains & Improve Finance
- Guides on Org Creation
- Guides on Fleet Doctrines (?, possibly unwise)
- Goonmetrics as a Market Tool
- Miniluv Exemption: those who bend the knee won’t be blown up en route to Jita – additional monthly fee for safety?
- NIP: aka ‘we don’t exterminate you’. We won’t attack the hard assets of subjects, though ships may be blown up randomly on roams.
Possible Tribute from Imperial Subjects
- 20% of Goo produced by Subject Moons, as confirmable by Recon and prorated given changes in ownership Alternative: Forced Discount, we buy all their goo sold in Jita at an enforced 10-15% discount under market.
- PI Taxation – Customs Fees – if trackable by API
- Station Refinery Taxes – refined minerals at a certain low rate, if trackable by API
- Region-Specific Special Goods – buyback programs for Faction BPCs where applicable
- Citadel Taxes – isk per allowed citadel
- ISK Tribute – more inflammatory than other methods but a possibility we’re writing down
Hiring, Incentive & Promotion System
- First Viceroy selected by CD and managed by CD/Mittens
- Assistant Viceroys chosen by allies
- Most effective assistant Viceroy is promoted to Viceroy for the next conquered region. Non-GSF is peachy, system not-GSF-locked
- The Viceroy receives a 5% of total regional tribute earned each month as a reward.
Tracking System
- API tracking of tribute
- Viceroy and Assistant Viceroys all need to disclose full APIs to avoid fraud risks
- Use PBLRD hangar + APIs for collection tracking
- Subforums: Each Viceroyalty may need its own subforum as logs with subjects and hostiles will need to be kept like CD. Perhaps one main department forum with subs for conquered regions as the system expands.
Collection of Tribute
- Taxes are delivered twice a month – should have rolling dates for each subject per region so subjects can’t all rebel on same day.
- Taxes are delivered to Jita by the subject, not the viceroy.
