Terminus Quest: A CKII Mass Effect Quest

[PoptartProdigy]

Poptart is this specifically only a land army, and if it is, would it be possible to shift them to other positions? Like since we're eventually going to do a marine expansion could some of these people become those marines? Also is taking these people only going to cost us the 50,000 credits listed? No potential for cost overruns do to this?

Click to shrink...

Well, in reality there is always the possibility of cost overruns, but I reserve that for failures.

The expansion is specifically for the land army given the specialized training needed for void marines marines. Roughly, a void marine is to a wet-water marine what a wet-water marine is to a ground-pounder. That being; they are elite units, given specialized training for difficult conditions above and beyond the typical demands of the latter. You're threshing an entire planet for the individuals responsible for Naval security and spearheads on planetary assaults. You pick the absolute best, or nobody at all. Thus, well outside the remit of a mass recruitment wave (a rule of special operations forces: you cannot mass-produce special operations forces given the standards at play. It takes time, patience, and dedicated effort).

So if we come up with all the good ideas, the Assembly is only going to come up with worse options? For instance, if people hadn't talked about unemployment benefits during the previous vote, would he have suggested it? Because that seems like bad mechanics that punishes the voters for insightful discussion and suggesting effective policies.

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And your tone has reached the level of hostility where I choose to depart the conversation.

 

[Versharl]

And your tone has reached the level of hostility where I choose to depart the conversation.

Click to shrink...

I'm sorry if you felt I was being hostile. That certainly wasn't my intention.

 

[Luminous]

Could we expand the Marines instead of the Army? Or just combine the two branches of service? I don't see any reason that army troopers couldn't do marine duties. As much as the USMC likes to beat their chest, marines aren't all that special.

Eh, I'll still vote for it.

 

[pbluekan]

Is this enough for people to finally reel her in? I certainly hope so. It doesn't even matter if the current head of the FDO is competent and upstanding, we're building an institution and giving these sorts of powers to a single institution is going to go wrong eventually. Furthermore, Virani seems to be ruthlessly ambitious to the point of obsession.

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I completely agree here.

You'd think a dude with economic acumen like Sugoma would be smarter than this. Investing in the military to lower unemployment and increase public consumption is hugely ineffective. Sure, you'll get an effect but it would've been much greater if you'd invested it in infrastructure, civilian industry and so on. Have to say I'm disappointed with his "proposal" to mitigate or solve the crisis.

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Really? It's actually a decent idea that will significantly slow the crash and give us breathing room. It isn't a fix. It isn't meant to be. But it buys time, which is what we need.

So if we come up with all the good ideas, the Assembly is only going to come up with worse options? For instance, if people hadn't talked about unemployment benefits during the previous vote, would he have suggested it? Because that seems like bad mechanics that punishes the voters for insightful discussion and suggesting effective policies.

Click to shrink...

Oh hey, now we're here. Let's not

 

[remulian]

I can tell I'm a veteran CK2 player, because my first thought was 'have her shot'.

Click to shrink...

Well, it would help her become a good communist...

A challenger has appeared.
[ ][PM] Campaign as normal. Ti'ord has gathered substantial support, but not nearly enough to threaten you as things stand.
[ ][PM] Retaliate by adopting a Mandate of your own to rally or solidify support.
-[ ][PM] Write in your Mandate. I will not moderate these write-ins, but if you choose unwisely, I will not softball the results.

Click to shrink...

There is no point in going with her mandate. And if we manage to fix the issue without welfare, or term it in such a way we can pretend it is not, we can tell her to get rekt and be stupid somewhere else.

Virani has come to ask if you wish to change the directives of her office in light of the ongoing crisis. Furthermore, she has requested to be granted authorization to directly develop ground-based infrastructure in valuable territories not under formal colonial administration, effectively giving her authority to establish unofficial planetary colonies under FDO oversight. She intends to use this authority to focus her office's efforts almost exclusively on the colonization prospect in the hub system of Nimal Pak, which she identifies as the single best development target for the purposes of employing people and expanding the Virmirean economy, but longer-term, it would require revisiting in order to ensure no...problems...arise.

Change FDO policy?

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[ ][POLICY] Yes, to [write-in; default policies and the rules for write-ins may be found on the Status Screen, under, "Stewardship"].
[ ][POLICY] No, a focus on a well-connected and -developed mining network can only be to your benefit at the moment.

Authorize FDO to establish unofficial ground colonies?

[ ][COLONIES] Yes, Virani makes an excellent argument. You need people in jobs and more production, and a faster, cheaper, and easier start to a second colony world is one of the best possible ways to ensure that.
[ ][COLONIES] No, this sets a poor precedent. The FDO will retain a limited remit of space-based development, and you will develop Nimal Pak at your leisure.
[ ][COLONIES] No, and fire Virani. She has been pushing to expand the bounds of her authority constantly ever since assuming office. This is a step too far; you do not trust her.
[ ][COLONIES] Yes, but the price is Virani's job. She makes a good argument; she always does. But you do not trust her ambition. Her idea flies, but somebody more dependable will see it through.

More happily, Assilia Prime has been settled. What do you name it?

[ ][NAME] Assilia Prime. Utilitarian and easily-scaled.
[ ][NAME] Industry. Evocative and descriptive of purpose.
[ ][NAME] Rebirth. Descriptive of attitude upon settling.
[ ][NAME] Something in pseudo-asari, -salarian, -whathaveyou I AM TIRED OF HAVING TO DO THIS FOR EVERY BLOODY STELLAR BODY IN THE CLUSTER.
[ ][NAME] Write-in.

Click to shrink...

...
Moar colonies!

Finally, Sugoma Damnir's commission has forwarded a proposal to the Assembly which passed a vote, subsequently landing on your desk. Unemployment paired with a starved civilian market compared to overdeveloped military industry being such a pressing concern, the bill proposes a massive Army recruitment drive in anticipation of future offensive against Rachni space, or failing that, garrison duty on current and future colonial properties. This will employ substantial portions of the population and rest their weight on a sector of your economy that can handle it, in theory. Furthermore, the bill places the administrative effort of arranging this drive on the Assembly rather than your office, sparing you from having to do it. You will need to fund it, though; there's not exactly a lot of slack in the economy for a new tax. What do you do with the bill?

[ ][BILL] Fetch me my rubber stamp! Assembly implements an army expansion option, raising the size of the standing army to a full one billion individuals in combat roles (from its current four hundred million). Takes up significant unemployed slack and lessens strain on civilian economy by way of removing huge swathe of population from civilian economy. Not actually a long-term fix and may actually lead to worse problems eventually by way of all of those individuals eventually going back onto the civilian market, all at once, but gives way more time to prepare for them and implement solutions. Also: gigantic army. Some would say the benefits are self-evident. -50,000 yearly income.
[ ][BILL] Veto for this one. Bill rejected. Army does not expand.!

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Yes! Yes! All of my yes!

We have quite a few options today, folks. Make sure you talk it out.

As for the most recent plausibility complaint: have some faith. Something being off might be Poptart being an idiot, or it might be there deliberately. You are at absolute liberty to pick one of those eventualities for which to plan.

Funny story: for that army vote, I originally typo'd it as -500,000 yearly income. Now that would've been amusing. Also on the army: sci-fi tech. Technology, historically, advances and permits vaster and vaster segments of the population to be supported as full-time fighters. I am uninterested in defining the exact percentage within the Mass Effect universe, and less interested in arguing over whatever I arbitrarily decide will function in the present moment. Just roll with it, folks.

Meanwhile, I hope you enjoyed the update, wherein everything was on fire, but you managed to get it down to smoldering.

That fire extinguisher is looking...a little lighter...though.

See ya!

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We could tie the unemployed benefits to job training and reprofilation courses as a gov investment in future skilled workforce, coupled with mass army expansion, we could claim we don't do welfare, and just pay people to do nothing and continue in their malaise but incentivinzing them to enter and prepare for job, even if self employed. We can't afford to have unproductive and unengaged population in a total war scenario, and defeinately not stay on permanent defensive. The deride the opposing candidate as military and economically illiterate, and if they change mandate as a wishy washy power seeker that is likely to become as our predecessor, only with the bribes above the board and swiftly turning worthless bribes at that for the voting block she addresses.

 

[redzonejoe]

Your technicians have worked over the quarian data with a fine-toothed comb. Fully implementing everything will require you to do the above things, which obviously is not immediately viable. A refit to modernize is, however...if only you had some reason to have this kind of a sudden, obvious leap in ship quality. Issues. But at least you're done.

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An idea: Fake a genius.

Have this guy head a team and pretend to come up with improvements over the course of a couple years, building or refitting a ship to test his ideas. Within a few years, lets say 5, he's producing modern standards of ship design. Naturally we refit our old ships to match.

Bonus; have actual smart people working on this fake team to modify the quarian designs to appear more Virmirian or unique so it's not as blatantly obvious that we're ripping off the quarians when our 'genius' stops innovating right at the quarian standard.

"Look, our new cruisers are totally different than your old ones! We've got red racing stripes! Everybody knows that improves speed!"

Edit: lots of funny ratings, no quotes or insightfuls. Can't tell if good idea or not

 

[Kinruush]

So if we come up with all the good ideas, the Assembly is only going to come up with worse options? For instance, if people hadn't talked about unemployment benefits during the previous vote, would he have suggested it? Because that seems like bad mechanics that punishes the voters for insightful discussion and suggesting effective policies.

Click to shrink...

It really isn't nearly as bad as you're making it out to be, and it has the benefit of not taking up an action slot for Stewardship next turn. It doesn't specify how many people will be hired by this, so we have to use the analysis given by the people Poptart writes. Their analysis is that this is significant enough of a hiring spree to give us even more time to work with better options. So, we have to take its mechanical effects at face value.

 

[Wiadi]

or term it in such a way we can pretend it is not

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...why the hell would we do that? It's so much more effective for undercutting her mandate if we just co-opt her policies openly. "Hey, elect me, I'll...do the thing the Prime Minister is already doing" is not exactly a winning campaign slogan.

 

[No7sHere]

Once we have completed our public works projects, will they have increased our yearly income, given that they are expanding the civilian economy?

 

[Blonddude42]

Well, in reality there is always the possibility of cost overruns, but I reserve that for failures.

The expansion is specifically for the land army given the specialized training needed for void marines marines. Roughly, a void marine is to a wet-water marine what a wet-water marine is to a ground-pounder. That being; they are elite units, given specialized training for difficult conditions above and beyond the typical demands of the latter. You're threshing an entire planet for the individuals responsible for Naval security and spearheads on planetary assaults. You pick the absolute best, or nobody at all. Thus, well outside the remit of a mass recruitment wave (a rule of special operations forces: you cannot mass-produce special operations forces given the standards at play. It takes time, patience, and dedicated effort).

Click to shrink...

At the scale this operates on I can understand not being able to make them all marines, but I'd expect this to be be able to siphon off a portion of the recruits to become void marines. Specialist training tends to be a thing for recruits that stand out from what I've heard. While I doubt it would be enough to expand the void marines on it's own, I'd expect to make it easier to do and cheaper than getting them from the general population.

 

[MTB]

@tech - we do provide the means for maintenance of the fleet, we are looking what they are doing (Rachni/2-day war), we've got performance scans ... and a war to fight. Could we tell them we were reverese engineering what we scanned?

 

[Chronic]

I may be alone here, but i would have no problem with allowing Virani her run as Prime Minister. She really seems like an extraordinarily competent administrator, and i never wanted this to be Terminus Dictator quest where we can't ever allow the rise of a rival. A peaceful transition of power to someone competent who worked her way up through the institutions is exactly what Virmire needs to establish itself as a stable polity. As long as she is above board in her methods and respects our democratic principles... If she can convince the voters, she can have the job.

Of course, we would need to make arrangements with her to keep Mira around in a leading military role since she is the best damn admiral on the planet and there are still Rachni out there trying to eat us. For that to happen i think it would be terrible to block her carreer on purpose. That will only poison relations between the two women.

 

[uju32]

Okay.Before I go to bed:

PROPOSAL
[ ][POLICY] Yes: Diamonds In the Rough. The FDO will prioritize systems that return the most profit, expense no object.
[ ][NAME] Assilia Prime. Utilitarian and easily-scaled.
[ ][COLONIES] No, this sets a poor precedent. The FDO will retain a limited remit of space-based development, and you will develop Nimal Pak at your leisure.
[ ][BILL] Fetch me my rubber stamp! Assembly implements an army expansion option, raising the size of the standing army to a full one billion individuals in combat roles (from its current four hundred million). Takes up significant unemployed slack and lessens strain on civilian economy by way of removing huge swathe of population from civilian economy. Not actually a long-term fix and may actually lead to worse problems eventually by way of all of those individuals eventually going back onto the civilian market, all at once, but gives way more time to prepare for them and implement solutions. Also: gigantic army. Some would say the benefits are self-evident. -50,000 yearly income.


REASONS
-FDO policy change to Diamonds In The Rough for maximum cash because our budget income is dwindling. We can switch back once the crisis is over.
-Assilia Prime because it's straightforward. If it isn't broke, why fix it?
-No to expanding FDO remit because we cannot afford to maintain a second colony while Assilia Prime isn't yet self-sufficient. We need the money invested in opening more mines. Once Assilia is self-supporting, we open another. Maybe even at Nimal Pak.
-Rubber Stamp because it helps solve the current unemployment crisis and dumps wages into the pockets of people, which dumps money into the economy. Military spending is a recognized method to spend one's way out of a recession.

And it helps remind people, lest they forget, that we're in an existential war.
The fact that the Rachni are no longer on the other side of the Relay doesn't change that.

EDIT

I may be alone here, but i would have no problem with allowing Virani her run as Prime Minister. She really seems like an extraordinarily competent administrator, and i never wanted this to be Terminus Dictator quest where we can't ever allow the rise of a rival. A peaceful transition of power to someone competent who worked her way up through the institutions is exactly what Virmire needs to establish itself as a stable polity. As long as she is above board in her methods and respects our democratic principles... If she can convince the voters, she can have the job.

Of course, we would need to make arrangements with her to keep Mira around in a leading military role since she is the best damn admiral on the planet and there are still Rachni out there trying to eat us. For that to happen i think it would be terrible to block her carreer on purpose. That will only poison relations between the two women.

Click to shrink...

Sure, if she can do the job, no problem.
Like I said, ambition is no sin as long as you play by the rules.

Besides, Mira is in a dangerous job, being both PM and field commander.
Having potential, competent successors is a hedge against her ship eating a dreadnought-scale railgun round in the ship bridge.

 

[remulian]

...why the hell would we do that? It's so much more effective for undercutting her mandate if we just co-opt her policies openly. "Hey, elect me, I'll...do the thing the Prime Minister is already doing" is not exactly a winning campaign slogan.

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No, because the argument would be you did it because I was running against you against that and you are affraid, coupled with a double down on it and nitpicking things to blow out of proportion and claim they could do it far better and what you did is inadequate.

Better to deliver the same shit practically while claiming what they want won't be ever done because of practical realities or whatever cultural argument works to obliterate it . The people who need shit get their problem addressed and the narrative is undercut by undermining the very premise the opponent first brought in the discourse as their own original idea do not steal.

Don't give the fuck a reason to grow in popularity by claiming the idea as first brought in political idea, instead deliver similar shit and dismantle them and their idea. Sucks, but works.

 

[Alliterate]

I may be alone here, but i would have no problem with allowing Virani her run as Prime Minister. She really seems like an extraordinarily competent administrator, and i never wanted this to be Terminus Dictator quest where we can't ever allow the rise of a rival. A peaceful transition of power to someone competent who worked her way up through the institutions is exactly what Virmire needs to establish itself as a stable polity. As long as she is above board in her methods and respects our democratic principles... If she can convince the voters, she can have the job.

Of course, we would need to make arrangements with her to keep Mira around in a leading military role since she is the best damn admiral on the planet and there are still Rachni out there trying to eat us. For that to happen i think it would be terrible to block her carreer on purpose. That will only poison relations between the two women.

Click to shrink...

One way you can do that is adopt her as a protege, support her career, give her a chance to build her skills, exposure and portfolio, with an understanding that you'll hand over the reins/step aside at some agreed future point.

Of course, we're about 500 years from reaching that life stage, sooo....

 

[Chronic]

One way you can do that is adopt her as a protege, support her career, give her a chance to build her skills, exposure and portfolio, with an understanding that you'll hand over the reins/step aside at some agreed future point.

Of course, we're about 500 years from reaching that life stage, sooo....

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Yeah, it is a bit of a conundrum. Especially since Mira used to be minister of war and launched a coup against the previous Prime Minister, so any new PM would rightfully have some reservations about her taking up her old job again...

 

[Wiadi]

-FDO policy change to Diamonds In The Rough for maximum cash because our budget income is dwindling. We can switch back once the crisis is over.

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Um...I'm pretty sure the "expense no object" rider on Diamonds in the Rough means that we'll actually be taking a short-term budget hit from that option, so unless you think we can ride that out for a few years while waiting for the returns to start making up for it I'm not sure that's a great plan.

No, because the argument would be you did it because I was running against you against that and you are affraid, coupled with a double down on it and nitpicking things to blow out of proportion and claim they could do it far better and what you did is inadequate.

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I don't see how "you implemented this policy because you got hard evidence that a full fifth of your population really wanted it" is a point against us. We're already doing something similar with Sugoma: admitting that people who challenge us can have good ideas, while maintaining that we are still the best choice to ultimately implement them. Sure, there'll be some hardcore holdouts who say we haven't done enough, but policy nitpicking is not a way to score points with the average voter.

 

[uju32]

Um...I'm pretty sure the "expense no object" rider on Diamonds in the Rough means that we'll actually be taking a short-term budget hit from that option, so unless you think we can ride that out for a few years while waiting for the returns to start making up for it I'm not sure that's a great plan.

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I don't believe so.
We have 3 HQ Mines waiting for exploitation; they're expensive, but each brings in ~22k.
Still

@PoptartProdigy
Can you please,at your leisure, explicitly state the difference between Diamonds In The Rough and Low-Hanging Fruit?

 

[Kinruush]

I don't see how "you implemented this policy because you got hard evidence that a full fifth of your population really wanted it" is a point against us. We're already doing something similar with Sugoma: admitting that people who challenge us can have good ideas, while maintaining that we are still the best choice to ultimately implement them. Sure, there'll be some hardcore holdouts who say we haven't done enough, but policy nitpicking is not a way to score points with the average voter.

Click to shrink...

Plus, if we announce it months before the election, we completely remove her platform. She can't spend three months saying, "Well, you only did it because I had the idea first!" The only other options she'll have are niggling over policy minutiae, which is terrible for getting votes, or building a new mandate and forming a new coalition of people to support her run, which I guarantee you won't hit the ~20% she has now.

 

[10ebbor10]

So, going over the options.

[ ][PM] Campaign as normal. Ti'ord has gathered substantial support, but not nearly enough to threaten you as things stand.
[ ][PM] Retaliate by adopting a Mandate of your own to rally or solidify support.
-[ ][PM] Write in your Mandate. I will not moderate these write-ins, but if you choose unwisely, I will not softball the results.

Click to shrink...

No strong opinions on this, so I'd say to just for a standard campaign. The economic crisis is basically a mandate on it's own, after all.

[ ][POLICY] Yes, to [write-in; default policies and the rules for write-ins may be found on the Status Screen, under, "Stewardship"].
[ ][POLICY] No, a focus on a well-connected and -developed mining network can only be to your benefit at the moment.

Click to shrink...

Change policy to Low-Hanging Fruit.

This ensures a rapid expansion of mining infrastructure. Not the most profitable mining infastructure, but it gives us the stuff when we need it, which is now.

[ ][COLONIES] Yes, Virani makes an excellent argument. You need people in jobs and more production, and a faster, cheaper, and easier start to a second colony world is one of the best possible ways to ensure that.
[ ][COLONIES] No, this sets a poor precedent. The FDO will retain a limited remit of space-based development, and you will develop Nimal Pak at your leisure.
[ ][COLONIES] No, and fire Virani. She has been pushing to expand the bounds of her authority constantly ever since assuming office. This is a step too far; you do not trust her.
[ ][COLONIES] Yes, but the price is Virani's job. She makes a good argument; she always does. But you do not trust her ambition. Her idea flies, but somebody more dependable will see it through.

Click to shrink...

No.

The FDO is not supposed to be an interstellar governement. Giving it control over not only our entire space infrastructure, but also colony construction is giing it entirely too much power.

Besides, we can't exactly afford colonization right now.

[ ][NAME] Assilia Prime. Utilitarian and easily-scaled.
[ ][NAME] Industry. Evocative and descriptive of purpose.
[ ][NAME] Rebirth. Descriptive of attitude upon settling.
[ ][NAME] Something in pseudo-asari, -salarian, -whathaveyou I AM TIRED OF HAVING TO DO THIS FOR EVERY BLOODY STELLAR BODY IN THE CLUSTER.
[ ][NAME] Write-in.

Click to shrink...

Just call it Assilia Prime.

[ ][BILL] Fetch me my rubber stamp! Assembly implements an army expansion option, raising the size of the standing army to a full one billion individuals in combat roles (from its current four hundred million). Takes up significant unemployed slack and lessens strain on civilian economy by way of removing huge swathe of population from civilian economy. Not actually a long-term fix and may actually lead to worse problems eventually by way of all of those individuals eventually going back onto the civilian market, all at once, but gives way more time to prepare for them and implement solutions. Also: gigantic army. Some would say the benefits are self-evident. -50,000 yearly income.
[ ][BILL] Veto for this one. Bill rejected. Army does not expand.

Click to shrink...

NO.

This is a terrible idea. A quick reminder, the primary issue why we're even having this economic crisis is because too much of our economy was dedicated to the military. The unemployment crisis and financial panic are only the result of that shortage. To spend a gigantic amount of money on the army now is completely irresponsible.

Doing a massive army expansion worked for WWII america because the Great Depression had left all the factories idle. That is not an accurate description of our situation.

 

[jacobk]

Unfortunately we've not got a China to buy T-bonds.

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A modern economy can run a large deficit for a good long time without relying on foreign creditors. Look at the US during WWII.

Virmire's economy seems modern-ish. It's a little weird that we're experiencing an economic crash during total war while the government has been running a surplus, but I chalk that up as being below our level of abstraction. From what we know Virmire at least has the concept of a credit economy in general and bonds in particular.

Your technicians have worked over the quarian data with a fine-toothed comb. Fully implementing everything will require you to do the above things, which obviously is not immediately viable. A refit to modernize is, however...if only you had some reason to have this kind of a sudden, obvious leap in ship quality. Issues. But at least you're done.

Click to shrink...

This seems like it ought to be easy enough for us to fake up. Our spies are competent, we've been legitimately doing extensive repairs on the Quarian fleet, and we won't realistically be in communication with the Quarian government for years if not decades. Not to mention that getting in contact with the Quarians will be more or less at our discretion.

I expect that we have to invest the action to come up with a cover story, but it doesn't seem like the DC should be too crazy. I guess we'll see.

Finally, Sugoma Damnir's commission has forwarded a proposal to the Assembly which passed a vote, subsequently landing on your desk. Unemployment paired with a starved civilian market compared to overdeveloped military industry being such a pressing concern, the bill proposes a massive Army recruitment drive in anticipation of future offensive against Rachni space, or failing that, garrison duty on current and future colonial properties. This will employ substantial portions of the population and rest their weight on a sector of your economy that can handle it, in theory. Furthermore, the bill places the administrative effort of arranging this drive on the Assembly rather than your office, sparing you from having to do it. You will need to fund it, though; there's not exactly a lot of slack in the economy for a new tax. What do you do with the bill?

Click to shrink...

If we really need to pick a mandate I'd rather go for something economic than a specific military objective. Our military doctrines are geared towards raiding and causing general havoc more than picking up specific pieces of territory. The economy is something we're planning to go all out trying to fix anyway, and failure there torpedoes us whether or not we've made it our mandate.

 

[Chronic]

If we really need to pick a mandate I'd rather go for something economic than a specific military objective. Our military doctrines are geared towards raiding and causing general havoc more than picking up specific pieces of territory. The economy is something we're planning to go all out trying to fix anyway, and failure there torpedoes us whether or not we've made it our mandate.

Click to shrink...

A viable target for the mandate, assuming we take the army expansion vote, might be conquering and taking over the Rachni colonies in Attican Beta and Kepler Verge. Right now a not insignificant part of our fleet is busy keeping them bottled up, but the very fact that we need to keep them bottled up indicates that these colonies have enough surplus industry to build back into space if they were left alone. If we could seize that halfway intact we'd have somewhere to put our unemployed workers...

We now have the logistics to project our fleet into these two clusters relatively effortlessly. We haven't really invested much in the army, but with orbital supremacy how hard would it be to make our army capable of taking those worlds out one at a time?

 

[Simon_Jester]

Anybody else wanna say I was too paranoid for insisting on spending 100,000 credits on putting sensor platforms throughout Lystheni space to track any ship movements?
Do those destroyed maps still look innocent?

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Uh... unless I'm parsing that sentence incorrectly, the mining stations in question were in fact abandoned quite a while ago- at the time the neutral zone between us and them was established.

The worst thing we have discovered about the Lystheni so far is that, when whichever one of their government functionaries purged the map database, they treacherously deprived us of the chance to restart mining faciliities they had abandoned most of a lifetime ago. Hardly evidence of a vast secret conspiracy.

Furthermore, since the very expensive array of surveillance platforms did not reveal this (the Explorer Corps did, at much lower expense), it cannot be claimed as a victory or vindication for the surveillance program.

Frankly, yes, since we are now down to around 200k surplus and 200k/year income and are perforce considering EVEN MORE income-reducing options for this next upcoming turn, I am still going to say that spending the 100k then, in that year, with a recession approaching, probably wasn't worth it.

Eh. Ambition is not a crime. And not liking a person isn't sufficient reason to fire them.
Unofficial colonies have to be reported anyway, so I don't really see where under the table deals can worm in.
OTOH, we do want coordination with the rest of the economy on where we site things, and not just allow the lady to do as she wants.

Click to shrink...

The longer we give her to turn the FDO into a private fiefdom with far-ranging power to control colonial development, the greater the potential for long term problems becomes. If her problem was personal ambition within Virmire's system (say, she wants to run for and win the office of president in 10-20 years) I wouldn't be so worried. Instead, she seems to be gathering legal powers into an organization well suited to building up a secret power base.

The director's an asari; if we keep leaving her in power indefinitely she'll keep doing this indefinitely, and while we can tolerate it now I don't want to have to spend the next fifty years wondering why she keeps trying to amass more control, then watch her laugh and flee the cluster after we resume contact with the Citadel, on a private spaceship stuffed with every kind of expensive treasure to enable her to keep her embezzled billions. Or to find out she's founded something like, well, the Lystheni out there.

EDIT:

I actually have less problem with Virani aspiring to political office. If she told us she wanted the Ministry of Finance starting ten years from now, I wouldn't be raising a big fuss about it; Lissa may be our best friend but the job is clearly wearing on her and we can still be her friend and trusted ally without having her spend the rest of her life in a major government position.

What worries me is the possibility of Virani having some other goal that isn't, for lack of a better term, "legitimate" within the context of Virmirean society.

Oops. Sorry. In hindsight, I can see how that might be a little inflammatory.
But I was .......well not pleased, but gratified to have my distrust of the convenient loss of lystheni star records confirmed so soon.

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So far the most we have confirmation of is that the Lystheni abandoned some mining platforms (as per a treaty we signed), and then neglected to tell us about them. The expensive surveillance buoys did not help us find those platforms. The Explorer Corps had to do it by hand.

So if we come up with all the good ideas, the Assembly is only going to come up with worse options?

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Experience suggests that we are very unlikely to come up with ALL the good ideas ourselves.

We could tie the unemployed benefits to job training and reprofilation courses as a gov investment in future skilled workforce, coupled with mass army expansion, we could claim we don't do welfare, and just pay people to do nothing and continue in their malaise but incentivinzing them to enter and prepare for job, even if self employed. We can't afford to have unproductive and unengaged population in a total war scenario, and defeinately not stay on permanent defensive. The deride the opposing candidate as military and economically illiterate, and if they change mandate as a wishy washy power seeker that is likely to become as our predecessor, only with the bribes above the board and swiftly turning worthless bribes at that for the voting block she addresses.

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I'd rather not ideologically commit Mira to a platform of "we don't do welfare." It may become economically necessary for us to 'do welfare,' not just because of able-bodied workers who we can't find jobs for (obviously a bad outcome), but because some slice of our population simply cannot work productively. Due to old age (e.g. 32-year-old salarians), due to disability, due to just plain not being smart enough or reliable enough to do work that someone wouldn't rather have a VI doing.

It's unlikely that everyone CAN contribute usefully to a sci-fi war economy, even if they want to.

 

[Wiadi]

We haven't really invested much in the army, but with orbital supremacy how hard would it be to make our army capable of taking those worlds out one at a time?

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Probably depends partly on how many bodies we're willing to throw into the meatgrinder. Remembering how the thing with the marines went, I imagine casualties would be ruinous unless we gave the army a (currently unaffordable) complete overhaul and upgrade.

 

[Alliterate]

Well, it would help her become a good communist...

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??? She's not proposed any communist policies. Welfare benefit does not mean communism.

I'd rather not ideologically commit Mira to a platform of "we don't do welfare."

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Same.

The longer we give her to turn the FDO into a private fiefdom with far-ranging power to control colonial development, the greater the potential for long term problems becomes

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Yeah, we need to make use of her- she does seem good at her job- while not letting her build more of an empire outside our supervision.

We've just seen some possible shenanigans with that (*&$*#) Secret Service bodyguard budget, who really knows what is hidden under there.

Next turns budget is going to be tight, we've still got investment-options we need to take. Unemployment will take tens of thousands alone.

Probably depends partly on how many bodies we're willing to throw into the meatgrinder. Remembering how the thing with the marines went, I imagine casualties would be ruinous unless we gave the army a (currently unaffordable) complete overhaul and upgrade.

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Then there's the eventual costs of brand new personal barrier tech for a Billion Sapient Army...