I think you should be able to upgrade someone through the class system to king and earn taxes through it. That way its still a choice, you decide if you want a monarchy or not. It could also help when it comes to diplomacy somehow.
1 Like
Havenāt played much Dwarf Fortress but only because I canāt stand ASCII games.
If you had a leader character that grew with your city and became what the city should be lead by, then no extra work from players to put into awesome extra. This would take a lot of work though and in the end would be practically uselessā¦ But would still be pretty cool.
Iām not saying that the leader should be your avatar, but since youāre doing the leaders job your actions will affect what the people think of the leader. If they chop off the kings head then you havenāt played the game very well. So the leaders success indicates your success.
However, success in this case does not have to mean that everyone is happy. The people could be starving but as long as you manage to keep the same leader in charge, by means of soldiers, magic or defame/bribe/assassinating the agitators, then the leader is successful, in his own way.
It was this use of power, scheming and backstabbing to keep the throne that made me think of GoT (but I admit, Iām more or less in love with that show so almost anything can make me think of it 
).
Iām not sure what you count as ācontemporary understandingsā, but if it was my use of the words ādictatorā and ādemocratic socialistā that made it sound too modern then yes, those words are too modern to fit the style, but if you think about it, the classical king is more or less a dictator and if all the people are equal then you have socialism (or something like that).
However, I do agree that these kind of things donāt fit the style of SH. It would change the focus of the gameplay too much. If it would ever be implemented then it should be as a separate game mode.
Take it more as an idea to draw inspiration from.
And I havenāt played Tropico. Would you recommend it?
Concerning money in any form (@Schmillt also mentioned taxes):
I see a problem with having money in a game that is so depending on resources. If you have money then it would be weird if it was just a temporary resource that you get from things like taxes, to spend on special items and thatās it.
If there is money then it should be integrated in the whole society. Something that goes from character to character and everyone needs, to pay for food and a place to live. This would mean that the characters have a more personal agenda, to make money and get a better quality of life. And this would mean that they might want to build a new home when they can afford it. So the initiative to build new houses would often come from the people. You probably donāt want them to build anywhere they want, but I guess this could be solved by letting the player know that "This family want to build a small wooden hut. Where can they build it and what do you want it to look like?"
Either way, it would have a rather big impact on gameplay and take away some of the freedom and control from the player. At least the way I see it.
1 Like
Tropico is pretty good, itās goes on sale from time to time so pick it up if its going cheap!
I understand your point but I think channelling things like that into what is essentially you in the gameworld, kind of forces you to play in specific ways, which to me goes against the whole sandbox idea. Obviously there are going to be right and wrong ways to approach things, but I would think that would be quite broad and up to the player how deeply they engage with something.
I just feel it might pigeonhole players into acting in certain ways, taking away from the freedom of the game.
My point with the whole socialism etc was that those methods of governing just didnāt exist. The King was the power of the time, including methods of governance such as socialism etc as far as Iām concerned just wouldnāt fit 1. the style of the game, and 2. the setting of the game.
I like the idea that money circulates around your settlement and would enable each settler to purchase items/ buildings of their choice, but I think this might be something for a mod, as I donāt think itās their vision for the game.
Yes, it would take away some of the freedom of the game, which is why it should be a separate game mode, if it would ever be implemented (like I said, somewhere in my wall of text ).
So we agree on that part. 
You are right that a king would be the best fit in many ways. However, a king would require a kingdom and the developers guess has been that a 100 people would be close to the top of what is manageable and Iām guessing that most of the time you will have far less than 100.
For a small settlement it would be more fitting to have a towns council or āThe Eldersā or just some man or woman that people respect and listen to.
1 Like
Reviving this topic about kings and queens etc., maybe, you, the player, is the ruler, and you can customise your characters appearance (from models that workers have), change the palette of your personās clothes, and choose what kind of leader you are (one kind for each class tree, so shepherd and trapper have same leader type). You can control youāre leader directly, and it can do all regular worker actions and some extra things, say, congratulate someone on their work or say that they are doing a horrible job, one would increase the morale, but lower the XP gain, while the other would do the opposite. Also, you have skills form leveling up, and can have a small party of hearthlings with you to assist in whatever you are doing. Hope this is good!