Fwurg

[Brend]

With the Mandalorian war behind us (in terms of flying around with fleets at least), I would like to discuss a big change in the Military rules: a change in the fleet upkeep calculations.

In my opinion, the Mandalorian war has inflated the value of a fleet upgrade by throwing around a lot of high-end (that is 4/4/4 fleets). The Military rules weren't really designed for Superfaction vs Superfaction battles, something that could be felt in the amount of OOC clarifications that were needed. Though those can be ascribed in part to the rules being relatively new.

The thing is: the rules were designed for armed conflicts between worlds of member-size against other worlds of roughly that size. Think about blockading an unaligned member world because they reneged on a deal, or performing fleet exercises in the sector of an outpost of a political enemy to put some pressure on them.

I think that the game would benefit from having less supercharged fleets around. The game isn't meant as a wargame, and though we are far away from FWURG being war-only, I think that we should be careful with the amount of raw firepower available to players.


To address this issue, I propose that we do two things: change fleet upkeep, and create an IC event to explain away the enormous OOC retrofit that the change would result in otherwise.

Military Fleet Upkeep

Related rules: Military Fleet Upkeep

I propose to change fleet upkeep by having it take into account the number of upgrades a fleet has. During design of the Military rules, RemcoSwenker already said that this was a good plan, though in the end we didn't go for it. It turns out that he was right.

By increasing upkeep when a fleet has more upgrades, the choice to take another upgrade becomes more meaningful. No longer is it a question of "Do I have the necessary and ?", but it becomes a question of "Do I really want to pay all the time for the increase in military power?"

What I propose is an increase of the base upkeep of the Military fleet (that's the part of the upkeep that is the same for the Inactive and Defensive levels of activity, currently 25 ), and to add an additional amount based on the number of basic upgrades:

• Base upkeep: 50 per
• Upgrades 1,2,3: +10 per
• Upgrades 4,5,6: +20 per
• Upgrades 7,8,9: +30 per

These rules lead to the following upkeep table:

• 0 upgrades:
  50
  per
• 1 upgrades:
  60
  per
• 2 upgrades:
  70
  per
• 3 upgrades:
  80
  per
• 4 upgrades:
  100
  per
• 5 upgrades:
  120
  per
• 6 upgrades:
  140
  per
• 7 upgrades:
  170
  per
• 8 upgrades:
  200
  per
• 9 upgrades:
  230
  per

Note that the base upkeep is still doubled if the fleet put in the Combat-Ready level of activity. Furthermore, this increase in upkeep is only from the basic upgrade that gives +● offense and +● defense. Upgrades from technologies and such do not count against this (but could require specific upkeep defined by the upgrade itself).

IC Event

Any change in the fleet upkeep to make fleets much more expensive will most likely result in an number of invocations of the meta-rules to retroactively change players fleets to a smaller size, and spend the resources on something else.

To ease the transition, I propose to do an IC event where the Union military buys up upgrades from member worlds. This will allow the transition to be less abrupt, and change the world in a way that makes sense from an IC perspective as well.

I am not sure on the exact details, but I think that they should be determined after we decided if and how we are changing the fleet rules. The Write-a-thon would be a good place to discuss the IC event.

[Chriz]

I agree that increased upkeep is required and think an IC event is a good way to solve the need for retroactive changes.

However when Brend and I discussed this topic we eventually agreed to disagree on the progression of the Fleet upkeep.

I reason that the upkeep proposed by Brend is a bit of a overkill since going over 200 / for a inactive fleet is a bit extreme. That is why I propose a less steep progression.

My proposal:

• Base upkeep: 50 per
• Upgrades 1,2,3: +10 per
• Upgrades 4,5,6: +15 per
• Upgrades 7,8,9: +20 per

• 0 upgrades:
  50
  per
• 1 upgrades:
  60
  per
• 2 upgrades:
  70
  per
• 3 upgrades:
  80
  per
• 4 upgrades:
  95
  per
• 5 upgrades:
  110
  per
• 6 upgrades:
  125
  per
• 7 upgrades:
  145
  per
• 8 upgrades:
  165
  per
• 9 upgrades:
  185
  per

[Brend]

Having a really pimped out fleet should cost you really big amounts of . So, I still disagree ;-)

[Stuiter]

The upkeep of the fleet should not be cost too much. Otherwise players will build a fleet, throw it in battle and let is be destroyed so they do not have to pay the high upkeep. Brends proposal is way too steep and my feeling from Chriz proposal that it is still much.

[Mercury]

I'm personally in favour of steep prices. If you want a big fleet, you should pay for it. Doesn't seem unreasonable to me. If you don't want to pay lots of upkeep... don't get a big fleet.

Honestly though, the difference between 185 / turn or 230 / turn seems trivial to me. Why not x4 the entire thing and make fully upgraded fleets cost 920 / turn?

[Gerben]

In my opinion the current upkeep is too low and should be increased significantly. Both proposal aren't that different to be honest, be it that they use a slightly different scale. Having to pay either 185 / or 230 / doesn't matter that much. Given the goal off this change, I believe that Brend's higher scale better reflects the intentions of maintaining military presence more of an economical choice, but the same could be said for the suggestion made by Niels to increase the costs even further, though the x4 seems a bit of an overshoot.

On the IC solution I'll say this, I'm favour of such an event and I'll be happy to run it as part of my program as your new Minister of Defence :P

[Brend]

I'm personally in favour of steep prices. If you want a big fleet, you should pay for it. Doesn't seem unreasonable to me. If you don't want to pay lots of upkeep... don't get a big fleet.

Honestly though, the difference between 185 / turn or 230 / turn seems trivial to me. Why not x4 the entire thing and make fully upgraded fleets cost 920 / turn?

I didn't want to make them that expensive because the of the low expected usefulness of having the military fleet, and the fact that if you want to actually make use of it (i.e., switch it to Combat-Ready), the price is already doubled, so you would already be paying 460 per as base upkeep, on top of which the distance amount still has to be added.

A second thing is that I do still want the smaller players to be able to afford a military fleet if they want to join in on that part of the FWURG game (the Military rules were designed as an add-on, though still one that should be usable by all players if they wated to). If we want to end up very high, we could also steepen the steps up the progression to have the final upgrades cost much more, instead of slapping a multiplier on everything.

[Elmer]

I agree that the current upkeep is too low (I pay 3 for my inactive fleet, come on). I really like the increasing costs for increasing upgrades. To keep the 'low weak fleets' affordable, while the pimped out fleets are just plain expensive.

I also already said that with not increasing the fleet upkeep, every player with a fleet just goes for the max. Making the upgrades more expensive was a nice idea but eventually not the best way to scare off players making expensive fleets.

At this moment I am still pondering on what the right amount of upkeep would be.

[Elmer]

I just realises a problem: (for tl;dr, see yellow text bellow)

There are member fleets and there are Union fleets.

The Union fleets are 4/4/4 and costs 250 to fly everywhere, they cost 500 to activate and be combat-ready everywhere. This is waaaaaaaayyyy cheaper than it cost for members to use their fleets. This create the following situation: Small problems where you can use a fleet don't exists as we have the Union fleets, and large problems can only be solved with Union fleets.

What members see is: It costs 250 per turn to have a Union fleet combat-ready anywhere (actually it is 500 , but 250 is standard paid by the members in the status quo situation). A Union member must pay ( 50 + 200 × (distance in trade factor) ) So 1 sector out of the Union, with an average factor of 2.5 it costs 550 . But wait, there is more! A member must assign a trade fleet, with the corresponding open market zone, which can be blocked.

So only within the Union it is cheaper to activate a member fleet. But someone will only activate a fleet if there is a fight, but nobody will start a fight because the Union fleets will come and get you.

So instead of being the protective fence against evil super powers, the Union fleets are this superior police force watching over us and shoot our conflict generators into oblivion.

This is very effective, but this also makes member fleets totally useless. There is no actual reason and no actual choice to build a fleet. This escalates when the upkeep increases of member fleets. There is no logical choice to build a fleet, if a Union fleet is superior in every way and WAAAAAAAYAYY cheaper. Because this is cheap, there is no reason for the senate to discuss over the use of Union fleets: Senate "How much does it costs?" Minister: "my budget can have 2 fleets combat-ready for 10 ." Senate: "What are you waiting for? Go use them already!"

We just had an all out war with the Mandalorians and it costs us only 100 per turn!, I mean the recession of 3 was more expensive than the whole war of 25 ! This is not the intention of the military rules.

The situation we actually want is the following: The Union fleets are there to prevent the other super powers to start an assault on us. But the Senate prefers not to use them. The different members have together a wide range of fleet stats, every fleet fulfilling the single needs of the Union member, but they are all different. When a member has issues with another member or minor world outside the Union, he can use his fleet to force his point on the other member/world. The Senate can choose to use the Union fleets, but must have a discussion first to decide if they think it is worth the effort to solve the issue between these two little brats.

In this case, members can use their fleets if they feel they have to make a point, without the fear of instant police force Union fleets of doom all over their heads and worlds. For members to have a fleet and to use it becomes an actual and meaningful choice, and not this useless money sink you have because your faction is paranoia or war hungering beings who never actually can use their fleets.

The way I propose to make the Union fleets more of a point of discussion instead of the military police force peace keepers is by increasing their upkeep: Outside the Union the defensive mode to 500 (Thus an increase of 250 per turn), combat-ready within the Union increasing to 1000 (thus an increase of 500 . And combat-ready outside the Union increase to 1500 (Thus an increase of 1000 ). This way, the Union fleets are these actual fences against the other super powers, but using them is a big choice.

This issue however does not say much about the Union member fleet upkeeps, that discussion still needs to be finished.

TL;DR:
Union fleets are way to cheap and thus there is no reason not to use them, I propose to increase their upkeep with 250 , 500 and 1000 for using them defensive outside the Union, combat-ready in the Union and combat-ready outside the Union respectively. This does not solve the discussion of increased upkeep for member fleets, but does help.

[Mercury]

Quadrupling was perhaps a bit excessive, but lets look at real world budgets:

I'll take the United States as an example. In 2013, the United States spent a total of 3,803 billion dollars. Of this 672.9 billion dollars was spent on the Department of Defence. That's about 17.7%. (source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Unit ... ral_budget)

The United States is the second largest economy in the world (after the EU), so lets look at the taxable income for the second largest player. I look at taxable income because other income through trade is incidental and dependent on current trades, whereas taxable income is stable and gives a reasonable estimate of the size of a world.

* 3235 (Unified Republic of Darya, Turn 140)

On average, this is a taxable income of 3235 . This leaves 2590 after Union taxation. 17.7% of that would be 458.43 .

I'll round it down to 450 / turn. I feel that is a reasonable estimation for a fully upgraded fleet. That means using a realistic expenditure on defence, a large world could maintain a fully upgraded military fleet (or multiple less upgraded ones).

The Netherlands, a much smaller country which spends very little on defence, spends a total of 267.7 billion euro's a year. Of this, 7.6 billion is spent on Defence. This is about 2.8% of the budget. (source: http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen ... -nederland)

Now, let's look at the income of starting players. Turn 11 is the first turn when players started paying taxes, so I took that as a base. Taxable incomes for players who began in turn 1 were 945, 945, 1569, 985 and 1045, an average of 1097.8. 2.8% would be 30.7 / turn.

I'll round it down to 30 / turn. I feel that is a reasonable estimation for an unupgraded fleet. That means using a realistic expenditure on defence, a small world could maintain a single unupgraded fleet.

As I mentioned at the start, quadrupling might be excessive. But I do feel it should be more expensive - rather than less - to maintain fleets.

I'd also propose adding an option to downgrade a fleet for a small amount of , representing cost cutting measures, firing personnel and selling expensive weapon systems and the likes.

[Chriz]

Looking at the numbers you posted I think they are reasonable. However in your comparison the fleet of the United States is either combat-ready and out of their own sector fighting in a distant land, making the base upkeep maximally 200 . Or they are two defensive fleets. To be honest a militaristic super power does not commit on only one fleet.

[Mercury]

I disagree that the United States armed forces are "combat ready". They do have troops in various places, but the US cannot really be considered in any type of serious warfare, nor preparing to get involved in it.

Regardless, let's do the calculation according to your numbers. The Confederacy of Excaria - an established military power - has a spendable income of 8391 . 17.7% would be 1485. Let's round that down to 1400. By your numbers, they currently have 7 fully upgraded fleets at their disposal. Following mine, that number drops to 3, which I feel is far more reasonable, especially considering that basically... they do. (They actually have them only "mostly" upgraded).

Again, I think players should have an option to downgrade their fleets, but all in all, I think somewhere in the direction of 500 / is reasonable for an inactive fleet that is fully upgraded.

Sun Tzu said: In the operations of war, where there are in the field a thousand swift chariots, as many heavy chariots, and a hundred thousand mail-clad soldiers, with provisions enough to carry them a thousand li, the expenditure at home and at the front, including entertainment of guests, small items such as glue and paint, and sums spent on chariots and armour, will reach the total of a thousand ounces of silver per day. Such is the cost of raising an army of 100,000 men. (Sun-Tzu 2-1)

[Fedor]

On the point of combat ready, I would agree with Mercury that the United States are not combat ready. Combat ready on all fleets I would see more as a state in total warfare. The US is nowhere near total war and they just have a bit of the war machine turned on right now.

For the rest of the thread I don't have a strong opinion yet. I'm just concerned that Mercury is reasoning about what the state of military expenditure in the real world is, but I'm unsure if that is what we want in FWURG.

[Mercury]

I understand that argument. I am sure we'll reach some sort of compromise on things. All I'm trying to do is explain that expensive does not automatically mean unreasonable.

Again, this would be a rule change so players who are affected by this would always be able to make adjustments in a way that is fair to all, regardless of the decision we make.

[Brend]

I appreciate the work Mercury did to give us some reference figures. I think that they form a good basis for tuning the cost. I also think that Elmer's point on the cost of Union fleets should not be ignored -- he rightfully points out that the deploying the Union Defence Fleets should not be 'cheap' compared to player fleets. Especially since this discussion is not only about the fleets, but about their impact on FWURG as a game as well.


I think we should not forget that the military fleets are more of a roleplaying choice than an economic choice. Because of this, we should also make sure that we don't lose sight of the fact that most other roleplaying choices are much, much cheaper: think of the advanced technologies of the Hiocans and the ACA, or the impressively cool artificial moon of the Teprogrenaians, or the extended computing power of the IO.

These things are not expressed directly in tax value. Instead, they are just roleplayed. For some of us, the military fleets are such a choice as well. For example, if we had no military rules, I would still roleplay the Veolians as having a strong military. I don't think that having something for the roleplay value should cost you half of your factions budget.


That being said. I still support the high costs advocated by Mercury, for a simple reason: it makes sense to me. Though I must admit that it makes more sense to me if the fleets would have use beyond purely bashing other fleets. This is why I also strongly support Elmer's idea of increasing the costs of the Union Defence Fleets. Making the use of Union Fleets more expensive for the Union makes union members less likely to vote in favour of activation for policing.

Furthermore, I think that not all Union fleets should be defensive at all times. I feel that the atmosphere of pending hostilities is better represented if the Union can go to 'Defensive Condition' at the ministers discretion -- this will allow the building of tension without actually going to war.

This in turn, will add value to the member's military fleets, as they can now be used as an extension of verbal politics. I'm not advocating total war towards other players, but I think that an investment in military should allow people to skirt the line between 'annoying neighbour' and 'Activate the Union Fleets!'. For me, the upkeep cost of Union Defence Forces and the upkeep cost of players' fleets is a linked thing.

Concrete proposal

Based on the numbers presented, I propose the following concrete changes to the rules.

Union Defence Fleet upkeep

• Inactive: 250 per
• Defensive: 750 per
• Combat-ready: 2000 per

Military Fleet Upkeep

• Base upkeep: 50 per
• Upgrades 1,2,3: +25 per
• Upgrades 4,5,6: +50 per
• Upgrades 7,8,9: +75 per

These rules lead to the following upkeep table:

• 0 upgrades:
  50
  per
• 1 upgrades:
  75
  per
• 2 upgrades:
  100
  per
• 3 upgrades:
  125
  per
• 4 upgrades:
  175
  per
• 5 upgrades:
  225
  per
• 6 upgrades:
  275
  per
• 7 upgrades:
  350
  per
• 8 upgrades:
  425
  per
• 9 upgrades:
  500
  per

Military Fleet Downgrading
I propose the addition of the 'Downgrade' Fleet action that can only be done in the Inactive state and when the fleet is in its home port: for the cost of 100 , a military fleet can be downgraded. The downgrade will remove 1 upgrade from the fleet, chaning both its upkeep and its combat ratings.

An downgraded military fleet removes -● on an attack ring of your choice, and -● on a defence ring of your choice.

Downgrading takes 1 , and finishing a downgrade counts as a completion on the home port.

Conclusion

A consequence of this is that the activation of a Union Defence Fleet for policing weighs in much heavier and will result in more political roleplay. At the same time, a player activating a fleet for a blockade is going to pay a rather large sum of to get near the other party.

If we combine these changes with properly-scaled external threats (i.e. not an all-out superfaction war) and the option for those with fleets to engage in storylines of conquest, crisis aid, etc., I think we will improve the experience of FWURG players both with and without fleets.

Again, this would be a rule change so players who are affected by this would always be able to make adjustments in a way that is fair to all, regardless of the decision we make.

Though I would appreciate it if we could do this through an IC event, to make it seem more logical -- this greatly enhances continuity within the setting.

[Mercury]

Though I must admit that it makes more sense to me if the fleets would have use beyond purely bashing other fleets.

I think military fleets might be relevant in foreign trade - that is, escorting trade fleets outside the Union. We don't as of yet have that option, but I do want to add that.

[Elmer]

I had an idea how to make fleets useful for empire expansion, but I wanted to wait with that till the issue of upkeep is settled.

[Gerben]

((OOC: first off it took me a while to read up and process the idea's posted here :P))

Creds to Mercury for putting in some time to provide us with a reasonable bases to compare. Though one can argue about the validity of the example it does, in my opinion, provide a fair guideline on which we can base our rules.

Secondly I very much like the consequences of the idea's posted by Mercury and Brend as set forth in Brend's proposal for the new rules. I also agree with Elmer's notion the Union Defence fleets are currently to cheap, and as a result create an atmosphere in which the player fleets have very little impact.

My thoughts on the proposal at hand:

increasing Union Defence fleet upkeep:
Though these costs are high, and maybe a bit too steep (for combat ready), they force us to consider the acts and consequences of war, because as wealthy as the Union is, we cannot support an all out conflict that long. They also provide member worlds to contribute in a meaning full way and don't take away 'roleplay' options, such as the Cradle, either.

Military fleet upgrade:
I support this proposal.

Military Fleet Downgrading:
I very much like this option, it adds flexibility and offers players more options. To resolve the current issues with member fleets that are bigger then wanted however, I'm in favour of an IC event run by the Ministry of Defence. It should generate some cool roleplay.

[Chriz]

I don't see why we don't put the Union Defence fleets on 250/500/1000 . At least make it look like they are using about the same military system.... We are still talking about a per fleet cost / that with the activity we had in the previous war would have been almost impossible to afford.

I still think that we are going way overboard by changing the fleet upkeep of a fully upgraded inactive fleet to 500 . However I have no arguments to support this since the whole upkeep will always be a guesstimate. My opinion is still that we are changing this far too extreme for something that costs to construct, to maintain and will never give any profit.

Although I feel that my opinion does not really matter in this case I will support this proposal under the condition that the economic event will buy the fleet upgrades at full value.

With the OOC rule change being so drastic I don't want to be forced to use the meta rule and rule that my military fleets never existed and spend all the investment in something else.

[Brend]

The cost of activating a union fleet for policing member fleet actions would be to low with 1000 .

I do agree that the upkeep in my proposal is very high when compared to other role play options, but an increase in military options should alleviate this. If you want economic growth, don't take military fleets...

[Chriz]

Does this also mean that the Union Defence budget will be magically twice as big? Since the Union will still have at least 6 defensive fleet together with 6 inactive fleets. This will be an average of 500 / fleet while we currently only have 250 / fleet in our budget.

Btw if you want to hold on to the 750 in defensive I would say make the combat-ready 1500 . Since combat-ready = twice the cost of defensive.

[Elmer]

The high cost for fleets are justified by the following reason: 4/4/4 fleets are the top of the line big ass own fleets of doom. You don't need the best of the best of the best for most things. In fact, we want that 4/4/4 fleets are special and rather uncommon. Players are encouraged to have smaller fleets.

The cost of 2000 was determined as follows as far I understand: when 1 sector out of the Union on the trade factor on average is around 2.5. So a fully upgraded fleet 1 sector out costs 1500 . However, the Union fleets don't need a fleet zone, a trade fleet and always costs the same amount to keep them combat ready. To compensate for these advantages, the cost is increased 500 . Especially when a fleet is more sectors out of the Union, the Union fleets will become very good. Aside this, there is 5000 just waiting around to be used from the minister of Defence. When activation cost is low, there will be no discussion in the senate as it can be paid with the contingency budged. However, when intervening between two factions result in a increase of taxes to pay for it, the hope is senators are less inclined to just throw a Union fleet against some squabbles between two small factions.

I think the increase in budget can be fixed with the lower bossy spine cost we get now that the free confederacy has left the Union.

[Stuiter]

The cost are high now and keeping more than one fleet will be too much for most worlds. It would be too bad if some players have to loose a fleet as it will be to expensive this will be quite a change as it takes a lot of investments.

It you want superpower battle the distance will be now a real problems as fighting a few sector away is very costly. So I think some techs will need to be make to things possible.

[Brend]

I have no problem with making the combat-ready costs of a union fleet 1500 .

To be honest, I did not take into account the union budget, and I think that having about 6 fleets inactive sounds about right... So that would indeed mean that the union is strapped for money. Elmer's proposal of retroactively explaining this with the confederacy split off sounds smart.

[Brend]

After some deliberation, I have come up with a way to improve the value of member fleets for the Union.

Step 1: No more supers!

Right now, the Union fleets have some special powers that set them apart from member fleets. For starters, they have no distance-based upkeep. They do not have a home port, their level of activity is Defensive at all times. All of these things conspire to make them effectively better, stronger and faster than member fleets.

There is a reason the Jedi masters of the Order are passive: if they would actively go on missions, they would always show up the PCs. The same is true for the Union fleets: the moment they are put in action, they start showing up the member fleets by being cheaper in use and stronger in combat.

I put forward the idea that we need to take away these special powers: let the Union fleets pay upkeep on the same scale as member fleets, and let them have home ports to calculate upkeep. This will greatly increase the cost of the Union military, and this is exactly the point. Let the Union military be expensive, and let the politicians work out the budget problems.

With an expensive Union military, member fleets start being a viable alternative for some of the duties of the Union military.

Step 2: Allow member fleets to serve

The OOC rationale for having a dedicated Union military was to combat piracy, to act as final step for policing Union law, and to protect against other superpowers.

On piracy: I do not think that a 4/4/4 super fleet is needed to stop pirates. A 1/1/1 fleets will do just as well, as pirates (other than the Mandalorians :P) are not nearly as organized as an actual army.

We can let member fleets handle patrolling against pirates by introducing the 'Piracy Patrol' fleet manoeuvre, and by declaring pirates to be cowards. Pirates are very economical: if the risk is greater than the reward, they're gone. Piracy is therefore prevented by having a fleet in the sector. Next to that the 'Piracy Patrol' manoeuvre can be used in Defensive and Combat-ready levels of activity, and prevents piracy in the sector of the fleet, and the sectors surrounding it.

If piracy control hasn't been done in a sector for 2 , the pirates start their raiding once more: trade routes through the sector suffer an additional +0.5 route factor per unpatrolled sector.

On policing: This is a very important point. If all Union fleets are replaced, the two or three members with the largest military force will be the de factor rulers of the Union -- this is clearly not what should happen. So, the Union keeps 6 of its 4/4/4 fleets around on inactive.

With the Union military consisting of those 6 fleets, and a selection of member fleets from all kinds of different worlds, no single world is capable of taking power from the Union government. Especially since most Jedi will side with the Union in the event of a member trying to become the single ruler. Besides, a world trying this will most likely see all their trades cancelled, their subsidies blocked and eventually their Bozzy Spine access revoked.

On protection from superpowers: The other superpowers only have superfleets because the Union does. If we change the rules so that most of the Union military is built up from member fleets, the same will hold for other superpowers. So, regardless of our choice of rules changes, the other superpowers will follow suit.

Example changes

Instead of having super fleets floating around without strings attached, let these duties be done by member fleets!

For example: if the we reduce the dedicated Union military to 6 (4/4/4|4/4/4) fleets, we can subsidize the members that provide fleets and automatically increase the value of member fleets by making them an integral part of the Union's military. The economic and political systems already in place will take over from here to regulate the amount of fleets and we have improved military feelings, better politics and more meaningful choices!

So, what yo you think?