Outsourcing the eAus military - Q & A
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by infin
Thanks for the interesting feedback on my original article concerning outsourcing of the military. I have read all these comments and have some responses and/or more detail according to how I envisioned this system in my mind. I am no expert on the mechanics of war so this is just conceptual but my main interest in professionalising the military from its present amatuer/honorary state so that eAus may enjoy a more organised and effective offensive capability.
Ari Lazarus
Q: From what I've heard damage reporting will be done via API calls. Can this currently be done yet? And who is in charge of keeping squad commanders honest about the damage they've dealt out?
A: I don't know about the capabilities of recording damage from battle. Presently, fighters are given weapons on an honour basis I guess. There is no way to prove that they have fought in the battle at the exact time as ordered. Until information on player activity can be locked down both the current and outsourced models will stay inefficient.
Q: Also, should government pay out things such as gifts or weapons, or leave it to squads to procure those themselves and simply provide gold / AUD? I feel it would be more economical and efficient in terms of estimating cost if the government simply paid in cash.
A: Cash. Cash allows each commander to organise their squads as they see fit. They source their equipment (food, wellness, gifts, moving tickets) from where they choose and pay their soldiers according to private agreement.
Q: Thirdly, how will the lower-damage players rank in this scene? I've heard boot camp can be extended to those who deal 50 damage and lower. Would it be beneficial to maintain an auctioning culture for such small amounts of damage? I personally feel it would benefit newbies to learn to function as a squad and thus agree with the idea of a boot camp as long as they do poor damage.
A: Theoretically, commanders with low damage players may choose to bite off smaller damage contracts. Instead of a 5,000 damage contract, they may go for 500 damage just to get started. This may be achieved with little or no weapons. In theory, a horde of players can deal large damage, but we all know that high damage individuals are the most desired assets. It's thge same way skill 1 players get a job.
Q: Finally, how about soldiers who wish to fight for free? People say that this will lead to mercenaries but I feel that true eAussie soldiers would fight whether or not they are paid to do so. Those worried about armaments could fight for cheap if they so wished, earning enough from the gov just to cover expenses. Elite troops will of course command a higher share / ask for more for their efficiency.
A: Every soldier's worth will be valued on the free market. Of course true patriotic Australian soldiers will only fight for Australia and will work for the commander who is most organised and able to pay the highest rate (or provde the best equipment for ranking).
Q: I think it might be helpful to divide 'contracts' into various 'levels' or ranks of damage. Following the 50k required, the government could split it:
4x 5k contracts, 5x 3k contracts, 10x 1k contracts, 10x 500 dmg contracts. Each contract would have a maximum rank any squad member can be (i.e. A squad with a FM cannot win a 500 dmg contract). This would limit competition for the lower end contracts from higher ups and would give squads with those members chance to compete for the contract.
A: I don't entireley agree. The cheapest most efficient tenderers can apply for all damage up the limit endorsed by parliament. This ensures the taxpayer's dollar is most efficiently spent. To get a 500 damage contract the tenderer will just have to undercut the big players and possibly work at a loss initially to build rep and atttract better fighters to his squad. In the long term I expect large cohesive groups of professional fighters will congregate together under highly experienced commanders. Together with effective lines of communication these squads will become dangerous dealers of damage. At the moment squads form and disband monthly. There is no continuity and this affects lines of communication.
Q: This works very well with squad sizes. Too big a squad? Too little payment. Too small a squad? Unable to complete contract. Therefore it is always in the squad's best interest to have members that are able to perform relatively well compared to their rank, and to have members that are close to them in rank.
A: The system can work for squads of any size because they are all bidding on a damage per gold basis.
Zarabos
Q: Run as a co-op, this kind of company can deal a respectable amount of damage, even with low strength, low rank workers. It would also take some of the financial burden off the government. If you are looking to recruit high ranking soldiers, then the tendering systems you proposed would be a great incentive. Experienced soldiers should be able to reap the benefits of their trade without being considered mercenary. A soldier being paid a sum in proportion to their battlefield presence is fair.
A: The beauty of the system is that each commander is free to organise his troops in whatever fashion he sees fit. If he owns companies and wishes to have his fighters work for him also then the efficiencies of a fully integrated system where the profit margin for each product is retained by the commander to deliver a very low damage/gold price. If the company is run badly then this will affect the cost of funding his fighters. It is essential that every fighter (like every worker) is paid according to their contribution and not simply according to their status.
Majester
Q: All fine for as an experiment in turning our professional military into mercenary companies... we'll see where their loyalty lays in a few months time.
A: Australians don't really want to be fighting for other countries, they just want to be in efficient organised military units. This is a new way of organising those units. And if instead you want to become a mercenary then wouldn't that be an exiciting development to the way eRep wars are conducted? I don't know.
Other comments
Q: So how do we fund all this extra military activity?
A: The same way expansionist countries have done so since time began: government revenue increases (either by GDP growth or tax increases) and plunder from regions obtained. This is an alternative strategy to the game I guess compared to signing a whole bunch of treaties and then making a bunch of weapons we can never use except in training wars (aw how nice... xD). America vs Japan is a great example. A war is begging to be fought and yet we stay neutral. Everyone wants ranks and XP and fighting delivers that. We could charge a country a particular amount of gold to come to their assistance and then tender out using this framework. I dunno I am just thinking out aloud. We will have to pay for their assistance in a similar situation. It will increase economic activity greatly.
War is a central mechanic to everyone getting higher levels so our country's citizens need to become highly involved in this apsect of the game, and eAus government should be enabling this.
An initial pilot is an essential step to seeing if this can work at all and it should be commenced without delay.
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I've spoken with Derek Apollyon and have confirmed that feeds from the API can be used, so we should be able to see what battles citizens have fought in (the feeds don't seem to be 100% so some safety measures will have to be placed I guess). It would be awesome if we could get displays of damage like the recent eUSA vs eJapan skirmish like so: http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/5664/8112f1.png" target="_blank">http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/5664/[..].png
The question then becomes what to do with squads that don't live up to their contract damage output. I said on IRC that it might be an idea to have squads pay a deposit, so if they fail to perform below a certain amount it can be kept. A variant would be to return the deposit plus payment pro-rata depending on how much total damage they DID deal.
Regarding contract levels, I suppose when you put it that way it becomes a very efficient free-market model of dealing damage. So you reckon that low-damage squads should sort themselves out (ala form themselves into a large group to deal more overall damage to compete with high damage groups) instead of the gov. reserving contracts at different levels?
I actually think, if done right, the gov. will save a lot of money overall from this, seeing as they will only pay as much as low as the lowest bidder will go.
Let's have a test scenario. Going with 50k damage dealt, we have, say, 4 teams.
Alpha
50,000 dmg possible
80g cost of contracting
Beta
30,000 dmg
35g cost
Charlie
10,000 dmg
10g cost
Delta
5,000 dmg
3g cost
What is the most efficient manner for the gov. to do this? If they only hire B, C, and D, then the mission will fail from lack of damage.
Whilst high damaging tanks are very important, we should also remember just how long it takes for a high lvl player to increase their damage by 50. The stronger you are the more time, money and effort it takes to gain an additional 50 damage. Conversly, to get a new player up to doing 50 damage is much quicker and easier. Effectively it should take less than a month for a new player to get through bootcamp and into the real fighting. We get 60 new citizens a day, so even if only 100 new players stay active for a month that's still an extra 50,000 damage delt during a war if our boot camp graduates fight. Effectively if we can keep our new players interested in this game long enough to get hooked (Generally happens through fighting a very fun war) we can increae eAustralians maximum damamge output by quite a lot and it's relatively cheap.
nice answers Ari 😃
infin good article, although the word outsourcing is a little misleading
btw, the SPMM, should cut costs to the military
I've got a question regarding the SPMM, this seems like a good place to put it.
If we are offering contracts to our soldiers to do damage, what's to stop our enemies from paying them more to NOT do damage?
personally, i think the whole idea of appealing to people's greed for money and weapons is a tad on the dangerous side.
I fight for my country, not because i get weapons of money, but because i want to see my country prevail.
Brenflakes - nothing....but if our enemies are foolish enough to waste their resources bribing me to not fight for eAus, then I'd say 'sure', take their bribe and fight anyway - using the bribe to buy more weapons. Trusting someone to betray is foolish.
It is not greed to want to fight effectively, and we can't fight effectively without resources.
Besides, if people aren't rewarded for doing the right thing, then people who do the *wrong* thing will end up controlling the enation as they'll be the only ones with money.
@whitelaughter - lol well thats one way to fleece the enemy i spose lol tho not everyone would be the same unfortunatley.
Dont get me wrong, im not knocking the idea, i think as it stands, a lot of our people fight for the love of their country, and incentivising that patriotism can have its pro's and cons. Im just trying to look at the bigger picture. Obviously our military isnt performing to its highest potential at the moment, but its not something we should immediatley jump to change to the first idea that pops up. I'd be keen to see more suggestions on ways to improve the military, the more options the better. The first idea that comes along, isnt always the best one.
Just something to think about 🙂
Why don't u guys have a branch like ACUK or AAR so that in the case the private sector is not good enough or if players that are in private squads think their squad is no longer what it used to be then they can join it? it just would have very infrequent weapon hand-outs.
Also i think the SPMM is good since it will inspire people to come up with efficient ways of doing things.
PEOPLE will contribute and volunteer more to a militia like group then a government military if there is a "we all have to work hard together" approach,the biggest bonus from this is increased activity and fun cuz fighting in a private squad is actually fun especially because of the sense of teamwork.
But i think weapons funding to new squads should be quite strict cuz u don't want fail squads and money to have to give out to somebody.
Remember the Peru incident though,look how much trouble ePoland was in when it couldn't control 1 of its private branches.