What about an Italian election game?

[Cranberry]

Lega Nord, per favore!

This sounds like a really interesting idea, I'll definetely want to play! The only thing that could prove to get difficult is to get enough players with a good enough understanding of Italian politics (I myself, I'm afraid, have just a rudimentary knowlegde of Italian politics out of South Tyrol / Alto Adige), but I'm sure that if you are ready to give out help and information, you can still find enough interested players!

Non vedo l'ora!

[Cranberry]

Thinking of it, Cris, I wonder if it wouldn't be better to prepone the elections so not that they are played as IRL in 2018, but at some point nearer to the present, sometime late 2015? The reason for this obviously being that we can play with the familiarity of present issues (austerity, the Renzi reforms, Greece, refugees... ), and you don't have to basically invent a timeline three years into the future, where for all we know the issues that matter to the Italians could be quite considerably different. (Not just saying this because playing Lega Nord with a refugee crisis going on is so much more fun )

If I may add to your discussion about a unified Centrodestra, while obviously my opinion is worthless because of me being basically clueless, I'd guess Antonio has quite the point when he says the differences between Salvini and Berlusconi, while mainly from what I could gather from personal nature, are quite too big to bridge; and I can't really see any of the two being ready to play second fiddle to each other in a coalition. But I'll rather let that to people who really know what they're talking about (that's you ).

[Cranberry]

Thinking of it, Cris, I wonder if it wouldn't be better to prepone the elections so not that they are played as IRL in 2018, but at some point nearer to the present, sometime late 2015? The reason for this obviously being that we can play with the familiarity of present issues (austerity, the Renzi reforms, Greece, refugees... ), and you don't have to basically invent a timeline three years into the future, where for all we know the issues that matter to the Italians could be quite considerably different. (Not just saying this because playing Lega Nord with a refugee crisis going on is so much more fun )

If I may add to your discussion about a unified Centrodestra, while obviously my opinion is worthless because of me being basically clueless, I'd guess Antonio has quite the point when he says the differences between Salvini and Berlusconi, while mainly from what I could gather from personal nature, are quite too big to bridge; and I can't really see any of the two being ready to play second fiddle to each other in a coalition. But I'll rather let that to people who really know what they're talking about (that's you ).

Well, except for local elections there will not be general elections until 2018, so the player wouldn't be able to simulate a campaign during 2016 or early 2017.

That's why I proposed to prepone the election in your game

[Cranberry]

Thinking of it, Cris, I wonder if it wouldn't be better to prepone the elections so not that they are played as IRL in 2018, but at some point nearer to the present, sometime late 2015? The reason for this obviously being that we can play with the familiarity of present issues (austerity, the Renzi reforms, Greece, refugees... ), and you don't have to basically invent a timeline three years into the future, where for all we know the issues that matter to the Italians could be quite considerably different. (Not just saying this because playing Lega Nord with a refugee crisis going on is so much more fun )

If I may add to your discussion about a unified Centrodestra, while obviously my opinion is worthless because of me being basically clueless, I'd guess Antonio has quite the point when he says the differences between Salvini and Berlusconi, while mainly from what I could gather from personal nature, are quite too big to bridge; and I can't really see any of the two being ready to play second fiddle to each other in a coalition. But I'll rather let that to people who really know what they're talking about (that's you ).

Well, except for local elections there will not be general elections until 2018, so the player wouldn't be able to simulate a campaign during 2016 or early 2017.

That's why I proposed to prepone the election in your game

Oh, yes... we can anticipate the election to September 2016 (that means starting to play in early 2016), that's when the new electoral law (Italicum) will enter into force.

Why not still a bit eariler, December 2015, say, and start June/July 2015; that way, we can play with the issues of the present?

[Cranberry]

Thinking of it, Cris, I wonder if it wouldn't be better to prepone the elections so not that they are played as IRL in 2018, but at some point nearer to the present, sometime late 2015? The reason for this obviously being that we can play with the familiarity of present issues (austerity, the Renzi reforms, Greece, refugees... ), and you don't have to basically invent a timeline three years into the future, where for all we know the issues that matter to the Italians could be quite considerably different. (Not just saying this because playing Lega Nord with a refugee crisis going on is so much more fun )

If I may add to your discussion about a unified Centrodestra, while obviously my opinion is worthless because of me being basically clueless, I'd guess Antonio has quite the point when he says the differences between Salvini and Berlusconi, while mainly from what I could gather from personal nature, are quite too big to bridge; and I can't really see any of the two being ready to play second fiddle to each other in a coalition. But I'll rather let that to people who really know what they're talking about (that's you ).

Well, except for local elections there will not be general elections until 2018, so the player wouldn't be able to simulate a campaign during 2016 or early 2017.

That's why I proposed to prepone the election in your game

Oh, yes... we can anticipate the election to September 2016 (that means starting to play in early 2016), that's when the new electoral law (Italicum) will enter into force.

Why not still a bit eariler, December 2015, say, and start June/July 2015; that way, we can play with the issues of the present?

I agree with you that December 2015 would be better for the timeline and more realistic than September 2016. But in real life, if there will be an election on December 2015, the new electoral law can't be used. So we should use the actual electoral law, that is a proportional law (4% treshold for parties out of a coalition, 2% for parties in a coalition but there isn't a majority price, that means caos). We can anticipate the election to December 2015 (a realistic thing) using the new electoral law (that should enter into force in July 2016), but it would not be realistic at all.

Well, I guess it shouldn't be too unrealistic moving the entrance of the Italicum law a bit earlier? But anyway, it's your game, please proceed the way you want to.

[Cranberry]

Can I still get dibs on Lega Nord?

[Cranberry]

If we just need one other, we could start by now, and you can play the remaining party until you find another player?

Once again, I would like to re-iterate that I want to be Lega Nord

[Cranberry]

Looks good to me!