.

[bore]

The thing is, a ten-person senate is probably the best makeup for a legislature. We can't sustain five 10-person senates, and with smaller legislative bodies it's hard to keep interest up.

There are five at-large seats at the moment and five regional seats, right?  Why couldn't we just remove two seats (one regional and one at-large) each time a region chose to secede.  I'm not advocating secession or even saying you're necessarily wrong about the ideal size of the Senate.  My point is simply that there is a relatively easy and logical fix if Senate size is your concern.  Another hypothetical possibility would be for each region to become it's own country (with a 3-5 person Assembly as it's sole legislative body) which would eliminate the need for a federal Senate.  Again, I want to stress that I'm not advocating secession; I'm merely considering how the game could adapt structurally to the secession of one or more regions.

You aren't reading Hagrid properly.

He's saying that if all of the regions were to be different countries, then they'd each have their own 10 member senates, which would mean at least 50 active players.

Now I think you could probably make do with a 6 person legislature, but you'd also need to factor in governors, justices among other things, so the point still stands.

[bore]

The thing is, a ten-person senate is probably the best makeup for a legislature. We can't sustain five 10-person senates, and with smaller legislative bodies it's hard to keep interest up.

There are five at-large seats at the moment and five regional seats, right?  Why couldn't we just remove two seats (one regional and one at-large) each time a region chose to secede.  I'm not advocating secession or even saying you're necessarily wrong about the ideal size of the Senate.  My point is simply that there is a relatively easy and logical fix if Senate size is your concern.  Another hypothetical possibility would be for each region to become it's own country (with a 3-5 person Assembly as it's sole legislative body) which would eliminate the need for a federal Senate.  Again, I want to stress that I'm not advocating secession; I'm merely considering how the game could adapt structurally to the secession of one or more regions.

You aren't reading Hagrid properly.

He's saying that if all of the regions were to be different countries, then they'd each have their own 10 member senates, which would mean at least 50 active players.

Now I think you could probably make do with a 6 person legislature, but you'd also need to factor in governors, justices among other things, so the point still stands.

Couldn't a five person Senate work just as well?  That way you only need 25 active players.  It is still a lot, but it seems much more doable.

Sure. You could probably get by with each region's assembly just being converted to their legislature, maybe adding an extra seat or two for returning cabinet members/ senators. A legislature of 10 or 8 or even 6 is basically impervious to being crippled by inactivity like so many regions have at some point been, which I think is hagrid's point.

[bore]

If a region wants to secede, and they hold a referendum wherein a majority of the population votes to secede, then they should be free to do so.

As for a state changing allegiances, from a game-perspective, this is simply not a box you want to open. The nature of Atlasia is such that one or two people alone could change a states' allegiances under such a system. You'd just have a constant game of musical chairs and people in charge of making the game actually work would get nothing but a headache. It's why we have regional consent for boundary changes.

Unfortunately that's not true. The Plebisicite Clause Removal Amendment only passed two regions, so the constitution still reads: A State by plebiscite shall be able to veto its transfer from one Region to another.

[bore]

If a region wants to secede, and they hold a referendum wherein a majority of the population votes to secede, then they should be free to do so.

As for a state changing allegiances, from a game-perspective, this is simply not a box you want to open. The nature of Atlasia is such that one or two people alone could change a states' allegiances under such a system. You'd just have a constant game of musical chairs and people in charge of making the game actually work would get nothing but a headache. It's why we have regional consent for boundary changes.

Unfortunately that's not true. The Plebisicite Clause Removal Amendment only passed two regions, so the constitution still reads: A State by plebiscite shall be able to veto its transfer from one Region to another.

You misunderstand me, I wasn't arguing against the way things are structured right now, merely against a theoretical system where a state could decide if it wanted to switch regions purely based on its own inhabitants. My point was that such a system would be a terrific headache, and we have things in place now to prevent that from happening because many states only have a one, two, or three citizens and those shifts could, in theory, happen constantly.

But the point is, if states start to secede or even regions start to consolidate, that theoretical system is our current, very real system.