How horribly confusing did you find it the first time you saw it? Its supposed to show you a line chart over time of the relative strength of each parties finances, and also show you the breakdown of where that money is coming from.
So in the example above, The Popular Democrats clearly have more members than anyone else, and this is helping them raise money. The social Justice party is raising nothing from members, and the Progressive Fundamentalists are also maybe just 1% member donations.
I think this chart sucks but cannot imagine a better method. Conventionally this stuff would be presented by a stacked graph, but I also want all 3 parties to be overlaid on top of each other, which would be gibberish. I’m wondering if 3 vertically arranged stacked charts might be better:
Does that make more sense, and make things easier to read?
I was never confused by the chart, but rather the donor system, which isn’t front and centre and only appears on the reports page to tell you they’re leaving or joining. I think this new system is excellent.
That said, for a while in Democracy 3 I was blissfully unaware that this system affected the game in the first place. Perhaps if you had some control over what donors you work with, as you do with ministers it’d feel less backgroundy.
I’ll be honest with you, in most games I play I don’t even look at that chart. If a piece of the game doesn’t have player actions involved, most players probably don’t look at it.
The donor system could also use another look. As it stands now, the only thing they do that I can do anything about is demand a policy. Much like the ministers, they are likely to abandon the party even if I appease their relevant groups, and new ones show up without me doing anything to earn them.
Some things to consider if you ever do a re-build of the donors:
-They should remain in play after abandoning a party, and move to supporting an opposition party. As it stands, when they leave I shrug. It should be a problem when they leave.
New donors should demand a policy before they will join.
-Donors should always sympathize with the wealthy as one of their alignments. In game the wealthy vote is a safe dump vote, as you can’t please everyone. In the real world this one or two percent of the vote gets pandered to a lot. Having all the donors sympathize with the wealthy would force the player to play a bit more realistically.
-Have them sometimes offer something rather than demanding something. As it stands, when the donor demand pops up I usually swear at them. Having a positive side would be good, like promised campaign funding if I implement a policy for them if they’re happy with me, but want a little more.
I’m sure there’s more that could be added on, but I think I’ll leave that here for now.
