Orsik waddles out of the Vongola Famiglia HQ and into the Streets. The dwarf, short and stout, was young by dwarf standards but quite aged by human standards. He journeyed to the Streets this day to proclaim some thoughts of his that he had been contemplating for some time. He was excited by the prospect of "starting over" and getting a "fresh start" with a lot of new leaders and a new GFC. With this in mind, he approached the masses. He hopped on a soap box; not to preach, but to simply be at eye level with everyone else.

Greetings criminals of the six cities! I come to you today for two reasons; one, I'd like to make it commonplace for men of honor to entreat the leadership of the criminal underworld with suggestions that can be earnestly and honestly discussed. Precluding, of course, that these men of honor have taken the time to consider the suggestion and explain it to its full potential. Let it never be my intention to waste the valuable time of the leaders on foolish endeavors. However, I feel that it would be a great privilege to bestow upon Made Men; that when they approach the Streets they will be met with some proportional amount of effort by the leaders (or their hands) to respond to their ideas/thoughts/suggestions.

I don't mean to force leaders into things they either don't do or don't want to do, but I feel this is a great time to change how the Streets are interacted with by both the leaders and button men. If a leader feels the topic contributes very little or is lacking effort, the leader or hand can say so freely instead of responding. If the leader is busy, it can be delegated to one of the hands or if they're comfortable with it, having a button man speak for you. I think by normalizing CL interactions with Made Men, we can subtly change how the Streets are used.

Following that, my second suggestion is simple. We have, at most, 750 men, women, and an Orko gracing our HQs. Dividing that among 18 districts comes to just above 40 members per district. Because of this, it's obvious that some districts will need more than one HQ (and some already do) to house these individuals. However, I would like to suggest stopping at 2 HQs per district. Upon someone attaining the rank of Godfather, that allow a district to auth one additional person to inherit the GF's excess members. At 2 HQs per district, we average about 20 members per crew, and I fear that's a bit too thin, assuming that all 750 individuals are active (which they are not).

I think these two suggestions will provide some effects that I find quite beneficial: increased Streets activity (with an emphasis on quality over quantity), granting some privileges to the Made Man rank, crews filled with more active members (which will serve to keep people staying around), and disincentivize harboring members long past their usefulness to strengthen the HQ or make it seem fuller than it really is. Plus, there will simply be less leaders around, which I think increases the value of the HQs themselves and makes the words/actions of a CL more important. Your thoughts?

Orisk steps off the soapbox and immediately regrets his decision, as now he can neither see nor hear the people talking. He waddles over to a park bench and hops up to see what people have to say.

I was wondering when speeches like this would start coming out, its something I had thought about myself.  With a new era, it does bring up some questions about how things will be done now.  Will there be rules again such as those that the deceased GF council had made?  Or will everyone be left to decide how their city will be ran? 

I very much like that you are encouraging mafioso to share their opinion.  While the leaders ultimately have the final say, I think its great for family members to share ideas of what they would like to see.  I do hope that people will take your suggestion and share their opinions and ideas at least with their leaders. 

I also agree that we need more quality activity in the streets.  We need to get back to the times where there is a constant stream of great speeches.  It would be wonderful to come to the streets every day and see something new.  While I don't feel that street activity should be forced upon anyone, as not all mafioso are comfortable with public speaking, we do need to start encouraging everyone to make an effort.  Along with that, we need to start setting higher standards for what is being put in our streets, which is a separate topic all together. 

As for the HQ limit, not sure I agree with that one.  I do see your point, we wouldn't want to overfill one district, and have other districts with absolutely no one.  But, a limit of two just doesn't seem like it would work.  The reason for that is most districts will soon be hitting that two family limit.  What happens when someone finally does want to take over the GF spot?  They would be forced to remove a family or move them to another district for that to happen, which does not seem plausible.  I think that a limit of three is acceptable, giving enough room to grow if needed. 

Great speech, I'm curious to see what others think about potential new rules and changes. 

Jaded looked around. Quite aware that she was just a mere leader she was slightly appalled at some of what she heard.

Do you feel that the things under Made Men say aren't worth the time to a leader? That they can't contribute anything of value to these streets or ideas that may spark something of value later on down the road?

As far as the HQ's go, the leaders will do as they will. Just as they have always done. If people chose to join one district or city over another more HQ's may be required. You cannot force members into crews that they do not wish to belong to.

With her piece said she looked around her, and shrugged her shoulders. Her words would be taken by some and not by others and that was okay with her. That was the way of opinions. Some agreed, others didn't.

JadedButterfly, you actually bring up some great points, some things that I missed while listening to the speech.  I agree, that anyone should be able to state their opinions, not just Made Men and above.  Every member of a family should be able to contribute and feel like their opinions and ideas mean something.  Thank you for pointing that out. 

You also make a good point about the limitations on HQ's.  By limiting to a certain amount, it does somewhat force people to choose between what is available, giving them less freedom to pick someone they really want to join.  As for districts doing what they want, it all depends on what this new era brings, which I touched on earlier.  Will there be another council with rules, or will districts be free to rule themselves, we shall see. 

Cole_Holland, do you think it is a fair request to ask CLs/RHs/LHs to come to the Streets when the topic meets a certain criteria? I think if leaders approached the Streets more regularly either to declare their opinion on some subject or to determine whether the subject was worth discussing, we could see more people showing up to hear what the leaders had to say. As for your question; "What happens when someone wants to take the GF spot?" I fear you didn't hear my full suggestion as I stated an individual attaining GF would allow for another auth to inherit the GF's members. I don't like the idea of removing auths because someone becomes a Godfather!

@JadedButterly, I don't think the quality of someone's words is predicated upon their rank. Considering my intention throughout this suggestion has been to encourage Streets discussion, I fear you may have deliberately found an issue where there is none. I don't think the leaders need to come out and weigh in on everything that is said in the Streets, and I therefore needed to draw a line somewhere in the criteria. Leaders are obviously welcome to respond to those below Made Man, but I leave that to their discretion. Personally, I think it also empowers the Made Man rank as at that point you will be held accountable for your words in the Streets to a greater degree (as you'll be under the scrutiny of other leaders).

Additionally, I am not trying to "force members into crews they don't wish to belong to." In my opinion, an HQ limit does nothing to force members anywhere, and instead requires crews to keep active members instead of holding onto inactives for weeks. The HQ limit has no effect on how many people can be a in a crew, and therefore an individual who wants into a full crew will have the same difficulty joining it whether there's 2 or 3 or 17 crews in its district. This allows for 36 crews in 18 districts (and more, once people go for Godfather), so I fear if you can't find a decent leader or one that's willing to make space for you, tough luck. But hopefully with an HQ limit in place, people will only be authing exemplary leaders instead of whoever's bloodline is due and HQ.

Dee pulls Orsik to the side after hearing his speech

Orsik these are two bold suggestions might I say.  Bold but also a tad bit out of the box thinking to me as I have not thought of either of the two ideas.

I think the change to the street post is a good idea actually, Im a fan of bringing more meaning to being made or meaning to rank in general.

Also I always thought we had too many crews.  I was more of a fan of our cities with no districts.  And 50 man HQs and only about 6 godfathers.

Hmm, I never took the original speech to mean that people of lower ranks do not have opinions worth debating, or voices worth hearing. I did, however, take it to mean that as a demonstration of what the button signifies it would be great to see the higher ups acknowledging those who've earned said buttons.

In saying that, I don't necessarily agree with the original sentiment. Are we talking about leaders and hands of other families acknowledging the button earned somewhere else? Or, just the leaders and hands of the original speaker's family that is being discussed?

If it's the former, I could easily see differing opinions on who is deserving of earning that family rank keeping people away from the conversation.

If it's the latter, I would like to think leaders and their hands are not above joining in conversations, when they're in town, for any of their members, from associates and up.

In recent times past, crew sizes where decreased from 50 members to 40 members in order to increase communications and interactions among the members. It didn't change things at all honestly. You can drop the crew max from 40 to 20, and things are not going to change unless you have a leader and crew members who wish to be interactive with one another. It isn't the number of people you can house, but the type of people you put in your house honestly.

Not every leader wants to be vocal, or even communicate really. I'm not going to stand here and tell you I support the mutes of the world, just remind you that they exist. We have had major destruction across our cities in the past, and never heard the slightest official word on any of it. I sometimes believe you'd have better luck turning shit into gold than getting a crew leader to come out to the streets and speak.

Orsik, I do agree with encouraging leaders and hands to come to the streets, but not so much requesting.  This has always been an issue where people disagree, does a leader need to come to the streets to prove themselves and entertain the masses?  That is basically what forcing them to be seen does.  While a leader should be able to competently carry on a discussion, the fact that they are not constantly in the streets does not mean they are a poor leader.  Its more important to take care of a family than to entertain in the streets.  And forcing people to speak will result in poor speeches that were quickly written, because they had to be.  But, I also think that if leaders, hands, and maybe higher ranks come to the streets, people would take more notice.  If we start seeing better speeches and more activity, it would set a higher standard that what we currently have.

Sorry, got a little off topic there.  One point leads to another, and so on. 

Thank you for pointing out that you did in fact mention the case of a GF.  I may need glasses.  I still don't feel that it would work.  You can't say one district can have three families because there is now a GF, and still limit another district to two.  There is the fairness factor, and you know people will complain about that.  But I do see your point of limiting the amount of families in a district.  It would also make more sense having families evenly spread out among this cities.  The reason that we have so many families in one district/city, is that family members like to stick together.  We see it all the time, everyone wants an alliance that is close by.  Not many are willing to take on the challenge of a whole new city, leaving their family behind.  If they do, they will want to set up alliances all around them.  Thus, having multiple families in one area. 

Cole, I actually do believe a leader does not need to be vocal, loud, or "entertaining". As a matter of fact, my suggestion included having hands or a designated button man speaking for his crew instead of forcing leaders out here. That way, we at least have some formal representation from the crew in the Streets without "forcing" or demanding it from the leaders themselves. That way, a crew's position on things is still voiced without putting rules or restrictions on how CLs are to behave. And honestly, if a CL is so bent on being silent that they won't even have someone approach the Streets in their stead, I'd be concerned.

Well, the promotion to Godfather only provides 11 more spaces in the district, and I'd say those 11 spaces are worth the effort. I don't think it's "unfair" that someone who ranks up to Godfather gets a few more spots than someone who hasn't. That's just life; the people who worked harder and lasted longer get better rewards. I agree there is an almost-geopolitical argument to be made about crew counts, but I feel like now is a time where we can establish a system free from those conditions.

Orsik, the way you spoke made it sound (and this is just to me because I cannot speak for others) that you were trying to exclude the lower ranks and their speeches. I would prefer leaders and hands to show up to the streets more frequently, however I am not quite sure that I think they will.  For them to come out to a Made Man speech rather than any of their low ranks seems a bit off, for lack of a better word. I think leaders should of course be out and supporting their members but at the same time it all depends if they have anything they feel they want to contribute.

We have gone quite a period where many leaders and hands do not feel that they need to bother with the streets. Some will just listen and pass along as if they were never there in the first place. Do I like that they do this? Not really. I feel that they should be out and encouraging activity just as anyone else is doing. They are supposed to be role models on how to behave after all.

So if I mistook your words then I apologize. However, I was basing off how your speech came across to me.

As for HQs, I just feel putting a cap is silly. If people think a particular group is better to work for then I don't see why they should be limited on their expansion.