Squishy posted this on another suggestion, but I'd like to rebut it with a couple suggestions of my own.

Purging can only happen with the compliance of all the leaders.  I hate to sound like a broken record, but users need to take an active role in their own game play. You can't sit back and watch the same people get to the top and do the same thing as last time all the while hoping someone else will do the heavy lifting for you.

I've heard this before and I can't help but object. Not that players shouldn't take an active role- obviously they should- but that purging only happens with compliance of all the leaders. None of the crew leaders in Philly were compliant, and purging happened all the same. Including some of our crewleaders and their hands. In this regard, I had little more say than anyone else in the game, regardless of my HQ.

• Any public effort to demand change from leaders was ignored. And any crew leader who openly chastises those with greater power is unlikely to chastise for long.
• Private efforts on my part to connect with individuals that could save my people were ignored. Not to mention, the regime was something I didn't want to be a part of.
• It was always assumed by those in power that those not in power were hostile to them. That's why they killed who they did, when they did. And so, the only true answer for dealing with a regime like that is with hostility. And hostility requires guns.

This is where my rebuttal will converge with a suggestion, because I believe there is something intrinsically inconsistent with how guns and BGs work in their present state and the ideal that the playerbase at large can take an active role in who takes and keeps power.

That inconsistency comes from:

• The massive number of BGs that players are allowed to purchase.
• The time requirements of gun training to shoot a player at cap.
• The marginal reduction in defense from a successful BG wack.

Players build fortresses with bodyguards, and laying siege to those fortresses is more potent with a single cannon than with twenty smaller guns. The guns in between unmaxed and cap-killing have been reduced to insignificance, and so many who can't train quickly are discouraged from training at all. I believe this is one reason why many players simply ignore it.

If you have 500 kills you can shoot someone with 100 bodyguards. But let's say your target has 101. Now, you either have to get five more kills on your gun (in five hours, basically), or have a friend of yours train their gun up over 100 kills (100 hours, basically) so they can BG wack that 101st BG. Getting five kills is easier than getting 100. It will always be easier to build the cannon up than to bring in additional shooters. And because of this, the game effectively tells players "you're either a cannon or a proer".

And keep in mind, each would-be cannon must train their gun under the watchful eye of those they are hostile to. And, in a regime like what was recently DDed, virtually every city had a member of that group in it. Demanding shot records. Watching your activity. Shooting victims at/near 60 days, also like a broken record. Plus, in a time where tapering is a significant factor in gun training, this suggestion couldn't be more timely.

The time requirements of gun training are rooted in the attack timer, and changing that would completely change the game. Not suggesting that. I don't think that's the problem.

However, changes could be made to Bodyguards or BG wacking that would bring the game's wack and defense system into consistency with the idea that players wield real power over who's in charge. Please interpret the following suggestions as alternatives, not to be taken together.

Consolidate BG Protection

Instead of 200 BGs, let's cap at 50 (for example). Multiply the price of each BG by 4 (and/or increase the rate at which they get more expensive, so the total for getting to cap is still the same). Multiply the defense they grant you by 4. Everything else can stay the same.

Now, a group of players who can each kill a single bodyguard with a BG wack is 4x more potent. Meaning, groups of smaller guns could compete with cannons by spreading out the gun training among themselves. Instead of 10 BG wacks reducing the number of kills required for a target by 50, it reduces it by 200. That's a step in the right direction.

This suggestion also has the consequence of reducing one of the big gun training tools- shooting thousands of unemployed BGs- by a factor of four. However, I think BG wacking should chiefly for wacking employed BGs and secondarily for gun training (which is not true right now) and I think it is a better fix than the one below. It brings the BG count to more sensible numbers and it doesn't fuck with the BG wack code.

Empower BG Wacking

Increase how many bodyguards can be killed in a single BG wack. On a linear scale, make it advantageous to have guns that aren't cannons. Give players a reason to go from 100 to 150. 150 to 200. 200 to 300. If, at each stage of their training their gun is significant, more people will participate. But if the only useful numbers are 0 (maxed), 1000, and 1200, this will turn people away.

This suggestion fucks with the BG wack code but leaves the BG cap and 5 kills = 1 BG relationship the same, which has been that way for a very long time.

I believe either of these suggestions would go a long way towards accomplishing what Squishy has considered an important way for people to play the game. It also does not change (at all) the relationship between a single attacker and a single target. The number of kills required to kill them remains exactly the same. But this would increase the significance of all guns, at every stage of training, which would hopefully get more people interested in what they can do to either support or oppose the players in power.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.

I would like to apply to have your babies.

I don't disagree with you. The problem with lower players being the ones to deal with 'tyrannical' rulers who do purges on the non-ruler playerbase who get so powerful is, nobody will ever be powerful enough to take that shot. That's why these purges happen in the first place, to ensure that nobody can step to the kings and queens  and win. It's saying "well why don't you fight back against them?" when I have a slingshot and they have nuclear weapons. That means the only real viable option is to just keep making characters, getting your gun, then immediately taking shots at someone in power and hoping you get the 1%. And that would completely trash any reputation you'd managed to build if you became known as 'the guy who rogues on every character.'

The game would be in serious trouble the day that the majority of people stop buying into the premise that following the rules will enable them to progress. 

This is a good suggestion. Should there be an appetite to explore this further, I would have several comments. Until then, good work.