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MoOving In: A Detailed Preview of Master of Orion III
PART 4: SOMETHING TO BE SAID FOR TALK (Page 4)
By Daniel Quick | Apolyton CS Co-Owner/Administrator

The New Orions had in excess of 1,000 votes while the race with the second highest total held less than 50. With the New Orions on side, my praise bill passes with flying colours. I guess they didn't judge me so insignificant after all! This may be true only officially, but I'll take what I can get. Still, all but one member race voted in favour of the bill but I'm not in the habit of naming names…

If and when passed, 'Bills' are moved to the 'Laws' column for you to review at any time for its duration on the books. They are otherwise removed. Similarly, when a law's interval expires, it too is eliminated from the list. While the following may be implied, I want to it to be explicit: the Senate need not be meeting for you to call up this data. The now “Praise Apolyton” law I spoke of earlier is admittedly more of a motion than a law. You might even consider it a largely frivolous and worthless token. Whatever the prevailing attitude toward such pacifications might be, I will now provide you with a few examples of, for lack of a better term, concrete laws that begin their lives as a 'Bill'.

The first such concrete law is 'Diplomatic Isolation for Hithoru'. In short and sweet terms, we – the members of the Senate – don't talk to them and they don't talk to us. It was the first law that came into being during my game and, lacking an expiry date, remained constant thereafter as it was never revoked. No one even tried their luck to suggest repealing it. Another case in point is the 'Orion Database Standardization', committing each member race to contribute to a collective research body where the results are shared on par with everyone.

As a final example to illustrate the point of laws, I turn to the 'Senate Research Program'. It was presented as to increase the sale value or Rare minerals by 30% while reducing Research Capacity in member empires by 25%. Being primarily an economic empire, I wasted no time putting my then dozen votes behind the plan. Having gained the favour of the New Orions, my opinion was relatively insignificant in determining the bill's ultimate fate but I nonetheless took part. I will now try to impart on you how a reactive as opposed to an active attitude towards Senate issues is not worth the odd number of seconds of time that it may save you.

Reflective Points and Thoughts
A Senate vote can pass you by if you choose not to participate in the process either by intention or disorganization; yes, the latter is a fanciful term for saying you forgot. Either way, the end result is a lack of participation and is regarded as an automatic abstention. Because membership in the Senate is a privilege that can be revoked, you had best not make such motionless attitudes a habit. This leads into my final point here: you can choose to ignore 'Laws' passed by the Senate if you fundamentally oppose it. This can be done from by clicking on the radio button in any dialogue-box that reviews a 'Law' on the digitized books. My advice: use this power most selectively and sparingly. As the MoO3 manual forewarns on page 103, “[v]iolation of these laws will bring swift retribution from other Senate Members”. If you do not even show up for a vote on an issue that you then choose to flaunt a further arrogance by ignoring it, your credibility is even worse off as a result. By the same measure, this debate means “very little” for those not apart of the Senate.