Influence

Influence is what is used by governments and institutions to form decisions. When a political event spawns every party with influence will decide on what option to take and will vote based on their own AI goals. Exactly which parties have a right to vote depends on different factors with an important one being the form of government. In order to control a nation it is necessary to have enough influence to steer it towards your goals. All voters, including the ones you control, have a preference for one of the options, going against this preference will generate clues that can be discovered by [hero]]es, with more extreme deviations yielding more clues. Influence can be used to shift a debate towards either side of an issue or towards the middle point. These uses are color-coded red, green and white respectively.

A current list of parties known to exert influence:
 * The ruler of a nation, be it a King, a Republican Council, or tribal leader.
 * Other influential persons in the nations, in a feudal society this would for example be the barons.
 * Council of advisers. A ruler can have advisers on many different subjects, ranging from military to occult, and these can also have influence on some or all of the votes.
 * Institutions, their influence is generally rather limited, but they might be an important swing vote.
 * Agents and/or (corrupted) Heroes.

Influence is not a fixed number, it can vary depending on rising or falling power in a nation and it even depends on the subject voted upon. A military adviser might have an important vote when deciding on whether or not a nation goes to war, but he might be ignored when dealing with a drought. Expanding a King's council would limit the power and influence of a king.