Impossible to win as an Independent!

[Starcomet1]

I have 100% name recognition, high approval from voters, and my policies match well with the voters. Yet even in local elections I never manage to beat the democratic candidate. Yes, both of our views may be similar but when I end up with more name recognition and policy support and approval than they do, I should be able to beat them and not only get 20% of the vote.

I even change the enthusiasm settings for independents and I still seem to lose. What am I doing wrong? I get that in real life Independents and third party candidates have a very hard time winning elections, but in this game I am able to do a lot more than most real life third party and independent candidates can do such as participate in debates and get fair media coverage.

[BigZuck08]

This is because in the Advanced Options, (under Elections > [insert election type here] > Other) there is a debuff given to candidates who would be seen as unlikely to win. Get rid of that debuff and that should fix it.

[Starcomet1]

Originally posted by BigZuck08:

This is because in the Advanced Options, (under Elections > [insert election type here] > Other) there is a debuff given to candidates who would be seen as unlikely to win. Get rid of that debuff and that should fix it.

I will try to change this number and see if it changes anything.

[iowaloha]

Is it just you versus Democrat? Or is there a Republican running as well?

[Starcomet1]

Originally posted by iowaloha:

Is it just you versus Democrat? Or is there a Republican running as well?

It depends on the race, usually state and national elections have republican candidates. The local elections do not. What is ironic is that even though the district is largely democratic/very liberal, the republican candidate still gets more votes than I do.

[Starcomet1]

Okay that did not seem to work. I set the unlikely to Win threshold and weight for all elections for independent candidates to 0 and I am still losing despite high approval rating, and name recognition. Do I need to make a new character?

[BigZuck08]

Originally posted by Starcomet1:

Okay that did not seem to work. I set the unlikely to Win threshold and weight for all elections for independent candidates to 0 and I am still losing despite high approval rating, and name recognition. Do I need to make a new character?

If your character has negative traits or their age is not between 35-70, then yes.

[Verlumino]

There is a party loyalty vote-factor that significantly influences voter decisions. You can set the value to 0 (for all political parties) in the advanced options and see if that helps.
In the advanced options menu, click the Elections Tab, and then click the tab for the type of election (School Board, City, etc.), then click the "Other" Tab. The first option in each column should be "Party - Democrat", "Party - Republican", and "Party - Independent".

As someone else already mentioned, the "Unlikely-to-Win" vote factor could also have an impact. If there is a Democrat and a Republican in the race, voters who prefer an Independent candidate may ignore that candidate because the candidate is unlikely to win, and the voter does not want to "throw away their vote".

[iowaloha]

Originally posted by Starcomet1:

Originally posted by iowaloha:

Is it just you versus Democrat? Or is there a Republican running as well?

It depends on the race, usually state and national elections have republican candidates. The local elections do not. What is ironic is that even though the district is largely democratic/very liberal, the republican candidate still gets more votes than I do.

I'd imagine just like in real life, an independent would be tough to win if both parties are running. People are generally party loyal. Most independents are successful when one of the two major parties isn't running so the other party has to choose between. Like in theory, if a Republican in California isn't running, republican voters would likely switch to the more conservative of the Democrat and independent.

[Starcomet1]

Originally posted by Verlumino:

There is a party loyalty vote-factor that significantly influences voter decisions. You can set the value to 0 (for all political parties) in the advanced options and see if that helps.
In the advanced options menu, click the Elections Tab, and then click the tab for the type of election (School Board, City, etc.), then click the "Other" Tab. The first option in each column should be "Party - Democrat", "Party - Republican", and "Party - Independent".

As someone else already mentioned, the "Unlikely-to-Win" vote factor could also have an impact. If there is a Democrat and a Republican in the race, voters who prefer an Independent candidate may ignore that candidate because the candidate is unlikely to win, and the voter does not want to "throw away their vote".

This worked, thanks!