Frostpunk 2 replaces the single-ruler decree tree of the original with a Council that votes. You are still the Steward, but the laws that shape your city take effect only if enough delegates back them — and the levers you have to move those delegates are promises, trust, and the order in which you bring proposals to the floor. This guide covers how the Council is composed, how delegates actually decide, what a promise costs you, and the one genuinely sequential track of laws the game enforces.
What this covers: The delegate count, the vote thresholds, the three-promise cap, and the Rule laws that expand the Steward’s authority. Why it matters: Passing a law is arithmetic plus trust, and the promise cap — three at once — is the real constraint on buying votes. Who should read this: Players losing council votes, or unsure why a law they want will not pass.
The Council Is 100 Delegates
The Council Hall is a building you place in the Central District, near the Generator. It carries no upkeep and cannot be disabled or deconstructed once finished, and laws can be proposed as soon as construction completes. Building it also adds the “Emergency Council Session” ability to the Central District.
The Council itself is 100 delegates. Each factionfaction. An in-game group or nation players can align with or fight against, with its own goals and reputation system. and community holds a number of seats equal to the percentage of the total population that belongs to it, so seat shares move with the population rather than with your preferences.
Delegates are not a block vote. On any proposal, each of the 100 sits in one of three states:
- For — will vote for it.
- Against — will vote against it.
- Hesitant — has an even chance of either.
“For” and “Against” delegates vote exactly as advertised. Only the “Hesitant” bloc is in play, and that is the bloc negotiation is able to move.
Vote thresholds
| Proposal | Votes required | How delegates decide | Negotiable? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ordinary law | 51 of 100 | Ideology alignment; communities flexible, factions rigid | Communities yes; factions no |
| Rule law | 67 of 100 (supermajority) | Trust toward the Steward, plus Tension | Communities and factions, for Rule laws |
Rule laws are the exception to everything else. They do not align with any ideology, so delegates fall back on their group’s relations with you: the higher their Trust in your leadership, the more likely they are to vote For increasing your authority. A negative Trust modifier will put at least some delegates Against, even when overall Trust is high — and often even after you negotiate. High Tension makes delegates more willing to vote For Rule laws.
How Delegates Decide
Three factors shape a delegate’s stance, but only two groups of delegates can be moved.
Communities are flexible. A community is aligned with one direction, and it will often field many Hesitant delegates even on proposals that match its outlook. You can negotiate with a community to sway delegates toward your preference, unless the proposal is already part of an active promise to that community.
Factions are rigid. A faction favours three directions at once, and its delegates always vote For proposals that align with its worldview and Against proposals that oppose it. Factions cannot be negotiated with on a law they favour or disfavour.
The distinction matters when you are short of 51 votes. A faction bloc is a fixed number you plan around; a community bloc is a number you can buy, one promise at a time. For the voting arithmetic in full, see our breakdown of the 51 and 67 thresholds.
The factions, and the three directions each favours
The game’s axes are Survival (Adaptation vs Progress), Economy (Equality vs Merit), and Society (Reason vs Tradition). Every faction is committed to one side of all three.
| Faction | Survival | Economy | Society |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stalwarts | Progress | Merit | Reason |
| Faithkeepers | Progress | Equality | Tradition |
| Pilgrims | Adaptation | Equality | Tradition |
| Evolvers | Adaptation | Merit | Reason |
| Icebloods | Adaptation | Merit | Tradition |
| Technocrats | Progress | Equality | Reason |
| Menders | Adaptation | Equality | Tradition |
| Legionnaires | Progress | Equality | Tradition |
| Proteans | Adaptation | Merit | Reason |
| Bohemians | Adaptation | Equality | Reason |
| Overseers | Progress | Merit | Tradition |
| Venturers | Progress | Merit | Reason |
Which factions you actually meet depends on the mode and the run — the starting factions can differ between the campaign and Utopia Builder mode, and new factions rise as community members splinter off into new groups. Favoring the Faithkeepers heavily, for example, can bring the Evolvers into being to oppose the direction the city is taking.
Factions also carry a unique ability, unlocked by clicking their portrait. It has a long cooldown and can only be used once the faction views you favourably, and the law you pass can reshape it. The Stalwarts’ “mobilize enforcers” ability produces guard squads, for example, but passing a law that lets automatons serve as guards changes it to produce twice as many.
Promises Are the Currency
When you need votes you do not already have, you negotiate. Negotiation has two sides:
- Your terms — you are asking the group to vote For (or Against) the proposal currently on the floor.
- Their terms — a promise: something you commit to deliver in exchange for that vote.
Their terms can include researching a specific building; constructing or demolishing a specific building; researching and passing a specific law; passing or repealing a specific law; using the Fund Projects or Grant Agenda action on that group; or using the Condemn action on the opposing faction. The game randomly picks three terms the group wants, and you choose one of those three to promise.
If you fulfil the promise, relations with that group rise and overall Trust rises. If you fail it, relations fall and overall Trust falls.
The cap is three
You can hold only one active promise with any single group, and at most three active promises in total. If you already have three open, you cannot start a new negotiation at all.
That cap, and not any hidden debt meter, is the honest constraint on buying votes: spending the third promise to reach the fifty-first delegate can strand two other negotiations you still need this chapter.
Law Ordering: Issues, Research, and the Rule Track
“Law chaining” is not a general mechanic in which every law unlocks the next one down a branch. Two narrower things, however, are real.
One law per issue
Laws are grouped by the issue they address, under tabs for Survival, City, Society, and Rule, each subdivided into topic columns. An issue starts as “No common rules” and offers several mutually exclusive laws. Only one law per issue can be in force at a time, though you can bring a different law for that issue back to the floor later. Most laws also begin as concepts: they must be researched on the Idea Tree before they can be proposed at all.
The Rule track is a real sequence
The Rule category is the one place the game enforces an order. It is split into two tracks of three laws each, and the laws in each track must be adopted in sequence:
| Track | Sequence |
|---|---|
| Order | Guard Enforcers → Steward’s Militia → Martial Law |
| Authority | Guided Voting → Bureau of Propaganda → Secret Police |
Adopting all six Rule laws unlocks “Captain’s Authority,” the game’s ultimate power-grab. Because Rule laws need 67 votes and are decided by Trust rather than ideology, the track is best entered when your relations across the Council are strong and Tension is high.
Guided Voting is the track’s first Authority law, and its ability lets you push Hesitant delegates a chosen way without negotiating at all — at the cost of a small global Trust decrease and a large one with any group that wanted the opposite outcome. It is often still not enough on its own, so targeted negotiations may be needed to clear the threshold.
Recess, Timing, and the Emergency Session
After any vote — passed or failed — the Council enters a 10-week recess during which it is unavailable, though you can still explore the available laws.
The Emergency Council Session ability calls the Council back during that recess for a vote. It resets the recess timer and decreases Trust with every community and faction; the ability itself has a 12-week cooldown.
That trade-off is the core timing decision. If a survival-critical law can wait, let the recess run and negotiate from a position of unchanged Trust; if it cannot wait, you are spending Trust with the whole Council to force the vote early.
Common Mistakes
- Reading a faction as a negotiable bloc. Faction delegates are fixed For or Against on ideological laws. Plan around their number rather than budgeting negotiations you cannot make.
- Spending the third promise casually. The three-promise cap is global. A promise that delivers one more delegate can block the negotiation you need next chapter.
- Forgetting the Rule threshold. Rule laws want 67 votes, not 51, and they are decided by Trust and Tension rather than ideology.
- Entering the Rule track weighed down by negative Trust modifiers. Even high overall Trust can leave delegates Against if they carry a negative modifier.
- Calling an Emergency Session by reflex. It costs Trust with everyone and locks the ability out for 12 weeks.
- Assuming a passed law is permanent. Only one law per issue can be in force, and a different law for the same issue can be voted in later.
Next read
- For the economy those laws feed, see Frostpunk 2: Resource Extraction and the Stockpile Economy.
- For how the council vote is counted in detail, see Frostpunk 2 Council Votes: 51, 67 and the Hesitant Bloc.
- All our coverage lives on the Frostpunk 2 hub.