The World Cup Discussion Thread (OOC, Version IV)

[Tumbra]

Agreed! It's something we're putting a lot of effort into.

[Commonwealth of Baker Park]

Have just spent 45 minutes typing up an RP only for something weird to happen to the forum and losing it.

Unfortunately I now need to leave for an archaeology conference in Swansea (the thrill!), and lack the time to type up a replacement.

I'm frustrated by the turn of events, but mainly want to apologise for my inability to post an RP this matchday.

Make sure to get down to The Mumbles if you can!

[NSWC Signups]

About 12 hours left for your Cup of Harmony bids and Presidential Nominations.

[Saint-Jean-Jacques et Burnham-on-Stove]

I'm sorry I didn't had time to RP yesterday and I won't today either.

I got a new job out of town, and yesterday I was on the road all day. This morning I'm at my parents house but I'm going back to my appartment in Montréal and I will be packing stuff and preparing to move, so I won't RP today. Next week i'll be moving and starting my new job and idk if I'll have internet access in my new place.

[Sarzonia]

Congrats on the new job!

[Srednjaci]

I'm sorry I didn't had time to RP yesterday and I won't today either.

I got a new job out of town, and yesterday I was on the road all day. This morning I'm at my parents house but I'm going back to my appartment in Montréal and I will be packing stuff and preparing to move, so I won't RP today. Next week i'll be moving and starting my new job and idk if I'll have internet access in my new place.

Congrats mate !

[Audioslavia]

Congratulations to SJJeBOS on the new job, and Chrom and Ko for the presidential nominations.

I've pinned the Presidential Announcements thread (at El Presidente's request) for the duration of the vote.

On a personal note, I'd forgotten how much I liked both CoH bids. Good luck to Kry and Tumbra, it was almost impossible to choose between the two.

[Valentine Z]

Not to be nitpicky, but for the scores here, the spoilers (apart from the first one) say MD5 instead of MD7. ^^;

[Mertagne]

Not to be nitpicky, but for the scores here, the spoilers (apart from the first one) say MD5 instead of MD7. ^^;

Good spot! I must have copied the wrong text. It's been fixed

[Tumbra]

THE APRIL FOOL'S CRAFTING EVENT IS OVER!

NationStates Sports took part in the April Fool's Crafting Event, and suffice it to say, it was a massive success! You can find our wonder — the NationStates World Cup Hall of Fame — here! We're not sure how the final standings matched up, but we ended up at

• 2nd in the World Assembly Pick category;
• 1st in the Most Impressive category, with a score of 2,311,454 — the only faction to cross 2,000,000 Jaws Dropped and with a gap of 443,822 over the second-placed wonder;
• 1st in Most Inventive, with a score of 152 — a whole 4 inventions over the second-placed wonderl
• 6th in Most Liked, with 133 swoons induced — a score which would have been higher if not for what we suspect are bots, but a score which would have been a lot lower if not for a valiant last-minute rearguard effort to defend our honour;
• 6th in Most Controversial, with 1,438 arguments triggered (which is pretty on brand for us)!

That should be enough to land us a mention in the overall summary post; especially as we were the first ones to create the Grand Unified Theory Model, the Large Pile of Hamster-Infested Scrap Metal, the Angry Volcano God, the Military Drone, the Tactical Hang Glider, the Streaming Platform, the Space Shuttle, the Cryptocurrency Exchange, the Bizarre Conspiracy Theorist, the Award for Exceptional Bravery, the Trapped Spirit of a Long Dead Being, the Tower of Terror, the Deadly Trap, Interactive Codex, Sports-Themed Restaurant Chain. Reincarnated Bird Pharaoh, the Miniature Wargame, but most importantly, we made two legendaries nobody else made — a Browser-Based Political Simulator, and, most importantly, finished our most important work — the THINKING SCORINATOR.

We were the only ones to also make the epics Interactive Codex, Bizarre Conspiracy Theorist, Tower of Terror, and Miniature Wargame, the last of which we made in the last two minutes of the event.

There were many memes made, including CLONG CLONG CLONG GET WORLDBUILT GET WORLDBUILT, Is That In The Matrix?, the Jaravan, It's So Kakurover/We're so Backuro, SPAM COMMONS SPAM COMMONS SPAM COMMONS, "We don't procreate, we automate"; The Shower-Activating Script, SHINY COLLECTIBLE, The Tumbran Scientific Method (explosions), Stone Puppets, Thinking Scorinator Truthers, "Clearly — You Didn't Have A Singaporean," Mertagne Can Into Hampter, Vdaran Delivery Drivers, Tikariotian Miners, and so on!

The team work we displayed during the event was the closest we've been for a long time — I don't think we had a single off-minute after the nerf to crafting which ensured that only one person could craft at a time. A big thank you to everyone for maintaining that continuity — it's probably the biggest reason why we were able to hold on to first place in Most Impressive! We really displayed a ton of efficiency, and our wild guesses — especially for the two unique legendaries we got — really helped!

Here is a long list of people who contributed — all of them contributed in some way or another! If I missed you out, please tell me and I'll add you to the honour roll!

Mertagne, Astograth, Farfadillis, Ko-oren, Sylestone, Drawkland, Yuezhou, Xanneria, Recuecn, Vdara, South Newlandia, West Barack and East Obama, Efnakia, Osterhalten, Tikariot, Osarius, Eshialand, Milchama, Oberour ar Moro, Equestrian States, Valentine Z, Damukuni, United Hawkland, Natanians and Nosts, Indusse, Banija, Ceni, and Zwangzug

A big thank you to all of you for contributing, and making NSS one of the new seven wonders of NationStates!

Thank you also to our opponents from the South Pacific — the Concrete Slabs — for giving us a terrific run for our money!

[Valentine Z]

Thank you very much as well, and it's definitely been an honor! Though admittedly, I didn't play a big part because I personally just suck at crafting games. Still, I had fun!

It is only right that we got the Thinking Scorinator. ♥

[Mertagne]

This is an official announcement from the hosts of World Cup 96.

My co-host, Huayramarca, has sadly suffered a bereavement recently and will not be available to scorinate his half of the upcoming cutoff. As a result, I, Mertagne, will be scorinating the results in his place. This should have no effect on the tournament itself, merely the user grading the remaining RPs and posting the results. Thank you for your patience and and I think I speak for everyone in saying we wish Huay all the best at this time.

[Sarzonia]

My condolences to Huay on his loss.

[Valentine Z]

My condolences for your loss, Huay. Please do take all the time you need.

[Recuecn]

All the best, Huay. We're thinking of you.

[Quebec and Shingoryeo]

My condolences Huay. Hope all's well with you and your family.

[Tumbra]

My condolences, Huay.

[Commonwealth of Baker Park]

Thoughts going out Huay.

Thanks to all who contributed to the success of the NSWC HoF project. It's pretty great when we in NSS can show our mettle in gamewide competition, like the Trade Fair thing AO excelled at a few yrs ago.

[Eshialand]

My condolences for your loss, Huay.

[Vyktoria]

My condolences to Huay for his loss.

[Crpostran]

My condolences going out to Huay for his loss.

[Zenic]

Condolences to Huay and their family.

[Huayramarca]

Guys, thank you all for the kind words. A big thank you to Mert for the help to continue with this MD as normal despite the circumstances, even bigger if we consider scorinating a whole 20 groups, playoff permutations at 2 a.m. in a Monday, it's just massive!

Congrats to the qualified nations, good luck to the playoff bound nations and commiserations to those who didn't made it to the finals.

[Tumbra]

Those of you who read my roleplays (I assume none) may have noticed that I have alluded to a potential crisis brewing in Græntfjall. I thought it could possibly make for some good RP fodder as we deal with the IC fallout of a nation who occupied quite an important place in the geopolitical continuum of our community suddenly withdrawing. To that end I've compiled a document summarising what's happened so far. Feel free to let me know, either here, or on the Discord, or through telegrams, if you have any ideas for the arc or if you want to get in on the action (but you can do that by just roleplaying). I don't expect this will last too long; probably not beyond the end of this cycle.

The document can be found at this link.

[Sarzonia]

In looking at the group tables, I noticed that only three of the top eight ranked teams qualified directly for the World Cup proper. Obviously, Græntfjall not competing throws things off a bit, but No. 6 Banija failed to make it to the playoffs.

Meanwhile, two triple-digit ranked teams won groups, headlined by No. 240 Crpostran, who beat out ninth ranked Yuezhou. Reçueçn (ranked 108th) and #258 Legalese qualified for the World Cup and the playoffs directly in Group 20, beating the likes of No. 23 Mytanija and 43rd ranked Cassadaigua. And I made the playoffs with the 112th ranked team, eliminating three higher seeds in my group.

I'm sure other folks might be better equipped to run a statistical analysis of this World Cup and whether rank or RP mattered more, but based on what I've seen, it looked like this qualifying campaign favoured active role-playing over pure rank in a very noticeable way. I personally don't have a problem with that, but I wonder what other folks think.