NS History: You've Got Questions, We've Got Answers!

[Punk Daddy]

Bring back Lanier!

[Blackbird]

Bring back Lanier!

Seriously though, probably my favorite West Pacifican. Also one of the first I ever met.

[Port blood]

ooooh,I've been looking for a thread like this



I'm really curious when the first recorded raid was,and when the first recorded defense was

[Blackbird]

ooooh,I've been looking for a thread like this



I'm really curious when the first recorded raid was,and when the first recorded defense was

I have no idea. The oldest organized raiders I can think of were the french pirates, and some of the farkers. There were raiding Nazis very early on too. Probably the most definite and recorded early group who exists in more than the foggy memories of pre-history is the Atlantic Alliance. I have no idea what their first raid was though.

In part, most of this history is lost to us, because so little of it was posted on the NS forums. The modern generation might not know this, but the NS forums were unusable for the first year or two of its existence. It was ludicrously slow, timed out all the time, etc., etc. That's actually one of the things that led to the proliferation of off-site forums, but also led to the balkinization of the greater NS community. There was no place for RPers and Gameplayers to come together. You only met other players through interactions in your regions, or in offsite forums. That's why the early defender organizations, such as the Sarduakar Defense Confederacy Trust, the Allied Liberation League, the Marxist-Anarcho-Syndicalist-Socialist Alliance, and the Alliance Defense Network were so important: they built up a communications infrastructure which NS entirely lacked.

As a secondary effect: we simply don't have much history from that time at all. Even if we still had the whole forums (and we don't even have the jolt forums), there just wouldn't be much on it. Gameplayers simply didn't post there, and even once the forums became usable, most Gameplayers continued to eschew the forums out of habit: communications channels had been set up elsewhere. It's one of the reasons why probably until around 2007-08 or so, older GPers still didn't use the forums out of habit. Since we don't have the NS forums, and for the most part, the offiste forums of that era are gone, we just don't have much recorded history from 2002-03.

[Port blood]

Everything is lost in time and fades away

[Unibot III]

What can be said is neither invading nor defending could have been desirable before April 29 2003 (when we gained "regional controls") and by May 16 2003, "region crashing", as Max Barry called it, was an epidemic that required a change to the game's legal disclaimer. That means there is a span of seventeen days there where the first real invasions occurred prompting concern across the site.

Before "Regional Controls", invading a region would be like invading TRR nowadays -- no ban button, no ability to hold the region.

[The Bruce]

ooooh,I've been looking for a thread like this

I'm really curious when the first recorded raid was,and when the first recorded defense was

The first known invaders were from a region called Evil (spelled with some random capitalization I can't remember and having no relation to any current incarnation of the region name). They managed to pull off four minor invasions in early January 2002 that few people even knew occurred, because of there was no impact outside of the tiny, inactive regions they targeted. 100 Nations of Conquest carried out similar barely noticeable operations at this time. Evil had already gone inactive by the time the Driftwood Gang and soon afterwards the Farkers got into the invading game.

[The Bruce]

What can be said is neither invading nor defending could have been desirable before April 29 2003 (when we gained "regional controls") and by May 16 2003, "region crashing", as Max Barry called it, was an epidemic that required a change to the game's legal disclaimer. That means there is a span of seventeen days there where the first real invasions occurred prompting concern across the site.

Before "Regional Controls", invading a region would be like invading TRR nowadays -- no ban button, no ability to hold the region.

Incorrect about the effectiveness of early invaders. Also the first "real" invasions were rampant during February and March of 2002.

Early invaders took control of the region's worldfact book entry and used it to torment the natives, as well as over the top and unmoderated posts on the region board (imagine region boards that degenerated into 4chan). Invaders would use nations details (flags, mottos, etc) of invader leads to further humiliate and provoke natives. They would also patrol the NationStates forum to antagonize natives who spoke out against the treatment of their region and generally gang up on them (fortunately, today if you go to the NationStates Gameplay forum you no longer see this kind of behavior ). The inability to use regional controls against natives was a two way street. Even gaining control of the regional forums meant that you also couldn't banject invaders. They were free to stay and torment natives as long as they wanted to, with as much personal attacks and vulgarity as they wanted to, as there were no moderators. This could be just as much or more damaging to the community of a region, because outside of a well moderated private, offsite forum there was no way to escape a long campaign of harassment. Regional communities could be disrupted and destroyed without even taking over the delegate position, by constant harassment from spammer-griefer regions like the Pudding Gang (a region filled with non-UN griefer-spammer puppets with close links to if not run by the Farkers). Your choices of dealing with players like this were either ignoring them (refusing to feed the trolls) or counter attacking their psyche so hard they ran away crying.

[Unibot III]

What can be said is neither invading nor defending could have been desirable before April 29 2003 (when we gained "regional controls") and by May 16 2003, "region crashing", as Max Barry called it, was an epidemic that required a change to the game's legal disclaimer. That means there is a span of seventeen days there where the first real invasions occurred prompting concern across the site.

Before "Regional Controls", invading a region would be like invading TRR nowadays -- no ban button, no ability to hold the region.

Incorrect about the effectiveness of early invaders. Also the first "real" invasions were rampant during February and March of 2002.

Early invaders took control of the region's worldfact book entry and used it to torment the natives, as well as over the top and unmoderated posts on the region board (imagine region boards that degenerated into 4chan). Invaders would use nations details (flags, mottos, etc) of invader leads to further humiliate and provoke natives. They would also patrol the NationStates forum to antagonize natives who spoke out against the treatment of their region and generally gang up on them (fortunately, today if you go to the NationStates Gameplay forum you no longer see this kind of behavior ). The inability to use regional controls against natives was a two way street. Even gaining control of the regional forums meant that you also couldn't banject invaders. They were free to stay and torment natives as long as they wanted to, with as much personal attacks and vulgarity as they wanted to, as there were no moderators. This could be just as much or more damaging to the community of a region, because outside of a well moderated private, offsite forum there was no way to escape a long campaign of harassment. Regional communities could be disrupted and destroyed without even taking over the delegate position, by constant harassment from spammer-griefer regions like the Pudding Gang (a region filled with non-UN griefer-spammer puppets with close links to if not run by the Farkers). Your choices of dealing with players like this were either ignoring them (refusing to feed the trolls) or counter attacking their psyche so hard they ran away crying.

Right, so "Regional Controls" was probably created to control invasions, but instead became the main tool for invaders too. >_<

[Frattastan II]

Strong work, admins.

[Crazy girl]

I remeber being in an invader group...we had invaded a region, and just while we were holding it (I'll spare you the details on the very sloppy execution where at one point I even ended up as delegate unintended) regional controls were introduced. That really must have sucked for the original inhabitants of that region. I felt sorry for them, and left. And indeed, there were no rules governing invasions yet then.

[Unibot III]

I remeber being in an invader group...we had invaded a region, and just while we were holding it (I'll spare you the details on the very sloppy execution where at one point I even ended up as delegate unintended) regional controls were introduced. That really must have sucked for the original inhabitants of that region. I felt sorry for them, and left. And indeed, there were no rules governing invasions yet then.

Did you become a defender after The Pacific was invaded, CG? Or were you a defender before that?

[The Bruce]

Incorrect about the effectiveness of early invaders. Also the first "real" invasions were rampant during February and March of 2002.

Early invaders took control of the region's worldfact book entry and used it to torment the natives, as well as over the top and unmoderated posts on the region board (imagine region boards that degenerated into 4chan). Invaders would use nations details (flags, mottos, etc) of invader leads to further humiliate and provoke natives. They would also patrol the NationStates forum to antagonize natives who spoke out against the treatment of their region and generally gang up on them (fortunately, today if you go to the NationStates Gameplay forum you no longer see this kind of behavior ). The inability to use regional controls against natives was a two way street. Even gaining control of the regional forums meant that you also couldn't banject invaders. They were free to stay and torment natives as long as they wanted to, with as much personal attacks and vulgarity as they wanted to, as there were no moderators. This could be just as much or more damaging to the community of a region, because outside of a well moderated private, offsite forum there was no way to escape a long campaign of harassment. Regional communities could be disrupted and destroyed without even taking over the delegate position, by constant harassment from spammer-griefer regions like the Pudding Gang (a region filled with non-UN griefer-spammer puppets with close links to if not run by the Farkers). Your choices of dealing with players like this were either ignoring them (refusing to feed the trolls) or counter attacking their psyche so hard they ran away crying.

Right, so "Regional Controls" was probably created to control invasions, but instead became the main tool for invaders too. >_<

Regional Controls was only useful for native delegates who were very vigilant about the security of their region. Otherwise they were as likely to be used against the natives as on their behalf, either by insane delegates or invaders. It was only by the introduction of the Anti-Griefing Rules that invading was pulled over to the curb. Those rules put strict limits on the percentage of nations you could punt, as a delegate, and if you violated them and ignored warnings, you could be deleted. That's what it took to cool down invaders. That subduing of invaders in turn reduced the need of defending, which caused a decline. When the new Regional Control system was introduced, the invaders sprang up all over the place, but many of the defenders had already left the game, so there was a great imbalance.

Founders and Moderators were what really turned things around for the natives, but unfortunately these two additions were also perverted by invaders. The first by making false claims of being natives to get made founders of regions they invaded (several regions today continue to be held by these fake founders) and refounding conquered regions as prize regions. The second by well organized campaigns of baiting prominent natives and founders, to cripple regions and open them up to attack.

One of the biggest set-backs to early invaders was improving the means of detecting UN multying, which really cut down on the Armies of One terrorizing the NationStates World. For instance, the Farkers had one player with over 50 UN nations at one point. They still didn't get caught though, despite having them all in one launch region, but were deleted instead for having an obscene nation name (after having it for six months or so). Like I've always said, things were a little rough around the edges back in the early days. Invaders today, with their triggers and scripts, are much more technically advanced than clumsy thugs were in the early days of the game. The biggest difference is that the invaders in the early days could pull stunts that would get today's players mod-bombed into oblivion and players are more aware that invaders actually exist (since they openly brag and advertise all the time).

[Unibot III]

several regions today continue to be held by these fake founders

America ?

[Italian Frogs]

Invaders today, with their triggers and scripts, are much more technically advanced than clumsy thugs were in the early days of the game. The biggest difference is that the invaders in the early days could pull stunts that would get today's players mod-bombed into oblivion and players are more aware that invaders actually exist (since they openly brag and advertise all the time).

God damn, those were the good old days.

Everything now is just so boring!

[SFBA wabbitslayah]

Invaders today, with their triggers and scripts, are much more technically advanced than clumsy thugs were in the early days of the game. The biggest difference is that the invaders in the early days could pull stunts that would get today's players mod-bombed into oblivion and players are more aware that invaders actually exist (since they openly brag and advertise all the time).

God damn, those were the good old days.

Everything now is just so boring!

.. and you were who in the "good old days"? Also, regions?

[The Bruce]

several regions today continue to be held by these fake founders

America ?

America, Blarney Castle, and Heaven are the three regions that first come to mind, but there were likely other fake founders created, during the petition phase for older regions, after the introduction of founders.

In the case of Heaven, the fake founder (Barney Fife) eventually got themselves deleted and the place has been refounded at least once.

In the case of Blarney Castle you had a region where someone had put a lot of work into the regional community, including an elaborate map. After invading the place, the Farkers took turns constantly baiting the usurped delegate on the NS Forum, to the point where they could get them deleted by the Mods. The more people had invested in a region, the more they enjoyed tormenting them and destroying what they'd built. They were especially vicious towards role-playing regions. The reason for holding onto Blarney Castle so long, after being made founder was to drive Eire Shamrock insane, because he wanted to unify all of the Irish themed regions. I'm not sure if it was the Farkers baiting Eire Shamrock that got them deleted though, since Eire Shamrock did a lot of different things to try to get themselves deleted by the Mods. Farkers were practically taking regular shifts on the NS forum to bait people into deletion. Sheol (Delegate of Hell) was another of their targets they killed off with moderators, after baiting them 24/7.

[Ananke II]

I'm not sure if it was the Farkers baiting Eire Shamrock that got them deleted though, since Eire Shamrock did a lot of different things to try to get themselves deleted by the Mods. Farkers were practically taking regular shifts on the NS forum to bait people into deletion. Sheol (Delegate of Hell) was another of their targets they killed off with moderators, after baiting them 24/7.

That's interesting. I remember Eire Shamrock getting deleted and have a hazy picture of Sheol as someone who got in trouble with the moderators (mostly from gossip I heard), but didn't know that the farkers were so involved.

[Port blood]

ooooh,I've been looking for a thread like this

I'm really curious when the first recorded raid was,and when the first recorded defense was

The first known invaders were from a region called Evil (spelled with some random capitalization I can't remember and having no relation to any current incarnation of the region name). They managed to pull off four minor invasions in early January 2002 that few people even knew occurred, because of there was no impact outside of the tiny, inactive regions they targeted. 100 Nations of Conquest carried out similar barely noticeable operations at this time. Evil had already gone inactive by the time the Driftwood Gang and soon afterwards the Farkers got into the invading game.

Thank you for your anwser,so 12 years ago + thats quite some time

[Charax]

Early January 02? When was this thing launched? I could've sworn it was toward the middle or end of 2002, because all the good stuff happened in 03.

[Frattastan II]

Early January 02? When was this thing launched?

It was publicly released on November 13, 2002.

[Charax]

So how were raids taking place in January 2002?

[The North Polish Union]

So how were raids taking place in January 2002?

Dark magick.

[Ballotonia]

So how were raids taking place in January 2002?

They were not. Back then the game did not exist.

Ballotonia

[The Blaatschapen]

So how were raids taking place in January 2002?

The Bruce is probably off by a year.