NationStates

Unibot III wrote:

Superbunny wrote:Strictly speaking from a non-defender/raider standpoint here: Do. Not. Want. Let me play the game without a bunch of powerdelegates telling me where I can and can't move. Liberations are overreaching enough.

What game is there to play when a region is piled sky high? There's no game. There's not an ounce of competition faced after endorsements are piled onto an invader delegate. It ceases to be a game at that point. It's a foregone conclusion.

As for non-Gameplay events, we know from past experience with WA Liberations that if a region is targeted with a WA Liberation, it's probably because of something GP-related. Other delegates don't vote for resolutions that could create a precedent that could see to it their own regions are targeted.

1. If you can't defend your region that's your own fault. If you're even big enough to be somewhat of a target for raiders then just take a couple of minutes and browse the nation list in your region to check for suspicious members. If one guy in a game-created region can defend himself for 15 years then so can you.

2. Yes, that's my point. Liberations are already fine enough for defenders if every other option has been exhausted and the raiders have password-locked the region. This embargo idea is like hitting a dead horse with a nuclear missile. Raider regions can be big but the combined forces of defenders will always be bigger, and it's not like raiders are going to pile on 600 nations into whatever 10-nation backwater region they've decided to raid this week. Not to mention that founders STILL have the executive power to overturn raiders anytime they want (and, once again, if your founder CTEs or only comes on to stop his nation from CTEing and never interacts, that's on you to either refound or find a way to help your WA Delegate deal with it.)

What I mean is that I should not have my freedom of movement restricted by a bunch of powerdelegates who have thousands of endorsements and can swing a vote any which way they like. The only way I would support this is if it were a special type of resolution that required something like a 2/3rds majority, or needed a larger amount of delegates to approve before reaching the voting floor.

Uhh not sure how this helps anything other than making raiding easier.

Few scenario I see with this.

1. Region gets invaded. Embargo passes. Now instead of piling raiders, using less man power they can take their time destroying the region free from any attempts to free it.
->Raider win, founderless residents and defenders loose.

2. Prior to being raided, embargo passes. Region slowly dies not able to have anyone new join it.
->Founderless residents loose.

3. Racist region becomes founderless, embargo passes. Racist region now protected from the likely swarm of people wanting to raid it, giving them time to come up with a plan, relocate or what have you.
->Racist residents win.

I literally can't come up with a good way this idea could be used even after reading the bulk of the comments.

The Stalker wrote:Uhh not sure how this helps anything other than making raiding easier.

Few scenario I see with this.

1. Region gets invaded. Embargo passes. Now instead of piling raiders, using less man power they can take their time destroying the region free from any attempts to free it.
->Raider win, founderless residents and defenders loose.

2. Prior to being raided, embargo passes. Region slowly dies not able to have anyone new join it.
->Founderless residents loose.

3. Racist region becomes founderless, embargo passes. Racist region now protected from the likely swarm of people wanting to raid it, giving them time to come up with a plan, relocate or what have you.
->Racist residents win.

I literally can't come up with a good way this idea could be used even after reading the bulk of the comments.

You've correctly identified that an embargo is not a free pass for anyone. It comes with risks and new difficulties for defenders, nor is it a good preventative security measure for a region, and if your goal is to grief a hate-related region, an embargo can obstruct those objectives over time.

I think what you're missing is that people will turn to a WA Embargo when the alternative is worse than the new challenges it poses. That is to say: yes, liberating an embargoed region would be challenging and yes, an embargo could help invaders grief the region faster -- but if the invasion is piled, your chances of liberating the region are basically nil.

In a way, the embargo escalates the stakes, the timeline, and the difficulty of the liberation in exchange for an opportunity to liberate the region that wouldn't otherwise exist.

Unibot III wrote:

The Stalker wrote:Uhh not sure how this helps anything other than making raiding easier.

Few scenario I see with this.

1. Region gets invaded. Embargo passes. Now instead of piling raiders, using less man power they can take their time destroying the region free from any attempts to free it.
->Raider win, founderless residents and defenders loose.

2. Prior to being raided, embargo passes. Region slowly dies not able to have anyone new join it.
->Founderless residents loose.

3. Racist region becomes founderless, embargo passes. Racist region now protected from the likely swarm of people wanting to raid it, giving them time to come up with a plan, relocate or what have you.
->Racist residents win.

I literally can't come up with a good way this idea could be used even after reading the bulk of the comments.

You've correctly identified that an embargo is not a free pass for anyone. It comes with risks and new difficulties for defenders, nor is it a good preventative security measure for a region, and if your goal is to grief a hate-related region, an embargo can obstruct those objectives over time.

I think what you're missing is that people will turn to a WA Embargo when the alternative is worse than the new challenges it poses. That is to say: yes, liberating an embargoed region would be challenging and yes, an embargo could help invaders grief the region faster -- but if the invasion is piled, your chances of liberating the region are basically nil.

In a way, the embargo escalates the stakes, the timeline, and the difficulty of the liberation in exchange for an opportunity to liberate the region that wouldn't otherwise exist.

I can agree piling is a problem. But this doesn't do anything to make it better. Just stops piling if it's submitted fast enough. Which just means raiders don't have to put as many resources into holding the region.

Basically the logic is we can't free a region if it gets piled on, so lets make it so it can't get piled on or freed. Getting piled on or embargoed means the region can't be freed.. honestly gonna be harder to free a region no one can enter than one that has a bunch of nations piled in it. It's just illogical to me to think this helps anything.

The Stalker wrote:I can agree piling is a problem. But this doesn't do anything to make it better. Just stops piling if it's submitted fast enough. Which just means raiders don't have to put as many resources into holding the region.

Basically the logic is we can't free a region if it gets piled on, so lets make it so it can't get piled on or freed. Getting piled on or embargoed means the region can't be freed.. honestly gonna be harder to free a region no one can enter than one that has a bunch of nations piled in it. It's just illogical to me to think this helps anything.

Just to clarify: You can move a new WA nation into an embargoed region, it's just your nation will lose WA status within a short window of time (10 Secs Approx). To the uninitiated, it looks like just a minor delay of enforcement. To trained defenders that is a window of time to liberate a region through conventional means.

The greatest new challenges to liberating the embargoed region occur in the post-Liberation stage because you can't sustain the native delegate's endorsement gap versus the invading forces without A) sending in new liberators for the next update or B) the new delegate ejects enough invaders, and/or C) repealing the WA Embargo.

So it’ll lose WA *and* be relocated to the rejected realms?

Boda wrote:So it’ll lose WA *and* be relocated to the rejected realms?

Yea the OP post is confusing. In the "ADDENDUM" part it says just the WA status goes away, but yea I didn't follow it either.

I guess if it's just the WA status it's a little more workable in a realistic sense, but I still don't really care for the idea. Making R/D more complicated doesn't really fix the problem in my eyes. Also feel even going off submission time, it's gonna be hard to get a well written resolution submitted to the WA in time in most cases. It's gonna be rushed in there and people will be like "is it really needed?" "you misspelled that" "that's incorrect grammar".

Personally I would like to see something added to the game that gives natives of founderless region to be more involved. You know instead of founderless regions being the battle ground for raiders and defenders to fight over.

Let me help Unibot a bit here (Kylia would be so disappointed in me ). The idea is that you cannot further build a pile, but a liberation (or raid) at update is still possible. That is what the delay is for, so a raid/liberation force coming in close to when the region updates can change who the delegate is, but you cannot build the pile more because they lose their WA status (or are ejected as in the original version of this proposal).

The potential problem I see is actually a different one then the one raised by others. You capture the delegate...but then what? If the existing pile (pre-embargo) has cross endorsed they will have built up some influence, and the new delegate unless they were a high influence native would be unable to eject enough of the raiding force to keep them from just taking it back at the next update. I suppose that could create an interesting chance at a back and forth until the embargo was lifted, but how do you see that working Unibot?

What if we have a timelimit on the embargo? This doesn't make a region impenetrable, but gives it a short timespan to either get up and be able to flee or prepare to fight back. How long a timelimit would be, I don't know; anywhere from 1-2 weeks?

The Stalker wrote:

Boda wrote:So it’ll lose WA *and* be relocated to the rejected realms?

Yea the OP post is confusing. In the "ADDENDUM" part it says just the WA status goes away, but yea I didn't follow it either.

The OP is confusing because I originally foresaw the proposal being an ejection-based enforcement but over the course of this discussion it became clear that the embargo could be enforced by just dropping WA status on violators -- which works just as well, if not better. I've kept both ideas up in the OP.

Making R/D more complicated doesn't really fix the problem in my eyes.

Whether R/D becomes more complicated or not is irrelevant to whether the problem (piling) is resolved.

Attempts to "simplify" R/D over the past few years have threatened to exchange skill for luck. The embargo helps to simulate conventional conditions for a liberation which maximizes the skill and commitment required for all parties. I would also argue that this proposal doesn't make R/D "more complicated" - it relies on the fundamentals of operational logistics that are already practiced.

Also feel even going off submission time, it's gonna be hard to get a well written resolution submitted to the WA in time in most cases. It's gonna be rushed in there and people will be like "is it really needed?" "you misspelled that" "that's incorrect grammar".

Yes it will be difficult. And it should be. The difficulty helps buttress the system from abuse / overuse.

Personally I would like to see something added to the game that gives natives of founderless region to be more involved. You know instead of founderless regions being the battle ground for raiders and defenders to fight over.

I think this attitude is misdirected - founderless regions are not a 'battleground' when the invasion is piled, there is no 'battle' taking place. Natives have no hope if the invasion is piled exorbitantly, your region will be destroyed within the span of a few weeks. There is no path to liberation - the siege tactics deployed are just to slow down the inevitable.

In an embargo situation, natives would also play a critical role in the liberation of their region because defenders would not (practically speaking) be able to use a defender lead nation to free the region. There would have to be some form of native-defender cooperation (which -- speaking as a veteran defender -- is often painfully frustrating due to misunderstandings or unreliability).

Leutria wrote:Let me help Unibot a bit here (Kylia would be so disappointed in me ). The idea is that you cannot further build a pile, but a liberation (or raid) at update is still possible. That is what the delay is for, so a raid/liberation force coming in close to when the region updates can change who the delegate is, but you cannot build the pile more because they lose their WA status (or are ejected as in the original version of this proposal).

Yes, but with a small caveat - invaders could still use counter-liberators at any update to push their delegate's endorsement count higher temporarily update-to-update. That's a strategy that I would envision invaders adopting to help counter liberations and pump their lead's influence growth. Sort of a "Reverse Siege" tactic.

The potential problem I see is actually a different one then the one raised by others. You capture the delegate...but then what? If the existing pile (pre-embargo) has cross endorsed they will have built up some influence, and the new delegate unless they were a high influence native would be unable to eject enough of the raiding force to keep them from just taking it back at the next update. I suppose that could create an interesting chance at a back and forth until the embargo was lifted, but how do you see that working Unibot?

Yes this is part of the original intention for the proposal - if the native lead is inactive or doesn't have enough influence to ban enough invaders straight away, you're in for some real difficulties ahead. The chance of "retaliation" on the part of invaders is high - they could take back an embargoed region. Defenders would have to send liberators in at the next update again to prevent a re-takeover: this would get messy because leads would have to identify defenders from invaders when they were ejecting at update.

I see this as important to the overall proposal (1) because it would be fun and more dynamic, especially for invaders, (2) it poses challenges for defenders, dissuading them from embargoing a region unless they must.

A WA category should be a double-edged sword, it should have consequences that work against defenders even if it offers an opportunity for liberation that wouldn't otherwise exist.

Likar wrote:What if we have a timelimit on the embargo? This doesn't make a region impenetrable, but gives it a short timespan to either get up and be able to flee or prepare to fight back. How long a timelimit would be, I don't know; anywhere from 1-2 weeks?

I've thought about sunset provisions before, I didn't include it in the initial OP because I was worried it would clutter/complicate the proposal and would undermine the ability of players to use WA Embargoes to "attack" targeted regions. I think for some it'll be very important that the WA Embargo category offers opportunities for both native resistance and mischief.

Unibot III wrote:[snip]
invaders could still use counter-liberators at any update to push their delegate's endorsement count higher temporarily update-to-update. That's a strategy that I would envision invaders adopting to help counter liberations and pump their lead's influence growth. Sort of a "Reverse Siege" tactic.

This is not a new or novel strategy. There is no adaption here. Defenders put endorsements on regions they're trying to bolster, invaders put endorsements on their points during tag raids. It doesn't matter much if their puppets get booted out of the target region at update because they're going to jump in with a fresh set of puppets next update anyway. This strategy is exceedingly common. The only difference under an embargo will be that a raider org's piler reserves have until the embargo hits the WA floor - and like Fris pointed out, the time that will take to happen makes this a non-issue.

For ASEAN REGION and Slatos, they hit a pile of 60+ pilers in two days. Are you trying to tell me that defenders will be able to draft an embargo proposal and force it through the SC in time for it to have any meaningful impact?

Also, in it's current form and with no absolute defined time limit, the idea that this is solely a 'liberation tool' is a bare-faced lie. If you embargoed nationstates you've effectively rendered any invasion of the region completely impossible. You can take the delegacy for an update, but you're losing WA 10 seconds after. So I hope you're really good at clearing and setting ROs because Mikeswill is ejecting you well before the next update.

There's only really 3 situations where I can see an embargo being useful, given the fact that a 50+ pile can show up before an embargo even has hope of being effective.

1: Making a founderless region R&D proof by effectively hitting the off switch on WA activity
2: Putting a problematic region into a chokehold until it's WA activity dies out
3: You want to make it very difficult to remove a raider delegate when your embargo passes after they're sitting on a 60+ pile