Frontiers, Governors, Successors and Injunctions

[Quebecshire]

A 5 nation endo minimum seems somewhat reasonable, but more than that could be difficult for new regions to manage.

Right, which is why I'm suggesting 5 instead of the initial 10 that Sedge considered hwowever many months ago.

Brand new people starting a region might even struggle to get 5 endorsements anyway. Kinda just feels like gatekeeping.

5 is easily achievable through any of the three standard recruitment methods even if you're starting the region solo with no help. It's not "gatekeeping", you should read my post here about why the current state of things is a hinderance to smaller Frontiers that are actually putting in the effort to grow.

[Unibot III]

However, I think it's beneficial to have both: the continuously eligible factor encourages other Frontiers to disrupt rival Frontiers; the region age factor encourages other Frontiers to destroy rival Frontiers (e.g. through forced conversion from Frontier).

And what happens if there isn’t this cultural shift?

Like, if disruption/regional destruction isn’t widely absorbed into Frontier culture, was the success (& sustainability) of the system predicated on it?

[Sedgistan]

Mlakhavia and QuebeConcord are both correct to an extent. I'm not intending to set up a system that perfectly funnels all the nations to the big secure model gameplay regions. The intent is very much to encourage conflict; if no-one takes out rival Frontiers, they'll all suffer. But the system needs also to ensure that it isn't too easy to set up a viable (i.e. significant spawn rate) Frontier with minimal time or effort or there's no point in taking out rivals as others can immediately pop up and get the same benefits.

I've made a request of Violet (which I think I mentioned further up) to record when regions first become eligible for spawns; wiped when they become ineligible. The isn't quite so simple to do because of the way Frontiers are processed during update; however it will be done.

Once that is in place, there will be a change to the factors, which will involve counting the time that a region has been continuously eligible for spawns towards their spawn rate.

My current view is that the changes put in place then should be sufficient that the regions people are concerned about here (low endorsement ones) can be dealt with militarily, and even if they reclaim the region or move on elsewhere, will take time for their spawn rate to get up to a more competitive level.

I have to balance this with the desire not to make Frontiers inaccessible to less experienced players wanting to start one; that's why I don't intend to change the endorsement level requirement as part of this.

That's not to say that things can't then be reviewed and tweaked further down the line, but if the hope is to sit out military intervention and hope we'll hand all the spawns to the big regions, that won't happen. I'm not suggesting that is anyone's line of argument, but the prospect has been raised by those concerned that might be the outcome, so I want to make clear it won't be.

[Quebecshire]

I'm not intending to set up a system that perfectly funnels all the nations to the big secure model gameplay regions. The intent is very much to encourage conflict; if no-one takes out rival Frontiers, they'll all suffer. But the system needs also to ensure that it isn't too easy to set up a viable (i.e. significant spawn rate) Frontier with minimal time or effort or there's no point in taking out rivals as others can immediately pop up and get the same benefits.

Yep. But here's the thing: these small Frontiers that have communities and are trying to grow (Community, Greater Sahara, Carcassonne, etc) can't afford to play the long game like Concord and Europeia can. We can sit on our asses for quite awhile and be fine, after all, we have strong recruitment and security apparatuses, our entire existence isn't predicated on Frontiers paying early dividends.

I've made a request of Violet (which I think I mentioned further up) to record when regions first become eligible for spawns; wiped when they become ineligible. The isn't quite so simple to do because of the way Frontiers are processed during update; however it will be done.

Once that is in place, there will be a change to the factors, which will involve counting the time that a region has been continuously eligible for spawns towards their spawn rate.

My current view is that the changes put in place then should be sufficient that the regions people are concerned about here (low endorsement ones) can be dealt with militarily, and even if they reclaim the region or move on elsewhere, will take time for their spawn rate to get up to a more competitive level.

I'm cautiously hopeful about this. How will this be in terms of weight compared to other factors? I think Sopo had some good points about that earlier in the thread.

That's not to say that things can't then be reviewed and tweaked further down the line, but if the hope is to sit out military intervention and hope we'll hand all the spawns to the big regions, that won't happen. I'm not suggesting that is anyone's line of argument, but the prospect has been raised by those concerned that might be the outcome, so I want to make clear it won't be.

See what I said earlier about the big regions having the luxury of waiting things out. The regions most impacted by the numbers I illustrated are the ones who don't have standing militaries/the option to play eternal whack-a-mole with these small Frontiers. What they do have are actual attempts at integration/security, but they're being matched if not outspawned at times by regions with nothing of the sort.

[All Wild Things]

A 5 nation endo minimum seems somewhat reasonable, but more than that could be difficult for new regions to manage.

Right, which is why I'm suggesting 5 instead of the initial 10 that Sedge considered hwowever many months ago.

Brand new people starting a region might even struggle to get 5 endorsements anyway. Kinda just feels like gatekeeping.

5 is easily achievable through any of the three standard recruitment methods even if you're starting the region solo with no help. It's not "gatekeeping", you should read my post here about why the current state of things is a hinderance to smaller Frontiers that are actually putting in the effort to grow.

Not having tried to recruit for years, I'm out of touch - what are the 3 methods? TG, GP forum thread, and ..?

I very much agree that new players would ideally spawn in regions that are able to support them. One draw-back of the 5-endo floor is that it could cost frontier founders financially. In an attempt to get to 5 endos, the founder may choose to buy stamps. I've no idea what success rates recruiters get these days, but I imagine it costs at least $5 to get 5 endos via stamps. And then if your region gets taken over, then you've lost the benefits of your cash. If you're some naive kid thinking you're about to start the next TNP, that's going to be an extra painful crash back to earth. Since the spawn rates are already tied to endo-count, maybe the rates could get tweaked to favour the small & mid-sized frontiers with communities?

[Comfed]

Not having tried to recruit for years, I'm out of touch - what are the 3 methods? TG, GP forum thread, and ..?

Presumably, the three methods of telegram recruitment - API, stamps and manual.

[All Wild Things]

Not having tried to recruit for years, I'm out of touch - what are the 3 methods? TG, GP forum thread, and ..?

Presumably, the three methods of telegram recruitment - API, stamps and manual.

Doh. Makes sense!

[Quebecshire]

- snip -

As a follow up to this, I'd like to put some more stuff out there.

Concerns about the continuous eligibility:

It's a bit volatile. If I cancel the welcome TG to replace it, do I get reset on a major spawn factor? Do I get a certain amount of time to replace it? Obviously I wouldn't get spawns while it's out of commission, but getting completely reset over that?

The same goes for if a Delegate accidentally resigns.

Regarding the "gameplay solution":

The whole point of Frontiers as marketed by Sedge was "high risk high reward". To address the "burn Algerheaven to the ground" point specifically (even discounting my earlier point about military capacity about the Frontiers actually harmed): why? He'll make "Algerheaven 2" before I've even finished burning the first one. If these 1-4e regions (some of which are brand new) can get these many spawns, there's clearly a near-zero consequence to getting raided. Make a new one, boom, done. It's not a "rival Frontier" that I get a tangible gain from harming if it's that quick a turnaround.

You want to incentivize new and engaging conflict/dynamics? Good, I agree. But you have to make it worth it if you want people to do it.

I'd also reiterate the figures I cited here and say 20% overall and 40% of Frontiers is just... a lot. A lot more than is warranted.

Not having tried to recruit for years, I'm out of touch - what are the 3 methods? TG, GP forum thread, and ..?

I very much agree that new players would ideally spawn in regions that are able to support them. One draw-back of the 5-endo floor is that it could cost frontier founders financially. In an attempt to get to 5 endos, the founder may choose to buy stamps. I've no idea what success rates recruiters get these days, but I imagine it costs at least $5 to get 5 endos via stamps. And then if your region gets taken over, then you've lost the benefits of your cash. If you're some naive kid thinking you're about to start the next TNP, that's going to be an extra painful crash back to earth. Since the spawn rates are already tied to endo-count, maybe the rates could get tweaked to favour the small & mid-sized frontiers with communities?

What Comfed said - in my experience, any of the three methods can get you to 5+ endorsements, in combination, much more. At least one should presumably be viable for the average region-builder... if none are, you might not be at the right time to build a region.

Regarding finances, two of the three methods are free, including the most effective one (manual).

[Varanius]

Regarding the "gameplay solution":

The whole point of Frontiers as marketed by Sedge was "high risk high reward". To address the "burn Algerheaven to the ground" point specifically (even discounting my earlier point about military capacity about the Frontiers actually harmed): why? He'll make "Algerheaven 2" before I've even finished burning the first one. If these 1-4e regions (some of which are brand new) can get these many spawns, there's clearly a near-zero consequence to getting raided. Make a new one, boom, done. It's not a "rival Frontier" that I get a tangible gain from harming if it's that quick a turnaround.

You want to incentivize new and engaging conflict/dynamics? Good, I agree. But you have to make it worth it if you want people to do it.

I'd also reiterate the figures I cited here and say 20% overall and 40% of Frontiers is just... a lot. A lot more than is warranted.

And to add on to the fact that it’s just not creating good gameplay, my main concern about these frontiers (and one I believe I raised ages ago in NSGP when F/S was in the early days of being discussed) is that it’s really just not great for retention of new players and site-wide integration. Regardless of any discussion about gameplay (though it’s clearly not good for gameplay either) the bar for being a place where new players spawn and immediately get involved in the site should be higher than “have a friend who can endorse you”. These places do not meet any reasonable standard for a developed and active community. Say what you will about the feeders, but the worst feeder on a bad day is a decades old community with tons of tradition and activity. And I’m not saying that that should be the requirement (that’s clearly too high a bar), but there obviously needs to be some threshold for being an actual community (much less an established one who the site can even trust to stick around another month). A system where a fifth of all nations spawn in these backwater nowhereville’s is a system where a lot of people just don’t log in a second time.

[All Wild Things]

What Comfed said - in my experience, any of the three methods can get you to 5+ endorsements, in combination, much more. At least one should presumably be viable for the average region-builder... if none are, you might not be at the right time to build a region.

Regarding finances, two of the three methods are free, including the most effective one (manual).

Yeah. I think we can agree that the vast majority of existing frontier founders aren't at the right time to build a region! Given the evidence that so few put thought into it, I doubt they'd put much thought into what would be the most cost-effective way of sending recruitment TGs either.

[Freedomanica]

Yeah, I’d definitely keep the 5 endorsement count if you want any hope of allowing some sort of benefits for older, more-established regions who have put considerable amount of regionbuilding and effort into their infrastructure, I’d even say 10 is reasonable to be honest. Right now, a lot of frontiers that aren’t necessarily developed at all to even cater or grow with a community are present right now and this hurts a new player’s potential prospects in the game. If you want to maintain “dynamic gameplay”, then cater that for well-built newly-founded prospectively promising regions who have perhaps done at least some efficient background recruitment practices on their part beforehand to receiving spawns as to directly raise their WA Del endo count to 10, reap the opportunities and not just for everyone with a name next to WA Delegate.

A factor you could consider is the potential prospect of R/D gameplay before a region can amount to said 10 endorsements, I think that could be an exciting avenue for frontier vs frontier disruption with the objective to stop the prospective region from attaining eligibility to receive spawns. R/D organizations could also take advantage of the fact that some may have started as frontiers and started recruiting with such a status, and thus actions of intervention could also take place there as to render their efforts futile.


I also support the sentiment regarding the prioritization of endorsement counts over age and would honestly scrap the RMB activity, the potential for exploitation is too attractive for any consideration.

Endorsement numbers on Delegate should be preferred over regional WA member count because honestly the amount of WA Members you actually engage with in the region should be rewarded.

[Pauline Bonaparte]

I've made a request of Violet (which I think I mentioned further up) to record when regions first become eligible for spawns; wiped when they become ineligible. The isn't quite so simple to do because of the way Frontiers are processed during update; however it will be done.

Once that is in place, there will be a change to the factors, which will involve counting the time that a region has been continuously eligible for spawns towards their spawn rate.

I agree with what's been said in this thread, though obviously I'm biased. I think that, while the majority (probably) of new nations do not participate in regional governments, it's better for the game for frontiers with those governments to get a bigger share; that way, those new players who choose to do get involved have an immediately accessible option for doing so.

I had a question about the quoted change, though. I was wondering about how changing a welcome telegram would factor into this, though it looks like Quebecshire already brought this up. The RMB posting rules are also of interest to me. If the RMB falls below the activity threshold for an update, will this impact the proposed spawn rate modifier?

[Sedgistan]

I'm cautiously hopeful about this. How will this be in terms of weight compared to other factors? I think Sopo had some good points about that earlier in the thread.

Undecided about numbers at present; I'm waiting for Violet to do the preliminaries first, though I'd only intend to give rough guidance rather than precise figures.

Welcome TGs - see "No welcome TG set - significant reduction to spawns". No welcome TG doesn't mean you're ineligible for spawns, just severely throttled. Also bear in mind that eligibility is calculated at update, so stuff that happens in between is irrelevant.

RMB posting - again I refer to the careful phrasing of "No recent RMB activity - tiered significant reduction to spawns or no spawns at all". It does not reward volume of posts (spam) just penalises lack of recent RMB activity.

[Freedomanica]

Welcome TGs - see "No welcome TG set - significant reduction to spawns". No welcome TG doesn't mean you're ineligible for spawns, just severely throttled. Also bear in mind that eligibility is calculated at update, so stuff that happens in between is irrelevant.

I don’t see why frontiers should even have the eligibility to receive spawns at all in that instance that they can’t even cater to new nations, regardless of whether its severely throttled or not. Many new nations come in with various expectations of the game and a welcome telegram is set for them to give them such a platform for opportunities of interaction not in only them getting involved with the community in question, but a means for them to stay invested in NS long term. I question whether the regional front would even want to build a community worthwhile in the instance that it’s not there especially for frontiers in particular.

[Quebecshire]

I'm cautiously hopeful about this. How will this be in terms of weight compared to other factors? I think Sopo had some good points about that earlier in the thread.

Undecided about numbers at present; I'm waiting for Violet to do the preliminaries first, though I'd only intend to give rough guidance rather than precise figures.

Welcome TGs - see "No welcome TG set - significant reduction to spawns". No welcome TG doesn't mean you're ineligible for spawns, just severely throttled. Also bear in mind that eligibility is calculated at update, so stuff that happens in between is irrelevant.

RMB posting - again I refer to the careful phrasing of "No recent RMB activity - tiered significant reduction to spawns or no spawns at all". It does not reward volume of posts (spam) just penalises lack of recent RMB activity.

Alright, that stuff makes sense. I do appreciate you hearing out ideas and being generally open to change. I have some skepticism about this (or at least about this being the only thing done), which I'll illustrate below.

Going back to Pronoun's site, I want to use three particular Frontiers (Algerheaven, Carcassonne, and E Region) for this example, but I am happy to discuss other points of data.

Let's start with the basics.

Region	Foundings (7 day period)
Algerheaven	246
Carcassonne	243
E Region	240

All are relatively equal in terms of spawns, with Carcassonne sitting as the median and mean of the three.

Now let's talk WAD endorsements.

Region	WA Delegate Endorsements
Algerheaven	1
Carcassonne	25
E Region	2

This is where it gets a little different. Since we're talking about a week long period and those numbers in the table are right now, let's establish some facts: Algerheaven's WAD has been at 1 endorsement for the full duration, Carcassonne's has ranged from 22-25 in the same period (steady growth overall). E Region's has only had 1 throughout the week.

So, now we get to your proposed solution of including continuous eligibility as a factor. How does that shake things up for these regions?

Region	Time as a Frontier
Algerheaven	22
Carcassonne	22
E Region	21

Oh.

Yes, I know being a Frontier =/= eligibility, but with such a low bar for eligibility, these ones have all managed it just fine. The proposed solution here really won't change anything, would it?

One look at each of these regions' pages tells you which ones are prioritizing integration and which ones are basically shitpost regions, if the WA endorsement data didn't already give you that impression.

Black = Algerheaven
Red = Carcassonne
Blue = E Region

Yes, these are only just a couple regions, but I think this is a glimpse into a broader problem, and with this in mind I'm not sure the current proposed new factor actually changes it in this case, for example. It's definitely not an end-all solution, if one at all, as much as I appreciate the spirit behind it.

[Haganham]

Is it worth considering using the size cap to encourage integration? For example, what if instead of fiddling with spawn rates you set it so that regions stop getting spawns once their population is more then 25 times the number of endorsements on the delegate?

[Ambrella]

Rather than fully eliminate spawns for regions with fewer than 5 endos on the delegate, could we significantly throttle them? For example, those regions get 20% of the spawns they currently get, and then from 5 endos onward, the formula remains the same as it is now. That way very small frontiers can still grow somewhat and new players get that instant gratification of spawns beginning, but they'll be highly incentivized to put in a small modicum of effort to reach a much higher level of spawns.

We could also have a tier for regions with 5-10 endos with, say, 60% of the current spawn rate.

[Juansonia]

Rather than fully eliminate spawns for regions with fewer than 5 endos on the delegate, could we significantly throttle them? For example, those regions get 20% of the spawns they currently get, and then from 5 endos onward, the formula remains the same as it is now. That way very small frontiers can still grow somewhat and new players get that instant gratification of spawns beginning, but they'll be highly incentivized to put in a small modicum of effort to reach a much higher level of spawns.
We could also have a tier for regions with 5-10 endos with, say, 60% of the current spawn rate.

Basically if endos <= 5, treat endos as 20% of the actual number of endos?

[Comfed]

Is it worth considering using the size cap to encourage integration? For example, what if instead of fiddling with spawn rates you set it so that regions stop getting spawns once their population is more then 25 times the number of endorsements on the delegate?

Then the solution is to eject nations until you're under the magic number.

[Improper Classifications]

Is it worth considering using the size cap to encourage integration? For example, what if instead of fiddling with spawn rates you set it so that regions stop getting spawns once their population is more then 25 times the number of endorsements on the delegate?

Then the solution is to eject nations until you're under the magic number.

You appear to be in the wrong Pacific.

[Ambrella]

Rather than fully eliminate spawns for regions with fewer than 5 endos on the delegate, could we significantly throttle them? For example, those regions get 20% of the spawns they currently get, and then from 5 endos onward, the formula remains the same as it is now. That way very small frontiers can still grow somewhat and new players get that instant gratification of spawns beginning, but they'll be highly incentivized to put in a small modicum of effort to reach a much higher level of spawns.
We could also have a tier for regions with 5-10 endos with, say, 60% of the current spawn rate.

Basically if endos <= 5, treat endos as 20% of the actual number of endos?

Well, not exactly, as I'm not sure how number of endos corresponds to number of spawns. There doesn't seem to be much difference between having 1 or having 5. So my suggestion is that with fewer than 5 you get heavily throttled (ex. 10 spawns per day if you get 50 per day now).

[Comfed]

Then the solution is to eject nations until you're under the magic number.

You appear to be in the wrong Pacific.

No. I'm just pointing out that basing things on the percentage of people who are in the WA or endorsing the delegate provides the pretty easy option of ejection non-WA or non-delegate-endorsing nations, so it's not really a significant barrier.

[Haganham]

Is it worth considering using the size cap to encourage integration? For example, what if instead of fiddling with spawn rates you set it so that regions stop getting spawns once their population is more then 25 times the number of endorsements on the delegate?

Then the solution is to eject nations until you're under the magic number.

Is that really easier than bugging people to join the WA and endorse the delegate though?

[Comfed]

Then the solution is to eject nations until you're under the magic number.

Is that really easier than bugging people to join the WA and endorse the delegate though?

I would say that going to all that trouble is considerably less easy than ejecting a bunch of low-influence nations. Of course regions will bug people to join the WA, but if you were a frontier and your spawns (i.e. the only reason to be a frontier) were at stake, it makes sense to to both.

[Haganham]

Is that really easier than bugging people to join the WA and endorse the delegate though?

I would say that going to all that trouble is considerably less easy than ejecting a bunch of low-influence nations. Of course regions will bug people to join the WA, but if you were a frontier and your spawns (i.e. the only reason to be a frontier) were at stake, it makes sense to to both.

Maybe. I expect that the optimal response to this would be to eject inactive players and run WA campaigns for the active ones. My experience is that a significant number of the people I recruit never even log in again, and I expect that its even worse with foundlings.