Security Council Guide and Q&A Thread

[Kshemarashtram]

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Thank you, by the way
Sorry I forgot to acknowledge it

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I've read on quite a few occasions that raiders can be Condemned, but on any of the drafts I see on Condemning some raider nation/region, they seem to be met with an avalanche of opposition and the comments seem to mostly boil down to "we don't give badges to raiders" without much reasoning or arguments as to why (while of course 'reasoning' is something most SC feedback finds itself deficient in, in most cases I concede the drafts don't do themselves any favour).

Condemnations are awarded for playing the IC villain, and raiders are playing the IC villain, so why aren't they Condemned if they do their job well? To be honest, while going through the Condemnations, I did see a few awarded for what seemed to be successful raiding operations, but I also recall reading in quite a few places that the Council is making efforts to repeal raider Condemnations as it doesn't want raiders to have badges. In addition, I see people express absolute and uncompromising opposition to any WA proposal, no matter how well-written, if the author is from a "raider region". The question is: why?

Though I know I've earlier been vehemently censured for calling R/D a waste of time, I admit that it's quite fun to observe from an outsider perspective. It's a game after all, and C/Cs seem to me quite like the aftermath of this game, offering recognition to players who did their job well. So why can't raiders be Condemned for playing the IC villain and doing a good job at that? Is there any reason other than base resentment for them destroying regions?

Compare it to a cricket match, where on the field, everyone is fiercely competitive and trying to win, but after the game, the blokes who get all cranky upon defeat earn the sobriquet of a "bad sport". But much more well-regarded are the blokes who, even after defeat, have grace enough to laugh and say "well played lads" and then go on to have dinner together.

I of course am very much a foolish newbie to this site and there might very well be some additional nuances I'm missing, so I'm asking this question.

[Heavens Reach]

snip

Thank you, by the way
Sorry I forgot to acknowledge it

---

I've read on quite a few occasions that raiders can be Condemned, but on any of the drafts I see on Condemning some raider nation/region, they seem to be met with an avalanche of opposition and the comments seem to mostly boil down to "we don't give badges to raiders" without much reasoning or arguments as to why (while of course 'reasoning' is something most SC feedback finds itself deficient in, in most cases I concede the drafts don't do themselves any favour).

Condemnations are awarded for playing the IC villain, and raiders are playing the IC villain, so why aren't they Condemned if they do their job well? To be honest, while going through the Condemnations, I did see a few awarded for what seemed to be successful raiding operations, but I also recall reading in quite a few places that the Council is making efforts to repeal raider Condemnations as it doesn't want raiders to have badges. In addition, I see people express absolute and uncompromising opposition to any WA proposal, no matter how well-written, if the author is from a "raider region". The question is: why?

Though I know I've earlier been vehemently censured for calling R/D a waste of time, I admit that it's quite fun to observe from an outsider perspective. It's a game after all, and C/Cs seem to me quite like the aftermath of this game, offering recognition to players who did their job well. So why can't raiders be Condemned for playing the IC villain and doing a good job at that? Is there any reason other than base resentment for them destroying regions?

Compare it to a cricket match, where on the field, everyone is fiercely competitive and trying to win, but after the game, the blokes who get all cranky upon defeat earn the sobriquet of a "bad sport". But much more well-regarded are the blokes who, even after defeat, have grace enough to laugh and say "well played lads" and then go on to have dinner together.

I of course am very much a foolish newbie to this site and there might very well be some additional nuances I'm missing, so I'm asking this question.

It is not actually the case that raiders have been historically excluded from receiving condemnations. However, you are seeing IC as exclusively being about RP, when it's also still a PolSim, and you don't reward your IC enemies with recognition. Damnatio memoriae and all that.

[Rhaza]

R/D is not a sport within the game. It’s warfare within the game. These people would wipe out any of our regions if they had the chance, it’s completely irrational to give them rewards that they want (which they in turn use as recruitment tools to bolster their numbers).

In an in-game sense, raiders are not "well regarded blokes" playing the other side of a baseball game. They are terrorist organizations whose sole purpose is to inflict as much distress on communities they are actively destroying, usually via taunting or etc, on top of the actual destruction. They don’t deserve anything other than being crushed and pushed to the fringes of the game’s politics.

Congrats on being their latest mouthpiece, likely unwittingly.

[Kshemarashtram]

Thanks for answering, Heavens Reach and Rhaza

Congrats on being their latest mouthpiece, likely unwittingly.

Unwittingly indeed; how am I to know? I mostly just answer issues and comment on GA drafts and talk to some people when I come to this site, and when I read the R/D sections in the FAQ and the guide in the Gameplay forum, it seemed like just another competitive minigame to me.

[Tinhampton]

To add that the 2017-19 period was transformational for SC community norms:

• Condemnations went from being genuine denounciations of the target's actions to "dark Commendations" (following both the 2017 wave of raider Condemnations and the 2019 wave of general Condemnations). Today, all Condemnations are seen as "badges of honour."
• Nominee consent became a foundational bedrock of C&Cs, not just Liberations (following the controversy of Commend Frattastan II, where the nominee let his nation CTE because he did not want a Commendation).
• Liberations stopped acknowledging raider groups by name (this started when Lenlyvit declined to name fascist regions and unsavoury raider groups in Liberate The Monarchist Entente and Liberate Boston, but became standard practice for all invasions requiring Liberations in the 2020s).

[Kshemarashtram]

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Nominee consent became a foundational bedrock of C&Cs, not just Liberations (following the controversy of Commend Frattastan II, where the nominee let his nation CTE because he did not want a Commendation).

I'm curious though, why would someone be so vehemently opposed to a badge of honour? Even going so far as to CTE just to avoid one?

And I assume repeals of C/Cs do not require consent?

Condemnations went from being genuine denounciations of the target's actions to "dark Commendations" (following both the 2017 wave of raider Condemnations and the 2019 wave of general Condemnations). Today, all Condemnations are seen as "badges of honour."

Ah, so were earlier Condemnations seen as badges of shame?

And to clarify, I saw that Condemnations have been awarded for playing the IC villain in the aspect of stats and roleplay, but in the aspect of gameplay, what kind of acts would even warrant a Condemn nowadays? I don't think I can rely on the earlier ones to get an understanding, since the norms were different then. Looking at the draft of "Condemn Gagium", Gagium seems to have played the IC good guy, and Rhaza said that they initially intended to go for a Commend, but went for a Condemn just because Gagium quipped that it would be funnier. And the people playing the actual IC villain are boycotted from the WA because we shouldn't give recognition to them. So what kind of players would actually deserve a Condemn nowadays from a gameplay perspective?

Edit: Well, I reckon I should take a look at post-2017 Condemnations.

[Islandwalk]

And I assume repeals of C/Cs do not require consent?

That depends. There is such a concept as a repeal and replace, and those do require consent, although they are somewhat rare. I think most repeals tend not to be done with consent, mainly because the player is held in poor regard or the C/C is extremely substandard.

And to clarify, I saw that Condemnations have been awarded for playing the IC villain in the aspect of stats and roleplay, but in the aspect of gameplay, what kind of acts would even warrant a Condemn nowadays? I don't think I can rely on the earlier ones to get an understanding, since the norms were different then. Looking at the draft of "Condemn Gagium", Gagium seems to have played the IC good guy, and Rhaza said that they initially intended to go for a Commend, but went for a Condemn just because Gagium quipped that it would be funnier. And the people playing the actual IC villain are boycotted from the WA because we shouldn't give recognition to them. So what kind of players would actually deserve a Condemn nowadays from a gameplay perspective?

Part of consent is that the nominee needs to be okay with which type they're getting. The view generally tends to be that a player is either C/C-able or not, and that can earn them either type depending on what they want/which is more fitting. The challenge is just to spin their accomplishments in whichever way is needed.