[DEFEATED] Liberate Moon (by Horo/Ever-Wandering Souls)

[Magecastle Embassy Building A5]

The Security Council,

Admiring that the Moon has existed since before recorded history began, and is home to a nation that has existed there since the dawn of international record-keeping,

Concerned that the Moon now appears to be haunted by the vicious forces of The Black Hawks, Lily, Lone Wolves United, The Brotherhood of Malice, The Communist Bloc, Osiris, Islamic States, and Hartfelden, several of which have been condemned by this body,

Worried that the Moon is especially vulnerable to attacks capable of delivering permanent damage due to its small scale,

Concerned that the international community has so far proved either unwilling or incapable of defending the Moon,

Aghast that the Moon and its resident nations may suffer irreparable harm without swift international action,

Hereby liberates Moon.

Discuss.

[Lenlyvit]

There's really not much to discuss? I'm not surprised it's getting to quorum, but it's a resolution written by a raider to showcase their operation and piling power. It won't pass at vote.

[This Hammer Bans Natives]

I can't wait to ban all of the natives and refound the region

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

I can't wait to ban all of the natives and refound the region

Defenders are really so apathetic that they're not even gonna try to stall a refound and ejection of an archaic native, much less actually try to lib, and they'll also give a big thumbs up as the wider-anti-raider-clique shoots down an at-vote lib out of spite, huh? Couldn't even be assed to get the usual defender-written boilerplate SC lib submitted.

What's the excuse this time? Natives not active enough to qualify for defending services? Pile to big for regions with cumulative endos-on-delegate in the multiple thousands to liberate? Eaiser to just agendapost about how raiding is failing despite your own liberation attempts grow more flaccid with each passing week?

How do the aspiring trainees and moralists feel about the total breakdown of defending to the point that leadership is just telling them at a lib won't even be attempted, and an SC lib will actually be blocked, on an innocent little native region?

[Tiber and Rione]

The lack of defenders actually doing any defending with Moon would make one think they all disappeared into the shadow realm.

[Chemgota]

How was this passed.

[Refiria]

Is this seriously being against'ed because of the author? lol

[Wallenburg]

How was this passed.

It wasn't and won't be. It merely made it to vote, which basically just requires someone with either the time to TG all the delegates or the money to have the game do it for them.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

Is this seriously being against'ed because of the author? lol

The defenders and anti-raiders of the world, after days of failing to put forth a lib of their own, would so far rather crush the free liberation handed to them than actually spend the effort to defend Moon and its natives in any way.

I can't wait to ban all of the natives and refound the region

Us raiders have made perfectly clear what our plans are should this fail. Should it pass, well, we'll still do all the ejections, since with exactly zero GP liberation attempts, we've had to waste exactly zero influence banning defenders, and can spend it allllll on banning natives. But it's basically impossible to refound under an SC liberation if any defender is watching (assuming they are these days, their spotting has gotten quite lazy too), so the region itself would more likely remain as-is.

Remember kids - defenders and friends don't care about helping natives, they care about beating raiders! and if they can't beat raiders outright, 100%, then they'll take their toys and go home, and not waste and time and energy on silly little things like "minimizing native harm" or "preventing a refound." Even when they typically pass boilerplate fill-in-the-blank SC liberations with no flavor, they couldn't be assed here to even fill in "Moon" on one and push it through with their voting bloc - to do the bare minimum 5 mins of work to give a measure of protection to Moon. Nope, they've declared the region not worth their energy, and will even shoot down the free SC lib dumped on their doorstep in the wake of their silence. Maybe at least it'll shame them into passing their own lib next, if they can get it to quorum after they're done crushing this one. If not, well - the world will know to thank regions like The League/Concord, The Order of The Grey Wardens, The South Pacific, The North Pacific, The Pacific, and Refugia, most of them proud defenders, for so bravely making sure they were online right when the vote started to stomp this lib into the ground and enable the destruction of Moon.

Wasn't long ago that The North Pacific and The Pacific, of those regions, formally pledged to vote FOR any SC lib of a Black Hawks operation (3e), too - but see, they also pledged to vote against anything written by members of those orgs (3a), and they seem to have decided that part of their pledge is more important than the other and saving native regions.

[Southern Zambezi]

Southern Zambezi think this problem should not concern of WA.
Nobody wants to second Crusade.

[Xeknos]

Voted for because this shit is hilarious.

[Romanic Imperium]

Ahh so thats why the moon has an angry face now. Seriously though where be the defenders.

[Philimbesi]

I rise to cast our vote for this measure as the WA intern, whose name, contrary to popular belief is not "coin" (at least I don't think it is), called "tails" and the coin landed tails side up.

May the odds be forever in your favor,
Nigel S Youlkin
USP Ambassador to the WA.

[Tiber and Rione]

Ahh so thats why the moon has an angry face now. Seriously though where be the defenders.

All the defenders got V E C T O R E D, along with the natives, as proudly displayed by the regional flag.

[Lakeside Valley]

The Community of Lakeside Valley ABSTAINS

Our political scientists and foreign policy experts have been working day and night to decide if this resolution is serious or not. We ask all member states, how did this get enough support to be voted on in the first place? After a six hour long debate convinced the receptionist to throw hot coffee at our experts and promptly tell them to be quiet, we've decided its not worth coming to a conclusion. We ask all member states join us in disregarding this unclear "resolution", and we ask all member states join us to silently scold the WA for letting this "resolution" develop this much.

[HumanSanity]

This proposal is a transparent raider effort to stir propaganda while ignoring that defenders made active tactical and strategic decisions in choosing whether or not to contest this occupation.

I can't wait to ban all of the natives and refound the region

Defenders are really so apathetic that they're not even gonna try to stall a refound and ejection of an archaic native, much less actually try to lib, and they'll also give a big thumbs up as the wider-anti-raider-clique shoots down an at-vote lib out of spite, huh? Couldn't even be assed to get the usual defender-written boilerplate SC lib submitted.

Writing a Liberation was discussed. We determined that it was likely raiders would be able to banject the remaining natives and refound the region before the Liberation could pass (keeping in mind that we would need to wait 3 full days for the existing SC resolution to clear out of the queue and then 4 days for a subsequent Liberation to pass) and thus passing a Liberation would only be a rhetoric and propaganda tool for raiders (similar to the passed and then repealed SC Liberation of Politics Amino which failed to actually save the region) rather than actually preserving Moon. The likelihood of raiders being able to successfully refound short term is amplified because raiders started the operation with 12 Border Control Regional Officers due to the way the operation was conducted.

Now, one of raiding's highest ranked leaders has proposed their own Liberation proposal, knowing that even if it passed it would be irrelevant. This proposal is entirely a stunt by Souls exactly so he can falsely equate tactical defender decisions with political and military malaise and make irrelevant "gotcha" quips about the sanctions forwarded by the Modern Gameplay Compact. All of this to advance the narrative from the Big Three raiding organizations to less experienced players that they should rally around their small oligarchy of players simply because they have momentum from raiding a region with no active playerbase.

What's the excuse this time? Natives not active enough to qualify for defending services? Pile to big for regions with cumulative endos-on-delegate in the multiple thousands to liberate? Eaiser to just agendapost about how raiding is failing despite your own liberation attempts grow more flaccid with each passing week?

Making decisions about attempting a given operation is something that has to be done in the context of the region being raided, the tactical advantages raiders have in that region, the potential goals of the operation, and the region being raided. In this case, the decision to not contest the occupation of Moon was made for a combination of these reasons, namely concern about officer and updater burnout, the substantial tactical advantage raiders had with 12 Border Control Regional Officers (both in banning liberators before they update in the region and as we would attempt to establish a siege beach head) and the raider lead having existing influence in the region, and an acknowledgement of low activity levels in the region. Moreover, one of the only members of the Raider Unity oligarchy with any capability, power, or influence wasted three weeks sitting in a low-value target and then deployed the full piling force of the Raider Unity oligarchy in order to win an ultimately hollow victory.

Ultimately, as much as raiders wish to spin the decision not to contest this operation as a sign of defending's weakness, in actuality it is a sign of raiding's desire to continually prop itself up with propaganda and self-congratulatory low-value victories to keep its hype train going and ensure the small circle of players who have controlled its levers of power for years remain on top.

How do the aspiring trainees and moralists feel about the total breakdown of defending to the point that leadership is just telling them at a lib won't even be attempted, and an SC lib will actually be blocked, on an innocent little native region?

Defenders who have questions about this decision are welcome to reach out to me via telegram or Discord. We are always looking for new talent and new members, and anyone interested in the SPSF or one of the other diversity of defender regions is also welcome to reach out.

Unlike in raiderdom, that conversation may actually get you involved in doing meaningful work to put us in a better position to contest future occupations and raids, instead of just propping up a set of players who never care about your contribution and take propaganda victories over strategic ones.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

This proposal is a transparent raider effort to stir propaganda while ignoring that defenders made active tactical and strategic decisions in choosing whether or not to contest this occupation.

You made poor decisions.

Defenders are really so apathetic that they're not even gonna try to stall a refound and ejection of an archaic native, much less actually try to lib, and they'll also give a big thumbs up as the wider-anti-raider-clique shoots down an at-vote lib out of spite, huh? Couldn't even be assed to get the usual defender-written boilerplate SC lib submitted.

Writing a Liberation was discussed. We determined that it was likely raiders would be able to banject the remaining natives and refound the region before the Liberation could pass (keeping in mind that we would need to wait 3 full days for the existing SC resolution to clear out of the queue and then 4 days for a subsequent Liberation to pass) and thus passing a Liberation would only be a rhetoric and propaganda tool for raiders (similar to the passed and then repealed SC Liberation of Politics Amino which failed to actually save the region) rather than actually preserving Moon. The likelihood of raiders being able to successfully refound short term is amplified because raiders started the operation with 12 Border Control Regional Officers due to the way the operation was conducted.

You should fire your math person. Highest inf native has around 10130 inf, which takes bare minimum about 3550 inf to eject only, which at 175e (more than we have!) takes ten days to obtain. Not to mention there's a second nation near that, so add some time to cycle the del (plus the Del-RO endorsement differential meaning another update or two despite needing 100 or so less inf) and do another cheap ejection. Call it 11 days minimum to refound from start of op (tick tock). 11 is more than 7. The 12 BC RO's make it harder to stall that timeline with a beachhead, but the base math on the natives is immutable.

Now, one of raiding's highest ranked leaders has proposed their own Liberation proposal, knowing that even if it passed it would be irrelevant. This proposal is entirely a stunt by Souls exactly so he can falsely equate tactical defender decisions with political and military malaise and make irrelevant "gotcha" quips about the sanctions forwarded by the Modern Gameplay Compact. All of this to advance the narrative from the Big Three raiding organizations to less experienced players that they should rally around their small oligarchy of players simply because they have momentum from raiding a region with no active playerbase.

I mean, I am handing you a free lib on a timeline that allows it to work, where you apparently just admitted to deciding not to for reasons that are just...incorrect. Take it or leave it. Or maybe get your own narrative that tells natives why you're just letting this raid happen.

What's the excuse this time? Natives not active enough to qualify for defending services? Pile to big for regions with cumulative endos-on-delegate in the multiple thousands to liberate? Eaiser to just agendapost about how raiding is failing despite your own liberation attempts grow more flaccid with each passing week?

Making decisions about attempting a given operation is something that has to be done in the context of the region being raided, the tactical advantages raiders have in that region, the potential goals of the operation, and the region being raided. In this case, the decision to not contest the occupation of Moon was made for a combination of these reasons, namely concern about officer and updater burnout, the substantial tactical advantage raiders had with 12 Border Control Regional Officers (both in banning liberators before they update in the region and as we would attempt to establish a siege beach head) and the raider lead having existing influence in the region, and an acknowledgement of low activity levels in the region. Moreover, one of the only members of the Raider Unity oligarchy with any capability, power, or influence wasted three weeks sitting in a low-value target and then deployed the full piling force of the Raider Unity oligarchy in order to win an ultimately hollow victory.

Ultimately, as much as raiders wish to spin the decision not to contest this operation as a sign of defending's weakness, in actuality it is a sign of raiding's desire to continually prop itself up with propaganda and self-congratulatory low-value victories to keep its hype train going and ensure the small circle of players who have controlled its levers of power for years remain on top.

So those seem like some much more real reasons than bad math - as I said all along, you decided you couldn't win outright, so you decided to not even try. Glad to hear that defenders consider a resident's 19-year residency streak to be of no value worth defending, though.

How do the aspiring trainees and moralists feel about the total breakdown of defending to the point that leadership is just telling them at a lib won't even be attempted, and an SC lib will actually be blocked, on an innocent little native region?

Defenders who have questions about this decision are welcome to reach out to me via telegram or Discord. We are always looking for new talent and new members, and anyone interested in the SPSF or one of the other diversity of defender regions is also welcome to reach out.

Unlike in raiderdom, that conversation may actually get you involved in doing meaningful work to put us in a better position to contest future occupations and raids, instead of just propping up a set of players who never care about your contribution and take propaganda victories over strategic ones.

You seem to be misconstrued: raiding currently accounts for every one of our pilers by name, for is it on their backs that we've won every single major operation this year handily. Malice makes them cards, TBH gives them feathers, and everyone would love to see any one of them rise to leading ops themselves someday. Raiding does not have the problem that only 4 officers or so are actually considered able to lead libs, and when they decide not to, there is no lib.

[Reventus Koth]

I'd like to take a minute to genuinely thank HumanSanity for being willing to be the one leader in defenderdom that bites the bullet and breaks the silence regarding recent defender decision making and practices. The game is better when both sides are visible and the zeitgeist can be recorded for future generations to look back on.

That being said, I have to back up Souls here and loudly protest the assertion that the operation in Moon, or any operation undertaken by raiderdom this year (or practically any year in living memory) has been done for any reason adjacent to "ensur[ing] the small circle of players who have controlled its levers of power for years remain on top". This is so utterly ridiculous that it can only be understood as projection. The Brotherhood of Malice, for example, has almost exclusively promoted players to Taskmaster that had never held authoritative positions in raiderdom before, including one new player who we promoted off the back of their project to establish a group of girl scouts.

I'd personally love nothing more than to prop up new players and inject new life into this game we play. You can call our repeated shared victories "self-congratulatory" and "low-value", but I don't see you anywhere when defenders do the same thing after patting themselves on the back for far lower-value defenses (when they bother to show up). And I shouldn't, because that kind of revelry is part of the R/D game that both sides (hopefully) enjoy.

[Christus Imperat]

Should NationStates members care about regions, they should vote FOR this resolution.

A group of raiders proudly pushing a preemptive resolution to make the natives look bad should be humiliated.

Will they be humiliated? Depends on the WA. Christus Imperat, however, votes FOR.

[Thorn1000]

Moreover, one of the only members of the Raider Unity oligarchy with any capability, power, or influence wasted three weeks sitting in a low-value target and then deployed the full piling force of the Raider Unity oligarchy in order to win an ultimately hollow victory.

I appreciate the response HS. That being said, I think this part might be the worst take out of everything you wrote, including the bad math that Souls already pointed out. To insinuate that you need to be WA mobile in order to not waste time seems a bit disingenuous. A multitude of people have been influential, powerful, and capable sitting from a WA locked position. Start by looking at any GCR delegate, they're WA locked but still incredibly influential. The thing that immediately came to my mind reading that and made me write this post was Vara helping organize the Warzone Asia raid despite being a WA locked TWP guardian.

If you want to say that those aren't low value targets or what be it and thus they don’t count, fine. I'll give you that. It doesn't change the fact that you still don't need a WA nation in order to motivate troops or even lead them in the form of triggering or organizing raids. Besides the fact that being WA locked in order to start operations is an absolute hallmark of raiding and I appreciate Mira for actually being on the field and getting his hands dirty. I've been on plenty of tag runs where my commanding officer was locked in an operation or has a WA up on a sleeper so maybe I've just gotten numb to them wasting their capability, but tag raids and treaties and what not still happened during those times. So to say that Mira wasted the entirety of 3 weeks in order to start an operation that ended in an "ultimately hollow victory" feels so dismissive of the work that's put into sleeper operations and even more dismissive of anyone who is WA locked.

[The Perfection Isles]

The moon is down (sorry I couldn't help myself)

[This Hammer Bans Natives]

Ultimately, as much as raiders wish to spin the decision not to contest this operation as a sign of defending's weakness, in actuality it is a sign of raiding's desire to continually prop itself up with propaganda and self-congratulatory low-value victories to keep its hype train going and ensure the small circle of players who have controlled its levers of power for years remain on top.

It's a sign that we're going to ban every native and refound the region

[The Hurricane]

I can't wait to ban all of the natives and refound the region

This is the best post i've ever seen.

[Juansonia]

The moon is down (sorry I couldn't help myself)

OOC: You could have called this Moonfall, or even Hermitcraft Season Eight, and it would have been a better pun.

[URA World Assembly Affairs]

The United Regions Alliance recommends a vote AGAINST "Liberate Moon" by a vote of 53.2% AGAINST, 9.8% ABSTAIN. 14 of 24 regions voting.

https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1795998