NS Cliches II: Re-Rebooted

[Elvectica]

Cliche: all-tech thread epic top 5 summie momentos

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

[-Astoria-]

Cliche: all-tech thread epic top 5 summie momentos

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

Likewise: last I remember, it went more or less well.

[The Merry-Men]

cliche: wannabe evil nations using red/black on their flags

add purple on this list and I am very guilty of this

infact, new cliche: me. This nation has more edge than a myriagon (a shape that has 1000 edges), and I'm fully willing to admit it. That being said, I'm doing my best to work on it... maybe compensate with some dark humor, but quite frankly there's a lot of details that need to be fleshed out.

And another more serious cliche: People who are too busy ramping up their military factbooks so much that they forget that their nation is supposed to have a regular culture outside the barracks, so they compensate by either making it a dictatorship, a warrior society or just leaving it to RPs to make it up as they go along. Like, what does Darth Vader eat for breakfast? Those are the real questions.

[Urmanian]

Cliche: all-tech thread epic top 5 summie momentos

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

You can have great all-tech RPs even if those words have been in fact uttered. NS was way more fun years ago when cross-tech RPs were more commonplace, and obsession with simulationism was less so.

Though I believe the other poster is referring specifically to random one-liner war threads where "all-tech" is just an excuse to wank and spam jpegs of cool spaceships you found on the internet.

[The Rio Grande River Basin]

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

You can have great all-tech RPs even if those words have been in fact uttered. NS was way more fun years ago when cross-tech RPs were more commonplace, and obsession with simulationism was less so.

Though I believe the other poster is referring specifically to random one-liner war threads where "all-tech" is just an excuse to wank and spam jpegs of cool spaceships you found on the internet.

I mainly join the occasional one to troll the summer posters with the fact that I had OPAF FT shit way before them.

[The Merry-Men]

You can have great all-tech RPs even if those words have been in fact uttered. NS was way more fun years ago when cross-tech RPs were more commonplace, and obsession with simulationism was less so.

Though I believe the other poster is referring specifically to random one-liner war threads where "all-tech" is just an excuse to wank and spam jpegs of cool spaceships you found on the internet.

I mainly join the occasional one to troll the summer posters with the fact that I had OPAF FT shit way before them.

I myself am really, really tempted to just make a puppet account of spacefaring Supermen (think Viltrumites) and show these strapping young lads what powerwanking really is. The only issue with that is I can't really think of any original ideas for a culture or lore for these guys without having to hark back to Invincible or Dragon Ball, and plus, it's more fun letting them have a fair chance.

And speaking of that, you have to also appreciate just how much it spirals out of hand. Like, the "(ALL-TECH) Civil Unrest in Whateveristan" that is literally just protestors and riot police having a scrap over a somewhat menial social issue turns into a massive intergalactic total war complete with planet-busting black hole bombs, every single alien empire in the vicinity and their dog, indoctrinated war crimes and omnicide, and motherships the size of yo mama by page 4.

[Elvectica]

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

You can have great all-tech RPs even if those words have been in fact uttered. NS was way more fun years ago when cross-tech RPs were more commonplace, and obsession with simulationism was less so.

Though I believe the other poster is referring specifically to random one-liner war threads where "all-tech" is just an excuse to wank and spam jpegs of cool spaceships you found on the internet.

Huh, good point. So it isn't just me or nostalgia that felt that NS and International Incidents was a lot more fun when I joined? I remember being a lil' goofball in the all-tech ones and it was fine because everyone else was

snip

Actually, on the topic of edgy nations, the first nation that you remind me of was Surrealist Patagonia. I will forever remember nations like yours, they're just different in a special way!

[The Rio Grande River Basin]

I mainly join the occasional one to troll the summer posters with the fact that I had OPAF FT shit way before them.

I myself am really, really tempted to just make a puppet account of spacefaring Supermen (think Viltrumites) and show these strapping young lads what powerwanking really is. The only issue with that is I can't really think of any original ideas for a culture or lore for these guys without having to hark back to Invincible or Dragon Ball, and plus, it's more fun letting them have a fair chance.

And speaking of that, you have to also appreciate just how much it spirals out of hand. Like, the "(ALL-TECH) Civil Unrest in Whateveristan" that is literally just protestors and riot police having a scrap over a somewhat menial social issue turns into a massive intergalactic total war complete with planet-busting black hole bombs, indoctrinated omnicide and motherships the size of yo mama by page 4.

You defeated my stomach with that one.

This is like that one time where “New Planet discovered” ended up with half the solar system exploding, an intergalactic war, a multiversal war, and literal almost gods fighting my ultimate powerwanking, and a few summies meta gaming.

[Gralov]

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

You can have great all-tech RPs even if those words have been in fact uttered. NS was way more fun years ago when cross-tech RPs were more commonplace, and obsession with simulationism was less so.

Though I believe the other poster is referring specifically to random one-liner war threads where "all-tech" is just an excuse to wank and spam jpegs of cool spaceships you found on the internet.

I feel guilty of seeing random cool PNGs I found on the Internet too and trying to use it in NS, except it wasn't for godmodding, mainly just to use it for factbooks (which I barely finish)

[Urmanian]

Huh, good point. So it isn't just me or nostalgia that felt that NS and International Incidents was a lot more fun when I joined?

It's not just you. As far as I'm concerned, NS was more fun when everyone used NS stats, had kilometer-long railgun battleships, cross-tech RPs were commonplace on all levels of writing ability and you could have Peter the Great-era Russians fight Transformers in space over a genocide of furries. I can bring up fewer and fewer entertaining threads, narratives and characters off of the top of my head the more we stray from that era.

The real and biggest cliché: thinking that realism, strict tech levels, miltech rivet-counting and so on are more important than just plain fun and good narratives, or are required for those. Now, all those things are perfectly fine - I like reading about miltech, I've done hard simulationist MT before, and I can see the appeal of having some rules and consistency to your imaginary world. But people are getting WAY too caught up on it nowadays. There's too much insularity, and too much focus on simulationist minutiae that it often feels "sweaty" for the lack of a better term.

Loosen up a bit. Go have a first contact RP with a FFT powerwank nation. Give a "summie" the time of the day (maybe not the one-liner guys though). Have a good ol' elf/furry/pony/anime girl genocide or war against Lord Bloodkill the Nazi Cannibal Slaver. Badwrongfun can still be fun. Or don't, I'm not your dad.

/boomerrant

[Lollipop Torture Force]

Huh, good point. So it isn't just me or nostalgia that felt that NS and International Incidents was a lot more fun when I joined?

It's not just you. As far as I'm concerned, NS was more fun when everyone used NS stats, had kilometer-long railgun battleships, cross-tech RPs were commonplace on all levels of writing ability and you could have Peter the Great-era Russians fight Transformers in space over a genocide of furries. I can bring up fewer and fewer entertaining threads, narratives and characters off of the top of my head the more we stray from that era.

The real and biggest cliché: thinking that realism, strict tech levels, miltech rivet-counting and so on are more important than just plain fun and good narratives, or are required for those. Now, all those things are perfectly fine - I like reading about miltech, I've done hard simulationist MT before, and I can see the appeal of having some rules and consistency to your imaginary world. But people are getting WAY too caught up on it nowadays. There's too much insularity, and too much focus on simulationist minutiae that it often feels "sweaty" for the lack of a better term.

Loosen up a bit. Go have a first contact RP with a FFT powerwank nation. Give a "summie" the time of the day (maybe not the one-liner guys though). Have a good ol' elf/furry/pony/anime girl genocide or war against Lord Bloodkill the Nazi Cannibal Slaver. Badwrongfun can still be fun. Or don't, I'm not your dad.

/boomerrant

Can still exist. One of the funnest rps ive been in ever was gas stations wars from a couple months ago. Was open to anything.

That being said sometimes you want that serious story to craft and improve your writing. Its like watching an improv group or going to the theature. Different methods and experiences but both can be fun

[The Rio Grande River Basin]

Huh, good point. So it isn't just me or nostalgia that felt that NS and International Incidents was a lot more fun when I joined?

It's not just you. As far as I'm concerned, NS was more fun when everyone used NS stats, had kilometer-long railgun battleships, cross-tech RPs were commonplace on all levels of writing ability and you could have Peter the Great-era Russians fight Transformers in space over a genocide of furries. I can bring up fewer and fewer entertaining threads, narratives and characters off of the top of my head the more we stray from that era.

The real and biggest cliché: thinking that realism, strict tech levels, miltech rivet-counting and so on are more important than just plain fun and good narratives, or are required for those. Now, all those things are perfectly fine - I like reading about miltech, I've done hard simulationist MT before, and I can see the appeal of having some rules and consistency to your imaginary world. But people are getting WAY too caught up on it nowadays. There's too much insularity, and too much focus on simulationist minutiae that it often feels "sweaty" for the lack of a better term.

Loosen up a bit. Go have a first contact RP with a FFT powerwank nation. Give a "summie" the time of the day (maybe not the one-liner guys though). Have a good ol' elf/furry/pony/anime girl genocide or war against Lord Bloodkill the Nazi Cannibal Slaver. Badwrongfun can still be fun. Or don't, I'm not your dad.

/boomerrant

The thing is, ridiculous RPs are fine. The issue is all summies are those one-liner guys. This is why I dipped from II, and now do P2TM RP, because of the marked quality increase. The worst RPs in P2TM are probably close to the top 20/10% of II RPs.

[The Merry-Men]

You can have great all-tech RPs even if those words have been in fact uttered. NS was way more fun years ago when cross-tech RPs were more commonplace, and obsession with simulationism was less so.

Though I believe the other poster is referring specifically to random one-liner war threads where "all-tech" is just an excuse to wank and spam jpegs of cool spaceships you found on the internet.

Huh, good point. So it isn't just me or nostalgia that felt that NS and International Incidents was a lot more fun when I joined? I remember being a lil' goofball in the all-tech ones and it was fine because everyone else was

snip

Actually, on the topic of edgy nations, the first nation that you remind me of was Surrealist Patagonia. I will forever remember nations like yours, they're just different in a special way!

Yeah, looking back into the factbooks, we really are quite similar. Both of our leaders are semi-artsy psychopaths of strange mindsets who perpetuate the downfall of society in order to embrace what's depraved... honestly, I could take a few points. Shame Patagonia presumably is not around anymore; there would have been some interesting IC interactions.

You defeated my stomach with that one.

This is like that one time where “New Planet discovered” ended up with half the solar system exploding, an intergalactic war, a multiversal war, and literal almost gods fighting my ultimate powerwanking, and a few summies meta gaming.

At this point, I could set up an all-tech RP named 'Bar Fight on Sixth Street', about two drunks getting into a fistfight after one makes a comment about the other's girlfriend. Watch as the entire multiverse is shaken to its' core by the massive rips in the space-time continuum made by the Elder Gods with the help of several Solar System Busters, the Avengers and Justice League combined, a fleet of ships that can mobilise instantly at 69 sextillion times the speed of light, and God's older brother Craig by the next two weeks.

It gets to a point where if RPs go public and not enclosed within a group or between 3 or less people, there's probably either a strict set of guidelines or basically locked at PT or MT to make sure nobody causes global annihilation.

[The Rio Grande River Basin]

Huh, good point. So it isn't just me or nostalgia that felt that NS and International Incidents was a lot more fun when I joined? I remember being a lil' goofball in the all-tech ones and it was fine because everyone else was


Actually, on the topic of edgy nations, the first nation that you remind me of was Surrealist Patagonia. I will forever remember nations like yours, they're just different in a special way!

Yeah, looking back into the factbooks, we really are quite similar. Both of our leaders are semi-artsy psychopaths of strange mindsets who perpetuate the downfall of society in order to embrace what's depraved... honestly, I could take a few points. Shame Patagonia presumably is not around anymore; there would have been some interesting IC interactions.

You defeated my stomach with that one.

This is like that one time where “New Planet discovered” ended up with half the solar system exploding, an intergalactic war, a multiversal war, and literal almost gods fighting my ultimate powerwanking, and a few summies meta gaming.

At this point, I could set up an all-tech RP named 'Bar Fight on Sixth Street', about two drunks getting into a fistfight after one makes a comment about the other's girlfriend. Watch as the entire multiverse is shaken to its' core by the massive rips in the space-time continuum made by the Elder Gods with the help of several Solar System Busters, the Avengers and Justice League combined, a fleet of ships that can mobilise instantly at 69 sextillion times the speed of light, and God's older brother Craig by the next two weeks.

It gets to a point where if RPs go public and not enclosed within a group or between 3 or less people, there's probably either a strict set of guidelines or basically locked at PT or MT to make sure nobody causes global annihilation.

*laughs my ass off in the background.

But yeah. I mean, I tried my hand at hosting a decent quality FT RP, and it barely kicked off before dying. That’s the thing, unless you already have “the group”, no-one joins anything not-open/summie, as almost everyone in II is a summie.

That’s why the better RPers went to NS and P2TM, and most people who recently left the summie phase (ie. Me, and a few P2TMers.) followed suite.

This is a good NS RP: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=526963&hilit=Wenchuanese

Not to say there aren’t good II RPs, this for example.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=531519

[Urmanian]

Not to say there aren’t good II RPs, this for example.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=531519

Yeh, Gholgoth is one of the surviving vestiges of boomer!NS and proof that you can have fairly unrealistic 40 billion nations and still have high-quality RP.

[The Second Order of Life]

Cliche: all-tech thread epic top 5 summie momentos

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

Hey, you only have to ditch realism! There can still be internal logic and consistent canon in a fictitious world. Often, FFT is just FanT but explained away with metallic alloys, plasma, and subspace/space distortion, unless you're seriously willing to engage in hard sci-fi technobabble, and that's okay.

[The Rio Grande River Basin]

Not to say there aren’t good II RPs, this for example.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=531519

Yeh, Gholgoth is one of the surviving vestiges of boomer!NS and proof that you can have fairly unrealistic 40 billion nations and still have high-quality RP.

Esvanovia?

Newer region, but plenty of old RPers. Azura, etc.

I know that some Gholgoth members lurk around there. It’s a who’s who of RPers.

[Valentine Z]

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

Likewise: last I remember, it went more or less well.

I'm happy that you guys remembered it fondly. Though I feel bad that you all had to deal with my crazy bitching ass in those years, occasionally. ^^;

And I didn't mean that sarcastically, sometimes I look back and go "Damn, dude."

[The Second Order of Life]

...sometimes I look back and go "Damn, dude."

Cliche: regretting your past self's actions with modern hindsight.

Less of an NS Cliche and more of a life one, really!

[The Merry-Men]

Yeah, looking back into the factbooks, we really are quite similar. Both of our leaders are semi-artsy psychopaths of strange mindsets who perpetuate the downfall of society in order to embrace what's depraved... honestly, I could take a few points. Shame Patagonia presumably is not around anymore; there would have been some interesting IC interactions.




At this point, I could set up an all-tech RP named 'Bar Fight on Sixth Street', about two drunks getting into a fistfight after one makes a comment about the other's girlfriend. Watch as the entire multiverse is shaken to its' core by the massive rips in the space-time continuum made by the Elder Gods with the help of several Solar System Busters, the Avengers and Justice League combined, a fleet of ships that can mobilise instantly at 69 sextillion times the speed of light, and God's older brother Craig by the next two weeks.

It gets to a point where if RPs go public and not enclosed within a group or between 3 or less people, there's probably either a strict set of guidelines or basically locked at PT or MT to make sure nobody causes global annihilation.

*laughs my ass off in the background.

But yeah. I mean, I tried my hand at hosting a decent quality FT RP, and it barely kicked off before dying. That’s the thing, unless you already have “the group”, no-one joins anything not-open/summie, as almost everyone in II is a summie.

That’s why the better RPers went to NS and P2TM, and most people who recently left the summie phase (ie. Me, and a few P2TMers.) followed suite.

This is a good NS RP: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=526963&hilit=Wenchuanese

Not to say there aren’t good II RPs, this for example.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=531519

See, the thing with FT nations is that usually among them, especially the summies, there is a meta. A meta of who can have the biggest, most potent and hottest laser they can think up of. If someone has a shinier, bigger laser? They'll adapt, and start writing in their factbooks and RPs about they have an even shinier, bigger laser. It results in an arms race that generally overtakes every other active aspect of the nation, like culture, politics, economics and society, and results in everything feeling like a dry and desperate slug to the death; a genuine contest that people expect to win rather than simply exercise their literary skills and (more importantly of all) have a bit of fun.

Most who are guilty for godmodding and wanking like that are usually the same types who probably didn't bother with things like Star Trek because they found it 'too boring' compared to more actiony and lasery things like Dune or Warhammer 40k, which by the way; 40k is especially guilty for FFT nations wanking themselves and wholeheartedly chanting "PURGE THE XENOS" like somewhere between 1930s Germany and Vinesauce Joel's phobia of aliens.

I predict, personally, in the future we'll move from "Ubernukes and a quadrillion space marines" meta to the "Ultrawank Superheroes" meta; all the FT/PMT/possibly FanT summies' leaders are going to end up jacked to the point they can punch out entire planets with their fists, and armies as a whole are just going to be left in the dust; because what's your ninja special forces and fleet of gigantic Death Stars going to do against, I don't know, this happening because one nation just decided to have their leader be that powerful in compensation for shitty logistics, tactics, an underwhelming military force, a lack of motivation or interest in ordinary WMDs, or just for the ease of only having to deal with one character in focus, deciding instead to have 'protectors of the globe' marauding by themselves through the multiverse and making 'Goku vs Superman' the new 'Democrat vs Republican'. Hell, I've seen a few of those kind of RPs go in that direction already, but that's just me and my nutty ramblings.

[Valentine Z]

...sometimes I look back and go "Damn, dude."

Cliche: regretting your past self's actions with modern hindsight.

Less of an NS Cliche and more of a life one, really!

I don't deny that it's for everyone, haha! Buuuut ahh well, I guess that's a living, right? Have some regrets here and there, you try to grow a little as a person. ♥

Hindsight is not just 20/20; it's some sub-atomic laser precision stuff.

[Lollipop Torture Force]

Todays cliche: new posters asking everyone what they think of their nation instead of using the group threads for it.

[Elvectica]

All-tech threads are fun if you are willing to believe that realism, sense, and canon are words that have never been uttered before. It's great!

Although maybe my opinion is biased/outdated, the last time I did one was that All-Tech All-Settings ball that Valentine Z hosted a few years ago.

Hey, you only have to ditch realism! There can still be internal logic and consistent canon in a fictitious world. Often, FFT is just FanT but explained away with metallic alloys, plasma, and subspace/space distortion, unless you're seriously willing to engage in hard sci-fi technobabble, and that's okay.

Hah, true that actually! I didn't mean to offend it was just thinly veiled sarcasm amid my brain being scrambled during finals season.

FFT rocks, I've had BNL Corporation be my ultra mega multiversal power fantasy nation, and I have fond memories just dreaming up all the stuff I wanted. I deleted most of that stuff because of embarrassment but my forum posts are all laid bare to embarrass me for years to come.

Likewise: last I remember, it went more or less well.

I'm happy that you guys remembered it fondly. Though I feel bad that you all had to deal with my crazy bitching ass in those years, occasionally. ^^;

And I didn't mean that sarcastically, sometimes I look back and go "Damn, dude."

Speaking of having old forum posts laid bare, I feel ya. I can't find the exact quote but someone once said I was dangling the line between NSFW because og Elvectica was... em different to say the least - furries and all!

[Urmanian]

snip

Ngl, a not!Saiyan/Viltrumite/Kryptonian nation would be quite interesting if written and worldbuilt well. It's not really a concept I've seen on NS before. I've made a Saiyan nation in the past where I wanted to try to apply some actual worldbuilding to them, but didn't find much interest in my RP circle unfortunately

[The Second Order of Life]

-snip-

I think a good way to avoid that is just refusing FT participants who don't have a fully fleshed-out military factbook yet in RPs that could lead to war. After trying out my hand in military RP with a barebones military canon a long while ago, I learnt very quickly that it's especially important for FT/FFT nations to be very explicit about what they have, where it is, and how they use it. I mean, it's important for everyone, but there's only so much you can exploit with that as an MT or PT nation; the further into the future you are, the bigger you can pretend the thirty-kilometre-long railgun you always had is.

That being said, I feel like there needs to be some form intervention in those types of threads that derail with escalating FT powerwanking. There's always (read: sometimes) a good idea behind it - a buddying literary conscience and writing ability. But organising a litigious RP between FT participants is seriously difficult - everyone needs to be on the same page in relation to technology and limitations. It's an ordeal that can easily take days of discussion in a Discord server, as well as unifying disparate canons of how things even work in a physics sense, as reality is what we make of it most of the time. Since, at some point, you just have no frame of reference of how things should be, you need to create one and have the participants agree to it. The only instance where that can be avoided is if you actively steal your canon from pre-existing fictional universes like Star Trek/Wars, Halo or (God save us) Warhammer.

I try not to judge meh-ish RPs too hard (I myself doubt my skills to write in higher-end RPs, something I've never really dabbled with in these forums specifically), and try my best to make them work to the best of my abilities, because this experience is useful for anyone participating, and can generate people who are able to avoid the age-old pitfalls of, say, invoking a space fleet with the power of plot armour, or producing a death star in a couple o' minutes. When a bunch of one-lines gather 'round to explore a new planet, they blow it and the surrounding solar system up, all they need is someone who can tell them not to and politely put their toys down.