Proposal: Mid-Season Card Inscription Option In Nationstates

[Farrakhan]

I appreciate those who made it possible for Season 3 to launch. I have played the Trading Card mini-game since Season 1; over the years, it has served as a fun addition to NationStates. But, lamentably, not everyone has been as fortunate as I have been.

Since 2019, the Trading Card forum has been filled with threads and posts made by players during Season 2 who had missed out on having a playing card manufactured into the marketplace, looking for answers as to if/when they would be able to engage. Among this group were site contributors, young and old, who missed a random cutoff date for inscription. Unfortunately, the result for nearly three years was an inability of others in the community to offer concrete solutions or a time frame for inclusion. Example below:

Season 3?

Instead of repeating this situation in the future, I suggest giving players the option to purchase Mid-Season Card Inscription through the NationStates store. Presently, Trading Cards are manufactured at particular points in time and only for nations that existed at that moment. This leaves out long-time players whose nations may have temporarily expired and newcomers who came too late. Right now, the Store benefits those who purchase the Supporter trophy with Trading Cards deck capacity doubled. In addition, a separate premium product tier could be created for mid-season Card inscription for those who missed the original point of manufacture.

A mid-season pay-to-manufacture model would limit demand abuse while providing financial support to the website, similar to how players can purchase Telegrams for gameplay purposes. Other benefits include:

*The model would allow all new players an option to pay to have their very own trading card by purchasing an inscription, eliminating the current barrier to entry

*The model would give all established players who, through inactivity, may have missed the initial inscription period the opportunity to pay to inscribe

*The model would allow inscribed players who use multiple nations an opportunity to inscribe additional nation cards that may either have expired or may not have existed during the inscription period

*The model would create a wildcard option for collectors to seek out additional in-season Nation artwork that would not otherwise have existed under the current system.

Most importantly, this could foster a more inclusive environment for all players who enjoy this mini-game. It's a shame seeing so many threads and posts by players who don't have their own cards and are left without a precise time frame for when they could get one. If this idea is possible from a technical standpoint, it can give players a chance to contribute both to the website and the mini-game.

[Western Lovia Sun]

I'm not sure if the trading card date was something that was advertised; if it was, perhaps that is something that can be advertised more loudly in the future? If I'm being candid, I am beyond bummed that I don't have a season 3 card, having been a long-time player, as you mentioned, whose nation temporarily expired. Additionally, my season 2 card bears the default flag, much to my chagrin, as I had not uploaded, reuploaded, my flag in time.

An option to pay, as a means to help support NS, is an idea. Although, I admit, it's not an idea that I would be able to afford. I did make the site supporter purchase for sans-ads, but I would not have the means to make a new purchase. I renewed my nation only recently, but not by November 12th. So, again, missed the date and this is my third season.

I'm my mind, this creates a few ideas/options:
1) Not force the trading cards to be available at a cost. Instead, market the impending deadline more obviously.
2) Do make trading cards available at cost.
3) Do make trading cards available at cost. However, as an add-on to one of the already existing purchase options.

I do have a question for you. Do you mean to have a nation's personal trading card exist as something that would be purchased? Or complete access to the trading card game?

So far, Western Lovia Sun votes for Option 1.

[Western Lovia Sun]

Also, thank you for your post! This was certainly on my mind.

[Haruhi Japan]

I believe this would be an interesting alternative to generating cards. The question is how long would this be available to players to buy? Also wouldn't this give these players an advantage because they can grind for stats before they generate their card so their rarity increases?

[Riemstagrad]

The one problem that concerns me at first sight: All those broken collections...
Imagine the player who returns is from the region Forest and qualifies for epic rarity. If that happens late on the season that will break a lot of complete collections.

[Farrakhan]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts Western Lovia Sun

I'm not sure if the trading card date was something that was advertised; if it was, perhaps that is something that can be advertised more loudly in the future? If I'm being candid, I am beyond bummed that I don't have a season 3 card, having been a long-time player, as you mentioned, whose nation temporarily expired. Additionally, my season 2 card bears the default flag, much to my chagrin, as I had not uploaded, reuploaded, my flag in time.

An option to pay, as a means to help support NS, is an idea. Although, I admit, it's not an idea that I would be able to afford. I did make the site supporter purchase for sans-ads, but I would not have the means to make a new purchase. I renewed my nation only recently, but not by November 12th. So, again, missed the date and this is my third season. .

Sadly, you are not alone. This proposal is designed to give you the option to inscribe mid-season. If the NationStates Store chose a price point identical to purchasing Telegram Stamps ($1), that wouldn't be a barrier too high for most players while at least creating an option. Currently, there is no recourse.

I'm my mind, this creates a few ideas/options:
1) Not force the trading cards to be available at a cost. Instead, market the impending deadline more obviously.
2) Do make trading cards available at cost.
3) Do make trading cards available at cost. However, as an add-on to one of the already existing purchase options.

While I encourage as much advance notice of the next season's inscription period as possible, the issue of established players missing the deadline and newcomers not having nations that existed during the deadline will remain. This proposal attempts to accommodate those players with an option to inscribe mid-season.

I do have a question for you. Do you mean to have a nation's personal trading card exist as something that would be purchased? Or complete access to the trading card game?

So far, Western Lovia Sun votes for Option 1.

To clarify the proposal's intent, card manufacturing for players active during the inscription period would remain free. In addition, an option to purchase mid-season inscriptions would be created in the Store. This would apply to established players with Nations that were inactive during that period (like yourself) or those who did not have a nation that existed before the deadline (newcomers).

Also, thank you for your post! This was certainly on my mind.

You are very welcome. Hopefully you will have an option to inscribe at some point for Season 3 in the future.

[Farrakhan]

I believe this would be an interesting alternative to generating cards. The question is how long would this be available to players to buy? Also wouldn't this give these players an advantage because they can grind for stats before they generate their card so their rarity increases?

Thank you for sharing your thoughts Haruhi Japan.

In theory, I recommend mid-season card inscription until the next season's manufacturing date for inscription has been announced.

You make a valid point about stat effects being different for a mid-season card vs. an initially inscribed card for that season. However, that is a tradeoff for providing the community with more inclusion. Therefore, I would suggest marking the card as Mid-Season to differentiate it (i.e., Nation Mid-Season 3 Ultra-Rare).

[Farrakhan]

The one problem that concerns me at first sight: All those broken collections...
Imagine the player who returns is from the region Forest and qualifies for epic rarity. If that happens late on the season that will break a lot of complete collections.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts Riemstagrad

You make a valid point concerning how collectors may be affected by the wild card element of mid-season inscription. I would err on favoring creating a more inclusive environment for currently excluded players. Still, there would undoubtedly be a change in gameplay strategy and context affecting those who are used to the current system.

[Doge Tax Collector]

I'm not exactly sure how to feel about this, sure we're probably never gonna see a season 4 ever happen, but collections would of course, as stated from Riemstagrad, would be kind of feel janky, and would be left to uncertainty if there were suddenly a new batch of cards with flags/region to be filled into the collection, it would basically be a completionists nightmare to try and get done and stay done.

The idea to me is quite unique though. And of course would maybe bring a bit more money into the site's wallet.

Am I personally against this? Ehh..not really, but I'm on the fence if this could actually work out.

But who knows, I'm just some crazed doge man for cards.

[Tinhampton]

I have some questions about how mid-season inscription (MSI) will work.

• MSI is not actually an inscription process. Inscription does not create a card of your nation: it already existed on the day those cards were generated. It merely allows you to change custom fields and badges, such as your flag. Will MSI be available for all nations, or only those without cards on inscription day? And can you purchase and use MSI for a single nation as often as you want?
  
  
• Can S1 and S2 cards be created through MSI, or will MSI only offer inscription for the current season of cards (as of time of purchase)?
  
  
• Various puppet nations that were caught in S3's puppet filter were told they could not have cards of their nations generated. Will MSI allow those puppets to generate cards?
  
  
• Since MSI "would create a wildcard option for collectors to seek out additional in-season Nation artwork:" do you propose any visual distinctions between a card inscribed on November 12th 2022 and a card inscribed mid-season? There is a difference between a card such as Minalarr (which actually had 5m population on inscription day) and my throwaway puppet (which I created ten months after S3 went live and literally just spent 87p on inscribing a few minutes ago).
  
  
• How will rarities be generated, or do you - for example - just propose a special "Mid-Season" rarity? When cards returned in December 2018, all national badges were updated to what they were as of December 2018, but the rarities of the cards did not change (Sacara and The Wallenburgian World Assembly Offices are my favourite examples of this), and no new cards were created for nations that existed in December 2018 but not for the April Fool's minigame.

Also: Suppose that Season 4 cards are inscribed on March 6th 2024. In the news post announcing S4, Max announces that the S5 inscription period will begin on April 22nd 2025. (This is arguably the maximal notice possible for S5.) Why is this less fair to new and returning players then allowing them to just spend money to create a new Season 4 card, other than because they could miss the S5 deadline? You admit in the OP that MSI is designed to relieve "players who don't have their own cards and are left without a precise time frame for when they could get one."

[Yukimura]

In a traditional trading card game, such as pokemon which I'm most familiar with, the creators will release 3-4 sets a year, to keep the cards fresh and keep people spending money to try to collect all of them, or to collect the rarest ones, or to collect the ones that are best for battling.

However, those sets are each in their entirety much smaller than a single season of NS Cards. For example the upcoming Crown Zenith Pokemon expansion, which will be the first of four new sets to premier in 2023 will contain 160 new cards (plus an unknown number of secret rares), the largest of the new sets will have about 190 new cards (plus an unknown number of secret rares). Whereas a single season of NationStates cards contains thousands of cards. So there is not really a need to release new cards to keep things fresh. You could open ten packs of NationStates cards a day, every day of the year, and even if you saw no repeat cards you would still see only a fraction of the cards in a season.

Because of the impossibly large size of a NationStates season, there is no reason to generate new cards, or to allow new designs of existing cards to enter the market, midseason. In fact the pokemon TCG would need to put out ~1700 new sets a year to match the volume of NationStates cards that are generated in a single season. There is an argument that could be made for such abundance being a good thing, but in reality its something of a nightmare for collectors as burnout is a very real thing that many collectors experience. Plus with such a wide array of available cards, it can make the task of collecting even a small group of cards a daunting task, as there is no guarantee that you will ever pull a particular card, and if it's a particularly rare card there is no guarantee that you will ever be able to buy it.

While the protracted nature of s2 of cards was soul crushing, and I don't recommend that the same length of time be applied to the generation of future seasons of NS cards, even generating one season of cards a year makes collecting them nearly impossible unless you're someone who is willing to spend every moment of their time opening cards, because you'd need to open ~165 packs a day (with no repeat cards) to collect every NationStates card.

Edit: all of my math is based on a certain degree of guesswork, as I don't know exactly how many cards there are in each NationStates season.

[Farrakhan]

I'm not exactly sure how to feel about this, sure we're probably never gonna see a season 4 ever happen, but collections would of course, as stated from Riemstagrad, would be kind of feel janky, and would be left to uncertainty if there were suddenly a new batch of cards with flags/region to be filled into the collection, it would basically be a completionists nightmare to try and get done and stay done.

The idea to me is quite unique though. And of course would maybe bring a bit more money into the site's wallet.

Am I personally against this? Ehh..not really, but I'm on the fence if this could actually work out.

But who knows, I'm just some crazed doge man for cards.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts Doge Tax Collector. There is nothing wrong with expressing ambivalence regarding an abstraction.

[Farrakhan]

In a traditional trading card game, such as pokemon which I'm most familiar with, the creators will release 3-4 sets a year, to keep the cards fresh and keep people spending money to try to collect all of them, or to collect the rarest ones, or to collect the ones that are best for battling.

However, those sets are each in their entirety much smaller than a single season of NS Cards. For example the upcoming Crown Zenith Pokemon expansion, which will be the first of four new sets to premier in 2023 will contain 160 new cards (plus an unknown number of secret rares), the largest of the new sets will have about 190 new cards (plus an unknown number of secret rares). Whereas a single season of NationStates cards contains thousands of cards. So there is not really a need to release new cards to keep things fresh. You could open ten packs of NationStates cards a day, every day of the year, and even if you saw no repeat cards you would still see only a fraction of the cards in a season.

Because of the impossibly large size of a NationStates season, there is no reason to generate new cards, or to allow new designs of existing cards to enter the market, midseason. In fact the pokemon TCG would need to put out ~1700 new sets a year to match the volume of NationStates cards that are generated in a single season. There is an argument that could be made for such abundance being a good thing, but in reality its something of a nightmare for collectors as burnout is a very real thing that many collectors experience. Plus with such a wide array of available cards, it can make the task of collecting even a small group of cards a daunting task, as there is no guarantee that you will ever pull a particular card, and if it's a particularly rare card there is no guarantee that you will ever be able to buy it.

While the protracted nature of s2 of cards was soul crushing, and I don't recommend that the same length of time be applied to the generation of future seasons of NS cards, even generating one season of cards a year makes collecting them nearly impossible unless you're someone who is willing to spend every moment of their time opening cards, because you'd need to open ~165 packs a day (with no repeat cards) to collect every NationStates card.

Edit: all of my math is based on a certain degree of guesswork, as I don't know exactly how many cards there are in each NationStates season.

Thank you, Yukimura, for expressing your experiences as a collector. The proposal's focus is to help those players who, for various reasons, are left out of having their own trading card. I understand your perspective and respect it.

[Farrakhan]

Thank you, Tinhampton, for taking the time to ask such considered and intelligent questions.

I have some questions about how mid-season inscription (MSI) will work.

• MSI is not actually an inscription process. Inscription does not create a card of your nation: it already existed on the day those cards were generated. It merely allows you to change custom fields and badges, such as your flag. Will MSI be available for all nations, or only those without cards on inscription day? And can you purchase and use MSI for a single nation as often as you want?

Mid-Season Inscription would only be available to players with a Nation that did not have a card manufactured for the current season. This would include those Nations that may have expired and those Nations that did not exist on the date of manufacture. As with the current system, a card could only be inscribed once within a given season.

I

Can S1 and S2 cards be created through MSI, or will MSI only offer inscription for the current season of cards (as of time of purchase)?

The later.

I

Various puppet nations that were caught in S3's puppet filter were told they could not have cards of their nations generated. Will MSI allow those puppets to generate cards?

Players could inscribe multiple nations if they chose to pay for each one. I consider the value of secondary nations (puppets) to be subjective. For example, I use a secondary nation (a puppet) as a bank. Luckily, it was manufactured for Season 3. If it weren't, I would pay to do so.

Since MSI "would create a wildcard option for collectors to seek out additional in-season Nation artwork:" do you propose any visual distinctions between a card inscribed on November 12th 2022 and a card inscribed mid-season? There is a difference between a card such as Minalarr (which actually had 5m population on inscription day) and my throwaway puppet (which I created ten months after S3 went live and literally just spent 87p on inscribing a few minutes ago).

A visual distinction is an excellent idea. However, other than the statement of Mid-Season 3 (as opposed to just Season 3), I don't have any brilliant ideas to suggest.

How will rarities be generated, or do you - for example - just propose a special "Mid-Season" rarity? When cards returned in December 2018, all national badges were updated to what they were as of December 2018, but the rarities of the cards did not change (Sacara and The Wallenburgian World Assembly Offices are my favourite examples of this), and no new cards were created for nations that existed in December 2018 but not for the April Fool's minigame.

I'm open to either method of rarity being generated 'as the stats relate' at the time of inscription or a separate tier of Mid-Season (as you suggest). I don't have a hard opinion either way.

Also: Suppose that Season 4 cards are inscribed on March 6th 2024. In the news post announcing S4, Max announces that the S5 inscription period will begin on April 22nd 2025. (This is arguably the maximal notice possible for S5.) Why is this less fair to new and returning players then allowing them to just spend money to create a new Season 4 card, other than because they could miss the S5 deadline? You admit in the OP that MSI is designed to relieve "players who don't have their own cards and are left without a precise time frame for when they could get one."

An excellent thought experiment. Suppose I had read the News post several months before but suffered a horrific accident that placed me in a coma sometime before April 22nd, 2025. I couldn't log into Nationstates, I didn't use Vacation mode, and my nation expired before the deadline. Upon recovering from the coma, I logged into Nationstates, but the Season 5 card manufacturing date had passed, and there was no Farrakhan Season 5 card. I would have ample time to be prepared for the deadline. I was given a fair warning and was solely responsible for not having my own trading card within the game for Season 5. Yet that being said, I would be very appreciative if there was an option in the Store to pay a small fee and inscribe. That's the environment I would like to see offered to others—your mileage may vary.

[Coffin-Breathe]

If I came out of a deep coma recently, I would have a lot of other problems than to buy me a flag card for a new season of the NS card-game, I guess.
Besides, real money shouldn´t have any place within NS or the card game; this was/is the intention NS was founded by Max, as I see and understand it. Otherwise we would have to buy our accounts, expansions, card packs and other privileges, like in many other 'pay to play' games, and the mods/admins would be employed and paid for it.

[Farrakhan]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts Coffin-Breathe!

If I came out of a deep coma recently, I would have a lot of other problems than to buy me a flag card for a new season of the NS card-game, I guess.

Possibly, but it is normal for people to get back into established routines and resume their hobbies at some point after recovery. In my case, this would include something such as the Nationstates trading card mini-game.

Besides, real money shouldn´t have any place within NS or the card game; this was/is the intention NS was founded by Max, as I see and understand it.

I'm not sure when the Store was introduced into Nationstates, but the use of real money has been a part of Max's site for quite some time.

Otherwise we would have to buy our accounts, expansions, card packs and other privileges, like in many other 'pay to play' games, and the mods/admins would be employed and paid for it.

The Store offers multiple pay-to-play elements already. For example, purchasing Supporter ($2.99) provides the privileges of removing ads, permanently reserving a nation name, gaining the supporter Trophy, and doubling Trading Cards deck capacity.

Postmaster ($4.99) offers additional privileges: expanded folder telegram capacity, creating custom folders, and a deleted items folder.

Finally, Postmaster-General ($9.99) extends pay-to-play privileges with unlimited Telegrams and 500 Telegram stamps. There is also a recurring pay-to-play product in the form of Telegram Stamps (to send mass telegrams to mention nations at once at $1 per 1000).

Whether this was or wasn't Max's original intent, this has already been happening.

[Western Lovia Sun]

I fancy this. A lot. I think you've presented a concise outline, and that we've covered all of the, "what-ifs" that I'm able to fathom. A delightfully linear thought pattern this post is. That being said, where do we go from here to push this? I'm unfamiliar with NS's process. Is there somewhere we can make a submission, or do we bring an admin into the thread? How can we gain traction?

[Farrakhan]

I fancy this. A lot. I think you've presented a concise outline, and that we've covered all of the, "what-ifs" that I'm able to fathom. A delightfully linear thought pattern this post is. That being said, where do we go from here to push this? I'm unfamiliar with NS's process. Is there somewhere we can make a submission, or do we bring an admin into the thread? How can we gain traction?

Thank you for your kind words Western Lovia Sun. I have added a link to this thread in the appropriate section of the Technical forum.

[The Atlae Isles]

I imagine as it currently stands, it would be technically impossible because the trading card dumps are advertised as virtually unchanging. The ability to change cards mid season would render the giant XML file obsolete and render many collections in flux.

However, in general, I would be in favor of this change. Personally, I have a few nations whose cards I was unable to change before the inscription deadline, thus have the default flag. I think, if this feature is implemented, that the trading card dumps could be given daily just like the nation and region dumps, and those that make tools would have to retrieve the most current one.

[Tinhampton]

Besides, real money shouldn´t have any place within NS or the card game; this was/is the intention NS was founded by Max, as I see and understand it.

I'm not sure when the Store was introduced into Nationstates, but the use of real money has been a part of Max's site for quite some time.

Otherwise we would have to buy our accounts, expansions, card packs and other privileges, like in many other 'pay to play' games, and the mods/admins would be employed and paid for it.

The Store offers multiple pay-to-play elements already. For example, purchasing Supporter ($2.99) provides the privileges of removing ads, permanently reserving a nation name, gaining the supporter Trophy, and doubling Trading Cards deck capacity.

Postmaster ($4.99) offers additional privileges: expanded folder telegram capacity, creating custom folders, and a deleted items folder.

Finally, Postmaster-General ($9.99) extends pay-to-play privileges with unlimited Telegrams and 500 Telegram stamps. There is also a recurring pay-to-play product in the form of Telegram Stamps (to send mass telegrams to mention nations at once at $1 per 1000).

Whether this was or wasn't Max's original intent, this has already been happening.

The features and paid nature of Supporter (introduced 12/2012), Postmaster (02/2013) and Postmaster-General (02/2013) were very much intended by His Maxiness. But, as far as I know, he has never accepted the idea that store items offer "pay-to-play" features. In his news post announcing Supporter, he said he did not want the paid-only features to give payers an "unfair advantage" such as "better stats or gameplay bonuses." I still think that's the ethos today, judging from the fact that no new features other than a larger deck capacity have been offered to payers since 2013.

[One Small Island]

Isn't it logistically impossible to give a nation that wasn't around at the time of the snapshot a card?

Paid card generation features would require admin to constantly be snapshotting the site and crafting new cards, which I feel like would take an inordinate amount of work to scale the snapshot down and delete everything but the singular new card that would have to exist.

[LucaBrasi]

Isn't it logistically impossible to give a nation that wasn't around at the time of the snapshot a card?

The OP said mid-season. So at any point between when the season starts and before it ends, anyone left out of the season could take the current snapshot and buy a card into the marketplace at the store. I remember when all those players flooded in from Brazil. Some were into the card stuff, but none of them could get their own card, and no one could tell them if they would ever be able to get one. They were just SOL.

[The first Galactic Republic]

Support 100%. When S2 began eons ago I made my card farming puppet nations so that I'd want them when they became cards. Then I forgot and they CTE'd.

Now I'm back into it and have the same problem. I don't think mid season inscriptions with no other changes would be so unreasonable.

[Shogunate Tamriel]

I'm also for that. Many players forgot to set up their nations to the certain deadline date, or missed it like me with S1, just some months too late. It would give these card collectors more cards to collect and yes, the site woukd have a another payment idea.

I think, even a late S1 card for these founded in the between range from 1.04.2019 and December same year (I not really know anymore when exactly the Print of the first Season was) would be then possible. Since for me every census are readable on the timeline it wouldn't be hard to make that possible, since I have two cards and a assigned ID for these. I would pay even for a remade S1 card.

[The United Peoples of Centrism]

I imagine as it currently stands, it would be technically impossible because the trading card dumps are advertised as virtually unchanging. The ability to change cards mid season would render the giant XML file obsolete and render many collections in flux.

However, in general, I would be in favor of this change. Personally, I have a few nations whose cards I was unable to change before the inscription deadline, thus have the default flag. I think, if this feature is implemented, that the trading card dumps could be given daily just like the nation and region dumps, and those that make tools would have to retrieve the most current one.

That would place a very large burden on the people who maintain these tools, and as someone who tried my hand at this recently I am strongly opposed.

I understand that it is not fun to miss out on having a trading card, or to be stuck with a default flag for years if you happen to revive at the wrong time (as I did for Season 2...), but also, the burden for maintaining a nation on this site is extremely low. You have to open a webpage once every two months, and if you're nearing the danger zone the site even warns you via email. I do not think that it is at all fair to collectors and developers to constantly have to move the goalposts for our projects in order to accommodate for these edge cases. Although I can't do more than vaguely speculate on this, I imagine that this system would also require a significant amount of admin time and resources, both of which have been very limited for some time.

I think that the real issue here is the three year gap between Season 2 and Season 3, which saw many new and returning players wait actual years for their own card. Hopefully reducing the time between seasons will provide a happy compromise between "you're never getting a card, tough luck" and "you can get a card whenever you please, collectors be damned."