The OOC Ethics of Being an IC Superpower

[Allanea]

Okay, I’ll do it now.

So as people have said, one very common form of thread in International Incidents is where a nation announces a controversial event happening in their nation – often a genocide, slavery being made legal, or some kind of flagrant violations of human (other sapient) rights. Often you might feel the desire to intervene. The in-character grounds might differ – maybe your nation’s people and government feel moral outrage, maybe the leadership wants to exploit the outrage of the world community for a geopolitical advantage. (Oh look! They’re butchering the Bigtopians! Let’s invade and stop them – and maybe seize their oil while we are at it !)

There are some things you want to implement if you want to be successful in this endeavour. On the OOC level, you want to ensure you have the other player’s boundaries in mind. While in a totally perfect universe everyone would accept any IC consequence of their IC actions, in reality many players are just not fully comfortable with a range of things. (And really, all of us have some boundaries – some of us don’t want to read awful torture scenes, or roleplays that involve sexual assault, or having their favourite characters killed, or their nation destroyed. Some have weirder, more idiosyncratic boundaries).

On the IC level, you need to consider your nation’s priorities and limitations. A lot of people will tend to deploy vast, enormous armies to resolve a conflict in a remote country they’ve never heard of. I roleplay a huge nation (nearly 32 billion Allaneans!), but it has literally been six years RL time since I have participated in any MT conflict that seriously taxed my armed forces. I tend to deploy a few hundred ground troops to a military conflict. The largest conflict I am currently in has something like five thousand ground troops deployed. The question always should be – is a conflict in this country really something my nation would care about to be deployed at this scale?.

Another thing to make sure of is establishing the objectives and demands you want to make on the other nation. It’s usually true both in the real world and in Nationstates that people are likely to reject demands that entail a far-reaching change in their society, or a serious humiliation. A book to read about this is Richard Pape’s Bombing To Win, which discusses a lot of the aspects of using military forces – and particularly air forces – in trying to force nations to the negotiating table. One thing that is true that nations are likely to reject policies that are seen as threatening to totally reshape their society, or remove their ruling class (as opposed to a specific ruling party) from power, or to violate the commandments of their religions – they are likely to reject this even if threatened with obliterating force.

As such, after years of experience and study, I decided that Allanea’s typical approach when faced with genocide, slavery, or whatnot, is not to try and mold the other society to be a liberal democracy or whatnot, but to try and abolish the offending practice itself and itself only. This is both ICly very practical (as this does not require an elaborate post-war effort, most of the time, and is more likely to be accepted), and allows the other player some room for maneuver OOC.

The IC course of actions I try to follow, in the event of a stereotypical II Conflict is like this:

1. Attempt to carry out negotiations with other players who are involved in the RP, especially those whose nations are located near the ‘target nation’. If there is any doubt, telegram the ‘target nation’ OOC and ask them what their goals in the RP are. ICly see if I can find out more about the events, the nation in question, and get a cooperation going with neighboring nations.

2. Attempt to work out a plan of joint action with other nations, or other factions within the ‘target nation’. Contemplate here issues of logistics, the social and economic make-up of the ‘target nations’, and its military strengths and weaknesses. I try to roleplay that a lot of this negotiation is at least initially carried out by diplomats or officers in my nation, and not – as is NS tradition – national leaders themselves. Often the situation escalates and I have the King or Queen give a message.

I also have some stock characters in my nation that I use to respond to different situations. Peter Nizhinsky, for instance, is known for his colourful rudeness. He’s there to respond to nations that are seen as totally evil or foolish and are beyond regular responses.

3. Deploy a small force (Special Forces, et.). The purpose of this, IC, is to figure out what is going on and gather more information. OOCly it’s to see just how good/bad the RP is, and if there are problems at this stage I can easily bail out.

4. If the situation is not resolved, gradually escalate my involvement. If I’ve given a positive impression to the other players in the thread so far, people are not likely to OOC object to the growth in my forces in the way they would have objected had I rolled up with 3 CVBGs to start with.

One thing to avoid, in my experience, is any sort of RP where you occupy the other person’s nation long-term unless you gave a good rapport built up with the player and the nation is well worldbuilt. On an OOC level, people prefer to have control over their nation’s general makeup. Even people who do not get upset – which, to be fair, the more seasoned roleplayers typically don’t – often get bored with roleplaying a nation that is not sovereign.

[I have several times tried to start a genocide RP with one of my other nations, but people don’t seem to care. Sad! Low-energy!]

[The Macabees]

Great thoughts Monavia!

Just to clarify on:

At no time was I ever under the impression that our IC activities remain unconstrained by normative principles.

Value-free as in divorced from our OOC values. I mean it in the sense of giving characters/organizations preferences and taking them as given when determining their decisions, rather than making IC decisions based on your own preferences.

[The Macabees]

That's solid advice, Allanea. I completely agree.

[Shwe Tu Colony]

[I have several times tried to start a genocide RP with one of my other nations, but people don’t seem to care. Sad! Low-energy!][/align]

I'd say that I might might be interested in participating in that sort of roleplay, but
A. I'm a fantasy-tech nation
B. Parfuhmerie mostly keeps to itself
C. A genocide would have to clearly impact Parfuhmerie for them to consider joining (for example, that targeted group of people may have religious ties to Parfuhmerie or are otherwise important; economic ties will be the most motivating)
D. I don't have much motivation nor time to write posts, unfortunately

[Raven Corps]

Shwe Tu Colony your posts brings up something that I, and probably a few others too, have been thinking about and that is the role Tech levels play in these types of rp's and how many people try and use tech levels as a means of plot-armoring in lieu of strategic and technical prowess and it almost feels like a right of passage looking back on it all.

I general RP in the PMT range- but that has a very wide interpretation for a lot of people. So many new players sign up and read the guides and decide that they are all Super-powers because that's their nations canon (which 9/10 its barely even coherent) and if we don't accept that then we are either being oppressive or trying at the very least to strong arm other nation into nerfing their nation. I know I, much like Allenea could probably run circles around new players with technical warfare terms and actual troop maneuvers, but I oftentimes opt to play the bad guy and leave myself open for a counter-attack. I don't mind taking a hit for the story especially so if its helping teach the new players how to rp on a better level then before, because if I try and post at my full power it gets labeled as powerplaying. Hell, even a simple post depending on my (long known weapons systems) is considered by most as power players and OOC bickering begins- despite my telling them over and over the various weaknesses and plot opening I gave them in order to fight me.

I don't consider myself a Super-Power by any means, but sometimes if feels like your slamming your head against a brick wall hahaha.

[Axis Nova]

Good stuff.

The way Allanea does things is ideally how I'd like to hop into things, but I slowly became less interested in NS for a variety of reasons, so I havn't been involved with stuff ICly in a very long time.

I think any sufficiently large nation is likely to have so many irons in the fire that they're unlikely to be able to devote their full attention to any particular conflict unless it is a threat to a wellbeing of that entire nation (and really, for a really big nation, how many things even qualify as that?)

[Allanea]

Good stuff.

The way Allanea does things is ideally how I'd like to hop into things, but I slowly became less interested in NS for a variety of reasons, so I havn't been involved with stuff ICly in a very long time.

I think any sufficiently large nation is likely to have so many irons in the fire that they're unlikely to be able to devote their full attention to any particular conflict unless it is a threat to a wellbeing of that entire nation (and really, for a really big nation, how many things even qualify as that?)

It's worth saying that the United States has military involvement (ranging from 'several thousand men' to 'a dozen Special Forces operatives') in more than 80 countries. Most of these are so far from being on the radar, even senior US officials are sometimes unaware that they're going on. You may remember the incident a few months back when US soldiers were killed in fighting in Niger, and several US Senators were stunned to find out that, yes, the USA had troops in Niger.

[The Macabees]

Because it has been talked about elsewhere, I just wanted to clarify the context of being a "superpower." I'll use my example of UWO to elucidate:

[Snip.]

When it comes to UWO’s goal of striving for superpower status, one item that remains ambiguous is the exact meaning of what such status entails. I attempted to reduce this ambiguity to a more tolerable level using my past experience to come up with a working definition of an IC superpower as a NS nation that does at least one of five distinct IC things. I think that UWO is aiming to meet the second and fifth criteria I provided.

I don't think there's such thing as a superpower in the overall sense of II. I don't think it matters to be a superpower in that sense, or that it should even be a practical (or valued) goal.

UWO wants to be a superpower within the context of the community he's in: GD. It's an easier task relative to the whole of II. And in a game where communities are fractured, and even when they are open world (GD) the majority of interactions still take place within a community, then the bounds of that community will be what's relevant to the role of a superpower. In other words, a superpower in Pardes has little relevant to affairs in GD, but is still a superpower within the narrower context of Pardes -- which for most Pardes players is what matters, not the whole of II.

Edit: Totally agree that superpower status should not be everyone's goal. UWO got there through context, context that has been RPd, and it has mostly been "spontaneous" (i.e. building on hard work vs. something that was planned from the very beginning).

[Yohannes]

In my view (which I know people will disagree with), a superpower in the context of a closed world region is even more undemocratic (and unfair) than a theoretical NationStates superpower; because more often than not the only way to be a superpower in a closed world region is to be the usual IC largest this largest that around, e.g., largest population, 2nd largest economy, 5th largest army, the usual wiki article copy paste [xxx nation name] is the [xxx number] largest economy in [xxx closed world region], therefore it is [nice word for mighty and strong] and is [major power/great power]. More flexible regions like Greater Dienstad, where one can in theory become a superpower through storytelling (like United World Order or Ralkovia), regardless whether one has an economically flawed nation or not, are few and far between/rare. The majority of closed world regions I have seen require the largest boys and girls around (i.e. great powers) to also have the largest population, economy, industry, army, etc.

[ Edit: Though in saying that Greater Dienstad is an open world region and not a closed world region anyway haha... so I guess that was not a fair comparison ]

Following what I have said in another thread [ link ], whereas to be seen as an influential nation/player (e.g. great powers) in NationStates, we don't need to have the largest population, economy, industry, army, etc. around; in fact, having those things (large multi billion population, large army, etc.) would in fact set you back (because you will have to repeatedly explain your position to, and reassure others regarding your multi billion population, having people not wanting to RP with you because of your very large population or armed forces, etc.). The way to become a great power in NationStates in 2018 is by doing what players like Allanea, New Edom, Ghant, etc. and regions like The Western Isles are doing very well: by continuing to create or participate in RP threads all around the NationStates and International Incidents sub forums. With activity more people will come across your threads and see you as a player or as a region ("I see New Edom's posting all over NationStates and International Incidents sub forums; wow that player is very active!" or "wow The Western Isles' threads are all around the NationStates and International Incidents sub forums; and I enjoy reading them too!")

That is why when The State of Monavia brought up my name (with Lyras and Lamoni), I thought: did I deserve that mention? Because the last RP post I made was on the [ 26th of November 2017 ], whilst people like New Edom and players in regions like The Western Isles have churned out many RP threads and RP posts continuously since then.

[ Edit: Though I agree fully with what The State of Monavia said (the overall message of the post); and I would like thank him for mentioning me (though I feel I don't deserve it haha...) ]

There is the truth that players with big storefronts or those affiliated with OOC wise influential alliances (I don't know why New Aeyariss, Pharthan, and Common Territories have not been mentioned so far; the last two are the owners of the two most active large military storefronts atm whilst the first has done many IC things since 2015) are influential, but I just feel that we need to rethink the way we look at the concept of being an IC superpower and redefine it to be something more healthy for the community (e.g. writing good stories like New Edom and Ghant or participating in open II threads a lot like Allanea), which is why I love this guide posted by The Macabees, because from reading it I am getting the vibe that The Macabees also do believe (and others posting here so far) that we need to redefine the word 'superpower' with actually writing good stories and actual writing activities all around the NationStates and International Incidents sub forums

Um I am sorry if I can't write this in a more coherent manner, I will edit this post later to improve it (aha...)

[The Macabees]

Yohannes, totally agreed. Superpowers, and even just powers (I just used superpower because it's a more powerful word that brings attention) are people who actively RP.

And, yes, GD is very narrative/RP/story driven, so superpower status is much more flexible. And, if other regions aren't like that, it could be why they are dying or dead, as I've suggested before. GD also has an evangelist, me, who's very vocal and very active in providing direct, honest feedback to help give players direction (for example, the word is that western GD is where everything is happening, but I then I say, "If that's true, where are the RPs? Talking on a chat is not IC activity. It doesn't replace it").

With regards to the more narrow scope of this essay, I actually didn't seek to define what a superpower is. People gain influence in different ways. I wanted to focus more on that relationship between the influencer and the influenced, and bring attention to the fact that this relationship can produce a lot of good, but it can also be damaging, and that if you are an influencer there's a responsibility that comes with that role (or, at least, that we ought to see it that way).

Edit: I also think that if influencers adopt this framework, the communities they lead will approximate more the culture and environment that you are talking about.

[Yohannes]

The Macabees, I agree with you and love reading this thread. And yeah I did get the hint why you put the superpower word (and it has worked as we can see; people posting here heaps and the views count well quite good atm aha I see that marketing side of you ).

I am curious though, would it be okay if I ask for you to give a good example/scenario of an influencer/superpower that has abused their position (can be a fake example)

[The Macabees]

There is a real example that comes to mind, and this example is a good one because it speaks to both an influencer not using their position to educate and to the problems with seeking "superpower" status.

For what it's worth, this person has improved immensely and has proven me wrong in many ways, and both of those things I love and is exactly what I hope for when I challenge players by giving my (very) honest, straightforward, no holds barred feedback. There still work to be done, but perfection is not a state, it's a standard to aspire to.

And this isn't super egregious but shows where these issues come up in practicality.

There are two main players in this situation:

• The more experienced (in general) roleplayer
• A brand new roleplayer who is in obvious need of mentoring

The experienced player roleplays with the new player, which is mentoring, but manipulates the relationship to his advantage. He uses it to for imperialistic purposes and there's never any effort to explain to the player his freedom in accepting this, his freedom in controlling the direction of his own canon, and there's never any mentoring in roleplay quality. All the signs point to the only reason for the relationship is for imperialism, but to maintain the position the experienced player is manipulating the inexperienced player emotionally through what is tantamount to extortion: I occupy your nation, or others will attack you and will end your 'contentious political system.'

This is a very borderline situation because in the right context there's nothing wrong with IC extortion. It's a perfectly plausible political scenario. But in writing there is an OOC aspect in the sense of making sure the player who you are doing this to is completely aware of his rights and the consequences of his decision, and if you are going to take on that role under the pretext of helping the player, then you should actually help the player. None of that happened, so the subtle signs to me point to predator manipulation of a player who doesn't know better. It's using relationships of relative power (in this context, influence and community weight) to take advantage.

At the end of the day, the manipulation was spreading and that player was turning into a battleground, but in a real sense the RP was going against his will as the player responsible for his own canon (in a direction he did not envision for his canon), and I had to step in and tell him that he could his canon in whatever direction he wanted, no matter what others told him. So it's all good there. The experienced player is still occupying him, the inexperienced player has still not been helped by the experienced player, but I recognize that I can't force people to do what I want, I can only nudge them, and at the end of the day if I want something done I need to take responsibility and do it myself -- so I have been working with the inexperienced player. And, of course, GD has many good roleplayers, and they are all understanding and are helping him too.

Again, very subtle, there are legitimate elements, but the undertone to me suggested predatory behavior.

The same experienced player also wants to meet "superpower" status and that is where many of these issues arise from, in my opinion. For example, he wants to abandon certain traits of his nation because, as an economist, I shared the economic implications and consequences of his system. He wants to abandon them so he too can have massive, strong, capital-intensive economy because that's what the cool kids have right? (The same cool kids who rarely RP, because they get bored with their generic world and the only outlet they have is others' worlds.) (1) Power status, as we've said, is not attained through stats, it's attained through roleplay and (2) even flawed, imperfect countries can be powers, even super powers (the USSR being the most obvious example). But that quest for power, rather than taking power as an organic reward for hard work, changes the focus of our actions on NS and it frames our behavior/actions in a way that can detract from the overall experience, and ultimately -- through frustration and lack of results -- cause us to burn out.

I'm at work, so had to quickly write this. I can elucidate where clarity is lacked.

Edit 1: Fixed many typoes.

[New Aeyariss]

He uses it to for imperialistic purposes and there's never any effort to explain to the player his freedom in accepting this, his freedom in controlling the direction of his own canon, and there's never any mentoring in roleplay quality.

Freedom, in RPing, works both ways. By exactly the same freedom that one is free to retcon a result he does not want others are free to retcon any interaction with said player and refrain from any further interaction with him. The same players have also full right to properly inform him of consequences of repeated behaviour like that.

During my entire career here - maybe not as long as yours, but certainly a considerable one I noticed that people who were loudest in their shouts for "cooperative" roleplaying were those who wanted to use cooperativeness as a weapon in order to compete. Whereas alliance I was part of (SACTO) attempted to solve the competition on the IC field, many RPers used completely other tools - and those tools ranged from generating strife in the OOC threads to outright shutting down entire RPs when they went not according to their will (here present Ausitoria is a very good example of this behaviour). In such variant, the demand for "cooperativeness" is de facto a thinly veiled competition carried out under a disguise meant to fool people.

I seen it in an RP where I have been recently, when the OP literally shut down the RP because it was going not according to his will. The problem is, that the people - ESPECIALLY those in RPing community - have to realize that NOT EVERYTHING will go according to their will and actually at times they will have to, frankly speaking, accept defeat. Not wanting that OOCly is no excuse for that.

In short:

Every RPer has a right not to accept a certain outcome. Others have a right not to accept it as well.

Cooperation takes two sides. Hiding yourself behind a "retcon button" just because something in the IC world went wrong, is by all means wrong and should not be by any means tolerated by RPing community. It's not a matter of any "OOC ethics" but a matter of general maturity and social skills. No RPer exists in the vacuum, and he should respect time and effort others put in.

Retconning things is a right, but also a "male copulative organ" move. Someone being able to do things does not make it right.

[Allanea]

I view it as a hugely double-edged sword.

If someone wants to retcon something that's their right. Sometimes if they did something awful, I will take a mental note and say to myself, 'okay, I will avoid this person'. [I try to keep the list of people I will ABSOLUTELY NEVER ROLEPLAY WITH very short. I have another, longer list of people whom I dislike, but will roleplay with and try to treat them decently.]

What I won't do however - except in very extreme and rare circumstances - is try to divert such an event into a discussion of how the person absoluely needs to roleplay with me or they are a BAD ROLEPLAYER or something. Maybe they are. But ultimately if they go off into a community where they feel comfortable with and have fun, that's their right too.

THere are people in this game who are 'bad roleplayers' by most definitions but they and the people that they're actually roleplaying with are having fun. I have no right to go and try and finagle them into my RP style somehow.

[New Aeyariss]

I view it as a hugely double-edged sword.

If someone wants to retcon something that's their right. Sometimes if they did something awful, I will take a mental note and say to myself, 'okay, I will avoid this person'. [I try to keep the list of people I will ABSOLUTELY NEVER ROLEPLAY WITH very short. I have another, longer list of people whom I dislike, but will roleplay with and try to treat them decently.]

What I won't do however - except in very extreme and rare circumstances - is try to divert such an event into a discussion of how the person absoluely needs to roleplay with me or they are a BAD ROLEPLAYER or something. Maybe they are. But ultimately if they go off into a community where they feel comfortable with and have fun, that's their right too.

THere are people in this game who are 'bad roleplayers' by most definitions but they and the people that they're actually roleplaying with are having fun. I have no right to go and try and finagle them into my RP style somehow.

Frankly I do regret that when I was dealing with worst offenders in this area I hadn't had the knowledge which I do have now, at this point. I of course realize that the right to retcon being a fundamental one - but it's kind of as with law not penalizing cheating on your wife. It's not banned, but does it make it right? Everyone with a strong moral compass will reply "no". The same kind is with retconning.

If you want to retcon because someone misbehaves, that by all means is fine with me. If you however want to retcon because something does not go along with your will, then I believe that negative feedback from the community is a natural consequence. After all, no one exists in vaccum and treating your fellow RPers, who have invested time and effort, like "male copulative organs" is shortest way to being avoided.

People who don't want to see their armies ICly loose shouldn't be participating in competitive war RPs in first place.

As such, I would never advocate anyone from retconning just because someone does not want to loose in a war RP he previously agreed to, and with joy entered until the shots were fired... Because how is that not "playing to win" so many have accused me of?

[The State of Monavia]

[align=justify]Okay, I’ll do it now.

So as people have said, one very common form of thread in International Incidents is where a nation announces a controversial event happening in their nation – often a genocide, slavery being made legal, or some kind of flagrant violations of human (other sapient) rights. Often you might feel the desire to intervene. The in-character grounds might differ – maybe your nation’s people and government feel moral outrage, maybe the leadership wants to exploit the outrage of the world community for a geopolitical advantage. (Oh look! They’re butchering the Bigtopians! Let’s invade and stop them – and maybe seize their oil while we are at it !)

I should clarify my previous remarks a bit before I proceed with addressing the rest of your post. The specific scenario I am alluding to is an OOC imbroglio in which Player A has his fictional nation do something controversial to satisfy a poor OOC motive—typically it is either “wish fulfillment” or begging for attention—only for Players B, C, D, E, and so forth all have their nations gang up on Player A’s nation with the OOC intention of scoring an “easy win” or spoiling Player A’s desire for “wish fulfillment” or attention. These scenarios oftentimes start with a bunch of newbies spamming the original thread with one-sentence posts and direct threats of war, followed by more serious players getting involved and leading to the participants posting increasing volumes of OOC chatter in Player A’s IC thread because Player A did not bother to create an OOC thread. Such threads usually end with the attackers mobilizing so much firepower that Player A simply refuses to take damage by wrapping all his stuff in godmodium plot armor, flaming and trolling everyone else, and taking his grievances to NSG to score “wins” elsewhere. The infamous Burleson Fiasco of 2014 is an archetypical example of the sort of OOC Charlie-Foxtrot I was referring to, and I should have been more specific.

There are some things you want to implement if you want to be successful in this endeavour. On the OOC level, you want to ensure you have the other player’s boundaries in mind. While in a totally perfect universe everyone would accept any IC consequence of their IC actions, in reality many players are just not fully comfortable with a range of things. (And really, all of us have some boundaries – some of us don’t want to read awful torture scenes, or roleplays that involve sexual assault, or having their favourite characters killed, or their nation destroyed. Some have weirder, more idiosyncratic boundaries).

On the IC level, you need to consider your nation’s priorities and limitations. A lot of people will tend to deploy vast, enormous armies to resolve a conflict in a remote country they’ve never heard of. I roleplay a huge nation (nearly 32 billion Allaneans!), but it has literally been six years RL time since I have participated in any MT conflict that seriously taxed my armed forces. I tend to deploy a few hundred ground troops to a military conflict. The largest conflict I am currently in has something like five thousand ground troops deployed. The question always should be – is a conflict in this country really something my nation would care about to be deployed at this scale?.

You have raised an entire series of excellent points here and I especially love the insightfulness behind your rhetorical question. In the past (especially the Jolt days), some players developed reputations for having their NS nation rove around the globe levying threats of coercion against every country that did not measure up to their IC society’s standards. In some cases, they often wound up invading someone else’s country a few posts later (never mind they just invaded five other countries last week) as if fighting all of these wars at once will have no IC psychological or economic impact on their own people. One phenomenon that I found particularly irritating in these cases was the common practice of invaders posting that they happened to have one or more naval vessels “on routine patrol” somewhere that was located conveniently close to the country they just smacked with a threat-laden condemnation letter.

While I agree with your remarks about killing off characters, I also think it is wise to remember that it is not fair to repeatedly have characters do things that make other characters want to kill them and then get upset out of character when the other players’ characters make attempts to do so. This is not to say that characters cannot enjoy the use of plot armor for story reasons agreed to by all participants involved, but when you decided to send Ling Tan to a diplomatic meeting it only seems fair if everybody starts drawing their guns. On the flip side of my last point, it also stands to reason that it is bad OOC form to casually deep-six someone else’s major characters with little regard for story development or wider canonical implications because you are in a hurry to advance the story or are simply RPing for power.

Another thing to make sure of is establishing the objectives and demands you want to make on the other nation. It’s usually true both in the real world and in Nationstates that people are likely to reject demands that entail a far-reaching change in their society, or a serious humiliation. A book to read about this is Richard Pape’s Bombing To Win, which discusses a lot of the aspects of using military forces – and particularly air forces – in trying to force nations to the negotiating table. One thing that is true that nations are likely to reject policies that are seen as threatening to totally reshape their society, or remove their ruling class (as opposed to a specific ruling party) from power, or to violate the commandments of their religions – they are likely to reject this even if threatened with obliterating force.

I agree with all of the principles you laid out here. As a longtime fan of your writing (and TurtleShroom’s), I have read more than my fair share of stuff related to the three Dark Harvest threads (which were a blast to read and represent superb examples of using plot as a worldbuilding mechanism). Nevertheless, fair is fair.

As such, after years of experience and study, I decided that Allanea’s typical approach when faced with genocide, slavery, or whatnot, is not to try and mold the other society to be a liberal democracy or whatnot, but to try and abolish the offending practice itself and itself only. This is both ICly very practical (as this does not require an elaborate post-war effort, most of the time, and is more likely to be accepted), and allows the other player some room for maneuver OOC.

The IC course of actions I try to follow, in the event of a stereotypical II Conflict is like this:

1. Attempt to carry out negotiations with other players who are involved in the RP, especially those whose nations are located near the ‘target nation’. If there is any doubt, telegram the ‘target nation’ OOC and ask them what their goals in the RP are. ICly see if I can find out more about the events, the nation in question, and get a cooperation going with neighboring nations.

2. Attempt to work out a plan of joint action with other nations, or other factions within the ‘target nation’. Contemplate here issues of logistics, the social and economic make-up of the ‘target nations’, and its military strengths and weaknesses. I try to roleplay that a lot of this negotiation is at least initially carried out by diplomats or officers in my nation, and not – as is NS tradition – national leaders themselves. Often the situation escalates and I have the King or Queen give a message.

I also have some stock characters in my nation that I use to respond to different situations. Peter Nizhinsky, for instance, is known for his colourful rudeness. He’s there to respond to nations that are seen as totally evil or foolish and are beyond regular responses.

3. Deploy a small force (Special Forces, et.). The purpose of this, IC, is to figure out what is going on and gather more information. OOCly it’s to see just how good/bad the RP is, and if there are problems at this stage I can easily bail out.

4. If the situation is not resolved, gradually escalate my involvement. If I’ve given a positive impression to the other players in the thread so far, people are not likely to OOC object to the growth in my forces in the way they would have objected had I rolled up with 3 CVBGs to start with.

One thing to avoid, in my experience, is any sort of RP where you occupy the other person’s nation long-term unless you gave a good rapport built up with the player and the nation is well worldbuilt. On an OOC level, people prefer to have control over their nation’s general makeup. Even people who do not get upset – which, to be fair, the more seasoned roleplayers typically don’t – often get bored with roleplaying a nation that is not sovereign.

[I have several times tried to start a genocide RP with one of my other nations, but people don’t seem to care. Sad! Low-energy!]

You will not find me disagreeing with any of what you posted here.

Great thoughts Monavia!

Just to clarify on:

At no time was I ever under the impression that our IC activities remain unconstrained by normative principles.

Value-free as in divorced from our OOC values. I mean it in the sense of giving characters/organizations preferences and taking them as given when determining their decisions, rather than making IC decisions based on your own preferences.

Thank you for clarifying this point.

Shwe Tu Colony your posts brings up something that I, and probably a few others too, have been thinking about and that is the role Tech levels play in these types of rp's and how many people try and use tech levels as a means of plot-armoring in lieu of strategic and technical prowess and it almost feels like a right [sic] of passage looking back on it all.

We all grow old eventually…

I general RP in the PMT range- but that has a very wide interpretation for a lot of people. So many new players sign up and read the guides and decide that they are all Super-powers because that's their nations canon (which 9/10 its barely even coherent) and if we don't accept that then we are either being oppressive or trying at the very least to strong arm other nation into nerfing their nation. I know I, much like Allenea could probably run circles around new players with technical warfare terms and actual troop maneuvers, but I oftentimes opt to play the bad guy and leave myself open for a counter-attack. I don't mind taking a hit for the story especially so if its helping teach the new players how to rp on a better level then [sic] before, because if I try and post at my full power it gets labeled as powerplaying. Hell, even a simple post depending on my (long known weapons systems) is considered by most as power players and OOC bickering begins- despite my telling them over and over the various weaknesses and plot opening I gave them in order to fight me.

I don't consider myself a Super-Power by any means, but sometimes if feels like your slamming your head against a brick wall hahaha.

One of the litmus tests for deciding whether to pull out of an RP thread is whether the other players even bother to reach for opportunities you present to them to satisfy their OOC desires fairly. If they cannot even do that decently, it does not make much sense to stick around them.

Good stuff.

The way Allanea does things is ideally how I'd like to hop into things, but I slowly became less interested in NS for a variety of reasons, so I havn't been involved with stuff ICly in a very long time.

I think any sufficiently large nation is likely to have so many irons in the fire that they're unlikely to be able to devote their full attention to any particular conflict unless it is a threat to a wellbeing of that entire nation (and really, for a really big nation, how many things even qualify as that?)

It's worth saying that the United States has military involvement (ranging from 'several thousand men' to 'a dozen Special Forces operatives') in more than 80 countries. Most of these are so far from being on the radar, even senior US officials are sometimes unaware that they're going on. You may remember the incident a few months back when US soldiers were killed in fighting in Niger, and several US Senators were stunned to find out that, yes, the USA had troops in Niger.

One problem that many players (especially newbies) encounter is an inability to understand that you do not need to mount a major invasion to impact another player’s NS nation. I attribute some of this problem to the fact that it is easier for newbies who are new to text-based RP to follow a “shock-and-awe” plot route than it is to write something that takes a more low-key approach.

Because it has been talked about elsewhere, I just wanted to clarify the context of being a "superpower." I'll use my example of UWO to elucidate:

When it comes to UWO’s goal of striving for superpower status, one item that remains ambiguous is the exact meaning of what such status entails. I attempted to reduce this ambiguity to a more tolerable level using my past experience to come up with a working definition of an IC superpower as a NS nation that does at least one of five distinct IC things. I think that UWO is aiming to meet the second and fifth criteria I provided.

I don't think there's such thing as a superpower in the overall sense of II. I don't think it matters to be a superpower in that sense, or that it should even be a practical (or valued) goal.

UWO wants to be a superpower within the context of the community he's in: GD. It's an easier task relative to the whole of II. And in a game where communities are fractured, and even when they are open world (GD) the majority of interactions still take place within a community, then the bounds of that community will be what's relevant to the role of a superpower. In other words, a superpower in Pardes has little relevant to affairs in GD, but is still a superpower within the narrower context of Pardes -- which for most Pardes players is what matters, not the whole of II.

Edit: Totally agree that superpower status should not be everyone's goal. UWO got there through context, context that has been RPd, and it has mostly been "spontaneous" (i.e. building on hard work vs. something that was planned from the very beginning).

While I concur with your assessment that there is such a thing as a global superpower in NS RP, it is true that some players cultivated NS nations that had truly outsized IC presences across much of the MT/PMT RP community. It is also true that UWO does not always keep the scope of his IC “reach” limited by regional boundaries—indeed, many players behind “lesser” NS nations try to make their marks all over the world as they can, especially if they have a history of moving between RP regions (canonical difficulties aside). This leads me to ask you another question: what does UWO consider “superpower status” within his nation’s regional context for story purposes? In other words, what does UWO want his NS nation to become in relation to its host region as a whole over the next few years?

In my view (which I know people will disagree with), a superpower in the context of a closed world region is even more undemocratic (and unfair) than a theoretical NationStates superpower; because more often than not the only way to be a superpower in a closed world region is to be the usual IC largest this largest that around, e.g., largest population, 2nd largest economy, 5th largest army, the usual wiki article copy paste [xxx nation name] is the [xxx number] largest economy in [xxx closed world region], therefore it is [nice word for mighty and strong] and is [major power/great power]. More flexible regions like Greater Dienstad, where one can in theory become a superpower through storytelling (like United World Order or Ralkovia), regardless whether one has an economically flawed nation or not, are few and far between/rare. The majority of closed world regions I have seen require the largest boys and girls around (i.e. great powers) to also have the largest population, economy, industry, army, etc.

[ Edit: Though in saying that Greater Dienstad is an open world region and not a closed world region anyway haha... so I guess that was not a fair comparison ]

Following what I have said in another thread [ link ], whereas to be seen as an influential nation/player (e.g. great powers) in NationStates, we don't need to have the largest population, economy, industry, army, etc. around; in fact, having those things (large multi billion population, large army, etc.) would in fact set you back (because you will have to repeatedly explain your position to, and reassure others regarding your multi billion population, having people not wanting to RP with you because of your very large population or armed forces, etc.). The way to become a great power in NationStates in 2018 is by doing what players like Allanea, New Edom, Ghant, etc. and regions like The Western Isles are doing very well: by continuing to create or participate in RP threads all around the NationStates and International Incidents sub forums. With activity more people will come across your threads and see you as a player or as a region ("I see New Edom's posting all over NationStates and International Incidents sub forums; wow that player is very active!" or "wow The Western Isles' threads are all around the NationStates and International Incidents sub forums; and I enjoy reading them too!")

The only drawback to this approach is that players must master time management to make it succeed. For example, most of the best RPers are college-age persons who are both mature enough to have developed solid communication and writing skills and an adult sense of personal decorum while also being young enough not to be bogged down in their career, raising children, etc. Some folks (e.g. Lamoni, Mac, Allanea, etc.) are older than that and have mastered this temporal juggling act. Others (e.g. AMF, Kraven) get sucked into spiraling RL commitments and wind up retiring from NS altogether or hibernating for months or even years at a time. In many respects, I did more RPing between 2009 and 2010 than I did between 2013 and 2018.

That is why when The State of Monavia brought up my name (with Lyras and Lamoni), I thought: did I deserve that mention? Because the last RP post I made was on the [ 26th of November 2017 ], whilst people like New Edom and players in regions like The Western Isles have churned out many RP threads and RP posts continuously since then.

[ Edit: Though I agree fully with what The State of Monavia said (the overall message of the post); and I would like thank him for mentioning me (though I feel I don't deserve it haha...) ]

Your NS nation’s enduringly prominent position on the GET forum and IC global commonwealth and other past RP achievements place your RP activities into a category that few have ever matched, so I felt that you had unambiguously earned this distinction. The fact that you have elected to rest on your past laurels and allow your reputation to speak for you more than any of your present activities (or lack thereof) was not relevant to my assessment as I elected to take a more historical approach. Were I to strictly view this subject in terms of present happenings, then I would have to regard many of the great founders and leaders of RP regions like Haven (RIP), Gholgoth, etc. and major RP alliances like the GASN, ODECON, COMITERN, IFA, Conglomerate, ACA, SACTO, etc. as mere footnotes in the history of NS. You can clearly discern how such reasoning would not be a wise idea.

There is the truth that players with big storefronts or those affiliated with OOC wise influential alliances (I don't know why New Aeyariss, Pharthan, and Common Territories have not been mentioned so far; the last two are the owners of the two most active large military storefronts atm whilst the first has done many IC things since 2015) are influential, but I just feel that we need to rethink the way we look at the concept of being an IC superpower and redefine it to be something more healthy for the community (e.g. writing good stories like New Edom and Ghant or participating in open II threads a lot like Allanea), which is why I love this guide posted by The Macabees, because from reading it I am getting the vibe that The Macabees also do believe (and others posting here so far) that we need to redefine the word 'superpower' with actually writing good stories and actual writing activities all around the NationStates and International Incidents sub forums

Um I am sorry if I can't write this in a more coherent manner, I will edit this post later to improve it (aha...)

My omissions were the result of my general inactivity in the GET forum over the past two years and a number of other factors, such as impatience with finishing my post.

Yohannes, totally agreed. Superpowers, and even just powers (I just used superpower because it's a more powerful word that brings attention) are people who actively RP.

And, yes, GD is very narrative/RP/story driven, so superpower status is much more flexible. And, if other regions aren't like that, it could be why they are dying or dead, as I've suggested before. GD also has an evangelist, me, who's very vocal and very active in providing direct, honest feedback to help give players direction (for example, the word is that western GD is where everything is happening, but I then I say, "If that's true, where are the RPs? Talking on a chat is not IC activity. It doesn't replace it").

That last remark was very true. It also does not help when an RP region gets into the habit of migrating its RP activities offsite or a bunch of NS players run off elsewhere altogether. One subject that I have yet to comment on at this juncture is the cause of RP region collapses. I have privately shared a few thoughts on this matter over the past few years, so permit me to release an excerpt from a telegram I sent back in 2015 or 2016:

I personally think that moving the site away from Jolt's control was ultimately necessary to save it from Jolt's endless treadmill of excrement-filled excuses for trying to control everything Max created. Also, the move did not adversely affect me; I actually have done all of my best writing after 2011. In my estimation, NS got messed up this way:

In 2010 and 2011, nations based off the fandom-that-shall-not-be-named, various sci-fi shows (e.g. Star Wars-based countries in FT), and various niche fandoms (e.g. the "furry" craze, which mystified me about as much as it did Dr. Phil) began appearing on the RP scene. While some of these players produced good writing (and a few produced quite a lot), many of them lasted barely a year (sometimes less) and ultimately represented an artistic fad that materially altered the aesthetic makeup of our community by being more active (on average) than most other groups. This fad has largely passed as of early last year, buts it left behind a pretty big impression.

The roleplaying community could survive the appearance and disappearance of fads, but not the collapse of interregional cooperation between the major RP regions. We all owe United Gordonopia enormous credit for trying to tie dedicated RP regions together by creating a world map that provided everyone a complete picture of the "core" roleplaying world. Unfortunately, UG got swamped by other commitments and projects over time and he stopped updating the world map. The community should have done a lot more to ensure that someone would always be around to maintain this mission-critical asset, but nobody else wanted to step up to the plate.

As you and I both know, dedicated RP regions are the engines of the wider RP community. If my memory serves me well, our community used to create a lot of new RP regions (e.g. Ellorea, Rodinia, etc.) four and five years ago, but most of them are currently dead or comatose. I believe that RP regions can still remain pretty productive without much interregional cooperation, but only if they maintain a certain critical mass by rotating in new players as old ones leave (Mac's comments on how RP regions thrive or die are pretty instructive here). For example, between 2010 and 2014, Nova's old guard (Mephras, New Manth, Pinguinum, Novikov, Katonazag, Krommindy, Prevania, and Damirez) either quit NS entirely or repeatedly ceased to exist for months at a time. Some roleplayers acted stupidly by going into NSG and repeatedly breaking the rules (see New Nicksylvania) and got cast into oblivion along with their substantial creative prowess.

I cannot speak for other regions, but I know that Nova utterly failed to maintain itself for three reasons. First, I let my regional recruitment officer duties slide to the bottom of my priorities list. Second, other RP regions attracted new players better than we did. Third, the new players who bothered to ask for entry either backed out of the admission process, got admitted and ran off to other RP regions (e.g. Glanodel in 2016), or got admitted and let their nation accounts CTE (e.g. Dneprdaniya in 2011 or 2012). I can probably assume that other regions had similar problems with desertion and account deletion.

Current conditions on the ground are still pretty adverse. Players like us are still dwindling, and while the Mentor program has added quite a few new people over the past year, it will take time for them to become as proficient at mentoring new players as their retired predecessors were. NSG ensnares good RPers and draws them into discussions where they end up getting their accounts deleted (see Valkia's player base for several examples). P2TM draws more RPers away from I.I., NS, and GET. Marketing professionals refer to this phenomenon (where a company sells multiple products that meet similar, oftentimes overlapping customer needs) as cannibalization because the launch of one new product steals sales from a similar product sold by the same company.

[Snip.]

A problem I see in the scenario you presented is that the inexperienced player might not have had any long-term plans for his canon and the experienced player might not have had the presence of mind or inclination to ask the inexperienced player to develop any such plans as part of their cooperation. Miscommunication is bad enough, but I will generally regard non-communication as an even greater evil precisely because it closes down potential pathways for moving forward.

He uses it to for imperialistic purposes and there's never any effort to explain to the player his freedom in accepting this, his freedom in controlling the direction of his own canon, and there's never any mentoring in roleplay quality.

Freedom, in RPing, works both ways. By exactly the same freedom that one is free to retcon a result he does not want others are free to retcon any interaction with said player and refrain from any further interaction with him. The same players have also full right to properly inform him of consequences of repeated behaviour like that.

During my entire career here - maybe not as long as yours, but certainly a considerable one I noticed that people who were loudest in their shouts for "cooperative" roleplaying were those who wanted to use cooperativeness as a weapon in order to compete. Whereas alliance I was part of (SACTO) attempted to solve the competition on the IC field, many RPers used completely other tools - and those tools ranged from generating strife in the OOC threads to outright shutting down entire RPs when they went not according to their will (here present Ausitoria is a very good example of this behaviour). In such variant, the demand for "cooperativeness" is de facto a thinly veiled competition carried out under a disguise meant to fool people.

I seen it in an RP where I have been recently, when the OP literally shut down the RP because it was going not according to his will. The problem is, that the people - ESPECIALLY those in RPing community - have to realize that NOT EVERYTHING will go according to their will and actually at times they will have to, frankly speaking, accept defeat. Not wanting that OOCly is no excuse for that.

One thing many RPers fail to realize is that the art of losing earns them respect. A callous disregard for sportsmanship does not serve any constructive purpose in this community.

In short:

Every RPer has a right not to accept a certain outcome. Others have a right not to accept it as well.

Cooperation takes two sides. Hiding yourself behind a "retcon button" just because something in the IC world went wrong, is by all means wrong and should not be by any means tolerated by RPing community. It's not a matter of any "OOC ethics" but a matter of general maturity and social skills. No RPer exists in the vacuum, and he should respect time and effort others put in.

Retconning things is a right, but also a "male copulative organ" move. Someone being able to do things does not make it right.

While every RPer has certain rights, neither NS not civil society can function well unless their members have the basic decency to abstain from exercising those rights in a deliberately insulting, antisocial, or divisive fashion every time they suffer a minor fit of pique.

I view it as a hugely double-edged sword.

If someone wants to retcon something that's their right. Sometimes if they did something awful, I will take a mental note and say to myself, 'okay, I will avoid this person'. [I try to keep the list of people I will ABSOLUTELY NEVER ROLEPLAY WITH very short. I have another, longer list of people whom I dislike, but will roleplay with and try to treat them decently.]

I am pleased to state that I also have few people I will never RP with at all—most of them are long gone!

[Allanea]

One thing many RPers fail to realize is that the art of losing earns them respect.

My Gods, I was going to link to that.

Losing a war or a fight, or taking casualties provides you a lot of opportunities, and people don't realize that.

1. If you are taking a casualty, you can create the carnage, like Krieg himself explained. If I post an attack on someone, they can just respond 'all my warships are sunk' and I have little control over how they respond. But if I decide that I lose a warship (I sometimes roll dice for the result), I get to describe the violence and mayhem that goes down. It's worth reading up on what happens on ships and tanks when they go down, so you can work it into your posts - not just the effects, but the smells, the sounds, the men scrambling for survival as they struggle against the hatches... you could write a short horror story right there.

2. One advantage of a war that's waged in your own territory is that you get to talk about your nation. When you are sending soldiers to participate in some poor country's civil war, it's typical that the only characters from your nation that are actively involved in the story are soldiers, politicians, and aid workers, and most of your story is about whether or not they take the right decisions. The other player gets to describe the terrain, weather, culture, the reactions of his citizens, the coffee shop owner that is asked to serve coffee to the foreign troops. What if they are nice? What if they only grudgingly sell coffee to the invader?

Conversely, as someone who roleplays an invading country or one that's militarily stronger, it's your responsibility in my view, to help the other player bring out more detail about their nation. I always ask as many questions as I can about the country's culture, its economy, it's architecture, etc. Partly it is a way for me to plan my military actions better (and when you're in a war with Allanea, any questions I ask can be used for some manner of military trickery, I'm just that kind of person), and partly it's a way to get people to tell more about their nation. This is something people enjoy doing.

One plot device that's underutilized in Nationstates, I thing, is the interrogation or the debriefing. You can use collaborative roleplays via Google Docs or a similar platform to write a very detailed conversation between two (or more!) characters. A prisoner of war from a given country can tell a lot about his life as a regular Bigtopian, or an officer, or a slave. This information can be used later in the war, and both provides an IC benefit to the player's nation, and an OOC benefit to both player in that it helps them think through things about their nation.

[United World Order]

While I concur with your assessment that there is such a thing as a global superpower in NS RP, it is true that some players cultivated NS nations that had truly outsized IC presences across much of the MT/PMT RP community. It is also true that UWO does not always keep the scope of his IC “reach” limited by regional boundaries—indeed, many players behind “lesser” NS nations try to make their marks all over the world as they can, especially if they have a history of moving between RP regions (canonical difficulties aside). This leads me to ask you another question: what does UWO consider “superpower status” within his nation’s regional context for story purposes? In other words, what does UWO want his NS nation to become in relation to its host region as a whole over the next few years?

It became very much clear to me what I wanted my nation to become in IC context back in 2014-2015 which was my first year or so in Greater Dienstad. In character, "UWO" or better referred to as the 'Ordenite Reich' is from what others in the community have said to be the sole best example and or representation of a truly fascist nation state. While I know their have been plenty before me who could just as well as I have, been labeled such(GWO, Tehraan, etc). The Ordenite Reich is a regime fighting the change of the times, i.e they are fighting against modernity at every turn at a reactionary level. Canon wise my nation state's current government has been running for over 80 years and has been able to perfect it's craft of population control at least within it's own borders(However the cracks are there, Deutsche Scythia and Caucasia which are colonial areas of my mainland claim could erupt into violence and revolution at any moment, provided the powder keg is lit). There is social Darwinism written all over it really and so to answer your question I would hope that my nation could become a nation relative to Greater Dienstad as a nation that's actions are always watched by it's neighbors, similar to the clout that surrounded Kraven for years over their dormancy and eventual return to perpetual warfare and brutality. I do not seek to be Kraven though as the IC political dynamic in the UWO is far more complex than the Kraven who simply strive to fuel their war machine.

Don't know if any of that made sense but that's how I see it.

[Inyourfaceistan]

On the subject of retcons, sometimes a mutual revocation or cessation of canon is just the only plausible outcome. Sometimes two (or more) players are just incompatible with how they view or play their nations to truly exist in the same canon and not come to some "make-or-break" issue.

(Spoilered as to not create a longer, distracting post.)
A major situation where I once found myself in dealt with this subject; about a year or two ago I was involved with a complex series of diplomatic and pseudo-military threads revolving largely around one player as an isolated but moderately powerful antagonist state.
After numerous incidents and outrages, it's pretty much come down to a final ultimatum, yada yada yada...

Basically there are two final IC situations that can happen:
1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military conflict

Now this breaks us into effectively 5 different outcomes:
1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team A
3) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team B
4) No IC Military Conflict - Team A suffers massive public outrage and regime change
5) No IC Military Conflict - Team B losses control of some outlying territorial holdings due to domestic issues & insurrection
6) OOC Deal
7) Retcon

We try IC negotiations, most players legitimately do try to find some common ground with Team B genocidal pariah state antagonist, but they refuse to budge. They effectively want all or nothing, and aren't willing to find common ground. So now we have to cross that option off the list:

1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team A
3) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team B
4) No IC Military Conflict - Team A suffers massive public outrage and regime change
5) No IC Military Conflict - Team B losses control of some outlying territorial holdings due to domestic issues & insurrection
6) OOC Deal
7) Retcon

Well so negotiations break down multiple times. Now, Team A is left with the choice of war with Team B, or effectively backing down in the face of massive public outrage and presumable regime change. Naturally war is the likely option - except the player behind Team B doesn't want to RP a military conflict with a "decided outcome" (an outcome where he wins, of course). Now we have to scratch not one but two options off the list, because an open military RP would allow of the possibility of either Team A or Team B winning.

1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team A
3) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team B
4) No IC Military Conflict - Team A suffers massive public outrage and regime change
5) No IC Military Conflict - Team B losses control of some outlying territorial holdings due to domestic issues & insurrection
6) OOC Deal
7) Retcon

Well there is no way any of the players on Team A are willing to have their nations suffer the domestic and economic fallout of going all-in and then folding; while Team B just gets to sit their giggling about how he fucked over an entire coalition of competent military nations just by OOC'ly not allowing military conflict to be an option.

1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team A
3) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team B
4) No IC Military Conflict - Team A suffers massive public outrage and regime change
5) No IC Military Conflict - Team B losses control of some outlying territorial holdings due to domestic issues & insurrection
6) OOC Deal
7) Retcon

Well naturally, Team B, who refused to negotiate IC and didn't want to risk it in a war with several military powers doesn't plan on releasing their rogue republics any time soon, so that option was probably never on the table to begin with.

1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team A
3) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team B
4) No IC Military Conflict - Team A suffers massive public outrage and regime change
5) No IC Military Conflict - Team B losses control of some outlying territorial holdings due to domestic issues & insurrection
6) OOC Deal
7) Retcon

So now, if our leaders & diplomats can't reach and agreement In-Character, we can't fight out and see who wins with the power of the gun, and neither side is willing to freely lose their investments, then pretty much the last option we have is to reach an OOC deal.
Honestly, RP'ing the effects of such an All-In-then-Fold move would be fine provided the other guy is willing to actually give up any meaningful physical effect (beside just more empty pinky-promises not to mass murder people he doesn't like). But he's not. No meaningful change is offered, and no agreement can be reached OOC.

1) IC Negotiations
2) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team A
3) IC Military Conflict - Victory Team B
4) No IC Military Conflict - Team A suffers massive public outrage and regime change
5) No IC Military Conflict - Team B losses control of some outlying territorial holdings due to domestic issues & insurrection
6) OOC Deal
7) Retcon

It's not necessarily personal, it's just an inevitable result of incompatibility. It was likely the only outcome when the two differing ideologies of "Nothing serious will ever happen to my nation!" vs "Anything can happen to any nation, I only care if it's done right".
Likewise to spread the word of the retcon isn't some form of evil "gossip", "blackmail" or some plan to "ostracize" the player; it's just explaining to other members of the close RP'ing community why the retcon happened, how it might affect their canon, and why their similar philosophy is likely to conflict with said player.

...is try to divert such an event into a discussion of how the person absoluely needs to roleplay with me or they are a BAD ROLEPLAYER or something...

I've dealt with people who think that you absolutely need to cooperate [read: come to their terms] with them or else you're a BAD ROLEPLAYER who is PLAYING TO WIN!!!
What's even worse is certain individuals have openly threatened to God-mod if favorable cooperation was not met...

[Allanea]

There's some motte-and-baileying going down here.

Because while doing the things you described is not intrinsically an asocial act, some groups of people do practice asocial variants of it.

[Ghant]

I see this as an example of the “every RPer wants to have the ‘best,’ ‘strongest,’ or ‘perfect’ nation” problem. In many cases, RPers create nations that either embody their own RL political views, satirize RL political views they dislike, or represent their ideal version of the RL country they inhabit. The RP environment you are describing is exactly what you get when RPers with these habits come together. At the same time, many of the players who are highly respected by virtue of the years they have spent writing well, helping others, etc. have also maintained their accounts long enough to rack up huge stats that keep growing at consistent rates. One reason RPers limit their stats for RP purposes is to avoid certain pitfalls that come with open-ended NS stat growth (e.g. population). For example, an old NS nation that gains six million people every day can afford to lose five million people every day to war or disease and still keep growing “bigger and stronger” when in reality losing millions of people daily should really, really suck from an IC perspective.

I would like to address this particular point as it relates to the thread topic. While there are certainly issues pertaining to OOC ethics of RPing superpowers, there's really nothing stopping anyone from doing so. Anyone can claim anything or construct their nation however they please, essentially for whatever reason they see fit. Which of course begs the question, if a writer can just claim anything, why doesn't everyone claim anything? What's stopping them? Well, the answer is more simple than most people would like to believe.

Simply put: you can claim anything, but if nobody else recognizes it, do you really have anything?

There is a great deal of power in a writer's ability to choose what they write, and what roleplays they participate in. I compare it to an actor choosing what movies to star in. An actor can read a script and say, "I find this compelling, I'd like to be involved," or "I don't like this script, so I'm going to pass on the role." I think a major problem in today's NS RP community is a lack of information about a writer's rights. Alot of the time they feel pressured into roleplays by their roleplaying groups or regions, for one reason or another (another reason why I recommend people develop as writers on their own in the N&I Forums before committing to a specific roleplaying community).

Yes, it is quite true that many (perhaps most) roleplayers want the best, strongest or most of something, but I usually the ask the question "why do you want this?" In NS RP, OOC motive is everything, and is central to the very nature of this thread. The motive, then, usually is one of two things. Either "I want to have or do this because I think it would make a compelling story" or "I want to do this because my ego demands it." The former I find commendable, and the latter I find extremely discerning, and I generally avoid it entirely.

I RP relatively weak nations, in terms of force projection and military strength, for three reasons. Firstly, I find it more challenging to roleplay that way, and exploring intrigues in my narratives is what keeps me engaged and interested in writing. Secondly, there's this general thought that "force projection and military power is the only thing that matters," and I'm out to prove that it isn't (I've always prided myself on overcoming stereotypes). Thirdly, when you write, there are two ways of going about it, and that is either writing to satisfy yourself, or writing to satisfy your reader. Most of the writers that exercise poor OOC ethics when RPing superpowers are trying to satisfy their own egos. I find that to be abhorrent simple because as a reader, I don't find that interesting or compelling.

Shocker, right? If I sit down to read something someone's written, I generally lose interest very quickly if I get the sense that what I'm reading is self-service, or a vehicle for the writer's OOC preferences, desires and fantasies. Instead, what I find compelling is when writers produce material that is completely separate from themselves. Complex stories that are a labor of love, written based upon the writer's desire to share a compelling narrative that the reader is likely to enjoy and come away with a positive experience. To me, it's that idea of sharing something that you enjoy, and finding that the reader enjoyed it too, is the greatest form of satisfaction in roleplaying.

Perhaps, for that reason, I could probably roleplay a superpower, but I'm quite content to continue RPing my "little train engine that could" nations that try to do alot with little. I'd encourage others out there to consider doing the same...you may find it rewarding

[Raven Corps]

One thing many RPers fail to realize is that the art of losing earns them respect.

My Gods, I was going to link to that.

Losing a war or a fight, or taking casualties provides you a lot of opportunities, and people don't realize that.

1. If you are taking a casualty, you can create the carnage, like Krieg himself explained. If I post an attack on someone, they can just respond 'all my warships are sunk' and I have little control over how they respond. But if I decide that I lose a warship (I sometimes roll dice for the result), I get to describe the violence and mayhem that goes down. It's worth reading up on what happens on ships and tanks when they go down, so you can work it into your posts - not just the effects, but the smells, the sounds, the men scrambling for survival as they struggle against the hatches... you could write a short horror story right there.

2. One advantage of a war that's waged in your own territory is that you get to talk about your nation. When you are sending soldiers to participate in some poor country's civil war, it's typical that the only characters from your nation that are actively involved in the story are soldiers, politicians, and aid workers, and most of your story is about whether or not they take the right decisions. The other player gets to describe the terrain, weather, culture, the reactions of his citizens, the coffee shop owner that is asked to serve coffee to the foreign troops. What if they are nice? What if they only grudgingly sell coffee to the invader?

Conversely, as someone who roleplays an invading country or one that's militarily stronger, it's your responsibility in my view, to help the other player bring out more detail about their nation. I always ask as many questions as I can about the country's culture, its economy, it's architecture, etc. Partly it is a way for me to plan my military actions better (and when you're in a war with Allanea, any questions I ask can be used for some manner of military trickery, I'm just that kind of person), and partly it's a way to get people to tell more about their nation. This is something people enjoy doing.

One plot device that's underutilized in Nationstates, I thing, is the interrogation or the debriefing. You can use collaborative roleplays via Google Docs or a similar platform to write a very detailed conversation between two (or more!) characters. A prisoner of war from a given country can tell a lot about his life as a regular Bigtopian, or an officer, or a slave. This information can be used later in the war, and both provides an IC benefit to the player's nation, and an OOC benefit to both player in that it helps them think through things about their nation.

As much as I loved doing that myself, I haven't seen many others doing anything close to what your describing. In someways its even affected my own posts because subconsciously I know I can write in ways that are far superior to what i'm putting out, but I think I default to only writing what I need to write based on the level of perceived effort I'm getting from those in the RP with me. for example if all i'm getting is one-liners I just done have the motivation to post up a 5 page reply.

[The Macabees]

I am probably giving myself too much credit, but I have always been something of a rogue. I was very involved with the general II scene between 2003 and 2005, but in 2005 I decided to bring my focus back to me and I launched a rebellion RP. Doing so separated me, to some extent, from the players I worked with in a general setting, but I felt very much like you -- I could do better and I wanted to, so I did my own thing. This rebellion RP ended up organically developing into GD's largest RPd war to that date, and it allowed me to do exactly what Allanea describes -- I was on the defensive, so much of the world, the destruction it was facing, etc., was in my hands. I was young, so I can't claim complete realism, but it was incredibly fun -- one of my cities is basically obliterated, there are (well RPd) nuke exchanges, and it ended up being a very successful PMT war (with 2,000 tonne super tanks and massive nuclear anti-tank shaped charges, and other ridiculous, but really fun stuff when RPd for the narrative).

My point is, if I am in a situation that is less than ideal for me, I am bored, I am not challenged, I take responsibility into my own hands and I get myself to where I need to be. The II community bickered too much (it was very alliance-based at the time, a lot of ego, etc.), the likelihood of a failed RP was too high, and I decided to just do things on my own. I ended up attracting RPers to the RP, and I strengthened my community while doing so by giving other RPers an outlet for quality storytelling.

Of course, I had a network of RPers that I knew, they knew me, and they risked taking the time to RP with me because of our history. My southern neighbor invaded me and he was a good RPer. You're right that it matters who you 'hang out with,' so to speak.

Have you considered getting into a second group of RPers? As long as you're having fun with your existing group, keep at it. But it doesn't hurt to meet new people, try to RP in new settings with new RPers, maybe you'll find an environment that challenges you as an RPer and brings out your potential.

[The State of Monavia]

One thing many RPers fail to realize is that the art of losing earns them respect.

My Gods, I was going to link to that.

Losing a war or a fight, or taking casualties provides you a lot of opportunities, and people don't realize that.

[Snip.]

Once again I concur with many of the points you presented. The two main ideas you described are both very helpful tools for helping an RPer develop as a writer and collaborator with others.

While I concur with your assessment that there is such a thing as a global superpower in NS RP, it is true that some players cultivated NS nations that had truly outsized IC presences across much of the MT/PMT RP community. It is also true that UWO does not always keep the scope of his IC “reach” limited by regional boundaries—indeed, many players behind “lesser” NS nations try to make their marks all over the world as they can, especially if they have a history of moving between RP regions (canonical difficulties aside). This leads me to ask you another question: what does UWO consider “superpower status” within his nation’s regional context for story purposes? In other words, what does UWO want his NS nation to become in relation to its host region as a whole over the next few years?

It became very much clear to me what I wanted my nation to become in IC context back in 2014-2015 which was my first year or so in Greater Dienstad. In character, "UWO" or better referred to as the 'Ordenite Reich' is from what others in the community have said to be the sole best example and or representation of a truly fascist nation state. While I know their have been plenty before me who could just as well as I have, been labeled such(GWO, Tehraan, etc). The Ordenite Reich is a regime fighting the change of the times, i.e they are fighting against modernity at every turn at a reactionary level. Canon wise my nation state's current government has been running for over 80 years and has been able to perfect it's craft of population control at least within it's own borders(However the cracks are there, Deutsche Scythia and Caucasia which are colonial areas of my mainland claim could erupt into violence and revolution at any moment, provided the powder keg is lit). There is social Darwinism written all over it really and so to answer your question I would hope that my nation could become a nation relative to Greater Dienstad as a nation that's actions are always watched by it's neighbors, similar to the clout that surrounded Kraven for years over their dormancy and eventual return to perpetual warfare and brutality. I do not seek to be Kraven though as the IC political dynamic in the UWO is far more complex than the Kraven who simply strive to fuel their war machine.

Don't know if any of that made sense but that's how I see it.

In other words, you main goal is to develop the Ordenite Reich into a regional powerbroker that influences other countries in the region and has enough pull to make others pay attention in their IC dealings. Such a development will mean that anytime you post an RP thread, everybody else int he region will have IC reasons to get involved.

On the subject of retcons, sometimes a mutual revocation or cessation of canon is just the only plausible outcome. Sometimes two (or more) players are just incompatible with how they view or play their nations to truly exist in the same canon and not come to some "make-or-break" issue.

[Snip.]

It's not necessarily personal, it's just an inevitable result of incompatibility. It was likely the only outcome when the two differing ideologies of "Nothing serious will ever happen to my nation!" vs "Anything can happen to any nation, I only care if it's done right".
Likewise to spread the word of the retcon isn't some form of evil "gossip", "blackmail" or some plan to "ostracize" the player; it's just explaining to other members of the close RP'ing community why the retcon happened, how it might affect their canon, and why their similar philosophy is likely to conflict with said player.

...is try to divert such an event into a discussion of how the person absoluely needs to roleplay with me or they are a BAD ROLEPLAYER or something...

I've dealt with people who think that you absolutely need to cooperate [read: come to their terms] with them or else you're a BAD ROLEPLAYER who is PLAYING TO WIN!!!
What's even worse is certain individuals have openly threatened to God-mod if favorable cooperation was not met...

There's some motte-and-baileying going down here.

Because while doing the things you described is not intrinsically an asocial act, some groups of people do practice asocial variants of it.

I concede that specific incidents of the nature you just described represent legitimate cases in which retconning IC canon is not only necessary but the best available option after others have been exhausted. My concern, which Allanea appeared to be hinting at, is retcon abuse. I am not just referring to the use of retcons for asocial OOC reasons, but also the use of retcons as a deus ex machina for godmoding themselves out of a canonical corner. The archetypical example is a player whose NS nation loses a war very badly and can no longer throw its weight around like it used to in the past, so he or she retcons the war in order to avoid RPing a restrained foreign policy.

[Snip.]

You will not find me disagreeing with any of the main points of your post. If anything, I am very pleased that there are others around here who believe that good RPing need not revolve around force projection and raw martial prowess. The community mentality you alluded to probably explains why we have more guides on war than any other RP topic and why newbies spend more time on developing their armed forces to the point of their factbooks reading like storefront profiles than they do developing other aspects of the NS nations. In many respects, my own RP history seems to follow a mentality similar to yours for a number of reasons.

As much as I loved doing that myself, I haven't seen many others doing anything close to what your describing. In someways its even affected my own posts because subconsciously I know I can write in ways that are far superior to what i'm putting out, but I think I default to only writing what I need to write based on the level of perceived effort I'm getting from those in the RP with me. for example if all i'm getting is one-liners I just done have the motivation to post up a 5 page reply.

One thing that has slightly annoyed me in the past is a tendency of some players to read through a long, carefully planned post I have written to show Monavian leaders in multiple settings and respond with a much shorter post that has only one or two scenes that provide only a single dimension in response. This phenomenon becomes a bit more irritating when one RPer posts a single generic response to several other posts at once. Whenever I respond to multiple people in a single post (consolidated posting is ultimately more efficient owing to reduced scrolling), I make a point of writing an individual scene responding to each of the other posters as needed and additional material to add tot he story.

I am probably giving myself too much credit, but I have always been something of a rogue. I was very involved with the general II scene between 2003 and 2005, but in 2005 I decided to bring my focus back to me and I launched a rebellion RP. Doing so separated me, to some extent, from the players I worked with in a general setting, but I felt very much like you -- I could do better and I wanted to, so I did my own thing. This rebellion RP ended up organically developing into GD's largest RPd war to that date, and it allowed me to do exactly what Allanea describes -- I was on the defensive, so much of the world, the destruction it was facing, etc., was in my hands. I was young, so I can't claim complete realism, but it was incredibly fun -- one of my cities is basically obliterated, there are (well RPd) nuke exchanges, and it ended up being a very successful PMT war (with 2,000 tonne super tanks and massive nuclear anti-tank shaped charges, and other ridiculous, but really fun stuff when RPd for the narrative).

My point is, if I am in a situation that is less than ideal for me, I am bored, I am not challenged, I take responsibility into my own hands and I get myself to where I need to be. The II community bickered too much (it was very alliance-based at the time, a lot of ego, etc.), the likelihood of a failed RP was too high, and I decided to just do things on my own. I ended up attracting RPers to the RP, and I strengthened my community while doing so by giving other RPers an outlet for quality storytelling.

Of course, I had a network of RPers that I knew, they knew me, and they risked taking the time to RP with me because of our history. My southern neighbor invaded me and he was a good RPer. You're right that it matters who you 'hang out with,' so to speak.

Have you considered getting into a second group of RPers? As long as you're having fun with your existing group, keep at it. But it doesn't hurt to meet new people, try to RP in new settings with new RPers, maybe you'll find an environment that challenges you as an RPer and brings out your potential.

My own formative RP experience in the vein you described represented a period of extensive evolution as a writer and RPer. Just compare the 2008-vintage posts I made early in the thread to the late 2011-vintage ones at the end. I sometimes feels as if I am reading works by two different writers.

[Raven Corps]

One thing that has slightly annoyed me in the past is a tendency of some players to read through a long, carefully planned post I have written to show Monavian leaders in multiple settings and respond with a much shorter post that has only one or two scenes that provide only a single dimension in response. This phenomenon becomes a bit more irritating when one RPer posts a single generic response to several other posts at once. Whenever I respond to multiple people in a single post (consolidated posting is ultimately more efficient owing to reduced scrolling), I make a point of writing an individual scene responding to each of the other posters as needed and additional material to add tot he story.

*Nods in agreement