NS History: You've Got Questions, We've Got Answers!

[Reploid Productions]

Although it was not an eventful year (for obvious reasons), what exactly was GP's most notable event in 2002?

2002?

That it existed?

[Unibot III]

I'm interested in hearing how you think the 'americanism' and 'europeanism' affected the defender groups you mentioned? Especially considering minor update wasn't a thing at the time several of them were active.

That's just something I noticed when I was defender, so perhaps it was only relevant when I was defending but I thought it might be related to the fact that defending was born during the same year as the Iraq War. Defending seems divided in culture between a more american tactical, unilateral style and a more European professional but not as 'tactical' multilateral approach. TITO for example often feels very tactical, you've got those deep US/Pacific Rim roots. FRA was always basically British / Continental European when I was defending. UDL's grunts were often American but its commanders were often not American: Unibot (Canadian), Ravania (Belgian), Ballotonia (Dutch), Johz (British), Harmonia (Thai), Riemstagrad (Belgian) etc. Sov and Mahaj were the major spotters who were American. Solm was American. It was a real mix but I don't feel either Ravania and I (Rav took Minor, I took Major) ever encouraged a tactical / army culture in the UDL.

At the heyday of "FRUDL", minor update was for detags and spotting, major update was for liberations. The minor guys were seen as very dedicated, very efficient - a smaller, professional unit - the major guys had to get the pom-poms out to get folks to do stuff, but could organize big liberations when need be. It was much more of "carnival" atmosphere in the channel at major when a mission was afoot.

[Unibot III]

Oh, and the fifth anniversary has just passed since I was delegate of the West Pacific and Francos Spain was delegate of Nasicournia. Eat your heart out, NS History nerds.

My favourite part of that data dump was Unibot being resurrected, but it was closely followed by the premise of an "Anti-Aussie" alliance and TRR's new motto ("Where everyone knows your name and nobody cares.") I kinda think TRR should adopt that for its real WFE. And Goobs was delegate!

[Consular]

I love that motto. Way better than that latin thing you adopted more recently.

[Sedgistan]

I still have the crossed-out Crocodile Dundee flag of the No Aussies alliance somewhere on my laptop. That was back when we were testing "Associations" - they worked fine, but were basically just alternate regions, so the idea fizzled out. When that data dump screw-up happened, I remember there being some concern that Unibot would be up in arms about a staff member who will remain anonymous (but only because I've forgotten) using his name. We were pleasantly surprised (and relieved) by the reaction.

There's another "playground" version of NS these days, but with some players allowed on it, we have to behave. Somewhat. The Pacific is a delegate-less wasteland with "Region cleared by moderators. Please do not attempt to reestablish this region." in the WFE (i.e. someone tested emptying it at some point), and there's a Warzone Osiris.

[Pierconium]

I still have the crossed-out Crocodile Dundee flag of the No Aussies alliance somewhere on my laptop. That was back when we were testing "Associations" - they worked fine, but were basically just alternate regions, so the idea fizzled out. When that data dump screw-up happened, I remember there being some concern that Unibot would be up in arms about a staff member who will remain anonymous (but only because I've forgotten) using his name. We were pleasantly surprised (and relieved) by the reaction.

There's another "playground" version of NS these days, but with some players allowed on it, we have to behave. Somewhat. The Pacific is a delegate-less wasteland with "Region cleared by moderators. Please do not attempt to reestablish this region." in the WFE (i.e. someone tested emptying it at some point), and there's a Warzone Osiris.

Well, its good to know that defenderdom has somewhere that allows their unrequited dreams to be fulfilled.

[Sedgistan]

4 years of defending, followed by over 6 years of modding. At one point am I no longer a representative of "defenderdom"?

[Cerian Quilor]

Warzone Osiris? Nice.

[Unibot III]

I love that motto. Way better than that latin thing you adopted more recently.

The Latin thing means "Don't let the bastards grind you down." Which seemed appropriate.

I still have the crossed-out Crocodile Dundee flag of the No Aussies alliance somewhere on my laptop. That was back when we were testing "Associations" - they worked fine, but were basically just alternate regions, so the idea fizzled out. When that data dump screw-up happened, I remember there being some concern that Unibot would be up in arms about a staff member who will remain anonymous (but only because I've forgotten) using his name. We were pleasantly surprised (and relieved) by the reaction.

There's another "playground" version of NS these days, but with some players allowed on it, we have to behave. Somewhat. The Pacific is a delegate-less wasteland with "Region cleared by moderators. Please do not attempt to reestablish this region." in the WFE (i.e. someone tested emptying it at some point), and there's a Warzone Osiris.

Oh so it was for the Associations test! I remember when you were floating it.

And no, I got a kick out of it. The old girl found herself back in the WA again. Had me splitting my sides.

Have we established it's impossible to destroy a GCR in the test server? Or does the question remain open for the jury?

And Warzone Osiris, bahaha. That was an old nickname for it - still appropriate.

[Sedgistan]

Have we established it's impossible to destroy a GCR in the test server? Or does the question remain open for the jury?

They don't CTE at update if empty, if that's what you're asking. Same as Warzones.

[Cerian Quilor]

What *was* the Association idea, if I can ask?

[The Blaatschapen]

The difference was that we usually slept during major update

In the early days spotting was mostly done by europeans and insomniac americans though. The sane americans would spot the early invader movements and then hand over spotting to us euros up to and throughout the update. Major update (the only one which mattered) ran from ~8 am to 12 am GMT back then. Those were fun times.

@ Unibot; The connections between defenders from Belgium/Netherlands and ADN grew pretty early. Their NS worldview were rather similar.

I'm interested in hearing how you think the 'americanism' and 'europeanism' affected the defender groups you mentioned? Especially considering minor update wasn't a thing at the time several of them were active.

Well, Nederland and Belgium were part of the ALL (Belgium a bit later than NL though). And that was very close to ADN. In a way, it was ADN, but without the big politicking. Though it allowed Free4All a seat at their table

4 years of defending, followed by over 6 years of modding. At one point am I no longer a representative of "defenderdom"?

Never. You're now married to Dutch Mafia

[Sedgistan]

What *was* the Association idea, if I can ask?

viewtopic.php?p=11345473#p11345473

[Unibot III]

Have we established it's impossible to destroy a GCR in the test server? Or does the question remain open for the jury?

They don't CTE at update if empty, if that's what you're asking. Same as Warzones.

Ah! Very cool.

What *was* the Association idea, if I can ask?

viewtopic.php?f=15&t=276700

The mods already had tested what was being proposed, see Sedge's post at the bottom.

---

I do have a bit of a mystery for NS History geeks. I found a really quite lovely piece by Sarda for the Meritocratic Times on the Rise of the NPO. [1] [2] but the dates have me screwed up. My intial thought was that Sarda's article must have been in one of the "missing" issues (my guess was #5.)

Missing Issues -

#5
#10
#11
#13
#14
#15

(If anyone has any copies of the missing issues, forward them and I'll put them in the index of recovered Meritocratic Times issues.)

However, Sarda's article predates the first issue which has me scratching my head. The Meritocracy Times Issue #1 was written at the beginning of Unlimited's delegacy but in Sarda's article it's clear he's writing from before Francos Spain's departure. The other thing that is confusing is Sarda says he's no longer the editor of the Meritocracy Times by July 2004 - but he was the editor for the first three issues of the Meritocracy Times that have been archived. My guess is that previous to it's issue format, the Meritocracy Times published individual articles on subjects. If that's the case, I'd love to see if the articles could be found! The sources for the Meritocracy are quite limited: the Max Barry interview had to be recovered by Winni especially by request.

[Canton Empire]

What is TRR's motto?

[Mallorea and Riva]

What is TRR's motto?

Illegitimi non carborundum

[Unibot III]

What is TRR's motto?

Illegitimi non carborundum

English translation: "Don't let the bastards grind you down."

It's an old army phrase that was adopted by the Regional Assembly after a public consultation. Pretty sure us rejects just like the fact the motto spells out something naughty in latin. *chuckles*

[Canton Empire]

Illegitimi non carborundum

English translation: "Don't let the bastards grind you down."

It's an old army phrase that was adopted by the Regional Assembly after a public consultation. Pretty sure us rejects just like the fact the motto spells out something naughty in latin. *chuckles*

Ahh, very good motto

[Pierconium]

They don't CTE at update if empty, if that's what you're asking. Same as Warzones.

Ah! Very cool.

What *was* the Association idea, if I can ask?

viewtopic.php?f=15&t=276700

The mods already had tested what was being proposed, see Sedge's post at the bottom.

---

I do have a bit of a mystery for NS History geeks. I found a really quite lovely piece by Sarda for the Meritocratic Times on the Rise of the NPO. [1] [2] but the dates have me screwed up. My intial thought was that Sarda's article must have been in one of the "missing" issues (my guess was #5.)

Missing Issues -

#5
#10
#11
#13
#14
#15

(If anyone has any copies of the missing issues, forward them and I'll put them in the index of recovered Meritocratic Times issues.)

However, Sarda's article predates the first issue which has me scratching my head. The Meritocracy Times Issue #1 was written at the beginning of Unlimited's delegacy but in Sarda's article it's clear he's writing from before Francos Spain's departure. The other thing that is confusing is Sarda says he's no longer the editor of the Meritocracy Times by July 2004 - but he was the editor for the first three issues of the Meritocracy Times that have been archived. My guess is that previous to it's issue format, the Meritocracy Times published individual articles on subjects. If that's the case, I'd love to see if the articles could be found! The sources for the Meritocracy are quite limited: the Max Barry interview had to be recovered by Winni especially by request.

I believe your dating problem stems from a possibly incorrect assumption regarding the date given to you by Winnipeg. He provided you with a copy of the Times from the nosync forum but that was not the original Meritocracy server. Several threads were copied from the original jink boards over to the new server.

I'm not sure about the numeric ordering of the issues. It is possible that the Times restarted its internal numbering with each new iteration of the government. Perhaps the early post is from the Charter and the later from the Accords? Not sure.

Regarding Sarda serving as editor, I believe he was elected Aedile on multiple occasions so his tenure would have been choppy (as the editorship came with the office).

[Drop Your Pants]

At the heyday of "FRUDL", minor update was for detags and spotting, major update was for liberations. The minor guys were seen as very dedicated, very efficient - a smaller, professional unit - the major guys had to get the pom-poms out to get folks to do stuff, but could organize big liberations when need be. It was much more of "carnival" atmosphere in the channel at major when a mission was afoot.

Raiders rarely came out to play at minor so we had to find something to do. Rae's lists kept most of the european defenders interested.

4 years of defending, followed by over 6 years of modding. At one point am I no longer a representative of "defenderdom"?

When no one remains that remembers your noob antics in COFR possibly

[Pierconium]

4 years of defending, followed by over 6 years of modding. At one point am I no longer a representative of "defenderdom"?

When no one remains that remembers your noob antics in COFR possibly

I just see it as defenderism by association.

Also, I'm guessing the Pacific on the test server was made as described by others from the mod team outside of Sedge. I wasn't necessarily speaking about him directly.

[Drop Your Pants]

Also, I'm guessing the Pacific on the test server was made as described by others from the mod team outside of Sedge. I wasn't necessarily speaking about him directly.

When in doubt, blame Sedge.

[Unibot III]

I believe your dating problem stems from a possibly incorrect assumption regarding the date given to you by Winnipeg. He provided you with a copy of the Times from the nosync forum but that was not the original Meritocracy server. Several threads were copied from the original jink boards over to the new server.

That would make sense, but the timing of the Issue #1 given (Aug 2004) matches the subject matter (the beginning of Unlimited's term.) Anyways, it's not a huge matter, just figured I would put the question out there.

[Luna Amore]

Also, I'm guessing the Pacific on the test server was made as described by others from the mod team outside of Sedge. I wasn't necessarily speaking about him directly.

When in doubt, blame Sedge.

The very words I live by.

[Canton Empire]

Who were the first mods?