The World Cup Discussion Thread (OOC, Version IV)

[Legalese]

I carried out the testing, so feel free to ask me questions regarding how we reached this conclusion.

How did you reach this conclusion?

Seconding this. Especially given the circumstances, the decision to apply a significant penalty beyond what had been envisioned, as well as the implication that it's not just an allegation related to the World Cup itself warrants some more detail.

[Warkus]

With perhaps the worst OOC timing possible, Warkus will be looking for a new manager after the qualifiers. Looking for managers with either national team experience or club experience (If ranked outside the top 100, then ideally they improved their national team. If ranked inside the top 100, then they can be downwardly mobile or 'meh'.)

If interested, please TG me or DM me on Discord if interested with a name, brief bio, previous history and any other preferences you have. I'm fine adjusting tactics and the like if you want to offer me a defensively-minded manager, for example.

[Farfadillis]

My bad for fielding questions on Discord and only recapping now. This is exhausting to recap so I might be a little too brief, just ask me to expand upon anything you're curious about.

Basically, I looked at small details in Tikariot's RPs, ran them through a couple AI detectors. Some of them, despite being unreliable, were pointing towards something bad going on. Some of the small details I'd looked were also very much not encouraging. I ended up settling on just singing for a free trial of Pangram, an AI detector that is well-known for being both good and focusing on having a considerably higher false negative rate than false positive rate (ie one that would be generous to Tikariot). Right around this time Para correctly pointed out it could be a good idea to check whether Pyazhnaya's RPs had been compromised. This had somewhow not occurred to me at all. Thanks Para.

I devised a ton of tests to a point where it's honestly kind of interesting just how badly they turned out. I grabbed samples of RPs at random, samples of RPs from World Cup 80 (ie pre-AI), samples of RPs from RPers I considered to be at least somewhat similar to Tikarior, samples of RPers I suspected of maybe using AI, samples of my own RPs, samples of high-quality RPs. I also tried a few AI-translated RPs and crafted a specific AI-aided RP (it was far from heavily AI-aided, and I bridged the gap between my own writing and the AI writing). I ran all of these things through Pangram and every single time the only way any RP would not come back as confidently 100% Human was if Tikariot/Pyazhnaya was the author. Pangram has a feature where it graphs which parts are more or less AI. I also combined Tikariot's RPs with RPs that could not be AI-written (think World Cup 80 RPs, for example) and invariably Pangram picked out Tikariot's RP as the one part that was AI-written. Even when the RPs were interspersed, Pangram didn't really like it unless Tikariot's relative presence in a certain chunk of text was fairly low. I could be forgetting some more of the evidence. I went over the process on Discord, in case anyone's curious, but I think what I've outlined already more than warrants the exceptionally harsh penalties applied.

Regarding the other tournaments, I also tried some RPs from past CRs and the last WBC. If I recall correctly, out of all of what I tried, the only RPs that didn't come back as fully 100% AI were Pyazhnaya's first, second, third and fourth (0%, 0%, very high%, extremely high% respectively) and Tik's WBC RP, which came back at about 60% and was apparently basically half human-written and then finished by an AI, according to Pangram. Pyazhnaya's third and fourth RPs followed the same pattern, if memory serves.

I was honestly glad literally no other RPer had Pangram questioning them in the slightest, if I'm honest. I don't think these results can be explained away by claiming one's writing is quirkily and exceptionally aligned with AI writing. False positives exist but actively imitating AI consistently is an extraordinarily hard endeavor. It doesn't really come down to writing "drab" or "meh" RPs, as some on the server seemed to think. It comes down to subtler stuff. One, two, maybe three false positives (and not at 100%, with high confidence every time) would've been something worth thinking thoroughly about. But as the tests came back so resoundingly positive we took the liberty to pull the figurative trigger much sooner than we thought we would have to.

I think this whole... thing... has been very regrettable, and I understand there's a possibility some among you (although based on the server's reaction so far these "some" would be an apparent vanishing minority) might find the evidence here not conclusive. The only answer I have to anyone not convinced is that we're the hosts and, at the end of the day, this was our very carefully deliberated decision. I'm sorry if you disagree with it, but it is what it is.

[Sel Appa]

My bad for fielding questions on Discord and only recapping now. This is exhausting to recap so I might be a little too brief, just ask me to expand upon anything you're curious about.

Basically, I looked at small details in Tikariot's RPs, ran them through a couple AI detectors. Some of them, despite being unreliable, were pointing towards something bad going on. Some of the small details I'd looked were also very much not encouraging. I ended up settling on just singing for a free trial of Pangram, an AI detector that is well-known for being both good and focusing on having a considerably higher false negative rate than false positive rate (ie one that would be generous to Tikariot). Right around this time Para correctly pointed out it could be a good idea to check whether Pyazhnaya's RPs had been compromised. This had somewhow not occurred to me at all. Thanks Para.

I devised a ton of tests to a point where it's honestly kind of interesting just how badly they turned out. I grabbed samples of RPs at random, samples of RPs from World Cup 80 (ie pre-AI), samples of RPs from RPers I considered to be at least somewhat similar to Tikarior, samples of RPers I suspected of maybe using AI, samples of my own RPs, samples of high-quality RPs. I also tried a few AI-translated RPs and crafted a specific AI-aided RP (it was far from heavily AI-aided, and I bridged the gap between my own writing and the AI writing). I ran all of these things through Pangram and every single time the only way any RP would not come back as confidently 100% Human was if Tikariot/Pyazhnaya was the author. Pangram has a feature where it graphs which parts are more or less AI. I also combined Tikariot's RPs with RPs that could not be AI-written (think World Cup 80 RPs, for example) and invariably Pangram picked out Tikariot's RP as the one part that was AI-written. Even when the RPs were interspersed, Pangram didn't really like it unless Tikariot's relative presence in a certain chunk of text was fairly low. I could be forgetting some more of the evidence. I went over the process on Discord, in case anyone's curious, but I think what I've outlined already more than warrants the exceptionally harsh penalties applied.

Regarding the other tournaments, I also tried some RPs from past CRs and the last WBC. If I recall correctly, out of all of what I tried, the only RPs that didn't come back as fully 100% AI were Pyazhnaya's first, second, third and fourth (0%, 0%, very high%, extremely high% respectively) and Tik's WBC RP, which came back at about 60% and was apparently basically half human-written and then finished by an AI, according to Pangram. Pyazhnaya's third and fourth RPs followed the same pattern, if memory serves.

I was honestly glad literally no other RPer had Pangram questioning them in the slightest, if I'm honest. I don't think these results can be explained away by claiming one's writing is quirkily and exceptionally aligned with AI writing. False positives exist but actively imitating AI consistently is an extraordinarily hard endeavor. It doesn't really come down to writing "drab" or "meh" RPs, as some on the server seemed to think. It comes down to subtler stuff. One, two, maybe three false positives (and not at 100%, with high confidence every time) would've been something worth thinking thoroughly about. But as the tests came back so resoundingly positive we took the liberty to pull the figurative trigger much sooner than we thought we would have to.

I think this whole... thing... has been very regrettable, and I understand there's a possibility some among you (although based on the server's reaction so far these "some" would be an apparent vanishing minority) might find the evidence here not conclusive. The only answer I have to anyone not convinced is that we're the hosts and, at the end of the day, this was our very carefully deliberated decision. I'm sorry if you disagree with it, but it is what it is.

Having just read thru the discord instead of slamming out an RP, I can endorse this as a sufficiently faithful depiction.

[Legalese]

snip

Thanks for elaborating/bringing us up to speed! I don't have any questions.

[Farfadillis]

Announcement: tomorrow's cut-off will be handled entirely by our lovely, neighborly, tortured-by-yours-truly co-host Paradystopia. Entirely. Groups 9-16 are his problem now. Also, his cut-off will likely happen later than usual, but that's still way earlier than my cut-offs, so participants in Groups 9 through 16 should really bear that in mind. Also, we're aware the forums have been acting up. If they keep at it, scorination could be pushed back a day, but for now work off the assumption that that's not going to be the case.

[Alasdair I Frosticus]

I, erm... wow.

I was coming in to Sports to tidy up an RP I'd been planning on naturalist David Atenboro [sic] observing footballing shoggoths in their natural habitat, and...; well, initially I thought my qualifying group had just been formatted badly.

Now I think I need to completely rework what I was going to write, and save David Atenboro for later. And I'm not quite sure how I'm going to do it yet; somehow I feel I need to explain this in RP terms. But how?

Ah; typing this, and I think I might have just found some inspiration.

[Paradystopia]

Announcement: tomorrow's cut-off will be handled entirely by our lovely, neighborly, tortured-by-yours-truly co-host Paradystopia.

"Yes boss ... Sure thing boss ..."

---

In all seriousness, I agreed to such things.

To re-iterate from a post on the discord, due to my own RL commitments, the final qualification cut-off window will be later than my usual time, and whilst I cannot accurately say how much later, my current estimate is at some point 22:00 - 23:00 UTC.

It may possibly be later than this and I will do my best to keep everyone updated should it differ wildly from the time stated here.

[The Kytler Peninsulae]

Obviously, as both the WCC President and an IC neighbour of Tikariot who rode this connection to multiple co-hosting jobs, this has been a pretty wild development.

My immediate reaction was... probably disbelief? But I also knew that Tik was big on the technology as a whole - obviously using them for images in NSS and also for text in the day job - and so the idea that he might have at least explored what machine-generated RP could look like, perhaps mixing in prompted filler text around his own writing, felt at least plausible. And it was precisely because of his broader boosterism that I was, quite honestly, starting to OOCly feel awkward about the extent to which I'd become ICly entangled with him, and by extension OOCly too given my tendency to care about geographic IC detail such as hosting tournaments with IC neighbours. Subconsciously, it was as if I was prepared for something to give, and here it is - and, by sheer coincidence, timed exactly as I gained another IC near-neighbour with Chromatika's move.

The TLDR of Farf's case is that it feels devastatingly undeniable; the multi-cycle, multi-competition evidence plus the lack of false negatives from the kind of RPs that I might have anticipated triggering them are both particularly eye-opening details. I cannot disapprove of the actions Farf/Para have made in light of the strength of their prosecution case, but beyond that, from an OOC/WCC perspective, I am not entirely sure what to do; a WCC vote along the lines of Vilitagate is possible, given that it would produce an outcome driven by community rather than individual judgment, but this is not locked in yet and time is not of the essence here. ICly, this could very plausibly trigger me abandoning The Kytler Peninsulae and rolling out a new main nation as early as WC102 - my potential IC narratives for this absolutely include an(other) isolationist spiral of the kind I've effectively left wide open for whenever I got disillusioned with NS and/or this specific nation, but I didn't expect a catalyst like this.

But I'm absolutely nervous about making hasty decisions, and if it sounds like I'm emotionally bewildered by this and more inclined to focus on the relative escapism of IC implications than to dare make Official Judgments in my administrative role... that's because I am!

[The Archregimancy]

Just posting briefly over the Tikariot matter with my mod hat on...

It's my informal opinion as a long-time NSWC participant that this is most likely not a moderation issue, and is solely an internal tournament governance issue. Extensive use of AI to support RP does not appear to be actionable under site rules - though it may well be considered poor etiquette - and the only sanctions available, should sanctions be considered desirable, are those which the NSWC community may choose to apply under its own rules (where the latter aren't superseded by broader site rules).

BUT ... and this is a big but ... should the community as a whole decide to ask for a more formal moderation ruling on this - and it's important to stress that the community is under no obligation to abide by my informal opinion offered above - then I have to recuse myself completely. My RP nation has only qualified directly for World Cup 101 because of the disqualification of Tikariot. As such, it would be completely inappropriate for me to be involved in any moderation capacity to rule for or against Tikariot or the actions of the community on this issue; it's an obvious conflict of interest.

[Sel Appa]

Whatever happens, I dont think there is any rush. Perhaps it might be best to wait until the cycle ends to take an action. Theyve already been provisionally disqualified from the tournament. Any retroactive action need not be done with any haste.

[Farfadillis]

I think the easiest (or, well, most frictionless) solution is for Tik to own up to what he did, apologize, never do it again, and for all of us to move forward. He'll obviously have a really careful eye placed on his RPing going forward, and another instance of this should be taken to be a very grave offense. That said, I do think it might warrant reframing his recent performances in some competitions. As co-caretake of the SRS+ rankings, I'm heavily leaning towards excluding his performances in WCs 96 through 100 from his SRS+ points (apart from the points accrued from hosting, which I see no reason to exclude; plus possibly the extra point for qualifying via hosting), since WC 96 is as far back as I've bothered to check enough to find strong signs of AI use.

But my central point, SRS+ business aside, is that I think it's best to hand out harsh but present punishments (as well as retroactive 'fixes', whatever those may be), as opposed to something that would make it prohibitive for Tik to rejoin the community in the future. And yes, I realize the irony in saying this as one of the hosts that thought it was best to disqualify him from the current World Cup.

[Liventia]

I'm surprised to read of the allegations but I think the evidence, especially that no other samples from others pinged the various checks, does lean towards proof on the balance of probabilities. I don't think it needs to go anywhere towards how Vilitagate was resolved. That was a very specific set of circumstances relating to puppetry.

All I want to add is Tikariot has asked the (Discord) community for personal help before when they were struggling with issues IRL and we were there for them, and I hope people continue to be there for them if necessary rather than look at this and decide not to help if they require it in the future.

[Audioslavia]

With the league phase of qualifying over, here are your Post-Qualifying rankings for the midway point of cycle 101. Let us know if you see any errors.

 Cycle 101 Post Qualifying           |KPB-----
  1┇SQUORNSHELOUS                   32.94
  2┇SAINT ELEANOR                   30.72
  3┇VALANORA                        28.20
  4┇FLAVOVESPIA                     27.26
  5┇TANIRINTHIA                     26.38
  6┇APHRILIA                        25.68
  7┇AUDIOSLAVIA                     24.86
  8┇KWRPANIA                        23.44
  9┇THE KYTLER PENINSULAE           22.30
 10┇KO-OREN                         21.25
 11┇STRAYAROOS                      21.24
 12┇SIOVANIJA AND TEUSLAND          21.07
 13┇BANIJA                          21.00
 14┇EDSMONTIK                       20.94
 15┇CHROMATIKA                      20.67
 16┇BUSOGA ISLANDS                  20.26
 17┇TIKARIOT                        20.02
 18┇FARFADILLIS                     19.77
 19┇VDARA                           19.74
 20┇COMMONWEALTH OF BAKER PARK      19.58
 21┇VALENTINE Z                     19.40
 22┇KELSSEK                         18.92
 23┇KAMIJIRO                        18.55
 24┇ZENIC                           18.37
 25┇PASARGA                         18.26
 26┇KANZLIA                         17.78
 27┇REÇUEÇN                         17.58
 28┇QUSMO                           17.06
 29┇ALEIRAVE                        16.22
 30┇HUELAVIA                        16.20
 31┇PARADYSTOPIA                    16.19
 32┇JUVENCUS                        16.01
 33┇INDUSSE                         15.74
 34┇OBEROUR AR MORO                 15.38
 35┇TJUN-IA                         15.37
 36┇ESHIALAND                       15.20
 37┇KIMI-SUOMI                      15.14
 38┇CRPOSTRAN                       15.01
 39┇BOSTOPIA                        14.74
 40┇DRAWKLAND                       14.73
 41┇DARMEN                          14.32
 42┇EASTFIELD LODGE                 13.70
 43┇THE HOLY EMPIRE                 13.63
 44┇AUPRUSSIA                       13.51
 45┇ZWANGZUG                        13.45
 46┇SATERUN                         13.40
 47┇KATZEBURG                       12.99
 48┇SARZONIA                        12.78
 49┇BONUSIA                         12.27
 50┇MILCHAMA                        12.18
 51┇CAPTINA ISLAND                  12.08
 52┇THE KO-ORENITE CONSTELLATION    11.98
 53┇DHEMIXIA                        11.97
 54┇PYAZHNAYA                       11.95
 55┇THE MARTIAN INDEPENDENT REPUBLIC11.78
 56┇BIYAMBI                         11.56
 57┇SUPER EARTH                     11.44
 58┇COBRIO                          11.21
 59┇CHOPPYHAUSEN                    11.18
 60┇HANALIA                         10.73
 61┇HOT-DAMN                        10.61
 62┇SNESTAR                         10.61
 63┇NATKR                           10.53
 64┇LEGALESE                        10.52
 65┇SOLGAVDEN                       10.35
 66┇BHUMI MATAWIS EMPIRE            10.33
 67┇UNITED STATES OF NOVA CALANIA   10.30
 68┇CARDENAO                        10.26
 69┇SUDILIA                         10.05
 70┇CARPATHIA AND RUTHENIA          09.99
 71┇SOVIET KEM                      09.61
 72┇CALGASIA                        09.45
 73┇ABANHFLEFT                      09.38
 74┇WARKUS                          09.26
 75┇THE OSNARI FEDERATION           09.13
 76┇ANEWKANSAS                      08.96
 77┇SHIN-ZETSUBO                    08.96
 78┇YANGCHENIA                      08.78
 79┇GYAROMIA                        08.68
 80┇SANGTI AND THE FILINDO ISLES    08.64
 81┇AIRANNIA                        08.42
 82┇DANTOPIA                        08.31
 83┇SERNET                          08.19
 84┇THE GOLDEN HARP                 08.17
 85┇WEST VDARA                      08.03
 86┇KANDORITH                       08.03
 87┇POMACHETTI                      07.87
 88┇XANNERIA                        07.82
 89┇SEL APPA                        07.75
 90┇THE REPUBLIC OF THE UNITED MARBL07.65
 91┇STEWARTIKA                      07.58
 92┇NATANIANS AND NOSTS             07.46
 93┇MERTAGNE                        07.38
 94┇HUAYRAMARCA                     07.37
 95┇OCHRE ISLANDS                   07.34
 96┇ESTORVIPA AND ESTORPIVA         07.32
 97┇MYRTLE BEACH                    07.17
 98┇TRISTAN DE CUNHA                07.13
 99┇SEEBERG                         07.05
100┇YUEZHOU                         07.02
101┇VIXETTE                         07.01
102┇KAUMANN                         06.96
103┇HAPILOPPER                      06.94
104┇KONSTANTINO                     06.69
105┇QASDEN                          06.67
106┇HAMBORN                         06.63
106┇RIANDERA                        06.63
108┇OSTERHALTEN                     06.38
109┇MONTAGNE NOIRE                  06.32
110┇WOODSMERE                       06.27
111┇SAPERETIA                       06.15
112┇NEW MONTREAL STATES             06.13
113┇GNEJS                           06.12
114┇KORDAVIA                        06.08
115┇UNITED ADAIKES                  05.89
116┇SARGOSSA                        05.84
117┇MIDDLE ALBA                     05.67
118┇GWARKOS                         05.66
119┇ANDSO MANGIS                    05.63
120┇LISANDER                        05.57
121┇SAJNUR                          05.57
122┇HISPINAS                        05.54
123┇MARSONNE                        05.49
124┇WEST BARACK AND EAST OBAMA      05.42
125┇DOUBEIA                         05.42
126┇UNITED STATES OF ALPHA          05.42
127┇ATHEARA                         05.40
128┇MYTANIJA                        05.40
129┇DĒMOS                           05.32
130┇MARITAINE                       05.31
131┇TUMBRA                          05.31
132┇ERIADNI                         05.30
133┇BULL SHEET                      05.27
134┇THE NORTH POLISH UNION          05.24
135┇OLASTOR                         05.23
136┇ETHANE                          05.21
137┇BORING PARADISE                 05.21
138┇TOMERION                        05.20
139┇DELACLAVA                       05.19
140┇AAMATHYR                        05.12
141┇EQUESTRIA                       05.05
142┇BRUSSELSTEIN                    04.94
143┇VETRAHJART                      04.88
144┇SERENITAS NOVAE                 04.87
145┇AFANC STRAIT                    04.83
146┇RUSSIAN EMPIRE EHA              04.79
147┇QUAKMYBUSH                      04.78
148┇KRYTENIA                        04.73
149┇VISAYAS ISLANDS                 04.69
150┇OSCIORU                         04.54
151┇LIBEGEIST                       04.44
152┇ALANIS STAR                     04.37
153┇VIELFALTIG                      04.30
154┇BRITONISEA                      04.25
154┇MASRAYA                         04.25
156┇ANDOSSA SE MITRIN VEGA          04.22
156┇SHARKTAIL                       04.22
156┇SREDNJACI                       04.22
159┇BAGGIELAND                      04.10
160┇BHARATAMANDALA                  04.09
161┇MOLADEA                         04.03
162┇SMOLTRENDESTOF                  04.00
162┇TAESHAN                         04.00
164┇NUSANDARA                       03.98
164┇THE KAISERS SYNDICATES          03.98
166┇SOLARAMPA                       03.89
167┇EQUINOX AURATERRA               03.88
168┇FREE REPUBLICS                  03.83
169┇TRAVANTA                        03.81
169┇UNITED STATES OF DEVONTA        03.81
171┇SALTSTEAD                       03.75
172┇MYSTRIS                         03.71
173┇ZIRAHUEN                        03.70
174┇PRIDNESTROVIA                   03.70
175┇BURIKINIA                       03.61
176┇AL-TAMAZGHA                     03.58
177┇GROD ISLAND                     03.56
178┇SYLESTONE                       03.53
179┇KRONBIA                         03.46
180┇MACBON                          03.45
181┇GOUVANARCH                      03.45
182┇EUROPEASIA                      03.44
182┇KHAELU                          03.44
182┇SAINT LAZARUS                   03.44
185┇IGRATIA                         03.39
186┇KITA-HINODE                     03.38
187┇MERULLA                         03.35
188┇HINTUWAN                        03.33
189┇ARCHALIT                        03.31
190┇AJTON                           03.25
190┇COERCIA                         03.25
192┇RALSALIN                        03.21
193┇CAERBANNOG                      03.20
194┇PICHVI                          03.19
195┇GRAND EXULTIA                   03.18
196┇ILE DE RICHELIEU                03.15
197┇BALDORIUM                       03.15
197┇HIMURAJIMA                      03.15
199┇KHARAKIA                        03.11
199┇LIBESIA                         03.11
199┇MEGISTOS                        03.11
202┇GOLFO CENTRAL                   03.10
202┇NATOT                           03.10
202┇X COUNTRY                       03.10
205┇AL-MOMENTA                      03.10
205┇KENDORIA                        03.10
207┇DIXIE FLORIDA                   03.06
208┇DARKMANIA                       03.01
209┇JECKLAND                        03.00
209┇LIVENTIA                        03.00
209┇TORNADICO                       03.00
212┇VAISHNAVARIA                    02.98
213┇ORCUO                           02.96
214┇THE ELDER LANDS                 02.95
215┇COLMAIJO                        02.94
216┇ANNESTAH                        02.94
216┇NEW EASTERN ROMA                02.94
218┇EPICLY AMAZING GIRAFFES         02.93
219┇BRUINSWIK                       02.92
219┇BYTHIA                          02.92
221┇BAKHUCHISTAN                    02.89
221┇BONGO JOHNSON                   02.89
221┇NEW EASTERN CANADA              02.89
221┇SERUMPUN                        02.89
221┇WONDERING REFUGEES              02.89
226┇WEDICH                          02.88
227┇CARDONIA                        02.88
228┇GERMANIC CAT                    02.85
229┇GIRINATHA EMPIRE                02.84
230┇VALLADARES                      02.82
231┇ANONYMEGG                       02.81
231┇LIBERECKY KRAJLAND              02.81
233┇ARITRAROY                       02.79
233┇PHOENICIA                       02.79
235┇SAFILOA                         02.78
236┇CANAMN                          02.75
236┇MOON DEING                      02.75
238┇ARMERIEA                        02.73
238┇DAMUKUNI                        02.73
238┇POROTIA                         02.73
238┇SURNE                           02.73
242┇DELITAI                         02.71
243┇POAFMERSIA                      02.70
244┇DOYCHNYA                        02.68
245┇MANUELIAN EMPIRE                02.67
246┇SPACE LASER DINOSAUR ROBOT PIRAT02.66
247┇HALTORIA                        02.65
248┇LANGENIA                        02.65
249┇NEW ZHENGGUO                    02.63
249┇SINYAL                          02.63
249┇THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE      02.63
252┇LOYO                            02.62
253┇BRUSSELDORF                     02.61
254┇PUTRASIA                        02.58
255┇IMPERIAL REGNUM                 02.56
255┇KILICHLOOM                      02.56
255┇SAVOJARNA                       02.56
255┇SOUTH KERALA                    02.56
255┇THE MINIONA ISLANDS             02.56
260┇SANTIRA                         02.54
261┇TAXHAVN                         02.53
262┇UNITED HAWKLAND                 02.50
263┇ERAMAN                          02.47
264┇BEAL AN MHUIRTHEAD              02.44
264┇NATION STATES LOGIC             02.44
264┇SKORPIIE                        02.44
267┇COTHE SARIA                     02.44
268┇FRAYSTON                        02.43
269┇SOUTH NEWLANDIA                 02.42
270┇GREGO                           02.42
270┇NEW ARBUCKLE                    02.42
272┇LEBRONSLEFTNUT                  02.40
272┇MINDHART                        02.40
272┇SHIZUNA REM MISURUGI            02.40
275┇MERIS                           02.38
275┇RANORIA                         02.38
277┇SEA PEOPLES LEAGUE              02.35
278┇THE BATAVIA                     02.33
278┇ZIOTAH & RIVERSIDE              02.33
280┇ASTOGRATH                       02.31
281┇VELESTE                         02.29
282┇PACITALIA                       02.28
283┇SIC TRANSIT GLORIA URSI         02.27
284┇CASSADAIGUA                     02.25
284┇FELINETOPIA                     02.25
284┇GEEKTOPIA                       02.25
284┇HAFAMARIMËT                     02.25
284┇LIGNUNTIA                       02.25
284┇THE KNOCKOUT GUN GALS           02.25
290┇ALLAMUNNIC STATES               02.22
290┇NUEVA COMPOSTELA                02.22
292┇BAMAN AND JUKET LIBERATIONISTS  02.21
292┇CRETIAN TERRITORIES             02.21
292┇KNIGHTS OF LUSITANIA            02.21
292┇WHISPINIA                       02.21
292┇WINDOWS 7 BLISS                 02.21
297┇ESISTAN                         02.19
297┇MINOPTRA                        02.19
297┇SKYBERIUS                       02.19
297┇THE FERRET LANDS                02.19
301┇SECTOR 18                       02.15
302┇BOHR                            02.14
303┇JERUSELEM                       02.11
304┇YUUGRIA                         02.08
305┇DEMOT                           02.07
306┇SAMBUCA                         02.06
306┇TXAKHAXI                        02.06
308┇TREMOSIA                        02.04
309┇DRAFTCUBIC                      02.02
309┇SALAGAVANYA                     02.02
311┇RASPOTOCHJE                     02.00
312┇BEARS ARMED                     01.97
313┇VEK KRONAKIYA                   01.93
314┇ELMYIA                          01.90
315┇TJORL                           01.88
316┇ACAPAIS                         01.88
316┇FRANCANADA                      01.88
316┇GREATER DEUTSCHE                01.88
316┇LASSIAH                         01.88
316┇ORIENTAL OF RIO DE LA PLATA     01.88
321┇NORRHEM                         01.86
322┇ESPORTIVAN DARMEN               01.86
323┇AETHELIA                        01.85
323┇BURG LAND                       01.85
325┇THE AUGUST ISLANDS              01.85
326┇BEHH                            01.83
326┇SALAGALU                        01.83
328┇THE ENQAB ARCHIPELAGO LABORATORI01.80
329┇PAKHOMIYA                       01.75
330┇PATRIOTLANDIA                   01.73
331┇EFNAKIA                         01.69
331┇NETHERTOPIA                     01.69
331┇RIZZMAN EMPIRE                  01.69
331┇THE DEMOCRATIC UNIONIST COOL KID01.69
335┇BRIGANTII                       01.67
335┇DIOLLO                          01.67
337┇JAOAA                           01.65
337┇KONKERT                         01.65
339┇DENYSSIA                        01.63
340┇NIEUWELAND                      01.60
341┇LIMEY GEORGE                    01.57
342┇FHULGHAMOUS PENINSULA           01.55
343┇INDO-ATHENA                     01.50
343┇LIBONESIA                       01.50
343┇NERGTUL                         01.50
343┇PAPIV NAPPON                    01.50
347┇KHACHEN                         01.48
348┇NOVA DACKIANS                   01.46
349┇NEW FERNIA                      01.44
350┇LEGENDENEX                      01.43
351┇ZALINIVIA                       01.42
352┇NEW-ADDLEBRAND                  01.40
353┇THREE GOLDEN KINGDOMS           01.39
354┇NEW CRYWYZYXYCYNYA              01.33
355┇AVOTE                           01.31
355┇KARMOSORA                       01.31
357┇CHEMICALA                       01.27
358┇THE 14 STARS                    01.26
359┇GOPNIKEA                        01.22
360┇ABAHAMBA                        01.21
361┇AMERICAN GENERATIONS            01.21
361┇UNITARNIA                       01.21
363┇OSARIUS                         01.18
364┇ADYATIN                         01.14
364┇FORT MCKINLEY                   01.14
364┇KARST SOCIALIST REPUBLIC        01.14
364┇OONTAZ                          01.14
368┇VERY TOTALLY FREE               01.13
369┇GREATER PORTUGALIZA             01.10
369┇SIBERSKY                        01.10
371┇ORIONI                          01.08
372┇COMMUNIST NORMANDY AND BRITTANY 01.07
372┇NEW ROTTERDAM CITY              01.07
374┇NAROVI                          01.00
375┇THAELORIA                       00.98
376┇CONCORDIA                       00.95
377┇LAS SAS LAS                     00.86
378┇CERULEAN ISLES                  00.82
378┇YESOPALITHA                     00.82
380┇ONLY SIX WORDS                  00.75
380┇PAPO-IRIYA                      00.75
382┇PULANG                          00.72
383┇INDEPENDENT ATHLETES FROM QUEBEC00.71
384┇NOTCOMMUNIST3                   00.67
384┇NPU                             00.67
386┇OMERICA                         00.66
387┇APALATCI                        00.57
387┇EBERLAND                        00.57
387┇QUEBEC                          00.57
387┇ROBOSTANIA                      00.57
387┇SANFORD                         00.57
387┇THE LICENTIAN ISLES             00.57
387┇THE POLLO                       00.57
394┇ELECTRUM                        00.56
394┇SHIVERIAN REPUBLICS             00.56
396┇SADAME                          00.56
397┇SOUTHERN PALM ISLANDS           00.53
398┇GATCHINGERRAK UNION             00.50
398┇INDEPENDENT ATHLETES FROM FILIS-00.50
398┇MAPHIDON                        00.50
401┇FRANCOBALKAN PENINSULA          00.44
401┇TEVUEKK                         00.44
403┇THE DOCÚVNIJA ISLANDS           00.44
404┇CASTOLO AND MINANDA             00.43
404┇XUOIS                           00.43
404┇YUZHNYA                         00.43
407┇NEXXUS DRAKO                    00.33
407┇SAGOTRA                         00.33
407┇SAO DOMINGGO                    00.33
407┇TANAH HIJAU                     00.33
407┇UNITED ARABIAN EMIRATE          00.33
407┇WENTZVILLE                      00.33
413┇ADAB                            00.31
413┇CHOBOTAN                        00.31
415┇A VARIABLE NUMBER OF KNIGHTS WHO00.29
415┇CRANSIA                         00.29
415┇ERROROPOLISISH PARADYSTOPIA     00.29
415┇GUCCI REPUBLIC                  00.29
415┇NEOPOLITAN CENTRAL REPUBLIC     00.29
415┇NYOWANI KITARA                  00.29
415┇SAINTLAND                       00.29
415┇SHURE REPUBLIC                  00.29
415┇XINHUA                          00.29
424┇LOZHO                           00.28
425┇DARWIZZYUNIVERSE                00.25
425┇JIRINHO                         00.25
425┇LAWANG DARUL ARIF               00.25
425┇MURALOS                         00.25
429┇MELBERGIA                       00.22
429┇REPUBLICANLAND                  00.22
431┇ALIXE                           00.17
431┇CAPITULISTS                     00.17
431┇HAZARDIA                        00.17
431┇KIJANG MAS                      00.17
435┇ACLAN                           00.13
435┇BEEFSTEAK CITY                  00.13
435┇REA SAN VEGAS                   00.13
438┇HENRIK P                        00.11
438┇SHEP                            00.11
440┇INGONT                          00.06
441┇THE UNITED QUEENDOM             00.06
442┇ACADIANA                        00.00
442┇AURELITHARION                   00.00
442┇FRJÁLSHÖFN                      00.00
442┇MALALAIME                       00.00
442┇PHILIPPINE ISLANDS AND FORMOSA  00.00
442┇POLKOPIA                        00.00
442┇PROTECTORIA                     00.00
442┇SASSADEGNA                      00.00
442┇SIXTY-NINE X                    00.00
442┇STRAYAROOS BARRIER ISLANDS      00.00
442┇THE GREARISH UNION              00.00
442┇TRIUMVIRATUS                    00.00

Find/Replace
Baker Park --> Commonwealth of Baker Park
Squornshelan Remnant States --> Squornshelous
Republic of the United Marble Tribes --> The Republic of the United Marble Tribes
Beal an Mhuirthread --> Beal an Mhuirthead
The Afanc Strait --> Afanc Strait

[Warkus]

On the technical front, I find Farf’s case very compelling. I mentioned this on the Discord, but I work in a university department with a number of AI and AI-adjacent researchers and have personally interacted with some influential figures who work for a leading AI company. There is a broad consensus among both groups that Pangram is the leading AI plagiarism detection software and that at the very least its current model has an astronomically low false positive rate. #NotAnAd. For what it’s worth, I don’t use Pangram in my own teaching because doing so would violate university policy and regardless there are ethical issues with handing student work to third parties.

On the OOC/WCC punishment front, I think it would be best to investigate their RPs in other competitions before considering any kind of retrospective punishment. I can already confirm that Pyazhnaya RP’s in CAFA Cup 12, which I hosted (They did not RP in the 13th edition), are among the AI-generated RPs. I did not clock this at the time, although I also did not think their RPs were very good and was perhaps too credulous in assuming they were the product of writing under time constraints plus a tendency to mimic some of the bad tendencies in AI-generated writing due to the user’s stated experience of working with AI. It looks like Pyazhnaya’s performance in that competition did not contribute to their KPB+ rank and non-WCC competitions, including regional tournaments, can presumably make their own independent decisions about this regardless of what the WCC decides.

This is unlike most other NSS plagiarism cases: Tikariot is a respected member of the community who knows better and they’ve violated rules made explicit by the hosts in multiple competitions – rules they have enforced themselves when hosting. That being said, I’m wary of doing anything more than enforcing the existing rules (and retrospectively doing so in the case of previous tournaments where Tikariot’s plagiarism flew under the radar). Not to dredge up ancient history, but back in the early 2010s Burchadinger was caught plagiarising by lightly editing RL news articles, admitted their wrongdoing and then got caught plagiarising again. They were penalised in the competitions they wrote plagiarised RPs for but, as far as I recall, were allowed back into the community even after getting caught the second time. The cases are still different in some important respects: Burchadinger was a child, English was their second language, they were still relatively new etc. But still, I think that precedent should count for something.

It might be a good idea for future hosts to look into more proactive ways to address AI plagiarism. One idea might be to reserve the right, if you suspect a user is engaging in AI plagiarism, to ask them to submit future RPs in the form of a shared Google Doc so you can check the version history. Though considering it's relatively easy to emulate iterative authorship that might not be a feasible solution.

[The Sernetian Empire]

With the league phase of qualifying over, here are your Post-Qualifying rankings for the midway point of cycle 101. Let us know if you see any errors.

 Cycle 101 Post Qualifying           |KPB-----
  1┇SQUORNSHELOUS                   32.94
  2┇SAINT ELEANOR                   30.72
  3┇VALANORA                        28.20
  4┇FLAVOVESPIA                     27.26
  5┇TANIRINTHIA                     26.38
  6┇APHRILIA                        25.68
  7┇AUDIOSLAVIA                     24.86
  8┇KWRPANIA                        23.44
  9┇THE KYTLER PENINSULAE           22.30
 10┇KO-OREN                         21.25
 11┇STRAYAROOS                      21.24
 12┇SIOVANIJA AND TEUSLAND          21.07
 13┇BANIJA                          21.00
 14┇EDSMONTIK                       20.94
 15┇CHROMATIKA                      20.67
 16┇BUSOGA ISLANDS                  20.26
 17┇TIKARIOT                        20.02
 18┇FARFADILLIS                     19.77
 19┇VDARA                           19.74
 20┇COMMONWEALTH OF BAKER PARK      19.58
 21┇VALENTINE Z                     19.40
 22┇KELSSEK                         18.92
 23┇KAMIJIRO                        18.55
 24┇ZENIC                           18.37
 25┇PASARGA                         18.26
 26┇KANZLIA                         17.78
 27┇REÇUEÇN                         17.58
 28┇QUSMO                           17.06
 29┇ALEIRAVE                        16.22
 30┇HUELAVIA                        16.20
 31┇PARADYSTOPIA                    16.19
 32┇JUVENCUS                        16.01
 33┇INDUSSE                         15.74
 34┇OBEROUR AR MORO                 15.38
 35┇TJUN-IA                         15.37
 36┇ESHIALAND                       15.20
 37┇KIMI-SUOMI                      15.14
 38┇CRPOSTRAN                       15.01
 39┇BOSTOPIA                        14.74
 40┇DRAWKLAND                       14.73
 41┇DARMEN                          14.32
 42┇EASTFIELD LODGE                 13.70
 43┇THE HOLY EMPIRE                 13.63
 44┇AUPRUSSIA                       13.51
 45┇ZWANGZUG                        13.45
 46┇SATERUN                         13.40
 47┇KATZEBURG                       12.99
 48┇SARZONIA                        12.78
 49┇BONUSIA                         12.27
 50┇MILCHAMA                        12.18
 51┇CAPTINA ISLAND                  12.08
 52┇THE KO-ORENITE CONSTELLATION    11.98
 53┇DHEMIXIA                        11.97
 54┇PYAZHNAYA                       11.95
 55┇THE MARTIAN INDEPENDENT REPUBLIC11.78
 56┇BIYAMBI                         11.56
 57┇SUPER EARTH                     11.44
 58┇COBRIO                          11.21
 59┇CHOPPYHAUSEN                    11.18
 60┇HANALIA                         10.73
 61┇HOT-DAMN                        10.61
 62┇SNESTAR                         10.61
 63┇NATKR                           10.53
 64┇LEGALESE                        10.52
 65┇SOLGAVDEN                       10.35
 66┇BHUMI MATAWIS EMPIRE            10.33
 67┇UNITED STATES OF NOVA CALANIA   10.30
 68┇CARDENAO                        10.26
 69┇SUDILIA                         10.05
 70┇CARPATHIA AND RUTHENIA          09.99
 71┇SOVIET KEM                      09.61
 72┇CALGASIA                        09.45
 73┇ABANHFLEFT                      09.38
 74┇WARKUS                          09.26
 75┇THE OSNARI FEDERATION           09.13
 76┇ANEWKANSAS                      08.96
 77┇SHIN-ZETSUBO                    08.96
 78┇YANGCHENIA                      08.78
 79┇GYAROMIA                        08.68
 80┇SANGTI AND THE FILINDO ISLES    08.64
 81┇AIRANNIA                        08.42
 82┇DANTOPIA                        08.31
 83┇SERNET                          08.19
 84┇THE GOLDEN HARP                 08.17
 85┇WEST VDARA                      08.03
 86┇KANDORITH                       08.03
 87┇POMACHETTI                      07.87
 88┇XANNERIA                        07.82
 89┇SEL APPA                        07.75
 90┇THE REPUBLIC OF THE UNITED MARBL07.65
 91┇STEWARTIKA                      07.58
 92┇NATANIANS AND NOSTS             07.46
 93┇MERTAGNE                        07.38
 94┇HUAYRAMARCA                     07.37
 95┇OCHRE ISLANDS                   07.34
 96┇ESTORVIPA AND ESTORPIVA         07.32
 97┇MYRTLE BEACH                    07.17
 98┇TRISTAN DE CUNHA                07.13
 99┇SEEBERG                         07.05
100┇YUEZHOU                         07.02
101┇VIXETTE                         07.01
102┇KAUMANN                         06.96
103┇HAPILOPPER                      06.94
104┇KONSTANTINO                     06.69
105┇QASDEN                          06.67
106┇HAMBORN                         06.63
106┇RIANDERA                        06.63
108┇OSTERHALTEN                     06.38
109┇MONTAGNE NOIRE                  06.32
110┇WOODSMERE                       06.27
111┇SAPERETIA                       06.15
112┇NEW MONTREAL STATES             06.13
113┇GNEJS                           06.12
114┇KORDAVIA                        06.08
115┇UNITED ADAIKES                  05.89
116┇SARGOSSA                        05.84
117┇MIDDLE ALBA                     05.67
118┇GWARKOS                         05.66
119┇ANDSO MANGIS                    05.63
120┇LISANDER                        05.57
121┇SAJNUR                          05.57
122┇HISPINAS                        05.54
123┇MARSONNE                        05.49
124┇WEST BARACK AND EAST OBAMA      05.42
125┇DOUBEIA                         05.42
126┇UNITED STATES OF ALPHA          05.42
127┇ATHEARA                         05.40
128┇MYTANIJA                        05.40
129┇DĒMOS                           05.32
130┇MARITAINE                       05.31
131┇TUMBRA                          05.31
132┇ERIADNI                         05.30
133┇BULL SHEET                      05.27
134┇THE NORTH POLISH UNION          05.24
135┇OLASTOR                         05.23
136┇ETHANE                          05.21
137┇BORING PARADISE                 05.21
138┇TOMERION                        05.20
139┇DELACLAVA                       05.19
140┇AAMATHYR                        05.12
141┇EQUESTRIA                       05.05
142┇BRUSSELSTEIN                    04.94
143┇VETRAHJART                      04.88
144┇SERENITAS NOVAE                 04.87
145┇AFANC STRAIT                    04.83
146┇RUSSIAN EMPIRE EHA              04.79
147┇QUAKMYBUSH                      04.78
148┇KRYTENIA                        04.73
149┇VISAYAS ISLANDS                 04.69
150┇OSCIORU                         04.54
151┇LIBEGEIST                       04.44
152┇ALANIS STAR                     04.37
153┇VIELFALTIG                      04.30
154┇BRITONISEA                      04.25
154┇MASRAYA                         04.25
156┇ANDOSSA SE MITRIN VEGA          04.22
156┇SHARKTAIL                       04.22
156┇SREDNJACI                       04.22
159┇BAGGIELAND                      04.10
160┇BHARATAMANDALA                  04.09
161┇MOLADEA                         04.03
162┇SMOLTRENDESTOF                  04.00
162┇TAESHAN                         04.00
164┇NUSANDARA                       03.98
164┇THE KAISERS SYNDICATES          03.98
166┇SOLARAMPA                       03.89
167┇EQUINOX AURATERRA               03.88
168┇FREE REPUBLICS                  03.83
169┇TRAVANTA                        03.81
169┇UNITED STATES OF DEVONTA        03.81
171┇SALTSTEAD                       03.75
172┇MYSTRIS                         03.71
173┇ZIRAHUEN                        03.70
174┇PRIDNESTROVIA                   03.70
175┇BURIKINIA                       03.61
176┇AL-TAMAZGHA                     03.58
177┇GROD ISLAND                     03.56
178┇SYLESTONE                       03.53
179┇KRONBIA                         03.46
180┇MACBON                          03.45
181┇GOUVANARCH                      03.45
182┇EUROPEASIA                      03.44
182┇KHAELU                          03.44
182┇SAINT LAZARUS                   03.44
185┇IGRATIA                         03.39
186┇KITA-HINODE                     03.38
187┇MERULLA                         03.35
188┇HINTUWAN                        03.33
189┇ARCHALIT                        03.31
190┇AJTON                           03.25
190┇COERCIA                         03.25
192┇RALSALIN                        03.21
193┇CAERBANNOG                      03.20
194┇PICHVI                          03.19
195┇GRAND EXULTIA                   03.18
196┇ILE DE RICHELIEU                03.15
197┇BALDORIUM                       03.15
197┇HIMURAJIMA                      03.15
199┇KHARAKIA                        03.11
199┇LIBESIA                         03.11
199┇MEGISTOS                        03.11
202┇GOLFO CENTRAL                   03.10
202┇NATOT                           03.10
202┇X COUNTRY                       03.10
205┇AL-MOMENTA                      03.10
205┇KENDORIA                        03.10
207┇DIXIE FLORIDA                   03.06
208┇DARKMANIA                       03.01
209┇JECKLAND                        03.00
209┇LIVENTIA                        03.00
209┇TORNADICO                       03.00
212┇VAISHNAVARIA                    02.98
213┇ORCUO                           02.96
214┇THE ELDER LANDS                 02.95
215┇COLMAIJO                        02.94
216┇ANNESTAH                        02.94
216┇NEW EASTERN ROMA                02.94
218┇EPICLY AMAZING GIRAFFES         02.93
219┇BRUINSWIK                       02.92
219┇BYTHIA                          02.92
221┇BAKHUCHISTAN                    02.89
221┇BONGO JOHNSON                   02.89
221┇NEW EASTERN CANADA              02.89
221┇SERUMPUN                        02.89
221┇WONDERING REFUGEES              02.89
226┇WEDICH                          02.88
227┇CARDONIA                        02.88
228┇GERMANIC CAT                    02.85
229┇GIRINATHA EMPIRE                02.84
230┇VALLADARES                      02.82
231┇ANONYMEGG                       02.81
231┇LIBERECKY KRAJLAND              02.81
233┇ARITRAROY                       02.79
233┇PHOENICIA                       02.79
235┇SAFILOA                         02.78
236┇CANAMN                          02.75
236┇MOON DEING                      02.75
238┇ARMERIEA                        02.73
238┇DAMUKUNI                        02.73
238┇POROTIA                         02.73
238┇SURNE                           02.73
242┇DELITAI                         02.71
243┇POAFMERSIA                      02.70
244┇DOYCHNYA                        02.68
245┇MANUELIAN EMPIRE                02.67
246┇SPACE LASER DINOSAUR ROBOT PIRAT02.66
247┇HALTORIA                        02.65
248┇LANGENIA                        02.65
249┇NEW ZHENGGUO                    02.63
249┇SINYAL                          02.63
249┇THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE      02.63
252┇LOYO                            02.62
253┇BRUSSELDORF                     02.61
254┇PUTRASIA                        02.58
255┇IMPERIAL REGNUM                 02.56
255┇KILICHLOOM                      02.56
255┇SAVOJARNA                       02.56
255┇SOUTH KERALA                    02.56
255┇THE MINIONA ISLANDS             02.56
260┇SANTIRA                         02.54
261┇TAXHAVN                         02.53
262┇UNITED HAWKLAND                 02.50
263┇ERAMAN                          02.47
264┇BEAL AN MHUIRTHEAD              02.44
264┇NATION STATES LOGIC             02.44
264┇SKORPIIE                        02.44
267┇COTHE SARIA                     02.44
268┇FRAYSTON                        02.43
269┇SOUTH NEWLANDIA                 02.42
270┇GREGO                           02.42
270┇NEW ARBUCKLE                    02.42
272┇LEBRONSLEFTNUT                  02.40
272┇MINDHART                        02.40
272┇SHIZUNA REM MISURUGI            02.40
275┇MERIS                           02.38
275┇RANORIA                         02.38
277┇SEA PEOPLES LEAGUE              02.35
278┇THE BATAVIA                     02.33
278┇ZIOTAH & RIVERSIDE              02.33
280┇ASTOGRATH                       02.31
281┇VELESTE                         02.29
282┇PACITALIA                       02.28
283┇SIC TRANSIT GLORIA URSI         02.27
284┇CASSADAIGUA                     02.25
284┇FELINETOPIA                     02.25
284┇GEEKTOPIA                       02.25
284┇HAFAMARIMËT                     02.25
284┇LIGNUNTIA                       02.25
284┇THE KNOCKOUT GUN GALS           02.25
290┇ALLAMUNNIC STATES               02.22
290┇NUEVA COMPOSTELA                02.22
292┇BAMAN AND JUKET LIBERATIONISTS  02.21
292┇CRETIAN TERRITORIES             02.21
292┇KNIGHTS OF LUSITANIA            02.21
292┇WHISPINIA                       02.21
292┇WINDOWS 7 BLISS                 02.21
297┇ESISTAN                         02.19
297┇MINOPTRA                        02.19
297┇SKYBERIUS                       02.19
297┇THE FERRET LANDS                02.19
301┇SECTOR 18                       02.15
302┇BOHR                            02.14
303┇JERUSELEM                       02.11
304┇YUUGRIA                         02.08
305┇DEMOT                           02.07
306┇SAMBUCA                         02.06
306┇TXAKHAXI                        02.06
308┇TREMOSIA                        02.04
309┇DRAFTCUBIC                      02.02
309┇SALAGAVANYA                     02.02
311┇RASPOTOCHJE                     02.00
312┇BEARS ARMED                     01.97
313┇VEK KRONAKIYA                   01.93
314┇ELMYIA                          01.90
315┇TJORL                           01.88
316┇ACAPAIS                         01.88
316┇FRANCANADA                      01.88
316┇GREATER DEUTSCHE                01.88
316┇LASSIAH                         01.88
316┇ORIENTAL OF RIO DE LA PLATA     01.88
321┇NORRHEM                         01.86
322┇ESPORTIVAN DARMEN               01.86
323┇AETHELIA                        01.85
323┇BURG LAND                       01.85
325┇THE AUGUST ISLANDS              01.85
326┇BEHH                            01.83
326┇SALAGALU                        01.83
328┇THE ENQAB ARCHIPELAGO LABORATORI01.80
329┇PAKHOMIYA                       01.75
330┇PATRIOTLANDIA                   01.73
331┇EFNAKIA                         01.69
331┇NETHERTOPIA                     01.69
331┇RIZZMAN EMPIRE                  01.69
331┇THE DEMOCRATIC UNIONIST COOL KID01.69
335┇BRIGANTII                       01.67
335┇DIOLLO                          01.67
337┇JAOAA                           01.65
337┇KONKERT                         01.65
339┇DENYSSIA                        01.63
340┇NIEUWELAND                      01.60
341┇LIMEY GEORGE                    01.57
342┇FHULGHAMOUS PENINSULA           01.55
343┇INDO-ATHENA                     01.50
343┇LIBONESIA                       01.50
343┇NERGTUL                         01.50
343┇PAPIV NAPPON                    01.50
347┇KHACHEN                         01.48
348┇NOVA DACKIANS                   01.46
349┇NEW FERNIA                      01.44
350┇LEGENDENEX                      01.43
351┇ZALINIVIA                       01.42
352┇NEW-ADDLEBRAND                  01.40
353┇THREE GOLDEN KINGDOMS           01.39
354┇NEW CRYWYZYXYCYNYA              01.33
355┇AVOTE                           01.31
355┇KARMOSORA                       01.31
357┇CHEMICALA                       01.27
358┇THE 14 STARS                    01.26
359┇GOPNIKEA                        01.22
360┇ABAHAMBA                        01.21
361┇AMERICAN GENERATIONS            01.21
361┇UNITARNIA                       01.21
363┇OSARIUS                         01.18
364┇ADYATIN                         01.14
364┇FORT MCKINLEY                   01.14
364┇KARST SOCIALIST REPUBLIC        01.14
364┇OONTAZ                          01.14
368┇VERY TOTALLY FREE               01.13
369┇GREATER PORTUGALIZA             01.10
369┇SIBERSKY                        01.10
371┇ORIONI                          01.08
372┇COMMUNIST NORMANDY AND BRITTANY 01.07
372┇NEW ROTTERDAM CITY              01.07
374┇NAROVI                          01.00
375┇THAELORIA                       00.98
376┇CONCORDIA                       00.95
377┇LAS SAS LAS                     00.86
378┇CERULEAN ISLES                  00.82
378┇YESOPALITHA                     00.82
380┇ONLY SIX WORDS                  00.75
380┇PAPO-IRIYA                      00.75
382┇PULANG                          00.72
383┇INDEPENDENT ATHLETES FROM QUEBEC00.71
384┇NOTCOMMUNIST3                   00.67
384┇NPU                             00.67
386┇OMERICA                         00.66
387┇APALATCI                        00.57
387┇EBERLAND                        00.57
387┇QUEBEC                          00.57
387┇ROBOSTANIA                      00.57
387┇SANFORD                         00.57
387┇THE LICENTIAN ISLES             00.57
387┇THE POLLO                       00.57
394┇ELECTRUM                        00.56
394┇SHIVERIAN REPUBLICS             00.56
396┇SADAME                          00.56
397┇SOUTHERN PALM ISLANDS           00.53
398┇GATCHINGERRAK UNION             00.50
398┇INDEPENDENT ATHLETES FROM FILIS-00.50
398┇MAPHIDON                        00.50
401┇FRANCOBALKAN PENINSULA          00.44
401┇TEVUEKK                         00.44
403┇THE DOCÚVNIJA ISLANDS           00.44
404┇CASTOLO AND MINANDA             00.43
404┇XUOIS                           00.43
404┇YUZHNYA                         00.43
407┇NEXXUS DRAKO                    00.33
407┇SAGOTRA                         00.33
407┇SAO DOMINGGO                    00.33
407┇TANAH HIJAU                     00.33
407┇UNITED ARABIAN EMIRATE          00.33
407┇WENTZVILLE                      00.33
413┇ADAB                            00.31
413┇CHOBOTAN                        00.31
415┇A VARIABLE NUMBER OF KNIGHTS WHO00.29
415┇CRANSIA                         00.29
415┇ERROROPOLISISH PARADYSTOPIA     00.29
415┇GUCCI REPUBLIC                  00.29
415┇NEOPOLITAN CENTRAL REPUBLIC     00.29
415┇NYOWANI KITARA                  00.29
415┇SAINTLAND                       00.29
415┇SHURE REPUBLIC                  00.29
415┇XINHUA                          00.29
424┇LOZHO                           00.28
425┇DARWIZZYUNIVERSE                00.25
425┇JIRINHO                         00.25
425┇LAWANG DARUL ARIF               00.25
425┇MURALOS                         00.25
429┇MELBERGIA                       00.22
429┇REPUBLICANLAND                  00.22
431┇ALIXE                           00.17
431┇CAPITULISTS                     00.17
431┇HAZARDIA                        00.17
431┇KIJANG MAS                      00.17
435┇ACLAN                           00.13
435┇BEEFSTEAK CITY                  00.13
435┇REA SAN VEGAS                   00.13
438┇HENRIK P                        00.11
438┇SHEP                            00.11
440┇INGONT                          00.06
441┇THE UNITED QUEENDOM             00.06
442┇ACADIANA                        00.00
442┇AURELITHARION                   00.00
442┇FRJÁLSHÖFN                      00.00
442┇MALALAIME                       00.00
442┇PHILIPPINE ISLANDS AND FORMOSA  00.00
442┇POLKOPIA                        00.00
442┇PROTECTORIA                     00.00
442┇SASSADEGNA                      00.00
442┇SIXTY-NINE X                    00.00
442┇STRAYAROOS BARRIER ISLANDS      00.00
442┇THE GREARISH UNION              00.00
442┇TRIUMVIRATUS                    00.00

Find/Replace
Baker Park --> Commonwealth of Baker Park
Squornshelan Remnant States --> Squornshelous
Republic of the United Marble Tribes --> The Republic of the United Marble Tribes
Beal an Mhuirthread --> Beal an Mhuirthead
The Afanc Strait --> Afanc Strait

sernet is at 83rd, let's gooooo

two questions btw:
1) Do the colours have any meanings?
2) Would it be advisable to RP each window during the playoffs even when I am not playing a match?

[The Kytler Peninsulae]

1) Do the colours have any meanings?
2) Would it be advisable to RP each window during the playoffs even when I am not playing a match?

1. It represents the regional tournament (or lack thereof) last participated in by the team in question. So Kwrpania and myself have the same colour because of being in the Copa Rushmori, while those in Anaia who played in the CAFA Cup have a different colour, those in the IAC (the "regional" tournament for teams whose regions don't have their own) another one again, etc.)
2. That's a Farf/Para question. The answer may be buried in the bid document, but I didn't see it there.

[The Sernetian Empire]

1) Do the colours have any meanings?
2) Would it be advisable to RP each window during the playoffs even when I am not playing a match?

1. It represents the regional tournament (or lack thereof) last participated in by the team in question. So Kwrpania and myself have the same colour because of being in the Copa Rushmori, while those in Anaia who played in the CAFA Cup have a different colour, those in the IAC (the "regional" tournament for teams whose regions don't have their own) another one again, etc.)
2. That's a Farf/Para question. The answer may be buried in the bid document, but I didn't see it there.

alr thanks

[The Kytler Peninsulae]

On the technical front, I find Farf’s case very compelling. I mentioned this on the Discord, but I work in a university department with a number of AI and AI-adjacent researchers and have personally interacted with some influential figures who work for a leading AI company. There is a broad consensus among both groups that Pangram is the leading AI plagiarism detection software and that at the very least its current model has an astronomically low false positive rate. #NotAnAd. For what it’s worth, I don’t use Pangram in my own teaching because doing so would violate university policy and regardless there are ethical issues with handing student work to third parties.

I really appreciate this perspective (including and especially that last bit!) - I've definitely heard enough people talk up Pangram specifically for me to think that its judgment here is pretty damning.

On the OOC/WCC punishment front, I think it would be best to investigate their RPs in other competitions before considering any kind of retrospective punishment. I can already confirm that Pyazhnaya RP’s in CAFA Cup 12, which I hosted (They did not RP in the 13th edition), are among the AI-generated RPs. I did not clock this at the time, although I also did not think their RPs were very good and was perhaps too credulous in assuming they were the product of writing under time constraints plus a tendency to mimic some of the bad tendencies in AI-generated writing due to the user’s stated experience of working with AI. It looks like Pyazhnaya’s performance in that competition did not contribute to their KPB+ rank and non-WCC competitions, including regional tournaments, can presumably make their own independent decisions about this regardless of what the WCC decides.

From the Copa Rushmori perspective - because that's the one I've been involved with - I can vouch for the plan being for Tikariot's three wins in four Copas (which overlaps precisely with the period where his RPs are Pangram-flagged) to be given the Lance Armstrong treatment and be expunged from the books along with the associated CR-specific ranking points. (This is provisional, pending views from others in the region.)

Having graded my share of Tikariotian RPs in the past - for the aforementioned Copas Rushmori and for the finals stage of the two WCs we co-hosted, plus Pyazhnaya's output in qualifying therein - I mostly just appreciated them at face value, and was only side-eyeing the enthusiasm for non-text machine-generated content. I didn't think he'd extend that to text, I also knew he knew the machine-generated "tells" better than me anyway, and I also knew that frankly he was capable of RPing at that level regardless. Heck, he prompted rings round us for well over a year - and that's almost an eternity in the evoluition of content-generation algorithms - and I'm entirely unsurprised that he could do that, just still shaken that he evidently would.

This is unlike most other NSS plagiarism cases: Tikariot is a respected member of the community who knows better and they’ve violated rules made explicit by the hosts in multiple competitions – rules they have enforced themselves when hosting. That being said, I’m wary of doing anything more than enforcing the existing rules (and retrospectively doing so in the case of previous tournaments where Tikariot’s plagiarism flew under the radar). Not to dredge up ancient history, but back in the early 2010s Burchadinger was caught plagiarising by lightly editing RL news articles, admitted their wrongdoing and then got caught plagiarising again. They were penalised in the competitions they wrote plagiarised RPs for but, as far as I recall, were allowed back into the community even after getting caught the second time. The cases are still different in some important respects: Burchadinger was a child, English was their second language, they were still relatively new etc. But still, I think that precedent should count for something.

It might be a good idea for future hosts to look into more proactive ways to address AI plagiarism. One idea might be to reserve the right, if you suspect a user is engaging in AI plagiarism, to ask them to submit future RPs in the form of a shared Google Doc so you can check the version history. Though considering it's relatively easy to emulate iterative authorship that might not be a feasible solution.

Very interesting history point that I for one had forgotten - and we've also more recently/specifically had Liventia flag up Crpostran's Olympic RP for machine-generated content back in 2024, before that nation's first WC involvement - and having been called out and then responding in the right way, Crpostran secured a meteoric and positively-received ascent straight to the business end of the WC. So there's precedent from literally the same period in question for someone responding positively, but the difference is that Tik was hiding far more, for far longer, and getting away with it for cycles plural in competitions plural. I don't think there's a precedent of any kind that's close enough to be binding in any direction, which doesn't help in terms of actually deciding upon a judgment, but does mean that we have options open - this case is sui generis and should be treated as such.

[Liventia]

The cases are still different in some important respects: Burchadinger was a child, English was their second language, they were still relatively new etc.

Out of fairness, if we're going to draw that comparison, then it's worth mentioning that English is not Tik's first language either. Not that it should serve as a mitigating factor, simply that if we're drawing parallels to that case, language is not a material difference.

[Farfadillis]

Host announcement (very important): we fucked up and we still don't really know how. We accidentally modified the sheet in between Para's 8th cut-off and mine. In a way that completely and very radically changes key results. We are terribly sorry. We have decided it's best to push back the whole schedule indefinitely (though not for more than, say, two days, realistically), because I will be pseudorescoring the results. The gist of it is I will be using the same rough 'randomness' that produced each result, except with the correct inputs. I can't reproduce the exact randomness, but I can recreate it quite faithfully by reverse engineering LISA and putting my math degree to use.

This basically means that if you had a bad set of results in the affected MDs and RP'd really well, your results will improve. The opposite also applies.

We are, again, terribly sorry. It's a strange screw up and, as I said, even looking at past version histories (which we can thankfully use to pinpoint the affected MDs), it's not at all clear how the fuck this happened. Send all relevant hatemail to my TGs.

Also, this naturally affects some of the RPs already posted. We will be grading without counting this against any of you, but we do recommend you to not RP until the final results are actually out. This will almost certainly be Saturday evening/night in Uruguay.

[Audioslavia]

Good job on the hosts for being so open.

The resimmed scores mean that the KPB+ rankings posted above will likely change slightly. We'll post the new ones after the resims.

[Ko-oren]

Thanks for catching this and taking the decision to rescore - not an easy decision, but a fair one nonetheless. I much rather have a host who gets it right the second time than a host who takes shortcuts in impartiality.

Please keep us updated on a timeline (for new results, playoff cutoffs, etc). I've also seen a few very frequently asked questions in discord that might need repeating here ('is it 2 MDs? 4 MDs? Or 2/4 scorination windows?')

[Saperetia]

I've also seen a few very frequently asked questions in discord that might need repeating here ('is it 2 MDs? 4 MDs? Or 2/4 scorination windows?')

Isn't that question answered in the RP thread?

OOC:

• PLEASE NOTE THAT THE PLAYOFF FIXTURES HAVE BEEN REMOVED OWING TO AN ISSUE WITH THE SCORINATION OF
  • MD17-18 GROUPS 1-8
  • MD15-18 GROUPS 9-16

[The Sernetian Empire]

Oh damn rescorination?