Add regions to your Dossier?

[UNIverseVERSE]

Its because it can be used by either military forces which makes it a 'life and death battle' to use your words...Those who can see a tactical advantage to any new idea being proposed are always going to argue for or against it, depending on the advantages (or indeed disadvantages) that it will bring...

That's like arguing that introducing houses is a bad thing, because they provide cover in warfare.

There are more people who play this game than just the invader/defender clique. There are vastly more people who play this game than just the invader/defender clique. I don't see why the invader/defender clique should be able to dictate terms and specifics of new features for everyone else, just because they bitch about it more.

[Pythagosaurus]

Because none of the other groups especially wanted regions added to the reports page. You wouldn't be hard pressed to find civilians who wanted houses.

[Pythagosaurus]

OK, this is now in the game. Let's hope it's all working properly.

[Evil Wolf]

Did you have to include the number of nations each region has into the Regional Dossier?

[Pythagosaurus]

Nope.

[Drab duck]

You're right Universeverse, but unfortunately a defender proposes a coding change and the invader community jumps on it immediately because theres absolutely no way that the defender could possibly be proposing a change to the game that wasnt intended to make defending easier If it were left to normal discussion it would be fine but Dysian feels the need to go round raider groups calling for their support on this forum for some imaginary ideological battle.

Thanks for implementing it Pyth!!

[Northern Chittowa]

Its because it can be used by either military forces which makes it a 'life and death battle' to use your words...Those who can see a tactical advantage to any new idea being proposed are always going to argue for or against it, depending on the advantages (or indeed disadvantages) that it will bring...

That's like arguing that introducing houses is a bad thing, because they provide cover in warfare.

There are more people who play this game than just the invader/defender clique. There are vastly more people who play this game than just the invader/defender clique. I don't see why the invader/defender clique should be able to dictate terms and specifics of new features for everyone else, just because they bitch about it more.

I wasn't arguing with you. I was giving you the reason as to why defenders and invaders often jump on any proposed gameplay change. I never said they were the only players, and i didn't challenge your point about there being a great deal more who play for other reasons. You asked why do defenders and invaders jump onto proposed ideas, and i told you why...Because they dig out the strategic benefit out of any idea.

[Neasmyrna]

OK, this is now in the game. Let's hope it's all working properly.

Wow... that's very nice.

Believe it or not I was not thinking about anything related to defender/invader stuff when I proposed this... but of course you can't believe that... and I can't prove it...

I think this is a great new feature though...

[Unibot]

OK, this is now in the game. Let's hope it's all working properly.

Awesome. Love it.

[Evil Wolf]

*begrudgingly admits that, upon extensive review, this feature has some useful value towards the raider cause*

Also I'm sure other players might find i helpful too

[Dysian]

We don't really want you permanently taking over regions anyway,

There it is. An admin doesn't want raiders to do something that is LEGAL & NORMAL within his own game. There you have ladies and gentlemen, a PROOF that admins hate raiders - and likely cooperate with fendas.

Not to mention all the anti-raider proposals passed with the speed of light - liberations first, and now this.

So umm, how about the Annex proposal? It benefits both raiders and natives (we won't have to crush their regions, which you said you didn't like), and it does NO harm to fendas. It's practically a win-win.
AND most importantly, it was proposed WAY before this one (June 24th).

SO, did you guys implement Annex yet? Well DID YOU? I don't think so?
There it is, another proof that admins hate invaders and favor defenders.

I don't believe excuses are in order, I believe you should at least have the virtue to admit it.

[Martyrdoom]

We don't really want you permanently taking over regions anyway,

There it is. An admin doesn't want raiders to do something that is LEGAL & NORMAL within his own game. There you have ladies and gentlemen, a PROOF that admins hate raiders - and likely cooperate with fendas.

Not to mention all the anti-raider proposals passed with the speed of light - liberations first, and now this.

So umm, how about the Annex proposal? It benefits both raiders and natives (we won't have to crush their regions, which you said you didn't like), and it does NO harm to fendas. It's practically a win-win.
AND most importantly, it was proposed WAY before this one (June 24th).

SO, did you guys implement Annex yet? Well DID YOU? I don't think so?
There it is, another proof that admins hate invaders and favor defenders.

I don't believe excuses are in order, I believe you should at least have the virtue to admit it.

That statement indeed confirmed a lot latent suspicions for me; I couldn't believe I was actually reading it to be honest.

[Northern Chittowa]

My lord you are tiresome at times...

Im guessing that this was a fairly easy addition to make, unlike the Annex addition which would require a lot more work to implement.

I don't believe that its a secret that admin's and mods mostly don't approve of region destroying (notice i said region destroying, not raiding).

And liberations weren't implemented with the 'speed of light'. It took a while, and a lot of discussion.

[Martyrdoom]

My lord you are tiresome at times...

Im guessing that this was a fairly easy addition to make, unlike the Annex addition which would require a lot more work to implement.

I don't believe that its a secret that admin's and mods mostly don't approve of region destroying (notice i said region destroying, not raiding).

And liberations weren't implemented with the 'speed of light'. It took a while, and a lot of discussion.

So admins and mods don't approve of their own game?! 'Invasion-griefing' as it was/is called and taking over regions permanently is an integral part of the game.

The liberation 'discussion' was pretty much a sham - it was going to be implemented in anycase; any dissenting voice was shouted down, especially if you were a raider or some other insidious variant.

[Northern Chittowa]

I don't believe its an integral part of the game, but then again i am a defender. I just don't see the point in taking over a region and destroying it, nor do i believe that it is something this game can sustain...But thats for another topic and debate.

Also, surely you can't expect Mods and admins to be fully unbiased against certain things? They all do have their own personalities and their own opinions on things. I do believe however that when it comes to the game, they put that to one side and implement things which will only improve the game. You only have to have a look at the Annex proposal, i think its almost surely going to be implemented even though some defenders -of which i include myself- are a tad weary of what it will bring.

[Gazilland]

*sigh* our voices are useless against biased mods.

[Dysian]

I don't believe its an integral part of the game

It doesn't really depend on whether you believe it or not. It's like saying you don't believe knights are an integral part of chess - they still are, it's written in the code of the game. Sure I don't like it when my opponents forks my king and queen with his knight - but according to the code of the game it's fair, and I can't complain.

You only have to have a look at the Annex proposal, i think its almost surely going to be implemented

I do hope we get it soon about time they stop giving you guys a break and give us one instead, no?

[Martyrdoom]

I don't believe its an integral part of the game, but then again i am a defender. I just don't see the point in taking over a region and destroying it, nor do i believe that it is something this game can sustain...But thats for another topic and debate.

Also, surely you can't expect Mods and admins to be fully unbiased against certain things? They all do have their own personalities and their own opinions on things. I do believe however that when it comes to the game, they put that to one side and implement things which will only improve the game. You only have to have a look at the Annex proposal, i think its almost surely going to be implemented even though some defenders -of which i include myself- are a tad weary of what it will bring.

It has to be an integral part of the game because influence is an integral part of the game: All About Influence.

"With the introduction of Regional Influence, our rules governing "Invasion Griefing" are abolished.

That means we no longer have complicated rules dictating, for example, how many residents a Delegate can eject before the moderators consider it illegal "griefing." Delegates need not worry about whether they are allowed to eject, ban, or password-protect—instead, if the game lets you do them, they're legal."

I don't see how the people who introduced influence and made invasion-griefing legal can set about trying to (systematically) undermine it; that's just disingenuous. Such tactics and world-view are more of a threat to driving people away from NS than any invasion could be.

And 'invasion-griefing' doesn't necessarily equate with region-destroying (I assume you mean the passworded region with one nation to keep it 'alive' scenario). The personal aim for me is take over regions, install my own founder, and open up the region to free-entry. You may not even like that MO, but it's a massive difference.

[Evil Wolf]

We don't really want you permanently taking over regions anyway,

There it is. An admin doesn't want raiders to do something that is LEGAL & NORMAL within his own game. There you have ladies and gentlemen, a PROOF that admins hate raiders - and likely cooperate with fendas.

You goon, the Admins are not on anyone side (except when I raid their regions and threaten to ban them to TRR for kicks).

That logic you used doesn't even make any sense. >_<

In any case, the Admins have listened to both sides on many issues and, in this case, although I did oppose it at first, the actions implemented by Admin Pyth are completely neutral. Sure Defenders can use this regional dossiering thing, sure, but so can raiders. I've already dossiered ever single founderless region in Nationstates with a population over 10 nations. I can't even tell you how much time this saves me in the long run.

[UNIverseVERSE]

So admins and mods don't approve of their own game?! 'Invasion-griefing' as it was/is called and taking over regions permanently is an integral part of the game.

False.

'Their own game' -- the game as written -- works like this. There are little nations, which putter along answering issues. They join or create regions, join the WA, and vote on delegates and proposals.

The game doesn't recognise invasions, regional takeovers (beyond change of WA delegate), raiding and defending organisations, inter-regional politics, or anything like that. These are all products of the players. Some are developments which were neither expected or entirely welcome, hence a long history of rules or tweaks relating to them. The most notable of these is the idea of raiding, because it's based on one group of players getting their kicks from damaging something another group of players have produced.

But they also aren't just going to shut it down -- people doing interesting and unexpected things with the game is one of the points. So they have spent most of the history of NS trying to work out a way that raiding and defending can play nicely with everything else, be that through rules, or through mechanisms like influence.

The idea that raiding is somehow integral to NS as a whole is just silly. The vast majority of NS players never touch a raid in their life, except negatively. They RP, or they debate, or they use the WA, or build their nation, or get into regional politics. Or they just answer issues for a while, create themselves a region, and slowly fade out. Raiding is one small facet of the game, only actively used by one small group of players. As far as most are concerned, it just ends up causing pain when their carefully organised region is trashed.

For an analogy, NS is like a big sandy beach in a university town which people come to when they want to have fun.. Some people come to the beach have fun by running up and down dressed like knights, or pretending to launch marine attacks. Some join free-wheeling arguments and discussions about whatever strikes their fancy. Some have formal debates, while some just read and work on their novel. Some build large and intricate sandcastles in collaboration with other people.

And some get their kicks by running around and knocking down other people's sandcastles and pushing them out of that bit of the beach.

But all that the game provides is the beach -- a space to work. That doesn't make smashing up other people's sandcastles an integral part of the beach.

To strain the analogy, influence is like rules about how much your voice gets to be heard when you're building a sandcastle.The more influence you have, the more control you'll have over the space the sandcastle is built on. It replaces the previous rules, which were about how much you could smash up sandcastles, and how many people you could force away. Because the people who provided the beach didn't anticipate that there would be groups who did run around to destroy sandcastles, and when they saw it, they weren't entirely thrilled by the idea (and who can blame them?).

To strain it yet further, this change was like giving out binoculars, so that people around one sandcastle could watch what other sandcastles were doing more easily. And then the people who destroy sandcastles -- and the people who try and stop them -- started fighting about it being an advantage to one or the other, and resulted in all the binoculars being made deliberately out of focus.

[Dysian]

The game doesn't recognise invasions, regional takeovers (beyond change of WA delegate), raiding and defending organisations,

Oh my badness
It appears as though, once again I will have to rely upon my beloved NS FAQ. The game doesn't recognise invasion, you say? Try reading THIS (at the bottom of that page):
http://www.nationstates.net/page=faq#etiquette
to save you the effort, it says:

Can I invade other people's regions?
Yes. The practice of "region crashing," where a group of nations all move to a region with the aim of seizing the WA Delegate position, is part of the game. Certain groups within NationStates are particularly adroit at this, and can attack very quickly.

>Once I've taken over a region, can I eject everyone else?
You can try. Invader Delegates tend to have very little Regional Influence, which makes ejecting long-time residents difficult. But Delegates can be as kind, generous, evil, or despotic as they wish. It's up to regional residents to elect good Delegates.

so umm, yeah. you fail
EDIT: Sorry, I meant: Your nation fails

[UNIverseVERSE]

The game doesn't recognise invasions, regional takeovers (beyond change of WA delegate), raiding and defending organisations,

Oh my badness
It appears as though, once again I will have to rely upon my beloved NS FAQ. The game doesn't recognise invasion, you say? Try reading THIS (at the bottom of that page):
http://www.nationstates.net/page=faq#etiquette
to save you the effort, it says:

Can I invade other people's regions?
Yes. The practice of "region crashing," where a group of nations all move to a region with the aim of seizing the WA Delegate position, is part of the game. Certain groups within NationStates are particularly adroit at this, and can attack very quickly.

>Once I've taken over a region, can I eject everyone else?
You can try. Invader Delegates tend to have very little Regional Influence, which makes ejecting long-time residents difficult. But Delegates can be as kind, generous, evil, or despotic as they wish. It's up to regional residents to elect good Delegates.

so umm, yeah. you fail
EDIT: Sorry, I meant: Your nation fails

The rules are a different matter, as reading my post beyond the first sentence would have indicated. In that post, the game referred specifically to the coding -- what was recognised and enforced automatically by the game code. Rules and statements about what people do with the options the code permits them are different.

[[violet]]

We don't really want you permanently taking over regions anyway,

There it is. An admin doesn't want raiders to do something that is LEGAL & NORMAL within his own game. There you have ladies and gentlemen, a PROOF that admins hate raiders - and likely cooperate with fendas.

That's a silly thing to say, Dys. If we wanted to, we'd ban raiding. The reality, as you know, is that we want to support an invasion game within reasonable limits; i.e. one that does not impose too much upon players who don't want to be part of it. I support the invasion game, but I don't support raiders being able to do whatever they like, including perma-locking regions.

So umm, how about the Annex proposal? It benefits both raiders and natives (we won't have to crush their regions, which you said you didn't like), and it does NO harm to fendas. It's practically a win-win.
AND most importantly, it was proposed WAY before this one (June 24th).

SO, did you guys implement Annex yet? Well DID YOU? I don't think so? There it is, another proof that admins hate invaders and favor defenders.

You think I'm delaying Annex to hurt invaders? If that was my aim, why would I suggest adding it in the first place? As I posted recently (in the Annex thread, which I hope you read), I have got code running on my local machine, but it's not ready yet. It's not a minor addition, I don't have unlimited time, and honestly, there are plenty of game improvements that were suggested long before Annex I could be working on instead. Hold your horses; it's coming.

[Darkesia]

Hold your horses; it's coming.

eeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Are we there yet?

Sorry. I got a little over excited.

[Dysian]

If we wanted to, we'd ban raiding...
I support the invasion game, but I don't support raiders being able to do whatever they like,

Two very contradictory statements. You support invading, therefor you don't ban it. You don't support region crashing - so why don't you ban it?

I will call upon the FAQ again. Invading is right there in the regional code, and SO is region crashing, imposing a password, banning all members etc. etc:

>Once I've taken over a region, can I eject everyone else?
You CAN try. Invader Delegates tend to have very little Regional Influence, which makes ejecting long-time residents difficult. But Delegates CAN be as kind, generous, EVIL, or DESPOTIC as they wish. It's up to regional residents to elect good Delegates.

A player plays by the rules of the admins own game, and the admin doesn't like that?
It's like being a democratic state in real life, and not allowing people to vote at all, doing all sorts of conspiracies to stop them from doing so, even though the voting right is right there in the constitution.
You are infringing on our basic player rights here