I genuinely believe that we can have a constructive conversation on this without actually devolving down to petty disputes. You get enough of it on WA, but given that there may be a need to discuss OOC related factors, I'm posting this in here.

So, here's the thesis. There have been numerous figures in Cybernations who have held positions of power based solely on reputation or past deeds and have done terrible jobs in those positions. I'm not going to sit here and name individuals (and I know some of you will give me **** for it), but I do believe it to be the case. I'm curious to see who comes up and more importantly what sort of reasoning is put forward. Of course, that means I'm expecting people to back up their claims, which may be asking for too much...

And before I end this, you might ask why even post this, when it'll probably just devolve into trolling. My rationale is as follows: if an alliance is suffering the leadership of unqualified leaders due solely to their reputation, nepotism, or something of a similar variety, this might help make that clear to the alliance. You'd be surprised how blind people can be, but also how passionate they can be when it comes to the betterment of their alliance.

Either that, or this'll end in failure and the mods will come in with a mercy killing. It'll be locked, drop off the front page, and no one will even remember it.

So...fire away.

Edit: If people want...they can email me their thoughts and I'll post them anonymously...I don't mind that.

archonshield at gmail dot com

hooo thats hard.

Archon is massively overrated. He doesn't even post on here anymore.

Are we talking about current gov officials? Or ones throughout history.

Both, I suppose, though with an ideal focus on current.

I'm pretty overrated.

If I were rated at all, it would definitely be in the over category.

Yeah, I'm gonna go with this.

I am most certainly overrated. But that's the joy of democracy!

Very much so I've not really worked with anyone overrated, thankfully. If I were to say anyone was overrated it would have to be VanHoo to some extent. Even though, he never actually got a position because of him being Hoo. :/

Wait...me or you?

Well, I honestly think most highly rated high gov is overrated. Don't get me wrong, there are some very strong leaders about, but a very large chunk of the credit for most people's major successes as leaders really goes to the lower gov that do the majority of the footwork to make everything function. A New Pacific Order, or even a Mushroom Kingdom for that matter, need strong leadership to hold them together properly but successful alliances don't run on personality alone. An amazing leader can get people to do amazing things, but the trick is bringing out talent and getting it where it needs to be. Even the best can't build a successful alliance out of nothing.

The too long; didn't read is something along the lines of the backbone of an army being the sergeants rather than the generals.

Settle down. You know what I meant.

I know that my urge to bite my tongue on this issue is not going to win out, so I'll hope that someone else says what's on my mind before I get myself into a heap of trouble.

In that case, It's been said that Ivan's been rather inactive as far as Monarch's go since his return to CN and founding of NSO. If that were true, I wouldn't really call that a quality that is very constructive for his alliance.

Any NSO member is welcome to refute my statement.

Quoted for great justice.



Ehhhh...you can do better, BEazy.



I don't know, you did have Emperor of Cheese in your government for a while. And Otter.

I think a lot of it is just resume-building. When I joined this tiny, tiny alliance ROFL after UjW they made me MoD because since I was in GOONS I was clearly a military expert. Then when ROFL merged into Purge and UberSpion (then MoD of Purge) quit in protest, they naturally made me MoD. When all gov except me and Kharn420 quit Purge during the TPF takeover, I rode the wave to Emperor. When Purge disbanded I chilled for a month or two before getting elected to MoFA of Browncaots based again simply on lack of talent and past positions.

A lot of incompetent gov can be attributed to the proliferation of alliances. The demand is greater than the supply. Seriously, how many alliances--even out of the sanctioned alliances--have MoDs that are actually experts? How many alliances' econ people are actual number whizzes or even do anything?


I've always been told that Ivan is "more of an ideas man." If your deputies are competent, a leader with ideas works.

I'm sorry Cour, that my put down did not do you enough Justice! For this, I shall take many of whips in hopes to become more wittier. Really though, it's good for being exhausted. Oh yeah, don't forget Poobah too

This is the sort of thing that only has a chance to succeed if it's anonymous. I could name half a dozen that jump to mind but I'm not going to post anything because it would put not only my ability to deal with said people's allies but the rest of my alliance at risk.

If you're looking for some real, genuine comments Archon I'd suggest finding some semi-retired person of unquestionable character people can send their summaries to that can turn around and compile them as an anonymous digest at the start of a new topic.

I would suggest Archon.

I'll go out on a limb and say Dilber in the last year or so. He has a reputation for excellent diplomacy but the NPO's FA actions during the Karma war build-up and the weeks/months before it were quite incompetent, notably by not doing much to properly maintain their relationships, and he in his position is at least partially responsible for that.

That could be the most overrated government..EVAR

In unrelated news i wish to nominate Allied Threat just for lulz and Fireguy too

Perhaps, though I do know a few higher-level leaders that have a good sense of both the 'strategic' and 'tactical' landscape -- the micromanagers of the world. They are rare, though.

I think your observation is generalizable for most large alliances -- the middle and lower management does a LOT of the legwork. I know I wouldn't have been able to accomplish any of what I did the last four months without a solid group of managers (and hardworking members).

Archon, I have much respect for this thread.

I would nominate all them leaders who allow their emotions to engulf their senses during diplomatic situations and completely blow up and misrepresent themselves and their alliance. This eliminates half of the 'big wigs'.

I think me and WalkerNinja have been not-enemies long enough to say in frankness that I absolutely had no clue how he kept in gov of ODN. He's even noted himself since then that in the past he did some outright retarded crap. Perils of democracy.

I definitely think that from all that crap, he learned a lot and I've 180ed in my opinion of him over the last 6 months. An overrated gov can definitely grow into a good gov.

Keeping in mind, faithful readers, I know better than anyone my own weaknesses; at the same time WN was rising, Sunstar was calling me generally retarded (bc I was [or "am", if you're a jerk])

Theres only so many things we can do with our roster and the relative knee-jerk paranoia regarding him. It's entirely justified, but Ivan is a factor that can take any government lineup and just take it to it's possible best.

I would say your point is valid, but only because the standard he's held in is second to Admin himself in regards to potential influence on the game. But Ivan's always been a person that has realized that leadership isn't just about him, so if you know what a competent, even a skilled leader is, Ivan is far above par.

But if you worship him as a deity, you will be disappointed. He's done some incredible things, mind you, but that was only when he had the best possible materials to work with, and I doubt anyone else who has ever been in this game could equal such feats were they in his position. But that was a truly exceptional time, and circumstances have changed somewhat since his glory days.

If people want...they can email me their thoughts and I'll post them anonymously...I don't mind that.

archonshield at gmail dot com

I honestly cannot think of any alliance Gov which is overrated, you can argue against Ivan Moldavi, but really, he was gone for a very long time and people started idolizing him as some kind of God during the dispute between the Orders, nobody can live up to that.


EDIT: didnt finish my sentence

Ehhh, I wouldn't go that far, Ejay.

I'd say any leader who has let their emotions engulf their senses during a diplomatic situation that brought forth holy hell upon their alliance at some point would definitely be eligible for this honor.

Everyone has emotions and everyone, no matter how much they try, has subjective urges override objective thought at some point.



I'll agree with you. WalkerNinja did pretty well over here in TOP -- he knew well enough to bring me along for the ride.



Good show, Archon.

Doitzel is pretty overrated with flag design. Sure, he had hits with IRON's flag and the second Vox flag, but between that (2, 3 years) was this barren wasteland of crap that you'd expect to see posted on the mother-of-a-kindergartener's refrigerator.

IRON's flag is terrible.

Exactly what I'm saying. When I was in TOP WN was a favored joke--it speaks volumes to me that by the time WN was in TOP he got elected by those same people. If only everyone could turn themselves around like he has.

wwwwwwoosh!

I sense this thread has the potential to be one large group therapy session for bob

Agreed.

We once had a new flag referendum, but it kinda fizzled out after a while.

They still get the old "DOES YOUR FLAG SAY 'IRAN'?" line from time to time.

Woah now. Don't be hatin'. Just because my masterpieces were not adopted does not mean they were bad. It's not my fault The Legion was bitter about our stewardship and didn't take my advice for this improvement of their flag:




Bite me.

Edit: Oh yeah, and I'm way overrated. Seriously not saying that for the faux-modesty thing either. Silver tongue, that's about it.

I don't know if im overrated, to be fair. I mean, ive pretty much come out and openly said "Just a troll, will travel" and such.

Heading to bed for the night. I'll post any emails I receive in the morning...judging from what I've received thus far I'll have to edit for language. Try to make my life easier by making it as though it were already a post on this forum. In some cases, I may be forced to summarize, and if I do I can't promise I will capture your sentiments as accurately as you would have wanted them put. So your safest bet is to send me an email that I can just copy-pasta right into here without getting warned.

Agreed.

The learning curve, I've realized, is quite high in this world -- and I think in some cases, there are people who are either not inclined toward it (e.g. names which may or may not be mentioned at some point in this thread -- but I think an example you may appreciate is BOWWOW3000, who I hear was our greatest Grand Master...or not. ) or don't get a good shot at it before something catastrophic happens (e.g. leaders cut down before their prime due to this internal drama or that war).



It is terrible!

I was one of the ones who tried to get it changed.

No offense, Doitzel.

Now THAT is a flag.

Legion, there's still time to use this flag! Get a referendum going or whatever it is you guys do.

I don't know if any leader of a major alliance is really overrated. They wouldn't get to where they were if they weren't good at something.

That said the one person I know is rated correctly is me, as I am not rated at all. As it should be.

If any positive comment was ever made about my leadership ability I would have I say I'm overrated

On a more serious note I'd have to say Ivan is probably overrated with NSO so far as he really hasn't done too much.

Oh, people... please. If you want to make comments about overrated government, have the balls to actually state your opinions. Don't be cowardly and send them to Archon to post anonymously.

Personally? I think most of the legendary leaders in Cyber Nations are overrated. This includes leadership from both alliances I like and dislike, including Frostbite and Citadel (hello Crymson) and all these other blocs. Being famous does not equal being an excellent leader... indeed, nor does charisma necessarily have much to do with it.

I absolutely detest aligning myself with Ivan Moldavi's hero worshippers, but I've read much of what he said on the NPO forums and on the old Cyber Nations Forums, and read about his exploits in the early stages of the game. I agree with some of the other posters in this thread in that I think he'd be a more effective leader if he were more active, but nevertheless I think he's the best leader Cyber Nations has seen. Every action, every word is designed to convey the strength of his alliance. I don't know about his ability to choose Imperial Officers (or the War Council, in those days) but from what I've heard he's pretty good at the rest of the whole leader jazz too.

A picture is worth 1000 words...or one Frenchman.

It's hard to actually label someone as overrated, because odds are if I've heard enough about you to form an opinion, you must have either done something right or something very very wrong.

Don't worry. You won't be on anyone's overrated list.

I personally like alliances that can hold themselves together without leadership. Call me biased, but if people can work together without rallying around central figures, then that speaks volumes about the character of the whole community.

lolcommie.

I think the best alliances are the ones that have members that will step up when faced with adversity. Going waaaaaay back, when \m/ had quite a few of it's prominent members removed from the Cyberverse, it basically collapsed. The mark of a great alliance? The exact opposite.

/page

Cheers, mate.

Also, CrymsoN isn't overrated -- he's over-credited with most of the evil done in the world. Listening to People's grievances with respect to CrymsOn is like listening to Chuck Norris facts at times.

At least give credit where credit is due.

MCXA comes to mind for me.

I think Jason8 has affirmed another highly generalizable trait about most alliances -- memberships with a solid-to-deep depth chart will become self-sustaining. Memberships without any depth will eventually falter should enough of the keystones be removed.

If we're not careful, these recent threads wrought of boredom will create a Theory of Everything for Planet Bob.

Of all the gov I've ever served under or been a part of, I'd say the only one that was not overrated was Elysium-TPF-gov-thingy, which in some form survives to this day (and is very much underrated, IMO).
Every government of FCO during my time there (though, this probably doesn't concern anyone from outside FCO) had some major flaw (my own included), I couldn't get a hang of ODN's gov (though, this doesn't say much, might be just me) and most of the Legion's members of gov during my time there (from early 2007 to Legion disbandment crisis) were either bickering amongst themselves, incompetent or handicapped by the incompetence of others.