On the Future of Warfare in CN
Entry posted by Lord Boris
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Well, I felt I'd continue my blogging series here with a discussion on the types of things we'll likely see in future wars. The way wars are fought in CN has evolved not only in line with changes to the actual game, but also with changes in the strategies and playing philosophies of the playing community.
Quick-Response
This strategy relies on declaring war and commencing attacks on an alliance just moments after it declares war on one of your allies. We started to really see this heavy during the Continuum - NoV war, with many of the declarations on the Continuum side taking place just minutes after a declaration from an alliance on the NoV side. During the War of the Coalition, we saw this continue, most notably with the combined group of TORN, OR, Elysium, and Molon Labe beginning attacks on Greenland Republic in under a minute from the time GR fired its opening shot in the war. Given the allure of this strategy to send an enemy's initial blitz into chaos, minimizing both the initial damage they can do as well as their sustained level of deliverable damage through the war, I suspect we will see this strategy show up more and more often in the wars of the future.
Preemption
Preemption takes the notion of a quick response time to the level of absurdity, declaring war on an alliance suspected of being involved in the war potentially a full day before the targeted alliance would even start issuing any declarations. We started to see this used and advocated during the War of the Coalition. The idea of removing a possible threat before they can even consider firing off a shot is appealing to some groups, but others (including myself) believe that this strategy is not only unnecessary, but in the long run also a dark road of unforeseen consequences that the community would be best to avoid walking down.
Nuclear Warfare
The use of nukes quickly and in large amounts in warfare has gained strength in recent conflicts. With most of the taboo over raining nukes down in a war dissipating, I suspect that at least a majority of larger wars will take more and more "let 'em rip" stances regarding widespread nuclear use. Combined with the steady increase in nations wielding large amounts of technology and WRC wonders, I foresee the wars of the future racking up casaulties at extremely fast rates, and would make the assertion that any war of moderate size will likely send the GRL for a little ride.
The War of Words
While propaganda has always been present in wars, more alliances in recent conflict have taken to the forums as well as ingame to wage their wars, intending not so much to damage their opponents directly, so much as damaging them politically. The War of the Coalition was fought quite heavily using propaganda, and to assume that such a trend will dissipate in future conflicts is an assumption that very few rational people at this point would be likely to make.
In Conclusion
The war of the future on Planet Bob is not only one that is going to rely even moreso than ever before on the rapid ability to deal significant amounts of damage ingame, but more and more it will likely be waged increasingly on the forums as the war over the minds of the uninvolved and the rank-and-file becomes an area of increasing focus. The casualties of war will cease to be confined to the players behind the keyboards and the pixel soldiers in the game, but also the sanity of the moderation team, which inevitably will become a bystander casualty in the forum portion of the wars.
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