Statements from Squad S

This is the sort of constructive post I'm looking for.

Okay that given, I'm of the opinion that Doomhouse is not threatened by a year long trench war. Our allies' income exceeds their expenses, we're growing at an absurd rate, and at this rate, NPO and friends will become essentially a permanent tech-raid. Obviously, my opinion is a little biased by my successes since the creation of my nation, and I don't have any inside info whatsoever what our allies income actually is to say for sure whether or not we can be sustained indefinitely in such a manner as I claim. I believe, however, that what we're going to see as this conflict progresses is a plateau in the losses that we are taking, which is already possibly starting to occur, and a shift of our resource pooling and slot efficiency to mutual exchange. Once we no longer need full aid bombs to maintain our wars, slots are freed up for tech exchanges, further decreasing ally outgoing losses and easing morale by supplementing their aid with a tangible reward as we're able to start sending tech in exchange.

That's a pretty huge best case scenario though.

You're focusing too much on near term and monetary costs. There is a harder to calculate strategic loss when carrying out extended wars for no reason.

I see that Doom House has become so desperate in their PR campaign they had no choice but to take it to the blogosphere as well. Nice propaganda piece, but don't expect to change any minds. You seem to think the world is gullible and blind. I have confidence you're going to be sorely disappointed.

We shall accept your surrender in 12 months. Losing your entire lower tier will leave you no option. Keep aiding them by the way, its keeping us going.

Or keep on fighting. Our upper tier might be destroyed, but you're going to run short on fighters and tech supply sources within a year or two as recruiting upper tier members is a lot harder than newbies, and the middle and lower tier will be a murder zone for any of your members that aren't in peace mode.

Eventually your fighters will no longer be able to deal with our current upper tier when many of them leave due to RL or boredom, or better (for us), they get overwhelmed by our new future upper tier fighters.

You're focusing too much on near term and monetary costs. There is a harder to calculate strategic loss when carrying out extended wars for no reason.

Explain this strategic loss in detail please. I keep seeing it referred to in the forums, but I'm not seeing its nature.

Posts usually reference it to a loss of allies, a loss of patience, or some sort of public support backlash, but I don't see a train of logic to facilitate this line of reasoning.

LOL! Since you couldn't address the fact that every official announcement your side makes spirals into chaos, you jump on a new tack. This has been your side's modus operandi. It's also called Red Herring. You act like some Washington hack who when asked a direct question goes instantly back to the talking points you prefer.

Since the Washington hacks can't seem to get any respect from that methodology what makes you think you can instead.

Quite frankly, we simply don't care about your talking points. Old news. I think you just keep trying in hopes we might actually give you back our strategic thinking. Sorry, we understand OpSec and don't shout our strategy from every street corner and tell every alliance n00b the plan. Our troops are mature enough to understand they don't get to learn the whole story. But it seems that your side must resort to crowing to all of Bob your intentions. Methinks it is like what Stormsend leaked out. You have to keep your masses somehow under control or they will grow restless.

But since you are desperate for anything to latch onto, how about something obvious?

You keep claiming the high ground assures victory. But in the end the key to long term victory is population count. If our side completely owns the lower ranks then new nations have only one alternative in order to survive. Join us. Your new guys you keep raving about since the war began? Not counting the convenient fact some of them are simply rerolls we already killed once, they are DOA anyway. Send them all the money you want. They won't grow or send you tech because we will keep crushing them back to first week n00b status the moment they try to boost. We will hold that lower area as our own and our n00bs will be the only ones with the chance to keep playing. Yes, it make take just about forever for us to rise up our masses to your upper levels, but you've already been effectively contained. Your upper nations are a fixed number facing natural attrition from RL and boredom. We keep all the new blood. You might own the "now", but our strategy assures us the future. Cut you off from new blood and watch you wither on the vine. Yes, you might have the time to have your toe tags engraved, embroidered, and gilded, but you'll still be wearing them if you don't get control of the low ranges again.

Buckle up! It's going to be a loooooong ride.

Facts do not support this argument. GOONS numbers are at a record high. Activity in our newbie training program is astronomical. Slide is losing his mind trying to keep newbie activity in our forums properly moderated. I am also one of these newbie players you're referring to (war is older than my nation, and contrary to popular belief, I am not a reroll). Anything under 10k NS from NPO is on effective lockdown at this point, and we're going to start creeping into your very active 10-15k range very very soon, in part because of our strategic gains from Nordreich arriving on the front.

Just a question for those who support DH's position...

Do you support "Innocent Until Proven Guilty"? Or "Guilty Until Proven Innocent"?

Please do not ignore my question, or I will repeat it until I get a clear answer.

There is no such thing as crime in an anarchic inter-alliance system. There would need to be some sort of hierarchical governing body over the inter-alliance system to create international law for there to be crime, and unless you think there's a new hegemony, which there isn't, then that international law doesn't exist.

There are five parts of war:

1: Having a valid reason for war

2: Having the initial firepower

3: Being able to maintain the firepower

4: Being logical

5: Patience

Lets see...

1: Doomhouse's only CB for its war against NPO was either paranoia, simple hatred, or both. Those two are not valid CB, and I'm very sure you and your buddies would agree with me when YOUR alliance and YOUR allies are attacked without a warning for; "Cuz we're afraid you're going to jump into the meat grinder, and we hate you, so screw you. That's why!"

No points.

2: Check.

Plus one point.

3: You have control over the upper tier, good for you. However, do you have control over the middle and lower tier? I don't think so. Even if we don't have control over the upper tier, we can still bring in new recruits. You? No amount of aid is going to save your new blood from getting triple-teamed, and they can't send any tech to your upper tier fighters if their aid slots are full. No alliance will survive without recruits for long.

No points.

4: This is subject to many different interpretations, though sparking a major war without any diplomacy is moronic. You didn't bother to contact NPO.

No points.

5: Your alliance's and allies' members had repeatedly demanded NPO and its allies to let their upper tier fighters out of PM and even threw some insults around and made an announcement. If you don't have the will to stick around, you are not ready for war.

No points.

1/5 points=Unlikely chance of winning the war for your side.

This is the worst summary of what a war is period. You're taking points from Just War Theory that favor your argument and points from some sort of strategic war theory that support your argument as well, and mashing them together.

Points four and five don't even make sense. Plus we have infinite patience as time will tell.

Just War Theory does not apply to inter-alliance warfare.

As for strategic war theories for inter-alliance warfare? We're busy rewriting all of those.

I love how you guys think your "winning" or that you have won already. You are far from it, just because we don't fight where you would be instantly winning, does not mean you are winning. I would argue that we are actually winning the lower-mid tier wars so far, contrary to what all the big bored tech heavy umbrella and MK guys think. (most of the big guys are the vocal ones on these boards)

There's no real way I can argue against this because I assume you've seen the same numbers that I have and merely have reached a differing conclusion, but I think at this point you're in the minority opinion.

Kyaris, this was a well written post, and I agree with most all of it.

The Just War Theory is interesting and something I intended to write about, but unfortunately I haven't been able to yet because of RL. I'll keep this blog in mind the next time I'm going to write about International Relations.

Plus we have infinite patience as time will tell.

As for strategic war theories for inter-alliance warfare? We're busy rewriting all of those.

You are either extremely optimistic, or just plain arrogant. If you can have infinite patience, what makes you think the people you are fighting are not capable of the same? Are they somehow inherently inferior to you? Please elaborate.

There is no such thing as international law here, but there have been and always will be conventions that people more or less follow. None of those are absolute, but those who flought convention often pay a high price for it. Witness NPO and what happened to them when they attacked in the middle of negotiations for one example of this. What theories are you re-writing? Other then attacking for no reason other then you want to and have the power to do so, where is the innovation? I'm sorry, but I've seen Might Makes Right before, it's not new.

If anyone is re-writing the strategic theory book, it is the other side, with this "PM for the upper tiers, war for the middle and lower tiers" strategy. Which I have already seen people on the DH side complain about rather vocally, since it flies in the face of conventional thought. I think DH is in the stronger physical position right now, but their situation isn't perfect by any means. If this war does go on for an extended period, you won't grow as fast as the people who are not involved in the war, and attrition from boredom is likely to affect you just as much as it does the NPO Coalition's side; that's hardly a win for you. Also, as long as this goes on your abilitiy to deal with any new business is severely curtailed, since you will always have to keep your eye on the people you're keeping down as well. You are like Brer Rabbit with your hands stuck in the tar baby right now. You aren't in any great danger, but you certainly are stuck with it. The other side has already been stifled by peace mode for months and seen their other alliance members torn up a lot in the war; they have no real incentive to come out and let you beat them to death, I don't understand why you don't seem to realise that. If you had made that offer a month ago I think it would have had a much better chance of being accepted. The longer this goes on, the less likely it will be that they accept it, since they've already been paying in on the installment plan so to speak.

In other words, your offer to them at this point looks light.

Explain this strategic loss in detail please. I keep seeing it referred to in the forums, but I'm not seeing its nature.

Posts usually reference it to a loss of allies, a loss of patience, or some sort of public support backlash, but I don't see a train of logic to facilitate this line of reasoning.

As someone who has rode that train, I think it is best experienced.

This is the worst summary of what a war is period. You're taking points from Just War Theory that favor your argument and points from some sort of strategic war theory that support your argument as well, and mashing them together.

Points four and five don't even make sense. Plus we have infinite patience as time will tell.

Just War Theory does not apply to inter-alliance warfare.

As for strategic war theories for inter-alliance warfare? We're busy rewriting all of those.

Go back into CN's history. Majority of the wars fought had some kind of a CB. There may be a few where the CB are questionable, but I have yet to know a war that had absolutely no CB, and the NPO-DH war is borderline CB-less war.

For point 4, NPO attacked during middle of negotiations. Had they didn't and the negotiations succeeded, then Karma War and many other events afterward would have never happened. There's no inter-alliance "rules", but most alliances agree on a set of common rules; don't attack during negotiations, don't be a jerk during diplomacy, don't spy, etc.

For point 5, you may think you have infinite patience. What about your other members and your allies' members? What about NPO's fighters and it's allies? They're all vulnerable to RL and boredom, and even veterans will find it annoying to fight a constant intensive war for more than a year, especially if the enemy has no incentive to surrender and the reason for war is very weak. NPO and its allies have very good reasons to keep on fighting.

I'm fairly certain that you will leave the !@#$storm after about one, two or even three years of endless fighting with victory nowhere close by.

RL and boredom are the worst enemies of CN players, and it's hard as hell to recruit to replace lost fighters during a war, especially when your middle and lower tier is a death zone.

Go back into CN's history. Majority of the wars fought had some kind of a CB. There may be a few where the CB are questionable, but I have yet to know a war that had absolutely no CB, and the NPO-DH war is borderline CB-less war.

For point 4, NPO attacked during middle of negotiations. Had they didn't and the negotiations succeeded, then Karma War and many other events afterward would have never happened. There's no inter-alliance "rules", but most alliances agree on a set of common rules; don't attack during negotiations, don't be a jerk during diplomacy, don't spy, etc.

For point 5, you may think you have infinite patience. What about your other members and your allies' members? What about NPO's fighters and it's allies? They're all vulnerable to RL and boredom, and even veterans will find it annoying to fight a constant intensive war for more than a year, especially if the enemy has no incentive to surrender and the reason for war is very weak. NPO and its allies have very good reasons to keep on fighting.

I'm fairly certain that you will leave the !@#$storm after about one, two or even three years of endless fighting with victory nowhere close by.

RL and boredom are the worst enemies of CN players, and it's hard as hell to recruit to replace lost fighters during a war, especially when your middle and lower tier is a death zone.

So what happens if this is a CB-less war, exactly?

also: Our middle/lower tier is a death zone, but war is where we thrive. It's something you pixelhuggers have never quite understood about us.

As someone who has rode that train, I think it is best experienced.

Okay cool so you don't have an answer and are deflecting. Thanks for your input.

You are either extremely optimistic, or just plain arrogant. If you can have infinite patience, what makes you think the people you are fighting are not capable of the same? Are they somehow inherently inferior to you? Please elaborate.

There is no such thing as international law here, but there have been and always will be conventions that people more or less follow. None of those are absolute, but those who flought convention often pay a high price for it. Witness NPO and what happened to them when they attacked in the middle of negotiations for one example of this. What theories are you re-writing? Other then attacking for no reason other then you want to and have the power to do so, where is the innovation? I'm sorry, but I've seen Might Makes Right before, it's not new.

If anyone is re-writing the strategic theory book, it is the other side, with this "PM for the upper tiers, war for the middle and lower tiers" strategy. Which I have already seen people on the DH side complain about rather vocally, since it flies in the face of conventional thought. I think DH is in the stronger physical position right now, but their situation isn't perfect by any means. If this war does go on for an extended period, you won't grow as fast as the people who are not involved in the war, and attrition from boredom is likely to affect you just as much as it does the NPO Coalition's side; that's hardly a win for you. Also, as long as this goes on your abilitiy to deal with any new business is severely curtailed, since you will always have to keep your eye on the people you're keeping down as well. You are like Brer Rabbit with your hands stuck in the tar baby right now. You aren't in any great danger, but you certainly are stuck with it. The other side has already been stifled by peace mode for months and seen their other alliance members torn up a lot in the war; they have no real incentive to come out and let you beat them to death, I don't understand why you don't seem to realise that. If you had made that offer a month ago I think it would have had a much better chance of being accepted. The longer this goes on, the less likely it will be that they accept it, since they've already been paying in on the installment plan so to speak.

In other words, your offer to them at this point looks light.

If we have infinite patience, but our opponents do also, in this case it means we win, because our opponents in peace mode cannot expand their nations or collect significant taxes while hiding in peace mode, whereas we can continue to grow and operate while they remain stagnant. I don't believe the peace mode war strategy is going to be proven effective in the long run in an "infinite patience scenario". As for us re-writing the strategy book, yeah, we have. We've proven the viability of infinite war chests, proven the importance of full NS combat spreads and aid bombs, and produced the most viable long-term siege in Cybernations history. We can, in fact, grow faster than the other side in this conflict because of our aid relationship and our ability to grow during war.

Your point about their unwillingness to accept the offer as time goes on seems reasonable. It does seem that they make the possibilities worse for themselves as time goes on in this regard, but I'm not sure whether to throw up my hands and put on my pixellated sunglasses for a shallow "Deal With It" in the vein of "Well you're just making this worse on yourself by waiting to accept, you know", or else suggesting that they try to negotiate for better terms for themselves.

However, it's not like Doomhouse could simply walk away from this war at this juncture without forcing a surrender of some sort. NPO, in their typical line of reasoning would declare some sort of moral victory, and that just doesn't make any sort of sense for us to accept when we have such a huge strategic advantage and, from our perspective, due moral cause for forcing that surrender. Your point seems reasonable, we are "stuck" in this war. It also is the most fun war we've ever had, and morale in GOONS is higher than it has ever been. The attrition and "fatigue" you're referring to isn't happening. It's just not there. NPO is in for a long ride.

So what happens if this is a CB-less war, exactly?

also: Our middle/lower tier is a death zone, but war is where we thrive. It's something you pixelhuggers have never quite understood about us.

Public Relations disaster. It may not affect your alliance in the short term if you have lots of allies, but in the long run; your alliance will be as known as the one that DoWs on anything that it damn pleases. Most likely if your alliance and their allies got away with it, what makes you think they won't try another CB-less war? And how about another? I hope you understand what happens when the general public begin to boil, it doesn't take long for other alliances' leadership to also dislike your alliance and its allies.

Your alliance isn't the first one to attempt to break common sense, but it won't be the last time where a curbstomp is organized to put the aggressors out of their misery.

If your argument is based on Roquentin, you are basing it on false information. There was no intention on our part to ever enter the war in favor of Polar; after the war in which they screwed TOP and IRON, among other reasons, they have shown themselves to be a most untrustworthy alliance. We quite simply do not trust them. We stated emphatically within our leadership we would not enter the war period. Attacking us pre-emptively based on speculation (false, at that) is not defensible, and does not warrant any trust from the NPO.

Attacking pre-emptively because DH doesn't like us, considers us to be a threat (thank you once again for making us the center of your universe) and essentially wants us dead, while more honest, is not conducive to having us trust DH either.

Our bank nations, usually our top 50 nations, have always been put into PM during a war and NEVER come out. It doesn't matter if you or anyone else states using banks is outmoded; it works for us (after GWI we reclaimed the number one spot in 3 weeks; after Karma, number two until this bogus war).

DH was the aggressor; they do not have the moral high ground here. DH cannot dictate to the NPO how to wage our war. And if DH thinks we cannot fight a long drawn-out war, then they haven't paid much attention to our long past history in this game. We can fight for as long as it takes. And, I wager, even though I am no longer in gov, that we will.

NOTE: Edited by friend Michael.

Okay cool so you don't have an answer and are deflecting. Thanks for your input.

Not a deflection, I don't feel like rehashing several years of history you could easily look up on the wiki. You'd do well to research before spouting such confident statements as the op and subsequent replies.

If we have infinite patience, but our opponents do also, in this case it means we win, because our opponents in peace mode cannot expand their nations or collect significant taxes while hiding in peace mode, whereas we can continue to grow and operate while they remain stagnant. I don't believe the peace mode war strategy is going to be proven effective in the long run in an "infinite patience scenario". As for us re-writing the strategy book, yeah, we have. We've proven the viability of infinite war chests, proven the importance of full NS combat spreads and aid bombs, and produced the most viable long-term siege in Cybernations history.

Your point seems reasonable, we are "stuck" in this war. It also is the most fun war we've ever had, and morale in GOONS is higher than it has ever been. The attrition and "fatigue" you're referring to isn't happening. It's just not there. NPO is in for a long ride.

"Infinite war chests"? I'm not sure what you are referring to there, would you mind explaining that concept to me? Full NS spreads and aid bombs have been done in war before, I'm not sure why you think that is new, though perhaps the scale of the aid being sent to GOONS is unprecedented. I wouldn't say you have produced the most viable siege just yet. VietFAN and the Karma War were both much longer then this one, and a lot can happen between now and the time when you would match those conflicts for length. Though your position seems strong enough right now.

When people are referring to fatigue I don't think they are talking about GOONS or the nations they are fighting, it's the ones in peace mode or twiddling their thumbs while waiting for a target to come out. I'm sure after the first week the upper tier nations have not had much fun. I honestly think both sides are in for a long ride, since the pre-emptive strike has given the NPO side enough morale/incentive to stick it out for a while. Now maybe that willpower will fade, but the more the DH side talks about it, the more likely they are to stick with the peace mode plan since it seems to be annoying them at least. You are right about growing faster then the NPO side, but those two groups are not the only ones in existance; Everyone else will move forward while those two stagnate. The NPO side moreso, but you will both be affected. I guess it comes down to opportunity costs.

right. you saw NPO as a threat and you aggressively attacked them. so the thinking is quite linear. the next time you see NPO as a threat you will aggressively attack them. i am not moving at all. i am using logical deduction. you are using the denial tactic and then a deflection because you lack any argument that can actually refute my logical deduction.

i could also go into what actually constitutes a threat being subjective. which means a threat to DH could be NPO having 100 nukes or having 100k tech or some such nonsense.

Me: Doom House doesn't see this as "trimming the hedges"

You: Then why did they post that exact line of thought in the DoW?

Me: They didn't post that in the DoW

You: They didn't have to, I can infer it

Unless you have a strange definition of "post" and/or "exact", then you're moving the target. If you don't want to admit that, then I don't want to even attempt to discuss this with you.

"Infinite war chests"? I'm not sure what you are referring to there, would you mind explaining that concept to me? Full NS spreads and aid bombs have been done in war before, I'm not sure why you think that is new, though perhaps the scale of the aid being sent to GOONS is unprecedented. I wouldn't say you have produced the most viable siege just yet. VietFAN and the Karma War were both much longer then this one, and a lot can happen between now and the time when you would match those conflicts for length. Though your position seems strong enough right now.

When people are referring to fatigue I don't think they are talking about GOONS or the nations they are fighting, it's the ones in peace mode or twiddling their thumbs while waiting for a target to come out. I'm sure after the first week the upper tier nations have not had much fun. I honestly think both sides are in for a long ride, since the pre-emptive strike has given the NPO side enough morale/incentive to stick it out for a while. Now maybe that willpower will fade, but the more the DH side talks about it, the more likely they are to stick with the peace mode plan since it seems to be annoying them at least. You are right about growing faster then the NPO side, but those two groups are not the only ones in existance; Everyone else will move forward while those two stagnate. The NPO side moreso, but you will both be affected. I guess it comes down to opportunity costs.

I should clarify; I meant infinite war chests in the context that there is no such thing as "too much warchest". The sky is the limit for our allies.

If your argument is based on Roquentin, you are basing it on false information. There was no intention on our part to ever enter the war in favor of Polar; after the war in which they screwed TOP and IRON, among other reasons, they have shown themselves to be a most untrustworthy alliance. We quite simply do not trust them. We stated emphatically within our leadership we would not enter the war period. Attacking us pre-emptively based on speculation (false, at that) is not defensible, and does not warrant any trust from the NPO.

Attacking pre-emptively because DH doesn't like us, considers us to be a threat (thank you once again for making us the center of your universe) and essentially wants us dead, while more honest, is not conducive to having us trust DH either.

Our bank nations, usually our top 50 nations, have always been put into PM during a war and NEVER come out. It doesn't matter if you or anyone else states using banks is outmoded; it works for us (after GWI we reclaimed the number one spot in 3 weeks; after Karma, number two until this bogus war).

DH was the aggressor; they do not have the moral high ground here. DH cannot dictate to the NPO how to wage our war. And if DH thinks we cannot fight a long drawn-out war, then they haven't paid much attention to our long past history in this game. We can fight for as long as it takes. And, I wager, even though I am no longer in gov, that we will.

NOTE: Edited by friend Michael.

I don't know this for fact, but I suspect DH had plenty of reasons to engage NPO that have nothing to do with the Polar conflict. You were vocally anti-DH long before that and I am pretty sure we just decided not to leave a vulture hanging on our back porch waiting for us to provide an opportunity.

Also, boy, it must be boring to be a top 50 nation in NPO during wartime. :\

I don't know this for fact, but I suspect DH had plenty of reasons to engage NPO that have nothing to do with the Polar conflict. You were vocally anti-DH long before that and I am pretty sure we just decided not to leave a vulture hanging on our back porch waiting for us to provide an opportunity.

Also, boy, it must be boring to be a top 50 nation in NPO during wartime. :\

DH said it in their DOW: they hate us, they think we're a threat(thank you for making us the center of the cyberverse once again) and they would like us to die.

And yes, it is boring to be a banker during wartime; some complain a lot.

Edited by Dan, therapist.

With respect, this statement suggests you don't understand the public justification provided by your leaders for this war:

I'm pretty sure this is the stated reason in the DoW. A pre-emptive strategic attack to prevent NPO's re-rise to Hegemony, which is a direct threat to us, plus as a deterrent to keep the VE-NpO front from becoming complicated further by NPOs manipulations by giving them something else to worry about. I won't pretend to know if I'm interpreting it correctly, but as I understand it NPO, left alone, was a huge threat to our operational security, so we're out here taking care of it right now.

Thus, you cannot possibly state that your cause is solid, because you do not even understand what that cause is.