A plea to various alliance leaders

[The AUT]

"Everybody wants heaven, but nobody wants dead. Everybody wants diamonds without the bloodshed."

CN, 2010.

[Ryan Greenberg]

The sides are much more easier to predict than a few months ago. We will have a war by April imo.

[Heft]

i know 2006/2007 saw the peak of nations in CN so it could be 40k. though i could have sworn hearing it was around 20k in 2008.

Then 2007 began with the Fark greenlight and saw the ascendancy of GOONS and FAN from their offline communities, as well as the creation of FOK and Genmay from theirs, and probably a bunch of others. Oh, /b/, right. I think ebaumsworld even tried to make an alliance at some point but GOONS stomped them out before they got anywhere. Point being, second half of 06 and throughout 07 there was a constant influx of "invasions" from a variety of communities, and CN did peak at around 40k. After UJW the population crashed. Through 2008 it seemed to stabilize around 30-33k for the most part. But after WotC it's been steadily declining, especially in the last few months.

Part of this is just unavoidable as the game ages and contracts.

[Voodoo Nova]

I'm having fun really. I don't care much for the game itself...I just sit there, collect my taxes and pay my bills. However, I do enjoy the various communities this game has to offer, from offsite alliance forums to this forum.

Also, as stated before, the CN world is probably steady as it is. There are influxes at 3 key time frames: winter break, spring break & summer break. A majority don't bother staying due to whatever reason, although I bet it has nothing to do with the political game itself. CN will continue on, and the community will remain steady with old players leaving and new players joining.

[King DrunkWino]

I would think that someone leading an alliance would understand that the game always has and always will be played by and for the benefit of an elite cadre of players in the backrooms.

That's a little bit unfair just for the simple reason that if anyone wants to break that glass ceiling, it really ain't that hard to do. Sure, there are always going to be folks who's OOC friendly relations keep them seeming like some sort of elitists snobs, but they're not some sort of unapproachable gods.

[Heft]

That's a little bit unfair just for the simple reason that if anyone wants to break that glass ceiling, it really ain't that hard to do. Sure, there are always going to be folks who's OOC friendly relations keep them seeming like some sort of elitists snobs, but they're not some sort of unapproachable gods.

Seriously, with the proliferation of alliances out there it's not that hard to become "leadership" simply because the "leadership" throughout the alliances is stretched so thin that a lot of it just isn't very good and thus not difficult to be better than and break into.

[Vilien]

Seriously, with the proliferation of alliances out there it's not that hard to become "leadership" simply because the "leadership" throughout the alliances is stretched so thin that a lot of it just isn't very good and thus not difficult to be better than and break into.

There's a difference between being the leader of an alliance and being someone who actually has an influence in world politics.

[King DrunkWino]

Seriously, with the proliferation of alliances out there it's not that hard to become "leadership" simply because the "leadership" throughout the alliances is stretched so thin that a lot of it just isn't very good and thus not difficult to be better than and break into.

Even if you take that out of the equation and just concentrate on the bigger and/or more well connected alliances, it's still surprisingly easy to become one of those backroom power players somewhere. All you really need is a brain and the ability to not say dumb things on a consistent basis.

/the second part of that is becoming more of an optional requirement more and more.

[Vivi]

I'm going to go ahead and get this over with now: There is no reason to discuss other online games in this thread.

[Sigrun Vapneir]

Honestly I think some good points are made but people overestimate the effect of them.

It's a pretty dull game if you think it's supposed to be a wargame. But if you think it's a wargame you probably have bigger problems.

I would guess the vast majority who enjoy the game focus on the nation building part, with community building also a large focus for most, with RP and politics running a distant third. Player retention is therefore dramatically hampered by pointless wars waged without reason.

Of course individual motivations vary, but seriously, if you want to be involved in politics, it isnt that hard. If you cant see a way to do that in your current alliance choose a new one, or start your own. If I am incorrect in assuming most players dont *want* to have to deal with politics (though that is my experience) then the obvious solution would simply be to form more alliances so that more political positions are open. That, also, is hampered by pointless wars waged without reason, however.

[Londo Mollari]

If we were to have a global war now of roughly even sides lasting for two months it would cause the nation count of CN to be reduced by between 2,000 and 4,000. How do I know? Because this is exactly what we saw in Karma. We just had a HUGE war a few months back, a lot of people got destroyed, and a lot of people left. There has been a slow drift downward (which has been a trend since I started playing) ever since the end of the Karma War, but truth be told, most of the loss happened during the (very long) war itself from what I remember.

The basic problem now is that nations take too long to be built into significant powers, and the loser of a GW can't rebuild in a month like in the old days. You lose now and you are done for a long time. Having a giant war under these conditions isn't going to solve anything at all, it's just going to make a bunch of people quit. What needs to be changed to address the issue you see is the nature of modern nations. A reset isn't the answer because that would make a ton of players leave too. The main issue I see is that nations grow too large. If an infra/tech erosion measure were added to the game to prevent people from ever getting much bigger than 5k infra and 2k tech, you would see much more frequent GWs. But a lot of people who have worked hard on their nations and donated would lose a lot of that effort. It's just about impossible to make a change that would make everyone happy.

A social change is in fact what is needed, and that is inclusion of all players who want to be included. The nature of the game has changed with the increasing size of nations and that's something that has to be addressed. With wars becoming far more destructive and therefore much less frequent, the game does become a lot more political. It's quite possible to key your membership in on what's happening. Really, what do I know that any reasonably active member of my alliance doesn't? They know that there are two sides in the world, and who is on which sides, and that in time it is quite likely that some event will precipitate a large, highly destructive nuclear war between the two sides, which everyone is planning to win. I know little more than this.

War is fun, but there's no way that it can be the central focus of a game in which losers will take more than a year to rebuild to a position where they can make a run at winning again (if they ever get the chance). Either the game mechanics need to be changed so that it takes less time to fully rebuild from a thoroughly devastating war, or people need to accept the changed nature of the game in which war is secondary to politics and start taking steps to engage members according to the new paradigm. I would love to see a game mechanics change which would return CN to its "Golden Age", but I can't even figure out how to do that without alienating a lot of CN's most active players. Maybe you can think of something SCM?

[Heft]

There's a difference between being the leader of an alliance and being someone who actually has an influence in world politics.

Well, as pointed out, even getting to the point of having an influence isn't necessarily that hard. It'll take time and patience and some actual commitment, but it's certainly possible, and always been, and is more true today than at many points in the past. With there being so many more alliances and no single ultimate power cluster or bloc or alliance, power and influence is much, much more diffuse. Which means that no one today has the influence that the select few had one, two, or three years ago, but also that the "select few" is a considerably larger group than it was before.

[JD Storm]

i think i came around a matter of weeks before GW3. i pretty much knew by the way things were going that sh*t was going to hit the fan, soon....though, nobody seemed to know when. while i don't have the benefit of seeing how things were during GW2 or earlier, it seemed like far less politics were needed then, as opposed to now. it was more postering (sp?).

between GW3 & the Karma War, i saw a lot of the standard chest beating. yet, when it came time to actually come to blows, i usually got the guys that didn't put much effort into the fighting. after 1 day of fighting, in both wars, most of my opponents pretty well just sat there & took it.

i don't know if there's something in the game mechanics that make it less appealing to fight or it's an issue with alliances getting the proper moral with their people to put up a good fight.

i'd have to agree with the thought that recovery time needs to be sped up, so we don't have to wait so long for a new war to take place.

i've definately noticed the point that people are less willing to fight, unless the odds are overwhelmingly in their favor. if there was a good reason to go to war, i'd take the necessary lumps....no matter how bad it hurts.

[Starcraftmazter]

There has been a slow drift downward (which has been a trend since I started playing) ever since the end of the Karma War, but truth be told, most of the loss happened during the (very long) war itself from what I remember.

In regards to when the drift downward began, I think it's fair to say it started after UJW - and coincidentally, UJW was the last war where the time between major wars was still below 160 days (not counting the first).

http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/5637/screenshot1ar.png

The basic problem now is that nations take too long to be built into significant powers, and the loser of a GW can't rebuild in a month like in the old days. You lose now and you are done for a long time. Having a giant war under these conditions isn't going to solve anything at all, it's just going to make a bunch of people quit. What needs to be changed to address the issue you see is the nature of modern nations. A reset isn't the answer because that would make a ton of players leave too. The main issue I see is that nations grow too large. If an infra/tech erosion measure were added to the game to prevent people from ever getting much bigger than 5k infra and 2k tech, you would see much more frequent GWs. But a lot of people who have worked hard on their nations and donated would lose a lot of that effort. It's just about impossible to make a change that would make everyone happy.

Perhaps some short-term unhappiness is necessary for some long term happiness? I agree with your assessment, and point out the fact that a long lasting war will push most nations back down to the range you refer to as more ideal for more frequent wars.

Maybe you can think of something SCM?

As you say, it is impossible to please everyone, but in my opinion that is no prelude to doing nothing

[LegendoftheSkies]

But neither will people play if what they spent 6, 9, or god forbid 12 months to build, is destroyed in a few days or a week of war, especially if that war is pointless.

Assuming they survive for more than 6 months without an alliance. I'd call that a stretch.

Anyway, I do think there's always a danger in taking the fun out of a game when people take winning too seriously. That applies to CN as much as any game. Even had a major war erupted over the TPF conflict, both sides were so afraid of losing that they took to the strategy of putting nations of a certain NS in peace mode. It would've been a stand-off and not fun in the slightest, which is why I laugh when people complain about the war ending prematurely.

[Dochartaigh]

Then 2007 began with the Fark greenlight and saw the ascendancy of GOONS and FAN from their offline communities, as well as the creation of FOK and Genmay from theirs, and probably a bunch of others. Oh, /b/, right. I think ebaumsworld even tried to make an alliance at some point but GOONS stomped them out before they got anywhere. Point being, second half of 06 and throughout 07 there was a constant influx of "invasions" from a variety of communities, and CN did peak at around 40k. After UJW the population crashed. Through 2008 it seemed to stabilize around 30-33k for the most part. But after WotC it's been steadily declining, especially in the last few months.

Part of this is just unavoidable as the game ages and contracts.

hmm... aiight. i knew around 2007 was the peak with all the invasion alliances coming out though FAN and GOONS were both 2006.

i thought 2008 saw some lower numbers but meh.

[Kzoppistan]

*Edit: Eh, I didn't really say anything that wasn't said better by others. Here, I'm saving you 3 minutes of your life. Aren't you happy?

--

I think the times are pretty exciting, myself.

Edited January 17, 2010 by Kzoppistan

[Marty McFly]

Let's be clear about what we're discussing here.

1. CN as a mechanical game is, for better or worse, straight foward and very simple. Make money, buy things, use them to blow up someone else's things. Rinse, wash, repeat.

2. CN as a political game on the forums is actually interesting when things happen on the forums because these occurances are accessible. Someone can stop by, read up, get an idea of what the deal is and then jump in with a thought. Unfortunately, people are so gun shy about the forums now because of the merciless heckling which goes on. People want to look good and get their egos stroked and that simply won't happen here. Those who want an intelligent discussion also won't generally find it here so you're left with the mindless drones who come to attempt to score a point or three and run off at the first sign of real opposition.

3. CN as a political game on IRC is horrible. You have maybe a hundred people who are actually involved and then the milling masses around them who flock to the drama when it occurs. It's inaccessible, boring and generally involves being told half-truths or just being told you're not going to get the story at all. The common player isn't allowed access to the fun maneuvering because of the entrenched older class. In effect, if you can't find a way in you either have to invent your own fun or simply idle away. Often inventing your own fun leads to being ejected so that's pretty much out.

What's the solution?

A. Ignore the current structure - I've advocated this before. Go out, do whatever you want to and have fun on your own terms. Want to get nukes? Get them. Want to attack some dude? Attack away. Ignore the hemming and the hawwing and go make your own good time. This, for the record, is my preferred option.

B. Deal with it - Suck it up, stop whining and accept it for what it is.

C. Bring the game back to the forums - Use IRC as an internal alliance comms network and put the actual good stuff on the OWF for once. End the backroom garbage and put it out where people can enjoy it. Lord, the only time people really seem to get interested is when people log dump or generally reveal on a big secret. Take advantage of this.

Why do I agree with you so much?

[Alterego]

The reforming of all these old alliances to try and bring back a golden age is a last ditch attempt to revive CN. There will be no more than 16k mostly inactive nations this time next year.

[lebubu]

Maybe you should try creating a community that people want to come back to, instead of blaming CN lolitics (which have been pretty much the same for my entire existence in the game) for the attrition.

Let's face it: the game itself isn't exciting at all, the war aspect gets old after 3 days of fighting (not to mention waking up for update if you're European), the game barely gets updated anymore and a lot of people simply don't give a !@#$ about what's happening on these boards. Try focusing on the social part of the alliance - give people stuff to do, spark discussion, activity, organize PC game tournaments, whatever. Anything to make people get on not because they need a tech deal or want to ask what wonder to buy, but because they want to come back to an actual community.

[Bob Janova]

I'm going to say what I say in all these threads: if you don't like it, do something about it. Start a war if fighting losing wars is fun to you. Get involved in the political game if you're jealous of 100 people having all the fun.

I would say that one big reason that the community isn't growing, apart from already having had invasions from all the main online communities already and the game itself looking like it comes from 1995, is that any new player who puts their face on these boards gets raided or heckled out of the game. Karma changed things on the alliance scale, although as current events show you can still have your alliance seriously damaged for nothing at all, but for the new player (who by definition isn't in an alliance yet) the game environment is just as toxic as ever.

[Bill Wallace]

I consider myself a casual player and from time to time will follow what happens on these boards. From what I see, there seems to be an elevated degree of snottiness that emanates from a large number of the established players who like to post here.

There's too much, "You're doing it wrong" and "You're not very good at this, are you?" type of comments if you ask me. Why can't there be a different way of doing things? The established ideas on behavior, politics, and what are acceptable reasons for war on Planet Bob are limiting the game.

I also think this game needs less "valid CB's" and more atrocities, brooding, hate, and revenge. Only then will there be a reason for more people to stick around. Somebody once said "Peace is a lie". I don't know about that, but what I do know is that peace is overrated and limits the amount of people who only play for the war aspect.

I'd also like to see limited reparations. Limit them to thirty days or less. The threat of long term reparations stifles creativity and boldness. More cunning. More daring. More drama.

Just my opinion.

[M6 Redneck]

I cannot offer anymore to the reasons CN could be stagnating, but I can stay that it has stagnated for me. I came to realise buying tech and infra was less than stimulating and that being in alliance government did not really offer much more due to the binds of the treaty web and the consensus on "how the game SHOULD be played".

All I could actually control were my own actions, so I set out on my own path. Call it roguery if you must but I prefer to see my nation as soveriegn and able to do as it pleases. Maybe if more nations come to this conclusion things will improve as alliances wane in power and as such the elitle rulers have the base of their power erroded, ie things become more unpredictable and fluid. That is only idle speculation but stepping outside the status quo and making my own decisions rekindled the spark for me - especially as it is such a hostile road to travel.

M6

[Monster]

Maybe you should try creating a community that people want to come back to, instead of blaming CN lolitics (which have been pretty much the same for my entire existence in the game) for the attrition.

Let's face it: the game itself isn't exciting at all, the war aspect gets old after 3 days of fighting (not to mention waking up for update if you're European), the game barely gets updated anymore and a lot of people simply don't give a !@#$ about what's happening on these boards. Try focusing on the social part of the alliance - give people stuff to do, spark discussion, activity, organize PC game tournaments, whatever. Anything to make people get on not because they need a tech deal or want to ask what wonder to buy, but because they want to come back to an actual community.

Yeah, I agree with this. CN ultimately isn't a wargame despite having the function. I've never been that thrilled by the war engine to be honest. There are plenty of venues I have access to where I can kill stuff whenever I please.

The communities as was previously stated are what make this game interesting at all. However, I understand why people get bored and land/tech raid.

If there was war all the time, I doubt many would stay interested after the first month or so.

Gecko's idea in the other thread could potentially help make the game become based on something other the usual political alliances that persist, though.

Edited January 17, 2010 by Antoine Roquentin

[White Chocolate]

Here's a wild and crazy idea. Everyone who thinks blowing each other up all the time is "fun" get together and do so. Just leave the rest of us out of it, thank you. This means no attacking other alliances and calling it a "tech raid" just because they don't have any treaties. If NOT having a treaty isn't a clear indication that a group wants to be left OUT of the treaty web, I don't know what is...

If the alliance leaders you've got aren't cooperating, leave and start your own alliance.

In fact, why not petition admin to create your own world where you can do that all you want? If your theory about the quiet majority really just wanting to war all the time is correct, such a place should be overflowing with membership...

oh wait...