Best and Worst Military Alliances (2010 Edition)

[Hyperion321]

[quote name='Blue Lightning' timestamp='1283395644' post='2438787']
As others pointed out, I'm talking about TOP in it's prime against any other alliance in it's prime. I don't think this poll is meant to be about the year 2010, it's meant to be about all of CN history up to (but not including) 2010. As a result, the current standings are not relevant. My argument is that TOP just prior to the bipolar war (which was only a few months into 2010) had the best military any alliance has ever had. If you take a few months off that to get back to very late 2009, we were still at a similar strength (but not quite as strong due to the tech we imported in the 2010 months leading up to the war). So in the period between early 2006 and the end of 2009, TOP had the best military of any alliance.

If we're talking about right now, I wouldn't put TOP as the best military. As you pointed out, we're not in fighting shape right now. We lost about half our tech in the last war and have lost quite a few members to deletion. I'd bet there are probably alliances around who could give us a good run for our money or even beat us. Not that I've looked at the stats recently. However, this thread isn't about right now.
[/quote]
I wouldn't put one period of time in one alliance as a determining factor in who has the best military [i]ever[/i]. I believe it is more about consistency and that certain sense of "legendariness" than having the most stats at one time. NPO has that legendariness for inventing the blitz and destroying alliances for years. Umbrella, FAN, Fark, MK, FOK, Valhalla, and TORN are also very consistently effective. TOP, however, has only really gone balls out in one war, which was the last one. You may have participated in several major wars, but you never really fought tooth and nail until this year, so there really isn't any basis for consistency in my opinion.

[im317]

wait, we have 10 vote? i want to say that's 10 of our members voting for us but im not sure we have 10 members who visit these forums often enough to have voted in this.

[President Obama]

[quote name='Hyperion321' timestamp='1283398095' post='2438825']
I wouldn't put one period of time in one alliance as a determining factor in who has the best military [i]ever[/i]. I believe it is more about consistency and that certain sense of "legendariness" than having the most stats at one time. NPO has that legendariness for inventing the blitz and destroying alliances for years. Umbrella, FAN, Fark, MK, FOK, Valhalla, and TORN are also very consistently effective. TOP, however, has only really gone balls out in one war, which was the last one. You may have participated in several major wars, but you never really fought tooth and nail until this year, so there really isn't any basis for consistency in my opinion.
[/quote]
GW2 and GW3 were both very successful for TOP. GW2 we destroyed GATO's upper tier and in GW3 we ripped through Legion along with FAN and some others. Just saying. TOP has fought in one less war than many of those on your list. While we've been on the losing side only once only MK, Valhalla, Fark and TORN on your list have lost more than that. We've been in wars, whether they've been difficult or not isn't something we can control. The only one I'll give you is UJW and that was a difficult situation to work out and I won't fault the TOP of the time for doing what they did.

Edited September 2, 2010 by President Obama

[kerschbs]

[quote name='President Obama' timestamp='1283399143' post='2438840']
GW2 and GW3 were both very successful for TOP. GW2 we destroyed GATO's upper tier and in GW3 we ripped through Legion along with FAN and some others. Just saying. TOP has fought in one less war than many of those on your list. While we've been on the losing side only once only MK, Valhalla, Fark and TORN on your list have lost more than that. We've been in wars, whether they've been difficult or not isn't something we can control. The only one I'll give you is UJW and that was a difficult situation to work out and I won't fault the TOP of the time for doing what they did.
[/quote]

The gw2 part is certainly true. TOP crunched our upper tier pretty hard. We hadn't really ever heard of em, and they put a licking on us. If that war had drawn out, we would have been in serious trouble.

[Hyperion321]

[quote name='President Obama' timestamp='1283399143' post='2438840']
GW2 and GW3 were both very successful for TOP. GW2 we destroyed GATO's upper tier and in GW3 we ripped through Legion along with FAN and some others. Just saying. TOP has fought in one less war than many of those on your list. While we've been on the losing side only once only MK, Valhalla, Fark and TORN on your list have lost more than that. We've been in wars, whether they've been difficult or not isn't something we can control. The only one I'll give you is UJW and that was a difficult situation to work out and I won't fault the TOP of the time for doing what they did.
[/quote]
Of course the difficulty isn't something you can control, but saying that you hypothetically could have handled those wars [i]if[/i] they were difficult and actually handling wars that are difficult are two different things. Sparta has only ever had to fight in two difficult wars. One we did bad, one we did better. MK, one the other hand, has been on the difficult side of the last [i]four[/i] major wars, and they did well in all of them. If you want an example on the other side of the web, NPO has also fought on the wrong end of multiple difficult wars and in most of them did pretty well.

I can understand TOP's position and focusing on the one-time stats and the hypothetical one on one's, but I just disagree with that approach. When I think about the single greatest military of all time I think about alliances that have shown they [i]deserve[/i] that title with consistency of combat ability and resilience under the harshest of conditions, rather than prime time stats and saying what they [i]could[/i] have done.

In short, when you want to know who is the best in history, look at all of history rather than one moment in time.

Edited September 2, 2010 by Hyperion321

[Thunder Strike]

[quote name='im317' timestamp='1283398749' post='2438833']
wait, we have 10 vote? i want to say that's 10 of our members voting for us but im not sure we have 10 members who visit these forums often enough to have voted in this.
[/quote]

I see a lot of NSO members voting for us. Which obviously is very amusing since they have never fought us.

[Blue Lightning]

[quote name='Hyperion321' timestamp='1283398095' post='2438825']
I wouldn't put one period of time in one alliance as a determining factor in who has the best military [i]ever[/i]. I believe it is more about consistency and that certain sense of "legendariness" than having the most stats at one time. NPO has that legendariness for inventing the blitz and destroying alliances for years. Umbrella, FAN, Fark, MK, FOK, Valhalla, and TORN are also very consistently effective. TOP, however, has only really gone balls out in one war, which was the last one. You may have participated in several major wars, but you never really fought tooth and nail until this year, so there really isn't any basis for consistency in my opinion.
[/quote]
We've had a consistently good war machine as well as the best of any single period in time. I mean, since the Karma war to the end of 09, our status as the top dog was fairly undisputed. And going right back to the early WUT days, times before Umbrella or MK were even founded, we've been notoriously heavy hitters. At first it was just great for our size, over time it became just flat out great.

I don't see how you can sit there and say that because we've only lost one war, we somehow haven't proven our military strength. As if all the times we've won wars at a canter count for nothing. Now obviously not all of these wars were easy purely because we're badass fighters, but it's not sheer coincidence either.

As an add on: When have Umbrella, MK, FOK, Valhalla or TORN ever had alliances that could beat us one on one? Going back to our early days, there were certainly plenty of alliances much stronger than us, but I don't recall any of the above being around and stronger than us.

[Hyperion321]

[quote name='Blue Lightning' timestamp='1283404939' post='2438915']
We've had a consistently good war machine as well as the best of any single period in time. I mean, since the Karma war to the end of 09, our status as the top dog was fairly undisputed. And going right back to the early WUT days, times before Umbrella or MK were even founded, we've been notoriously heavy hitters. At first it was just great for our size, over time it became just flat out great.

I don't see how you can sit there and say that because we've only lost one war, we somehow haven't proven our military strength. As if all the times we've won wars at a canter count for nothing. Now obviously not all of these wars were easy purely because we're badass fighters, but it's not sheer coincidence either.

As an add on: When have Umbrella, MK, FOK, Valhalla or TORN ever had alliances that could beat us one on one? Going back to our early days, there were certainly plenty of alliances much stronger than us, but I don't recall any of the above being around and stronger than us.
[/quote]
I guess we just have different opinions then. Either way I still don't think TOP is the best.

[Feanor Noldorin]

[quote name='Hyperion321' timestamp='1283385331' post='2438621']
Sometimes I wonder if Genmay was still alive if it would be as powerful as Umbrella is today...or perhaps even [i]more[/i] powerful.
[/quote]
It would not. Umbrella operates under a completely different internal and foreign affairs process than Genmay.

[iamthey]

Excellent second poll reflects reality. Hey sparta.

[bigwoody]

On an aside, the gap in skill between alliances is shrinking nowadays.

Back when TORN was founded, we and a handful of other alliances were far and away above the rest, because the proper tactics for warfighting were not widely known. Back then we had tricks for anarchying larger nations 1-on-1 rather reliably, as did others with GOONS/MK/a few other lineages. I remember a few of the wars in our early days where quite literally opponents didn't know what hit them.

By now, however, pretty much everyone knows how to fight, and war has turned into how your nation is built + who is the most active. Hence, size and activity rule over tactics almost universally. Alliances that are exceptions to this rule and are disproportionately deadly (i.e. GOD) or disproportionately pathetic (i.e. Sparta) for their size are now aberrations.

War in this game is now all about numbers, unfortunately.

[Taishaku]

This poll is biased in its conception. The application of military force is subject to an alliance's foreign affairs.

[Cataduanes]

Well credit to the OP, for such a flawed conception this thread and poll seems to be still chugging along

[the damned]

Haha, what a lulzy poll. You guys are rich

[Kowalski]

[quote name='Feanor Noldorin' timestamp='1283407282' post='2438951']
It would not. Umbrella operates under a completely different internal and foreign affairs process than Genmay.
[/quote]
This is correct, Umbrella exists the way it does now largely due to lessons learned from the failure of Genmay. If Genmay had survived it's likely those lessons would have not been learned, or if they eventually had been they certainly wouldn't have been enforced in such a manner.

Edited September 2, 2010 by Kowalski

[Timmmehhh]

[quote name='KingEd' timestamp='1283397169' post='2438807']
If this is about the "Stats"...Pacifica, during its prime, had over 22Mill NS, and 3-4 Million Units of Tech [Correct me if I'm wrong]. Sure, it was spread out over 900+ nations, but still a lot of Stats. I don't have the specifics on Military wonders for Pacifica during their prime but with 900 nations, they must have been on Par with TOP at the very least. (Like I said, I don't know, just my not common sense).

This discussion is gonna drag...
[/quote]
You are totally wrong Pacific had like 1,1 million tech 70 WRC's and 140 MHP at the height of their power. 4 million tech is insane lol. TOP was stronger on their prime they had the tech distributed over 200 strong nations with 160 WRC's.

[Chief Savage Man]

Umbrella is the best :X

[Haflinger]

[quote name='Timmehhh' timestamp='1283434607' post='2439108']
You are totally wrong Pacific had like 1,1 million tech 70 WRC's and 140 MHP at the height of their power. 4 million tech is insane lol. TOP was stronger on their prime they had the tech distributed over 200 strong nations with 160 WRC's.
[/quote]
I'm pretty sure that if NPO had had 4 million tech they would have won Karma fairly easily. lol.

Just a footnote, they now have 79 WRCs and 218 MPs.

[Lusitan]

I am surprised to see so few votes on Monos Archein tbh. In my opinion they're clearly the weakest link in SuperFriends.

[mrcalkin]

[quote name='Hyperion321' timestamp='1283392925' post='2438761']
You never know what an alliance can do in 3 years. Who knows, they could have been ruling the world by now

On another note...holy crap it's almost been 3 years since Genmay disbanded.
[/quote]

I can almost assure you that Genmay would have still been crap had we somehow managed to survive until now. The only reason Umbrella was feasible was for the fact that we changed direction drastically.

Also, 9/19 is both the three year anniversary of our disbandment and the 1000th day of Umbrella

[KingEd]

[quote name='Timmehhh' timestamp='1283434607' post='2439108']
You are totally wrong Pacific had like 1,1 million tech 70 WRC's and 140 MHP at the height of their power. 4 million tech is insane lol. TOP was stronger on their prime they had the tech distributed over 200 strong nations with 160 WRC's.
[/quote]

I thought I was wrong. Couldn't remember any of their stats for ^$^$. I think I confused their Infra Lvl w/ their Tech Level.

[quote name='Haflinger' timestamp='1283435479' post='2439115']
I'm pretty sure that if NPO had had 4 million tech they would have won Karma fairly easily. lol.

Just a footnote, they now have 79 WRCs and 218 MPs.
[/quote]

Are you sure ? I get that 4 million tech is a lot, but facing the odds that they did I'm sure they would have eventually surrendered but the war would have lasted maybe twice as long if not longer---or the latter, they would have won. Hell of a different world, if they had won...

Edited September 2, 2010 by KingEd

[Sandwich Controversy]

[quote name='KingEd' timestamp='1283442838' post='2439191']
I thought I was wrong. Couldn't remember any of their stats for ^$^$. I think I confused their Infra Lvl w/ their Tech Level.



Are you sure ? I get that 4 million tech is a lot, but facing the odds that they did I'm sure they would have eventually surrendered but the war would have lasted maybe twice as long if not longer---or the latter, they would have won. Hell of a different world, if they had won...
[/quote]
They had about 4m infra which may be the source of your confusion.

[Steve Buscemi]

[quote name='bigwoody' timestamp='1283410340' post='2438991']
[b]On an aside, the gap in skill between alliances is shrinking nowadays.[/b]

Back when TORN was founded, we and a handful of other alliances were far and away above the rest, because the proper tactics for warfighting were not widely known. Back then we had tricks for anarchying larger nations 1-on-1 rather reliably, as did others with GOONS/MK/a few other lineages. I remember a few of the wars in our early days where quite literally opponents didn't know what hit them.

By now, however, pretty much everyone knows how to fight, and [b]war has turned into how your nation is built + who is the most active.[/b] Hence, size and activity rule over tactics almost universally. Alliances that are exceptions to this rule and are disproportionately deadly (i.e. GOD) or disproportionately pathetic (i.e. Sparta) for their size are now aberrations.

War in this game is now all about numbers, unfortunately.
[/quote]
I think you really are dead on here. For awhile game mechanics and the war system changed quite often, whether by new wonders or parts of the actual battle system. Navy did very little and didn't matter until round 2-3 of the war which was already pretty much decided anyway. Since nothing has changed lately it's really taken most of the skill out of the war system everything just boils down to activity levels and nuclear power. What we need is more options in attacking like the choice between say an anarchy missle vs. a tech missle vs. a standard nuke (infra missle). Choices that really affect great war strategy.

With that said the best military is probably the most active x highest ANS x fearlessness. It's the last category that puts FOK and NpO up there with the likes of MK/Umbrella/TOP. EDIT: In my actual war experience STA/BAPS were tough and Wolfpack/Invicta/Legion were laughable.

Edited September 2, 2010 by Steve Buscemi

[Vol Navy]

[quote name='Hyperion321' timestamp='1283400734' post='2438855']
MK, one the other hand, has been on the difficult side of the last [i]four[/i] major wars, and they did well in all of them. If you want an example on the other side of the web, NPO has also fought on the wrong end of multiple difficult wars and in most of them did pretty well.

[/quote]


They have??? They were in a tough spot at the start of the last war before their allies whittled down TOP. They were one of about 9 allianes on us during Karma where we were 1 vs 3 the entire war. They were outnumbered in WoTC but were only at war for 13 days, they were only at war for 6 days during UJP.

So I'm not real clear on how MK was on the difficult side for the last 4 major wars.

[CoffeeshopFrank]

Biased polls are biased. You should make it so that all of the mentioned alliances are in both polls.