Hello from the newly formed nation of GnuLinux. I am the Grand Sysadmin, Chmod000. I found this game while searching for interesting strategy/nation building games (I've always loved games in that category, like the Civ series and Empire Earth) to try out, and so far it seems very interesting. Before trying out P&W, I played (and still play, actually) >BLOC. I'm still interested in bloc, but from what I've seen so far P&W seems a lot more in depth (i.e. there are a large number of resource types and units).
It also seems like large wars are somewhat common here, or at least more common than on BLOC, and that nukes are a lot more common (there's only one nuke in the entire BLOC game now; whereas I've seen several alliances that have a couple dozen in P&W). I can't help but feel that the increased presence of nuclear weapons alone makes this game more fun than BLOC .