Dear BK and NPO

Avakael · October 11, 2016

Oculi Coluber, Perg.

greatkitteh · October 11, 2016

Told you guys not to bring Partisan out of retirement. What did you do? You brought him out of retirement.

Whoever from NPO/UPN makes a full response to his post, I will love you forever. Not because of your content, but because whoever does it will have to dedicate hours of their life responding.

Will at home.

Cypher · October 11, 2016

Oh god no.

Roquentin · October 11, 2016

It's your good right to continue your fight, don't get me wrong. It's the notion that your fate came to be because of '(That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) events' which both amuses and slightly annoys me.

You see, I am the Syndicate official who ultimately made every Syndicate decision concerning you (whether it be action or inaction at the time) right up until I retired after your first war. This includes the decision to strike you. If it is thoughtful and reasonable responses you wish, I'll try to provide you with one by outlining my thoughts on your alliance and the development of my stance towards you as major events occurred. I hope that this will help you get a better understanding of why you were attacked.

You formed a bit after Oktoberfest. Oktoberfest was the war in which UPN attacked us and in which we ultimately beat covenant. This defeat led a severely weakened DEIC to move towards more isolationist FA policies. It was also followed by government turnover in UPN, with the new government actively (and slowly) working with us on burying the hatchet. While this ultimately did not pan out for various reasons, I think both emmad and victor can attest that the attempt was there over an extended period of time, for both parties. I'm noting this specific bit of information because tS was in a position of relative strength over covenant as a singular entity at the time. Our only concern was the tie between VE and UPN, and the looming threat of both parties (after both suffering defeat, one in proxy and the other in oktoberfest) joining hands to take us out. This was not an immediate concern as both UPN and VE were war-torn. The only party which was a potential threat while UPN/VE rebuilt was a fresh rose who sat out oktoberfest and profiteered, creating a disproportionate upper tier.

That breather technically gave me the wiggling room to move in on other parties if I had wanted to. I didn't for a variety of reason, amongst which 1) the expectation of being hit in the future by that joint force and 2) not really seeing anyone worth taking out.

So, moving back to your DoE: I've witnessed NPO in other games and yes, I do know what you are capable of organisationally speaking. I also am aware of your staying power and you experience, as well as te ambitions you've had in other worlds. I did not however, view this as a threat: You came in with a bunch of fresh nations who would not be able to effectively operate at our tier for a long time. To put it frankly: You had no way of directly competing or threatening tS unless you had backup from a grand coalition which included upper tier nations.

You also looked like a potentially interesting player who could add spice to a world which was increasingly moving towards a bipolar structure (with paracov increasingly consolidating into one entity to take on our sphere). I like interesting. Those who worked with me closely (on an opsec level- looking at you, Roy/Thrax/Jess!) can attest that I have a tendency to throw out the whackiest of scenarios; constantly. All of them with political benefits and considerations of their own. Most of them out-of-the-box and potentially game-changing (if pursued and worked out). The majority ends up in the bin. Some of these ideas are implemented. To me, you looked like exactly that. So I invested in amiable relations (particularly with Jasmin) while refraining from ever trying to actually pull you into my sphere or ally you. My hope was that you would 1) develop into a major player over time and 2) end up creating a sphere of your own. One of the two came to be.

To that end, there was a point where I offered you economic deals similarly to the deals Guardian offered tS when we founded. Cash up front for resources over time. Time value of money would be the determining factor which you would profit from (as you did not really have large nations yet). You ended up getting a bunch of loans iirc, and those talks never really left the 'pitching' stage. Understandable. My point being: I knew who you were, understood your potential and chose to let you sit out wars, chose to let you make your first diplomatic moves without pushback and chose to simply wait for you to grow and position yourselves. My intent was to leave (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) in (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) and let your actions dictate my attitude towards you.

Now, as we move on I realize that you might not know me well. I consider myself a pragmatist. There are various events which eventually led me to consider you a future enemy, and that led to the decision for war:

- After you sat out the 168 day war, Vanguard merged into you. This gave you a (ravaged) small upper tier base and propelled you up the rankings. You became more relevant and thus more primed to start making waves.

- You simultaneously came out of protection by signing a series of treaties in February 2016. The following treaties were signed (on February 18/19)

1. NPO-SK ODP

2. NPO-TKR MDoAP

3. NPO-VE MDoAP

4. NPO-Alpha MDoAP

Simultaneously, an Alpha-VE MDoAP was signed.

With VE and UPN already tied together prior to oktoberfest, we now had VE-Alpha-NPO creating a defacto threeway. While VE-tS relations had been improving since the retirement of their previous leader, Impero, fact remained that the VE-tS relationship had been a rocky one, and VE had been one of tS' primary adversaries since our respective alliances fell out. Similarly, tS-Alpha relations were at an all-time low (at least...at the time. It arguably got worse ) coming out of the 168-day war (Hi Steve, i'm trying to just provide perspective. Let's refrain from diving into the specifics again, shall we?). This was Alpha's first move following our cancellation on them.

We took this move with mixed feelings: On one end we had NPO tieing itself somewhat to a few alliances on our side. We also had NPO tieing itself to one adversary of tS and one ex-ally of tS whom we believed to have betrayed us. VE became the lynchpin that could technically rally the entirety of paracov + NPO/Alpha.

We could take this in a few ways:

1. You were looking to create your own NPO-centric powersphere and were trying to break alliances off of existing spheres.

2. You were trying to straddle the pre-existing spheres for as long as you could in order to catch up in city-count and nation builds, profiting off of your status as "new guy"

3. You were clueless and randomly signing away

4. You were using the SK-and TKR treaties to safeguard you from any aggression while you positioned yourself to (long-term) set up a combined ParaCov+NPO/Alpha sphere to take out tS (this could include trying to convince SK/TKR to break off). Time was your friend due to the necessity for NPO to both catch up and build a warchest, as well as due to the need for ParaCov to recover its war-torn nations and morale.

Over the following weeks/months, minors were signed (Valkyrie, Fark, Polaris etc.)- not alarming in itself, but still an accumulation of power.

As Jasmin went inactive and I took a small hiatus, NPO-tS communication went quiet. Our joint channel similarly went quiet (I was surprised when I came back).

On March 7th, about three weeks after your moves, UPN and Rose signed a MDoAP. We now had:

UPN-Rose

UPN-VE

VE-NPO

VE-Alpha

Alpha-NPO

This move defacto merged Paragon and the Covenant. NPO's direct ties to both Alpha and VE meant that in case of an escalation to war, NPO would have a strong, strong pull to assist ParaCov. Moreover, we simply noticed a trend of consolidation.

Around this period, we were also in various discussions with UPN govt regarding a pending ODP (which was to be signed on April 1st and then was delayed to April 10th), and we had previously had ODP discussions with VE which died down around 168. Both revolved to a large degree around wanting to 'break' the constant tS v paracov war cycle. To us, this consolidation was a bit of a mixed signal: On one hand we had a bunch of old adversaries who had (after each war they lost; in proxy, in oktoberfest and now in 168) claimed to want to move past our issues. On the other hand, we had these same old adversaries signing increasingly intertwining treaties. Were we supposed to view this as threatening? We were offered explanations for the UPN-Rose treaty which I will not delve into, but which we were understanding of.

So, our VE ODP had died in its crib. Our UPN ODP suffered the same fate after Hans returned to activity. We received a screenshot of the post in which he revealed the pending treaty to the UPN public (given that we had been told the ODP was a go, we assumed UPN membership had been somewhat aware). This post contained very strong language and a specific anti-tS narrative: We were UPN's gravest enemies (quote), we were not the be trusted. The reps levied half a year earlier in oktoberfest had not been forgotten, etcetera. We kept our knowledge of this post/rhetoric close to our chest and continued to try and soothe relations, to no avail. Ultimately, the treaty was torpedoed.

Shortly thereafter, Hansarius would be (re)elected as the leader of UPN. The aforementioned intel left us no illusions: Hansarius considered us an enemy and was likely to shift gears. We would see UPN wary of us once more and our diplomatic work undone at best. We would see UPN return to actively opposing us at worst.

This left us with a bleak outlook:

- Rose, UPN and VE looked united via intertwining treaties. DEIC being as close to UPN as it is was going to be along for the ride no matter what in our estimations. Alpha-tS relations were a cluster!@#$ with animosity on both sides (note: we believed Alpha to be plotting against us). NPO had tied itself to A hostile Alpha and a lynchpin in VE (of whom we weren't sure of their motives at that point). Paracov was slowly recovering from wounds incurred in the previus war. NPO was slowly growing and building its warchest.

UPN, Rose and VE all claimed not to want war. This left us with the consideration of whether this was a legitimate desire to bury the hatchet, or whether these alliances did not want war *at the moment* due to aforementioned morale- and physical losses incurred in the previous war (which had not been recovered yet)? Would their stance change when they came back to full capacity? Simultaneously, NPO kept its cards close to the chest: Radio silence on the OWF, quiet private channels. Just the moves they made and steady growth. Would you plan something? Or would you be content coexisting?

We had been receiving various tidbits of information concerning Alpha's movements. A bunch of logs we received are at this point public commodity and viewable on the OWF if you search for them. Long story short: We'd received logs from months back in which Abbas outlined a plan to let NPO head up an anti-tS coalition (with rose intending to profit off of it). This log too is on the forums somewhere in the hundreds of alpha vs tS pages.

We also received various reports Alpha spreading rumors that tS had paid arrgh to hit NPO around 168. Something which was blatantly false (and which Ogaden has since confirmed to be false. Also on the OWF). It ended up being an additional factor in our decision to go after Alpha. I digress. Some logs detailed that Alpha would send NPO to weaponize the supposed intel that 'tS paid arrgh to roll NPO' in an attempt to drive a wedge between tS and TKR-SK. This in itself alarmed us. We naturally took steps to mitigate the impact of an such efforts. Moreover though, it was a reason for us to be wary of you.

Moving on: at the onset of the Alpha-tS war, we received various signals: VE, Rose and UPN all in their own way privately voiced dissent with Alpha's behavior and/or voiced a desire for peace. Regardless of how things played out: We received intel that NPO had been ready to defend Alpha. Moreover, NPO had supposedly been pissed at Alpha for asking them to stay out. While I can respect the loyalty, if I am being pragmatic, this made you look like more of a threat than say, a Rose who had screenshots leaked in which they considered dropping Alpha. You supported Alpha unconditionally in what we felt was directly aggressive behavior against tS and its sphere. This further put you on our radar.

So the Alpha war continued. Alliances like Rose and VE agreed to a mutual decommissioning of troops with our allies (as the entire world was in a state of high alert, all built up, while tS/Alpha slugged it out- a defacto cold war). NPO refused to decommission. In this case, it was your right to do as you pleased, but it again sent a message to me: NPO just became a bigger blip yet.

On June 1st, Hansarius was officially elected to UPN government (or unofficially; in an case, greatkitteh brought out the news that day). This marked a turning point: As discussed earlier, I could not ignore the intel which showed Hansarius stating that he considered tS his gravest enemies along with a series of accusations as well as what looked like a clear maintenance of a grudge for our extraction of reps in oktoberfest (a war in which Hansarius had lied to us about his intentions to hit us, and launched an aggressive attack). We had no reason to trust his word or his intentions, given all that had transpired; UPN became an enemy state in my eyes, and I planned accordingly.

On June 8th, UPN and NPO signed their MDoAP, officially completing the unification of ParaCov+NPO: You were one sphere now and to me, it was clear that UPN and NPO had both made the choice to ultimately pursue direct opposition to The Syndicate. To a lesser degree, I viewed VE and Rose equally complicit by virtue of their continued support of this unification. I think it's reasonable to conclude that your FA lads are smart enough to realize that such a unification would eventually result war with tS (if only by virtue of the bipolar structure it perpetuated).

On June 13th, the UPN announced the inclusion of NAC and Polaris in the Covenant.

On June 14th, The Syndicate opened fire on UPN and NPO. We struck two alliances for strategic purposes: Given the overwhelming numbers on the other side, we needed to take at least two of the main hitters within the opposing coalition out of the fight. We considered UPN as one of the more competent mass alliances on the other side. We considered NPO to be a wildcard. We banked on VE/Rose to botch their counters. We anticipated that if NPO was given the room to pull off a blitz, they could theoretically give Mensa problems by virtue of tier matchups due to NPO's cohesion in the lower tiers.

We also chose NPO because frankly, you positioned yourself as a threat to us. Big enough of a threat to warrant military action. Similarly, a factor in choosing UPN as an entry point was Hansarius' positioning of UPN as a threat to tS. VE was safeguarded because we did not want to place our unsuspecting allies in Pantheon in a tough predicament.

The entire operation was a hail mary pre-empt of what we believed to be an inevitable war. We knew that you were not ready. That you needed time. We figured our best bet was an immediate strike. So we moved quickly.

Now, many of you have brought forth that NPO was supposedly hit because of (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways). I'll put that one to rest:

- NG (Alpha) struck MI6 (an alliance from which an at this point small/dwindling contingent of tS members (and govt) stem) on June 7th, 2016. The DoW included defacto support from NG's (dominant) allies in NPO, among others.

- The DoW directly referenced Steve (Placentica) with the rallying cry "for steve". The DoW also contained direct satire of the writing style of "the pen", a persona which I embraced some time ago in (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways). It's essentially a shitposting persona. In other words: The DoW directly referred to tS' war on Alpha (Steve) and made a direct appeal to me (though I am pretty much retired/inactive in that game). It was later (after various inquiries) explained that there were (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways)-related CB's. This was not however, clear from the start. Whether those CBs are/were legit is irrelevant to me, as I do not care for the fate of (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways). Given the direct reference to myself as well as PW, I did respond in kind on the (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) forums with similar "The Pen" doomsday trolling.

- a few days after that DoW, I was handed a screenshot of a thread from another NPO branch. This thread was a rallying call/recruitment call which leveraged a PW-related screenshot of Chimaera (controversial (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) leader in MI6 and primary opponent of NPO there; inactive shit in tS in PW who never did a thing politically, and who just sat around) supposedly threatening NPO members with war (read; Being eradicated from the game).

Image:

"The Politics and war NPO branch would like your support for its survival in a potential upcoming conflict. The Alliance has been threatened by people wishing to wipe NPO because of its existence and success in cybernations".

Upon receipt, I inquired into the logs and acquired context:

Given context, the ominous threat presented in the recruitment thread became a simple matter of chim shooting the shit with a few NPO members. Moreover, the 'you'll get killed off' comment is a direct reply to the NPO member's suggestion for chim to join NPO. He replies with his personal take on the world. Reiterating that he was politically inactive (and known to be so) in PW. The 'ominous chim' narrative had apparently also been spread in backchannels.

All of NPO's movements, in combination with the screenshot gave us the impression that NPO was actively spinning a narrative against us and positioning itself to take u out. The framing of tS as a boogeyman based on an offhand comment by an inactive tS member who happens to be a well known (and despised by NPO) figurehead of MI6 in (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) was, in our eyes, deliberate in nature.

This prompted me to call NPO out on the PW forums on June 10th.

So, the june 10th callout was a direct (and immediate) reaction to the receipt of the screenshot. In hindsight, I probably should not have made the callout as it would not have given you the option to spin a PR-narrative around "OMG THIS IS BECAUSE OF (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways)". That's hindsight talking though.

My decision to treat the NPO as an enemy however gradually came to be as a consequence of your own political manouvering and your own decisions. I do not fault you for manouvering as you did, but similarly it would be naive for me not o take precautions. The pragmatic reaction to the identification of a threat is the neutralization of said threat.

Closing off with a timeline including militarization of allied alliances. tS will be discounted as we saw no notable change due to our alliance already being milled up from the Alpha war (thanks to yosodog for letting me use his parcer to gather data):

June 1st: Hansarius is elected --> tS internally begin seriously considering a pre-empt, discusses with select allies in following days

June 7th: The (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) DoW --> Trolling occurs. No militarization is seen yet

June 8th: NPO-UPN MDoAP signed --> We make the decision to roll out

June 8th: Mensa military begins to spike (somewhat, they were already running a high build)

June 9th: BK military begins to spike

June 9th: Chola military begins to spike

June 10th: TKR military begins to spike

June 10th: Guardian military begins to spike

June 10th: Partisan calls out NPO for received screenshot

June 13th: Covenant inclusion of NAC/Polar

June 14th: War

Military buildup was prompted by the treaty. Not by the (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) events. The callout was also made *after* militarization had begun.

I hope that I have given you a clearer idea, and I hope we can finally put this (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) nonsense to rest. For the prevailing NPO narrative of this all being about (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) is either a grand delusion or a deliberately crafted self-victimization.

http://i.imgur.com/G9vLh5S.mp4

So, first off, not sure why you're replying to Perg. Anyway, there are some inaccuracies here.

Okay, Partisan, here's a big issue I have with this. It's pretty much the whole "if I didn't say it, it doesn't matter," thing when it comes to your leadership of tS. People from virtually every level of your alliance have brought up their (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) grievances with the exception of the actual triumvirate. This is what I refer to as the "double game". The actual leadership can absolve itself of the tarring of bringing (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways), but virtually everyone else can hold grudges. This does not work for me or anyone. Though actual leadership in your sphere have told me that a lot of people will hold (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) against us perpetually. I won't betray their confidence, however.

Thanks for giving the history lesson and most people are aware that there was a history between you and Paracovenant before NPO showed up. This isn't exactly new to anyone aware of PW politics. I don't think it'll be a huge surprise that you had bad blood with other alliances or tried to swing some before NPO showed up. I've raised it quite a few times that tSphere has fostered resentment in a heterogenous group of people.

The problem is you've said before you're cautious around every new arrival and weigh the potential risks. You may have not seen NPO as a statistical threat. It actually never was a statistical threat to tS, hence BK doing most of the fighting in the last war, which along with them being the most bulked on your side led to the preempt in this war by NPO.

Here's the deal: while you tried to send feelers out and had amicable relations with one person basically, that quickly broke down and there was no real interest from your alliance aside from that. This doesn't really suit the narrative nicely, though. I've told you time and time over again, there was no chance of new sphere forming. While it was NPO's initial intention to make a third sphere, it was quickly seen as unviable as it was a two sphere game and no one would leave their sphere and we didn't try to push it especially since it was clear there were significant tensions between tS-Alpha.

The loans were likely a better deal as they were interest free. I know because my alliance at the time gave a portion of them and so did Alpha, so it made sense for NPO. Essentially though, this paragraph is "NPO is too small to matter yet so I wasn't really concerned."

As for the treaty signings, at the time I believe most of the alliances that we signed had expressed an interest in shaking things up. I know that the motivation behind thinking the TKR treaty had potential to change things was that the FA IO at the time, Lykos, had gotten the impression they were unhappy with their FA situation and they had also indicated to a Paracov alliance that they were more displeased with their side in the 168 day war than Paracov. Evidently it wasn't the case and when it became clear no one actually wanted to do anything different, the third sphere idea was abandoned, since we weren't in a position to do it and we weren't going to try to pry people away. With SK, it was mostly based on long-standing relationships and them being the initial protector and they did provide economic assistance. There was interest in shaking things up, but they weren't quite ready to make a huge move. It turned out they started getting more serious about shaking things up when the idea had already died for us. As for VE, we had pretty good relations with their gov and they had protected NPO as well. With Alpha, Alpha had invested a lot of money into NPO from the very beginning and despite the negative feelings many have towards Alpha, I would say they were crucial to NPO's rapid growth as they were willing to provide a huge sum of cash without interest.

I've gone over the ODP offers ad nauseum in terms of how they were perceived by anyone skeptical of tS. To most, it did not appear as a genuine attempt to change the dynamic and just treaty chess instead. You told me I was being too CNesque in thinking, but there was no real other way to look at it. This whole part just returns to tS being able to make a lot of diverse enemies.

People were aware of you being suspicious of NPO. I mean, you literally told us as much and that would get our backs up further especially with bringing up crossover-related things. Ultimately, we weren't going to push for a war since 1. we didn't want to 2. didn't have the political capital to do so due in part to perceived side straddling but we would defend allies.

I'm not really sure what abbas who never really talked to NPO has to do with us. In fact, those logs came off as pretty hostile and we had to clarify it with the Rose gov at the time. He may have had his designs but by then he wasn't actually running Rose in any capacity. Alpha made movements, but they weren't offensively oriented. They were concerned with being attacked at some point. I know this isn't a commonly held perception, so I will just say they prepared due to perceiving tS as a threat to them. Hopefully that isn't put in contention.

As for the Arrgh thing, the reason the rumor spread is because of a convo between you and Jasmine shortly before it happened about the loans being paid off. While Alpha was inclined to believe it was you, the suspicion wouldn't have existed as majorly without that happening. There was never definitive evidence aside from tS having paid Arrgh for arrangements previously but combined with your own stated concerns about "Paracov/NPO consolidation" that you stated to a gov member a the time just increased the perception you had a stake in setting us back.

Our allies will always receive unconditional support if they are attacked first. There is no other way to look at it. While some of Alpha's allies were upset with their handling of things and we had some criticisms as well(like I thought it was a bad move for steve to post the logs), all were willing to defend. And yes, the Regent( you know the one you liked) at the time and many others were pretty angry that we had to stay out because we didn't want to let our ally get beaten up without defending, but we chose to respect their wishes. We wouldn't have had an issue if the 1 v 1 Keegoz proposed was accepted though. We chose not to decom since we had already maintained fairly high mil before the war and it was clear eventually a global war would happen but it was a purely defensive measure. The deliberate misinterpretation of it as aggressive/hostile is one of the major things we've been pretty upset as there was no attempt to clear it up.

Everyone knows your opinion of Hans, so I won't delve into this too much. You could have hit UPN sooner if you saw it this way, you didn't.

As for the militarization, it actually started before the UPN-NPO treaty as we had noticed it throughout the 7-8th in-game. The treaty wasn't announced until 12:26 AM on the 8th my time(Pacific) and I had brought up BK/BoC/Chola's militarization as a concern to other alliances before that since multiple people were noticing it. Other alliances had noticed it too and had commenced militarizing. The other reasoning given for the militarization has been that people thought Alpha was getting aided and were going on high alert due to that, but the initial movements certainly were not because of the UPN-NPO treaty.

Your other time points seem to be muddied up due to time zones. We were attacked on the 13th, not 14th in-game. NPO was still not a particularly good match up despite the things you've stated for either Mensa or tS. You already had had BK ready to hit us in the Alpha war and it appeared they were potentially out for blood due to getting blueballsed and other factors that we didn't know about at the time. While it's nice of you to present a reason, VE/Rose were still heavier hitters than we could have been. The difference is it seems and you hint at it that your antipathy wasn't as high towards them despite historical reasons. With Hans, maybe you can explain that one away, but with NPO it's a lot harder.

Now we can turn to the (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) thing.

NG DoWs MI6

Both you and Roy appear in the topic making comments about the separation of the games being gone. This is coupled by militarization we notice in traditionally low mil alliances. Before your post, Chimaera, a gov official in MI6 says "I'm sure their(Alpha)'s allies are going to have problems in the other world real soon."

While we chose to use the screenshot to encapsulate a commonly-held view within the game(that wasn't exclusive to Chimaera), initially it had been treated as a throwaway thing and I didn't take it seriously. When it was backed up by an actual threat on the (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) forums to come after us here and seemingly supported by a tS gov, things changed and we chose to deploy it in the topic. Chim knew plenty about PW's politics to make assessments of other alliances despite "being inactive" and the one ex-TS member we had said he wasn't that inactive.

The narrative was pretty clearly defensive as we expected to be attacked when we noticed the militarization. This was explained a million times. My original mobilization topic was made on the 7th when I noticed it in your sphere since a lot of BK was at 0 and it became alarming when I noticed some of their members shooting up. There sure as hell was militarization before the 9th but we thought it might fizzle out. We didn't make the topic until the 9th(you posted it at the 10th your time but it was less than 24 hours after) since it was made once it became clearer war was likely. The militarization could not have been prompted by the treaty as we were already worrying about it before it went up and it was discussed with other paracov alliances.

I'm not sure why you expect this to put it to rest. The commentary by various people in your sphere gives a very different indication. I might even grant that you had other proximal causes, but it certainly doesn't put it to rest. The proximal cause isn't even the real issue here since it would only be one war. It's the underlying predispositions in your sphere. The issue here is, you seemingly don't want to be held accountable for what even gov officials in your current alliance/previous allies have said. Am I going to have to compile all the quotes?

@Yosodog. You know I'm good for it.

@Sabcat: If I really wanted to be whiny, I could spell out the implications of your dentist comment. Given I was given flak for a crackpipe idiom, it would be something pretty bad to highlight.

@Avakael as if

Edited October 11, 2016 by Roquentin

Yosodog · October 11, 2016

-- snip --

THE MADMAN DID IT

Kastor · October 11, 2016

It's 4:30am here but Roq did it so lemme read this response.

Avakael · October 11, 2016

I wonder how many other games politics we can drag into this debate, just to make it more infuriating to read for anyone who doesn't know the details.

Flanderlion · October 11, 2016

I wonder how many other games politics we can drag into this debate, just to make it more infuriating to read for anyone who doesn't know the details.

We could bring in some NS between you and Sci (sorry for including you in the same sentence as it, I know you hate its guts and I'm fairly sure it feels the same about you). Planetside is always another option.

greatkitteh · October 11, 2016

I said I would reply smh

Go to sleep ;~;

Prefonteen · October 11, 2016

Okay, Partisan, here's a big issue I have with this. It's pretty much the whole "if I didn't say it, it doesn't matter," thing when it comes to your leadership of tS. People from virtually every level of your alliance have brought up their (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) grievances with the exception of the actual triumvirate. This is what I refer to as the "double game". The actual leadership can absolve itself of the tarring of bringing (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways), but virtually everyone else can hold grudges. This does not work for me or anyone. Though actual leadership in your sphere have told me that a lot of people will hold (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) against us perpetually. I won't betray their confidence, however.

Here's the thing: During my time leading tS FA, my word was the official stance of tS. The general lines of the political decision I made were supported and echoed by the rest of tS government: That is how we operated. Our members were free to maintain their own worldviews and opinions, but they did not represent The Syndicate in any official capacity. Why do I stress this?

Because you have had a habit of attributing the statements and opinions of members to my Foreign Policy, and that has led to severe misconceptions on various occasions. I digress though, as this is not too relevant to the core conversation.

For the past months, you and various NPO members/govt have consistently pushed a narrative in which you were attacked by the Syndicate for (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways)-related reasons (OOC grudge). My point addressed that notion and provided you with my rationale for war. You are free to disagree with it. You are free to dislike me for it. But it seems disingenous to push the 'omg OOC' narrative when there has been a pile of PW-related motivations and reasons for me to pull the trigger on you.

Thanks for giving the history lesson and most people are aware that there was a history between you and Paracovenant before NPO showed up. This isn't exactly new to anyone aware of PW politics. I don't think it'll be a huge surprise that you had bad blood with other alliances or tried to swing some before NPO showed up. I've raised it quite a few times that tSphere has fostered resentment in a heterogenous group of people.

It shouldn't be new to anyone, and I do feel like im spelling out the obvious to people who have paid attention. Yet.... here we are, and i'm still replying to a stubborn NPO narrative of 'OMG OOC' when reasons have been laid out clear for all to see over and over, and when anyone with a brain could have seen that war coming in preceding months by virtue of the impact your movements would have on tS' alertness.

Fostered resentment is not relevant to this conversation and is also a seperate argument as it delves into a 'he-said, she-said' per instance. Let's not get into that this time around.

The problem is you've said before you're cautious around every new arrival and weigh the potential risks. You may have not seen NPO as a statistical threat. It actually never was a statistical threat to tS, hence BK doing most of the fighting in the last war, which along with them being the most bulked on your side led to the preempt in this war by NPO.

I do not see how me weighing risks of new arrivals is a problem in this instance. It's called prudence. I've already outlined my motivation behind leaving you be at the time..

Re: pre-empt. You were one of the most militarized parties on the other side in that war as well.

Here's the deal: while you tried to send feelers out and had amicable relations with one person basically, that quickly broke down and there was no real interest from your alliance aside from that. This doesn't really suit the narrative nicely, though. I've told you time and time over again, there was no chance of new sphere forming. While it was NPO's initial intention to make a third sphere, it was quickly seen as unviable as it was a two sphere game and no one would leave their sphere and we didn't try to push it especially since it was clear there were significant tensions between tS-Alpha.

i sent out general feelers and this led to a development of a working relation with your regent. How in the world does that signal 'no interest' to you? Come on man.

This touches on a point though. Let's look at the situation:

- You form

- tS sends out feelers and begins working on relations. This was initiated by tS, not by NPO.

- tS FA guy goes poof for a bit. Jasmin equally goes poof for a bit (not sure about the 'when' on this one). Talks die off.

- When I come back, communications are dead. I literally check back in with NPO.

- NPO now continues to hammer on the notion that 'tS supposedly showed no real interest in amiable relations'

You could have put in the work yourself. We are not obligated to lick your heels, nor are you entitled to our advances. We made an effort to coexist. You- less so. You then made a series of moves which could be construed as hostile. You have the right to do so, but every action has a reaction.

As for third sphere: You may have had the intention. We may have had the hope you would. That's not relevnt to what i'm saying though:

- You kept your cards close to the chest and treated us with mistrust (radio silence) for some period. This is by your own admission on the OWF

- This gave us no way of reading your motivations.

- You increasingly consolidated into a sphere hostile to us.

The problem is that you gave us every reason to believe that you were up to something, and this is ultimately why we acted. Whether you did so intentionally or unintentionally has no bearing on the fact that you did position yourself as a threat.

Moreover, if as you state, the attempt at a third sphere failed, this means that according to your own logic the world was to remain bipolar. So you then made the choice to sign with UPN, effectively picking a side in this bipolar dynamic. This means that you defacto chose to oppose us, and ties directly into the reason why you were attacked.

The loans were likely a better deal as they were interest free. I know because my alliance at the time gave a portion of them and so did Alpha, so it made sense for NPO. Essentially though, this paragraph is "NPO is too small to matter yet so I wasn't really concerned."

Again, mental gymnastics. Loans were quite possibly a better idea. We weren't aware you had them though and did make the offer for your benefit. The paragraph was not essentially "NPO is too small to matter yet so we're not concerned". You're putting words in my mouth again. I literally stated that I hoped you would grow into a major player who would provide an extra layer to PW politics, and I literally stated that I wanted to give you the chance to develop and base my stance towards you on your own actions. Seriously, are you purposefully Obtuse?

As for the treaty signings, at the time I believe most of the alliances that we signed had expressed an interest in shaking things up. I know that the motivation behind thinking the TKR treaty had potential to change things was that the FA IO at the time, Lykos, had gotten the impression they were unhappy with their FA situation and they had also indicated to a Paracov alliance that they were more displeased with their side in the 168 day war than Paracov. Evidently it wasn't the case and when it became clear no one actually wanted to do anything different, the third sphere idea was abandoned, since we weren't in a position to do it and we weren't going to try to pry people away. With SK, it was mostly based on long-standing relationships and them being the initial protector and they did provide economic assistance. There was interest in shaking things up, but they weren't quite ready to make a huge move. It turned out they started getting more serious about shaking things up when the idea had already died for us. As for VE, we had pretty good relations with their gov and they had protected NPO as well. With Alpha, Alpha had invested a lot of money into NPO from the very beginning and despite the negative feelings many have towards Alpha, I would say they were crucial to NPO's rapid growth as they were willing to provide a huge sum of cash without interest.

I understand your rationale in this paragraph. That does *not* change the fact that the specific set of treaties signed by you made you look awfully suspicious and turned you into a threat. If you signed with various tS adversaries and expected to remain entirely off our radar, you were being naive. Basically: Your reason has no bearing on our reason for war. We perceived you as a threat based on a combination of your words, your actions and your political movements.

Even moe frankly: You have at multiple points referred to comments I made to NPO in private about being concerned over your consolidation. This means that I literally gave you warning signals. Instead of taking advantage of that and soothing those concerns (if you wanted peace) you continued to consolidate. Not only that, but you chose to interpret my concerns as a threat (and later used that false interpretation against me on the OWF).

I've gone over the ODP offers ad nauseum in terms of how they were perceived by anyone skeptical of tS. To most, it did not appear as a genuine attempt to change the dynamic and just treaty chess instead. You told me I was being too CNesque in thinking, but there was no real other way to look at it. This whole part just returns to tS being able to make a lot of diverse enemies.

I understand how a group perceived it in hindsight. That was not what was conveyed to us at the time. We spent many months working on relations, both in public embassies and in private government channels. These months started out with accusations and mistrust thrown back an forth, eventually progressed to closure and agreement to disagree on some matters and very slowly transitioned to tentative building of trust. It never got to leave that final stage. Thing is: When we are told that things are okay. When we are told that ODP offers are pretty much ready to go and not much more than a formality, we are going to assume that the alliance in question has its ducks in a row internally.

When a fomer leader who still holds a grudge then comes out with the post we received, riling members up and calling us their 'gravest enemy' based on historic events months past which we had thought we moved on from, and when that former leader manages to force the treaty off the table only to then get elected shortly thereafter; and finally, when that leader's first move is to put the final nails in the framework of a consolidated opposition agains tS (paracov+NPO), we're going to take note.

People were aware of you being suspicious of NPO. I mean, you literally told us as much and that would get our backs up further especially with bringing up crossover-related things. Ultimately, we weren't going to push for a war since 1. we didn't want to 2. didn't have the political capital to do so due in part to perceived side straddling but we would defend allies.

Yeah, as I mentioned before- I think I made it pretty clear privately towards the end that I was wary of NPO's political movements. Let me ask you this: Do you really think that if I was hell-bent on killing you off because of (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways), I would signal my intentions to you by letting you know that i'm wary of your movements?

If it had been the case, you would not have seen a gradual progression of relations from amiable to hostile. You would have simply been strangled without warning when you had not consolidated a base yet and were more vulnerable.

I'm not really sure what abbas who never really talked to NPO has to do with us. In fact, those logs came off as pretty hostile and we had to clarify it with the Rose gov at the time. He may have had his designs but by then he wasn't actually running Rose in any capacity. Alpha made movements, but they weren't offensively oriented. They were concerned with being attacked at some point. I know this isn't a commonly held perception, so I will just say they prepared due to perceiving tS as a threat to them. Hopefully that isn't put in contention.

My commentary was an explanation of my rationale for war. Abbas is known to come back every now and then, plot a little and then go inactive again (as much as I like the guy OOC haha). His inclusion of NPO in a plan centered around defeating tS put us on edge. When you receive stuff like that you don't act immediately but you do keep your eyes open for further movements.

Prefonteen · October 11, 2016

As for the Arrgh thing, the reason the rumor spread is because of a convo between you and Jasmine shortly before it happened about the loans being paid off. While Alpha was inclined to believe it was you, the suspicion wouldn't have existed as majorly without that happening. There was never definitive evidence aside from tS having paid Arrgh for arrangements previously but combined with your own stated concerns about "Paracov/NPO consolidation" that you stated to a gov member a the time just increased the perception you had a stake in setting us back.

tS at the time would not even have had the financial resources to make an arrgh raid on NPO viable. Our finances went to the war effort and rebuild.

I think it's safe to say that at this point, the arrgh theory has long been debunked (with Arrgh themselves stating that it was not tS). If it was a misconception, that's fine. The backchannel accusations and mistrust led to soured perceptions within tS govt however: It looked like there was a deliberate campaign being pushe against us to implicate and isolate us. couple that with treaty movements and voila.

Our allies will always receive unconditional support if they are attacked first. There is no other way to look at it. While some of Alpha's allies were upset with their handling of things and we had some criticisms as well(like I thought it was a bad move for steve to post the logs), all were willing to defend. And yes, the Regent( you know the one you liked) at the time and many others were pretty angry that we had to stay out because we didn't want to let our ally get beaten up without defending, but we chose to respect their wishes. We wouldn't have had an issue if the 1 v 1 Keegoz proposed was accepted though. We chose not to decom since we had already maintained fairly high mil before the war and it was clear eventually a global war would happen but it was a purely defensive measure. The deliberate misinterpretation of it as aggressive/hostile is one of the major things we've been pretty upset as there was no attempt to clear it up.

I don't fault you for your loyalty. But it did make you look more aggressive/threatening to us than your peers, and in turn we took note.

Everyone knows your opinion of Hans, so I won't delve into this too much. You could have hit UPN sooner if you saw it this way, you didn't.

I hit UPN within 14 days of Hans' ascension. Your point is moot.

Moreover, i was waiting for signals, proof, evidence. Things to confirm my suspicions before I pulled the trigger since going in, we fully intended it to be a political suicide on our part.

As for the militarization, it actually started before the UPN-NPO treaty as we had noticed it throughout the 7-8th in-game. The treaty wasn't announced until 12:26 AM on the 8th my time(Pacific) and I had brought up BK/BoC/Chola's militarization as a concern to other alliances before that since multiple people were noticing it. Other alliances had noticed it too and had commenced militarizing. The other reasoning given for the militarization has been that people thought Alpha was getting aided and were going on high alert due to that, but the initial movements certainly were not because of the UPN-NPO treaty.

Incorrect. tS was already milled up. at the time. Alliances like BK, Guardian and TKR did not start seeing a spike until the 9th.

Your other time points seem to be muddied up due to time zones. We were attacked on the 13th, not 14th in-game. NPO was still not a particularly good match up despite the things you've stated for either Mensa or tS. You already had had BK ready to hit us in the Alpha war and it appeared they were potentially out for blood due to getting blueballsed and other factors that we didn't know about at the time. While it's nice of you to present a reason, VE/Rose were still heavier hitters than we could have been. The difference is it seems and you hint at it that your antipathy wasn't as high towards them despite historical reasons. With Hans, maybe you can explain that one away, but with NPO it's a lot harder.

DoW was at daychange. Might explain the overlap with 13/14.

And yes, we did have BK ready to hit you, they were blueballed etcetera. You guys were a tier below Mensa and one of the most milled up alliances. Taking you down was strategically viable. VE/Rose were both still out of spec and we anticipated them to need at least 1 - 2 days more than you. VE also could not be hit because that would have !@#$ed over Pantheon. And as you stated, we had the most legit reason re: UPN/NPO (your movements).

Re: NG stuff- i'm pretty sure chim was hoping for escalation, yeah. He was no more than a member though. Here's the thing: There was a brief period after the NG DoW where it looked like a direct and immediate crossover due to the way the DoW was presented and the absence of *any* CB. During that time, roy and i both posted about the muddling of OOC lines. We also spent a lot of time hearing out CB's in private to figure out whether there actually was crossover or not.

NG's inability to communicate their CB in a (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) DoW which directly referred to PW is the crux of this. That's not on us, it's on them. The fact that it took me personally seeking out involved parties to gain access to an actual CB to ensure that my alliance was not being punished in another game for events in this game is an annoyance in itself.

The gall to then attribute (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) motivations to my PW actions becaus I called people out on such crossover is quite simply insulting to my intelligence.

Lastly: feel free to compile the quotes. We've already talked about this elsewhere but:

- As tS head official, I represented the official stances and policies of tS at the time. These were supported by government.

- You (and others) have often attributed the actions of other alliances in our sphere to tS --> Every action taken by people in our sphere according to this rationale ultimately stems from tS. We are the enablers and we call the shots (if we are to believe you those who follow this rationale).

- We are generally held accountable for these actions, and earn the ire of your sphere because of it.

..

- You now, rather than referring to my personal motivations and statements in my capacity as tS head of FA, use comments from people in my sphere and alliance to attribute motivations to our DoW

- Yet, if tS supposedy makes the final call, and I make the FA call in tS, then their opinions are moot: My rationale should not be discarded.

You can't have it both ways. Either our sphere is a homogenous entity led by tS and my word is law (and so, my reasons should be considered, rather than those of my allies) OR we are a heterogenous entity and tS is perhap not the evil puppetmaster you (and various others) make it out to be.