Why Politics and War is Dead During Peace

[darkblade]

Intro
When it comes to Politics and War, the height of the game is during global wars when alliances/spheres fight each other. However during peace, the game is essentially dead outside of logging in once a day. Why is it like that? Well it comes down to the lack of content to encourage players to keep playing, a lack of a centralized community outside of player ran servers, and potentially pay to win content as well.

Lack of Content
Outside of trading or wasting your money on keno, there isn't really anything you can do. This is not good for player retention because the further you go down the game, the less content there is for you to enjoy. Remember being a new player and raiding inactive nations for a ton of money? I bet it was a lot of fun (until you realize that it was also shit). But now that you're city 30, there probably isn't much for you to do outside the community/discord side of the game which I will get into later. But I would argue that the lack of content hurts the retention rate of the player base and makes it contingent on the community or their alliance. What Alex needs to do is add more content that gives players a reason to be more active in the game and reward them for it. Perhaps even content focused around alliance members working together.

The Community
Let's be real here. Outside of player ran discords, there isn't really a centralized community outside the quarterly events the game hosts on the official server. The forums used to be the main stage of the general community. But ever since discord became main stream, The forums have become a rotten corpse outside of Alliance Affairs and the occasional shit post. And while people are still trying to revive the forums (Ahem Roberts), the biggest change with the forums being dead outside of discussion is the decentralization of Politics and War's community. The PNW discord has the potential to be the main hub of all that goes on in PNW, but a lack of management and no real drive to make it good is the reason why it's a mummified corpse with only new players active on it. This is how servers like DNN, RON, OCN, and other player ran servers have become so popular as of the past few years. And while player ran servers can be a good thing for the community, there's always will be bias and different atmospheres that not everyone will enjoy. So if the forums is doomed to die, then at least try to fix the official PNW server. Fix the moderation. Give players a reason to be active in the server by either hosting game nights and other events or running news segments. Then bring in prominent players or alliances to make it active again.

Keep Credits Out
While Alex may be inspired by my post to add more content for the game, so that players have something to do during peace time. It needs to be brought up that any future content should not have credits or any IRL financial involvement at all. While I understand Alex needs to pay the bills and be able to afford his daily Ramen, making any content P2W will ruin the whole reason for why the content is added. It should be activity and/or skilled based so that players actually earn what they worked for instead of getting it via their wallets.

In Conclusion
The game isn't as fun as it seems on paper. And new content to keep the players active in the game have been long overdue. There also needs to be a centralized community in the game and the PNW server is the perfect place for it. I'm making this post in hopes that Alex, Game Staff, and the player base make the push needed to make the game fun during peace.

[KindaEpicMoah]

We need lootboxes or a battle pass 

[darkblade]

3 minutes ago, KindaEpicMoah said:

We need lootboxes or a battle pass 

Exactly, and we need to do a MrBeast collab and sell MrBeast Skins for $60!!!!

[Japan]

39 minutes ago, KindaEpicMoah said:

We need lootboxes or a battle pass 

we def need lootboxes AND a battle pass

throw in seasonal mechanic rebalances that no one likes either 

Edited October 17, 2023 by Chute Mi

[Rein Dvorak]

Definitely can agree with this. As much as I hate it, NationStates recently had a nuclear event that seemed fairly interesting and often have events in the spring for April fools day.

Having unique events once in awhile, community stuff in the discord as you mentioned, ect would help increase player retention in my opinion.

[Denison]

[Ragnarok8085]

I don't see how you think PnW is Pay to Win. Sure I could buy 100 credits with real cash, but it's not like I would be able to use them all at once, there are limits on their use, I could also just as easily buy credits with in game cash and again would be limited on how many I could use in a month.

The uses for credits, the gains in terms of resources is rather insignificant in the long term. I'd argue a majority of credits used are for timers, which sure give you a minuscule increase in growth speed, but you'd also have to actually be able to afford the growth itself.

[Xaria]

13 hours ago, Denison said:

I just clicked “I forgot my password” to log in and post about how I hysterically laughed at this 💀

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

6 hours ago, Ragnarok8085 said:

I don't see how you think PnW is Pay to Win. Sure I could buy 100 credits with real cash, but it's not like I would be able to use them all at once, there are limits on their use, I could also just as easily buy credits with in game cash and again would be limited on how many I could use in a month.

The uses for credits, the gains in terms of resources is rather insignificant in the long term. I'd argue a majority of credits used are for timers, which sure give you a minuscule increase in growth speed, but you'd also have to actually be able to afford the growth itself.

600 million a month over 12 months is 7.2 billion a year.  Its been too long since i have been a C20-C30, but i would assume that might as much as double your normal daily income over that span.  I ran the math on this once, but with donations and smart nation growth i believe you can get to around c30 in a year with max donations.  That is absolutely bonkers as it took me a day 1 player and someone that has been a top 10-20 nation over my entire nation history over 1200 days to do.

Even for a nation like mine were I make around 50 million cash a day, an extra 600 million is not an insignificant number. its the difference between buying a city once every 3 months to once every 2 months.

Just looking at your nation it took you almost 2000 days to get to 30 cities, a motivated nation willing to max donate every month can catch you in about a year.  That is not pay to win?

Edited October 17, 2023 by Sweeeeet Ronny D

[Ragnarok8085]

47 minutes ago, Sweeeeet Ronny D said:

Just looking at your nation it took you almost 2000 days to get to 30 cities.

I could have gotten to c30 much sooner, I just didn't care enough to bother and did other things with my money.

[Lolgod2]

4 hours ago, Sweeeeet Ronny D said:

600 million a month over 12 months is 7.2 billion a year.  Its been too long since i have been a C20-C30, but i would assume that might as much as double your normal daily income over that span.  I ran the math on this once, but with donations and smart nation growth i believe you can get to around c30 in a year with max donations.  That is absolutely bonkers as it took me a day 1 player and someone that has been a top 10-20 nation over my entire nation history over 1200 days to do.

Even for a nation like mine were I make around 50 million cash a day, an extra 600 million is not an insignificant number. its the difference between buying a city once every 3 months to once every 2 months.

Just looking at your nation it took you almost 2000 days to get to 30 cities, a motivated nation willing to max donate every month can catch you in about a year.  That is not pay to win?

ok but, just turn rose into a tax farm and get 1b/day

[Kohai Ky]

3 minutes ago, Lolgod2 said:

ok but, just turn rose into a tax farm and get 1b/day

Erm, rose makes a significant amount more than a bil a day. Closer to the amount of 2.9 bil Cash not including rss a day

[JamieGamie09]

make politics and war great again (pic unrelated)

[Japan]

58 minutes ago, Kohai Ky said:

Erm, rose makes a significant amount more than a bil a day. Closer to the amount of 2.9 bil Cash not including rss a day

[darkblade]

Also want to say that this is actually a serious post written by me and not by an AI to be a shitpost. Most people here clearly know that but for the few of you who haven't or messaged me about it. There you go lmfao.

Edited October 18, 2023 by darkblade

[KiWilliam]

13 minutes ago, darkblade said:

Also want to say that this is actually a serious post written by me and not by an AI to be a shitpost. Most people here clearly know that but for the few of you who haven't or messaged me about it. There you go lmfao.

No joke I skipped the OP because I don't read AI garbage.

[Kastor]

I think the main problem is that nothing actually happens outside of *you*
 

i think hurricanes should randomly hit nations. Earthquakes should happen, etc 

 

then there’s a chance of your mines blowing up, or oil rig leaking, or a pilot stealing an aircraft.

 

these events can happen to your nation, and causes your income to drop by X or causes an airbase to blow up and deal 2.00-5.00 infra damage. 
 

these things may seem silly, but they bring life to the game that would cause people to check their nation. 
 

i recently bought food/uranium for a month, deposited my money, and half-ass a log in every few days. But I don’t really *check* my nations.

 

another thing is we can literally take from Nationstates and do “issues” we can trial run 1-10 of them, and have them randomly hit nations, and based off of nation ideology. Like the Communist country can’t pick the capitalist option and vice versa. 
 

but I think the main issue is something no one will agree with but should be the biggest point is that the small oligarchy of people who are apart of the development team suck. Minus maybe a few people, majority of the conversations that have leaked from them have been terrible ideas. 
 

another large part is majority of players have said they don’t like a large part of the changes and the people of that development team + the admins don’t actually care if people don’t like it. That one dude with the assassin profile picture said the quiet part out loud literally a few months ago. When he said no matter what nothing would be reverted. 
 

tldr; development team needs to change. Whatever work they do isn’t working, they aren’t the right people for the job, and they should pass the baton to people who have actual ideas. Nothing just redoing ideas from long ago. (Looking forward to the next resource buff/nerf).

[Avatar Patrick]

On 10/19/2023 at 4:34 PM, Kastor said:

I think the main problem is that nothing actually happens outside of *you*
 

i think hurricanes should randomly hit nations. Earthquakes should happen, etc 

 

then there’s a chance of your mines blowing up, or oil rig leaking, or a pilot stealing an aircraft.

 

these events can happen to your nation, and causes your income to drop by X or causes an airbase to blow up and deal 2.00-5.00 infra damage. 
 

these things may seem silly, but they bring life to the game that would cause people to check their nation. 
 

i recently bought food/uranium for a month, deposited my money, and half-ass a log in every few days. But I don’t really *check* my nations.

 

another thing is we can literally take from Nationstates and do “issues” we can trial run 1-10 of them, and have them randomly hit nations, and based off of nation ideology. Like the Communist country can’t pick the capitalist option and vice versa. 
 

but I think the main issue is something no one will agree with but should be the biggest point is that the small oligarchy of people who are apart of the development team suck. Minus maybe a few people, majority of the conversations that have leaked from them have been terrible ideas. 
 

another large part is majority of players have said they don’t like a large part of the changes and the people of that development team + the admins don’t actually care if people don’t like it. That one dude with the assassin profile picture said the quiet part out loud literally a few months ago. When he said no matter what nothing would be reverted. 
 

tldr; development team needs to change. Whatever work they do isn’t working, they aren’t the right people for the job, and they should pass the baton to people who have actual ideas. Nothing just redoing ideas from long ago. (Looking forward to the next resource buff/nerf).

Issues would be a neat concept to bring to the game. Nationstates has many flaws but that was one aspect I really enjoyed at least for a while. Like most people who found this game probably, I thought the focus would be on running your own nation. It would be nice to have some roleplay options that actually matter although it would probably lead to meta gaming.

[Arthur Wellington]

I think it all boils down to Alex. I'm really curious if he intends to keep changes small and keep the game like it is and has been or is he willing to shake things up? And does he consider that a difference between keeping players happy or driving core players away or is it something else all together?

[Anarchist Empire]

This game is to whimsical in deleting people's nations. Deleted an alliance to end one war, deleted a ton of players who have invested over a decade in this game just to do so low city people can't get loot as easily. So game keeps cutting it's player base, rather than acting like it values players and want them to stay; bring more people over.

During global wars you kind of need to be active to fight, once you grow a certain city count finding good unaligned raid targets is rare. So ends up being log in once daily eventually; until a war kicks things off. I think moderation should only ban people in really severe cases, where it's impossible for someone to accidentally break a rule that can get them banned. Like what happened with NPO and all those players who had been inactive not even a full year. (I was gone a lot longer than that & came back eventually.)

Other than stop deleting people who don't even realize they're doing anything that can get them deleted, should add to the space feature. Space bases, where moon and mars are separate worlds people can fight in. However the mechanics & resources you can harvest on them are different. However some resources can be transported by rocket, where costs a certain amount of aluminum, steel and gasoline to send a rocket. Rockets would be limited in capacity for resources, so creating their bases on other planets most would do a combo of transporting resources from Earth to get a base started & then start mining for resources off planet; as well as raiding other colonies not aligned with them. Some alliances might just focus purely on dominating specific planets.

So in some ways would be new worlds for people to compete for control and biggest bases; but would also still be linked to this game. With it possible to transport resources & some space projects giving benefits for space travel.

Edited October 22, 2023 by Anarchist Empire

[zigbigadorlou]

On 10/16/2023 at 8:54 PM, darkblade said:

But ever since discord became main stream,

2016...

Ever since 2016...

I don't think many of us are left that played pre-discord. 

[Insert Name Here]

9 hours ago, zigbigadorlou said:

2016...

Ever since 2016...

I don't think many of us are left that played pre-discord. 

 

Imagine not having used IRC to chat with your fellow alliance members... 

[Raphael]

On 10/17/2023 at 9:38 PM, darkblade said:

Also want to say that this is actually a serious post written by me and not by an AI to be a shitpost. Most people here clearly know that but for the few of you who haven't or messaged me about it. There you go lmfao.

This was my first question before I went to respond to it lol.

[Raphael]

On 10/16/2023 at 9:54 PM, darkblade said:

Intro
When it comes to Politics and War, the height of the game is during global wars when alliances/spheres fight each other. However during peace, the game is essentially dead outside of logging in once a day.

I feel like this has always been the case since 2006 CN. There either is stuff happening or you're waiting for stuff to happen. If you're lucky and smart, you might be able to make things happen but almost all of us are not in a position to really make impactful decisions. This is the core of why I advocate for democratic systems, open communication within alliances, transparency in governments, etc. People who have never been in a democratic alliance decry it as something that would destroy their way of life if they had the power to vote, or more realistically I think many people look at their fellow alliance members and think "god I don't want them voting"...

As in life, I think people can take this a step further but usually don't: If I dislike my alliance community and distrust their ability to work together or towards my own goals, why am I still in this alliance? I think democracy would help establish a new meta of activity and competence internally within alliances whose governments are now forced to self-advocate. Would it be perfect? No. But it's a huge increase in the political content that most of us want from a nationsim.

 

On 10/16/2023 at 9:54 PM, darkblade said:

The Community
Let's be real here. Outside of player ran discords, there isn't really a centralized community outside the quarterly events the game hosts on the official server. The forums used to be the main stage of the general community. But ever since discord became main stream, The forums have become a rotten corpse outside of Alliance Affairs and the occasional shit post. And while people are still trying to revive the forums (Ahem Roberts),

I will never give up on the forums

 

On 10/16/2023 at 9:54 PM, darkblade said:

Lack of Content

I hate to tell you this but you're screaming into the void, and I think you know it. Village is gone, at least for the moment, and Alex has been AFK going on years now in regards to coding or development. We have no one to actually setup any of these lovely suggestions.

 

[Kastor]

23 hours ago, zigbigadorlou said:

2016...

Ever since 2016...

I don't think many of us are left that played pre-discord. 

The game was VERY active in 2016-2018. The game stopped being as interesting when NPO got deleted. Let’s just put it out there. Everything that happened after was bland and an overcorrection from the alliances in charge because people didn’t want any hegemonies or actual OOC beef. Before the game was almost majority OOC beef. Think about it:

 

SK/Guardian thought Rose/Keegoz were dumb so they planned to backstab them.

 

Pfieffer was rude to a bunch of people which caused Rose to dislike them. That caused several wars.

 

TKR backstabbing NPO because they didn’t trust Roq like they did Jasmine.

 

Steve-Partisan beef which caused a super long war. 
 

Hans getting reelected that started a war, 

 

Point is there were a ton of actual OOC issues that caused IC wars. There was beef on both sides and people disliked one another. Nowadays people don’t interact with each other(not because of discord) but because of the overcorrection.
 

Moderators are quick to stop alliances/members from flaming/hazing other people. Look at the cuck memes for Taroq, they deleted all of them multiple times.

 

point is the game completely changed after NPO got deleted. Even Alex changed certain things so it couldn’t happen again. The overcorrection has resulted in this game becoming stale.

 

which is why I will reiterate that @Alex should get rid of people on the development team and bring in people who have different ideas. All the new ideas and things have had little effect on the actual gameplay and have barely been received positively in most cases. Otherwise we will just be going down the same exact road we’ve been going.