Interview conducted by Noahs Second Country

Obviously, you had already been around for a while prior to the release of cards - what kept you on the site, what kind of activities did you enjoy, and does your attitude towards the game remain the same now?

Koem Kab: Before cards, the only thing I did on NS was answer issues. I did not care about anything else. I had many nations that each prioritized building up different stats. My attitude had definitely changed. I eventually got bored of building up stats for puppets and now those nations are dead, but I still care about the stats of Koem Kab and continue to answer its issues. I obviously now care about cards and this is the only thing I really care about on NS.

Noah: Your stats on Koem Kab are very impressive(if I recall correctly, you have the most gold badges out of any nation right now).

Do you ever see yourself losing interest in cards like you did with stats, and do you think you'll ever be involved with other areas of the site?

Koem Kab:Right now I don't see myself losing interest in cards. I still find it enjoyable since I am able to play extremely well. I don't see myself involving myself with other areas in the game, it simply doesn't interest me one bit.

Noah: Speaking of your puppets, is that the reason why they are named things like "fakecommunism," "testing nation44xx", etc.?

Some of my puppets are named for this reason. For example, Fake communism was meant to be technically communist but ran like it was capitalist, then I made it into a puppet chain. The puppet chains I created just for cards did not have much thought in their naming.

Noah: You do indeed play really well - I haven't really seen you make any major mistakes.

When a clumsier trader such as myself makes a mistake, you're quick to pounce on the opportunity to make some easy bank. However, this isn't always true. My accidental 3,222 bid on S1 Farnhamia was an example of this. What is your general thought process when interacting with other traders on the market?

Koem Kab:The player that I see in an auction does have an effect on my actions as I will be more aggressive to some players than others, but not too much of an effect as I will act the same in many scenarios regardless of who the other player is. Most often, I have the most leverage in an auction so I am able to take advantage of a mistake, and mistakes happen very frequently on the selling side.
In the particular case of your Farnhamia mistake, it just seemed wrong in that particular case to fight despite the staggering amount of bank, and also you were able to maintain the status quo. I actually know what it is like to be in that position as I made this mistake on Season 1 Lamoni, added an extra 0 on the bid but I didn't lose the bank.

Noah: I have a lot of respect for you doing that. I'm a "new" player to cards in the sense that I wasn't around for any of Season 1, or at least I didn't take interest in cards at the time. In contrast, you've been active since the beginning. You brought up an auction I've never heard of, so I'm curious if you have any other interesting stories about a particular auction. Is there a trade that sticks with you?

Koem Kab:There have been some big auctions that have taken place during season 1 that have occured. One in particular bring soops and mindless contempt pull events in August, where The Northern Light willingly bid 3000 each on both cards. Just an extraordinary amount to pay for a card! Both cards were pulled a few times and I pulled a mindless contempt which I used to underask which initiated an underasking war which ended in me selling to luna Amore for about 2750 and luna selling for 3000 to The Northern Light. Luna also sold soops for 3000. This resulted in both cards being inflated crazy amounts.

A different trade in particular sticks with me which was different soops trade before there one previously mentioned where I bought it when it was the only legendary I did not have. Back then soops had around 15 owners, many didn't want to sell so I had to jump in the first opportunity I saw as another soops sale wasn't a guarantee.

Noah: Similarly, cards has gone through multiple periods of change, ultimately culminating into the current meta-game today. Do you think there is one particular event or trade that sparked such change, and is the change created something you agree with?

The pergamon pull event that occurred in April was definitely a trade that sparked a big change in the meta. Now it became known that a particular card can be mass generated in a short amount of time. Pull events were primarily used as a method of exploitation. This is something that was just way too exploitable as thousands of value can be produced in a short span of time and I'm glad that this later was eventually changed. I also felt I had to exploit this feature to keep up with others.

Noah: The unregulated TCALS meta was definitely a wild time, and it has permanently imbalanced some copy counts of various s1/s2 cards.

You still largely benefited from this - is this a particularly regrettable period in cards?

Koem Kab:The TCALS nerf definitely has brought sufficient balance to the game as it takes longer for a TCALS pull to occur. One of the advantages of the old system was that you can start your pull event and you pull a few cards before anyone else notices and has a chance to jump in and you can open packs at a much faster rate than others and one player will pull almost all the cards. Now that issues have to be answered the speed gap is lessened, and there is more diversity in the pulls. However, a large effect is that people aren't as willing to do pull events as often.

This is the reason why the meta before the change will be looked at negatively. It was too easy to gain high value cards and it was an exploitation that was used for self gain. But it also will be fun to look at some of the noteworthy pull events that have occurred during that time, the consequential auctions that occurred as a result, and how some of the cards and players were affected by this meta.

I do see TCALS being used in season 3, as there will still be community-wide pull events but nowhere near the role before the change. Of course there isn't actually a way of knowing what will happen as you can't predict how the meta will change.

Noah: I'm also curious about your thoughts on inflation - many farmers are sitting on increasingly large sums of bank, and the only real "sink" is gifting fees and DV upgrades. Do you feel as if a counter-inflation mechanism(one that is more direct than TCALS) could be useful for the health of cards going into the future?

Koem Kab:Regarding the increased bank some players have, I don't think this is hurting the game too much. This doesn't seem to affect many players as only a few players have a lot of unspent bank. Ideally if there are many players with a large amount of bank, people would be willing to spend more than they currently are, increasing demand for cards and also the prices which is happening for S1 legendary cards but not so much for S2 legendary cards.

Noah: That's pretty much along the lines of what I thought you would say, it makes sense.

I have a few quick questions before wrapping things up here:

If you were to make one change to the card game, what would it be?

Koem Kab:I can't really think of any change that I'd make.

Noah: Some people claim you are multiple people controlling a single account, what is your response to this?

Koem Kab:I am one person controlling Koem Kab and all its puppets.

Noah: In your opinion, what is the most tedious part of puppet management? (ex, opening packs, answering issues, doing transfers, etc.)

Koem Kab:Answering issues is the most tedious part as it takes up most of the time and effort compared to everything else.

Noah: Do you read Card News/The Monthly Snapshot/any other kind of card-based content?

Koem Kab:I do read the 2 card based content mentioned as I receive the notification when it gets released.

Noah: How often do you receive random TGs as a result of your position? What is the most memorable one you've received?

Koem Kab:I receive several telegrams per week, a good amount are people wanting to buy a card I own, some are also people asking for a free legendary card, some are related to an auction that is occuring or just finished, and some are completely random. I would say the most memorable was being wished good luck on the condemnation which was sent while at vote.

Noah: Why do you fly the default flag?

Koem Kab:I actually had a flag which wasn't a good flag regardless, but then my nation CTE'd for a short time and I never cared about my flag after that so I left it as the default flag.

Thank you Koem Kab for your participation! The next edition of Card News will feature an interview with Midlands. If you have a particular question you want asked, please let me know!