NATION

PASSWORD

Search

Search

[+] Advanced...

Author:

Region:

Sort:

«12. . .338339340341342343344. . .1,1211,122»
Messages

Aephony

COLONY? PFF, I WOULD LIKE TO GO BY "THE ّّّّّ OF AEPHONY"

The Civic Republic of Everetunga-Hari

“The Everetungahari” it doesn’t sound that bad actually (i’m never gonna use it though)

The Republic of Melenavenia

I know this was achieved a long time ago, but I never expected our delegate to receive the top 1% Most World Assembly Endorsements badge. Never thought we'd get that big, but alas we are and we are pretty dang good at endorsing too.

The Socialist Solarpunk Society of Sylh Alanor

Melenavenia wrote:I know this was achieved a long time ago, but I never expected our delegate to receive the top 1% Most World Assembly Endorsements badge. Never thought we'd get that big, but alas we are and we are pretty dang good at endorsing too.

It's made me so happy :D next step is to grow even more and get more 1% endorsement badges in the region.

Lower French Gregballs, Cheesy Tots, Typica, Melenavenia, and 8 othersVikoland, Araine, Floofybit, Imperve, Dacay, Haibaria, Remnants of the pacific, and Tiralta

Moulk2

Sylh Alanor wrote:It's made me so happy :D next step is to grow even more and get more 1% endorsement badges in the region.

Nah 0.1% endorsements.

The Enchanted Forest of Araine

Sylh Alanor wrote:It's made me so happy :D next step is to grow even more and get more 1% endorsement badges in the region.

We have 42 nations in the top 2%!

The Elemental Adventurer of Avatar Webby

Aephony wrote:COLONY? PFF, I WOULD LIKE TO GO BY "THE ّّّّّ OF AEPHONY"

Get yourself to 500 million citizens and you can be whatever you'd like.

Vikoland, Floofybit, Imperve, and Dacay

Gogoratsk

Ello umies, I found a letter about this region, and I thought it was pretty kickass, so I joined. I'll be honest my nation is gonna be very RP and worldbuilding focused, so that's gonna be fun.

Call us gogoratsk, we're a bit ova "coalition" as you's people says of orcs. I 'ope we can have a good time, mates

The Fanciful Tales of Refuge Isle

Happy Birthday, Refugia

Chacapoya, Lower French Gregballs, Honeydewistania, Cheesy Tots, and 19 othersTypica, Sylh Alanor, Melenavenia, Vikoland, Araine, Floofybit, Chatula, Liphia, Tovenia, Valdonland, Imperve, Avatar Webby, Dacay, Remnants of the pacific, Erie-arcadia of wombats, Tiralta, Brizola, Anga rea nash, and Gogoratsk

Dacay

Sylh Alanor wrote:It's made me so happy :D next step is to grow even more and get more 1% endorsement badges in the region.

One day :hyper:

Typica, Vikoland, Floofybit, and Imperve

The Jolly Fields of Lower French Gregballs

Aephony wrote:COLONY? PFF, I WOULD LIKE TO GO BY "THE ّّّّّ OF AEPHONY"

Ok, I changed my own classification as well. We are now "the⁗⁗⁗⁗ of Lower French Gregballs."

Sylh Alanor, Floofybit, and Imperve

Djorner

Happy Birthday, Refugia!. I Have Not Been Here For Super Long But I Am Extremely Happy To Have A Family Here And I Wish Everyone A Joyous Day!

Signed In The Utmost Respect and Admiration,
The Democratic States of Djorner
Member State of Refugia
Scientia Sit Potentia

Chacapoya, Lower French Gregballs, Sylh Alanor, Vikoland, and 9 othersAraine, Floofybit, New filippe, Tovenia, Imperve, Aephony, Remnants of the pacific, Pacific anarchist, and Tiralta

The Jolly Fields of Lower French Gregballs

Lower French Gregballs wrote:Ok, I changed my own classification as well. We are now "the⁗⁗⁗⁗ of Lower French Gregballs."

A man by the name of &%*\@# Smith hit the headlines yesterday when he had his first name legally changed to ‘John’, citing the ridicule and stress he suffered because of his given name.
I guess calling ourselves the ⁗⁗⁗⁗ of Lower French Gregballs may cause trauma to kids moving out of our country. "Where are you from?" "I'm from the 16th prime of LFG" "haha!" (local kids proceed to throw rotten tangerines at Gregballist kid)

Floofybit, New filippe, Imperve, and Aephony

Heanam 2

im gonna make the fruit buddhas hand illegal

The People's Democratic Kingdom of Pangeodrea

Okay…?

Floofybit and Imperve

The Floofy Socialist Monarchy of Floofybit

Lower French Gregballs wrote:
A man by the name of &%*\@# Smith hit the headlines yesterday when he had his first name legally changed to ‘John’, citing the ridicule and stress he suffered because of his given name.
I guess calling ourselves the ⁗⁗⁗⁗ of Lower French Gregballs may cause trauma to kids moving out of our country. "Where are you from?" "I'm from the 16th prime of LFG" "haha!" (local kids proceed to throw rotten tangerines at Gregballist kid)

Finally! Some good use for these tangerines we imported to Aephony but they didn't eat.

Imperve

Aephony

Floofybit wrote:these tangerines we imported to Aephony but they didn't eat.

What did you possibly expect? they got executed, guillotine. they exploded, we used that liquid left in torture camps by cutting a scar in their hands and squirting it. Much better than eating.

Narwhal, Floofybit, and Imperve

The Catocracy of Catiania

Hello Friends! TEP has made a news again. Will we ever cease?

Dispatch:


⤆ ⤇ ↺ ☖ | 🔒 Secure | https://epns.moin.gov.caek/issue/2021/10.html

.
The East Pacific News Service
. .

Editor's Note: This article was edited especially for dispatch readers. The original, unedited version may be seen Linkhere.

The East Pacific News Service
January 31, 2022

The Story of The East Pacific Volume One - Our Pre-Loop History

FEATURE | Contributed and Edited by Nociav on behalf of the University of The East Pacific

Foreword

I thank Unibot for his permission to use his "Anatomy of the Coup III: TEP, the Early Days" which you can read here:

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=447629

Without his work, this volume would not have been possible.

I'd also like to thank Heinekenbier, who also goes by the name HC Eredivisie, for allowing me to interview him about AA and pre-AA TEP.

Contrary to the popular misspelling, "Lothlanderamore" is actually spelled "Lotlanthanderamore". No nation called "Lothlanderamore" has ever existed[18]. Lotlanthanderamore was last online in 2005 which means either "Loth" revived his nation or he never went away[16]. I use the incorrect spelling here so it isn't confusing to read. The misspelling is one of Loop's from way back in 2005[17] which explains why it's so entrenched.

Should new information come out or any errors need fixing, I will release an addendum to this and other volumes.

As a side note, I'd like to point out that TEP, being a UCR at one point, has the "T" capitalized whereas TWP, TSP, and TP all have lowercase "t"s. TNP is the only other Feeder with a capital T. Since the order of feeder foundings go TP, TSP, TNP, TWP, TEP, it is almost certain that someone founded TNP as a UCR before it became a feeder. Its order in the founding makes it incredibly likely that it wasn't a mere mistake from the admins. Hopefully, someone in the north will get on this case. I'll look forward to reading any history someone might create about the founding of TNP.

I'd like to stress that I have found absolutely nothing else about this pre-Loop TEP. Absolutely nothing else. You are getting absolutely everything I have found. This is extraordinarily frustrating because there are so many unanswered questions that may never get answered ever because all history of this era depends on memory, which is fallible, and random posts from here and there. I'm sure that many people will share my frustration but please enjoy whatever has been found out in this volume.

Pre-Atlantic Alliance

Despite the popular story of TEP being founded by Hitler the Great (HTG), as a trophy before being raided by the Farkers and becoming a GCR, TEP's history predates HTG and the Atlantic Alliance (AA). By how much? We might never know. Why did HTG get so associated with the founding of TEP? We also might never know.

TEP's Pre-Atlantic Alliance history is mostly unknown as the AA kept no public record of what TEP was like before their occupation. The only things that we do know is that Reubenlucy may have been the Delegate before the AA and that it did exist before the Atlantic Alliance took over[3]. Heineken, in a telegram exchange, tells me that he thinks it may have been someone else other than Reubenlucy as Reubenlucy was part of the AA. Further inference can be drawn to prove it existed pre-AA from a post Nusseburg made saying, on the 12th of May, 2003, that it was taken during "that huge flurry of activity a few weeks ago". He most likely references the introduction of regional controls[4] which happened on the 29th of April, 2003[14]. Heineken also implies that it existed before the AA when he said it must have been someone else. Since you can't raid a region that doesn't exist, logically speaking, TEP pre-dates the AA.

Other than this, nothing is known. The Founding date is unknown, who founded it is unknown, what the WFE was, and what the RMB was like, who was in the region, and everything else has all been lost to history. We can assume that the reason it was founded was because of its namesake GCR, the West Pacific. The only nations that may know this are Reubenlucy but they and their puppet, Reubenlucy Jr, CTE'd 13 and 15 years ago respectively. HTG, the often-cited founder, may also know but he also CTE'd a long time ago.

Loop says he had screenshots of TEP in April 2003 but they have presumably been lost over time[20]. A real shame.

I haven't found anything else about pre-AA TEP and neither has anyone else as far as I can tell. Nevertheless, I present a challenge to everyone reading this. The first person who finds out anything else about TEP before the Atlantic Alliance with sure proof will be gifted five legendary cards and ten epic cards.

The Atlantic Alliance Occupation

The Atlantic Alliance, a proto-imperialist raiding group, raided The East Pacific on or shortly after the 29th of April, 2003[14] as inferred by Nusseburg[4]. After being taken, it became the forward base for the Third Legion[7]. The member list for the Third Legion was Hitler the Great, Phenmark, Pimpmaro, and Reubenlucy[7]. Although it was for the Third Legion, other Atlantic Alliance soldiers did move in and out of the region from time to time[6][13]. The only documented Delegates during the Atlantic Alliance's occupation are Reubenlucy and Heinekenbier[19]. Heineken has told me that Reubenlucy was Delegate and then he was Delegate. He doesn't remember any of the other Delegates during this era. It is fair to assume that the Delegacy did bounce around to various trusted AA officials. Perhaps HTG was a Delegate at some point, it certainly isn't impossible. Loop testifies to this[15] but Loop also says that it was a trophy region[19] which is known to be false since it was the Third Legion's forward base.

During this occupation, The East Pacific was passworded with a numerical password and the only way to get in was to request the password from the Delegate. Only Atlantic Alliance soldiers with permission could enter[2].

The exact WFE during the Atlantic Alliance occupation is unknown but it was most likely a variant of the standard WFE for forward bases which was:

"Established on [MONTH] [DAY], [YEAR], Forward base of the Atlantic and home of The [LEGION NUMBER] Legion. http://homepages.nyu.edu/~ncl206/Atlantic/"[10]

The RMB was just random chatter between the various AA soldiers, nothing else according to Heineken.

The Farker Invasion

The Farkers, another raiding group, seized the Delegacy on the 13th of May, 2003, at around 9 am UTC with, what was presumably, a small contingent of raiders after they had learned the password. Unibot estimated a figure of 15 or so but the links he gave as a source are now dead. Loop says that when he assumed the Delegacy after Lothlanderamore, who was the point for the raid[8], he had 13 endorsements[15] all of which were presumably fellow Farkers. Either way, it was most likely no more than 20 but greater than 10.

After the successful raid, Loth ejected the Atlantic Alliance soldiers as was remembered by Heinekenbier who recalls logging in to find himself ejected from the region[19].

The Farkers gained the password by having it leaked to them from Myrth/Borisland who was sent the password shortly before the raid[19]. Although Myrth denies this, it seems to me that the evidence against him is too great to be plausibly denied. His initial defense, when put to trial, is laughable and very suspect[2]. His motive can't be precisely established but he said that it was interesting to see how long he could lead the AA on[2]. The opportunity came with the advent of the Farkers. Heineken also says that he sent the password to Myrth before the Farker raid[19].

A few days later, around the 15th of May, 2003, the region had its password struck down and its status changed from a UCR to a GCR[19]. This change was completely unexpected and blindsided the Farkers as no announcement was made beforehand or after about TEP becoming the fifth and final feeder. The Farker confusion about nations finding their way in was justified as they thought they had passworded it. Loth's initial reaction was to eject every non-Farker nation. This was quickly loosened to all UN nations and then to UN nations not endorsing the Delegate[1].

After the policy was loosened to UN nations not endorsing the Delegate, Loop succeeded as Delegate. The precise date isn't known but Loop has claimed that it was on the 24th[5], he has claimed it was on the 25th[11]. However, NSDossier has Loth listed as the Delegate on the 28th of May but Loop on the 2nd of June[19]. It has to be between the 28th and the 1st of June since Loop's earliest boot logs are dated on the forums to the 1st of June[21]. My guess is the 31st of May, the date the forums were created. Whatever the exact date, Loop took the Delegacy with just 13 endorsements[15], beginning a new chapter in the story of The East Pacific.

I'm aware that the handover isn't this simple and I'll elaborate on this in the next volume; The Story of The East Pacific Volume Two - The Age of Loop.

Sources

[1]viewtopic.php?p=8221905
[2]https://atlantic.proboards.com/thread/164/east-pacific-traitor
https://atlantic.proboards.com/thread/164/east-pacific-traitor?page=2
[3]https://networkradio.proboards.com/thread/171/twinkles-siggis-secret-identity
[4]https://atlantic.proboards.com/post/1029
[5]https://nationstates.ermarian.net/jolt/1223/297680
[6]https://web.archive.org/web/20030506215334/http://www.nationstates.net:80/cgi-bin/index.cgi/pin=-1/page=list_region_members/region=the_east_pacific
[7]http://graptor.net/atlantic/members.html
[8]Given that Loop has always stated that Loth was the only Farker Delegate before him and no other source contradicts this, it is safe to assume that Loth was the point.
[9]It's on the last page of here.
http://nsdossier.texasregion.net//history.aspx?region=The+East+Pacific&type=Exact&group=region&start=&end=
[10]This was the standard WFE format for forward bases as evidenced by The West Pacific which was an Atlantic Alliance forward base at the time.
https://web.archive.org/web/20030502163531/http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/pin=-1/page=display_region/region=the_west_pacific
[11]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/viewtopic.php?p=49367
[13]You can read an Atlantic Alliance soldier saying he'll move back to The East Pacific here:
https://web.archive.org/web/20030505143636/http://www.nationstates.net:80/cgi-bin/index.cgi/pin=-1/page=display_region/region=the_rejected_realms/start=300
[14]page=news/2003/04/29/index.html
[15]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/the-fractured-history-of-the-east-pacific-updated-t2803.html#p126100
[16]page=boneyard?nation=Lotlanthanderamore
[17]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/viewtopic.php?p=30354#p30354
[18]page=boneyard?nation=lothlanderamore
[19]viewtopic.php?f=12&t=447629
Heineken also confirmed in a telegram exchange that Reubenlucy was a Delegate.
[20]https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thepacific/dear-pacific-t1485-s15.html#p9504885
[21]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/boot-logs-t13437.html

Raiders hold A Liberal Haven, but Foul Play suspected?

FEATURE | BY: Albrook | Edited by: Le sol,Ponthieu, and Catiania

On January 2, 2022, by the combined efforts from Lone Wolves United, The Black Hawks, Karma, Osiris, Kantrias, the Empire of Great Britain, Caer Sidi, and The Brotherhood of Malice, the raiders seized A Liberal Haven from native control and have successfully held it for almost a month now.

While a victory is to be celebrated, two aspects drag the raiders down. Firstly, The East Pacific does not condone griefing regions as part of any offensive military action. Secondly, and even more egregious, is the presence of technical anomalies that prevented Defenders from otherwise legitimately seizing the region weeks ago.

THE RAID

A Liberal Haven is an ancient region, dating back to the times of Antiquity, and has not done too well on the great test of time. Native Delegate Garchyland and a handful of active natives alone maintained the region and fought for its protection since their founder CTEd in 2011.

On that fateful day, January 2, 2022, now Raider Delegate Got the munchies real bad man – better known as Vandoosa – seized the Delegacy. Vandoosa’s puppet was a raider plant in the region masquerading as a native – a sleeper nation. Despite the region’s security, this fatal flaw had permitted raiders to access the region and proved fundamental in executing their raid. Upon seizing the Delegacy, the controlling raider forces passworded the region – thanks to the sufficient Influence Vandoosa had accumulated over the years – that the natives could not see.
As iterated in the overview, The East Pacific does not condone the practice of griefing, including such institution of a hidden password. Nonetheless, the author does not intend this to become too big of a soapbox, and instead wishes to quell any suspicions of support in this paragraph.

THE LIBERATION

A Liberal Haven’s occupation is not a normal raid. In any normal circumstance, the raiders would occupy and tag a region, then leave it to pursue other regions to tag or hold fast within the region to protect their occupation. Often this occurs when high-value targets are seized, such as previous raids on Asia and Japan in years past.
However, it is exceedingly rare that the raiders have enough influence to password protect the region on the very first night of occupation. At this point, Defenders must write and pass a Liberation resolution in the World Assembly Security Council.

On the same night after the raid, The South Pacific rapidly contacted its allies for support, and drafted and obtained the necessary approvals to get Liberate A Liberal Haven within five hours.The vote on the Liberation became open at minor update the next day. During the minor update on January 7, the resolution passed with over 85% support.
On the major update on January 7, the Defenders obtained the password to the region and attempted to liberate the region. They failed. In response to massive Defender participation, the raiders shored up their numbers by contacting friends and family to join the raider pile, prompting their success in the minor update on January 7. On January 8, a massive Defender force – including civilian conscripts from The East Pacific, joining the fight on behalf of the Eastern Pacific Sovereign Army – still failed to liberate the region despite advance and determined coordination. On this fateful night, however, an anomaly was discovered.

Starting with the major update on January 7, multiple reports summoned NS Admin’s attention claiming that the twice-daily update cycle was behaving incorrectly. Every region was updating within an acceptable time frame up until the last two regions, The Rejected Realms and Russian Sfsr, update. The data powering sub-second jumps by Defender forces was accurate until just before A Liberal Haven was slated to update. Two minute warnings for Defender jumps turned into seven minute warnings and actions intended to take a few seconds took over a minute.
Raiders celebrated as malcoordinated Defenders jumped too early into a pack of waiting Border Control Regional Officers, thus weakening the critical mass that was supposed to hit the region all at once. Following the major update on January 8, and because of these anomalies, Defenders’ plans to restore Delegate Garchyland to power by endorsements liberating A Liberal Heaven were paused indefinitely.

THE DISCUSSION TODAY

What caused such weird update behavior? Who is interfering with the game’s update cycle? How does this so consistently happen just before A Liberal Haven updates and so cleanly returns to normal shortly after? These questions riddle the minds of NS’s technical staff and the major R/D players.

It is said that NationStates experiences the most load during the major and minor updates, but technical insight shows that fluctuations in update timings never exceed 30 seconds. Even the Brazillian Youtube Boom, having taken place in the week following the liberation attempts, had negligible effects on update times - especially to the point of destroying liberation attempts.
NS technical staff are encouraging another massive liberation operation to gather more data, hoping to catch the source of whoever or whatever is seizing up update times, and is cracking down on popular scripts improperly enforcing the rate limit on the NS API.

The Free Nations Defense Association’s R/D script, Storm, was one of these scripts. Thanks to very swift action from the Free Nations Region’s technical staff, they have resolved the issue with their script. Prior to the fixes, an improperly configured stop condition was causing users to create thousands more requests than they had intended to make at a time. Storm will now urge all users to upgrade to the latest version.

The East Pacific wishes to thank our allies for support in the liberation and the 16 TEPers in the EPSA who participated with us.

page=dispatch/id=1643478

Albrook's 3/4-term Delegate Address

FEATURE | BY: Albrook | Edited by: Le sol

EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was released on January 16.

Citizens of The East Pacific,

Welcome to the fourth month of my delegacy – the final month of this term. Very shortly, come February, once again we will begin voting for the next Delegate. In the meantime, I wanted to give you a holistic report as to the state of our region in a midterm, well, actually ¾-term address.

  • TEP has excelled in the following areas over the last three months:

  • Revisioning WA voting procedures as to give the most representative regional voice

  • Empowering newcomer and rising talent into positions of significance in TEP’s government

  • Engaging TEP in the Interregional Community

  • Strengthening ties with TEP’s allies in Cultural and Gameplay Partnership

Early in my Delegacy, I entertained the opinions from my cabinet regarding the establishment of on-site polls restricted to sufficiently Influential WA citizens and expansion of Discord voting to Hussars of the East. Since implementing these opportunities for citizens to vote, on average the number of votes and opinions submitted towards proposals at vote has quadrupled. Before this change, voting was restricted to members of the Ministry of World Assembly Affairs. Now with more opinions, TEP is better equipped to demonstrate the best regional opinion possible to the WA. I especially wish to thank A mean old man for suggesting hosting the WA voting on the main server.

Observe a few offices in the Executive and elsewhere in the region – you have Raiu east as the Minister of Foreign Affairs, American-Cascadia as the Minister of Culture, Ysg hermitcraft as Provost, and Professor Casillo y real of UTEP. Across all of TEP, we are empowering rising talent into very prestigious positions of government. In each of these positions, those who chose them didn’t see a Residency statistic, national population, or even care if they have been around off-site for a long time or not – each applied for their positions with their best set of ideas and promise to excel. I am proud to be working alongside each of them in serving this region.

Immediately upon assuming the Delegacy, I was asked by many members of the interregional community and Senior Diplomat Libertanny – “when can TEP join this cool thing we’re doing”? Since October, TEP has assisted the NS Christmas Charity Fundraiser in raising $4,305 for Doctors Without Borders, organized events and contests for Harry Potter and the Festival of Friends, and hosts and co-manages a Minecraft server alongside The South Pacific, 10000 Islands, the Alstroemerian Commonwealths, Thaecia, and The Free Nations Region. Even today, TEP is still organizing events for the upcoming month – including celebrating the anniversary of the Free Nations Region’s creation on January 15. There are, of course, some others on deck that I can’t share at the moment. :p

When TEP isn’t partying with its regional allies, it’s working with them in R/D, the WA, and other aspects of gameplay. The greatest testament to our friendship came with the recent A Liberal Haven occupation. At the start of the month, Lone Wolves United and The Black Hawks seized A Liberal Haven in what TEP declares griefing – subverting the native government with a sleeper nation to grab the Delegacy, ban natives, and restrict entry to the region with a hidden password. TEP assisted TSP and our other Defender allies in pledging voting support to Liberate A Liberal Haven and finally manpower from the Eastern Pacific Sovereign Army in the last week. All while this is underway, we still hold a trusting cultural relationship with The Black Hawks, mutually respecting that each of us has our own rules for our regional militaries.

While the above successes are noted, there is still greatly some room to grow. Firstly, between school, work, other cool games, and other sources of distraction and fatigue, there are only so many people at any time in TEP’s government. It is clear we are no longer in a population boom situation like we were in April 2020 with the Drew Boom, where for every two government workers there was one task, so things just got done because there were so many hands. This causes things to slip through that otherwise wouldn’t, admittedly true with the Eastern Pacific News Service – now under direct management from the Chief Minister of Regional Affairs and myself now lacking a Minister with Eastern Alksearia’s recent resignation.

With respect to my campaign promises, I am proud to see that the average citizen is more empowered and aware of opportunities in TEP to have a say and participate. We are still hard at work and have a plan to make EPNS most consistent in 2022 and the Chief Ministries are still assisting with the development of training materials for newcomers, and assigning deputies wherever staffing is available within the ministries. I certainly did not anticipate being in the Delegate seat with the lowest staffing numbers since I joined TEP, but it is the situation we are in and an obstacle to overcome.

Please continue to give your feedback as to the state of our region, do consider participating in the Magisterium – where you can vote on regional law – or the Executive where you can assist in planning events and write for TEP, and do continue to endorse myself and the Viziers to secure the safety of our democracy and boost our regional say in the World Assembly. This is no single nation’s region – it is a community that each of us helps create and define every day. Greatly consider being the voice that makes the change happen – I do my best to listen out for each of them.

TEP Haiku Contest in Review

FEATURE | BY: Albrook | Edited by: The Atlae Isles

The Ministry of Regional Affairs organized the TEP Holiday Haiku Contest, which took place between December 14, 2021, and January 1, 2022. This year’s contest was Holiday-themed, so all qualifying haikus for the contest were related to the Holiday season.

Upon conclusion of the contest, Doggorland (Boro) penned the winning haiku. To explain, this poem exploits the “Padoru Padoru” lyric popularly shared around the Holiday season by anime and manga enthusiasts, as made popular by Fate/Extra. It has since obtained meme status, and was even present on the December 2021 animated TEP flag.

Pado~ Padoru~
Pado~ Pado~ Padoru~
Pado~ Padoru~

Wallenburg achieved the runner-up position with this wintery imagery:

Hills against orange skies
One by one, stars born above
Cold, trickling creek below

A special thanks to all participants for the very beautiful holiday haikus and the very excellent meme haikus!

Wait, Did Somebody Say Minecraft?

FEATURE | BY: Raiu east | Edited by Albrook

Fade in from Black

Let me set the scene for you. Imagine a dark, stormy night somewhere in the American Midwest. A computer lay waiting at a desk, with a parrot asleep just next to the keyboard. Suddenly, it awakes with a start, having suddenly gotten a bright idea. The parrot frantically reaches for its seasonal hat and logs onto Discord. Serge quickly flicks through the endless channels in TEP’s foreign affairs discord server, eventually finding the one he has been looking for, #fa-inner-circle. He gathers everybody around to hear him speak, and in the almighty parrot’s wisdom, he whispers but one word, “Minecraft”.

Thus, dearest reader, was the proceedings of the 11th of December 2021 (or 10th if you’re not in Oceania). Since then, a small army of technical supporters and visionaries have gathered, determined to bring the Minecraftian dream to fruition. With a colorful array of teams working literally around the clock. The server, aptly named [Cool Name] Minecraft Server, was somehow brought into existence within 72 hours of Serge’s original message. Coming fully fitted with a wild set of diverse and unique biomes, an armory of plugins and a very enthusiastic player base, ready to cause havoc in any way they could (in a good way obviously).

Since then, Senior Diplomat Serge’s Foreign Affairs project has blossomed into a community of its own, becoming bigger and better than any of us anticipated. With the server always being tweaked and updated (and a big update on the horizon), now is as good a time as any to register your region and join the fray.

Forest and Frost

Within this expansive custom Minecraft world, several regions and nations exist. Each has an entirely different system of laws, governance, and customs. While there are four different regions within the world, being Snow, Forest, Canyon, and Desert, they are not technically a nation in their own right. A region is ruled by the largest faction working in tandem with all the smaller factions on behalf of their region. It is quite a common occurrence to have national borders overlap regions, causing some minor conflict on specific occasions.

Nations that inhabit the world of [Cool Name]Minecraft Server are as follows:

The Granite Elves

A powerful Forest settlement of miners and tree builders, the Granite Elves are known far and wide for the sheer scale of resource production and infrastructure development. With the “Big Tree” being constantly worked on by dedicated residents (but mainly Emjay), motivated by little more than national pride. While the Granite Elves have no specific leader, the de facto chief of the nation is none other than the almighty parrot himself (and server creator), Serge.

Upon approaching Emjay (a crazed resident) and requesting an interview, I observed them only mumbling “must build the tree, must build the tree”. After making the mistake of asking “what the hell is the tree”, I was violently chased from the Granite Elves’ borders and told never to return.

The Treehouse Empire

A bustling federation of trading settlements that inhabit the Snow region of the world. With approximately 7 members, the Treehouse Empire co-runs the snow with the Frozen Sun. While this faction is not nearly as active as its Frozen Sun counterpart, it has created a strong reputation as a trade hub within members of the community, priding itself on its villager trades and resource production. Going on record with a Treehouse Empire resident, they had this to say.

“Yeah man you should totally join us, we have treehouses, who doesn’t want treehouses? No seriously, join us, it’s really lonely here.”

The Frozen Sun

The largest and frostiest region in the world, the Frozen Sun lays claim to everywhere with snow and mountains. Led by her majesty, the Yukihime Aurora, and flanked by several members of the royal court (myself being included), the Frozen Sun sets an impressive standard when it comes to raw influence. Although the conditions of the region are usually quite treacherous, several small settlements have popped up within the remotest sections of the tundra, somehow surviving on crops and trade with forest regions for agricultural products.

When meeting with a resident of the Frozen Sun who looked like a mix between a Viking and a Bear, I was promptly laughed at for wearing only 3 layers of coats.

“Aye Las, it’s a bit frosty today, mind, its frosty most days ‘round ‘ere. You bring any food with yers? Been a rough few moons of late”

While the Frozen Sun is ruled by a queen, the Yukihime, most of the settlements are self-governing to some degree, only relying on the Yukihime for heading the nation, policy and national coordination of projects.

The Obsidian Realm

Although The Obsidian Realm has only four members, it makes up for it with sheer military and tactical prowess. Its players are all hardened veterans of Minecraft, making each of them a force to be reckoned with. As if to further prove just how powerful this region and its members are, the main settlement is literally surrounded by volcanoes, you know, just because. On top of PVP, TOR is also known for its widespread export of netherite to its allies, cementing its name as the go-to producer of wartime supplies.

Blood Spilled On Sacred Sand

As is bound to happen in any good Minecraft server, geopolitical conflict inevitably arose.

The first seeds of war were laid on Discord, approximately two weeks into the server’s life. As various nations laid claim to more and more of the world around them, fighting to see who could establish colonies more convincingly. The Desert Nation decided to sail across the sea and establish colonies on the coast of the Canyon Nation, laying claim to the region.

Upon posting their border claim to the rest of the world, the Nation of Canyon became outraged. A Canyon-ese representative posted an angry message on Discord, professing that the Desert Nation’s claim was illegitimate, and demanded they leave sovereign Canyon borders immediately, threatening retaliation for non-compliance. Naturally, The Desert Nation, in their supreme wisdom, basically responded “lol no”, and engaged in bickering for the next two days or so about borders. Eventually, it became clear that the Desert Nation would not relinquish its claim, so the same Canyon-ese representative wrote an open letter to all nations, calling The Canyon Nation and its allies to arms against the “Desert dogs'' who were clearly encroaching on Canyons holy lands.

Shortly after this message went out, the Canyon Nation launched a full-scale offensive on the underprepared Desert Nation, quickly overwhelming their defenses. Within a few hours, it became clear that the Desert would not win the war, and were quickly pushed back deep into their own territory. Seeing this, Canyon decided to go all out, and effectively annexed the entirety of the Desert Nation. Seeing that the very existence of Desert may be on the line, the mods stepped in and told Canyon to chill out a bit. After a few days of occupation, Canyon agreed to retreat into their borders but left the Desert Nation crippled.

Many post-war mutual defense and peace treaties were made between nervous bystanders, seeing the decimation at the hands of Canyon, and hoping not to be next. Jump to the current day, many regions have agreed to be as cooperative as possible in the pursuit of peace, with the rough world borders looking something like this.

Sounds Cool! I Want In!

You may be asking, dearest reader, how does an individual such as yourself join our esteemed Minecraftian paradise? Well, currently only a few select regions are members. To check if you are one of those few, have a look around in your resident Discord for possible mention of the [Cool Name] Minecraft Server. If you are unable to find anything, it is likely that your region has not yet been considered. We take region approval on a case-by-case basis, so please feel free to send a request to either Serge, myself or your local TEP diplomat on behalf of your region.

Read dispatch


NS Forums: viewtopic.php?p=39326055#p39326055

The Goose's Old Snacc of Cheesy Tots

Catiania wrote:Hello Friends! TEP has made a news again. Will we ever cease?

Dispatch:


⤆ ⤇ ↺ ☖ | 🔒 Secure | https://epns.moin.gov.caek/issue/2021/10.html

.
The East Pacific News Service
. .

Editor's Note: This article was edited especially for dispatch readers. The original, unedited version may be seen Linkhere.

The East Pacific News Service
January 31, 2022

The Story of The East Pacific Volume One - Our Pre-Loop History

FEATURE | Contributed and Edited by Nociav on behalf of the University of The East Pacific

Foreword

I thank Unibot for his permission to use his "Anatomy of the Coup III: TEP, the Early Days" which you can read here:

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=447629

Without his work, this volume would not have been possible.

I'd also like to thank Heinekenbier, who also goes by the name HC Eredivisie, for allowing me to interview him about AA and pre-AA TEP.

Contrary to the popular misspelling, "Lothlanderamore" is actually spelled "Lotlanthanderamore". No nation called "Lothlanderamore" has ever existed[18]. Lotlanthanderamore was last online in 2005 which means either "Loth" revived his nation or he never went away[16]. I use the incorrect spelling here so it isn't confusing to read. The misspelling is one of Loop's from way back in 2005[17] which explains why it's so entrenched.

Should new information come out or any errors need fixing, I will release an addendum to this and other volumes.

As a side note, I'd like to point out that TEP, being a UCR at one point, has the "T" capitalized whereas TWP, TSP, and TP all have lowercase "t"s. TNP is the only other Feeder with a capital T. Since the order of feeder foundings go TP, TSP, TNP, TWP, TEP, it is almost certain that someone founded TNP as a UCR before it became a feeder. Its order in the founding makes it incredibly likely that it wasn't a mere mistake from the admins. Hopefully, someone in the north will get on this case. I'll look forward to reading any history someone might create about the founding of TNP.

I'd like to stress that I have found absolutely nothing else about this pre-Loop TEP. Absolutely nothing else. You are getting absolutely everything I have found. This is extraordinarily frustrating because there are so many unanswered questions that may never get answered ever because all history of this era depends on memory, which is fallible, and random posts from here and there. I'm sure that many people will share my frustration but please enjoy whatever has been found out in this volume.

Pre-Atlantic Alliance

Despite the popular story of TEP being founded by Hitler the Great (HTG), as a trophy before being raided by the Farkers and becoming a GCR, TEP's history predates HTG and the Atlantic Alliance (AA). By how much? We might never know. Why did HTG get so associated with the founding of TEP? We also might never know.

TEP's Pre-Atlantic Alliance history is mostly unknown as the AA kept no public record of what TEP was like before their occupation. The only things that we do know is that Reubenlucy may have been the Delegate before the AA and that it did exist before the Atlantic Alliance took over[3]. Heineken, in a telegram exchange, tells me that he thinks it may have been someone else other than Reubenlucy as Reubenlucy was part of the AA. Further inference can be drawn to prove it existed pre-AA from a post Nusseburg made saying, on the 12th of May, 2003, that it was taken during "that huge flurry of activity a few weeks ago". He most likely references the introduction of regional controls[4] which happened on the 29th of April, 2003[14]. Heineken also implies that it existed before the AA when he said it must have been someone else. Since you can't raid a region that doesn't exist, logically speaking, TEP pre-dates the AA.

Other than this, nothing is known. The Founding date is unknown, who founded it is unknown, what the WFE was, and what the RMB was like, who was in the region, and everything else has all been lost to history. We can assume that the reason it was founded was because of its namesake GCR, the West Pacific. The only nations that may know this are Reubenlucy but they and their puppet, Reubenlucy Jr, CTE'd 13 and 15 years ago respectively. HTG, the often-cited founder, may also know but he also CTE'd a long time ago.

Loop says he had screenshots of TEP in April 2003 but they have presumably been lost over time[20]. A real shame.

I haven't found anything else about pre-AA TEP and neither has anyone else as far as I can tell. Nevertheless, I present a challenge to everyone reading this. The first person who finds out anything else about TEP before the Atlantic Alliance with sure proof will be gifted five legendary cards and ten epic cards.

The Atlantic Alliance Occupation

The Atlantic Alliance, a proto-imperialist raiding group, raided The East Pacific on or shortly after the 29th of April, 2003[14] as inferred by Nusseburg[4]. After being taken, it became the forward base for the Third Legion[7]. The member list for the Third Legion was Hitler the Great, Phenmark, Pimpmaro, and Reubenlucy[7]. Although it was for the Third Legion, other Atlantic Alliance soldiers did move in and out of the region from time to time[6][13]. The only documented Delegates during the Atlantic Alliance's occupation are Reubenlucy and Heinekenbier[19]. Heineken has told me that Reubenlucy was Delegate and then he was Delegate. He doesn't remember any of the other Delegates during this era. It is fair to assume that the Delegacy did bounce around to various trusted AA officials. Perhaps HTG was a Delegate at some point, it certainly isn't impossible. Loop testifies to this[15] but Loop also says that it was a trophy region[19] which is known to be false since it was the Third Legion's forward base.

During this occupation, The East Pacific was passworded with a numerical password and the only way to get in was to request the password from the Delegate. Only Atlantic Alliance soldiers with permission could enter[2].

The exact WFE during the Atlantic Alliance occupation is unknown but it was most likely a variant of the standard WFE for forward bases which was:

"Established on [MONTH] [DAY], [YEAR], Forward base of the Atlantic and home of The [LEGION NUMBER] Legion. http://homepages.nyu.edu/~ncl206/Atlantic/"[10]

The RMB was just random chatter between the various AA soldiers, nothing else according to Heineken.

The Farker Invasion

The Farkers, another raiding group, seized the Delegacy on the 13th of May, 2003, at around 9 am UTC with, what was presumably, a small contingent of raiders after they had learned the password. Unibot estimated a figure of 15 or so but the links he gave as a source are now dead. Loop says that when he assumed the Delegacy after Lothlanderamore, who was the point for the raid[8], he had 13 endorsements[15] all of which were presumably fellow Farkers. Either way, it was most likely no more than 20 but greater than 10.

After the successful raid, Loth ejected the Atlantic Alliance soldiers as was remembered by Heinekenbier who recalls logging in to find himself ejected from the region[19].

The Farkers gained the password by having it leaked to them from Myrth/Borisland who was sent the password shortly before the raid[19]. Although Myrth denies this, it seems to me that the evidence against him is too great to be plausibly denied. His initial defense, when put to trial, is laughable and very suspect[2]. His motive can't be precisely established but he said that it was interesting to see how long he could lead the AA on[2]. The opportunity came with the advent of the Farkers. Heineken also says that he sent the password to Myrth before the Farker raid[19].

A few days later, around the 15th of May, 2003, the region had its password struck down and its status changed from a UCR to a GCR[19]. This change was completely unexpected and blindsided the Farkers as no announcement was made beforehand or after about TEP becoming the fifth and final feeder. The Farker confusion about nations finding their way in was justified as they thought they had passworded it. Loth's initial reaction was to eject every non-Farker nation. This was quickly loosened to all UN nations and then to UN nations not endorsing the Delegate[1].

After the policy was loosened to UN nations not endorsing the Delegate, Loop succeeded as Delegate. The precise date isn't known but Loop has claimed that it was on the 24th[5], he has claimed it was on the 25th[11]. However, NSDossier has Loth listed as the Delegate on the 28th of May but Loop on the 2nd of June[19]. It has to be between the 28th and the 1st of June since Loop's earliest boot logs are dated on the forums to the 1st of June[21]. My guess is the 31st of May, the date the forums were created. Whatever the exact date, Loop took the Delegacy with just 13 endorsements[15], beginning a new chapter in the story of The East Pacific.

I'm aware that the handover isn't this simple and I'll elaborate on this in the next volume; The Story of The East Pacific Volume Two - The Age of Loop.

Sources

[1]viewtopic.php?p=8221905
[2]https://atlantic.proboards.com/thread/164/east-pacific-traitor
https://atlantic.proboards.com/thread/164/east-pacific-traitor?page=2
[3]https://networkradio.proboards.com/thread/171/twinkles-siggis-secret-identity
[4]https://atlantic.proboards.com/post/1029
[5]https://nationstates.ermarian.net/jolt/1223/297680
[6]https://web.archive.org/web/20030506215334/http://www.nationstates.net:80/cgi-bin/index.cgi/pin=-1/page=list_region_members/region=the_east_pacific
[7]http://graptor.net/atlantic/members.html
[8]Given that Loop has always stated that Loth was the only Farker Delegate before him and no other source contradicts this, it is safe to assume that Loth was the point.
[9]It's on the last page of here.
http://nsdossier.texasregion.net//history.aspx?region=The+East+Pacific&type=Exact&group=region&start=&end=
[10]This was the standard WFE format for forward bases as evidenced by The West Pacific which was an Atlantic Alliance forward base at the time.
https://web.archive.org/web/20030502163531/http://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/index.cgi/pin=-1/page=display_region/region=the_west_pacific
[11]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/viewtopic.php?p=49367
[13]You can read an Atlantic Alliance soldier saying he'll move back to The East Pacific here:
https://web.archive.org/web/20030505143636/http://www.nationstates.net:80/cgi-bin/index.cgi/pin=-1/page=display_region/region=the_rejected_realms/start=300
[14]page=news/2003/04/29/index.html
[15]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/the-fractured-history-of-the-east-pacific-updated-t2803.html#p126100
[16]page=boneyard?nation=Lotlanthanderamore
[17]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/viewtopic.php?p=30354#p30354
[18]page=boneyard?nation=lothlanderamore
[19]viewtopic.php?f=12&t=447629
Heineken also confirmed in a telegram exchange that Reubenlucy was a Delegate.
[20]https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thepacific/dear-pacific-t1485-s15.html#p9504885
[21]https://forum.theeastpacific.com/boot-logs-t13437.html

Raiders hold A Liberal Haven, but Foul Play suspected?

FEATURE | BY: Albrook | Edited by: Le sol,Ponthieu, and Catiania

On January 2, 2022, by the combined efforts from Lone Wolves United, The Black Hawks, Karma, Osiris, Kantrias, the Empire of Great Britain, Caer Sidi, and The Brotherhood of Malice, the raiders seized A Liberal Haven from native control and have successfully held it for almost a month now.

While a victory is to be celebrated, two aspects drag the raiders down. Firstly, The East Pacific does not condone griefing regions as part of any offensive military action. Secondly, and even more egregious, is the presence of technical anomalies that prevented Defenders from otherwise legitimately seizing the region weeks ago.

THE RAID

A Liberal Haven is an ancient region, dating back to the times of Antiquity, and has not done too well on the great test of time. Native Delegate Garchyland and a handful of active natives alone maintained the region and fought for its protection since their founder CTEd in 2011.

On that fateful day, January 2, 2022, now Raider Delegate Got the munchies real bad man – better known as Vandoosa – seized the Delegacy. Vandoosa’s puppet was a raider plant in the region masquerading as a native – a sleeper nation. Despite the region’s security, this fatal flaw had permitted raiders to access the region and proved fundamental in executing their raid. Upon seizing the Delegacy, the controlling raider forces passworded the region – thanks to the sufficient Influence Vandoosa had accumulated over the years – that the natives could not see.
As iterated in the overview, The East Pacific does not condone the practice of griefing, including such institution of a hidden password. Nonetheless, the author does not intend this to become too big of a soapbox, and instead wishes to quell any suspicions of support in this paragraph.

THE LIBERATION

A Liberal Haven’s occupation is not a normal raid. In any normal circumstance, the raiders would occupy and tag a region, then leave it to pursue other regions to tag or hold fast within the region to protect their occupation. Often this occurs when high-value targets are seized, such as previous raids on Asia and Japan in years past.
However, it is exceedingly rare that the raiders have enough influence to password protect the region on the very first night of occupation. At this point, Defenders must write and pass a Liberation resolution in the World Assembly Security Council.

On the same night after the raid, The South Pacific rapidly contacted its allies for support, and drafted and obtained the necessary approvals to get Liberate A Liberal Haven within five hours.The vote on the Liberation became open at minor update the next day. During the minor update on January 7, the resolution passed with over 85% support.
On the major update on January 7, the Defenders obtained the password to the region and attempted to liberate the region. They failed. In response to massive Defender participation, the raiders shored up their numbers by contacting friends and family to join the raider pile, prompting their success in the minor update on January 7. On January 8, a massive Defender force – including civilian conscripts from The East Pacific, joining the fight on behalf of the Eastern Pacific Sovereign Army – still failed to liberate the region despite advance and determined coordination. On this fateful night, however, an anomaly was discovered.

Starting with the major update on January 7, multiple reports summoned NS Admin’s attention claiming that the twice-daily update cycle was behaving incorrectly. Every region was updating within an acceptable time frame up until the last two regions, The Rejected Realms and Russian Sfsr, update. The data powering sub-second jumps by Defender forces was accurate until just before A Liberal Haven was slated to update. Two minute warnings for Defender jumps turned into seven minute warnings and actions intended to take a few seconds took over a minute.
Raiders celebrated as malcoordinated Defenders jumped too early into a pack of waiting Border Control Regional Officers, thus weakening the critical mass that was supposed to hit the region all at once. Following the major update on January 8, and because of these anomalies, Defenders’ plans to restore Delegate Garchyland to power by endorsements liberating A Liberal Heaven were paused indefinitely.

THE DISCUSSION TODAY

What caused such weird update behavior? Who is interfering with the game’s update cycle? How does this so consistently happen just before A Liberal Haven updates and so cleanly returns to normal shortly after? These questions riddle the minds of NS’s technical staff and the major R/D players.

It is said that NationStates experiences the most load during the major and minor updates, but technical insight shows that fluctuations in update timings never exceed 30 seconds. Even the Brazillian Youtube Boom, having taken place in the week following the liberation attempts, had negligible effects on update times - especially to the point of destroying liberation attempts.
NS technical staff are encouraging another massive liberation operation to gather more data, hoping to catch the source of whoever or whatever is seizing up update times, and is cracking down on popular scripts improperly enforcing the rate limit on the NS API.

The Free Nations Defense Association’s R/D script, Storm, was one of these scripts. Thanks to very swift action from the Free Nations Region’s technical staff, they have resolved the issue with their script. Prior to the fixes, an improperly configured stop condition was causing users to create thousands more requests than they had intended to make at a time. Storm will now urge all users to upgrade to the latest version.

The East Pacific wishes to thank our allies for support in the liberation and the 16 TEPers in the EPSA who participated with us.

page=dispatch/id=1643478

Albrook's 3/4-term Delegate Address

FEATURE | BY: Albrook | Edited by: Le sol

EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was released on January 16.

Citizens of The East Pacific,

Welcome to the fourth month of my delegacy – the final month of this term. Very shortly, come February, once again we will begin voting for the next Delegate. In the meantime, I wanted to give you a holistic report as to the state of our region in a midterm, well, actually ¾-term address.

  • TEP has excelled in the following areas over the last three months:

  • Revisioning WA voting procedures as to give the most representative regional voice

  • Empowering newcomer and rising talent into positions of significance in TEP’s government

  • Engaging TEP in the Interregional Community

  • Strengthening ties with TEP’s allies in Cultural and Gameplay Partnership

Early in my Delegacy, I entertained the opinions from my cabinet regarding the establishment of on-site polls restricted to sufficiently Influential WA citizens and expansion of Discord voting to Hussars of the East. Since implementing these opportunities for citizens to vote, on average the number of votes and opinions submitted towards proposals at vote has quadrupled. Before this change, voting was restricted to members of the Ministry of World Assembly Affairs. Now with more opinions, TEP is better equipped to demonstrate the best regional opinion possible to the WA. I especially wish to thank A mean old man for suggesting hosting the WA voting on the main server.

Observe a few offices in the Executive and elsewhere in the region – you have Raiu east as the Minister of Foreign Affairs, American-Cascadia as the Minister of Culture, Ysg hermitcraft as Provost, and Professor Casillo y real of UTEP. Across all of TEP, we are empowering rising talent into very prestigious positions of government. In each of these positions, those who chose them didn’t see a Residency statistic, national population, or even care if they have been around off-site for a long time or not – each applied for their positions with their best set of ideas and promise to excel. I am proud to be working alongside each of them in serving this region.

Immediately upon assuming the Delegacy, I was asked by many members of the interregional community and Senior Diplomat Libertanny – “when can TEP join this cool thing we’re doing”? Since October, TEP has assisted the NS Christmas Charity Fundraiser in raising $4,305 for Doctors Without Borders, organized events and contests for Harry Potter and the Festival of Friends, and hosts and co-manages a Minecraft server alongside The South Pacific, 10000 Islands, the Alstroemerian Commonwealths, Thaecia, and The Free Nations Region. Even today, TEP is still organizing events for the upcoming month – including celebrating the anniversary of the Free Nations Region’s creation on January 15. There are, of course, some others on deck that I can’t share at the moment. :p

When TEP isn’t partying with its regional allies, it’s working with them in R/D, the WA, and other aspects of gameplay. The greatest testament to our friendship came with the recent A Liberal Haven occupation. At the start of the month, Lone Wolves United and The Black Hawks seized A Liberal Haven in what TEP declares griefing – subverting the native government with a sleeper nation to grab the Delegacy, ban natives, and restrict entry to the region with a hidden password. TEP assisted TSP and our other Defender allies in pledging voting support to Liberate A Liberal Haven and finally manpower from the Eastern Pacific Sovereign Army in the last week. All while this is underway, we still hold a trusting cultural relationship with The Black Hawks, mutually respecting that each of us has our own rules for our regional militaries.

While the above successes are noted, there is still greatly some room to grow. Firstly, between school, work, other cool games, and other sources of distraction and fatigue, there are only so many people at any time in TEP’s government. It is clear we are no longer in a population boom situation like we were in April 2020 with the Drew Boom, where for every two government workers there was one task, so things just got done because there were so many hands. This causes things to slip through that otherwise wouldn’t, admittedly true with the Eastern Pacific News Service – now under direct management from the Chief Minister of Regional Affairs and myself now lacking a Minister with Eastern Alksearia’s recent resignation.

With respect to my campaign promises, I am proud to see that the average citizen is more empowered and aware of opportunities in TEP to have a say and participate. We are still hard at work and have a plan to make EPNS most consistent in 2022 and the Chief Ministries are still assisting with the development of training materials for newcomers, and assigning deputies wherever staffing is available within the ministries. I certainly did not anticipate being in the Delegate seat with the lowest staffing numbers since I joined TEP, but it is the situation we are in and an obstacle to overcome.

Please continue to give your feedback as to the state of our region, do consider participating in the Magisterium – where you can vote on regional law – or the Executive where you can assist in planning events and write for TEP, and do continue to endorse myself and the Viziers to secure the safety of our democracy and boost our regional say in the World Assembly. This is no single nation’s region – it is a community that each of us helps create and define every day. Greatly consider being the voice that makes the change happen – I do my best to listen out for each of them.

TEP Haiku Contest in Review

FEATURE | BY: Albrook | Edited by: The Atlae Isles

The Ministry of Regional Affairs organized the TEP Holiday Haiku Contest, which took place between December 14, 2021, and January 1, 2022. This year’s contest was Holiday-themed, so all qualifying haikus for the contest were related to the Holiday season.

Upon conclusion of the contest, Doggorland (Boro) penned the winning haiku. To explain, this poem exploits the “Padoru Padoru” lyric popularly shared around the Holiday season by anime and manga enthusiasts, as made popular by Fate/Extra. It has since obtained meme status, and was even present on the December 2021 animated TEP flag.

Pado~ Padoru~
Pado~ Pado~ Padoru~
Pado~ Padoru~

Wallenburg achieved the runner-up position with this wintery imagery:

Hills against orange skies
One by one, stars born above
Cold, trickling creek below

A special thanks to all participants for the very beautiful holiday haikus and the very excellent meme haikus!

Wait, Did Somebody Say Minecraft?

FEATURE | BY: Raiu east | Edited by Albrook

Fade in from Black

Let me set the scene for you. Imagine a dark, stormy night somewhere in the American Midwest. A computer lay waiting at a desk, with a parrot asleep just next to the keyboard. Suddenly, it awakes with a start, having suddenly gotten a bright idea. The parrot frantically reaches for its seasonal hat and logs onto Discord. Serge quickly flicks through the endless channels in TEP’s foreign affairs discord server, eventually finding the one he has been looking for, #fa-inner-circle. He gathers everybody around to hear him speak, and in the almighty parrot’s wisdom, he whispers but one word, “Minecraft”.

Thus, dearest reader, was the proceedings of the 11th of December 2021 (or 10th if you’re not in Oceania). Since then, a small army of technical supporters and visionaries have gathered, determined to bring the Minecraftian dream to fruition. With a colorful array of teams working literally around the clock. The server, aptly named [Cool Name] Minecraft Server, was somehow brought into existence within 72 hours of Serge’s original message. Coming fully fitted with a wild set of diverse and unique biomes, an armory of plugins and a very enthusiastic player base, ready to cause havoc in any way they could (in a good way obviously).

Since then, Senior Diplomat Serge’s Foreign Affairs project has blossomed into a community of its own, becoming bigger and better than any of us anticipated. With the server always being tweaked and updated (and a big update on the horizon), now is as good a time as any to register your region and join the fray.

Forest and Frost

Within this expansive custom Minecraft world, several regions and nations exist. Each has an entirely different system of laws, governance, and customs. While there are four different regions within the world, being Snow, Forest, Canyon, and Desert, they are not technically a nation in their own right. A region is ruled by the largest faction working in tandem with all the smaller factions on behalf of their region. It is quite a common occurrence to have national borders overlap regions, causing some minor conflict on specific occasions.

Nations that inhabit the world of [Cool Name]Minecraft Server are as follows:

The Granite Elves

A powerful Forest settlement of miners and tree builders, the Granite Elves are known far and wide for the sheer scale of resource production and infrastructure development. With the “Big Tree” being constantly worked on by dedicated residents (but mainly Emjay), motivated by little more than national pride. While the Granite Elves have no specific leader, the de facto chief of the nation is none other than the almighty parrot himself (and server creator), Serge.

Upon approaching Emjay (a crazed resident) and requesting an interview, I observed them only mumbling “must build the tree, must build the tree”. After making the mistake of asking “what the hell is the tree”, I was violently chased from the Granite Elves’ borders and told never to return.

The Treehouse Empire

A bustling federation of trading settlements that inhabit the Snow region of the world. With approximately 7 members, the Treehouse Empire co-runs the snow with the Frozen Sun. While this faction is not nearly as active as its Frozen Sun counterpart, it has created a strong reputation as a trade hub within members of the community, priding itself on its villager trades and resource production. Going on record with a Treehouse Empire resident, they had this to say.

“Yeah man you should totally join us, we have treehouses, who doesn’t want treehouses? No seriously, join us, it’s really lonely here.”

The Frozen Sun

The largest and frostiest region in the world, the Frozen Sun lays claim to everywhere with snow and mountains. Led by her majesty, the Yukihime Aurora, and flanked by several members of the royal court (myself being included), the Frozen Sun sets an impressive standard when it comes to raw influence. Although the conditions of the region are usually quite treacherous, several small settlements have popped up within the remotest sections of the tundra, somehow surviving on crops and trade with forest regions for agricultural products.

When meeting with a resident of the Frozen Sun who looked like a mix between a Viking and a Bear, I was promptly laughed at for wearing only 3 layers of coats.

“Aye Las, it’s a bit frosty today, mind, its frosty most days ‘round ‘ere. You bring any food with yers? Been a rough few moons of late”

While the Frozen Sun is ruled by a queen, the Yukihime, most of the settlements are self-governing to some degree, only relying on the Yukihime for heading the nation, policy and national coordination of projects.

The Obsidian Realm

Although The Obsidian Realm has only four members, it makes up for it with sheer military and tactical prowess. Its players are all hardened veterans of Minecraft, making each of them a force to be reckoned with. As if to further prove just how powerful this region and its members are, the main settlement is literally surrounded by volcanoes, you know, just because. On top of PVP, TOR is also known for its widespread export of netherite to its allies, cementing its name as the go-to producer of wartime supplies.

Blood Spilled On Sacred Sand

As is bound to happen in any good Minecraft server, geopolitical conflict inevitably arose.

The first seeds of war were laid on Discord, approximately two weeks into the server’s life. As various nations laid claim to more and more of the world around them, fighting to see who could establish colonies more convincingly. The Desert Nation decided to sail across the sea and establish colonies on the coast of the Canyon Nation, laying claim to the region.

Upon posting their border claim to the rest of the world, the Nation of Canyon became outraged. A Canyon-ese representative posted an angry message on Discord, professing that the Desert Nation’s claim was illegitimate, and demanded they leave sovereign Canyon borders immediately, threatening retaliation for non-compliance. Naturally, The Desert Nation, in their supreme wisdom, basically responded “lol no”, and engaged in bickering for the next two days or so about borders. Eventually, it became clear that the Desert Nation would not relinquish its claim, so the same Canyon-ese representative wrote an open letter to all nations, calling The Canyon Nation and its allies to arms against the “Desert dogs'' who were clearly encroaching on Canyons holy lands.

Shortly after this message went out, the Canyon Nation launched a full-scale offensive on the underprepared Desert Nation, quickly overwhelming their defenses. Within a few hours, it became clear that the Desert would not win the war, and were quickly pushed back deep into their own territory. Seeing this, Canyon decided to go all out, and effectively annexed the entirety of the Desert Nation. Seeing that the very existence of Desert may be on the line, the mods stepped in and told Canyon to chill out a bit. After a few days of occupation, Canyon agreed to retreat into their borders but left the Desert Nation crippled.

Many post-war mutual defense and peace treaties were made between nervous bystanders, seeing the decimation at the hands of Canyon, and hoping not to be next. Jump to the current day, many regions have agreed to be as cooperative as possible in the pursuit of peace, with the rough world borders looking something like this.

Sounds Cool! I Want In!

You may be asking, dearest reader, how does an individual such as yourself join our esteemed Minecraftian paradise? Well, currently only a few select regions are members. To check if you are one of those few, have a look around in your resident Discord for possible mention of the [Cool Name] Minecraft Server. If you are unable to find anything, it is likely that your region has not yet been considered. We take region approval on a case-by-case basis, so please feel free to send a request to either Serge, myself or your local TEP diplomat on behalf of your region.

Read dispatch


NS Forums: viewtopic.php?p=39326055#p39326055

Nevah cease

The Elemental Adventurer of Avatar Webby

Heanam 2 wrote:im gonna make the fruit buddhas hand illegal

Don't forget about the vegetable buddhas hand!

The ✨🐳🐳🐳🤎 of Narwhal

Avatar Webby wrote:Don't forget about the vegetable buddhas hand!

Also meaty buddhas hand!

The Elemental Adventurer of Avatar Webby

Frankly, it might be best to do away with all buddhas altogether.

Floofybit and Imperve

Germakia

Hello

The People's Democratic Kingdom of Pangeodrea

I can’t wait for the next map update!

Floofybit, New filippe, Tovenia, and Imperve

Germakia

«12. . .338339340341342343344. . .1,1211,122»