Westwind and The Crimson Order

[Westwind]

...flying penguins. It was addictive.

Yes it was!

My daughter was grossed out by the Cat throwing game.

I enjoyed having you in the cabinet, you served TNP well! Just as I enjoyed working with you in TWP. I am sorry I went inactive on you. Sometimes I couldn't keep up with NS, and I failed you.

You were not fully in the loop on the whole of TCO, but that's probably true for most everyone as I tried to balance the factions and plans, *chuckles*. It was an audacious plan that worked for a time, even when it never should have worked. Our intentions were good, the NS world wanted a conflict, and we tried to give them activity, progress, and conflict. You had a heart for the well being of TNP, and I am thankful for your help.

I haven't tried to open the database of the TNP Crimson forums, maybe I'll take a look someday and have more to share. I think that forum was IPB 3.x. The Crimson Order organization forums were |invisionfree| and compromised by Brom/Khark and were abandoned, and now comes Tapatalk and I haven't found that link anyway.

Miscellaneous......

The warning that was sent to RMB Spammers:

Greetings !

I noticed your recruitment ad posted on The North Pacific RMB, and I wanted to take a moment to advise you of our 15-line AdSpam limit policy, which is noted in our WFE. I would ask if you would please give our regional policies due consideration, and help keep our regional RMB free of excessively long AdSpam.

Thank you for your consideration. Our full AdSpam policy can be found here:

http://z13.|invisionfree|.com/TNP/index.p ... topic=4061

Lewis and Clark
UN Delegate and Head of State of The North Pacific

Easter on the TNP WFE:

Code: Select all

[color=blue][b]Welcome to The North Pacific! 
The beautiful blue waters await you.[/b][/color]

Join The North Pacific community at: [u][color=green]http://www.thenorthpacific.info/forum[/color][/u]
Or...Tired of Politics? Visit Old Blue: [u][color=green]http://s2.|invisionfree|.com/The_North_Pacific[/color][/u]

Our IRC chat channel is [b]#thenorthpacific[/b]

[b]Please endorse -[/b]

[b]The Delegate:[/b] Lewis and Clark
[b]Vice Delegate:[/b] Nastic

[color=purple]Has anyone seen the NationStates Easter Bunny?[/color]

And the announcement:

An Address to The North Pacific

Another turning point has come before us. While the new Constitution, flawed as it is, provided us with an opportunity to reignite activity and usher in a New Age in TNP, we have encountered the continued entrenchment of old bureaucrats.

One seat in the judiciary was successfully filled by election, yet the Speaker and the remaining judiciaries from the previous constitution, still recognize the old over the new, refusing to provide elections to fill the full judiciary under the new Constitution. They have presumed upon the region a decision unsupported by any legal authority, that the former judiciary stand as sound for the new constitution. I will make it clear. I do not recognize the authority of these persons that have not been elected under the current Constitution.

As Delegate, I was empowered with all authority over regional security, and yet I was given an empty Intelligence forum. Now I'm told that the NPIA yet exists, but that they are secret. If that were to be true, then they are now renegades serving against the region.

Dalimbar, whom I have charged with responsibility for the Defense and Security of the region, announced the replacement of the NPA and NPIA with the Regional Defense Forces. Once again, the old bureaucrats charged that it couldn't be done, even though all authority is given to the Delegate over such matters.

Rather than taking our opportunity to spur activity, our administrators and our Speaker have dragged their feet in taking action to ensure the speedy adoption of the new Constitution. To the point that the Speaker failed to provide a simple open thread for RA applicants in a timely manner. Something that takes no more than a few minutes, took a week. The Speaker should facilitate the good governance of the RA, and administrators should be responsive to the needs of the region.

These are but a few of the issues that have arisen.

But more importantly than any of this, we are seeing a decline across NationStates that requires proactive action to reverse. It's no longer a bipolar NS world of defenders vs. raiders, or NPO vs. ADN. That is the past. Defenders won their fight against griefers and then the victory was sealed with the Age of Influence. Most of the great defender regions failed to adjust to the new age, and faded away. What is left of defending today is counter-invading. It no longer has the great cause that it once did.

Activity must be brought into the game again if we are to interest players into becoming active. Yes, activity begets activity. In my region Equilism, we have been discussing new policies and means to generate activity in NationStates for months now. And at the recent NS Conference, a wide array of players came together to brainstorm what could be done. All the talking and planning in the world, however, does not bring results without action.

The North Pacific can be a part of the solution. We can be a place of action, and a leverage point to build new opportunities for activity. And so today we begin. With my unique position as Delegate of The North Pacific, and Founder of Equilism, this new opportunity is forged.

From the days when Wilkshire and Equility negotiated and signed the first Equilism-TNP Alliance, our regions have shared a common interest in the well being of NationStates. Together, working closely as allies, bilaterally, through ADN, and through A.L.L., we fought the good fight. Defenders together, to bring an end to the plague of griefers.

In times of need, Equilism has been the staunchest of allies of The North Pacific. Equilism provided the largest army in the only liberation of a feeder region ever successfully performed in NationStates, to remove Great Bight from the TNP Delegacy. And again, when Pixiedance handed her nation over to Gracious Maximus, Equilism worked within the NPD and with the exiled government to seek a resolution to the strife in the North.

It has been a long road that we have traveled, to seek to repair the damage from those days. Those terrible schisms destroyed the vitality of TNP, and resulted in the horrendous bureaucracy of the now former constitution.

Then, in 2007, with good intentions, the region struggled with the entrenched bureaucracy to extract itself from the abyss of inactivity, and with a single changed vote passed the current flawed Constitution. However, the old guard of the bureaucracy would rebuild our tangled past, and continue the stagnation that leads to the ever spiraling decline and decay into inactivity that is being suffered throughout so much of NationStates.

Beyond even this, there are forces outside of the region that would also prefer to see the status quo toward inactivity and decay continue, rather than see a revitalization effort to give hope to the future. They hold on to outdated concepts and dynamics that have been gone from NS for years now.

Therefore on this day, in order to join together in common effort to defeat the great inactivity that has decended upon NationStates, and those that would impose their will upon the nations of TNP, as UN Delegate and Head of State, a state of emergency is declared and the Constitution of The North Pacific is hereby dissolved.

The Regional Assembly is dissolved, the Speaker dismissed, the Judiciary invalid.

The regions of Equilism and The North Pacific shall both be autonomous regions under my authority, as Founder and King of Equilism, and UN Delegate of The North Pacific. Duality is not a concept that I care for, nor shall I recognize it in either region.

In times of crisis such as these, the true metal of individuals shines through, and displays the extent of dedication to the spirit of man. Today we give tribute to that spirit, and together, inspired by hope in the darkness of the End of The World, we ignite the Typhoon Storm, and stir life anew into these fallow lands of NationStates.

The z13 forum is no longer recognized as the forum of The North Pacific. The official forum is now:

http://www.thenorthpacific.info/forum

Thank you for your time and attention,

Westwind, aka Lewis and Clark

The Crimson King, UN Delegate of The North Pacific, King of the Realm of Equilism

[Westwind]

PS - To emphasis how inactive NS was, and how some players felt NS would soon Cease To Exist itself, there were two well known players that were working on coding a similar game that would include warfare. They were doubling their efforts to work on the new game...it even had a name already...to try to complete it before NS was no more.

[John Ashcroft Land]

Manson asked me to contribute to this thread. My recollections aren't nearly as vivid as Westwind's -- in part because it's been, you know, over a decade; and in part because I wasn't leading the thing. I was the most duplicitous cabinet member by far, and labored hard to earn that reputation in the years prior heh. I never actually betrayed the CO, but I don't recall being informed of any particularly injurious secrets in the first place.

My post at the time was Interior Minister, or whatever the formal title was in CO. I think my proudest work however was in my trolling of various public FRA threads on the CO and related topics. They were useful foils. My recollection is that we had significantly more expertise on our side compared to the relatively young and frankly amateur players in charge of FRA.

I remember at the time being super butt hurt over the NPO, and other cabinet members felt similarly. These cabinet members were involved in an unending sequence of machinations against the NPO and against Moo-Cows. I don't remember the details. I'm sure this caused a lot of problems for Westwind, who was evidently trying to move in a divergent direction heh. I'd remember if we cooperated with Blackbird, but the name Blamange sounds familiar to me.

CO is near and dear to me because it was the first coup I participated in, and it marked the watershed moment of my transformation from a defender sycophant to an imperialist/couping/tyrant sycophant. Whatever it took to get ahead. I'd never return to the defender side, and I would hold dearly onto my reputation as a tyrant for the balance of my in game career.

I don't play NS anymore and don't have any opinions on defenders, independents, feeder democracy, or whatever.

[thechurchofsatan]

You a defender anything? I couldn't imagine it!
Makes me wonder if, despite all my principles, I'll ultimately end up going down the same road, heh.

[Westwind]

You a defender anything?

Yes, he was an even an ADN member in good standing.

These cabinet members were involved in an unending sequence of machinations against the NPO and against Moo-Cows. I don't remember the details. I'm sure this caused a lot of problems for Westwind, who was evidently trying to move in a divergent direction heh.

Moo was a problem, and was also easily manipulated. He had a history of getting involved with nefarious groups opposed to those in which he was a member/official, only to deny participation when caught and claim he was just observing. Logs proved otherwise. Chaucerin prevented me from putting Moo on trial in Equilism regardless of the overwhelming evidence. I almost left Equilism over that. Then Moo resigned as Equilism President and revealed he was now an NPO Senator, thus confirming my evidence and saving the region from a split.

During TCO, logging in to find the Cabinet was on the edge of war with NPO for no good reason while I was negotiating an alliance was exasperating, heh. Yet many (including me) wanted him removed from The Pacific so The Pacific could have a chance to be a vital part of NS again. Moo stifled activity there for too many years and needed to go. I blame Ivan for making Moo his heir.

There were also operations regarding Moo in The Pacific during The Schism in Equilism. I brought him into the Imperial Equilism Magisterium (Cabinet), and flipped Equilism/NPO relations from enemy to ally. Defenders didn't like that, but didn't know we were subverting him.

If we tried to get Moo to prove he's a real Francoist, Ivan might take over TNP.

...that would be fun... I mean, terrible, really terrible. But Ivan says and does terribly interesting things.

[Manson]

Interesting.

How did you get into gameplay, WW?

[Westwind]

I joined the Equilism Army (E-Army) soon after it was formed, in early February '04. We were advised/trained by GLA. They rightfully berated our poor performance on our first mission. *chuckles* We were on track by our second mission. I was named a commander pretty quickly.

Ostendt was our primary advisor/trainer and became a co-founder along with myself under Equility. He retired from active gameplay and the co-foundership soon afterwards, but stayed ingame for many years. Belgium and Nederland were the first Equilism treatied allies.

Another early intel/military advisor was P-topia.

The military name changed under Equilism's first Minister of Defense (and first Prime Minister) Tomika. He and I wrote the first Military awards and training legislation, which also changed the name officially. It was the first legislation Equilism passed after the first elections. Tomika then stepped down as Prime Minister to concentrate on the E-Army, and I replaced him as Prime Minister/Delegate while still Intel Minister. I was later Military Minister and Intel Minister off and on for years after my times as Prime Minister and then President.

My work to uncover the Ellandar infiltration gained attention in ADN, so they became interested in my Intel skills, so I'd joined there about a month after starting NS.

[Manson]

I joined the Equilism Army (E-Army) soon after it was formed, in early February '04. We were advised/trained by GLA. They rightfully berated our poor performance on our first mission. *chuckles* We were on track by our second mission. I was named a commander pretty quickly.

Ostendt was our primary advisor/trainer and became a co-founder along with myself under Equility. He retired from active gameplay and the co-foundership soon afterwards, but stayed ingame for many years. Belgium and Nederland were the first Equilism treatied allies.

Another early intel/military advisor was P-topia.

The military name changed under Equilism's first Minister of Defense (and first Prime Minister) Tomika. He and I wrote the first Military awards and training legislation, which also changed the name officially. It was the first legislation Equilism passed after the first elections. Tomika then stepped down as Prime Minister to concentrate on the E-Army, and I replaced him as Prime Minister/Delegate while still Intel Minister. I was later Military Minister and Intel Minister off and on for years after my times as Prime Minister and then President.

My work to uncover the Ellandar infiltration gained attention in ADN, so they became interested in my Intel skills, so I'd joined there about a month after starting NS.

Who founded Equilism? Also, could you include a resumé here? What all have you done? I'd like to create a few biographies covering a few people for TRR's Library.

[Westwind]

I remember at the time being super butt hurt over the NPO, and other cabinet members felt similarly.

I think you'll enjoy this:

<Moo-Cows> JAL would shiht a brick to have to be on the same side of the Pacific

Equility was the founder of Equilism, a university student in Netherlands studying International Studies. His father was Iraqi and his mother was Russian.

He gave Ostendt and I access to his nation to protect the region when he'd be gone on vacation. By mid-2005, Ostendt had retired/resigned and Equility never came back from vacation. I was the last of the original Founder and Co-founders. We made my Foundership official with The Schism.

I later passed the Founder nation Equility to Chaucerin. He then passed it on to Naivetry. Who then passed it back to me. And then I passed it back to Chaucerin. Who then offered it to me. I declined and we agreed in passing it to Whamabama. Wham remains Equilism Founder today.

In RL, Equility later worked at the United Nations before working with a business intelligence company. So Equility may be long gone, but not forgotten.

His favorite thing in NS was building a community structure. But once it was built and self-maintaining, he lost interest. He enjoyed our frequent Constitutional conventions.

I don't think I could successfully assemble a resume without it feeling like work. I stopped trying to list everything ten years ago or longer. I once had a long paragraph of titles, but that was '06ish, and I'd have to add a few more paragraphs. Then sometime Unibot called me 'Former Everything' so I just went with that.

I think I failed to mention that Chaucerin (later Equilism Founder) was Steward and Head of Equilism while I was TNP Delegate. He was also a NPO Senator at the time. He later served as my Chief Justice during my TWP Delegacy.

On the possibility of my winning the TNP Delegacy election Chauce said:

Certainly would serve as a great first act in our intervention to save NS.

Privately, the whole effort came to be called the Great Intervention before the ideas were developed that eventually became The Crimson Order.

We had alot of fun in Equilism back in the days...three future GCR delegates sat down for dinner with friends....

* Moo-Cows is now known as Moo|dinner
<Sub-A> mmm, beef
<Westwind> Everyone should have a moo-dinner
* Sub-A is eating a moo-dinner RIGHT NOW!!!
<Moo|dinner> HEY! THAT DOES NOT MEAN TO EAT ME!
<Moo|dinner> it means Moo is casually grazing on dinner
<Sub-A> not YOU, your brethren!
* Astarial nibbles Moo
<Moo|dinner> sheesh...can't leave for a second and you all try to eat me or my fellow bovines
<Sub-A> lol
<Moo|dinner> OUCH!
<Moo|dinner> kinda tickles