On power and wank [A theory of NationStates]

[Knootoss]

Lead in

This thread was inspired by the whole 'superpower' discussion. (See here) where it was argued that no one nation is -capable- of achieving the level of dominance that is necessary for superpower status.

But this begs a more basic question of what actually determines power in NS. This is why I have developed the theorem that power equals wank. (P=W), which is limited only by credibility. For a definition of wank, I point to the NSWiki entry on wank which defines it as “the abusive over-use of a particular strategem, technique, or style.”

Knoots theorem
The biggest power in NS is, by definition, the player or nation with the wankiest claims whose claims are still accepted by the players of other nations. The amount of power a nation directly corresponds to the amount of wank.

There is a “Wank-power optimum”, at which any marginal increase in the claim of existing power would not increase but decrease a nations power through the use of IGNORE.

Postulations
I will now present the postulates leading to this conclusion. I'm sure you’ll say: that idea can’t be true?! I am a superpower because I am superior! After all, there are hardcoded aspects of the game. Really? Look at my frightening economy!

Postulate of irrelevant population
There are no vast differences in power as a result of population. Because NS nations grow very rapidly, populations soon reach a level of economic production where ‘everything is possible’. A nation of 3 billion population and a nation with a 3,5 billion population are essentially peers, when speaking in terms of capabilities. With such numbers, the population becomes much less important then it would have been when comparing a nation of 50 million to a nation of five million people because a nation of five million people will have a hard time maintaining, say, a carrier or a huge nuclear arsenal that is sufficient to have MAD with its rivals. In NS, virtually every nation has all these strategic options.

In addition, virtually every player who is the least bit senior has a three billion-or-so population and this makes relative differences between the potential powers small.

Postulate of irrelevant economy
Economic ranking is fairly unimportant in determining superpower status. This is because any man and his dog can have a frightening economy. Any half-wit with ambitions can figure out how to answer the issues in a way that you get a frightening economy (with or without hurting other rankings.) In the NS economic system rankings are effectively determined independently, so nations do not gain at the expense of other nations. There is no limit in terms of resources. A “frightening” economy is a deliciously vague asset that everyone who takes this game seriously has or can have. Nations with top rankings are common. The same goes for rankings: just answer the issues and you’ll reach the top percentile eventually. It does not matter if you rank 400th for your IT or 1200th because in both cases you are in the top of the NS world. The relative difference is small.

Taking care of these two indicators of things you can actually ‘see’ in the game, in turn, leads to the...

Postulate of equal power
Once a certain level is reached in terms of population and economy, all nations are essentially peers. There may be differences, but no nation has a huge leverage over another nation.

From the postulations follows that everything that was coded is essentially irrelevant to power. So… if hardcoded aspects of the game are unimportant in your quest for becoming the biggest superpower in NS.. What remains, then?
Answer: “everything that is not hardcoded power”.

Postulate on the source of power in NS
Power, therefore, lies in everything that is not specifically coded. These are the things you claim on how it is in your nation, the things you roleplay, “the shit you make up”. The only theoretical limit is the imagination of the player behind the nation and his ability to type really high numbers when describing the size of his army and the abilities of his or her demi-god mechanoid commando telepaths in gravships. Therefore, the more exaggerated the claims are the more powerful a nation becomes. The only way to become more powerful is the abusive over-use of a particular strategem, technique, or style. Wank. The amount of power a nation directly corresponds to the amount of wank.

Hence, in NS, power = wank. An accepted superpower is just another player like you whose wanky claims of being superior to his/her peers happen to be accepted. (Honorary C'tan wank is the NSWiki term, see the article linked above.)

Limitations
The limit to power through wank is other players. At some point, ones claims become so outrageous that other players will ignore them. Impenetrable shields, invisible bullets, divine intervention and armies that encompass 50 percent of the population will generally (but not always) get ignored.

Where exactly this limit is, depends on the crowd you hang out with. In the International Incidents forum, limits to the size of ones army are strongly relaxed compared to what NS players will deem acceptable. Different rules apply to future tech and modern tech. More on this below...

Wank-power optimum
There is, therefore, a shifting optimum of wank and power. The optimum situation for a nation is to make claims regarding power that are so big that they are just not ignored, while everyone in the same situation claiming anything more powerful would be ignored. At this point, any marginal increase in the claim of existing power would not increase but decrease a nations power through the use of IGNORE.

This optimum is not an “objective value” that is the same for everyone. OOC reasons and roleplaying ability heavily affect this. As Rezo put it when talking about a player who successfully balances near the wank-power optimum: "[He] rips off the wankiest science fiction [he] can find, while being accepted as existing, since, unlike Xanthal, [because he knows] what a 'paragraph' is."

Some nations can get away with roleplaying a God, a personification of evil or an Elven Queen with many gravships purely by merit of other players accepting it for whatever reason whereas other would be ignored for claiming exactly the same. Roleplaying ability, likeability and such heavily weigh in here.

Disclaimer
This post was NOT written to encourage nations to seek the wank-power optimum for themselves. Rather it was an attempt to describe the situation as is.

[Thelas]

Knoot, exactly. I agree with you, power eventualy becomes equal. There is no apparent reason why the C'tan can have uber-ships and the Thelasi can't have uber-ships. It all becomes one giant wank-fest, and if you wank higher, you have to accept that other people will also wank away to your level.

So all of this "I am a better RP, I can wank more" crap is bull-sh*t. There is no logical, non-subjective reason. To put it plainly, after so much time, nations are becoming so much alike in power, its becoming hard to tell them apart. Another year, and nations like Thelas and Menelmacar will efectively be on the same footing.

I know this is scary for many people, but it is the truth. Yes Siri will still be larger than me by several hundred million, but as we get larger, several hundred million becomes insignificant compared to our general population. And eventualy Thelas or Menelmacar will hit 'wank optimum' and no longer progress, soon after the second nation will hit the same barrier.

Then, both nations will be equal in power. Yes Menelmacari will still have Sirithil nos Feanor, and the aura that she summons, but still, it is merely a figment of the imagination that Menelmacar is UBERLY MORE POWERFUL than the rest of us nations. It is a myth, probably propogated by people's desire for there to be some one more powerful than them, some one to take orders from and to obey. (yes, this means that most of the players on NS are brown-nosers, myself, I admit, I used to be one of them)

Yet there are ways to escape this cycle, character RPing for instance, where there is no way to "win" or "loose". Even buisness RP, where again there is no way to totaly "win" or "loose".

But that leads me to another point, to be discussed in a later post. That is, the exact reasons why one nation (over two billion) cannot conquer, through pure military means, a nation of comperable size.... most of the time.

[Callisdrun]

So true...

I tread along the line between wank and god-mode sometimes, but I counter balance it by having fewer advantages in other things. I haven't been in very many wars, partly because no one has really gone after me yet.

[Five Civilized Nations]

Tagoo... Very interesting...

[Santa Barbara]

If all this is true, Knoot - and it may well be - then it really reduces any power struggles in the game to a matter of who can convince the most people to accept their bullshit. And thats not what I consider good RP at ALL (though I know you've made no "good RP" postulates above.)

Because when the game is about players convincing other players, then you get, for example, storefronts that appeal to the players mindset (i.e, advertising techniques used in the consumer market, as opposed to industrial/political/strategic/national business methods), and contests about who can most effectively exert power through the use of ignore.

Nor do I think that power is established by ignore or acceptance. Nor do I agree that what the masses (i.e. the most players) think is what "is."

And, I also don't sweep aside the game mechanics like that. If it's so damn easy to get in the top 10 how come only 10 seem to manage it? Even after years. Not everyone wants to, or should (based on RP preferences and what-would-you-do) be aiming for that kind of power, but I don't think its irrelevant...

Now as far as your theorem.

Let's say X is the amount of wank. Let's say Y is the number of players who accept that wank. And let's have Z be the power.

Your theorem is essentially X*Y=Z or X+Y=Z, from what I can tell. (Bear in mind I am a mathematical retard.)

But the problem I have with this is the assumption that the higher Y is, the higher Z is.

Also, we need to define power more accurately. To me, there are two kinds - OOC and IC.

OOC power = I ignore you, ten others ignore you, I win in this contest and you are shunned.

or...

=My roleplaying is well written and involved and moving, and therefore superior.

or...

=I know the most players, and have the most friends from an online-buddy type perspective, so have the more power.

But I don't think any of that OOC should be relevant as far as calculating power. It hinges on not only the belief in democracy (majority=right/better) but that power over people playing the game is the same as power of one NS over another NS. Also, it gives power to the IGNORE cannon, which is like giving people roleplaying awards for NOT ROLEPLAYING.

It works out like that, more often than not... but it SHOULDN'T as it distracts from the whole... well, RPing aspect. Undermines it really, since it casts a value judgement on peoples writing ability, say, or the time and effort they have to make posting. This is like saying the USSR won the Cold War because Russian authors of the time were better. No basis in the actual political, economic and social standing (or simulated political standing, etc in NS).

In physics, power is energy used over time. Used. There is no power at all in having dozens of loyal groupies. There is none in having a high economic ranking. Just like in physics, if you increase the amount of energy in a system you do not necessarily get more power out of it. More likely you get more waste (like, in the form of wankage, whether accepted or no) and a decrease in the potential effects and uses of it.

I'm just rambling now. Suffice it to say, most people seem to estimate power differently than I do. Personally I stick with the rankings for a lot of the raw potential stuff. Everyone has an equal chance to succeed there, and then the only contest is the actuals - the usage of that potential, and to what gain, meeting objectives - to me THAT is power, not the ability to metagame.

[Northwestern Liang]

I won't address the game mechanics as such, but I do think you are missing an element in your theorem, and that is the overall intelligence of the player.


If W(ank) + A(cceptance) = P(ower), we totally rule out things like alliances, war-winning battles, wars being won period, etc.

Thus, say nation X is less wanky than nation Y, but more intelligent. Lets quantify intelligence as I.

In our imaginary scenario, lets say the hordes of wanky Necrons commanded by a certain Jackal God are overrunning nation X. Necron nation Y, however, fails to notice the clever OOC literary and IC military ambush waiting for him. The Necron hordes are cut off, surrounded, and destroyed by the superior intelligence of nation X, all with no exceptional wankiness. In the same way, a player with superior I will build more effective alliances, conduct better diplomacy, and choose better when to go into wars than a player of less I.
All affect the quantity of P.

Now, you say, what if nation Y decides to wank his way out of nation X's? Well, there is the eternal struggle. Wanking your way out of a clever trap may damage your credibility, and lower your A factor, ultimately resulting in a loss of P.

Thus, a superior quantity of I can be utilized to negate W.

Thus, I propose the Liang Corollary to the Knoot theorem:

A nation's wank can be negated by a certain amount of intelligence, and intelligence can increase (and thus, decrease) one's relative power. Greater Wank will negate one's acceptance, and thus also result in a decrease of power when met with intelligence.

[Alcona and Hubris]

Hmm, I think you need to demonstrate a definate example of that Laing.

As for Knootos Theory: It fails upon the acceptence of Mega Nations:

That is nations actually comprised of numerous player nations. Since Mega Nations can range upwards into the tens of Billions they become quite powerful and quite weak at the same time. (A single player nation is not going to get into an IC argument about who's general should led the bleeding war...except for a very good Rper...)

No, here is my personal take on this, that for most nations of great senority Wank is a factor but then so comes the power of alliances/Mega nations.

Actually, I don't want to be powerful. I enjoy just being a 2.8 billion nation...hell I want my pop down a good bit actually...I want to be the 'quietest mouse' but I have no volume control*

*I have some KIST cookies for anyone who can 'name that quote'

[Syskeyia]

Must. Think. Of. Something. Meaningful. To. Contribute....

Anyway, I think that a lot of the people who've posted here make a good point when they say that power = [acceptable] wank, as it overlooks alliances, personal charm (a la Siri), tactical ability, etc. Personally, I've thought of "wank" as a bad thing, and hate it when I try to have a large, effective military without wanking, and then see everyone else going to war with me in Alaska-size battelships, Texas-size tanks with Dora-caliber gatling guns.

I exaggerate, of course, but it seems that one of the unofficial NS commandments is Thou shalt not godmod, unless thou art fighting a war with Syskeyia; then thou mayest godmod, as long as thine godmodding is well-written...

[Sarzonia]

The following post is entirely OOC.

I am of the mindset that we really shouldn't have to start talking about "power" as it relates to strength of numbers or anything of the sort. In my opinion, the people who trumpet their power are weak somewhere. Perhaps they're trying to show off their OMG HUGE METAL PENIS RAWRR! because they're a little "small" in some other areas. (JOKING!)

I'm not that impressed with power. To me, it's more important to have influence than to be powerful. You may not have the world's largest army or be the name people automatically fear, but if you can get people to follow you without having to threaten or cajole people, you have the kind of influence that you need.

In my first "combat" RP, I faced another country in a naval exercise. That country had more plentiful and more advanced aircraft than I had. He had more and larger aircraft carriers and battleships than I had. Not only that, but he had more experience since it was my very first combat RP. I dealt him enough damage for him to take lessons from the exercise even though I was at decided disadvantage after decided disadvantage.

As another example, one of my allies put in some policies that I thought were reprehensible and I posted a condemnation just before I left work that day. I fully expected there to be some tensions and I was fully ready to post diplomatic backlash. When I returned to the thread, I found out that the player whose country put in those policies revoked all of them a scant four RL minutes later, citing my request. THAT'S influence.

In the NationStates world, a country that has the world's largest army will not necessarily be the most powerful or even the country that wins the war. I would rather have a country with a smaller, well-trained military RP'd by a player who is better at strategy than a larger, more "powerful" country with a less accomplished RPer.

Size doesn't always result in wins. In the War of 1812 (or the British/American War for you Brits), the U.S. Navy was much much much much much much much smaller than the British navy. However, the Americans won a lot of single ship battles because their individual ships were often better built and more powerful or they were sailed by more accomplished crews. American gunners could often fire three or four broadsides at a British ship for every single broadside by their Royal Navy counterparts.

[Vegana]

Awwww... Can't we all just get along?

[Kaenei]

....So after all this, what your basically telling me is, Ctan is the most powerful nation in NS?


Over my still warm, recently departed corpse! =)

[The Shakhtal]

....So after all this, what your basically telling me is, Ctan is the most powerful nation in NS?

Whoever told you that? o.0
I am the most powerful! With my 10 million Roleplayed population... yeah, right.

[Alcona and Hubris]

Nah, under Knootian Theory Above

The Nation with the greatest Wank is the world superpower...

Therefore: Vrak is the world's superpower I mean who else gets away with having talking Walruses running about the place, and only being forced to wear funny hats...

[Thelas]

....So after all this, what your basically telling me is, Ctan is the most powerful nation in NS?


Over my still warm, recently departed corpse! =)

OOC: I can see Mephet'ran saying "That can be arranged"

[Five Civilized Nations]

C'tan is!?! What!?! When did that happen!?!