Soramra's Campaign

TEP banner maybe idk

Hello! My name is Jo, or as you may know me on-site, Soramra, and I’m running for Delegate this cycle, as the title might have suggested. The past few terms have highlighted to me that the Frontier update, introduced last year, has been quietly devastating to TEP. This is not merely an issue of staffing, though that is an issue as well, but also one of training. We have many great old hands in the region, but they are just that, old hands. They cannot run the region forever, they have lives, their availability fluctuates. We are in need of new talent, and we can’t wait for it to come to us. That is why I’m firmly convinced our government should be focussed on raising up new talent, and I aim to do just that.

I’m of the opinion that it is the task of the Delegate in the coming term to be proactive and push the region forward in a time of challenges, and we do have them. As said, the Executive is highly reliant on an increasingly small pool of old hands, and it is often unclear even to me how much movement is ongoing in the Ministries that aren’t my own. I think most Ministries are doing their jobs, but I also think this is staying one step ahead of inactivity moreso than thriving, which is precarious when the coming term runs into summer. Last summer was crushing, and in light of that, I think it’s crucial that the Delegate is very proactive with pushing the Ministries and the region as a whole forward, keep them active, coordinate them on events, and engages the Residents of TEP.

Recruitment

It’s really no surprise that I’m going to start off with this one, since it really is the pillar of the campaign and in my opinion should be the focus of the next term as much as it was my personal focus in the last. Recruitment is the most important tool we have to counteract the effects of the Frontier update and pull our region out of and through any slump. Recruitment leaderboards in the EPNS, competitions for the most telegrams sent, frequent promotion of the Ministry, these are all tools that we will be using to push more people towards Recruitment. We do not want to burn out our recruiters, and by sharing the burden we can at once keep it firing at all times without tiring anyone out.

Recruitment has expanded over the past term to also take integration under its wing, and I aim to recognise this role more formally - Recruitment will also be charged with mentoring, welcoming, guiding and recruiting. Manual recruitment is easy - if you think you are the only one doing it, it can be exhausting and demoralising, but actually recruiting is not intensive - leaving the Ministry with its hands free to take on more demanding or longer-term projects, such as overhauling our welcoming dispatches like STEP (something we’ve started on, but I’d like to explore improvements there and on REWARD). We’ve also been brainstorming (and prior to my death-by-exams, working on) boosting Urth’s visibility in particular. Valsora runs well, and while I think the Executive has a duty to assist them as well, I’d like to shift some focus of Recruitment in the coming term to recruiting for Urth as well. The Executive should be here for the entire region, and I aim to step this up through dedicated Urth dispatches as well as overhauling STEP and providing Urth more priority there.

As for Discord-side integration, this is something we initially struggled with over the past term. Getting people into the region isn’t so hard, neither is getting them into the Discord. Getting them to join the Executive, however, can be trickier. We’ve made some progress over the latter half of the term - assigning the Welcome helper role to Recruitment staffers is a simple but positive step here, as would be making this role more available and giving active TEPers guidance on how to welcome new joins - but I’d like to work with the Minister in charge of Recruitment to come up with new ideas and improve old ones.

I intend to focus my personal attention on this area of government, but I’ll be encouraging the Minister in charge to come up with new ideas of their own as well, no matter if they’re experimental or not, and propose them.

Culture

I have gained more appreciation for regional culture over the past few months, and as such I have more of an idea where I want to go with Culture in the coming term. The first point is that I’d like us to focus on-site more in the coming term. I think discord-side events are good to continue running - the Hunger Games is very popular, and I’d like to see that continued. As a Ministry, however, I want Culture to add its considerable arsenal to the broader theme of integration and retention.

Flag and banner contests are always a classic, and I’d like to see those encouraged and promoted on the RMB especially. If you’ve ever glanced at our RMB, you’ll see just how much creativity the East’s members have, and I’d like to see that celebrated more. I’m more wary of WFE contests, though - overhauling or themeing the entire thing seems unwise when it is the main entry point of our region. We can, and should, however, promote poems or memorable quotes where we have space.

The next topic is polls, and here I’d like to promote a fairly common idea I’d like to see pursued - story polls. Basically, the Ministry would write up a story, give it at least three or four options, and Residents would vote on it, after which the Ministry would write the next episode on the basis of the chosen option. I think this would be worthwhile to pursue for two reasons - A) we have a ton of talented writers, as our hyper-active writing ministries constantly prove, B) these sorts of polls are an excellent way to stay in touch with our on-site residents, to retain and integrate them, and also to draw in new folks looking at our region page. Here, too, I’d like to draw in the participation of our on-sites and RMBers, not merely by letting them vote but also by opening up a point where they can submit ideas. A dedicated nation will be created and maintained for this purpose.

In between the above, running miscellaneous polls should also be done. The next big topic for Culture will get its separate space.

Propaganda

Now, to start, I don’t intend to make this its own Ministry, at least not immediately. I’d like to sort of “pilot” this, if you will, under the Ministry of Culture as a department, helmed by a Deputy or, in the absence of a dedicated one, by the Minister themselves. Propaganda has always been a part of our culture. If you look at the RMB, again, you will see just how talented some of our members are at it, and I’d like to channel that energy for the region as a whole. Propaganda will be charged with spreading the glory of the East, through posters, dispatches, speeches, etc. These will be submitted to News, to feature monthly in the EPNS, and as said before Culture will be charged with hosting competitions for it.

The most important reason for this is that it’s fun, this is a game, and we should be having fun with it as a region. It is also an engaging way to get people involved in the Executive. If they enjoy writing propaganda dispatches, they might be willing to help promote the Executive in Recruitment, or if it’s posters they make, they might want to help out Culture to organise contests. The Executive needs to be fun (and it is, in my experience, but it also needs to appear fun, which it sometimes doesn’t), and I firmly think a Propaganda department, or eventual Ministry, is a good step towards making it appear moreso.

Outreach

As a Ministry, Outreach is an odd duck, since it’s charged with keeping up with our on-site members, essentially functioning as a bridge between the government and our on-site community. This task sounds obvious on the surface but doesn’t really give much in the way of specific directions when you’re actually supposed to run it. However, Outreach does serve an important function in my view, which is to advice the Delegate and Cabinet on how the RMB community feels, what its concerns are and coordinate with the other Ministries for on-site events. As such, I have no real plans for Outreach in particular. Not every branch needs a long-term goal or plan, sometimes it can simply serve a passive but important role to the Executive.

I do have a general plan to engage with Outreach’s core task, which is to move all Delegate announcements to the RMB. They will still be announced on Discord, but Discord cannot be and isn’t the sole heart of the community and the Delegate has a broader responsibility. I aim to be active and seen, but also to keep the community there in the loop on what the Executive is up to. Whatever gets announced in our announcement or Executive-updates channels by the Executive will be announced on the RMB all the same, barring discord-only announcements.

Endorsement Affairs

Over the past two terms, I’ve had some time to mull over how Endorsement Affairs works as a Ministry, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t think this should be its own ministry. Its core goal - encouraging endorsements on the Delegate - is already overlapping with both Outreach and Recruitment. Welcoming new players to discord is likely to get them to WA up, a lot of our welcome infrastructure is already set up to take over its job and will be increasingly so as we move forward to reform STEP. Encouraging endotarting, as of right now, doesn’t really seem to be what the Ministry is focussed on and can easily be re-allocated to Recruitment. As for gathering endorsements, running NNE dispatches I can do myself. As such, I think Endorsement Affairs should be shelved.

World Assembly Affairs

I don’t have any radical plans for WAA. This is a Ministry that mostly does its job, and well. It’s also a Ministry that doesn’t really function like any other Ministry - it is more or less convention that the Delegate follows the results of the polls. I think this is good, and I have no intention of actually changing that. What I do want to encourage, however, is our FA Ministry to be more involved in advising voters and with pushing out IFVs, and also to make these more regular. The stance of the East should be loud and clear, and beholden to the citizenry. If there are FA considerations to a vote, then it is FA’s task to inform the citizens of this so that it can be taken into account by votes.

UTEP

UTEP isn’t really a Ministry, and to be honest, I don’t really want it to be. It’s just nice that it’s there, where East Pacificans are free to simply write what it is that they wish to express and share in a semi-academic format, it’s running nicely, and it is pretty visible to all. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Foreign Affairs

This is relatively near the bottom, because I don’t think it should be our priority in the coming term. This is not to say we can’t make strides, however, and we can and will. The first thing I want to address here is direction, and I think that direction is clearer now than ever. A few weeks back, a draft was brought to the forums to repeal the commend of Wallenburg. Residents of the East have united to express our opposition, but there was an undercurrent of defeatism that I sensed amongst us, that this would be passed regardless. To me, this is unacceptable. Of the top 15 Delegates in the game, we are allied to 7 of them, and we ourselves make 8. By all rights, our Ministry of FA should be capable of lobbying the death of this proposal, and yet even senior members of our Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressed this defeatism.

In that regard, I think it’s important to embark upon a tour of our treaties. Most of them were signed years ago, and I’m not sure we’ve been keeping in touch and actively communicating with our friends abroad to the extent that we should be. This should be the first object of Foreign Affairs in the coming term, and while it sounds like a relatively unintensive goal I think it is vital that we solidify this before we move on to any more ambitious projects.

News

This runs great, and I appreciate our excellent writers putting out solid content every month.

EPSA

EPSA is like Foreign Affairs in the sense that I don’t intend to make it my focus. EPSA is, after all, a tool of foreign policy and while I think it can be an activity driver at the moment other areas take priority. However, unlike Foreign Affairs, I do intend on giving this more personal attention. I’ve been a raider for six years, so I have some experience when it comes to rebuilding militaries. What precisely needs working on I can’t seriously say yet - I have kept my distance from EPSA, as it was not my place to interfere with, so as Delegate I’ll need to fully evaluate first what needs doing and what its strengths and weaknesses are.

There is one main thing I already want to touch on, however. That would be reports - the EPSA should vastly extend its reporting. We do a small raid, we should report it. We participate in a liberation with more than three members, we should report it. These reports should be internal, posted in dispatches and promoted to the RMB and the #executive-updates channel. This is a type of understated recruitment, reminding residents and those interested that we are here and active, but they should also be fun to write.

On top of that, I’d like to streamline our training procedures. EPSA’s focus should be on two things in the coming term: recruiting as many interested folks as possible through advertising and regular visibility, both in its piler forces and its updating crew, and training any new recruits as quickly as possible to promote them to whatever the equivalent rank of regular soldier is. That means a very simple and slow-paced five puppet tag run should suffice to teach any new EPSA recruit the basics, and get them integrated. This is not a high bar, and that’s by design - any further knowledge can be taught once they feel at home and part of the team, and much as I loathe tagging personally it teaches anyone the basic mechanics that form the core of the military game.

As a region we should be backing EPSA as well. Celebrate its successes through reports, advertise it to new joins, promote a program for on-site only members to participate as reinforcements. If there’s a promotion to the rank of officer, that should be shared in #executive-updates and celebrated on our RMB. If elected, I aim to invest my time and energy spent on EPSA in this area more than any other. I trust our officers are capable and dedicated, so I won’t interfere much with EPSA’s day-to-day operations unless it’s necessary or they want me to, but when it comes to the wider support of EPSA, I think there’s a big role for the Delegate to play.

Conclusion

In general, I believe the coming few months to be crucial, and I think the Delegate has a duty to be proactive and push things forward. Whether I’m elected Delegate or not, and though I certainly hope I am, I’ll be working to push the Executive forward in any way I can.

Thank you all for reading the campaign - I recognise it’s long, but I felt it best to be comprehensive and touch on most of the things I want to do and see. I’m happy to answer any questions anyone may have, obviously, and I look forward to seeing them!

I have a few questions or statements to make:

Recruitment:

  • Another problem you seem to gloss over is the main server’s activity. Its overall activity has considerably declined compared to early 2024 and this has yet to change. What do you have in mind to remedy this?
  • I brought this up before while pinging Cabinet: how do you plan on capitalising on Valsora’s immense activity? Encapsulated in the RMB Cafeteria or the RMB - away from Government work infrastructures - how do you plan on bringing them there, or maybe bringing Government to them?

Culture:

  • You talk about more onsite. Those type have been done before with varying amounts of success, but generally most failing to meet the desired benchmarks. Be it story polls, banner contests, and so on. What is your answer to that?
  • Propaganda: How? We have talented people, yes. How do you plan on enticing them?

Outreach:

  • Does this mean you will only make Outreach a pigeon messenger to the RMB - or do you have other ideas, even rough sketches, related to the MInistry?

Foreign Affairs:

  • Was the attitude you mention a Government stance though? There may have been defeatism, yet the Ministry - I would know since this is mine - was very proactive in contacting all our allies and even partners beyond to combat such proposal. You’ve yourself witnessed it.
  • What makes you think a tour of our allies is needed - or rather - do you apply the view leading to the tour idea to all our allies, or only a specific subset? Past that, what would such tour even entail?

EPSA:

  • First I’d like to note EPSA has been rebuilding after a recent purge of ranks. We have been hosting and taking part in tag runs, and recently took the piling in the NPO to assist their delegacy transition to quickly conscript residents into pilers which we considered successful.
  • Now then: Why do you want EPSA to be what you describe? What is the purpose you want EPSA to pursue that would justify having numbers. It’s obviously tied to Foreign Affairs - but what is your view of how EPSA, and thus by extension TEP’s military FA, should fit in in the current Gameplay climate?

First off, appreciate the questions. These are pretty tough, and most won’t have a straightforward “here’s a fix”. I’ll do my best to answer each of them, though.

Good question for sure. Again, this doesn’t have an easy fix - there’s no Delegate directive that simply says “talk more” for obvious reasons. Ultimately, activity is a marathon, and cultivating it is indirect at best. There are some fairly basic and simple things we can do here though - we can host an array of smaller events. The Hunger Games are fun, but we don’t want to overdo it, and other large cultural events are pretty taxing. But fairly simple things are very achievable - we could semi-regularly host small games like Gartic phone, or increase our currently sometimes dormant weekly questions to something like a daily question. None of that is structurally very difficult to run or encourage, but we do need to do it and keep it up. I also think that once again there’s an understated role for the Delegate and Cabinet here to simply chat more in public. Just making conversation, saying hello, good morning, starting a chat, etc. already does a huge leap for encouraging others to do the same and making our main server look a lot more like the inviting and warm community it actually is.

Firstly, as mentioned in the campaign, I aim to launch a propaganda initiative. This isn’t inherently aimed at our Valsoran or RMBer members, but I think it’s pretty fair to say that there’s definitely a significant overlap there when it comes to interests, and once they’re engaged with the Executive, they are far more likely to see about joining other parts of it. Secondly, I aim to promote these endeavours on both the RMB and in the Cafeteria server - you are ultimately correct that a large portion of our folks are more likely to check in there than in the main server alone, and we should be aware of that.

I think any events should be cross-promoted as much as we can - a large part of why I want Culture to orient itself towards the RMB and on-site is because I want the Executive to be more present in the region, to have more of our members feel that the Executive is also their government instead of the government, and to bring otherwise relatively disparate elements of the region together - the main server, the RMB, Valsora and Urth alike. In line with this, I’d also like to cross-share government announcements within the Cafeteria server.

I don’t know if capitalising is really the word. I think Valsora and the RMB’s activity is in and of itself already a great thing for TEP - ultimately the Executive is here to serve the region, not the other way around. What I’d like to see is not transferring that enthusiasm or activity but rather to integrate prominent Valsorans and RMBers into the Executive. This is a large part of why I aim to be more active there as well in the coming term - I think the government should be easily approachable by the folks whose primary activity is on the RMB or in the Cafeteria server, but I also think the Delegate, Vice Delegate and Minister of Recruitment should be proactively looking to reach out to prominent and talented players that find their start there, and reach out to them individually.

I don’t think the success or failure of such things can really be determined at the outset. I think that always depends on a couple factors, including presentation, aims and just straight-up timing. I’m fully aware that they can fail to engage our residents, that they could go largely ignored or that they could simply prove too taxing to run. I also think these problems can be mitigated - engage people through messaging, have the government or Cabinet members themselves set the example by visibly engaging or participating - but I think fundamentally the question boils down to “is it worth trying?” I think the answer there is absolutely yes - yes, it could prove taxing for Culture to run these things, and if so we can always scale it back (again, this we won’t know until we attempt it), but fundamentally I think it is important that Culture shifts focus back to on-site. Our on-site members deserve to be included in our cultural events, and culture and on-site engagement is insanely important to any thriving region for integration purposes.

When we launch this, it should be with a bang, and by that I mean that we should open with an event. Contests are good for this, especially when it’s something that the entire region can vote on - it’s added visibility, it’s a great excuse to showcase and celebrate our members’ talents. More importantly though, I don’t aim to run this right out of the gate - in fact, I’d like to start by privately reaching out to some RMB and Valsora prominents, as well as some of our wise elders in the Executive who ran similar initiatives in the past, and ask them for advice on how best to frame such an event. What would the contest be about, what would people like to make for it? I recognise that might sound fairly vague, but it’s partially because I don’t want to come out swinging with wrong assumptions. Again, fundamentally this is about fun, it’s about engaging our members in an activity they enjoy more than anything. Once it’s under way, I think it will be a lot easier to draw in folks, but that means the opening event to draw people in initially is even more important.

Nope. If I say something as Delegate or the government I’ll say it on the RMB myself, because fundamentally the RMB is a core part of the region and the Delegate needs to engage there themselves - NS isn’t so big that there is any need for layers between the Delegate and the community they’re a part of.

What I mean when I say that Outreach is a bridge between the government and the RMB community is the other way around. The delegate should be present on-site and in touch with our residents, but they also can’t be everywhere and our RMB community is, as you note, a fairly distinct group. Outreach always struck me more as a ministry that advises and works together with other Ministries than one that performs tasks themselves. As such, that is a role that I think will have increasing prominence moving forward - I’d like to involve the Minister of Outreach with the on-site cultural events like polls or contests, and in general I’d like them to serve as a more direct and approachable line to the Cabinet than our other Ministers usually tend to serve as. If RMBers have a thought, an idea, a complaint, I would like them to be able and feel encouraged to contact either myself or the Minister of Outreach.

I know, I offered my help. I think our Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded precisely as we needed to, and I think that response was solid and well-organised. What I also think is that it showcases the fact that we - as a region - are relatively distant from at least some of our treaty allies. If our residents and even FA Councillors aren’t certain that A) we have the ties and treaties in place to stop such a thing or B) that those allies will side with us in such an instance, then I think that highlights that it is worth publicly strengthening those ties again, whether through events or military cooperation.

Yes, I think we should proactively reach out to all our allies. Checking in with our treaty allies and publicly strengthening ties is important for all of them. I do think it’s fair to say we are much closer to our Lausanne partners than we are to, for example, 10000 Islands, so I think in that regard it would be best to begin with treaty allies that we have heard less from. I do intend to touch on all of them, however.

What I mean by touring is relatively straightforward - the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and I myself should pull up the treaty list and go down the list of them one by one. When was the treaty signed? When was the last time we did something with them in culture or military affairs? If that was a while ago, what sort of shared activities or events should we approach them about? When should we plan it? I aim to generally introduce myself and get in touch with every one of our allies if elected, but I also think we as a region should make a concerted effort towards rekindling our friendships abroad.

This is fantastic, and I’m very glad to hear it.

EPSA occupies an odd spot in our FA, and to be clear, I do think it fits within our broader FA - we are an unaligned region, and while having a military is so our members can participate in military gameplay if they want, what that military chooses to do and engage with is up to the regional government. I think in a game marked primarily by R/D conflict, military power is perhaps the most important factor in foreign affairs, but it’s relatively distant from us. This is largely why it’s at the bottom, alongside FA - it’s not something TEP is presently very invested in, and we have far larger problems I think we should direct our time and energy towards.

That said, while I think it is not key to our region in the coming term, I absolutely think EPSA is worth retaining and helping out where the Delegate can do so for two main reasons: the first is simply a matter of activity. I have no desire to see active East Pacificans who want to participate in military gameplay drift elsewhere, I want TEP to be able to provide a military for those that are interested in that and I want us to put the considerable military expertise we already have to good use. The second reason is FA-related. We are, frankly, in no position to single-handedly determine the fates of liberations or raids if we have an interest. I would like us to be in that position but we aren’t, and investing the resources needed to get to that at the moment would be a waste. What we can do, however, is work together with our friends. Remember, if military gameplay is the central thing foreign affairs revolves around in the current environment, then things like military cooperation, joint raids, participation in liberations, etc. serves a very similar purpose to a festival with people we like - it’s a dedicated, official way for us to get close and cooperate with a region we like, it provides material support to our friends, and much like a cultural event it is just fun for our members and their who participate together and have a good time.

Got a few questions for you.


“We have many great old hands in the region, but they are just that, old hands. They cannot run the region forever, they have lives, their availability fluctuates.”

“As said, the Executive is highly reliant on an increasingly small pool of old hands”

This is going to be an uncomfortable question, but making bold statements requires a bold answer. Who are you referring to here, and what areas of the government/region are overreliant on ‘old hands’?

Along with this, how would you, if elected, go about bringing in new blood to these areas? Would you dismiss the old hands, ask them to resign, or hope they simply leave?


I heavily agree with you on the matter of recruitment, and thank you and all involved for the hard work demonstrated in this Ministry over the latter half of this term.


We’ve also been brainstorming (and prior to my death-by-exams, working on) boosting Urth’s visibility in particular. Valsora runs well, and while I think the Executive has a duty to assist them as well, I’d like to shift some focus of Recruitment in the coming term to recruiting for Urth as well.

You and I spoke in DM’s briefly one time re: updating Valsora links in the welcome telegram, that’s the most attention Valsora has been shown regarding recruitment this term.

Both the recruitment and outreach ministries should be in constant contact with the cartographer(s) of both maps to work on ways of boosting recruitment and better co-operating with the regional government. More can and should be done, and I’d expect to see the next delegate and minister(s) put focus on that.


Speaking of Outreach, I will again re-iterate my stance that the Ministry is aimless. It just exists for the sake of it nowadays, and doesn’t accomplish anything. In my opinion, digging it up and reinstating it wasn’t a great idea. Either it needs a passionate and active minister who’s willing to give it some direction, or it needs to be laid back to rest.


How do you plan to help mend the continuing divide between the RMB and other areas of the region? In light of a swathe of recent moderation actions, however justified they were, the RMB community has had mixed emotions. Some remain distrustful that regional moderation, and regional government, have their best interests at heart. While I don’t expect you to answer for moderation, I do expect to know how you’ll manage the government’s relationship with the region’s most active subcommunity.


Leadership & Activity

  1. You emphasize the need for proactive leadership, yet your own words admit you were inactive due to “death-by-exams.” How can the region trust that you won’t disappear again when real life gets in the way?
  2. You say you’ll push the region forward, but what concrete evidence do we have that you can execute major initiatives rather than just talk about them?
  3. Many past Delegates have also promised to “push things forward,” yet TEP remains stagnant. Why should we believe you’ll be any different?
  4. Your campaign is highly detailed, but do you have the stamina to personally oversee all these ambitious plans for an entire term?

Recruitment & Integration

  1. Your recruitment plan relies heavily on manual recruiting through leaderboards and competitions. Given the burnout this has caused in the past, what is your plan B if recruitment participation remains low?
  2. You say that getting people into TEP isn’t the problem, but integrating them into the Executive is. If your previous efforts in Recruitment couldn’t solve this issue, what specifically will you do differently this time?
  3. You mention a lot of ideas like revamping STEP, REWARD, and boosting Urth’s visibility, but why weren’t these completed under your leadership before? What guarantees they won’t stall again?

Government & Ministries

  1. You admit that you often don’t know what’s happening in Ministries outside your own. How can you expect to coordinate an entire government when you don’t seem to have had a firm grasp of its inner workings?
  2. You advocate for the Delegate to be very involved in keeping Ministries active. How do you plan to do this without micromanaging and driving away competent officials?
  3. You propose moving Delegate announcements to the RMB, but past efforts to do this have had limited impact. How will your plan avoid becoming another failed initiative?
  4. You claim Outreach is a “passive but important” Ministry but offer no clear plan for improving its function. Why should we accept the status quo when it has proven ineffective in the past?
  5. You advocate eliminating Endorsement Affairs as a Ministry. Given TEP’s historical struggles with WA growth, isn’t this an unnecessary risk?

Foreign Affairs & EPSA

  1. You admit to sensing “defeatism” in TEP’s Foreign Affairs approach but offer no clear strategy to fix it beyond vague goals like a “tour of our treaties.” What is your specific plan for making TEP a true FA powerhouse?
  2. You say you’ve been a raider for six years, yet you have no firm grasp of EPSA’s strengths and weaknesses. How can you claim to improve something you admit to knowing little about?
  3. You say EPSA reports should be “fun to write.” Is this really the most important reform for a struggling military force? Shouldn’t combat effectiveness take priority over PR?
  4. You claim you won’t interfere with EPSA unless necessary, but if EPSA continues to stagnate, will you take direct control, or just let it struggle under the current leadership?

Culture & Propaganda

  1. Your “Propaganda” initiative is pitched as a fun activity but lacks any clear benefit to governance. Why should we prioritize memes and posters when actual government functions remain underdeveloped?
  2. You claim culture should focus more on the on-site community, but RMB-driven events have struggled to maintain momentum in the past. How will you sustain engagement long-term?

Final Challenges

  1. Your campaign is full of ambitious plans, but you offer no timelines, no measurable goals, and no accountability structures. How will citizens know if you’re actually making progress or just making excuses?
  2. If your policies fail to yield significant improvements in TEP’s recruitment, integration, and activity within the first three months, will you resign?
  3. Past Delegates have also claimed they’d “push the region forward” but ended up as placeholders. What guaranteesthat you won’t just be another forgettable Delegate in TEP’s history?

I indeed didn’t and still don’t really want to name names, but since you asked, practically all of them. Aurora has run WAA for well over a year now, Altys has been the Minister of Foreign Affairs practically since he stepped down as Delegate. I don’t say this because I think they are failing in any way - I want to make this abundantly clear, I appreciate them filling important roles in our government, I am grateful for their expertise, and their service should be celebrated.

But it is a risk, and a sizable one. We’re already seeing the cracks start to show - Cappedore has more or less been forced to re-take the position of Minister of Culture, and before that it was handed to Serge, who I greatly appreciate but who also has been around for years. Aivintis is presently doubling as Minister of News and heading UTEP. If Aivintis or Cappedore get swamped with RL, do we have new people who could step in? If Altys gets burned out, do we have someone who can step up? Those aren’t questions I want to consider, but they are questions that I think we need to consider.

That’d be deeply silly. I don’t think axing our entire Executive in one swoop is productive, for very obvious reasons. I also do not - at all - want them to leave. What I do want to do is bring in more new people into the Executive, and have the old hands take these people under their wing.

I actually very much support Dead’s method of opening up the positions of Ministers to the public by running a form in hindsight. I think that attracts those that have ambition and interest, and I think that should be nurtured. If someone isn’t an immediate fit for Minister, I think they should be made Deputy and mentored.

I also don’t think that is sufficient, however. I aim to proactively seek out and recruit citizens and staffers that I think should be on Cabinet or in the role of Deputy. There’s already several names that I’m thinking of that I’ll be approaching privately after the election, should that be my role then. You’ll have to forgive me, but I will not be naming them here.

Fully agreed on this.

This, though, I respectfully have mixed feelings on. I definitely agree with you that Outreach in its current form doesn’t seem to do much of anything, nor does it seem to have had a clear goal or mandate in the past term.

However, I genuinely think that an active, dedicated and energetic minister of Outreach would be a huge boon to the Executive. As you note, the RMB community is distrustful of the Executive. The Executive as a whole is not very present in the Cafeteria server. In light of that, I think there actually is a very big role for Outreach to play, if the Minister is an active RMBer, well-liked by the community there, and interested in helping out the Executive. Not only should they serve as a voice for the RMBer community in Cabinet, they should also serve to demonstrate to our RMB community that they are valued, that the Executive is their government and not some distant force that shows up to interfere every so often.

This kind of bleeds over into your final question, which is arguably the most important one. Mending distrust between our RMB community and the wider region will, frankly, take time and a concerted effort. Part of why I want to move so much on-site is precisely because I think we are perceived as too distant. Frankly, even the main server doesn’t hear enough from the Executive, but when it does, is that communicated to our RMBers? I think the Delegate in the coming term has a duty to be engaging actively with our RMBers, to talk with them, to clue them in on what the Executive is doing, to make it clear that their input is welcome and who to contact about it. Again, this game is not so big that the Delegate should or even can be a distant figure, and neither should the ministers. Similarly, the Delegate should be active in the Cafeteria server, and as you said, be proactively in contact with the Cartographers.

  1. I didn’t disappear. Shortly before elections started, my exams did, which is why I didn’t finish some of the larger projects I was working on. This doesn’t remotely equal disappearing.
  2. I’m confident in saying Recruitment has been one of if not the most successful and active ministries over the past terms.
  3. This is a question you can ask any Delegate or candidate, though I’ll note you’re not doing that.
  4. Yes.
  5. That isn’t how manual recruitment works. Participation isn’t “remaining low”, it’s actually pretty solid.
  6. As the campaign notes, this absolutely has improved over the course of the term.
  7. Actually, various of these are pretty much near completion, and some were. Some of them absolutely are larger and longer-term projects, that’s a side effect of having to functionally stamp recruitment out of the ground. You can see the results in Altys’ graphs on Discord, or even looking at Dead’s endocount, or viewing our leaderboard.
  8. I have a firm grasp of its inner workings. More transparency and clear communication of what ministries are working on and towards is what I want.
  9. The Delegate provides the view and the direction, and should be in active communication with their Ministers, setting the course and listening to what the Ministers think they need for it.
  10. I’m unclear on what you think would be a “failed initiative” here. What harm do you think there is in attempting this?
  11. I’m slightly surprised you’re asking me that question. I refer you to what I said to Merlo, though.
  12. What? The task of building endorsements has already been taken up by Recruitment over the past term.
  13. I don’t intend to make TEP an FA powerhouse, not in the coming term. That requires time and resources that we can’t spare. As such, my goal for FA is only to anchor ourselves in a good spot that we should already be in on paper. External strength is nothing if we’re weak on the inside.
  14. Huh? What does this even mean? Again, I refer you to the campaign.
  15. I’m confused as to what you mean with “combat effectiveness”. See point 22.
  16. I value EPSA’s officers. I will personally help out where I can if I think that’s necessary and EPSA’s leadership asks me to when it comes to operations, yes, but preferably it won’t.
  17. I’m not answering “why should we make the government seem fun on a game?”
  18. See my reply to Altys.
  19. This feels very corporate for some reason.
  20. Our delegate terms are four months, I’m confused as to why I’d quit 3/4ths through the term.
  21. Could you clarify?

Here’s a 22nd response: did you generate this with ChatGPT? It hardly seems like they’re your genuine questions if they include “combat effectiveness” and corporatespeak.

Thank you for taking the time to answer to my loaded questions.

To answer point #22, yes, I will be lying to say that GPT isn’t involved. However, these are my genuine questions and pointers. I just use gpt to refine or restructure the sentence/s and then edit/remove/add etc. In essence, I’m using gpt as sort of like ghostwriting.

#3 I do intend to ask this to other serious running candidates. I just got to yours first.

#4 Would prefer if you could elaborate or reassure us further than just a simple “Yes”.

#10 Wasn’t speaking from a “harm” perspective but rather how do you see this working out better than those that are already in placed or other methods.

#13 If not on this term. How many more term/s are you planning to run if elected? And what is this “good spot on paper”? Could you elaborate this further.

#14 The delegate is the Commander-in-chief of EPSA. Having being a raider for 6 years(in terms of experience). How do you see yourself being able to make EPSA soar to even greater heights? What will be your direction for EPSA if elected?

#15 It means combat ready. Able to lead and join military expeditions with other region’s/alliances’ armies.

#17 I am not saying we can’t have “fun in a game”. I’m saying there’s a more complex underlying issue and we should address those first. Of course fun in a game should continue as a game should.

#20 It’s just an example. So what if it’s 1 month or 2 months into your delegacy if elected?

#21 In essence, many have overpromised in their campaigns in the past. So how can you reassure citizens of TEP that you’re not over promising or giving us false hopes.

I didn’t draft this with GPT. Thank you in advance.

It kind of caught me off guard for a bit, in combination with the rapidfire questions. Thanks for clarifying, I’m happy to reply further, of course.

I have a hard time elaborating on this too much, since it’s hard to concretely prove, but I can absolutely say that since taking over Recruitment and getting to work on our integration that I’ve re-found a lot of time, energy and momentum for the game. TEP is home, now, and I will absolutely dedicate my time and energy to seeing it thrive.

I think it is a relatively small change - after all, the announcements need to happen either way. Ideally, I will simply just post them double - one for the Discord, one for the RMB. The ideal here is that it works in conjunction with our other on-site efforts as well as an increased presence of the Delegate on the RMB to bring the Executive both closer to our RMB community, get our Executive more of a presence to newcomers that check out the RMB, make the Delegate seem more approachable and celebrate our successes or announcements with our RMBers. They are a vital part of TEP, very active and welcoming.

No idea to the first question, to be honest. I don’t intend to run again if the coming term goes poorly or if I find that at the end of it we’re still in a rough spot on all the areas I mentioned - that would mean I’ve failed and it’s time for someone else to take the reins and do better. I’ll only run again if I think the job isn’t finished at the end. As for a good spot, I think that’s the relatively cozy space where we’re certain that A) there will be no successful attempts at stripping commend or condemn badges away from our members, B) that if one of our members wants to author something in the WA that it will not be shot down just on the basis that they’re from TEP, and C) that our allies and friends know we have their backs and that they have ours in return. I think all of this is in reach, but I’m also wary of us backsliding on this front - a lot of WA power is held by people who don’t particularly like us, most noticeably TWP, and we should be very wary of them continuing to use their influence against us, chiefly in the WA.

I think for EPSA I would primarily like to build up its piling and updating capacities. This is a large part of why I put such a heavy emphasis on its advertising - it should be present and active, it should look fun, it should be there to draw people in. We have the expertise, but R/D is reliant on numbers. I can personally help train, trigger, run influence calculations for operations, teach any up-and-coming officers these skills, and assist in writing reports. In this regard I can absolutely assist our officer corps - I’m very confident they are capable of all that themselves, but if it’s needed I can absolutely help carry some of the operational burdens. Again, I think the Delegate’s role is primarily more of a supportive role in giving EPSA the resources it needs to succeed, but if needed I can absolutely lend assistance on pretty much anything that needs doing except jumping myself.

I hope this also clarifies point 15 - the expertise is there, now it’s a matter of drawing in the people to build our capabilities and numbers up.

I think that’s valid, but I think drawing people in, recruiting and branding are vital to overcoming our issues. Hence my emphasis on doing so.

I think this would be screwing over the region twice. If I get nowhere after a month, I think that would be too soon to quit - there’s no delegate that can snap their fingers and make it happen, you have to put in the work and keep it up. I aim to do so. If the stress genuinely becomes too much, if I think I’m really weighing the region due to my RL interfering, then I will resign, but I think it’s very unlikely. I think the Delegate has a duty to see their work through, and I think it’d be irresponsible to dip if the going gets tough.

I see, thank you for clarifying. I think that’s a valid concern for sure, and one that can hardly be fully laid to rest. What I can absolutely say is that I’ve loved putting in the work over the last term, and that I have a very long track record in this game, leading governments in Lazarus, its military, and leading Lone Wolves United for years and seeing it thrive. TEP has been a home to me, I’ve enjoyed engaging and building here, and I am very much stoked to see it thrive even further.

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Thank you for your answers, I’ve got one more question.

Given your history as a former Khan of LWU, and TEP’s historically rocky relationship with former raiders from LWU seeking the Delegacy, what assurances can you offer that you’re not following the same path the region has seen before?

You have, in the past, cast doubt on the activity of Viziers in the Magisterium, insinuating many should be recalled, and have recently fiercely opposed a lowering of the endocap when proposed by the Praesidium. To make matters more concerning, the Conclave, wherein I preside as Viceroy, recently knocked back a ban appeal from an Alpha Emeritus of LWU who was involved in Fedele’s coup attempt. The current Khan of LWU also recently re-applied for citizenship, just in time to retain their magister status. I’d like to hear from you why I should put these concerns aside, and vote for you as our next Delegate.

I appreciate this question being asked - it’s an understandable concern that I think more people share but are hesitant to express, and I’m glad to get a chance to address it. I hope to do so meaningfully. I recall Fedele’s coup - I was here at the time (though a not-too-bright 15 year old), opposing the coup, endorsing Aelitia and Marrabuk and encouraging others to do so at the time: NationStates | RMB Post

I had to search up the recall thing, as it was a while ago (October 2023, apparently, unless there was something else I entirely forgot). I didn’t insinuate any should be recalled, reading back, but I did inquire whether a mechanism existed and questioned whether one was needed. I’m admittedly a bit embarrassed by it in hindsight, but it was borne of frustration with the Praesidium’s activity - apparently another Vizier had CTE’d at the time, a pattern at the time, and various others weren’t logging in to gain influence. Looking back, the argument was flawed - I didn’t seriously propose a recall mechanism, but the thinking was that the threat of one would be able to enforce more activity on the Praesidium’s part. I’ve had some time to reconsider, obviously, and I think having more Viziers, even with a lower standard of activity, is ultimately better, even if I still get frustrated over inactivity on occasion.

I think the endocap thing is a mischaracterisation, and I apologise if it came off that way - like many, I was very firmly in favour of 250 over 200, for all the reasons I laid out there, and I still stand by that. I was one of the first to vote for 250 when it was proposed, and was pretty vocal about my desire to see the cap lowered as much as I was about my wariness to see it lowered so drastically as to interfere with our endorsement culture.

As for the last two points, I’m assuming you mean Lamb Stone. I didn’t know he appealed his ban here but it would make sense, I saw he was recently unbanned from Lazarus as well. We don’t have much of a history together - he was not around in LWU for my tenure as Khan, barring a brief stint in 2022 when he briefly came back to build his own region and stopped by LWU. The Conclave’s decision seems reasonable to me. If he wants to rehabilitate his image, he can do so elsewhere. As for Tom, while I consider him a good friend I have a hard time keeping track of where he is or isn’t - I recall him being in TRR and TNP as well at various points. We haven’t really spoken about TEP bar me briefly mentioning I wanted to step back in LWU to focus on my work here late last year. If I had to guess, he probably saw that he was explicitly named in the recent Magisterium discussion.

I hope this addresses the concerns adequately. I can see where it’s coming from, but I have always served the regions I call home loyally, competently and faithfully - Unknown in 2018, LWU, for my four year service as Khan, Lazarus, prior to its demise, in 2019-2021 as variously Prime Minister of Minister of Defence, and currently the East. I hope this clears the air of the concerns you have here - I have a lot of energy, momentum and enthusiasm to help build TEP, I think I have the concrete plans and the capability to see them through, and I hope to do so.

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I’d like to start by addressing your campaign:

1… Mentorship programs have always failed in the past. How would you make them succeed? And why haven’t you done it yet as Minister of Recruitment?

2… How would a dedicated CYOA poll nation be accounted for in the limited RO spaces we have?

3… Your proposal for Propaganda sounds a lot like the defunct Ministry of Virtual Enhancement. This question is in two parts. (A) How would it succeed this time after failing multiple times in the past? (B) Why the name “Propaganda,” one which holds incredibly negative connotations especially in the connotations of recent accusations of cabalism?

4… In the Recruitment Ministry, the talks about Urth have tended towards the negative side. There has been neglect and there have been insults, both of which happened under your watch. I appreciate the effort to at least address the prior, but how can we members of the Urth community trust in a government that has permitted its members to badmouth us with no recourse, especially after the aforementioned neglect?

5… In a similar vein to the above, I notice your plan for the Outreach Ministry is very RMB-centric. While I agree with and fully support the need to involve this side of TEP (in fact, I’ve been a major part of that integration effort), I’m worried that there’s no focus on Outreach to Urth, which is an equally promising arena to recruit from and engage, or even any minor focus on the chatter or issue-answering communities – though the latter is a lower priority, I must admit. The idea that RMB is Outreach’s “core” task rather than engaging RPers as a whole is also indicative of this practice of overlooking Urth. How would you respond to these concerns?

6… While I do see the Endorsement Affairs Ministry similarly as wasteful, I can’t deny that The Ambis has been really on top of things and it saves the Delegate some time on that. Would you be open to considering keeping the role alive in a different form or potentially delaying the Ministry slasher until or unless Ambis resigns?

7… Could you elaborate on your claim that UTEP isn’t really a Ministry? There is a Minister (me) who serves in Cabinet, is appointed by and answers to the Delegate, and leads a cohort of staff dedicated to producing output for the enhancement of the region.

8… How would reviewing or even repealing our treaties combat the sense of defeatism? As far as I can tell, it would just lift the veil and make the defeatism more obvious.

9… Why oh why on god’s green earth do you think you’re a better choice than our incumbent? Why now and not in four months?

And now I’ll address security concerns:

1… The question why now and not in four months can be honestly answered in one of two ways – (1) you think Dead is doing a bad job or (2) you want to get ahead of a potential future change in the elected leader position that separates the Delegacy. Two could be due to nefarious purposes or it could just be that you, like too many others, see a GCR delegacy as a trophy to collect. This, I believe, is also unacceptable. If the honest answer is that you don’t think Dead’s doing a good enough job, then I wonder what you would point to as the cause of that? You praise News, UTEP, Culture, and Recruitment, you don’t have a strong focus on FA or EPSA, Endorsement Affairs you just want to remove (although it works well anyway), and Outreach you don’t seem to understand as well. What need is there for a change in leadership now when our current Delegate has unfinished business and significant momentum? Especially when we’re only just now getting to high endorsement counts. A disruption would only hurt our government. What help could you bring that outweighs this? If the answer is nothing, then we can only assume you want the Delegacy for another reason.

2… What do you have to say for the divisiveness that you have stoked? Divisiveness is, after all, a powerful tool to weaken our unity. You say you regret insinuating that our Viziers should be recalled, but you still promote the idea that the region should be frustrated with us. You say you only wanted a better option for the endorsement cap but you do not denounce accusations against the entire Vizier branch which fed into the us vs. them mentality that grew in that debate and poisoned the atmosphere. Whether you meant well or not, your actions have consequences and I don’t feel like your response to Merlovich shows any acknowledgement of that.

3… “I don’t know Lamb appealed” and “I don’t pay attention to Tom, he’s in a lot of places” dodges the key concerns here. LWU, a group that has attempted to coup us before and is very close with regions and individuals who hate TEP with all their heart, is building a presence here. Anyone can deny that it’s an organized effort but there’s a correlation and right now little logical explanation. Why would the LWU government leader arrive in TEP just to vote in the Magisterium or elections and nothing else?

4… “I have served my home regions loyally” with only one past example does not show a pattern. Crucially, if you were attempting to subvert TEP, one would still say you remain loyal to LWU. There is no precedent for you serving as a cosmopolitan in a non-LWU regional government before. To this, I say: Why did you choose TEP? Why did you choose us when you did? How can we believe you? You recruit and you vote in the Magisterium, but I’ve yet to see a truly integrated dedication, the kind of dedication that one can find in a roleplayer or a powerhouse of a government official. How can we reconcile that?

5… You did not support Fedele’s coup when you were, as you say, only 15. When you weren’t an established player with quite the history of raiding and knowledge of governmental structures, when you didn’t have the connections you currently do. Why should we take this as a sign of strong loyalty to TEP? I will also point out – Aelitia, the one who reclaimed the region for us, was not a very loyal TEPer, having plotted to “accidentally” take the Delegacy many years in the past. This is not proof. Why should we see it as such?

To any observers who might think us Viziers paranoid, let me briefly sum this up for you: A raider leader connected with anti-TEP regions has arrived in our government, challenged our security apparatuses, contributed to disunity, and rose through the government with strong ambitions to hold a much-coveted spot as GCR Delegate. At the same time, allies of this raider leader have made moves to join TEP and build their own presence. This raider, unlike many cosmopolitan raiders, also happened to avoid joining the military and instead endotart up to the endorsement cap, railing against any attempt to lower it, while they gained influence. This raider spoke with Feux, one of the most prolific coupers in NS history, who recently attempted another, nearly-successful coup of our treaty ally, and bragged that they could have accomplished said coup better. This is more than questioning someone for being a raider or a cosmo – this is a building pattern that is cause for strong concern and hesitance. I am not satisfied by Jo’s answers, though I would certainly like to be.

For the benefit of the doubt I put myself forward to take the position as an interim as a service and as it is part of my job to do so; I wasn’t forced by any means.

I have, it has been up for a while now, advertised in our welcome message. For the most part, it currently consists of points of contact who can be reached out to by newcomers, so that there’s an easy way to ask questions and help welcome them into the region. I don’t currently intend to expand that program considerably, though I’d like to see about putting it more front and center.

I fail to see why it’d need to be an RO at all. It would merely be the nation with its telegrams dedicated to this particular cultural endeavour, and people would be referred to it in the communications around the CYOA polls.

Going to refer you to my answer to Altys for the most part, but it’s a valid question.

Firstly, I don’t think propaganda has all that many negative connotations on NS. This is a political simulator, and dabbling in propaganda is pretty natural for any organised group looking to have fun on such a game. Secondly, because it’s a very natural, straightforward name that indicates precisely what it’s supposed to do. Thirdly, the accusations of cabalism aren’t really my problem - I nor most of our residents took the accusation too seriously when a disgruntled, banned member ranted about cabals, and I don’t think anyone can seriously associate me with any. I don’t think that’s a compelling reason not to do something.

Huh? What are you referring to? I searched the executive hub for mentions of “Urth” but I could not find anything remotely like what you say.

I think Outreach is best focussed on our RMBer community in the coming term. As noted previously, they are a huge, active part of the East, and at present there exists a measure of distrust between us and them. Hence why I want Outreach to primarily focus on mending that divide - I would like the Minister to be someone specifically from our RMBer community, who is active and enthusiastically engaging there and who can advice me on what they need, how they feel on things and how any decision I make impacts them.

I agree that our Urthers are some of our most appreciated and talented members. I absolutely would love to have more Urthers in the Executive. However, I think that Outreach is best off when it’s focussed on one particular area, helmed by a Minister that knows that community well. Currently, that is the RMB community, a community relatively distant from and at the moment distrustful of the Executive.

I don’t think our priority should be to recruit from Urth. We should be doing the opposite, and directing Recruitment to engage with Urth to recruit for it. This is something that I touch on in the campaign and have elaborated a bit on on Discord, but the long and short of it is that the Executive should be supporting Urth, boosting its visibility, and not inherently be looking to recruit from there.

What would be the reasoning behind this? I appreciate Ambis taking on the role, but I don’t think that is inherently a reason to keep the Ministry.

It isn’t traditionally directed as one, and doesn’t fulfil a government purpose in the same way as, say, News would. Its Chancellor is part of Cabinet and that is a good thing, but it functions as more independent than any of the other ones and I have no wish to interfere with it at all.

Repealing? I never said anything in this vein. I’ll refer you to what I mean by tour of our treaties, and to the campaign again.

I’m going to generally refer you to the campaign - answering every single questions takes time and energy. I do not believe in the idea that an incumbent should go unchallenged or that there is a natural reason to hold off on running because an incumbent is seeking re-election. If you have solid ideas, you think you can do a good job, you should be encouraged to participate - whether that is in Cabinet or in election season. I have always firmly believed in this. This is an election and I’m running - I don’t see what’s unusual about or wrong with that.

I’ll answer the security concerns in a second post, I don’t want to make this so long that it’s borderline unreadable and it more or less deals with different topics.

Okay, now the security bit - I already addressed something similar with Merlo’s post above, so I’ll occasionally refer to that.

I’m not sure what (2) means, and I’m just going to refer to the above. If I wanted the delegacy out of mere opportunism running against an incumbent seems like a terrible idea?

I know, Recruitment has worked our asses off to see that happen and keep that trend going, and I’m very proud of the progress there. We have been recruiting, integrating, personally welcoming and monitoring the count. I don’t think this will at all stop if a new delegate is elected, nor do I think it is a compelling point to essentially disregard elections as a concept.

But it… isn’t. I wrote a very lengthy campaign and a lot of responses to a pretty harsh volume of questions to answer the why. Please read it?

This isn’t what I said? I said I was personally frustated at the time with the Viziers CTEing or failing to log in, and that was why I said what I said. I acknowledge freely that it was kind of silly in hindsight.

I’m not really interested in digging that particularly unfortunate debate back up. I’m not really going to do so now, that strikes me as more divisive than anything. If you think I stepped out of line back then, I’m happy to discuss that on Discord or privately.

I’m genuinely just confused as to what I’m supposed to say here? Those are the concrete examples I was given and answered to the best of my ability.

That’s probably a question to ask Tom? I don’t know what the nefarious scheme here would be?

There were… four.

And extremely disloyal to TEP?

This is explicitly untrue, I was Prime Minister and MoD in Lazarus for years while in and heading LWU, as I said.

I have been recruiting manually, I have helmed and practically set up the Recruitment ministry, I have been welcoming, I have written the welcome telegram, worked on overhauling various dispatches, published several others, I’ve weighed in on every discussion in Cabinet, the regional ministry, various cross-government plans, personally made an effort to reach out and welcome practically every new join in the discord for weeks, and offered my assistance to FA to reaching out to our allies when needed. I resent the implication that I don’t contribute.

…yes.

What does this refer to? Unless it’s the endocap thing where I was one of many who were wary of lowering it all the way to 200. I don’t see how being a Magister and weighing in on the debate there with real concerns is a suspicious offence. Again, happy to discuss if you think my tone was out of line.

???

I just did my job and now I’m running for an election?

I answered as best as I could to what I know of Tom and Lamb Stone, I don’t really know what more to say here.

It’s suspicious that I didn’t join the non-raider military to avoid a conflict with my raider sympathies?

I was Minister of Endorsement Affairs. Not a great one, I’ll concede, but that was doing my job. I don’t get the suspicion?

But this never happened? I was a vocal proponent for lowering it from the start, I just questioned - like many - whether 200 was too steep.

I knew Feux as Debussy in Lazarus and considered him a friend.

I never did this?

I genuinely have no idea what you’re even questioning me for anymore.

Judging by the comments that I’ve never been in a government outside of LWU when I namedropped the four regions I’ve mainly spent time in over the years in this very thread I’m not even entirely sure you’re reading them.

If the Viziers have a concern I am more than happy to talk with them. Working through all this has been draining and exhausting, but I’m happy to keep answering any questions. I’m sure anyone with concerns has their reasons, and I’d like to address them. I’ll admit to being slightly disheartened that they seemed to get lost, but it is admittedly a pretty wordy thread.

I would like to say, that Altys only became MoFA because they were the only qualified candidate who applied for the position when I opened up applications, also Tommo was never forced, he offered to do it. I will say only two people applied to Culture and Serge was the most qualified, I’m okay bringing in people who are new blood, but not people who had just joined the server. I did state in my campaign that I will answer these questions as well if I get reelected because as you said, it is a very good idea to train replacements just in case.

I’m just going to say it:

I cannot vote for a former Khan of Lone Wolves United. You are in too deep with an organization with an extensive history of region crashing, griefing, coup attempts, and voter importation, and before you try to hold up a mirror and say something about glass houses, allow me to preemptively counter: it takes one to know one. Something about your activity here doesn’t sit right with me.

I did not fail to notice that Tom, the current Khan of LWU, was apparently aware enough to reapply for citizenship both before this election and before he would have lost his position as a Magister due to an SOM amendment. It seems unlikely he would have noticed this entirely on his own, given he hasn’t done anything here in ages. I also noticed that Lamb attempted to appeal his ban (rightfully earned for aiding / planning Fedele’s coup attempt), and that LWU membership currently contains a colorful casting of Funk, Lamb, and Fedele, all notorious for said failed coup attempt just over five years ago. I’m not going to return to the old conversation of whether “LWU was involved” at the time: I don’t think it’s that cut and dry. I think you, in particular, are too intelligent to have outwardly chosen the losing side back then. I’ll just point out that you’re all currently rubbing elbows, and while “people change”, avarice and ambition are a difficult vice to overcome. I have to wonder what kind of conversations are being held in places that no one from TEP will ever see.

I don’t particularly trust or appreciate the way this campaign opened with references to “old hands” needing replacement: your diction these days is more cautious, and I think you were very careful with all of the names you just chose, but I have memories of you stumping for Vizier removal for inactivity / not accruing influence (and had a long list of names), barely six months after you ramped up your activity here back in 2023: a hypothetically valid position, but one I have pretty explicit thoughts on (amusingly, this quote is from way back in 2020, well before your TEP government tenure began): “Any time someone comes in here with that sort of “wE nEeD tO CLaMp dOWn oN thESe iNacTiVe viZiErS” they’re usually just trying to bump off people who are in their way”. Naturally, you doing that back then raised alarms in my subconscious. I also noticed how you rapidly beelined for the Executive, joining WA and FA, influencing foreign policy, and pretty clearly, in my eyes, positioning yourself to run for delegate since the minute you assumed an identity as East Pacifican. You and I both know how much raw numerical power that position holds onsite, and how much incredible transformative power it has in the government.

Additionally, something about this run feels premature. It’s versus a well-liked incumbent, and comes after recent discussions about tightening security, bolstering branches of the government with native members, and public considerations of a system that would change the format of the government from WAD-executive to executive “head of government”. Maybe that’s all just coincidence, but this seems like a very serious go at the position at least one term before it would have been appropriate, in my opinion, and maybe before the position changes and holds less mechanical hard power.

It’s not out of personal dislike, but rather circumstantial reasoning that I personally cannot believe that anything you do and say is truly in good faith, and will not end in attempts to replace the government piece by piece, allow for the open return of people like Lamb and Fedele to our government, and ultimately result in the soft- or hard-power capture of TEP, a highly-coveted gameplay asset, especially for members of a raider organization that would love to farm its spawn rate for their army, and possible ultimate dismantling / subjugation / destruction of the existing community, if it suits this purpose. The latter not necessarily perpetrated by you, but by some LWU asset that was transferred here.

This is all I’m going to say, all I feel I need to say, and the only time I’m going to say it.

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I’m on AMOM’s side here… I didn’t want to voice this personally, but the fact that this entire campaign has been making me anxious…

Jo, I read your campaign very thoroughly, hence why my questions responded to specific sections, so I resent and deplore your condescension in telling me I haven’t. I furthermore resent your characterization of the “harsh volume” of questions. If you find it annoying to answer to the East Pacifican citizenry, this may not be the job for you. I will not take the time to further probe you because your answers have shown me that you have no intention to assuage me of any of my concerns, only to spin a story for the bystanders.

The one point I will expound on is the idea that the Urth Roleplay shouldn’t be engaged with on government matters, just the RMB. Regional unity is not partial, it is complete, and even if you hadn’t demonstrated your lack of accountability to me in your responses or made such suspicious moves in your history here, I would find it unconscionable to vote for a candidate who believes the RMB is more important than the Urth community. I want our communities to be equal.

That is very unfortunate - I doubt I can convince you otherwise, but I’d still like to try and clear my name.

For what it’s worth, I don’t doubt your dedication to TEP. This isn’t really something I’d counter.

I was going to ignore this but it seems this more or less implies something nefarious on my part, so I’ll note that I’m relatively sure Tom pretty regularly votes. Could be wrong, though, haven’t really checked.

Funk is not in LWU?

I seriously wish I shared your estimation of me back then, to be honest.

I don’t really know what to tell you here, but I’ll ask: do you think running an Executive - and a very sizable one at that - only with people who have been helming it for years and years is sustainable? That is my primary concern here. I like our current government. I respect all of them, and I hope to retain them for our region as long as we can. But I absolutely think that with Frontiers sapping our strength left and right that we should do our absolute best to start raising up new talent. We have a lot of that talent in the region already, but it needs nurturing and mentorship.

Yes, that was the incident Merlo referred to and that I did answer.

That’s not unfair, since that is your job, though it strikes me as a fairly stupid subversion attempt to attempt to raise the issue of Vizier inactivity.

For what it’s worth, while I’m somewhat disheartened at the constant insinuations regarding my loyalty, I’ll note that I hold no personal hard feelings either. Being suspicious is your job, but I do hope to prove your theories wrong.