New West Conifer

State of the Region, November 2024
We're weathering the storm!

Hi, I’m ATG, here to talk generally about the current state of TRTHNBB. I think we all know that October has been an incredibly hectic month for our region – both Syrasia and New United Common-lands resigned, a Snap Election for Deputy Prime Minister was held, we’ve hosted a ton of events, recorded multiple Yodcast episodes, and worked on a bunch of treaties. More details will come on many of these events later, but I want to speak more broadly about NBB.

First, I’d like to say that I’m quite impressed with how our region has picked itself up from the chaotic, uncertain period directly following NUCL’s resignation in particular. NUCL was a bulwark of the regional government, and I wasn’t entirely sure how smooth our transition would be, but having Faralried and Venesia Grande by my side led to a quick recovery. As our new Minister of Foreign Affairs, Faralried has been doing great work, opening consulates and negotiating treaties left and right while also advising me on critical regional decisions. Venesia Grande has been another massive help, picking up the slack and working on key regional announcements.

Our events have also maintained a relatively high level of activity, and our domestic affairs are encouraging, with the recent Government Approval poll evidence enough that our government isn’t faltering, even after a massive shakeup. Gine Caruttiva has also been performing his duties as DPM excellently, helping me carry out the truly staggering amount of responsibilities of the Prime Minister. Western Arba Fir has even returned, and immediately began pitching in, helping to guide our government in an active direction. Finally, the inclusion of Rogue River on our Culture Committee has been incredible - he’s got great ideas and, like everyone here, he’s such a pleasure to work with. Having new people who are eager to join the government is always so encouraging, and as a result of their efforts, even our long-awaited regional roleplay is finally heading in the right direction.

I’d also like to highlight the NBBC, which is to say, The Social Reformer and the Yodcast. I’ve had a great time being the unofficial head of our region’s media programs, and I’m happy to announce that our recent media expansion has been a big success. The Social Reformer has expanded, including interviews with notable people, and those sections add quite a bit of interesting content to the newspaper. They also help highlight individual contributions, which is crucial to building a region, as people often don’t keep working if they aren’t recognized for their effort. Further, the Yodcast has exceeded my expectations by far. I didn’t think the project would last forever, as it was heavily experimental in the beginning, but I feel as if we’ve truly come into our own during this last month. At time of writing, we’ve published four episodes, and I’m genuinely proud of each of them. Our live viewership is also impressive; generally, we can expect more than 10 people to be present in the audience for the entirety of the podcast’s recording. As a whole, our media efforts are an exciting new direction for the region, and they’ve thoroughly proven their worth.

To conclude, I want to say thank you to everyone who’s contributed to our region during this past month. Whether you pitched in by directly working in our government or simply kept chatting on our RMB and creating a positive, eccentric environment, like (to name just a few) The Holy Cult of Julia, Brocklandia, and Bean territory, you’re all such incredible parts of this region. I’m very proud of how far NBB has come, and I’m excited to keep leading it into the future. With your help, I know we can continue to make our region the friendliest out there!

Written by America the Greater for The Social Reformer
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It’s certainly no secret that running a NationStates government is not an easy task. Active regions have massive responsibilities – government officials have to maintain relations with dozens of regions, produce content like The Social Reformer, plan consistent cultural events, maintain the region’s dispatches, provide a functioning roleplay, and engage in the region’s legislature. That certainly isn’t an exhaustive list of duties, either. As a result, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that burnout is a key issue affecting NationStates leadership.

During this term, that sense of burnout has been one of the key factors impacting our region. We faced three separate resignations, and even prior to that, our former Head of Roleplay, Socialistic Britain, decided to step down from the regional government. Quite simply, none of us live only for NationStates – we’ve all got complex, busy lives outside of this website. New United Common-lands had spearheaded the region’s revival and remained as a steward of the region for years. Syrasia had dedicated countless hours to fully rebuilding our region’s roleplay from the ground up. Western Arba Fir spent so much time crafting new regional initiatives and welcoming new members. It only makes sense that people with so many responsibilities would naturally be forced to step back at a certain point.

However, as is probably evident, losing much of our regional leadership is not a problem with an easy solution. Remaining members of the government had to step in and carry out the duties fulfilled by these individuals, and as a result, burnout is actively setting in among those who remained. So how can we address this burnout?

The key, in the opinion of many regional officials, is to expand the regional government to include newer members. Enthusiasm begins to naturally fade away during lengthy terms in office, and regional officers can’t be expected to have enough time and energy to manage the region forever. New members bring with them new ideas and inject new activity into leadership, as older members of the region are forced to consider these new ideas and possibly reshape their understanding of governance. (For further reading, this topic is investigated in depth in an excellent dispatch written by Emiline of the Augustin Alliance, UCRs and Investing in the Common Nation.)

It is not as simple as waiting for new residents to volunteer for Cabinet positions, though. Nurturing newer talent requires older members of the region to be willing to step aside, and it also necessitates the creation of newer positions with smaller responsibilities in order to avoid overwhelming prospective officials. The ‘Old Guard’ of a region often has a working system and a specific delineation of tasks – each official generally knows what assignments are right for them, and there generally exists an easy shorthand. However, this efficiency comes at the cost of longevity. In order to maintain a region in the long term, the ‘Old Guard’ must be willing to forfeit the roles they enjoy and serve as mentors to newer generations of leadership.

In conclusion, our wave of resignations was certainly stunning, but it was not wholly surprising. In order to adapt, and ensure that our region does not once again slip into a period of inactivity when each current government member succumbs to burnout or takes on too many offsite responsibilities to fully engage on NationStates, we must be proactive. It is the responsibility of the regional government to identify, contact, and encourage new leadership at every turn. In doing so, we can create a cycle of officials through which our region can survive the loss of members of the Old Guard without having to rely on a few individuals to ‘fill in.’ Above all, we must recognize the extent to which NationStates can cause burnout, and recognize that no one can lead a region forever.

Written by America the Greater for The Social Reformer
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Recently, our government approval poll was set up once again, and we had a decent turnout of 24 people in total answering the poll, which gave us a good idea about how people feel about this term.

In this article, I'll overview just a select few percentages that I deem most interesting, but if you'd like to see them all, you can do so here.

First of all, our new government members Faralried and Sidervidaii received respectable first results in this poll with Faralried receiving a score of 7.96 and Sidervidaii coming out with a 7.13.

These are both pretty great first scores and in the coming months, I suspect these scores will gradually climb higher as their faces become more familiar with the community and as they prove themselves deserving of their positions.

Next, I'd like to highlight the results of New United Common-lands and America the Greater, as their results surprised me quite a bit. Both of them have been with the region and in the government for an incredibly long amount of time, with NUCL being largely responsible for setting many of our region's foundations and ATG being a co-founder, here in the region since its very beginning and before. However, both had decreases in their scores for this poll.

Though their scores are still incredibly high, and the amount they decreased in scores isn't too major, I find it quite surprising how they dipped at all, considering the amount of work they have been putting into the region.

First off, New United Common-lands score stands at 8.71, a decrease of -0.03 since the last approval poll. Though an incredibly small decrease, I am surprised nonetheless. This stands as his final score for the foreseeable future as he has retired from the regional government.

And lastly, we have America the Greater, who received the largest decrease, going from 9.30 to 8.83, a decrease of -0.47. My personal theory is a simple one, I suspect the reasoning behind this decrease has something to do with the prominent position ATG is now in, as being the Prime Minister means a much higher degree of expectations, whereas when he was Minister of Domestic Affairs he was seen as going far beyond duty and expectation.

If you have your own ideas about the cause of any changes behind these scores, feel free to let it be known on our RMB! And remember to check out the full results in the dispatch linked.

Written by Ardeyn for The Social Reformer
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I was elected quite some time ago as the new Deputy Prime Minister of The Region That Has No Big Banks, promising to focus on direct democracy and citizen engagement. Well known for pushing reforms, I plan to introduce a new Cabinet Policy to give the Deputy Prime Minister more say in the creation of a government, ensuring that every elected position has a voice in the process.

I also aim to revitalize The Social Reformer, the region’s newspaper, by recruiting new voices and ensuring Ministers give monthly reports. As I said before, "Our region deserves a government that listens to its people, ", thus pledging to make the regional government more democratic, transparent, and welcoming.

Written by Gine Caruttiva for The Social Reformer
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I’m excited to bring you a brief report on the progress of our ongoing roleplay reform. For context, we convened the RP Reform committee months ago, and it saw little progress for a long time. However, with the help of Syrasia, we were able to construct an entirely new scenario, including a new rulebook and some impressive dispatches which will serve as the hub for roleplay information.

Now that Syrasia has resigned, though, we have been left with an incomplete map. This map is the final requirement for us to restart our roleplay - when it is finished, roleplay is ready to commence. Thankfully, Gine Caruttiva has recently volunteered to complete the map, finalizing the plots and adding basic biomes and resources. As a result, I feel confident in announcing that our regional roleplay will be fully ready to commence by the end of the month.

The scenario is public, and we encourage citizens who are interested in our roleplay to begin crafting their lore now. Please submit it to roleplay administrators in order to ensure that your nation’s lore will be a good fit for our scenario and will not break any of our rules. In the meantime, have a lovely November, and I’ll get back to you soon with the official announcement of a new beginning for our roleplay.

Written by America the Greater for The Social Reformer
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This October was a busy month for our regional events, but I think we’ve learned our lesson with regards to event fatigue. We decided to slow our events down and space them much farther apart, and as a result, we’ve seen a serious uptick in attendance. On October 5th, we hosted regional Games Night, including Skribbl.io and King of the Castle. This event had an impressive turnout of roughly 15 people at its peak, which is quite remarkable compared to the lower levels of interest we’d been facing during Summerfest. Concurrently, NUCL decided to begin hosting watch parties for Doctor Who episodes. These watch parties did not see much turnout, but the idea is novel and I expect to see more TV and movie viewing events in the future, as they are quite easy to administer.

As October went on, we hosted a joint movie night with Blue Ridge, viewing Over the Garden Wall. That event saw truly massive turnout, which only serves to reinforce our strong ties of friendship with Blue Ridge!

As October drew to a close, the The Washington Federation and the Ministry of Culture announced TRTHNBB’s Spooky Week, a series of events including a Spooky Story competition, an as-of-yet unsolved Murder Mystery, a Nightmare Before Christmas movie night, a Horde Chess event, and two consecutive Games Nights! October may be over, but the Halloween celebrations certainly aren’t. I hope to see you at our next Games Nights, and in all of our November events!

Written by America the Greater for The Social Reformer
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This October, a proposal to condemn New Ordered was submitted to the Security Council. Collectively, after receiving many identical telegrams asking for support, delegates came together to ask: “Who?”

New Ordered is the founder of the region of Bangladeshi Puppet, but is currently located in The East Pacific. The majority of their posts within Bangladeshi Puppet consist of comments on different YouTube channels, but within recent times, they’ve become more belligerent, suppressing a significant number of seemingly innocuous messages on their RMB. Facing complaints about their behavior, they claimed “I hate when people lick my feet.”

It appears that New Ordered ran afoul of Drakonheimist, a compact of small regions with ties to the region of China. This pact worked together on the proposal to condemn New Ordered for his actions, drafting it openly on many of their associated RMBs. The proposal took many attempts, as the author, Mist Covered Mountains, repeatedly broke the SC rule against mentioning ‘NationStates’ itself within a proposal. I actually sent them a telegram personally and let them know why their proposal was failing, and they made the necessary adjustments, submitting it to the WA. I mistakenly sent this telegram to New Ordered himself at first, leading to this exchange.

So, who is Mist Covered Mountains? Mist Covered Mountains is an alt account of Mystic Shores, with some evidence presented here: Image 1, Image 2. If that name rings a bell, it’s probably because you’ve heard about the Roses Without Thorns drama. Mystic Shores is famously the author of multiple failed proposals to liberate and injunct that region, and also, most notably, coined the term “Gay Furry Pacific Clique.” It would appear, therefore, that Mystic Shores’ draft of this proposal was simply an attempt to badge-hunt, as they’ve since engaged in a great deal of seemingly unrelated WA activity.

However, I feel it is unfair to solely attribute Condemn New Ordered to an unsuccessful attempt at badge-hunting. Drakonheimist, the pact of small regions heavily involved in the drafting process, appears to be somewhat active and certainly was engaged in a great deal of diplomacy when the proposal was submitted. In fact, there was an open ‘war’ between Bangladeshi Puppet and the Drakonheimist regions at the time, leading to the short-lived seizure of Drakonheimist itself by nations supportive of New Ordered, and the raising of this flag over the region. Now that New Ordered has vacated Bangladeshi Puppet, the region has been seized by forces aligned to Drakonheimist.

Why go to all this effort, now that the proposal has been thoroughly rejected by the Security Council, both on- and off-site? It seems that, though the efforts of Mystic Shores may certainly have been intended to badge-hunt, there truly was passion for the idea of condemning New Ordered among a not-insignificant number of nations. Representatives of Drakonheimist consistently fought for the Condemnation, providing ‘evidence’ which generally consisted of screenshots of rude RMB posts by New Ordered.

Further, Mystic Shores themselves appears to follow a somewhat consistent set of ideals - they have frequently posted about engaging in defending, long before the RWOT situation emerged, and it appears that their frustrations with the DND may have come about as a result of a genuine feeling that all regions deserve to be defended. It is difficult to sympathize with Mystic Shores, given their frequent offensive comments on the forums, and I certainly do not recommend viewing Mystic Shores as any kind of noble defender. However, I do feel it is unfair to discount the idea that, perhaps, Condemn New Ordered was the result of a genuine effort to punish someone for treating others poorly.

In many ways, though this proposal has been severely maligned, it seems to have been at least partially legitimate. Even if Mystic Shores was simply taking advantage of a small group of regions in order to publicize their issue in the Security Council, those small regions still matter – they sought to address an interregional issue in the World Assembly. Many of us are quite familiar with the workings of the WA, and understand that proposals must be sufficiently high-stakes in order to merit any kind of approval. However, a proposal like Condemn New Ordered sometimes makes me wonder – is the WA being unfair to the plight of smaller regions? Looking back upon the very first SC proposals, most of them were quite low-stakes and largely based on the personality of the target. The current standard system for submitting a proposal requires a great deal of research and includes weeks of vetting on the forum to ensure top quality and sufficient relevance to the wider world of NationStates. Condemn New Ordered was certainly not an extensive, top-quality proposal, but it mattered to quite a few people. Should we really dismiss proposals like these out-of-hand?

Regardless of the quality of Condemn New Ordered, it certainly draws attention to the issues facing smaller regions. Drakonheimist was, at least at one point, an active community, serving as the hub for many different regions and facilitating dialogue and cooperation. They certainly don’t have the diplomatic weight of a feeder, or even a mid-size UCR, but they do have active members and interests of their own. If the World Assembly doesn’t represent those interests, then who will?

Written by America the Greater for The Social Reformer
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Recently NBB has signed not 1, not 2 but 3 treaties! And since I’m lazy my statement last week was so good on our discord and RMB, I have copied and pasted it here as well. Enjoy.

So to speak more generally, I am super excited about all 3 treaties and where our relationship goes with each region. All 3 regions have strongly culturally intertwined with ours and cementing a lasting relationship felt like a natural step, and we are truly blessed to have so many friends in other regions. Wanna shout out New United Common-lands who was still MOFA for the TEP and Forest treaty negotiations and helped establish relations with Blue Ridge and whose work helped allow that relationship to blossom. You did such an amazing job to the point I get to look good and ride your coattails a bit :p

Back to the treaties, I wanna touch on each one more generally.

Forest	I actually wasn't around for these negotiations but having been around Forest for a long time now through JEFF. That community is always a blast even if a bit chaotic at times much like I think we are as well. I'm glad to call them friends and I am really happy to be around for this new chapter of our relationship. Full Treaty - page=dispatch/id=2537424 As reported by Faralried, Minister of Foreign Affairs.
The East Pacific	Our relationship really started with N day where JEFF and ANAL have worked really closely to until recently a vastly successful relationship with this most recent N day being the first time our relationship failed to produce an outcome that could be categorized as a victory for our team. Since that foundation the cultural cooperation has been great and the members who have moved here because of that relationship have been equally amazing. Future is bright! Full Treaty - page=dispatch/id=2566769 As reported by Faralried, Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Blue Ridge	Finally the treaty I was MOFA for start to finish for, a truly grueling *checks notes* 4 total days from Adkissa DMing me with a full polished treaty to its announcement. The like 8-10 total messages I sent were truly hard work and I don't know if I'll fully recover. Lowkey tho if any other MOFAs are lurking, come to me with a full treaty like Adkissa did and I'll love you forever lmao. I can't write to save my life. As for the treaty itself the joint event every 6 months or so should be a blast. Already looking forward to our next one! Full Treaty - page=dispatch/id=2568621 As reported by Faralried, Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Recently we here in TRTHNBB have adopted the consulate system for our foreign affairs! We’ve grown a lot recently and believe establishing consulates prior to an embassy to be the best move forward to help us determine the best fits for our long term partners. While we did have some consulates before hand since the adoption of having consulates as an official policy, we have opened many consulates especially over the last month or so with the following regions-

• New Pacific Order

• The Leftist Assembly

• Conch Kingdom

• Avaldonia

• Commonwealth of Sovereign States

• The Wellspring

Recently our friends in The East Pacific have had a Delegate election. Our congrats go out to American-Cascadia for winning the delegacy with 21 out of 25 votes! Additionally congrats to Merlovich for their successful term as delegate!

We've recently established a consulate with The North Pacific, and I'm pleased to be our representative to their region. The North Pacific quite recently conducted its Delegate elections, with Picairn defeating the assumed front-runner candidate. Picairn pledged to "address the activity and manpower issues plaguing our government and army, and implement necessary reforms to make TNP a stronger and better region."

The North Pacific has also recently released its newest round of WADP awards for active WA members in the region, increased the frequency of its raiding operations, and announced the beginning of its Judicial Election period.
Written by Faralried and America the Greater for The Social Reformer
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New United Common-lands

Issue Number XX

Thanks for reading! Be sure to upvote this dispatch! Please wire any suggestions to our RMB and view our archived issues here
Issue Number XX

WRITERS ON THIS ISSUE: America the Greater (Chief Editor), Ardeyn, Gine Caruttiva, Faralried
CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ISSUE: New United Common-lands, Rogue River, Arstotskiano Helix-Caelorum
SPECIAL THANKS TO Syrasia FOR FORMATTING