The Campaign, Activity, and other stuff.

[Hyperspatial Travel]

Essentially, I feel it's time for some discussion. We're all bogged down in things, I know. But without discussion, we're never going to come up with new ideas. I want to give my take on it - if anyone else wants to give their view on it, and what they think should happen, that'd be great. But, as it stands, once the three squads finish their initial missions, we're still not doing all that much.

My take so far:

Gamma has essentially been kicked out by Xanthal. They're all gone. And they're not doing anything. Not any more. I feel an attack on Coreworlds and Gaia Rodina could really help Gamma activity.

Perhaps we need to revise Gamma targets. An attack on Abh or ND right now could, perhaps, slow the invasion on me.

Delta, the privateer group, have done damage. Sufficient to their resources, I'd say. They haven't made any major impact as of yet, but that's because it's moving fairly slowly, and the GFFA haven't had any chance to RP their impact.

Alpha's done remarkably well. They've done well with Kendari, and it's been a stonking good RP. However, we're looking at sheer overkill. I think they could safely split their forces into another system now, and begin trying to make sure Kendari's well and truly out of the war.




Funnily enough, Beta's done the most. But, at the same time, it's accomplished very little of those initial goals. Hell, we're only just starting on attacking Kendari, for the most part!

However, so far, we've taken down Yukatania and Neo Zeta, which is hardly a miniscule contribution.

So, based on this, I think we need to revise, at least a little bit.

Alpha: CF, Torontonias, Metallinauts, Noberusi (sic), and AZN.

I believe all of Alpha' active. That's five or so members. Perhaps four.

Gamma: Indra, Sskiss, Jordi, Mindset, Peng, Neo-Mekanta, and NG.

Gamma's fairly inactive, so far as I kow. Mindset, Peng, and NM might be the only ones.

Beta: Xenonier, HT, JJR, Crystal Palais, Chronosia, Siesatia and Azaha.

Xenonier, Chron, and me. That's all.

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That's a brief, but cluttered (Hey, it's one) summary of the war so far. We started off with twenty nations. (5 for Alpha, 7 for Gamma, and 8 for Beta). We're down to what's probably 4 in Alpha (I believe), three in Gamma, and three in Beta.

So yeah. Our capacity for waging war has been halved. Sure, the GFFA isn't active either. But I don't believe that half of them are inactive. We might have taken down a third. Right now, due to OOC inactivity, we're not ahead.

I'm being invaded (I'm not sure about Otagia), with a fleet of around 1.5k ships. Not terribly dangerous, but it shows that we're hardly omnipotent. If they can throw around that kind of firepower still, it also shows they're hardly toothless.

So here's my suggestion, in its totality.

Firstly, we need to ditch the squad mentality. Putting people into groups worked at first - it's not any more. We have ten of the largest, most arse-kicking nations in NS. That may not be twenty nations, but it's still enough firepower to level the entire fucking GFFA. We need to split up more, and start taking down the enemy wholesale. We still have an overwhelming amount of firepower. However, I fear, if inactivity continues the way it has been, we could be looking at a.. distinctly underwhelming amount of firepower. And ending the war is bad. Ending the war on GFFA terms because of inactivity will destroy us.

Secondly, any forces you have that aren't needed for defense, any at all, we can use. We can still open new fronts. We can unleash a lot more hell on the GFFA than they ever suspected we could. But we need every man jack to do so.

That includes the privateering nations, as well. If you're not wholesale into the war, please! We need you in there! Every ship you can muster is another ship the GFFA has to counter! Every post you make is another blow against this crippling inactivity!

Now, down to really specific suggestions. I'm listing every nation that they listed at the start of the war, so we can see exactly what we've done.

Kendari: He's a great guy. And I suspect, given enough application of force, we can get him to concede. He's not batshit crazy, and Xenonier's liberal enough to get him out without too much collateral damage. If we can force him out of the war, we can get Alpha and Beta up again. His posts are beautiful - and I enjoy reading them, but having two squads rely on one person simply isn't taking risk into account. If he goes inactive, suddenly half a war's worth of effort is down the drain.

The Solarin League: Nothing. He's not a major threat, as of yet. If someone has the location of his worlds, and wants to start fraggin', that'd be awesome. But it's not vital.

Xanthal: He's all but ignored us. And N-G, the last combatant, is leaving. Then again, since he's all but ignored us, we can turn right around, and all but ignore him. I suggest simply leaving him. Once he wants to play on our terms, let him. Before that.. he can't kick us out of threads he doesn't make, no?

Whyatica: He's been inactive for ages. Another non-entity.

Tidan: It appears he's re-entering the galactic scene. If he re-enter the war, things could be bad. But, as it stands, he's a non-threat.

Godular: Beautiful, isn't it? -1 for them, +1 for us. We love you, buddy!

Yukatania: Due to real-life, his nation collapsed after the invasion of Harvest. One mission kill there.

Neo Zeta: He's currently RPing the end of his nation. I believe Chron has dominated him well and truly.

Gaia Rodina: Damn, the GFFA's as inactive as we are!

Talaax: He should be active. After all, he was elected in the GFFA as Diplomacy Head. (Of course, we wouldn't know that ICly). I'm not sure about his activity, though..

Beta Aurigae VII: He was in, then I shot down a plan they had (Y'know, because we had nuclear weapons, so putting facepaint on and sneaking through jungles after surrendering ain't a winning strategy), and he started screaming that I didn't know how to have an fun RP, or something. It was then someone else said something about him not being in.

Coreworlds: Ah, it'd almost hurt me to invade CW. The guy's great. I'd think the best strategy for CW is a mission-kill. We offer him ESUS aid in the war with Sith, equal to, say, half of the forces that we would need to invade him, to betray the GFFA. If he doesn't take it, we invade him. One way or another, we win there.

Trinity Prime: He said he wanted in, but I haven't seen anything.

Tannennmille: Ditto to Trinity Prime.

Abh: Our two main dudes. Abh, and New Dornalia. Perhaps they're not terribly big, and perhaps their posts aren't epic. But Abh, even though he's skirmishing with ND, remains a threat. He's active enough to launch an invasion of me, and, to put it quite simply, he's the heart of the enemy war effort. However, he lives in spaceships. Which are, needless to say, harder to pinpoint then planetoids.

New Dornalia: Like Abh, he's active. And he's constantly on the ball. With these two, we're looking at the two most dangerous GFFA members there are. My suggestion is quite simple. Invade. We have the force. Get a few fleets, and show him the napalm-covered olive branch of the ESUS. If we can destroy him, he'll have to come home. If he comes home, Abh's fleet in my territory will be crushed. If Abh's fleet is crushed.. we will be able to slaughter him, decisively ending the war.

Those are my suggestions. And my take on the war. Does anyone else have something to say; or some complaints to make about what I've said. (If you do, let the disjointedness go. I'm functioning on a distinct lack of sleep right now, and I'm having a bit of trouble with sentence structure, let alone advanced post structure)

[The Mindset]

Indra is long dead and gone. His nation died of inactivity several months ago and I've not seen him on MSN since the very beginning of the campaign. I'm completely swamped with work at the moment and won't be active on NS until around February next year at the earliest.

[Hyperspatial Travel]

Ah. I think I'll just compile the list of actives in here for brevity.

Active ESUS Members:
Flaming Souls
Central Facehuggeria
Megas
Kanuckistan
Torontonias (Ground only)
Metallinauts (?)
Neo-Mekanta (?)
Arizona Nova (?)
Xenonier
Hyperspatial Travel
Chronosia
Balrogga
Godular
Otagia

Active GFFA ones:
Kendari
The Solarin League
New Dornalia
Abh
Coreworlds (?)
Xanthal (?)

So...yeah. After a bit of consultation with Mindset, it boils down to thus. Eleven (or eight) for us, six for them, so far as I can see. If anyone has any more info, it'd really be appreciated.

[Central Facehuggeria]

Actually, I'm sort of in limbo with inactivity. Have no fear, though, I have a big honking in the pipeline!

And yes, I am agreeing much with you. The initial plan was based on flawed intelligence, ie that the GFFA would be competent in the prosecution of their own defense.

Now, Xenonier, Blasea, one of our more diplomatic members. I'd like you to work on Kendari diplomatically. We don't want to lay waste to his nation. We just want him out of the war.

[Hyperspatial Travel]

Indeed. CF, do you have MSNIM? I think we need to teleconference. Err.. IMconference. But, yeah. Getting Kendari out of the way is vital. If we have to dedicate large portions of our armies, and large amounts of time to putting down insurgencies, we'll be looking at a slow, long war.

[Balrogga]

Coreworlds:

Godular and I are taking care of him behind the scenes. So far I have his 3rd fleet converted completely to Kython and he is basically asking for an alliance with me. Through our two manipulations we have made him pull out of Mirfak and we are now trying to keep him occupied in the Sith battle. I do not know if he is in any other ESUS-GFFA battle. If he is let me know and I will include that in the conditions.

New Dornalia:

I asked him earlier this week for an invasion. He claimed he was too busy with school to do anything extra. If he lied to me because he is afraid, invade him and invite me along so I can show him what fear is…



Also:

It seems there is nobody that wants to play pirates anymore so I have many fleets to swarm GFFA members with. So far I have used a totality of maybe 1.2 fleets. I have a total of 15 of which I volunteered 6 for this action. That means I have 5.8 more to use seeing as I only have the single Battlegroup fighting ND at the moment (and waiting endlessly for GFFA members to post I might add, although there are also a number of ESUS members failing in that category too. Xenonier has been asking for posts for weeks…) so I am available for many maneuvers.

[Hyperspatial Travel]

New Dornalia:

I asked him earlier this week for an invasion. He claimed he was too busy with school to do anything extra. If he lied to me because he is afraid, invade him and invite me along so I can show him what fear is…

Well, he is being invaded by Abh, and invading me, to boot. He does have a few RPs he's doing.

[Torontonias]

Unfortunately, and completely unrelated to real life issues (I'm busy, but as I've proven to myself I can whip up some posts if I add hours to my day) Whatever comes immediately after the Kendari Salmath Invasion will be without Torontonian Support.

Ironically, this is entirely due to the IC runnings of my nation. Although the Government is currently being dominated by a Militaristic, Autocratic Beurocrasy that is willing to futher the war at any cost, the battle has been extremely costly to the TSDC.

Although I haven't been publishing this information, Casualty rates are approaching the critical 50% range (In the navy, The Majority of the ground forces are still waiting in Mobile Installations outside the system until the battle is finished), and for the TSDC that is simply unacceptable. Now, I'm not blaming anyone because its mainly due to my reckless "Get real close with guns blazing" tactics, it does mean that immediately after the battle, the entire fleet is going to be in for Repair and Refit. Including the installation of a New Armour System that I've been developing for a while now. (While I'm at it, I'd probably be upgrading weapons soon as well, which means that lucrative weapons contracts will be circulating soon)

Either way, even if I can stem the casualty rates for the duration of the Salmath Invasion, I'd be looking at about 20% of the ships being entirely destroyed (Curse Matter-To-Energy Weapons) with another 30-40% of the ships being disabled and have to be manually towed out of the system for repairs, with the rest of the ships being in far-flung states of damage.

So this is just to inform everyone, especially those who take it upon themselves to continue planning the war, Torontonian Naval Committments will be unavaliable for the next wave of attacks, although there will be forces avaliable for the Third Wave, if there is a Third Wave.

As well, I still have 100% of my Ground Forces avaliable for Planetside battles and occupying new territories so that Hardened, Experiences Ground troops can be transferred to the new front line battles, as well I'll still be providing Diplomatic and Logistical Support when we start penetrating far into GFFA territory. So I'm not out of this war at all, just a part that happens to be really big right now.

[Central Facehuggeria]

Well, Tor... on MSN we've decided to try and get Kendari out of the war by landing boots on his breadbasket.

Once that happens, we'll be moving on ND and Abh. After that, we'll need the services of your ground forces.

[Siesatia]

I'm in senior year, and life is real hectic lately, as evidenced by my lack of activity on MSN... I use AIM in this new school program where our teachers hand out thier aim handle and we can get assignments and the like, but otherwise I'm either working, or maybe a bit of WoW-ing.

I plan on getting back in when my college applications are in and accepted.